Commissioning
Safety Assessment for CommissioningTÜV NORD Nuclear provides all services required from the safety perspective in the commissioning stage. The scope of these services is adapted to the processes and issues relevant for this stage of the life cycle and detailed below.
In product realisation of a plant, commissioning is the link between construction/erection and operation. During the operation stage, commissioning might become an issue again, e.g. after design changes or plant modifications, up-rating of the thermal power or increase of the fuel enrichment as well as maintenance, repair or refurbishment of components. It should be evident that in such cases the scope of commissioning is distinctly less than in product realisation of a nuclear facility.
Usually, commissioning a nuclear power plant is carried out in two distinct stages, which are pre-nuclear and nuclear commissioning. The scope of commissioning and the interface to the ensuing operation stage is subject to the specific requirements in the respective licensing process and can vary from country to country. Depending on the regulatory environment, the aforementioned stages could be subdivided into further sub-stages. To ensure well-structured and controlled processes in commissioning, it is common practice to elaborate beforehand commissioning plans and programmes and instructions. They describe inter alia the overall approach in commissioning, the actions to be taken and their sequence as well as the responsibilities of the involved staff and parties and the requirements on the documentation of the commissioning activities.
From the regulatory perspective, the prerequisite for commissioning a nuclear facility is a respective licence – the licence to commission – being granted. Such licence requires submission and safety assessment of a Safety Case which defines the procedural and technical framework to be followed in the commissioning stage. The Safety Case for a licence to commission has at least two objectives:
- To demonstrate that the activities carried out in the preceding stage – construction & erection – have been concluded as required and
- to make credible that the planned commissioning of the facility complies with the applicable safety requirements.
The Safety Case for a licence to commission comprises the necessary information on e.g. the
- outline of the stages in commissioning,
- commissioning plans and programmes for the respective stages,
- organisational measures.
Safety assessment of the Safety Case for a licence to commission is typically a pre-licence activity.
http://www.tuev-nord.de/en/Safety_Assessment_12155.htm
