This Technical Report describes the state of wireless technology for industrial applications in fossil and chemical plants and discusses the specific issues to be addressed in order to apply wireless technologies to nuclear power plants.

The review of the technology behind wireless communication and the status of existing implementations are described in Clauses 7 and 8, respectively. Issues associated with wireless implementations in nuclear facilities are discussed in Clause 10, and final conclusions are presented in Clause 11 of this Technical Report.

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4	CONTENTS
7	FOREWORD
9	INTRODUCTION
11	1 Scope 2 Normative references 3 Terms and definitions
13	4 Motivation
14	Figures Figure 1 – Cost comparison – Wired versus wireless for an extensive building automation system Figure 2 – Wireless use in nuclear power plants
15	5 Generic applications Figure 3 – Possible application areas for wireless instrumentation in a nuclear power plant
16	Figure 4 – Bandwidth requirements for a variety of applications and the associated wireless technology that can support such requirements
17	Figure 5 – Structured fabric design of layered wireless for an industrial facility
18	6 Technology 6.1 Wireless basics Figure 6 – Inexpensive wireless sensors in a fossil-fuel plant
20	Figure 7 – Functional hierarchy
21	6.2 Industrial wireless sensor networks Figure 8 – Simplified diagram of a generic wireless sensor design
22	6.3 Radio frequency 6.3.1 Applications Figure 9 – Standard compliant network
23	Tables Table 1 – List of “industrial” radio technology standards and their candidate applications
24	Table 2 – Cellular telephony frequencies in the US
25	6.3.2 802.11 (Wi-Fi), 802.15.1 (Bluetooth), 802.15.4 (sensors) Figure 10 – 802.15.1 (Bluetooth) frequency channels in the 2 450 MHz range Table 3 – GSM frequency bands, channel numbers assigned by the ITU
26	Figure 11 – 802.15.4 frequency channels in the 2 450 MHz range Figure 12 – Overlapping channel assignments for 802.11 operation in the 2 400 MHz range
27	6.4 Satellite leased channels and VSAT Figure 13 – 802.11n dual stream occupies 44 MHz of bandwidth. Dual stream 802.11n in the 2,4 GHz band
28	6.5 Magnetic field communications Figure 14 – VSAT mini-hub network configuration
29	6.6 Visual light communication (VLC) 6.7 Acoustic communication
30	6.8 Asset tracking utilizing IEEE 802.11 – Focus on received signal strength Figure 15 – Spatial resolution is provided in multiple axes only if the tag (target in this Figure) is in communications with multiple APs
31	6.9 Asset tracking (RFID/RTLS): ISO 24730 Figure 16 – ISO 24730-2 architecture
32	7 Current wireless technology implementations 7.1 General 7.2 Comanche Peak nuclear generating station Table 4 – Specific uses of wireless technologies in the nuclear industry
33	7.3 Arkansas Nuclear One (ANO) nuclear power plant
34	7.4 Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant Figure 17 – Wireless vibration system at ANO
35	7.5 Farley nuclear power plant 7.6 San Onofre nuclear generating station Figure 18 – ANO wireless tank level system
36	7.7 South Texas project electric generating station 7.8 High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR), Oak Ridge, TN
37	Figure 19 – Installation of accelerometers on ORNL HFIR cold source expansion engines (9-2010) Figure 20 – Cold source expansion engine monitoring system software
38	8 Considerations 8.1 General 8.2 Concerns regarding wireless technology Figure 21 – Installation of permanent wireless monitoring system at ORNL HFIR cooling tower (8-2011) Figure 22 – System commissioned in August 2011
39	8.3 Wireless deployment challenges
40	8.4 Coexistence of 802.11 and 802.15.4 Figure 23 – Identification of containment in a nuclear facility
41	Figure 24 – Non-overlapping 802.11b/g channels and 802.15.4 channels Figure 25 – Spectral analysis of Wi-Fi traffic for the case where a) minimal wi-fi channel “usage” and b) streaming video transfer across Wi-Fi channel 7 are analyzed
42	8.5 Signal propagation
43	8.6 Lessons learned from wireless implementations 8.6.1 General 8.6.2 Comanche Peak implementation Figure 26 – Multipath is exemplified in this indoor environment as the signal from Source (S) to Origin (O) may take many paths
44	9 Concerns 9.1 Common reliability and security concerns for wired media and wireless media 9.2 Reliability and security concerns that are more of an issue for wired systems 9.3 Reliability and security concerns that are more of an issue for wireless systems
45	10 Standards 10.1 Nuclear standards 10.1.1 General 10.1.2 IEEE Std. 603-1998
46	10.1.3 IEEE Std. 7-4.3.2-2003 10.1.4 IEC 61500
47	10.2 Other safety-related standards and guidelines 10.2.1 IEC 61784-3
48	10.2.2 VTT research notes 2265
49	10.2.3 European Workshop on Industrial Computer Systems – Technical Committee 7 (EWICS TC7) 11 Conclusions 11.1 Issues for wireless application to NPP
50	11.2 Recommendations
52	Annex A (informative) Use of 5 GHz in the world Table A.1 – Use of 5 GHz in America, Asia/Pacific, and Europe
53	Annex B (informative) Synopses of wireless technologies B.1 802.11
58	B.2 ISO 14443 Near Field Communications (NFC)
59	Figure B.1 – The Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model defines the end-to-end communications means and needs for a wireless field transmitter to securely communicate with a distributed control system (DCS)
60	Figure B.2 – Operating frequencies for an IEEE 802.15.4 radio are 868 MHz, 902-926 MHz and 2 405-2 485 MHz. The worldwide license-free band at 2400 MHz is shown Figure B.3 – Networking topologies take many forms with associated levels of complexity required for robust fault-tolerant data transport
61	B.3 Real details of mesh networking Figure B.4 – Typical mesh network diagram
62	Figure B.5 – Requirement for mesh-networking communication of Figure B.4’s topology
63	Figure B.6 – RF footprint map for a mesh network gateway and four nodes Figure B.7 – The connectivity diagram for Figure B.6’s RF footprint coverage map
64	B.4 Not all mesh networks are created equal – Latency and indeterminism in mesh networks
65	B.5 ISA100.11a – “Mesh – When You Need It – Networking” Figure B.8 – Representation of the latency and indeterminism that it takes for a message to be transported through a mesh network that relies on time synchronization
66	Figure B.9 – The technical specifications associated with ISA100.11a end at the gateway. The area shaded falls within the Backhaul Work Group, ISA100.15 Figure B.10 – ISA100.11a utilizes the best topology for the application, in this case, a star
67	Figure B.11 – ISA100.11a allows for the deployment of multiple “hub and spoke” network elements with high speed interconnection to a gateway Figure B.12 – The ISA100.11a network deployed at Arkema was a logical mix of wireless field transmitters and an ISA100.15 backhaul network
68	B.6 Security by non-routing edge nodes Figure B.13 – Networks deployed at neighbouring facilities will not “cross-talk” if non-routing nodes are deployed along the periphery of each facility
69	B.7 Device and network provisioning methods
70	Figure B.14 – State transition diagram showing various paths to joining a secured network
71	Bibliography

Status	Definitive
Pages	74
Publication Date	2014-07-15
ISBN	978 0 580 85816 1
Standard Number	PD IEC/TR 62918:2014
Title	Nuclear power plants. Instrumentation and control important to safety. Use and selection of wireless devices to be integrated in systems important to safety
Identical National Standard Of	IEC TR 62918:2014
Descriptors	Control equipment, Nuclear power, Control systems, Data transmission, Interfaces (data processing), Computerized control, Nuclear technology, Nuclear-electric power stations, Nuclear safety, Nuclear reactors, Electric cables, Computer applications, Instruments, Computer software
Publisher	BSI
Committee	NCE/8
ICS Codes	27.120.20 - Nuclear power plants. Safety