GO-VIKING

The Sixth Assessment Report of the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) made it abundantly clear that it is only possible to avoid inevitable and irreversible climate changes if massive and immediate reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are made (IPCC, 2021). Nuclear safety, being one of the ten priority actions to be performed to accelerate the energy system transformation and the realization of this aim, clearly illustrates the significant role of nuclear energy foreseen by the EU within a future low-carbon energy system. NPPs in Europe are ageing. Extending their lifetime from 40 to 60 years, or even longer, allows for a faster transition to a low-carbon energy system as new-built reactors will not replace existing units, but will rather supplement them. To assure safe operation of the existing plants in case of Long-term operation programs, more in-depth understanding of Flow-Induced Vibration (FIV) phenomena as well as their accurate and reliable prediction for Fuel Assembly and Steam Generator are needed, as vibrations are one of the major causes of failures of these components. The GO-VIKING project will improve the safety of contemporary reactors and the design evaluation of new concepts by making new experimental results available, and by improving numerical approaches for the evaluation of FIV. These will allow the nuclear operators to enhance the prediction of FIV phenomena in key NSSS components, and the vendors to improve the design of the relevant equipment, thus leading to increased reliability, availability, and safety of the European NPPs. For GO-VIKING, the success of the project is not only based on the results of the research, but also on the communication and dissemination among nowadays and upcoming stakeholders, academics, and professionals in this field. Visit the project website for more information at https://go-viking.eu/ Coordinator: Dr. Angel PAPUKCHIEV, GRS gGmbH