Seismic Resilience Quantification of Concrete Systems in Canada's Nuclear Infrastructure

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

An earthquake-induced nuclear disaster can cause devastating consequences at the global level. As such, nuclear components, systems, and structures are typically designed to maintain their functionality under specified design-basis earthquakes in order to perform their intended safety functions. However, after the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami catastrophe in Japan, the seismic safety of such structures has attracted much attention of nuclear regulators worldwide, including the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. The catastrophe highlighted the urgent need to ensure that Canada's nuclear energy infrastructure is resilient enough under beyond-design-basis earthquakes. According to a report commissioned by the Insurance Bureau of Canada, a major portion of Canada's infrastructure will experience substantial damage following a major earthquake. The report estimates that a realistic damaging earthquake in the Quebec City-Montreal-Ottawa corridor would result in direct losses of more than $49 billion. The three interrelated focus areas of the proposed research program are structured to develop advanced seismic resilience-based quantification tools for Canada's nuclear infrastructure. Focus Area I will involve testing reinforced concrete walls similar to those in Canadian nuclear structures under quasi-static cyclic loading that simulates different levels of seismic hazard. Such walls will be uniquely designed to be thick enough for radiation shielding as well as blast and fire protection. This focus area will yield the necessary experimental validation to quantify the hysteretic response of such walls that is key for both code-based design and seismic performance assessment. Focus Area II will include hybrid simulation (computer modelling combined with real-time physical testing) of complete reinforced concrete nuclear structures. This focus area will facilitate quantifying the system-level seismic response of such thick walls without the need to recreate the (often very large) mass and stiffness associated with the rest of the structure. Focus Area III will aim at developing system-level performance predictive models for nuclear structures using numerical and data-driven modelling techniques. These models will be integrated into probabilistic risk assessment tools to facilitate resilience quantification of Canada's nuclear infrastructure under beyond-design-basis earthquakes. The Canadian nuclear industry generates revenues of over $6 billion every year and provides over 30,000 direct jobs, while also meeting several Canadian government atmospheric emission objectives. The industry is in need of resilience-based quantification tools similar to those to be developed in the proposed research program. Adopting such tools will provide Canadian communities safe infrastructure systems under natural hazards and also will capitalize on Canada's clean electricity generation profile to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.