Benchmark analysis on probabilistic fracture mechanics analysis codes concerning fatigue crack growth in aged piping of nuclear power plants

Katsuyama, Jinya  ; Ito, Hiroto*; Li, Y.* ; Osakabe, Kazuya*; Onizawa, Kunio ; Yoshimura, Shinobu*

Several probabilistic fracture mechanical (PFM) analysis codes have been improved or developed in Japan, such as PASCAL-SP developed at JAEA, and PRAISE-JNES developed at JNES for structural integrity assessment of aged piping in nuclear power plants. Although they were developed for different purposes, they have similar functions. In this paper, in order to confirm the reliability and applicability of two PFM analysis codes, PASCAL-SP and PRAISE-JNES, benchmark analyses on piping failure probability have been carried out considering typical aging mechanisms, such as fatigue crack growth for piping materials in BWR plants Moreover, a criterion is proposed to judge whether the differences between the analysis results from two codes can be acceptable. Based on the proposed criterion, it is concluded that the analysis results of these two codes are in good agreements.