Radioactive contamination distribution in nuclear facilities is typically measured and analyzed using radiation sensors. Since generally used detection sensors have relatively high efficiency, it is difficult to apply them to a high radiation field. Therefore, shielding/collimators and small size detectors are typically used. Nevertheless, problems of pulse accumulation and dead time still remain. This can cause measurement errors and distort the energy spectrum. In this study, this problem was confirmed through experiments, and signal pile-up and dead time correction studies were performed. A detection system combining a GAGG sensor and SiPM with a size of 10 mm × 10 mm × 10 mm was used, and GAGG radiation characteristics were evaluated for each radiation dose (0.001~57 mSv/h). As a result, efficiency increased as the dose increased, but the energy spectrum tended to shift to the left. At a radiation dose intensity of 400 Ci (14.8 TBq), a collimator was additionally installed, but efficiency decreased and the spectrum was distorted. It was analyzed that signal loss occurred when more than 1 million particles were incident on the detector. In this high-radioactivity area, quantitative analysis is likely to be difficult due to spectral distortion, and this needs to be supplemented through a correction algorithm. In recent research cases, the development of correction algorithms using MCNP and AI is being actively carried out around the world, and more than 98% of the signals have been corrected and the spectrum has been restored. Nevertheless, the artificial intelligence (AI) results were based on only 2-3 overlapping pulse data and did not consider the effect of noise, so they did not solve realistic problems. Additional research is needed. In the future, we plan to conduct signal correction research using ≈10×10 mm small size detectors (GAGG, CZT etc.). Also, the performance evaluation of the measurement/analysis system is intended to be performed in an environment similar to the high radiation field of an actual nuclear facility.
At domestic nuclear power plant, concrete containers are stored to store waste generated before waste acceptance criteria (WAC) was established. Concrete container store concentrated waste liquid and waste resin. In order to disposal radioactive waste to a disposal site, it is necessary to conduct a characteristic evaluation inside the waste to check whether it satisfies the WAC. Two types of concrete containers are stored: round and square. The round type is filled with one 200-liter drum, and the square type is filled with four 200-liter drums. In the case of a round shape, the top lid is fastened with bolts, so it is possible to collect samples after opening the top lid without the need for additional equipment. However, in the case of a square shape, there is no top lid, and concrete is poured to cure the lid, so the separate equipment for characteristic evaluation is required. It is necessary to install a workstation for sample collection on the top of the concrete container, equipment for coring the top of the concrete container, and a device to prevent concrete dust scattering. Currently, the design of equipment for evaluating the characteristics of concrete containers has been completed, and equipment optimization through mock-up test will be performed in the future.
A lot of CANDU Spent Fuels (CSFs) have been stored in spent nuclear fuel pools and dry storage facilities. In accordance with the enhanced nuclear regulations, the initial characteristics of CSF should be inspected to ensure the integrity of CSF and the reliable operation of storage system before loading it into a cask for long-term dry storage. For the inspections, an initial characteristics measurement equipment was designed, which is used for Pool-Side Examination (PSE) in the spent fuel pool of the pressurized heavy water reactor nuclear power plant. Measurements using the equipment consist of non-contact inspections and contact inspections. The non-contact inspections do not affect CSF integrity, whereas the integrity of CSF can be reduced during the contact inspections under abnormal operating conditions because the probe of equipment may apply specific loads to the CSF. Therefore, the structural integrity evaluations of equipment and CSF are performed using Finite Element (FE) analyses for four combinations based on two abnormal conditions and two probe positions. The used abnormal conditions are the pressing load condition and the scratching load condition, and two probe positions are the center and bottom of the fuel rod in the longitudinal direction, respectively. In this evaluation, the bottoms of the fuel rod or CSF are defined as the regions facing the bottom surface of equipment. The analysis of the pressing load condition is performed by pressing the probe of the equipment in radial direction of the CSF fuel rod. That of the scratching load condition is carried out by applying a specific radial load to the CSF fuel rod using the probe and then applying the load to the surface of the fuel rod while moving axially along the surface. All combinations are analyzed considering geometric, boundary and material non-linearity under the dynamic load, which is dependent on the equipment operating velocity. The stresses of CSF and equipment components were obtained from these analyses. The maximum stress of each component was generated at the combination on the scratching load condition for the bottom position among the four combinations. The obtained maximum stresses are lower than the yield stress for each component material. Also, the CSF is not overturned due to the support plate of the equipment in all analyses. Therefore, the structural integrity and safety of the equipment and the CSF are maintained under abnormal operating conditions during the inspection using the initial characteristic measurement equipment.
Expensive PCBN or ceramic cutting tools are used for the processing of difficult-to-cut materials such as Ti and Ni alloy materials. These tools have a problem of breaking easily due to their high hardness but low fracture toughness. To solve this problem, cutting tools that form various coating layers are used in low-cost WC-Co hard material tools, and researches on various tool materials are being conducted. In this study, WC-5, 10, and 15 wt%Ni hard materials for difficult-to-cut cutting materials are densified using horizontal ball milled WC-Ni powders and pulsed current activated sintering method (PCAS method). Each PCASed WC–Ni hard materials are almost completely dense, with a relative density of up to 99.7 ~ 99.9 %, after the simultaneous application of pressure of 60 MPa and electric current for 2 min; process involves almost no change in the grain size. The average grain sizes of WC and Ni for WC-5, 10, and 15 wt%Ni hard materials are about 1.09 ~ 1.29 and 0.31 ~ 0.51 μm, respectively. Vickers hardness and fracture toughness of WC-5, 10, and 15 wt%Ni hard materials are about 1,923 ~ 1,788 kg/mm2 and 13.2 ~ 14.3 MPa.m1/2, respectively. Microstructure and phase analyses of PCASed WC-Ni hard materials are performed.
Generally, vibration absorber systems are composed of spring-mass systems to reduce the vibration of a structure, and there are also methods to simply increase damping to achieve a damping effect across a wide frequency band. One similar method is to use a mechanism in which the eddy current is converted into a mechanical damping effect. When an eddy current is generated by electromotive force due to magnetic flux change, the reaction force is generated by the eddy current’s circulation. In this study, the damping system using the reaction force was constructed to reduce the transmission of vibrations generating from internal fluid and the vibration reduction characteristics that are transmitted externally were analyzed. As a result, 8.2 % of the vibration reduction effect from primary excitation frequency was confirmed.
원자력발전소를 운영하게 되면 사용후핵연료와 같은 고준위방사성폐기물이 필연적으로 발생한다. 이러한 고준위방사성폐 기물을 처분하기 위해 심층처분방식이 가장 적합한 대안으로 알려져 있으며 고준위방사성폐기물은 공학적방벽과 천연방벽에 둘러 쌓여 지하 500~1,000 m 깊이의 심지층에 처분된다. 이 중 압축 벤토나이트 완충재는 공학적방벽의 가장 중요한 구성요소이다. 완충재는 처분용기와 자연 암반 사이에 위치해 있기에 주변 지하수 흐름으로부터 처분용기를 보호하고 처분 용기로부터 핵종이 유출되는 것을 저지하는 역할을 한다. 주변 지하수 흐름으로 인한 완충재의 불포화 함수특성 규명은 전체 공학적방벽의 성능을 평가하는데 있어 매우 중요하다고 할 수 있다. 따라서 본 연구에서는 실내 시험을 수행하여 국내 압축 벤토나이트 완충재의 건조밀도, 구속조건 여부, 그리고 건조 및 포화 이력에 따른 압축 벤토나이트 완충재의 함수특성곡선을 도출하여 분석하였다. 구속 조건하에서 건조밀도에 따른 함수특성곡선은 큰 차이를 보이지 않았다. 또한 비구속 조건이 구 속 조건에 비해 보다 큰 수분흡입력을 나타냈으며, 아울러 포화 과정보다 건조 과정에서 보다 큰 수분흡인력이 측정되었다.
The odor substances generated in a feed manufactory operating for the commercialization of animal-vegetable materials were analyzed and the odor reduction efficiency by a chemical scrubber was evaluated. The major causative substances in the feed manufactory comprised about 45.4% of ketone compounds and about 13.3% of aldehyde compounds. On the other hand, the removal efficiencies of diacetyl and acetoin as ketone compounds were 77.3% and 78.1%, respectively, by a chemical scrubber. Additionally, the removal efficiencies of acetaldehyde, butyraldehyde, valeraldehyde, 2-furancarboxaldehyde, and nonanal were 86.0%, 78.9%, 67.4%, 52.8%, and 71.9%, respectively. These rates were higher than the odor generation substance contribution rate as a result of treating the exhaust gas generated from the feed manufactory by the chemical scrubber using 5% of C3. It was also found that xylene, methylcyclopentane, benzene, ethylbenzene, 1,3,5-trimethylbenzene, and decane were almost not removed.
PURPOSES: The purpose of this research is to analyze the characteristics of panels that affect the evaluating results of riding quality and to evaluate the appropriateness of roughness management criteria based on ride comfort satisfaction. METHODS: In order to analyze the influence of panel characteristics of riding quality, 33 panels, consisting of civilians and experts, were selected. Also, considering the roughness distribution of the expressway, 35 sections with MRI ranging from 1.17 m/km to 4.65 m/km were selected. Each panel boarded a passenger car and evaluated the riding quality with grades from 0 to 10, and assessed whether it was satisfied or not. After removing outlier results using a box plot technique, 964 results were analyzed. An ANOVA was conducted to evaluate the effects of panel expertise, age, driving experience, vehicle ownership, and gender on the evaluation results. In addition, by using the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve, the MRI value, which can most accurately evaluate the satisfaction with riding quality, was derived. Then, the compatibility of MRI was evaluated using AUC as a criterion to assess whether the riding quality was satisfactory. RESULTS: Only the age of the panel participants were found to have an effect on the riding quality satisfaction. It was found that satisfaction with riding quality and MRI are strongly correlated. The satisfaction rate of roughness management criteria on new (MRI 1.6 m/km) and maintenance (MRI 3.0 m/km) expressways were 95% and 53%, respectively. As a result of evaluating the roughness management criteria by using the ROC curve, it was found that the accuracy of satisfaction was the highest at MRI 3.1-3.2 m/km. In addition, the AUC of the MRI was about 0.8, indicating that the MRI was an appropriate index for evaluating the riding quality satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: Based on the results, the distribution of the panels’age should be considered when panel rating is conducted. From the results of the ROC curve, MRI of 3.0 m/km, which is a criterion of roughness management on maintenance expressways, is considered as appropriate.
PURPOSES: The purpose of this study is to analyze the characteristics of the weight values of evaluation items by traffic safety project type.
METHODS: In general, a large-scale investment in projects such as the traffic safety project requires economic analyses to be performed in advance. However, there is an argument for considering special characteristics of the traffic safety project. Therefore, this study conducted characteristic analysis of the weight values of evaluation items. The analysis consisted of two steps. The first step was hypothesis verification using analysis of variance (ANOVA). In this process, the authors examined whether the weight of evaluation items is the same regardless of the traffic safety project type. Based on the first step's results, the authors proceeded to the second step. The objective of this step was to analyze how different the weight values are by traffic safety project type using an analytic hierarchy process.
RESULTS: According to the ANOVA test results, the benefit to cost ratios have different weight values based on traffic safety project type at the 0.01 significance level. The policy evaluation items, such as the plans connection, resident opinion, and regional equity, also showed the same results except that the result for the related plans connection was statistically significant at the 0.05 level. Based on the first step's result, the AHP analysis in the second step showed that the traffic safety projects for vulnerable users and pedestrians have very low weight values in economic evaluation factors compared with other safety project types. The weight values for vulnerable users and pedestrians were 0.29 and 0.26, respectively, in economic evaluation items. On the other hand, the weight values for other safety project types were around 0.6. Among the policy evaluation items, resident opinion showed a higher weight value than other factors, such as connection and regional equity items.
CONCLUSIONS: The social and economic impact of a traffic safety project varies by project type and project characteristics. Although the economic approach is overarching and a reasonable methodology is applied for large-scale projects, it should be noted that the safety issue, especially for transportation of vulnerable uses, requires a non-economical approach. Based on the analysis results, this study suggests that the priority of the projects should be determined by separating them into independent assessment groups depending on their characteristics.
As the 3D laser scanning technology capable of databaseing large sewage box culverts becomes possible, it is necessary to develop a standardization manual that can clearly distinguish the structural and operational defect types of box culver and analyze the defect data. In this study, we collected and analyzed defects in sewage box culverts of 14,827m in total by selecting three districts in Korea. The major defects were surface damages, and their defect densities were 2.17 m2/m, 0.27 m2/m and 0.10 m2/m for aggregate exposure, Steel reinforcement exposure, and Steel reinforcement projecting. In order to support the decision of the box culverment management, it was divided into five grades and each defect code and defect score were allocated. The results of this study are useful for the diagnosis of the sewage box culverts in Korea and it is expected to support a decision making for management.