Maintenance risk management in Daya Bay nuclear power plant: PSA model, tools and applications

The importance of proper maintenance for safe and reliable operations of nuclear power plants (NPPs) has long been recognized by the nuclear utilities and regulatory bodies. This paper presents a pilot risk-informed probabilistic safety analysis (PSA) application, i.e. maintenance risk management, conducted in Daya Bay nuclear power plant in P.R. China. The purpose of the maintenance risk management developed in this pilot application is to assess and manage plant risk during maintenance activities using risk-informed PSA insights. Some important issues related to the three-phase maintenance risk management process, risk monitor tools, underlying plant specific PSA model, risk measures and acceptance criteria, and the role of the regulatory bodies and plant managers, etc. are discussed. It is expected that the experience obtained from the pilot study would be beneficial to both regulatory bodies and utilities in promoting risk-informed PSA applications in China and other countries with similar situations.