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NRC NEWS
U. S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION I
475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 | | CONTACT: |
Diane Screnci (610)337-5330/ e-mail: dps@nrc.gov
Neil A. Sheehan (610)337-5331/e-mail: nas@nrc.gov |
or vld@nrc.gov
I-96-34 May 23, 1996
Contact: Diane Screnci FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NRC STAFF RATES PILGRIM "GOOD" IN OPERATIONS, MAINTENANCE AND
PLANT SUPPORT AND "EXCELLENT" IN ENGINEERING
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has rated Boston
Edison Company's (BECO) Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Pilgrim,
Massachusetts, "good" in operations, maintenance and plant
support, and "excellent" in engineering, in its latest systematic
assessment of licensee performance (SALP) report.
SALP reports assess licensee performance in four functional
areas - plant operations, maintenance, engineering and plant
support - and assign ratings of Category 1 (superior
performance), Category 2 (good performance) and Category 3
(adequate performance). The Pilgrim SALP evaluated performance
for the period October 10, 1994, through April 6, of this year.
The NRC staff will meet with BECO officials at 1 p.m. on
June 4 in the BECO Support Building at the Pilgrim site to
discuss the SALP report. The meeting will be open to the public
for observation only.
In a letter to BECO officials, NRC Region I Administrator
Thomas T. Martin said in regard to overall plant performance:
"Although the NRC noted a continuing strong management
safety perspective, overall performance at the Pilgrim Station
declined from the previous SALP period. This resulted in lower
SALP scores in the Operations and Plant Support areas.
Mr. Martin had these comments concerning individual SALP
rating categories:
OPERATIONS
"While operations management demonstrated a proper safety
focus and operators responded effectively to plant transients and
off-normal conditions, a decline in operations performance was
reflected by operator errors made during RFO10 [refueling outage
number 10] and later in the period. Also, some training
deficiencies became evident during this assessment period. One
commonality between the RFO10 operator errors and the initial
operator license candidate performance results was a weakness in
the use of procedures and self-verification techniques.
"Further the organization, in particular, operators and
support personnel, including some managers were not always
aggressive in ensuring identified hardware deficiencies were
promptly evaluated and resolved. The operator errors experienced
during this assessment period and occasional lapses in problem
identification and resolution detracted from the otherwise strong
safety focus and effective response to off-normal and transient
conditions."
MAINTENANCE
Management oversight of the maintenance and surveillance
program was generally effective, in that, several weaknesses from
the previous SALP period were effectively resolved and strong
performance in other areas continued. The reduction of the
corrective maintenance backlog resulted from positive management
involvement.
"However, instances of weakness in the areas of work
planning, work control, supervisory oversight, and worker self-checking occurred that resulted in maintenance performance
problems. The work control system that was implemented this
period was not yet fully effective, particularly with regard to
work planning. Late in the period, the maintenance and I&C
managers began to better trend and evaluate human performance
issues. Component failures continued to challenge operators,
although at a reduced frequency when compared to the previous
SALP period."
ENGINEERING
"Overall performance in the engineering area continued to be
superior. Management oversight and involvement were important in
achieving that level of performance. The quality of engineering
work products was very good. Self-assessment activities in the
engineering area provided for improved organizational performance
and engineering personnel displayed excellent skills. However,
some generally isolated instances of weak performance occurred
during the period.
"Those weaknesses involved an increase in the backlog of
certain administrative activities, problems in licensee review of
vendor-provided analyses and root cause assessments, and weak
initial response to some conditions adverse to quality."
PLANT SUPPORT
"Performance in the emergency preparedness, effluent, and
environmental programs remained strong. In the radiological
protection area, although technician performance remained very
good and improvements were achieved in recovery of contaminated
plant areas, problems with material controls and with ALARA
implementation were noted. Further, problems with maintenance
support for security equipment presented challenges to the
security staff. Fire protection performance remained good.
Plant housekeeping improved, with some continuing problems in
certain plant areas."
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