Harmonization of Nuclear Codes & Standards Pacific Nuclear Council Working and Task Group Report 1. Introduction By S. S Dua PNC Working Group/Task Group Chair Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. Canada This is 2 nd report on the Group activities and covers the progress since the last report presented in 2004 at the PBNC Conference in Hawaii, USA in March 2004. The Pacific Nuclear Council (PNC) recognized the need for harmonization of the nuclear codes and standards for its member countries back in late 90 s. Most of the major nuclear vendor countries (USA, Canada, Japan, S. Korea, China) have established a set of nuclear codes and standards in support of its reactor concepts. As most of these standards are technology based, there are a number of similarities between these codes and standards at least for the technology part (e.g. ASME on pressure vessels and piping). The differences are mainly on the administrative aspects and on the application of technologies. Considering some of the these similarities and the need for rationalization & harmonization between the Pacific rim countries, the PNC formed a Task Group to look into the Codes and Standards area. The group was formed in late 90 s and started its work in 2000 / 2001. The Task Group requested participation from a number of PNC member countries. The TG mandate is to review and identify the nuclear codes and standards used by the member countries and recommend a harmonized suite of C&S for use in the nuclear arena by the PNC member and non-member organizations. The objective is to cover both the research and power reactors. The PNC took a bit of time to obtain nominations from the member countries for qualified members for its TG work activities. For the last two years it has established a core membership base and active participation from some of its key members. This paper presents a status report on the TG mandate and activities, its membership, work done to date and its major milestones and deliverables. During the later part of 2005, PNC further raised the profile of this task and formed a Working Group to cover a broader mandate and scope of activities. The Working Group (WG) mandate is to identify and analyze the different codes and standards introduced to the Pacific Basin region, in order to achieve mutual understanding, harmonization and application in each country. This requires the WG to develop and encourage the use of reasonably consistent criteria for the design and development, engineering, procurement, fabrication, construction, testing, operations, maintenance, waste management, decommissioning and the management of the commercial nuclear power plants in the Pacific Basin so as to: Promote consistent safety, quality, environmental and management standards for nuclear energy and other peaceful applications of nuclear technology. Encourage commerce among PNC member countries Reduce the costs of fabrication, construction, testing, operation and maintenance Facilitate the sharing of spare parts Facilitate harmonization and alignment with other regional and international standards and criteria, and Organize & conduct training and workshops to enhance Pacific Basin countries understanding of the harmonized suite of codes and standards and criteria for their application. PNC has nominated the Chair for the Working Group and is now seeking nominations from the member organizations. The Chair has been closely working with the IAEA & ISO organizations to pursue some of its activities.
The Chair had a meeting with the IAEA representatives in Vienna, Austria to discuss the mutual cooperation between the PNC TG/WG and IAEA on the codes and standards activities. IAEA has been developing its new Management System Requirements Standard, GS-R-3 that has now been approved by its Board of Governors. The new MS Standard GS-R-3 supersedes IAEA documents on Q/QA 50-C/SG-Q and integrates the management of quality, environment, health & safety, security and economics. A number of PNC member countries have participated in the development of this new IAEA MS Standard. IAEA is planning to conduct a series of workshops and seminars on the new Standard and is keen to work with the PNC to hold a joint workshop in the Pacific region. A proposal to the PNC was tabled at the PNC 2006 June meeting for the joint IAEA/PNC International workshop to be held in 2007/ 2008. For the ISO, the Chair has been working with ISO TC 176 / SC2 to help in the assessment of specific sector needs for QMS standards and in obtaining support from the ISO TC 176 organization. 2. Task Group Objectives The main objective of the TG is to first obtain an understanding of the needs of its members for the specific suite of codes and standards they use for their reactor system within their country and on the reactor system they market abroad or import from outside. This will then lead to identify the common codes and standards and their needs to harmonize with the international and more widely accepted codes and standards (IAEA, ISO, IEC, ASME, ASTM, etc.). The final mandate of the TG is to recommend a harmonized suite of codes and standards for use in the nuclear arena, covering both research & power reactors, by the PNC member and non-member organizations in the Pacific rim. 3. Task Group Membership Although PNC identified the need for the TG in late 90 s, it took a bit of time to define its mandate and objectives. PNC being a volunteer organization took a bit of time to seek nominations from the member organizations, the full TG membership will include the following: South Korea Japan Taiwan China Mexico Brazil Thailand Vietnam Malaysia Australia Russia Canada USA And Representation as Observers from IAEA & possibly ISO/IEC Although PNC has made good progress to secure the representation from South Korea, Japan, Australia, China, USA, Mexico & Canada, it is still trying hard to request other member organizations to nominate their TG members. The Canadian representative currently chairs the TG. PNC has now requested the Canadian representative to chair the Working Group also. Based on the recommendations from the TG membership, PNC has approved to form a TG subgroup to focus on the research reactors only. The Australian representative on the TG has been requested to
lead this sub-group on Research reactors. TG will soon seek membership for the sub-group and then define its exact mandate and objectives.
4. Task Group Scope The main scope of activities for the TG was tabled at a number of PNC meetings in USA, Canada, South Korea, Japan and China. After considerable discussions with the PNC and within the TG, the scope of activities is defined as follows: To identify, compile, review and understand which codes and standards are being developed and / or used in the nuclear area by each PNC member organization. To determine the needs of PNC member organizations to harmonize with the internationally accepted suite of nuclear codes and standards such as IAEA, ASME/ASTM, IEC, ISO 9000, etc. To develop a position paper documenting overall vision and strategies for PNC member organization to harmonize on the use of nuclear codes and standards. This shall cover the following key aspects: To identify a recommended widely accepted suite of codes and standards for member countries and non member countries embarking on a nuclear program To ensure that the member organizations are aware of the efforts of the international standards writing bodies on the ongoing development and changes in the standards arena to support the global market environment addressing some of the deregulation requirements, trade agreements, open market competitiveness, etc. To harmonize the recommended suite with the international codes and standards, as required. A pilot project covering a sub-set of the recommended suite for a specific area (nuclear pressure vessels, manufacturing of nuclear components, environment, etc.) to test the recommendations of the position paper 5. TG Workshops & Progress To-date The TG has met a number of times and arranged two workshops in China and USA. During the workshop in China, the TG identified a number of nuclear technology related topics of interest to the members. The topics listed below are based on initial brainstorming efforts of the TG and may not be complete to cover all its needs: Siting & Environmental Protection Radiation Protection Nuclear Fuel Cycle Spent Fuel Management Plant and Reactor Operation Safety & Risk Analysis Quality Management & Quality Assurance Nuclear Management & Transportation Testing, Inspection & Surveillance Health, Safety & Environment Pressure Boundary Components Containment Reactor Cooling System Reactor Physics Electrical Equipment Civil and Structures Material Standards Material Test Methods Fire Protection Ventilation & Air Conditioning Plant Life Management Outage Management Safeguards Physical Security & Protection from Terrorism
Corporate Governance and Ethics For each of these topics the TG provided brief introductory remarks and the intent and contents of each section such as: o Siting & Environmental Protection: The topic shall cover geologic, seismic, meteorology, hydrology, non-radiological environmental effects, air pollution, water pollution and other general considerations such as exposure limits, environmental impact, exclusion zone, environmental surveillance, etc. o Quality Management & Quality Assurance: This shall cover management systems and processes, all nuclear life cycle activities starting from siting, R&D, development, conceptual & detail design, engineering, procurement, manufacturing, construction & installation, commissioning, operation & maintenance, decommissioning, & other general considerations on cleanliness, protective coatings, contamination and decontamination. o Pressure Boundary Components: This area shall cover pressure vessels and boilers, piping, tubing & fittings, pumps and valves, heaters, heat exchangers, pressurizer, steam generators and other general considerations on overpressure protection, leak detection, rules for construction and classifications The TG shall soon finalize the list of topics including a brief coverage for each of these topics. The TG Chair is planning to assign a select number of topics to each of the members who will then complete their research and findings from each of the member countries. For the listing of nuclear codes and standards being used by the member countries, efforts are underway to compile this master list for the Pacific Rim countries. Some of the members have already identified the suite of the codes and standards used in their respective country and on their reactor system. The third workshop is being proposed for the 2006 October PBNC conference in Australia. A number of meetings were held with the Nuclear Facilities standards Committee (NFSC) of the American Nuclear Standards (ANS) and efforts are underway to obtain their input on the nuclear codes & standards used in USA. A catalogue of ANS 2005/06 standards was obtained and this is now being inputted into the Master Listing of PNC codes & standards. An initiative to develop a closer working relationship between the Canadian CSA and ANS NFSC is being established and recommendations were made to their Steering Committees to harmonize existing standards and share draft standards & seed documents on topics of interest. Based on the limited discussions with some of the members it is becoming apparent that two of the key standards that can be considered for harmonization are as follows: IAEA Safety Standards- The Management system for Facilities and Activities, GS-R-3 ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code The IAEA MS Standard GS-R-3 will be soon published and issued to member countries. A number of PNC countries have been participating in the development of this standard since early 2001 and basically have endorsed the criteria and requirements of the standard. The development of this standard is an excellent example of the international cooperation and harmonization to establish a common set of integrated management system requirements. IAEA is conducting a number of workshops to disseminate the information and raise awareness of the new management environment for the nuclear facilities and
activities. The WG is looking at hosting a joint IAEA / PNC International workshop in the Pacific region in 2007/2008. The ASME B&PV Code is also very widely used all across the world in the nuclear area. A number of PNC countries such as Canada, China, Japan, Korea, and Australia have adapted the code for its technical requirements. As the Code covers a broad scope of the design, construction, and inspection activities for the NPPs, the Task Group will try to identify some specific areas for the application on the pilot basis in a member country that is getting into the nuclear program. 6. Future Activities and Action Plan The WG/TG Chair is actively working with the PNC to complete its representation from the member countries. The PNC President and Executive Director are actively supporting these activities and are assisting the chair to complete the nominations for the WG & TG memberships asap The PNC has also approached and got agreement from the Australian representation to appoint their expert to consider the formation of the TG Sub-group on Research Reactors. The focus in the near future is to address the following areas: Seek & secure nominations to complete WG and TG memberships including o Need for the formation of a separate Research reactor sub-group and its membership & mandate o Backup for members and succession planning Complete listing of codes and standards currently being used and being developed for each of the PNC member countries Complete assignment of selected topics to TG members, members will cover these topics briefly including their scope and need priorities For the higher priority areas such as pressure boundary components, quality management, safeguards, physical security, etc., complete the research to identify a harmonized suite of codes & standards for use. Joint workshops with the IAEA in the Pacific region on the newly developed Management System Requirement Standard (GS-R-3) 7. Major Deliverables & Milestone As the TG membership is on a voluntarily basis and is still not complete, it is difficult to provide a definitive schedule for the completion of its activities. The following key deliverables and milestones are on a best effort basis based on the targets discussed with PNC: Master Listing of Codes and Standards used / being developed by member Countries 2006/7 Listing of Topics, Needs & Priorities for a harmonized suite - 2007 For the higher priority areas, Recommend a harmonized suite of codes and standards for use by PNC member and non-member counties 2007 Joint IAEA / PNC workshop on GS-R-3 in 2007 /08 Develop and support the use of the harmonized suite of codes and standards by a Pacific basin country on a new nuclear project TBE
8. Conclusion The nuclear codes and standards have been an integral part of the nuclear industry since its inception. As the industry came into the main stream over the 2 nd half of the 20 th century, a number of national and international standards were developed to support a specific nuclear reactor concept. These codes and standards have been a key component of the industry to maintain its focus on nuclear safety, reliability and quality. Although all the codes and standards do have a component based on the underlying technology and science, they do cover a number of national administrative and prescriptive aspects that can become barriers to trade and cause difficulties to compete in the global arena. The Pacific Nuclear Council noted the proliferation of codes and standards among the nuclear vendors and recognized the need to develop a harmonized listing for use by the Pacific basin countries. The Task Group is charged to review the existing suite of codes and standards used by the PNC members and to develop the harmonized suite for acceptance and use by its members. The TG has made good progress to identify a number of topics that need to be addressed including some of the new security areas that became apparent after September 2000 terrorist activities. PNC has further raised the profile of the task and formed a Working Group to cover a broader mandate and scope of activities. The member countries are encouraged to contact PNC Executive Director and WG/ TG Chair to participate in the PNC codes and Standards activities