ML20078L667
| ML20078L667 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Catawba  |
| Issue date: | 05/20/1983 |
| From: | Vaughn G DUKE POWER CO. |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20078L617 | List: |
| References | |
| FOIA-83-434 NUDOCS 8310240030 | |
| Download: ML20078L667 (41) | |
Text
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+. . 4 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA k'
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BEFORE THE $TOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD 1
- In the Matter of: ) Docket Nos.
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DUKE POWER COMPANY, et al ) 50-413 (Catawba Nuclear Station ) 50-414 Units 1 & 2) )
I;' Barbara V. Haas, Commissioner and Notary Public, proceeded to take the deposition of Gerald E. Vaughn on the twentieth day of May, 1983, beginning at 9:00 o' clock P.M. in the offices of Duke Power Company, South Church Street, Charlotte, North Carolina.
Duke Power Company was represented by Albert V .
Carr, Jr., Ronald Gibson and Mike McGarey.
. NRC was represented by George Johnson.
l Palmetto Alliance, Inc. was represented by Robert Guild and Michael Lowe.
l DEPOSITION OF GERALD E. VAUGHN 1
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}'\b 8310240030 830810 PDR FOIA PDR AHLERS83-434
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t 1 GERALD E . VAUG HN , being first duly sworn, testified as 4- 2 -follows:
3 E<R4INATION: ' '(By Mr . McGarey) 4 Q. I would like to make some introduc' tory remarks. My 5 name is Mike'McGarey. I'm one of the counrel for Duke 6 Power Company in this case. This deposition is being 7 .taken pursuant to a stipulation entered into between 8 Palmetto Alliance and the applicants. That stipulation 9 is set forth in the deposition.of Mary Burch and will 10 govern thE taking of this deposition. I will note that 11 there is one correction to the deposition -- to the j 12 stipulation references in Mary Burch's deposition, and 13 that has to do with Palmetto Alliance's election to
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(' utilize its tape and a transcription thereof as evidence 15 in a hearing. In the event they do make such an election, 16 Palmetto Alliance Will Cause to be transcribed at its sols 17 expense the relevant deposition. The language in its i
18 entirety is delated. I would note just as a preliminary 19 matter that this is the deposition of Gerald Vaughn. Mr.
t Vaughn was asked to appear pursuant to telephonc conversa-
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20 21 tions with Mr. Guild, and particularly Mr. Guild asked 22 applicants to make a knowledgeable individual available 23- concerning contention 7. We have made Mr. Vaughn available.
24 This was done as an accommodation to Palmetto Alliance. -
25 There was not a notice of deposition taken, we are beginning 2
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h I hopefully the last deposition at 9:50.
2 EXAMINATION: (By Mr. Guild) 3 Q. Will you state your full name, please?
4 A. Gerald E. Vaughn.
5 Q. What is your position with Duke Power Company?
6 A. General Manager, Nuclear Stations, Nuclear Production 7 . Department.
8 Q. Mr. Vaughn, I represent Palmetto Alliance, intervenor 9 in the Catawba operating license proceding, and we have
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10 asked you.to be present this evening to respond to discovery 11 questions by Palmstto with respect to the contention which .
12 has been admitted by the licensing board in this case.
13 That contention is number seven. I show you a copy of S ky .
& 14 the document that contains a ' quotation of the text of that 15 contention. The document I'm referring to is a December 16 31, 1982, applicant's response to Palmetto Alliance's 17 first set of interrogatories and request to produce with 18 regard to, amongst others, contention 7. Page seven of 19 that document indented single-space is the text, and take 20 a moment, please, Mr. Vaughn, and read that if you would, 21 sir.
22 A. I have read it.
23 Q. Have you seen that contention before?
24 A. I have read that before.
25 Q. I'm going to ask you a series of questions, Mr. Vaughn, 4 .'1 3 w
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1 and hopefully it won't take long; and we appreciate you 2 being available this late in the evening. If I'm not clear 3 in my question or you don't understand either the question 4 or term I use, please ask me to clarif'y and tell me so.
5 I would like'to be informal. We are trying to get informa-6 tion. I would appreciate your cooperation, but if you 7 . don't ask me a question or you don't ask for clarification, 8 the record will reflect your answer and we will presume 9 you understood the question and .that your answer was respon-
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10 sive, is .that agreeable to you?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. I need to ask you when you answer, answer audibly so 13 the tape and the Court Reporter can piUI; up your response. ,
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-( 14 A. If I answer a question, it would be under the assumption 15 that I do understand the question.
16 Q. Correct, that's what --
17 A. I may or may not understand what you are asking.
18 Q. Well, if you don't, and you know you don' t understand, 19 please tell me; and I will be happy to try to rephrse. it.
20 I want to make sure we are speaking the same language to the 21 extent we can and that your answers w e .
esponsive to the 22 que stions . I understood from your counsel's preliminary 23 observation, that you have been designated as a person for 24 the company most knowledgeable with respect to the subj ect -
25 matter of our contention 7, .is that your understanding?
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h i A. Well, I have some knowledge of the subject matter. I :
2 'couldn't say if I'm most knowledgeable or not.
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3 Q. How did you come to be elected to the position of 4 appearing tonight?
5 A. I guess my position would be in the general manager 6 of the three stations was one factor. Another factor is 7 ,very recent experience at the nuclear station and being 8 intimately involved in the station activities.
9 Q. Let me interrupt you. Which station do you have 10 reference,'to?
11 A. Oconee.
12 Q. Anything fur ther you want to say in response to the 13 question?
7 14 A. I assume that's why.
15 Q. If you would, sir, describe your duties as general 16 manager of nuclear station.
17 A. I report to the Department Vice President.
18 Q. Who would that be?
19 A. Hal B. Tucker.
20 Q. What is Mr. Tucker's title, if you know?
21 A. Vice President of Nuclear Production.
22 Q. All r ight, sir.
23 A. I'm over the line operation that reports to Mr. Tucker.
24 He has a number of other managers that report directly to '
25 him over technical areas, general office support areas.
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1 You might look at my responsibilities as being in the i
2 area of execution and the other managers are more in 3 program development and things'of that nature.
4 Q. Wbul: you briefly describe your professional back-5 ground including your work history up until you took 6 the position you now hold?
7 ,A. Graduated from the University of South Carolina in 8 1965, B.S. in Electrical Engineering, and joined Duke in 9 June of '65. At that time, they had a training program 10 for engin,Eers.. I spent about six months visiting differ-11 ent departments in be company. I was then assigned to 12 Marshall Steam Station for the start up of unit 2 at 13 Marshall as a junior engineer in the Instrument Controls kk '
14 Group. I worked there for about a year doing instrument
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15 control work. I became involved with putting computers 16 in our fossil stations, process control computers. I 17 got involved with that, and abou t a year af ter coming 18 with Duke, they form ed a group of people .to program and 19 design the computer system at Marshall 3 and 4 and future 20 plants at Duke, and I became part of that group. I worked i
21 for a couple of years in design engineering, after which 22 the Steam Department formed a computer group; and, I guess 23 I was in computer work for about six years. We worked on 24 the computer systems that are the basis for the process .
25 control computers that are in the nuclear plants. In
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I 1972, I was promoted to Manager of the Dan River Steam 2
Station which is a small three unit fossil station up 3 near Virginia,' and I served in that capacity for two years d
in doing general management duties of the station. In 5 1974, I transferred back to Charlotte as Manager of 6 Administrative Services reporting to the Vice President 7
of Steam Production at that time.
8 Q. Who was that?
9 A. W. O. Parker. Then, I was moved to work for Austin 10 Thies, the. Senior Vice President. I was Assistant to the 11 Senior Vice President for a couple of years.
12 Q. What is Mr. Thies' area of responsibility?
13 A. Today he is the Executive Vice President over power NW '
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( operations. He reports to the company president. One of 15 the departments reporting to Mr. Thies is the Nuclear 16 Production Department. Mr. Hal Tucker reports directly 17 to Mr. Thies.
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- Q. At the time,1974, when you were assisting Mr. Thies, l'
what was his position?
20 A. I think this was probably 1977.
21 Q. I'm sorry.
22 A. Mr. Thies was Senior Vice President Production and 23 Transmission and at that time, the Steam Department under 2'
which Oconee and the other nuclear stations, you know, were '
25 in, the department the nuclear stations were in, it was 7
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@' 1 the Steam Department, and Mr. W. O. Parker was Vice Presi-2 dent and he reported to Mr. Thies at that time. In 1979, 3 right after TAI the workload on our station manager at 4 Oconee was'such that he was pressed to' cover his technical P
5 duties and personnel management duties. So, I was moved 6 from Charlotte to go down initially for about six months 7 ,on loan. I having ha'd rather extensive personnel back-8 ground, a previous plant manager and familiar with 9 per.sonnel policies and things of that nature, I helped 10 the stati[n manager at Oconee in that area, and that allowed 11 him to concentrate almost all of his attention to the 12 technical matters occuring af ter TMI. I was moved into 13 a position at Oconee as the Assistant Station Manager. We hv
( > 14 did not officially have that title. They made that title 15 for me. Again, it was to be a six month on loan period, 16 and I had no safety-related or technical duties initially.
17 Q. Those duties were primarily personnel-related?
18 A. Primarily personnel and administrative. While that 19 was from 1979_-- While I was at Oconee, I took some training 20 courses and spent a lot of time in the plant, went through 21 the operator program for an RO licnese. I did get an RO li-22 cense and an SRO license on the Oconee units. Last y er, 23 in the reorganization, we had corporate reorganization, 24 departmental reorganization, they split the Steam Department .
25 up. That was one example. .There were other changes, but 8
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I they split the Steam Department up into three departments; 7' Fossil Department, Production Support Department and
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3 Nuclear Production Department allowing added emphasis and 4 single point focusing of resources for' nuclear; and, at 5 that time, Hal Tucker was promoted from Manager of the 6 Nuclear Division in the Steam Department to the Vice 7 . President of the Nuclear Production Department, and I 8 was transferred from Oconee to the General Manager position.
? Q. How would you distinguish, Mr. Vaughn, your duties 10 and r espo,dsibilities from Mr. Tucker 's?
11 A. I would 'say that Mr. Tucker 's duties -- of course, he 12 is over the line implementhtion area. That 's my part, 13 and in addition to that, over other managers, the Manager
/ 14 of Nuclear Operations, the Manager of Nuclear Maintenance, 15 the Manager of Nuclear Technical Support, the Manager of 16 Nuclear Engineering Services, the Manager of Nuclear 17 Safety Assurance, the Manager of Nuclear Liability and 18 so those managers report directly to Mr. Tucker. So, 19 their portion of our business would be the distinction.
20 Q. Those managers are organizationally on a par with you?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Let me understand how your area -- is a Manager of 23 Stations, is that right?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. Help me understand how your position, which is Manager 9
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1 of Nuclear Stations --
2 A. Yes.
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3 Q. Compares or' relates to say'a Manager of Nuclear 4 ' Operations or Safety Assurance? '
5 A. Well, the Manager of Nuclear Operations is a staff 6 function versus a line function. He would be working 7 ,directly with th6 station operating people associated B
with operating programs, operating detail operating 9 philosophics, the scheduling of units, the scheduling of 10 outages, rbsolution of any problems or incidents or safety 11 concerns in an operating aspect. So, from a technical 12 advisory staff function, he would directly support the 13 stations. Dealing very directly with the Superintendent kV 14 of Operations of a very active communications channel 15 directly from his office and the people working for him 16 to the Superintendent of Oper5tions in the plant. We have 17 a group in the plant almost a mirror of the different groups 18 we have in GO.
19 Q. T hen , if you would, the same question with respect 20 to Manager for Safety Assurance.
21 A. The Manager of Nuclear Safety Assurances is the current 22 chairman of the Nuclear Safety Review Board. He reports 23 directly to the V.P. He is over -- generally overseeing 24 the . activities that go on in our stations and in our -
25 department to assure nuclear. safety.
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1 Q. Help me understand a little better , Mr. Vaughn', with 2 respect to the subject matter of our contention 7, help 3 me understand "why your duties and responsibilities are 4 more relevant to adressing that subjec't than the duties 5 and responsibilities of the other managers who work with 6 you?
7 A. Well, I guess my phase of the work deals with working 8 execution, and as I read the contention, it seem to be 9 related to the management of our work execution.
10 Q. Allriiht, sir.
11 A. So, I would th' ink that would be the relationship.
12 Q. Does anyone of the managers under Mr. Tucker have 13 primary responsibility for assuring compliance with Nuclear W
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, 14 Regulatory Commission requirements?
15 A. In a staff role, yes. The Manager of Nuclear Engineering 16 Services, he has working for aim a licensing function, a 17 reactor safety function, nuclear fuels reports to him.
18 Q. Who is that person?
19 A. Mr. Ken Cannady. _.
20 Q. Let's dig in a little bit. If you believe that one 21 of these other gentlemen or someone else is more knowledgeable 22 on the subject of :some of these matters, please so indicate 23 if you would, Mr. Vaughn. I want to direct your attention 24 first to efforts that have been made by the Nuclear Regula- -
25 tory Commission to systematically assess-performance by '
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'k 1 Duke Power Company with its nuclear . regulatory requirements.
2 Are you familiar with the SALP study, the systematic l
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3 assessment of 1'icensing performance?
4 A. In general, yes, sir.
5 Q. Are you aware there are two SALP reports have been issued 6 by the NRC?
7 .A. Yes.
8 Q. First, is it fair to assume on my part that your area 9 of f amiliarity is limited to nuclear operations as opposed 10 to nuclear" construction?
11 A. That's a fair assessment. ,
12 Q. You understand , don ' t you , that the Nuclear Regulatory 13 Commission has requirements that are applicable to con-h'- ' 14 - struction practices and quality for nuclear power plants
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15 prior to operation?
16 A. Yes, I am aware of that. i 17 Q. As well as regulatory requirements that are applicable 18 to plants in operation?
19 A. That are license, yes. -
20 Q. And, that the SALP assessments distingguish construction 21 from operations. They evaluate separately licensees who 22 are under construction permits from licensees who are under 23 operating licenses?
24 A. .W ell, I'm not f amiliar how they do that, but you are -
25 .saying that bhey do.
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. 1 Q. Yes.
2 A. Fine.
3 Q. So, is it'f air that I assume -- I will limit my ques-4 tions to those that relate to operatio'ns which is your 5 area.
6 A. Righ t.
7 .Q. The first SALP report I will identify as nureg 0834 8 and it's a document entitled "NRC Licensee Assessments,"
9 and if I show you this docum ent, would you recognize it?
10 A. Yes, [ have seen the nureg 0834.
11 Q. Of cours~e, this is an operating license proceeding.
12 for Cataw ba , and they rate, as we discussed, units under 13 construction. Catawba in this SALP report received a below NW 14 average rating. Is it fair to conclude that since that
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15 relates to construction activities that you would not be 16 the appropriate person to talk to about that?
17 A. As to why itt was below average?
, 18 Q. Yes.
I 19 A. That would be a fair assessment. I wouldn't be the l
l 20 one to speak to that. I would like to go back and add
. 21 someth ing .
l 22 Q. Please do.
23 A. There was a rating of below average there, and I think 24 I made a comment about it being below average. That has -
25 a connotation that I think is explained in the foreward of 13 bv
i I that report that indicates that below average is a relative 2 term measured against a very high standard, and it doesn't 3 mean that it is unsafe.
4 Q. Well, I appreciate that and that i's consistent, bu t 5 just for clarity, if you would, look at appendix B to o that report, and if you would, just for the record, read 7 ,off the names of the f acilities that are also rated below 8 average along with Catawba?
9 A. These ,are facilities outside of our company.
10 Q. 'Yes,[ir, I understand that. Would you read those, 11 please?
12 MR. McGAREY: Just for the record, we'll stipulate 13 that nureg 0834 reflects an appendix B and certain plants, W 14 Catawba 1 and 2, Marble Hill 1 and 2, Midland 1 and 2,
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15 South Texas Project 1 and 2, Washington Nuclear Project 1 16 and 2, Watsbar 1 and 2 and Zimmer, and I believe that is 17 it that appear in appendix B, pages Bl through B6.
18 Q. Counsel, just for -- I appreciate the witness's observa-19 tion, but to put it in perspective, there were no plants 20 rated above average under construction, table 2; there were 21 36 plants rated average and there were seven plants rated 22 below average which Catawba 1 and 2 were one of those 23 plants.
24 MR. McGAREY: Just so the record is clear , we ,
25 will acknowledge that the nureg speaks for itself, and I 14 hv
h I haven't counted the number of each of the categories, but 2 obviously it's set forth in the nureg.
3 Q. Appendix A lists for operating facilities, Mr. Vaughn, 4 the SALP board's rating, and would you' agree for this 5 period Oconee Units 1, 2 and 3 are rated above average?
6 A. Yes, they received the highest rating the NRC gave.
7 .Q. The the three ratings above average, average and below 8 average?
9 A. Yes. -
10 Q. And, ,Ehat the the Oconee description appears at Page 11 A3. Although receiving an above average rating, would you 12 agree that the SALP board observed as follows: "Although 13 the licensee displayed weaknesses in personnel adherence kW - 14 to operating and administrative procedures, the licensee
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15 was responsive to NRC concerns in this area."
16 A. Yes, that sentence appears in the information under 17 Oconee. I'm not exactly sure what the NRC meant by dis-18 played weaknesses, but I think the rating speaks for itself.
19 Q. I guess that is the question. Do you know what the 20 weaknesses in personnel adherence to operating administra-21 tive procedures were, Mr. Vaughn, during that rating 22 period? "'lat is 5/1/79 through 4/30/80?
23 .A. I don't know the details.
24 Q. Tell me what you do know about the basis for that finding.
25 A. Well, during the course of any year _, a few personnel -
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I errors are made. I would assume that is what it was 2
associated with, but that is without looking at the details 3
behind the statement, and I cou'ldn' t say.
4 Q. Do you have those details availabl'e to you?
5 A. I don't have them available to me right now. They 6
probably were brought out as part of the meeting between 7
.the NRC and management prior to that report coming out.
8 Q. That just would -- I won't belabor the point, but were 9
there have been an identifiable meeting wherein the NRC
. 10 detailed the basis for the specific findings?
11 A. Generally the NRC meets with the utility management 12 associated $ith that review, and they discuss information 13 associated with the NRC's evaluation and performance, Nd 14
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the feedback to the utility in order that the utility can 15 receive this feedbac'k and make improvements. We are always 16 striving to improve.
17 Q. Did you participate in that meeting with respect to 18 the SALP review?
19 A. No, I did not. I was at Oconee at the time. _.
20 Q. Mr. Vaughn, I'm looking for the same review of the 21 McQuire for that same period.
22 A. You won't find that in 0834, I don't think.
23 Q. Are average facilities not separately described?
24 A. . As best I can remember, appendix A was above average -
25 facilities and appendix B was below average. I don't think 16
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1 the average ones were listed.
2 Q. I want to show you this table one and does that reflect 3 the --
4 A. This is a listing, but the detaild are not shown in 5 the appendix.
6 Q. McGuire 1 is rated average for that SALP review, is 7 _that right?
8 A. Again, this is average in keeping with the definition 9 as outlined in the foreward of the nureg.
10 Q.Whatiftheevaluationperiodsetforthinthattable 11 for McGuire 1, if'you would, sir?
12 A. May 1, 1979, through April 30, 1980.
13 Q. Thank you. Are you familiar with the details behind
.%v - 14 the average rating for McGuire 1 for that period?
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15 A. No, I'm not.
16 Q. Would they have been reflected in either the same or 17 aother meeting between the NRC and Duke management, do you 18 know?
19 A. If the meeting was handled similarly to this meeting, 20 it would have been.
21 Q. I want to turn to the second SALP report, and are you 22 f amiliar with it? I have a report that's with a cover 23 . letter to Mr. Tucker, October 19, 1982, reflecting the 2d results of the systematic assessment and licensing perfor-25 mance for Oconee and McGuire for the period May 1, 1980, 17 kr k
1 through May 30, 1982. It's Oconee, McGuire 1 and Catawba 2 and McGuire 2, September 1, 1980, through May 30, 1982, 3 and ask you if 'you are f amiliar with that report, sir ?
4 A. Generally I am familiar with it, yes.
5 Q. Kbuld you agree that both the format and the review 6 of the program in that SALP report differs substantially 7 _from the format and review program reflected in the nureg 8 0834 the first SALP?
9 A. Yes, there are some differences in the report.
10 Q. In SA[P 2, and I'm just going to call it that, would 11 you agree that the NRC no longer ranks construction and 12 operating facilities.averag'e, above average, below average.
13 A. They have changed their rating to a more effective NW 14
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rating system, yes.
15 Q. They have change'd their rating -- more effective in your 16 opinion?
17 A. Yes, I feel certain that it is more effective based on 18 my experience.
19 Q. But, a rating that no longer represents a qualitative 20 ranking of licensees?
21 A. I think it's a much more effective rating system 22 because, you know, you can say what is your definition of 23 average or above average. You know, the best in the nation 24 was above average. .
25 And, the worst in the nation were -- in the case of Q.
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1 Ca taw ba , t he worst in the nation were seven that related 2 to below average but still the worst in the nation was 3 safe as indicated by the NRC in their own document. This 4 rating system has categories for the s'pecific things the 5 NRC things are important on rating utilities, and they 6 give a category rating for each one of the areas that --
7 .and it's on that basis that I think it's more effective 8 because you can see by category. You know, you can see 9 the areas easier than you can if you have a very generic
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10 rating. ,
11 Q. Could you describe those categories, if you know?
12 A. Well, I think these are ones that are listed here.
13 Q. Yes, -- .
- 14 A. Functional areas, and then there are three categories.
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15 Category 1, 2 and 3. Category one being the hig hest 16 where the -- in that category, the company is doing so 17 well the NRC feels they don't have to look at you as much.
18 That you -- Category two is that normal NRC surveillance 19 is all that's required. Category three, and I'm generalizing 20 this -- there are som e other things associated with it.
21 Category three, if the utility had an item that was in 22 category three, it would be one that additiona attention 23 needed to be given to.
24 Q. If you can, I'm not sure exactly where I can put my ,
25 hands on it, but let's turn.to -- If you could help maybe 19 her
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r 1 we can get through this quicker. What I would like to 2 do is I would like to turn our attention to the facilities 3 of the company 'that are evaluated in this second SALP.
4 A. As best I can remember, both Oconde and McGuire had 5 only threeb and two's. They had the highest and the 6 second highest ratings. One's and two's.
7 ,Q. Oconee 1, 2 and 3 in the tabulations of the nine 8 areas,. categories 2 or 1, is that right. Let me count --
9 I count four category 2's and four category l's.
10 A. I thi,5k you missed one of the categories. There's 11 a total of nine.
12 Q. Five 2's and four l's?
13 A. Yes.
( . 14 Q. And, that's the overall rating for Oconee. McGuire, 15 page five, for unit'one is operational tating, and if 16 you will tell mn how many in each category?
17 A. There's five category one's and leaving four for cate-18 gory two.
19 Q. Unit two, construction and testing of the nine areas 20 some are not rated, but can you tell me how many were?
21 A. Of those items we have a rating, we have four in the 22 highest category, number one; and I see only one in the 23 category two.
24 Then, lastly, Catawba.
Q.
25 A. Catawba has one in the highest and four rated in category 20 Iv l
k i two and some others that no rating was assigned.
2 0 I want to focus, Mr. Vaughn, on the areas in the SALP 3 report where weaknesses are disclosed, and ask you if you a can give me some assistance in underst'anding to the extent 5 you know the. ba sis for some of the SALP board's weakness 6 evaluation. First on page two. This is a paragraph under 7 ,the summary of results. I will just --
8 A. Are we talking about a particular station?
9 Q. No, this is a summary of results, overall utility 10 evaluatis ,
and I will go through specifics.
11 A. For Duke Power as a total?
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12 Q. Yes, a significant weakness observed at all three ia f acilities was a lack of thorough evaluation or effective
, 14 corrective action for personn.el related errors. This 15 Problem is evident in reviews of licensee event reports.
16 Examples at Oconee include failures to follow procedures l'7 and adequate surveillance procedures and poor Communication is between different site units. Prior to start up at McGuire i
19 1, numerous errors relating to poor communication and 20 f ailure to follow procedures were identified. A review 21 of Catawba non-compliance items revealed problems associated 22 with breakdowns in communications betwee'n utility divisions 23 and management approval of inadequate evaluations. Can you 24 refer to specific portion of the report. Can you help me ,
25- with some of the detail behind those significant weakness 21 b me I
[ 1 identifications?
2 A. Well, I can't agree with significant weaknesses.
3 Q. I'm not asking you to. I'm asking you to recognize --
4 A. Putting it in perspective, t hat comment is made a long 5 with rating Oconee very high in the report itself; so, of 6 the things they did find, when they rate one high, they don't 7 . find as much as they find at one they don' t rate so high.
8 But, of the things they. do find, what few there are, then 9 they point- out what they do find. So, as you mentioned, 10 there was,'some areas of procedure deficiencies and some 11 personnel errors, and while we strive for absolute perfec-12 tion and that's zero, over the course of a year, th ere 13 are a few things that occur and I think they are just kW . 14 pointing that out. But, in light of a very high rating for
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15 Oconee and Duke Powe'r total. Maybe to help put that in a 16 little more perspective, if you look at when you are being I'7 judged against absolute perfection, it would appear that 18 there are some things and there are a few. things here, but 19 relative to all the actions that we execute, and, you 20 know, which proba bly ~ runs into the millions, then we 21 are looking at -- instead of a few errors relative to 22 perfection, we are looking at a percent success rate of 99.99 23 some thing . And, while that is a judgment call on a. success 24 rate, it would be good if there was a way that you could 25 administratively determine all the steps that you did take and it would help put that in perspective, that comment.
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1 Q. Let's look at the specifics, Mr. Vaughn, and see if 2 you can help me with it. For Oconee units 1,2 and 3 3 in operations, twenty-two violations were identified for 4 the period.
5 A. What was' that time period.
6 . Q. We have it in the record here.
i 7 _A. Is that over a year?
8 MR. McGAREY: Is this the SALP two report?
9 Q. Yes. ,
t Is thjt a two-year period?
10 A. .
11 MR., McG AREY: Yes.
, 12 Q. Page ten reflects the observations with respect to 13 those twenty-two operating violations. There are many
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14 violations concerning f ailure to follow procedures or 15 other written instructions. These recurrent violations 16 appear to indicate inadequate licensing management involve-17 ment in controlling this situation. Can you help.me 18 understand what the -- first what the basis for t' hat 19 was Mr. Vaughn, and what corrective action you have taken?
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20 A. The key word in that is appears, and while on the l
21 surfact it might appear to be, I can assure you there i
22 has been no lack on the management's pa'rt to take action, i 23 .
appropriate corrective action on every violation that we 24 hav e had .
25 Q. I appreciate'your judgment, but first of all can you
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I help me understar.d what the basis was for that observation?
2 MR. McGAREY: Lat me just note an objection 3
and that is that these question's are best directed to the d
staff and it's their report. I will not instruct Mr.
Vaughn from refraining to answer the questions, but note 6
that obj ection.
7
<>. Do you know, Mr. Vaughn, what the basis was for that 8
observation?
9 A. Let's read the question over ,again so I can get it 10 clear. .
11 Q. I direct your attention to that observation. I won't 12 read it again. You can read it for yourself. It's the 13 first paragraph in the text on page ten, and I ask you, sir, 4
Id
( with respect to that observat~ ion what is the basis for it 15 and what corrective action did they take.
16 A. On every incident that we have at the plant, a very 17 thorough evaluation is made by an independent evaluation 18 group that does not report to the station- manager. 'This l'
is our on-si:te safety review group. This group repor ts 20 to the nuclear safety assurance manager who reports to 21 the department V.P. A v.ery thorough investigation is 22 made to determine root causes and to make recommendations 23 to the station manager. When the station manager signs 24 that report, he makes a commitment to implement those 25 recommendations. It may be a procedure change, to correct b, 24 l,
l
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I a procedure deficiency of whatever it might be. In the 2 cases where there are personnel errors, employees are 3- given a very " strong counseling as a minimum, so there 4 is corrective disciplinary action takdn. So, depending 5 on the incident, and the incident report would have to 6 speak for itself, but very definite and specific correction 7 . actions are taken and followed through on f or every 8 incident that occurs at the station.
9 Q. Mr. Vaughn, can you help me generally understand with 10 respect tj this specific observation if there is a 11 corrective action' that you are aware of that addresses 12 the many violations which concern failure to follow procedures
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13 or other written instructions at Oconee?
14 N. Well, I think I'm missing your -- Are you talking in
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15 more generic terme?
16 Q, yes, I'm talking about Corrective action, if you know, 17 sir, that addresses that specific finding by the NRC 18 SALP Review Board with respect to Oconee.
19 A. I know the station manager of Oconee has placed 20 emphasis on th'e -- or he has really reemphasizes the 21 importance of meticulous attention to detail and that's 22 our goal. We strive for that and that's required to 23 . follow procedures day in and day out and never making a 24 mistake. So, t her e 's been added emphasis placed there. -
25 Every violation which includes those that where there has 25 kr i
k i been failure to follow procedure is recorded through out 2 management channel and reviewed and a summary of these
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3 are reviewed weekly by our company's executive committee.
4 So, there is top management in our com'pany, the top manage-5 ment of our company, dedicating, focusing attention on 6 the LER summary which these would be involved, be included.
7 .Q . By these, you mean the specific violations that are 8 indicated with reference to that observation?
9 A. Yes, each violation would be,a separate incident 10 report, sgharateLER, and they are listed separately on 11 a weekly summary.
12 Q. Mr. Vaughn, are you aware of any specific written 13 program or corrective action that addresses that observation 14 by the same board with respect to the company?
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15 A. We have programs' that are involved in -- like our 16 corrective discipline program is a written program.
17 Q. What's with respect to personnel discipline?
18 A. Uh huh.
19 Q. I'm sorry. -
20 A. It's documented in our management procedures manual.
21 Q. Yes, sir.
22 A. We have documented performance management program for 23 exempt employees. This would be supervisory personnel and 24 where an error is made by a person under a supervisor, 25 the supervisor that is taken into account in the evaluation 26
%v
1 s 1 process for that supervisor for salary purposes. The 2 .
cancelling aspect of procedure violation or personnel 3 error or whatever, that is one level of disciplinary 4 action and that's part of the disciplinary action program.
5 Q. Let me understand, cancelling?
6 A. That's one of the levels int he disciplinary action 7 . p r'o g r a m , so it's part of a written program. So, there 8 are programs associated with addressing this area. In 9 addition to that, we have a program for our department
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10 to f'ollow.up on every one of these.
11 Q. Which department is that?
12 A. Nuclear P'roduction Department. When this safety 13 review board, this independent on-site safety review group,
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14 investigates the incident and the investigation is over 15 a copy of that goes into our nuclear engineering services 16 group where the reactor safety group is, the licensing 17 group; a copy goes to the nuclear safety review board and 18 a copy to the reactor safety group which reviews all the 19 LER's and all the incidents, a copy goes to the other-20 stations' on-site safety review group; so ther:e is a 21 formalized process, and I feel sure it's procedurized 22 and documented that this department uses to distribute, 23 to evaluate and distribute information associated with 24 every one of these incidents. '
25 Q. Anything else you would like to add? I'm not trying 27
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I to cut you off, but if you have completed your answer, 2 that's fine. The hour is getting late, Mr. Vaughn.
3 Beg hning pag 5 'll under the second subject, logical controls, d
the SALP Board makes the observation a'f ter noting twelve 5 violations on page 12, violations and weaknesses identified 6 above indicate the need for management to focus attention 7
.in the area of compliance with the technical specifications 8 and procedures and regulations.
9 A. Management does that. I think in Mr. Tucker's 10 resp'onseSothat, I believe he addressed that point in 11 his letter responding to' the report in that our reports 12 to the NRC it's hard to reflect everything that is done 13 associated with an incident. In that regard the NRC may h Id
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not be seeing everything that we do and might be some 15 basis for that comment, But, from my experience, I think 16 that comment is a little bit out of context.
17 Q. Under the same heading, observation is made the health 18 physics appraisal team visited the f acility during the l'
evaluation period and identified weaknesses in the plant's 20 contamination control program. General employee radiation 21 protection training, adherence to health physics procedures, 22 rad waste volumn reduction training for plant staff and 23 implementation of the ALARA manual. Can you shed some 24 light on the basis of that observation and if corrective >
25 action was taken?
28 hv .
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k i A. I don't have the information on be corrective action 2 that was taken, but in the appraisal teams ' visit to a 3 plant where they make recommendations, the station manager 4 is part of an exit meeting or follow-up. We make commit-5 ments to follow-up on all those items, and we do, so, 6 I'm sure that where thert was any -- you know, I'm a 7 .little concerned about the definition of what the word 8 " weakness" means. Weakness relative to perfection or --
9 most programs are, you know, if you look at them long 10 enough,thereareenoughdifferentpeoplelookingatthe 11 same program, you'can propose improvements, and that 12 doesn't necessarily mean that your program is no. atis-13 factory nor safe. Yod ' can always improve something, so I 4 . .
( 14 have a feeling that that is in the category of making 15 improvements to a right good program.
16 Q. For the fourth topic, still with Oconee now, is the 17 subject of surveillance. The observation, page fifteen, is 18 as follows, " Major violations in 6e area of surveillance 19 are rare; however, one surveillance-related issue was~the 20 object of escalated enforcement proceedings including the 21 proposed imposition of a civil penalty. This issue involved 22 the failure to replace test tee cap following surveillance 23 testing resulting in a breach of. containment integrity."
24 Can you help us with understanding the basis for that 25 observation, Mr. Vaughn, and' corrective action that was 29 v
f-t 1 taken?
2 A. That was a case where a test tee cap, a small quarter 3 inch cap that you connect test equipment to a pressure 4 instrument, apparently was left off an'd a violation of 5 the surveill'ance procedure resulted. The last' step of 6 the procedure read something like this, " Remove test 7 . equipment, replace test tee cap, return isolation valves 8 to normal," or cut the instrument back in normal service.
9 That was all on one line. Of course, the fact the cap to was not relurned was an employee error because the procedure 11 so stated. But, in addition to that, we modified the 12 procedure to add independent verification of that step and 13 also to break that step out into a number of different
( 14 steps to be signed off instead of having two or three 15 operations in the one step to do everything we could from 16 a human f actor standpoint to help insure that it would be 17 even easier for a person not to miss that step. So, we 18 made a procedure improvement. There were two employees 19 associated with running that test. One of them lef t 'the 20 company's employ prior to our catching the incident. The 21 other one was counseled, so we added another level of 22 an independent check on the return to normal of that piece 23 of instrumentation as well as -- as a matter of fact, we 24 upgraded all the I and E proceedures like this, not just 25 this one procedure. So, we made some procedure enhancements 30
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1 as well as taking corrective disciplinary action with the
- 2 employee.
3 h. Could you identify the two employees who are associated 4 with this?
5 A. I can't ' remember their names.
6 Q. Was this a radiation monitoring line?
7 .A. No, it was not.
8 Q. What was the line on which the test tee cap was --
9 A. It was one of the multiple channels -- special trans-ducers as,5cciated with reactor building spray, I think.
_,' 10 11 Q. How long was the test tee cap not in place on the 12 line?
13 A. I can't renember, some period of time.
id ,
14 4 Q. A period of days?
15 A. I think it was more than days.
16 Q. Months?
17 A. I'm not sure. I would like to add something to that.
18 Q. Sure.
19 A. And, this is really -- it goes along with all of the 20 violations that we have been talking about or incidents.
21 In this case and all of the dhers, Duke Power has never had 22 an incident that had an effect on the health and safety of 23 the public and this didn' t either -- the evalution of that.
24 Q. We will turn to some point, when we get done, Mr . Vaughn/
25 to the 1977 releases of Lake Hartwell which there may be 31
,me
1 some difference of opinion on the question of health 2 effects. ' That was a radiation releas e to the environment.
3 A. I think my comment still applies to that one as well.
4 The evaluation of that I think supported it.
5 Q. .With resheet to the subject of licensing, the last 6 subject of the nine categories evaluated, Mr. Vaug hn, the 7 .SALP Board makes the following observation. Staffing of 8 the f acility appears to be adequate containing many know-9 ledgeable' members, however, in view of the tardiness of 10 the respoEses by the licensing staff, there appears to be 11 need _for increased management attention to the expeditious 12 resolution of technical issues. Can you help me understand 13 the basis for that observation and any corrective action 14- that you may know of? Page twenty-one of that.
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15 A. I,'m probably not the most knowledgeable person to speak 16 to'that one. Is this the licensing staff in Charlotte, 17 , staff licensing staff?
1 18 Q. I'm afraid I can't tell you that. With respect to 19 the Oconee facility anyway. -
20 A. Of course, our licensing staff in Charlotte works with 5 21 all three of the stations. I'm not familiar with this.
22 I will just 'say one thing about it. The technical issues 23 are very complicated and to get -- to root causes and 2d very accurate determination of corrective actions that need '
25 to be taken and things of that nature, it takes some time to 32
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I do an accurate job. That might well be what is associated 2 with this. I'm f amiliar with cases where we have asked 3 for additional time in order that we can complete a thor-4 ough evaluation of an incident.
5 Q. Let's tu'rn then to McGuire. Of the facilities evaluated, 6 Oconee was for operations we have just completed that, 7 .and the only other operating facility which you may have 8 knowledge of would be McGuire unit 1 for this, is that 9 right? -
10 A. As I h~cntioned I was at Oconee during that review
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11 period, assigned to Oconee, and I was out of the main 12 stream of the McGuire activities. I will try to address 13 your questions as best I can.
%d ,
( 14 Q. I won't belabor if you don't know and don't have 15 information, please 'so indicate . Under the first heading, 16 under the category plant operations, Mr. Vaughn, page 26 17 the following observation is made by the SALP Review Board.
18 Lack of communication was noted for example between 19 maintenance and operation that resulted in returning 'inoper-20 able equipment to operable status. The situation still 21 appears to need improvement and that two recent LER's 22 demonstrated that corrective action was not thorough. As 23 two additional pieces of equipment were returned to operable 24 status. Take a look at it and I will ask you if you can 25 share with us the basis for -that observation any any 33
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1 corrective action taken?
2 A. Where were you reading?
3 Q. Right here.
4 A. I can't speak to this nor the NRCs evaluation of it.
5 You know, just genericaliy, when you start looking at 6 whether its a mistake in the legal business or anywhere 7 _else, communications, a lot of times, generically is a 8 . problem. You say, "What I meant to say was this," or 9 whatever. I would not just thinking about how things 10 happen in,'our business from experience, you can have 11 a communications problem that may be very different 12 communications here or communications there; and without 13 looking at the two events reports, I couldn't say that 14 they were related except generically from obviously the
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15 NRC's saying a communications point. We stress proper 16 Communications throughout our management and with employees l'7 and that is an indication that we are not quite perfect.
18 But, I will repeat again every incident that occurs is 19 treated as individual and given full and dedicated and focused 20 attention by our management and our incident process to i 21 evaluate i'c, determine root causes to take corrective 22 actions, and I'm sure if that was done in this case, in 23 each one of those cases I'm sure that was done. That's l
24 our normal process and we just go through it.
25 Q. The seventh category, security and safeguards, p ge 33 34 l kr l
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l
I of the report the observation follows, " Violations noted 2 are attributed to f ailure by security personnel to comply 3 with-establisbedwrittenproceduresandweaknessinsecurity 4 supervision relative to monitoring pe/sonnel performance 5 and documentation of daily activity and recorded incidents.
6 Circumstances of violations reflect inadequate job knowledge 7 .and training deficiencies in some instances," and, if you 8 can, if you can't please tell me, but can you share with 9 us the basis for that observation and corrective action 10 thatyou[nowof.
11 A. I'm not f amiliar with the details of the corrective 12 action that was taken.
13 Q. How about the basis for that observation by the SALP V
[N 14 Board ?
15 A. Well, it must be from their review of the incident 16 report.
17 Q. Beyond what appears in the f ace of the document, you have 18 any other information?
19 A. No, I don't. -
20 Q. You are not the person best suited to respond to ques-21 tions with respect to McGuire 2 and Catawba, facilities 22 that were under construction at the time of this review?
23 A. I would not be.
24 Q. I think we are just about rapping it up, Mr. Vaughn.
25 Are you knowledgeable about' the circumstances surrounding
.(v I .
, , . e fs 1 the 1977 imposition of civil penalty for incidents at the 2 Oconee facility?
3 A. I have been made aware of some details behind that.
4 I was not at Oconee at the time. I wa's in GO and --
5 Q. General Office?
6 A. General office.
7 .Q. I have , I guess, I'm interested in information you 8 have beyond the report.which I have and have read and 9 the company's response to that report, and so if you have 10 independe,5t knowledge beyond that, that would'be helpful 11 let me just make specific reference to this body of our 12 contention. The observation of the commission in the 13 documentation accompanying the proposed imposition of
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( civil penalty made the following observations. History 15 of repetative and chronic non-compliance when considered 16 in conjunction with the failure to institute affective 17 corrective action and management control demonstrates 18 that management is apparently not conducting licensed 19 activities with adequate concern for the health, safsty 20 or interest of its employees or the general public. That 21 is a reference as reflected in the body of the contention,
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22 a letter of'Marcy 29, 1977, to Mr. Horn, President of Duke 23 . Power from Mr. Ernest Volgennau of NRC. Mr. Vaughn, do 24 you -- can you bare with us any information you might 25 have regarding the basis for that observation by NRC and 36
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~_ _ _ _ _ _. _
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.A 1 any corrective action that was taken?
2 A. First, our Chairman of the Board, Mr. Carl Horn, 3 received that letter and he made a very extensive reply 4 addressing each contention. In that r'eply we disagreed 5 with the statement that you read. We do not agree with 6 the words repetitive nor chronic. By our definition of 7 .those words, the incidents associated with it as I 8 can remember somethings. in Mr. Horn's letter indicated 9 that maybe the majority of the incidents that were alleged 10 to be chrp'nic and repetitive were minor administrative-type 11 things that__ if you look at the incidents individually, there 12 was not enough of a pattern to say that they had a relation-13 ship that you could say would be repetitive. That most of y
them or many of them were corrected before the inspector (k 14 15 every left the site. So, I'm aware personally of changes 16 that have been made in our company.
I'7 Q. L & me ask a question. Directing your attention first 18 to the basis. I have Mr. Horn's letter , and I can -- that will 19 speak for itself. May I ask you if you have any independent 20 knowledge beyond what is ave.ilable to us in Mr. Horn's 21 official response to the NRC with respect to that observation, 22 and if you do, can you share that with us?
23 A. I know some of th e changes that were made.
24 Q. Yes.
25 A I think they are brought out here.
37
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( i Q. Let me shift your attention. The answer to the first 2 question is, No, no other additional information?
3 A. No.
4 Q. Now, please continue with the chan'ges, corrective 5 actions.
6 A. There were procedural changes made to -- procedural 7 . changes and a contingency plan made to better handle a a Primary to secondary leak. A major change. There were 9 automatic s cut-offs put on certain pumps that -- and a io radiation [honitor put on the pumps such that it would con-it tain within .the turbine building itself any leakage. Improve-12 ments were made not just at Oconee but at McGuire and 13 Catawba to put them in a much better position to handle primary to secondary leaks and there were a lot of other
( %# i4 15 things made, but the improvements were at McGuire and 16 Catawba were in the area of having additional hold up 17 volumns so you Could hold up any liquid processing and is then at that point based on recommendations from a task 19 force and Duke's managem Ent evaluation of this lead toward 20 a much more comprehensive radioactive waste handling program.
21 That's been the basis for modifications, very extensive 22 modifications at Oconee, McGuire and Catawba. The systems 23 for McGuire and Catawba improvement in those systems as 24 those stations were being built. So, from seeing nuclear 25 station modifications and where we are spending money, I 38 kr
I see places that resulted from our company learning things 2 from that incident.
3 Q. What task force did you have reference to?
4 A. There's a -- going through the documents, there was 5 a task force that was formed in addition to all the other 6 reviews that were going on to look at this area, this 7 . radioactive waste handling.
8 Q. Was .it organized at that time in 1977?
9 'A. My impression, from reading the documents, is that it 10 was organEzed soon af ter the incident to take' a total 11 overall view of not just thing incident,but the radioactive 12 waste program as a whole. You know, you don' t want to lose 13 sight of the whole forest trying to concentrate on one or
( 14 two of the trees and that's what that task force did.
15 Q. Can you help me ' identify that task force and its 16 product a little bit better with th e names of the people 17 who are on it or maybe the identification of its 18 report if it issued one?
19 A. I couldn't. I can tell you generally who, you know --
20 the groups of people ~that would have been on it. Tho sn 21 people that -- on our GO staff associated with rad waste.
22 Q. Mary Burch?
23 A. Mary Burch might have been on it, yes, I think she wa.s 24 with Duke at that time.
25 Q. Do you have anything else to add with respect to that 39 mv.
1
4-( 1 specific matter?
2 A. I can ' t think of anything .
3 Q. I think that's all.
J 4
5 GERALD E. VAUGHN 6
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- b. 1 STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA )
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2 COUNTY OF MECKLENBURG )
4 5 I, the undersigned Commissioner and Notary Public, 6 in and for the State of North Carolina, do hereby certify 7 .that Gerald E. Vaughn was duly sworn prior to the taking 8 of his deposition.
9 I .do further certify that the foregoing forty
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10 pages constitute a t, rue and accurate transcript of the 11 evidence given by 'the said witness as taken down and 12 transcribed by me.
13 This the twenty-seventh day of May,1983.
(-h . 14 .
/
15 ~ .'j , 4 0 . . ~ [ /'/4<..
BARBARA V. HAAS 16 Commissioner and -
Notary Public '
17 My Commission expires:
18 April 23, 1987 19 .
20 21 22 23 24 ,
25
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