A methodology for evaluation and licensing of nuclear power plant control rooms

In the safe operation of nuclear power plants the performance of the control room crews plays an important role. In this respect, a well-designed control room and human-system interfaces (HSI) are crucial for safe and efficient operation of the plant. It is therefore essential that the design, development and evaluation of nuclear control rooms are conducted in a well-structured way, applying human factors principles, ergonomics requirements and guidelines in all phases. The aim of this paper is to propose a new methodology to evaluate nuclear power plant control rooms that includes the ergonomic approach, based on the operator activity analysis, together with human factors standards and guidelines already used. We describe a case study in which this methodology has been applied in a nuclear power plant control room. We show that the operator activity analysis uncovers a series of important safety related features in control room operation that are not detected by using the traditional methodology, based only on the human factors standards and human factors guidelines. The information gathered through this methodology make possible the generation of a series of recommendations for the adequacy of the control room to the legal requirements of the regulating agency, assisting the licensing process