User's manual and analysis methodology of probabilistic fracture mechanics analysis code PASCAL Ver.2 for reactor pressure vessel

Osakabe, Kazuya; Kato, Daisuke*; Onizawa, Kunio ; Shibata, Katsuyuki

As a part of the aging structural integrity research for LWR components, the probabilistic fracture mechanics analysis code PASCAL has been developed in JAEA. This code evaluates the conditional probabilities of crack initiation and fracture of a reactor pressure vessel under transient conditions such as pressurized thermal shock. PASCAL Ver.1 has functions of optimized sampling in stratified Monte Carlo simulation and so on. Since then, under the contract between the Ministry of Economy, Trading and Industry of Japan and JAEA, we have continued to develop and introduce new functions into PASCAL Ver.2 such as the evaluation method for an embedded crack and others. A generalized analysis method is proposed based on the development of PASCAL Ver.2 and results of sensitivity analyses. Graphical user interface including a generalized method as default values has been also developed for PASCAL Ver.2. This report provides the user's manual and theoretical background of PASCAL Ver.2.