Based on ASME Boilers and Pressure Vessels Code the major fracture mechanic analysis is limited to protection of class 1 components to brittle fracture.
All the Operators of future plants have to enlarge the scope of these analyses to different concepts, at design or operation stage:
- brittle and ductile analysis of hypothetical large flaw
- leak before break approach
- break exclusion concept
- incredibility of failure of high integrity components
- end of fabrication acceptable defect
- in-service inspection performance
- acceptable standards in operation
- Long Term Operation (LTO)
All these requirements needs a procedure, an analysis method with material properties and criteria.
After a short overview of each topic, the paper will present how RCC-M, RSE-M French Codes and ASME III and XI take care of all these new modern regulatory requirements.
