Recent applications of PSA for managing nuclear power plant safety

The safety design and regulation of nuclear power plants has traditionally been based upon deterministic approaches that consider a set of challenges to safety, e.g. design basis accidents, and determine how those challenges should be handled. The approach has been very successful since no plant designed or regulated to United States standards has ever harmed a member of the public. The arbitrary nature of these safety criteria, the potential inconsistencies in the judgments on relative probabilities, and the lack of definition for ‘safety’ became increasingly evident during the 1960s. Probabilistic approaches to reactor safety were proposed ^1,2,3 but did not take off in the United States until publication of the Reactor Safety Study ⁴ in 1975. Even as the methodology matured, there remained a challenge to integrate it into the regulatory process. This article will describe this integration process. A probabilistic approach to regulation enhances and extends the traditional deterministic approach by introducing the concept of safety (risk) significance that allows the designer/operator to focus on important issues. Emphasis was initially placed on relative risk but now regulatory decision-making is employing both relative and absolute risk. Measures of importance will be defined. Risk information can be used to prioritize the allocation of resources and three examples will be described. Equipment configuration control systems are being installed and used at nuclear power plants to enhance safety and to reduce Operating and Maintenance costs; they will be described. Finally, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's introduction of risk-informed decision-making into the regulatory process will be discussed.