Patent Number: 
Section: claims

1. A method for recovering operating margin in a nuclear reactor, the nuclear reactor including a steam generator, a Reactor Coolant System having a hot leg with a temperature, Thot, and a cold leg with a temperature, Tcold, a Reactor Trip System having an Over Temperature Delta Temperature trip function and an Over Power Delta Temperature trip function, and a control system, the method comprising:measuring a temperature in the hot leg of the Reactor Coolant System and providing a hot leg temperature signal representative thereof;filtering the hot leg temperature signal to smooth signal perturbations resulting from temperature fluctuations;measuring a temperature in the cold leg of the Reactor Coolant System and providing an unfiltered cold leg temperature signal representative thereof;establishing an Over Temperature Delta Temperature setpoint for the Reactor Trip System from the filtered hot leg temperature signal and the unfiltered cold leg temperature signal;establishing an Over Power Delta Temperature setpoint for the Reactor Trip System from the filtered hot leg temperature signal and the unfiltered cold leg temperature signal;measuring the difference between the filtered hot leg temperature signal and the unfiltered cold leg temperature signal;comparing the measured difference between the filtered hot leg temperature signal and the unfiltered cold leg temperature signal to said Over Temperature Delta Temperature setpoint;comparing the measured difference between the filtered hot leg temperature signal and the unfiltered cold leg temperature signal to said Over Power Delta Temperature setpoint; andtripping the nuclear reactor when the measured difference between the filtered hot leg temperature signal and the unfiltered cold leg temperature signal exceeds the Over Temperature Delta Temperature setpoint or the Over Power Delta Temperature setpoint. 2. The method of claim 1 wherein:tripping the nuclear reactor includes sending a trip signal to the reactor control system in order to initiate the reactor trip. 3. The method of claim 1 further comprising:providing a single filter in the hot leg of said Reactor Coolant System; andemploying said single filter to perform said step of smoothing signal perturbations resulting from temperature fluctuations only in the hot leg of said Reactor Coolant System. 4. The method of claim 1 further comprising:isolating the hot leg and cold leg temperatures, Thot, Tcold, for use in the Over Temperature Delta Temperature and Over Power Delta Temperature functions; andproviding separate dynamic compensations for the Over Temperature Delta Temperature and Over Power Delta Temperature functions based upon the values of said isolated Thot and Tcold. 5. The method of claim 1 wherein said nuclear reactor is a pressurized water reactor.