Development of PLC-based reactor protection system.

In preparation for the utilization of green energy sources and to ensure the sustainability of the national energy system in Indonesia, the nuclear power plant is an option for green energy technology. Since 2014, BATAN (National Nuclear Energy Agency) has taken steps to develop a High Temperature Gas Cooled Reactor (HTGR) technology through the Experimental Power Reactor (EPR) program which is a Non-Commercial Power Reactor. HTGR technology was chosen for EPR because of its inherent safety system, higher power efficiency, and cogeneration reactor. The safety system is the most critical system of a nuclear power plant, so it should be designed with the highest reliability requirements. This study aims to support EPR development activities, especially in developing a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC)-based Reactor Protection System (RPS). RPS is part of the nuclear reactor safety system that functions to keep the reactor operating within normal limits. If any operating parameters exceed the safety limit, the RPS will automatically trip the reactor. The RPS is designed by considering the Design Basic Accident and General Design Criteria of the reactor safety system. In this research, the design of the RPS architecture uses a redundancy logic of 2 out of 3. The RPS output signal will initiate the actuation of the control rod drop and activate the engineered safety features. The result of RPS design includes the RPS design criteria, determination of RPS input signal, RPS architecture modeling, and PLC-based RPS implementation. From the test results, it is found that this RPS can carry out the reactor protection functions in case of abnormal operation contained in the DBA. The measurement of RPS response time indicates this RPS meets the design requirements regarding RPS response time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]