Analysis of errors of commission for a CE type plant with the advanced control room in the full power condition

Abstract

This study analyzes errors of commission (E0Cs) committed by operators of an Combustion Engineering (CE) type plant with the advanced control room during full power operation, by using the Commission Errors Search and Assessment (CESA) and Misdiagnosis Tree Analysis (MDTA) methods. The contribution of E0Cs to plant safety is significant in the digital control room of the reference plant, where the cognitive behavior of an operator plays more important role in the control than in the analog control room. In this study, the CESA and MDTA methods are applied to the identification and quantification of E0Cs, respectively. This study chooses eight initiating events that account for approximately 90% of the total core damage frequency (CDF) in the full power condition of the reference plant. As a result of applying the CESA method, twelve EOCs are identified along with the accident sequence groups. Then, the probabilities of those E0Cs are quantified through the MDTA method. Finally, this study discusses the effect of E0Cs on system failure probability, as well as the necessity of considering E0Cs in the probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) of the reference plant. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.