ML19329E962
| ML19329E962 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Midland |
| Issue date: | 10/09/1973 |
| From: | Kartalia D US ATOMIC ENERGY COMMISSION (AEC) |
| To: | Morrison W, Thornburg H, Vetter W US ATOMIC ENERGY COMMISSION (AEC) |
| References | |
| ALAB-147, ALAB-152, NUDOCS 8006190726 | |
| Download: ML19329E962 (1) | |
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October 9,1973 p
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-3so Enrold D. Thornburg, B0 Uniter Vetter, Engion 3 Wilber M. Morrison, RS Samuel D. MacKay, DL Richard H. Vollmer, DL MliMORANDG( ON ALAB-152 Attached hereto is a copy of ALAB-152,.an Appeal Board Memorandum and Order denying our petition for reconsideration of a prior holding in ALAB-147, that the Bechtel QA organization for Midland violates criterion I of Appendix B.
Enclosure:
As stated above DISTRIBUTION:
David E. Karta14m OGC Files Attorney, Office of the General Kartalia Counsal l
Massar Shapar Engelhardt Pink Green Reg Central PDR THIS DOCUMENT CONTAINS LPDR POOR QUAllTY PAGES 8006190 7 %
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ATOMIC EtjERGY CO31 MISSION g
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- ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING APPEAL BOARD 373 GCT 5 pr.:. 4 30
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Alan S. Rosenthal, Chairman M$!d7 Dr. John H. Buck, Member nG!,EC
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l d William C. Parler, Member c r,J3Eir.ESD A 6bcu.hr
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In the Matter of
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CONSUMERS POWER COMPANY
) Docket Nos. 50-329
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50-330 (Midland Plant, Units 1 and 2)
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Messrs. Judd L.
Bacon, Jackson, Michigan and Haro;'. F.
Reis, Washington, D.C.,
for the applicant, Consumers Power Co.
Mr. David E.
Kartal'ia for the AEC Regulatory Staff.
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MEMORANDUM AND ORDER October 5, 1973 (ALAB-lS 2 )
Both the applicant and the regulatory staff have accepted the invitation extended in ALAB-147, RAI-73-9 (Neptember18, 1973) to seek reconsideration of our holding in Part IV thereof.
That holding wasi to the effect that, at least as it had been represented to us, the quality assurance (QA) organization of the architect-engineer for the Midland facility (Bechtel) failed in i 'alW 7d%4Avf
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y.' one specific respect to comply with the requirtments of Appendix B to 10 CFR Part 50.
The defect which we found pertained to the work relationship between Bechtel's e
quality control engineers and its Project Superintendent.
It appeared from Bechtel organization charts which had been submitted to us by the applicant that those engineers report to the Project Field Quality Control Engineer who, in turn,' reports to the Project Superintendent.
In view of the cost and scheduling responsibilities of the Project Superintendent, we concluded that this arrangement could not be squared with Section I of Appendix B -- which in relevant part provides:
The authority and duties of persons and organi-zations performing quality assurance functions shall be clearly established and delineated in writing.
Such persons and organizations shall have sufficient authority and organizational freedom to identify quality problems; to initiate, recommend, or provide solutions; and to verify implementation of solutions.
In general,
\\s assurance of quality recuires management measures which provide that the individual.or group assigned the responsibility for checking, audit-ing, inspecting, or otherwise verifying that an activity has been correctly performed is inde-pendent of the individual or groue directly responsible for cerforming the soecific activity.
[ Emphasis supplied)
Neither of the petitions for reconsideration persuades us to change our opinion that, if in fact the quality control engineers report to the Project Superintendent (albeit through the Project Field Quality Control Engineer),
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there is a lack of full compl'iance with the requirements of Appendix B.
Thus, to the extent that they seek an p
alteration of our interpretation of Appendix B, the petitions are being denied.
We are told by the appli-
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cant, however, that, contrary to what we had previously been led to believe, the Project Superintendent does not exercise any meaningful degree of supervision over the quality control engineers.1/
The relief which we are now ordering takes into account the new assertions in this regard.
I O
As we noted in Duke Power Co. (William B. McGuire Nuclear Station, Units 1 and 2), ALAB-128, RAI-73-6 399, 409 (June 13, 197 3), and as its terms clearly reflect,Section I of Appendix B embodies the fundamental
, principle that those charged with the function of assur-ing the quality of particular work must be independent' of the individual or group who have direct repponsibility for performing that work.
Neither the applicant nor the staff contends otherwise or minimizes the importance of 1/ While not going into the matter in as much
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detail, the staff also suggests that the cuality control engineers are independent of the Project Superintendent "to a significant extent".
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- such independence to the proper execution of a QA program.
What they do insist, however, is that the 1
phrase "directly responsible", as used in Section I, should not be taken as embracing an official such as the Bechtel Project Superintendent here involved, even though he may be accountable for the cost and scheduling aspects of the various phases of construction.
1.
We can readily agree that the Commission could not have intended "directly responsible" to encompass
-every company official who might have some measure of responsibility for the cost and scheduling of construction of the particular project at. issue.
As the applicant and 4
the staff correctly observe, such an expansive reading of that phrase would render compliance with Section I a practical impossibility.
For inevitably there will be one or more officials at the pinnacle of the company organization -- if no one else, its President -- who in an' ultimate sense will be responsible for both the per--
formance of the construction activities and the assurance f
that those activities are being properly carried out.
The conclusion that, as the staff puts it, "it is not possible to achieve within a single organization absolute separation of those who perform activities and i
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those who pass upon the acceptability of such perform-ance" does not, however, dispose of the question which 9
is presented here.
What we need decide is not the feasi-bility or. necessity of drawing an impregnable wall between QA personnel 2/ and those top-level management officials
,___ _ who-have broad, general responsibility for the proper conduct of all facets of the company's operations.
- Rather, the issue before us is whether, giving due regard to its underlyir.g objective,Section I permits a situation in which employees having a.QA function report to (i.e., are under the direction and control oO a middle-management
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J field official who (1) is concerned.at any particular time with only the single project to which he is then assigned; and (2) is held accountable for the on-schedule progress of the construction work on that project.
We think the mere statement of the question provides its answer.
An interpretation of Section-I which would i
countenance such a situatio6 would severely undercut the Section's plainly stated purpose to ensure that the
" persons and organizations performing quality assurance functions * *
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organizational freedom" to perform their crucial functions
, fn. 11)
~/ As indicated in ALAB-147 (RAI-73-9 at 2
we are employing the term "QA" to embrace both
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quality assurance and quality control.
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effectivelyand without reservation.
It well might be that, despite his overriding interest in the completion s.
of each phase of construction without untoward delay, a project superintendent would not undertake affirmatively to
,, influence the manner in which QA personnel subordinate to him discharged their functions.
But, at the very least, his position in the chain of command vis a vis that of any QA personnel placed under his direction could'be expected to produce a chilling effect upon the institution or recommendation by the latter of any QA action which might put the project behind schedule.
This is one of the very evils to which Section I appears to be addressed.
2.
Our continuing conviction that, for the purposes of Section I, the Bechtel Project Superintendent must therefore be regarded as a person "directly responsible for performing the specific [ construction] activity" is-not affected by-the consideration that there are several I
supervisory levels in the construction group which uome between that Superintendent and the craftsmen who.
I are actually doing the work (e.g., various types of fore-men and lower-ranking superintendents).
In stressing this fact, the applicant and the staff seem to be, suggesting O
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that, by reason of these intermediate supervisory per-sonnel, the Project Superintendent must be deemed to possess, at most, indirect responsibility for the
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performance of any soecific construction activity at the site.
bf giving the narrowest possible scope to " direct" 2 -; 2: 0 and " specific", one could, of course, conclude that, in the case of welding activities for example,Section I of Appendix B requires only that the quality control engin-cers detailed to inspect the welds be independent of the welders themselves --
i.e.,
the persons actually perform-ing the work.1!
In the interpretation and application 4
of an AEC regulation, however, we perceive no mandate to accord the language employed by the Commission thb most restrictive reach which a lexicologist would find accept-able.
Rather, where several alternative interpretations are possible, we should make that choice which comes
- I closest to fulfilling the reg,ulation's objectives.
This is particularly so if the regulation is concerned, as is Appendix B, with activities having manifest safety implications.
Il In this instance, no matter by how maqf ayers of l
_3/ As.will be seen, the applicant does urg$' this general result on the basis of another Section of Appendix B.
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supervision he ma, )ae separated from the cri jsmen, the inescapable' fact remains that the Project Superint,endent has 1
a significant area of responsibility insofar as the performance I
of the construction work on his project is concerned; and has a most immediate interest in avoiding scheduling delays and the resultant incurring of additional expense.
Certainly the fact that work is actually performed by others does not
- mean thd~t the direct responsibility for the work resides exclusively with the performer.
But even if, in some contexts, the Project Superintendent's responsibility could be thought of as " indirect", within the framework of Appendix B it does no violence to the English language to treat it as being " direct".
Indeed, treating his responsibility as indirect for the purpose a
urged by the applicant and staff world clearly do violence s
to the fundamental principle of " organizational freedom to identify quality problems" enunciated in Section I.
3.
The applicant's reliance upon Section X of Appendix B (a reliance in which the staff seemingly does not join) is likewise unavailing.
In relevant part, that Section stipulates that the inspection of activities affecting quality shall.
beperformedbyindividualsotherthanthosewhoherformthe
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activity being inspected.
But this sensible requirement i
hardly can be-converted, as the applicant would do, into a limitation on'the ambit of the entirely discrete Section I.
~It just does not follow from the fact that it isjnot permissible for the. craftsmen who perform the work also to inspect it, that it is perfectly acceptable for the inspectors to be
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subject to the direction of persons on higher levels in a
the construction group who have cost and scheduling responsibilities.4/
4.
No claim has been made to us of any administra-tive imperative that the Project Superintendent be able to exercise direction over the activities of the quality control engineers.5/
Moreover, it appears that at least some other major architect-engineer firms have encountered
-no serious difficulty in establishing QA organizations which are wholly independent of the construction group.
- See, c.g., charts following p. 17.1.5-52 of the Prelim-inary Safety Analysis Report in Virginia Electric and Power Co. (Surry Power ' Station, Units 3 and 4), Docket Nos. 50-434 and 50-435; and p. 17.1-81 of the Preliminary Safety Analysis Report in Texas Utilities Generating Co.
(Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station), Docket Nos.
50-445 and 50-446.
It thus cannot be said that our read-ing of Appen, dix B calls upon Bechtel to do the impossible, I
or even something at odds with settled indus'try practices.
4/_A similar non secuitur underlies applicant's reliance upon AEC regulatory guide 1.28, and the material referred to therein.
In addition, it might be noted that this regulatory guide does not have the force of a Commission regulation and, therefore, cannot. alter the terms of Section I to Appendix B.
-5/ Indeed, as is discussed later in this opinion
- (infra,pp.12-13), the applicant disavows the existence _of such authority in the. Project
-Superintendent.
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For the foregoing reasons, we adhere to our ALAB-147 interpretation of the requirements of Section I of Appendix B -- namely, that that Section "makes unac-ceptable an arrangement under which auality control engineers are responsible to an official possessing such
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duties as those assigned to the Project Superintendent here-involved".
RAI-73-9 at Anticipating that we i
might not accept its position as to the meaning of Section I, the staff has included in its pe%ition for reconsideration an alternative request that we certify the matter to the Commission as a major and novel question of law.
While 10 CFR 2.785 (d) (1) gives us the authority to take this step, we decline to do so.
In order to ' certify, we would first have to withdraw our resolution of the Appendix B question.5!
Such n withdrawal would carry with 6/ Under the Rules of Practige, a certification involves the submission of.a legal issue to a higher tribunal for its consideration, without a ruling.having been made on that issue by the certi-fying body.
In contrast, a referral involves the submission to the higher tribunal of a ruline which the inferior body has made; the purpose of the referral being to obtain a determination of the I
correctness of that ruling.
The Rules of Practice do not appear to contemplate the referral of rulings of this Board.
This is doubtless because the Com-mission has the power to review sua sconte deter-minations which we make, whether contained in a final or in an interlocutory order.
In this con-nection, Section 2'.786(a) of the Rules expressly provides for the exercise of that power where, in the Commission's judgment, we may have misconstrued a regulation having significance to the public health and safety.
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9 it an implication that we entertain substantial doubt as to what Section I means as applicd to the present case
-- an implication which would be entirely unwarranted.
Further, we ar$ far from clear that, in fact, a major issue of law is involved.
In the totality of circum-
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- standes, we perceive no good reason why it cannot be left to the Commission to decide for itself, upon its routine examination of our ruling, whether it should exercise its review power.
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III In ALAB-147, we left it open to the' applicant and the staff to challenge not merely the correctness of our apprehension of the requir'ements of Appendix B but, as well, our understanding of the present Bechtel QA organi-zation.
As previously noted, that understanding was derived from Bechtel organization charts which were fur-nished to us by the applicant itself.
It appeared clearly from one of those charts that the organizational scheme -
contemplated that the Project Superintendent would have
" functional supervision" of the Project Field Quality /
Control Engineer -- who, in turn, supervises the. quality control engineers performing the actual inspections.
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The applicant now asserts, however, that, in reality, the quality control engineers are wholly inde-pendent of the Project Superintendent insofar as hiring, dismissal, training, assignment and pay are concerned.
All of these matters are, according to the applicant,
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In this connection, we are informed that the Project Superintendent's advice is solicited only respecting the total number of quality control engineers necessary for the work planned.
4 As for performance evaluations and salary increases, the applicant is most emphatic in its insistence that the requisite determinations are made within the QA organi-zation -- and that the project construction organ ~ization does no more than to assure that any salary increases recommended by the Project Field Quality Control Engineer are "within the limits established by Bechtel's personnel.
policy for the various pay grades, and within# governmental wage guidelines".
Any conclusion that a particular
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' increase would not fall wit.hin such policy limits and
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guidelines requires the concurrence of the Chief Field Quality Control Engineer.
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Additionally,, the applicant goes into the question of the power of the Project Superintendent to direct the activities of the quality control engineers.
We are referred to the fact that Bechtel's " current" Field Inspection Manual authorizes (in Section 3.8) the Project Field Quality Control Engineer to issue stop-work orders; and we are informed that such orders-cannot be counter-manded by the Project Superintendent.1!
The Bechtel Manual is also cited for the proposition that the Project Superin-tendent cannot either (1) direct that a quality control inspection be by-passed, or (2) proceed'with construction beyond a particular control point unless the inspections called for at that point have been properly completed.
3.
If all of these representations are well-founded, the actual relationship between the Project Superinten'dont and the quality control engineers is, of course, quite different from that suggested by the Bechtel organization
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charts in our possession.
The picture which the applicant 7/ The portion of the Manual cuoted to us states that the authority to issue a stop-work order is to be
" exercised through the Project Superintendent".
I We assume that this means simply that the Project Superintendent is the company official who is, to 1
communicate the order to the concerned employees of the construction group, and that this is a minis-terial act on his part.
If " exercised through the Project Superintendent" had any broader import, the applicant could not have asserted his lack of authority to countermand stop-work orders.
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l paints is scarcely one which the term " functional super-vision" would readily bring to mind.8/
I We see no necessity to attempt ourselves to resolve the apparent conflict between what the Bechtel organi-zation charts reflect and what the applicant avers are the real facts.E/
In all events, the Bechtel quality assurance program not only must comply substantively with Appendix B' (as we have construed it), but also must include a written and, of course, accurate delineation of the authority and duties of the persons and organizations per-forming QA functions.
At best, there is a present failure 4
to have fulfilled this second requirement.
At worst, the Bechtel organization will require substantial revisions to obviate any meaningful possibility that the quality control engineers will be subject to improper command influences in the discharge of their vital functions.
Ac.cordingly, no matter where the truth lies, some form of corrective action must be taken.
p 8/ According to the applicant, there is a
" functional independence" between the quality control engineers and the Project Superintendent.
j[/ The applicant does not itself offer any explanation for the conflict.
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On the basis of the foregoing, the petitions for i
reconsideration are denied.
The relief which we ordered in ALAB-147 is, however, modified as follows:
Within.45 days of the entry of this order, the
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determine the extent to which, as presently constituted, the Bechtel QA organization is in conformity with the requirements of Section I of Appendix B to 10 CFR Part 50, as construed in ALAB-147 and herein; v
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require such revision of that organization, if any, as may be necessary to ef fect promptly such conformity; and c.
require such revision of the relevant Bechtel o,rganizational charts and manuals as may be neces-sary to ensure that they fully and accurately.
delineate the authority and duties of all Bechtel I
personnel and organizations performing QA functions.
It is so ORDERED.
I For the Atomic Safety and Licensing Appeal Board l0, /
47.t nd V Mdrgaret E.
Du Flo Secretary to the Appeal Board
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