Expert: Babak Esmailzadeh Hakimi - 2/1/2012

Question
sir,i wanna know something about the building engineering field...can you tell me that how much part does a building engg or a structure engg can have in nuclear reactor design. Can a building engg do any research in nuclear reactor disaster due to some sort of a natural hazard like earthquake...or they should retain themselves in buildings only?

Answer
Dear Anna

Nuclear reactor is a small part of a nuclear power plant. Several buildings exists in a nuclear power plant each with its specific function. According to type of nuclear power plant , other structure than Nuclear reactor could be polluted with nuclear radiation. Then not only the reactor but all equipment and installations and structures inside a nuclear power plant have to be considered critical. Nuclear Reactor is the most important installation and has its own structure to protect it against natural disaster and protect the environment from nuclear radiation.

Yes sure you can have your research on it. EDF ( Electricite de France Co.) has had a problem with a typical nuclear reactor which had been designed against MCE earthquake level of about 0.3g (ground acceleration). The problem arose when they have had a project to install a nuclear power plant in an area with 0.45g of seismic acceleration ( in Algeria as I remember) . This was a real structural challenge. At last they decided to use a Seismic Isolation System to reduce the intensity of seismic acceleration.  

The nuclear reactor is an egg like structure which has to be analyzed against a lot of loadings. A nuclear reactor must be designed against impact due to a missile falling on it. You see that a collection of structural problems is ready for a civil engineer to face with.

Civil engineering is the base of civilization , don't forget it.

Regards
Babak E Hakimi