Turn-Key EMC Solutions

Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) testing is an integral part of ensuring safe and reliable operations in nuclear facilities. When implementing new electronic equipment into a nuclear facility, it is important to understand and quantify the equipment’s conducted (transmitted through power or signal cables) and radiated (transmitted through the air) emissions and susceptibility to ensure that the new upgrade will operate as intended with no effect on nearby equipment. These unintended effects, known as electromagnetic Interference (EMI), can cause issues ranging from erroneous indication of sensors and spurious actuation of components, to larger problems that can interrupt facility operations. A wide range of services are offered by AMS to help prevent these EMI problems and mitigate them when they occur.

The best time to solve EMC issues is before they happen, during the design phase when the greatest amount of design flexibility exists. AMS offers comprehensive EMC design reviews for equipment upgrades to minimize any EMI risk posed by the system to the plant environment and reduce emission levels generated by the system. These design reviews provide recommendations on various aspects such as component layout and selection, locations of signal and power I/O, EMI filtering, cable routing and terminations, and grounding and shielding methods to ensure all EMC best practices have been incorporated for the final plant installation. Performing a design review helps to minimize the number of modifications necessary during formal EMC qualification, which can significantly shorten the qualification process and help control project costs.

In addition to design reviews, numerous facilities use EMI/RFI Site Surveys to support equipment upgrades as well as site-wide implementation of wireless devices. EMI/RFI Site Surveys use passive antennas and/or current probes to capture and characterize the Electromagnetic Environment (EME) in a certain area. The data can be used in conjunction with EMC qualification reports or industry standards to ensure that the equipment is compatible with the plant environment. These site surveys are an invaluable tool for new site upgrades as they provide increased assurance of compatibility and can be used as justification in cases of excessive emissions during qualification.

Laboratory and field qualification testing is at the core of what AMS does in the area of EMC. AMS has an extensive array of equipment and technologies to meet the EMC qualification needs of nuclear facilities and performs qualification testing to meet the requirements of NRC Regulatory Guide 1.180 and EPRI TR-102323 using either Military Standard or IEC testing methodologies. AMS also provides field qualification testing at a client facility for systems that are too large or complex to be sent to our headquarters.

Often during qualification testing, one or several of the tests being performed will not meet the limits as required by the client or the testing standard. AMS strives to not only provide a qualification report, but to effectively mitigate susceptibilities and excessive emissions in order to provide the customer with a passing configuration quickly and without performing multiple sets of qualifications after each design change. AMS’s ability to effectively mitigate EMI problems during qualification testing helps to ensure that client projects are completed on-time and under-budget.

Interested in learning more about our EMC testing services? Please call 865-691-1756 or email info@ams-corp.com.