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This report provides an overview of the specialized instrumentation necessary to operate and maintain liquid-fueled molten salt reactors (MSRs). The report does not address nonspecialized industrial process control instrumentation, fissile material tracking instrumentation, or digital control/communication technologies. The report focuses on identifying MSR measurement technology gaps and recommending research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) activities to close the identified gaps.Modern MSRs can rely on the instrumentation demonstrated during prior MSR development efforts. No fundamental technology gaps have been identified that would prevent operating or maintaining MSRs. However, improved instrumentation technology, combined with the integration of modern process modeling and simulation, could significantly improve the reliability and decrease the operating costs of future MSRs. The largest potential impact of new instrumentation technologies is in the integration of maintenance automation into reactor operations. Flow measurement has the largest technology hurdles remaining to enable deployment of robust systems. Also, the technology for reliable online fuel salt sample acquisition remains at a relatively low level of technology readiness.

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In a carbon-constrained world, future uses of nuclear power technologies can contribute to climate change mitigation as the installed electricity generating capacity and range of applications could be much greater and more diverse than with the current plants. To preserve the nuclear industry competitiveness in the global energy market, prognostics and health management (PHM) of plant assets is expected to be important for supporting and sustaining improvements in the economics associated with operating nuclear power plants (NPPs) while maintaining their high availability. Of interest are long-term operation of the legacy fleet to 80 years through subsequent license renewals and economic operation of new builds of either light water reactors or advanced reactor designs. Recent advances in data-driven analysis methods—largely represented by those in artificial intelligence and machine learning—have enhanced applications ranging from robust anomaly detection to automated control and autonomous operation of complex systems. The NPP equipment PHM is one area where the application of these algorithmic advances can significantly improve the ability to perform asset management. This paper provides an updated method-centric review of the full PHM suite in NPPs focusing on data-driven methods and advances since the last major survey article was published in 2015. The main approaches and the state of practice are described, including those for the tasks of data acquisition, condition monitoring, diagnostics, prognostics, and planning and decision-making. Research advances in non-nuclear power applications are also included to assess findings that may be applicable to the nuclear industry, along with the opportunities and challenges when adapting these developments to NPPs. Finally, this paper identifies key research needs in regard to data availability and quality, verification and validation, and uncertainty quantification.