Seismic demand estimation of electrical cabinet in nuclear power plant considering equipment-anchor-interaction

This paper investigates the seismic behavior of an electrical cabinet considering the influence of equipment-anchor-interaction (EAI) that is generally not taken into consideration in a decoupled analysis. The hysteresis behavior of an anchor bolt in concrete was thereby considered to highlight this interaction effect. To this end, the experimental behavior of an anchor bolt under reversed cyclic loading was taken from the recently developed literature, and a numerical model for the anchor hysteresis was developed using the component approach. The hysteresis properties were then used to calibrate the multi-linear link element that is implemented as a boundary condition for the cabinet incorporating the EAI. To highlight this EAI further, the nonlinear time history analysis was performed for a cabinet considering the hysteresis behavior comparative to a fixed boundary condition. Additionally, the influence on the seismic fragility was evaluated for the operational and structural condition of the cabinet. The numerical analysis considering the anchor hysteresis manifests that the in-cabinet response spectra (ICRS) are significantly amplified with the corresponding reduction in the seismic capacity of 25% and 15% for an operational and structural safety condition under the selected protocols. Considering the fixed boundary condition over a realistic hysteresis behavior of the anchor bolt is more likely to overestimate the seismic capacity of the cabinet in a seismic qualification procedure.