IR 05000341/2009011

IR 05000341-09-011, (Drs), on 08/14/2009 - 10/23/2009, for Fermi, Unit 2

ML100191104
Person / Time
Site:	Fermi
Issue date:	01/15/2010
From:	Boland A Division of Reactor Safety III
To:	Jennifer Davis Detroit Edison
References
EA-09-267 IR-09-011
Download: ML100191104 (7)

Text

UNITED STATES ary 15, 2010

SUBJECT:

FERMI POWER PLANT, UNIT 2 - NOTICE OF VIOLATION NRC INSPECTION REPORT NO. 05000341/2009011(DRS)

Dear Mr. Davis:

This refers to the inspection conducted on August 14 through October 23, 2009, to review the circumstances surrounding your failure to provide complete and accurate information to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) regarding licensed operator medical examinations.

During the inspection, an apparent violation of NRC requirements was identified. Details regarding the apparent violation were provided in NRC Inspection Report No. 05000341/2009010(DRS) dated November 12, 2009.

In the letter transmitting the inspection report, we provided you with the opportunity to address the apparent violation identified in the report by either attending a Predecisional Enforcement Conference or by providing a written response before we made our final enforcement decision.

You requested a Predecisional Enforcement Conference which was held on December 14, 2009.

Based on the information developed during the inspection and the information that you provided during the conference, the NRC has determined that a violation of NRC requirements occurred.

The violation is cited in the enclosed Notice of Violation (Notice) and the circumstances surrounding it are described in detail in NRC Inspection Report No. 05000341/2009010(DRS).

On August 13, 2009, while performing a self-assessment of the Licensed Operator Requalification Program, your staff identified that since May 1999, two required licensed operator medical examination tests were no longer being conducted at Fermi. Specifically, American National Standards Institute/American Nuclear Society (ANSI/ANS) 3.4-1976, Section 5.4.2, required operators to be able to detect the odor of products of combustion, and Section 5.4.14 required tactile discrimination sufficient for operators to distinguish among various shapes of control knobs and handles by touch. All licensed operators subsequently passed olfactory and tactile tests prior to resuming licensed activities. Your staff determined that the licensed operator medical certification program contained in Procedure MGA10, Fitness-for-Duty, was incorporated in Procedure MGA13, Licensed Operator Medical Certification, in December 1997. The associated forms for MGA13 did not contain testing requirements for products of combustion (olfactory testing) and tactile testing.

Licensed operator medical examinations were conducted using these forms beginning in May 1999.

Since May 1999, the NRC issued and renewed numerous operator licenses based on each NRC Form 396 signed by the facility licensee stating that the licensed operator (and operator license applicant) had received a complete medical examination following the criteria provided in ANS/ANSI 3.4-1976. Because the licensee inappropriately certified on each NRC Form 396 that the requirements of ANS/ANSI 3.4-1976 were met, incorrect licensing actions were taken by the NRC. As such, the information provided to the NRC in the license renewal applications (and initial license applications) was material to the NRC licensing actions, and the licensees failure to provide complete and accurate information to the NRC in the license renewal applications (and initial license applications) is a violation of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR) 50.9.

Violations involving the provision of incomplete and inaccurate information are of particular concern to the NRC. In this case, the violation was considered for escalated enforcement.

However, the NRC has classified this violation at Severity Level IV, after determining that its actual and potential safety significance was very low based on the following considerations:

(1) the licensing decision made by the NRC was not invalidated since no actual changes or restrictions were required on any operator license because all licensed operators subsequently passed both olfactory and tactile tests before resuming licensed activities; and (2) although tactile testing was not conducted and olfactory testing was not completed in its entirety, the licensed operators had been observed successfully manipulating control knobs and handles by licensee and NRC personnel, and only the products of combustion portion of the olfactory testing was missed. Nonetheless, this violation demonstrates the importance of taking all of the necessary steps and conducting all of the necessary reviews to assure that information submitted to the NRC is complete and accurate in all material respects.

Although this violation has been placed in your corrective action program, a Notice of Violation is being issued and a response is being required for the NRC to better understand: (1) what actions were taken in 2004 in response to NRC Information Notice (IN) 2004-20, Recent Issues Associated with NRC Medical Requirements for Licensed Operators, which, in part, reminded facility licensees that licensed operators and the personnel who perform and interpret their medical examinations need to be familiar with the regulatory requirements and guidelines (it should be noted that this IN specifically described an instance in which a facility licensee had not conducted some tests required in the ANSI standard for any of its licensed operators);

(2) why appropriate action was not taken in response to IN 2004-20 to identify the lack of olfactory and tactile testing; and (3) the corrective actions taken and planned at this time to assure all information submitted to the NRC is complete and accurate in all material respects.

You are required to respond to this letter and should follow the instructions specified in the enclosed Notice when preparing your response. The NRC will use your response, in part, to determine whether further enforcement action is necessary to ensure compliance with regulatory requirements. In accordance with 10 CFR 2.390 of the NRC's "Rules of Practice," a copy of this letter, its enclosure, and your response will be made available electronically for public inspection in the NRC Public Document Room or from the NRCs Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS), accessible from the NRC Web site at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. To the extent possible, your response should not include any personal privacy, proprietary, or safeguards information so that it can be made available to the public without redaction. If personal privacy or proprietary information is necessary to provide an acceptable response, please provide a bracketed copy of your response that identifies the information that should be protected and a redacted copy of your response that deletes such information. If you request withholding of such information, you must specifically identify the portions of your response that you seek to have withheld and provide in detail the bases for your claim of withholding (e.g., explain why the disclosure of information will create an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy or provide the information required by 10 CFR 2.390(b) to support a request for withholding confidential commercial or financial information).

Should you have any questions, please contact Mr. Hironori Peterson, Chief, Operations Branch, at (630) 829-9707.

Sincerely,

/RA by Kenneth G. OBrien Acting for/

Anne T. Boland, Director Division of Reactor Safety Docket No. 50-341 License No. NPF-43 Enclosure:

Notice of Violation cc w/encl: Distribution via ListServ

Letter to Mr. Jack