ML18009A388
| ML18009A388 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Harris  |
| Issue date: | 01/17/1990 |
| From: | Dance H, Shannon M, Tedrow J NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION II) |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML18009A387 | List: |
| References | |
| 50-400-90-01, 50-400-90-1, NUDOCS 9002230125 | |
| Download: ML18009A388 (9) | |
See also: IR 05000400/1990001
Text
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UNITED STATES
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
REGION II
101 MARIETTASTREET, N.W.
ATLANTA,GEORGIA 30323
h
Report No.:
50-400/90-01
Licensee:
Carolin-
Power
and Light Company
P. 0.
Box
1551
Raleigh,
NC 27602
Docket No.:
50-400
License No.:
Facility Name:
Harris
1
I
Inspection
Conduc:ed:
Decemoer
26,
1989 - January
5.
1990
Inspectors:
Te row,
enior Resid
t
nspe
or
r rz/gc
Date Signed
Shannon,
R
ident In
ctor
l/7 o
Date Signed
I
Approved ty:
Dane
, Section Chief
Division of Reactor Projects
Date Signed
SUMMARY
Scope:
This special i nspec .ion was conducted
by the resident
i nspectors
in the areas
of plant operations,
to review the licensee's
activities during
a recent
reactor startup
and
subsequent
power escalation.
Results:
One violation was identified:
Failure to establish limiting safety
system settings for the reactor trip system,
paragraph
2.
An operational
weakness
is also identified in paragraph
2 concerning
the
disregard for abnormal
plant conditions
and indications
and lack of attention
to detai
1 by plant operators.
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REPORT DETAjLS
Persons
Contacted
Licensee
Employees
- G. Forehand,
Director,
QA/AC
"C. Gibson, Director, Progress
and Procedures
- P. Hadel, Project Specialist,
Planning
"J.
Hammond,
Manaaer,
Onsite Nuclear Safety
"C. Hinnant, Plant General
Manager
"D. McCarthy, Unit Manager,
Site Engineering
"C. Olexik, Supervisor,
Shift Operations
- H. Powell, Manager,
Training
- R. Richey,
Manager,
Harris Nuclear Project Department
- J. Sipp,
Manager,
Environmental
and Radiation Monitoring
"J. Smith, Supervisor,
Radwaste
Operation
"D. Tibbits, Director, Regulatory
Compliance
"R.
Van Metre, Manager,
Technical
Support
- M. Wallace,
Senior Specialist,
Regulatory
Compliance
Other licensee
employees
contacted
included office, operations,
engineering,
maintenance,
chemistryiradiation
and corporate
personnel.
"Attended exit interview
Acronyms and initialisms used
through out this report are listed in the
last paragraph.
Review of Plant Operations
(71707)
On December
20,
1989,
a reactor startup
was performed
and the reactor
achieved criticality at 9:47 a.m.
Power operation
(Mode 1) was
commenced
at 5: 17 a.m.
on December
22.
The plant continued in power operation for
the duration of this inspection period.
The inspector
reviewed records
and discussed
various entries with
operations
personnel
to verify compliance with the Technical
Specifications
(TS) and the licensee's
administrative
procedures.
On December
26,
1989, during
a review of the shift foreman's
log, the
inspector
noted that at 3:30 a.m.
on December
23,
1989,
a calorimetric
calibration
was completed for .the nuclear instruments.
The nuclear
power
range
instruments
were found to be reading significantly below actual
core
power and were subsequently
adjusted.
The logs indicated that
actual
power
was approximately
41 percent while indicated
power was
approximately
28 percent.
This condition had existed
since the reactor
startup
was performed
on December
20.
NI High Power Trip
NI Low Power Trip
NI High Positive
Rate
NI High,Negative
Rate
- This setpoint
was required by'TS 3.7.1 for an inoperable
main
steam
safety valve.
Using the percentage
of nuclear instrumentation error,
the inspector
calculated
the error in the nuclear
power range trip setpoints
inputted
into the reactor protection
system.
The reactor tri'p setpoints,
based
on
actual
rated
thermal
power,
were calculated
to be as follows:
4
Actual
Required
by TS 2.2. 1
127
5'o'
. <87'o'
37. 5;o
<25;o"
7. 5;o
7. 5;o
<
5'he"'inspector
noted that all four nuclear
power range
channel trips greatly
exceeded
the allowable instrument drift values listed in technical
specificationC.
This condition potentially placed
the 'plant in an
unanalyzed
condition in,that the reactor protection
system would not have
tripped the reactor- as designed.
Since the power range
nuclear
instrument reactor trips listed above are identified as the primary
protective action for several
accidents listed in the
FSAR, this item
appeared
to significantly compromise- plant safety.
This concern
was
immediately brought to the attention of plant management.
The concern
was identified by the inspector
as being potentially reportable at this
time.
On December
30 and 31,
1989, further discussions
were held with the
on-duty shift foreman
and acting operations
supervisor.
These
discussions
centered
on the plant potentially operating
outside of the
design basis,
and contrary to the requirements
of TS.
The shift foreman
subsequently
initiated
a significant operational
occurrence
report
(SOOR
90-01) to initiate
a reportabi lity determination.
As of January
5, this
matter
had not been reported to the
NRC Operations
Center.
Reportabi lity
will be reviewed with the apparent violation described
in this section.
During this refueling outage,
the plant received
new fuel
and
had
implemented
a fuel load design
change.
The design
change
placed
low
reactivity fuel modules
on the periphery of the core in order to reduce
neutron flux at the reactor vessel walls.
This had the effect of
reducing
the neutron flux at the excore nuclear detectors,
and th'ereby
caused
the instrument's
to be in error in
a nonconservative
direction.
A letter from the nuclear
steam
supply vendor (Westinghouse)
dated
March 16,
1988,
warned the licensee
of how the
low leakage
loading
patterns
could impact nuclear instrument detector output currents.
This
letter'pecified that the intermediate
and
power range detectors
needed
to
be recalibrated prior to criticality.
Three related industry event
reports also discussed
various
problems with miscalibration of nuclear
detectors
and the
NRC issued
an information notice
( IEN 83-43) which
discussed
problems with miscalibration of nuclear detectors.
'
0
To address
.IEN 83-43 the licensee
deve'loped
procedure
EPT-008,
Intermedia-.
Range Detector Setpoint Determination.
The procedure
was
revised
on July 21,
1988 following the Westinghouse letter of March 16,
1988.
This procedure
required that p'rior to criticality, a calibration
adjustment
of each nuclear instrumentation
system
power range
channel
be
performed.
Procedure
EPT-008 was not implemented for the four power range nuclear
instrument
channels
but was completed for the two intermediate
range
channels.
The intermediate
range
channels
appeared
to be accurate
during
startup.
The outage
planning
schedule listed this procedure
to 'be
completed prior to startup but the partial completion of the procedure
for the intermediate
range detectors
is believed to have resulted
in the
whole procedure
being crossed off the outage
schedule
as being completed.
Although the industry event reports
had
been
forwarded to the technical
support
group
and operations
management,
operating
personnel
had not
reviewed the event reports
and
had not been trained
on this issue
by the
training deoartment.
The operations
procedure
group
was in the process
of implementing the precautions
for miscalibration of nuclear detectors
into the general
plant startup
procedures,
but the procedures
had not
been modified as of the
December
1989 startup.
TS. 3.3. 1 requires
the nuclear
power range monitors to be operable
in
Modes
1 and 2.
Failure to properly establish limiting safety
system
settings
for the reactor trip system is contrary io the requirements
of
TS 2.2. 1, 3.3. 1 and 3.7. 1 and is identified as
an apparent violation.
Apparent Violation (90-01-01):
Failure to properly establish
reactor
trip system trip setpoints.
During power escalation,
the operators
had various warnings/indications
that the
power range nuclear instruments
could be/were
in error and
reading nonconservative:
a
~
The initial point of criticality and the point of adding heat
occurred at about
one decade
lower in the source
and intermediate
ranges
than previously experienced.
This was attributed to moving
the detectors.
b.
Difficultywas experienced
with clearing the P-10 interlock (NIs >
10 percent) prior to reaching
th'e intermediate
range detector
low
power rod stop of 20 percent
and low'ower trip of 25 percent
setpoints.
Differential temperature
instruments
indicated that actual
power was
50 percent greater
than indicated
power.
A subsequent
review. of
computer data
showed that six channels
of differential temperature
measured
in percent
power exceeded
that indicated by"NI power by
50 percent at various points during the
power escalation.
d.
It was noted that turbine
power was at
39 percent with reactor
power
at 28 percent.
The operators attributed this to increased
plant
efficiency.
It appeared
that with the data available to '.he operators,
the
miscalibration of the nuclear
instruments
should
have
been detected
by
the operating staff.
The operators
should not have relied
on
a single
indication of vital plant conditions
when mul iple indications were
available.
The operators
appeared
weak in responding
to offnormal plant
conditions.
3.
Exit Interview (30703)
The inspectors
met with licensee
representatives
(denoted
in paragraph
1)
at the conclusion of the inspection
on January
5,
1990.
During this
meeting,
the inspectors
summarized
the
scope
and findings of the
inspection
as they are detailed
in thi s report, with particular emphasis
on the Violation.
The licensee
representatives
acknowledged
the
inspector's
comments
and did not identify as proprie ary any of the
materials
provided to or reviewed
by -he inspectors
during this
inspection.
Item Number
Description
and Reference
90-01-01
Violation-Failure to properly establish
reactor
protection
system trip setpoints
4.
Acronyms and Initialisms
EPT
IEN
NI
NRC
SOOR-
TS
Engineering
Performance
Test
Final Safety Analysis Report
Information Notice
Nuclear Instrumentation
Nuclear Regulatory
Commission
Significant Operational
Occurence
Report
Technical Specifications