L-3 MAPPS, a subsidiary of L-3 Communications, announced today that it has been awarded a contract from AREVA to upgrade three simulators with the incorporation of CATHARE, an advanced thermal-hydraulic calculation code used to study the behavior of pressurized water reactors in accident situations.
L-3 will integrate CATHARE on AREVA’s engineering simulators – known as Simulateurs d’Analyse du Fonctionnement (SAF) – located at the AREVA Tower in Paris La Defense (France), which are used to perform plant engineering and emergency response training, operating procedures analysis and improvement, system design modifications, and preliminary safety analysis. The three simulators represent the CP2 (900 MWe, 3-loop), DPY (1,300 MWe, 4-loop) and N4 (1,450 MWe, 4-loop) French-designed nuclear power plants. Through a previous collaboration with AREVA, both the CP2 and the DPY simulators operate on L-3’s PC/Windows-based simulation environment. The N4 simulator will be rehosted by L-3 and available in L-3′[s simulation environment through the current project. In addition, L-3 will replace the N4 simulator’s conventional island and electrical systems models with higher fidelity models.
“This is a great opportunity for L-3 MAPPS,” said Michael Chatlani, vice president, marketing & sales, L-3 MAPPS Power Systems and Simulation. “In addition to working with AREVA in a collaborative environment, this project will provide L-3 MAPPS with invaluable experience in deploying our first real-time implementation of CATHARE.”
CATHARE is a thermal-hydraulic computer engineering code for nuclear power plant safety analysis. The software is the effort of some three decades of cooperation between engineers of the Commissariat l’Energie Atomique (CEA), French electricity group EDF, AREVA, and the IRSN. The version of the code being adapted for the simulators is CATHARE 2 version 2.5_1.
AREVA, a world leader in nuclear power and the only company to cover all industrial activities in this field, has manufacturing facilities in 41 countries and a sales network in more than 100. AREVA offers technological solutions for CO2-free power generation and electricity transmission and distribution.
L-3 MAPPS has over 20 years of experience in pioneering technological advances in the marine automation field and over 30 years of experience in delivering high-fidelity power plant simulation to leading utilities worldwide. In addition, the company has more than three decades of expertise in supplying plant computer systems for Canadian heavy water reactors. L-3 MAPPS also provides targeted controls and simulation solutions to the space sector.