17.03.2011 Public Information Centre of Kola NPP

Kola Atomists Master the Newest Digital Technologies of Safety Management

On March 17, the representatives of STUK Finnish regulatory authority and Fortum* Concern finished their work at Kola NPP. In the course of their visit, the foreign colleagues, together with the specialists of nuclear safety and reliability department, studied the questions of APROS** system further development at the nuclear plant.

APROS program that had been successfully operating at Kola NPP for more than 10 years was supplied to the enterprise directly by its developers: Finnish Centre of Technical Research and FORTUM Concern as a part of the program of Finland technical assistance to Russian NPPs.

Using this program, the computer models of Kola NPP power units, accounting the equipment modernization accomplished, were developed. APROS-models were applied for development of operation documentation, issue of conclusions for a number of projects concerning the changes in the systems important for safety. The calculations made using the developed digital models helped the NPP specialists significantly to improve understanding of the peculiarities of the transitional processes and unit systems interrelation.

Today the technology simulator is actively used by the Finnish party in the process of development of a new digital NPP safety management system Loviisa***, in particular, for modernization of the full-scale simulator.

According to FORTUM Concern Vice-President Kari Porkholm, the APROS system is regularly upgraded. ТAt present, a new version of the simulator helps Finnish atomists to test the system of control and measuring instruments being developed yet before its commissioning. Such a testing allows revealing of all the equipment defects and faults before the power unit commissioning and excludes the possibility of unscheduled shutdown because of failure work of the new facilitiesУ, - he reported.

The Finnish party reported the information concerning the works carried out at Loviisa and new properties of the ATROS system to Russian specialists. In the course of the year Fortum representatives will provide the Russian party with the upgrade for APROS simulators operating at Kola NPP. This upgrade will allow further perfection of the system in the future.

Kola NPP is a branch of Rosenergoatom Concern OJSC. The plant is located 200 km to the south of Murmansk on the bank of Lake Imandra. Power unit No.1 of Kola NPP was commissioned in 1973. Currently, the plant operates 4 power units with VVER-type reactors. Each reactor has capacity of 440 mW. Kola NPP supplies power for Murmansk region and Karelia.

Timely information about the radiation environment near Russian NPPs and other objects of the nuclear industry is available in the site www.russianatom.ru.

* Fortum is one of the leading electric power concerns of North Europe countries (Finland and Scandinavia), Russia and the Baltic Sea district. The company produces, delivers and sales electric power and heat, provides services on electric plants operation and maintenance. Fortum owns 3,000 MW (el.) nominal nuclear facilities in Finland and Sweden, including Loviisa NPP as well.

** APROS, or advanced technology simulator, is a computer technology, developed in Finland in the middle of 80s of the last century, and since that time it has been widely used at Loviisa NPP while performing safety analysis for the purpose of a complete imitation of all the NPP working technological processes, including the work of the automatics, as well as for the NPP personnel training using the full-scale simulators.

*** Loviisa NPP is the first Finnish nuclear plant. It is located on Hastholmen island, 15 km to the south-east from Loviisa city. It is owned by Fortum State Company. The plant operates two VVER-440 reactors with water under pressure, which were produced at Izhora plant, also turbines, generators and other equipment was made in the USSR. The first reactor was commissioned in February 1977, the second one Р in November 1980. As the result of the reconstruction, each reactor capacity was increased from the initial 440 MW up to 488 MW.

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