Session 2B: Rancor-HUNTER: A Virtual Plant and Operator Environment for Predicting Human Performance
Dr. Thomas Ulrich is a human factors and reliability research scientist at the Idaho National Laboratory. He has led and participated in several full-scope, full-scale simulator studies using the Human Systems Simulation Laboratory (HSSL) to investigate a range of nuclear control room topics. Dr. Ulrich possesses expertise in human performance assessment methodology. He is an expert in nuclear process control simulation and interface prototyping development. Dr. Ulrich’s active research includes dynamic human reliability analysis methodology and digital and automated HMI software development for existing and advanced reactor nuclear power plant operations. He is the codeveloper of the Rancor microworld simulator and holds a copyright for “RANCOR Microworld Simulation Environment for Nuclear Process Control,” assertion extension granted on 9/27/18, for a period of ten (10) years, under BEA Attorney Docket No. CW-18-08. He actively develops the HUNTER INL software, which supports dynamic human reliability analysis via simulating virtual operators for nuclear and electric grid operations. Dr. Ulrich currently leads a research project using the HSSL to evaluate commercial flexible power operation and generation concepts of operations for coupling offsite hydrogen production to existing light water reactors. Most recently Dr. Ulrich started supporting a first of a kind research project to develop an advanced reactor remote concept of operations leveraging multiple digital twins located at both the reactor site and as a support tool for operators at a remote operations center.
Advances in simulation capabilities to model physical systems have outpaced the development of simulations for humans using those physical systems. There is an argument that the infinite span of potential human behaviors inherently render human modeling more challenging than physical systems. Despite this challenge, the need for modeling humans interacting with these complex systems is paramount. As technologies have improved, many of the failure modes originating from the physical systems have been solved. This means the overall proportion of human errors has increased, such that it is not uncommon to be the primary driver of system failure in modern complex systems. Moreover, technologies such as automated systems may introduce emerging contexts that can cause new, unanticipated modes of human error. Therefore, it is now more important than ever to develop models of human behavior to realize overall system error reductions and achieve established safety margins. To support new and novel concepts of operations for the anticipated wave of advanced nuclear reactor deployments, human factors and human reliability analysis researchers need to develop advanced simulation-based approaches. This talk presents a simulation environment suitable to both collect data and then perform Monte Carlo simulations to evaluate human performance and develop better models of human behavior. Specifically, the Rancor Microworld Simulator models a complex energy production system in a simplified manner. Rancor includes computer-based procedures, which serve as a framework to automatically classify human behaviors without manual, subjective experimenter coding during scenarios. This method supports a detailed level of analysis at the task level. It is feasible for collecting large sample sizes required to develop quantitative modelling elements that have historically challenged traditional full-scope simulator study approaches. Additionally, the other portion of this experimental platform, the Human Unimodel for Nuclear Technology to Enhance Reliability (HUNTER), is presented to show how the collected data can be used to evaluate novel scenarios based on the contextual factors, or performance shaping factors, derived from Rancor simulations. Rancor-HUNTER is being used to predict operator performance with new procedures, such as results from control room modernization or new-build situations. Rancor-HUNTER is also proving a useful surrogate platform to model human performance for other complex systems.
Session Materials: https://dataworks.testscience.org/wp-...