Dr. Mihai A. Diaconeasa of the PRA Group was awarded a grant for a collaborative project led by the Idaho National Laboratory on INL Grant on model-based software common cause failure modeling and error propagation for digital instrumentation and control systems.
Advances that support the licensing case to enable the transition from analog instrumentation and control (I&C) technologies to digital technologies in the U.S. nuclear industry are greatly needed. The objective of this research is to offer a capability of design architecture evaluation of various digital I&C (DI&C) systems to support system design decisions and diversity and redundancy applications; assure the long-term safety and reliability of safety-critical DI&C systems; provide a best-estimate, risk-informed capability to quantitatively and accurately estimate the safety margin obtained from plant modernization, especially for the safety-critical DI&C systems; support and supplement existing advanced risk-informed DI&C design guides by providing quantitative risk-informed and performance-based evidence; and, reduce uncertainty in costs and support integration of DI&C systems at nuclear power plants. The project expects to develop the capability of quantitative assessment to fill the technical gaps and follows the trend and the need for the digital modernization of existing nuclear power plants.