New regulatory guides for nuclear facilities (YVL Guides) already adopted at Olkiluoto power plant

​The new Guides lay down increased requirements and specify them in more detail. They cover the design and operation of nuclear power plants, the safety of the plant and the environment, nuclear materials and nuclear waste as well as structures and equipment at nuclear facilities. STUK issued separate decisions regarding the application of the requirements at existing plant units, such as Olkiluoto 1 and Olkiluoto 2. As far as new nuclear power plants are concerned, the new Guides will be enforced as such. An assessment of compliance with the new requirements at the Olkiluoto 3 nuclear power plant unit will be submitted to STUK at the latest in the same context as the operating licence application for OL3 is submitted to the Ministry of Employment and the Economy.

Teollisuuden Voima carried out the compliance assessment as part of a more extensive project that focused on the assessment of the safety level. The requirements were recorded in assessment forms drawn up in collaboration with Fortum, the licensee of the Loviisa nuclear power plant. The major part of the assessment forms were submitted to STUK already towards the end of 2014. Some further clarification and more specific information was added to the assessments during the spring and the summer.

- The reform of the YVL Guides, including the practical application of the Guides, has been a huge project, which was started almost ten years ago and required the input of more than 40 Guide-specific coordinators with their work groups. The assessment work has employed some three hundred people all in all, explains Tiia Puukka, Head of the project implemented for the assessment of compliance with YVL requirements.

According to Ms. Puukka, the existing plant units are in good accordance with the new YVL Guides, but improvement measures could not be completely avoided. In part, compliance with the new requirements could be ensured with safety improvements that had already been implemented or were ongoing as part of the continuous improvement principle. The improvement needs identified in the assessment process mainly pertained to updating of various instructions, requirement specifications for equipment and repeating of analyses.

The objective is to complete the improvements by the time the operating license is to be renewed, i.e., at the end of 2016, with the exception of some ongoing modifications that will be executed according to specific schedules. An example of such modifications is the replacement of the emergency diesel generators, which is expected to be completed in 2018. The transition times required by modifications completed according to specific schedules will not endanger the safety of the plant.

For more information, please contact:
Tiia Puukka, Project Manager, tel. +358 2 8381 3258.