Dose–time dependence of steel critical brittleness temperature for VVER-1000 vessel service life prediction

• Published in: Atomic energy (New York, N.Y.) N.Y.), 2011-07, Vol.110 (3), p.141-150
• Main Authors: Dub, A. V., Skorobogatykh, V. N., Anosov, N. P., Zharov, V. V., Zubchenko, A. S., Piminov, V. A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Analysis; Brittleness; Calibration; Containers; Copper; Dependence; Hadrons; Heavy Ions; Nickel; Nuclear accidents & safety; Nuclear Chemistry; Nuclear Energy; Nuclear Physics; Nuclear radiation; Phosphorus; Physics; Physics and Astronomy; Radiation; Standard deviation; Steel; Structural analysis; Studies; Temperature; Toy industry
• ISSN: 1063-4258; 1573-8205
• DOI: 10.1007/s10512-011-9403-7

The high conservativeness of the evaluation of the service life of VVER-1000 vessels is due to the operational reliability margin and the high error in determining the initial computational data. A structural analysis of the error in critical brittleness temperature investigations is presented and the factors which have a large effect on the error in constructing the dose–time dependences of the critical brittleness temperature are determined. In constructing dose–time curves, the use of the critical temperature of a calibration metal and heat-treatment regimes of calibration samples makes available and permits checking a wide range of structures that is characteristic for large blanks, makes it possible to take account of radiation embrittlement effects and radiation-stimulated reversible brittleness, decrease the error in determining the guaranteed values to T cr  ± 5°C, and eliminate the large effect of structural nonuniformity on objective predictions made for a reactor vessel.