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Content archived on 2022-12-05

REVISA - Reactor vessel integrity in severe accidents

Objective



The assessment of the mechanical integrity of the reactor vessel in case of a severe accident gives rise to difficult questions linked with the complex temperature and load history (including dynamic aspects) occurring during such an event: the models to use must have improved capabilities in comparison with those used in more stationary situations.

In fact they must be capable of:
.accounting for various types of damage occurring at the same point under various temperature and loading conditions
.accounting for the stress transfer from heavily damaged zones towards less damaged ones
.accounting for the instability as well as for the creep rupture
.accounting for deformation heterogeneity and size effects

In this context, the "REVISA" project is centred around the three following themes:
.mechanical approaches to assess the margins to failure
.comparative behaviour of various vessel steel grades
.size and scale effects in plastic flow and failure.

The objectives of the project are:
.to determine the capabilities of various approaches to predict the creep failure of the vessel in typical severe accident situations by comparison with experimental results
.to gain a first view of the severity of those situations and the capability of the vessel to withstand them and retain the corium inside
.to compare the properties of several steel grades, envisaged or used for reactor vessels
.to assess the size effects related to deformation and failure models as well as material data under quasi-static and dynamic conditions inhomogeneous and non-homogeneous states of strain.

To meet these objectives 5 interrelated tasks will be carried out:
.Task 1: "material characterisation", consisting in producing the mechanical data suitable for the structural assessments of tasks 3 and 4
.Task 2: "mechanical modelling", consisting in developing and implementing advanced mechanical models to structural mechanics software
.Task 3: "experimental validation", consisting in performing high temperature analytical experiments with the RUPTHER facility and interpreting them with various life assessment procedures and damage models
.Task 4: "analysis of the RPV strength", consisting in predicting the time to failure of a generic vessel lower head under typical severe accidents situations.
.Task 5: "size effects", consisting in clarifying the size and scale effects in plasticity and dynamics by direct mechanical characterisation, theoretical development on plasticity and formulation of similarity laws.

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Topic(s)

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Funding Scheme

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CSC - Cost-sharing contracts

Coordinator

COMMISSARIAT A L'ENERGIE ATOMIQUE
EU contribution
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Address
Centre d'Etudes de Saclay
91191 GIF SUR YVETTE
France

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Total cost

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Participants (10)

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