Considerations in Standardizing Control Room Arrangements

The key to expeditious design, construction and licensing of today's Nuclear Power Plant is standardization - standardization of site arrangement, building arrangement, control room layout, system design and construction. This paper considers the problems of standardizing only one of these areas - the control room. The obvious questions asked are: . Can the room arrangement be standardized? * Will incorporation of design improvements be significantly restricted? * How can standardization be implemented? A review of the factors that affect the room arrangement, such as building dimensional constraints, operational requirements and economics, indicates that a standard arrangement can be achieved. Improvements can also be incorporated, after sufficient evaluation, through the release of a new updated standard. And finally, some solutions to the implementation question may be to establish licensing priorities, to limit supplier design options and to establish standards through engineering societies. The mounting energy crisis is forcing decisions in many areas and the obvious advantages of standardization will become even more evident in the immediate future.