Method and practice on safety software verification & validation for digital reactor protection system

LI Duo, ZHANG Liangju, FENG Junting

Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology, Tsinghua University., Beijing 100084, China

E-mail:{ liduo, zhanglj, fengjt}@tsinghua.edu.cn

Abstract: The key issue arising from digitalization of reactor protection system for Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) is in essence, how to carry out Verification and Validation (V&V), to demonstrate and confirm the software is reliable enough to perform reactor safety functions. Among others the most important activity of software V&V process is unit testing. This paper discusses the basic concepts on safety software V&V and the appropriate technique for software unit testing, focusing on such aspects as how to ensure test completeness, how to establish test platform, how to develop test cases and how to carry out unit testing. The technique discussed herein was successfully used in the work of unit testing on safety software of a digital reactor protection system.

Keywords: Software Reliability, Verification, Digital Instruments