Nuclear Energy
With over 86% of nuclear power plants operating beyond their original 40-year license period, the operations’ safety and reliability have become a subject of significant attention. To address this need, Nordisch offer a simulation tool for license renewal of NPPs (nuclear power plants) by determining the SLP of cables, Orings, and rubbers used in NPPs.
Cables and pipes are an integral part of nuclear power plant safety systems and are quite difficult and expensive to replace. Degradation of the electrical insulation, cable jacket, and other cable components is a key issue that is likely to affect the ability of the currently installed cables to operate safely and reliably for another 20 to 40 years beyond the initial operating life. Thus, accurate prediction of their life-time can significantly reduce the risk, time, and cost associated with the replacement of those components. In nuclear applications, polymer aging occurs under combined high-intensity radiation and thermal oxidation. That is intrinsically more convoluted than isolated thermal aging, especially those encountered during long-term use conditions in nuclear power plants or other applications with high-intensity radiation.
Nordisch LLC has been making significant investments in technologies and systems intended to operate in complex and challenging nuclear environments. Our solution to this challenge is Multiphysics simulation software named NordRad. Nord2.0 is a customized version of NordRad developed for the nuclear industry. NordRad2.0 responds to this immediate target market for low-voltage (LV) cables under the category of section (c) verification of aging effects in which the health and sustainability of the installed cables need to be verified to ensure and guarantee a suitable life extension of NPPs. This is a framework that (1) predicts damage accumulation in polymers induced by coupled thermal and radiative loads, and (2) establishes a link between real-time aging and accelerated thermal-radiative aging tests. Our customer can use NordRad2.0 to generate reliable date to assess (i) the current performance and (ii) the remaining service-life (RUL) of the cables in real time.
NordRad2.0 ability to monitor residual damage in operating cables without disconnecting the cable can save significant time, cost, and resources associated with the safety of the power grid while increasing the efficiency of maintenance outages. This Multi-Physics simulation tool helps our customers to predict the performance and reliability cables exposed to severe thermal radiation at nuclear reactors of NPPs. Nordisch can assist NPPs and regulatory agencies to meet NRC requirements for the license renewal of power plants for another 20 years by obtaining comprehensive information about the health monitoring of cables to identify the level of degradation in the cable circult that could impact plant performance now or in the future.
