A study on the evaluation of performance of the PSC inner containment dome with large openings during prestress transfer

•Corroborated the findings of the past FE studies on actual PSC IC dome.•Corroborated via comparison of the experimental results with FE study results.•FE study presented is novel as the FE model includes PS ducts and the passive steel.•FE study presented has other distinctive features compared to the past FE studies. A linear three dimensional finite element (FE) analysis has been carried out for the loading condition at pre-stress transfer of a representative test specimen for a typical pre-stressed concrete (PSC) inner containment (IC) dome with due emphasis on the local behaviour of the steel plate concrete interfaces at the steam generator (SG) openings. The FE model includes the pre-stressing ducts and passive reinforcements. The FE analysis results have been compared with the past experimental results for the same representative test specimen. Due thrust has been put on the objective of predicting the possibility of separation at the steel plate concrete interfaces. An attempt has been made in corroborating the findings of the past two FE analytical studies on the linear behaviour of the PSC IC dome (with large SG openings) of the same actual double containment reactor building of the typical 220MWe capacity Indian nuclear power plant. Finally important conclusions in line with the desired objectives have been made based on the summary observations of all the studies conducted on this typical PSC IC dome.