ML20215D213

Order Imposing Civil Monetary Penalties in Amount of $50,000 for Violations Noted During Insps from Jul 1984 - Dec 1985

ML20215D213
Person / Time
Site:	Comanche Peak
Issue date:	12/15/1986
From:	Taylor J NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE)
To:	TEXAS UTILITIES ELECTRIC CO. (TU ELECTRIC)
Shared Package
ML20215D212	List: ML20215D209 ML20215D213
References
EA-86-009, EA-86-9, NUDOCS 8612160271
Download: ML20215D213 (7)

Text

-__ - _

.' o 4

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION In the Matter of )

TEXAS UTILITIES ELECTRIC COMPANY Docket Nos. 50-445 and 50-446

~(Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station) Permit Nos. CPPR-126 and CPPR-127 Unit 1) , ) EA 86-09 ORDER IMPOSING CIVIL MONETARY PENALTIES I .

Texas Utilities Electric Company (the licensee) is the holder of Construction Permit Nos. CPPR-126 and 127 (Construction Permits) issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Comission (the NRC or the Comission). The Construction Permits authorize construction of the Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station, Units 1 l and 2. The Construction Permits will expire on August 1,1988 and August 1, 1987, respectively.

II Safety inspections of the licensee's activities were conducted during various times from July, 1984 - December, 1985. A separate special inspection to evaluate the CPSES Unit I as-built cable tray inspection program was conducted during the period November 18 - December 18, 1985. The results of this inspection were discussed with licensee representatives during an enforcement conference on December 18, 1985.

A written Notice of Violation and Proposed Imposition of Civil Penalties (Notice) was subsequently served upon the licensee by letter dated May 2,1986. This Notice stated the nature of the violations, the provisions of the NRC regulations that were violated, and proposed civil penalties in the amount of $50,000 for the violations set out in the Notice in Appendix B to the May 2,1986 letter.

8612160271 861215 PDR ADOCK 05000445 G PDR

The licensee responded to the Notice of Violation and Proposed Imposition of Civil Per;alties in a letter dated August 4,1986 and requested mitigation of the civil penalty associated with the deficiencies identified in cable tray as-built inspection program described in Violation I.A.

III Upon consideration of the licensee's response and the statements of fact, explanation, and arguments for mitigation of the proposed civil . penalty ,

contained therein, as set forth in the Appendix to this Order, the Director, Office of Inspection and Enforcement, has determined that the violation occurred as stated and the penalty proposed for the violation designated in the Notice of Violation and Proposed Imposition of Civil Penalties should be imposed.

IV In view of the foregoing and pursuant to Section 234 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (42 U.S.C. 2282, PL 96-295), and 10 CFR 2.205, IT IS

, HEREBY ORDERED THAT:

The licensee pay the civil penalty in the amount of Fifty Thousand Dollars ($50,000) within thirty days of the date of this Order, by check, draft, or money order payable to the Treasurer of the United I States and mailed to the Director, Office of Inspec' tion and Enforcement, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C. 20555.

4 V

The licensee may, within 30 days of the date of this Order, request a hearing.

A request for hearing shall be addressed to the Director, Office of Inspection and Enforcement, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C. 20555.

A copy of the hearing request also shall be sent to the %ssistant General Counsel for Enforcement at the same address. If a hearing is requested, the Commission will issue an Order designating the time and place of hearing. Upon failure of the licensee to request a hearing within thirty days of the date of this Order, the provisions of this Order shall be effective without further .

proceedings. If payment has not been made by that time, the matter may be referred to the Attorney General for collection.

In the event the licensee requests a hearing as provided above, the issues to be considered at such hearing shall be:

(a) whether the licensee violated NRC requirements set forth in the Notice of Violation and Proposed Imposition of Civil Penalties referred to herein, and (b) whether, on the basis of such violation, this Order should be sustained.

FOR THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION m - //

N , rector fice of In ' ection and Enforcement Dated at Bethesda, Maryland, the /gLtday of December,1986.

. s APPENDIX On May 2,' 1986, a Notice of Violation and Proposed Impositions of Civil Penalties (Notice) was issued for violations identified during inspections conducted at various times from July,1984 - December,1985 proposing civil penalties in the amount of $50,000. Texas Utilities Electric Company (TUEC) did not pay the proposed $50,000 civil penalties for the violations in Appendix B. TUEC' admitted Violation I.A of Appendix B, but requested mitigation of the civil penalty amount associated with Violation I.A. Since TUEC did not request mitigation for Violation I.B. only Violation I.A is discussed below. The proposed $50,000 civil penalties were assessed equally between the two violations. -

RESTATEMENT OF VIOLATION I.B 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix B, Criterion X requires, in part, that a program for inspection of activities affecting quality be established and executed by or for the organization performing the activity to verify conformance with the documented instructions, procedures, and drawings for accomplishing the activity.

In addition, Criterion XVIII requires, in part, that a comprehensive system ,

of planned and periodic audits be carried out to verify compliance with all aspects of the quality assurance program and to determine the effectiveness of the program.

The Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station (CPSES) Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR), Section 17.1.10, states, in part, "... inspection planning is utilized to assure conformance to procedures, drawings, specifications, codes, standards, and other documented instructions." The CPSES FSAR, Section 17.1.18 states, in part, with respect to audits, "TUGC0 requires that planned and periodic audits be performed to verify compliance with all aspects of the quality assurance program to determine effectiveness of the program...."

Section 3.0 of Texas Utilities Generating Company (TUGCO) Nuclear Engineering Procedure TNE-AB-CS-1, Revision 1, dated September 30, 1985, "As-Built Procedure, Cable Tray Hanger Design Adequacy Verification," states, in part, "...The

'as-designed' drawing will be marked up by the 'as-built' walkdown team in red...to denote actual dimension / configuration of the CTH attributes that are to be 'as-built.' The QC inspector will verify all dimension / configuration on the redlined drawing...."

Contrary to the above, as of the inspection from November 18 - December 18, 1985, attrib"tes of a number of cable tray hangers located in the Reactor Building and Fuel Building related to tray size, tray span, tray clamps, member size, weld goalitative measurements, dimensional measurements, bolt size, and member orientation were not either correctly determined by walkdown engineers or correctly verified by quality control inspectors for 15 of 32 cable trays that had been walked down prior to the NRC inspection. In addition, the licensee failed to perform audits of these activities.

i l

l

Appendix '

Summary of Licensee's Response TUEC admits the violation occurred as stated. Although TUEC does not agree with some of the examples documented in Inspection Report 50-445/85-19, the number of examples with which it does agree indicated that the Unit 1 Cable Tray Hanger (CTH) as-built program was not properly implemented.

The licensee believes the primary reasons for the violation and its failure to identify that the Unit 1 CTH As-Built Program was not being properly implemented were: (1) directives given by the Unit 1 CTH.Walkdown Manager were c:ntrary to procedures (2) production quotas were set by the Unit 1 CTH wal'down x Manager which tended to encourage walkdown engineers to violate theengineeringprocedure,and(3)surveillancebyQualityControl(QC) supervision was inadequate. .

The licensee requests mitigation of the civil penalty associated with this violation because of its extensive corrective actions. TUEC initiated a Corrective Action Request to address the problem, suspended the program

• in November,1985 when the problem was identified, and did not resume the program until late January, 1986. The licensee contends that its reviews and investigation in response to the Unit 1 CTH as-built program resulted in a multitude of corrective actions by engineering and QC regarding the conduct of the program and the associated inspection activities, and lists fifteen of these significant actions in its response.

NRC Evaluation of Licensee's Response After a thorough review of the licensee's response and its request for miti-gation of the civil penalty, the NRC staff has concluded that the violation occurred as set forth in the Notice and that no additional information was provided by the licensee which was not known to the staff at the time the Notice was issued. The staff has evaluated the licensee's request for mitigation, and after considering the factors allowed by the Enforcement Policy, determined that mitigation of the civil penalties would not be appropriate.

The NRC staff, when assessing civil penalties associated with this violation, recognized the licensee's extensive corrective actions taken after this violation was identified. The staff acknowledged in the May 2,1986 letter that TUEC "took extensive actions to address the problems." However, when a breakdown in the quality verification program occurs, as was the case here, extensive corrective actions are necessary to reestablish confidence in the affected structures, systems, and components.

While the NRC staff acknowledges that TUEC has taken these extensive actions, these actions were necessary considering the lengthy duration of the violation and its pervasiveness. In fact, the NRC staff believed that escalation of the civil penalties could have been appropriate because of the duration of the violation, the many examples involved and the number of opportunities the

, licensee had to identify and to correct the problem. In view of the extent and significance of the problem, the corrective actions taken were not extra-ordinary and were required to verify the quality of the installation of the l

P Appendix CTHs after construction was essentially completed. Therefore, on balance ~,

the NRC staff does not believe mitigation of the civil penalty associated with Violation I.A. is warranted and is imposing the full amount of civil penalties associated with the violations in Appendix B to emphasize to the licensee the importance of promptly identifying and correcting significant problems while activities are in progress.

Conclusion Mitigation of the proposed civil penalties is not warranted. Accordingly, civil penalties in the amount of Fifty Thousand Dollars ($50,000) are imposed.

e

+

..<. or

. Texas Utilities Electric Company Distribution ,

,. 'PDR  ;

LPDR SECY CA JMTaylor, IE RMartin, RIV RStarostecki, IE '

A88each, IE JLieberman, OGC FIngram, PA GJohnson, RM Enforcement Coordinators RI, RII, RIII, RIV, RV BHayes, O!  !

SConnelly, 0IA JCrooks, AE0D HDenton, NRR VNoonan, NRR State of Texas ES File EA File DCS ED0 Rdg File RIV Distribution PA0 RSLO Division Director, DRSP ,

Branch Chief, DRSP Branch, RSP P

\g. [

IE:ES OGCll, BBeac k er RIV),blJAxelradES:D RMartin b IE:DD lor RStarostecki lu zzes p JLieg/86

% g /8e viv8s Iu /88 u foe

~ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ - . . _ - . _