Method of determining margins to operating limits for nuclear reactor operation

摘要

In a method of determining an operating margin to a given operating limit in a nuclear reactor, operational plant data from an on-line nuclear reactor plant (110) is accessed (210), and reactor operation is simulated (220) off-line using the operational plant data to generate predicted dependent variable data representative of the given operating limit. The predicted dependent variable data is normalized (230) for evaluation with normalized historical dependent variable data from stored operating cycles of plants having a similar plant configuration to the on-line plant. A time-dependent average bias and a time-dependent uncertainty value for the predicted dependent variable data are determined (240), (250) using the normalized historical dependent variable data, and a risk-tolerance level for the on-line plant is obtained (260). An operating margin to the given operating limit is determined (270) based on the determined time time-dependent average bias value and time-dependent uncertainty value so as to satisfy the risk-tolerance level of the evaluated plant.