The NEA Working Group on the Safety of Advanced Reactors (WGSAR) held its biannual meeting via video conference on 21-23 April 2021, welcoming a new member representing Poland’s National Centre for Nuclear Research (NCBJ).
The WGSAR constitutes a forum of co-operation and exchange among NEA members on safety implications of advanced non-light water reactor technologies and small modular reactors. The group aims to provide regulatory guidance through the issuance of technical reports on licensing approaches and safety research.
In April, the group members continued developing their technical report on regulatory approaches related to the use of analytical codes and methods in safety assessment of advanced reactors. The group members also discussed the progress made on the international WGSAR benchmark considering a core damage scenario in a lead-cooled fast reactor system to assess code capabilities and to address knowledge gaps for regulators.
Among the key highlights of the April meeting, the working group also launched a new activity on common regulatory practices to ensure appropriate qualification and through-life performance of materials in advanced reactors.
The meeting was joined by the Generation IV International Forum (GIF) Risk and Safety Working Group (RSWG) to improve GIF/WGSAR interactions for the identification of critical issues related to safety‑relevant phenomena and regulatory aspects for the different Gen IV concepts. Discussions with GIF focused on a technical position paper prepared by the RSWG on risk-informed approach for event selection and component classification. Currently the RSWG is also working on the development of safety design criteria for very-high-temperature reactors and safety approaches for liquid fuel molten salt reactors.