Seismic effects on a proposed underground reactor facility

A study was conducted to determine the seismic effects on the containment structure of a proposed underground reactor facility. Simplified and often inadequate building code equivalent static design procedures frequently used for conventional reactor systems are not adequate for partially buried or fully buried reactor systems. A sophisticated dynamic analysis which can consider soilstructure interaction effects resulting from both seismic displacements and forces must be employed. One such approach would be to use the finite element method. The results of using such an approach to consider both the static overburden and dynamic earthquake effects on the containment structure of the proposed underground reactor facility are presented. (auth