ML20195B667
| ML20195B667 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Peach Bottom  |
| Issue date: | 12/22/1987 |
| From: | NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20151L163 | List: |
| References | |
| FOIA-88-478 NUDOCS 8811020129 | |
| Download: ML20195B667 (81) | |
Text
U.Nn ED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION IN THE MATTER OF:
) DOCKET NO:
)
ENFORCEMENT CONFERENCE CONCERNING )
PEACH BOTTOM ATOMIC POWER STATION )
(CLOSED)
LOCATION:
Delta, Pennsylvania PAGES:
1 through 77 l
DAT2:
December 2.,
1987
..................................................l
.....oc..........................
Heritage Reporting Corporation Ofncial Reporters I:31 L Street, N.W.
Wunin31on. D.C. 2000$
(202) 628-4 44 eggiOh01A PDR l
1 1
gousee-47
/
~,
1 1
UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION NUCLEAR REACTOR REGULATION AND REGION I 2
In the Matter of:
)
3
)
ENFORCEMENT CONFERENCE CONCERNING
')
4 PEACH BOTTOM ATOMIC POWER STATION
)
)
5 (CLOSED)
)
6
- Tuesday, December 22, 1987 7
Cla50TTL Conference Center 8
Atom Road Delta, Pennsylvanja 9
The above-entitled matter came on.for Conference, 10 pursuant to notice, at 1:17 p.m.
11 APPEARAllCES :
12 On behalf of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission:
13 WILLIAM F. KANE Director 14 Division of Reactor Projects Region I ED WENZINGER 16 Chief of Projects l
Branch 2, Region I 17
[
THOMAS JOHNSON 18 NRC Senior Resident Inspector Peach Bottom 19 l
JAMES LINVILLE 20 Chief, Reactor Projects Section 2-A 21 BRUCE BOGER 22 Assistant Director i
Region I Projects 23
' Nuclear Reactor Regulation i
24 JIM LIEBERMAN Director 25 Office for Enforcement i
4 Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 l
t
,,--,..,__..__-_.,,__,-.L-,_.-.._-.._._,_.___..,--__.___.,,__.-_
... -~-
2 1
APPEARANCES:
2 On behalf of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission j
(continued):
3 DANIEL HOLODY 4
Enforcement Officer Region I l
5 I
JAY GUTIERREZ, ESQ.
j 6
Regional Counsel t
Region I a
7 BRENT CLAYTON 8
Coordinator for Deputy Executive Director for Regional Operations j
9 Region I i
10 JAMES LOEHMAN Senior Enforcement Specialist l
11 Office of Enforcement i
i 12 BOB MARTIN
)
t NRC Project Manager 13 Peach Bottom Headquarters 14 On behalf of Peach Bottom Atomic Power Stations 15 DICKINSON SMITH Vice President 16 JOHN KEMPER 17 Senior Vice President, Nuclear i
j Philadelphia Electric Company GENE BRADLEY, ESQ.
19 Associate General Counsel Philadelphia Electric Company i
20 HANK TUFTS j
21 Corporate Psychologist Rohrer, Hibler and Replogie j
22 i
3 JIM COOK 23 Senior Consultant i
1 Rohrer, Hibler and Replogie l
24 i
FREDERICK POLASKI i
l 25 Assistant Superintendent, Operations
{
Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station f
i L
4 Heritage Reporting Corporation j
(202) 628-4888 4
r 1
I
. _.__ __-,_,,,~
~,__.
3 1
APPEARANCES:
2 On behalf of Peach Bottom Power Station (continued):
3 NEIL THOMAS 4
Training Project Manager Management Analysis Company 5
DAVID CALLAHAN 6
Consultant Management Analysis Company 7
ROBERT BULMER 8
Superintendent Nuclear Training Sessions 9
Peach Bottosi. Power Station 10 HARRY ABENDROTH Senior Engineer 11 Atlantic Electric Company 12 MICMAEL PHILLIPS Senior Engineer 13 Public Service Electric and Gas 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
3A 1
PROCEEDINGS 2
MR. KANE:
Good afternoon.
3 This is an enforcement conference between the NRC and 4
the Philadelphia Electric Company.
And this conference is 5
being transcribed and the transcript will be made available at 6
the conclusion of the enforcement process.
7 I would like to begin by having everyone introduce 8
themselves for the record.
Pleace state your name, title and 9
organization.
10 Starting with NRC, I am William F.
Kane, Director, 11 Division of Reactor Projects, Region I.
12 MR. WENZINGER:
I am Ed Wenzinger, and I am Chief of 13 Projects, Branch 2, Region I.
\\'
14 MR. JOHNSON:
I am Thomas Johnson.
I am the NRC 15 Senior Resident Inspector at Peach Bottom.
16 MR. LINVILLE:
I am James Linville, Chief Reactor 17 Projects, Section 2-A.
18 MR. BOGER:
I am Bruce Boger.
I am the Assistant 19 Director for Region I Projects, NRR.
20 MR. LIEBERMAN:
I am Jim Lieberman, the Director of 21 the Of fice f' r Enf orcement.
22 MR. HOLODY:
I am Daniel Holody, Enforcement Officer, 23 NRC, Region I.
24 MR. GUTIERRJZ:
Jay Gutierrez, Regional Counsel, NRC 25 Region I.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 O
4 1
MR. CLAYTON:
Brent Clayton, Region I, Coordi.nator 2
for Deputy Executive Director for Regional Operations.
3 MR. LUEHMAN:
I am James Loehrnan, Senior Enforcement 4
Specialist, Office of Enforcement.
5 MR. MARTIN:
I am Bob Martin, NRC Project Manager for 6
Peach Bottom Headquarters.
7 MR. SMITH:
I am Dickinson Smith, Vice President of 8
Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station.
9 MR. KEMPER:
John Kemper, Senior Vice President of 10 Nuclear, Philadelphia Electric.
11 MR. BRADLEY:
Gene Bradley, Associate General 12 Counsel, Philadelphia Electric.
13 MR. TUFTS:
Hank Tufts, Corporate Psychologist for 14 Rohrer, Hibler and Replogle.
15 MR. COOK:
Jim Cook, Senior Consultant for Rohrer, 16 Hibler and Replogle.
17 MR. POLASKI:
Frederick Polaski, Assistant 18 Superintendent for Operations, Peach Bottom Atomic Power 19 Station.
20 MR. THOMAS:
I am Neil Thomas, Training Project 21 Manager, Management Analysis Company.
22 MR. CALLAHAN:
David Callahan, Consultant, Management i
23 Analyais Company.
24 MR. BULMER:
Robert Bulmer, Superintendent Nuclear 25 Training Sessions, Peach Bottom.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 1
s
5 1
MR. ABENDROTH:
I am Harry Abendroth, Senior Engineer 2'
of Atlantic Electric Company, assigned to Peach Bottom, co-3 owner representative.
4 MR. PHILLIPS:
Michael Phillips, Senior Engineer, 5
Public Service Electric and Gas.
6 MR. KANE:
The purpose of this conference today is to 7
obtain information to assist the Staff in reaching a 8
determination as t<> whether, and if so, what kind of additional 9
enforcement actions are appropriate in relation to the order 10 suspending operation of the Peach Bottom facility on March 31, 11 1987?
12 This conference is the first step of the enforcement 13 process.
Myself, Jim Lieberman and Bruce Boger will be 14 conducting this conference.
Subsequent conferences may be 15 required.
16 Today, we want to focus on the PECo decisionmaking 17 process used to select operators as suitable for restoration of 18 licensed duties should the Peach Bottom facility be allowed to 19 restart.
20 This is an important and serious matter.
Based on 21 the information flRC has acquired independently, as well as the 22 information provided by PECo to the NRC, it is clear that the 23 licensed operators involved in control room activities, prior 24 to March 31, 1987, were either inattentive to their duties, or 25 condoned others being inattentive.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4088
6 1
Either situation is unacceptable and cannot be 2
tolerated.
Thus, there is a question as to whether NRC should 3
allow these operators to conduct licensed activities during 4
subsequent power operations, if authorized.
5 Before permitting operators to resume licensed 6
activi' ties at power, NRC will need to know the basis for PECo 7
concluding that the operators can be relied upon to properly 8
perform their licensed duties.
9 At this time, I will ask Mr. Lieberman and Mr. Boger 10 if they have any opening comments?
11 MR. LIEBERMAN:
No.
12 MR. BOGER:
No.
13 MR. KANE Who will be the senior spokesman?
14 MR. KEMPER:
I will.
15 MR. KANE:
Will you or your staff to start the 16 process, describe for us the process by which PECo management 17 determined which operators were suitable to restore to their 18 licensed duties for power operations, if authorized?
19 MR. KEMPER:
First, I would just like to point out 20 that, in addition to the operator concerns associated with a 21 shutdown, over and above that we have made a review as a result 22 of the shutdown order and looked not only at the operators 23 themselves, but also at the management of the plant, and the 24 overall corporate management.
25 As you know, as a result of that, there has been a Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
=
7 1
major change in the management reorganization structure.
There 2
has been a management change-out at Peach Bottom, itself, which 3
we will review in more detail with you as we proceed.
4 We are changing the culture.
We are changing the 5
environment in which the operators operate. And we are changing 6
the methods of operation with respect to procedure adherence 7
and with respect to procedure quality and with respect to the 8
acceptance level that is expected from the operators over and 9
above what it was expected in the past.
10 At the time of the shutdown order we had hired a 11 consultant, Management Analysis Corporation, MAC, to do it 12 independent of review, as they saw the situation here, at Peach 13 Bottom, and to make a recommendation to us as to their 14 conclusions with respect to the root cause analysis as to what 15 was the fundamental problem at Peach Bottom.
16 Which turned out to be a series of four root cause 17 conclusions.
Which one of them was the operators' performance 18 and we will address that and what we have done about that.
19 As a result of that, we also have conducted our cwn 20 independent assessment of the operators and their 21 inattentiveness, and did independent reviews of them by our own 22 security group, to come to some conclusions associated with 23 that.
24 The not result of all of that was that then we will 25 go into details and I will have Dick Smith present the overview Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
=
8 1
of how we went through this step-by-step.
In addition to that, f
2 as we go through the program and the procedure that we
[
3 followed, I will point out what the management did specifically l
l 4
about it; what reviews; what interviews were conducted; what 5
material was used to make our decision; how we reviewed the 6
operators and decided who was acceptable and who was not I
I 7
acceptable to enter a training program; what consisted of that 8
training program; what psychological interviews were conducted 9
by outside consultants to determine and what criteria was used 10 to determine whether the operators were acceptable to enter i
11 that retraining program?
(
i 12 As a result of that training program and it wad l
13 conducted -- and I will ask the folks that were involved in 14 that, our training and the MAC people -- what their conclusion 15 was, what the criteria was for acceptance, fer passing that 16 training program?
17 At the conclusion of that there was a review with 18 respect to see if there was any improvement or attitudinal 19 change and what the reasons and conclusions and criteria 20 associated with that were?
And we will have the HRR folks 21 review that with you as to what their criteria was.
}
22 And then, what our overall view was; how we conducted l
23 that and what our criteria was'for acceptance; what operators t
24 were acceptable and were not acceptable?
25 Fred Polaski who has been involved in the day-to-day l
i Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 e
9 1
conduct of the training program, who is the Assistant 2
Superintendent for Operation has been almost in daily and 3
hourly contact throughout this training program, not only the 4
program and rehabilitation program that was conducted here, Hat 5
the site, b'ut also the continuing that it is going on at the, 6
training simulator at Limerick, where we had the ship training i
and the ship programs going on there, and what the analysis has 7
8 been as a result of the leadership capabilities that are being 9
demonstrated by the SROs.
10 So we, I have given an overview here, of the-fact 11 that we had a management problem and we had a culture problem j
l 12 and we had an operator attitudinal problem.
And what we have i
13 done to correct the management; what we have done to improve 14 the culture; and then more specifically, in what is the case 15 here, with reep:sct to today, is the operator part of that.
i 16 I would like Dick Smith, at this time, to go through
,l i
l 17 the procedures had the sequence of events that we went through 18 and then have the various people that were involved in the 19 development of the criteria in the program go through that
- i-20 step-by-step with you and at any time that you have any 21 questions, in any of the areas, why please feel free to ask 22 your questions as we go through this.
23 MR. SMITH:
Good afternoon, Mr. Kane, gentlemen.
24 As Mr. Kemper has said, there have been a number of 1
)
25 management changes as well as other changes
.'.n an effort to 1
1 1
Heritage Rsporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 li
4 l
t 10 1
change the entire environment out at Peach Bottom and to 2
provide the surroundings necessary for the retrained operators i
'3 to perform to the standards that we expect them to meet.
4 Shortly after receiving the shutdown order, 5
Philadelphia Electric Company decided to replace the operations 6
management just as soon as the replacements could be made 7
available.
8 Mr. Polaski relieved Mr. Roberts as the Engineer 9
Operations shortly after the shutdown.
I came in and relieved I
j 10 Mr. Fleischman as the Plant Manager and with the recent i
11 reorganization we are going through at the present time, I will 4
j 12 have become the Vice President and will be relieved at the 13 first of next month by Mr. Franz, who will be coming down to us j
14 from our Limerick Generating Station, where he has clearly 15 demonstrated superior performance and brings a wealth of 16 operating experience to us.
i 17 Mr. Cotton has recently relieved Mr. Smith as the t
l 18 Superintendent of Operations.
So the entire management chain 19 at the station in the Operations Branch has been changed.
1 20 Philadelphia Electric Company then decided to replace 21 the shift superintendents with appropriately qualified staff 22 enginee.rs.
And that led to the retirement of two of the shift 3
23 superintendents, and the reassignment of the other four shift l
24 superintendents, with this move, all of the direct management, 25 on-shift first level had been replaced.
4 4
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 1
4 s
11 1
Looking at the overall problem, Philadelphia 2
Electric Company then decided to try to retrain the other 3
operators, pending the.results of the company's security 4
investigation, and commenced development of a training program.
5 The original plan, as perceived by management, was to 6
have a six-weeks course for the senior readtor operators and a l
7 three-week course for the reactor operators.
And our intention 8
was that the senior reactor operator course would contain
]
9 supervisory level material that would not be in the reactor's l
r 10 operators' course.
)
l 11 However, on the advice of our consultants and our I
1 12 training department, we soon concluded that the reactor 13 operators could well profit from the supervisory level training 14 plan for the senior operators. And being in training with those 15 people who they would be interacting with in the control room 16 would be most beneficial.
17 Therefore, we developed a senior reactor operator 18 level course, and presented that training to all of the f
l 19 operators. We also because they would be closely involved, j
20 included the six to be assigned shift technical advisors in~
f 21 that same supervisory level training course that we had 22 prepared for the senior reactor operators.
4 23 In parallel with this, we have put a great deal of j
24 effort into upgrading and writing where they were non-existent, 2
{
25 procedures for the operators to follow.
4 1
Heritage Reporting Corporation 1
(202) 628-4888
12 1
We are putting a major emphasis in rewriting the 2
procedures that direct the watch-standing performance of the 3
operators.
That effort is not yet completed, because it is a 4
major undertaking and there will be significant training of the 5
operators on those revised procedures when they are available.
6 And that will help us set forth for the operators a 7
guideline for the performance that we expect from them.
The 8
concepts have been discussed with them but the document, itself i
9 is still being written.
10 Having made the decision to look into.the possibility 11 of retraining the other operators, that is, those below the j
12 shift superintendents, we needed to decide which ones of those 13 would be suitable for, as you put it, the restoration as 14 reactor operators.
15 I will describe several of the steps and turn to some 16 of the colleagues on this side of the table for specific 17 comments on those steps.
18 The firr t step was my personal interview with each of 19 the operators shortly after I arrived on the Station in early 20 May 1987.
The purpose of my interviews was to engago the 21 willingness of each of the operators to meet high performance 22 standards, those standards which are clearly laid out in their 23 license requirement or laid out in our station procedures but 24 were not being met.
25 I was trying to engage their willingness to meet Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
13 1
those higher performance standards and their willingness to 2
participate in a training program.
Overall, I was trying to 3
judge their attitudes.
4 I was looking for those that were burnt out and did 5
not feel that they were ready to undertake a change of 6
direction. Did they recognize why the plant had been shutdown?
7 Did they have a basic level of contrition?
Did they have an 8
enthusiasm for a new beginning?
Were they ready to embark on a 9
program that we all knew was going to be very difficult?
Were 10 they too rigid in their beliefs to be able to respond *to such a 11 training program?
12 On the conclusion of those interviews, there were 13 some of whom I had some concern.
Some of whom were not, did 14 not fully recognize the reasons for the shutdowr, did not fully 15 understand their personal involvement in it.
16 Of those that were weak, two of them withdrew from 17 further consideration. One resigned from the company. One asked I
18 that he not be considered as an operator in the restart effort i
19 and he has since been reassigned.
20 Keeping in mind those that were weak at this' level of 21 the interview proceso, we turned to the company investigation 22 by our own security investigators.
That investigation was 23 reviewed very carefully to eliminate any operators who admitted 24 or were accused of intentionally sleeping while they were on 25 watch or violating technical specifications.
J Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
1 14 1
In those interviews there was no evidence of licensee 2
event reports, not being filed when they were appropriate or 3
any lack of or other violations of technical specifications, 4
such as improper manning in the control room.
5 There were in my review of the companiy's 6
investigations, clearly two people who deliberately let 7
themselves fall asleep.
They either did not try to avoid 8
sleeping or deliberately put themselves in a position to go to 9
sleep.
10 Those two were eliminated from the retraining 11 program.
Neither one of them were formally licensed operators.
12 The third step of the process was a psychological 13 interviews by the psychologist from the firm of Rohrer, Hibler, 14 and Replogie, Incorporated.
15 And let me now call upon Dr. Tufts, or Dr. Cook to 16 describe that interview process.
17 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Before we do that,
'r. Smith?
A 18 MR. SMITH:
Yes?
4 19 MR. LIEBERMAN:
You say, of the people that you 20 interviewed, four individuals did not make that cuts two chose I
21 to withdraw and two chose not to include in the next level.
I 22 MR. SMITH:
I was not fully clear there. Mr.
23 Lieberman.
24 In my personal interviews with them, there were some 25 operators that I felt were weaker than the others.
Of those, lleritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 9
15 1
two of them chose to withdraw.
One left the company and one 2
said that he just did not want to be a part of the restart 3
effort and has been reassigned within the company.
[
4 Upon my review of the security investigation, I felt 5
that there were two individuals clearly indicated as 6
intentionally falling asleep: putting themselves in a position 7
whors they did fall asleep or being shaken by another watch-8 stander did not immediately leap up and try to do something 9
about it.
l 10 Those two were unacceptable to me.
One has been 11 reassigned and one has left the company.
12 MR. KANE:
Excuse me, those two individuals were 13 licensed operators?
14 MR. SMITH:
No.
15 MR. KANE:
They were not?
l 16 MR. 3MITH:
One was a licensed operator, one of the r
17 shift superintendents, and one was a shift technical advisor.
t l
18 MR. KEMPER:
So one was a --
j 19 MR. SMITH:
That shift technical advisor was I
i 20 scheduled to go into the training program and we replaced him i
j 21 at the last moment with another candidato.
22 MR. KANE:
Thank you.
j J
23 MR. KEMPER:
But just one correction on what Dick l
24 said.
One was a senior licensed operator.
a i
25 MR. SMITH:
The superintendent.
l t
t I
Heritage Reporting Corporation 1
(202) 628-4888
(
I
I 4
16 3
1 MR. KEMPER:
Yes.
2 MR. SMITH:
Yes.
l 3
Doctor Tufts?
l 4
DR. TUFTS:
Our charge, as we understood it, was to' 5
on a basis of two-to-one, two psychologists from my firm, our 6
fit would sit oown with each potential participant in the j
training program and spend approximately two-to-two-and-one -
7 8
half hours with him to determine if, indeed, he..'as ready to 9
participate in such a program and potentially benefit from it.
10 We did this essentially through an interview process' j
11 getting a sense of his attitudes regarding the company; his l
12 attitudes regarding himself; what his work experience had meant 4
13 to h'im; and essentially if he was susceptible, if you will, to i
j 14 being impacted upon by a three-to-six-week training program.
1 15 And having interviewed the first 15 people in the i
16 latter part of June, we reported back to the company that, 17 indeed, there wan clearly variability among the 15, but in our i
)
18 opinion, from the perJpectives that we have or use, the 15 i
19 people were recommended from our perspective for the program l
?
)
20 and appeared to be in a posture that would probably lead to
}
)
21 some individual benefit.
I
\\
- 22 MR. SMITH:
If there are no other questions or no i
23 questions for Dr. Tufts, so we will proceed.
l 3
24 As we went into the training program, each of the 25 operators was clearly informed that this was a voluntary 1
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 I
l' 17 1
training program.
2 MR. KANd:
Excuse me, before you go further, I am 3
trying to focus on the principal inputs to the decisionmaking 4
process.
5 And I have thus far, your personal interviews?
i 6
MR. SMITH:
Yes.
i i
7 MR. KANE:
The security, PECo's security 8
invuccigation and the RHR-interviews?
I 9
MR. SMITH:
Yes, sir.
3)
DR. TUFTS:
Yes, sir.
'l MR. KANE:
Those constitute the principal inputs into 12
- he 13 MR. SMITH:
Up to that point, yes.
11 MR. KANE:
-- into the decisionmaking process as to 15 MR. SMIT (( s
-- allowing them to begin the retraining 16 program, yes.
17 MR. KEMPER:
Ju'at one point, if I may?
18 Dr. Tufts seid 13, that was the first group for the 19 first training program and a similar interview process went on 20 for the next group.
21 MR. SMITH:
And the third group also.
1 22 DR. TUFTS:
And the third groJp also.
I 23 MR. KEMPER:
So the --
24 MR. SMITH:
The process continued for all of them.
25 MR. KEMPERt So the same criteria was used across the Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628 4888
18 1
board with respect to whom we would penait to go into the 2
train'.ng program.
And one, the interview by Dick; two, the 3
results of the security investigation; and then a review by RHR 4
as to whether the fellows had the ability or the psychological 5
set-up to be able to be part of this training program and see 6
that there would be beneficial attributes come out as a result i
7 of the training program.
8 MR. LIEBERMAN:
At this time, you have the
[
]
9 observations of your security investigators concerning the 10 candor of various individuals?
1 11 MR. SMITH:
Yes.
12 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Okay.
13 MR. SMITH:
I believe the answer is yes.
I have i
14 received nothing subsequent to this from our investigators.
15 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Okay.
l 16 In the information that the company provided NRC, 17 there were a number of situations where the investigators 18 indicated that the operators wera, lass than candid during the 19 investigation.
)
20 I was wondering how that information was f actored
?
l 21 into the process?
j 22 MR. SMITH:
I would say that it was not a factor.
\\
J 23 Those comments by the investigators were very subjectivo.
I f
i l
24 would say that was not a factor.
i i
25 MR. LIEBERMAN:
How about with RHR7 l
i Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 I
[
t 19 i
1 MR. SMITH:
RHR was not privy to the investigations, 2
the security investigations.
3 DR. COOK:
We found the individuals very candid in 4
our interviews.
5 MR. SMITH:
Which is not unreasonable because they 6
are interviews for two different purposes.
7 DR. TUFTS:
Probably after a period of about 10 j
8 minutes, we found most of the individuals welcomed the 9
opportunity to sit down with someone 'ike ourselves and get 10 some things off their chest.
Get some different perspectives 11 to kind of hear from us, what we were hearing from them, kind 12 of replay the event.
13 We found them to be cuite candid, i
14 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Do you think that if these 15 individuals were re-interviewed -- I am not Suggesting that i
4 16 they should be re-intervic,wed -- but if they were re-17 interviewed, do you think that they would be more candid, now?
l i
18 MR. SMITH:
More candid if they were re-interviewed 19 by our own security invostigators, for what they porceived as f
20 perhaps criminal action?
i 21 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Or not complying with company
[
s j
22 procedures?
J 23 MR. SMITH:
If they were interviewed by me, they f
21 would be condid, end if they were interviewod by Dr. 'tuf ts they
]
25 would be candid.
I Heritage Reporting Corporation i
(202) G28-4888 t
1 l
2
20 i
Again, if they were interviewed by security 2
investigators for, what they perceived as criminal, as a 3
criminal invastigation, I am not sure.
4 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Okay.
5 MR. KANE:
Just for the record, during the RHR 6
interviews, did that result in any one being screened out of
?
the program?
0 MR. SMIT 18:
It did not.
9 MR. KANE:
Could you describe the population of 10 people who held licenses at the time of the shutdown, and in 11 terms of your interviews and not I am not talking about i
12 numbers, but I am talking about those that were excluded for 13 some reason or another from any of the three separate -- I am i
14 searching for a word --
interviews, investigation 0, for entry 15 into the program?
16 MR. SMITH:
Of the operators that were routinely 17 standing watch or licensed as operators before the shutdown
!?
order, or at the time of the shutdown order, the decision was 19 made to replace the shift superintendents and that was six 20 senior reactor operators.
21 One senior reactor operator left the company and one 22 reactor operator asked to be reassigned and is still with the j
23 company but not in a licensed position and one senior reactor 24 operator is presently suspended from operations for medical 25
- reasons, i
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) o28-4888 I
i I
21 1
There were also two staff officers with senior 2
licenses that were replaced in the management chain.
I 3
mentioned the operations superintendent and the operations 4
engineer.
5 And, of course, the plant manager, who had previously 6
been licensed.
7 As we commenced the training program, we made it 8
clear to the operators ttat *his was a voluntary training 9
program and that they were free to opt out of it at any time 10 and be reassigned within Philadelphia Electric Company either 11, at Peach Bottom or elsewhere in the system, if they desired.
12 So this was a course for which they were volunteers, 13 and I think that was tne of our criteria for their continuing.
14 Now, during the training course, their performance was P
15 evaluated by plant staff primarily from Mr. Polaski, although 1,
16 myself on occasion and by the instructors to evaluate their 17 participation and attitude changes.
18 And I would like, at this time, to call on Mr. Thomas 19 to discuss briefly the c~ourse.
20 MR. THOMAS:
From the period of July 6 to November 21 24th, we conducted three five-week and two-day programs, the 22 27-day programs.
23 The training pregrams had, as thnir purpose, 24 acquainting people and increasing their understanding in four i
25 different areast number one, the area of personal insight l
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 m
22 1
that is, increasing their own self-awareness, knowledge of 2
themselves, some of their perconality preferences, recognition i
3 of their attitudes and the roots for those attitudes.
4 And sr.Ondly, an expanded awareness and understanding 5
of interpersonal dynamics, how their behavior impacted other 6
people and indeed, other people's behavior affected them and 7
how they reacted and interacted.
8 Thirdly, an increased awareness of group dynamics:
9 how they worked as members of teams; what the skills and i
10 knowledge needed to function more effectively as the member of 11 a high-performance team; what would be necessary and what they 12 would had to develop, i
13 And then finally a unit on dealing with differences j
14 in which we encouraged them and worked with them to increase 15 thotr understanding of conflict utilization, conflict 16 management and working in the larger organization.
17 Throughout the 27 days, the staff and management 18 representatives conducted observational assessments.
And the 19 staff conducted a unit assessment, unit-by-unic, taking note of 20 attitudinal changes as evidenced by behavioral changes: such 21 things as speaking more for themselves, as opposed to speaking 22 for the total group.
23 I don't want to call it, covering up for each other, 24 but being able to confront each other when people did not agree 25 with each other. And understanding the difference between 1
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888'
23 1
working as a member of a team and yet, still'being able to have 2
your own individual viewpoint and to stand up for that 3
viewpoint.
4 Those are a number of things.
We also assessed their 5
participation throughout.
We asked individuals to make 6
self-assessments.throughout the program on how they thought 7
they were achieving the goals, and we particularly utilized t
8 videotape reviews of their participation in the course.
And 9
throughout we would be able to make evaluations of what we saw L
10 happening through the five-and-one-half weeks.
11 MR. SMITH:
Mr. Polaski was a frequent observer in 12 the class.
Did you have anything else to add on that, Fred?
i 13 MR. POLASKI:
All I could say is that I was there t
l 14 almost every day for at least four hours a day. And I did an 15 evaluation of both programs, and I used several criteria that 16 we were looking for, for the operators to be able to say at the 17 end that they had completed the program successfully.
18 Some of them are right in line with the objectives I
J i
1 19 that Mr. Thomas outlined.
It would be a better understanding t
20 of themselves and learning how to work with other people, both 21 on a one-on-one basis and within a group.
22 To see that they had accepted that their behavior
]
23 prior to the shutdown was wrong and that they agreed that l
24 change was needed.
l 25 That they were open-minded to this change and were i
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 i
1
24 1
willing to work with management.
That they could take a 2
positive approach to problem solving.
That they had a 3
professional attitude and understood the expectations required 4
for nuclear workers, and that they were willing to be leaders 5
at Peach Bottom in spreading high expectations and standards 6
throughout other work groups.
7 And also to accept that evaluation of their 8
performance was part of being a professional nuclear worker.
9 At the beginning of the programs the behavior 10 displayed by most of the operators, to varying degrees was 11 somewhat defensive, nonparticipatory and tight-lipped.
12 At first they didn't fully accept their involvemen'.
13 with the problems and they did not trust management.
They 14 seemed to be very self-centered and they did not know how to 15 deal with other people and problems that were not of a 16 technical nature.
17 And there was some thought on their part, that they 18 did not want to change or were not willing to accept higher 19 industry standards.
20 This varied from person to person.
But as we went 21 through the program and the instructors worked with them and I 22 spent a lot of time there, not only observing but 23 participating, and talking to them on an individual basis, by
)
24 the end of the program they had met all of the criteria that I L
25 had established and conveyed to them that were necessary.
\\
Herit ge Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
)
l 25 1
They had accepted that their behavior was wrong.
2 They did not go around proclaiming it to everybody because they 3
still had an inherent fear of losing their job, but they had 4
accepted that what they did was wrong.
5 And they had accepted that change was necessary and 6
they were willing to work within the system, at Peach Bottom, i
7 to have those changes occur.
And a belief was starting to 8
build within them in these improvements.
9 They showed a willingness to work with management and 10 had a positive attitude toward fixing problems.
They also have 11 accepted that problems cannot be fixed over night and that i
1 12 there is a lot to be done but they are willing to work with the 13 system and help develop a positive attitude at Peach Bottom I
i 14 towards solving the problems.
15 They have also displayed an ability to work well with 16 other groups, within Peach Bottom, even when there has been 17 difficulties, they take a very positive and professional l
]
18 approach to it.
i j
19 There are some otner things that have shown that they 20 have developed a professional attitude.
Prior to the shutdown, 21 we had provided the operators with what we call, professional 22 attire, that we wanted them to wear and some had resisted that.
23 After the shutdown and during the training program, l
l 24 on their own, without any pressure from management, they l
25 started wearing that clothing to show that they really felt U
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
26 1
like they were professionals and that is what they wanted to 2
be.
3 The atmosphere in the control room has changed 4
between themselves and working with other people.
There is no 5
longer any confrontations with other groups.
It is a very 6
calm, controlled atmosphere.
And they take a very positive 7
approach to their job.
8 The other thing thrt I find very interesting that 9
because of the actions of the operators in the control room in 10 this area, I have been these more positive attitudes, 11 professional attitudes begin to spread to the non-licensed 12 operators that they deal with a lot ano this was before they 13 had gone into any trair.ing program.
14 And that was reflected to me by comments from my 15 licensed operators, they said, we are really trying hard to 16 work with some other groups, but they don't understand us yet.
17 So that has shown to me that they have taken this to heart and 18 are willing to do the things that are necessary to perform at 19 the standards that are expected of them.
20 (Continued on the next page.)
21 22
- l l
23 j
i 24 i
25 l
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
^
l I
27 1
2 MR. SMITH:
You laid out a sat of criteria there.
3 Could you tell us how those were developed?
Who developed the 4
criteria?
How were they put together for the measurement of 5
success of the program?
6 MR. KANE:
It is a very difficult criteria to 7
quantify concretely.
The criteria were developed as we worked 8
to develop the program, and in discussions between myself and 9
Mr. Smith as to what we expected of operators in the control 10 room and the things we wanted to see changed.
Some of the 11 criteria developed because of problems we saw with operators.
12 They had a very strong resistance to evaluation.
We felt that 13 they had to gain an understanding that evaluation of 14 performance was something that happens all of the time.
15 MR. SMITH:
I take it from what you have said that 16 you use these criteria to measure the effectiveness of the 17 training program?
18 MR. POLASKIt Yes; it was also built into the program 19 that these were the things that we were trying to achieve.
A 20 lot of the program, as Bill mentioned was talked about from 21 their standpoint was interpersonal relationships, working with 22 a team, conflict development, but we did it in a context a lot 23 of times of actual problems at Peach Bottom.
It was not 24 strictly in an artificial area.
They developed team skills by 25 addressing problems that concerned them -- what concerns they Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
A 28 1
had with management and conflicts that had been there.
2 So we did a lot of work 'in those areas while we were 3
developing their skills in these areas.
4 MR. THOMAS:
If I might add to that, one of the 5
things that we could observe, then, would be their real-time 6
interactions, for example, with management, when Mr.. Smith, Mr.
7 Cotton, and Mr. Polaski came in and had roundtable discussions 0
with them.
We would see evidence three, four weeks into the 9
program of active utilization of the skills that they had been 10 learning in the class, and the attitudes changing in terms of 11 just their behavior and their way of dealing with upper 12 management and communicating.
13 MR. LIEBERMAN:
The attitudes that were 14 changing -- are those generalities, or does each individual 15 operator fael that their 59havior might have been unacceptable 16 and part of the shutdown?
17 MR. SMITH:
Jim, if I could jump in, it relates back 18 to the question that you asked earlier.
I am absolutely 19 convinced from what I have gotten personally from the 20 operators, and what I have gotten from the other people who 21 have worked with tho operators that each of those cporators 22 accepts.that what he did before was inappropriate behavior.
If 23 we would sit down and talk back and forth, he and I, we could i
24 discuss that.
I'm just absolutely convinced that they 1
25 recognized that that behavior was inappropriate.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
29 1
MR. LIEBERMAN:
Obviously that is really the 2
foundation and the most critical issue.
I don't think there is 3
any question --
4 MR. POLASKI:
I agree fully.
Every one of them to 5
the man met the criteria established --
6 MR. SMITH:
During the discussions in the course,
'7 some of them would bring that subject up and would say, "What I 8
was doing was not appropriate.
It was not acceptable.
I was l
9 wrong."
Not all of them would, but I am telling you that I 10 think each and every one of them would sit down and tell you 11 privately, yes.
12 MR. BOGER:
When you say "inappropriate,"
do you 13 include within that "unsafe" -- that what they were doing was 14 unsafe?
15 MR. SMITH:
Well, I think they realized that it was 16 unsafe.
Yes, I think so.
Not just that they were violating a 17 written rule, but that there was a reason for that rule.
It l
18 was inappropriate whether it
- ras a written ru.a or not.
Yes, I 19 think so.
20 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Did you get into the issue of not 21 only whether the individual might have been involved with the i
22 particular behavior, but whether the person observed others j
23 being in that frame of inattentiveness and not raising it to I
l 24 the attention of others?
I
^
25 MR. SMITH:
I and I'll defer to the 7eople who 1
l Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
30 1
spend more time with them in the course --
but I think there 2
was an attitude of "live and let live."
"I am responsible for 3
myself, but not the others," even, unfortunately, on behalf of 4
the supervisors.
But I think that attitude was overcome.
5 MR. POLASKI:
I have seen developed a strong attitude 6
of unity among them, not to the point where they want to keep
?
people out, but they really care about each other and their own 8
performance and helping each other become better operators and 9
have a better attitude.
One of the things that was discussed 10 as a topic in the course was what was called re-entry, and how 11 they were going to go back into the control room and how they 12 were going to hiive to work together to maintain the skills, the 13 good behavior, the attitude that they had developed in the 14 program.
And they ree' 71 zed that when they went back, they l
15 were going to have to do a lot of that themselves.
I have seen 16 that in the control room and their interactions with each other 17 to continue that good behavior and attitude.
j i
18 MR. KANE:
Let me ask it in a different way.
It l
19 seems to me that there are two aspects that you are trying to i
20 get out here that are important issues and relevant to what we 21 are talking today.
One is the recognition that what was going 22 on was not proper.
That is an individual thing, certainly, but 23 there is the issue that Jim raised, which is really more of a 24 collective issue.
Although I would not engage in it myself, I 25 being an operator, is there recognition now that those Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
31 1
individuals, if they saw an improper activity taking place, 2
that it is their responsibility not only to do it themselves, 3
but to take the action to make sure that others are not?
Those 4
are two points.
5 But the question is -- and I think we can probably 6
all agree that those ure both proper -- but I am trying to get 7
an understanding of how you now understand that that will take 8
place, and you are assured that it will take place, if it does 9
happen, for those operators that you are going to put back on i
10 or will soon shift to power operation again as authvrised.
11 MR. SMITH:
Well, I have no example of their doing 12 that, fortunately, but I am convinced that if they saw 13 inappropriate behavior, they would not accept it.
I would 14 assume that they would first use.the supervision on the shift 15 to try to correct the problem.
But there is no doubt in my 16 mind that they would come to me, and if unsatisfied at that 4
17 point, would come to you.
I don't think that they would l
18
, accept I think that none of them are willing to get the a
19 plant in such a condition that this happens again.
It has been 20 too painful to each of them individually.
They wen't le't it
(
21 happen again.
They will tell you if I won't do it.
i j
22 MR. KANE:
What I'm trying to understand is where you 23 derive that assurance from.
Is that from interviews?
From j
24 completion of the program?
What is it that you could describe 25 which forms the basis for your confidence that that will not Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
32 j
1 take place?
2 MR. LIEBERMAN:
It's easy for someone to say that.
I 3
guess the question is, why should you believe it, or why do you 4
believe it?
5 MR. THOMAS:
Well, I have a few exemples from the 6
last four weeks at the simulator in the team training observing 7
how the teams workod there.
The previous behavior would have 8
been if someone, for example, an RO was missing something or 9
not attending to a certain procedure, other people might sit 10 back and not pay a lot of attention to that -- thdt's his job; 11 he should take care of it.
1 12 In fact, what we saw happening is that the people who 13 were in support roles, like the Unit 3 operator in the 14 scenarios, would call out to the attention of someone if he was 15 missing something.
That, to me, is the kind of behavior now --
16 we are talking about a slightly different area of.
17 responsibility there, but it is the same kind of thing.
18 Rather than just sitting back and letting someone else fail, 19 they are recognizing that they do have a responsibility to the 20 team that is running that control room.
1 21 MR. SMITH:
Would they have done that prior to the 22 shutdown?
23 MR. LIEBERMAN:
As you pointed out, previously, in 24 the simulator, they didn't do that.
25 MR. KEMPER:
I think when we get to the simulator Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
33 1
part of the training and the criteria for that, and what not, 2
this team play, this development of this a.titude, I think we 3
have seen tremendous change in that area.
Fred, who has 4
operated before, has seen the change between the way it was in 5
the control room an.d the way were are seeing it up at the 6
simulator.
It has been very gratifying for us to see this team 7
play and to see that they want to all be at that same standard 8
of excellence.
They att not letting the other fellow fall back 9
behind.
As Bill was pointing out, they are jiving thnm and 10 getting back up.
11 I am absolutely convinced from the feedback and from 12 my observations and where we are today that they will not 13 accept anything but the level of standards that they all know 14 that the should be at.
And if somebody starts to step aside 15 from that, they now know to speak up, and they will speak up.
16 They won't have it.
17 The other thing that has been a major change has been 18 in our shift managers.
The shift manager and that new culture 19 is developing it, promoting it, and supporting it where it was 20 not there before.
They have a roll model now that tells them 21 what is expected of them, and they understand that, as we see 22 it beautifully up on the simulator.
It's just a tremendous 23 difference of operation.
When the plant's in the shutdown mode 24 here, you can't see it as well.
But when you get up under the 25 dynamics of what goes on in the simulator, you can really see Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
)
34 1
the same people, but by God, a different team.
I'll tell you, 2
it's just beautiful the way this thing has developed.
3 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Mr. Kemper, have there been 4
procedures issued addressing the question of advising others 5
concerning unacceptable performance?
6 MR. KEMPER:
As part of our A procedures --
7 MR. SMITH:
We are reviling the A-7 procedure, which 8
is our watch standing guidance, in effect, into a much more 9
comprehensive watch stander's manual.
As I said earlier, that 10 has not yet been completed.
But that is being revised, and 11 when it is completed, there will be extensive training on it.
12 Now, I am jumping ahead a little bit of my story.
13 But efter the conclusion of the course, we realized that what 14 while we were developing interpersonal relations, 15 communications skills, etcetera, and we had talked to them 16 about some specific operator items such as, "What are the roles 17 and responsibilities of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, tho 18 Institute of Nuclear Power Operations?"
However, we had never 19 really sat down with them and said, "What are your individual 20 responsibilities as a licensed operator?
What does that piece 21 of paper really mean to you, and what are the regulations 22 behind it?"
23 We developed a training module since the course which I
24 has now been given -- to three or four of the sections?
l 25 MR. POLASKI:
Three.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
35 1
MR. SMITH:
Three.
In any case, it will be given to 2
all of the six sections, which I think answers your last 3
question -- specifically discussing with them their licensed t
4 responsibilities.
5 MR. LIEBERMAN:
And that will be put into your 6
procedures -- A-7 --
7 MR. SMITH:
The operations -- the Watch Stander,'s 8
Manual -- WSM.
9 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Okay.
You mentioned that this has 10 been very painful for the operators.
11 MR. SMITH:
Yes.
i 12 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Painful in what way?
Have you taken
)
13 disciplinary action?
i 14 MR. SMITH:
For one thing, they have been twisting 15 slowly in the wind since the 31st of March, and are still 16 waiting for a determination as to what action will be taken.
L 17 They don't know whether they will be allowed to participate in 18 the restart, or will have their licenses withdrawn.
It's a 19 very unpleasant situation for them.
20 MR. LIEBERMAN:
But has the company taken any --
21 MR. SMITH:
The next step that I was going to 22 mention, after the training course, or on the conclusion of the J
23 training course, the company issued a letter of reprimand to j
24 each of the operators -- a written letter of reprimand.
In our 25 disciplinary system, that is a relatively high step.
We j
i i
Heritage Reporting Corpolation (202) 629-4886
36 1
normally start with cital warnings, and work our way up to 2
written warnings.
A written reprimand is a third or fourth 3
level disciplinary step.
4 Each of the operators received a written letter of 5
reprimand for his previous behavior in the control room.
Each 6
of the operators accepted that letter, and had it placed in his 7
personal file without recourse to the employee grievance 8
system.
And that, in itself, is a significant statement.
The 9
issuance of 27, I believe, letters of reprimand without any one 10 of them using his employee grievance system to complain about 11 it was a definite indication of an attitude change.
That was 12 the discipline that was taken with those licensed operators.
13 During the summer, two reactor operators -- one a 14 senior-licensed and ene a ju.ior-licensed operator from Peach 15 Bottom, and similarly from Limerick, got together and developed 16 an Operator Professional Performance Statement -- a code of 17 conduct.
We called it the "Commitment to Excellence 18 S tatement.. "
This was discussed wit,h the operators, and each 19 licensed operator has signed that commitment to excellence 20 statement.
21 On the conclusion of the training period, 22 psychological interviews were again conducted by RHR to see if 23 we could meastre any attitudinal changes.
Let me refer again 24 to Dr. Tufts.
25 MR. TUFTS:
Our sense was that during all three of Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
37 1
the training experiences, each participant was impacted upon, 2
but the impact was gaite variable.
One person was affected 3
more than the other.
One of the things that we were looking 4
for was:
how was Person A's attitude regarding himself, 5
management, the organization, the situation that they find 6
themselves in?
How were their attitudes affected along those 7
lines?
8 By and large, we saw a change in how they viewed 9
those situations.
For some, it was appreciable, for others, it 10 was only slight.
I think a surprise to those of us who 11 interviewed them, some who probably were perhaps a little 12 resistant to go into the training appeared to be those 13 sometimes affected the most in terms of their attitude change.
14 Another thing that happened is that I think a number of them 15 came away knowing themselves a little bit better -- more 16 appreciative of how them impact on other people, knowing a 17 little better how they impact occa subordinates and peers.
I 18 think as a group, they tended not to be particularly 19 reficctive, not particularly insightful about themselves.
They 20 has been good workers, or good implementors and good engineers, 21 but not individuals who would ponder about what motivated them, 1
22 what were their drives, what they liked and what they didn't 23 like.
24 I think for many of them, as a result of the training 25 program, they became a little more reflective about themselves, Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
=
38 1
a little bit more questioning about themselves.
I think as a 2
result of that, they were able perhaps to begin to change some 3
of their behaviors.
Not all of them -- and believe me, it was 4
quite variable.
But I think part1cularly with the first group 5
and the second group more than the third group, there was some 6
impact.
7 I think one of the reasons for the impact was that, 8
particularly with the first group, you had many men who were 9
operating with some fear in them.
They were afraid.
They were 10 afraid for their jobs.
I think that that was part of their i
11 motivation to take advantage of this experience.
For all of I
12 them, unlike maybe in some other crganizations where I consult, 13 for all of them, this kind of experience was really a 14 first-time thing.
They came away kind of surprised at it, 4
15 surprised about it, and surprised about the impact, i
1 l
16 There was -- again, it was variable.
But it was i
17 impactful.
Joe, do you want to add to that?
i
)
L i
18 MR. COOK Again, these are generalizations, but we l
19 found that tnose individuals who might be categorized as having I
20 a more negative attitude towards management or other
]
21 professional organizations were the most significantly 22 impacted.
l 23 MR. TUFTS:
I think that for a number of them, you l
I 24 had quite a bit of anger inside of them.
They were angry at 25 either themselves, or angry at management, or angry at the 1
i
)
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 i
l i
39 1
company for a number of reasons.
I think as a result of some 2
of the experiences -- some of the information that has been 3
shared with them during the training -- that some of.that anger 4
had been. defused.
I think for some of them, prior to the 5
training, there was what you would call a little bit of 6
depression, a little bit of feeling down.
I think, again, 7
through information they received through training, I think 8
some of that was addressed, and we say perhaps slightly less of 9
that also.
10 MR. LIEBERMAN:
But there is still some of it?
11 MR. TUFTS:
It's variable.
I think there were some 12 wito were still a little bit angry and some who were still down 13 on themselves or down about the situation'here.
But by an 14 large, for the majority, I would say that those issues were 15 impacted upon.
16 I think part of it was that for many of them, this 17 experience was so different from what many of them had 18 experienced before, and the newness of it, and the difference 19 from what they had experienced before itself was impactful.
It 20 was like opening up some doors.
Some of them were even angry 21 at themselves because they had been unaware of so many 22 behaviors in the past.
All of a sudden the light went on, and 21 they were glad that they hcd discovered some of these things 24 about themselves.
25 MR. LIEBERMAN:
So you really believe that there has Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 b_
40 1
been in fact a chango in attuude?
2 MR. TUFTS:
When we i aterviewed th61, which was a l
3 week or two after the experience, at that moment in timo -- we 1
4 had not seen them since -- but after each training program we 5
interviewed them.
Our impression is that for all of them, t
6 there had been, in varying degrees, impact on certain attitudes 7
and views that they had towards themselves, the organization, f
8 work hero, etcotora, etcotera.
How lasting it is going to be, 9
I can't say.
But at the time we interviewed them, there was l
t 10 some impact.
The gentleman in the table, I think, maybe speak-11 to the lasting effect, the generalizability of the effect.
But I
i 12 at that particular time, there was an effect.
13 MR. BOGER:
And the timing of those interviews was t
14 after the completion of the twenty-seven day course?
[
15 MR. TUFTS:
We tried to see them within -- we did see 16 them within a two-week period subsequent to the completion of 17 the course -- all three groups.
18 MR. BOGER:
Is thera a follow-on planned?
[
I 19 MR. SMITH:
We will come back and talk again.
- Again, i
20 I'm driving ahead of the story, but wo are also planning to do i
21 some of this type of training as part of our continuing 22 training program for our operators.
I think it would be I
23 necessary for us to sample the long-term effect of it.
24 MR. KEMPER:
We intend to, right up to the first
(
25 year, to take an attitude survey slice throughout the operating i
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
r 1
41 1
organization, throughout the engineering organ'ization, and l
2 throughout the support organization, just to see where our 3
morale is, where our productivity is, what our quality attitude 4
is.
So we intend to do that for the entire nuclear department.
5 over and above that, as a continuum, as part of our training 6
program, as we go.down to make sure that we keep this level up 7
that we have established as a result of this training program, 8
as part of the training program we are going to instill this 9
attitudinal training in each and every one of our modules so l
t 10 that we have it.
1
]
11 We see the effect of it.
We were very pleased, not J
12 being experts in this area, listening to the folks that are in 13 this area, with respect to the psychology and the psychological
]
14 impact and the sociological impact.
We have seen great l
l 15 results, and we want to make sure that we keep that level that j
16 we have.
While we are shut down, we want to keep that so that 17 when we go back up again, we have maintaineu that attitude.
So 1
i 18 it will be part of our continuing training program.
We will 19 continue to conduct interviews, continue to stay on top of this i
20 so that we get t'eedback and we don't operate in a vacuum, which i
21 we were before the shutdown.
i l
22 I really believe -- I'd like Dick to really wrap this i
23 up -- just kind of walk through what the criteria was that he l
24 had, what the criteria was that we went through with RHR, what i
25 the criteria was that we went through, that Fred went through,
)
I I
Heritage i.eporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
1 42 1
and we went through with the training program.
When we wrap 2
that all up, what did Dick finally do, and what did we finally 1
3 collectively agree on as a result of the shutdown, what we went 8
4 through, and then what was the net result of all of that.
5 MR. SMITH:
Well, af ter the interviews, of course, 6
the process continues.
We have not started up, of course, and j
7 therefore all we are saying now is that all the indicators that i
8 we have on these operators is that they will be satisfactory
[
9 for the rescart.
That doesn't mean that there couldn't be l
10 something that comes up in the future.
Ws are continuing to 11 monitor their performance in the control room, on watch by 12 myself and other plant management.
We have done the team J
13 training and tae simulator at Limerick.
4 14 As ycu are aware, each of the groups has gone through I
l 15 at least one week of team training, closely monitored, 100 i
16 percent monitored by Mr. Polaski, and this has been an l
17 evaluated team-training program.
Some of the groups have gone t
I 18 through two weeks of the training, and some have tone through
(
t 19 ten days of the training.
It depends on the various groups.
I 1
20 But each of the groups has been evaluated in detail in the L
21 simulator because, since we are not operating, it is our best 22 environment to see them in a dynamic situation.
Wo have been i
j 23 pleased with their performance in the simulator to date, but we i
24 will continue to watch them in training programs and in the i
25 control room.
Heritage Reporting Corporation 1
(202) 628-4888
43 1
Now, with those specific steps having gone past, we 2
ended up with this list of reactor operators and senior reactor 3
operators who we would, at this date, intend to use for the 4
4 restart.
Of the senior reactor operators listed in the first 5
group, the first six will be the shift supervisors on each of 6
the six shift sections.
The next three are other qualified 7
senior reactor operators.
The next group of senior reactor 8
operators pending are those presently-licensed reactor 9
oporators who passed the NRC-administered exam in October, 10 1987, and who are awaiting the results of that examination.
So 1) that would be the population of senior reactor operators.
12 We will, on startup, have six shift supervisors, one 13 for each section.
If the others are qualified, we will have 14 two on each section.
Our goal is to have two supervisors, one 15 a lead supervisor, and one an assistant supervisor in each 16 section.
Based on the evaluations received from RHR, based on 17 our own observations, we have teamed those top six senior 18 reactor operators with an appropriate shift manager to make a i
19 management team.
r 20 The reactor operators are listed in the next group, 21 and finally, I have listed the two men who have just passed the 22 NRC-administered examination in October, and until they have 1
23 gained operating experience, will only be able to be used on 24 the shutdown plant.
25 MR. KANE:
Okay.
Of the processes that we talked Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 i
44 1
about before -- the three inps's to you assessment 2
MR. SMITH:
Yes?
3 MR. KANE:
-- in going down this list of operators, 4
could you describe who has gone through the entire process ar.d S
who has been excluded from part of the process, and why?
It's 6
a convoluted question.
If I need to explain it, maybe we can i
7 go off the record for a moment, j
8 MR. EMITH:
If the steps we talked about, starting l
9 with my individual interview with the operators, down through 10 the continued observation of them in the control room, has
(
11 been gone through by all of the operators on this page with the 12 exception of the reactor operators for the shutdown plant only.
13 MR. KANE:
So that is your screening process?
14 MR. SMITH:
All of the steps --
15 MR. KANE:
You have interviewed all of these f
16 individuals?
17 MR. SMITH:
Let me start again.
We provided several l
18 items that each of the operators has gone throught a plant 19 manager's interview -- and I have personally interviewed all of f
20 these operators including Mr. Angle and Mr. Sheridan, although f
21 at that time they were not licensed, so the discussion was to a i
22 different point and to a different depth.
A review of the l
23 company's investigation
-4 of course, Mr. Angle and Mr.
l 24 Sheridan were not operators in a control room, so they were not 25 part of the company's investigation.
All have been through e
i i
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 i
t n
45 l
1 psychological interviews by RHR, both before the course and 2
after the course.
3 All of them were volunteers for the retraining 4
program.
All of them had their performance in the training 5
y/ogram evalu'ated by plant staff and by the instructors.
All 6
of them received a letter or reprimand, again, with the
't exception of Mr. Angle and Mr. Sheridan, who were not licensed 8
operators.
All of them, incivding Mr. Angle and Mr. Sheridan, 9
have signed the commitment to excellence statement, and their
)
10 performance is continuing to be evaluated, j
11 MR. KANE:
While we are on the letters of reprimand, i
i 12 were those general, or were those personalized?
[
i i
13 MR. SMITH:
They were general letters personalized 5
j 14 only as necessary, depending on the person's involvement in the i
l 15 control room.
By that I mean that there were some operators
)
l 16 who had only been licensed for a few weeks prior to the f
17 shutdown.
Their letter of reprimand was written to point out q
18 that they had only been in the control room for a short period l
I l
l 19 of time.
There were some operaters -- those that took the exam j
8 j
20 this fall that had not been in the control room for a long
{
t I
21 period before the shutdown -- and their letters were i
k 22 personalized that it was for inappropriate behavior prior to a
23 their going into training.
Otherwise, the lettere were the L
24 same.
i 5
25 MR. LIEBERMAN:
What is a letter of reprimand?
Does l
i Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
.&n
.--__c,,
--n.-,,
l 46 I
that stay in the file for five years?
I l
2 MR. SMITH:
No.
l 3
MR. LIEBERMAN:
Porever?
4 MR. SMITH:
Yes, forever.
Let me say that it does
}
5 not have an automatic withdrawal time period on it.
6 MR. LIEBERMAN:
What is the significance of it?
If 7
an individual receives a letter of reprimand, does the same i
8 type thing that causes the letter to be issued in the first j
9 place -- does that cause the next level of discipline, or is 10 that re-evaluated in the merits?
What happens?
i 7
11 MR. SMITH:
Well, let me say that in a routine j
12 situation, if a person had a letter of reprimand for some i
13 particular type of offense and committed that type of offense 14 again, it would escalate the disciplinary policy.
Let ma say r
]
15 in this case, the letter of reprimand for inappropriate l
3 16 behavior in the control room -- that type of behavior is 17 already at the top of the list.
So the punishment would not be 18 escalated.
The punishment will be severe in any case.
[
t 13 Am I making myself clear?
If the situation was an 4
i 10 absence. and the letter of reprimand being in the file would l
1 t
21 mean that the punishment for the next absence would be more
(
3 22 severe.
.But if the next inappropriate action is sleeping in i
23 the control room, there will be an ultimate disciplinary action
[
f j
24 whether there is a letter of reprimand in the file or not.
4 j
25 MR. LIEBERMAN:
And the eperators all appreciate I
Heritage Reporting Corporation j
(202) 628-4888 I
i
- ~
l 47 1
that?
2 MR. S!!ITH:
The operators appreciate that 3
inappropriat,e behavior is just not going to be accepted.
I 4
don't think that t.here is any question in anyone's mind on 1
5 that.
6 MR. KANE:
So if I understand, I w[s trying to get an 7-assesement of where a 'etter of reprimand fits -- one step 8
Above it and one step below it.
9 MR. SMITH:
One step below a lettet of reprimand r
i 10 would be a letter of warning.
A letter of warning is placed in
[
11 the Individual's local file, but noi in hio permanent file.
12 And the next sttp above it would be a suspension. s 1
13 MR. KANE:
In that process, was there any attempt to i
1 3
14 judge the lovel of culpability of the operatore in the 15 reprimand process?
16 MP. SMITH:
No we felt in reading the interviews by e
17 our claims security group, that the behavior of all of them was l
)
18 anacceptable.
It was too difficult to say if it was darker at 1
19 night or lighter at night.
It was all unacceptable.
We really I
20 did not want to -- one of the issues we have had with them is' 21 that some or them would like us to agree with them that their 22 level of.;ulpability was not as great as the others'.
We are 23 trying to say that there is a line.
Once you cross ov9r, the 24 behavior is unacceptsble.
25 MR. KEMPER:
That's a very important criteria that's Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
i r
48 i
i stated.
That's really fundamentally what it'n all. about.
It's i
2 not a level -- it's the fact that they'croso Once you 3
cross ovar, how far you cross over ir unacceptat
' They.
[
?
4 recognize *, hat now.
t 5
MR. LIERERMAN:
I'd like to ask a folicw-up of that.
6 I presume you had standards' of performance,. either written or i
r 7
unwritten, prior to th,e order.
Did the operators' appreciate l
l 8
that their conduct was unacceptable as individuals, or did the 9
operators take the view that they were just part of a, I guess 1
10 you use the term "culture" -- that they really weren't 11 individually culpable.
They were just there.
l 12 MR. SMITH:
Mr. Lieberman, I of course was not there i
.I 13 either.
So I am making some suppositions based on the l
f 14 discussions that I have had with the operators and vlth other 15 people out here.
But I'm convinced that ' hey knew what was i
16 acceptable and what was not acceptable.
They also knew what t
i i
i 17 was permitted and what was not permitted.
If we had sat them l
18 down and given them a written exem, or, in fact, when your 4
19 inspectcrs came into the control room, they knew what was l
20 permitted and what was not permitted by the book f
21 But they also knew what was accepted when someone was 22 not watching over their shoulders.
As human beings normally i
23 will do, they performed to the standards that they were being l
24 hela accountable to.
25 MR. KEMPER:
It's fundamentally why the chift i
l l
2 i
i Horitage Reporting Corporation I.
(202) 628-4888 I
I
_______,,_,_-.-__,m_.,_,_.
.-~.._,J
49 r
1 superintendents were removed.
They were the roll models, and i
2 they permitted.it, and that's unacceptable.
3 MR. SMITH:
One of the things that we are trying to 4
do, and I think :ie have achieved it -- but we're going to have 5
to keep watching in the future -- we're trying to get them to 6
understand within themselves what ~1s acceptable and what is 7
not, not because it's-writter,dowr., but because that's 8
necessary for safety, because they have a license with our 9
government which they have ascribed to, that they know what it i
10 is, and that they feel what it is.
Not just to take an* exam, 11 but to live it.
And I think we have gotten that across.
12 Really, time will tell.
l 13 If I could make some concluding comments --
i 14 MR. BOGER:
It appears that the list includes 15 twenty-seven --
16 MR. SMITH:
Yes.
17 MR. BOGER:
Were letters of reprimand given to anyone 18 else that does not appear on the list?
19 MR. SMITH:
Was other disciplinary action taken?
20 Yes.
As I mentioned, the three in the management chain were
(
21 transferred back to other assignments and takon out of the 22 progression line that they were in.
Clearly, there was severe 23 disciplinary action.
The six shift superintendents were taken 24 off watch.
I he:ve written a letter to the NRC revoking their 25 licenses.
I'm sure that they agree with me that that was sever i
Heritage Repor* lng Corporation (202) 648-4888 i
50 1
disciplinary action.
2 As far as letter of reprimand -- no, no other letters 3
of reprimand were written.
But I am sure that any one of the 4
people I have mentioned would trade the action that was taken 5
for a letter of reprimand.
6 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Do you know what the operators have 7
has a view towards how the company has treated the people who 8
are no longer going to be on shift work?
9 MR. SMITH:
Say the last part of the question again?
10 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Do you know how the operators view 11 the actions you have taken concerning the superintendents in 12 the management affairs?
13 (Continued on next page) 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
51 1
MR. SMITH:
No, I really don't.
2-would you care to comment on that, Mr. Polaski?
3 MR. POLASKI:
I think as far (.s totally generally, 4
because different people have different views of it.
5 I think, in general, they feel that the shift 6
superintendents received what was strong action against them.
7 From whatever kind of a viewpoint they wish to take, whether it 8
is because of essentially what was a demotion from their 9
position or whether you look at it from a financial standpoint, 10 it hurt those guys, the shift superintendents in several 11 different ways.
And the operators recognized that and the 12 impact it had on them.
s 13 MR. SMITH:
We have never asked them if they agreed.
14 MR. CALLAHAN:
One other comment about that.
15 I think c'.at most of the people in the control room 4
16 would agree with the action taken in removing the shift 4
j 17 superintendents.
They are concerned over the tremendous amount 18 of experience that goes away with them.
19 MR. SMITH:
Yes, that statement has clearly been.
20 MR. KANE:
Let me ask another question concerning 21 this list.
This does not constitute all of the people who held 22 licenses.
j i
23 In terms of again, going back and looking at the l
t 24 inputs to your process for determining who was fit for license l
25 duties, what other idividuals are involved and what proportion 1
)
Heritage Reporting Corporation l
(202) 628-4888
52 1
of the process did they go through?
2 MR. SMITH:
If you mean the staff engineers who held 3
licenses?
4 MR. KANE:
And the shift managers?
5 MR. SMITH:
Well, they were the staff engineers who 6
held licenses.
7 MR. KANE:
Yes.
6 MR. SMITH:
The total number of active licenses or 9
current licenses at Peach Bottom, I believe were 16 other than 10 the operators.
11 The number may have been a little higher.
As I said, 12 the superintendent and the engineer of operatioas had been 13 transf' erred and we have asked to revoke their licenses.
14 We did a shift manager training program for seven of 15 the staff engineers that held licenses and this program that 16 they went to, was very similar to the program that we described 17 that the operators went through, very similar to the six-week 18 program that the operators went through.
19 The other approximately 10 licenses that are held by 20 staff, we have not questioned at all.
21 MR. KANE:
I guess what I am getting at here 10 the 22 issue of -- back to what we talked about before -- either 23 participated in or otherwise condoned, you know, the sort of 24 inattentiveness that we are talking about here.
25 What process did you go through to assure that the Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
1 53 1
shift managers were acceptable in that regard?
2 MR. SMITH:
Well, we can go into that, it is another 3
whole story.
4 The shift managers were selected from the group of 5
staff operators, staff senior licensed operators that we had 6
from a population of 16, which included 12 of the mid-level 7
seniority staff and four of the more senior staff, Mr. Polaski 0
being one of those four.
9 We evaluated amongst those 16, to determine which 10 half dozen we thought would be the best people to manage the 11 shifts. We selected from those the six that we thought would be 12 the best managers.
13 MR. KEMPER:
Seven took the course.
14 MR. SMITH:
Seven took the course, but we selected 15 the six that we wanted to use as managers and we put a seventh 16 one who was our seventh choice through the training program 17 also.
18 The process of selection of those managers, included 19 many of these same steps.
I had extensive interviews with them 20 to determine whether or not they were the appropriate 21 candidates for the shift manager program.
The four more senior 22 staff that had licenses, I knew very closely from my routine 23 dealing with them, because they are all at the senior engineer 24 level.
25 The other 12, I held extensive interviews with I
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-48S8
l 54 l
1 personally'to determine whether I thought they were appropriate 2
to be the shift managers.
They were all also interviewed by 3
our claims security group and those investigations were 4
reviewed by'myself.
5 Again, there were none of them who admitted or were 6
accused of intentionally sleeping while on duty or doing 7
anything that was in a violation of the technical 8
specifications.
9 They were interviewed by the psychologist prior to 10 the training program, and they were not asked to volunteer for 11 the retraining program.
They were told that the company needed 12 their services as shift managers and that was the place for 13 them in the company at the present time.
14 There were, their performance during the training was 15 evaluated by the plant staff, by Mr. Polaski, who participated 16 in that entire course; Mr. Cotton, who participated in the last 17 two weeks of it; and by myself, who participated in the last 18 week of the course.
19 They were evaluated throughout that course and they 20 have, I am not sure if they have signed the commitment to 21 excellence statement or not, they have all agreed to it, but 22 there is a question of the venue that we are going to use for 23 their actually signing it.
But they have all agreed to the 24 commitment to excellence statement.
25 MR. POLASKI:
They have signed it.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
55 i
1 MR. SMITH:
They have in fact, signed the individual.
2 We are doing a publicity thing with them.
And they 3
were interviewed again by RHR, at the conclusion of their 4
training course.
5 And, of course, we have been heavily evaluating them 6
in the simulator, without any question.
7 MR. KANE:
So they have been through all of the 8
process.
9 MR. SMITH:
With the exception of being a volunteer 10 for the retraining.
11 MR. KANE:
Well, your individual interviews --
12 MR. SMITH:
And the reception of a letter of 13 reprimand.
14 MR. KANE:
-- the security investigation?
15 MR. SMITH:
Yes, and the RHR - -
16 MR. KANE:
-- and the RHR-interviews?
17 MR. SMITH:
And the training program.
18 MR. KANE:
And the training program.
19 MR. SMITH:
Yes.
20 And evaluation in the simulator.
21 DR. TUFTS:
But the criteria that we used in look'ing 22 at the 12 candidates were different from the criteria that we 23 used in looking at the people who were c'andidates for the 24 training program.
25 And the question with these 12 individuals, the Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
56 1
question was, what was their potential to be leaders; to be 2
managers; te be handlers of people, which were different from 3
the questions that we asked when we were looking~at people and 4
whether or not they were susceptible or cpen to impact:from 5
training.
6 So we really were using different yardsticks.
And 7
looked at them in that manner, and. essentially ranked them one l
8 through 12, as we saw them in terms of what they would bring to 9
the table in terms of management skills, share this with Dick, l
10 both prior to the training program as well as subsequent to the t
11 training program.
12 MR. SMITH:
And now that I am reflecting on it, Bill, 13 let me add a couple of other steps that we did with these that 14 we were not able to do with the licensed operators.
15 We had a performance evaluation system at f
16 Philadelphia Electric Company for the engineers at this level i
17 so that we had their performance evaluations to refcr to as a L
i 18 check point.
i I
19 We also, many of them, of the six, had been on watch f
20 as supervisors during the summer, assisting us as we had the I
i 21 operators off for training, so that we had seen them in a l
22 semi-operating environment. We had seen them in a leadership i
i 23 role of shift supervisor, so that we had that evaluation.
l 24 So we had a little more input.
Again, as Dr. Tufts j
4 i
25 had pointed out, a little more input toward their ability to be i
i I
[
q Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 I
l
._.__.=___,..__..-._.___,_._.___-.....______m,...
\\
i 57 1
managers.
2 MR. BOGER:
Some of these individuals were implicated 3
in some of the security interviews as having been inattentive 4
on shift.
5 You indicated or maybe Mr. Kemper indicated that they 6
are serving as role models.
What type of --
7 MR. SMITH:
I don't know of any of them who were 8
implicated as being inattentive on shift, in the interviews.
9 Are you --
10 MR. KAN":
I guess you might want to clarify.
I 11
.think it may indicate that they were aware of it.
12 MR. SMITH:
Yes.
13 MR. KANE:
And the question is, in that presumably if 14 I am remembering correctly, nothing was done with that, and 15 what significance did you attach to that in terms of their 16 u'timate selection?
'7 MR. SMITH:
Of tha 12, some of them had been involved 18 in control and operations to a greater extent than some of the 19 others.
20 If I remember correctly, three of them had formerly 21 served as shift technical advisors, at such a time that the 22 snift technical advisor was on shif t all of the time.
23 Some others of them had been STAS, when the STA was 24 an on-call position so that they really were not in the control 25 room.
If my memory is correct, there were three of them that Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
58 1
had been STAS, one of them going back into the early '80's, and 2
two of them in about
'82, or '83.
3 Those three individuals all agree that the behavior 4
that they saw in the control room was not what they had 5
expected and they were surprised at that behavior level. They 6
were all non-licensed at the time.
They were STAS.
And they 7
spoke to the shift. supervisors and the shift superintendents, 8
and they were, they came quickly to understand as young 9
graduates quickly learn that this was the accepted behavior 10 standard.
11 And they did not understand it, but no one told them 12 any different.
13 MR. KEMPER:
I think that the candidates we looked 14 at, we reviewed this very carefully with a very serious 15 consideration in selecting them und those that we reviewed, we 16 looked at their age, looked at the time and looked at what they 17 did about the specific instances that they were involved in and 18 that they reported to our claims security forces.
19 And that was very carefully revie
-d and reviewed all i
20 the way up the line.
And of the 12, we w~at down each and 21 overy one of them, looked at them and we selected the best six 22 and the ones that had been STAS and there had been some 23 question about the inattentiveness, Dick had conversations with 24 them, reviewed it with them, and it was our considered opinion 25 that that was a time in their life when they were very young Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
59 1
and very naive and the role model that they wer~e looking at, at 2
the time, was not the correct role model.
3 MR. SMITH:
I would also point out then, that one of 4
them was iniplicated or mentioned in the claims security 5
investigation concerning the actual shutdown order.
6 And perhaps this is what you are referring to, Mr.
7 Boger.
8 The, in his case, he did report the matter to his 4
9 line management ar.J saw that no action was being taken.
In 10 retrospect, both he and I would prefer that he would not have 11 let it lie there, that he would have gone further and done 12 something about it.
13 At that time, he felt that he was, that was his 14 reporting responcibility and if line management was aware of 15 it, he did not see taking it any further.
He made a mistake 16 and he recognizes that it was a mistake.
17 MR. KEMPER:
And this was all very carefully reviewed 18 with him on a one-on-one basis.
19 MR. KANE:
Okay, so the two factors that I take away 20 from the discussion that wo just had, were: one, the 'ge of the 21 individuals in/olved; and two, the type of -- call it the 22 improper role model that the shift superintendents were 23 demonstrating and their, that they were not licensed at the 24 time, and that this was considered to be the rule, rather than 25 the exception.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
60 1
MR. SMITH:
And as you are well aware, I believe, Mr.
2 Kane, the culture at Peach Bottem is that the young engineer is 3
hired directly out of college and he has not had work 4
experience anywhere else.
5 There are very few people brought in with work 6
experiencs in other power plants.
They did'not know any 7
better.
8 If I could make a few summary comments?
9 MR. KANE:
Before you do, I think what we need to do 10 is that we have a number of other questions here, I.would like 11 to make sure that they are all dealt with.
12 MR. SMITH:
Very well, we are agreeable to stay all 13 afternoon and answer questions.
14 (Pause.)
15 MR. KANE:
Bear with me a moment, while I see where 16 we are.
17 (Pause.)
18 MR. KANE:
I will tell you what, let's go off the 19 record, and take a 15-minute break so that we can caucus and 20 decide what other questions we need to ask here, and then we 21 can resume at 3:00 o' clock.
22 MR. KEMPER:
Fine.
i 23 (At 2:42 p.m.,
a 15-minute recess was taken, the i
l 24 hearing to resume at 3:00 p.m.,
the same day.)
25 Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
61 1
MR.,KANE:
Okay, it is 3:20.
We are back on the 2
Record.' Jim?
3 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Okay, an important issue for us is 4
this question of candor.
We have discussed the investigators' 5
observations, which are obviously subjective, concerning their 6
lack of candor.
NRC, from time to time, as we look into
~
7 various instruments, have to talk to operators, and we have to 8
be able to rely on the views of the operators.
9 You indicated, Mr. Smith, that you thought that the 10 Operators were.being candid with you, in that the operators 11 were not being candid with the company's investigators was 12 because of the potential, or fear, of what might happen to i
13 them.
I guess th,e question I have is, when NRC investigates 14 matters, NRC may well tak3 action against individuals.
Do you 15 think they are going to be candid with NRC?
j 16 MR. SMITH:
I think so.
I certainly hope so, Jim.
I
[
l 17 think so.
Yes.
1 18 Now, you realize that the interview you are referring i
l 19 back to occurred in May or June.
I 20 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Prior to the training?
]
21 MR. SMITH:
The shutdown was very recerit.
The 22 operators had no idea what would be happening to them.
They i
23 did not know if the company would be trying to assist them or 1
l 24 would be trying to replace them regardless of their individual l
25 culpability.
They had not gone through this training that we 4
r 1
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 h
l
62-I had conducted.
It was a very frightening period for the 2
operators.
I would axpect that they would be candid with you.
3 The operators I.am convinced are -- clearly recognize 4
that their previous behavior was' inappropriate; was 5
unacceptable; and was unsafe.
I think they do recognize that.
6 MR. LIEBERMAN:
So, I presume you ace familiar with 7
an incident that occurred at Oyster Creek, where we.had a 8
problem with operators -- or might have a candor -- do you 9
think that -- so you are saying that you do not think that will 10 happen.
11 MR. SMITH:
No, and I think that that was a 12 significant point of the, investigation;, not only the claims 13 security investigation was done with each operator, but also 14 the Management Analysia Corporation's interviews of all the 15 operators, there was no indication in any of those interviews 16 that there had been a coverup of any activities.
The 17 discussion of play.i.ng video games -- they were not trying to 18 cover that up.
They discussed the fact that video games were 19 being played.
20 Thore were some individual statements in so.no of the 21 intervicws that indicated that maybe there was some other 22 technical performance that was not adequate.
In each case we 23 investigated those and looked into them and it was not the 24 situation.
25 So there was no indication in any of those Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 e
a
63 1
interviews, both the claims, security and the MAC interviews, 2
of any coverup of activities.
3 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Other than the question of 4
individuals' attentiveness?
5 MR. SMITH:
The lack of candor was, I believe, in 6
discussion of whether that individual himself was behaving 7
inappropriately, and the lack of candor was exhibited when the 8
individual was asked to describe whether or not he had been 9
sleeping?
10 I believe they demonstrated a great deal of candor 11 admitting that they had played video games; that they had read 12 non-technical material.
But I believe the lack of candor was 13 only in the discussion of whether or not they had been 14 sleeping.
15 MR. LIEBERMAN:
And you think that today, or 16 tomorrow, or a year from now, and there is a problem where NRC 17 was asking serious questions to these operators, which may have 18 great significance to these operators, they will be candid with 19 NRC?
20 MR. SMITH:
I think so.
We are trying very hard to 21 foster an attitude other than leading by fear.
We are trying 22 to foster the attitude
- hat if you made a mistake. let us know 23 so that we can work with you to avoid that mistake in the 24 future.
If you have not been able te d your job, what has 25 been your itfficulty in doing the job?
What tools have you Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
t 64 1
lacked; what training do you lack?
2 1 cannot guarantee that an operator will always come r
3 forward and admit that he has made a mistake, but we are i
4 certainly trying to-foster thet attitude, and we have no l
5 indication in any of these interviews that they.were trying to j
6 cover.up their performance on watch, with the exception of the l
7 issue of sleeping oli watch.
8 MR. KANE:
Could you,. just to follow up on that,.you 9
mentioned training.
Could you describe how that aspect of, or.
I J
10 that concern that Jim has expressed, ist factored into the l
l 11 training program and measured?
12 MR. SMITH:
Okay, is.that what you wanted to respond 13 to, Jim?
14 MR. Callahan Partially, yes.
15 MR. SMITH:
Would you pass him the microphone?
l 16 MR. Callahan:
In my judgment of any interviews 1
17 conducted by any Agency, the operators will, in fact, be 2
18 candid.
I do not know to what extent individuals will respond.
[
i
{
19 There is an element of self-incrimination that goes along with j
20 the candor -- I do not know about that.
21 What occurred during the training courses themselves 22 was that the concern about sleeping on watch was address l
9 j
23 explicitly, openly -- for example, one of the statements made i
24 was that, 'Even though you are sitting in a classroom for eight f
25 hours2.893519e-4 days <br />0.00694 hours <br />4.133598e-5 weeks <br />9.5125e-6 months <br /> a day, sleeping is unacceptable; will not be accepted at
]
4 i
i Heritage Reporting Corporation 1
(202) 628-4888 1
~ - - - - -
\\
l l
i 65 1
all; and will be reported."
2 One of the comments made by the operators as a group, 3
was to the effect that, "The entire sequence of events and 4
inattentiveness to duty that led to the shutdown order was the 5
type of situation that was so painful to them that there was no 6
way int he world that they would allow that to begin to happen 7-again."
8 There is one statement made to the effect that:
"If 9
it became a situation where the combination of management's 10 approach to the operators; and the operators' behavior --
11 inappropriate behavior, that situation even began to develop, 12 they would leave before they would go through that again."
13 That was a statement that was made out loud in the 14 classroom and was agreed to by every single operator there.
15 MR. SMITH:
I would just I had been thinking and 16 reviewing the subject matter outlined for the lecture that had 17 been given by the superintendent of operations on the 18 operators' responsibilities, ano those things you allude to are 19 specifically montioned therein, that this, "All on-duty NRC 20 licensed operators and operating supervisors must be aware of 21 and responsible for the plant status at all times.
This 22 includes supervisors being responsible for the performance of 23 all personnel assigned to their shift, et cetera, etc.*
24 Those points are specifically made in this training 25 module and will continue to be emphasized in the future.
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) C28-4888
66 1
MR. LIEBERMAN:
Does that training module, this or 2
another one, address the question of candor with the company; 3
candor with NRC?
4 MR. POLASKI:
I do not think the word, "candor," is 5
in it, Mr. Lieberman, but the thought is clearly in it.
6 Clearly in it.
I guess the idea of telling our operators not 7
to lie to the NRC did not occur to us.
We do not expect them 8
to lie to the NRC.
9 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Or the compeny?
10 MR. POLASKI:
Or the company.
11 MR. KANE:
Would you expect, then, that the issues of 12 inattentiveness -- the issue of being candid with respect to 13 advising PECo and NRC with respect to the performance of 14 licensed duties, such as inattentiveness, would extend to other 15 matters, as well?
I think that is the thrust of our i
16 questioning:
what in the training woulm assure us that this 17 issue of being candid both with management as well as with the 18 NRC would extend to all licensed duties and let us not focus on 19 playing video games; reading materials; sleeping; et cetera; 20 but the broad spectrum of licensed activities?
21 HR. SMITH:
I think we focused on those because that 22 is where we failed before.
I do not think we have any 23 indication that the operators would try to cover up the other 24 types of failure. I think the history has been that they do --
25 they are candid in errors that they make in operating the Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
l r
67 1
plant.
i 2
MR. KEMPER:
I think that has been a main point and.a 1
3 policy all along that we can not manage by fear.
It has.been I
4 management and open with respect to the regulations and with i
5 respect to operating sequences, and I think the history down 6
through the years has'always been open when there have been 1
operating errors,.there has not been any reprimands or 8
reprisals.
There has been openness.
t 4
9 In fact, sometimes we have been criticized that we 10 have been too open with our employees and our discipline *has i
j 11 not been as rigid as it should have been.
And part of it has 12 been the fact that we want the men to be open, and to respond 13 and do things properly.
]
14 I believe in the role of the training programs, i
15 adherence to the technical specifications following the 1
16 operating guides that were there with procedures and programs a
17 that were in effect, were followed.
Those procedures that were 18 not followed were ones that were repetitive and felt that there 4
19 was not a requirement to pull them out or adopt them.
But all
{
20 of my experience has been for the last 20 years, there has' 21 never, in any way, shape or form, been a coverup or a I
22 misrepresentation of the data.
I think it has always been 23 open, very open.
d 1
24 So this is what came as such a surprise in this one 25 area hern in this inattentiveness.
But I think it was the fact I
i
]'
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 l
3
-aw
,,--r
,e
-,-,Gr.--,-+m,r,
_,a w,
v,,_,.
,_..v-
,--,.m--,,.,,.-m n--.,
n,.w,,
y g-p
68 1
that the management one shift permitted it and that was the 2
level of its acceptance when it really was not.
3 But if you look in all those interviews and all these 4
procedures and progrsms that we have been through, we have 5
r:ever seen e thread of coverup or lack of performance in 6
reporting in those specific safety related areas and the 7
technical specifications or in known procedures.
There has 8
been no indication at all of any coverup whatsoever.
9 MR. LIEBERMAN:
Other than the fact that this 10 inattentiveness was never reported?
11 MR. KEMPER:
THe inattentiveness from their 12 standpoint was not -- at that time, was not regarded at the 13 level -- that they were inattentive -- was not regarded as a 14 safety issue.
But sure is now.
15 MR. KANE:
Just to follow up on that, I want to go 16 back and understand.
We asked before about the staff. engineers 17 and there was one issue where an individual did raise a concern 18 to his management, but did not pursue it further.
I just want 19 to go back and understand your line of reasoning there as to 20 the wisdom of what that individual did and your reaction to it 21 and his suitability to serve now on shift?
22 MR. KEMPER:
I would be much more comfortable with 23 him i'n the position he is in if this had not occurred.
It was 24 something that we took into the balarice very much when deciding 25 which were the best of the six -- which are the six best Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628 4888
l 69 1
Individuals to run those shifts:
it was a very hard decision a
2 to reach.
1 3
He has very good strengths in a number of areas. Had 4
it not been for this, it would have been absolutely no question.
5 that he would have been a leading candidate to be a shift 6
manager.
Because of this, we considered it very mightily 7
before comir.g to the conclusion that that was something that he l
l 8
had done through a lack of leadership; a lack of understanding 9
of standards; and following the norm behavior standards that he
. 10 was familiar with before.
I j
11 He had been at Philadelphia Electric. Company as a 12 Coop while he was a student at the University; he saw this type 13 of behavior; he was here as a fresh graduate engineer serving 14 as a shift technical advisor' he saw the same kind of behavior; i
1 15 he saw it again when he was later staff senior licensed 16 operator; he had never seen operation in any other plant, and 17 when it was reported to him, and brought to his attention by 18 other observers, he felt that his responsibilities ended when 19 he told line management the sitv ition.
1 j
20 In retrospect we certainly wish that he had realized
{
21 that that was not good enough.
a l
22 MR. KEMPER:
And I think that the timing of waiting 23 for feedback from management response, in all fairness to him,
}
24 he told, and was waiting to see what would happen.
And the 25 shut-down order came within about a week after that, as I i
l Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
---+,eg---..
_ my
.7TP"TW*
i l
70 1
remember, as I recall the situation.
2 MR. SMITH:
As I recall the dates, it was brought to 3
his attention a week before the shutdown.
4 MR. KEMPER:
So he was told by the people on ship; 5
took it to his management; told his management about it.
I f
6 think the significant thing about it was he did not sit on it.
1 i
7 He took it to his management and was waiting to see what his 8
management was going to do about it when the shut down order i
j 9
came.
l 2
10 So if it had gone on for several more weeks or months 11 and no* ting -- I think that would have been a different story.
a 12 But looking back on it, in this one man's qualifications, 4
J 13 looking'at him with respect to all others, if you take that one l
14 instance, he would probably be the best of all of them.
j 15 MR. KANE:
At the time of this his position was --
16 MR. SMITH:
He was in the operations department.
i 17 MR. KANE:
He was assistant --
l i
l 18 MR. SMITH:
He was assistant to the operations 19 engineer on day work.
{
i 20 MR. POLASKI:
I think something else that I would a
l' 21 like to add in that area is that the six shift managers and I I
i 22 -
confer frequently on almost any topic that comes up dealing l
I 1
23 with standards, policy -- any time they make a decision; have a 24 question, they do not go off making it on their own.
They do l
l 25 not go in directions in setting their own policies.
We will 1,
i l
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 t
i l
I a_. _.-,_ __
71 1
talk about that much more than we talk about even the technical 2
aspect of operations of the plant.
It is one of their major 3
concerns is making sure they are setting high standards and 4
that they are consistent among themselves.
5 MR. SMITH:
I would like to throw out one other 6
comment concerning this specific individual.
The information 7
which he recei red was brought to him by an outside observer in 8
the control room.
It was not that he continued to observe the 9
same behavioral pattern.
As an assistant engineer in the 10 operations department, he was seldom in the operations in the 11 control room unless there was some activity going on.
So he 12 did not spend evenings and night shifts in the control room in 13, this position.
He had as an STA.
14 MR. KANE:
Finally perhaps, in terms of your 15 assessments of individuals, do I understand it, or -- well, let 16 me ask the question:
are there written assessments of -- by, 17 you taking all of these various interviews, investigations; 18 your own personal intervie.<s, into effect in terms of your 19 bottom line assessment, individual by individual, for 20 resumption of operation?
21 MR. SMITH:
No.
22 MR.KANE:
A follow up to that What, then, serves as 23 the basis for what nappens from here on?
Is this a one-time 24 assessment that is made?
And, you know, for example, a new 25 plant manager comes in, how will this be dealt with in terms of Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
t 72 1
the nes plan't manager?
How will this information exchange take 2
place in a way that the new plant manager understands what in 3
fact he is assuming here?
4 MR. SMITH:
The new plant manager will be aware that 5
each of the operators has received a letter of reprimand for 6
inappropriate behavior in the control room before, and since 7
that type of behavior is unacceptable in the future, I do not 8
really see the need to advise him in-depth of the opinions of 9
the operators' performance within that envelope.
When their 10 performance as unacceptable, we decided that they were 11 restrainable and could be retrainod; we have done that; the 12 performance similar to that in the future was just i
13 unacceptable.
I do not see the gradations again.
f 14 MR. KANE:
The three components, then -- I will go j
15 back to the inputs to the decision.
I go back to the RMR 16 interviews, the security investigations and the Dickinson Smith 17 interviews.
Of those, how many are -- I know the security 18 investigations are in fact documented.
19 MR. SMITH:
Yos.
j 20 MR. KANS:
The RHR interviews --
t 21 MR. SMITH:
Are documented --
l 22 MR. KANE:
-- are documented?
23 MR. SMITH:
-- but held by RHR.
24 MR. KANE:
Your interviews are not?
l 25 MR. SMITH:
Notes only.
I i
Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
73 1
MR. KANE:
Notes only?
2 MR. KEMPER:
And we have inputs from the MAC with 3
respect to the condu.'t and the successful passing of their 4
course in the criteria that was satisfied for that, so when the b
follows finish the course, there was a letter from the 6
instructors from that course saying that these candidates did 7
the following things ano satisfactorily pa,ssed the program.
8 MR, SMITH:
So it is an evaluation of the course, not 9
a grading of the individuals.
10 MR. KEMPER:
But the fact that the individuals all 11 collectively were satisfactorily competed the course, 12 One other thing, back, Bill, to pick up on j
13 performance and what would a new plant manager see, one of the 14 things that we have done and one of the things that w were 15 faulted as a result of the interviews that went on, across the i
16 board, Philadelphia Electric did performance evaluations, and 17 performance evaluations are supposedly conducted at all levels, i
18 and unfortunately the performance evaluations had dropped in to 19 a crack and were not conducted here at Peach Bottom.
20 Now, as a result of an evaluation of that and looking 21 at each and every operator, each and every man at the site will 22 be having a performance evaluation; will be evaluated; put in l
23 his docket; and will be reviewed and signed by the plant 24 manager.
25 So, starting from the past, this man has a reprimand Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 I
4
---,-n-
t j
74 1
in his jacket, and then his performance from now on is. going to 2
be measured against that new standard.
So a new -- someone 3
coming in a year from now, two years from now, three years from 4
now, will have the reprimand and will have the performance j
5 since then, so it is a naw launching, we are starting a new 6
beginning and we are starting from here.
7 MR. THOMAS:
And the skills to do that and the l
8 conduct was that was covered in the People Foundation of.
9 Excellence courses, so peop.1.e spent about c day and a half, the 10 participants in those courses going over the process as it is 11 being used in PECo.
So they are quite familiar with it.
12 MR. KANE:
Okay, that concludes our questioning.
Do 13 you want to make some closing remarks /
14 MR. SMITH:
Well, we have pretty well covered most l
15 things, Mr. Kane, but I would like to just sum up as f see it 16 from my limited experience here:
17 I think we found here at Peach Bottom an average l
18 group of operators, as compared to a cross-rection of operators f
i 19 throughout the country, these are probably a little better and 20 probably little worse than probably any group of op-I l
21 fee,1 that they are capable of meeting appropriately.s "
l 22 performance standards.
They lacked leadership; they lacxed 23 direction; and unfortunately they were not individually or as a 24 group fully committed to carrying out their licence
{
l 25 responsibility without clear direction from management.
And lleritage Reporting Corporation j
(202) 628-4888 i
4
--n-.
-e m
._n.,..-e-
-.,g.-
w---,,,---
,.-m-
.,ne-,,,,,--,,,,,,a. - -.,
75 1
that clear direction they did not receive.
2 I think the operators' performance since the shut 4
3 cown order has clearly shown that they are no longer 4
complacent.
Their willingness and enthusiasm ta participate 5
int he training program was remarkable.
There were strengths 6
and weaknesses shown by various operators for each of the 7
criteria in different strengths and weaknesses at the different 8
levels, but we found none of them to be satisfactory, except 9
those that I mentioned in the course of the presentation.
10 The simulator team training periods which have been 11 conducted over the last six weeks which have been observed in i
12 the cast four of the shifts by NRC inspectors, I think have d
13 shown ver, good command and control room the part of shift 14 managers and supervisors, and I would say that I have been i
15 especially pleased by what I have gotten back about the shift 16 supervisors taking control.
17 The communications formality and procedural 18 complian m have been demonstrated in the sjmulator exercises.
19 Sinca 99 training program has been completed, many l
20 peoplo have
.Tr
the control room to observe the 21 operations in the control room who have been on previous 22 situations and have come to comment to me on what they saw is 23 ar. increased level of professionalism in the control room.
Not f
24 specific things that they could point to and nait down, but an 25 whole entire aura of difference in the control room.
i Heritage Report.ing Corporation i
(202) 628-4888 b
w
,~j
76 1
Clearly the shift supervisors are in charge in the 2
control room; the shift managers are setting the standards.
We 3
think that -- wa know, I am carry -- that the procedures 4
throughout ar6 being upgraded and we have recently instituted a 5
responsive change suggestion program to the procedures so that 6
when procedures are lacking, the operators can request a change 7
and expect to receive a change in the near future.
8 We think that there has been a culturni change here 9
at Peach Bottom, and we think we can reinforce that by 10 continuing training cf the type we have discussed this 11 afternoon.
12 Finally, having experienced the trauma of this shut 13 down order as alluded to by Mr. Cal,lahan, the shut down order 14 which cited the control room performance as a "smoking gun," it j
15 is certainly unlikely that any of these operators will ever 16 again fail to disenarge his personal responsibilities.
17 Given the cupervision by shift managers and increased i
I 18 oversight by plant and corporate management, I think it is 10 ceasonable to expect that high standards will be met in the i
20 tuture.
I believe that the operators can be relied upon to l
21 carry out their license duties.
Thank you.
27 MR. KANE:
Thank you.
I guess in closing, it is clear to us, as I am sure it is to yo'.
we are dealing with some very difficult issues here, largely subjective in nature.
I think from the Heritage
-cort ing Corporation I
(?O.) 628 ^188 n
s
. _ ~.
=
1 77 1
discussions today, we have asked you what is on our minds our 2
concerns.
Some of them, I think, have been dealt with very 3
clearly; others, which I am sure you can recognize, there 4
remains some questions -- hard questions -- to really get 5
answers to.
6 The -- at this point, we, I will conclude the meeting 7
and I think what we will have to do is review the information 8
that was presented here today, after we have a chance to get 9
the transcript and go through it in detail.
10 And following that, we will be back with you as to 11 whether we need to meet further on these issues.
Thank you.
12 MR. KANEt Thank you.
13 (Whereupon, at 3:47 p.m. the hear'ng was concluded.)
14 15 16 17 18 19 i
20 il 22
]
23 24 25 Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888
r-1 CERTIFICATE 2
3 This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the 4
United States Nuclear Regulatory Coinmission in the matter of:
5 Names ENFORCEMENT CONFERENCE CONCERNING PEACH BOTTOM ATOMIC POWER STATION 6
7 Docket Number:
8 Place:
Delta, Pennsylvania 9
Date:
10 were held as herein apoears, and tnat this is the original j
11 transcript thereof for the file of the Unitec' States Nuclear 12 Regulatory Commission taken stenogre.phically by me and, 13 tpereafter reduced to typewriting by me or under the direction 14 of the court reporting company, and that the transcript is a trueandaccuraterecordoftheforegoingprfceSdings.
15 f/
3 16
/S/4 \\lIdd
,4
'. > +
i 17 (Signature typed):
KENT ANDREWS 18 Official Reporter 19 Heritage Reporting Corporation i
1 20 t
21 22 23 6
24 25 l
r Heritage Reporting Corporation (202) 628-4888 L
.. - -. -.i
-