ML040631105

6:00 P.M. Transcript of Public Meeting Between NRC and Firstenergy Nuclear Power Operating Company Results of Follow-up Restart Readiness Assessment Team Inspection and Follow-up Management and Human Performance Team Inspection

ML040631105
Person / Time
Site:	Davis Besse
Issue date:	02/12/2004
From:	NRC/RGN-III
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FOIA/PA-2004-0277
Download: ML040631105 (161)

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2 3 PUBLIC MEETING BETWEEN U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION O350 PANEL 4 AND FIRST ENERGY NUCLEAR OPERATING COMPANY 5 ---

6 Meeting held on Thursday, February 12, 2004, at 6:00 p.m. at Camp Perry, Oak Harbor, Ohio, taken by me, 7 Marie B. Fresch, Registered Merit Reporter, and Notary Public in and for the State of Ohio.

8 9

PANEL MEMBERS PRESENT:

10 U. S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 11 John "Jack" Grobe, 12 Senior Manager, Region III Office

& Chairman, MC 0350 Panel 13 William Ruland, Senior Manager NRR

& Vice Chairman, MC 0350 Panel 14 Christine Lipa, Projects Branch Chief Christopher Scott Thomas, 15 Senior Resident Inspector U.S. NRC Office - Davis-Besse 16 Jon Hopkins, NRR Project Manager - Davis-Besse 17 Jack Rutkowski, NRC Resident Inspector Anthony Mendiola, 18 Section Chief PDIII-2, NRR 19 FIRST ENERGY NUCLEAR OPERATING COMPANY 20 Lew Myers, FENOC Chief Operating Officer Mark Bezilla, Site Vice President 21 Barry Allen, Plant Manager Fred von Ahn, Vice President - Oversight 22 Gary Leidich, FENOC President & Chief Nuclear Officer 23 24 25 MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

2 1 MR. GROBE: Good evening, 2 and welcome. My name is Jack Grobe and Im the Chairman of 3 the NRCs Davis-Besse Oversight Panel.

4 This meeting tonight is a business meeting between 5 FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company and the NRC. Were 6 making this meeting publicly available for observation, 7 both here at Camp Perry and also available to interested 8 persons who have called into our teleconference bridge 9 lines. If everyone can use the microphones, it will ensure 10 effective communication over the bridge.

11 After the discovery of the reactor pressure vessel 12 head degradation of Davis-Besse in March of 2002, the NRC 13 issued a Confirmatory Action Letter to FirstEnergy Nuclear 14 Operating Company documenting commitments made by FENOC.

15 One of those commitments was to meet with the NRC prior to 16 restart to discuss the cause of the head degradation, the 17 actions taken to understand the extent of the problems at 18 Davis-Besse, and the corrective actions taken to address 19 the problems and to prevent recurrence.

20 On November 23rd of 2003, FirstEnergy Nuclear 21 Operating Company provided the NRC their Integrated Report 22 to Support Restart and Request for Restart Approval. That 23 report was subsequently updated and supplemented on 24 February 6th, 2004.

25 Those documents include the information requested in MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

3 1 our Confirmatory Action Letter, and also include 2 commitments for continuing improvement in FENOCs 3 Operational Improvement Plan for oOperating Cycle 14 should 4 the NRC authorize restart of the Davis-Besse facility.

5 The purpose of this evenings meeting is for FENOC 6 to discuss the information on in those reports and provide the 7 Oversight Panel an opportunity to ask clarifying 8 questions. The NRC will not be authorizing restart of the 9 Davis-Besse facility this evening.

10 FirstEnergy has prepared slides for this evenings 11 meeting, which are available in the foyer as you came in 12 and on the NRCs website. Also available is a meeting 13 feedback form, which provides an opportunity for you to 14 provide information to us on how we can improve our 15 meetings.

16 In addition, the NRCs monthly newsletter is 17 available in the foyer and it provides an update on NRC 18 activities that have been occurring in the last several 19 weeks.

20 I would now like to take a moment to introduce the 21 other members of the NRC staff that are here this evening.

22 There are several additional members of the NRCs 23 Davis-Besse Oversight Panel here. On my immediate left is 24 Christine Lipa. Christine is a Branch Chief in the NRC 25 Region III Office in Chicago, Illinois responsible for MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

4 1 inspection programs at Davis-Besse.

2 On her left is Tony Mendiola. Tony is a Supervisor 3 in our Headquarters Office responsible for licensing 4 activities at Davis-Besse.

5 Next to Tony is Jon Hopkins. Jon is the Licensing 6 Project Manager in our NRC Headquarters responsible for 7 Davis-Besse activities.

8 And next the Jon is Bill Ruland. Bill is a Senior 9 Manager in our Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulations in 10 Headquarters and hes the Vice Chairman of the Oversight 11 Panel.

12 On my right is Scott Thomas. And Scott is the 13 Senior Resident Inspector working at the Davis-Besse 14 facility for the NRC every day.

15 In addition in the audience, I believe we have Jack 16 Rutkowski and Monica Salter-Williams. Theyre the two 17 Resident Inspectors at the Davis-Besse facility.

18 We have Viktoria Mitlyng and Jan Strasma, Public 19 Affairs Officers for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

20 Rolland Roland Lickus. Rolland Roland is the State Government 21 Affairs Officer.

22 I believe also we have Geoff Wright. Geoff was the 23 Team Leader for the Management and Human Performance 24 Inspection Team that had an Exit Meeting with FirstEnergy 25 this afternoon. And along with Jeff Geoff are two individuals MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

5 1 from our headquarters offices that were members of those --

2 of that team, excuse me. And thats Jay Persensky and June 3 Cai.

4 Also in the audience is Rick Skokowski. Rick was 5 the Team Leader for our Restart Readiness Assessment Team.

6 Rick is the Senior Resident Inspector from the Byron 7 Nuclear Station in Illinois. He also presented his 8 inspection findings this afternoon.

9 One of the most important people thats here this 10 evening is Nancy Keller. Nancy is the Resident Office 11 Assistant at the Davis-Besse Resident Inspectors Office.

12 Shes the young lady who was greeting you at the door and 13 making sure each of you got copies of the handouts.

14 And, of course, we have Marie Fresch here this 15 evening transcribing our meeting.

16 We have three NRC executives from the Nuclear 17 Regulatory Commission here this evening. Sam Collins is 18 the Deputy Executive Director for Operations of the 19 agency. He has responsibility for reactor programs.

20 Jim Dyer is the Director of the Office of Nuclear 21 Reactor Regulation in Headquarters.

22 And Jim Caldwell is the Regional Administrator, NRC 23 Region III in Chicago. Jim Caldwell is responsible for 24 making the decision on whether the NRC should authorize 25 restart of the Davis-Besse facility.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

6 1 In making that decision, he will receive input from 2 the Oversight Panel, and he is meeting personally with the 3 leaders of various inspections that have been conducted 4 since the shutdown of Davis-Besse in February of 2002. Jim 5 will also consult with Sam Collins and Jim Dyer to gain 6 their insights.

7 Jim, Sam, and Jim have spent yesterday and today 8 meeting with the Resident Inspection staff and various 9 panel members and touring the Davis-Besse facility.

10 I would like to take a moment now to invite any 11 public officials or representatives of public officials; 12 give them an opportunity to introduce themselves that are 13 here this evening.

14 MR. PAPCUN: John Papcun, 15 Ottawa County Commissioner.

16 MR. ARNDT: Steve Arndt, 17 Ottawa County Commissioner.

18 MR. KOEBEL: Carl Koebel, 19 Ottawa County Commissioner.

20 MR. WITT: Jere Witt, Ottawa 21 County Administrator.

22 MR. GROBE: Okay, very good.

23 Thank you very much and welcome.

24 Gary, I understand that you have some opening 25 comments and you would like to introduce your staff.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

7 1 MR. LEIDICH: Yes, thank you 2 very much, Jack, and good evening.

3 I really appreciate the opportunity to address the 4 panel this evening. I would like to start with perhaps the 5 most important introduction. We have several of our 6 employees, and, in fact, many of your employees here this 7 evening. I would just like to acknowledge their presence 8 and, more importantly, acknowledge the fine and hard and 9 dedicated work that theyve accomplished over the past 10 couple years associated with this restart. Quite frankly, 11 this Senior Team would not be sitting here, but for your 12 excellent effort in getting Davis-Besse ready for return to 13 service. So, we appreciate that very much.

14 And we do appreciate the opportunity to address the 15 panel. Its been a challenging couple of years for us at 16 Davis-Besse, and for the company, but we are looking 17 forward to the opportunity to run the facility again.

18 Our purpose here tonight is to summarize the last 19 two years worth of activity. Were going to try to cover 20 two years in about 30 to 40 minutes, but most importantly, 21 to put that behind us in many respects; to make sure that 22 we learn from it; to make sure that we acknowledge the 23 change that weve accomplished at Davis-Besse over the past 24 year or so; and to represent that as a strong foundation 25 for going forward in the future.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

8 1 Were also here to make clear our commitment for a 2 strong safety focus, going forward 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> a day, 7 days a 3 week at the Davis-Besse nuclear facility. Part of that 4 focus is the strength of the Senior Management team thats 5 here at this table tonight. I would like to introduce 6 them.

7 First of all, on my far right is our Plant Manager, 8 Barry Allen. As discussed at previous meetings, we 9 recruited Barry from the Entergy System, who had many years 10 of operating and engineering experience.

11 To his immediate left is Mark Bezilla, our Site Vice 12 President. Mark was originally licensed at Davis-Besse 13 years ago, went off to PSE&G Salem Oak Hope Creek and has also 14 been back at our Beaver Valley Station, and came over to 15 Davis-Besse several months ago.

16 To my immediate right is Lew Myers. Lew has over 30 17 years of operating experience in a variety of utility 18 settings; and as all of you know, Lew has been intimately 19 involved here at Davis-Besse at the restart. Hes our 20 Chief Operating Officer for FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating 21 Company.

22 To my immediate left is Fred von Ahn, Vice President 23 of Oversight. Fred reports directly to me in that role and 24 also has a dotted line reporting relationship to the 25 Nuclear Committee Board of Directors.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

9 1 Also in the audience from our Executive Office at 2 FENOC is Joe Hagan. Joe is our Senior Vice President of 3 Engineering and Services, and weve also been fortunate to 4 recruit Joe from Excelon, where he was responsible for the 5 entire mid Atlantic Regional Operating Group and their 6 operating facilities.

7 Lets go to the next slide, please.

8 This is our meeting agenda. Without any further 9 delay, I would like to turn it over to Lew Myers.

10 Lew.

11 MR. MYERS: Thank you, Gary.

12 "I dont measure a mans success by how he climbs, 13 but by how high he bounces when he hits the bottom."

14 Thats a quote from George S. Patton. In March of 2002, we 15 hit the bottom when we found the damage on our reactor 16 vessel head.

17 We, the FENOC staff, have accomplished a lot since 18 that time. Accomplishment is defined as the act of 19 achievement. Today we have bounced back.

20 We have three desired outcomes that I would like to 21 share with you. First, to provide you and the public with 22 an overview of the many safety improvements that weve made 23 over the past two years. Second, to demonstrate that our 24 people, our plant, and our programs are ready for a safe 25 return to service and operations. Third, to request NRCs MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

10 1 approval tonight for restart.

2 Our Return to Service Plan has been a tool thats 3 been used to guide us since May of 2002. This plan was 4 developed to address the root cause, extent of condition, 5 and the corrective actions needed for restart. I would 6 like to take a few moments to discuss a few of the many 7 accomplishments.

8 After we discovered -- next slide.

9 After we discovered the damage on the reactor vessel 10 head in March, on March 5th of 2002, we began taking strong 11 actions to resolve the issue. First, and most importantly, 12 we promptly reported the damage to the industry. Second, 13 in April of 2002, we submitted what I think is a thorough 14 Root Cause Report to the NRC. Third, in August of 2002, we 15 completed a detailed Management/Human Performance Root 16 Cause and shared that report and the findings with you and 17 the public, as well as the industry.

18 The issues focused on stress corrosion cracking and 19 boric acid corrosion, management acceptance of degraded 20 material condition, deficiencies in several of the 21 Davis-Besse programs.

22 Finally, between April and June, we placed a strong 23 management team and a strong Independent Oversight Panel in 24 place to guide the Return to Service Plan.

25 On May the 21st of 2002, we submitted our MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

11 1 Davis-Besse Return to Service Plan, which is provide the 2 guidance for many of the accomplishments that we have, that 3 brought us to the implementation of the return to safe and 4 reliable operation of our unit.

5 As you recall, the Return to Service Plan provided 6 the basis for Davis-Besses course of action for both safe 7 and reliable operations in the future. This plan was 8 designed to address six sets of commitments in the 9 Confirmatory Action Letter that we received on May of 10 2002. Let me tell you, there is a lot of strategic 11 activities that took place between March 5th of 2002 and 12 May of 2002.

13 The Return to Service Plan consists of seven 14 Building Blocks, and a strong experienced Restart Oversight 15 Panel that once again ensured comprehensive implementation 16 of our plan.

17 To-date, six of the Building Blocks are complete as 18 shown. The Restart Oversight Panel has recommended restart 19 for the Davis-Besse station. The station is implementing 20 the Restart Action Plan. That plan is the administrative 21 building block that is used to monitor and drive close both 22 regulatory issues and our management items and was designed 23 to stay open until a hundred percent power.

24 Next slide.

25 MR. RUTKOWSKI Ruland: Lew.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

12 1 MR. MYERS: Yes?

2 MR. RUTKOWSKI: You mentioned the 3 Restart Overview Panel. Do you intend to keep that 4 oversight, the Overview Panel together, disband subsequent, 5 if in fact we approve restart?

6 MR. MYERS: We intend to shift 7 some of the members of that panel, which weve already 8 done, to our Independent Oversight Review Board, and keep 9 that type of interface in place, but not that panel as 10 such.

11 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Thank you.

12 MR. GROBE: Lew, could we go 13 back to slide 5 just for a moment? Thank you.

14 I wanted to make an observation and understand your 15 thoughts. You indicate you completed a comprehensive root 16 cause analysis and identified the causes of the head 17 degradation and the organizational problems. And in the 18 end, we agreed with you and we concluded that you did 19 perform a comprehensive root cause.

20 But the first time that the Management/Human 21 Performance Inspection Team came in to do their first phase 22 of the inspection, which was an examination of your root 23 cause, they found that the work that you had done was done 24 well, but it wasnt sufficiently broad or deep to address 25 all of the issues that needed to be addressed. And, you MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

13 1 then further expanded that, looking in other areas like 2 Engineering and Company Nuclear Review Board and corporate 3 commitment and things like that.

4 Could you talk a little bit about the need for 5 expanding that and why the first inspection, first time we 6 came in, it wasnt at the level of breadth and depth it 7 needed to be?

8 MR. MYERS: The way I would 9 characterize that, I think because that root cause, we 10 brought in some very sophisticated, experienced people to 11 look at the total root cause. We used a combination of, I 12 think its MORT and several other root cause type 13 analysis. We put a team together, they spent months, I 14 think going back to the 70s looking at items, and 15 developed what I thought was a very comprehensive Root 16 Cause Report.

17 Now, after that, we shared that with you, and we 18 came in and we were willing to go deeper in specific 19 organizations that affected that root cause. Those 20 organizations was our Quality Organization, our Engineering 21 Organization, our Operations Organization.

22 So, we took and did vertical slices of those groups 23 to try to understand better what was going on in those 24 areas. We had good examples, like lack of involvement in 25 some areas of Operations or Engineering rigor. So, we went MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

14 1 through those vertical slices to try to understand exactly 2 what we needed to change, and that global root cause would 3 not do that for you.

4 MR. GROBE: Okay.

5 MR. MYERS: Okay.

6 The next slide.

7 In our July 2003 Public Meeting, we provided you an 8 update on the arrival of a new reactor vessel head at our 9 site. Many people in the industry thought that the head 10 repair was the simplest method to return our Davis-Besse 11 station to service.

12 We elected to purchase a new head from the Midland 13 plant. That reactor head had never been used, but we 14 completed a comprehensive testing of the head and 15 radiography inspections to ensure the quality prior to 16 installation.

17 Finally, on October of 2003 meeting, we provided 18 both you and the public with the results of an RCS Pressure 19 Test, Reactor Coolant System Pressure Test, with our new 20 reactor vessel head installed. That test demonstrated 21 confidence in our plant, in our equipment, and finally in 22 our new reactor vessel head.

23 We performed the test at 50 pounds and looked for 24 leaks, 250 pounds per square inch and looked for leaks, and 25 finally went on up to normal operating pressure of 2155 MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

15 1 pounds, we completed a detail and thorough review of the 2 entire Reactor Coolant System on October the 7th. This 3 week, we successfully completed the final test; the 4 Control Rod Drive Insertion Test. That test validates 5 proper movement of the control rod drives.

6 The reactor is at normal operating pressure 7 temperature today, and the reactor vessel head fully 8 supports return to service of our station.

9 Next, our Containment Health is excellent. The 10 Containment Health Building Block was charted to evaluate 11 and disposition the extent of condition throughout the 12 Reactor Coolant System; so, the Reactor Coolant System and 13 the Containment System. Many accomplishments have been 14 completed that went far beyond this charter.

15 We now have a Containment Sump that I believe is a 16 model for the industry. We solved a longstanding issue by 17 installing a Decay Heat Valve Tank in our Containment. We 18 refurbished completely two Reactor Coolant Pumps, both pump 19 and motor. We are the only plant that can now continuously 20 monitor the reactor vessel bottom head for leakage with our 21 new FLUS Monitoring Leakage System.

22 We installed a Permanent Reactor Cavity Seal that 23 will continue to reduce radiation dose and refueling outage 24 throughout the future and protect the reactor vessel from 25 possible leakage from the refueling canal.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

16 1 We removed the fibrous insulation from our 2 Containment. We installed additional upgrades on or 3 Containment cranes to improve both safety and reliability.

4 We demonstrated our Containment integrity was good 5 with a solid Integrated Leak Rate Test. That test was 6 performed at a slightly higher pressure than normal to once 7 again gain additional operating margin.

8 We performed a comprehensive inspection of our fuel, 9 made some modifications to ensure quality fuel reliability 10 throughout this site.

11 We thoroughly addressed the extent of condition of 12 boric acid which was in our containment. We conducted a 13 Boric Acid and Alloy 600 Component Inspections and to the 14 extent of corrective actions.

15 We repacked over a hundred valves. We completed 16 2500 restart corrective actions. We installed new coolers 17 in our Containment Cooling Unit. Then we upgraded the 18 thermal performance of the units and replaced the duct work 19 with stainless steel.

20 Our Reactor Coolant System has demonstrated 21 excellent integrity. The Containment systems and 22 structures are in excellent material condition. Our 23 outside oversight groups have commented on the excellent 24 material condition of the Containment.

25 I know that you and your staff toured our MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

17 1 Containment last night. This building and the RCS fully 2 supports restart.

3 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Are there any 4 work -- I know your presentation really is a high level 5 presentation about the major things that youve done. Are 6 there any items that you have left in your work list as we 7 stand here that you need to work off between now and when 8 you change modes?

9 MR. MYERS: Not in 10 containment. We have the restoration of our transformer.

11 Is there anything else that you have?

12 MR. BEZILLA: No.

13 MR. MYERS: No, thats it.

14 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Other than the 15 restoration of the transformer, you believe thats the only 16 work you believe you have remaining?

17 MR. MYERS: Thats correct.

18 MR. GROBE: Lew, in the last 19 three slides, youve covered the Reactor Vessel Head 20 Replacement and Containment Health and Containment Extent 21 of Condition. The Reactor Vessel Head Replacement, we did 22 extensive inspection of the replacement head and the 23 methods by which you certified that head and had very few 24 problems, and that was accomplished very well.

25 In a number of these, on your slide 8, a number of MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

18 1 these Containment Health issues are clear commitments on 2 the part of your staff to make improvements; and while we 3 may have had some inspection findings on some of these 4 issues, overall that was a positive situation also.

5 But the initial evaluation of Containment Extent of 6 Condition, as I recall, that activity was initially 7 conducted in such a way that it would not provide reliable, 8 consistent results of the evaluation of the extent of 9 condition of the boric acid corrosion inside Containment 10 and you needed to stop work and ended up writing new 11 procedures and training programs and qualifying your staff 12 to a higher level of capability in accomplishing those 13 inspections and then you recommenced work. It was about a 14 30-day stop work, if I recall.

15 MR. MYERS: Thats correct.

16 MR. GROBE: Could you give me 17 some insight from your perspective as to why some of these 18 activities occurred very well and other activities seem to 19 have some substantial blips in the process?

20 MR. MYERS: Yes. We have the 21 qualification program, thats a visual examination program, 22 VT-2. Thats pretty standard in the industry.

23 When we started doing the inspections for boric acid 24 leakage, when we got to asking some questions, and you all 25 asked some questions too; thats a visual examination for MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

19 1 rust and deterioration of components, but its not, its 2 not a training program that qualifies people to look for 3 Boron, and boric acid damage.

4 So, we came back and said "What does that mean?"

5 There was not an industry program that we found, so we 6 created our own. And what we wound up doing is developing 7 our own training program, which includes the VT-2 plus some 8 additional training that we wanted to qualify people to, 9 and then we went and did our inspection. I think, I dont 10 remember, I think we qualified like 20 or 30 people at that 11 training program.

12 What that did, it gave us, it bounded that question 13 that was raised about the qualifications of individuals.

14 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Lew, what was that 15 program called where you qualified the inspectors; do you 16 remember?

17 MR. MYERS: Its physically 18 call the Boric Acid Inspection Program.

19 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Thank you.

20 MS. LIPA: I have one other 21 question. On the bottom of page 8, you talked about ensure 22 fuel integrity and you mentioned modification. Are those 23 procedure, fuel handling procedure modifications actually 24 hardware modifications?

25 MR. MYERS: Hardware MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

20 1 modifications. There was several places where the flows 2 were such in the core, if you look at our vendor, 3 Framatone, they recommend that we make some minor mods 4 there in some pins; some pins, in some stainless steel 5 pins.

6 We also inspected a hundred percent of our fuel, one 7 hundred percent. And we did, I always call it a fuel 8 sifting process, one hundred percent fuel.

9 MS. LIPA: Okay, thank you.

10 MR. MYERS: Yes.

11 Once again, our Containment Building, we believe 12 fully supports restart.

13 Our System Health Review; our System Health Building 14 Block was chartered to perform the operational review on 15 our systems and for the safe and reliable operations of the 16 Davis-Besse station. This comprehensive review consisted 17 of the following three separate reviews.

18 We did an Operational Readiness Review of the 19 Maintenance Rule Systems that was performed by the System 20 Engineers and the Plant Manager.

21 We then performed System Health Reviews on 31 Risk 22 Significant Systems.

23 And finally, we went back and performed five Latent 24 Issue Reviews looking for hidden type problems on an 25 additional five systems.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

21 1 Many actions were taken as a result of those 2 reviews. Over a 140 modifications have been made on our 3 systems. Over 7,700 work orders were completed. Once 4 again we repacked, I think, around 140 work order valves in 5 the Reactor Coolant System in the Containment area.

6 Approximately 2,000 Condition Reports were written, and 7 2,800 associated Corrective Actions have been completed.

8 15,000 tests were performed; 2200 Preventative Maintenance 9 Tests.

10 We went beyond the regulatory requirements and 11 upgraded the air system on our emergency diesel generator 12 and installed two new air dryers on our emergency diesels, 13 ensuring good long performance there.

14 All systems with performance issues, Maintenance A-1 Rule (a)(1) 15 Systems, we call those, were repaired. Thats not to say 16 there is not some new additional A-1 (a)(1) Systems. I think 17 today there is one, heat trace.

18 We believe our system health is good, and fully 19 supports the restart of the Davis-Besse station.

20 MR. HOPKINS: Lew, I have a 21 question. 1996, NRC issued a 5054 F-liner 10 CFR 50.54f letter on design basis, 22 which you developed a number of corrective actions in 23 regard to. Do you still have some corrective actions open 24 in response to that?

25 MR. MYERS: Im familiar with MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

22 1 that. Jim Powers, I think, is in the audience. Do you 2 want him to answer that?

3 MR. POWERS: Sure.

4 MR. MYERS: Jim is our 5 Director of Engineering.

6 MR. POWERS: Jim Powers, 7 Director of Engineering at Davis-Besse.

8 We still have several of the calculation updates 9 that were working on, Jon. We had, as you know, we had 10 done a Design Basis Validation Project as part of the 11 commitment for the 54-F 50.54f letter and there was a large number 12 of calculations that were reviewed and a number of them 13 were identified for improvements to be done and they were 14 categorized based on their importance and safety 15 significance, and some of the lower level ones remain to be 16 updated and completed, and that work continues to on go.

17 MR. HOPKINS: Okay, but the 18 remaining ones are still all in your Corrective Action 19 Program?

20 MR. POWERS: Thats correct.

21 MR. HOPKINS: And determined not 22 necessary for restart?

23 MR. POWERS: Right, that was an 24 important improvement that we made as part and course of 25 this outage was to ensure that all those actions were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

23 1 entered into our Corrective Action Program.

2 MR. HOPKINS: All right, thank 3 you.

4 MR. MYERS: Our programs meet 5 both the industry and regulatory standards, and in some 6 cases set a new benchmark for the industry. The charter 7 for the Program Building Block was to ensure that listed 8 programs are fulfilling the required obligations, including 9 interfaces and handoffs and are sufficient to support safe 10 and reliable operation. That was the charter of that 11 building block.

12 65 programs received the Phase One Review to ensure 13 that they meet industry requirements, they have good 14 ownership, and then we are implementing the Program program 15 properly.

16 Six programs received a detail systematic review 17 looking for latent-type issues. Theres a slide were 18 missing here.

19 The Boric Acid Control Program is I believe an 20 industry standard program. The Quality Assurance Program 21 is now independent and reports to the President of FENOC 22 and the Nuclear Committee of our Board. The Corrective 23 Action Program has been benchmarked against industry 24 standards. The In-Service Inspection Program, Operating 25 Experience Program and Plant Modification Program have all MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

24 1 been strengthened.

2 Finally, at the beginning of this outage, our Health 3 Physics Program had concerns. We are confident today that 4 both our people and our program in Health Physics 5 represents the highest industry standards. We are 6 competent confident that our plant programs meet and, once again in 7 many ways, set a new industry standard.

8 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Lew, you stated 9 the Boric Acid Control Program was an industry standard 10 program. Can you give me an example of a facet of that 11 program, why you believe thats the case?

12 MR. MYERS: One of the things, 13 we think for instance our training program is unique. We 14 also have an engineer that physically, we have a dedicated 15 Boric Acid Program and engineer that physically has 16 ownership of that program and tracks that boric acid leaks 17 individually. And we think that is unique and the 18 inspections we do are unique.

19 Jim, do you have anything you want to add to that?

20 MR. POWERS: As you said, Lew, 21 we do have a dedicated owner for the Boric Acid Corrosion 22 Control Program that came to us from our Beaver Valley Unit 23 in Pennsylvania. He volunteered to come and take control 24 of that program. Hes been working with the plant 25 engineers to make sure we have a strong program in place.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

25 1 Going forward in the future, we think its one of the 2 leadership programs in the industry.

3 And, particularly, one of the important improvements 4 that we made was to link it to our other related programs, 5 such as our In-Service Inspection Program and our Leakage 6 Reduction Program, so that they integrate, and the 7 observations and findings in one program are communicated 8 to the other program owners. We can see the synergy 9 between them, that give a stronger network of programs as a 10 result.

11 MR. MYERS: Part of that 12 program is RCS Leakage Procedure that we have. That is 13 very unique also. That looks for changes, not just the 14 calculations, but changes in other systems.

15 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Thank you.

16 MR. GROBE: Lew, before you go 17 on. Again, a similar question to what I asked before. In 18 your System Design Reviews, you found by and large, our 19 inspections found that those were performed very well, and 20 you continue expanding the scope of reviews until youre 21 satisfied you understood the full extent of condition, 22 including boric design, detailed design reviews and 23 cross-cutting topical area reviews.

24 In many of the programs on slide 11, program reviews 25 that you conducted were good, but there were two programs MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

26 1 that, one is the Radiation Protection Program, which was 2 added to the Restart Checklist specifically in response to 3 some risk significant findings regarding the control of 4 exposure to the contamination, and the control of internal 5 dose.

6 MR. MYERS: The tiny discrete 7 particles.

8 MR. GROBE: Right. And, 9 secondly -- and that was something that found you.

10 MR. MYERS: Right.

11 MR. GROBE: And our inspection 12 continued to explain and further develop the extent of 13 those problems. It wasnt something that you found.

14 And then the Corrective Action Program, the 15 inspection in that area, identified some 20 to 30 16 violations and identified some fairly substantive concerns 17 in the quality of engineering work products, which again, 18 you didnt identify this through your own internal reviews 19 and assessments.

20 Im still struggling. Ive asked the question three 21 times on three different topics now and Im still 22 struggling to understand why some activities seem to be 23 performed very well, other activities seem to be not always 24 hitting the mark.

25 MR. MYERS: Well, the two MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

27 1 questions are somewhat different. The question on the 2 Health Physics Program, youre right, that we did find the 3 issue with the tiny discrete particles. I think we took 4 that on well. It took us some time to get our hands around 5 it. Once again, if I go look today, based on procedure 6 changes we made, management changes we made, and training 7 and stuff weve done with our employees, the feedback that 8 we get now is that our HP programs, you all gave us and the 9 industry gave us, are some of the best in the nation.

10 That being said, if you go look at our Corrective 11 Action Program, Corrective Action Program consists of, you 12 know, identification. You know, I think if you look 13 throughout this period, no one has ever questioned our 14 identification threshold is extremely low. Then, it has to 15 do with analysis. And, then, it has to do with fixing the 16 problems.

17 Well, the area that weve had some issues in is the 18 analysis phase or discovery phase, whatever you want to 19 call it there. Weve had none where we had to go back and 20 follow up, reinstall a pump or anything.

21 One of the things I brought some data with me 22 tonight, if I can find it. That were back, we created our 23 Engineering Review Board to, to strengthen the quality of 24 products coming out of Engineering, the rigor.

25 Now, that board is part of the process. Thats a MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

28 1 permanent part of the process. So, that being said, you 2 know, we think the quality of documents given to that board 3 has been pretty good. When the Restart Readiness Assessment Team Inspection) RRATI 4 Team came in, most of the issues they had were in the calculation area. So, we 5 took data and calculations, the issue you brought up awhile 6 ago, Jon.

7 So, weve taken that, were sending the calculations 8 through the Engineering Review Board now. What weve done 9 is created a detailed set of attributes that are like this, 10 and if you go look at the engineering quality of them as a 11 board, were seeing some very good positive trends now.

12 So, we think that was something that was not going 13 through our Engineering Review Board. Weve got them going 14 through there now. Thats having a very good positive 15 effect on the quality of calculations, which 90 percent of 16 the issues youre talking about were in, you know.

17 MR. GROBE: I dont think 18 youre quite hitting the nail on the head. Maybe we can 19 continue dialoguing this as we go on. The question, I 20 dont have a question regarding once an issue is clearly 21 brought to your attention; you address it comprehensively.

22 MR. MYERS: Right.

23 MR. GROBE: And the issues on 24 the Radiation Protection Program, when we came back and did 25 our supplemental inspection several months later found that MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

29 1 the improvements were substantive; similar to the 2 discussion we had this afternoon on Operations; between 3 December and February, there was a step change in 4 performance.

5 My question is, why is it that we come in and 6 inspect some programs, some calculations, some engineering 7 reviews, some inspections, and find them done very well; 8 and come in and inspect some other areas and find some 9 problems? And, what is it thats causing that over the 10 past two years, causing some level of inconsistency?

11 MR. MYERS: I think if you go 12 look at the past two years, we went through the Building 13 Blocks. The Discovery Phase, we brought in hundreds of 14 people in system walkdowns, all the mods and everything 15 else. Now that were at this point with our plant on 16 standby, were able to focus. We dont have as many issues 17 to deal with. And what thats going to allow us to do is 18 physically implement the FENOC Self-Assessment Process.

19 We have done a lot of self-assessments over the past 20 two years, have not been systematic based on feedback from 21 our Corrective Action Program, if you will. One of the 22 things we typically do -- as you know, we quit trending 23 Corrective Actions because of all the {Condition Report} CRs put in there.

24 One of the things we do is look at those trends and 25 then focus self-assessments in place with high level teams MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

30 1 of FENOC personnel and outside personnel to go look for 2 those type of issues. And, we normally have latent type 3 issue reviews.

4 I think we still have some spotty implementation of 5 some of our programs that youre talking about. And I 6 think now that weve got the plant on standby, and we have 7 all this discovery using our normal processes, well 8 continue to see good strong improvement using our 9 Self-Assessment Program. In fact, weve already got, Ive 10 got a list of all the self-assessments lined up for next 11 year already -- this year, Im sorry.

12 MR. GROBE: I dont want to 13 leave an incorrect perception, you know, that the head 14 degradation was the highest level of risk significance that 15 our agency has, it was a red finding; and some of the other 16 issues that were identified were less significant 17 findings.

18 MR. MYERS: Right.

19 MR. GROBE: The containment 20 sump clogging, containment coatings issues was a yellow 21 findings, Rad protection issues were white findings.

22 More recently, all of the findings that we, have 23 been, are lowest category, green or minor issues. So, 24 there has been a steady improvement as far as the 25 significance of the findings.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

31 1 What Im trying to get at, I think we just need to 2 continue going through the meeting and well keep thinking 3 about this, is why there is this kind of inconsistency.

4 So, lets go on. Its in the back of my mind and Ill 5 still think about it and probably ask more questions.

6 MR. MYERS: Good.

7 I think I ended though, were confident that our 8 programs are effectively implemented to support restart, 9 and we will set a new standard.

10 The next area, Management and Human Performance 11 Building Block created both a comprehensive leadership and 12 comprehensive organizational development actions that we 13 need to ensure that the Davis-Besse station will safely 14 operate and reliably operate.

15 The new corporate management at FENOC, as the Chief 16 Operating Officer, my new job, was created to ensure 17 consistency of operations in the FENOC plant. We also 18 created the VP of Quality Assurance that reports directly 19 to the President of FENOC and Nuclear Committee of the 20 Board. Our corporate organization and that governance that 21 we have today, I believe would prevent this type of issue 22 in the future.

23 We took prompt actions to place a strong management 24 team at the site. Let me take a moment to describe them.

25 The Senior Leadership Team at our site has over 125 years MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

32 1 of nuclear experience and all have Senior Reactor Operator 2 experience.

3 The Management Team at the site has over 225 years 4 of nuclear experience, and 10 of the 13 have Senior Reactor 5 Operator experience. The jobs that dont, are jobs like 6 Human Resources, which you wouldnt expect to have that 7 in.

8 We completed the Root Cause Training for many of our 9 employees, over a hundred. We enhanced the Corrective 10 Action Program. We created a new Problem-Solving and 11 Decision-Making Nuclear Operating Procedure. Standards and 12 Expectations Training has been completed for all our 13 employees. We trained each and every employee on our 14 Safety Culture Model, and had them assess us as a 15 Management Team. Then we performed Operability Training 16 for our SROs and engineers.

17 Next slide.

18 Finally, the Restart Test Plan Building Block was 19 designed to assess the Reactor Coolant System, the 20 operation -- Operational Programs and the Leakage Control 21 Program. The NOP Test, being, demonstrated confidence in 22 our plant systems. That test demonstrated good confidence 23 in the plant systems.

24 We thoroughly tested the safety equipment, including 25 the Safety Features Actuation System, the Reactor MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

33 1 Protection System, the Steam and Feedwater Line Rupture 2 Control System.

3 We completed numerous inspections on our primary 4 systems as well and completed hundreds of corrective 5 actions. These systems include the Reactor Coolant System 6 and the Makeup and Purification System. We validate the 7 RCS leakage integrity and the sensitivity, if you will, of 8 our new FLUS Monitoring System.

9 We have inspected and operated secondary systems, 10 including the Condensate System, the Circulating Water 11 System and the Main Steam System. We have demonstrated a 12 positive Safety Culture at the Davis-Besse station and good 13 teamwork.

14 We have focused on the industrial safety, nuclear 15 and radiological safety, and organizational effectiveness.

16 Our new Problem-Solving and Decision-Making Process has 17 been effectively exercised. I think you all have monitored 18 that plan, that process being exercised.

19 Once again, I believe this process alone would have 20 prevented the reactor vessel head event. I think that we 21 have demonstrated that the, the Restart Test Plan supports 22 restart of the unit.

23 In summary, we performed detailed root causes and 24 demonstrated good integrity when we did that, Jack. We 25 have completed comprehensive actions from the building MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

34 1 blocks and went far beyond the regulatory requirements in 2 many areas.

3 We have demonstrated our ability to operate the 4 plant both safely and reliably. We have people with a 5 strong safety focus. We are now ready to return the plant 6 to service in a safe and reliable operation. Thank you.

7 MR. THOMAS: Lew, I have a 8 question. This afternoon, you heard one of our inspection 9 team leaders tell you that his team had observed a step 10 increase in performance of your staff over the last they 11 were, over the first time this team had looked at your 12 performance.

13 Briefly, what would you attribute that increase in 14 performance to?

15 MR. MYERS: If you go look at 16 the performance, what we did is, there is a chart that we 17 have, its a root cause chart, which we went back over a 18 year or so ago and plotted all the issues in Operations.

19 What you found was when the plant was sitting there with no 20 fuel or fuel loaded, Mode 5, then, you know, we didnt see 21 many issues.

22 As we moved forward into the complex evolutions of 23 the heatup, what I call very complex evolutions, we started 24 finding deviations between the way we trained, the way we 25 physically operated the plant. And, we had some issues in MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

35 1 the first, the heat up of the plant. We identified 2 basically the same issues that you did.

3 We came down, we took what we thought were 4 corrective actions. Got ready to heat back up again. We 5 got back into those complex issues, we saw some performance 6 improvements, but not the level of performance we expected 7 to see. So, we stopped. We looked at it. And thats when 8 we pulled the Integrated Root Cause Team together I talked 9 about.

10 What we found in that area is that many of the 11 corrective actions that we, many of the issues had 12 corrective actions that had been properly implemented by 13 the management team in Operations would have improved the 14 performance to the standards youre seeing today. Based on 15 that, we had to make some changes in the Operations 16 management performance. Thats what we did. Thats what I 17 attribute that to; lack of really detailed implementation 18 of corrective actions.

19 MR. THOMAS: I guess a logical 20 follow-up question to that would be, to what do you 21 attribute any confidence going forward? Is the management 22 team put in place, is that what gives you the confidence 23 that the performance will continue going forward?

24 MR. ALLEN: Scott, I think 25 thats part of, we have a good leadership team in place at MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

36 1 the station. Weve also given a lot of thought to what we 2 need to do to sustain continued improvement of performance 3 down the road, because good performance is not just stable 4 performance, its improving or trying to achieve 5 excellence.

6 Part of our Operational Improvement Plan for this 7 cycle, one of the things were looking at is the actions we 8 can put in place to ensure we do maintain our progress.

9 I think Lew talked a little about the focus 10 self-assessments. As we get out of this phase where we 11 have so many outside folks in assessing our performance, 12 returning to the FENOC model of the focus self-assessments, 13 which still use external forces to FENOC and to people in 14 FENOC to come help us perform those assessments.

15 Our ongoing assessments, observation cards, and 16 those type of activities which you routinely see in this 17 exercise, those will continue. And weve not had a great 18 deal of opportunity to do benchmarking except in very 19 limited cases. So, weve laid out benchmarking plans and 20 were laying out self-assessments plans to make sure were 21 not an isolated station. So, were out looking at what the 22 best industry practices are to help us ensure improving our 23 performance.

24 Were looking at an Operations Staff Plan over the 25 next five years. Were hiring additional [Senior Reactor Operators] SROs, get some MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

37 1 bench training. Allow us to rotate Operations performance 2 throughout more organizations on the site. That, I 3 believe, will give us a good operational focus, not just 4 out of Operations, but from a site perspective, will help 5 us beef up our training, improve our training everywhere we 6 can within the Operations Department.

7 Were utilizing FENOC to help leverage Conduct of 8 Operations standards throughout the fleet, so it will be 9 standard with FENOC and then well go benchmark that 10 against Institute of Nuclear Power Operations and other 11 higher performing utilities to ensure we have the highest 12 standards in relation to quality.

13 Weve got our Operations crews where were working 14 on our procedures. We looked at our complex integrated 15 procedures for heating up and cooling down the plant. We 16 went through and worked very hard on those to ensure those 17 were verified, validated, run on the simulator. Were 18 going to take that same experience, which has been very 19 successful for us, expand that to other aspects of 20 operational procedures and make sure we can leverage that 21 going forward also.

22 So, were looking at a great number of things. All 23 of which comes back to again the leadership team, the 24 management team we have in place, setting those activities 25 in motion; and then utilizing internal forces, FENOC MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

38 1 resources, and external resources to help us benchmark, 2 self-assess, and assure that we are maintaining sustained 3 improved performance.

4 MR. BEZILLA: Scott, I believe 5 Barrys presentation will address some of those, address 6 your question also.

7 MR. THOMAS: Sorry to jump 8 ahead.

9 MR. MENDIOLA: If I could also, 10 prior to your presentation, but you gave a lot of different 11 areas where youre seeking to excel. Have you discovered 12 or determined any specific area or areas that you, if you 13 will, your highest priority to work on?

14 MR. ALLEN: Thats a good 15 question, Tony. I think we seen, the area that we felt 16 like was the most significant to us in the last several 17 weeks, was the formality in the rigor in which we addressed 18 technical specification actions. And, so, we have taken 19 probably the most significant actions in that area, and 20 were working very hard to make sure we have that 21 formalized right on the detail.

22 So, were ensuring on those type of activities, 23 where were interfacing the technical specifications and 24 [Limiting Condition for Operations] LCOs, that we actually get the tech specs out. We brought 25 the book over, we read it, be sure we get a peer check.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

39 1 Ill cover this more in my presentation, but were 2 involved with the crew in there. Were building in layers 3 to ensure we do a good job from a Human Performance 4 perspective and then were building those expectations into 5 our log keeping and other tools to ensure that we dont 6 forget to do some of those things, and were putting that 7 structure in our programs, as well as working on the 8 individual performance.

9 MR. THOMAS: I have one 10 follow-up question.

11 MR. ALLEN: Yes, Scott.

12 MR. THOMAS: I believe it was 13 either Mark or Lew stated that they attributed the increase 14 in performance primarily due to some organizational changes 15 that had occurred recently. What did these individuals 16 bring to your, bring to your staff that caused these 17 changes to occur?

18 MR. ALLEN: Scott, a few 19 things. I think were looking at some individuals in new 20 positions, as far as Davis-Besse sees them right now, but 21 in reality the individuals that we have put in, for 22 instance, as the Operations Manager and the Operations 23 Superintendent, those individuals are not new to those 24 positions; they both have prior experience in those roles, 25 okay, in those positions.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

40 1 So, we have experienced people with those tasks.

2 They have been successful in those roles, now back in those 3 roles to help us be successful. They are doing a good job 4 of taking standards and applying them and putting forth the 5 expectation as Plant Manager, and theyre holding the shift 6 managers and the supervisors accountable to that level of 7 performance, okay, and those individuals are doing the same 8 with their crews.

9 So, what were seeing is increased ownership and 10 accountability on the part of the organization, and were 11 seeing good follow-up and checking to make sure that were 12 getting the results we desire. So, its, I think its 13 taking the proper actions.

14 And then the oversight, not only from the external 15 folks who we have help from, but just from our management 16 leadership team, going out and checking and making sure we 17 are getting the changes we want forward; and if were not 18 getting those cases, you know, on individual cases, were 19 correcting those promptly and in a timely fashion to ensure 20 that we resolve issues, you know, as they, as they arise 21 before they become more generic behavior or problematic 22 issues throughout the Operations group.

23 MR. MYERS: Ive finished my 24 presentation. I was going to turn my presentation over to 25 Barry Allen now.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

41 1 MR. GROBE: I apologize for 2 that. This has been very helpful, because its, its 3 brought into focus, rather lengthy period of time 4 activities, a lengthy period of time. On your slide 13, 5 you highlighted Containment Integrated Leak Rate Test; 6 that was done extremely well.

7 MR. MYERS: Right.

8 MR. GROBE: Some of our best 9 inspectors were evaluating your performance in the 10 preparation of those procedures, and preparation for the 11 conduct of the test, the actual conduct of the test. And, 12 in particular, her comment was, it was very, very 13 adequate. And thats about as good as it gets.

14 MR. MYERS: You dont give 15 excellents?

16 MR. GROBE: Very, very 17 adequate. (laughter) 18 And the Normal Operating Pressure Test, the fact 19 that you committed to that test, that commitment was far 20 beyond the ASME code requirements, and were going to be 21 getting into operational performance in a little bit, but 22 during the conduct of the test, there was a variety of 23 operational problems.

24 And, again, one of the very difficult challenges 25 that I feel and I face as a panel member, and Im sure the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

42 1 rest of the panel feels this same way, you dont have to be 2 perfect to be authorized for restart. Nobody is perfect.

3 But the panel needs to have confidence that the actions 4 youve taken are going to produce consistent, safe 5 performance.

6 And what Im trying to get at is, there has been a 7 steady improvement in performance, but theres also been 8 these blips, and Im trying to fully understand why we 9 should have confidence in consistency of the performance 10 and that it will stay at least at that level if not 11 continue going up.

12 MR. MYERS: You know, I think 13 one of the things were trying to do is strive for 14 consistency ourselves. Barry was talking awhile ago, Barry 15 is one of the new, the new Plant Manager we brought in.

16 About the time we were doing the heatup, he was really just 17 getting settled into his job. And we brought Kevin 18 Ostrowski over some time ago. Weve made him the Ops 19 Manager now; and Dave Imlay the Ops Superintendent.

20 I think the Management Team we put in place is the 21 Management Team here that will continue to strive for 22 consistency. They have good experience. And I think that 23 as we move forward utilizing the FENOC fleet approach, 24 youll see in the corporate governance we have, youll see 25 an improved consistency.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

43 1 MR. BEZILLA: Jack, just one 2 thing to add to that. Our Ops Managers Charter, the 3 safety focus of plant operations through consistent 4 implementation of our rigorous Conduct of Ops. So, Dave 5 and Kevins focus is on consistent and rigorous 6 implementation of Conduct of Operations and theyre driving 7 that down through the shift managers into the crews, and 8 the shift managers in turn are driving that through the 9 organization. So, from being able to sustain it, its 10 having the shift managers drive it through their crews and 11 through the organization. Were seeing that happen today.

12 MR. GROBE: When was that 13 charter drafted?

14 MR. BEZILLA: That was early 15 January.

16 MR. GROBE: So, thats 17 something new?

18 MR. BEZILLA: Thats correct.

19 MR. ALLEN: Okay, thank you 20 and good evening. My desired outcome for this evening is 21 to share with you how our recent operational performance 22 supports safe plant restart.

23 Next slide, please.

24 Davis-Besse operations continues to demonstrate 25 continuing positive improvement. Visible example of this MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

44 1 positive trend include the very critical behavior of 2 Operations leadership driving the station.

3 As a recent example of this, where we had a 4 situation where the shift manager observed an indication 5 issue in the control room. Shift manager ensured the unit 6 was in a stable condition. He then activated the duty 7 team. Got the duty team to perform a Problem-Solving 8 Decision-Making Team to assess and understand the issue.

9 Shift manager engaged the senior leadership team to make 10 sure the problems was found and understood and make sure we 11 had proper oversight. And the team went off and resolved 12 the issue. And then only after the issue was resolved from 13 a safety perspective did the shift manager then resume 14 activities.

15 That was a very critical behavior of leadership in 16 the shift managers that were now seeing daily. So, thats 17 a very key, thats a very key visible improvement for the 18 station.

19 Our Operations management and our other line 20 managers are also out visible in the plant enforcing 21 standards. And a very key change also is our shift 22 managers are now focused on spending their time in an 23 oversight role. We had some issues with distractions and 24 we had been involved in other activities that eliminated 25 those kinds of things. So, we now have those folks focused MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

45 1 in the control room, spend more time in the control room 2 and maintain the oversight perspective of the activities 3 occurring on their crews.

4 Our prejob briefings. We now have consistency and 5 quality in our prejob briefings, such that our field 6 execution has improved. And another very key point that I 7 really want to stress, is that the role of our reactor 8 operators has been expanded to capitalize on their 9 ownership knowledge and expertise.

10 So, our reactor operators are now utilizing a peer 11 check entry and exit from tech spec action statements.

12 They were not doing that before. They are also tracking 13 with electronic timers, a short duration technical 14 specification action timers. They were not doing that 15 before.

16 Theyre also, if we have maintenance on a safety 17 related implementation plan, before the senior reactor 18 operator signs off and operates that maintenance, the 19 reactor operator co-authorizes that to get the RO buying 20 and understanding the activity thats taking place. Thats 21 a very key change in our Conduct of Operations.

22 We have seen just across the board significant 23 improved ownership and accountability for performance 24 within Operations. And we have resolved our enunciator 25 response issues where we had some inconsistency before. We MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

46 1 now have consistent and correct enunciator response in the 2 control room.

3 We have formalized our guidance for station log 4 keeping. Its significantly improved now. Its 5 significantly more thorough, more detailed, and more 6 consistent amongst all the Operations crews. And we have 7 formalized very prescriptive technical specification 8 implementation requirements.

9 And, lastly, from a demonstrated performance 10 perspective --

11 MR. THOMAS: Before you move 12 on, Barry, can I ask you a question?

13 MR. ALLEN: Yes, sir.

14 MR. THOMAS: If you ask the 15 same question to a nonlicensed operator, and a mechanic, an 16 RP tech; and the question being, what organization leads at 17 Davis-Besse; do you believe you would get a consistent 18 answer?

19 MR. ALLEN: I believe I would 20 get a consistent answer of Operations.

21 Now, from a demonstrated performance perspective, I 22 think its very critical to note that Operations has 23 recently conducted its safe and eventless plant heatups and 24 cooldowns. Demonstrated performance. Examples Ive given 25 are visible improvements which demonstrate significant MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

47 1 improvements in Operations.

2 Next slide, please.

3 As you recall on the January 21st public meeting, we 4 provided you with the assessment criteria that we would use 5 to assess our most recent plant heatup. During our most 6 recent plant heatup, our Operations performance fully 7 satisfied all eight of the NOP assessment period criteria.

8 The criteria list includes some very key items, such 9 as no inadvertent safety system actuations; no significant 10 events due to operator errors, no unplanned technical 11 specification injuries due to operator errors, a work 12 schedule adherence rate of 90 percent or greater, and 13 consistent implementation of Conduct of Operations 14 standards and requirements.

15 In summary, Davis-Besse Operations fully satisfied 16 the NOP assessment criteria. They have demonstrated their 17 readiness for restart, but most importantly are 18 demonstrating continuous improvement. Thank you.

19 MR. MENDIOLA: If I could ask a 20 question, Barry. The improvement to the staff, the 21 on-shift crews, if you will, was performed, to summarize 22 basically some of the topics on page 13. It sounds like 23 you just removed certain functions from certain people to 24 other folks. And, I guess my question is, did you augment, 25 did you have to rely on augmenting staffs or did you do MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

48 1 this with the currently existing shift staffs, or some 2 other way?

3 MR. ALLEN: Tony, we used our 4 existing Operations staff. Okay. We got a little more 5 intrusive on some checking that we did as we tried, as I 6 told you, we were most concerned about implementation of 7 technical specification departments. We wanted to make 8 sure we had to do that flawless. Were looking for 9 perfection or near perfection on that.

10 So, we took our Operations Oversight Manager 11 Program. We worked that. We wrote that into a different 12 charter and made that a Shift Manager Peer Verifier 13 Program. And so the individuals we put in place for the 14 Shift Manager Peer Verifier Program, we put them in place 15 to be more intrusive.

16 So, if Im getting ready to enter a technical 17 specification, I get the books out and look at it, turn to 18 my peer here, I get a peer check from a reactor operator 19 now and another SRO, people available in the control room.

20 Then we get the shift manager peer verifier, who is not 21 part of the chain of command and does not make decisions 22 for the crew, but that individual is there, just an 23 observer, peer checking that. And then if there is any 24 questions, ensuring that theyre clarified.

25 So, weve been more intrusive in our checking and MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

49 1 then we dont ask those folks to sign our procedures, 2 because theyre not qualified to do that. We do have them 3 document that in their observation cards. So, at the end 4 of every shift, we have that feedback from those Shift 5 Manager Peer Verifiers that says; did a good job with this, 6 understood this, this is well communicated, this entry, 7 this exit, this tech spec was good clean, you know, good 8 discussions for an entry, so we have graded visible 9 anecdotal evidence, if you will, how we performed that 10 activity by the way we redirected those Shift Manager Peer 11 Verifiers.

12 MR. MENDIOLA: So, youve 13 removed, if I understand you right, you removed a certain 14 amount of solidarity that an operator would have by 15 themselves by having them interact intrusively, the word 16 you used, with each other more often?

17 MR. ALLEN: Thats correct.

18 MR. MENDIOLA: Would that account 19 for them to have more responsibility, but no need to 20 augment the staff, per se, with extra folks to handle the 21 extra tasks, because the others are checking on each 22 other.

23 MR. ALLEN: I think, if you 24 want to look at it from an increased staff, that is a good 25 question, I hadnt thought of this before, but prior to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

50 1 some of the changes we had instituted recently, we may have 2 had, say, one individual read technical specifications and 3 say, "Were entering technical specification whatever, 4 whatever." Now, we have built in the formality and the 5 rigor and structure, okay, of getting the peer checks, not 6 only at the SRO level, but make sure that the reactor 7 operators who are watching the panels understand whats 8 going on and getting peer check from them and authorizing 9 those activities.

10 So, do we put more people in the control room, no.

11 Did we involve all the people in the control room now with 12 that process, yes. Theyre now all part of that team, and 13 so were ensuring that that team is functioning. Since 14 thats kind of new for us, kind of a new change, very 15 positive, seeing extremely good results on Operations 16 behaviors, we still put the Shift Manager Peer Verifier 17 there just to watch that process. Being new to us, we want 18 to make sure it rolls out of the box 4-0 as opposed to 19 missing some parts. So, we made some changes, tried to 20 strengthen the crews ability to work together and 21 strengthen our oversight there to make sure we monitor that 22 change.

23 MR. MENDIOLA: Thank you.

24 MR. BEZILLA: Okay. Good 25 evening.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

51 1 MR. GROBE: Mark, before we, 2 before we go on, weve been going for about an hour and 15 3 minutes; I think it might be a good time for a brief 4 break. Its now 11 minutes after 7. Why dont we resume 5 at 20 after.

6 (Off the record.)

7 MR. GROBE: Okay, Mark, thank 8 you.

9 MR. BEZILLA: Okay, thank you, 10 Jack.

11 Good evening. My desired outcome for this evening 12 is to communicate the effectiveness of our corrective 13 actions in ensuring the site readiness for restart.

14 Next slide.

15 Lew and Barry went into details. I would like to 16 summarize. We are ready to safely and eventlessly restart 17 Davis-Besse. We have trained, qualified, competent 18 individuals. We have strong programs in place. We have a 19 new effective management team. And we have an intrusive 20 Quality Oversight Organization. We have the barriers in 21 place that are ensuring safe eventless operation at 22 Davis-Besse.

23 Next slide, please.

24 Let me spend a minute and detail our remaining 25 Return to Service items. We are currently in Mode 3 at MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

52 1 normal operating pressure. We will be conducted our Mode 2 2 Restart Readiness Reviews next week.

3 Following NRC approval for restart, we will complete 4 our mode change checklist procedure. This ensures that 5 everything is in order prior to proceeding to Mode 2.

6 We will then enter Mode 2 and perform the required 7 testing. This is mostly zero power physics testing.

8 Upon safely completion of Mode 2 testing, we will 9 raise reactor power and enter Mode 1. Prior to 10 synchronization of the main turbine generator to the grid, 11 we will conduct an effectiveness assessment, "How have we 12 done?" and a readiness review, "Are we ready to proceed?"

13 When we are satisfied we can proceed, we will 14 synchronize to the grid and continue with plant startup.

15 When we place the second main feedwater pump in 16 service and stabilize the plant at about 50 percent power, 17 we will again perform an effectiveness assessment; again, 18 "How did we do?" and a readiness review, "Are we ready to 19 proceed?" When we are satisfied we can proceed, we will 20 complete our startup to full power.

21 When at full power, for about two weeks, we will 22 perform a critique. And then after about four weeks, we 23 will conduct another effectiveness assessment.

24 MR. HOPKINS: Question, Mark.

25 MR. BEZILLA: Yes.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

53 1 MR. HOPKINS: You referred 2 earlier to work that you were doing on a large transformer 3 on site. For the other large transformers on site, could 4 you tell me what immediate actions are reviewed for?

5 MR. BEZILLA: Jon, I believe the 6 question is, are we taking any other actions in regard to 7 the transformers on site?

8 MR. HOPKINS: Yes.

9 MR. BEZILLA: Okay. We have, 10 Ill say, three other main important transformers to us.

11 The number two startup transformer, which is currently in 12 service and is available for service, weve checked that 13 out thoroughly, meaning looked at the observable 14 indications. I dont see any issues. And during this 15 outage, we refurbished that transformer, so we believe that 16 transformer is in good stead.

17 And we are currently in back feed condition, using 18 our main transformer, having power flow backwards through 19 it into an Aux transformer and thats currently powering up 20 our in-house power supplies. We see no issues with those 21 other two transformers.

22 So, we believe the three transformers are currently 23 available and in service, dont have any issues. And we 24 are completing the restoration to service of our number one 25 startup transformer, and essentially what we did there was MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

54 1 we overhauled that transformer. Since we had to replace 2 the bushing and drain the oil, we just did the overhaul 3 that we had planned, I believe, for the next refuel 4 outage. So, we believe were going to have a good set of 5 transformers here in a few days.

6 MR. HOPKINS: Okay, thank you.

7 MR. THOMAS: Mark, would you 8 please tell me more about these effectiveness and readiness 9 assessments that you have on the transition of power?

10 MR. BEZILLA: Yes, Scott.

11 Barry talked about the NOP criteria where we did 12 assessment of our performance and effectiveness. We have 13 similar hold points, if you will, in the process. And what 14 well do is, when we do one of those hold points, well 15 take a look at the Condition Reports that were written, 16 take a look at our management observations. We have some 17 criteria established. Well meet as a collegial body of 18 the management team, and well review our performance and 19 determine if there is any adjustments that we need to make 20 in our people, our plant, and our programs before we 21 proceed.

22 MR. THOMAS: Are you using your 23 current, I guess what process, is this a proceduralized 24 process youre using?

25 MR. BEZILLA: This is in our MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

55 1 Integrated Restart Test Plan, and we have that documented 2 in that plan.

3 MR. THOMAS: Okay.

4 MS. LIPA: Mark, before you 5 talked about barriers to ensure success, and previously 6 Barry talked about how you met your criteria for the NOP.

7 And you also talked earlier about the shift management 8 observers. And I wonder how much you rely on that as a 9 barrier and how long youll have that in place and how 10 youll know when thats no longer needed as a barrier.

11 MR. BEZILLA: Christine, we 12 talked about the barriers. We have the individuals, like 13 the operators or the mechanics, those are a barrier. We 14 have programs and processes which Lew detailed in his talk, 15 right, we have those in place. We have management, which 16 Lew and Barry both talked about. Then we have oversight, 17 which is a fourth barrier. So, we have a four barrier 18 concept that we use.

19 Our Shift Manager Peer Verifiers, Ill say are part 20 of the oversight barrier. Theyre an asset to us today.

21 As we bring the plant to full power, when we do our 22 critique and effectiveness reviews, well make a 23 determination at that point if we believe we need to 24 continue that program or if we would want to adjust or 25 shift, Ill say, some of the function again or things that MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

56 1 theyre currently doing for us or if we believe that were 2 strong enough to not need the Shift Manager Peer 3 Verifiers.

4 MS. LIPA: Okay, thank you.

5 MR. GROBE: Mark, there was 6 one thing you said that confused me, maybe I didnt just 7 hear correctly. These post restart effectiveness critiques 8 at two weeks and one month. Are those two weeks and one 9 month after you achieve full power or two weeks -- okay, so 10 theyre post restart, but theyre not post to the point in 11 time you get to Mode 2.

12 MR. BEZILLA: Thats correct, 13 Jack. Once we get to hundred percent power, after about 14 two weeks, and then after about four weeks.

15 MR. GROBE: And those will be 16 done similar to your Restart Readiness Assessments where 17 you bring your team together?

18 MR. BEZILLA: Thats correct.

19 MR. GROBE: Maybe you said 20 this already, and I just wasnt listening carefully. Im 21 not sure what you call them. The peer to the shift 22 managers on shift.

23 MR. BEZILLA: Shift Manager Peer 24 Verifiers.

25 MR. GROBE: Shift Manager Peer MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

57 1 Verifiers. How long after restart do you anticipate that 2 being in place?

3 MR. BEZILLA: Could be a month, 4 or maybe longer, based on our assessment of the 5 effectiveness of our shift managers, our crews. Right now, 6 like I said, theyre a valuable asset to us, and well see 7 how we perform. Its going to be based on our performance 8 and our assessment of the need to continue that function.

9 MR. GROBE: Okay. I dont 10 want anybody to get the wrong impression. Were now 11 talking about things that happen after NRC approval for 12 restart, thats your bullet "Following NRC Approval For 13 Restart." The reason this is important to us is this issue 14 on consistency and performance.

15 MR. MYERS: Thats correct.

16 MR. GROBE: And even though 17 these would be the activities that would occur after NRC 18 approval for restart, its important that we clearly 19 understand them before we can get to a point of authorizing 20 this startup. It could be somewhat confusing that were 21 focusing on this area, but thats why its important to 22 us.

23 MR. BEZILLA: Jack, the reason I 24 wanted to talk about this is a number of your questions had 25 centered around consistency or inconsistency in the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

58 1 self-assessments. We wanted to show you that we have 2 built-in hold points where we are going to do effectiveness 3 reviews and readiness reviews prior to proceeding, because 4 we want to make sure that we know how we had performed and 5 want to make sure we make any adjustments prior to 6 proceeding, so that we have safe and eventless 7 performance.

8 MR. GROBE: Okay.

9 MR. MENDIOLA: Just a quick 10 question on this, Mark. Where is turbine roll on this, is 11 it before or after that management hold on Mode 1?

12 MR. BEZILLA: The 13 synchronization, the turbine roll could be occurring while 14 were doing our effectiveness and readiness assessment.

15 Prior to synchronization, we would hold, we will do an 16 effectiveness assessment in a readiness review. And we 17 have to bring the turbine up, we have to do an over speed 18 trip, et cetera, prior to synchronization; so, there may be 19 turbine activities occurring while were pausing to do the 20 assessment or they may be completed prior to the 21 assessment.

22 MR. GROBE: How long is this 23 management hold? Is this a matter of a couple hours?

24 MR. BEZILLA: We put in a shift, 25 Jack, as a hold spot. It may take less, it may take more, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

59 1 depending on what we see.

2 MR. MENDIOLA: Thats the shift 3 youll be working the turbine?

4 MR. BEZILLA: Not necessarily.

5 MR. MENDIOLA: I guess my concern 6 is the turbine has been in its current state for the last 7 couple of years. First time you start spinning it a lot 8 faster than its been going, how it will react, and just 9 whether that will hold was to assess the turbines reaction 10 or perform the turbine reaction. From what I understand, 11 its during the turbine preparation.

12 I think thats what I heard you say. Thats the 13 point where youre going to stop, youre going to see what 14 the turbine does and use that as part of your effectiveness 15 and readiness assessment, how well it reacts to steam.

16 MR. BEZILLA: Thats correct.

17 MR. MYERS: Well be doing 18 assessment. We have a team looking at how effective the 19 turbine will roll. Thats a major activity, rolling that 20 turbine the first time.

21 MR. BEZILLA: Tony and Jack, 22 just I didnt mention it here, but what weve done is we 23 commissioned a team to go look for opportunities that might 24 present themselves in Mode 2 and in Mode 1. And I believe 25 the team came up with about 25, Ill say, topic areas or MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

60 1 systems that either havent been in service or that we see 2 as potential problem points or where issues could arise.

3 Those individuals and teams are currently working on 4 contingency plans. Okay, what if this happens, do we need 5 a work order, do we have parts available, do we need to 6 have some additional vendors in or industry experts on 7 site. An example would be like our physics testing, 8 rolling the main turbine, synchronizing the generator, 9 putting the main feedwater pumps in service.

10 Those components that weve done as much testing as 11 we can, but we cant put them in service until we get the 12 proper plant conditions, and I dont have those right now 13 to do the testing or put the pieces of equipment in 14 service. So, weve got a team, thats a look-ahead team, 15 thats identifying those pinch points that we might run 16 into as we proceed up once we get permission.

17 Okay. The purpose of going through this, the 18 overall picture that I wanted to share with you is that the 19 startup is very prescriptive, very controlled, and well be 20 assessing and adjusting as needed to ensure a safe and 21 eventless startup.

22 Next slide.

23 To ensure continuous improvement, weve created an 24 Operational Improvement Plan for Cycle 14. I believe Lew 25 had mentioned that and Barry also had mentioned that. This MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

61 1 plan will take us, Ill say, through the next two years.

2 This plan encompasses areas identified on this slide. And 3 you can see its pretty encompassing as to the areas that 4 were going to be focusing on over the next couple of 5 years.

6 This plan will build upon a foundation built over 7 the past two years, and will ensure our continued 8 improvement as we continue on our journey to excellence.

9 And consistent performance is really what our goal is.

10 Jack, any questions? You were looking?

11 MR. GROBE: The plan that 12 youre talking about is available on our website.

13 Actually, there is are three versions of it; Res Rev 0, 1 and 2.

14 Theyre all on the website.

15 Ive been struggling with the same question that 16 Ive been asking myself all evening and I think I know the 17 answer. I think its summarized in one word and thats 18 alignment. And I jotted down a whole bunch of preachy 19 things on what alignment should entail, but I notice, I 20 think its important, the first bullet there, 21 "Organizational Effectiveness."

22 In your Improvement Plan under that heading, you 23 have quite a few specific activities that should be 24 ongoing, some of them now, and should be completed 25 shortly.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

62 1 "Improved individual organizational performance and 2 alignment and development utilization of alignment mass maps.

3 Second quarter 04."

4 "Implement FENOC business practices, but focus 5 self-assessments, ongoing self-assessments, benchmark" and 6 those are all first quarter.

7 There is quite a few activities in here. I think 8 that weve done enough inspection to realize that when you 9 folks get alignment top to bottom, things happen; and good 10 things. And when you get that laser light pinpoint focus 11 on safety and that disciplined approached to operations, or 12 all safety activities, the effective corrective actions, 13 disciplined effective corrective actions, things happen.

14 As evidenced by whats happened in the last two months in 15 Operations. I think thats key.

16 Tell me a little bit more. Youre talking about 17 alignment. Tell me a little bit more what youre talking 18 about as far as what are you trying to align? What is it 19 that youre trying to gain alignment on?

20 MR. BEZILLA: Jack, thats a 21 good question. All right. Our vision is people with a 22 strong safety focus delivering top fleet performance. All 23 right? And its people with a strong safety focus. Thats 24 the first key piece of the alignment that youre talking 25 about. And thats my job, my senior leadership teams job, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

63 1 my managers job, and my employees job. Ill say it 2 right, because we have to be focused on safety first and 3 foremost.

4 Weve talked about that, weve preached that. As 5 you said, its about getting the laser point on that. That 6 is, Ill say the gate that we have to go through before we 7 worry about anything else. All right?

8 So, people with a strong safety focus, delivering 9 top fleet operating performance. And in our business plan, 10 Jack, we have various pieces; we have a people piece, we 11 have a safety piece, we have an outage performance piece, 12 we have a material condition piece. And within those 13 various pieces, a business plan. And then we have, Ill 14 say, sub items. We have performance indicators. So, its 15 getting focused around safe, reliable operations.

16 And if you remember, Jack, I think we showed you 17 some of the AEdventures things we did with our folks a few 18 months ago. That was the first step in having all the 19 employees understand their role and how important it is for 20 them to do their tasks correct the first time, each and 21 every time.

22 And also when we went through those AEdventure maps, 23 we laid out and had them identify what their interfaces 24 were, and how important they were to make sure that, Ill 25 say, all the machinery works to make sure we can be safe MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

64 1 and reliable at what we do.

2 Does that help?

3 MR. GROBE: Yeah. The very 4 first Regional Administrator many years ago, I wont tell 5 you how many, said to me one time hes never seen a program 6 he didnt like. And I tell you, the way I interpret this 7 program, it has all the right pieces in it. The challenge, 8 though, is putting it into action, making it alive, making 9 the organization respond to these issues.

10 You havent always found your own problems. Weve 11 helped you in that regard. Could you talk a little bit 12 about how youre going to be confident, what kind of 13 assessments -- I think its the last one down there. What 14 kind of external assessments youre going to be doing that 15 are going to give you confidence that youll always find 16 your own problems?

17 MR. BEZILLA: We want to always 18 find our problems, but we have guys like Scott, and I know 19 hes going to find some things that we dont, okay, as much 20 as we may try. Jack, what we may do --

21 MR. GROBE: He better.

22 MR. BEZILLA: I understand.

23 What we have planned is we have ongoing assessments, 24 okay, ongoing self-assessments; and those are things like 25 management observations, off hour tours, those types of MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

65 1 things. We have also focused self-assessments that Lew 2 talked about. These will be corporate, Ill say, driven, 3 corporate sponsored. And they may look at a single site, 4 but theyre going to look at the FENOC organizations in 5 total. So, well have focused self-assessments.

6 Were going to use the INPO, the Institute of 7 Nuclear Power Operations organization, to provide us assist 8 visits. As an example, we have one scheduled in March for 9 our Aux. Feedwater System. Were going to get INPO help 10 and industry expertise to come in and help us take a look 11 at that and make sure we have been thorough and we havent 12 missed something in our Aux. Feedwater System, because its 13 so critical to our safety profile, if you will.

14 Those are the types of things, Jack, we will use 15 moving forward from a self-assessment standpoint.

16 The other thing in our Operational Improvement Plan 17 here, we are going to provide training to, Ill say, our 18 managers and supervisors on things like observation skills, 19 all right, to improve their toolbox, so that they can do a 20 better job when they go out at being critical, identifying 21 issues, and raising them, Ill say, the minor items, so 22 they dont become larger items.

23 MR. GROBE: Again, Im 24 looking at some of the details in this plan.

25 Under item 10, which is internal and external MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

66 1 oversight. The very last item in that section says, 2 "Conduct assessment activities in Corrective Action Program 3 to evaluate effectiveness of corrective actions taken to 4 improve implementation and improve trend evaluation."

5 Thats a long sentence.

6 But, who, it says the owner is Steve Loehlein. Is 7 that an internal assessment or is that one thats going to 8 be conducted by people from outside of the FirstEnergy 9 family?

10 MR. MYERS: If you go look at 11 our, Ive some process here in my hand for 12 self-assessments. Fred is going to cover a lot of that in 13 his presentation. You want to hold that question and bring 14 it back up so Fred can answer it?

15 MR. GROBE: Okay.

16 I noticed in section 7, which is safety culture, you 17 have a number of different types of monitoring activities 18 going for monthly performance indicators, things that are 19 more easy to measure quantifiably, to you have your 20 quarterly elective significance reviews, and then a whole 21 bunch of annual activities, independent assessments by QA, 22 surveys in a Safety Conscious Work Environment, Safety 23 Culture, and then outside completely within assessments 24 similar to, Im sure similar to the one that Doctor Haber 25 did a year and a half ago.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

67 1 Thats an area where youve laid out fairly 2 comprehensive assessment activities to ensure that youre 3 continuing on track. Im not sure the assessments in the 4 other areas are quite as comprehensive.

5 What other areas do you have independent assessments 6 planned, other than having INPO come, which happens 7 anyways. What other areas do you have independent 8 assessments planned?

9 MR. BEZILLA: Jack, I briefly 10 looked at the focus self-assessments for the year. There 11 is things in there about, Ill say, like fuel, fuel 12 performance, outage preparedness, and preparations. As you 13 said, the corrective action process is in there.

14 MR. VON AHN: Jack, you touched 15 on three of the self-assessments. With regard to 16 corrective actions, there will be two self-assessments.

17 The first one being in March and it will be a D-B specific 18 self-assessment on corrective action on significant 19 conditions adverse to quality. The second self-assessment 20 will be a fleet focus self-assessment on root and apparent 21 causes. Thats scheduled for August and will be a fleet, 22 fleet assessment, basically team made up of fleets with an 23 external representative.

24 As well, there will be an engineering 25 self-assessment. That will be conducted in July, is the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

68 1 tentative time frame right now for this assessment. This 2 will have three industry peer managers, as well it will 3 have an INPO representative, as well as FENOC peer 4 managers. This will cover calculation quality, 5 modification quality, system engineering effectiveness, and 6 engineering corrective action, and cause analysis and 7 quality.

8 As well, we have a safety culture, self-assessment 9 follow-up.

10 MR. GROBE: Fred, I think I 11 should have listened more carefully to Lew. Sounds like I 12 was getting a little bit ahead. Why dont I let Mark 13 finish his presentation and then well get into yours. I 14 apologize.

15 MR. BEZILLA: Okay, next slide, 16 Kevin.

17 Jack, in conclusion, our people, our plant, and our 18 programs are ready to support safe and eventless restart at 19 Davis-Besse. We are ready. Thats all I have, Jack.

20 Okay, Fred.

21 MR. VON AHN: Okay, thanks 22 Mark.

23 And good evening. Im going to discuss the 24 conclusions of independent internal and external oversight 25 regarding Davis-Besses Restart Readiness.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

69 1 Next slide.

2 Quality Assurance has provided independent internal 3 oversight of the Davis-Besse Return to Service Plan. The 4 Return to Service Plan defined the activities required for 5 Davis-Besse to return to safe and reliable operation.

6 Quality Assurance is determined that the plan has been 7 adequately implemented and Davis-Besse is ready for 8 restart.

9 In addition to Quality Assurance, two other bodies 10 have been providing independent external oversight of 11 Davis-Besse activities in addition to the NRC. First, the 12 Company Nuclear Review Board or CNRB. This board consists 13 of external consultants, a local government representative, 14 as well as FENOC executive management. Each of the four 15 subcommittees of the CNRB determined that there were no 16 safety issues preventing restart of the Davis-Besse plant.

17 Second, the Restart Overview Panel. This is a panel 18 of utility senior executives, past nuclear regulatory 19 commission executives, as well as a local government and 20 Institute of Nuclear Power Operations representative. The 21 collective experience of this panel exceeds two hundred 22 person years of nuclear power experience.

23 The Restart Overview Panel was commissioned to 24 provide a separate independent oversight and review of both 25 internal and external plant activities associated with the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

70 1 return to service Building Blocks. This panel has been 2 meeting monthly for the past twenty months assessing 3 Davis-Besse activities and the ROP has also determined that 4 Davis-Besse is ready for restart.

5 Multiple groups of experienced personnel, both 6 internal and external, have thoroughly, objectively, and 7 intrusively looked at Davis-Besse activities and determined 8 that Davis-Besse is ready for restart.

9 Next slide.

10 Going forward. Oversight will continue to 11 independently monitor and assess station performance 12 throughout Cycle 14. Both Quality Assurance and the 13 Company Nuclear Review Board will continue their oversight 14 activities.

15 Additionally, a corporate collective significant 16 function will be established reporting to the line.

17 MR. THOMAS: Fred, before you 18 go on, a quick question. In your opinion, how receptive is 19 Davis-Besse Senior Management to observations from your 20 staff?

21 MR. VON AHN: Senior Management 22 takes some convincing, but once they get behind the 23 observation, they carry through the line, quite a bit.

24 For example, it took some convincing with one of the 25 activities we had on the NOP/NOT testing with some breaker MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

71 1 testing, but once senior management saw that activity, 2 there was a Significant Condition Adverse to Quality 3 Condition Report written. It was reviewed by senior 4 management and they recognized the issue associated 5 that Quality Assurance was bringing up.

6 MR. THOMAS: Okay.

7 MR. VON AHN: This, back to the 8 corporate collective significance function. This function 9 will monitor and assess the collective significance of 10 diverse internal and external inputs to look for 11 performance trends and they continue to drive improved 12 performance.

13 This may get to your point, Jack, about 14 self-criticality and the hit or miss aspects of that with 15 this function.

16 MS. LIPA: Fred, it sounds 17 like thats not fully set up yet. Is that in the Cycle 14?

18 MR. VON AHN: Thats in its 19 infancy right now. We have an experienced individual 20 thats come back from the Institute of Nuclear Power 21 Operations that has significant multi-plan experience 22 thats setting this function up for us.

23 MS. LIPA: So, its being set 24 up, but is the concept contained in your Cycle 14 25 commitment listing?

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72 1 MR. MYERS: Yes.

2 MR. BEZILLA: Its page 7.

3 MR. MYERS: Page 7.

4 MS. LIPA: Thank you.

5 MR. VON AHN: Further, there are 6 external focus assessments in Safety Culture, Engineering 7 Quality and Corrective Actions planned for Cycle 14.

8 As the station moves forward, multiple methods of 9 independent assessment, both internal and external, will 10 continue to be used to monitor and improve performance.

11 MS. LIPA: Fred, when you say 12 external focused assessment, is that completely independent 13 of FENOC?

14 MR. VON AHN: When I say 15 external, it will be made up of external members. We also 16 want to have a peer member to learn from that on the team, 17 so we would have internal membership as well.

18 MS. LIPA: Is it mostly 19 external or is it kind of mixed?

20 MR. VON AHN: It depends.

21 MR. MYERS: Mixed, it depends 22 on the assessment.

23 MR. VON AHN: Safety Culture 24 will be strictly external. The Engineering probably 60/40; 25 60 percent being external, 40 percent being internal. And MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

73 1 if you count strictly Davis-Besse, it will probably be 80 2 percent external, and the other facilities being considered 3 external, Beaver and Perry.

4 MS. LIPA: I was just trying 5 to get an understanding of external, what it would mean.

6 Thank you.

7 MR. VON AHN: Other questions?

8 Well, now, I would like to turn the presentation 9 over to Gary Leidich for concluding remarks.

10 MR. LEIDICH: I think Jack has a 11 question.

12 MR. VON AHN: Im sorry, Jack.

13 MR. GROBE: It was a little 14 quick. The Safety Culture assessment in your Cycle 14 15 Plan, the independent one, says it will be done in the 16 forth quarter of 04. Corrective Action Program is the 17 second quarter of 04.

18 The Engineering Quality Cycle 14, what does that 19 mean? Does that mean by the end of Cycle 14, or regularly 20 every quarter during Cycle 14?

21 MR. VON AHN: The Engineering 22 self-assessment is tentatively scheduled for late July time 23 frame.

24 MR. GROBE: Late July, so 25 that would be third quarter.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

74 1 MR. MYERS: Jack, once again, 2 this is a different plan now. We planned, when we built 3 this, we thought the plant would be running in December, 4 so some of these things may move somewhat.

5 MR. VON AHN: And some of the 6 dependencies is on getting those external resources. You 7 know, if they cant make it.

8 MR. MYERS: Right.

9 Well schedule it. The plans will be very visible.

10 MR. GROBE: Okay. Other 11 questions?

12 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Just a little 13 background on I think Jacks request. As you heard 14 earlier, one of the things were doing is, as we evaluate 15 whether to recommend to our management whether to approve 16 restart, is to try to decide what other regulatory 17 vehicles, if any, we need to incorporate some of the things 18 that youre telling us. And so were asking questions 19 about what are you doing, whats your schedule.

20 Try to put that in context, so when we deliberate, 21 when we ask questions about, what should we recommend to 22 our management, we need this information. So, thats just 23 a little background.

24 MR. MYERS: Okay.

25 MR. GROBE: Another question.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

75 1 In the Operations area, it says one of your activities is 2 to benchmark the Conduct of Operations. What exactly does 3 that mean in your vernacular?

4 MR. ALLEN: As far as Conduct 5 of Operations benchmark, is that your question, Jack?

6 MR. GROBE: Right.

7 MR. ALLEN: If you look at 8 Conduct of Operations, that could be defined pretty 9 broadly. Thats log keeping, rounds, how you do certain 10 activities looking forward. What Ive seen since Ive been 11 here at Davis-Besse is were very good at the what. We 12 understand what were supposed to do. I think we 13 understand that very clearly.

14 I think that how to accomplish that in the best 15 fashion is what we need to go benchmark, so we can find 16 some better ways to perform some activities. Its just to 17 help us be consistent with, how do I verbalize a peer check 18 with a peer in the control room. We do that consistently, 19 as far as performing the peer check, but exactly how do we 20 verbalize that, express that, is not as consistent as we 21 would like it to be. So, those are the kinds of things we 22 want to bench mark.

23 So, one of the things we have already done is gone 24 up to INPO and taken their Conduct of Operations criteria.

25 We laid it out, and how does our Conduct of Operations MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

76 1 compare with what the industry puts out as what you ought 2 to have for Conduct of Operations.

3 We went through and did that delta assessment and we 4 found some enhancements we could make. Again, kind of more 5 in the "how would you implement this?" Because I think we 6 have pretty good guidance as far as overall, but some 7 detail, we found some detail.

8 We also got some, Im sure, the insights on the 9 reactor operators with you earlier, that was one of the 10 things we saw on that benchmark, which was with the Conduct 11 of Operations, we needed to define those roles more 12 explicitly to ensure those licensed folks are involved.

13 So, weve already done some of that benchmarking and 14 weve got quite a bit more.

15 We also -- I forgot that, Lew reminded me. One of 16 things were doing is taking our licensed folks and were 17 sending them over to either Perry or to Beaver Valley 18 station and spending about three days in control room at 19 power, and just benchmarking a crew thats in the control 20 room in a power plant at hundred percent power, doing 21 normal daily operations activities in a run situation.

22 So, were taking care of that. Got some pretty 23 positive feedback from the individuals who have done that, 24 that benchmarking also.

25 MR. GROBE: One more question MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

77 1 in the Operations area, Barry. One of the items, that 3D 2 in your plan, says "strengthening independent oversight of 3 Operations." Thats pretty broad statement. Would you 4 give me a sense of what that means, what your plans are, 5 specific plans on strengthening oversight of Operations?

6 MR. ALLEN: Jack, I think, 7 theres probably several things were going to have to look 8 at. Independent oversight of Operations is, I think its 9 going to go back to, I think taking advantage of some of 10 the things we talked about earlier. For instance, we 11 talked about expectations from Scott. He goes out and sees 12 some things that we dont pick up on.

13 We intend to go take some observation training and 14 give that to the people at our station to improve our 15 observation skills, so were out doing activities and 16 performing observations. Were more self-critical and can 17 see things that perhaps we had blinders on to right now.

18 So, well take those type of activities and well 19 look at how we can utilize those then to come up with 20 strengthening independent oversight of Operations.

21 Now, we also have the shift folks and other folks 22 in training who are in the Operations Department that might 23 not be on the crew. Were looking what we can do to 24 strengthen their ability to give us independent oversight.

25 And then we have the leadership team within Operations.

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78 1 Were trying to utilize those individuals for oversight.

2 Talk over how were taking action. Were doing follow-ups 3 to see how effective we are.

4 Were continuing those efforts. And, I think 5 since -- one of the keys for us is our shift managers and 6 unit supervisors. Our supervisors provide good leadership 7 for crews and we can look at what we can do to help them in 8 their oversight role. It may not be particularly 9 independent, but again you put them in an oversight role, 10 they back up from activity.

11 So, Im very interested in what we can do to train 12 those individuals then in better broader understanding and 13 positive impact they can have from an oversight 14 perspective.

15 So, we have some work to do and play that out, but 16 oversight is a pretty broad, pretty broad concept.

17 MR. GROBE: I think I 18 understand better what you meant by that. Did you have a 19 question, Christine?

20 MS. LIPA: No.

21 MR. GROBE: Any other 22 questions? Okay.

23 MR. LEIDICH: Okay, thank you, 24 Jack. Lets go to the next slide.

25 Well, obviously, were here to respectfully request MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

79 1 your approval for restart. I would just like to quickly 2 summarize what we tried to cover here tonight.

3 First of all, I think we demonstrated that 4 management team not only at Davis-Besse, but FirstEnergy 5 Nuclear Operating Company has been strengthened. Any 6 message about where a facility has gone or what an 7 organization is all about starts at the top, and we fixed 8 that at FirstEnergy.

9 Weve also demonstrated that our people have gone 10 through a tremendous learning curve, a relearning curve on 11 the importance of nuclear safety. We have a good solid 12 quest in terms of their behaviors on a day-to-day basis in 13 being relentless on their safety focus. Weve measured 14 that. Weve assessed it. Weve surveyed it. Weve done 15 some very innovative things to try to understand where our 16 work force is. Our work force is clearly positioned to be 17 ready for restart.

18 Weve talked about the plant, the changes weve made 19 to the plant, extensive modifications, many of those 20 leading edge modifications in the industry. The plant is 21 clearly ready for restart.

22 And weve talked about our programs. Weve done a 23 complete overhaul of most of our programs. Weve talked 24 here tonight about corrective action, the importance of 25 corrective action. We have a very low threshold. Okay, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

80 1 weve got that part. Now, weve got to ensure on a 2 day-to-day basis we execute strong, corrective action and 3 effective corrective action that we find and fix our 4 problems.

5 And were in that learning curve and we understand 6 that. We think were in a good spot on that curve for 7 restart. We recognize we talked a lot tonight about the 8 importance of getting additional and further external 9 assessments, and then continuing to strengthen our internal 10 assessment program.

11 The key to any strong safety culture in any one of 12 these facilities, and we at this table clearly understand 13 this, is that the station identifies and solves its own 14 problems. Were going to continue to progress towards that 15 and I think its clear that at any nuclear plant that job 16 is never done. That job always needs perfecting. Well 17 continue to work on that.

18 We think weve established a strong foundation here 19 at Davis-Besse, but the important word is foundation. Its 20 a building process, in many respects its a rebuilding 21 process.

22 You see the sign on the back. The word beginning.

23 This is a beginning of a new era at Davis-Besse. Its a 24 beginning of a group of people with a strong safety focus, 25 strongly associated with the FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

81 1 Company, which is clearly capable and will deliver top 2 operating performance.

3 And part of that is the recognition that no nuclear 4 plant, whether its Davis-Besse or any other, is an island 5 unto itself. And weve already put in place a strong 6 corporate governance and a strong corporate oversight 7 organization, so that we, whether its Lew or Joe or 8 myself, or the others in the corporate office, monitor on a 9 routine day-to-day basis the safe operation of this 10 facility. Were already doing it across the fleet; 11 maintaining that constant vigilance, so that no plant is by 12 themselves.

13 And, that Fred and his organization, then again, up 14 to and including the Board of Directors, provides 15 independent and strong oversight of that operation.

16 We believe that were the only utility in the 17 country that has a strong reporting relationship right to 18 the nuclear committee with its oversight organization.

19 So, that governance and oversight is part of our 20 checks and balances to ensure that programs are in place 21 here at Davis-Besse and at FirstEnergy to put this 22 community never in a position where anything like this ever 23 happens again.

24 Weve established that strong safety focus; and, 25 once again, that starts at the top of the shop. Our Board MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

82 1 of Directors last year passed a new resolution on nuclear 2 safety. The board continuously focuses on nuclear safety 3 and our board reports. The nuclear committee of the board 4 does the same.

5 At the very top of our shop now, our Chief Executive 6 Officer, Henry Alexander, is strongly committed to nuclear 7 safety. And Ive already discussed the FENOC corporate 8 organization and the organization of the employees here at 9 Davis-Besse. The bottom line is, were ready to run this 10 plant.

11 That completes our presentation.

12 MR. GROBE: Questions?

13 MR. HOPKINS: Yeah, one question 14 for Mark. You mentioned you have a final Mode 2 Readiness 15 Review that youre going to do, after you, if you get 16 restart approval.

17 You sent us a February 6th letter, which is 18 a supplement to your Integrated Report to Support Restart.

19 In there you have an Attachment 3, which is remaining major 20 actions for restart; its called Appendix C Update; as of 21 January 30th. There are several actions that this list has 22 not complete as of January 30th, which again is almost two 23 weeks ago. I just want to make sure that this table is one 24 of the items that youll go over in your Mode 2 Readiness 25 Review.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

83 1 MR. BEZILLA: Yes, Jon, all these 2 items are in our Mode Hold Restraint Checklist, if you 3 will, and I believe the latest date on any of these items 4 is February the 19th.

5 MR. HOPKINS: Okay, thank you.

6 MR. GROBE: Any questions?

7 Gary, I appreciate your remarks at the end, and I 8 was thinking about what I might have heard in March of 9 2002. And I dont think I would have heard many of the 10 things you said today in March of 2002.

11 Its clear that there is a difference in the 12 performance at Davis-Besse. There has been steady 13 improvement over the past two years. The challenge for us 14 as a panel, I think each panel member feels this 15 responsibility as a weighty responsibility, is trying to 16 make sure that we make a decision at the right time, that 17 our recommendation to Jim Caldwell has a sound foundation, 18 and that we have confidence not only that you meet minimum 19 safety standards, but that your performance going forward 20 will not degrade. And, thats a difficult issue to wrestle 21 with. We are wrestling with it.

22 Under the cover page, it says "The quest to get our 23 plant back, better, and beyond." Right now were working 24 on back, and thats a challenge for us.

25 I think this presentation has been helpful. There MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

84 1 is a lot more detail in the documents that youve sent us.

2 I appreciate that youve done a good job summarizing that 3 this evening. Appreciate you answering all of our 4 questions.

5 Weve all been studying these documents carefully, 6 along with reviewing the results of the inspections that 7 have been performed in trying to make our judgments.

8 I may have not communicated as effectively this 9 afternoon as I intended when we were talking about the 10 improvements in the Management and Human Performance area.

11 We have seen steady improvement in that area. There has 12 been, there was a difference in the character of the way in 13 which people responded during the interviews that we 14 conducted in May and the interviews we conducted in 15 December and January.

16 That indicated that there was somewhat of a less 17 strong focus on the confidence in your staff in the 18 management of the organization. Thats another alignment 19 issue. I dont think the management of the organization 20 has changed, but the perceptions of the people have changed 21 somewhat.

22 And again, the overall safety culture, as you assess 23 it, has continued to improve in your organization, but 24 again, there is these blips, and I think thats all related 25 to, to alignment; making sure that people understand your MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

85 1 expectations, which you clearly and consistently 2 communicate those; and I think performance, consistent 3 performance, safety performance will follow that.

4 So, we need, we need to think about everything 5 youve told us tonight and we need to consider you 6 considering the four remaining checklist items that we have 7 to evaluate, and determine what, if any, further actions 8 are necessary. And that will take some time. And well be 9 getting back to you if we have additional questions and 10 need further information.

11 Of course, Scott and his team are here every day, 12 so our inspections will continue. And we continue to have 13 regional inspectors visit the site on a periodic basis to 14 perform specialist activities and those activities will 15 continue.

16 So, with that, let us take a short break, and then 17 convene the second half of this evenings activities, which 18 is a question and answer session from members of the 19 public. So, its 10 after 8. Why dont we start at 20 20 after 8. Thank you.

21 (Off the record.)

22 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 23 much for coming to order so quickly. The second half of 24 this meeting is a meeting between the NRC staff and the 25 public. And, this evening, this portion of the meeting is MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

86 1 complicated a little bit because of the fact that some of 2 the members of the public that are going to be 3 participating in this meeting are on the telephone.

4 We had some challenges with that this afternoon.

5 There was some feedback problems, but hopefully those will 6 all be worked out.

7 What I would like to do is start with questions or 8 comments from members of the public here in the Camp Perry 9 Meeting Room, and after a period of time move to any 10 questions or comments from members of the public that are 11 on the phone lines, and then as necessary go back and 12 forth.

13 I always like to afford an opportunity to elected 14 officials or representatives of elected officials to make 15 comments first. So, I would first like to invite any 16 elected officials or representatives of elected officials 17 to the podium. Please sign in. And if you can limit your 18 comments to 3 to 5 minutes, we would appreciate it, because 19 we have a lot of people here this evening.

20 MR. KOEBEL: Thank you. My 21 name is Carl Koebel. Im President of the Ottawa County 22 Commissioners and Im speaking tonight on behalf of my 23 fellow commissioners, John Papcun and Steve Arndt.

24 I wish to stress that our number one concern is for 25 the health and safety of our 40,000 Ottawa County residents MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

87 1 and the two hundred and so thousand visitors to our county 2 on any given weekend.

3 We have attended every one of the public meetings 4 held with the NRC, both the afternoon and the evening 5 sessions, and we have personally taken a tour of the 6 physical plant at Davis-Besse.

7 And, from what weve seen, I would like to read the 8 following resolution into record:

9 Whereas, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission 0350 10 Process to evaluate the Readiness for Restart has been a 11 good process, and will continue to effectively evaluate 12 Davis-Besse after restart.

13 And, whereas, the plant condition is better than it 14 ever has been.

15 And, whereas, the employees are working hard to make 16 sure that similar problems never happen again.

17 And, whereas, continued oversight after restart by 18 the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and their willingness to 19 involve and keep the county involved in it is definitely 20 important.

21 And, whereas, FENOC agreeing to a closer working 22 relationship with Ottawa County through County 23 Adminstrator, Jere Witt, being appointed to the Restart 24 Overview Panel and the Company Nuclear Regulatory Board --

25 or Review Board as an independent oversight.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

88 1 Now, therefore, be it revolved by the Ottawa County 2 Commissioners that we support and encourage the safe 3 restart of Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station.

4 Witnessed this 12th day of February; signed by the 5 three County Commissioners.

6 We have similar petitions that we have already 7 submitted to Mr. Caldwell from the City of Port Clinton, 8 Bay Township, Erie Township, Benton Township, Carroll 9 Township, Catawba Township, Danbury Township, Harris 10 Township, Portage Township and Put-In-Bay Township. We 11 also have resolutions from the Village of Oak Harbor, the 12 Village of Clay Center and the Village of Rocky Ridge.

13 We look forward to your approval of the restart of 14 Davis-Besse. We thank you. We thank the employees of 15 Davis-Besse and the management of Davis-Besse for the hard 16 work they have put into the restart over the past two 17 years.

18 Thank you.

19 MR. GROBE: Thanks, Carl.

20 Ive been involved in a number of recovery efforts of 21 challenged plants, and Ive never had one where the county 22 has been so earnestly involved in staying abreast of whats 23 going on and insisting on being kept informed. The panel 24 has met almost monthly with the County Commissioners and 25 Jere Witt has been involved, actively involved in the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

89 1 oversight assessment of the restart process and has been 2 put on the Company Nuclear Review Board.

3 Thats a very unusual situation. I have not seen 4 that elsewhere in the midwest. So, I appreciate the 5 countys involvement and interest in whats going on, and 6 in what the NRC is doing. I also appreciate the fact that 7 theyve asked us a lot of tough questions about our 8 responsibilities and our oversight and how were doing our 9 job. So, thank you for your comments Carl.

10 Yes, maam.

11 MS. BURRIL: My name is 12 Jennifer Burril. Im here on behalf of Congressman Dennis 13 Kucinich, who gives his apologies that he could not be here 14 tonight, but because this has been an important issue for 15 him and our staff were here on his behalf. I would like 16 to read a statement that he has prepared.

17 We are here today because two years ago we got 18 lucky. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission coaxed 19 Davis-Besse to shut down and soon thereafter workers found 20 a hole in the top of the reactor. A major nuclear accident 21 it was averted. We got lucky because the NRC was concerned 22 about a separate safety issue and FirstEnergy just happened 23 to find the hole.

24 Much has been learned about how this happened. It 25 is clear that FirstEnergy failed to safely operate the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

90 1 Davis-Besse power plant. The NRC failed to effectively 2 regulate the nuclear power plant. And both entities failed 3 to place the health and safety of those living near this 4 power plant above the profits of FirstEnergy.

5 Investigations into this incident have revealed that 6 FirstEnergy possessed the empirical data that suggested a 7 problem existed. For example, air monitoring filters were 8 consistently clogged with rust suggesting a serious 9 problem.

10 FirstEnergy chose to ignore the problems to protect 11 its profits. The NRC Inspector General has found that the 12 NRC chose to protect the financial impact on FENOC rather 13 than force compliance with safety regulations.

14 After the shutdown of Davis-Besse, the NRC released 15 a report that documented its Lessons Learned. The report 16 made a few recommendations as to how the NRC might avoid 17 future incidents, like the corrosion problems at 18 Davis-Besse.

19 Since the release of the final report, a draft 20 Lessons Learned Report surfaced that contained several 21 far-reaching recommendations that would in fact make a real 22 difference in nuclear power plant safety, but to avoid 23 costly regulations, those recommendations did not make it 24 into the final report.

25 My topical is public safety and I can not ask my MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

91 1 constituents to trust the word of FirstEnergy or the 2 Nuclear Regulatory Commission if they can not place safety 3 ahead of economic interest.

4 To-date the NRC has denied all efforts to push for 5 greater inspections of Davis-Besse. I personally petition 6 the NRC and several public interest groups also petition 7 the NRC to force a more complete review of Davis-Besse.

8 It is well known that the NRC forwarded a criminal 9 investigation to the Department of Justice for review. As 10 it seems clear that FirstEnergy is at least suspected of 11 criminal conduct, it only makes sense to wait for the 12 conclusion of that investigation before Davis-Besse is 13 permitted to restart.

14 Confidence in FirstEnergys operation of this 15 nuclear power plant cannot be determined with an ongoing 16 criminal investigation. The public has the right to hear 17 about FirstEnergys wrongdoing before FirstEnergy is 18 rewarded with a restart at this reactor.

19 I continue to oppose the restart at Davis-Besse, 20 because I do not have confidence in FirstEnergy or NRC to 21 place safety ahead of profits. Thank you.

22 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 23 much for your comments, or for the comments of 24 Representative Kucinich.

25 I have several issues that I would like to address MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

92 1 and if you would carry this message back to Representative 2 Kucinich, Id appreciate it.

3 The first has to do with the NRCs placing profits, 4 FirstEnergy profits ahead of safety. That has not 5 occurred. And that is not a correct inference from the 6 facts that the Representative has. The NRC never placed 7 profits ahead of safety.

8 Secondly, with respect to the ongoing federal 9 investigation; our enforcement policy and our enforcement 10 manual provide guidance on when and how the NRC would take 11 immediate enforcement action concurrent with an ongoing 12 criminal investigation; and, the focus of that 13 decision-making process is whether or not there is a safety 14 concern.

15 We have carefully implemented our enforcement manual 16 and carefully evaluated the evidence that has been 17 developed to-date in the various investigative activities, 18 and concluded that there is not a safety concern with 19 respect to the results of those ongoing investigations.

20 In addition, the agency took the step of assigning a 21 Senior Manager to continue to monitor the ongoing federal 22 investigation, such that if there were a development or a 23 revelation of something that could be a safety concern, 24 that that would promptly be dealt with.

25 So, the agency is taking timely and appropriate MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

93 1 actions with respect to the ongoing federal investigation 2 to ensure that safety is not at all compromised by the 3 facts and circumstances surrounding that investigation.

4 Thank you very much.

5 Jere.

6 MR. WITT: Thank you, Jack.

7 My name is Jere Witt, Im the County Administrator 8 for Ottawa County and Im also, as stated earlier, a member 9 of the Restart Overview Panel, and the Company Nuclear 10 Review Board. Ive been closely involved with this process 11 for the past two years, and watched the evolution of the 12 0350 Process.

13 Tonight we are at the goal which is to request 14 restart. To the NRC, you have done your job well, and we 15 appreciate that. To the Davis-Besse employees, you have 16 done your job well. It is now time to restart the plant 17 safely.

18 As a member of the Restart Overview Panel, I am 19 convinced the plant, the employees, and the NRC is ready 20 for restart. I support and urge the NRC to allow a safe 21 restart of Davis-Besse as soon as appropriate, but I 22 caution, we, as a community, will be watching closely to 23 make sure that FENOC operates the plant safely and the NRC 24 provides a proper oversight and regulation.

25 Thank you.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

94 1 MR. GROBE: Thank you, Jere.

2 Are there any other -- Donna -- are there any other 3 local public officials?

4 Darrell?

5 MR. OPFER: Thank you, Jack, 6 and members of the panel.

7 The time has come -- my name is Darrell Opfer. I 8 live within the ten mile EPZ [Emergency Planning Zone]. Im a former County 9 Commissioner and was very involved with the Emergency 10 Operations Program at the County, and then as a State 11 Representative, worked on the deregulation issue.

12 The time has come for the Nuclear Regulatory 13 Commission to decide whether after two years of extremely 14 hard work on everyones part, that Davis-Besse Nuclear 15 Power Station is ready for restart.

16 FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Corporation has 17 submitted the official request. The final testing is being 18 completed and thousands of emails, letters, and signatures 19 on petitions have been sent to the NRC both opposing and 20 supporting restart.

21 Nonresidents and those who use fear of the unknown 22 to generate support for their own causes and to inflate 23 their membership numbers find it difficult to understand 24 the local prevailing attitude of support for the plant and 25 for its workers.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

95 1 It is true that this plant is the largest employer 2 and taxpayer in the county; however, our support is not 3 based on jobs and taxes. We live here, and we know the 4 consequences that a nuclear release would have on our 5 tourism industry, our agriculture, and our standards of 6 living and the way of life that we have all grown to 7 enjoy.

8 Our children and our grandchildren are important, as 9 important to us as they are to those who live in any other 10 area of the State of Ohio. The differences that a great 11 majority of local residents know other residents and 12 friends who work at the plant and who are proud of their 13 contributions to the community and the safe production of 14 energy.

15 We are also proud of the hard work, the technical 16 skills, and the dedication shown, and the difficult task of 17 building new systems and rebuilding the old. Because we 18 know the people who work there, we are confident that this 19 plant will become the most efficient, and the safest 20 nuclear power plant in the United States, if not the world, 21 and an example for other nuclear plants and other 22 industries.

23 Another difference between supporters and opponents 24 is that our elected and appointed officials, as Jack has 25 referred to, have played a vital and a persistent role in MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

96 1 working with the NRC and the company to ensure that safety 2 is in fact the first priority.

3 No other officials have been as intimately involved 4 in the oversight of this plant or understand the nuclear 5 industry and its regulation as well.

6 While testimony and opinions are important, the most 7 important thing is whether the skills and dedications of 8 plant workers have produced significant changes at the 9 plant, and whether those changes will be sustained over a 10 period of time.

11 I believe those changes are in place, and request 12 that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission give approval for a 13 restart. Thank you very much.

14 MR. GROBE: Thanks, Darrell.

15 Are there other local officials or representatives 16 of elected officials?

17 MR. ELUM: My name is Charles 18 Elum, E L U M, and Im Chairman of the Board of Directors 19 of the Port Clinton Area Chamber of Commerce.

20 We, like everybody else in Ottawa County, have been 21 following this with great interest, this situation at 22 Davis-Besse. Its our feeling that Davis-Besse has always 23 been a good neighbor and supporter of our community.

24 We recognize that the workers at Davis-Besse are not 25 apart from the community, but in fact a very vital part of MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

97 1 the community. We see the 800 member Davis-Besse family in 2 our schools, our churches, our voting booths, restaurants, 3 stores, at civic events, and as volunteers in many 4 charitable organizations around Ottawa County. Many of 5 them serve in our civic, fraternal, service and religious 6 and fraternal organizations and among the first ones to 7 support our schools, cities and communities.

8 We would like to thank everyone for the hard work 9 theyve put in to correct the problems here. And, it is 10 for these reasons that the Board of Directors of the Port 11 Clinton Area Chamber of Commerce has put forth the 12 following resolution.

13 Whereas, the businesses in our community need a 14 safe, affordable, and reliable source of electricity.

15 And, whereas, the Davis-Besse physical plant has had 16 considerable improvement in its systems to ensure safe 17 operation.

18 And, whereas, both the corporation and its employees 19 have demonstrated a commitment to creating and maintaining 20 a Safety Conscious Work Environment.

21 And, whereas, a provision for continued oversight 22 after restart by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is in 23 place to maintain the Countys involvement.

24 And, whereas, FENOC is agreeing to maintain an 25 independent corporate oversight board with representation MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

98 1 from the county.

2 Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Port Clinton 3 Area Chamber of Commerce of Ottawa County, hereby supports 4 the restart of the Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Plant.

5 This resolution was unanimously passed by the Board 6 of Directors of the Port Clinton Area Chamber of Commerce 7 this 8th day of December, 2003. Signed by myself as 8 Chairman of the Board, and Richard Spicer, Executive 9 Director.

10 Thank you.

11 MR. GROBE: Thank you.

12 Other local officials, or elected representatives?

13 Donna.

14 MS. LUEKE: My name is Donna 15 Lueke, and Im unofficial and unelected. My opinions do 16 however represent those of many people in the area, but 17 these words are my own and its a prepared statement for 18 the NRC, for FirstEnergy, for watch-dog groups, elected 19 officials, media, and local citizens, which I think pretty 20 much covers most everybody here.

21 In 2002, we nearly experienced a great loss at 22 Davis-Besse. Opinions differ as to how close we came to 23 losing the plant and incurring catastrophic damage to our 24 health and our safety and economy and environment. Since 25 so much damage was found to the reactor head and since so MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

99 1 many other problems have been uncovered in the past two 2 years, one thing seems very clear; many people did not do 3 their jobs.

4 As Davis-Besse prepares for restart, we ask all 5 concerned to do their jobs, to put safety ahead of profits 6 and promotions, and to be responsible conscientious and 7 courageous.

8 To the NRC personnel:

9 Number 1, put safety first, ahead of internal and 10 external politics.

11 Number 2, implement in a timely manner the changes 12 recommended by the Lessons Learned Task Force and the 13 Inspector General.

14 Number 3, continue to improve policies and 15 procedures, so that situations like Davis-Besse, 1985; and 16 Davis-Besse, 2002, do not happen again here or anywhere.

17 Number 4, proactively seek input from employees and 18 critics for ideas and to increase objectivity.

19 Number 5, provide real answers to real concerns.

20 To FirstEnergy Executives:

21 Number 1, put safety ahead of production and 22 profits; make safety performance the primary criteria for 23 raises, for promotions, for bonuses.

24 Number 2, do a better job of providing rate payers 25 with reliable, cost-efficient, safe electricity.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

100 1 Number 3, proactively seek input from employees and 2 customers and critics for ideas and to increase your 3 objectivity.

4 Number 4, provide real answers to real concerns.

5 And, Number 5, be good, moral, corporate citizens by 6 three things; take initiative and responsibility instead of 7 waiting for the NRC, or P.U.C.O., or the EPA or the Justice 8 Department to force changes.

9 Next, absorb the costs of your Davis-Besse mistakes 10 internally. Do not punish the rate payers again.

11 And, the next point, dedicate substantial effort and 12 funds to safe and renewable energy sources, now less than 13 one percent of your generation sources. Be a leader.

14 To many of those in this room tonight, the FENOC 15 employees, managers, and executives:

16 Number 1, put safety ahead of raises and 17 promotions.

18 Number 2, immediately let supervisors know of safety 19 problems and ideas. If they wont listen, tell the NRC.

20 If they dont listen, tell the media or consumers groups.

21 Number 3, if youre fatigued, working too many hours 22 in the push to restart or in the future, tell your 23 supervisor and/or the NRC inspector. Put your and our 24 safety ahead of pressure from your boss or the extra pay.

25 Number 4, be grateful to those who caught the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

101 1 problems at Davis-Besse and had the courage to act. Your 2 health and your job would have been the first casualties of 3 an accident.

4 To the elected officials:

5 Put first the safety and health of your 6 constituents. Your constituents also include the children, 7 the voters of the future. Discuss and plan for the 8 eventual decommission of Davis-Besse, the disposal of its 9 nuclear waste, and future use of the land.

10 Next, maintain high vigilance with Davis-Besse, the 11 NRC, and FirstEnergy. Restart was achieved after the 1985 12 incident and we still had 2002.

13 3, explore aggregation and other ways to lower the 14 high electric rates that burden your constituents and 15 discourage new businesses.

16 And, Number 4, explore and demand increased use of 17 renewable sources of energy in our environmentally 18 sensitive area. Learn more about whats being done in 19 Bowling Green, for example.

20 To the media and watch-dog groups:

21 Continue to investigate and report on Davis-Besse, 22 on the NRC, on nuclear power, on FirstEnergy; even when 23 its not headline material. You are the eyes and ears that 24 protect and inform the citizens.

25 And, lastly, to the local citizens, and to all MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

102 1 citizens:

2 Number 1, put safety concerns over economic 3 concerns, for the sake of our children.

4 Number 2, conserve energy, so we are less dependent 5 on foreign oil and nuclear power and polluting fuels, so we 6 produce less damage to our environment.

7 Number 3, reduce, reuse, recycle.

8 Number 4, vote, communicate with elected officials, 9 attend public meetings. And lastly, lets do our jobs as 10 citizens of a democracy.

11 In filmmaker Akira Kurasawas "Dreams", a young 12 mother clutches her children as they are engulfed by 13 radiation from a nuclear plant explosion and she cries, 14 "But they told us nuclear plants were safe." And then 15 realizes that human accident is the danger, not the nuclear 16 plant itself.

17 Lets all do our jobs better this time and thank you 18 for the opportunity to be heard.

19 MR. GROBE: Donna, as 20 always, your comments are very well made. You had several 21 items for the NRC, and I think I can say with confidence 22 that the NRC is completely aligned with the four items, 23 first four items you mentioned. The fifth item only you 24 can judge, and that is whether were providing real answers 25 to the hard questions. We aspire to the position of having MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

103 1 each of the people that come to our public meetings to be 2 able to say, yes, they gave us a real answer to each of our 3 questions. So, I hope we meet your standards in that 4 regard.

5 Yes, sir.

6 MR. LODGE: Thank you. My 7 name is Terry Lodge. Im from Toledo, so I dont live in 8 the ten mile radius, but I live occasionally downwind of 9 Davis-Besse. I have a number of questions.

10 Mr. Grobe, at the end of December, Paul Gunder Gunter of 11 the Nuclear Information Resource Service and I sent a 12 letter to you pointing out what we believe is an unresolved 13 safety issue that actually dates back to the early 1990s.

14 Its contemporaneous with the problems that have brought us 15 all here tonight; that is that the so-called complete 16 manual actions per 10CFR50 Appendix R Section 3G2 at 17 Davis-Besse do not conform to license requirements.

18 A man named Phillip Quals Qualls, who is a lead Fire 19 Protection Engineer at NRC Headquarters identified in 2003 20 that the Davis-Besse operator had substituted manual 21 actions, which as you know are circumstances where the 22 Licensee rather than providing the required physical 23 protection to control room operated electrical systems for 24 remote shutdown of the reactor in the event of fire, 25 instead substitutes the sending of licensed or unlicensed MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

104 1 operators into the reactor complex potentially exposing 2 them to areas involved in a fire to manually operate safe 3 shutdown equipment.

4 Manual actions in and of themselves are not approved 5 long-term alternatives for the protection of safe shutdown 6 electrical systems as required by the 10CFR regs, and 7 moreover, Mr. Quals Qualls pointed out that the reference manual 8 actions plant specific to Davis-Besse did not complete nor 9 were they branded license amendments or exemptions before 10 the operator implemented them as substitutes for required 11 physical separation of electrical systems or alternatively 12 protection with fire barrier suppression and detection 13 equipment.

14 We believe these manual actions are therefore 15 illegal and are an unresolved public safety risk pertaining 16 to the restart of Davis-Besse.

17 In 1998, the NRC ordered the utility to basically 18 fix and revise its fire protection, fire suppression plans 19 to restore functionality to inoperable fire barriers. To 20 our knowledge, that has not been accomplished even today.

21 There were a number of questions that we stated in 22 the letter. Most salient to me are, has the 0350 Panel 23 inspection of the 1991 Safety Evaluation Report that was 24 referenced by Mr. Quals Qualls in a 2003 email, established that 25 the Licensee is not in compliance with fire protection MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

105 1 requirements per the federal regs?

2 It would appear that to grant a restart request 3 without analyzing and addressing fire protection issues, 4 that the Licensee would be, effectively illegally starting 5 up outside of its licensing agreement. How does the 0350 6 Panel plan to visit these fundamental fire protection 7 issues and the lack of analysis that was identified by the 8 NRC Headquarters prior to any proposed restart?

9 Finally, has the panel inspection process determined 10 that the Davis-Besse operator has fulfilled its legal 11 obligations per the agreement dated May 4th, 1998, and the 12 accompanying NRC order dated June 22nd, 1998, to come into 13 compliance with the federal regs?

14 Mr. Grobe, I differ distinctly with your earlier 15 comment. The public record documents that were discovered 16 by the Union of Concerned Scientists showed that indeed the 17 NRC did take economic hardship considerations into account 18 in extending the operating permission to Davis-Besse in 19 2001. And if you havent seen those documents, Ill be 20 happy to provide them to you.

21 I am concerned not just that the management culture 22 and the lack of change of that, that we believe continues 23 to persist at Davis-Besse; Im concerned that there doesnt 24 appear to be any significant change in the culture of the 25 management of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

106 1 We, the public have not heard of the disciplinings, 2 of the sanctioning of any NRC staff members for the 75 day 3 operating extension. The public has seen and heard nothing 4 of any fines or other sanctions other than public shaming 5 imposed on the utility after 26 or 27 months.

6 It is entirely inappropriate to commence the restart 7 without seriously and publicly visiting the issues of 8 imposing sanctions, of imposing punishment.

9 It is wonderful that the utility and its 10 hard-working staff is here telling you that they want their 11 future back, that they want their plant back, but a 12 generation into operation for what happened to have 13 happened, is abominable. It is astounding.

14 I would even submit that the NRC arguably looks as 15 though it continues to protect the utility through the 16 Grand Jury inquiry that we understand to be ongoing, by not 17 imposing civil fines and other sanctions.

18 Respectfully request that you answers the questions.

19 Thank you.

20 MR. GROBE: Ill give it a 21 try. Maybe it would be easiest to do it in reverse order.

22 MR. RUTKOWSKI: Jack, why dont 23 you answer all, all questions that are non Appendix R 24 related. Ill take those Appendix R questions.

25 MR. GROBE: I was actually MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

107 1 going to do that.

2 You indicated Terry that the NRC continues to 3 protect the interests of FirstEnergy by not imposing civil 4 penalties while there is an ongoing federal investigation.

5 In fact, the relationship that the NRC has with the 6 Department of Justice is specifically crafted to ensure 7 that the safety of the public is the first priority of both 8 organizations, and then the next priority is to protect the 9 integrity of the investigation.

10 And were working carefully and closely with the 11 Department of Justice consistent with our Memorandum of 12 Understanding to make sure that the safety of the public is 13 protected and the veracity of the ongoing investigation is 14 not compromised.

15 I wish you had had the opportunity to come to more 16 of these public panel meetings over the last two years. I 17 think Ive seen you here twice. But I can tell you, you 18 would have observed, had you been able to come to more 19 meetings, that the safety culture of this panel has clearly 20 been demonstrated to the public and the safety focus of 21 this panel is its paramount focus and priority.

22 Let me just talk broadly about technical issues 23 raised by the staff. Ill turn it over to Bill to 24 specifically talk about the Appendix R issue.

25 We are continually soliciting our staff to ensure MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

108 1 that any particular issues that come up are brought to the 2 attention of the panel and properly dealt with. And when 3 Mr. Quals Qualls brought his issue forward, he was reacting to 4 some conversations that he had with inspectors that were 5 out doing Appendix R or fire protection inspections.

6 We entered it into our process, and we attempt to 7 work very methodically and carefully with a primary focus 8 on safety to work through all the issues we have on our 9 plate.

10 Your letter to us was not news. Phils email was 11 provided to us many months ago, and its an issue we have 12 been pursuing. Just like we regularly solicit all of the 13 staff who have an opinion on Davis-Besse on any particular 14 issues they are a technical expert in, and make sure that 15 we get all those thoughts captured, so we can adequately 16 resolve them.

17 And Bills staff is in the midst of finishing a 18 review on the issue that Phil raised. It has to do with a 19 very unique set of circumstances and a post fire 20 situation.

21 Bill, do you want to comment on the status of that 22 review?

23 MR. RUTKOWSKI RULAND: Yes, thank you 24 Jack.

25 Mr. Lodge, essentially the questions you asked were MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

109 1 contained in a letter that we, that I think was addressed 2 to you, wasnt it, Jack?

3 MR. GROBE: Yes.

4 MR. RUTKOWSKI RULAND: A letter that was 5 addressed to Mr. Grobe about this very issue. As Jack has 6 said, we put this into our system and we are actively 7 working the issue.

8 If you notice, one of our Restart Checklist Items, 9 5B, is systems ready -- excuse me, Systems Readiness for 10 Restart. So, for us to say that that Restart Checklist 11 item is closed, we, the 0350 Panel, have to have confidence 12 that this particular issue that is contained in your letter 13 regarding the use of manual actions that Davis-Besse would 14 have to take post fire, that issue would have to be 15 resolved.

16 The way this particular issue is working right now, 17 and were not done yet, and we will be done. We will have 18 to come to closure one way or another on this item before 19 the panel recommends restart. And thats been our 20 intention all along.

21 What were doing now is, there is a document that 22 the Region sends Headquarters. Its called a Task 23 Interface Agreement. And, basically, it lays out the 24 questions that Headquarters technical staff needs to 25 answer, specifically regarding the issue that youre MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

110 1 raising. Were working through that process as we speak.

2 Were not done yet. And the 0350 Panel has not made a 3 final resolution on this matter.

4 However, our preliminary judgments containing the 5 specific technical requirements is that the plant in this 6 particular area is as the safety evaluation has described, 7 and that safety evaluation was issued about 1991. The 8 plant is designed in accordance and operated in accordance 9 with that safety evaluation. And, through a number of 10 inspections that the staff has performed, we continue to 11 review that.

12 So, this item is strictly, its on our front burner, 13 and were looking at it, and we will have this issue 14 documented to you shortly.

15 MR. GROBE: Thanks, Bill.

16 MR. RUTKOWSKI RULAND: One more thing.

17 One of the things that I think a number of the questions 18 that Mr. Lodge had concerning, about the legal 19 requirements, you know, whether its legal, what 20 Davis-Besse did; and thats also something we are examining 21 and were going to disposition.

22 MR. GROBE: Just to give you a 23 broader prospective of what weve been doing for the last 24 two years. We have a document we call our Restart Action 25 Matrix. And you can think of it as a rather large To-Do MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

111 1 List. It contains a total of several hundred issues, just 2 like this one. Issues that come from technical staff, 3 issues that are raised by inspectors, issues that come from 4 members of the public that warrant follow-up.

5 Along with the Restart Checklist, there is things 6 like the Restart Action Matrix that underpins it. And, as 7 Bill clearly articulated, the Systems Readiness for 8 Restart; there is multiple issues were still working 9 before we can draw a conclusion on that checklist item.

10 And the one that Phil Quals Qualls raised to us a number of months 11 ago is just one of those.

12 All of those are in process, and were making very 13 good progress on that, but there are a number of issues 14 remaining. I think there is roughly 40 Restart Action 15 Matrix items that are left to be closed by the panel. Each 16 one is carefully evaluated, closure is documented, the 17 basis for closure. And if there is a violation involved, 18 thats taken care of. If the issue is determined to be 19 adequate, then thats fine too.

20 So, there is a lot of work that goes into what weve 21 been doing, and I appreciate you bringing that one to our 22 attention.

23 One other comment. We did do a fairly complete Fire 24 Protection Inspection during the course of this long-term 25 shutdown, and thats what generated the question from MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

112 1 Phil. We plan on doing our normal, whats referred to as a 2 Triennial, once every three years, Detailed Fire Inspection 3 Protection. I believe thats scheduled for the very early 4 parts of 2005.

5 So, fire protection is a regular focus area of 6 Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and we will be meeting all 7 of the agencys expectations in that area.

8 Yes, sir?

9 MR. RUTKOWSKI RULAND: Jack, one more 10 thing I would like to add. As part of this process of 11 resolving this technical issue just to give you an 12 example. Mr. Quals Qualls, an NRC employee, as we resolve this, 13 we talked specifically to Mr. Quals Qualls about, you know, how we 14 see this; how we see the resolution of this issue. So, 15 its, essentially, were doing this completely above board, 16 and well continue to do it that way.

17 MR. GROBE: Yes, sir.

18 MR. GATTER: Good evening. Im 19 Shane Gatter, Corrective Action Program at Davis-Besse.

20 I would like to say that I believe we are ready for 21 restart, just as my management team has been up here for 22 the last couple of hours explaining. And I believe I can 23 speak for the rest of the team at Davis-Besse when I say, 24 we are people currently and will be people with a strong 25 safety focus. Thank you.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

113 1 MR. GROBE: Thank you.

2 MR. MILLER: My name is Steve 3 Miller, and I live in the west end of Toledo, Ohio, and 4 like Mr. Lodge, Im occasionally in the downwind of what 5 happened at Davis-Besse as well.

6 I would like to say, I appreciate you allowing me to 7 speak. I also appreciate the fact that you are trying to 8 reassure us that the plant is ready to start.

9 I unfortunately am not reassured. I think in light 10 of what happened a couple years ago and the fact that we 11 have a patched reactor head still gives me serious doubts 12 and reservations.

13 I would like to be, as I said, reassured that this 14 is something that is ready to be restarted. I am not. I 15 am unequivocally opposed to the restart of Davis-Besse.

16 And I would like to say that it is my sense, my 17 inclination, that this plant will be in fact restarted.

18 And, if it is, Im going to ask that we all do better, 19 because of what happened two years ago, or what almost 20 happened two years, cant happen again.

21 Thank you.

22 MR. GROBE: Steve, I 23 appreciate your comments. I just want to clarify one 24 thing, and maybe its a good time to talk a little about 25 about the process.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

114 1 Im not trying to reassure you that this plant is 2 ready to restart, because I havent come to that 3 conclusion. Thats what FirstEnergy was trying to convince 4 us of this evening, and were not convinced yet. So, this 5 panel has not yet come to a conclusion that this plant is 6 ready to restart. I want it very clear that you understand 7 that.

8 Just one more, I think you probably just misspoke, 9 but you indicated that the reactor head was patched. In 10 fact, there is a whole new reactor head that was installed 11 in the plant.

12 I hope you can continue coming to our public 13 meetings. And, you know, you expressed that you have 14 serious doubts. And you didnt provide much detail on 15 those, but hopefully we can have a dialogue in the future 16 of what those doubts are and we can make sure that were 17 addressing them.

18 Yes, sir.

19 MR. HASANAT: NRC, FirstEnergy 20 employees, various officials and guests, good afternoon.

21 My name is Abul Hasanat. I have a Ph.D. in Nuclear 22 Engineering, and several years of Nuclear Engineering 23 experience from several nuclear power plants in U. S. and 24 abroad. Im a new employee to Davis-Besse. I joined 25 Davis-Besse around five months ago. I came from another MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

115 1 nuclear power plant.

2 Before joining Davis-Besse, I had one thing in mind 3 about Davis-Besse; that this plant once was the number one 4 best plant in the U. S., and second best plant in the 5 world. That keeping in mind, I was closely watching the 6 progress of reactor replacement activities, and I was 7 regularly contacting with the Director of Nuclear 8 Engineering, Mr. Jim Powers, and with many other people.

9 And I was convinced that this plant has the capability to 10 become again the number one best plant in U. S. and in the 11 world.

12 Based on that, I joined Davis-Besse. I joined, I 13 moved with my two-years-old daughter, and eleven-years-old 14 daughter. My family also, they are in the back. They came 15 here to suffer this Davis-Besse restart.

16 This plant has done a tremendous amount of work, as 17 you have seen. Davis-Besse last two years have done over 18 140 modifications, 24,000 corrective actions, 15,000 19 distinct surveillances, and many, many others.

20 I mean, well done, in the Containment Building, in 21 the Auxiliary Building, into the other buildings. Its 22 very clean, and very good condition, and looks new.

23 If you compare this Davis-Besse plant and the plant, 24 those were built in 1977, you will see that this plant is 25 much, much, much better condition. Even the plant, those MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

116 1 are built in 1987, still this plant is better than those 2 plants. Why Im saying so? Because I have been in those 3 plants. I know I can testify it.

4 I am pretty much confident that this plant is in 5 excellent condition. As a engineering professional, I am 6 confident that this plant is safe and ready for restart. I 7 am requesting NRC to grant permission for restart.

8 Thank you for your attention.

9 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 10 much.

11 Its about quarter after 9, what I would like to do 12 is take one more comment from here at Camp Perry and then 13 go to any comments on the phone line, and allow them a few 14 minutes to provide comments.

15 MR. TRAHARNE: Good evening. My 16 name is Larry Traharne. Im the Business Manager of IBEW 17 Local 245. Im pleased to speak to you tonight on behalf 18 of over 900 men and women of Local Union 245 as you 19 contemplate the restart of Davis-Besse.

20 My message tonight is brief. Were for it. This 21 isnt just an academic discussion for us. Were uniquely 22 well qualified to address this issue. Fully over two 23 hundred of our members work at Davis-Besse. We believe the 24 NRC inspection regime performed as it was truly intended.

25 The serious issues it revealed have been properly, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

117 1 thoughtfully and safely addressed. Additionally, my 2 international union, the International Brotherhood of 3 Electrical Workers is also firmly committed to the safe 4 operation of Americas 103 nuclear power plants.

5 Not only do we have an insiders view of the 6 retrofits and the improvements, we also live in Oak Harbor 7 and the surrounding communities. Many of our families live 8 here; grandparents, moms, dads and the kids.

9 Weve looked our loved ones in the eyes and weve 10 assured them that Davis-Besse is safer, stronger, and more 11 secure than ever before.

12 Tonight, I am here to convey our confidence to the 13 Commission and especially to our friends and neighbors. We 14 understand that theyre looking for our assurance that this 15 will be fine; and it will be.

16 Weve been there. Weve seen the progress. We know 17 Davis-Besse is ready. We also know that our community 18 needs the energy that drives Ohios economic engine. And 19 now that Davis-Besse is safer that ever before, were ready 20 to restart the plant. Thank you.

21 MR. GROBE: Thanks, Larry.

22 At this point, what I would like to do is see if we can 23 take a few comments and questions from folks on the phone 24 line. I understand that we may still be having the same 25 feedback problem that we experienced earlier today. I hope MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

118 1 not, but well give it a try and see if we can get some 2 comments and questions from those on the phone.

3 OPERATOR: Our first caller 4 is Michael Keagan.

5 MR. KEAGAN: Michael Keagan.

6 Am I getting feedback on audio? Are you able to hear me?

7 MR. GROBE: Yes, I think so.

8 Keep going.

9 MR. KEAGAN: Okay. The fact 10 that Davis-Besse since 77, TMI accident, the actions of 11 tonight, 1985, where it came down to some 31 seconds of the 12 plant shutdown. And now the hole in the head, a hole in 13 the core. There is a hole in the core and there is a hole 14 in the core of the NRC which has been pointed out before.

15 Its not been a regulatory agency thats been regulating.

16 The reactor boric acid was raised in the generic 17 letters, the bulletin. Davis-Besse signed off on that 18 bulletin saying it was taken care of. And the NRC signed 19 off on that. Early at that time, the deception began.

20 The hole in the head on the reactor is merely a 21 symptom of a larger problem. That plant, that system, 22 the NRC, are systematically flawed. You have failed to be 23 a regulator. You have been captive by the regulation 24 industry.

25 Now, continuing problems going on, but they are not MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

119 1 resolved. I would like to know how many standing 2 maintenance back logs exist at this time? Would you 3 respond to me?

4 MR. GROBE: Im not sure if I 5 can give you the exact number of preventative maintenance 6 activities that are in process at this time. I believe the 7 number of corrective maintenance activities is on the order 8 of two hundred or so, but I just dont have those specific 9 numbers at my fingertips.

10 MR. KEAGAN: On preventative 11 maintenance backlog, I want to know that were watching 12 you, every one of those regulators in that room, and this 13 company, were going to be tracking.

14 What occurred was a Chernobyl situation, and well 15 perhaps be looking at it again. We need our time for 16 humanity. And regardless, the NRC, were going to be 17 tracking you, to make those decisions. Well be tracking 18 your careers. Well be following you.

19 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 20 much. Let me respond a little bit more broadly to what I 21 think youre comment and question was, just to make sure 22 that I hit the nail on the head.

23 As is the situation in a plant thats in a long-term 24 shutdown, there is many issues identified that are put into 25 the Corrective Action Program. Some of those are not MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

120 1 safety significant to the point where they need to be 2 completed prior to restart, and end up in what is referred 3 to as a backlog. And there will be some engineering 4 activities and some maintenance activities; there is a 5 whole variety of activities, procedural changes that enter 6 into the backlog. That backlog currently contains more 7 than five thousand items.

8 Thats a concern to us. And because of that, we 9 conducted a specific focused inspection on two particular 10 activities with regard to the backlog. One was the, 11 whether or not issues were properly prioritized from the 12 standpoint of whether they need to be completed prior to 13 restart or after restart. And, we found that FirstEnergy 14 had done an adequate job segregating those specific items 15 as prerestart and post restart.

16 The second thing is once you have a backlog of items 17 to be accomplished post restart, its possible that there 18 maybe a synergy between those issues. While an individual 19 issue did not rise to the level of being something that 20 needed to be completed prior to restart, there may be a 21 relationship between multiple issues that caused them, 22 while not individually significant, but collectively to be 23 more significant.

24 We utilize three individuals who are qualified in 25 our organization as, what we call a Senior Reactor MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

121 1 Analyst. Its an individual whos got extensive experience 2 in nuclear operations and all of them have been prior 3 Senior Resident Inspectors, and then they receive two years 4 of training in risk analysis. And, so theyre experts not 5 only in reactor operations, but also in probabilistic risk 6 analysis.

7 And those three individuals came out to the plant 8 and spent a considerable period of time evaluating from a 9 risk perspective the backlog of activities, and concluded 10 that there was no imbedded safety concerns or reason to be 11 concerned about the backlog.

12 Our continuing inspections, well make sure that 13 those issues that are safety significant get worked off in 14 an appropriate time frame, but from a restart perspective 15 none of those issues rise to the level of concern that 16 would cause us to move them into a prerestart category.

17 Is there, we had some difficulty hearing on the 18 phone, but let us try one more comment or question from the 19 phone lines and see.

20 MR. RUTKOWSKI RULAND: Jack, can I?

21 There is a couple other issues I think the question 22 raised. I would like to link two of those issues.

23 One, the question I believe talked about the 24 Chernobyl plant and talked about tracking the NRC. And 25 its interesting that he links those, because had he been MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

122 1 near Chernobyl, he wouldnt have been able to track it.

2 Chernobyl was built in basically a closed society.

3 And, that kind of plant, of course, wouldnt have been 4 permitted to be built in the United States. And, in fact, 5 the people near that plant couldnt have tracked it. So, I 6 welcome the callers assertions that hes going to be 7 tracking us. And, as a matter of fact, this very meeting, 8 the phone call that the caller is on, is part and parcel of 9 our commitment to foster that tracking. We want him to 10 track, not only him, but all the citizens both nearby and 11 far away from Davis-Besse.

12 As you might, as anybody who has visited our website 13 in the near, or recently, it continues to have more and 14 more information to help people track the progress and to 15 hold us accountable. Frankly, I welcome that. So, I 16 encourage the caller to not only track what were doing, 17 but like Donna Lueke was urging us to do, was to give real 18 answers to real questions. We look forward to doing that.

19 Thank you.

20 MR. GROBE: Well stated, 21 Bill. Thank you.

22 Is there another question or comment on the phone 23 lines?

24 OPERATOR: Michael Keagan is 25 still on the line.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

123 1 MR. KEAGAN: Thank you.

2 Michael Keagan. I couldnt tell whether you heard my 3 comments or not. I just wasnt sure. You, in fact, did 4 hear them, and Ill be tracking you and the documents as 5 well.

6 And, this plant has a track record, they have a 7 track record of looking downwind of this plant. And the 8 NRC is on the line more so than Davis-Besse. And its 9 really their career is on the line here. So, you better 10 know what youre handling here.

11 So, those are my comments. And again, I am opposed 12 to the restart of the plant. Its foolish to have spent 13 five hundred million dollars when youre going to be 14 replaced by solar and wind. Its a shame, its a shame, 15 Its a shame. Thats it.

16 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you 17 very much.

18 OPERATOR: We have a question 19 from Tom Gurta Gurdziel. Your line is open.

20 MR. GURTA GURDZIEL: Good evening, Tom 21 Gurta Gurdziel here in New York State. First off, I want to thank 22 you for the telephone system tonight. Its working since 23 about 7:20 at about 85 percent, which is quite an 24 improvement for me for the transcript.

25 Secondly, I guess I want to say thank you to the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

124 1 present and the past members of the 350 Panel. Im very 2 confident in the fact of your work, and thank you for the 3 work youve been doing.

4 So, I have two questions and a statement. First 5 question is, are security and programs found to be 6 satisfactory at Davis-Besse Plant?

7 MR. GROBE: The answers to 8 that question, Tom, is yes. And I cant really go into 9 more detail than that.

10 MR. GURTA GURDZIEL: I have another 11 question on the backlog, and actually I want to ask it this 12 way. Has anybody put the backlog into hours and determined 13 that they can be worked off before the end of the plants 14 20-year life?

15 MR. GROBE: The Licensee put 16 the backlog into work hours, and then costed that out. And 17 I cant remember the number, but I think it was around 20 18 million dollars worth of effort that they gained commitment 19 from the corporate FirstEnergy office to have that 20 additional money available to work the backlog. So, thats 21 an issue that has already been dealt with.

22 Is that it, Tom?

23 MR. GURTA GURDZIEL: I cant hear you.

24 Would you repeat that last part, I couldnt hear you?

25 MR. GROBE: I said that the MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

125 1 FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company has person loaded the 2 backlogged activities and costed them out, and it came to 3 approximately 20 million dollars of effort; and they 4 secured approval from the corporate office to have 5 additional funds for that amount, over I think it was a 6 couple years, to be able to resolve the backlogged items.

7 MR. GURTA GURDZIEL: Okay. Finally, I 8 have to say, I have concluded that FirstEnergy cannot run 9 Davis-Besse safely. So, therefore, I request that if you 10 do decide to give them approval to start, that it requires 11 a change of ownership to occur first.

12 Okay, thanks for this opportunity to talk.

13 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you 14 very much.

15 MR. GURTA GURDZIEL: All right, bye.

16 MR. GROBE: I think what I 17 would like to do is ask other people that are on the phone, 18 were having a great deal of difficulty understanding the 19 callers.

20 What I would like to do is ask them to email their 21 questions to us, and use the email address OPA, that stands 22 for Office of Public Affairs. OPA, the number 3, at NRC 23 dot gov. If you didnt hear that clearly, that email 24 address is all over our website. And, just email that, and 25 well get back to you with the answer to your question.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

126 1 I would like to, and also the phone number, our 2 phone number is on the website and available on our public 3 newsletter. So, if you cant email, you can call us.

4 I would like to return to folks here in the 5 audience. If there is any other members of the audience 6 here at Camp Perry that have a question or comment, please 7 step forward.

8 Yes, sir?

9 MR. KHAN: My name is Ashar 10 Khan with Foresight. I just wanted to get a sense, Jack, we 11 heard issue of consistency, if you could wrap it up; are 12 you happy with the consistency that you have seen over, if 13 I mention your words, two months as you sit over here in 14 terms of making a decision?

15 MR. GROBE: Im not going to 16 provide a time frame for a decision, because there is many 17 things that are outside my control in that decision-making 18 process. What I can tell you is that we have four 19 checklist items that are remaining open. We need to 20 resolve those issues. And underpining that is what I 21 called earlier Restart Action Matrix. There is a number of 22 issues there that we need to address. And we also have a 23 document we called Process Plan, and those lay out a number 24 of activities that we need to accomplish.

25 So, there is a lot of work to do yet. I cant MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

127 1 speculate on, on when we would be completing that work. I 2 appreciate your question, because it gives me an 3 opportunity to go into a little more detail on the process 4 going forward.

5 The first step is for the panel to continue in its 6 evaluation of the inspection findings. Our meeting 7 tonight -- the meetings this afternoon and the meeting 8 tonight are helpful in that process of gaining 9 information. If we have additional needs for information 10 from the company, we will be getting back to them.

11 If in that course, the panel concludes that it needs 12 to perform additional inspections, it will schedule and 13 perform those inspections.

14 If the panel decides that at some point, that it 15 feels comfortable that the plant can be restarted safely 16 and will operate safely into the future, then it would make 17 that recommendation. The panel doesnt make a decision, it 18 makes a recommendation to Jim Caldwell, and he has a number 19 of activities that he will accomplish. And Im sure one of 20 them will be carefully questioning us on the basis for our 21 conclusions, so that he can gain confidence. And then 22 consulting the various folks in headquarters.

23 So, its a bit of a process. It involves a lot of 24 people. There is certainly the potential that there could 25 be additional questions that come up. And, so, I cant MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

128 1 speculate on how long it would take.

2 MR. KHAN: Could you tell us 3 if the remaining open items are pretty low significance or 4 is anything which is of any high significance which could 5 delay things?

6 MR. GROBE: The only -- let me 7 think for a minute, make sure I give you a correct answer.

8 The only remaining open issue that has a 9 significance greater than green, and green is our lowest 10 risk level, is the, well, potentially greater than green is 11 the high pressure injection pump Restart Checklist item.

12 We have done most of the work and our review of that issue 13 is complete. The reason it was called out specifically as a 14 separate checklist item was because of its risk 15 significance.

16 We still have some additional analysis to do to be 17 fully satisfied that we agree with FirstEnergys 18 conclusions regarding the adequacy of that pump, and that 19 work is ongoing right now.

20 I dont believe there are any other risk significant 21 outstanding issues. There is a number of lower level 22 significance issues. And, as I mentioned before, in the 23 questioning of FirstEnergy, there is two things that we 24 need to be confident of as a panel before we would 25 recommend to Jim Caldwell that the plant is ready to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

129 1 restart; one is that the plant meets our safety 2 requirements at the time of restart, and the second is that 3 we have confidence in going forward, that it will continue 4 to meet our safety requirements and it will not, there will 5 be a very low likelihood of any recurrence of the kinds of 6 situations that occurred in the past at Davis-Besse.

7 We may conclude that we need additional information 8 or additional commitments or we need to impose additional 9 requirements on FirstEnergy. Its difficult to speculate 10 on that at this point.

11 We need to go through our process. Were in our 12 process. We need to complete that. I can assure you that 13 its not focused on meeting anybodys schedule. Its 14 focused on making sure the plant is safe and will remain 15 safe if its allowed to restart.

16 MR. KHAN: But if I could 17 just end by asking the next thing well hear in the public 18 will be whether a decision for restart has been granted by 19 Jim; is that correct; or we wont hear anything else other 20 than that?

21 MR. GROBE: I dont 22 anticipate additional public meetings, but there could be 23 additional public dialogue in the sense of press releases 24 or additional letters going back and forth between 25 FirstEnergy and the NRC.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

130 1 So, I dont anticipate further public meetings 2 before restart, but that could change. I mean, thats not 3 a guarantee.

4 MR. KHAN: Thank you very 5 much.

6 MR. GROBE: Okay, thank you.

7 MS. WEIR: Hi, Im Shari 8 Weir, and tonight we have to deliver for Mr. Caldwell 9 letters and messages from 1,100 Northern Ohio residents 10 urging that the NRC follow its mandate to protect public 11 safety by not allowing FirstEnergy to restart the 12 Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Plant.

13 I also want to just quickly say that we fully 14 understand that the problems at Davis-Besse were caused by, 15 by management at the plant, and management of FirstEnergy 16 and that future problems would also be the result of 17 management at the plant and management at FirstEnergy and 18 not the workers.

19 Thank you.

20 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 21 much. We have been carefully reading the letters that you 22 have provided to us in the past, and have responded to most 23 of them. In reading those letters, our most, our highest 24 level of interest is on anything that is a potential safety 25 issue that we need to deal with.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

131 1 We appreciate your perspective and concerns, but we 2 screen them for any potential safety issues or equipment 3 deficiencies or specific concerns that are important for us 4 to follow-up on.

5 I dont believe weve identified any specific safety 6 concerns or specific issues with respect to the plant. We 7 appreciate the perspectives, the general perspectives that 8 your folks have been providing us. We may not be able to 9 respond to all of these letters on a timely basis. And, 10 what I mean by that is before restart. It takes a long 11 time to read a thousand letters and respond to them.

12 But we will read them and we anticipate responding 13 to them. We appreciate the fact that you are providing 14 them to us and there is a number of concerned people out 15 there.

16 I wont make Jim Caldwell carry them back to the 17 Region office though, I think well do that for him.

18 MS. WEIR: Thats good of you 19 and you basically just said the plant is going to restart.

20 Thank you.

21 MR. GROBE: I dont believe I 22 said that. What I said was that were very busy right now, 23 and we havent identified any specific safety issues in the 24 prior four or five thousand letters that youve given us.

25 What I would like to do is, if you know of any specific MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

132 1 safety issues at the plant or specific technical issues 2 that you think need to be brought to our attention, please 3 bring them to our attention.

4 And we will read the letters and we will get to 5 them, I just cant assure you that that will happen before 6 a restart decision is processed. Were very busy at the 7 moment and we need to continue our focus.

8 So, I would ask you to bring any specific issues to 9 our attention if there are specific issues there; 10 otherwise, we plan on responding to each of those letters.

11 Thank you.

12 MS. BUCHANON: My name is Sandy 13 Buchanon. Im the Executive Director of Ohio Citizen 14 Action. Were the states largest environmental 15 organization, with a hundred thousand members state-wide, 16 many of them in the Northern Ohio area and in this 17 community.

18 I have written information which Ive already 19 submitted, so I will not read that out loud. We do have 20 three points why we believe FirstEnergy should not be given 21 permission to restart Davis-Besse. I want to zero in on 22 one of them though, Ill quickly mention the first two.

23 The first two are that the company cannot have 24 turned around its corporate safety culture in this quick of 25 a time period. As recently as December, there were very MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

133 1 serious violations found, and as Jack said earlier, yes, 2 there are some ideas and programs in place, but it is not 3 possible or, give the public any confidence that its 4 anything other than promises at this point, particularly 5 given the decision of the Board of Directors quite recently 6 not to change direction, but to appoint Mr. Alexander who 7 has been Chief of Operations during this entire time period 8 as Chief Executive Officer.

9 The second point is that FirstEnergys financial 10 situation which has driven the production over safety 11 mentality which weve heard so much about in the past has 12 gotten only worse in the last two years.

13 There has been a series of blows to the company, 14 everything from losing cases on failing to upgrade its coal 15 fired plants, not being able to sell the coal fired plants, 16 the blackout, and the huge investment needed in 17 transmission; of course, the safety problems at Davis-Besse 18 and the recent down grading of its debt.

19 As you know, the company requested a three billion 20 dollar rate case which is currently being discussed in 21 Columbus. They numerous times promise that they need that 22 for their financial operations and there is certainly no 23 guarantee they will get that. So, we do not see that as a 24 sign of confidence or as a sign that they will be able to 25 slow down this production over safety mentality.

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134 1 But what I would like to zero in on tonight is the 2 fact that FirstEnergy and individuals who may have been 3 responsible for the conditions which led us here tonight 4 have not been punished for the negligence and the possible 5 criminal activity in allowing Davis-Besse to come within 6 three inches, 3/8 of an inch of a nuclear disaster.

7 As has been mentioned earlier, the Grand Jury 8 investigation while under way as a secret process, it has 9 not been completed. We do not believe that this company 10 should be given restart permission until the Grand Jury and 11 any other criminal investigations and procedures and trials 12 are complete. It sends absolutely the wrong message out to 13 the rest of the industry; that action of this seriousness 14 could be allowed to kind of skate by and the plant allowed 15 to restart before consequences have been levied.

16 I have some new information, which we just put 17 together this afternoon from looking at Freedom of 18 Information Act information available through the Freedom 19 of Information Act, and this is where my question lies.

20 According to the Root Cause Analysis and other 21 things done by both FirstEnergy and the Nuclear Regulatory 22 Commission, the problems with the hole in the head began 23 around 1994, 1996. The situation continued on through 24 1998, where there was some decisions made, documents signed 25 by key people at the plant. Again, more things going on in MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

135 1 2000, and finally the discovery in 2002.

2 When we, and I will provide this in writing, but I 3 just have a list here to read. When we looked through 4 those documents and look at the key individuals who signed 5 many of the reports that covered up the corrosion or said 6 no action was needed or contradicted other reports, none of 7 the names are people that, to, as far as we know, although 8 we would like to request information about this, are still 9 employed within FENOC, some may even be at Davis-Besse, 10 some may be in decision-making roles in FENOC.

11 Given Mr. Leidichs earlier comments about the 12 critical relationship between the three plants and sharing 13 information and the corporate culture, if any of those 14 individuals are eventually found to be through a proper 15 legal process responsible and prosecuted, we do not believe 16 that they should be allowed to be operating nuclear 17 plants. And, again, it sends the wrong message.

18 I will just read some of the names and I will 19 provide them as well. These are names that we are curious 20 as to whether they are still involved in FENOC: Robert 21 Donalyn Donnellon, Don Shelton, Lonnie Worley, Jim Lasch, Robert Hod, 22 Dave Eshelman, Michael Stevens, Theo Swim, David Lockwood, 23 Joseph Rogers, Dale Woco Wuokko, Phillip Schultz, Henry Stevens, 24 Robert Schrauder, Patrick McClauskey McCloskey, Robert Pell and John 25 Mesina Messina.

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136 1 Those are all questions we think the public has a 2 right to know whether those individuals are under 3 investigation, whether we may at some point find out if 4 they played a critical role in what led us here today.

5 Thank you.

6 MR. GROBE: I can give you a 7 preliminary response. Some of those names are familiar to 8 me, and I am confident that theyre still involved in 9 activities at Davis-Besse or other FirstEnergy plants.

10 Some of those names are not familiar to me.

11 Im uncomfortable with your inference that all of 12 those names or individuals who had some signature on 13 various documents that youve obtained has any relationship 14 with the ongoing federal investigation. I dont think 15 there is a nexus there and I think its inappropriate to 16 make that connection.

17 MS. BUCHANON: The problem is, 18 Jack, we dont know. Its a secret process. So, Im 19 saying the public is in the dark about exactly whats being 20 investigated, because were not allowed privy to the Grand 21 Jury and youre saying were not going to see the results 22 of the Grand Jury before you make the decision. So, thats 23 why Im asking.

24 MR. GROBE: Thats correct, 25 and weve talked about this in the past. And I mentioned MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

137 1 it somewhat in response to Mr. Lodges questions earlier 2 this evening. I dont think any of us would want Grand 3 Jury proceedings to be public. Theyre private for a 4 reason, and thats to protect the innocent.

5 We have a very clear and carefully crafted 6 relationship with the Department of Justice to ensure that 7 the safety of the public is paramount in the proceedings of 8 any investigation, that that takes precedent over any other 9 standards.

10 If necessary, and as I mentioned earlier, a member 11 of Jim Dyers staff from NRC Headquarters, a senior 12 executive on his staff has been made whats referred to as 13 an agent, and he works with the Department of Justice, and 14 he maintains an awareness of whats going on in Grand 15 Jury.

16 He cant tell us anything he knows, because thats a 17 secret process thats protected by law, but what he can do 18 is a continual assessment of the ongoing federal 19 investigation; and if there is a need, he can get the 20 Department of Justice to seek permission through court 21 order to release information to us, if there is a safety 22 need, because safety is the number one priority in our 23 relationship with the Department of Justice.

24 We have evaluated all the evidence generated to-date 25 through this investigation and concluded that there is no MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

138 1 immediate safety issues or concerns associated with the 2 individuals that are involved in that investigation.

3 So, I guess what I have to say is, youre going to 4 have to trust us, because those are the laws of our 5 country. We dont release Grand Jury information. We have 6 the permission -- or the relationship that if there is a 7 safety issue, they will proceed and support us in dealing 8 with that safety issue whatever is necessary. Were 9 monitoring that, and if there is a safety issue, well deal 10 with it. As of right now, there is not.

11 MS. BUCHANON: I appreciate 12 thats a judgment call at this point, but my major point 13 is, that we believe the Grand Jury process should be 14 allowed to make its way through criminal investigations, 15 criminal trials, whatever they are, before you would allow 16 this plant permission to restart.

17 MR. GROBE: I appreciate 18 thats what you believe, but absent a safety reason to 19 prevent this plant from restarting, it would not make sense 20 to, it would not be consistent with our rules and 21 regulations to prohibit this plant from restarting simply 22 because there is an ongoing investigation, something that 23 happened years ago, by people that cant have an impact on 24 safety.

25 MS. BUCHANON: Well, that becomes MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

139 1 the question now thats valid.

2 MR. GROBE: Its a question 3 that youre going to have to trust us on. We have done 4 those evaluations consistent with our procedures and we 5 will continue to monitor the ongoing federal 6 investigation.

7 I dont know if you wanted me to respond to those 8 other comments?

9 MS. BUCHANON: No, thats all 10 right. I know were short on time.

11 MR. GROBE: Okay. Thank you.

12 I have to tell you, I appreciate your involvement in 13 the Davis-Besse situation, and I appreciate the opportunity 14 that Jim and I have had to meet with you once in the summer 15 and again this morning, I guess. Seemed like a long time 16 ago.

17 Thank you.

18 MS. BUCHANON: Thank you.

19 MS. BOWSER: Hi, thank you for 20 the opportunity. My name is Erin Bowser and Im the State 21 Director of Ohio Public Interest Research Group. Ohio 22 Public is a nonprofit consumer and environmental advocacy 23 organization and Ive been State Director for roughly six 24 months. I just have a few questions. Theyll be brief.

25 As recently as last November, the NRC reported that MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

140 1 one fourth of all control room and equipment operators 2 indicated that they believe FirstEnergy puts profits ahead 3 of safety. What number of control room and equipment 4 operators now believe that FirstEnergy puts profit ahead of 5 safety?

6 Number two, the Lessons Learned Task Force made 49 7 recommendations that the NRC accepted to proof -- to 8 improve your oversight of nuclear power plants. Can you 9 tell me how many of those 49 recommendations have been 10 implemented, what they are, and if the NRC is committed to 11 implementing all of the recommendations before making a 12 decision on FirstEnergy application?

13 MR. GROBE: Is that it?

14 MS. BOWSER: Yes.

15 MR. GROBE: Excellent. I 16 think Im able to give good answers to both those 17 questions.

18 The first question you asked, I think is a little 19 bit, not fully contextualized. The survey results, Im not 20 sure about the numbers, but the survey results werent as 21 clear as what you articulated, that a certain percentage of 22 the operators believe that management placed profits ahead 23 of safety.

24 The basis for our conclusions today are the 25 inspection we presented the results of this afternoon, and MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

141 1 that involved a thorough review after the identification of 2 those trends in a couple of departments at FirstEnergy that 3 were not positive trends; they were trends in the negative 4 direction.

5 Overall, the plant was on a positive course, but 6 there were a couple of departments that had some downturns 7 under certain of the attributes, and FirstEnergy did a 8 comprehensive review of that. We had a very large team, I 9 think it was 8 or 10 folks here, for a week and a half or 10 so, maybe two weeks, doing an evaluation of FirstEnergys 11 review after they completed it, but more importantly doing 12 dozens and dozens of independent interviews and dialogues 13 with people in those critical departments. And, to make 14 sure that we understood what was doing on and what the 15 current perceptions were.

16 And our conclusion was that the issues were 17 adequately addressed. And weve closed that Checklist 18 item. That was Checklist Item 4b, in other words, the 19 Effectiveness of Corrective Actions in Management and Human 20 Performance Area.

21 So, we had a comprehensive inspection and reported 22 on it this afternoon. And, while there are still 23 opportunities to improve and will continue to be 24 opportunities to improve in the future, that specific area, 25 the panel concluded, was adequately resolved for restart.

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142 1 The Lessons Learned Task Force, Im going to ask Jim 2 Dyer, because thats, I think its out of his shop, and I 3 believe there is a semi-annual Commission Report that we 4 provide and thats a public document. And I believe that 5 he just recently did -- no, recently getting ready to do 6 that.

7 Jim, could you give us more details on that?

8 MR. DYER: Yes.

9 Im Jim Dyer, Director of Nuclear -- NRR, Nuclear 10 Reactor Regulation at the NRC. And, youre correct, Jack.

11 The, we are still implementing all 49 of the 12 recommendations. At the end of this month, we owe a 13 semi-annual report to the Commission, which will have the 14 current status of those. In fact, on the 26th of this 15 month of February, there will be a Public Commission 16 Meeting where we will be reporting out on the status of 17 the, of the Lessons Learned Task Force recommendation in 18 the four key areas.

19 I think of most import is in December, the 20 Commission finished an extensive Operating Experience Task 21 Force Review, where they made a large number of 22 recommendations for how to improve the way we get our, 23 share experience from both overseas to, operating 24 experience overseas as well as internally within the United 25 States plants and how we implement those into our MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

143 1 regulations and our inspection programs.

2 So, were expecting a lot of work in that area right 3 now, in a more detailed flushed out set of milestones and 4 activities coming, if not at the end of this month, then 5 certainly to the next report as to how we are exactly going 6 to go through this rather significant change in the way we 7 do business.

8 MS. BOWSER: May I follow-up 9 quickly on that question, please?

10 MR. GROBE: Absolutely. The 11 rest of your question was, are all 49 going to be done 12 before this panel considers restart of Davis-Besse. And, 13 the answer to that question is there is not a relationship 14 between the Lessons Learned Task Force actions and the 15 restart of Davis-Besse. Thats not part of our checklist.

16 Its not part of our consideration.

17 Were not shutting down other operating nuclear 18 power plants because of those recommendations, so it would 19 not be appropriate to hold Davis-Besse if the plant could 20 be restarted safely.

21 That doesnt mean we dont take these improvement 22 issues seriously, and many of them are largely implemented 23 already. And, as Jim said, youll be able to get access to 24 that information, most recent information on the 26th.

25 MS. BOWSER: My follow-up is, MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

144 1 as of the time of the last public report, how many of the 2 recommendations had been implemented out of the 49 that the 3 NRC had accepted?

4 MR. GROBE: Go ahead, Sam, 5 thank you.

6 MR. COLLINS: Thank you for the 7 question. Im Sam Collins. The answer is 13, on the 8 recommendation that have been implemented and that includes 9 the follow-up to the bulletin that required inspections of 10 the reactor vessel heads, including inspection follow-up of 11 the completion of those activities.

12 MS. BOWSER: Thank you.

13 MR. DeMAISON: Good evening, Im 14 Brad DeMaison. Im Project Manager at Davis-Besse.

15 First, I would like to address a comment that was 16 addressed, made earlier regarding the lady that read the 17 names of the individuals off. Those individuals I know 18 personally. I would work with them anywhere, any time, 19 they are true fine nuclear professionals.

20 The lady also referred to we cannot, how was it that 21 we are able to turn around our safety culture in two 22 years. She obviously is not familiar with the standard 23 Davis-Besse employee who is honest, hard working, 24 tenacious; and with our strong management team, we work 25 together as a team to turn around our safety culture. And MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

145 1 that is how we are able to accomplish it in two years.

2 Also, when the individual caller referred to 3 Davis-Besse having a track record. It is true we have a 4 track record. Something that we obviously are working hard 5 to overcome, but I can assure you our track record going 6 forward will be one of excellence.

7 Again, Im Brad DeMaison, and Im here also to tell 8 you personally that I am committed to the safe and reliable 9 return to service at Davis-Besse. Thank you.

10 MR. GROBE: Thanks, Brad.

11 MS. RUST: Hello I am --

12 MR. GROBE: Before you start, 13 its about four minutes to ten, so I think what well do is 14 well take these four folks here and then call it an 15 evening.

16 MS. RUST: Okay, thank you.

17 I am Beverly Rust of Oak Harbor. I am a native 18 Toussaingter. I grew up on a small family farm about three 19 miles from Davis-Besse. My husband Dave and I chose to 20 build our home and raise our four children on that same 21 family farm along the Toussaint River.

22 I can tell you that the residents of Carroll 23 Township and the Oak Harbor area never asked for a nuke 24 plant to be built in our backyard, but after 30 some years 25 together, I think we could not have asked for a better MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

146 1 industrial neighbor.

2 We have fresh air to breathe and clean water in our 3 river and lake. Our wildlife agencies have worked with the 4 owners of Davis-Besse to maintain a large portion of the 5 plant property as a nature preserve.

6 The plant has provided jobs to our community, a good 7 tax base, and of course, all that electricity that we love 8 to use.

9 Three years ago, I was hired as a contractor at 10 Davis-Besse to help write the maintenance procedures. I 11 remember being very impressed with the level of detail, all 12 the rules and regulations, and the high regard for nuclear 13 safety that are just normal business, everyday life in the 14 nuclear industry.

15 Two years ago, like most workers at Davis-Besse, I 16 was shocked to learn about the hole in the reactor head, 17 and then to find out that a lax safety culture was identify 18 as a Root Cause. However, over the past two years, workers 19 at Davis-Besse have come to realize that each of us has a 20 responsibility to be vigilant and to identify any and all 21 potential concerns.

22 Everyone knows that they have a duty to write a 23 Condition Report any time they think there may be a problem 24 or even a minor concern, to ensure that every problem is 25 properly addressed.

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147 1 Workers have developed questioning attitudes and 2 will not accept inadequate answers. We have learned a hard 3 lesson.

4 Our equipment has been upgraded and many processes 5 have been improved. The plant is ready and so are we.

6 Like many people in this room, I signed that big 7 banner back there to show my personal commitment to nuclear 8 safety. Our Site Vice President, Mark Bezilla, tells us 9 "We have all the time we need to do each job right the 10 first time, but not a moment to waste."

11 I stand behind Mark and FirstEnergy in supporting 12 the safe restart of Davis-Besse.

13 MR. GROBE: Thank you.

14 MR. NONEMAKER: Hello, my name is 15 Kenny Nonemaker. Im Site Superintendent for Kennis Line 16 Paint Contractor.

17 MR. GROBE: Turn the mike down 18 if you want to.

19 MR. NONEMAKER: Paint contractor.

20 Ive been at Davis-Besse for about 22 months.

21 When I first came to Davis-Besse -- first, let me 22 say this. Davis-Besse done, the personnel out there have 23 done a great job. They have refurbished this plant, made 24 it better than its ever been before. The material 25 conditions are excellent. Theyve done lots of MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

148 1 modifications to make sure this place can run safe.

2 22 months ago when I first came out here, I saw the 3 makings of a team, but a team with the wrong concept. In 4 the 22-month period that Ive been there, through the 5 management realignment, the change in the personnel, and 6 reassigning people, I feel that Davis-Besse hasnt only 7 built this plant to be safe, they have taken and built a 8 team that has focused theirself solely on the safety in 9 operating the plant and reliability of operating this 10 plant.

11 I would like to commend them for all their efforts, 12 and I ask that you allow them to restart Davis-Besse.

13 Thank you.

14 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 15 much.

16 MR. KENDALL: Good evening. My 17 name is Joseph Kendall, and Im an electrical engineer in 18 the Design Unit at Davis-Besse.

19 I believe Davis-Besse is ready for restart. I not 20 only work at Davis-Besse, but I live next to Davis-Besse.

21 I go to work each day knowing that the manner in which I do 22 my job affects the safety of not only my family, but my 23 friends and my neighbors. That is why as a nuclear 24 professional, I give you my oath, as Im sure all of my 25 colleagues would, as is proven by the sign which we all MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

149 1 signed back there saying that were ready for restart, to 2 put safety first every day and ensure that I will do my 3 part to keep safety at the forefront of my managements 4 priorities.

5 Thank you.

6 MR. GROBE: Thank you.

7 MR. RITTER: Hi, my name is 8 Dave Ritter. I work with Public Citizen, the Critical Mass 9 Energy and Environment Program, Washington, D.C.

10 Overall, I hope to address the concept Ive heard 11 about that we should trust the NRC. Trust us.

12 For nearly two full years, the Davis-Besse nuclear 13 reactor has been little more than an electricity and money 14 consuming reminder of the inherent problems and extreme 15 risks to nuclear power. The bright side of that scenario 16 is that the community has been marginally safer with the 17 reactor shut down.

18 From the first deal NRC struck with FENOC to 19 postpone a critical inspection to the discovery of the 20 football size hole in the vital vessel head component, and 21 on through to the recent errors during testing, Davis-Besse 22 has a striking example of how not to run a nuclear 23 reactor. And the risks involved and regulators 24 act primarily as promoters for the industry.

25 FirstEnergy has demonstrated it has little or no MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

150 1 safety culture. FirstEnergy, the owner/operator licensed 2 by the NRC to run Davis-Besse has finally admitted that 3 emphasis was placed on production over safety and that 4 financial considerations were behind their resistance to 5 shutting down the reactor by a deadline originally put 6 forth by the NRC to allow for conducting safety 7 inspections.

8 Some evidence does suggest that FirstEnergy had 9 knowledge and photographs of leaks and corrosion on the 10 reactors vessel head and did not previously disclose these 11 to the NRC. In the two years since Davis-Besse was shut 12 down, FirstEnergy has had massive, has fed massive 13 quantities of money into the reactor. It will inevitably 14 be attempting for FENOC to recoup these costs in creative 15 ways that could compromise safety or security.

16 NRC risked public health and safety by striking a 17 deal with Davis-Besses owners. As the situation at 18 Davis-Besse unfolded in late 2001, NRC had every reason to 19 force FirstEnergy to shut down the reactor immediately.

20 According to the technical specifications that Davis-Besse 21 is required to operate by, leakage from the reactor vessel 22 requires that the vessel be shut down within 30 hours3.472222e-4 days <br />0.00833 hours <br />4.960317e-5 weeks <br />1.1415e-5 months <br />.

23 NRC knew that cracks and leaks had occurred at other 24 reactors of the same type as Davis-Besse, pressurized water 25 reactors, PWRs and they knew that Davis-Besse was highly MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

151 1 susceptible to those cracks and leaks.

2 The NRC, considering costs and convenience of the 3 reactor operators, established an arbitrary deadline of 4 December 31, 2001, for full shutdown of the plants that it 5 believed were at highest risk, of which Davis-Besse was 6 one. FirstEnergy protested that deadline and indicated a 7 preference for a March 30th, 2002, shutdown, for which the 8 reactor was already scheduled to shut down for routine 9 refueling.

10 In the end, the shutdown order for Davis-Besse was 11 not issued to FirstEnergy and a compromise was made upon 12 compromise as NRC agreed to a February 16 shutdown date.

13 NRCs own office of the Inspector General judged 14 NRCs actions as improper. The OIG is the Nuclear 15 Regulatory Commissions internal investigative agency. An 16 event inquiry report from the OIG released on December 17 30th, 2002, entitled NRCs Regulation of Davis-Besse 18 Regarding Damage to the Reactor Vessel Head, raised many 19 troubling questions pertaining to NRCs ability to 20 effectively safeguard public health and safety.

21 In short, the internal investigative body of NRC 22 found that the agency knowingly permitted a reactor to 23 operate with reduced safety margins for the sake of the 24 industrys practical convenience. And the agency could not 25 assure protection of the publics safety and health due to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

152 1 these decisions.

2 A survey of NRCs employees has found NRCs own 3 safety culture to be deficient. A recent report puts the 4 Davis-Besse incident and the NRCs response in sharp 5 relief. The OIG Commission, an outside independent firm to 6 conduct the 2002 survey of NRCs safety culture and 7 climate. The Inspector Generals issuance of the survey 8 included a number of disturbing revelations, all of which 9 have relevance to the Davis-Besse incident.

10 In regard to safety and security, the IG determined 11 that quote "Many NRC employees perceive a compromise in the 12 safety culture" and that quote "Safety training is 13 considerably based on outdated scenarios that lead the 14 security of the nuclear site and the U.S. vulnerable to 15 sabotage." Only slightly more than half, 53 of percent of 16 employees feel it is quote "Safe to speak up in the NRC."

17 Compared to the same survey performed in 1998, 18 there was a quote "Significant decrease in the percentage 19 of employees who felt that NRCs commitment to public 20 safety is apparent in what we do on a day-to-day basis."

21 Broader critical findings revealed in the report, included 22 the fact that quote, "Employees tend to be confused 23 regarding overall agency mission" end quote.

24 Dovetailing this confusion in our own longstanding 25 critique that the agency acts more as promoter of nuclear MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

153 1 power than as a regulator, the report also found quote 2 "Concern that NRC is becoming influenced by private 3 industry and its power to regulate is diminishing" end 4 quote, within the ranks of the NRC itself.

5 One must ask, if the NRCs own employees feel 6 confused about the agencys mission, feel that the safety 7 culture is compromised, and are concerned with the nuclear 8 industrys influence over its own regulatory agency, how 9 safe can the public possibly feel about any recommendations 10 from the NRC regarding FENOCs safety culture and the 11 approval for Davis-Besse to restart.

12 Wrapping up. FirstEnergys violation in the 13 operation of the Davis-Besse reactor have been egregious 14 and extremely significant in their potential impact on 15 public health and safety. The NRC failed to act as the 16 strict regulator the public expects it to be.

17 FirstEnergy has been given numerous second chances 18 to prove that it can operate Davis-Besse safely. It has 19 failed. Now the NRC is being given a second chance to 20 prove that it is a serious regulator of the nuclear power 21 industry, working to safeguard public health and safety.

22 To demonstrate this, it is most appropriate that NRC 23 not permit FENOC to restart Davis-Besse. Our organization 24 does not trust NRC.

25 Thats it. Thanks.

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154 1 MR. GROBE: Thanks for your 2 comments. Just a couple of things. As Bill so aptly 3 stated, were here at least every month, and well continue 4 to be here on a regular basis into the future. You dont 5 need to trust us. You can come here and you can listen.

6 You can question us and well answer your questions.

7 My comments to Sandy Buchanon were strictly related 8 to the specific issue of review of the ongoing federal 9 investigation.

10 The Chairman very clearly replied to the Inspector 11 Generals December 2002 Report, and I think that reply was 12 within days of the report being issued. And thats 13 certainly a matter of public record.

14 We have many different levels of oversight in the 15 agency. One is NRR, the Office of Nuclear Reactor 16 Regulation, providing oversight and audit and assessment of 17 the Region performance. We have our Inspector General, who 18 performs regular evaluations of our performance. The 19 General Accounting Office performs evaluations of our 20 performance on a regular basis. We have oversight 21 committees on the House and Senate side that regularly 22 conduct hearings on our performance.

23 So, there is certainly many opportunities, and as I 24 said, were out here all the time putting ourselves in 25 front of you and having you critique our performance.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

155 1 There is many opportunities for folks to get information to 2 the NRC and be able to question us, and we look forward to 3 seeing you again in the future. Thank you.

4 This will be the last question. Thank you.

5 MS. GORDON: I appreciate it 6 very much. Good evening. My name is Mary Gordon. I 7 reside in Port Clinton, Ohio. My husband, Bill, and I own 8 and operate a successful portrait studio. We have been in 9 business in Port Clinton for 20 years. This community has 10 been very supportive of us.

11 You might ask the question, what would a small 12 portrait studio and this magnificent nuclear facility have 13 in common? The answer is the employment of about 850 14 people. The 850 employees of this facility are our 15 customers, past customers, present customers, and future 16 customers. They are also our friends and neighbors.

17 Without their support, the economic activity of the 18 business community would be greatly compromised to the tune 19 of approximately 15 to 30 million dollars annually.

20 If my customers, friends, and neighbors lose their 21 jobs, they will have to seek jobs elsewhere. Eventually 22 they will be forced to leave this community. Our portrait 23 studio and other businesses might have to close their doors 24 permanently. This downhill slide cannot be stopped if the 25 Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station is not allowed to MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

156 1 restart.

2 I have been reading a very interesting article in 3 the National Geographic issue of February 2004. The 4 article skillfully deals with carbon dioxide put into our 5 atmosphere primarily from our use of fossil fuels. Quote.

6 "Each year humanity dumps 8 billion tons of carbon into the 7 atmosphere; 6.5 billion tons from fossil fuels and 1.5 8 billion tons from deforestation.

9 The conversion of fossil fuels into energy accounts 10 for 80 percent of the annual contribution to CO2 emissions, 11 with 60 percent of that coming from industrial emissions.

12 Carbon dioxide is foremost in a rate of gasses from human 13 activity that increase the atmospheres ability to trap 14 heat. Few scientists doubt that this greenhouse warming of 15 the atmosphere is already taking hold." Unquote.

16 The Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station produces no 17 emissions similar to the fossil fuel electric generators.

18 The 25 years of electricity generated at Davis-Besse has 19 averted more than one hundred million tons of by-products, 20 such as carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxide 21 from the atmosphere.

22 An important fact is that Davis-Besse has had an 23 excellent safety record for the past 25 years also. I am 24 not a scientist, but I believe that nuclear energy is a 25 natural way of producing energy established by the creator MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

157 1 of the universe. It is part of the natural order of 2 things. Is not the sun a nuclear reaction?

3 I thank all the employees here who are trying to get 4 this plant started by putting our safety foremost, and I 5 thank you for your attention.

6 MR. GROBE: Thank you very 7 much.

8 MR. REDFERN: I apologize for 9 being a little over the 10:00 deadline. My name is Chris 10 Redfern and I represent 125,000 residents that live along 11 the south shore of Lake Erie from Vermilion to the City of 12 Northwood. Im a State Representative in the Ohio General 13 Assembly. I also serve in the capacity as Democratic 14 Leader in the House of Representatives. I have a very 15 brief three paragraph letter that I would like to read and 16 submit for the record.

17 "

Dear Mr. Grobe,

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission 18 was forced to close the Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station 19 when the plant failed to meet certain safety standards.

20 During the intervening two years, the NRC, as well as the 21 operator, have addressed safety and design issues to such a 22 level, that I would recommend reactivating the plant.

23 In light of the progress that has been made toward 24 creating a strong safety culture at every level of 25 operation within the plant, and the acceptance, apparent MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

158 1 acceptance by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that 2 on-site inspectors share a certain amount of responsibility 3 for their failure to aggressively react to corrosion 4 issues, I believe the operator meets and exceeds standards 5 set by the NRC for reactivation.

6 While safety standard at Davis-Besse may have deemed 7 deficient in the past, the current management is conscious 8 of its responsibility to ensure the safety of both 9 employees and local residents. Furthermore, increased 10 vigilance and oversight by the NRC will prevent management 11 from making the errors of the previous administration.

12 Finally, the local community is strongly in favor of 13 reactivating Davis-Besse. The plant, and its employees, 14 which I represent in the Statehouse, provides over 900 jobs 15 directly and indirectly, and its operation is vital to 16 maintaining a strong economy. The Davis-Besse Nuclear 17 Power Station can and should be operated. Reactivating the 18 plant immediately will increase the prosperity of the 19 community without compromising the safety of employees or 20 residents that I represent. I appreciate your efforts to 21 address this situation as soon as possible.

22 Sincerely yours, 23 Chris Redfern" 24 Thank you, sir.

25 MR. GROBE: Thank you.

MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

159 1 I realize its getting late. If there is anyone 2 here who did not have a question responded to, and wants to 3 approach us, well be here for a few minutes. You can also 4 contact us; there is phone numbers, email addresses in the 5 monthly newsletter thats out on the table.

6 Thank you very much for coming.

7 (Off the record.)

8 ---

9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO

160 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 23rd 10 day of February, 2004.

11 12 13 14 Marie B. Fresch, RMR 15 NOTARY PUBLIC, STATE OF OHIO 16 My Commission Expires 10-10-08.

17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MARIE B. FRESCH & ASSOCIATES 1-800-669-DEPO