Tecnatom to supply Norway with SMR simulator
28 January 2022
Spanish engineering firm Tecnatom has been awarded a contract by Norway's Institute for Energy Technology for the development and supply of a simulator based on small modular reactors (SMRs).
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(Image: Tecnatom)
The Institute for Energy Technology already uses the Integral Pressurised Water Reactor (iPWR) SMR simulator, which Tecnatom developed and supplied to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) some years ago. The IAEA has made the iPWR simulator available free for member states to use for educational purposes.
However, although until now the iPWR simulator has met its needs, the Institute for Energy Technology has decided to have their own simulator not only for validating its Human Factors Engineering, but also for testing the management and training of multi-event sessions of a simulator of up to 12 units.
The scope of the new contract - the value of which has not been disclosed - comprises the supply of a simplified and configurable simulator with a variable number of units based on generic SMR designs. This simulator is to allow the institute to conduct research associated with the operation and monitoring in a multi-unit control room, with highly automated control systems. In addition, the simulator will also allow the development of studies associated with cybersecurity.
The new simulator will allow simulating in real time all the phenomena occurring in each of the selected units, not only in normal operating conditions, but also in abnormal and emergency scenarios, as well as in multi-unit events. The simulator will communicate with different operation and monitoring interfaces (human-machine interfaces) and will be able to transfer all the necessary variables to new interface systems to test their designs, as well as the response of the operating personnel.
In recent years, Tecnatom has supplied simulators for different purposes and scopes to clients in Europe, Asia and the Americas, including for unit 1 at Brazil's Angra nuclear power plant.
Researched and written by World Nuclear News