PNNL

Abstract

This paper describes research into the physical fidelity requirements of control room simulators to train U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff for their duties as inspectors and license examiners for next-generation nuclear power plants. The control rooms of these power plants are expected to utilize digital instrumentation and controls to a much greater extent than do current plants. The NRC is assessing training facility needs, particularly for control room simulators, which play a central role in NRC training. Simulator fidelity affects both training effectiveness and cost. Research has shown high simulation fidelity sometimes positively affects transfer to the operational environment but sometimes makes no significant difference or actually impedes learning. The conditions in which these different effects occur are often unclear, especially for regulators (as opposed to operators) about whom research is particularly sparse. This project developed an inventory of the tasks and knowledges, skills, and abilities that NRC regulators need to fulfill job duties and used expert panels to characterize the inventory items by type and level of cognitive/behavioral capability needed, difficulty to perform, importance to safety, frequency of performance, and the importance of simulator training for learning these capabilities. A survey of current NRC staff provides information about the physical fidelity of the simulator on which the student trained to the control room to which the student was assigned and the effect lack of fidelity had on learning and job performance. The study concludes that a high level of physical fidelity is not required for effective training of NRC staff.