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control power was lost

English translation: power to the control system(s) failed

GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)
English term or phrase:control power was lost
Selected answer:power to the control system(s) failed
Entered by: Tony M

06:31 Jun 4, 2016
English language (monolingual) [PRO]
Nuclear Eng/Sci
English term or phrase: control power was lost
All the inside containment isolation condenser valves would keep their position when the AC power was lost, but they would close, by design, if the control power (i.e. DC power) was lost to the protection system — for the line break situation — that would have sent ‘close signal’ signals to those valves.

I have two problems regarding this sentence. Firstly, I cannot understand what control power is, and what it means when control power is lost to something, in this case "protection system".
Masoud Kakouli Varnousfaderani
Türkiye
Local time: 05:11
See explanation
Explanation:
'control power' is the power that is used to control the valves: the implication is that the AC power is used to actually drive the valves (presumably motorized ones), but the valves are 'controlled' (told when to open or close) using a DC control signal.

So the AC supply must have been OK, otherwise the valves wouldn't have moved at all; but failure ('loss') of the power supply going to the protection system would result in loss of the DC control signal, which would cause the valves to close automatically by default.

Sounds like a 'fail-safe' system that wasn't!
Selected response from:

Tony M
France
Local time: 04:11
Grading comment
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



SUMMARY OF ALL EXPLANATIONS PROVIDED
4 +7See explanation
Tony M


  

Answers


10 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +7
See explanation


Explanation:
'control power' is the power that is used to control the valves: the implication is that the AC power is used to actually drive the valves (presumably motorized ones), but the valves are 'controlled' (told when to open or close) using a DC control signal.

So the AC supply must have been OK, otherwise the valves wouldn't have moved at all; but failure ('loss') of the power supply going to the protection system would result in loss of the DC control signal, which would cause the valves to close automatically by default.

Sounds like a 'fail-safe' system that wasn't!

Tony M
France
Local time: 04:11
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in category: 36

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Erzsébet Czopyk: very nice explanation
12 mins
  -> Thanks, Erzsébet!
agree  Yasutomo Kanazawa: Well explained.
1 hr
  -> Thanks, Yasutomo san!
agree  Tushar Deep
9 hrs
  -> Thanks, Tushar!
agree  Jörgen Slet
11 hrs
  -> Thanks, Jörgen!
agree  Martin Riordan
17 hrs
  -> Thanks, Martin!
agree  Didier Fourcot: Fukushima plant was not exactly fail-safe as we all know, but the design was to close the valves in case of line break, only envisioned cause for control power loss, however inundating the backup generators proved an other option
2 days 2 hrs
  -> Merci, Didier ! Hindsight is always 20/20 ;-)
agree  Harry Crawford
2 days 20 hrs
  -> Thanks, Harry!
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