1992- ON SITE ASSISTANCE - S.UKRAINE NPP

The South Ukraine Nuclear Power Plant site has three VVER-1000 units in operation. A fourth unit was moth-balled in the early 80's half wav through civil construction. No equipment had been installed and the turbine hall building is presently being completed to host a mechanical work shop.
The site is located 350 km south of KIEV on the banks of the South Bug river. The construction of the first unit began in April 1976 and the unit synchronized to the grid in December 1982. The second and the third unit were commissioned in January 1982 and September 1989 respectively.

The main objectives of the project was to provide assistance to the plant management in the design, assessment and implementation of a number of plant safety improvement projects.

Feasibility to implement modifications to address the following issues have been discussed as part of the first phase of the current project:

1. Reactor Vessel Inservice Inspections;
2. Steam Generator feedwater control modifications;
3. Automatic control of primary circuit weld;
4. Feasibility Study on the I&C modernization.

Achievements (as requested in the TORs)

During this first phase of the project several meetings took place at the site of South Ukrainian NPP which allowed Western experts and their Ukrainian partners to reach common understanding of the problems encountered at SU NPP in relation to the ISI practices, SG water level control and I&C. In addition visits were arranged for the SU NPP staff to NPPs in Western Europe to let them gain first hand information on the way the safety issues subject of the current project were handled at NPPs of Western design.

For each of the above mentioned subjects the first phase project final report contained information related to:

• General description of the plant system/programme under consideration;Detailed description of the installed equipment, control systems and associated equipment and instruments concerned;
• A list of problems related to the issue as identified by the South Ukraine plant staff and members of the Western Consortium;
• A list with proposed technical solutions elaborated based on the experience of the Western consortium;
• Proposal for a time schedule for the possible implementation of NPP relevant modifications;
• Estimation of the required consultant’s manpower and budget needed for phase 2 of the project.

Comments

(quality of the results, lesson learnt, recommendations for follow-up)
The four base projects selected by the SUK NPP, which are listed under the paragraph “Objectives”, were found to be all related to safety and reliability of the plant. Their implementation required close cooperation with local companies which was fully in line with the spirit of the TACIS program.

It was further noted that the selected projects were all of a general character and the results could have been therefore very useful for other Ukrainian and Russian plants.

In view of the depth of the investigations made and the advanced status of the preliminary engineering and in order to avoid duplication of the work already done it was recommendable to continue the engineering activities without any delay and with the same companies that initiated the projects, i.e. UNESA and its partners (TRACTEBEL, TECNATOM, EMPRESARIOS AGRUPADOS, GKN).

Further information

Further information on the project results could be sought from the beneficiary organizations.

The Project Final report is available at the JRC-IE archive.