Experimental study on team coordination of NPP plant operators based on the simultaneous NIRS measurements

One of the key features when dealing with severe situations far beyond the previous experiences and expectations is the coordination capability among operators with different roles. In this study, the feasibility of estimating coordination capability of nuclear plant operators has been examined based on the correlation analysis of brain activities among operators. The cognitive experiments have been performed in the full scope NPP simulator at BWR Operator Training Center Cooperation. Four experienced instructors participated in the experiments. They played different roles such as shift supervisor, turbine operator, reactor operator and auxiliary operator and were instructed to go through four training scenarios shown below with NIRS devices attached. The brain activity of each operator has been measured along with the progress of anomaly events and the correlation of brain activities for every pair of operators have been calculated. The correlations of brain activities have also analyzed focusing on the specific events along with the progress in the anomaly scenarios. It has been shown in the results that the higher correlation among all operators were observed when the global events occurred and the higher correlation among specific pair of operators related to the specific event were partially observed.