ML030360172
| ML030360172 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Davis Besse  |
| Issue date: | 01/24/2003 |
| From: | NRC/RGN-III |
| To: | |
| References | |
| Download: ML030360172 (148) | |
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2 3 PUBLIC MEETING BETWEEN U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION O350 PANEL 4 AND FIRST ENERGY NUCLEAR OPERATING COMPANY OAK HARBOR, OHIO 5
6 Meeting held on Tuesday, January 14, 2003, at 7 2:00 p.m. at the Camp Perry Clubhouse, Oak Harbor, Ohio, taken by me, Marie B. Fresch, Registered Merit Reporter, 8 and Notary Public in and for the State of Ohio.
9 - - -
10 PANEL MEMBERS PRESENT:
11 U. S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 12 John "Jack" Grobe, Chairman, MC Oversight Panel William Dean, Vice Chairman, MC Oversight Panel 13 Douglas Simpkins, NRC Resident Inspector Christopher Scott Thomas, 14 Senior Resident Inspector U.S. NRC Office - Davis-Besse 15 Jon Hopkins, Project Manager Davis-Besse Anthony Mendiola, 16 Section Chief PDIII-2, NRR 17 FIRST ENERGY NUCLEAR OPERATING COMPANY 18 Lew Myers, FENOC Chief Operating Officer Robert W. Schrauder, 19 Director - Support Services J. Randel Fast, Plant Manager 20 James J. Powers, III Director - Nuclear Engineering 21 Michael J. Stevens, Director - Nuclear Maintenance 22 L. William Pearce, Vice President FENOC Oversight 23 Mike Ross, Manager - Operations Effectiveness 24 25 MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
2 1 MR. GROBE: Good afternoon.
2 My name is Jack Grobe. Im the Chairman of the NRCs 3 Oversight Panel for the Davis-Besse facility.
4 Our purpose today is to discuss Davis-Besses 5 progress on the Return to Service Plan, as well as to 6 inform the public of the NRCs activities at the 7 Davis-Besse facility. This meeting is between the NRC and 8 FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company; and its open to 9 public observation.
10 Before the meeting is adjourned, there will be an 11 opportunity for the public to ask questions of the NRC 12 staff and provide comments. Were having this meeting 13 transcribed to maintain a record of the meeting and also to 14 allowed others who are unable to attend the meeting today 15 in person, the opportunity to review the information 16 presented and discussed today. The transcript of this 17 meeting will be posted on the NRCs Website in 18 approximately three weeks.
19 Todays agendas and handouts are available in the 20 lobby, as well as our monthly report. I hope you folks had 21 an opportunity to pick that up and look at it. Its a 22 monthly public document that the NRC publishes. And there 23 is one other important document out there and thats what 24 we refer to as a feedback form. Its a one-page form. It 25 gives you an opportunity to provide comments on the format MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
3 1 and content of this meeting and give us your feedback, so 2 that we can improve the meetings.
3 As evidenced by the risers today, one of the 4 comments last month in this facility was that folks 5 couldnt see us. And now we have to be careful standing 6 up, for fear of hitting our heads on the ceiling. So, 7 hopefully, you can all see us today.
8 I would like to introduce the NRC staff thats here 9 today. On my immediate left is Bill Dean. Bill is the 10 Deputy Director of the Division of Engineering in our 11 Headquarters Office and hes the Vice Chairman of this 12 panel.
13 On his left is Tony Mendiola. Tony is the 14 Supervisor in the Licensing Area in our Office of Nuclear 15 Reactor Regulation in Headquarters.
16 And, on his left is Jon Hopkins. Jon is the 17 Licensing Project Manager and Jon specifically works on 18 Davis-Besse.
19 On my right is Scott Thomas. Scott raise your 20 hand. Scott is the Senior Resident Inspector at the 21 Davis-Besse facility; reports to work every day at 22 Davis-Besse.
23 And, on his right is Doug Simpkins. Doug is the 24 Resident Inspector.
25 Also, in the audience is Jay Collins. Jay is an MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
4 1 engineer out of our Headquarters Offices on rotation at 2 Davis-Besse. Hes also working at the site every day.
3 In the audience is Jan Strasma. There is Jan. Jan 4 is our Public Affairs OfficeOfficer in Region III; and is 5 available to help anybody with public information 6 questions.
7 Rolland Lickus. Where is Rolland? There he is.
8 Rolland is our State Liaison Officer.
9 We also have Nancy Keller out in the foyer. Nancy 10 is the Resident Office Assistant of the Resident 11 Inspectors Office here at Davis-Besse.
12 And, of course, we have Marie Fresch again, who is 13 our transcriber.
14 I would like now if there are any public officials, 15 local public officials, I would like to give them an 16 opportunity to introduce themselves.
17 STEVE ARNDT: Steve Arndt, 18 County Commissioner.
19 JOHN PAPCUN: John Papcun, 20 Ottawa County Commissioner.
21 CARL KOEBEL: Carl Koebel, 22 Ottawa County Commissioner.
23 JERE WITT: Jere Witt, County 24 Administrator.
25 TOM BROWN: Tom Brown, Mayor MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
5 1 of Port Clinton.
2 MR. GROBE: Welcome. Thank 3 you for coming today.
4 Slide three, please.
5 During the meeting today, well summarize the two 6 recent meetings we had in December, as well as recent 7 inspection activities; and then turn the meeting over and 8 ask FirstEnergy for their presentation.
9 As I mentioned earlier, well take a brief recess 10 and then invite questions and comments from the public.
11 Lew, at this time would you introduce your staff?
12 MR. MYERS: Yes, thank you.
13 At the end of our table at the right, we have Bob 14 Saunders -- Bob Schrauder, Im sorry. Bob is in charge 15 of, he comes from our Perry Plant. Hes our Support 16 Director. Bob is now working on, with the engineering 17 staff on our engineering issues.
18 Next to him is Mike Ross. Mike Ross is filling in 19 for Bob at the present time in his capacity.
20 Jim Powers next to me. Hes our Director of 21 Engineering.
22 Im Lew Myers, Im the site Vice President, and 23 Chief Operating Officer of FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating 24 Company.
25 Randy Fast next to, on my left here, is our Plant MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
6 1 Manager; and has been with the plant for about a year or 2 so, before that he was at our Beaver Valley Plant.
3 Mike Stevens next to him. Mike came to us from, 4 from our Perry Plant, been here a couple years, Director of 5 Maintenance.
6 And then Bill Pearce is next to him. And, Bill is 7 our VP of Oversight.
8 In the audience also, we have Bob Saunders with us 9 today. Bob is the President of FirstEnergy Nuclear 10 Operating Company.
11 And also have Fred Giese with us today. Fred is the 12 FENOC Manager in charge of Human Resources.
13 MR. GROBE: Okay, very good.
14 Thanks.
15 Lets go to slide 4. At this time, I would ask Bill 16 Dean to briefly summarize the December 10th, 2002 meeting.
17 MR. PEARCE: Thank you, Jack.
18 First of all, one of the things that we discussed at 19 that meeting was the status of current NRC activities as 20 they relate to inspections of Davis-Besse activities. In 21 particular, we noted at the meeting that we had released 22 inspection reports related to our inspection of Davis-Besse 23 containment, extended condition efforts, as well as our 24 efforts regarding reactor pressure vessel head 25 replacement. And that those inspection reports were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
7 1 publicly available.
2 We also described the status of some of our ongoing 3 activities related to things like Program Effectiveness, 4 System Health Assurance, Organizational Effectiveness and 5 Human Performance and Resident Inspector Activities; and 6 noted that a key aspect of completing those procedures is 7 the fact that they are contingent upon progress that the 8 Licensee makes relative to their own programs in trying to 9 restore those activities.
10 With respect to information that the Licensee 11 provided to us and thats pretty much conveyed on the slide 12 in terms of the key topics discussed. Under Management and 13 Human Performance, we spent some time talking about the 14 Safety Conscious Work Environment and Organizational 15 Alignment, and efforts that the Licensee has to try and 16 improve and solidify those areas, as well as insights 17 gained from their Management Observation Program to-date, 18 which they are using to determine how well safety standards 19 and expectations are being translated and implemented to 20 the field.
21 We spent some time talking about their Root Cause 22 Assessment of Operations. The key aspect of that Root 23 Cause Assessment was that Operations did not take a 24 leadership role in assuring plant safety. And they 25 described efforts that were in place to try and embody this MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
8 1 in their site activities; and the greater involvement in 2 things like plant reviews and maintenance work.
3 We discussed some of the near term goals that the 4 Licensee had identified and need to be completed in terms 5 of supporting potential plant restart; and they described a 6 sequence of events, including reloading the core, 7 performing integrated leak rate test of containment, 8 reaching normal operating pressure and normal operating 9 temperature in order to do a leak test of the Reactor 10 Coolant System, with some particular focus on areas where 11 they had done work in the Reactor Coolant System as well as 12 the bottom of the reactor vessel head.
13 Under Containment Health area, the Licensee noted 14 that they felt they had completed the discovery activities, 15 though there still was a substantial amount of effort 16 needed to characterize corrective actions for those things 17 that they identified, and that major work was in progress 18 on components, such as the containment air coolers, 19 modification to the sump in containment and paint and 20 coatings activity within containment.
21 In the System Health area, it was noted that many 22 reviews had been done and were awaiting Senior Management 23 review. That there were, through their assessment, they 24 identified several key design issues, including things like 25 calculational problems, service water temperature issues MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
9 1 and diesel loading. That they were taking these lessons 2 learned and conducting a thorough, more thorough assessment 3 of 15 key safety systems, and that there would be a meeting 4 on the 23rd of December in the Region to discuss these 5 plans, and Jack will summarize that meeting in a few 6 minutes.
7 Under the area of Plant Programs, they noted much of 8 their review work had been done. A key aspect of that was 9 development of a Integrated Leakage Program, which would be 10 one of the things that we will assess.
11 Over there on the wall facing the lake are some 12 performance indicators and trends. And at the last 13 meeting, the Licensee utilized the same approach towards 14 showing where they were relative to what we call discovery 15 versus work-off rate. And the Licensee used those matrixes 16 as evidence that they believed that they had reached a key 17 milestone, that being the rate of work-off was now 18 exceeding the rate of work identification.
19 In other words, they had turned a corner, as you 20 will, in terms of discovery of issues that needed to be 21 assessed and corrected, and that they are now on an 22 increasingly improved trend of effecting corrective 23 actions. And so, that will be something that certainly 24 well talk about some more today.
25 Finally, in the area of realignment of resources to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
10 1 get operational alignment; fairly soon before a previous 2 meeting, the Licensee had taken some action to reduce the 3 amount of contractor work force that existed on the site.
4 And we discussed it at some length the intent of that.
5 And, for example, reducing reliance on contractors 6 and bringing plant staff more in line, in terms of what 7 theyre trying to do organizationally and operationally; 8 and, the fact that we felt that that change warranted some 9 close attention and monitoring, and that the Quality 10 Assurance Organization had instituted a review of plant 11 activities associated with that effort. And we hope to 12 hear some more about that today.
13 So, that pretty much summarizes fairly quickly the 14 meeting from last time.
15 You notice at the bottom of the slide, the 16 transcripts of the meeting, I think -- are they available 17 now? Are available now on that Website and that page 18 address is given there. Thank you.
19 MR. GROBE: Thanks, Bill.
20 As Bill indicated, if we could go to the next slide, 21 Im going to briefly summarize a specialized, a specially 22 focused meeting that we had on December 23rd. That meeting 23 was particularly focused on the engineering and engineering 24 specifically design issues that the company was identifying 25 and how they were going to resolve those issues.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
11 1 FirstEnergy described three separate activities 2 that they had under way to continue identifying issues and 3 address the issues that theyve identified to-date.
4 To step back a little bit, let me previously 5 summarize the activities that FirstEnergy had previously 6 undertaken. They performed a detailed design review on 7 five risk significant safety systems. And in addition to 8 that, they performed a functional review, a less detailed, 9 less design focused review on 31 additional systems.
10 They completed those reviews and identified a number 11 of issues. The three activities that they have now 12 undertaken, the first one is simply the fact that they have 13 to address all of the engineering issues that theyve 14 identified to-date, determine whether or not those issues 15 affect the functionality of systems, and implement 16 appropriate actions to address those deficiencies.
17 The second focus area that they have under, have 18 undertaken currently, has to do with the fact that through 19 the course of doing the detailed design reviews, they 20 identified six engineering areas, specific technical 21 issues, that they believe required a broader look across 22 other systems. And, on the 23rd, FirstEnergy described the 23 topical areas and how theyre going to accomplish those 24 broad foundational-type reviews in those engineering 25 areas.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
12 1 And the third focus area was an expansion of the 2 design review. They identified a number of design issues 3 that caused some concern in their minds, regarding whether 4 or not there is additional design issues out there that 5 they had not yet identified. So, they chose to expand the 6 scope to 15 systems. So, theyre doing, currently have 7 under way detailed design review of an additional number of 8 systems, so the total of 15 systems will be reviewed.
9 Throughout this entire process, theyll be 10 continuing to evaluate the findings that they identify, and 11 how those findings might translate into the need for 12 additional evaluation.
13 Currently, we have two Engineering Design Inspectors 14 out of the Region III Office in Chicago that are in 15 Virginia where that work is ongoing as we speak, performing 16 inspections of those activities.
17 As indicated at the bottom of this page, the 18 transcript of the 23rd meeting is not yet completed, but it 19 will be shortly posted on the NRC Website.
20 Can we go to slide 6, please.
21 I would now like to just briefly go through our 22 Restart Checklist and summarize the recent inspection 23 activities weve accomplished.
24 The first checklist area is, focuses on root causes; 25 and specifically the root cause of the technical issues MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
13 1 that resulted in the head degradation, and the root cause 2 of the organizational, programmatic, and human performance 3 issues.
4 The review of the technical root cause is ongoing.
5 I expect it to be completed this month, and we have not 6 identified any significant concerns with respect to restart 7 regarding the technical root cause.
8 I would like to talk about the organizational, 9 programmatic issues a little bit later when we get into the 10 human performance area of the checklist.
11 The next slide describes the, what we call the 12 Adequacy of Safety Significant Structures, Systems and 13 Components. There is a number of areas that are captured 14 under this checklist item. As I mentioned earlier, 15 inspection is ongoing in the Systems area, specific design 16 inspection work. There have been no inspections completed 17 in this area since the last time we met publicly.
18 Adequacy of Safety Significant Programs; when we 19 undertook this inspection in October, several of the 20 programs were completed and we reported out in a previous 21 public meeting on our inspections of those programs. The 22 remainder of the programs, with the exception of the 23 Radiation Protection Program, have been completed by the 24 company, and our inspection is scheduled to examine those 25 programs.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
14 1 Since the last time we met publicly, weve issued a 2 report regarding Radiation Protection Program. It was 3 actually two special inspection reports that were 4 transmitted to FirstEnergy under one letter. These are the 5 inspections that were precipitated by some release of 6 radioactive materials that occurred last spring.
7 The inspection focused on two aspects of the events 8 that led up to that release. One was the off-site 9 consequences of the release of radioactive materials that 10 occurred, as well as the organizational deficiencies that 11 allowed that to occur.
12 We had one violation that we cited in that report.
13 It was characterized as what we call a green finding. What 14 that means is, its of low safety significance. We 15 concluded that the material that was released to the 16 public, in the public domain, was not of health concern to 17 members of the public.
18 The second aspect of that inspection focused on the 19 workers and the work control of their radiological 20 protection while they were working in the plant. We had 21 two violations, two findings in that area of the 22 inspection. The first one concerned the companys failure 23 to adequately assess the working conditions prior to 24 commencing work. That was characterized as what we call a 25 white finding. That means it has low to moderate safety MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
15 1 significance.
2 The reason that finding was elevated above our 3 lowest level of significance was because there was a 4 substantial potential for those workers to experience an 5 overexposure in excess of our limits. In this case, they 6 did not experience that, but the work controls and the 7 assessment of the radiological conditions was such that it 8 was clearly possible for them to have experienced an 9 overexposure.
10 And those are not good situations to be in, so that 11 violation was characterized as what we call escalated 12 enforcement or white finding. And there will be additional 13 inspecting work in that area.
14 The third finding, second finding in the area of 15 worker control had to do with the assessment of dose of the 16 workers. These workers were exposed to an unusual type of 17 radiation that you dont often find in nuclear power 18 plants. Its whats referred to as alpha radiation. It 19 comes from certain elements that are found in the fuel, 20 theyre call transuranic elements.
21 When you have a worker exposed to that radiation, 22 there is different type of dose assessment techniques that 23 have to be used, and the company had deficiencies in that 24 aspect of their dose assessment. That was also 25 characterized as a white finding, because it was more MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
16 1 significant.
2 So, that is, those are the results of the Radiation 3 Protection Special Inspections. As you will recall, we 4 added Radiation Protection to the Restart Checklist in 5 October after we completed those inspections. Those 6 inspection were actually completed in the middle of 7 October. And, because of the findings from those 8 inspections, the panel determined that the Radiation 9 Protection Program should get additional evaluation by the 10 NRC prior to restart.
11 Go on to the next slide.
12 This area is the Adequacy of Organizational 13 Effectiveness and Human Performance. There will be a 14 report; hopefully its on my desk right now; thats issued 15 in the next week or so, addressing these areas. When we 16 completed this inspection, we were able to address 17 approximately one third of the areas that we need to 18 address prior to restart.
19 At that time, two of the Root Cause Analyses were 20 done. One concerned the Quality Assurance Organizations 21 effectiveness and their contribution to what resulted in 22 the shutdown of Davis-Besse plant. And the second one was 23 a specific analysis of what we call Organizational 24 Barriers. Its a barrier analysis. It looks at all the 25 different things that could have prevented this problem MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
17 1 from occurring at Davis-Besse.
2 There was a number of other assessments that the 3 company had under way. One in the Engineering area; one in 4 evaluating the Corporate Nuclear Oversight Board. I cant 5 recall all of them right at the moment, but those four were 6 not completed at the time of this inspection. They are 7 completed now. And I believe theyve been submitted on the 8 docket, and theyre publicly available for interested 9 members of the public. This inspection will be ongoing, 10 and well examine those other areas in the future.
11 The findings to-date evaluating the two assessments 12 that we were able to complete, we found that the 13 assessments were comprehensive; that they identified, we 14 believe, appropriate issues; and appropriate corrective 15 actions were identified to address those issues.
16 As I said though, the inspection is only 17 approximately a third complete, so there is additional work 18 to do in that area.
19 On the next slide, we have what we call Readiness 20 for Restart. Thats three particular areas that were 21 going to be focusing prior to restart. These inspections 22 have not yet begun.
23 The next slide, Licensing Issue Resolution and 24 Resolution of Confirmatory Action Letter. The remaining 25 three American Society Mechanical Engineering code relief MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
18 1 requests have been issued by our Office of Nuclear Reactor 2 Regulation. So, those three issues have been adequately 3 resolved since the last time we met.
4 And, of course, prior to restart approval, the 5 company needs to meet with us: and in a recent letter that 6 we issued updating the CAL, we described in more detail the 7 letter that the company intends to send to us when they 8 believe that theyre ready for restart, and the meeting 9 that will occur at that time, if and when we get there.
10 We have a number of continuing NRC inspections. As 11 I mentioned a moment ago, the Organizational Effectiveness 12 and Human Performance Inspection is ongoing. As I 13 mentioned a little bit earlier, System Health Reviews, 14 thats the design issues is the principle focus of the 15 inspection work we have ongoing in that area.
16 Safety Significant Programs, we have a number of 17 programs yet to review. And of course we have ongoing 18 Resident Inspection. Our Residents inspect on a six-week 19 cycle. That inspection cycle completes today. Well be 20 exiting with the company tomorrow on the inspection 21 findings from the last six weeks and that report will be 22 issued in about 21 days. Well be discussing the results 23 of that inspection at our next public meeting.
24 Before we go on, I would like to briefly mention a 25 very important meeting we have coming up at the end of MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
19 1 January. Its scheduled for, currently for January 30th, I 2 believe at 10:00 in the morning. It will be conducted in 3 the Region III office.
4 Well make availability to attend that meeting both 5 through video teleconference with our headquarters office 6 for anybody in the Washington area thats interested; also 7 through audio teleconferencing for anybody who is 8 interested in this area to sit in on that meeting, if 9 theyre not able to travel to Chicago.
10 The focus of that meeting will be Safety Culture; 11 one of the principal root causes that resulted in the head 12 degradation going undiscovered for a number of years at 13 Davis-Besse was the safety focus or safety culture of the 14 facility. The company has determined that theyre going to 15 develop a more clear and focused method to assess the 16 safety culture of the facility, but that assessment will be 17 ongoing. It will start immediately and go on well past 18 restart.
19 And, on the 30th, theyre going to present to us the 20 context of that safety culture assessment, what types of 21 indicators and assessment tools theyre going to use. So, 22 thats a very important meeting, and I look forward to 23 that.
24 Unless there is anything I forgot -- oh, okay.
25 Scott just reminded me that the last inspection site were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
20 1 completed December 28th. So, I apologize for that.
2 With that, let me turn it over to you, Lew, for your 3 presentation, with the information you want to share with 4 us today.
5 MR. MYERS: Thank you very 6 much.
7 For the public were going to try to do some things 8 a little different today. Our desired outcome is to 9 demonstrate that we continue to make progress to support 10 the restart of the plant.
11 Were going to have Randy Fast our director, our 12 Plant Manager talk about that.
13 The 350 process, Clark Price talked about last 14 month, will discuss the 350 process, and status with you.
15 The Corrective Action Program, the Corrective Action 16 Program is probably one of the most important management 17 programs that we have at our plant. And its designed to 18 identify our problems and give management a way to keep 19 them visible, classify them, prioritize them and fix the 20 problems that we find on a daily basis.
21 That program was one of the major programmatic 22 breakdowns that we had. Weve done things to enhance the 23 program since shutdown. Weve done things to increase the 24 line management involvement and ownership. Dave Gudger is 25 the owner of that program. Hes one of our first line MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
21 1 managers.
2 Were going to have him present to you today the 3 status of the Corrective Action Program that weve been 4 using since the shutdown, and weve got to make that 5 program work well in order to restart the plant.
6 The Reactor Coolant System and its integrity is why 7 were here today. You know, I believe that weve got some, 8 a new program in place, thats different, a different 9 approach than what weve seen at D-B before, and we think 10 in the industry. Jerry Lee, one of our lead engineers and 11 the owner of that program will discuss that today.
12 Next desired outcome, if you will, is to demonstrate 13 that were getting ready to reload the reactor core, fuel 14 reload, if you will.
15 Well discuss Fuel Reload Readiness. Mike Roder is 16 our Operations Manager. He will come up to the microphone 17 and discuss that.
18 Fuel Reliability is a really important part of 19 restarting the plant. And when we reload the core, we need 20 to make sure that our fuel is going to be very reliable.
21 We have Dan Kelley with us. Dan is our Director Engineer.
22 His degree is in Nuclear Engineering, from the University 23 of Cincinnati. We think we have him ready to communicate 24 with the public. And hes going to talk about our fuel, 25 and what hes done to ensure that fuel integrity is good MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
22 1 and better than when we initially planned, as a matter of 2 fact.
3 Greg Dunn is going to talk about the Integrity 4 Assurance, and he will spend some time on that today.
5 Finally, we want to discuss the Human Performance 6 and Safety Culture. What were going to try to do here is 7 give you a briefing, if you will, on some of the things 8 well discuss at the January 30th meeting. And Im going 9 to talk a little bit about the Safety Culture.
10 And what we do at our plant is we tend to separate 11 Safety Culture and Safety Conscious Work Environment. And 12 Safety Conscious Work Environment is a really important 13 part of getting people to be able to identify problems.
14 Corrective Action Program is a key part of that, but we 15 have some other ways that people can bring up issues also.
16 Bill Pearce is going to discuss Safety Conscious Work 17 Environment.
18 Finally, were going to provide you an update, if 19 you will, on the integrated schedule, if time permits, and 20 Mike Stevens will talk about that. Okay. Thats what our 21 desire is today.
22 MR. GROBE: Okay.
23 MR. MYERS: Now, before we 24 get started, I thought I would take a moment and just 25 clarify terms with the public. Were going to use some MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
23 1 terms called Mode 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.
2 Mode 6, if you will, is when we load the core or the 3 fuel back into the reactor vessel. The fuel is now in our 4 spent fuel pit, and we move it from the spent fuel pit area 5 over to the reactor vessel. Thats an activity were 6 getting ready to do.
7 When we do that, we normally do it under at least 21 8 feet of water. Were having Restart Readiness Review 9 meetings tomorrow to make sure were ready to reload the 10 core. Not to restart the plant, but to reload the core.
11 And we want to make sure we are ready. Thats Mode 6.
12 Mode 5, now, is a different mode. Now, the only 13 difference between Mode 5 and 6 is we go in and we hook up 14 all the electronics and all the control rod drives that we 15 use to control the reactor with and put the reactor head 16 down and bolt it down. When we do that, the reactor vessel 17 is a, becomes a pressure boundary. It will hold pressure, 18 much like a steam pot in your house, something like that, 19 ready to hold pressure. So thats a changing condition in 20 our plant. We refer to that as Mode 5.
21 The startup, startup and heatup on reactor coolant 22 pumps is Mode 4. What that is, thats not starting the 23 reactor up. Thats starting the reactor coolant pumps up.
24 Randy is going to talk some about the reactor coolant pumps 25 later on.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
24 1 What youll see is each one of those, these coolant 2 pumps circulate about 9,000 gallons of water each. And if 3 you circulate all that water, you create what we call pump 4 heat; several megawatts of pump heat. With that pump heat 5 alone, you could heat the reactor up to normal operating 6 temperatures and pressures, which is normally about 2250 7 pounds, 600 degrees or so.
8 So, we intend to do that sometime to do a leak check 9 early part of March. And thats where you start to heat 10 up. And, then as you get full system temperature and 11 pressure, its called Mode 3; thats normal operating 12 temperature and pressure.
13 Then, finally, you take the reactor to critical.
14 Were going to talk some today about, that is about the 15 reactor fuel assemblies. When we take the reactor critical 16 for the first time, thats called reactor startup, Mode 2.
17 And then, finally, Mode 1 is power operations, and 18 thats reactor power of 5 percent, a very rigid, licensed 19 nuclear power. Okay.
20 With that, Ill turn it over to Randy Fast.
21 MR. FAST: All right, thank 22 you, Lew.
23 Good afternoon. Im pleased to update us on our 24 restart preparations. In that vein, we really have three 25 key activities that I want to focus on. Certainly, were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
25 1 doing many, many activities, but these three really 2 highlight some of our preparations for restart, and this is 3 our commitment to safety.
4 So, Im going to get down from the stage. I have a 5 series of pictures that I want to go through and I want to 6 be able to at least show, show you where we are on these 7 three key areas, and the preparations that weve made.
8 Those are on the Containment Emergency Sump.
9 Certainly, every meeting weve had a good bit of discussion 10 with that. Ive brought a little show and tell. Well 11 talk that through. Well talk about the Reactor Safety 12 Seal Plate. Show some pictures, why thats important. And 13 as Lew identified, well talk about Reactor Coolant Pumps.
14 All right, first picture, please.
15 What we have is, down in containment at the 565 foot 16 elevation, thats down in the bottom of the containment, is 17 a bunker. Its a concrete bunker, and its called a sump, 18 much like in maybe the basement of your house, you have a 19 sump where water will collect and you can pump it out.
20 This is an area in the lower elevation of containment where 21 water can be collected.
22 Under design basis accident, water is collected in 23 this area and is recirculated through safety pumps to 24 assure long term cooling. Whats important about this is 25 the as-found condition at a sump with a screen square MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
26 1 footage area of around 50 square feet.
2 Now, what that demonstrates is the ability to be 3 able to strain out any miscellaneous debris that would be 4 in containment and recirculate through these pumps. We 5 found that that did not meet industry standards and we 6 wanted to take a leadership role in improving our sump 7 design.
8 So, what we see here is one of our iron workers, the 9 craft people that are doing this work. And hes standing 10 on top of what we call W-4, stainless steel I-beams. Those 11 I-beams are providing structural support in that sump.
12 Sitting there, what we have is two, what we call, 13 kind of affectionately call, top hats. What those are is a 14 strainer; and Ive got one up here. Ill just describe a 15 little bit about it.
16 As I had talked about the original design of the 17 sump had about 50 square feet of sump area. This is a 18 single top hat strainer that has about 15 square feet of 19 surface area per strainer capability. It has an inside and 20 an outside, kind of like an oil filter in your car where 21 you have a dual filter, they had years ago, you know, the 22 auto manufacturers came up with this dual filter 23 arrangement.
24 Thats kind of what this is. You have filtration 25 from the outside, as well, water can come up -- and MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
27 1 certainly at the break or afterwards, come up and take a 2 look at this -- but water can also spill into the inside.
3 So, you have about 9 square feet of surface area on the 4 outside, about 6 square feet on the inside.
5 Well, thats 15 square feet. That doesnt sound, 6 thats less than 50. There are 27 of these that will be 7 installed as part of that top hat on the upper sump. Now, 8 the upper sump, thats about 400 square feet. The lower 9 sump as well has a series of pipes that are drilled, these 10 are 3/16 holes. So, actually anything less than 3/16 inch 11 would be strained out.
12 So, this series of top hats are installed; the 27 on 13 top; and there is, there is an end bed here that goes down 14 underneath the reactor vessel, and that contains the 15 additional, about 800 to 900 square feet of sump that will 16 be available.
17 Next picture, please.
18 Okay, this is just a series of photographs of the 19 iron workers again welding in the supports associated with 20 that emergency sump.
21 Next picture.
22 MR. GROBE: Randy, before you 23 go on. Is the design change completed for the emergency 24 sump modification that youre describing?
25 MR. FAST: Jack, we have a MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
28 1 series of design changes. What were doing is working with 2 our primary vendor on this design, and what weve done is 3 work through a series of changes that represent the 4 engineering requirements to advance this project. So, not 5 all of the design work is completed. All of the conceptual 6 design work is completed, but we still have a number of 7 packages that will come.
8 The most recently I reviewed was about a week ago, 9 and it provides for all of the structural steel down 10 adjacent to the reactor vessel. So, we still have some 11 additional design change work to do.
12 MR. GROBE: Okay, when will 13 that design work be completed?
14 MR. FAST: I was going to 15 say, I think --
16 MR. POWERS: Prior to restart.
17 MR. FAST: Yeah, prior to 18 reactor startup; and Im thinking in my head around the end 19 of February.
20 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you.
21 I think the modification youre making to the sump 22 is very important. Certainly, youre going to provide 23 substantial additional design margin for the sump strainer, 24 but because of the importance of the sump, the risk 25 significance of this one piece of passive equipment, its MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
29 1 just a pit, essentially, to the functioning of all safety 2 systems; we added this to the Restart Checklist.
3 And we have to perform a detailed inspection, my 4 expectation is our staff will perform a detailed inspection 5 of that design work as well as the installation, the 6 results of the installation work. So, that design package 7 will be ready for our inspection late February?
8 MR. FAST: Thats when all of 9 the physical work will be completed.
10 MR. GROBE: Okay, when the 11 design, the engineering work be completed, so we can start 12 looking at the design?
13 MR. POWERS: Jack, we dont 14 have that yet.
15 MR. FAST: I dont have that, 16 Jack, well get back with you on the specific dates.
17 I was going to identify -- let me go a step further, 18 just to identify from a technical specification requirement 19 standpoint, as you had identified with system, safety 20 related systems that have to be in service, Lew briefed us 21 on modes. Those would be required for Mode 4; however, 22 administratively as part of power defense in depth, we have 23 a requirement that we have functionality on the sump. And 24 we will demonstrate functionality on the top portion of the 25 sump prior to fuel load.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
30 1 MR. GROBE: I understand 2 that, but design inspections, as youre well aware, are not 3 trivial; they take time. And were not going to look at it 4 until youre done with it, so as soon as youre done with 5 it, we need to get a hold of that design package and be 6 able to begin our inspection in that area.
7 MR. MYERS: Were looking at 8 the schedule up here, it looks like the first part of 9 February.
10 MR. GROBE: First part of 11 February?
12 MR. MYERS: Yeah, the design 13 work will be done.
14 MR. GROBE: Okay.
15 MR. FAST: I may have been 16 thinking about then as well the construction. Obviously, 17 well get you the specific information, so that we can 18 schedule those inspections.
19 MR. GROBE: Okay.
20 MR. FAST: Okay. The next 21 area that we want to talk about is the seal plate. Now, 22 whats important about the seal plate is there is an 23 annular space, thats a void space between the reactor 24 vessel and the reactor cavity. And for the life of the 25 plant, and as most plants coming on line, you would provide MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
31 1 a temporary seal. That was a stainless steel plate that 2 would be bolted down and sealed, so we could flood up. We 3 flood to 23 feet to ensure that we can move fuel from the 4 spent fuel pool to the reactor vessel.
5 What weve done is incorporate a permanent design, a 6 permanent cavity seal. And what youll see here, and Ive 7 got some additional detail in pictures, but we have 8 supports. Thats these gray square structures, you see 9 three of them here in the picture. Thats for structural 10 rigidity.
11 Then you have, what you have is a cantilevered box 12 that runs in a circle around the reactor vessel. That 13 provides the structural support.
14 And then this area is the seal membrane. This is 15 all welded in place and it provides a permanent seal, so 16 that as we flood up, there is no leakage path from the 17 reactor cavity down underneath the reactor vessel.
18 So, this is certainly an improvement. And there is 19 a couple of things I wanted to mention. One is because 20 this is an evolution that we go through each time we go 21 through a refueling operation; by putting this in 22 permanently, it does not require the time, the effort, and 23 the dose that our workers receive each and every refueling 24 outage. This is now permanent and there will be no dose 25 going forward.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
32 1 Next slide.
2 MR. MYERS: Maybe from a 3 safety culture standpoint this is a mod our safety culture 4 people have been asking for, for a long time.
5 MR. FAST: Yeah. Actually, 6 we did this over at our other station, at Beaver Valley on 7 both units. And the work force, they see this and say, why 8 are we, the rest of the industry has gone and put a 9 permanent seal in, and our workers have reached out.
10 In fact, I talked to a health physics supervisor the 11 other day. I just asked him, because I always want to 12 check for understanding and verify that our folks 13 appreciate the things were doing and we are developing the 14 right safety culture. I said, is this important? He said, 15 you betcha. Absolutely. That maneuvering heavy steel 16 plates with gaskets, bolting them down, collecting that 17 dose represents a challenge on our folks.
18 So, putting this in permanently one time, its, its 19 a fail-safe design and it really provides the right 20 standard. And our folks appreciate that. So, its a 21 significant level of effort to put this in, but it has long 22 reaching improvements and benefits to the station.
23 Here we have one of our boilermakers. I talked 24 before about iron workers. The iron workers work with the 25 steel. Boilermakers -- Lews a boilermaker.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
33 1 MR. MYERS: Yeah.
2 MR. FAST: I think, Jack, 3 youre a boilermaker.
4 MR. GROBE: Perdue 5 Boilermaker. (laughter) 6 MR. FAST: As I was a kid, I 7 didnt know what boilermakers were. Boilermakers make 8 water tanks. You go around the country, you see these 9 water tanks. Boilermakers always make them. Well, thats 10 one of their contributions to society. But, boilermakers 11 really work with steel; and in this case, putting that 12 cavity seal is a boilermaker activity.
13 Here we have a boilermaker actually measuring with 14 an indexing fixture to make sure that the clearances are 15 exactly right, very exact and demanding tolerances on this, 16 because as it goes through heatup and cooldown, we want to 17 make sure we have the proper flexure and rigidity on the 18 system.
19 Next slide, please.
20 Here is a, this is a tool that we used for, to keep 21 our dose as low as reasonably achievable; and what it was, 22 is a movable shield platform. Down in this annulus space 23 is lead blankets.
24 We did two activities to make sure that our folks 25 maintained our dose as low as reasonably achievable; one is MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
34 1 we placed the reactor vessel head on the vessel. That had 2 two-fold functioning. One, verify proper fitup, but 3 additionally to reduce stringing streaming radiation or the dose to 4 our workers.
5 Additionally, we put in this shield platform. You 6 can see its on a wheel, right here where it can rotate 7 around, adjustable on this side, kind of like a hand crank 8 like you have on the front of our your boat. That would level 9 it, put the shielding below, and allow then the workers to 10 have that radiation blocked while the guys were welding the 11 seams on that cavity seal.
12 So, it just shows the level of effort were going to 13 with our craft and with our engineering staff to keep our 14 dose low and make these, incorporate these design changes.
15 MR. MYERS: What is that big 16 thing on the righthand side?
17 MR. FAST: Thats the reactor 18 vessel head. So, this thing actually comes right over 19 adjacent to, its actually, this is the head.
20 MR. MYERS: Okay.
21 MR. FAST: Okay. This is 22 part of the, adjacent to the reactor vessel head, the 23 flange area. This is truly just a barrier, in this case 24 the studs, which are bolted down as part of Mode 5 that Lew 25 talked about, would be just on the other side of that MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
35 1 barrier.
2 So, this will connect. It bridges from the head 3 over to the cavity, and that provides then the ability to 4 flood up to 23 feet for fuel load.
5 Okay, the next area and the last area we want to 6 talk about are reactor coolant pumps. This whole assembly 7 is a rotating element, rotating assembly. This is a Byron 8 Jackson pump. And as Lew said, it pumps about 90,000 9 gallons a minute. Thats lot of water. That would, 10 probably just a regular swimming pool in your backyard; it 11 would fill five of those in the course of a minute. So, 12 its a lot of water.
13 This portion right here is called the impeller. And 14 you see the veins on the impeller. Now, this picture, I 15 have a better picture a little closer up. But this is what 16 is actually rotating as part of the pump. Just like a 17 water pump in your car thats circulating coolant or fluid 18 through your car to keep it cool, this pump is then pumping 19 reactor coolant through our Reactor Coolant System. There 20 are four reactor coolant pumps.
21 Now, we actually elected to do preventative 22 maintenance early in its cycle. In fact, let me give you 23 the periodicity. Its about 175,000 hours0 days <br />0 hours <br />0 weeks <br />0 months <br />. Every 175,000 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />, we go in, disassemble and do an inspection. We were 25 only at about 103,000 operating hours on this. Thats MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
36 1 about 20 years of operating. And we went in to look at 2 these on the 1/1 and the 1/2. So, thats two of the four 3 reactor coolant pumps.
4 This is a seal cooler, so we circulate water through 5 a seal package, and that seal package actually provides 6 isolation from the Reactor Coolant System then to the 7 environment of containment.
8 Next slide.
9 Here weve got really a better picture. I like this 10 one a little better, because it shows a closer up. And you 11 can see the veins of the pump. Heres the bottom of the 12 pump impeller, and the top portion. This bolts down. This 13 is the flange that actually bolts into the casing for the 14 reactor coolant pump.
15 So, this was elective maintenance that we did. Its 16 part of our preventative maintenance program. We pulled 17 that up early, so we could get a good look and see what the 18 condition of our reactor coolant pumps were.
19 And lastly, this is a reactor coolant pump motor.
20 Now, just like with any pump, you have to have a prime 21 mover, something that drives that pump. So, what do you 22 drive that pump with? What do you think it takes to drive 23 90,000 gallons a minute of fluid? Its a reactor coolant 24 pump motor. This runs at 13,800 volts. This thing is 25 about 9,000 horsepower. This weighs about a hundred MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
37 1 thousand pounds. Thats more than 25 average cars in 2 weight. Why? Because there is a lot of copper in this 3 motor.
4 This is the actual air box. This is the stater.
5 So, thats the outside of the motor. And then inside of 6 the motor running up and down, this is a vertical motor, is 7 the rotor. And that rotor turns at 1800 RPM, and that 8 drives the reactor coolant pump itself.
9 So, this is actually going back into the, what we 10 call the D-ring. You call it a D-ring, because its in the 11 shape of a D. Two sides on either side of the reactor is 12 the D-ring, and the two pumps, two motors on each side of 13 the D-ring.
14 So, this is a significant amount of work for the 15 station. Its been done well. Its been done without 16 injury. And its been done within the dose budget that we 17 put in place. And were just about done with this. In 18 fact, we are ready to establish Reactor Coolant System 19 integrity for fuel load; and then, subsequently, we have to 20 couple up the pump to the motor.
21 So, I just wanted to at least demonstrate some of 22 the work we had been doing in the plant. Folks are working 23 hard and marking making a lot of progress.
24 MR. MYERS: What do we lift 25 the motor with?
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
38 1 MR. FAST: The question is, 2 what do we lift the motor with? We use the polar crane.
3 The polar crane is rated at 180 tons. So, this is a crane 4 that extends across the periphery of the top of the 5 containment, and reaches down and lifts that motor. So, 6 180 ton crane it takes to lift 100,000 pound motor.
7 Other questions?
8 MR. DEAN: Randy, could you 9 spend, some of the things we discussed in the past as 10 significant work in containment has been the refurbishment 11 of containment air coolers, as well as the substantial 12 effort relative to coatings and painting of containment.
13 Can you update us on where we are with those?
14 MR. FAST: Sure, Bill.
15 Quickly on the painting project, we have completed both 16 core flood tanks have been, paint has been removed and 17 replaced. Weve replaced or repainted all of the 18 containment air cooler supports have been completed, 19 including the fan motors and the fans themselves.
20 In fact, were going back in, I was in containment 21 yesterday, were putting the first of the cooling coils 22 in.
23 Weve removed paint from the majority of the service 24 water piping. We still have a little bit to do yet. And 25 the major part of this project is up in the overhead, is MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
39 1 the dome. Its better than 50 percent done. Weve 2 completed down through the lower containment spray ring.
3 And were continuing to remove that paint from the 4 containment dome with our contractors. So, that work is 5 continuing on.
6 The containment air coolers, just a quick update on 7 that; the motors are installed on each of the three 8 containment air coolers. As we talked before, those are 9 the large air-handling devices that take air from 10 containment, it draws it in through -- each containment air 11 cooler has twelve cooler assemblies, much like a radiator 12 in your car. However, this radiator weighs 1100 pounds.
13 Its a little bit bigger. Stainless steel. Its built to 14 ASME requirements, because its a safety piece of 15 equipment.
16 So, were installing those. As well, the drop-down 17 dampers. There is a series of dampers that come underneath 18 the containment air coolers. Containment air cooler number 19 one, the drop-down damper is installed. The number 3 is 20 actually rigged up and is probably being lifted today. I 21 havent been in today, but that was the plan. And then the 22 last is number 2; that one is being delivered to the 23 containment and that will be installed.
24 Additionally, we have the plenum, which is the 25 outlet where we collect the air that is recirculated MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
40 1 through containment. Thats all stainless steel. The 2 floor is not completed, but a lot of the portions are done; 3 and the side walls are starting to go up on that. So, 4 were making pretty good progress in both painting and the 5 containment air coolers.
6 Did I miss anything, Bill?
7 MR. PEARCE: No, thank you.
8 MR. GROBE: Just a quick 9 follow-up, Randy. I think last time we talked about this 10 subject, but there is some question on what your final 11 approach was going to be on the unqualified coating that 12 was on conduits inside containment. Whats your final 13 decision on how youre going to approach that as far as 14 resolution and how do you stand on that?
15 MR. FAST: Well, engineering 16 has an action to look at a transport analysis that weve 17 contracted. We have to weigh the unqualified coatings in 18 containment against the ability to strain or filter out, as 19 we talked about on the first project, the emergency sump.
20 We need to make sure were bounded by the amount of 21 unqualified coatings that could get into the sump area and 22 still ensure that we have adequate positive suction for 23 those cooling pumps.
24 That is still under review. I cant give you 25 specific information on that, but I think by the next MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
41 1 meeting we can give you some very specific information 2 about what that total surface area is and how that will be 3 bounded by our design.
4 MR. GROBE: Have you decided 5 then to not remove any of the coat-- any of the conduits 6 prior to restart?
7 MR. FAST: We did the service 8 water piping. We are not doing conduits at this time; 9 however, we have an operations initiative where some of our 10 nonlicensed operators are working with engineering to do 11 some local removal of conduit paint.
12 MR. POWERS: To add to that, 13 what were doing, Randy described the nonoperator auxoperator class, so 14 we have containment working with us. This week were 15 looking at the methodology for removing that unqualified 16 coating of conduit. We want to do it carefully. And the 17 method of cleaning, we dont want to introduce any other 18 problems, for example, stripper chemicals that might be 19 applicable, were evaluating those; were also evaluating 20 high pressure spray laser washing to remove it, but we 21 dont want to introduce water into the joints of the 22 conduit system. So, this is some of the consideration 23 were going through to look at the best way to remove and 24 the most efficient way to remove those coatings. So, these 25 meetings are ongoing this week.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
42 1 MR. GROBE: Do you expect 2 that you would be initiating coating removal on conduits 3 before restart or is that something youll be doing in the 4 future?
5 MR. POWERS: Yes, I would 6 expect we would, Jack. If you look in containment now, as 7 a matter of fact, there is a lot of sponge blasting 8 activity, for example, that were using to remove coatings 9 on surface service water piping, and we would expect that we would 10 also be removing coatings on conduit. We were just 11 grappling with what the best approach is to do that.
12 MR. DEAN: Jim, you mentioned 13 localized areas there. Is there some factors or some 14 criteria as far as your focus on some particular areas of 15 removal?
16 MR. POWERS: Randy described 17 the transport analysis were preparing, supports our sump 18 design. What that transport analysis means is, in the 19 containment after an accident you have water flow both from 20 sprays above as well as any leaks or water condensation.
21 That water moves through containment down through lower 22 levels. As it does, it may transport along with it paint 23 chips, dust, particulates and such.
24 And some areas of containment are more susceptible 25 to that water flow than others. For example, some of the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
43 1 conduit is located in areas where there is no water spray 2 that would affect it. Then, the likelihood of transport of 3 any unqualified coating chips to the sump is minimal.
4 So, were focusing on the areas that would have the 5 highest potential for any sort of paint debris to be 6 transported to the sump.
7 MR. DEAN: Thanks, Jim.
8 MR. FAST: Any other 9 questions? Okay. With that, Ill turn it over to Clark 10 Price.
11 MR. MYERS: Jack, I would 12 like to make a couple points.
13 As were going through Randys presentation, we 14 noted that the lifting of the reactor coolant pump motors, 15 the reactor coolant pumps themselves, work inside on the, 16 on the reactor vessel head. The work horse in our 17 containment is our crane, our polar crane. And, Randy kept 18 showing pictures.
19 Thats one of the things that we discussed for about 20 an hour one day in one of our public meetings and that 21 crane now is used on a daily basis. And, in fact, Ive 22 been monitoring the use of it. It seems to be, the 23 refurbishments that weve done are working extremely well.
24 Weve added a lot of new technology to it.
25 MR. PRICE: Okay, I guess its MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
44 1 my turn. My name is Clark Price. As Randy stated, Im the 2 owner of the Restart Action Process at Davis-Besse.
3 One of my responsibilities is to coordinate the 4 plants restart activities associated with the NRC 0350 5 Restart Checklist; and today, I would like to provide you 6 with an overall status of our progress to-date.
7 Under our Return to Service Plan, weve developed 8 several Building Blocks to detail our restart plans.
9 Listed on this slide are several significant milestones 10 that we have completed in those actions.
11 Im going to do a little movement too. Im going to 12 go over to the charts and discuss some of these milestones, 13 and looking at the charts at the same time. If I get in 14 your way, please let me know.
15 One of our Building Blocks is the Containment Health 16 Assurance Plan, which we developed to address the effects 17 the boric acid environment had on our containment 18 structure, systems and components.
19 We completed all of our discovery restart activities 20 associated with that, including comprehensive walkdowns and 21 inspections of the entire containment building.
22 We documented everything we found on condition 23 reports, which is what is shown on the first chart here.
24 As you can see, we are making progress. Were working down 25 those condition reports and doing the necessary evaluations MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
45 1 that are necessary to identify the corrective actions that 2 are necessary to complete what we found. And those are 3 identified in the second chart here.
4 These evaluations generate, well, these corrective 5 actions are then, they go through the Restart Station 6 Review Board for classification to determine what 7 corrective actions are required for restart and which can 8 wait until after restart. And once they are determined to 9 be restart, theyre put into our schedule and then 10 implemented by the assigned organizations.
11 So, what you can see here, and what Bill Dean 12 mentioned earlier, is part of what we discussed last month, 13 is we peaked out in late October and November time frame in 14 a lot of our discovery activities; and you can see that in 15 the chart. What that basically says, is the incoming 16 conditions that we identified, were working those off now 17 at a greater rate.
18 As a matter of fact, now as weve gotten through 19 discovery our incoming is almost nil and were continuing 20 to work off the condition reports. We need to work those 21 off and turn those into corrective actions and get about 22 working on those. And, thats what you see.
23 In the second set of two charts here are Program 24 Compliance Building Blocks. Weve completed both our Phase 25 1 and Phase 2 Program Reviews. The Phase 2 Program Reviews MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
46 1 are specifically on the NRCs 350 checklist. Again, we 2 generated condition reports out of all those reviews.
3 Thats shown in this chart here. And then those condition 4 reports are evaluated and turned into corrective actions, 5 which are shown in the next chart.
6 Again, you can see in both cases, were making 7 progress. We did -- the holiday season did have a little 8 bit of a negative effect. You can see we plateaued on some 9 of our efforts, but were gearing back up and we should be 10 making good progress through January.
11 The third set of charts here of two, are on our 12 System Health Assurance Building Block. Weve really 13 completed actually four major milestones in our System 14 Health Reviews. Early on, actually last year in the 15 spring, we completed our Operational Readiness Reviews, but 16 more recently what we completed is the Boric Acid System 17 Walkdown Outside of Containment.
18 One of our Restart Checklist items is to evaluate 19 the potential effects of any leakage we may have had on 20 boric acid systems outside of the containment building.
21 And, we went through that process, we did all the 22 inspections and walkdowns. Weve completed those, and 23 those are part of the System Health Review Condition 24 Reports that you see here.
25 Another major effort that was partaken underneath MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
47 1 the System Health Reviews, was the System Health Readiness 2 Reviews, where we reviewed over 31 -- we reviewed 31 3 systems that, which Jack mentioned earlier, that we 4 reviewed of our safety significant or risk significant 5 systems.
6 Finally, weve also completed our Latent Issues 7 Reviews on five additional selected systems, and those are 8 also included in there. I guess this will probably be the 9 right time to note too, Jack Grobe mentioned we met with 10 NRC on December 23rd and discussed our plans associated 11 with some of the issues we identified in this process that 12 we have to develop some further plans for; which we have, 13 and were currently implementing those plans.
14 Those plans like these will go through the same 15 process of identifying conditions, documenting those 16 condition reports, and then evaluating them and developing 17 the corrective actions that we need to take prior to 18 restart to resolve those issues.
19 Again, you can see were making good progress on our 20 condition report evaluations. And corrective actions, we 21 need to bend the curve a little bit. Weve got a lot of 22 them out there. Theres a lot of work and lot of restart 23 activities identified through the, through these reviews.
24 Then, finally, the last two graphs are the total 25 population of the condition reports and corrective actions MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
48 1 that weve identified to-date that are all required, that 2 these are the populations required for restart. And you 3 can see these two curves. These include the other Building 4 Blocks we have as well as corrective actions and condition 5 reports from normal day-to-day plant operations.
6 MR. GROBE: Clark, have 7 you -- I havent seen those charts with projected closure 8 rates and anticipated completion of those activities. Do 9 you have charts that show where youve man-loaded the work 10 effort thats necessary and projected out when those 11 activities are going to be complete? When I say those 12 activities, I mean completing review of the condition 13 reports so you know what corrective actions have to be done 14 and then completing the corrective actions.
15 MR. PRICE: Right. Yeah, we 16 have, we have a couple major contractors working on our 17 condition reports and helping us to manage those. And they 18 have charts that they put together that they bring into the 19 senior management team that will identify work-off rates 20 and work-off curves on these condition reports.
21 In addition, they are scheduling all of those 22 evaluations based on what weve identified as mode 23 restraints associated with each of those condition 24 reports.
25 MR. GROBE: Would it be MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
49 1 possible to share those work-off reports with us?
2 MR. PRICE: Yes.
3 MR. GROBE: Are they meeting 4 the work-off rates as projected?
5 MR. PRICE: I would say for 6 the last week, we thought we would get a little higher 7 production than we did. Most of them, I believe its on 8 the performance indicators that we supply; there is some 9 expected completion dates in mid February, mid to late 10 February, for completion of all the condition report 11 evaluations.
12 MR. MYERS: You have to watch 13 out for those numbers though. In that, one of the, you 14 look at, made you go through these things, some are 15 procedure changes, some are lets repack a valve or clean 16 up a little rust. Then you have another one, lets rebuild 17 a reactor coolant pump. And the reactor coolant pump is 18 probably worth half the others put together.
19 So, one of the things the management team has done, 20 we scrubbed all the CRs and CAs in the past few weeks, so 21 the top ones there.
22 Do you want to talk about that effort?
23 MR. GROBE: What I was going 24 to say, I agree with you, Lew. Just looking at strictly 25 numbers is not a complete --
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
50 1 MR. MYERS: Picture.
2 MR. GROBE: -- impression of 3 whats going on there. Thats why I like to focus on man 4 hours4.62963e-5 days <br />0.00111 hours <br />6.613757e-6 weeks <br />1.522e-6 months <br /> of work activities. One corrective action might take 5 10,000 man hours to complete; one might take five man hours 6 to complete. You have those type of work-off rates with 7 man worked hours loaded projections on them?
8 MR. PRICE: Yes, I do.
9 MR. GROBE: I would like to 10 see those.
11 MR. PRICE: Okay.
12 MR. DEAN: Sorry, Clark, 13 before you continue, I just wanted to comment, maybe ask 14 you to expound on a comment you made and maybe I didnt 15 quite understand it.
16 In discussing the relationship between incoming and 17 work-off rate, you basically noted that incoming work is 18 nil. Can you please expound on that a little bit?
19 MR. PRICE: Yeah. What were 20 seeing right now is the restart station where the review 21 board meets each day and goes through the condition reports 22 that were initiated the previous day, there are not too 23 many of those right now that are being classified as 24 required for restart.
25 Its really the context of the condition reports MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
51 1 that caused that to be. The majority of our condition 2 reports came out of our discovery efforts off our Building 3 Block Plans. So, that, does that answer your question, 4 Bill?
5 MR. DEAN: So, really what 6 youre saying is those items that are being deemed 7 necessary to support restart is relatively low even though 8 youre still identifying issues that are feeding your 9 Corrective Action Program.
10 MR. PRICE: Correct.
11 MR. DEAN: Okay.
12 MR. PRICE: Okay, this next 13 slide just goes through a little bit of our process. If I 14 sounded a little repetitive before, I really was. The 15 basic process behind all of our restart plans is the same 16 as depicted on this slide.
17 We perform our discovery activities that are laid 18 out in Building Block Plans, and we document all of our 19 findings on condition reports in our Corrective Action 20 Program. Those condition reports are classified as restart 21 O350, restart with our site criteria and nonrestart.
22 Mike Roder will talk a little more about the 23 Restart Safety Review Board in a moment, but the 350 means 24 that its associated directly with our Restart Checklist.
25 Site criteria actually is restart criteria at the site that MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
52 1 is established that go above and beyond the 350 criteria 2 for restart consideration.
3 And then, nonrestart are items that we determine are 4 not either required for restart or not really associated 5 with restart activities. It could be done any time. Many 6 of those are done right away, but theyre not necessarily 7 focused from a restart perspective.
8 These condition reports all go through an evaluation 9 phase, and then corrective actions come out of those 10 restart -- excuse me. Corrective actions come out of those 11 condition reports. And again, they are classified in the 12 same three categories.
13 Then, they go on to implementation, and our priority 14 for implementation is based on technical mode restraints, 15 administrative mode restraints, and pretty much logic and 16 schedule and management preference on where we want to 17 schedule those activities.
18 MR. GROBE: Clark, I know 19 that youve been spending a lot of effort on site to go 20 through the issues that are identified to make sure that 21 theyre properly characterized as to what milestone they 22 need to be closed by. Could you give me an idea of how 23 many issues have previously been characterized as restart 24 required items that are now characterized as something that 25 can be delayed to after restart?
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
53 1 MR. PRICE: Where we have 2 actually made a classification change on them? Oh, I 3 dont know, there havent been too many. What we do is, we 4 go through the condition reports and evaluations, and many 5 of those get classified as restarts. Are you talking kind 6 of percentage-wise how many get classified as required for 7 restart, how many post restart?
8 MR. GROBE: Actually what I 9 was looking at was more specifically, as youve gone 10 through these reviews and maybe, Randy, this is more a 11 question for you in the Operations area. I think youve 12 been trying to get your arms around from an Operations 13 perspective exactly whats needed in each mode. I was 14 wondering if there were things characterized as restart 15 required, that youve now deferred until after restart; and 16 how many issues like that have been coming up?
17 MR. RODER: I can address that 18 right now, if youd like.
19 Yeah, Jack. One of the things we did -- Im Mike 20 Roder, The Operations Manager.
21 One of the things we did in the last several weeks 22 is, we had several work orders and several corrective 23 actions that were coded as Priority 300. What that meant 24 was there a high desire to get those done, however they 25 werent necessarily required for restart.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
54 1 So, as we approach our restart dates, we are now 2 looking at those very seriously to which ones we still want 3 to get done and have a strong desire to get done and which 4 ones were going to defer to a later time.
5 So, we went through those, and I believe we came up 6 with somewhere in the area of maybe two, three hundred that 7 we deferred until later through our recent review; out of, 8 oh, I dont know how many total. Maybe Mike Stevens has a 9 better idea of the total number, but it was about maybe 20 10 percent of the electives that we deferred.
11 MR. GROBE: Just to make sure 12 I understand, Mike. Youve eliminated the Category 300, 13 and that was highly desirable prior to restart and made 14 those either restart requirements or you deferred them 15 until after restart?
16 MR. RODER: Thats correct.
17 MR. GROBE: And none of those 18 items that you deferred are viewed as equipment operability 19 issues or mode change restraints?
20 MR. RODER: No, none of them.
21 MR. GROBE: Have you got a 22 sense of what your corrective action backlog is going to be 23 at the time you restart the plant given what you know 24 today?
25 MR. STEVENS: Yes, its going to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
55 1 be less than 250 corrective action work orders. We define 2 our corrective maintenance through 18928, which is 3 the Institute of Nuclear Power Operators definition for 4 corrective maintenance and how the rest of the industry 5 characterizes that. It will be less than 250.
6 When we started into this refueling outage, our 7 corrective maintenance backlog was 193. So, weve taken, I 8 dont like to always use numbers, because it really doesnt 9 tell the story, but I can answer your question directly.
10 We had 160 Mode 6 restraints, that we took all the 11 work orders, all the corrective actions, all the CRs. Each 12 one has an owner. We had the whole team at the station go 13 through all their assignments and identify with the 14 Operations Mode Restraint Team, which are required for Mode 15 6. The result of that was 522, I believe, mode 16 restraints. So, we went from 160, and ended up with 522.
17 Came into work after the Christmas holiday, all 18 during the Christmas holiday, work control and work 19 management worked on identifying those restraints, figuring 20 out where they fit into schedule, readjusting our schedule 21 so we had a total integrated picture.
22 The management team at the station spent two whole 23 days touching each and every one of those owners and the 24 system managers going through each and every one of those 25 issues so they could understand and make recommendations.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
56 1 The team constituted the Restart Station Review 2 Board, but there were additional managers on that team to 3 ensure that we didnt miss anything.
4 The result of that, what came out of that, we 5 decided to take train one of the emergency diesel generator 6 out of service; go perform maintenance on that machine.
7 There is some issues with some of the bolting that make up 8 the coupling. We didnt have the documentation to assure 9 ourselves that those coupling bolts were tight. We needed 10 to know that before we called that machine operable.
11 That came out of the Operations Department. We took 12 that work activity. The bolts we found them at, torqued at 13 the proper value, however we added some additional work to 14 that outage that we normally would not have done and would 15 not have been restrained to start up, but because we were 16 in that condition and we had the materials ready to perform 17 that work, we lumped those together and performed that 18 maintenance.
19 Were doing those kinds of things. Were taking 20 advantage of the system, the structure, bringing the 21 systems back to support our milestones, as well as 22 implementing the work orders with the resources we have, 23 which includes the materials and the maintenance 24 organization.
25 And where we can, were implementing modifications.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
57 1 For example, we took, on our decay heat system, we have 2 decay heat valve 23. We took that apart for inspection.
3 We wanted to replace a gasket on its bonnet because there 4 was a indication of minor leakage. We got that identified, 5 scheduled.
6 We talked with the engineering department. We found 7 out we had a stainless steel yoke for that valve. The 8 craftsman, because of the deep drain valve work we did, 9 recognized that the use of the stainless steel yoke would 10 make that valve more robust.
11 We had our Design Engineering Just In Time Team, 12 which affectionately call the DE-JIT, involved in a work 13 support center. They said they could support the paperwork 14 necessary to put that stainless steel yoke on that valve.
15 So, we added that work order, real time went after that.
16 So, there is a lot like that, Jack, with examples I 17 can give. Its more than just the numbers. I would say we 18 added more work, in total, as were going forward meeting 19 these milestones and developing this schedule and getting 20 the work scope clearly defined and integrated.
21 MR. THOMAS: Does this process 22 also capture engineering projects that are being performed 23 at risk and ensure that the engineering work is completed 24 prior to that equipment, or transitioning to a mode where 25 that equipment is required?
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
58 1 MR. POWERS: Yes, Scott. The 2 process for releasing work to the field; although, we have 3 a built-in mechanism to release, where we call it an 4 at-risk release of a modification package. The operations 5 group cannot return a system to an operable status until 6 work is completed satisfactorily on a modification package; 7 and that means the mod is all complete and turned over.
8 So, that process is built in, those checks and controls.
9 (inaudible) 10 MR. GROBE: Is that 11 microphone working? No? I think you guys are going to 12 have to share one mike.
13 And you all dont have to write on the feedback form 14 that the sound system stinks. Ive already got that.
15 MR. POWERS: One of the things 16 that Mike is referring to is when we release work to the 17 field under this mechanism; for example, your earlier 18 question, Jack, on the emergency sump work is ongoing.
19 We go through a process of assuring that as work is 20 released, its scrutinized both by the Design Engineering 21 Manager, theyre reviewing it. Also our Engineering 22 Assessment Board takes a look at the change packages as 23 they go to the field. And then a summary of the risk 24 associated with that release is prepared by the engineers, 25 for my assessment and signature.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
59 1 And, when we talk about risk in this context what 2 were talking about is commercial risk to ourselves. Were 3 releasing work to the field for construction; and we saw 4 the pictures of the iron workers, boilermakers working down 5 in the sump area. If we were to release something that, on 6 the final package issue was, needed to be changed, then it 7 would be at our cost and schedule to go and change it, but 8 ultimately, the final package is issued before the system 9 is returned to service and all the detail is provided 10 there.
11 As I review the memorandum that summarizes what is 12 required to be completed yet, the formal final package, 13 then I can make a determination on the acceptability of the 14 commercial risk associated with that. And I provide 15 that then to Mike Stevens as the Outage Director. And he 16 provides a review of that, and then releases work to the 17 field if he believes that thats appropriate.
18 So, we have a number of checks and balances in the 19 process as we go through it that allows us to provide a 20 release of work to the field and get done those 21 improvements that we feel are necessary in the plant. And 22 ultimately through the program, make sure all the paperwork 23 is finalized prior to the system being returned to operable 24 status.
25 MR. MYERS: Thanks, Jim.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
60 1 MR. GROBE: I appreciate 2 that, Jim, and the reason I was asking questions, 3 particularly about the sump mod, we went through quite a 4 bit of planning over the last couple of weeks, and have 5 come up with about 80 inspector weeks of effort that we 6 need to put in on Davis-Besse before Mode 2.
7 And, one of the things we need to do before Mode 4 8 is confirm that the design of the sump that youre going to 9 have in place at the time you go to Mode 4 is adequate.
10 Now, I understand that youre separating that design 11 package into a couple of pieces, but the sump is an 12 important enough risk significant system, support system, 13 that we want to have confidence that its adequately 14 addressed before the first time you go to Mode 4.
15 So, its absolutely critical that we get that design 16 work. No job is done, especially in the nuclear industry, 17 until the paperwork is done. This job isnt done until the 18 NRC inspects it. So, were going to have to have time to 19 inspect those activities, and I hope you built that 20 appropriately into your schedule, getting this design work 21 early enough.
22 We dont have any problem with your at-risk 23 installation work. If you do it wrong, you just have to 24 redo it. We do have a concern regarding the completion of 25 the design and giving us enough time to inspect it.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
61 1 MR. STEVENS: How many weeks did 2 you say, Jack?
3 MR. GROBE: 80.
4 MR. STEVENS: 80 man weeks.
5 MR. MYERS: A couple comments, 6 I think. Were sitting here asking some technical 7 questions back and forth. From a public standpoint, I 8 think its important to note that we wound up with a 9 reactor vessel head issue when we built the Building 10 Blocks; and that put us into an outage thats considerably 11 different than what we typically will do.
12 In a typical refueling outage, we would plan the 13 outage probably starting a year ahead. We would know all 14 the CRs. We would generate the condition reports. We 15 would buy all the parts. And when we come down, we have 16 the work plans in place, we walked all the packages down 17 and were ready to implement.
18 In this particular outage, we walked all the systems 19 down. We decided to go over our reactor coolant pumps, 20 once we got in our extended outage. We decided to do a lot 21 more work, like the containment sump work, a lot of the 22 stuff we did in containment.
23 And were finding the problems on these curves, or 24 the questions, were finding the questions. Were 25 generating condition questions. And its called a CR.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
62 1 Then out of that comes CAs, and thats a condition we want 2 to go fix. And we divide those up, and there may be four 3 CAs for CR on the average.
4 Then were going to separate those things into 5 restart pile. Now once we do that, then we have to build a 6 work package. We have to order parts. Were actually 7 having parts manufactured in the field.
8 So, were out looking for parts and going to 9 vendors, and parts are a really important thing with us 10 right now. So, weve built this outage as were going 11 through it.
12 So, some of these questions that were asking about 13 CRs and CAs, and when are we going to have that done. A 14 lot of it is because were still, were out of the 15 discovery phase, and now were into full implementation.
16 Were out building work packages for people to use. Were 17 out building, estimating the job, the times and the parts, 18 and buying parts. So, all that is going on while these 19 meetings are going on.
20 So, I think thats the reason some of these 21 questions dont seem as clean as they should be. Is that 22 fair?
23 MR. GROBE: Yep.
24 MR. MYERS: Okay.
25 MR. MENDIOLA: If I can ask a MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
63 1 question in a different direction on the same topic. We 2 talked a lot about all these condition reports turning into 3 corrective actions and then being sorted out into restart, 4 if you will, and nonrestart. I can not get out of my head 5 the image that there is a large stack of nonrestart 6 corrective actions that are, that are going to be scheduled 7 to some milestone or some future date, if you will, beyond 8 restart.
9 MR. MYERS: Yep.
10 MR. MENDIOLA: And Im not 11 getting, if you will, a clear understanding of what theyre 12 being tied to or what event theyre being tied to or that 13 theyre actually being scheduled to a date, an 14 opportunity.
15 MR. MYERS: If theyre not, 16 you know, if theyre not a restart item, then theyre going 17 into our bucket, and that bucket right now looks like, I 18 think its about three thousand?
19 MR. PRICE: Yeah, there is 20 seven thousand.
21 MR. MYERS: Yeah, corrective 22 actions that well probably have when we start up, is 23 pretty much in line with what we see. How many?
24 MR. PRICE: Seven.
25 MR. MYERS: Seven? Which is, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
64 1 thats --
2 MR. RODER: Thats total.
3 MR. MYERS; Thats total.
4 MR. RODER: And there is 1500 5 restart right now that weve identified. So, there is 6 about 5500 that are undergoing that review process.
7 MR. MENDIOLA: My view is that 8 3000 or so of these items are suddenly going to come, for 9 lack of better terminology, due on the plants restart.
10 That youll have to suddenly, if you will, have a large 11 crush of resources needed to plan, implement, prep for and, 12 you know, seek an opportunity.
13 MR. MYERS: Thats right.
14 MR. MENDIOLA: I want to get, if 15 you will, the feeling that these are also being planned.
16 If you will, that the organization, as we go through these 17 condition reports and corrective actions, is looking beyond 18 restart to properly place these items, if you will, in a 19 scheme that will get them complete.
20 MR. POWERS: Ill give you a 21 picture in the engineering world, Tony, on that one. We 22 completed recently an Engineering Capabilities Assessment, 23 as you know. One of the action items we got there is to 24 prepare a plan, resource allocated plan, to work off the 25 remaining actions that will be in place following the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
65 1 restart of the plant.
2 That action plan is going to be created and be in 3 place by June 30th. We already have that action within our 4 Corrective Action Program. Its an item that needs to 5 occur. Chuck Holly, who is my manager, project manager, 6 has that action, put it together.
7 Dave Eshelman who is our Director of Asset, Complete 8 Asset Management, has the action to divide resources among 9 the FENOC fleet to ensure that resources are applied to 10 work those off.
11 So, were already turning an eye to that concern 12 that we start up and have work ahead of us that we will be 13 scheduling and resource well be working off.
14 MR. MENDIOLA: I would almost 15 hope there would be, if you will, more work than you have 16 between now and restart.
17 MR. POWERS: That may be the 18 case.
19 MR. MYERS: I dont think 20 thats the case. I think that there may be more 21 activities.
22 MR. MENDIOLA: Thats right; more 23 activities, more, if you will, more tasks.
24 MR. MYERS: The big work is 25 done. There is no containment sumps or anything like MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
66 1 that.
2 MR. POWERS: Right.
3 MR. MYERS: Ready for 4 restart? Go ahead.
5 MR. GUDGER: Im Dave Gudger, 6 Manager for Performance Improvement.
7 We consciously underwent a review of these 8 corrective actions and condition reports youre referring 9 to. Most of these are conditions nonadverse to quality.
10 We knew that we were going to move these out to a later 11 point in time following our restart.
12 This process is allowing us to focus on the more 13 critical and safety significant work for the power plant.
14 In doing so, part of our process is, as soon as we 15 restart, were going to take these items and we are going 16 to take a look at scheduling them out, based on our 17 resources at that time, but we wanted our staff to focus 18 more importantly on the critical items right now. And, 19 these items were getting in the way of that, so we took a 20 proactive approach of this and performed that review.
21 MR. MENDIOLA: So, Im sorry, to 22 paraphrase what you said, more or less set aside for now 23 until restart is over, at which time they will be 24 scheduled, and resourced.
25 MR. GUDGER: Thats correct.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
67 1 MR. PRICE: Tony, one of the 2 other things that the Restart Station Review Board does in 3 reviewing both condition reports and corrective actions 4 that we classify as nonrestart, we identify whether those 5 are needed. A plant outage, refueling outage, system 6 outage or it can be done any time on the line to help us in 7 the future in prioritizing that work and getting it laid 8 out.
9 MR. MENDIOLA: Not to belabor 10 this more, but it seems that, if you will, whats being set 11 up is a process now to identify those items necessary for 12 restart in order to have them resourced and completed prior 13 to restart; and if you will, a new separate scheme to deal 14 with items after restart; rather than, if you will, one 15 continuous in place process to do all work, whether it be 16 before restart or after restart.
17 MR. MYERS: Thats correct.
18 MR. MENDIOLA: What I said first, 19 the first part?
20 MR. MYERS: Thats correct, 21 yes.
22 MR. MENDIOLA: So, the plan is to 23 have one plan, if you will, between now and restart, and a 24 separate plan, if you will, after restart.
25 MR. MYERS: Thats correct.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
68 1 Once, weve got these items that are on the plate that we 2 know about. Weve reviewed all those. Weve characterized 3 them for restart. And as soon as we restart, well start 4 going through those activities, and we built in a midcycle 5 outage, which will take on a lot of that.
6 So, we thought about that and planned that out. So, 7 we have a midcycle that we planned in somewhere after about 8 a year of operation. Thats what our intent is there.
9 MR. GROBE: This is not 10 unanticipated for a plant in your condition.
11 MR. MYERS: No, its 12 typical.
13 MR. GROBE: I expected there 14 would be several thousand items that need to be addressed 15 after restart. The number 250 corrective maintenance kind 16 of surprised me, that seemed low, but well look at that.
17 Why dont we get on with Clarks presentation, the 18 last couple of slides, and then well take a five minute 19 break.
20 MR. PRICE: Okay. This last 21 slide, I would like to present today, is a simplified 22 version of a management tool we use on site to monitor our 23 progress towards our Restart Checklist activities.
24 The first two columns that are colored in that 25 chart, the first column -- I dont know if you can see the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
69 1 overhead, or you can look on your slides.
2 The first column is a discovery column. Thats 3 where we do all our inspection walkdown and other types of 4 discovery activities, document those, and complete that 5 discovery activity. And, as you can see, most of those 6 activities in that area are complete. Green indicates 7 complete on the chart, and blue indicates work that is 8 still in progress.
9 The second column is the implementation phase.
10 And then the last column thats on that, that 11 report, is a restart ready column, which essentially says 12 that weve completed all the discovery and implementation 13 activities associated with the particular Restart Checklist 14 item. And from a site perspective, weve determined its 15 ready for restart. It will still require NRC inspection 16 prior to it being closed out, and closed the Restart 17 Checklist from an NRC perspective.
18 So, I think from this chart, you can see were 19 making good progress. Kind of affectionately call it our 20 Go Green Chart on site.
21 Now, next meeting when we come in, we expect to see 22 a lot of these progress, considerably more, and many of 23 them nearing completion, if not complete, from the work 24 that were going to be doing on site, and preparations for 25 the final NRC inspections.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
70 1 Any questions on this chart?
2 MR. GROBE: Two questions.
3 The Boric Acid Corrosion Management Program and the Reactor 4 Coolant System Unidentified Leakage Monitoring Program.
5 Thats 3 Delta and Echo. Are those going to be complete 6 before the first Mode 4?
7 MR. PRICE: Yes, they will.
8 MR. GROBE: Okay. Its my 9 expectation that we will have those two areas, those two 10 programs inspected before you go to Mode 4 the first time.
11 Thats not a requirement on our part, but thats my 12 expectation.
13 Is the Reactor Coolant System -- I think the Boric 14 Acid Corrosion Management Program is now complete. Is the 15 Boric Acid Reactor Coolant System Unidentified Leakage 16 Monitoring Program, what condition is that in right now?
17 MR. PRICE: Were actually 18 going to talk about that shortly. Ill defer that 19 question, you can defer to later, to Jerry Lee, who will be 20 discussing that program, if you would.
21 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you.
22 MR. PRICE: Okay, if there is 23 no other questions -- well, were going to take a break.
24 MR. GROBE: Its, yeah, weve 25 been at it for about an hour and a half, why dont we just MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
71 1 take a ten minute break. I hesitate saying that, because 2 that sometimes stretches into 15, but I expect to start 3 promptly in 10 minutes. Bill says thats a five minute 4 break.
5 (Off the record.)
6 MR. GROBE: The number I 7 noted was 79 inspector weeks between now and Mode 2, which 8 is a couple of months from now, several months from now.
9 That is performed by a fairly large number of inspectors.
10 And these are, there is multiple inspections that are going 11 on, on a regular basis.
12 Apparently, some folks developed some concerns that 13 that was 80 weeks sequentially, or that these two gentlemen 14 on my right are going to be performing the next 40 weeks 15 continuous inspection. This is many inspectors coming from 16 both Region III, other regions and headquarters that will 17 be performing these inspections.
18 This is not an unusual level of work effort that is 19 necessary to bring one of these types of outages to a 20 closure. So, I didnt mean to cause excitement or concern 21 that the workload was onerous or unattainable. This is 22 something that weve clearly planned for. The NRC will put 23 the necessary staff on this project to get the job done 24 consistent with the schedule that FirstEnergy expects for 25 their restart.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
72 1 I dont anticipate any delays associated with NRC 2 inspection activities. Of course, unless the inspection 3 findings are not positive, in which case, additional work 4 would have to be done on the part of FirstEnergy to address 5 those issues.
6 So, the message you should take from those comments 7 is the NRC clearly has its work mapped out, and resource 8 loaded, and that we will perform the inspections that need 9 to be performed to make sure this plant is safe before it 10 would restart. Okay? Thanks.
11 Go ahead, Dave.
12 MR. GUDGER: Im Dave Gudger.
13 Im the Manager of Performance Improvement.
14 MR. GROBE: I dont think your 15 microphone is on.
16 MR. GUDGER: Im Dave Gudger, 17 Manager of Performance Improvement. Performance 18 Improvement is responsible for the corrective action 19 process, the day-to-day administration of the program, as 20 well as the restart improvements that were here to share 21 with you today.
22 First, the Corrective Action Program is first line 23 of defense for identifying and addressing problems in the 24 plant, as Lew has previously stated.
25 Im very excited to be here today. We have many MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
73 1 enhancements well share with you during the course of this 2 presentation. These enhancements include process 3 improvements, procedure change, oversight and training 4 needs. This presentation provides the status of the 5 progress the Corrective Action Program is making towards 6 restart.
7 In general, the program works, as evidenced by Clark 8 Price, who was showing you all the work activities that we 9 have that were working off during the course of this 10 outage.
11 We performed a comprehensive assessment of the 12 program. We learned the mechanics of the program are 13 acceptable; however, improvement of the programs 14 implementation is needed. The desired outcome today is to 15 show how our action plan drive the necessary improvements 16 for restart.
17 Next slide.
18 This slide is an overview of our program. For 19 simplification purposes, it is comprised of four functional 20 areas. To your left, there is rectangular boxes. It 21 requires interactive monitoring and management feedback, 22 which is represented by the center double areas of the 23 program.
24 We utilized performance indicators to communicate 25 this need of the program and to accomplish this. Our MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
74 1 enhanced performance indicators are giving us feedback on 2 our implementation activities as well as theyll be 3 utilized for continued plant operation.
4 The programs effectiveness on the interim was 5 maintained with immediate actions that we took.
6 Next slide.
7 This slide presents some of the key actions that we 8 took. Its not all inclusive, but these are important 9 actions for which not only do these maintain the programs 10 effectiveness, but also weve strengthened the program at 11 the same time.
12 The first item is, we provided feedback to the 13 initiator of condition reports, as well as their 14 supervisors through he mail e-mail. This is automated and this 15 ensures that the initiators of conditions have an 16 understanding of how weve dispositioned them and corrected 17 them. This is an important part of our program.
18 Enhanced performance indicators have been developed, 19 as you will see, as well as weve increased our performance 20 monitoring over the program. This is what gives us the 21 feedback to give our management the input to make the 22 necessary adjustments.
23 Supervisor awareness training of leadership behavior 24 expectations was conducted. The supervisors are the most 25 important part of our program. These individuals start on MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
75 1 the initiation of a condition report with communications up 2 through management. They provide the leadership and 3 direction for oversight on the evaluation process, as well 4 as theyre at the closure of the process to make the 5 corrective actions implement in the proper way.
6 Operations has enhanced the senior reactor operator 7 review standards. Operations focus is on plant equipment 8 and systems reviews; the impact, the way the plant 9 operates. They are more rigorously evaluated and 10 documented providing adequate basis for the site to 11 understand the decision and the determination made.
12 The independent validation reviews have been 13 conducted by the performance improvement organization, as 14 well as there were other reviews during the course of the 15 process by other review groups. This ensures the program 16 is in compliance with the following procedure. Individuals 17 get feedback from the various program reviews, as weve 18 provided them in our performance indicators.
19 Next slide.
20 This slide as on overview of improvement actions 21 that were taking for restart. Ive simplified it. Its 22 not all inclusive again; however, it brings the major 23 points for you to understand.
24 There will be process changes in the areas of 25 communication. Were establishing routine feedback MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
76 1 mechanisms, as I suggested with the initiator and 2 supervisor feedback; a newsletter and a website, as well as 3 we have a planned case study coming up.
4 The database user aids provide process checklists 5 for individuals using the program. So, we ensure that 6 were complying to procedures; as well as electronic forms 7 to ease the burden and make it more efficient on the 8 users.
9 Performance appraisals now include a Corrective 10 Action Program expectation, as well as weve raised it to 11 the highest level, its a nuclear safety competency for our 12 organization.
13 In the area of procedure enhancements, were 14 reformating the procedure in a work flow layout, as well as 15 ensuring that the user has input where we are able to 16 accept it. This increases user efficiency and ownership by 17 the organization.
18 Weve also included a responsibility section. Each 19 individual that interfaces with the program up through the 20 management ranks has responsibilities. Theyre delineating 21 delineated in the procedure now.
22 Weve incorporated effectiveness and collected 23 significant significance reviews. Effectiveness reviews are where we 24 evaluate corrective actions to ensure that theyre 25 addressing the causes. Collective significant significance reviews, we MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
77 1 evaluate similar issues and we look for or identify our 2 cost-cutting causes that we can address across the 3 organization.
4 In the oversight changes, weve provided the 5 Corrective Action Review Board Charter. It now includes 6 quorum requirements. We have specific section level 7 managers participation, as well as we have a director 8 chairing the board. And, lastly, we also include root 9 cause quorum requirements of these managers.
10 We have root cause approval levels that have been 11 raised. The Vice President reviews all root causes, as 12 well as selected significant conditions adverse to quality 13 reports will be reviewed by the Chief Operating Officer, 14 as well as the Nuclear Group Council, which is comprised of 15 our executive level management.
16 Training needs have also been addressed. We have 17 provided root cause and evaluator training to our people.
18 We have over 180 qualified individuals, as well as training 19 now controls the qualifications of all of our evaluators.
20 We have annual, we are proposing annual site 21 training, like plant access training and radiologic worker 22 training which each of our folks receive each year, we are 23 also going to have a module for the Corrective Action 24 Program. This will bring the Corrective Action Program to 25 the forefront of our operation.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
78 1 We will also have refresher evaluator requirements.
2 This will be conducted on a periodic basis, and it will 3 include computer based training.
4 These particular improvement actions that Ive 5 described will bring the Corrective Action Program to the 6 forefront of our operation.
7 Next slide.
8 This slide provides an overview of our top level 9 performance indicators. As the process owner, Performance 10 Improvement monitors the programs effectiveness. These 11 are the top level performance indicators by which we do 12 so. Performance indicators indicate the actions taken are 13 effective so far, as you can see from the status here. We 14 see positive results from these actions taken.
15 If there is no question on performance indicators, 16 Ill move right on. Jack, you may have had a question 17 earlier --
18 MR. GROBE: I have one 19 question.
20 MR. GUDGER: -- on some of the 21 numbers here.
22 MR. GROBE: The Condition 23 Report Category, Accuracy; you call it CR Category Accuracy 24 in your chart.
25 MR. GUDGER: Thats correct.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
79 1 MR. GROBE: That indicator 2 kind of bounces all around, doesnt appear to be trending 3 in any particular direction. That indicator, if I 4 understand it correctly, is an indicator that judges how 5 your field folk and first line supervisors assess the 6 significance of conditions that are identified in the 7 plant, and whether they do that accurately or not. Is that 8 correct?
9 MR. GUDGER: Yes, thats 10 correct.
11 MR. GROBE: Why is it that you 12 dont have -- I interpret that as one of the many 13 indicators that you can use to look at Safety Culture. Why 14 is it that youre not having a positive trend in that area?
15 MR. GUDGER: If you look at the 16 data that youre referring to, we have had a couple points 17 of which it dropped, thats probably overly influenced the 18 indicator. We consistently stayed high in the range of 19 categorization. There is going to be some deviation, but 20 when the supervisor makes a recommendation to the manager, 21 we gauge the difference between when the MRB or the 22 Management Review Board, in the morning managers meeting, 23 determines a categorization difference.
24 MR. GROBE: Im not sure you 25 answered my question. Maybe you can, I expect that on the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
80 1 30th, youre probably going to be talking about some 2 performance indicators that youre going to be using to 3 assess Safety Culture. Maybe you could look at this one 4 and determine whether or not this is something that is, 5 provides some indication of Safety Culture and whether 6 youre comfortable that its a valid indicator in what its 7 telling you.
8 MR. GUDGER: Okay, well 9 consider that. It was not developed for Safety Culture in 10 mind.
11 MR. GROBE: I understand.
12 Youre just now developing Safety Culture assessment 13 methodology, but this seems to me to be one that goes to 14 the appreciation of the people in the field, the staff and 15 the first line supervisors of the relative significance of 16 the various issues that come up. Okay. Im going to be 17 interested in further dialogue on that.
18 MR. GUDGER: Okay. These 19 indicators show that we are improving and were on track 20 for restart.
21 Next slide.
22 In summary, we have an approved action plan in place 23 that addresses the necessary improvements for the program.
24 We are scheduled, we are scheduled for implementation of 25 the enhanced program by the end of February, 2003.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
81 1 Thats all I have.
2 MR. DEAN: Dave, I have a 3 question for you. It kind of ties a little bit where Jack 4 was heading, so maybe were foreshadowing a little bit the 5 meeting on the 30th.
6 In looking ahead to the discussion later on, talking 7 about Safety Conscious Work Environment and Safety Culture, 8 it addresses the importance of having an effective 9 Corrective Action Program as being an indicator that 10 employees feel problems are being identified, that they are 11 being resolved.
12 I guess what I want to ask you was, how were you 13 tying or are you typing tying things that come out of the 14 Employee Concerns Program into your Corrective Action 15 Program in monitoring and measuring those?
16 MR. GUDGER: Bill Pearce will 17 speak more toward that at the end of the presentation. We 18 do have a strategy for how we allowed for our different 19 programs to be integrated under the Safety Conscious Work 20 Environment. The Corrective Action Program is one element 21 of that; however, it is only one element of several ways 22 for people to express their concerns.
23 MR. DEAN: Okay, thanks.
24 Well get to it later.
25 MR. GUDGER: Okay, any other MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
82 1 questions? If not, Ill turn it over to Jerry Lee.
2 MR. MYERS: We start out --
3 let me see if I can save some of the discussion we had 4 earlier.
5 Question was asked earlier about backlogs, after 6 startup. Now our backlogs after startup, Im not going to 7 use numbers, but lets just say were estimating right now 8 in the 7000 CA range. Thats relatively low, you know, 9 compared to some operating plants and also low compared to 10 a plant thats been in an extended shutdown. So, we feel 11 like thats in line.
12 The other question was asked is, are we prepared to 13 deal with that. I thought we answered it earlier. Weve 14 already looked ahead. We know that backlog is there. And 15 as soon as we start up, we intend to put a team together 16 and go after that backlog and that resource. So, that 17 workload we do anticipate and we think its easily 18 managed.
19 MR. GROBE: I hope our 20 questions in that area were not interpreted as criticisms.
21 Its expected that there will be a substantive amount of 22 work that is not necessary to assure the safety of the 23 plant, but are issues that youve identified. Youve spent 24 a lot of effort going through the plant and essentially 25 turning over every rock, so to speak, to find what issues MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
83 1 might be there.
2 And some of them are very low level issues as far as 3 significance, and those are going to be part of your 4 backlog. There may be some that are more important that 5 are part of your backlog, but dont affect safety systems 6 or the safety of the plant in an immediate sense.
7 We plan on taking a pretty good look at your backlog 8 just prior to restart, to get a sense of the, the 9 integrated effect of that backlog; both from an impact on 10 any safety systems. Sometimes individual issues look like 11 theyre not particularly important, but when you put it 12 together with another 20 individual issues that didnt look 13 pretty important, sometimes it tells a different story.
14 So, part of our inspection activities prior to 15 restart, the readiness for restart, will be an integrated 16 look at the backlog and whether or not there is some 17 embedded safety strands there that need attention.
18 MR. MYERS: I understand.
19 MR. LEE: Good afternoon, 20 my name is Jerry Lee, and Im a plant engineer and Im the 21 owner of the Reactor Coolant Integrity Management Program 22 or the Reactor Coolant Integrated Leakage Program.
23 My desire today is to provide a structural overview 24 of this new and comprehensive program. The Reactor Coolant 25 Leakage Program will challenge, evaluate, identify and MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
84 1 repair low level leakage, reinforcing a strong reactor 2 coolant system inventory balance. The program is designed 3 with two fundamental values of safe plant operation.
4 The first is to provide assurance of zero pressure, 5 additional assurance of zero pressure boundary leakage.
6 The second is to provide early detection and resolution of 7 low level reactor coolant system leakage. Additionally, 8 this program was designed to set industry standards for the 9 identification and resolution of leakage.
10 This really starts by the plant employees. Their 11 sensitivity to the reactor coolant system leak indicators, 12 particularly the changes in the reactor coolant leakage 13 system.
14 Part of this was with the reactor coolant head case 15 study presented to the employees. This clearly identified 16 the results of low level reactor coolant leakage.
17 Reactor coolant leakage trends will be made visible 18 to plant employees using BBTB, and other media sources to 19 ensure that leakage is clearly presented daily.
20 The program action triggers for adverse trends for 21 unidentified leakage and for indirect leakage, such as 22 containment activity, radiation elements, filter plugging, 23 primary and secondary leaks; will be documented in 24 corrective action programs and will be evaluated for plant 25 impact.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
85 1 Adverse trends will be, are going to be very low.
2 The trigger for these trends are very low to provide for 3 ample time for training and implementation for any actions 4 required for a safe, documented and controlled function.
5 Thats up to and including a shutdown.
6 The improvements in the leakage rate calculation 7 algorithm and reactor coolant system inventory balance is 8 to insure that we have the best possible measurement and 9 analysis results.
10 The Boric Acid Corrosion Control and the In-service 11 Inspection Programs link with the Reactor Coolant System 12 Integrated Leakage Program to form an inclusive reactor 13 coolant system integrity management program, thus providing 14 assurance of the reactor coolant system boundary.
15 Three different reactor coolant system leakage 16 evaluation trends will be obtained from the water 17 inconventory balance requiring, thats required to be 18 performed at least every 72 hours8.333333e-4 days <br />0.02 hours <br />1.190476e-4 weeks <br />2.7396e-5 months <br />. Typically, we do this 19 daily.
20 These evaluation trends are cumulative. This is a 21 summation of all the leakage that has come out from the 22 reactor coolant system over a period of time.
23 We also have a rate of change, which is the actual 24 change in the rate of leakage. This is calculated over a 25 seven day period and extrapolated to a 13 -- or a 30-day MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
86 1 period.
2 Then we have a step change. Now, this is a 3 sustained change in the leakage level, and it has to be 4 stained for greater than three days. These evaluation 5 trends were used to analyze the 1996 to 2002 leakage data 6 from Davis-Besse. And the triggers or action levels 7 provided in the program would have prompted the plant to 8 take safe, or take actions to resolve leakage in the summer 9 of 1998.
10 The plant will have a 7-day hold coming up. Well 11 do a nonnuclear heatup to normal operating power, normal 12 operating temperature. At this point, were really going 13 to validate our new algorithm, and our new methodology, and 14 make sure that we can achieve the lowest possible measured 15 leak rate.
16 This is an unusual time for us, because we normally 17 do not have steady state conditions at normal operating 18 power and temperature -- or normal operating pressure and 19 temperature.
20 Typically, we would go through Mode 3, Mode 2 and 21 then to Mode 1, so we would not have steady state 22 conditions. This will allow us an opportunity to fine tune 23 this program, but it will also provide us with information 24 for a baseline during Mode 3 testing, which can be compared 25 to the hundred percent power data we would obtain later.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
87 1 During the 7-day hold period, we will also have 2 Engineering, Operations, Radiation Protection and 3 In-service Inspectors, along with Boric Acid Corrosion 4 Control Inspectors throughout Containment walking down the 5 systems. We would do this at a pressure of approximately 6 250 pounds prior to the heatup. And we would do another 7 inspection at normal operating pressure and temperature.
8 Well come back down from normal operating pressure 9 and temperature after about a 7-day hold; and well come 10 back in and do another inspection of the Reactor Coolant 11 System.
12 Now, each of the these evaluation trend types has 13 three different Action Levels. The Action Levels are very 14 low, but Action Level I, we want to provide added 15 management oversight. Were going to bring this up to the 16 attention of the management in the morning meeting as soon 17 as we find an indicator. Well increase the walkdowns and 18 readily assessable areas throughout the plant, and well 19 monitor all the indirect leakage indicators.
20 Action Level II, well come back and do again all 21 the readily available walkdowns, accessible areas. Were 22 doing the same actions as in Level I, but were going to 23 extend it. The walkdown will include some of the not 24 readily accessible areas, such as in containment that can 25 be accessed during power operation.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
88 1 And were going to add a containment walkdown and 2 inspection to a forced outage list. Action Level III, 3 were going to repeat everything again, and evaluate and 4 schedule a plant shutdown to find and repair the leakage.
5 Are there any questions?
6 MR. POWERS: There is a 7 question on, with the program here, one of the things 8 thats you designed into it is consideration for how this 9 program enhancement would have helped us find the head 10 degradation issue. Can you describe the sensitivity of 11 this program?
12 MR. LEE: Well, the 13 sensitivity of this program is such that had we had this 14 program in place prior to the head degradation, we would 15 have had about 13 opportunities -- Im sorry, about 21 16 opportunities to enter Action Level III, which would mean 17 we would look at a shutdown, schedule a shutdown to go in 18 and inspect for leakage.
19 During cycle 13, that would have been eleven times 20 of entering Action Level III, so eleven different 21 opportunities. So, thats the sensitivity of this 22 program.
23 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you 24 very much, Jerry. I just have one question. Maybe youre 25 not the right guy to answer this, but I understand that MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
89 1 prior to restart, youre going to be installing the Flus 2 system, the new leakage monitoring system. Are your, is 3 your leakage management program written to address the 4 traditional leakage monitoring tools that you have in 5 containment, or is it also going to incorporate the input 6 that youre going to get from the Flus Monitoring System?
7 MR. LEE: The program, this 8 program is really designed for the low level leakage, 9 thats what were going after. The Flus Program will be 10 incorporated into this, any new modifications in the future 11 to give us higher detectability levels on whether its 12 activity or whatever, will be added into this. This is an 13 ongoing program.
14 The completion of this program, it will be complete 15 prior to entering Mode 4. Well have some enhancement 16 steps to come out of Mode 4, or out of the Mode 3, 7-day.
17 We want to verify our Action Levels. We want to make them 18 as low as possible. But the program will be in place prior 19 to Mode 4 -- yeah, prior to Mode 4. And then we will make 20 those enhancements prior to starting up.
21 MR. MYERS: So, the answer to 22 the question is yes.
23 MR. LEE: Yes, sir.
24 MR. MYERS: It also includes 25 the radiation monitors, stuff like that, right?
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
90 1 MR. LEE: It includes 2 everything thats coming down the pike.
3 MR. DEAN: To build on Jacks 4 question, I think the last time we met, there was still 5 some, some doubt as to whether the Flus System would be 6 installed in time for the NOT/NOP Test. Where is the 7 status of that?
8 MR. SCHRAUDER: It is expected 9 that the Flus System will be able to be installed prior to 10 the NOP/NOT.
11 MR. DEAN: Okay. Thanks, 12 Bob.
13 MR. HOPKINS: Yeah, I have a 14 question. Are you going to do a similar type system at 15 Beaver Valley or any of your other plants?
16 MR. MYERS: We havent made 17 that decision yet. Im unable to answer that now.
18 MR. HOPKINS: And the 19 improvements of the program, you say, is setting an 20 industry standard; right? This isnt bringing you up to 21 what the other industry has, this is going above?
22 MR. MYERS: This is very 23 unique, were excited about this program. This was 24 something we added based on going back and reviewing the 25 entire history over several years of the head degradation, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
91 1 and saying, what could we have done different. So, what 2 were trying to do is take those lessons learned and anchor 3 them using one of our processes and a procedure, so that in 4 the future that wont be there. It will send the red flag 5 and set the Actions Levels that management will have to 6 look at. So, were really excited about this program.
7 Its unique.
8 MR. HOPKINS: The number of 9 times you indicated that you had opportunities to enter 10 Level Action III, thats just based on leakage, correct, 11 and not the indirect indicators of one containment cooler 12 fouling?
13 MR. MYERS: I think its 14 related on indirect --
15 MR. LEE: This is based on 16 the direct.
17 MR. MYERS: Direct indicators.
18 MR. LEE: Direct indicators.
19 Indirect indicators that we could also use to narrow down 20 the leakage or provide us information, yes.
21 MR. HOPKINS: Okay.
22 MR. GROBE: I would like to 23 follow-up with Jons question with just a little more -- I 24 get confused when you talk about operating cycles.
25 You indicated that there were more than ten MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
92 1 opportunities that this program would have presented in a 2 formal way for management to consider reactor coolant 3 system leakage questions during Operating Cycle 13. That 4 was from 2000 to 2002; is that correct?
5 MR. LEE: That would be 6 correct, yes.
7 MR. GROBE: Okay. The Boric 8 Acid Management Program, the Corrective Action Program, in 9 this topical area, while previously it was not a specific 10 program. I dont think there was a lack of awareness 11 necessarily of reactor coolant system leakage at the plant.
12 I think the Corrective Action Program itself was in fairly 13 good shape as far as a procedure document.
14 I think the Boric Acid Management Program also is in 15 fairly good shape. Youve made enhancements to both of 16 those programs, but really what was going on at the station 17 wasnt the programs themselves, it was the people 18 monitoring the program.
19 And, I appreciate this initiative. As you 20 mentioned, Lew, this is a first in the industry. It 21 provides an additional barrier.
22 MR. MYERS: Right.
23 MR. GROBE: And gives you 24 additional insight that you might not have readily 25 available to you, so I think thats positive.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
93 1 But really, in all three of those areas, its really 2 the safety culture that resulted in failures. It wasnt 3 the programs per se. So, Im keenly interested, and Im 4 giving Mike Roder a preamble of a question Im going to 5 have for his discussion; Im keenly interested in how 6 youre considering safety culture improvements in your mode 7 change decisions.
8 MR. MYERS: Let me comment on 9 what you said too. Many of our programs like the, this is 10 written similar to the Action Level Program that you see 11 that works every day for chemistry control. All right?
12 MR. GROBE: Right.
13 MR. MYERS: This program is 14 sort of molded like that. And that works, because it has 15 trigger points where it forces you to make management 16 decisions. What we had before did not force you to make 17 those decisions. And it also has requirements like that, 18 if you see these type, a Level III, you got to start 19 scheduling within the next 30 days a shutdown, to go look 20 for it. So, its got management requirements.
21 So, that is a fundamental difference in safety 22 culture, of anchoring a safety culture change different 23 than what we had before. Okay?
24 MR. GROBE: Yep.
25 Any other questions?
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
94 1 MR. MENDIOLA: Im sorry, you 2 probably said it sometime in there. Whats your schedule 3 for implementation of this?
4 MR. LEE: Were putting 5 together an implementation schedule today. Were getting 6 ready to put one together, but the schedule for the actual 7 program, the program will be implemented prior to entering 8 Mode 4. During the 7-day hold period, the nonnuclear 9 heatup, we will be doing some verification and some 10 enhancements, possibly, and making sure that we have the 11 lowest minimum detected level that we can achieve.
12 After we come back down from that 7-day hold, we may 13 very well do some enhancements to the program, but the 14 program will be complete prior to entering Mode 4.
15 MR. MENDIOLA: Okay. I would 16 feel from that statement alone that there is feeling that 17 there is no changes to any of our text tech. specs or your text 18 tech. spec bases associated with this program?
19 MR. LEE: No, this is much 20 lower than those numbers.
21 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you.
22 MR. LEE: Now, I would like 23 to introduce Mike Roder.
24 MR. RODER: Thank you, 25 Jerry.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
95 1 My name is Mike Roder, again, I am the Manager of 2 Plant Operations. And Im pleased to be here today to 3 report on a couple different things.
4 First of all, our personnel readiness for Mode 6, 5 and also I would like to spend a little more time on what 6 Clark started us off on; and thats the Station Review 7 Board, Restart Station Review Board, and how that process 8 of reviewing the condition reports and corrective actions 9 lead to our departmental reviews of items for Mode 6.
10 And also independent of that, totally independent 11 and redundant, the Operations organization did our reviews 12 for Mode 6, and then finally, the Multi-discipline Review 13 that we had, spoke of earlier, about a two-day process of 14 finding exactly what was required for our mode stations.
15 Next slide, please.
16 First of all, from personnel readiness, we spent a 17 lot of time benchmarking over the last couple months, and 18 developing our revised standards and expectations for 19 operators. That was also reviewed by the Institute of 20 Nuclear Power Operators; and they, we had some individuals 21 on site that spent some time, spent some time with our 22 operators and discussed our new standards and 23 expectations.
24 But more importantly we take these expectations and 25 we discuss them daily at our operator turnover, and we also MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
96 1 perform observations of selected expectations on a daily 2 basis. That served to reinforce our different 3 expectations, and also to make sure weve communicated them 4 accurately and consistently.
5 To assure our team has consistent expectations, we 6 place different Senior Reactor Operators in key decision 7 making roles within the other organizations. And I have a 8 couple examples up here.
9 First of all, we placed two Senior Reactor 10 Operators, experienced individuals, on the Fix It Now 11 Team. Thats our rapid maintenance team.
12 Weve also placed two senior SROs and two staff 13 members on our Containment Health Organization; and that 14 served to specifically target and identify what containment 15 health corrective actions need to be done and are required 16 to be done prior to starting up and prior, more 17 specifically prior to Mode 6.
18 We also had for about a year now an SRO with 19 previous radiation protection experience. We have put him 20 back on loan in the Radiation Protection Organization.
21 Thats also served to foster some additional teamwork 22 between Operations and the other organizations.
23 With regard to the Senior Reactor Operator role, not 24 only have we placed several people in our organizations, 25 but I have spent many opportunities and time discussing the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
97 1 Senior Operators role with the Senior Operators and 2 have, I guess -- thats a long dramatic pause. Explaining 3 to them my reaffirmation to them as their role as an agent 4 to the public. And that has been echoed, and I certainly 5 appreciate the reinforcement of that by members of the NRC, 6 both Region III Administrator and others. And I have 7 gotten good feedback and a full understanding of that role, 8 and more importantly too the understanding of how they have 9 not fulfilled that role to the maximum ability.
10 So, from those items from both standards and 11 expectations, placing SROs in different organizations, and 12 also the continued advocacy of their unique role as a 13 licensed operator, there has been tremendous ownership 14 displayed by the Operations organization.
15 MR. SIMPKINS: Mike, question for 16 you there. This is for the Fuel Reload Readiness. Now, 17 under the standards and expectation, would it be safe to 18 assume that will continue after restart?
19 MR. RODER: My discussion 20 about daily coverage?
21 MR. SIMPKINS: Yes.
22 MR. RODER: Oh, yes, that has 23 become an expectation that will continue well past restart, 24 yes.
25 MR. SIMPKINS: Okay. Then, the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
98 1 two additional SROs for the Fix It Now Team -- well, not 2 necessarily containment health, but Fix It Now and the Rate 3 Detection. Do you view that as a weakness before this 4 issue, that you did not have Operations representation on 5 this?
6 MR. RODER: Yes, in todays 7 world, I view that as a weakness. We did not have 8 Operations representation on the Fix It Now Team.
9 MR. SIMPKINS: Will it continue 10 then after restart?
11 MR. RODER: Yes, right now we 12 have --
13 MR. MYERS: Let me answer this 14 question, as the site Vice President. I consider it a 15 weakness in any organization that doesnt have Operations 16 expertise in that organization. Ill show you an Org.
17 chart in a little while on my presentation that will 18 demonstrate that.
19 MR. SIMPKINS: Okay, will this 20 result in additional personnel coming, additional staffing, 21 or is this just collateral duty and representation from the 22 current SROs?
23 MR. MYERS: It may result in 24 more people getting SROs or maybe not maintaining an SRO, 25 but having an SRO. My belief is you should have active MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
99 1 SROs in places like emergency repairs, maintenance, work 2 scheduling, outage, all those organizations; operations, 3 ownership should be involved in all the organizations in 4 the plant; design changes, all those organizations.
5 You dont have the SROs involved, thats going to 6 operate your plant, how can you make a design change and 7 say it fulfills their needs? So, the expectation is were 8 going to need more SROs.
9 MR. SIMPKINS: So, you may 10 reactivate some SROs?
11 MR. MYERS: Yes, and may get 12 some new ones. We have two classes going on now. Two 13 classes going now. Thats consistent with our other plants 14 too. We just finished a class of 26 people, I believe it 15 is, at our Beaver Valley Plant, but it was sort of the same 16 way, we have a good SRO ownership and good technical 17 knowledge from our previous SRO experience and all of our 18 management positions at our other plants. So, those are my 19 expectations. There are some exceptions; there are not 20 many.
21 MR. SIMPKINS: Okay. What Im 22 trying to narrow it down to then is, is it a licensed 23 individual or an Operations staff person? I guess the 24 reason why Im asking this is I see a distinct difference 25 between formerly licensed people perhaps regaining their MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
100 1 license and those actively involved in the Operations 2 staff.
3 MR. MYERS: I guess the way I 4 would answer that is, you know, what Im accustomed to, is 5 physically having some Operations staff people in the 6 organizations like training and emergency preparedness that 7 are on rotational assignments; physically in those 8 organizations. Does that answer your question?
9 MR. SIMPKINS: Its starting to, 10 yes.
11 MR. RODER: The answer, I 12 believe, would be a blend. We would have some rotation of 13 assignment. We would have some that were previously 14 licensed, that had gained experience and then moved on to 15 other organizations.
16 MR. SIMPKINS: Thats fine.
17 MR. MYERS: If that didnt 18 answer it, lets -- this is important.
19 MR. SIMPKINS: Well, my point 20 that I was trying to get to is that, I know that during the 21 operations cycle, at times the Operations staff was very, I 22 dont want to say --
23 MR. MYERS: Strapped?
24 MR. SIMPKINS: Yes, pretty much 25 so.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
101 1 MR. MYERS: Well fix that 2 problem.
3 MR. SIMPKINS: Okay. Bringing in 4 additional personnel or just reactivation of?
5 MR. MYERS: Right now we have 6 two classes going on. Well make sure that our Davis-Besse 7 Plant is above industry standards or at industry standards 8 for SROs. Well make sure we have active SROs in 9 departments like work control, emergency repair and 10 training, things like that.
11 For example, at our Beaver Valley Plant, we keep 12 five ROs by design in our training department, that are 13 part of Operations at all times. Thats sort of the way 14 that we operated over at our Perry Plant when I was there 15 and thats sort of my expectation as Chief Operating 16 Officer, you know, that we will have active SROs. That 17 may mean that we need more SROs, so Ill develop those.
18 MR. PEARCE: Doug, let me see 19 if I can add something to what hes saying here.
20 What we did at Beaver Valley, Im sure what were 21 going to do here, is we took people out of the existing 22 organization and got them SROs and put them on shift for a 23 period of time and then rotated them into different parts 24 of the organization in order to achieve that. Thats 25 really what we intend to do.
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102 1 When you say bringing in more people, its not 2 necessarily more people, but upgrading the people we have 3 available in the organization, that we feel like have upper 4 mobility over time. And its important to get that 5 credential in a lot of places in your organization, but 6 were going to utilize the people that we have, that we 7 think are the best people that we have in the organization.
8 Get them the SRO, put them back out in different parts of 9 the organization after they have some Operations 10 experience. Thats kind of the philosophy.
11 MR. MYERS: Both of those 12 things are true. At other plants, what we do, we got 13 people that we went and got SROs and that are in 14 engineering, stuff like that. That is true. However, we 15 have specific organizations and we had a chart that we used 16 for like training, work control, outage management, quality 17 assurance, where we had people physically out of the 18 Operations group working in those groups at all times.
19 MR. SIMPKINS: Okay, that answers 20 my question. I didnt mean to have such a subtle 21 difference, but if youre going to be an Operations lead 22 organization, its not somebody just having a license from 23 engineering on the Fix It Now Team, but somebody right from 24 the beginning that has the input back into the Operations 25 staff. So, okay, thank you.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
103 1 MR. MYERS: Good.
2 MR. RODER: Thanks, Doug.
3 All right. Now, Restart Station Review Board, we 4 have developed a procedure thats been in place for quite 5 sometime now that does establish quorum requirements.
6 Those quorum requirements focus on Operations members, 7 Maintenance and Engineering. I am a Chairman for the 8 Station Review Board.
9 And our charter is essentially to take the condition 10 reports and corrective actions that Clark talked about, and 11 review every corrective action, every condition report, all 12 work orders, all modifications, and others. And we 13 categorize those again as required for restart or post 14 restart. There is a lot more categorizations in there, but 15 those are the two main categories.
16 We have used that list then and assigned owners as 17 the different departments. Those departments have used the 18 list that the Restart Station Review Board has generated, 19 and then they categorize all their condition reports and 20 corrective actions to a mode. Thats established world 21 population of activities required for Mode 6 at this 22 point.
23 Independent of that, we have established a Mode 24 Restraint Manager. We have an experienced SRO and a team 25 put together the Operations Review for Mode 6. We MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
104 1 additionally have reviewed all condition reports, 2 corrective actions, work activities, surveillance tests, 3 and plant configuration documents to assure ourselves we 4 have met the requirements for Mode 6.
5 Currently, were conducting plant walkdowns to 6 assure configuration control, equipment readiness and 7 housekeeping.
8 In fact, Jeff Cuff is here today. Jeff is my Mode 9 Restraint Manager. Jeff, you have a couple of things you 10 want to say?
11 MR. CUFF: Sure. Im a 12 little nervous. Ive taught a lot before, but Ive not 13 spoken before committees. My name is Jeff Cuff. Im Mode 14 Restraint Manager. I was assigned to this position in 15 early December, and I have eleven Operations personnel 16 working underneath me.
17 For the entire month of December, we had all eleven 18 people working on identifying Mode 6 restraints; anything 19 that would stop us from our judgment of loading fuel into 20 the reactor in a safe manner.
21 We came up with some 500 restraints in reviewing 22 condition reports, corrective actions, work orders, and 23 other documents, and weve gone to the level of detail we 24 acknowledged. In midDecember, we found surveillance 25 testing on our diesel generators that wasnt current.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
105 1 Thats led us the need to do special testing on our diesel 2 generators, so well have those available to us when we go 3 into Mode 6, put fuel inside the reactor.
4 Additionally with the diesel generators, we 5 identified a few days ago a condition report that stated 6 the floor drains in the room were not flowing the adequate 7 amount of water that we would expect. And our team pushed, 8 and yesterday they went down and cleaned out those drains 9 to ensure that if the fire deluge system were to actuate in 10 that room, all the water would be drained out through the 11 floor system, floor drain systems, and wouldnt affect 12 diesel operability.
13 So, weve been working with Mode 6, and once we 14 completed our checklist, we sat down; Mike said it was two 15 days; it was a grueling 20 hours2.314815e-4 days <br />0.00556 hours <br />3.306878e-5 weeks <br />7.61e-6 months <br /> that we spent going line 16 item by line item through that checklist. And through the 17 five hundred restraints we identified, we came up with two 18 additional items to add to the list; one was a radiation 19 element that failed to surveillance test the night before; 20 and the other one was another condition report the team 21 felt needed to be added to the list.
22 So, weve worked extensively on this list. Now we 23 are working to bring that list to completion and to close 24 each of those items to an operations standard that is 25 acceptable.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
106 1 Questions?
2 MR. THOMAS: Quick question, if 3 youre done. In the last 4, 5 days, youve closed out 4 approximately 150 Mode 6 restraints. Could you briefly 5 characterize the significance of those mode restraints that 6 you closed down?
7 MR. CUFF: A lot of mode 8 restraints we closed out in the last two days have been 9 engineering evaluations. And we have had, Intercon has 10 been working extensively with us in the plant engineering 11 and in the design basis engineering.
12 They have been doing studies and evaluations for 13 us. They document those evaluations on whats called a 14 mode restraint form and then it is only one of three 15 operations superintendent level people that review those 16 mode restraint forms.
17 Then, thats some of the issues weve cleared off 18 the list. The other issues that were cleared off the list 19 were work orders that were in process of being worked. And 20 when those work orders are completed, so, for instance, a 21 valve was torn apart to repack that valve. You can not 22 refuel the reactor with that valve torn apart. Once that 23 valve has been resembled re-assembled and is in a condition where it 24 will hold water, my team has gone out and looked at those 25 valves, verified their integrity, and then we signed off MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
107 1 that work order as no longer being a restraint. That has 2 been the majority.
3 We did a walkdown last week of the main steam line 4 rooms to verify integrity of the main steam system and 5 utilized that to sign off a number of work orders revolving 6 around steam generator integrity for containment closure 7 issues.
8 MR. THOMAS: Of the remaining 9 150, 200, I know it may not be precise numbers.
10 MR. MYERS; Pretty close.
11 MR. THOMAS: But how many of 12 those would you characterize as significant issues?
13 MR. CUFF: There is currently 14 96 condition reports. Significant in those condition 15 reports, I would say there is, personal judgment on my 16 part; I would say there is probably about 30 to 40 -- 30 of 17 those condition reports that are significant, and the 18 majority of those condition reports are being closed out by 19 the outage that were currently having on decay heat train 20 one and diesel generator number one. Thats ongoing today 21 and through the next 3, 4 days.
22 MR. THOMAS: Thank you.
23 MR. CUFF: Any other 24 questions?
25 MR. RODER: Thanks, Jeff.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
108 1 So, what weve created so far, I want to describe so 2 far, is two lists, if you will, or independent lists of 3 Mode 6 issues. And what Jeff described was the grueling 20 4 hours4.62963e-5 days <br />0.00111 hours <br />6.613757e-6 weeks <br />1.522e-6 months <br /> of review. The final Multi-discipline Team is what 5 we put together to review that. I was the chairman for 6 that team. We had Design Engineering Manager, Outage 7 Director, Maintenance Manager, myself, Mode Restraint 8 Manager, as well as several others that established or that 9 met for two days straight.
10 And we had plant engineer walk in with all of the 11 restraints on both lists and discuss those. So, we had a 12 collaborative effort with the plant engineer as the lead to 13 allow -- allowed the plant engineer to advocate positions 14 and describe the actual situation.
15 So, we also, we also met to understand clear 16 ownership, clear due dates, and exactly what was needed to 17 clear that restraint. So, we felt that was a very good and 18 thorough review; and we intend to, like the last bullet 19 says, we intend to have the same process for all of our 20 mode changes.
21 Even, in addition to that though, as a manager, and 22 as part of the manager team, I spent significant time on 23 the Restart Station Review Board, these different 24 multi-disciplined panels. And, that opportunity has served 25 to bring our manager team together and start to gel. And I MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
109 1 think thats one of the things thats going to put us in a 2 position to be an industry leader as we go forward.
3 And, what Bill is going to talk about is Safety 4 Culture, because thats extremely important point to, for 5 Safety Culture, that we are as a team really stepping up 6 and making sure we have thorough reviews and were working 7 as a team to look at things from a diversity standpoint.
8 Thats all of my presentation. Are there any other 9 questions?
10 MR. DEAN: Can I interpret 11 that last comment to mean that, Bill, youre going to 12 discuss what QAs observations have been over this process, 13 because I consider this to be a pretty key activity at the 14 site, that would be a good indicator of conservative 15 decision-making safety culture.
16 MR. PEARCE: We werent 17 prepared, Bill, to address that particular issue today, but 18 we have watched -- in fact, the first morning they started 19 out, I watched it myself and sat in for a couple hours of 20 the reviews; and I thought it was very thorough.
21 We can get, we have been observing those issues as 22 QA Organization. And Steve, we dont have a report yet on 23 that, right?
24 MR. LOEHLEIN: No, we dont have 25 a report yet, but we have been monitoring that.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
110 1 MR. PEARCE: For those of you 2 cant hear, Steve Loehlein is the QA Manager, and he said 3 that we do not have the report ready yet, but we have been 4 monitoring those issues and we will come to some conclusion 5 on the adequacy of the review.
6 MR. DEAN: It may be worth 7 while at our next meeting, maybe Steve can give us some ad 8 hoc comments now, but I would certainly be interested in 9 getting perhaps a more detailed assessment of observations 10 and insights the QA Organization has gathered in looking at 11 key evolutions like this.
12 MR. PEARCE: Certainly we can 13 provide that, Bill.
14 MR. LOEHLEIN: Steve Loehlein, QA 15 Manager.
16 I heard a lot about the Safety Culture, so I thought 17 I would put it a little bit in context. We have been 18 observing the mode restraint. In terms of Safety Culture, 19 there is a couple things that we observed so far. First of 20 all, when the station decided to start to get assembled and 21 talk about, well, what is it weve got to do for Mode 6; 22 there was a lot of the natural pressure that you see.
23 Okay, whos got what, and what do we got to do to get them 24 cleared.
25 So, I took that opportunity to ask the management MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
111 1 team, hey, who is covering these mode restraints, who is 2 the authority here. And Operations stood up, said, hey, we 3 control the mode restraints. So, it was clear from a 4 Safety Culture standpoint, the site was focused on 5 managing, getting and assembling the issues, but Operations 6 was in control of the decisions. So I thought that was a 7 good indication of some of the Safety Culture things we 8 were looking for.
9 MR. PEARCE: Can you give us 10 some not so good examples?
11 MR. LOEHLEIN: Some of the not so 12 good. I thought the not so good was I was the one who 13 brought that out rather than having the organization 14 recognize it on their own, but its good to see that they 15 were aware that that was their role relationship.
16 MR. PEARCE: Okay.
17 MR. RODER: Thanks, Steve.
18 Other questions?
19 MR. GROBE: I dont think so, 20 Mike. Thanks.
21 MR. RODER: I would like to 22 introduce Dan Kelley.
23 MR. GROBE: Before we do 24 that, I think we need to do a time check. Its about 17 25 minutes to 5. I was trying to be complete by 5. I think MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
112 1 the most important of the remaining sections is the one on 2 Safety Culture. And I was wondering if you might consider, 3 we have the slides on the other topic areas, if we might 4 consider reading those and reviewing them, and if there is 5 additional information, next month we could pick that up, 6 but I would like to get into yours and Bills.
7 MR. MYERS: Thats fine.
8 MR. GROBE: Okay.
9 MR. MYERS: All that work you 10 did. (laughter) 11 MR. KELLEY: Thats okay.
12 MR. GROBE: They are good 13 looking slides.
14 MR. MYERS: Moving on to 15 Safety Culture, one of the things we want to talk about 16 today a little bit is both Safety Culture and Safety 17 Conscious Work Environment. You notice we separated 18 those. So, Ill talk some about Safety Culture. Then, 19 Bill is going to take over on Safety Conscious Work 20 Environment.
21 Our desire, I wanted to talk about Safety Culture 22 and Safety Conscious Work Environment and the many actions 23 weve taken to-date; and then finally, we would like to 24 give you some of the taste, if you will, some of the 25 activities we are going to be talking about at the January MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
113 1 30th meeting with NRC, which is more of an in-depth 2 detailed meeting of where were looking at and how were 3 going to report back on Safety Culture.
4 There is a new methodology we just decided to use.
5 I dont want to call it new methodology, but its new for 6 us. Performance Safety and Health Assurance has been 7 contracted, thats a company, to implement a new safety 8 methodology.
9 With us today, we have Sonja Haber, who is a Ph.D.
10 Shes specialized in Safety Culture throughout the last 15 11 years. I have a couple notes here. Doctor Haber has been 12 consulting in nuclear performance for over 25 years. She 13 has worked extensively with the Nuclear Regulatory Agency 14 for one. We wont hold that against her. Shes worked 15 with several of the utilities. Thats good. Shes worked 16 with the U. S. Department of Energy, the Canadian Nuclear 17 Safety Commission and the International Atomic Energy 18 Agency.
19 For the last 15 years, she specialized in Safety 20 Culture, and she has a methodology that were going to use 21 as an independent process at our plant to provide our 22 management team some feedback on other activities we might 23 take from a Safety Culture standpoint.
24 With that, I would like to have Doctor Haber step 25 up.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
114 1 DR. HABER: Thank you.
2 Good afternoon, Im Sonja Haber.
3 As Mr. Myers said to you, Ive been working in the 4 area of Safety Culture for some time. In particular, I 5 have worked with the US NRC. I have worked with Department 6 of Energy, and probably most recently with the 7 International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, which is 8 doing a lot of the recent work in this area.
9 The methodology that were proposing to use here at 10 Davis-Besse; I want to tell you a little bit about the 11 development of that and why we think its the appropriate 12 one.
13 The research behind that methodology was actually 14 funded by the US NRC for almost ten years, in the late 15 1980s and through the mid 90s. It was then adopted by 16 the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission that benchmarked all 17 of their facilities, their nuclear facilities, using the 18 methodology. Its also been utilized in several European 19 plants and its been used in former Soviet Union countries 20 with Soviet designed reactors as well.
21 And the concepts that are promoted by the 22 International Atomic Energy Agency are those that are 23 really a lot of apprentices of the methodology. So, I 24 think it meets a lot of characteristics that everybody is 25 looking for in trying to instill Safety Culture.
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115 1 Basically, without going into too much detail, I 2 just want to point out that one of the strengths of the 3 methodology we receive feedback on and we believe is true 4 is that we use multiple methods to look at the different 5 behaviors that influence Safety Culture. And what I mean 6 by that, is that we have whats called convergent 7 validity. We dont just use one tool or one instrument to 8 measure or observe a behavior, but rather usually a minimum 9 of four.
10 Ill just give you a little example. If you think 11 that decision-making is an important behavior for Safety 12 Culture, and I think we would all agree to that, then we 13 will use things that involve interviews, observations, 14 survey techniques, to look at decision-making. We wont 15 just rely on one particular tool, but well get information 16 from several tools. Then, the results that we can present, 17 we feel, will be much more reliable and valid with respect 18 to that behavior.
19 I dont really want to spend too much time on the 20 details, other than to say that there are safety 21 characteristic that really the international community and 22 the nuclear industry do agree upon, and those are the ones 23 well be using and we would be looking at the behaviors 24 that influence those characteristics.
25 So, we will report back with respect to the absence MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
116 1 or presence of those characteristics here at Davis-Besse.
2 Well look at the areas of strengths, where things are 3 moving on, where programs are in place, and the areas still 4 in need of improvement with respect to the Safety Culture 5 characteristics. And well try to get some idea of the 6 progression or the trending of those characteristics, 7 perhaps from where things were to where things are today.
8 MR. MYERS: Thank you. Sonja 9 will be reporting to Fred Giese, the Human Resources 10 Manager. The reason for that, as we finish this, we want 11 to take any lessons learned and fold that back into the 12 process for, for personal development, which is our 13 Leadership in Action Program. So, that was a natural place 14 to put that.
15 I would comment once again, the report that you will 16 be writing will be from her, their company, it will be used 17 by our management team and it will be completely 18 independent. We look forward to getting that report, to 19 further convergent validity. Thats a new term for me, I want to try 20 to figure out how to use that more often.
21 Since our last meeting, we have taken some actions 22 in FirstEnergy. First thing that we did is weve, weve 23 approved a policy with Bob Saunders. And that policy 24 defines what we at FENOC are going to use a definition for 25 Safety Culture. Its in the slide.
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117 1 Safety codes. Were defining that assembly of 2 characteristics and attitudes. Its a group of 3 characteristics and attitudes. This is pretty hard for a 4 bunch of engineers; characteristics and attitudes in the 5 organization and the individuals.
6 So, its how we as managers, myself as Chief 7 Operating Officer, VP of the site, we affect the 8 organization. And then, how do the individuals behaviors 9 and attitudes, how do they respond, which establishes as 10 overriding priority toward nuclear safety activities. And 11 that these issues receive the attention warranted by their 12 significance.
13 Because every activity we do is not real safety 14 significant. Some of them have low significance as far as 15 safety and some of them have very high. So, its important 16 that we understand the difference.
17 The next thing we did was, we defined Safety 18 Conscious Work Environment as employees willingness to 19 raise safety, raise issues and managements response to 20 those issues. Key definitions in my mind.
21 Next thing we have is a Safety Culture model that 22 were using. Starts out with very basics, with a corporate 23 level, that we call Policy Level Commitment. Thats in the 24 management organization of Bob Saunders, myself, and Gary 25 Leidich. And it starts out with a statement of policy; we MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
118 1 have completed that.
2 Management values at Davis-Besse are clearly 3 understood now. And the FENOC values are in all the 4 meeting rooms, at all of our plants. And weve shared 5 those values with all of our employees. Were making sure 6 that theyre consistently understood.
7 Next level is the management commitment. That has 8 to do with the managers sitting at this table and the 9 managers at our plant. And, if you go look at the 10 management commitment, there is things that you look for, 11 now that you have the value and policy statement; for 12 example, clear responsibilities and cohesiveness of the 13 organization, and a daily emphasis on safety based on that 14 policy.
15 Then you go up and reflect on the individual 16 commitment, and you go out and monitor the drive for 17 excellence by the employees. They clearly understand we 18 want this polar crane meeting the highest industry 19 standards, you know, or do we have questioning attitudes 20 when we find degradation and material condition like Boron 21 on the reactor vessel head.
22 All of those things and characteristics are in 23 place, and its possible to say that you have a good Safety 24 Culture. So, well be monitoring those types of 25 characteristics. So, thats sort of the model that were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
119 1 using.
2 We talked about some of the actions that weve 3 completed. Weve completed our policy on Safety Culture.
4 Thats done now. Ive shared some of that with you.
5 The FENOC vision, mission and values are clearly 6 visible at our plant now. You all asked that question at 7 one of the meetings, and I articulated the values, and then 8 I went back and looked. At our other plants, its a lot 9 more visible than it is at this one, so I think you see 10 good improvement there.
11 The Business Plan. Weve gone back and revisited 12 our Business Plan a couple of months ago, our senior team, 13 and made sure the plan is focused properly on safety, and 14 it was very clear and crisp.
15 Our Incentive Program. Bob has looked at our 16 Incentive Program. I was with him not long ago. We 17 revamped our Incentive Program somewhat to make sure were 18 focusing properly not only on safety, but reliability on 19 people. And we have those incentive programs, I think, 20 properly balanced. Im pretty excited about some of the 21 things we did.
22 FENOC Corporate Organizational Structure. When we 23 started out here at the Davis-Besse event, there was not a 24 Chief Operating Officer and there was not a corporate 25 organization. We didnt have a corporate organization in MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
120 1 place with good program and process owners. That alone 2 could probably have prevented this issue.
3 Additionally, we created the Executive VP of Quality 4 Oversight that now reports to our board. You know, one of 5 the problems we had was our quality organization folding up 6 into our plants from a Safety Culture standpoint, became a 7 part of the Safety Culture. This independence we have now 8 we think is a long term improvement in Safety Culture that 9 will help us out in our plants.
10 And finally, the dedication of our CEO. Let me talk 11 about that. Were the fourth largest utility in the United 12 States and our CEO has been in our plant four times since 13 this shutdown. You know, thats I think pretty unique.
14 And, each time he came there, he came one night and had two 15 meeting with our employees and spoke to our employees for 16 about four hours, until 7, 8:00 at night, emphasizing, 17 emphasizing his commitment to the plant and to nuclear 18 safety. And to me, thats the basis.
19 From a management standpoint, I want to talk about 20 that for a moment. I think management technical competence 21 is important. We talked somewhat about Operations 22 involvement in the organizations. Lets go to the slide 23 for a second. I have an Org. chart over here I put 24 together.
25 One of the things we have done, we have a number of MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
121 1 managers in the Org. chart. We rotated and promoted some 2 people to management positions. One of the things I would 3 say, if you look on our Org. chart now, there is 22 4 managers at our site, thats including the directors and 5 myself. All but three of those people are previous SROs, 6 have certifications. So, that shows you our commitment, 7 the technical competence of our managers.
8 Not only are all but three that have SROs, or 9 certifications; if you go look now, the top management team 10 across the board has 160 years of significant good 11 operating experience. And down below us, is another 160 12 years or so. I havent added that up.
13 So, we think now that we not only have a senior 14 management team that we talked about in place, that we feel 15 good about, but the management team at our site, we begin 16 to feel real good about that too. And you heard them talk 17 about some of the teamwork. I want to tell you, in the 18 last month or so, Ive seen this management team come 19 together to do some pretty unique things that Im pleased 20 with.
21 From a management involvement standpoint, we got 22 strong management involvement now. In our restart 23 activities, monitoring program that we have in place is 24 serving us well, management observation program down below; 25 and, finally, the standards that we set for our management MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
122 1 ownership.
2 You know, weve anchored some of those standards.
3 One of the things you have to do with management standards, 4 its okay to just go out and talk, but you have to anchor 5 them in your business, the way you do business, very 6 specific. And one of the things weve done, for example, 7 is the Corrective Action Review Board. You know, that was 8 a very low level review board. Its now got a director 9 that runs the review board and assigns managers. We talked 10 about that earlier, its on the review board, rather than 11 just low level people.
12 So, its impossible for us to sit here and say we 13 dont know whats in the Corrective Action Program. I mean, 14 were reviewing those things every day at the management 15 level. So, we have that ownership and responsibility.
16 From an individual commitment standpoint, weve 17 taken several actions also. We evaluate our supervisors.
18 We told you that we would evaluate key supervisors in our 19 plant. We brought in an industrial psychologist to help us 20 with that, and weve completed it. Not only did we do 21 that, we went a step higher to evaluate our managers. Then 22 we went a step higher to evaluate our directors. Then they 23 evaluated me, and I survived.
24 Then we went a step higher than that. Bob said, you 25 know, we should also do that at our other plants and at his MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
123 1 level also. So, now we think we have a very good baseline 2 of data on ways to improve our management team based on 3 their feedback.
4 The new safety consciousness has been added in 5 our yearly appraisal process with all of our people.
6 Thats part of our Leadership in Action Program. Weve 7 added two new competencies based on this event, each 8 persons yearly appraisal that will affect how theyre 9 rated.
10 Town Hall Meetings continue, and meeting with, 4-Cs 11 Meetings continue. We think were, Im taking good 12 corrective actions there, I think, and getting good 13 feedback. Monthly All-hands Meetings have been, I think, 14 positive.
15 Also it strengthened the questioning attitude, we 16 think, of our employees with our Management Monitoring 17 Program. Weve got several examples of, weve watched 18 prejob briefs that werent as thorough as we thought they 19 should be, procedures not being used properly. We think 20 we have greatly strengthened the prejob briefs, the 21 improved ownership in the plant, and demonstrated the 22 willingness to drive work activities to meet industry 23 standards.
24 I think the polar crane, the cavity seal, the 25 containment when we had the standdowns there; those were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
124 1 tough. They cost us weeks in scheduled time, but weve 2 proved we would take those weeks if needed to get the job 3 done correctly. To me, thats Safety Culture.
4 With that, I would like to let Bill talk a few 5 moments about the Safety Conscious Work Environment.
6 MR. PEARCE: Okay. Thank you.
7 MR. GROBE: Bill, what I want 8 to do is defer my questions. The information, I agree with 9 you, Lew, that you initiated a large number of actions to 10 address the Safety Culture issues at the plant. The 11 Management and Human Performance Action Plan, I think I got 12 the title right, had a lot more activities in that you have 13 due dates between now and lets say the end of April.
14 Those due dates dont seem to be aligned with restart 15 decisions on your part.
16 So, one of the things Im interested in, maybe for 17 the, either prior to or at the January 30 meeting is trying 18 to get confidence that we understand what actions you plan 19 on completing before restart, what actions youre not going 20 to accomplish until after restart.
21 Then, also, how do you plan on measuring your 22 success in these areas, and how youre going to factor 23 those measurement tools into your restart decision-making.
24 MR. MYERS: One of the things 25 that was interesting in this new methodology is, it doesnt MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
125 1 tell you, you have the best Safety Culture, it tells you 2 that youre in line with what theyve seen elsewhere. So, 3 thats going to be one of the tools were going to have, 4 use to help the manager monitor our success; is it working 5 or not. Also gives us some trends. Additionally we have 6 some performance indicators. So, well be glad to talk 7 about that January 30th.
8 MR. GROBE: The two brief 9 statements I made about one minute is probably a two-hour 10 conversation, so well defer that to the 30th.
11 MR. MYERS: That would be 12 good.
13 MR. PEARCE: Okay, my name is 14 Bill Pearce. Im the Vice President of Oversight for 15 FENOC. Let me reiterate first of all the definition of 16 Safety Conscious Work Environment, which is the subject Im 17 going to speak on.
18 That part --
19 MR. GROBE: Bill, I think your 20 microphone is not working.
21 MR. PEARCE: Ill start over 22 again. My name is Bill Pearce. Im Vice President of 23 Oversight for FENOC. Im going to talk about Safety 24 Conscious Work Environment.
25 Let me start that out by reiterating the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
126 1 definition. "That part of a Safety Culture addressing 2 employee willingness to raise issues and managements 3 response to these issues."
4 I think youll see that in what were doing here.
5 First of all, weve got, somewhere weve got a picture.
6 There we go. Weve got a picture, and we put this picture 7 together to try to depict what Safety Conscious Work 8 Environment is about. Its a piece of Safety Culture, but 9 its only a part.
10 And first of all, let me talk about the foundation; 11 and the foundation, you cant read it there, but it says 12 basic principles. And there is a list of basic 13 principles. What thats about is, in Leadership in Action, 14 when we train our supervisors, there is a standard set of 15 basic principles that are taught and reinforced throughout 16 their supervisor career. These are kind of the foundation 17 of how we treat people and how, how we expect people to act 18 in some regard.
19 Let me read those to you, because they are the basis 20 of what goes on above. "Focus on the situation, issue or 21 behavior, not on the person." "Maintain self-confidence 22 and self-esteem of others." "Maintain constructive 23 relationships." "Take initiatives to make things better."
24 "Lead by example."
25 And thats the foundation of, actually of a Safety MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
127 1 Conscious Work Environment, because treating people in that 2 manner is, you know, kind of the basic peaks.
3 Then, there is four pillars. And Im going to 4 describe each of these pillars individually, but these four 5 pillars support a strong Safety Conscious Work 6 Environment. The first pillar is Management Support, and 7 Worker Confidence. And what weve done in that regard is 8 we issued a FENOC policy, signed by Bob Saunders, on Safety 9 Conscious Work Environment; what our expectations are for 10 the organization about Safety Conscious Work Environment.
11 And its important to have a policy level, high level 12 policy statement on what we expect from people.
13 Next, very important I think, is Lew, the site Vice 14 President has been met with approximately four hundred 15 employees in groups of about 15 people each to reinforce 16 the management support of Safety Conscious Work 17 Environment. Each one of those, he discusses Safety 18 Conscious Work Environment with groups and employees along 19 with other issues. And, the main thing that we should get 20 out of that is establishing a relationship between the 21 highest level in the organization at the plant and the 22 working level of people and telling them that he really, he 23 wants to have issues raised and that he values those issues 24 when they are raised.
25 I think that was a very important thing to do.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
128 1 Believe me, Lew is a busy guy, and to take four hours a 2 week of his time to do that, you can see the level of 3 importance that he gives to that.
4 MR. DEAN: Excuse me, Bill.
5 In that area, when you talk about meeting with employees, 6 given the large contingent of contractor employees still at 7 the site; does that include contractor employees in that?
8 MR. PEARCE: We have not gotten 9 to the contractor employees yet. Although, we did train in 10 the next area, we did train the contractor supervisors on 11 Safety Conscious Work Environment. And thats what Im 12 going to talk about next, as a matter of fact.
13 We trained managers and supervisors on Safety 14 Conscious Work Environment. Let me talk a minute about 15 that. We used expert legal counsel to do that.
16 We brought some people in that have dealt a lot with 17 the issue of Safety Conscious Work Environment and the 18 legal issues around that, and let them train our 19 supervisors and managers. They did it through a set of 20 case studies where they discussed what had happened at 21 other facilities and what is the rights and wrongs about 22 how to deal with that issue.
23 And there is, we had discussion of our legal 24 obligation, but more importantly, there was a lot of 25 discussion about what are the right things to do and how to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
129 1 deal with that issue. So, all our managers and supervisors 2 had training in that issue.
3 In addition, weve started training our operators by 4 the same folks. As theyre going through recall requal cycle, 5 were starting to catch them and train all the operators in 6 Safety Conscious Work Environment. And thats the first 7 pillar.
8 The second pillar is the Corrective Action Program 9 process. And, Dave Gudger talked about that at length. Im 10 not going to go through all the actions we have taken, but 11 there is two key aspects I want to reinforce.
12 One, is its extremely important to have problems 13 identified by people and have them effectively resolved.
14 The important aspect of that is, the second thing about it 15 is, its important that employees feel that when they 16 identify problems, that management is going to care enough 17 about the problem to get them resolved. And if the 18 management doesnt get problems resolved, then theyre not 19 going to bring problems up very long, if they feel like 20 its a futile effort. So, those two aspects are key in the 21 Corrective Action Program.
22 Thats why I personally am so pleased to see the 23 management team getting together and looking at the 24 corrective actions, that are being taken on an individual 25 basis in the Corrective Action Program, and ensuring MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
130 1 themselves that were doing the right things. So, I think 2 thats a good thing.
3 The third pillar is Employee Concerns Program. What 4 the Employee Concerns Program, for those of you that might 5 not be familiar with it, its a program that we have in 6 place, so that if an employee has a concern and the normal 7 line management hasnt resolved his concern or her concern, 8 they can take it to an independent group and give that 9 concern to the group; and hopefully, well get it resolved 10 with that program.
11 We revamped the program. We had a program in place 12 prior to this within FENOC, but weve revamped the program 13 the latter part of last year, actually. We got the new 14 program in place. We brought in a new experienced manager 15 thats had experience getting this program off the ground 16 at other sites. Weve got him now getting ours off the 17 ground.
18 He reports directly to me, the Vice President of 19 Oversight. And we did that to have that program be 20 independent of site management. Thats been one of the 21 issues we had previously here is, when we only had the site 22 management was responsible for employee concern problem.
23 If a concern was brought up, it was investigated by someone 24 out of site management. And it kind of made people feel or 25 not trust the program, because you know, if you have people MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
131 1 out of management trying to review what it may even be 2 about, some of the concern may be about those individuals, 3 so it caused some distrust. So, we tried to remove that.
4 Under the Confidentiality. Confidentiality is an 5 important feature of an Employee Concern Program; and it is 6 because sometimes the concerns that we may have as 7 individuals might be about our supervisor or manager. And, 8 thats kind of hard to go get them resolved for you 9 sometimes.
10 So, Sometimes employees ask, they want their concern 11 to be kept confidential. They have reasons to do that and 12 we want to make sure that we respect that, and we maintain 13 that confidentiality.
14 Then I got a mistake here. It says, four full-time 15 independent investigators, it should just say just four 16 independent investigators, because we dont keep them here 17 full time. Theyre contractors, and thats the advantage 18 of them at the moment is we can bring them in and out as we 19 need to do investigations. Theyre not part of our normal 20 staff. They maintained independence and they can do an 21 investigation for us and give us some feedback.
22 And Bill, its under this area, that you asked 23 earlier, about the CR process, and how the CR process might 24 be related to the Employee Concern Program; is that 25 correct?
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
132 1 MR. DEAN: Correct.
2 MR. PEARCE: The way I would 3 see that, is the Program Manager for the Employee Concern 4 Program reviews the condition reports and so does the 5 Quality Assurance Manager. And, they look for evidence of 6 things that have been brought up previously in the Employee 7 Concern Program. And, thats kind of the process that we 8 use to make sure that were seeing repetitive issues that 9 are coming out of the system.
10 I think at least partially answers your question; 11 doesnt it?
12 MR. DEAN: Yeah. I guess the 13 other part I was looking for, relationship between those 14 types of issues that emanate through the Employee Concerns 15 Program, how do those translate back then into Corrective 16 Action Program or is it an independent program?
17 MR. PEARCE: Actually, I have 18 some data, but I dont want to go into that, in the 19 interest of time.
20 MR. DEAN: No, I dont need 21 to get into a lot of detail on that.
22 MR. PEARCE: There is pretty 23 good congruence between that. In fact, a lot of the 24 condition reports, or a lot of the things we end up in the 25 Employee Concern Program have already surfaced at some MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
133 1 level in the condition reports system. And, in fact, some 2 of those issues that go on to the NRC have shown up in both 3 of those before they ended up at the NRC.
4 So, there is a pretty good congruence in that 5 regard. The issues that are being brought forward are 6 being put in the Corrective Action Program.
7 MR. DEAN: I guess I would be 8 interested, and maybe part of this discussion would be 9 better to wait until we get together on the 30th of 10 January, but I would be interested, you said you revamped 11 your program. I guess I would be interested if there was a 12 particular model that you used? I know there has been 13 some plants in the past that have been at the cutting edge 14 in terms of designing and implementing employee concerns 15 programs.
16 MR. PEARCE: Well, we did look 17 at a lot of models and we didnt pick any particular one.
18 I think we used the buffet method. We chose the ones we 19 thought were the best aspects of models that were out 20 there, and we got advice from who we considered to be the 21 experts in those areas to make those decisions.
22 The next --
23 MR. DEAN: Not to interrupt, 24 but if you could be prepared on the 30th, I would be 25 interested in at least having some discussion on the 30th, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
134 1 in terms of what was it that you felt was inadequate or 2 needed improvement out of your preexisting and what have 3 you done to enhance the program.
4 MR. PEARCE: I certainly can do 5 that. Ill be prepared to do that.
6 MR. DEAN: Okay.
7 MR. PEARCE: And the last 8 pillar is kind of unique thing, or something that has been 9 at a couple other plants at different levels. Were using 10 it, and we put it in place here. Its called the Safety 11 Conscious Work Environment Review Team.
12 What we did there, was we put a charter together.
13 We wanted a group of people to review any action that were 14 taking at the site dealing with any type of discipline 15 issue or something that were doing with someone like a 16 demotion or some negative behavior toward individuals.
17 And, we put this team together to review all those actions, 18 and to make sure that there are not issues going on where 19 were taking inappropriate action or even that there might, 20 the person might receive an inappropriate action, because 21 of some safety issue or some issue that they brought 22 forward.
23 The teams made up of top level managers at the 24 site, Human Resources and the Legal Department. And the 25 team, one of the examples I was going to talk about is; MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
135 1 recently, when we were getting ready to do, you know, we 2 did, as you talk about earlier, we did quite a large 3 contract reduction at the site. Well, this review team, 4 before we did the contract reduction, actually got 5 together.
6 We reviewed the contracts that were out there, and 7 how our contractors who were going to reduce their people; 8 what was the methodology that they used to make sure there 9 would be, you know, we reviewed that to see that there 10 would be no discrimination or retaliation, or no perception 11 of discrimination or retaliation.
12 In addition, this team recommended that we do exit 13 interviews. And we exit interviewed every person that 14 left. We asked each one of them, did they have any safety 15 concerns that they wished to give to us. And actually, we 16 got out of several hundred people, we got four issues that 17 we brought into the Employee Concerns Program to look at.
18 So, I think this team did a good job at looking how 19 we did that and gave us feedback. So, this team 20 actually -- actively looks for issues which may even give 21 the perception of discrimination thats going on within the 22 organization.
23 They look at promotions, transfers, you know, a lot 24 of different things, trying to glean anything that might be 25 going on at the site that we might ought to intervene in, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
136 1 to make sure that were not having something that would 2 keep people from, or make people feel like we didnt value 3 them finding problems and bringing them forward.
4 Thats it, unless you have some questions. I think 5 Lew wanted to conclude.
6 MR. DEAN: Just a quick 7 question. In terms of this review teams activities, you 8 mentioned the contractor reduction effort. Prior to that, 9 there was some, a number of personnel actions that were 10 taken. Were they involved in anything with those, or was 11 this team formed subsequent to that?
12 MR. PEARCE: It was formed 13 subsequent to that.
14 MR. GROBE: Okay, Lew, could 15 you wrap up?
16 MR. MYERS: First I would 17 like to wrap up on Safety Culture. I think this Safety 18 Conscious Work Environment is an extremely important area.
19 We think weve seen improved performance. Our senior team 20 has 160 years of successful operation under our belt. We 21 sort of know what good plants look like; and weve seen 22 some signs that we think are good, especially in the 23 management areas. Thats not to say we dont know what 24 were doing. Were not the PhDs, so we went and got us 25 one. But we feel good about where were going. Were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
137 1 going to continue our employee meetings. Were going to 2 continue with our oversight of our employees. Were going 3 to continue with the management assessments. And then 4 finally we have the independent assessments were going to 5 do. We know this is an important effort for restart, and 6 were going to make it good for all of us there.
7 Finally, are you ready for me to just close the 8 meeting?
9 MR. GROBE: That would be 10 great.
11 MR. MYERS: That would be 12 good. Our desired outcomes today, were showing were 13 making progress.
14 I would like to talk just a second, Ill talk a 15 little about Dans presentation. We brought our fuel 16 assembly with us. Its a very important part of fuel 17 load. So, with the public here, we took the reactor core 18 out, put it in the spent fuel pit. We sift all the fuel 19 assemblies to make sure theyre leak free. We looked at, 20 as you move fuel assemblies around, there is structures 21 designed to take wear. We visually inspected our fuel 22 assemblies. We looked for debris. We cleaned debris. We 23 put in a lot of efforts. We sent one fuel assembly back 24 for reconstruction. We have it back now as a new assembly, 25 where we found a grid damage on.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
138 1 We brought this demo up here with us, so anybody 2 that wants to look at this afterwards, I guess Dan would 3 spend some time with them.
4 MR. KELLEY: Sure.
5 MR. MYERS: Sure, that would 6 be good. And with that, I did that presentation.
7 Once again, we think were making good progress with 8 restart. I think we demonstrated that today. We try.
9 Our plan for core reload I think is good. Weve had 10 a lot of Ops. involvement. We dont want to make a mistake 11 and find something that we missed that causes us to reload 12 the core any more than you all want to see us do that or 13 public wants to see us do that.
14 So, weve had thousands of activities, thousands of 15 contractors and thousands of questions. Weve gone through 16 those pretty well.
17 We tried to show some unique things today. The Leak 18 Rate Program is going to be unique to the industry. We 19 think its going to set a new standard.
20 We think the upgrade that were making on the 21 cavities, the sumps, all the unique things. And, I think 22 what that will demonstrate is the right Safety Culture for 23 our plant, and for our employees. And well also ensure 24 that the public has a plant in here, that its not only a 25 good plant, but meets, its excellent from an industry MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
139 1 standpoint. Thank you.
2 MR. GROBE: Thanks a lot, 3 Lew.
4 Instead of taking a break, I think Bill and I will 5 just step down in the front and entertain any questions or 6 comments from the public. Okay? So, dont get out of 7 your seats. Thank you.
8 (Off the record.)
9 MR. GROBE: Okay, excellent.
10 The way we usually conduct this, is first I invite 11 any representatives of local public officials, or in this 12 case we had some public officials here today, so thats 13 great. I think we lost the Mayor of Port Clinton, so 14 thats unfortunate, but I appreciate your patience. It was 15 a bit of a long meeting.
16 We normally try to limit comments to a couple of 17 minutes, so that other people can have an opportunity. So, 18 please come forward, state your name, and were eager to 19 hear your comments or answer your questions.
20 MR. ARNDT: My name is Steve 21 Arndt, President of the Board of Ottawa County 22 Commissioners. And, Ive been a County Commissioner now 23 for 14 years. And, I have had a few observations I would 24 like to share with both the NRC as well as management from 25 FirstEnergy.
MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
140 1 D-B has been able to enjoy a very fine reputation, 2 being one of the best run nuclear plants, not only in the 3 nation, but also rated right up there in the top tier in 4 the world. One of the downfalls of that particular -- is 5 it not on?
6 (microphone) 7 Is everyone able to hear me back there or should I 8 restart? Start over?
9 (audience responded - no.)
10 MR. ARNDT: Good. In order to 11 hold to the two minutes, I should probably just pick up 12 where I left off.
13 One of the observations that I have seen is that 14 the downfall of having that reputation, I know the 15 employees were quite concerned of falling into what they 16 call complacency. Well, we also raised the issue a number 17 of times with management, one of the successes of D-B was, 18 a lot of talent we found leaving D-B and joining forces in 19 other facilities. That was a downfall. And unfortunately, 20 we ended up just exactly where fear was, many of the 21 employees was, that we had fallen into that complacency.
22 Im glad to see Mr. Saunders here. Im glad to see 23 the management team that FENOC has represented or has 24 recognized is necessary to put back in place at D-B. I can 25 tell you one of the things as a County Commissioner and as MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
141 1 an elected official, you get a very strong sense of where 2 the community is at. They dont hesitate to seek out local 3 officials. We can not hide. We live in that community.
4 And I can tell you the confidence in the community, 5 the confidence in those frontline employees, and those 6 supervisors is still there, they will meet this challenge.
7 They have the management team there at D-B now. They are 8 willing to, and ready to step up to the challenge of 9 getting Davis-Besse back into the forefront of not only 10 national, but as a world example. And we look forward to 11 seeing that come, in a not too distant future. Thank you.
12 MR. GROBE: Thanks for your 13 comments, Steve.
14 MR. WITT: Im Jere Witt, 15 County Administrator, and also a member of the Restart 16 Oversight Panel. I have one question and one comment.
17 The one question is, Jack, and I have been fortunate 18 enough to have been part of that Restart Oversight Panel to 19 see many of the things that have happened over the past six 20 months. And, my one question is, if you could characterize 21 maybe for the public thats here, the meaning of that new 22 head, and the other improvements that have been made over 23 and above what would possibly even have been required from 24 a mechanical standpoint for the plant?
25 MR. GROBE: Sure. Why dont MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
142 1 you make your comment while I think about that.
2 MR. WITT: Okay, fair 3 enough. My comment would be, also as part of that 4 Oversight Panel, Ive been closely involved with this issue 5 of Safety Conscious Work Environment and Safety Culture; 6 and was involved from day one and given free reign by 7 Mr. Myer to go in and talk to employees to help determine 8 what some of the problems were. And there certainly were 9 problems to start.
10 But Ive also been able to glean information of how 11 thats improving, from my perspective. And I know that you 12 can talk until the cows come home about benchmarking and 13 all those good things, but the proof in the pudding, I 14 believe, comes from what youre seeing happening at the 15 plant. And what I believe will happen in the future from a 16 Safety Culture standpoint.
17 And, Ive seen great improvements, and not just from 18 a management standpoint, but all the away from the top to 19 the bottom. I think those improvements will continue.
20 And, I think as a representative of Ottawa County, I want 21 to be there to ask those questions to make sure they 22 continue in the future.
23 And, I frankly have confidence in this group of 24 employees, and I think the public has confidence in this 25 group of employees that is there now, and will continue to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
143 1 only get better.
2 MR. GROBE: Okay, thanks 3 Jere.
4 The question you asked, was the, for me to put a 5 context on the hardware changes, I think, that have been 6 made at the plant. Let me talk first just a little bit 7 about the reactor head.
8 Its entirely possible that FirstEnergy could have 9 pursued the option of repair of the old head. Im not sure 10 if the technical challenges were such that it would have 11 been overwhelming. It certainly was a technical 12 challenge. But FirstEnergy chose, and quite frankly, Lew 13 Myers drove this issue, chose to replace the head. And, I 14 think when you look at Safety Culture, that clearly was 15 going above and beyond.
16 You all have heard Lew talk for the last several 17 months. It seems like a long time. But, and I think there 18 is no question that Lew has the right Safety Culture. And, 19 he and the current management team drove other issues, like 20 the sump, not only repairing the damage and deficiencies in 21 the old sump screen, but just taking it out and putting in 22 a new one that should be substantially better.
23 We can talk about a lot of other issues that Lew and 24 the team have taken on. The important aspect of that for 25 me is not only Lews Safety Culture and the Senior MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
144 1 Management Teams Safety Culture, but Ive talked 2 previously about alignment down to the firstline 3 supervisors. Those are the folks that are in the field 4 every day, day in and day out; supervising the work thats 5 going on, inculcating it to the workers, ensuring that they 6 have the proper safety focus, that theyre doing work at 7 high quality level; coaching them, training them to 8 continuous improvement.
9 And, those are the issues that are a little bit 10 harder to understand and measure. And those are the things 11 that were looking forward to how FirstEnergy is going to 12 in some more reproducible way get a sense of the culture at 13 that level, such that its not driven from the top, but 14 its an endemic part of the organization.
15 Bill, do you have any other thoughts?
16 MR. DEAN: No.
17 MR. GROBE: Did I answer your 18 question?
19 MR. WITT: Yes, thank you.
20 And I would only add to that, Jack is, I believe that 21 culture is there, and I believe that you have a group of 22 employees that have worked under tough conditions for a 23 year now, that have worked hard. I think, you know, I have 24 some idea of what they put into this, but probably not 25 close to what they really have. And I want to say from MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
145 1 Ottawa Countys standpoint, we appreciate that, and look 2 forward to many future years.
3 MR. GROBE: Okay, thanks, 4 Jere.
5 Any other local officials? Yes, sir?
6 MR. ANDERSON: My name is Bart 7 Anderson. Im the School Superintendent here in Port 8 Clinton.
9 Ladies and gentlemen, I speak today upon our good 10 neighbors, Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station. Today, I 11 want to speak to several points, but I want to stress just 12 one; thats peace of mind. And as a neighbor and a partner 13 in our community, Davis-Besse has never thrown caution 14 to the wind of the students that I represent.
15 I want to have a very clear issue right now, that I 16 believe there is maintenance plan thats scheduled to 17 restart the plant, that I have comfort, confidence and no 18 reservations but to support. And I shall continue to 19 support FENOCs efforts to bring this plant on line.
20 Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that there is 21 complete and total peace of mind in your public school 22 system with regards to our good neighbors at the 23 Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station. I want that to be 24 absolutely clear. Thank you.
25 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO
146 1 very much.
2 Okay. Open it up to any other comments or questions 3 from members of the public.
4 We do have a follow-up meeting at 7:00, which I 5 anticipate there may be a number of members of the public 6 which will choose to come back to that meeting and ask 7 questions or comments.
8 Last chance. Okay, very good.
9 Thank you very much. Well see you at 7.
10 (Off the record.)
11 - - -
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147 1 CERTIFICATE 2 I, Marie B. Fresch, Registered Merit Reporter and 3 Notary Public in and for the State of Ohio, duly 4 commissioned and qualified therein, do hereby certify that 5 the foregoing is a true and correct transcript of the 6 proceedings as taken by me and that I was present during 7 all of said proceedings.
8 IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and 9 affixed my seal of office at Norwalk, Ohio, on this 24th 10 day of January, 2003.
11 12 13 14 Marie B. Fresch, RMR 15 NOTARY PUBLIC, STATE OF OHIO 16 My Commission Expires 10-9-03.
17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO