An expert system for corrosion rate monitoring and diagnosis in the heating circuits of nuclear power plants

The radiation field of out of core components of a water reactor primary plant depends on corrosion product equilibria. The computer programs that try to simulate the behaviour of the corrosion products and the radiation build up didn't provide good results, especially in describing several different plants with the same program. In order to obtain better results the authors decided to use a different approach, building an expert system, which performs on-line corrosion rate monitoring by means of a number of probes connected to an automatic corrosimeter, evaluates expected corrosion rate values and behaviours, and, if there are discrepancies, performs a diagnosis, providing suggestions to overcome the difficulty. (author)