The EC MUSA Project on Management and Uncertainty of Severe Accidents: Main Pillars and Status

Abstract

In the current state of maturity of severe accident codes, the time has come to foster the systematic application of Best Estimate Plus Uncertainties (BEPU) in this domain. The overall objective of the HORIZON-2020 project on “Management and Uncertainties of Severe Accidents (MUSA)” is to quantify the uncertainties of severe accident codes (e.g., ASTEC, MAAP, MELCOR, and AC2) when modeling reactor and spent fuel pools accident scenarios of Gen II and Gen III reactor designs for the prediction of the radiological source term. To do so, different Uncertainty Quantification (UQ) methodologies are to be used for the uncertainty and sensitivity analysis. Innovative AM measures will be considered in performing these UQ analyses, in addition to initial/boundary conditions and model parameters, to assess their impact on the source term prediction. This paper synthesizes the major pillars and the overall structure of the MUSA project, as well as the expectations and the progress made over the first year and a half of operation.

Keywords

• nuclear fission
• safety
• severe accidents
• BEPU
• accident management
• uncertainty quantification