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% NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION j
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%.....' JUL 0 81986 EGM 86-03 MEMORANDUM FOR:
Thomas E. Murley, Regional Administrator, Region I J. Nelson Grace, Regional Administrator, Region It Region III James Robert D. G. Keppler, Martin, Regional Regional Administrator' Administ N. tor, Regen IV John B. Martin, Regional Administrator, Regioni L
FROM: James M. Taylor, Director
't Office of Inspectior and Enforcement
SUBJECT:
ENFORCEMENT GUIDANCE ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALIFICATION By memorandum dated July 3,1986 from S. J. Chilk to V. Stello the staff was advised of the Commission's approval of the enclosed enforcement guidance on environmental qualification and directed to distribute the. guidance, as modified, to the regions for implementation. The Commission 'ciso modified the paper which forwarded the Commission guidance for approval, as indicated in.the r;nclosed markup, ground. and directed that it be Jiistributed to the regions as additional back-
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You should now begin to process any environmental qualification cases you have '
pending using this guidance, and submit the cases to IE for concurrence. EQ f l
cases that have the guidance andalready been submitted should,be reevaluated in accordance with resubmitted. *
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f j James M. T r
or, Director
/ Office of nspectionandEypreement y/ a
Enclosure:
As stated ,
cc: R. Vollner, NRR i3 ,
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I FhFORCEMENT CRITERIA FOR EQ ENFORCEMENT o
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i Application of the " Clearly knew, nr should have known" test I I
The staff believes it is unlikely thap licensees will be identified that i:
" clearly knew" they had equipment for which qualification cannot be established.
/ The staff believes from discussions with licensees that all licensees who were aware before November 30 that they had equipment for which qualification could nct be established elected to shut down rather than operate in noncompliance
, under the daily penalty provision. Thus, the issue in most cases will be for the staff to determine whether the licensee " clearly should have known" that c
fts equipment was not qualified. The staff will examine the circumstances in !
each case to make the determination. The factors the staff will examine include:
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Did the licensee have vendor-supplied documentation that demonstrated that the equipment was qualified?
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q l Did the licensee perform adequate receiving and/or field verification , 1I f
inspection to determine that the configuration of the installed ' l equipment by the vendor?matched the configuration of the equipment that was qualified i
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Did the licensee have prior notice from ai>y source that equipment qualification deficiencies might fxist? n ,
- 4. Did some licensees identify similar probleas and correct them before the deadline? ;
To illustrate how these factors would be app 1 fed in specific cases, the staff will use as an example in the discussion which follows deficiencies in the qualification of the inu's:al wiring of certain valve ope'rators recently identified at several plants. Vendor EQ test reports provided to licensees were ambiguous regarding"whether the internal wiring of the operators was qualified by the reports.
Lt has now been determined that vendor EQ test reporth Md not include quebfication of the internal wiring of the operators and that the wiring used in lhe test operators could be different than the
' wiring installed in production units. Subsequent wiring modifications by the valve manufacturer or by the installer have introduced additional wiring which was not covered by the operator qualification reports. Physical inspection has shown instances of unidentified or not qualified wiring installed in several valve operators.
- These operators are used on a wide variety of valves at the plants and in many cases were used on valves which were part of systems covered by technical specifications (TS) such ascontainrent isolation valves. The wiring in the operators should have been qualified by November 30, 1985. Thus, plants at which such significant deficiencies are identified after the deadline for which further testing or analysis 'k, required to establish qualification and which operated in noncompliance are subject to a possible penalty of $5,000 per item per day if such licensees clearly knew or clearly should have known of the deficiencies. In some plants, this could amount to a substantial penalty.
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With regard to the first two factors, reliance on vendor-supplied informatiori on testing of equipment and performance of receiving and/or field verification inspections, the licensees took the position that the EQ test reports provided by the vendor covered the wiring and did not perform adequate receiving or field verification inspections to positively identify the internal wiring.
We and wiring inthe thelicensees operators.now know that the vendor test reports did not cover the In addressing qualification by test, paragraph (f) of 10 CFR 50.49 requires testing an identical item or testing a similar item with sup that the equipment to be qualified is acceptable. It may not be reasonable to rely entirely on vendor-supplied information in establishing similarity since changes to complex process and/or equipment are likely to occur during the manufacturing installation.
A comprehensive receiving and/or field verification inspection of the equipment by the licensees should be conducted to identify significant discrepancies between the as-installed vs. qualified configurations. i of one field verification inspection of equipment prompted IE '
Information equipment Notice in 1983 to alert licensees to several deficiencies affecting qualification.
related to inspection.of valve opgrators at a plant under constr0ction.
several specific qualification-related concerns, this Notice stated that "No'Among l
i (e.g., wiring, insulation, etc.)" and stated that "It is not pre whether these types are qualified for the service conditions." This Information notice also highlighted the fact that "Information obtained from purchase order files and qualification files does not agree Mth the installed components.*
Eased on the above, the staff concluded this document provided prior notice of t.he potential problems with certain valve operators.
Given this information, it was unreasonable for licensees to rely entirely on the vendor reports withcot doing additional work to ensure that the wiring was qualified.
With regard to the fourth factor, some licensees did identify and correct this problem before the November 30, 1985 deadline.
i The unqualified wiring was identified by these licensees as a result of walkdown verification of the installed equipment or comprehensive review of qualification files.
After consideration of all of these factors, the staff has concluded that in the case of the wiring, licensees " clearly should have known" that the vendor !
documentation was m adequate to support qualification. i Time Period to be Ccosidered for Daily Civil Penalty ___
l Or>ce the staff concluoe that tM " clearly knew or should have known" test is applicable, assess a daily the civilstaff nest detrnnine the appropriate period over which to penalty.
period is from November 30, 1985The staff has concluded that the appropriate I evaluation and schedules corrective action.to the time the licensee completes its This approach should encourage I
timely identification Nd evaluations by licensees of the qualification of the eqpipment.
A licensee should not be penalized for each day after the problem i
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l is identified and appropriate corrective action is scheduled that it elects to operate until the problem is fixed assuming a reasonable determination was made that it was safe to allow continued operation. Imposing daily civil penalties until the violation is corrected would provide strong incentives for shutdown {
j even though the licensee had detemined that continued operation for some i reasonable period of time is not unsafe. However, if the licensee's determination that it was safe to operate is later found to be in error, shutdown may be required and the licensee may be subject to daily civil penalties. Since such penalties are likely to quickly become abnormally high, particularly as the length of time between the November 30 deadline and the date of inspection increases, the staff has determined that some cap on the possible amount of l
the civil penalty should be imposed. The staff has detemined that this is l appropriate especially for those cases in which the " clearly should have known" l test is applied as opposed to cases in which the licensee " clearly knew" that they were not in compliance. The staff has selected a cap of $500,000 per item I or approximately the amount that would be imposed for one item that was deficient for 100 days after the deadline. The mitigation factors would then be applied to mitigate from $500,000 per item down if appropriate. Similarly, since the reasonableness of the schedule for corrective action is a factor to be considered for mitigation of the daily civil penalty, if the licensee fails to meet its schedule, additional civil penalties will be considered.
In the case of the valve operators described above, in one hypothetical situation, suppose that a Resident Inspector notified one licensee two weeks af ter the deadline that the qualification of the valve operators was suspect.
That licensee evaluated the situation and concluded that the qualification of the wiring could not be verified. The licensee performed a final evaluation two weeks later justifying continued operation with the unqualified equipment and planned to replace the equipment at the next scheduled refueling outage in two months.
The staff would conclude that this licensee would be subject to a daily civil penalty of $5,000/ item / day for 28 days.
Application of the Mitigation Factors Once it has been detemined that a licensee may be subject to a daily civil penalty under this test, Generic Letter 85-15 specifies that the staff should apply certain mitigation factors to determine the amount of the proposed !
j penalty. The factors specified in the letter were:
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Did the licensee identify and promptly report the noncompliance with 10 CFR 50.49? !
- 2. Did the licensee apply best efforts to complete environmental qualification within the deadline?
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Has the licensee proposed actions which can be expected to result in full compliance within a reasonable time?
These factors are self-explanatory. In addition, the staff would consider I
the circumstances of each particular case including the significance of the g
deficiencies identified, the opportunities available to identify and correct l
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them, the time taken by the licensee to make a determination, the quality of the supporting before analysis, and the length of time the deficiencies existed identification. The following discussion illustrates how these which identified the valve be mitigation factors would applied operator in the hypothetical case of a licensee problem.
of the Inspector.
Resident internal wiring of valve operators after conversation i
We assume that it inanediately initiated a timely fully supported due to problems with the internal wiring, Within two weeks of becoming aware of the problem, the 10 CFR Part 21 report to the NRC.
justification action. ,
for continued operation of the plant and a plan for correc deadline of the second refueling outage after MarchFurther we ass 31, 1982 and was able to meet it except operation (JCOs) for hadsome items of equipment for which justifications for continued been approved.
all work on equipment scheduled for replacement and/or relocation and by the previously approved JCOs had been accomplished.
within November the30, scope of 10 CFR 50.49;eas believed to be qualified well before theThere 1985 deadline.
Finally, we assume that this licensee's 10 CFR Part 21 report submitted to the NRC included a schedule for corrective actions to establish qualification of the wiring of all valve operators within the . scope of 10 CFR 50.49 and that wiring on all affected operators within two months.this schedule calle The staff has mitigation underconcluded that this licensee would be entitled to complete these factors.
However, to be fair and equitable to those licensees who either took appropriate actions prior to November 30 or shut down on November 30 in order to be in compliance, some civil penalty should be impose Thus, the staff has concluded that the daily civil penalty in any case in which significant deficiencies remained at th ,
inspection for which further testing or analysis was required to establish qualification and which the licensee " clearly knew or should have known" existed before the November 30 deadline.
Operating Af ter November 30Other Enforcement Regarding Violations of EO _ ,
l If violations of the EQ rule identified during first-round M inspections at plants operating after November 30, 1985 then the " clearly knew or should have known" test should be applied.apparent Ifthe
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First-roundwith compliance inspections are special team inspections to review licensees' 10 CFR 50.49.
licensee meets the test, enforcement should be taken as described above. If the licensee does not meet this test, no enforcement action should be taken.
If the licensee could not have reasonably been expected to discover the problem before the November 30 deadline, presumably the noncompliance could not have been no avoided and enforcement action to deter future noncompliance would serve purpose.
If the violations of the EQ rule identified after hovember 30, 1985 do not relate back to action or lack of action before the deadline; e.g., a modification was made in January 1986 that created the violation, or are identified after first-round inspections are completed, enforcement should be taken under the current Enforcement Policy. The present policy states as an example of Severity level III: "2.
A system designed to prevent or mitigate a serious safety event not being able to perform its intended function under certain conditions (e.g., safety system not operable unless offsite power is available; materials or components not environmentally qualified)." Thus, no changes to the Enforcement Policy are necessary to take into account EQ violations.
Consistent with the interpretations of the Enforcement Policy in other areas, less significant violations that indicate a programmatic breakdown can also be grouped and categorized as Severity Level III violations.
For licensees that were not in compliance with the rule before the November 30, 1985 deadline and did not submit timely requests for extension, but which did not operate in noncompliance after the deadline, con ~sistent with the Connission's direction in response to SECY 85-220. (Memorandum from S. J. Chilk to W. J.
Dircks, August 27,1985) the staff will exercise enforcement discretion af ter considering whether adequate JCO's were provided and whether an extension would have been granted if timely filed.
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/v.a nsg( ~ UN TED STATES
! ', Action: Taylor. IE 5*
I NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION wAsumotow, o.c. mosas Cys: Stello Roc
- "'.o* Rehm Sniezek orFN:E OF THE July 3, 1986 Denton srcRETARY GCunningham pg]pgd Regions I-V MEMORANDUM FOR: Victor Stello, Jr.
Executive Director for Operations FROM:
Y' hSamuelJ.Chilk, y Secretary
SUBJECT:
STAFF REQUIREMENTS - SECY-86-122,
" POLICY FOR ENFORCEMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALIFICATION
- REQUIREMENTS" i
l The Commission,'with all Commissioners agreeing, has l approved the attached Policy for Enforcement of Environmental Qualification Requirements, as modified.
Both the attached policy paper and the e'nclosure should be distributed to,the regi,o,ns for implementation. ~ !
Attachment:
As stated cc: Chairman Zech Commissioner Roberts **
Commissioner Asselstine Commissioner Bernthal OGC OPE R::'d Off. EDO gg 1-3-34 m El TP l
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