Seismic Analysis of Safety-Related Nuclear Structures

Standard 4 provides requirements to determine the reliability of safety-related nuclear structures under earthquake motions. This Standard is applicable to analyses of new structure design or evaluations of existing structures. The Standard also outlines the rules and analysis parameters that are expected to produce seismic responses with about the same probability of non-exceedance as the input. Specifications of input motions are provided. Analysis standards are given for:

• modeling structures;
• analyzing structures;
• soil–structure interaction modeling and analysis;
• input for subsystem seismic analysis; and
• special structures, such as buried pipes and conduits, earth-retaining walls, above-ground vertical tanks, raceways, and seismic-isolated structures.

Additionally, nonmandatory Appendix A provides a discussion on Seismic Probabilistic Risk Assessments and Seismic Margin Assessments.