Status of French flaw evaluation procedures

The RSE-M Code is under development in France and the 1996 edition will include a complete flaw evaluation procedure for operating PWRs. For FBRs the authors have developed the RCC-MR for design and they are now developing RSE-MR rules for operating plants; a first set of flaw evaluation rules are proposed in the A16 document for low and high temperature regime. After some comments on the organization of RSE and RCC Committees, the paper presents: (1) the status of the different French code rules (RSE-M and A16 document); (2) how can one take into consideration some complex geometry or loading case situations; (3) some comparisons with ASME Code-Section XI; and (4) few examples of major on-going developments for flaw evaluation for different components. In conclusion, two different sets of rules are under development one in RSE-M for PWRs and one in RSE-MR for FBRs using partly the A16 proposals. These rules have to remain consistent, but not necessary identical due to the specific components covered by these documents. The components can be very different in term of pressure load, operating temperature, transient thermal loads and seismic loads.