Results of large-scale test of discontinuity region in a prestressed concrete containment

The test described in this paper is part of an Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) program (Research Program RP2172-2) to provide a test-verified analytical method of estimating capacities of concrete reactor containment buildings under internal overpressurization from postulated degraded core accidents.Phase 2 of the EPRI program, on which this paper is based, includes tests of five large-scale specimens with steel liner plates. The specimens represent structural elements of prestressed concrete containment buildings. Four full-scale square wall element specimens and one specimen representing the wall/basemat junction region were tested. This paper describes results of the wall/basemat junction region test.Results of this experimental work indicate that highly localized strains in the steel liner plate caused by internal overpressurization or other accident conditions can result in liner tearing and subsequent containment leakage. It appears that this liner tearing occurs in a controller manner. Extrapolating from these test results, leakage and depressurization is more likely to occur than global failure.     

设计基准内压下混凝土安全壳的有效预应力作用研究

核电厂安全壳建造过程中大量采用预应力技术,预应力在设计基准内压下的分布状况、损失规律直接影响到安全壳结构的耐久性。介绍了某核电厂安全壳结构和预应力系统的布置情况和预应力损失的分析过程,以闸门洞口附近水平预应力钢柬为例进行了预应力损失计算,同时计算了5年打压试验时安全壳结构的有效预应力。基于以上分析,利用ANSYS程序建立预应力混凝土安全壳有限元模型进行结构计算,对设计基准内压下的有效预应力作用进行了总结。结果表明,预应力系统承担了打压试验下大部分设计内压,安全壳整体结构是安全的,这些结论与安全壳的预应力系统设计理念一致,可供工程设计人员参考。     

Testing of large-scale concrete containment structural elements

The tests described in this paper are part of an Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) program (Research Project 2172-2) to provide a test-verified analytical method of estimating capacities of concrete reactor containment buildings under internal overpressurization from postulated degraded core accidents.Experimental study in Phase 2 of the investigation, on which this paper is based, includes tests of five large-scale specimens with steel liner plates representing structural elements of prestressed concrete containment buildings. Four square wall element specimens and one specimen representing the wall/basemat junction region were tested.This experimental work indicates that under internal overpressurization or other accident conditions, highly localized strains in the steel liner plate can result in liner tearing and subsequent containment leakage. These results support the theory of leak before break where liner tearing occurs in a controlled manner and leakage and depressurization occur rather than global failure.     

严重事故下预应力混凝土安全壳非线性分析及性能评估

预应力混凝土安全壳作为核电厂重要防泄漏屏障,对保证核电厂正常运行、确保人员安全至关重要。本文基于顺序热力耦合方法对严重事故工况下预应力混凝土安全壳进行非线性有限元分析,考虑了温度和内压荷载共同的影响,分析了安全壳结构典型不连续区域和连续区域的位移响应。研究表明:安全壳混凝土不连续区域位移响应沿厚度方向上差异较为显著,而连续区域处的差异相对较小;安全壳泄漏失效模式由设备闸门位置控制,50%和95%分位水平的内压分别为1.266 MPa和1.072 MPa;破口失效模式由筒体某一位置控制,50%和95%分位水平的内压分别为2.224 MPa和1.883 MPa;本文所分析的预应力混凝土安全壳的内压承载力满足最小安全裕度不小于2.5的要求。      

Prestressed concrete containment of nuclear power station with PWR

The initial steps of the development of prestressed concrete containment (PCC) for nuclear power plant (NPP) with pressurized water reactors (PWR) in the former USSR are analyzed. The constructive and technological decisions, accepted for primary PCC of Novovoronez NPP, such as the positioning of reinforcement elements and seaths in cylindrical wall and dome of the containment, the anchorage of reinforcement element ends, the technological aspects of concrete works, system and technology of a high level of biaxial pressing on a thin-wall structure at large wrapping angles of power reinforcing strands and etc. are observed. Experience won through the construction and operation of the primary PCC served as a basis for development of a new generation of improved unified PCC (IUPCC) for serial NPP, equipped with PWR of capacity of 1000 MW. The IUPCC is actually a cylinder 45 m in diameter and 54-m high covered with a gently sloping spherical dome. Thickness of cylinder wall is 1200 mm and that of dome wall is 1100 mm. The principle novelty of this PCC is the type and positioning of reinforcement strands. The paper describes strand arrangement and their anchorage in IUPCC. In the vertical part of PCC, strands are arranged on a helical-loop scheme and both strand ends are firmly anchored at the ring girder. Each strand is bended at the bottom of the containment. In the dome, strands are grouped on the orthogonal-loop scheme with the anchorage on one side and with bend of loop on the opposite side of the ring girder. To prevent the leakage of gases and to ensure tightness of the IUPCC an inner metal 8-mm liner with special anti-corrosion coating is designed. Monitoring and checking the stress and strain state of IUPCC is possible during the building, testing as well as operating periods. If any defects or decreased prestress of concrete are detected it is possible to tighten or replace the strands. It is noted that the more than 20 IUPCCs are in-service in Russia, Ukraine, and Bulgaria where NPP with PWR of capacity of 1000 MW were constructed.     

秦山核电厂预应力安全壳的结构设计

本文介绍了秦山核电厂安全壳的设计概况,作为后张法预应力壳体结构,本文从选型考虑到结构概貌、设计依据、应力分析以及预应力钢束及钢衬里的设计考虑等各个重要环节都作了较为详细的叙述。它不仅对核结构的设计具有较大的参考价值,而且对某些预应力筒仓,贮罐和水池结构等的设计也有一定的参考价值。     

Analytical correlation and interpretation of full scale containment specimen tests

The work presented in this paper is part of an EPRI-sponsored research program to develop experimentally verified methodology for predicting failure modes and leakage characteristics of concrete containments. This paper deals specifically with recent results of the analytical correlation and interpretation of full scale containment specimen tests. The tests under consideration are a wall/skirt-basemat specimen of a typical prestressed concrete containment, a specimen with a flawed liner to study liner crack growth, and a specimen with a typical steampipe penetration. Computational models of specimens are described, and pre-test and post-test analysis results are presented. The importance of local effects is discussed, and the role of specimen tests and analysis in failure prediction of containment structures is summarized.     

Construction of a concrete containment model

This paper discusses the features and construction of a reinforced-concrete containment model that has been built at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The model Light-Water-Reactor (LWR) containment building was designed and built to the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) code by United Engineers and Constructors, Inc. The containment model will be tested to failure to determine its response to static internal overpressurization. The results from testing the heavily instrumented containment will be used to assess the capability of analytical methods for predicting the performance of containments subject to severe accident loads as part of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's program on containment integrity.The scaled dimensions of the cylindrical wall and hemispherical dome are typical of a full-size containment. Features representative of a prototypical containment and included in the heavily reinforced model are equipment hatches, personnel airlocks, several small piping penetrations, and a thin steel liner attached to the concrete by headed studs.     

Moisture flow in concrete under steady state non-uniform temperature states: experimental observations and theoretical modelling

The migration of water in concrete at temperatures up to 400 °C is controlled dominantly by pore vapour pressures. The free pore volume is as-cast concrete serves as a reservoir during the migration process and plays an important role in the mitigation of high pore vapour pressures in the hottest regions.Experimental results are presented for two concretes containing limestone and basalt aggregates. They illustrate two sets of overheat conditions in reactor containment walls: (i) long-term service conditions at steady state liner temperatures in the range 105–200 °C, with and without pressure venting close to the liner; (ii) short-term transient behaviour for an accident with temperatures to 400 °C. The results show the distributions of free and bound water in walls of two thicknesses (1.55 and 3.1 m) after approximately 1.5 years from the imposition of a temperature crossfall. The vented experiments confirm significantly higher rates of drying and the ability of water to migrate towards higher temperature locations when driven by pore pressure gradients which are in opposition to the local temperature gradients.A theoretical model, based on pore pressure gradients as the driving potentials, is introduced and used to predict water migration in a concrete wall of 5 m thickness, heated at the inner face to 200 °C. It is suggested that thick walls will take many years to dry significantly, eventhough they dry simultaneously near to the liner and at the exposed cold face. Finally it is demonstrated that the theoretical model is capable of predicting this special behaviour and therefore has an advantage over diffusion-based analyses which cannot model this feature.     

Concept study for a combined reinforced concrete containment

A variety of different types of steel and concrete containments have been designed and constructed in the past. Most of the concrete containments had been pre-stressed, offering the advantage of small displacements and a certain leak-tightness of the concrete itself. However, considerable stresses in concrete as well as in the tendons have to be maintained during the whole lifetime of the plant in order to guarantee the required pre-stressing. The long-time behaviour and the ductility in the case of beyond-design-load cases must be verified. Contrary to a pre-stressed containment a reinforced containment will only be significantly loaded during test conditions or when needed in case of an accident. It offers additional margins which can be used especially for dynamic loads such as impacts or for beyond-design events.The aim of this paper is to show the feasibility of a so-called combined containment which means a containment capable of resisting both severe internal accidents and external hazards, mainly the aircraft crash impact as considered in the design of nuclear power plants in Germany.The concept is based on a lined reinforced containment without pre-stressing. The mechanical resistance function is provided by the reinforced concrete and the leak-tightness function is provided by a so-called composite liner made of non-metallic materials. Some results of tests performed at Siemens laboratories and at the University of Karlsruhe which show the capability of a composite liner to bridge over cracks at the concrete surface will be presented in the paper.The study shows that the combined reinforced concrete containment with a composite liner offers a robust concept with high flexibility with respect to load requirements, beyond-design events and geometrical shaping (arrangement of openings, an integration of adjacent structures). The concept may be further optimized by partial pre-stressing at areas of high concentration of stresses such as at transition zones or at disturbances around large openings.     

Current state of knowledge on the behavior of steel liners in concrete containments subjected to overpressurization loads

In the US, concrete containment buildings for commercial nuclear power plants have steel liners that act as the internal pressure boundary. The liner abuts the concrete, acting as the interior concrete form. The liner is attached to the concrete by either studs or by a continuous structural shape (such as a T-section or channel) that is either continuously or intermittently welded to the liner. Studs are commonly used in reinforced concrete containments, while prestressed containments utilize a structural element as the anchorage. The practice in some countries follows the US practice, while in other countries the containment does not have a steel liner. In this latter case, there is a true double containment, and the annular region between the two containments is vented.This paper will review the practice of design of the liner system prior to the consideration of severe accident loads (overpressurization loads beyond the design conditions).An overpressurization test of a 1:6 scale reinforced concrete containment at Sandia National Laboratories resulted in a failure mechanism in the liner that was not fully anticipated. Post-test analyses and experiments have been conducted to understand the failure better. This work and the activities that followed the test are reviewed. Areas in which additional research should be conducted are given.     

The design and evaluation of a passively cooled containment for a high-rating pressurized water reactor

An integrated pressurized water reactor (PWR) containment was conceptualized that allows heat to be rejected passively to the environment. The proposed containment is based on the demonstrated Ebasco Waterford 3 design. The secondary concrete shell was equipped with inlet and outlet vents that create an air-convection annulus. These vents also permit the submersion of the lower part of the primary containment into an external water pool. An internal water pool located at the bottom of the lower containment was added to increase in-containment heat storage. The performance of the proposed passively cooled containment was evaluated using a subdivided volume code, version 3.4e; the relative novelty of subdivided volume analyses for containment performance evaluation requires experimental verification of principal code predictions. Two experiments were carried out; one to test the performance of the external moat, and one to verify the code’s ability to predict thermal-stratification inside the containment. To improve the subdivided-volume simulation of convection-related parameters, a modeling technique (boundary layer flow approximation) was devised. Finally, the behavior of the proposed containment was evaluated for the worst-case large break loss of coolant accident and the worst-case main steam line break accident. Peak pressures remained below 0.45 MPa during both transients; internal wall pressure differences, equipment qualification temperatures, pressure restoration time also remained below design limits. The mitigation capability of hydrogen recombiners was also evaluated.     

Early-age behaviour of concrete nuclear containments

A numerical model has been developed to predict early-age cracking for massive concrete structures. Taking into account creep at early-age is essential if one wants to predict quantitatively the induced stresses if autogenous or thermal strains are restrained. Because creep strains may relax internal stresses, a creep model which includes the effects of hydration and temperature is used. For the prediction of cracking, a simple elastic damage model is used. Numerical simulations are performed in order to predict the behaviour of a massive wall and a concrete containment of a nuclear power plant. They show that significant relaxation of stresses (due to creep) occurs only after about 10 days, after cracking occurs. Moreover, since temperature in concrete may reach important values in massive concrete structures, it appears that effect of temperature on creep must be taken into account for an accurate prediction of cracking.     

Tension tests of concrete containment wall elements

Tension tests of concrete containment wall elements were conducted as part of a three-phase research program sponsored by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI). The objective of the EPRI experimental/analytical program is twofold. The first objective is to provide the utility industry with a test-verified analytical method for making realistic estimates of actual capacities of reinforced and prestressed concrete containments under internal over-pressurization from postulated degraded core accidents. The second objective is to determine qualitative and quantitative leak rate characteristics of typical containment cross-sections with and without penetrations. This paper covers the experimental portion the the EPRI program.The testing program for Phase 1 included eight large-scale specimens representing elements from the wall of a containment. Each specimen was 60-in (1525-mm) square, 24-in (610-mm) thick, and had full-size reinforcing bars. Six specimens were representative of prototypical reinforced concrete containment designs. The remaining two specimens represented prototypical prestressed containment designs.Various reinforcement configurations and loading arrangements resulted in data that permit comparisons of the effects of controlled variables on cracking and subsequent concrete/reinforcement/liner interaction in containment elements.Subtle differences, due to variations in reinforcement patterns and load applications among the eight specimens, are being used to benchmark the codes being developed in the analytical portion of the EPRI program.Phases 2 and 3 of the test program will examine leak rate characteristics and failure mechanisms at penetrations and structural discontinuities.     

Pretest predictions for the response of a 1:8 scale steel LWR containment building model to static overpressurization

The analyses used to predict the behavior of a 1:8-scale model of a steel LWR containment building to static overpressurization are described and results are presented. Finite strain, large displacement, and nonlinear material properties were accounted for using finite element methods. Three-dimensional models were needed to analyze the penetrations, which included operable equipment hatches, personnel lock representations, and a constrained pipe. It was concluded that the scale model would fail due to leakage caused by large deformations of the equipment hatch sleeves.     

Stresses and strains in the steel containment resulting from transient pressure and temperature loading during loss-of-coolant accident

Posttest calculations of stresses and strains in the steel containment of the German research reactor HDR were performed for a simulated LOCA. The results of the theoretical investigations will be presented and compared to experimental findings. The pressure and temperature loading of the shell was determined with the thermodynamic code COFLOW on the basis of a multi-compartment model. Using a three-dimensional finite element model the temporal behaviour of the containment was calculated employing the structural mechanics code ASKA. Global bending deformations and local negative straining of the steel shell is discussed. Theoretical and experimental results agree in most cases rather well. Reasons for deviations will be discussed. The specific behaviour of strains found in the vicinity of locally heated areas will be explained by means of analytical considerations.     

Mechanical and leakrate predictions for nuclear power plant containments in accidental conditions

In 1996, EDF decided to build a containment model at the scale 1:3, the Maquette echange vapeur/air (MAEVA) mock-up, in order to check and study the behavior of a prestressed concrete containment vessel without liner in terms of mechanical strength and leaktightness, for loadings corresponding to its design and beyond design conditions. In parallel to the construction and testing of the mock-up, predictive calculations of the mechanical and leaktightness behaviour of the mock-up were performed in the framework of a cost shared R&D action supported by the European Union, the Containment Evaluation under Severe Accidents (CESA) project. The strategy of EDF concerning the R&D performed on leaktightness of concrete and concrete structures is first explained and the goal of two interesting programs is shortly presented and discussed in the first part of the paper. Then, the emphasis is made on the predictive calculations performed on the MAEVA mock-up by means of finite elements (FE) calculations. A summary of the main achievements is then given and the interest of FE calculations is discussed for describing both the mechanical and leaktightness behaviour of a concrete structure as a function of crack development.     

A review of procedures for the analysis and design of concrete structures to resist missile impact effects

Concrete containment walls and internal concrete barrier walls are often required to withstand the effects of missile impact. Potential missiles include external tornado generated missiles (steel rods, steel pipes, wooden poles, and automobiles), aircraft crash, and internal accident generated missiles (turbine blade, and steel pipe missiles resulting from pipe break). Impacting missiles can be classified as either ‘hard’ or ‘soft’ depending upon whether the missile deformability is small or large relative to the target deformability. This paper only deals with the effects of ‘hard’ missile impact. Missile velocities between 100 and 1500 ft/sec are emphasized. ‘Hard’ missile impact results in both local wall damage and in overall dynamic response of the target wall. Local damage consists of spalling of concrete from the front (impacted) face and scabbing of concrete from the rear face of the target together with missile penetration into the target. If damage is sufficient the missile may perforate or pass through the target. This paper reviews the various empirical procedures commonly used for determining penetration depth, perforation thickness, and scabbing thickness for concrete targets subjected to ‘hard’ missile impact. Results obtained from these procedures are compared with test data results for low velocity impacts (200–1500 ft/sec). Design recommendations to prevent detrimental local wall damage are presented. Overall dynamic response of the target wall consists of flexural deformations and a potential flexural or shear failure if the strain energy capacity of the wall does not exceed the kinetic energy input to the wall by the striking ‘hard’ missile. Simplified procedures are defined for determining the dynamic response of the target wall and for preventing overall failure of the wall. Included are procedures for defining the effective target mass to be used in determining the fraction of the total missile kinetic energy which is transferred or ‘input’ into the target wall. Also included are procedures for defining the total strain energy capacity of the target wall as determined from the moment and rotational capacities of flexural yield hinges and the yield line deformation pattern of the wall. Lastly, criteria for preventing a premature shear failure are presented.     

Refined cracked concrete analysis of concrete containment structures subject to operational and environmental loadings

Recent commercial nuclear power plant containment concepts involve the use of large reinforced concrete structures to form pressure boundaries. Where these structures are not provided with an integral steel liner, excessive cracking of the concrete under loads could result in the loss of the pressure boundary integrity with the risk of over-pressurization of other structures. Cracking of concrete is a local phenomenon and considerable detail must be included in any analytical model to obtain sufficiently refined results for the prediction of crack size and propagation. This imposes severe limitations on the overall size of structures or structural components for which detailed cracking analysis can be considered directly. To overcome this restriction, a two step procedure was developed in which linear analyses were performed to obtain the gross response, and nonlinear cracking analyses were performed for selected portions of the structure to evaluate local cracking in detail. Through iteration, compatibility of behavior between the linear and nonlinear analyses was achieved with the gross response being used to extrapolate the local cracking results to predict cracking over the entire structure. This paper discusses the analysis procedures for the detailed evaluation of cracking in large reinforced concrete structures and components. Analyses performed for an actual unlined reinforced concrete containment structure using these procedures are discussed and results are presented.