The public radiological risk assessment for a generic HPR1000 in China

Abstract

The public radiological risk assessment after severe accidents is considered a reasonable and comprehensive metric to determine the safety of a nuclear power plant, and it has attracted increasing attention since the Fukushima accident. Based on a generic HPR1000 in China, utilizing the source terms of Level-2 PSA and the site hourly meteorological data, individual doses and risks were simulated using a self-developed Level-3 PSA platform. The risk values were compared with the acceptability criteria of US NRC, UK and AR3.1.3. The results show that for both the most frequent and the most severe accident sequences, using the 90th percentile meteorological conditions, the doses are all below the dose limits specified in the Chinese national standard within a 5 km radius from the release point. For each release category, the exceedance frequency corresponding to the 7-day effective dose limit of 50 mSv within 3 km from the site is less than 30 %. The risk of each release category at the site boundary across the average meteorological conditions, and the annual average risks corresponding to the entire accident spectrum at different distances are all less than 10⁻⁸/reactor year, demonstrating good compliance with international risk acceptance criteria.