Acceptance Criteria for Maintenance of Nuclear Concrete Structures

In order to assess the effects of age-related deterioration of reinforced concrete structures, structural condition assessment of concrete structures must be performed. This includes visual inspections, special inspections and analytical methods.  The study reveals that a significant proportion of condition assessment is limited to the use of visual inspection. Since inspection based on observation is subjective, and the assessment is in great part qualitative, effort has been put into developing acceptance criteria for the assessment of reinforced concrete structures.

Concrete durability performance is a function of its constituents, its quality, its location and environmental loading conditions. This makes concrete durability a unique evaluation for every structure, and even for the same structure for different structural elements. For this reason, it is based on current expertise and knowledge level, and it is not possible to generalise acceptance criteria for all levels of condition assessment, and for all structures.

This study also includes a list of R&D needs.