SAFEST Roadmap for Corium Experimental Research in Europe

SAFEST (Severe Accident Facilities for European Safety Targets) is a European project networking the European corium experimental laboratories with the objective to establish coordination activities, enabling the development of a common vision and research roadmaps for the next years, and of the management structure to achieve these goals. In this frame, a European roadmap on corium experimental research has been written to define research challenges to contribute to further reinforcement of Gen II and III NPP safety. It is based on the research priorities determined by SARNET SARP group as well as those from the recently formulated in the NUGENIA Roadmap for severe accidents and the recently published NUGENIA Global Vision report. It also takes into account issues identified in the analysis of the European stress tests and from the interpretation of the Fukushima accident. 19 relevant issues related to corium have been selected during these prioritization efforts. These issues have been compared to a survey of the European corium experimental facilities and corium analysis laboratories. Finally, the coherence between European infrastructures and R&D needs has been assessed and a table linking issues and infrastructures has been derived. It shows a few lacks in EU corium infrastructures, especially in the domains of core late reflooding impact on source term, Reactor Pressure Vessel failure and corium release, Spent Fuel Pool accidents, as well as the need for a large mass (100–500 kg) prototypic corium facility.