ML090350426
| ML090350426 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Callaway  |
| Issue date: | 03/18/2008 |
| From: | Chamberlain D NRC/RGN-IV/DRP |
| To: | - No Known Affiliation |
| References | |
| FOIA/PA-2009-0042, RIV-2007-A-0130 | |
| Download: ML090350426 (4) | |
Text
0A, 0
- S UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION REGION IV o
611 RYAN PLAZA DRIVE, SUITE 400 ARLINGTON, TEXAS 76011-4005 March 18, 2008
SUBJECT:
CALLAWAY SAFETY-CONSCIOUS WORK-ENVIRONMENT ALLEGATION RIV-2007-A-0130 De b)( 7)c De b'.*
This refers to the November 29, 2007, letter from Mr. Harry Freeman, Senior Allegation Coordinator, which acknowledged receipt of the concerns you provided to Ms. Weiss of the Honorable Senator Claire McCaskill's Office regarding activities at AmerenUE's Callaway Plant. Mr. Freeman's letter noted that you had provided one new concern that would be addressed ur--207-Laur U"ter concerns were already being addressed under Allegations[ *nd b)n On November, 28, 2007, members from the NRC technical staff and management met to determine a course of action to address what appeared to be a common concern about activities at the Callaway Plant. Specifically, several individuals believed that the licensee of the Callaway Plant had not developed an environment where employees felt free to raise and pursue resolution of safety concerns without fear of retaliation. Based upon this meeting, the NRC decided to move the regularly scheduled Problem Identification and Resolution inspection forward and to perform a focused inspection of the safety conscious work environment as part of this inspection.
The NRC has completed its inspection of this concern. The enclosed "Resolution of Concern' documents your concern and summarizes the NRC resolution. In summary, the NRC found that the licensee does have a healthy safety conscious work environment where employees felt free to raise concerns without fear of retaliation.
Thank you for informing us of your concern. We believe that our actions in this matter have been responsive to your concern. We take our safety responsibilities to the public very seriously and will continue to do so within the bounds of our lawful authority. Unless the NRC receives additional information that suggests that our conclusions should be altered, we plan no further action and we consider this case closed.
Should you have any additional questions regarding our resolution, please contact Mr. Vincent Gaddy, Chief, Reactor Projects Branch B, at 800-952-9677, Extension 141, Ms. Linda Smith, Chief, Engineering Branch 2, at Extension 137, or Mr. Freeman at Extension 245, Monday - Friday between 8:00 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Central time.
Sincerely, Dwight D. Chamberlain, Director Division of Reactor Projects
Enclosure:
Resolution of Concern CERTIFIED MAIL RWTURN RECEIPT REQUESTED 11ormat111on in this record wa4 dl a6t~lg if, accordan~ce with the Freedom of lIfurrrw~ii M ExemptionsQ_ýC FOPA
-00
RESOLUTION OF CONCERN RIV-2007-A-01 30 Concern Callaway Plant has a culture that discourages disagreement with upper management and inhibits effective problem identification and resolution. Management would prefer not to know about problems and is reluctant to fully investigate them.
Resolution This concern was not substantiated.
In February and March of 2008, the NRC conducted a biennial problem identification and resolution (PI&R) inspection. Part of this inspection was to assess the health of the safety conscious work environment (SCWE) at Callaway. Safety conscious work environment, as defined in the NRC Inspection Manual 0305, 'Operating Reactor Assessment Program," is an environment in which employees feel free to raise safety concerns, both to their management and to the NRC, without fear of retaliation and where such concerns are promptly reviewed, given their proper priority based on their potential safety significance, and appropriately resolved with timely feedback to employees.
Normally, to assess SCWE at plants during PI&R inspections, 20-25 confidential interviews are conducted with employees regarding these workers' assessment of the SCWE at their site. The questions asked during the interviews are prescribed in NRC Inspection Procedure 71152, "Problem Identification and Resolution." To perform a more comprehensive look at the state of the SCWE at Callaway, during the weeks of February 11-15, and March 10-14, 2008, the inspection team conducted an increased number of approximately 90 interviews.
During 52 of the approximately 90 interviews, the inspectors asked the following questions, in addition to those prescribed in the inspection procedure, to address the alleged concern:
Do you believe that you can readily disagree with your management?
Does your management encourage differing views?
Does the culture here promote or inhibit using the corrective action program?
Is management open to hearing problems?
Is management reluctant to investigate problems fully?
" Does management recognize and commit to doing the right thing with regard to nuclear safety?
The interviews were at the worker, supervisory, and management levels. The interviews were conducted with individuals with a broad mix of experience at Callaway, from relatively new individuals to individuals with over 20 years of experience. The interviews were conducted in the following departments:
Operations Engineering Radiation protection Regulatory Affairs Plant Helper Training
" Maintenance
" Security Radioactive Waste Processing Outage Scheduling Quality Assurance Additionally, the inspectors included 16 individuals within the sample population that you indicated would challenge the state of the SCWE at Callaway. You provided these names to PI&R team inspectors and the NRC Region IV Senior Allegation Coordinator during a phone call the week of February 4, 2008. The inspectors interviewed 15 of these Individuals. The final person no longer worked at Callaway and was not available for interview.
Enclosure
RESOLUTION OF CONCERN RIV-2007-A-0130 From these interviews, the Pl&R team concluded that a healthy SCWE existed at Callaway. Without exception, the personnel interviewed responded that they felt free to disagree with all levels of management, the current culture at Callaway promotes effective problem identification and resolution.
management encourages employees to raise nuclear safety problems and other concems, and management fully investigates nuclear safety problems and other concerns.
Based on the responses to our 2008 PI&R SCWE interviews and the responses to our enhanced questions, particularly by the persons named by you to provide adverse comments, the NRC could not substantiate this concern.
Enclosure RIV-2007-A-0130 of Concern:
Allegation File i
. P sa
-Uev i
e I OF F-1AL USC Postage Certified Fee Retum Receipt Fee Hae ndoriernent Required) iesrtcted Delivery Fee
- ndorsernent Required)
Total Postage & Fees $
en 0o r PO Box No, I
S 'ri 80 S
glt20 55 nv
-etI tm 0" SUNSI Review Completed:
HAF ADAMS: o Yes n No Initials:
HAF o Publicly Available n Non-Publicly Available a Sensitive o Non-Sensitive DOCUMENT NAME: S:\\RAS\\ACES\\ALLEGATIONS\\2007 Case Files\\RIV-2007-A-0130\\07130 Letter - Closure.doc OFF.*-E ]RIV:SAC C:RPBB D:DIP ME.
HAFreeman VGGaddy DD~lVberlain.
DATE 03/14/2008 03/H/2008 03//8/2008 OFFICIAL RECORD COPY T=Telephone E=E-mail F=Fax