IR 05000155/1986008

Insp Rept 50-155/86-08 on 860519-21.No Violation or Deviation Noted.Major Areas Inspected:Emergency Preparedness Exercise Involving Observations by NRC Inspectors.One Exercise Weakness Identified

ML20199C717
Person / Time
Site:	Big Rock Point File:Consumers Energy icon.png
Issue date:	06/12/1986
From:	Guthrie S, Snell W, Vanniel C, Williamson N NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION III)
To:
Shared Package
ML20199C698	List: IR 05000155/1986008 ML20199C693
References
50-155-86-08, 50-155-86-8, NUDOCS 8606180233
Download: ML20199C717 (10)

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U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMISSION REGION III-Report No. 50-155/86008(DRSS)

Docket No. 50-155 License No. DPR-6

. Licensee: Consumers Power Company 212 West Michigan Avenue Jackson, MI 49201 Facility Name: Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant Inspection At: Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant Site, Charlevoix, MI

' Inspection Conducted: May 19-21, 1986 Inspectors: WY illiansen e .

, /76 Team Leader Date '

W ne -G 2_/E Date C in ,

(*ltL/mL Date (.a. L e S.Guthr'$$ 4/8 L/dd Date Approved By: W ne lef 6/1/4 Emergency Preparedness Section Date Inspection Summary Inspection on May 19-21, 1986 (Report No. 50-155/86008(DRSS))

Areas Inspected: Routine, announced inspection of the Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant emergency preparedness exercise involving observations by four NRC inspector Results: No violations, deficiencies, or deviations were identified. One exercise weakness was identified as summarized in the Appendix of tha cover letter to this repor ^

8606180233 860612 PDR ADOCK 05000155-G PDR

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DETAILS 1. Persons Contacted NRC Observers and Areas Observed N. Williamsen, Control Room (CR), Technical Support Center (TSC), Emergency Operations Facility (EOF), PASS S. Guthrie, CR, Operational Support Center (OSC),-PASS W. Snell, TSC, EOF C. R. VanNiel, EOF Cppsumers Power Company (CPCo) and Observers D. Hoffman, Plant Superintendent P. Loomis, Emergency Planning Administrator, CPCo A. Katarsky, Emergency Preparedness, CPCo D. Fugere, Emergency Preparedness, CPCo M. Hobe, Nuclear Instructor, CPCo K. Penrod, Emergency Preparedness, CPCo R. English, Health Physics, CPCo G. Slade, Executive Director, Nuclear Assurance, CPCo B. Jahn, Nuclear Instructor, CPCo D. DeNise, Instructor, CPCo C. MacInnis, Public Affairs Director, BRPNP J. Warner, Senior Nuclear Emergency Planning Coordinator, Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant (BRPNP)

L. Monshor, Quality Assurance Superintendent, BRPNP N. Popa, Engineering Analyst, BRPNP

• D. Blanchard, Technical Engineer, BRPNP R. Alexander, Technical Engineer, BRPNP R. May, Shift Supervisor, BRPNP T. Hancock, C&HP Engineer, BRPNP T. Dugan, Property Protection, BRPNP J. Beer, C&HP Superintendent, BRPNP D. McIntosh, Engineer, BRPNP J. Brunet, Emergency Planning, Palisades

• J. Mulvehill, Detroit Edison

• With these exceptions, all of the above attended the May 21, 1986 exit meetin . Licensee Action on Previously-Identified Open Item Related to Emergency Preparedness (Closed) Open Item No. 155/85004-01, Failure to track plume: During the 1985 exercise the EOF was unable to effectively coordinate the offsite monitoring teams to locate the plume center line and edges. During the 1986 exercise the plume within the EPZ was effectively located and monitore This item is close , .

, Interface with Canada The closest portion of Canada is more than 75 miles from Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant. Furthermore, the licensee's Emergency Planning Zones (EPZs) are five miles and thirty miles, for the plume exposure and ,

ingestion EPZs, respectively. The licensee has no direct communication !

channels with Canad The inspector talked to Lt. J. M. Tyler of the Emergency Management Division, Michigan State Police. This Division has channels to communicate with Canada. Based on the emergency planning for Fermi-2, the " warning entrance point" with Canada is the Ontario Provincial Police. The Michigan police can access Canada by phone, thru Interpol, by facsimile, or thru the FEMA radio networ . General An exercise of the licensee's Site Emergency Plan (SEP) was conducted at the Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant on May 20, 1986. The exercise tested

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-the licensee's capability to respond to a hypothetical accident scenario resulting in a major release of radioactive material to the environmen Attachment 1 describes the Scope and Objectives. Attachment 2 is the exercise narrative summary. This was a utility-only exercise, except that the State of Michigan provided personnel to simulate offsite respons '

> General Observations Coordination This exercise was conducted in accordance with 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix E requirements using appropriate station and corporate procedures. The licensee's response was coordinated, orderly, and timely. If the events had been real, the actions taken by the licensee would have been sufficient to permit the State and local authorities to take appropriate action Critique Licensee observers monitored and critiqued this exercise along with four NRC observers. The licensee held a critique on May 21, 1986, followed by the NRC critique. The NRC identified an exercise weakness as discussed in this report. (Section 6.b) Specific Observations Control Room The Control Room (CR) operators correctly responded to the simulated plant conditions. The CR operators acted promptly as the hypotheti-cal scenario began. Within a period of less than six minutes they had scrammed the reactor, called out the fire brigade, telephoned for a backup fire truck from a local fire department, activated the plant fire-warning siren, and declared an Alert. (The notifications were made from the Technical Support Center).

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Congestion and noise were kept to a minimum in the Control Roo Adequate logs were kept. ' Habitability was monitored. Mitigating actions were good, such as a suggestion to use the machine shop air compressor when the station air compressor had to be shut down for

. lack of service-water cooling, and the suggestion to use the offsite fire truck to provide cooling water and/or fire service wate Communication with the Technical Support Center (TSC) was good, via written data sheets, a communicator who relayed information between the CR and the TSC, and the Site Emergency Director who periodically entered the CR from the TSC to give or receive briefing However, the following improper actions were observed:

• - There was a lack of teamwork in assessing the developing accident situation and.in anticipating problem-solving solution One of the operators asked out loud, "Why did the Feedwater Regulator Valve fail closed?" and no one answered him. Or again, when one of the operators was being sent out on a repair team, he said that he was not sure how to do the job, but he was sent out anyway. Later in the accident scenario another operator asked why the radiation levels were decreasing, and no one answered hi Overall, the CR took the necessary minimum actions that were called for but there was a lack of an organized, systematic, and aggressive approach to problem solving and diagnosi The following item is recommended for improvement:

• The licensee should strive for a more aggressive, organized team-approach to problem solving and diagnosis, Technical Support Center The TSC was adequately staffed within abotet nine minutes after the hypothetical airplane crash into the screen house, less than five minutes after declaration of'an Alert. . Plant procedures were up-to-date and available in the TSC. The Site Emergency Director (SED)

demonstrated effective command and control in the TSC. He coordinated all aspects of the emergency. The SED made prompt and correct decisions regarding EALs, PARS, and radiation doses to inplant team member He briefed the Joint Public Information Center (JPIC)

supervisor before the .1PIC was operational and also approved the first press releas The TSC properly directed the offsite teams during the early part of the exercise when the TSC had control of the emergency. Trending was adequately done. Accountability was completed in less than thirty minutes. Radiation surveys and air-sampling were carried out. The a

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communication channels were operable. Transfer of command and

. control from the TSC to the Emergency Operations Facility in Boyne City was carried out efficiently and without inciden i The following improper actions were observed:

i- * The Health Physics Group was slow to provide wind direction and protective action recommendation information to the SED. For i- example, when the wind shifted to 346 degrees at 0915 hours0.0106 days <br />0.254 hours <br />0.00151 weeks <br />3.481575e-4 months <br />, the result should have been to change the downwind affected

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sectors. The HP Group did change the wind direction on their map to reflect this, but they failed to tell the SED about-this change. The SED found out about the change when he walked ove to the HP Group and asked them for any change L * The TSC was roped off for contamination control, but only a few i players frisked themselves before coming into the TS '

• Recordkeeping in the TSC was inadequate to easily reconstruct

] the events and notifications of the exercise.

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• The Technical Group in the TSC showed little initiative in

supporting the SE They responded to questions from the SED j but did not anticipate his request It proved to be difficult, after the termination of the exercise, to

reconstruct the time frames for the various emergency notifications.

? However, for the Alert, the notifications were timely but the order i of the notifications was contrary to 10 CFR 50.72 in that the NRC  !

, was notified before (rather than "immediately after") notification

of the State and local agencies. This is an exercise weakness and j will be tracked as Open Item No. 155/86008-0 Operational Support Center (OSC)

) The OSC was staffed and activated in a timely manner and made good utilization of the Emergency Plan Implementing Procedures throughout  :

the exercise. The OSC supervisor was knowledgeable of his duties and i responsiDilitie Assignment of personnel to perform specific tasks

, as requested by management was accomplished in an efficient and timely manner. For the inplant teams, job planning, stay times, and 1 tracking of the teams were well done.

l Status boards were adequate, but the data sometimes lagged the events by as much as twenty minutes. One reason for the slowness in '

j entering data on the boards could have been that the layout of the

' status board did not match the layout of the data-sheet that was

! given to the communicator.

l The OSC was innovative in repairs. One example is the using of a

nitrogen bottle to operate the feed water regulator valve after the <

! station air compressors had stoppe Further, the OSC teams held i.

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simulation to a minimu In the nitrogen bottle case, the repair team actually brought in a cylinder of N-2 and cleverly " jury-rigged" a connection which could have operated the regulator valv Habitability of the OSC was periodically assesse HP technicians were utilized both for inplant surveys and for radiation protection for the team One of the objectives of the exercise was to demonstrate the operability of the post accident sample system (PASS). Because the scenario did not lend itself to a request for a post accident sample, this demonstration was carried out after the termination of the exercise, using a scenario specific to PASS. The licensee demonstrated (1) the ability to use their formulae and procedures to generate realistic values using hypothetical data, and (2) the adequacy of the tools and materials necessary to successfully obtain a post accident sample. The PASS capability was adequately demonstrate d. Emergency Operations Facility Plant personnel assigned to staff the Emergency Operations Facility (EOF) arrived in a timely manner. Security at the entrance was goo Personnel signed in and used their plant badge for identificatio Non-company observers were cleared by the senior controller prior to entr The EOF Administrator arrived and called the TSC for a status repor He then began to activate the EOF and made periodic aanouncements to the arriving staff. He provided good coordination between the EOF and the TSC for 40 minutes prior to the arrivals of the EOF Director, the Emergency Officer, and the several EOF Department Heads. After receiving turnover from the EOF Administrator, the EOF Director briefed the Department Heads on the current reactor status. At this time, the plant was in a General Emergency status, a release was occurring out of the vent stack, and monitoring teams had already been dispatched. As a result, protective actions recommendations had been initiated from the TS The use of the various status boards in the EOF was satisfactory, and the extensive use of status sheets was effective in keeping EOF personnel current. There was some difficulty with the transmission

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of data via telefax from the TSC to the EOF. However, missing or ,

unclear information on the status sheets was obtained by telephon It appeared that little additional information was obtained by the EOF staff using direct or open telephone lines to the TS Effective coordination was demonstrated between the licensee and the State of Michigan. The State forward command post was established at the EOF and the State representative was available to attend the periodic briefings by the EOF Director and to interact directly with the HP Department Head concerning plume location, radiation and contamination readings offsite, and the progress in the completion of recommended protective action recommendation _ . . _ . _ _ _ _ _ - _ . _ _ _ -_ _ _ -

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The two offsite monitoring teams were effective in locating the plume, ascertaining the plume center line, and in communicating recorded dose rates to the EO Readings were measured at the main gate, site boundary, the railroad tracks and at Quarter Line roa However, it appeared that no effort was made to verify the extent of the plume in a downwind direction beyond Quarter Line road at about three mile A reentry and recovery discussion with the E0F Director and the various Department Heads and team leaders was held following termination of exercise activities. Overall, the EOF functioned in an effective manner, Joint Public Information Center The Joint Public Information Center (JPIC) was activated for this exercise but without the participation of State and local authorities. The JPIC was not directly observed by the inspection tea However, a number of messages were prepared by the public affairs staff in the E0F for transmission to the JPI The messages were informative, timely and were edited and approved by the E0F Director before issuance. While the time of preparation was not always recorded on the message form, the forms were numbered sequentiall The coordination with the State and final issuance of these messages was not observe . Exit Interview On May 21, 1986 the licensee held a critique, following which the NRC held the exit interview with the licensee representative shown in Section 1. The inspector discussed the likely content of the inspection report. The licensee did not identify any of the material as proprietary or safeguard Attachments: Big Rock Point Plant Exercise

Scope and Objectives Scenario Narrative Summary o

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. SCOPE AND OBJECTIVES SCOPE A simulated abnormal radiological incident at the Big Rock Point Plant will escalate and will involve planned response and recovery actions that include emergency classification, notification of offsite organi-zations and plant personnel, simulated actions to correct the emergency conditions, initiation of accident assessment and protective action recommendations as necessary to cope with the accident. The emergency will then de-escalate, the recovery phase will be initiated and the exercise will be terminated. The exercise will simulate an emergency that results in offsite radiological releases which would require response by offsite emergency response organization .2 OBJECTIVES The major objective of the exercise is to evaluate the integrated capa-bility and a major portion of the basic elements of the onsite and offsite emergency plans and the emergency response organizatio Specific objectives of the exerci.ne to be demonstrated in various phases are listed below. The " free play" aspect of the exercise will be emphasized where practical. The exercise will demonstrate: Adequacy of the Site Emergency Plan and the Site Emergency Plan Implementing Procedures to ensure compliance with 10 CFR 50.47 and NUREG-0654 Activation, staffing and operation of emergency response facilities Effective transfer of responsibilities from the Control Room to the Technical Support Center to the Emergency Operations Facility Recognition, classification and trending of emergency conditions j Notification of Federal, State, local, Corporate and plant person-l nel within specified time constraints * Coordination of news releases and ability to handle public inquiries in a timely and accurate fashion i

, Coordination with State of Michigan emergency response j organization

. Ability to monitor, assess and trend radiological field data Collection of a post-accident primary coolant sample

' *The State of Michigan will provide personnel to communicate with CP Co and l will provide simulated offsite respons NUO685-0020A-TP13-TPl7 2.1 i '

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1 Ability to formulate timely and appropriate protective actions based on Protective Action Guides and postulated event conditions 1 Mobilization and capabilities of onsite and offsite radiological monitoring teams 1 Site assembly and accountability of personnel within 30 minutes

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The exercise will include support from the State of Michigan to simulate offsite response.

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I NUO685-0020A-TP13-TPl7 2.2 L

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.. .. NARRATIVE SUMMARY The plant is operating at 90% rated power following a recently completed refueling atage. Due to a few failed fuel pins, offgas readings are approxi-mately 6,000 microcuries per secon At 0830, a private jet departing Charlevoix Airport loses control and crashes into the Big Rock Point screenhouse. Physical and fire damage from the crash results in the loss of service water, diesel and electric fire pumps, condenser circulating water pumps, the domestic water system and Motor Control Centers Ic and 2c. In addition to the noise of the crash, the operator will use these alarms and lights to enter corrective actions. An Alert may be declared at this point based on a projectile potentially affecting safety system Soon after the plane crash, the operator is expected to scram the reacto Following the scram, the operator will attempt to cool the reactor using the emergency condenser. When the emergency condenser is placed into service, 20 tubes in one of the tube bundles will rupture. The operator will attempt to isolate the failed bundle by closing the inlet valve. The valve, however, fails open preventing isolation of the break. There is now the equivalent of a 0.05 square foot steam line break in progress with a release from the reactor coolant system to the environment through the emergency condenser exhaust. The operator will be alerted by the drop in pressure and the emergency condenser vent' monitor alarm. Due to steam drum level swell, the feedwater flow centrol valve closes, then fails close At 0839, the feedwater bypass valve fails closed on loss of air due to failure of air compressor rings on loss of cooling water and subsequent system

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depressurization due to leakage. There is now no core coolin At 0858, fuel cladding release begins due to overheated fuel rods at a rate of 137 microcuries per second at ground leve By approximately 0905, the fire in the screenhouse will be extinguiahe By 0930, it is anticipated that the plant will have determined a meant of opening the normal feedwater path. At this point the core is covered. The release is essentially terminated due to the time it would take for decay heat to boil water in the vessel, the subsequent low boil-off rate and the large dilutio However, the release path still exists and the " normal" accident method of cooling has not yet been established. Operations personnel will continue to participate until they determine how to repair the emergency condenser inlet valve, terminating the release. Operations participation will terminate between 11:30 and 11:4 TSC and EOF personnel will continue to participate based on offsite rad data and development of a recovery plan. The exercise will be terminated based on judgment of the Exercise Coordinato .

NUO386-0114A-TP01-TP03

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