Risk Informed Asset Management (RIAM)
This project started in
October 2018 in response to the need to develop data analytics tools coupled with risk-informed methods
to manage plant assets over periods of extended operation (including license renewal and second license
renewal). The first application of this project targets replacement/refurbishment expenditures of plant
capital assets (i.e., Structures, Systems and Components - SSCs) as part of the plant license renewal process.
The objective is to optimize the SSC replacement/refurbishment schedule based on economic constraints,
data uncertainties and SSC reliability data.
We started our work by formalizing, from a mathematical perspective, the SSC optimization
replacement schedule by identifying its requirements, degrees of freedom and constraints. We then
proceeded to develop computational tools able to solve this class of problems. We proceeded in two
development directions: the first direction consists of stand-alone algorithms designed to optimize the SSC
replacement/refurbishment schedule while the second one consists of methods that evaluate the impact of
data uncertainties (e.g., budget and costs) on the replacement/refurbishment schedule.
The outcome of this project during FY19-20 has been the creation of a software tool which contains a
library of methods that can be employed to solve SSC replacement/refurbishment schedule optimization
problems. The developed methods integrate both safety/reliability and cost models in a single decision making
tool, which also provides the user with data analysis capabilities to explore and analyze the
generated solution.
Several examples with increasing levels of complexity are presented and analyzed in detail in order to
demonstrate the developed capabilities and tools. The objective is to present a pragmatic workflow that can
be followed by plant management workers, which considers the type of analysis, the type of constraints,
data uncertainties and provides the most suited method and computational tool to be employed. The intent
of this workflow and tool is to provide nuclear plant and fleet decision-makers with the capability to
effectively and efficiently evaluate long-term asset management strategies to select the most effective and
profitable investment portfolio.
RIAM and PHM projects overview