This standard applies to the software engineering of safety critical software used in real-time protective systems in nuclear generating stations. Software engineering includes software requirements definition, software design, code implementation, requirements verification, design verification, code verification, hazards analysis, testing, reliability qualification, planning, configuration management and training processes.

The standard applies to safety critical software which is part of a special safety system and which is directly required for the special safety system to meet its minimum allowable performance requirements as defined for the specific project. Special safety systems are the shutdown systems, the emergency coolant injection system, and the containment system of a CANDU nuclear generating station.

The standard defines: a minimum set of software engineering processes to be followed in creating and revisiong the software; the minimum set of outputs to be produced by the processes; and the requirements for the content of the outputs based on quality objectives, quality attributes, and fundamental principles, to ensure the software developed is of acceptable quality. The requirements in this standard do not unnecessarily constrain the methodologies and work practices used for producing the outputs.

The standard requires the software engineering project using it adopt and/or define and document the standards and procecurders for the methodologies and work practices that will be employed. These standards and procedures shall be followed to provide confidence that the software is of acceptable quality for all software engineering from inception until the retirement of the software. To be of acceptable quality all of the requirements which this standard imposes must be met.