ML20217B152
| ML20217B152 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Cooper  |
| Issue date: | 09/11/1997 |
| From: | Hall J NRC (Affiliation Not Assigned) |
| To: | NRC (Affiliation Not Assigned) |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 9709230245 | |
| Download: ML20217B152 (4) | |
Text
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September 11, 1997 NOTE 10:
PD IV-1 Reading Files FROM:
James R. Hall, Senior Project Manager 7
SUBJECT:
SITE VISIT TO C00 PEP. NUCLEAR STATION ND ATTENDANCE AT ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT FOCUS HEETING, AUGUST 20-22, 1997 1 visited the Cooper site from August 20 through August 22, 1997, primarily to attend the Engineering mnagement focus meeting held on August 21, 1997.
This was the second in a series of meetings initiated by the Region IV Administrator Ellis Herschoff, to focus on specific engineering issues at Cooper. These periodic focus meetings are being held with several Region IV licensees in an effort to better understand how the licensees are addressing areas of longstanding weaknesses (in Cooper's case, Engineering).
To make the meetings more productive, Region IV plans to conduct a narrowly-focused inspection prior to each meeting, related to the primary item on the agenda.
For this meeting, the Region performed an inspection of Cooper's operability assessments, and also reviewed a number of 10 CFR 50.59 evaluations.
Preliminary results from the inspection indicated continuing weaknesses in the licensee's process for and performance of operability assessments; the staff expressed a lesser degree of concern
- elative to 10 CFR 50.59 evaluations.
' found the meeting to be an improvement over past management meetings. All of the licensee's senior managers attended (Guy Horn, Senior VP of Energy Supply; Phil Graham, VP of Nuclear Energy, Mike Peckham, Plant Manager and Jim Pelletier, Senior Engineering Manager), as well as members of the licensee's operations and engiraering staffs.
Through discussions focusing on the details of the licensee's operability process, areas for further review and improvement vore identified and the concerns of the Regional Administrator and NRC staff were clearly and directly articulated to the licensee's senior management.
These areas included the need for more effective management oversight of the operability process, both in assuring that the safety functions of degraded components are promptly addressed, and in tracking and assessing the cumulative impact of a large number of open operability assessments.
The licensee indicated that Operations had responsibility for performing operability assessments (OAs), with significant support from Engineering.
However, two separate procedures providing guidance on OAs were in use, one for Engineering and one for Operations. The Ops procedure was more detailed, and more closely followed the process outlined in NRC Generic Letter 91-18.
To reconcile the two different procedures, the licensee is developing a pd single, comprehensive operability procedure. Although open OAs are currently reviewed every 4-6 weeks by the Station Operations Review Committee (SORC),
s this review ic not required by )rocedure, the population of osen OAs can l V change significantly (by more tian 1/3) over this time, and tie licensee's tracking systems require considerable manual data entry to update.
It is not clear how the SORC members are able to evaluate the cumulative impact of open ok 00$obOoo298 hhh(( { m {~p{ppy P
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2 0As. The licensee lacked a formal mechanism to effectively track the number and significance of open OAs. The licensee indicated that the Shift Technical Engineer reviews each new OA to assess potential interactions due to other open OAs, but the NRC staff still expressed concern with the licensee's ability to assess the cumulative impact of open OAs in real time.
The Senior VP acknowledged NRC's concern, and the Plant and Engineering Managers agreed to look into this issue in greater detail. Overall, the licensee was receptive to NRC comments and concerns regarding their operability process; i
however, it appears that the NRC inspection was a necessary catalyst to get the itcensee to examine the process, even though weaknesses in this area have been identifieu for some time.
I attended the plan of the day meetings on Thursday, a normal work day, and on Friday, which is an off day (Cooper started working four-day weeks in June The Thursday meeting had at least 40 attendees, including senior licensee ).
management.
Consequently, it appeared that everyone felt compelled to make a statement and the meeting was too long. However, the new Assistant Ops Manager was generally effective in conducting the meetings and in establishing accountability or responsibility for issues. He opened both meetings with a request to identify any safety concerns.
Friday's meeting was much more focussed and shorter, attended only by those who needed to be there.
I took an initial plant tour with the SRI and the Regional Branch Chief, and a later one with a larger group. Areas visited included the elevated release point tower, the Z-sump, the service water building, diesel generator rooms, battery rooms, ECCS rooms, standby liquid control system room, refueling floor, and general areas. With the plant at power, there were few work activities in progress; I did observe work on a service water pump and the replacement of drywell pressure switches for the low-low set function of the ADS valves.
Both work activities appeared to be performed appropriately.
I noticed very few tags on equipment; an expected condition since they just started up from an outage in June. However, there seemed to be a large number of oil leaks so soon after an outage; all 3 condensate booster pumps exhibited such leakage. Also, some water leakage from the "C" condensate booster pump was observed; the licensee had earlier identified the need for repairs to a packing gland. The plant was otherwise generally clean.
My sense from this trip is that certain NPPD managers genuinely want to improve performance at Cooper, but the station is still challenged by the scope of issues and the ineffectiveness of some managers.
Current issues indicate that Engineering continues to struggle in-trying to provide prompt and effective support to operations, as evidenced by the length of time it has taken to understand and correct the interaction between the A0G system and the I sump, with the consequent potential for loss of the SGTS.
Due to minor oscillations in feedwater flow, the licensee has decided to slightly reduce power, but troubleshooting has not been successful thus far.. A developing issue involves the breach of the primary containment boundary for about
4-l 3-4 hours during maintenance activities while at power.
Historically, the licensee has displayed a low sensitivity to ensuring primary containment integrity; this current event is another example. An NRC-led architect / engineering team inspection is scheduled for later this Fall; this inspection will provide additional insights into the quality and maintenance of the design basis at Cooper.
cc:
J. Clifford I
10 September 11, 1997 l 4 hours4.62963e-5 days <br />0.00111 hours <br />6.613757e-6 weeks <br />1.522e-6 months <br /> during maintenance activities while at power.
Historically, the licensee has displayed a low sensitivity to ensuring primary containment integrity; this current event is another example. An NRC-led architect / engineering team inspection is scheduled for later this Fall; this inspection will provide additional insights into the quality and maintenance of the design basis at Cooper.
cc:
J. Clifford DISTRIBUT'ON:,
. Central'F le-PUBLIC (PDR)
JClifford JHall Document Naine:
C00082097.N0T OFC PM/PD4-1
_NAME JHa11/vwek/[M DATE T/// /97b COPY @yNO 0FFICIAL lECORD COPY
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