No.: II-96-105
Contacts: Ken Clark 404-331-5503
Roger Hannah 404-331-7878
December 26, 1996
NRC STAFF PROPOSES $100,000 IN FINES AGAINST TVA AT SEQUOYAH
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has proposed $100,000 in
civil penalties against the Tennessee Valley Authority for
violations of NRC requirements at the Sequoyah nuclear power
plant near Chattanooga, Tennessee.
One group of violations relates to identification of equipment
problems and corrective actions. Another group involves the
failure to follow technical specifications for electrical
breakers in the system that automatically shuts down the reactor.
The NRC staff combined three violations into one group and
assigned a single increased severity level due to the similarity
of the corrective action program deficiencies. Those violations
are: 1) failure to identify the root cause and take adequate
corrective actions for feedwater equipment failures; 2) failure
to implement corrective actions to control use of a material
susceptible to rapid aging at high temperatures in safety-related
valves; and 3) failure to adequately check all equipment after a
fire system sprayed water on plant equipment in July.
In a letter to TVA, NRC Regional Administrator Stewart Ebneter
wrote that "the NRC is particularly concerned that the apparent
root cause of [the violations] is inadequate implementation of
your corrective action program." The NRC staff is proposing a
$50,000 civil penalty for this first group of violations.
The second group also has three violations which were combined
and assigned a single increased severity level because, according
to Ebneter's letter, "the violations contibuted to or were a
direct consequence of the underlying problem." Those violations
are: 1) inadequate maintenance and testing of a reactor trip
breaker which resulted in the installation of an inoperable
breaker in Unit 2; 2) failure to maintain the minimum required
channels of a reactor trip function; and 3) failure to follow
plant procedures to evaluate operability of the breaker and
report the event to the plant's shift operations supervisor.
The NRC staff has determined that the root causes for the three
violations related to the reactor trip breaker were poor
communications between operations, maintenance and engineering;
non-conservative decision-making; training deficiencies; and poor
event analysis. The NRC staff is proposing a $50,000 civil
penalty for this second group of violations, making a total of
$100,000.
The company has 30 days to either pay the fines or to protest
their imposition.
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