ML21035A256
| ML21035A256 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 02/02/2021 |
| From: | NRC/OCIO |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML21035A252 | List: |
| References | |
| NRC-2021-000029 | |
| Download: ML21035A256 (112) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Predecisional Enforcement Conference RE Tennessee Valley Authority Docket Number: EA-19-092 Location: teleconference Date: Thursday, July 23, 2020 Work Order No.: NRC-0998 Pages 1-111 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island A venue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + + + + +
4 PRE-DECISIONAL ENFORCEMENT CONFERENCE 5 RE 6 TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY (TVA) 7 (DOCKET NO . EA-19-092) 8 + + + + +
9 THURSDAY 10 JULY 23, 2020 11 + + + + +
12 The conference was convened at 8 : 00 a . m.
13 EDT via Video Teleconference, Kenneth O ' Brien, Region 14 III , Deputy Regional Administrator , presiding .
15 16 NRC STAFF PRESENT:
17 KENNETH O ' BRI EN , Region III, 18 Deputy Regional Administrator 19 ALEX ECHAVARRIA , Region II ,
20 Office of I nvestigations 21 IAN GIFFORD , Office of Enforcement 22 JOE GI LLESP I E , At torney ,
23 Office of the General Counsel 24 NI CK HILTON , Senior Enforcement Advisor ,
25 Office of Enforcement NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 1 CRAIG KONTZ , Region II ,
2 Office of I nvestigation s 3 MARK MI LLER , Region II, Director, 4 Division of Reactor Projects 5 MARCIA S I MON , Senior Attorney ,
6 Office of the General Counsel 7 ANDY SHUTTLEWORTH , Director, 8 Office of I nvestigations 9 SCOTT SPARKS , Region II ,
10 Senior Enforcemen t Spec i a l ist 11 12 ALSO PRESENT :
13 J IM BARSTOW , TVA , Vice President ,
14 Nuclear Regulatory Affairs 15 TIM RAUSCH, TVA , Chief Nuc l ear Officer 16 TRICIA ROELOFS, TVA, Director ,
17 Data Governance & Analytics 18 CHRIS RICE, TVA , Director , Plant Operations ,
19 Wat ts Bar Nuc l ear Plant 20 RANDY STAGGS , TVA, Director, Plant Support ,
21 Watts Bar Nuclear Plant 22 TONY WILL I AMS , TVA , Site Vice President ,
23 Watts Bar Nuclear Plant 24 BRENDAN HENNESSEY , Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw 25 P i ttman NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 1 MONICA HERNANDEZ, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw 2 Pittman 3 TOM HILL, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman 4 MICHAEL LEPRE, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman 5 DAVID LEWI S , Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman 6 DREW NAVIKAS , Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman 7
8 HOWARD FELDMAN, Blank Rome 9 BARRY LEVINE , Blank Rome 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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4 1 CONTENTS 2
3 Opening Remarks . 5 4 - Director , Office of Enforcement 5 Enforcement Policy Overview 5 6 - Office of Enforcement Staff 7 Apparent Violation 6 8 - Office of Enforcement Staff 9 External Presentation 6 10 Complainan t Comments 32 11 External Response to Complainant Comments 55 12 Questions . 78 13 Closing Remarks 103 14 - Director , Office of Enforcement 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 8 :0 0 a.m.
3 MR. O' BRI EN: Good morning , everybody.
4 It ' s top of the hour , so I 'd l i ke to begin if we 5 could . This is Ken O 'Brien again. We are going to 6 conduct a PEC today , a continuation of yesterday so we 7 are going to go back on the record .
8 Before we begin, I want to make sure 9 everybody ' s available . I'll check my team first .
10 Marcia?
11 MS. SIMON: I'm here .
12 MR . O'BRIEN : Nick?
13 MR. HILTON: Good morning.
14 MR . O'BRIEN : Scott?
15 MR. SPARKS : Yes, Ken. Good morning.
16 MR. O'BRIEN: Good morning .
17 And t hen , Mr. Rausch and Mr . Barstow , do 18 you have everybody that you need?
19 MR . BARSTOW : Yes , we do . Thank you.
20 MR. O 'BRIEN: Thank you. I just have a 21 brief opening statement and then I am going to turn it 22 back over to you.
23 As we continue to today , the PEC started 24 yesterday , we are back on the record and the cou rt 25 reporter i s available, we are going to discuss the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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6 1 NRC ' s letter to the TVA dated March 9th. It 2 document ed 12 appar e n t viol ation s that i n cluded 3 factual summaries for those. Today , as I understand 4 it , we are going to discu ss three of the 12 apparent 5 violations , apparent v i olations 4, 7 and 9 .
6 In summary, these apparent violations 7 involved the deliberate fail u re to follow procedures 8 associated with not ensuring that shift operations 9 were condu cted in a safe and conservative manner , not 10 stoppi ng operations when unsure and only proceeding in 11 a deliberate and controlled manner , not validating 12 available information, a l lowing production to override 13 safety and proceeding in the face of uncertainty, and 14 two examples of a deliberate failure to provide the 15 Commission complete and accurate information in a l l 16 material respects.
17 Wi th that , I ' ll t u rn the mee ting over to 18 you , Mr. Rausch and Mr. Barstow , for your 19 presentations .
20 MR. WI LL I AMS : Thank you. Good morning .
21 This is Tony Williams . Before I turn it over to our 22 attorneys to respond t o apparent viol ation 4 , I want 23 to briefly go back over some of my points that I made 24 in my opening statement yesterday .
25 I n 2015, Watts Bar was not where it needed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 1 to be. We lacked conservative bias in decision 2 makin g , we had weaknesse s i n operative fundamenta l s 3 and we did not maintain a strong safety-conscious work 4 environment . These organizational failures 5 con tributed to the RHR event .
6 It was not a conservative decision to heat 7 up withou t verified , effec tive , pressurizer level 8 control of (audio interference). While the 9 environment at that time may have contributed to poor 10 decis i on mak i ng, our empl oyees did not intentionally 11 violate procedures or NRC requirements.
12 While many of u s were not here at the 13 time , we take responsibility for ensuring that these 14 fail u res have been and remain corrected today. Our 15 operators u nderstand that a proposed action must be 16 determined to be safe in order to proceed, rather than 17 u nsafe in order t o stop .
18 Management behaviors have been changed to 19 ensu re employees feel free to raise concerns without 20 fear of retaliation. Our safety culture monitoring 21 program has the tools to ensure subtle work 22 envi r onmen t i ssu es are i dentif i ed and acted upon .
23 This event or similar events simply would 24 not occur at Watts Bar today . If faced with a simil ar 25 operat i on decision making , our organizat i on woul d NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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8 1 react very different . We would evaluate a condition 2 as an infrequently performed test or evolution and 3 additional controls that could be put in place for the 4 infrequ ently performed test or evolu tion .
5 We have sen i or leaders assigned to an 6 evolution oversight commission with roles and 7 respon sibilities clearly established. Standalone 8 procedure would be developed and there would be 9 formalities in the development of calcu lations and 10 con t ingency steps.
11 Just-in-time training would be performed 12 in the simu lator to address operators ' profici-e ncy .
13 There would be use of an operation decision making 14 index that has been -- that would be developed . There 15 wou ld also be station alignment with the on-watch 16 operations crew authorizing -- with the authorization 17 requi rement s .
18 As I described to you yesterday, TVA has 19 worked hard over the last several years to fix these 20 deficiencies identified in the RHR event. We at Watts 21 Bar are confident that we have fixed those issues by 22 ensuring o u r n u clear safety is an ongoin g mission .
23 Today , we are a different site with a 24 different leadership . Our operators' f u ndamentals and 25 performance are the best they ' ve ever been. In NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 1 particular , we ' ve taken significant steps to improve 2 o ur nuc l ear safety culture . Some of those steps are 3 discussed in our written response to the apparent 4 violat i ons form .
5 I am proud to say that TVA ' s improvements 6 have been recognized by industry groups as well as the 7 NRC . At the same time , I am conc ern ed that the NRC is 8 seeking to revisit these events despite all the work 9 and cooperation between TVA and the NRC to improve the 10 work envi r onment at Watts Bar .
11 I would like to turn it over to our 12 counsel to set o u t TVA ' s position in more detail and 13 to also address the concerns as I just stated from a 14 legal perspective .
15 MR . LEWI S: Thank you, Tony .
16 As you've just heard from Mr. Williams, 17 TVA acknowl edges that its employees engaged in 18 nonconservative decision making at Watts Bar on 19 November 11th , 2015 . In response , TVA has taken 20 extensive corrective action and the safety cul ture at 21 Watts Bar today is light-years ahead of where it was 22 i n 20 15 .
23 Although TVA does not deny that there were 24 nonconservative actions at Watts Bar on November 11th ,
25 TVA denies apparent violat i on 4 on both legal and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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10 1 policy grounds . And TVA also denies that the 2 n o n con servat i ve decis i on making wa s the result of any 3 deliberate misconduct.
4 First , TVA denies the apparent violation 5 becau se the NRC has chosen not to regu late adherence 6 to its safety culture policy statement. As I will 7 explain, the provisions in OPDP-1 , on which this 8 apparent violation are based , are safety culture 9 traits and their inclusion as part of TVA 1 s efforts to 10 promote positive safety culture cons i stent with the 11 NRC ' s safety culture policy statement and the 12 expectation s therein .
13 The policy statement and the statement by 14 the commissioners when it was issued clearly indicate 15 that the policy statement does not create enforceabl e 16 requirements and this implementation should not r *e sult 17 in de facto requ irements . Issuing a notice of 18 violation based on violations of the safety culture 19 traits in OPDP- 1 would thus contradict the 20 Commission's directions .
21 Second , TVA denies the allegations of 22 de l iberate miscondu ct by Mess r s Johnson , Bl ankensh i p ,
23 l(b)(7)(C) I, l(b )(7)(C) I and (b )(7)(C) . Even if the safety 24 c u ltu re traits that have been inserted into OPDP-1 to 25 promote good safety culture were treated as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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11 1 enforceable regulatory requirements , which they should 2 no t be , a n y violations of tho s e traits were non-3 deliberate. TVA has found no evidence including the 4 PEC presentations over the past two weeks that wou ld 5 lead it to conclude that any employee deliberately 6 violated the provisions of OPDP- 1 cited in this 7 apparent violation .
8 I 'll now explain our legal argument 9 regarding OPDP-1. The NRC bases this violation on 10 certai n provisions of OPDP-1, a procedure govern i ng 11 conduct of operations for operations personnel.
12 Specifically , the NRC has identified violations of 13 sub-parts A and E in Section 3.3 dedicated to 14 conservative decision making .
15 This section of the procedure incorporates 16 into OPDP-1 safety culture traits which the Commission 17 through its safety culture pol icy statement has 18 encouraged all licensees to foster.
19 As I will discuss , the Commission has 20 specifically chosen in its safety culture policy 21 statement to encourage licensees to promote and foster 22 safety culture as a matter of policy , but not to 23 establish enforceable requirements. Consequently ,
24 safety culture traits do not constitute enforceable 25 requi remen ts or provide the bas i s for viol ations .
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12 1 The NRC ' s safety culture policy statement 2 lays out various policy safety culture traits that the 3 Commission expects licensees to foster. As the 4 Commission's policy statement explains , safety culture 5 traits describe a pattern of thinking, feeling and 6 behaving that emphasize safety .
7 OPDP-1 Section 3 . 3 sub-parts A and E are 8 exactly that, traits of thinking, feeling and behaving 9 that emphasize safety, in particular conservative 10 decision making that Watts Bar operators should 11 exhibit .
12 The NRC has developed NUREG-2165 to 13 present a common language agreed upon by the NRC and 14 the nuclear industry for classifying and grouping 15 traits and attributes for healthy safety culture.
16 There is a clear correlation between the provisions in 17 OPDP-1 cited by the NRC and the traits described in 18 both the policy statement and NUREG -216 5.
19 While the Commission's safety culture 20 policy statement sets forth expectations and 21 encourages licensees to foster good safety culture, it 22 does not create enforceable requirements . In 23 promulgating the safety culture policy statement, the 24 Commission explicitly stated its policy statements do 25 not constitute rules and are not enforceabl e against NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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13 1 licensees.
2 The policy statement also states that the 3 traits of positive safety culture were not developed 4 to be used for inspection purposes. This stat-e ment 5 that the traits were not developed for inspection 6 purposes implies that they were not developed for 7 enforcement .
8 In addition , the policy statement states 9 that the NRC will not monitor or trend values. These 10 will be the organization's responsibility as part of 11 its safety culture program. This statement too 12 implies that the Commission did not expect that the 13 staff would be treating values as enforceable 14 requirements.
15 In this regard, when the draft policy 16 statement was presented to the Commission and at that 17 time it included a statement, the draft policy 18 statement did , the statement that the NRC will include 19 appropriate means to monitor safety culture in its 20 oversight programs and internal management processes.
21 Then-Commissioner, now Chairman Svinicki, obs-e rved 22 that this statement is fundamentally inconsistent with 23 the statement that the safety culture traits are not 24 necessarily inspectable and were not developed for 25 that purpose , and the statement inserting monitoring NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 1 safety culture in oversight programs was deleted.
2 Commissioner Ostendorff expressed similar 3 views. He cautioned against implementation in a 4 manner that could result in de facto requirements and 5 he advised that the staff should come back to the 6 Commission for further review and approval before any 7 broader implementation . That TVA has incorporated the 8 safety culture traits into OPDP-1 should not convert 9 those traits to requi rements enforced under 10 CFR 10 Part 50 Index B Crite rion 5 .
11 The safety culture policy statement states 12 the Commission's expectations that licensees take 13 necessary steps to promote safety culture by fostering 14 those traits as they apply to their organizational 15 environments.
16 Emphasizing safety culture traits by 17 emphasizing them in a procedure is a key means to do 18 so , to apply the procedures in the operations 19 department's organizational environment , what method 20 to do so.
21 Further , the NRC staff ' s inspection 22 procedures provide an example of the NRC encouraging 23 licensees to incorporate safety culture traits into 24 their procedures. NRC Inspection Procedure 95003 . 02 25 Appendix A, which is in sample inspection NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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15 1 requirements , tells the inspector , review policies or 2 procedures which address proceeding in t h e face of 3 uncertainty or unexpected circumstances to verify that 4 related guidance is adequ ate . This i s the very trait 5 that ' s before us today .
6 Consequently , reflecting safety culture 7 traits and procedures is simply part of a licensee's 8 implementation of the policy statement, a licensee's 9 implementation of the Commission's expectations , not 10 requirements, a n d thus not subject to e n forcement .
11 10 CFR Part 50 Appendix B Criterion 5 does 12 not and should not alter that result . Its well-13 established legal maxim recognized by the Commission 14 that the specific prevails over the general, and I'm 15 sure that Murray (phonetic) and Marcia will understand 16 this is primarily for their benefit.
17 Criterion 5 establishes a general 18 requirement that activities affecting quality be 19 implemented in accordance with establ ished procedure .
20 That general requirement gives way to t h e Commission ' s 21 specific direction that the promotion of safety 22 culture traits under its po l icy statement does not 23 create enforceable requirements , nor is it reasonable 24 to interpret the requirement in Criterion 5 to 25 accomplish act i vities affect i ng q uality in accordance NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 1 with these procedures as applying to expected pat terns 2 of thinking, feeling and behaving embodied in safety 3 culture traits.
4 The logical interpretation of Criterion 5 5 is that a licensee must prescribe and adhere to 6 specific steps of actions required to accomplish 7 activities affecting quality and nothing more .
8 In this regard, as stated in Section 1 of 9 OPDP-1, OPDP-1 provides both instructions and 10 guidelines. The expected behaviors in Section 3 . 3 11 sub-parts A and E are in the nature of guidelines 12 reflecting general principles of behavior and 13 expectations.
14 These provisions are markedly different 15 from the procedural steps in a continuous u se 16 procedure , for example , compliance with which is 17 required under Criterion 5 .
18 Indeed, when you look at the alleged 19 violations, the issue is not so much whether the 20 behaviors were applied , but rather whether the 21 behaviors were sufficiently applied. Not whether the 22 operators stopped, but whether they stopped long 23 enough .
24 Not whether they questioned assumptions ,
25 but whether they were questioning enough. Not whether NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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17 1 they proceeded in a controlled manner, but whether it 2 was controlled enou gh . Further , as a matter of 3 policy, if the NRC turns safety culture traits into 4 enforceable requirements when they are incorporated by 5 licensees into written procedures or to emphasize them 6 before operators it would be counterproductive .
7 Usin g voluntary reference to safety 8 culture traits in a licensee ' s procedure as the basis 9 for violations might encou rage licensees to remove any 10 mention of those traits from a ny quality-related 11 procedure or instruction.
12 Further, it would be doing exactly what 13 the Commission has said not to do, create de facto 14 requirements without first coming back to the 15 Commission and proceeding through appropr i ate 16 rulemaking .
17 And last but not l east , the NRC wou ld be 18 entering into the realm of regulating attitude.
19 Fundamentally, the NRC would be regulating licensees' 20 employees ' subjective judgments. When is some action 21 conservative enough? When is an individual 22 questioning enough?
23 This would represent a marked expansion of 24 the NRC's enforcement regime , one that is 25 unprecedented. NRC enforcement under Criterion 5 has NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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18 1 always focused on whether an operator has objectively 2 follows specific procedures. The NRC has never tried 3 as far as we are aware to regulate the subjective 4 values of operators who are trying to follow 5 procedures, perhaps not in NRC' s estimation trying 6 hard enough .
7 It would be a sea change for the industry 8 to expose operators to this degree of management by 9 the NRC staff. Rather , as the Commission 's policy 10 statement indicates , managing safety culture is l eft 11 to the organization.
12 Further, the subjective standard created 13 by safety culture traits is fundamentally incompatible 14 with the NRC's deliberate misconduct rule. The 15 deliberate misconduct rule prohibits knowing and 16 intentional violations.
17 That standard presumes that licensees and 18 their employees knows what constitute a violation ,
19 that the safety culture traits are so f undamentally 20 subjective and susceptible to armchair quarterbacking 21 that individuals at risk of sanctions under the 22 deliberate misconduct rule can hardly be expected to 23 know what the NRC will decide was, in hindsight ,
24 conservative enough.
25 Even without the strong l egal and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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19 1 prudential reasons for the NRC to refrain from 2 enforcing safety culture, under 10 CFR Part 50 3 Appendix B, Criterion 5, a factual record does not 4 support a finding of deliberate misconduct.
5 Viewed fairly, the evidence does not 6 support the allegations that TVA' s employees knowingly 7 and intentionally violated the cited provisions of 8 OPDP - 1 on November 11th, 2015.
9 As has been discussed but bears repeating ,
10 deliberate misconduct requires an intentional act or 11 omission that the individual knows would cause a 12 licensee to violate an NRC requirement . Given the 13 Commission ' s statements that its safety culture policy 14 statement is not a rule , it's difficult to know, to 15 see how any employee would know that not being 16 conservative enough would cause TVA to be in violation 17 of an NRC rule .
18 Regardless, it appears that the accused 19 individuals believed on November 11th that they were 20 acting appropriately . They may have been wrong, but 21 they were not deliberately violating the cited 22 provisions of OPDP-1 .
23 I'll discuss the evidence with regard to 24 each individual argu ed by apparent violation 4 25 starting with the operators in the control room and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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20 1 then turn to plant management.
2 Apparent violation 4 targets two operators 3 in the control room on November 11th, Mr. Billy 4 Johnson , the shift manager, and Mr. Todd Blankenship, 5 a reactor operator.
6 With respect to Mr. Johnson, he stopped, 7 he deliberated about the evolution before proceeding.
8 He discussed the plan with other control room 9 operators and with the OCC operations representative .
10 It appears he also discussed the plan with the 11 operations director.
12 He heard from the occ operations 13 representative and the operations director that the 14 plant evolut ion would work. Mr. Johnson reviewed the 15 plant procedures and could not identify any 16 restriction on the proposed evolution .
17 Although it appears he may not have been 18 confident in the evolution , he did not view it as 19 posing a safety risk because he was confident that he 20 could control the pressurizer level by restoring RHR 21 letdown, for example . He directed the operators to 22 proceed with the evolution knowing that he could 23 control pressurizer level, and the operators reduced 24 the pressurizer level before doing so. They proceeded 25 with a heat-up very slowly .
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21 1 These points I've just made and the points 2 I'm going to make on the other individuals are set out 3 in more detail in our written response, so I am not 4 going to go through all the quotes on which these are 5 based. But if you look at our written response, 6 you'll see them laid out.
7 So were Mr. Johnson's actions non-8 conservative? Yes. Did he make mistakes? Yes. But 9 did he intentionally, knowingly violate NRC 10 requirements? Of course not. He showed poor judgment 11 and weaknesses in operator fundamentals.
12 He should have done more to confirm 13 assumptions. He should have ensured the evolution was 14 properly evaluated including with a simulator . He 15 should have put a procedure in place for the untried 16 evolution including provisions controlling the 17 pressu rizer level.
18 But there's no evidence that Mr. Johnson 19 considered taking those steps , knew that failing to do 20 so would violate NRC requirements, and decided just to 21 go ahead and violate them. His conduct thus did not 22 rise to the level of deliberate misconduct in TVA's 23 estimation.
24 Mr. Blankenship . Mr . Blankenship thought 25 and deliberated about the evolution before proceeding NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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22 1 and he ultimately proceeded at his shift manager's 2 direction . Mr. Blankenship had questions about the 3 ability to control pressurizer level and he raised 4 those questions appropriately with his shift manager, 5 Mr. Johnson.
6 He was led to believe by Mr. Johnson that 7 those concerns had been addressed by the OCC and 8 engineering . As the operator at the controls during 9 a busy startup, Mr. Blankenship was not in the 10 position to be personally performing an engin eering 11 analysis. The shift manager directed Mr. Blankenship 12 to proceed .
13 Mr. Blankenship had no reason to suspect 14 that his questions had not been adequately addressed 15 or that his shift manager, Mr. Johnson, still harbored 16 his own concerns. Nothing suggests that Mr.
17 Blankenship could have or should have known, let alone 18 actually knew that his conduct would violate an NRC 19 r ul e .
20 Further, Mr. Blankenship was not part of 21 the non-conservative decision making that occurred on 22 November 11th . Mr. Blankenship was merely an operator 23 who properly raised concerns, thought they had been 24 addressed, and then complied with the instructions of 25 his shift manager .
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23 1 Further , Mr. Johnson had the command 2 f uncti o n. Therefore , the decision shoul d not be 3 attributed to Mr. Blankenship. Indeed, the 4 enforcement policy provides this very situation as an 5 exampl e where enforcement should not be taken against 6 an individual.
7 I'll now t ur n to Watts Bar plant 8 management. Apparent violation 4 also targets three 9 former members of Watts Bar plant management, Mr.
10 l(b)(?)(C) I, the l(b)(?)(C) I, Mr .
(b )(?)(C) 71 l(b)(?)(C) I, the l(b)(?)(C) ~ and Mr ......l(b_)(?_)(_C)_ _ _!, the 12 l...(b_)_(?_)(_C_)_ _ _ _ _ _ _____.~ none of whom are current TVA 13 employees .
14 While TVA expects all of its employees to 15 exhibit the traits of good safety culture, of the 16 three , only Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I was part of the operating 17 personnel to which OPDP-1 applies. But strictl y 18 speaking, the safety culture provisions in Section 19 3 . 3(e) of OPDP-1 appl y only to the control room team .
20 I am just saying that procedure applies. It ' s clearly 21 that the expectations for safety culture applies to 22 the e n tire s i te .
23 Regardless, there's no evidence that any 24 of these three managers deliberately violated the 25 cited provis i ons of OPDP-1 or otherwi se de l iberatel y NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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24 1 acted non - conservatively.
2 Mr .1(b)(?)(C) Mr .1(b)(?)(C) deliberated 1*
3 about the violation before encouraging proceeding. In 4 his position as l(b ...._)(_7)_(C_)_ _ _ _ _ _....,I, Mr *l(b)(?)(C) Iwas 5 on site to provide support and oversight to the shift 6 manager. He was not part of the OCC. He thus was not 7 responsible for either manipulation of the plant 8 controls or for the planning and scheduling functions 9 of the OCC .
10 But Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) Isupported the plan to heat 11 up on excess letdown based on his understanding that 12 the plan had been validated by the OCC, including 13 representatives from operations and engineering 14 departments . He was aware of questions from the 15 control room operators, but he believed they had been 16 answered by the work of the OCC.
17 He thought they could proceed safely. He 18 understood the plan. He thought it was thought out.
19 After a heat-up of about 25 degrees, the steam 20 generators would be able to provide cooling and they 21 estimated that a one percent increase in RCS 22 temperature would correspond to a one-degree increase 23 in pressurizer level.
24 To accommodate this expected rise, the 25 operators reduced the pressurizer level to abou t 43 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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25 1 percent prior to removing RHR from service. If the 2 correlation between the temperature increase and the 3 pressurizer level had been correct, the evolution may 4 have been successful. Unfortunately, that correlation 5 was incorrect and Mr .l(b)(?)(C) lwas mistaken, but it was 6 just a technical mistake , not a deliberate act.
7 Consistent with his belief that the 8 evolution would be successful, Mr ~(b)(?)(C) I encouraged 9 Mr . Johnson to proceed with the plan to heat up. The 10 apparent violation seems to suggest that Mr l(b)(?)(C) 11 urging Mr. Johnson to proceed was improper .
12 As a general matter, it's not improper for 13 an l(b)(?)(C) I to urge the shift managers to 14 stay on schedule by performing an evolution that the 15 l(b)(7)(C) believes has been appropriately 16 validated .
17 We ' ve looked at this i nteraction closely 18 and as best we can determine, Mr* l(b)(?)(C) I did not 19 direct Mr. Johnson to proceed or coerce him. Mr .
20 l(b)(?)(C) I is adamant about this and we have found his 21 accounts forthright.
22 What is particularly telling is that Mr.
23 Johnson in many interviews prior to 2017 made no 24 mention of Mr. l(b)(?)(C) having any particular 25 involvement in proceeding with the h eat-up . I t seems NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 1 inconceivable if the heat-up had occurred as Mr.
2 l(b)(?)(C) !directed or coerced Mr. Johnson into doing so 3 that Mr. Johnson would not have said so.
4 In h is 2016 interviews when he was laying 5 his actions off on the OCC and Watts Bar senior 6 management, and even in his written PEC response, Mr.
7 Johnson makes no mention of Mr .l(b)(?)(C) 1.
8 We have been unable to substantiate the 9 allegation , which is in the factual summary of 10 apparent violation 4 provided to Mr l(b)(?)(C) ~ that an 11 employee witnessed Mr . l(b)(?)(C) telling Mr. Johnson 12 that he wanted RHR removed from service as soon as 13 possible and then challenging a resistant Mr. Johnson.
14 We are aware of a statement by an 15 7 (b-)(_ )-(C_) _ _ _ _ _ _ ___.l l_ who, according to the statement, 16 recalled witnessing an exchange between Mr. Johnson 17 and an unidentified OCC staff member in the control 18 room on November 11th, 2015. But the auxiliary 19 l_
( b-)(-?)-(C_) _ __.I has declined to provide further information ,
20 and we've been unable to ascertain whether the 21 individual whom he thought he saw was Mr -l(b)(?)(C) 22 We ' ve also been unable to determine the 23 nature of the challenge or how the auxiliary operator 24 would challenge , would describe his recollection in 25 his own words . As you are aware, we requested release NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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27 1 of the OI report and other interviews , summaries , and 2 transcripts. This is one of the items that we are 3 particularly interested in, but we do not have the 4 benefit of that informat ion.
5 It's possible that the auxiliary 6 operator's account relates to some interaction between 7 Mr. Johnson and Mr .j(b)(?)(C) I, as Mr -l(b)(7)(C) lhas freely 8 admitted both in his PEC presentation and in past 9 statements that he had a discussion with Mr . Johnson 10 in the control room on November 11th, 2015, but as 11 already discussed, Mr. l(b)(7)(C) has stated that he 12 neither directed nor coerced Mr . Johnson.
13 That he understood from the discussion 14 that Mr . Johnson was comfortable proceeding and that 15 Mr. Johnson decided to do so. In his own PEC 16 statement , Mr. Johnson acknowledges that he made the 17 decision to proceed himself and he does not attribute 18 any influence on his decision to Mr . j(b)(?)(C) 1-19 In sum, the inte rac tion between Mr .
20 l(b)(?)(C) Ia nd Mr. Johnson does n ot appear to TVA to have 21 been improper based on the available evidence. The 22 7 l(b_)_<_l(_C_) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ___,lexpres sing to the 23 shift manager a desire to move forward and stay on 24 schedule does not amount to a direction to proceed.
25 Although TVA has acknowledged in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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28 1 connection with this apparent violation 4 and in our 2 root cause analysis that personnel in the OCC and MCR 3 made non-conservative decision making, TVA has not 4 found any intentional effort to override or ignore 5 operators ' concerns.
6 I' 11 now turn to Mr . l(b)(?)(C) and Mr.
7 (b)(7)(C) . TVA has not identified any evidence they need 8 to conclude that Mr - l(b)(7)(C) I or Mr .l(b)(?)(C) Iwere aware 9 that operators expressed concerns with the heat-up on 10 November 11th, 20 15.
11 It seems that Mr . r_ ... )_(?-)(_c_
) _I and Mr. (b)(?)(C) 12 were likely briefed on the plan to heat up . That 13 would be normal, given their positions at the p l ant, 14 but there's no evidence of which TVA is aware that 15 they directed the plan for heating up on excess 16 letdown, and there's no evidence of which TVA is aware 17 that they directed Mr . Johnson to proceed with heating 18 up, or that they told anyone else to direct Mr.
19 Johnson to do so .
20 I n fact, Mr. l(b)(?)(C) l has stated that he 21 was not told to direct Mr. Johnson to proceed, and Mr.
22 Johnson has stated that he did not have any 23 communications with senior management. Rather, Mr.
24 Johnson appears to simply infer that Mr .1(b)(?)(C) lwould 25 be upset with any delay, and thus he took it upon NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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29 1 himself to avoid Mr .l(b)(?)(C) !attention by deciding to 2 heat up on excess letdown. Furth er , there ' s no 3 indication that either Mr . l(b)(7)(C) I or Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I 4 recognized that the continued heat up might result in 5 an uncontrol l ed rise in the pressurizer level.
6 Instead , it appears that apparent 7 violation 4 is accusing Mr *l(b)(7)(C) Iand Mr .,(b)(7)(C) Iof 8 deliberate misconduct again of intentionally taking 9 actions that they knew would cau se a violation of an 10 NRC rule by v irtue of their management styl es . This 11 is a pretty remarkable basis for alleging deliberate 12 misconduct.
13 I don ' t think there ' s any dispute that, 14 when Mr .1(b)(?)(C) Iand Mr ~(b)(7)(C) Ibecame senior managers 15 at Watts Bar in mid-2014, the plant was performing 16 poorly , and I don't think there was any dispute that 17 in late 2015, operational procedure errors were still 18 occurring in the operations department at Watts Bar.
19 So it should not be surprising that Mr .
20 l(b)(7)(C) Iand Mr *l(b)(?)(C) I were taking actions to hold 21 employees , include operations personnel, accountable 22 for their performance, and it should not be surprising 23 that some operators did not like it.
24 Bu t for the NRC to then suggest that s u ch 25 efforts to improve performance constitut ed de l iberate NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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30 1 misconduct is wrong. One can disagree with their 2 man agement styles , but there ' s little doubt that their 3 actions were intended to improve performance and 4 there's no evidence that their actions were intended 5 to cause a violation to occur. That is no indication 6 that they took deliberate actions that they knew would 7 cause the reactor operators t:o violate any procedures.
8 To sum it up, the five individuals 9 targeted by apparent violation 4 do not appear to have 10 engaged in deliberate violations of NRC requirements .
11 Mr. Blankenship appears to have done 12 nothing wrong. Both Mr . Johnson and Mr *l(b)(7)(C) 13 appear to have believed that they were retaining plant 14 safety, and Mr l(b)(7)(C) Iand Mr l(b)(?)(C) Iwere engaged in 15 efforts t:o turn around the performance at Watts Bar to 16 improve safety, the complete opposite of alleged 17 deliberate misconduct .
18 Accordingly, this scenario is a good 19 example of why the NRC was correct to decide not to 20 enforce safety culture traits as a regulation, as 21 requirements. Anybody's performance can be criticized 22 and found wanting when scru tinized under subjective 23 behavioral standards, but that should not expose them 24 to charges of deliberate misconduct .
25 Thank you for your time and attention and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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31 1 I'll now hand it back over to Mr . Williams.
2 MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr . Lewis .
3 As just explained , TVA contests apparent 4 violation 4. TVA has acknowledged that the non-5 conservative decision making incurred on November 11th 6 and has implemented corrective actions to fix the 7 fail ures that occurred that day .
8 But as Mr. Lewis explained, none of the 9 individuals implicated in apparent violation 4 10 deliberately made non-conservative decisions. Mr.
11 Johnson stopped and deliberated about the evolution 12 before proceeding. And while he acted in poor 13 judgment, he thought his actions were consistent with 14 NRC's requ irements .
15 Mr. Blankenship stopped and deliberated 16 about the evolution before proceeding and only 17 proceeded after being led to believe his concerns were 18 addressed and being given the express direction to 19 proceed. Mr. l(b)(7)(C) I also deliberated about the 20 evolution, and while he encouraged proceeding, he only 21 did so because he understood that the heat-up could 22 proceed safely .
23 And while it seems likely that Mr l(b)(?)(C) 24 and Mr l(b)(?)(C) l were briefed on the heat-up given their 25 positions, there's no evidence that they directed the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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32 1 plant to heat up on excess letdown . Finall y , as Mr .
2 Lewis discussed, since the NRC has chosen not to 3 enforce safety culture traits against the l icensees ,
4 it cannot do so here .
5 This concludes our presentation on 6 apparent violation 4. Of course , we are happy to 7 answer any q uest i ons you have .
8 MR. O' BRIEN: Thank you, Mr . Williams .
9 Consistent with our schedule , I b eliev e the next point 10 is for u s to take a caucus, so why don't we do that?
11 Why don' t we take and have a caucus for the next hou r ,
12 and we'l l reconvene and come back on the record at 20 13 minutes before the hou r . I s that acceptable to you?
14 MR. WILLIAMS: Yes , i t is.
15 MR. 0 ' BRIEN: Tha nk you very much. We a r e 16 off the record. We ' ll come b ack at 20 minutes before 17 the hour.
18 (Whereupon, the above - entitled matter went 19 off the r ecord at 8:36 a . m. and resumed at 9:15 a . m.)
20 MR. O 'BRIEN: Good morning. It ' s 15 21 minutes after the hour , as we agreed on a side call 22 that we begin now . Let me ma ke sure my team is ready .
23 Marcia? Nick?
24 MS. SIMON: Sorry. Sorry , Ken . I'm ready.
25 I just couldn ' t find my name on the list. Too many NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AN D TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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33 1 people .
2 MR. O 'BRIEN : Than k you . Next , Scott.
3 MR. WARRINGTON : Yeah, Ken, ready to go .
4 MR. O 'BRIEN : Than k you. Mr. Williams , are 5 we r eady to go from your perspective?
6 MR . WILLIAMS: Yes . We are ready to go .
7 MR . O'BRIEN : Thank you , sir. We have but 8 one , maybe two questions. And I' 11 take the questions 9 myself, if that's okay with everybody .
10 The first quest ion -- and I 'm not sure who 11 might be able to answer , but we're trying to 12 understand you r knowledge of who was i n the OCC on the 13 11th of November of 2015 from an engineering 14 perspective .
15 MS. ROELOFS: Mr. 0 ' Brien , this is Ms .
16 Roelofs . We will turn that over to our counsel to 17 answer based on their investigation.
18 MR. O 'BRI EN : Thank you, Ms . Roelofs.
19 MR. LEWIS : Yeah. This is Mr. Lewis . We 20 have been unable to identi fy because Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Idoes 21 not recall who were the engineering people he recalls 22 wr i ting input on that day. We do believe that -- and 23 I' ve asked TVA to remain because I can ' t quite 24 remember , I t hink it's ~l(b_)(_?)_(C_) _ ____,l may have been the 25 engineering rep that day . Tony , did I get that name NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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34 1 right? I can't remember exactly. I think it's l(b)(l)(C) 2 or (b)(?)(C) 3 MR. WILLIAMS: I believe it's Mr. (b)(?)(C)
(b)(?)(C) 4 5 MR. LEWIS: Casner. Thank you.
6 7 MS . ROELOFS: Yes . _r_w_x_~_ _ _ _lfor the 8 record.
9 MR . O ' BRIEN: Thank you , Ms. Roelofs. That 10 was exactly my next thing to ask. And I was going to 11 ask it. My follow-up question to that is then did you (b)(?)(C) 12 get any information from Mr. regarding the 1 13 percent to 1 degree rule , thumb rule? Is that where 14 that came from , or other aspects of that?
15 MR. LEWIS : No.
16 MS. ROELOFS: This is Ms. Roe l ofs . We'll 17 t urn that over to counsel. Looks like he's already 18 in.
19 MR . O'BRIEN : Thank you .
20 MR. LEWI S: Yes. No, we were unable to 21 determine where that came from.
22 MR . O'BRIEN : Did you get any information 23 from Mr . l(b)(?)(C) relative to whose involvement in the 24 discussions in the OCC that day with regard to heat-25 up?
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35 1 MR. LEWIS: No.
2 MR. O'BRIEN: Thank you very much. That's 3 all the questions we have relative to AV 4, Mr.
4 Williams. If you're ready to move on to the next AV, 5 that would be fine with us.
6 MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, we are ready to move on 7 to the next AV .
8 MR. BARSTOW: Good morning. Jim Barstow.
9 I' 11 open the comments around Apparent Violations 7 to 10 9. Before counsel discusses apparent violations 7 to 11 9 I 'd like to share a few thoughts regarding those 12 apparent violations to reflect some of the important 13 issues. Get my video on. I 'll address that.
14 MR. O'BRIEN: Thank you, sir . I appreciate 15 your recognizing that . Thank you .
16 MR. BARSTOW: You' re welcome. Apparent 17 Violation 7 essentially alleges that site personnel 18 intentionally provided an NRC resident inspector with 19 incomplete and inaccurate information .
20 The TVA management ' s expectations are 21 members of the nuclear organization will be responsive 22 to any NRC inspector q uestions in a timely and 23 accurate manner. TVA ' s review of the circumstances 24 associated with Apparent Violation 7 indicates that 25 the individuals who met with the senior resident NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 1 inspector on December 14th, 2015 , were doing exactly 2 what was inspected of them: answering his q uest ions to 3 the best of their ability.
4 This apparent violation is deeply 5 troubling for TVA and for the nuclear industry because 6 it would set a new precedent for what the NRC 7 considers evidence of providing incomplete or 8 inaccurate information. Stated plainly, the NRC is 9 relying on its own interpretation of an internal TVA 10 document which site personnel have said would not be 11 then provided to the resident inspector at the time 12 alleged, rather than recogni zin g the intent of the 13 author of the document and the interpretations that 14 the intended audience had of the document .
15 The NRC is a l so substituting its own 16 interpretation of language in a Condition Report 17 written to capture the site's understanding of the 18 inspector ' s question for that reason held by the 19 aut hor of the Condition Report . In the case of this 20 Condition report , the NRC has not only misinterpreted 21 TVA's words , but also incorrectly understood the date 22 the CR was initiated. As a result, TVA finds the 23 basis asserted for Apparent Violation 7 to be entirely 24 without merit.
25 On the other hand, Apparent Violation 9 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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37 1 concerns statements provided to an NRC Office of 2 Investigations agent on December 18th , 2015. While a 3 former shift manager has admitted to providing an 4 incomplete statement , the ... l(b_)_(7_)(_C_) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __.
5 has been wrongly accused on the basis of 6 circumstantial evidence and taking a portion of his 7 statement o u t of context.
8 In reviewing this alleged violation, TVA 9 has been particularly concerned about the use of the 7
10 l(b
..._)_( _)_
(c_)_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _,I interview as evidence 11 because of the imprecise questions asked of them, the 12 numerous interruptions by NRC personnel as they 13 attempted to answer their questions, and ultimately 14 the NRC's selective use of a statement taken out of 15 con text. I will now turn the presentation over to Tom 16 Hill who will take us through the details of these two 17 apparent violations.
18 MR. HILL: Thanks, Jim. TVA denies 19 Apparent Violat ion 7 for two primary reasons:
20 First, TVA has not been able to 21 substantiate that any written response was provided to 22 Mr. Nadel on December 14th, 2015. Rather, it appears, 23 contrary to the NRC ' s allegations, that Mr. Nadel was 24 not given any written response .
25 Second , TVA does not find the purported NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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38 1 written response described in the apparent violation, 2 even if given, to be inaccurate or incomplete in 3 response to Mr. Nadel's questions. Moreover, TVA has 4 identified no evidence that Mr. (b)(?)(C) or Mr .l(b)(?)(C) 5 knowingly and intentionally provided incomplete or 6 inaccurate information to Mr. Nadel, even assuming, 7 for the sake of argument that they did give him the 8 purported written response and that it was somehow 9 inaccurate or incomplete .
10 Rather, the evidence available to TVA 11 shows that Mr. (b)(?)(C) and Mr. l(b)(?)(C) worked 12 diligently over the weekend of December 12th, 2015, to 13 answer Mr. Nadel ' s questions , which were focused 14 primarily on the issu e of whether RHR had been 15 rendered i nope rable on November the 11th, not on the 16 reasons for cycling the RHR valves which Mr. Nadel 17 already knew and understood when he first approached 18 7
~l(b-J(_ l_
(c_i _ _ _ __.l, TVA senior reactor operator, on Friday, 19 December 11th .
20 What Mr. Nadel was primarily focused on 21 was the question he did not already know the answer 22 to: had RHR been made inoperable? l (b)(?)(C)
Mr. ~-----~ I and 23 Mr ~(b)(?)(C) I, and other TVA employees, continued working 24 transparently to answer Mr. Nadel's questions 25 throughout December 2015, and were able to demonstrate NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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39 1 that RHR had in fact remained operable .
2 To my first point, the apparent violation 3 is based on a faulty premise. The NRC alleges a 4 written response was given to Mr. Nadel , but it has 5 declined to provide a copy of that document to TVA or 6 to Mr . (b)(?)(C) or Mr *l(b)(?)(C) Mr .l(b)(?)(C) I and Mr.
7 _l(b_)(_7_)(_C)_ ___.I both stated clearly at their PECs that they 8 recall no written document being given to Mr. Nadel on 9 December the 14th .
10 As Mr l(b)(?)(C) !expl ained, it would have been 11 contrary to TVA 1 s standard practice, as well as his 12 own standard practice , to give Mr. Nadel any kind of 13 draft response or internal TVA document in writing.
14 And as Mr. l(b)(7)(C) !explained , he did not prepare any 15 documents with the intent to give them to Mr. Nadel on 16 December the 14th.
17 From the language quoted in the NRC' s 18 factual summary it appears to TVA that, in fact , the 19 document the NRC alleges was given to Mr. Nadel in 20 truth was actually taken from an internal TVA email 21 attachment written for internal TVA use to brief TVA' s 22 senior management . Either Mr . (b)(7)(C) or Mr . l(b)(7)(C) 23 believes they even took a copy of that internal email 24 document at the meeting , .so t hey could not have 25 accidentally l eft it behind .
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40 1 Without more specific information 2 regarding the document Mr. Nadel believes he received, 3 and his recollection of the meeting , which of course 4 would be available in litigation if needed, TVA simply 5 cannot credit the allegation that Mr. ~ or Mr.
6 l(b)(?)(C) gave Mr. Nadel any written response on 7 December 14th , 2015. And because it appears no 8 written response that forms the basis for Apparent 9 Violation 7 allegations was ever given, the apparent 10 violation should now be dropped.
11 My second point. The internal email that 12 the NRC mistakenly seems to allege that Mr. Nade l was 13 given was simply inaccurate. TVA has reviewed the 14 internal email attachment that appears to be the 15 sourc e of these allegations, and the facts and 16 circumstances surrounding its creation. This factual 17 background and chronology are laid out in TVA' s 18 written response to Apparent Violation 7, and I'll not 19 repeat them here.
20 The document that appears to be at issue 21 would certainly not have been incomplete, inaccurate, 22 or misunderstood had it somehow been provided to Mr .
23 Nadel when reviewed in the context of the verbal 24 discussions and ongoing communications with Mr. Nadel 25 over the weekend of December 12 th, 2015, and into the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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41 1 following week. To rende r the purported written 2 response inaccurate, NRC has seized on a single 3 sentence in that document, and reading it without any 4 context, given it an implausible interpretat ion .
5 The NRR alleges -- the NRC alleges the 6 purported TVA written response 3B is inaccurate. That 7 response stated, as you can see on the screen, that 8 the RHR inlet valves were open for placing RHR letdown 9 in service , and then goes on in subsection 1 to say 10 that, this was done to allow the r epai r of a valve 11 inside containment on the normal letdown line.
12 NRC then alleges that this was purposely 13 inaccurate because, in fact, the repair was initiated 14 hours before the valves were opened. Clearly , had Mr .
15 _l (b
_ )_(
7_)(_c_) _ _l b een a better and mor e precise writer, and 16 had he written in his internal email attachment 17 because of instead of to allow, we wouldn't be here .
18 Thus , the sentence of subsection 1 would have read ,
19 This was done because of the repair of a valve inside 20 containment on the normal l etdown l ine .
21 But Mr . _l(b_)_(7_)(_C_) _ _ _I superiors , even with 22 his less-than-perfect choice of language, understood 23 perfectly well that Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) was e xp laining to 24 them why normal l etdown was not availabl e as they 25 would have expected it to be during the heat-up.
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42 1 Indeed, in a contemporaneous December 14th memo, TVA 2 senior reactor operator Mr* l(b)(?)(C) Iuses the exact 3 same to allow language to explain, and I quote, we had 4 to remove normal letdown to allow the repair of a 5 valve.
6 Is the NRC really going to find deliberate 7 misconduct, an essentially criminal standard , because 8 Mr - l(b)(7)(C) Icould have chosen two better words in an 9 email intended for his boss Mr .,(b)(?)(C) I?
10 The NRC's after-the-fact reading of the 11 document is nonsensical. Obviously , the RHR inlet 12 valves were not open to allow repair of normal 13 letdown, as Mr. McKnapp excuse me - - as Mr. Nadel 14 well knew and understood on December the 14th.
15 I ndeed, that was apparent even to me , someone without 16 any technical background, let alone anyone familiar 17 with nuclear power plants , especially someone like Mr .
18 Nadel who was also already very familiar with the 19 events of November 11th , 2015 , at Watts Bar .
20 As Mr. (b)(?)(C) and Mr ~(b)(?)(C) Ihave said in 21 their PEC statements, Mr. Nadel was familiar with the 22 plant configuration on November the 11th befor e he 23 ever spoke to them on December 12th. But they also 24 stated that they recall walking through the plant 25 configuration with him on December 12th, and again on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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43 1 December 14th , at the same time this purported written 2 statement is alleged to have been provided. And as 3 Mr. Nadel would have well known on December 14th when 4 he allegedly received this document , the only possible 5 reason to place the RHR letdown back in service with 6 the plant in Mode 4 would have been to control 7 pressu rizer level .
8 It 's also clear from the documentary 9 record that Mr. Nadel knew, even before speaking to 10 I Mr . l(b)(7)(C) or Mr -l(b)(7)(C) I, that the repairs to normal 11 letdown had begun well before the RHR valves were 12 open. Thu s , he already knew facts that make the NRC's 13 now after-the-fact contrived reading of the alleged 14 written response nonsensical .
15 On December the 11th Mr. Nadel showed 16 documents to a shift manager .. !(b_)(_ ) _ _ __.I that cl,e arly
?)(_C_
17 highlight a log entry reflecting that normal letdown 18 was already out of service early on November 11th when 19 the B train of RHR was still in service. You can see 20 on the slide, normal charging, excess letdown is in 21 service, normal charging and letdown are out of 22 servi ce for repair to the valves .
23 By the time they met on December 14th, Mr.
24 (b)(7)(C) and Mr -l(b)(7)(C) Ihad copies of the documents Mr .
25 Nade l had shown to Mr . (b)(?)(C) The NRC ' s a l legation NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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44 1 in Apparent Violation 7 is premised on reading the 2 purported written response to say that RHR valves were 3 open to allow the repair on normal le t down to start, 4 but that obviously wasn't the situation .
5 Mr. Nadel had, before even approaching TVA 6 to discuss the events of November 11th, determined as 7 much for himself from the logs, which reflected 8 clearly that normal letdown was out of service for 9 repairs hours before the RHR valves were open to 10 restore letdown. And Mr .1(b)(?)(C) Ian~ (b)(?)(C) Iknew that 11 Mr. Nadel had reviewed the logs. It is simply not 12 credible that Mr. l(b)(7)(C) I or Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) Iwould have 13 written a document contradicting a log entry that they 14 knew that Mr. Nadel had and knew about.
15 In the context of the ongoing 16 communications at Watts Bar over the weekend of 17 December 12th, 2015, and through that following week, 18 the language of the purported written response would 19 and could not have been misunderstood. As Mr .
20 (7_)(_c_) _
l(b_)_
... __.I explained at his PEC, the email attached 21 language was never meant for Mr. Nadel, rather it was 22 meant to explain an unusual plant configuration to an 23 internal audience of TVA management who would have 24 realized that it was unusual to have RHR letdown in 25 service in Mode 4, and would have wanted to know why.
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45 1 That is exactly what Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I did on 2 the morning of December 13th when he emailed the 3 attachment in question to his boss Mr . .l~b)(?)(C) 4 explaining to Mr l(b)(?)(C) ~ who unlike Mr. Nadel would 5 not have known that on November 11th normal letdown 6 was out of service due to a valve repair .
7 In fact , l(b)(?)(C) l said at his PEC that he 8 added 3B1 to his draft summary for Mr _,(b)(?)(C) in 9 response to a similar question that had arisen in one 10 of his internal verbal communications on the topic .
11 And as Mr .l(b)(?)(C) Iexplained at his PEC, he 12 was not confused by the language, he understood it and 13 its purpose at the time, probably given to his own 14 internal correspondence with TVA management. There is 15 every indication that Mr. !(b)(?)(C) ! and Mr* l(b)(?)(C) 16 thought the purported written response was accurate 17 and helpful, otherwise there is no explanation for why 18 they shared it repeatedly within TVA.
19 There is also every indication that Mr .
20 (b)(?)(C) and Mr j(b)(?)(C) Ithought they were giving Mr.
21 Nadel a complete response to his questions. Indeed, 22 the NRC has not a l leged that Mr . (b)(?)(C) and Mr .
23 l(b)(?)(C) failed to answer any of Mr. Nadel's 24 questions. The only allegation is that this specific 25 purported written response again, which TVA NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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46 1 believes was never provided was not complete 2 because, in the NRC 's words, it omitted the actual 3 reason why the RHR inlet valves were cycled, which was 4 to arrest the increase in pressurizer water level 5 resulting from the inability of excess letdown 6 pressurizer water level during the heat - up.
7 But the written response, if it was given 8 at all, was given as part of an ongoing weekend 9 exchange of information during an in- person meeting.
10 First, as noted, Mr . (b)(?)(C) and Mr . l(b)(?)(C) I recal l 11 discussing with Mr. Nadel on December 12th and 14th, 12 2015 , that RHR letdown was used to control the 13 pressurizer level.
14 Second , given the recognition that RHR 15 letdown was placed back in service, there can be no 16 plausible uncertainty about why RHR was placed in 17 service in Mode 4. The only conceivable p urpose is to 18 control pressurizer level. In effect, the NRC is 19 accu sing TVA of not answering an unasked question ,
20 which was not asked because it was clear that the 21 answer to it was obvious and not worthy of pursuit.
22 Third, the p urported written response , if 23 it was given to Mr. Nadel, was not a single-page 24 document. But as with TVA's internal email it 25 included Dataware graphs. The graphs show plainl y NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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47 1 that pressurizer level was rising until the RHR valves 2 were opened, at which point pressurizer level was 3 arrested. The correlation is unmistakable. Of course 4 Mr .!(b)(7)(C) Iwas answering Mr. Nadel' s real questions, 5 which were about RHR operability, not a question about 6 the pressurizer level, and the handwritten notes are 7 not targeting the pressurizer level.
8 If there is any confusion about the 9 relationship between RHR letdown and pressurizer 10 level, however, it would have been dispelled by the 11 graphs. Indeed, Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Iand Mr. (b)(?)(C) have said 12 that they do recall discussing a different graph 13 prepared by Mr* l(b)(?)(C) Iwith Mr. Nadel on December 14 14th which clearly showed the same correlation .
15 I f there is still any question that Mr.
16 Nadel knew and understood that RHR letdown was put 17 back in service to arrest pressurizer level on the 18 very next day, on the very next day, December 15th, 19 l(b)(?)(C) from TVA wrote Mr. Nadel to confirm 20 TVA' s understanding of Mr. Nadel's remaining 21 questions. In framing the questions, Mr . . l ~b)(?)(C) 22 stated, and I q uote , the MCR operators made the 23 decision to commence the RHR letdown to manage 24 pressurizer level and RCS pressure.
25 And Mr. Nadel responded to Mr. _l(b_J(_7)_(c _) _ __ .
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48 1 that same day that Mr. l(b)(?)(C) recital of the 2 questions, quote, they look good. Moreover, the NRC' s 3 accusation that information was omitted from a 4 response to a specific question, Mr. Nadel had not, 5 however, asked why RHR letdown was placed in service.
6 It is thus unreasonable to accuse TVA of providing 7 incomplete information by failing to answer an unasked 8 question, especially one that Misters l(b)(?)(C) and 9 (b)(?)(C) understood that Nadel knew the answer to.
10 The NRC should not look back on its 11 questions and decide that the follow-up questions were 12 implicitly included, and then allege violations 13 against licensees who failed to infer the right 14 follow-up questions that they had to answer ,
15 especially when they believed and understood the NRC 16 already knew the answer to the unasked questions.
17 That is simply not the way to approach regulation of 18 the industry.
19 l Mr . .
(b)(7)(C) has explained in his PEC 20 I statement that l_(b_)(_7)_(c_) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ on Saturday, 21 December 12th, after Mr. Nadel's questions, shortly 22 after he and Mr . (b)(?)(C) spoke to Mr. Nadel by phone 23 that morning. It was not a response to Mr. Nadel.
24 Mr
- l(b)(7)(C) use of the CR in this matter was 25 consistent with the general practice of Watts Bar at NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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49 1 the time .
2 Based on Mr. l(b)(7)(C) notes of the 3 Saturday, December 12th call with Mr. Nadel and Mr.
4 l(b)(7)(C) CR1114975 indeed did accurately and 5 compl etely reflect Mr. Nadel's questions . The NRC 6 does not challenge that Mr. l(b)(7)(C) correctly 7 unde rstood and reflected Mr . Nadel' s questions. Based 8 on Mr - 1.... c )_ _____. recollection of his preliminary (b_)(_?_)(_
9 investigation and the related email tra ff ic , it 10 appears that CR1114975 accurately and completel y 11 reflected his preliminary findings .
12 Question 3 , which is highlight ed here ,
13 was, why were the RHR valves cycled? As stated 14 before, Mr . Nadel ' s first two questions had focused on 15 RHR ope r abil i ty . The RHR valves were cycled for the 16 following reasons:
17 The opened for p l ac ing RHR letdown 18 service . In particular, the condition report 19 accu rately and compl etely answered Mr. Nadel's 20 q u estions, as s h own on the slide in the type of 21 thread. Critically , given that he knew the answer ,
22 Mr. Nade l had not asked why RHR l etdown was p ut into 23 service . There was no reason for Mr. Nadel to ask the 24 question when he already knew, and it was obvious that 25 RHR l etdown would have been put back into service in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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50 1 Mode 4 for one reason , and o n ly one reason , to control 2 pres s u rize r l evel. Th ere is no othe r poss ible 3 purpose.
4 Consequ ently , in a docu ment intended for 5 the Operations Department and to track Mr. Nadel's 6 questions like this Condition Report , there wou l d be 7 no n eed for Mr
- l(b)(?)(C) I to have stated the obviou s .
8 Even if Mr. Nadel had asked such an unnecessary and 9 s u bs tan ti ve q u estion , TVA did not need Mr -l(b)(?)(C) 10 write the answer i n t h is Condition Report . Failure to 11 state the obvious in a Condition Report is not 12 remotely equ ivalent to giving the NRC incomplete 13 information, let alone deliberately.
14 TVA thus finds no fault with CR1114975 .
15 As wi th the purported wr itten response that I 16 discussed earlier , it is unreasonable and unworkable 17 for TVA ' s Condition Reports to be expec t ed to ref l ect 18 all the possible follow - up questions and answers the 19 NRC might decide were relevant in hindsight .
20 This CR was appropriate at the time it was 21 writ ten , which as Mr .l(b)(?)(C) Iexplained to you was on 22 Satu rday , December 13th , not as the NRC alleges 23 Tuesday , December 15th. And as you can see on the 24 slide , the date is reflected in the top right -hand 25 corner .
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51 1 Further , TVA objects to the NRC's efforts 2 to turn TVA's internal tracking system into an after-3 the-fact basis for attacking its employees. Mr.
4 l~ - - - - - - - - - ~Ithe Condition Report (b)(?)(C) in an effort to 5 promote transparency with the NRC, and ensure a 6 complete and timely response to Mr. Nadel' s quest ions.
7 It is really unfortunate for the NRC to twist his 8 efforts into a baseless accusation of not only 9 misconduct but deliberate misconduct.
10 TVA relies on the timely creation of 11 Condition Reports for tracking important learning at 12 its facilities .
13 Beyond finding that there was no 14 misconduct here, TVA cannot understand the allegations 15 of deliberate misconduct in Apparent Violation 7. The 16 NRC has offered no direct evidence that Mr . l(b)(?)(C) lor 17 Mr . l(b)(7)(C) intentionally and knowingly submitted 18 inaccurate or incomplete information to the NRC or to 19 TVA. TVA is aware of no such evidence .
20 To the contrary, the record shows that Mr.
21 (b)(7)(C) and Mr l(b)(7)(C) Iwere being highly responsive to 22 Mr . Nadel ' s questions, diligently engaging with him 23 for a Saturday morning teleconference and Monday 24 meeting following his questions on Friday night.
25 I Mr .l(b)(?)(C) and Mr ~(b)(?)(C) Iappear to have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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52 1 attempted in good faith to answer Mr. Nadel's 2 q ues tions to the best of their ability and 3 understanding. Mr. l(b)(7)(C) ICR1114975 in good 4 faith , believing it captu res Mr. Nadel ' s questions and 5 his preliminary i nvestigation completely and 6 accurately .
7 Nevertheless, the NRC appears to be 8 relying on an unsupported and contrived reading of the 9 document, which remember , there appears to be no 10 evidence was ever actually given to Mr. Nadel on 11 December 14th , to infer that Messrs. l(b)(7)(C) Iand 12 l(b)(7)(C) I, both experienc ed in nuclear plant 13 operations, must have understood that contrived 14 reading to be false .
15 That would be equally true of Mr. Nade l.
16 Mr. l(b)(7)(C) Iand Mr ~(b)(?)(C) lmust have known a reading 17 of the document was fa ls e . So too must Mr. Nade l have 18 known it to be false at the time. Indeed, the NRC's 19 allegations would imply there was no confusion at all ,
20 but that Mr. Nadel without any reason assumed that 21 Messrs .1(b)(?)(C) I an~{b)(?)(C) lwere trying to deceive him.
22 And again , TVA has seen no evidence that 23 the document was given to Mr. Nadel or that he did 24 read it in such a non-cynical -- nonsensical and 25 cyn ical manner.
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53 1 Moreover, if the document had been 2 intended for Mr. Nadel, there could have been no 3 reasonable expectation by Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Ior Mr l(b)(7)(C) I 4 that Mr. Nadel would read it in the counter-factual 5 way that the NRC now proposes. Consequently, the 6 NRC's reasoning for attributing knowing and 7 intentional misconduct to Mr. (b)(?)(C) and Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) 8 seeks the NRC's own after-the-fact alleged and 9 contrived reading of the purported written response.
10 I f the document really meant what the NRC 11 alleges, it would have been pointless to give it to 12 Mr. Nadel. If the document was so clearly false that 13 Mr. l(b)(7)(C) I and Mr, l(b)(7)(C) Imust have known it was 14 inaccurate , then it could not possibly have confused 15 Mr. Nadel.
16 Finally, if the purported written response 17 was, as the NRC seems to imply, intended to conceal 18 that there was a pressurizer level rise necessitating 19 placing RHR letdown in service , it makes no sense that 20 Mr
- l(b)(7)(C) !included a Dataware graph plainly showing 21 the timeline of pressurizer level rise. It is 22 ridiculous to suggest that a document with this graph 23 attached to it was meant to conceal a pressurizer 24 level rise.
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54 1 that Mr. l(b)(? )(C) or Mr . 1(b)(? )(C) I knowingly gave Mr.
2 Nadel a document that purposely faile d to expl ain the 3 relationship between pressurizer level and opening RHR 4 valves deliberately , and then took this graph and 5 explained it to Mr . Nadel at the very same meeting .
6 The allegations of deliberate misconduct 7 here are false a n d contrived. They should never have 8 been made, and they certainly cannot be sustained.
9 As I have explained , in the first place 10 TVA has not i den t i fied any basis to believe t h at a 11 writ ten response was given to Mr. Nadel on Dec,e mber 12 14th , 2015 .
13 Second , to the extent the NRC alleges 14 certain langu age was given to Mr . Nadel in writing ,
15 that s u ch language was inaccurate and i ncompl ete , TVA 16 strongly disagrees. The language quoted by the NRC in 17 i ts allegations was intended for an internal TVA 18 audience and was complete and accurate, even if Mr.
19 (7_)(_C_) _ __.! could have chosen better words and u nderstood l(b_)_
20 the context of the dialog that weekend between Mr.
21 Nadel and TVA.
22 Finall y , the NRC has a l leged de l iberate 23 I misconduct by Mr
- l(b)(7)(C) and Mr . ,(b)(7)(C) I, but TVA has 24 seen absolu te l y no evidence that either individual 25 intentional l y, knowin g l y s u bmitted i n complete or NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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55 1 inaccu rate information to the NRC . Deliberate 2 misconduct is a ver y s e ri ous alleg a t i o n, one that 3 shoul d be based on direct evidence , a subjective 4 b e l ief , and not ba s ed on conjecture , inference , or 5 s u spen sion of b el i ef .
6 Let me now turn to AV 9 . Excuse me for 7 one s e cond .
8 (Pause . )
9 MR . HILL : Thank you for your i ndulgence .
10 MR. O'BRI EN : Mr. Hill, would you like to 11 take a short break?
12 MR . HILL : No. A s i p o f water wa s h e lpful.
13 But thank you .
14 MR . O' BRIEN : Okay .
15 MR. HI LL: Than k you .
16 MR . O' BRIEN : Go ahead .
17 MR . HI LL: Okay . Obviously , if t he p a nel 18 wants to take a break , t h at ' s fine . Bu t I ' m prepared 19 t o proceed .
20 Appar e n t Violation 9 combines a ll egat i o n s 21 of deliberate misconduct against two individual s , to 22 Billy J ohn son , the shif t manag er who was on sh i f t 23 d u ring the RHR event ; Mr. L(b2_(7_)(_C~- - - - - - I. (b)(7)(C) 24 I
..._)_(?_)(_c_) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _.... was not on shift du ring l(b 25 t h e RHR event .
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56 1 The NRC interviewed both on December 18th ,
2 2015 , a n d now accuses both of deliberately mak ing 3 inaccurate and incomplete statements.
4 In his recent written statement to the 5 NRC, Mr. Johnson acknowledged that portions o f his 6 interview with the NRC were inaccurate or incomplete .
7 TVA is not in a position to dispute Mr. Johnson 's own 8 account of his own state of mind , so I will only say 9 a f e w words regarding the allegat ions against Mr .
10 Johnson .
11 In contrast , Mr . l(b)(7)(C) Ihas vehemently 12 den ied that he would or did make inaccurate or 13 incompl ete statements, or that he did so de l iberately .
14 TVA cert ainly concurs.
15 TVA has reviewed the NRC transcript o f Mr.
l(b)(7)(C) 7 16 interview . TVA finds Mr - 1....
(b-)(_ )_(C
_)_ ___,
17 de fe nse of t he completeness and accuracy of his 18 statements during the interview to be persuasive and 19 compelling.
20 Sadly and ironically, TVA a l so notes that 21 some of the NRC' s allegations about what Mr - l(b)(?)(C) 22 said are themselves inaccurate .
23 TVA also has seen no evidence that Mr.
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57 1 appears that Mr .l(b)(7)(C) l was meeting with the NRC in 2 an effort to be transparent and helpful.
3 Unfortunately, the questions posed to Mr. l(b)(?)(C) 4 the participants , often speaking over each other and 5 over Mr. l(b)(?)(C) made the interview and the 6 transcript often confusing and lacking in precision.
7 Precisely , particularly under these 8 circumstances, TVA finds the NRC efforts now to twist 9 Mr -l(b)(?)(C) l words against him to be unwarranted.
10 The NRC alleges that Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) I made 11 three statements that were inaccurate or incomp l ete.
12 Two of those alleged statements are simply 13 mischaracterizations of his testimony and could be 14 easily dismissed .
15 The third alleged statement is complete 16 and accurate, however , when understood, as it 17 certainly should be, in context of the entire 18 interview.
19 The NRC alleges that Mr . l(b)(?)(C) 20 represented that the decision to continue with the 21 heat-up was not influenced by anyone outside the 22 control room. To our surprise, we could not find any 23 such statement in the transcript of Mr. ~l(b_)_(7_)_(c_)_ ___,
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58 1 about the interview , was quoting or at least 2 paraphrasing what Mr. j(b)(? )(C) Isaid.
3 But according to the NRC's transcript of 4 the interview , NRC never asked Mr . l(b)(?)(C) I about 5 whether the heat-up was " i n fl u enced" by anyone o u tside 6 the control room . And Mr. l(b)(? )(C) I never said the 7 heat-up was not influenced by anyone outside the 8 control room.
9 To the contrary , Mr -l(b)(?)(C) Idiscussed at 10 l e n gth t h e process that led to the plant heat- up ,
11 which included discussions outside the control room.
12 And as you will note in the transcript ,
13 the interview was conducted in such a way that it was 14 impossible for the cou rt reporter to even indicate who 15 was asking specific questions. They are i dentified 16 usually as Participant .
17 "So who was on both sides of the 18 discussion?"
19 Mr . l(b)(7)(C) Ianswered , "Operations crew-20 wide and then, I guess, maintenance decisions ."
21 And one of the participants then asked ,
22 "Was any of that documented in l ike a support or in 23 any kind of OCC product? "
24 Mr . ,(b)(7)(C) I= "Yes, sir. I don 't know if 25 we have a picture of it , b u t I know that -- so we have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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59 1 this , I ' ll use their words, like a stick and ball or 2 you k n ow, a white board of here's the l ayou t. "
3 And the participant, "I'm visualizing like 4 a conference room with a big white board or 5 somewhere? "
6 "Yes , sir."
7 Mr
- l(b)(?)(C) ! was specifically asked who 8 was involved in the discussion of the plant heat-up, 9 inclu ding whether the discu ssion was documented by the 10 occ . Mr . l(b)(?)(C) explained that the discussion 11 involved the OCC and was documented on a white board 12 for the OCC .
13 One of the investigators, as I just read, 14 even said on the record that he was visualizing that 15 OCC room with the big white board .
16 It is obvious from l. .
Mr . (b-)(_7)_(c_)_ ____,
17 interview transcri pt that he testif i ed the personnel 18 outside the control room, namely the individuals in 19 the OCC as well as Maintenance , inf l uenced the 20 decision to heat-up.
21 And of course , as we have already 22 discu ssed in response to Apparen t Vi o l ation 4 , there 23 is nothing wrong with the OCC influencing the plant to 24 heat up. The OCC involvement , participation , and 25 i nfluence i s normal and expected , and appropriate .
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60 1 This allegation against Mr. l(b)(?)(C) is not only 2 unfounded; it is directly contradicted by the NRC's 3 own transcript.
4 The NRC also alleges that Mr. 1(b)(?)(C) 5 stated that there was no significant pushback from the 6 control room operator. This allegation similarly has 7 no basis in the transcript of Mr. _l(b_)_(7_)(_C_) _ ____.I 1 hour1.157407e-5 days <br />2.777778e-4 hours <br />1.653439e-6 weeks <br />3.805e-7 months <br /> 8 and 25 minute interview.
9 The only time the word pushup -- pushback 10 comes up in Mr. ...l (b _)_(7_)(_c_) _ ___. 75 -page interview 11 transcript is when the NRC investigators introduced 12 it , and Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) asked for clarification of the 13 term.
14 Mr ~(b)(?)(C) ~ "Pushback for what? I don't 15 understand."
16 Participant: "Pushback to the heat-up with 17 only excess letdowns being in service ."
18 Another participant , presumably another 19 one: "Or challenging it , challenging any of this? I'm 20 not sure if you have any knowledge or understanding of 21 what."
22 Mr* l(b)(?)(C) I= "No, sir."
23 "Are you aware of anyone challenging that 24 sequ ence?"
25 So the NRC changed the words of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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61 1 question about pushback to challenges . And when Mr.
2 ~l (7_
(b_)_ )(_c_)_~I answered the NRC's questions regarding 3 challenges to the plant heat-up, he answered to the 4 best of his knowledge.
5 Mr .,(b)(?)(C) l has already explained in his 6 own PEC how he understood the question , what he knew 7 at the time . TVA is not aware of any evidence that 8 Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I answer was incomplete or inaccurate, 9 let alone deliberately so.
10 I n the NRC ' s own transcript Mr *l(b ..._)_(?_)(_c_) _ _~
11 response appears to be a complete and accurate 12 response to the q u estions that he was asked.
13 I don't Mr. l(b)(7)(C) "It was I=
14 discussed. I don't know that it was a challenge, but 15 it was a healthy discussion of we put excess letdown 16 in. II 17 And at the end he concludes, "So I don't 18 want to mix challenge and discuss."
19 So Mr .1(b)(7)(C) I explained to the NRC on 20 December the 18th that he was aware of a healthy 21 discussion, but not what he would characterize as a 22 challenge .
23 Mr .l(b)(7)(C) Inever spoke to the level of 24 pushback , let alone denied that there was significant 25 pushback -- whatever that means . Indeed, the question NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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62 1 was changed to challenge. Rather, he chose his own 2 words and described a heal thy discu ssion of we put 3 excess letdown in.
4 The interviewers were, of cou rse, free to 5 ask more questions, to probe . They chose not to .
6 More than anything , one might speculate 7 that the NRC may have intended these two allegations 8 about outside influence and significant pushback to be 9 intended for Mr. Johnson, then inexplicably left them 10 in the allegations against Mr. l(b)(?)(C) With I-11 allegations of deliberate misconduct that threaten an 12 individual's livelihood and reputation, one would have 13 hoped the NRC would have been more careful completing 14 its transcript.
15 This was an interview that produced a 16 jumbled and poorly worde d transcript with three NRC 17 interviewers talking over each other and over Mr .
18 ~l(b_)_(7_)(_C_) _ __.~ the stenographer not able to even identify 19 who was speaking. It's certainly troubling that such 20 a garbled transcript can now serve as the basis for an 21 allegation of deliberate misconduct.
22 The onl y a llegat i on that appears to 23 perhaps have been actually rooted in Mr. ~l(b_)_(7_)(_C_) _ ____,
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63 1 regarding the Unit 1 startup before, during, or after 2 the November 11th, 2015 event . "
3 There's a passage .n
- l. Mr. ...______....
l(b)(7)(C) 4 transcript where he was initially asked a somewhat 5 similar question. "Did anybody bring any concerns to 6 you either before, during , or after that they had 7 hesitations or concerns with the startup or any of the 8 actions taken on that day?"
9 But that passage is immediately followed 10 by a lengthy exchange where Mr - l(b)(?)(C) I tried to 11 clarify the questions as the investigators talked over 12 each other and over Mr .l(b)(7)(C) ~ and then changed the 13 question. At times, the reporter could not even make 14 out what was being said.
15 Again, Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I: "Ask me that again."
16 One of the participants: "Did anybody 17 either, you know, forward planning to do this, during, 18 or after this, bring any concerns to you concerning he 19 actions, saying , you know, hey, I was concerned about 20 doing this . I don't want to do this, or--"
21 Mr - l(b)(7)(C) I= "No."
22 There's simultaneous speaking .
23 Mr. l(b)(7)(C) I= "Sorry. I didn ' t know if 24 you were asking me like the lessons learned. I've 25 talked to-- "
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64 1 Participant: "No, sir."
2 " -- about vacuum or something ."
3 Participant: "No, no."
4 Mr .l(b)(7)(C) I: "No, sir , not - -"
5 Participant: "Based on these evolutions ."
6 Mr. l(b)(7)(C) I"No . "
7 "Like being 8 Mr .1(b)(?)(C) ~ "I'm kind of worried about 9 putting excess letdowns in. Is that like what you ' re 10 asking me?"
11 "No."
12 "Or did my operators or anyone come to you 13 to say I was uncomfortable doing this and was told to 14 do this anyway type of stuff?"
15 Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) I= Oh no. No , sir. "
16 Participant: "Any concerns based on 17 operators and that--"
18 Mr l(b)(7)(C) I= "No, sir."
19 " -- type of manner?"
20 " Sorry. I did not understand your 21 question."
22 "Okay ."
23 " But no, sir. "
24 "Okay. Anything else?"
25 "No ."
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65 1 The transcript shows that one or more of 2 the interviewers -- their names are not included , so 3 it ' s impossible to tell who -- continually rephrased 4 the compound question about concerns before, during, 5 or after the RHR event, and clarified that they were 6 not interested in hearing about post - event lessons 7 learned .
8 Their focus to Mr . l(b)(?)(C) Iwas : did any 9 operators come to you to say I was uncomfortable 10 during t his, was told to do this anyway type of stuff.
11 Mr .1(b)(7)(C) I truthfully answered, "No, sir ."
12 This was not an effective interview 13 technique , and it certainly did not produce a useful 14 transcript . It is well known and well understood by 15 investigators that compound questions can confuse a 16 witness, especially when coming simultaneously from 17 three interrogators speaking over each other .
18 Compound questions are also widely 19 unde rstood to result in answers t hat have little, if 20 any, evidentiary value because it's impossible to know 21 which question was being answered.
22 Here the question changed so many times in 23 rapid succession that it is impossible to tell from 24 the transcript what question Mr -l(b)(?)(C) Ithought he 25 was answering. After this confusing exchange, the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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66 1 three interviewers decided to end the interview , not 2 seek a ny clarification or follow-up on Mr . ~l(b_)_(7_)_(c_)_ __
3 efforts to address the shifting questions, as they 4 certainly cou ld have .
5 Given the i ncoherent questioning and the 6 incomplete transcript , it is grossly unfair to accuse 7 Mr . l(b)(?)(C ) of giving a deliberately misleading 8 answer to what were compound , confusing, changing, and 9 imprecise q u estions .
(b)(7)(C) 10 Taken in context , Mr . l.
11 statements were reasonable responses to imprecise, 12 con fli c tin g , and confusing questions that Mr .l(b)(?)(C) 13 did his best to understand.
14 The factual summary to Mr _,(b)(?)(C) ~ it 15 appears the NRC is also alleging that Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) 16 gave inaccurate and incomplete statements in his 17 remarks at the end of the intervi ew . He r e is a 18 passage referenced by the NRC:
19 "Anyt hing else you want to add , sir ,
20 anything you want to c l arify? "
21 The first thing Mr *l(b)(?)(C) ldoes is talk 22 abou t t he fact that he respond s to the frank l y 23 offensive suggestion that TVA chose Veterans' Day to 24 do this evolu tion , you know .
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67 1 anything of I feel uncomfortable at any time ,
2 particularly in the discussions of will excess letdown 3 work the way it's supposed to work. Nobody brought up 4 anything that I was forced, coerced , or pushed into 5 any kind of corner whatsoever, or attempted to hide 6 anything at all. This was simply I got to a place 7 that I didn't expect, and I took an action to 8 stabilize the plant. And now we're going to look back 9 and get lessons learned out of it. 11 10 As Mr *l(b)(?)(C) Iexpl ained at his PEC, he 11 meant this statement to address his pr,e sent 12 recollection of what he observed and heard on Nov-ember 13 11th. As he had already explained to the NRC, he was 14 not at the plant when the decision was made to 15 continue to proceed on only excess letdowns and to 16 take RHR out of service.
17 When he returned to the plant that evening 18 he spoke briefly to the outgoing shift manager, Mr.
19 Johnson, at the turnover in the control room. Mr.
20 Johnson did not express any concerns about what had 21 happened, he simply stated that RHR letdown had been 22 used to control pressurizer level. The atmosphere in 23 the control room seemed calm to Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) 1.
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68 1 that was successfully controlled. His closing remarks 2 to the NRC on December 18th were complete and 3 accurate.
4 The NRC alleges , however , that Mr.
5 l(b)(7)(C) subsequently learned information based on 6 emails he allegedly received in a meeting he allegedly 7 attended that he ought to have disclosed to the NRC on 8 December 18th.
9 l(b)(?)(C) I First , Mr. ...._ _ _ __. believed on December 10 18th that he was being asked about what he recalled 11 from November 10 and 11 about what he actually 12 observed firsthand that day, not as he was instructed 13 by the interviewers, " lessons learned. " But even if 14 the questions were meant to include subsequent emails 15 he might have received, nothing Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Ireceived 16 could have told him that any operator had pushed back 17 or been told to do something he was uncomfortable 18 with .
19 As far as the emails Mr. l(b)(?)(C) 20 received, NRC has not specified what documents these 21 allegations rely upon. Even if Mr. l(b)(?)(C) 22 understood that he was being asked about post-November 23 11th lessons learned, from our review none of Mr.
24 _l c )_ _ _l email traffic before December 18th did or (b_)(_?_)(_
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69 1 told the NRC.
2 And Mr
- l(b)(?)(C) stated persuasively at 3 his PEC that he did not, in fact, have any 4 understanding based on his emails that was different 5 from what he told the NRC.
6 TVA has searched and has identified three 7 emails that the NRC night conceivably have alluded to .
8 Though, it is hard to imagine why the NRC would choose 9 when making an allegation of deliberate misconduct not 10 to identify specifically the emails it believes Mr.
11 1- !
(b_)(_?)_(C_)__ should have discussed.
12 First, as for a ~l(b_)(_?)_(C_) _ _ _ _ ~I email from 13 l(b-)(7-)(C_) _ _ _.....I, Mr .l(b)(7)(C)
.... Iwas actually asked about 14 it and testified on December 18th that he did not 15 recall ever receiving or reading it.
16 "Do you recall an email from ~l(b-)(?_)_(c_)_____.
17 in the hours or days after ... l(b_)(_?)(_C_) _____I? Do you 18 recall an email regarding his experiences in this 19 sequence?"
20 Mr .l(b)(7)(C) Ianswer: "I don ' t know if I 21 did or not. I don't remember . I can look and find 22 it , II 23 Of course, the interviewers could have 24 shown Mr !(b)(?)(C) I the l(b)(?)(C) lemail and 25 asked him whether it refreshed his memory . And even NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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70 1 if it did not, how he now would read it. But they 2 chose, for some inexplicable reason, not to.
3 But as Mr. l(b)(7)(C) Itold you at his PEC, 4 as he reads it now , he would simply have read it as 5 l(b)(7)(C) Ititled it, "l(b)(7)(C) 6 l(b)(?)(C) I* II 7 Second, on l(b)(?)(C) 1, Mr .
8 l(b)(7)(C) ! received an email from Mr. l(b)(7)(C) I in which 9 Mr. l(b)(7)(C) says about the events of November 11th 10 that, in retrospect, knowing now that excess letdown 11 had not worked as he had hoped, he "should have pushed 12 back . "
(b)(7)(C) 13 l Mr . . correctly and reasonably 14 assumed that this meant that Mr. l(b)(?)(C) l had not, in 15 fact, pushed back on November 11th -- I' m sorry -- Mr.
16 l(b)(7)(C) 17 Third, at Mr. l(b)(?)(C) interview of Mr .
18 l(b)(7)(C)
Ithe next day on December 16th, Mr. l(b)(7)(C) 19 also explained at his PEC that he was not 20 participating in the interview, not participating and 21 was busy with other work. An d Mr* l(b)(?)(C) Iand l(b)(?)(C) 22 were just using Mr. l._ (7_)(_C_) _ ___, office (b_)_ as a 23 convenience.
24 However , even if he had overheard Mr.
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71 l____
(b )(7)(C) 1 interview later , nothing that Mr. _, said was 2 inconsistent with Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) Istatement on Dec-ember 3 the 18th. Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Ievidently did say that some 4 operat ors were uneasy about heating up on excess 5 letdown, but he certainl y did not say or even impl y 6 that any operators expressed concerns to the OCC that 7 any "unease" was never addressed and resolved .
8 Especially read in context of Mr.
9 _l(b_)_(7_)(_C_) _ _....,I email the prior day that he had not pu shed 10 back, Mr. _l(b_)_(7_)(_c _) _ ___.I commen ts about any unease was 11 completely unremarkable to Mr .l(b)(?)(C) Even had he 12 heard or knew about Mr. _l(b_)_C7_)(_C_) _ __. statement, Mr .
13 l(b)(7)(C) would have understood Mr. _l(b_)_(7_)(_c_) _ _ __,
14 statement to imply that the operators resolved any 15 uneasiness before proceeding.
16 Overall , Mr *_r_)-(?-)(_c _) _ _.....INRC interviews and 17 transc ript is j umbled , confusing, a nd at times 18 incoherent , as the interviewer made it clear -- as the 19 interviewers made it, appears to be a completely fair 20 account of what Mr .1(b)(?)(C) lknew at the time . This 21 is how Mr .l(b)(?)(C) Idescribed it in his own PEC .
22 "I f the NRC is going to accus e someone of 23 deliberate misconduct by deliberately making false 24 statements , the NRC needs to makes s u re that the 25 qu estions asked are precise , the answers are NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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72 1 unambiguously false , that the transcripts cited fairly 2 and accu rate l y ref l ect the interview . None of these 3 criteria have been satisfied here."
4 The NRC offers no evidence that Mr.
7 5 ~l(b_)_( _)_(c_)_ __.I knowingly and intentionally made inaccurate 6 or incomplete statements to the NRC. The NRC seems to 7 be relying on the presumption that the statements were 8 incomplete or inaccurate, which as I have discussed, 9 is a false premise. And simply inferred that Mr.
10 l~-----~
(b)(7)(C) I must have realized his statements were 11 incomplete or inaccurate.
12 That is grossly unfair to Mr. l(b)(?)(C) 13 sitting through the NRC interview in an effort to be 14 transparent and helpful. As Mr .l(b)(7)(C) Iexplained at 15 his PEC , he did his very best to answer the NRC' s 16 often confusing and compound questions. Even if he 17 misspoke at any point , it was cau sed either by the way 18 that the interview was conducted or by a simple 19 mistake . There was certainly no effort to do anything 20 but answer questions truthfully , honestly, and 21 completely.
22 Let me t u rn to Mr. Johnson . In his 23 written statement, Mr . Johnson did not defend his 24 statements to the NRC as entirely complete and 25 accu rate . TVA has no tole r ance for employees that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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73 1 make incomplete or inaccurate statements to the NRC 2 becau se TVA takes transparency and honesty toward the 3 NRC with the utmost seriousness.
4 TVA cannot ignore that Mr. Johnson has 5 expressed that he perceived his job to be at risk .
6 While Mr. Johnson should have told the NRC 7 investigators immediately about his job concerns and 8 how they affected his mindset on November 11th, he has 9 told us that he could tell the NRC shortly after 10 December 18th about his complete recollection of the 11 RHR event.
12 Does not excuse Mr . Johnson from his 13 statements on December 18th, but it would tend to show 14 that he was not really trying to hide anything from 15 the NRC.
16 Mr. Barstow will now speak to the 17 corrective actions the TVA has taken and is taking in 18 connection with Apparent Violation 7.
19 MR . BARSTOW: Thank you , Mr. Hill. As Mr.
20 Hill has explained, TVA wholly denies Apparent 21 Violation 7 and believes that there is no basis for 22 asserting that TVA employees provided inaccurate or 23 incomplete information to the NRC during the Dec-ember 24 14th, 2015 meeting with the senior resident 25 inspector .
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74 1 TVA has not been able to substantiate , and 2 in fact believes to the contrary that the document 3 with allegedly inaccurate and incomplete information 4 was provided to the NRC. Further, even if that 5 document had been provided to t he NRC, TVA does not 6 believe that it contained inaccurate or incomplete 7 information.
8 Mr. l(b)(7)(C) l used Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) used 9 language that he thought reflected the resident 10 inspector's questions, and that he understood and 11 answered the resident inspectors questions accurately.
12 Moreover, the document was intended for the NRC -- was 13 not intended for the NRC and was specifically drafted 14 to convey a meaning that would be understood by the 15 intended audience.
16 As for Apparent Violation 9 , TVA denies 17 that Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Iprovided inaccurate and incomplete 18 information to the NRC, although TVA acknowledges that 19 Mr . Johnson's statement constitutes a violation of 10 20 CFR 50.9(a) 21 TVA acknowledges that Mr. Johnson made 22 inconsistent statements about his expectations that 23 proceeding with the heat-up on only excess letdown 24 would be successful, and that he evaded and answered 25 incompletely questions about operator concerns and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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75 1 influence from outside the main control room.
2 TVA also acknowledges that Mr. Johnson 3 omitted from his statement to the NRC that his 4 decision-making had been influenced by the fear of 5 losing his job.
6 TVA acknowledges that Mr. Johnson's lack 7 of candor appears to have been caused to some extent 8 by his fear of losing his job. Mr. Johnson ' s concern 9 seems to have stemmed from the reported June 20 , '14 10 discussion with a plant manager about an 11 organizational realignment planned for after the Unit 12 2 initial startup .
13 More broadly, TVA recognizes that there 14 were problems with the work environment at Watts Bar 15 in 2015. TVA acknowledges much in the response to the 16 NRC's Chilling Effect letter issued in March of 2016.
17 However, TVA has taken extensive action to address the 18 issues identified in that Chilling Effect letter.
19 Indeed, these actions have been the subject of 20 numerous inspections, NRC inspections, over the past 21 four years which TVA has partially outlined in its 22 written responses to the apparent violations .
23 Importantly, the NRC documented its 24 findings that TVA has made progress in improving the 25 Safety-Conscious Work Environment at Watts Bar.
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76 1 TVA emphatically agrees that comple t e and 2 accurate communication with the NRC is essential at 3 all times, and that no one should ever be afraid to 4 provide information to the NRC.
5 Recently, a communication to a ll TVA 6 nuclear employees reiterated TVA ' s policy and the 7 chief nuclear officer ' s personal expectations in this 8 regard. While the actions of Mr. Johnson do not 9 reflect TVA' s past or present expectations , it is 10 worth noting that Mr. Johnson has explained that he 11 corrected his omissions in the December 18th, 2015, 12 interview just a few days later during a subsequent 13 interview by an NRC representative in the Resident 14 Inspector's Office .
15 While TVA does not have access to the 16 information regarding his follow-up interview , Mr.
17 Johnson correcting his statement appears consistent 18 with the guidance in Section 2.3.11 of the NRC 19 Enforcement Policy .
20 The Enforcement Policy states , and I 21 quote , "In determining whether to take an enforc-e ment 22 action for an oral statement, the Commission may 23 consider factors such as the reasonableness of the 24 explanation for not providing complete and accurate 25 information."
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77 1 The Enforcement Policy further indicates 2 that, and I q uote, "No enforcement will be taken for 3 the initial inaccurate or incomplete information if 4 the matter is promptly identified and corrected by the 5 licensee before the NRC relies on that information, or 6 before the NRC raises a question about that 7 information."
8 TVA believes that the NRC ' s deliberations 9 on the enforcement sanction for Mr. Johnson and TVA 10 should take into account the degraded work environment 11 that existed in 2015 , and his effort to amend his 12 interview statement in a relatively short period of 13 time when afforded a private venue for consultation 14 with NRC's representative.
15 This concludes our presentations on 16 apparent violations on Apparent Violations 7 and 9.
17 MR . O'BRIEN : Thank you , Mr. Barstow . We 18 appreciate clearly your dialogue and information.
19 Given the time and the schedu l -e , I 20 propose, if it ' s acceptable to you, that we break for 21 a caucus and lunch, and return at 12:30. Is that 22 reasonabl e from you r perspective?
23 MR. BARSTOW: Yes, it is, Mr. O'Brien.
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78 1 court reporter doesn ' t have any needs? Court 2 reporter, do you have everything you need?
3 So once we go off record, I'll let you get 4 some from all of u s here. So we will go off the 5 record, and we'll reconvene at 12:30 your time. Thank 6 you , everybody.
7 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 8 off the record at 10:22 a.m. and resumed at 12:30 9 p. m . )
10 MR. 0 ' BRIEN: Mr. Hill and Mr. Barstow, we 11 had our caucus , and we have a few questions for you 12 relative to AV 7 and AV 9, and I'm going to let Marcia 13 begin, if that ' s okay with you.
14 MR. BARSTOW: Yes , Mr . O'Brien, that's 15 correct. We ' re ready to take questions.
16 MR. O ' BRIEN: Thank you very much. I 17 appreciate that .
18 Marcia?
19 MS. SIMON: Thank you, Ken .
20 My first question is this: based on Mr.
21 Hill's presentation, there were several references to 22 the resident inspector not ask ing certain questions .
23 So, is it TVA ' s position that TVA only has to provide 24 information to the NRC that is directly responsive to 25 specific questions asked by a resident inspector?
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79 1 MS . ROELOFS: This is Ms. Roelofs. Mr .
2 Bar stow wil l take that q uestion .
3 MR. BARSTOW: Ms. Simon , I guess I would 4 ask you maybe to rephrase that q u estion . And the 5 reason I' m saying that is because we provide 6 information to the NRC based on what they are 7 interested in knowing . So , if you could help me , try 8 to rephrase your question, so I can better answer it, 9 I g u ess?
10 MS . SIMON : Okay . I' ll try that .
11 MR. O'BRIEN: Mr . Barstow , would you put 12 on you r c amera , please?
13 MR. BARSTOW: Oh.
14 MR . O' BRIEN: Sorry about that , Marcia .
15 My apol ogies.
16 MS . SIMON: Okay. Now I have to think 17 abou t my rephrasing aga in. My t r a i n of thought was 18 interrupted.
19 MR . O' BRIEN : I apologize .
20 MS. SIMON: Okay. So, when you have an 21 unusual event occur at the plant and you're 22 i nvest i gating it , and the res i dent asks quest i ons 23 about it, is it your position that you only have to 24 provide information that responds to the questions?
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80 1 would wa nt to know the entire, all the underlying 2 facts related to that event?
3 MR. BARSTOW: Well, thank you for 4 rephrasing . What I would say to that is that our 5 intent would always be to be forthright, transparent, 6 truthful, and provide information about the event.
7 MS. SIMON: Okay. Because I ' m trying 8 to --
9 MR. BARSTOW: So, I'm not sure how else we 10 should approach it.
11 MS. SIMON: Yes, I mean , clearly, the 12 resident had some specific questions. And I think one 13 of the issues with this Apparent Violation is, even if 14 those questions focused on a certain aspect of this 15 event, there were other aspects of the event that the 16 NRC might have been interes t ed in. And so , I guess 17 the question is, why would TVA not provide information 18 about certain aspects of the event just because he 19 didn't ask about them? I don't know if I asked that 20 very well, but -- so, I guess what you're saying is 21 TVA would make an effort to be as complete and 22 accurate as possible. Is that your response?
23 MR. BARSTOW: I guess, first of all, I'll 24 say my intent personally , and I think as TVA in 25 general that I've found - - I haven't been in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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81 1 position that long -- but, certainly , our intent would 2 always be to provide information that we feel the NRC 3 would be interested in and be able to understand the 4 situation.
5 But, getting back to this specific AV, I 6 think that, to talk specifics , Mr. (b)(?)(C) and Mr.
7 _l_ )_(7_)_(C_)_ _j (b both intended to provide as much information 8 as they could to the resident inspector.
9 Specifically, they were focused on the operability 10 question that the inspector asked. I t hink they were 11 aware of what the inspector knew already about the 12 event . So, in my opinion, and from what I've seen 13 from the inspection and investigation activities that 14 our counsel did and what I've read , their intent was 15 to be open a nd transparent and provide information 16 about the event.
17 So, I don't know how to -- I mean, I guess 18 I struggle with a little bit your -- it feels a little 19 bit like you're asking us to be a l ittle bit of a mind 20 reader. And this is my personal opinion, but t h e way 21 you phrased the question , you said - - I can ' t remember 22 how you said it now, but it made me think of us trying 23 to guess what the inspector may be wanting to ask.
24 MS. SIMON: That wasn't really what I was 25 getting at . I just got the impression -- and again ,
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82 1 I wish I had an encyclopedic memory and could remember 2 exactl y what Tom said during his presentation -- but 3 I got the impression at several points that there was 4 an emphasis on the inspector didn I t , the resident 5 didn' t ask this, and therefore, we didn ' t tell him .
6 And if I'm misinterpreting that , then I ' m sorry , but 7 I got that impression.
8 And so, I'm asking you, is it TVA's view 9 that that's why I asked the original question - -
10 that you only have to provide information to the NRC 11 that is directly responsive to specific questions 12 asked by the resident surrounding an event? Or would 13 you be proactive, I guess, in volunteering more 14 information , if you had it , even if the resident had 15 not asked about it, if it was relevant and you thought 16 it was of interest to the NRC?
17 MR . BARSTOW: Well, because you're 18 specifically asking about Tom Hill's presentation, and 19 obviously , he's investigated this thoroughly, maybe I 20 could ask Tom to weigh in here.
21 MR. HILL: Thanks, Jim. I appreciate 22 that .
23 Ms. Simon, if you got that impression, I'm 24 not quite sure --
25 MR. O 'BRIEN: Mr. Hill?
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83 1 MR. HILL: Yes?
2 MR. 0 ' BRIEN: Could I ask you to bring the 3 microphone closer to you or to turn up the volume?
4 MR. HILL: Is that any better? Usually, 5 I'm not --
6 MR. 0' BRIEN: Yes , that is a little 7 better. Thank you .
8 MR. HILL: Most people never suggest that 9 they can't hear me. So , you let me know . Okay?
10 MR. O'BRI EN: I 'm in that same boat with 11 you .
12 MR. HILL: Ms. Simon, or Marcia , if you 13 don't mind, your characterization of what I had to say 14 I don't think is at all accurate. I was not trying to 15 suggest in any way that the only circumstances under 16 which a licensee should be providing information to 17 the NRC is if they ' re asked a very specific, narrow 18 question. So, let's start with that premise. Okay?
19 That having been said, I think the 20 questions that are posed are relevant in assessing 21 after the fact the reasonableness and the accuracy and 22 the completeness of the response that 's being given by 23 the licensee. You can't ignore the questions that 24 were asked as you evaluate the answers that were 25 given .
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84 1 Now , in the context here , I think all of 2 that is sort of an academic exercise because I think 3 the record is abundantly clear that, in fact , the 4 issue of the pressurizer rise and the abatement of the 5 pressuri.zer rise by opening the valve was cl-early 6 discussed with Mr. Nadel over that weekend. Both Mr.
7 l(b_)(_7_)(_
... C)_ ___.I and Mr. (b)(?)(C) have testified on several 8 occasions, and certainly in their PECs, that they 9 recall having had specific discussions with Mr . Nadel 10 about that very subject, irrespective of whether Mr.
11 Nadel asked the questions on December 12 and December 12 14.
13 Secondly , Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I, al though he did 14 not bring the attachment that 's in question, or the 15 email I ' ll call it the email attachment, for 16 simplicity ' s sake he does not have any 17 recollection, nor does Mr . l(b)(7)(C) I, of even bringing 18 that to the meeting on December 14th. And it 19 certainly would have been contrary to their own 20 practices and policies to bring an internal -email 21 attachment with them. He does have a recollection of 22 bringing the graph that he created with him, and that 23 was brought primarily for the purpose of discussing 24 what they understood to be Mr. Nadel' s principal 25 question which had to do with operability .
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85 1 However, the same graph that deals with 2 operability also, unmistakably, shows the correlation 3 between pressurizer rise and pressurizer abatement 4 when the valves were open. So , that's more evidence 5 that the subject was clearly discussed.
6 Finally , or I think finally, I would say 7 that the following day , on December 15th, there is 8 absolute documentary evidence in the form of the email 9 correspondence between Mr . _l(b_)(_ !
7)_(C_)_ _ _ and Mr. Nadel 10 that the s ubj ect of the relationship between 11 pressurizer rise and the opening of the valves was 12 discussed . So, I guess in response to your question, 13 no , do I think that you absolutely - - does the license 14 absolut ely need to limit itself to answering questions 15 that are specifically addressed? No. But, in this 16 particular instance, whether the question was asked or 17 not, the issue was discussed.
18 MS. SIMON : Okay. Thank you. That was a 19 very thorough response .
20 Tom, I will call you Tom if you call me 21 Marcia.
22 MR. HILL: Okay .
23 MS. SIMON: And this question is, of 24 course, addressed to anyone from TVA who wants to 25 answer it, but I have a feeling it might end up being NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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86 1 you.
2 I believe that you said in your 3 presentation at one point that the only plausible 4 reason for opening the valve , the RHR letdown , was to 5 reduce pressurizer level. And the first question is, 6 but could there have been a number of possible reasons 7 why pressurizer level increased in the first place or 8 increased enough to have them have to open that valve?
9 MR . HILL : I ' m sorry, Marcia , I was 10 distracted here for a second and I didn't catch the 11 last part of your question . Could you --
12 MS . SIMON : Okay. I ' ll just repeat the 13 whole thing. At one point in your presentation , you 14 said that the only plausible reason for opening the 15 RHR letdown valve was to reduce pressurizer level. My 16 question is, but could there have been a number of 17 poss ible reas ons why pressurizer leve l increased in 18 the first place or increased enough to have to open 19 the RHR valve?
20 MR. O'BRI EN : I' d offer you, Mr. Hill --
21 and I ' m going to throw you a lifeline here - - I'd 22 offer the licensee may c hoose to answer it, as opposed 23 to you .
24 MR . HILL : Well, now that's what I was 25 abou t to say. I think that's probably mu ch more of a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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87 1 technical question that the licensee is going to be 2 better equipped to deal with than I am.
3 However, that having been said, let me say 4 as a predicate that, my understanding , that in Mode 4 5 where they were at the time, at that particular point 6 in the evolution, the only plausible reason for 7 opening up the RHR valve would have been to put the 8 letdown back in.
9 But I'll now welcome my colleagues on the 10 more technical side to correct me or --
11 MS. ROELOFS: Yes , from TVA - - and this is 12 Ms . Roelofs -- Mr . Rice can address that question .
13 MR. RICE: Ms. Simon, can you be explicit 14 with what pressurizer level rise, which part of it?
15 Because is it stage or condition? Because there are 16 multiple events or plant maneuvers that could result 17 in pressurizer level rising.
18 MS. SIMON: Well, I'm referring 19 specifically to this event. My understanding is that, 20 when you heat up the reactor, the pressurizer level 21 rises. And Mr. Hill said the only plausible , in the 22 context of this event, the only plausible reason for 23 opening the RHR letdown valve was to reduce 24 pressurizer level . And so, not discussing whether or 25 not that ' s the case, but could there have been a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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88 1 number of possible reasons why the pressurizer level 2 increased in the first place? Or maybe the better way 3 to ask it is, increased enough to have to open the 4 pressurizer sorry -- to open the RHR valve?
5 MR. RICE: Yes, there are other plant 6 failures or other maneuvers that could have resulted 7 in pressurizer level rising . However, given the 8 condition that was there , the action would be the 9 same , which would be to place RHR back in service 10 through RHR letdown to reduce pressurizer l evel.
11 MS. SIMON: Okay. So, then , wouldn't the 12 underlying reason why pressurizer level increase in 13 the first place be part of a complete description of 14 what happened during that event?
15 MR. RICE: I was not in the position at 16 the time or in the office at the time. So, I'm not 17 able to understand what conversations that previously 18 transpired between Mr. Nadel and operations staff at 19 the time.
20 MS. SIMON: But I'm really just asking , if 21 there are several possible reasons why the pressurizer 22 level increased, wouldn't a complete description of 23 what happened that day want to specify the actual 24 reason why it happened in that event , as opposed to 25 any one of the possible failures you just alluded to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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89 1 that could have happened?
2 MR. RICE: Yes, I can ' t speculate to that 3 conversation at that time.
4 MR . O ' BRIEN: Mr. Rice , let me help, if I 5 might, in this q u estioning. There's been a lot of 6 dialog here relative to putting the letdown back in 7 service. Do you have a specific procedure for p u tting 8 the letdown in service that does only just that?
9 MR . RICE: Are you referring normal 10 l etdown or RHR l etdown?
11 MR. O'BRIEN: RHR. My apologies. Thank 12 you for the q uest ion. RHR letdown . Do you have a 13 specific standalone procedure that puts RHR letdown in 14 service without any other actions being taken by , say ,
15 for example, the procedure writers to change it or the 16 shift manager to eliminate steps?
17 MR . RI CE : There i s a standalone section 18 for establishing RHR letdown.
19 MR . O' BRIEN : So , would the operator be 20 allowed to go to that section without deleting things 21 prior to it?
22 MR. RICE: Without deleting things?
23 MR. O' BRIEN: I mean any steps prior to 24 those actions , s u ch as starting t he RHR pump.
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90 1 the RHR pump is a separate section of the same system 2 operating instruc tion .
3 MR. O' BRIEN: So, you don ' t have a 4 procedure that they could go to without having to take 5 some specific actions that would allow them to only 6 open up the RHR valves?
7 MR . RICE : I 'm sorry, which RHR valves?
8 Which RHR valves are you referring to?
9 MR. O'BRIEN: Suction and letdown.
10 MR. RICE: Okay . To establish RHR, to put 11 RHR in service, there is one section that is required.
12 That does open up the suction valves .
13 MR. O'BRIEN: And it does also start the 14 pump , correct?
15 MR. RI CE: Yes, sir.
16 MR. O'BRIEN: So , you have no standalone 17 procedure without actions that would be needed to be 18 taken to put RHR in service without taking other 19 actions besides the ones that were taken?
20 MR. RICE: May I confer for just a second 21 before answering that question?
22 MR. O'BRIEN : Sure, sure .
23 (Pause.)
24 MS. ROELOFS: Mr. O'Brien , this is Ms.
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91 1 will answer the question on the table.
2 MR. O'BRIEN: Thank you very much .
3 MR. RICE: Mr. O'Brien, this is Chris Rice 4 again.
5 So, as I was stating, there are two 6 procedural sections inside the same system operating 7 instructions. They are required to be performed to 8 establish the flow path to allow RHR letdown to reduce 9 pressuri.z er inventory. As I stated yesterday in AV 6 ,
10 those procedure sections should have been performed in 11 a bette r manner, but it does require those two 12 sections, as stated before.
13 MR. O'BRIEN: So, part of what I was 14 trying to get to and it 's in response to Ms.
15 Simon's question -- is that, when you articulate as 16 the answer that the complete answer , the accurate 17 answer, is to put letdown in service, it omits the 18 underlying reason for putting letdown in service ,
19 because in that mode and at that time that would not 20 be a normal activity in the sense that, yes, the other 21 reason you had to do it was you had letdown of 22 service, but that's really not the reason at all that 23 you had to put it in service . You had to put it in 24 service because it appears -- I don't want to conclude 25 anything at this point in time -- it appears you had NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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92 1 undertaken an evolution that removed the source of 2 being able to control it; that is, doing the evolution 3 with RHR isolated. And that ' s what caused you to end 4 up having to be there , that in combination with normal 5 letdown.
6 So , I'm trying to get back to Ms . Simon's 7 q ues tion, which is the answer that was given that --
8 and it's an obvious answer, I think is what Mr. Hill 9 said - - that it was to control pressurizer 1-e vel .
10 That ' s really not a complete answer in that there are 11 many , as you are articul ated , many potential 12 underlying causes that could cause you to be there.
13 And in this particular case, there were a number of 14 underlying causes that were not articulated .
15 You don ' t have to answer that that I 'm 16 articulating unless you guys disagree with me on that 17 part icular statement.
18 MR. HILL: Mr. O ' Brien --
19 MS . ROELOFS : I'm sorry , this is Ms.
20 Roelofs. We will turn that over to our counsel to 21 answer that question , please.
22 MR. O'BRIEN : Thank you very much 23 MR. HILL: Well, it's more of a comment.
24 Maybe it is responsive to your question , Mr. O'Brien .
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93 1 this in response to Marcia earlier -- in evaluating ,
2 and t h is really goes to t h e q u estion of the o b ligat i on 3 of the licensee to give accurate and full information, 4 which obviou sly we agree that i s the obligat ion 5 MR . O' BRI EN : Mr. Hill, I can barely hear 6 you.
7 MR . HILL : Sorry . Obviously , we agree 8 that the licensee is obligated to give complete and 9 tru thfu l information. But I probably should have 10 s uppl emented my respon se to Ms. Simon earlier . That 11 being s a id - - and we all agree on that in the 12 con text of then after the fact evaluatin g whether or 13 not somebody engaged, or the license engaged, in 14 deliberate misconduct , okay , the question is , in fact ,
15 by providi ng i n compl ete i nformation, okay, the 16 question that is posed , and how it is posed , and in 17 the context of which it ' s posed, becomes very 18 relevant .
19 So , t hose two ideas have to be , are not 20 incompatible with each other , notwithstanding whatever 21 the obligation may be on the licensee when you 22 eval uate -- I g u ess I 'm j u st repeat i ng myse l f , and I 23 apologize for that . But when you ' re evaluating the 24 high standard of deliberate miscondu ct , and you're 25 evaluating i t becau se you' re c l aiming that there was NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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94 1 a failure to give further information, you really need 2 to look at it in the context of the question.
3 And I would finally add that, as crafted 4 currently, Apparent Violation No. 7 is really limited 5 to the written documents that the NRC claims that it 6 somehow received from Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I and Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I on 7 December 14th. In other words, the allegation, the 8 Apparent Violation is not a generic allegation that 9 the licensee failed to provide information with 10 respect to the complete details of the evolution.
11 MR. O 'BRIEN: Thank you, Mr. Hill. I 12 appreciate that clarification . That was helpful for 13 me. Thank you.
14 Marcia?
15 MS. SIMON: That ' s actually all the 16 questions I have on that , Ken.
17 MR. O'BRIEN : So, I have another question 18 -- thank you, Marcia -- relative to AV 7. And, Mr.
19 Hill , it goes t o some of the comments that you made ,
20 and during the conversation you often pointed to - - my 21 phrasing , please -- information you believed Mr. Nadel 22 already had or already was aware of . And I wanted to 23 ask if you have specific evidence to demonstrate that 24 Mr . Nadel knew the points that you have asserted that 25 he knew at the time .
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95 1 MR . HILL : It ' s o u r understanding from the 2 investigation that that information came to us from, 3 of what Mr. Nadel knew , came to us in the first 4 instance from Mr
- l(b)(?)(C) Iwith respect to Mr . ...
l(b-)(-7)-(C_) _ __.
5 interaction with Mr . Nadel on December 11th, and then ,
6 as Mr
- l(b)(7)(C) Ithen reported, that interaction through 7 ______I and Mr . ._____ that evening and the next Mr. l._(b)(7)(C) (b)(?)(C) 8 day.
9 MR. O ' BRIEN : So , let me be clear. I want 10 to make sur e I understood . So, you have no direct 11 evidence? You have inference from a discussion from 12 somebody else of what they bel ieve Mr. Nade l knew?
13 You have no direct evidence of Mr . Nadel's statements 14 and/or writings that c l early art icul ate the points 15 that you made that you believe he knew?
16 MR . HILL : I think it ' s corre ct to say 17 that I don ' t have any specific writ i ng of Mr. Nadel' s .
18 I would be delighted to see it , but I don't have it .
19 As I have, whether you wou ld call it firs t hand or 20 secondhand, I guess I have Mr . ... l(b_)(? ) _ __.l recollections
_)(_c_
21 of what it was that occurre d during his meeting with 22 Mr . Nadel .
23 MR . O 'BRI EN : One of those things -- and 24 I'll be a little more specific of what I believe --
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96 1 aware of the pressurizer level increase. I ' m not 2 clear that there was any dialog or any information 3 that he articulated in his questions to Mr. (b)(?)(C) , or 4 otherwise, to assert that fact .
5 MR. HILL: It's my understanding that 6 certainly the fact that normal letdown was out of 7 service as a result of the repair was known to Mr.
8 Nadel on the 11th . And I know that the issue of the 9 pressuri.z er rise was discussed between Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) 10 Mr . 1(b)(?)(C) ~ and Mr. Nadel beginning on the 12th.
11 MR. O'BRIEN: You have evidence that they 12 talked about the operability of the RHR discussion 13 from his discussion? I want to make sure it's clear 14 that you're saying you have testimony from Mr.
15 ...
l(b_)_
7
( _)(_c )_ _ I
_.I or Mr .l(b)(?)(C) that they informed him that the 16 pressurizer rise had occurred?
17 MR. HILL: Yes, both on December 12th and 18 14th, they both say, they both say that that was part 19 of the d i scuss ion on the morning of the 12th , and then 20 again, in the meeting on the 14th.
21 MR. O'BRIEN: Thank you very much.
22 That's all the questions I believe we have 23 on any of these seven. Let me make sure my team 24 agrees with that and there isn't a question that arose 25 as a part of the discussion .
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97 1 With that , we'l l go to AV 9. Marcia?
2 MS. SIMON: Thanks, Ken. I have a few 3 questions that relate to Mr. ,J ohnson, and specifically 4 to his statements regarding his, I guess his fears of 5 los ing his job .
6 In Mr . l(b)(?)(C) p Ec , Mr ..... 1(b-)(_7_)(C_)_..,l discussed 7 the decision that was made in June 2014 about the 8 decision that Mr. Johnson would not be retained after 9 Unit 2 came online. And Mr .l(b)(?)(C) I said that this 10 was, the primary reasons for that were Mr. Johnson's 11 performance and potential and that this was something 12 that was recommended by Mr. l(b)(?)(C) ..,.,..,.~..,,.,...----, I; and 13 Mr. l(b)(?)(C) Iconcurred, and that Mr ,l(b)(?)(C) Iand the HR 14 representative met with Mr. Johnson in June 2014 to 15 inform him of the decision. And Mr. Johnson also 16 discussed this in one of his TVA OIG interviews .
17 So, I have a couple of questions related 18 to that June 2014 context , and I'm hoping you might be 19 able to answer them . The first one is , can someone 20 provide any context to the decision? In other words, 21 was it part of a larger-scale downsizing effort by TVA 22 at Watts Bar or was this a more isolated decision 23 about Mr . Johnson based on his performance?
24 MS. ROELOFS: Ms. Simon, this is Ms.
25 Roelofs . We will turn that question over to our NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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98 1 attorneys.
2 MR. HILL : Ou r u nderstanding , Marcia , is 3 that it was part of a broader - - and I ' m blanking 4 right now on the actual term of art that was used , but 5 it was a -- it was not maybe -- well , I was going to 6 say "reduction in force , " but I thought there was 7 another term , actually , a reorganization or something.
8 But it was a broad - - it was not, by any means, 9 isolated to Mr. Johnson.
10 MS. SIMON: Okay. And are you aware of 11 whether any other SROs or reactor operators were 12 affected by that?
13 MR. HILL: I believe the answer is yes, 14 but I'd want to confirm that . But I believe the 15 answer is yes.
16 MS. SIMON: Are you --
17 MS . ROELOFS : I'm sorry , Ms . Simon , this 18 is Ms. Roelofs. We ' re happy to supplement the record 19 with an answer to that question . We would want to 20 review our HR records to ensure that we gave you an 21 accurate answer. And so, we will take note of your 22 q u est i on and suppl emen t the record shortly following 23 this conference today.
24 MS . SIMON: Okay. That sounds great.
25 Thanks .
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99 1 MS. ROELOFS: Okay. Thank you.
2 MS. SIMON : And my next question is, Mr.
3 Johnson said he was told at that meeting that there 4 would be no place for him within a year; i.e., as of 5 June 2015, but, obviously, he was still employed as an 6 SRO after June 2015. So, my question is , are you 7 aware of any follow-up with Mr. Johnson regarding his 8 job status after June 2015?
9 MR. HILL: I'm only hesitating because I 10 wanted to make sure that my colleagues --
11 MS. ROELOFS: No. No, Ms. Simon , this is 12 Ms. Roelofs again . I think that's another one of 13 those where we would want to review the HR records 14 just to be certain we're answering your question. We 15 did look into this issue, but just because of the 16 length of time that has passed, we weren't always able 17 to find the precise records that we were looking for .
18 But, if we have your precise questions, we can look 19 into the issu e further .
20 And I don ' t know if Mr. Hill can 21 supplement based on the investigation , but we're also 22 happy to supplement or respond back to the PEC.
23 MS. SI MON: Okay.
24 MS. ROELOFS: So, I don't know if Mr. Hill 25 has anything to add .
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100 1 MR . HILL: Well , I think it ' s probably 2 bes t if we supplement to make s ure we' re compl-e tel y 3 accurate. We will supplement , but I believe the 4 answer is I don ' t believe there was any further formal 5 discu ssion with him after J u n e of '15 , if that was the 6 question that you were asking .
7 MS . SIMON : Yes , and 8 MR. HILL: After ' 15. I think you were 9 asking after the year it expired, weren't you?
10 MS . S IMON : Yes .
11 MR. HILL: I think that ' s what you were 12 asking . Yes .
13 MS. SIMON: And I guess the first thought 14 that came to my mind was -- and this is purely guess 15 on my part was that perhaps June 2015 was an 16 original target date for when they thought Unit 2 17 might come o nl i n e , and therefore , maybe he was g i ven 18 that date with that in mind. So, if that's 19 something 20 MR. HI LL : Yes, I think you're probably 21 right , Marcia.
22 MS . S IMON : Okay .
23 MR . HILL: That ' s my recollection as well.
24 MS . SIMON : That might be part of the --
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101 1 determine , you can let us know that .
2 MR. HILL: I do know that Mr. J ohnson, in 3 his words, after June of ' 15, felt he was living on 4 borrowed time.
5 MS. S IMON : Okay .
6 MS . ROELOFS : Ms. Simon , this is Ms.
7 Roelofs . We've taken notes to make sure that we got 8 your questions down correctly, and we will ensure that 9 we supplement the record with the information t hat you 10 are seeking .
11 MS . SIMON: Okay . Thanks.
12 MS. ROELOFS : You' re welcome.
13 MS . SI MON: So, Mr, l(b)(?)(C) I also in his 14 PEC discussed Mr. Johnson's performance evalu a t ion and 15 a statement that Mr. Johnson made saying t hat Mr.
16 l(b)(?)(C) Ihad had Mr. Johnson's performance evaluation 17 (b)(?)(C) 18 19 20 21 And so , I have two questions . The first 22 q u estion is , I think Mr. Johnson said he was given 23 this evaluation around November 5th, 2015. And I was 24 wondering if there 's any way for TVA to confirm t hat .
25 MS . ROELOFS : Ms. Simon, this is Mr.
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102 1 Roelofs . We will add that to our list of items to 2 s uppl ement . We can certainly l ook into that .
3 MS. SIMON: Okay. And then, this question 4 is more general. Prior to this effort to redistribu te 5 the ratings , were there any communications made to 6 operators that this process was going to be 7 u ndertaken ?
8 MS. ROELOFS : Ms. Simon , I apologize. Can 9 you repeat you r q u estion?
10 MS . SIMON: Yes . So, prior to this effort 11 to redistribute the ratings according to a Gaussian 12 c u rve that Mr . l(b)(?)(C) I mentioned , were there any 13 communications made to operators that this process was 14 going to be undertaken? In other words, that 15 performance rat i ngs were going to be redistr i buted to 16 a bell curve , basically?
17 MS . ROELOFS : Ms . Simon , I think this is 18 another area where we would have to look back in time 19 and l ook at those communications and supplement the 20 record.
21 MS. SIMON: Yes , I ' m just trying to get a 22 sen se of whether the operators were p u t on not i ce 23 that, basically, this was going to be a change in how 24 performance was assessed .
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103 1 the case , but I ' m just saying that , in general , with 2 the TVA employees, I want to make sure that I have an 3 accurate answer to your question . And so, we will 4 definitely look back and s upplement our answer in t hat 5 regard .
6 MS . SIMON: Okay. Yes, so I ' m looking at 7 when they wou ld have been told and what they were 8 told.
9 MS . ROELOFS : Yes , we got it . Thank you ,
10 Ms. S i mon .
11 MS. SIMON: Okay . And those are all my 12 q u estions . So , thank you.
13 MR. O'BRIEN: Thank you.
14 I want to make s u re , before we go on any 15 further , make s u re that other team members , Nick and 16 Scott , no other questions develop?
17 MR . HI LTON : Noth i ng for me .
18 MR . SPARKS: Yes , I'm good, Ken.
19 MR . O' BRIEN : Thank you.
20 Mr. Barstow and Ms . Roelofs , at this point 21 in time , we are completed with our questions. Would 22 you li k e to take a short break or woul d you like to 23 move directly to any closing comments you might have?
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104 1 at , let's say , 20 after the hour?
2 MR. O'BRIEN: Ms. Roelofs, you're doing a 3 great job estimating the things I would ask. Thank 4 you.
5 Twenty minutes after the hour we ' ll come 6 back on the record .
7 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 8 off the record at 1:08 p.m. and resumed at 1:20 p.m.)
9 MR. O'BRIEN: Ms. Roelofs , I'm slow to 10 l earn, but I' m trying to get there. Since you' re 11 recording things on your side , I'll ask you if you are 12 ready, and whoever would like to give brief closing 13 comments who would like to speak?
14 MS . ROELOFS : Yes, Mr . O'Brien. Thank 15 you. Mr. Rausch would like to give a few brief 16 closing comments , please .
17 MR. O'BRIEN: Thank you very much . I 18 appreciate that.
19 Mr . Rausch?
20 CLOSING COMMENTS ON BEHALF OF TVA 21 MR. RAUSCH: Yes, I would just like to 22 check volume first . Can you hear me okay, Mr .
23 O'Brien?
24 MR . O'BRIEN : Very well . Thank you very 25 much.
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105 1 MR. RAUSCH: Okay. So , I 'd 1 ike to 2 address just one thing before I really close. And it 3 was a question that Ms. Simon asked that we answered 4 regarding how we communicate with the NRC resident or 5 senior resident, and how forthcoming, and what we do 6 offer , and does it require a question in order for us 7 to provide an answer. So , I don't want to undo any of 8 the dialog that has been had, but I just would like to 9 tell you specifically how we function.
10 So, on any given day, if there is an 11 abnormality in the power plant of any kind, one of us 12 on the collective call or in a meeting is sure to ask 13 who is going to inform the resident. And typically, 14 the Ops Director will take that action or one of the 15 other Directors will say, "I've got communications 16 with the resident. "
17 Well, they would either call or go in 18 person and inform the resident of what the issue is ,
19 what we know about it at that point, what o u r next 20 steps are to l earn more about it , and then , we'll talk 21 about when we'll get back to them following a prompt 22 investigation or following six hours of investigation, 23 or interviewing the operator or the mechanic, or 24 whatever it is.
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106 1 have effectively and efficiently and in a timely 2 manner communicated with the resident to give them 3 everything we know upfront. From there, the residents 4 typically will look through tools that they have at 5 their disposal, our Corrective Action Program, our 6 plant computer , other sources of information . And 7 they may go out actually and start asking questions of 8 folks themselves, and typically do.
9 And then, from that point, when we do the 10 follow-up, we'll traditionally get a question or a set 11 of questions from them where they would like 12 additional information or a specific chart or a 13 drawing or a procedure that was marked up and actually 14 us ed , and so forth . And we'll go a lot of times and 15 document the questions, like Mr
- l(b)(?)(C) Idid in one 16 of the exhibits. And we'll work through our 17 regulatory affairs group to document those questions 18 that we have lookups on , and then , we'll go get that 19 additional information and t ake it back.
20 And from there, it typically goes into a 21 back-and-forth communication where the resident would 22 ask us for the additional information; we would go 23 gather that additional information and provide it.
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107 1 information to the resident to help keep them informed 2 as much as possible.
3 So, the way we function is to ensure we're 4 providing what we believe they would be interested in 5 u pfron t , forthright , and initially without any 6 prompting. It ' s our goal to get to them before they 7 have to reach out and ask from us.
8 We follow up when there is new information 9 that we told them that we would f ollow up with, and 10 then, in between, take the ir questions, respond to 11 their questions, and then , go back to them either via 12 telephone or, again, face to face , or a n email .
13 So , I just wanted to make sure that piece 14 of o u r answer was not lost. We do not only wait for 15 a q u est i on , and we do n ot screen our responses to make 16 sure we ' re only addressing the question. And our goal 17 is to effectively and effic i ent l y communicate, so that 18 they understand the issue as well as we do , as the 19 investigation unfolds , as we learn more , and as we 20 reach a resolu tion all the way up to we consider the 21 issue resolved or we're going to move forward, or 22 we 're going to continue with a startup, whatever it 23 may be .
24 So , that ' s how we function . It's 25 important for us to have trust and respect with our NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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108 1 residents, be forthright and timely, and be efficient 2 in our communications with them. So, I just wanted to 3 make sure that was clear before we close the day.
4 Relative to today's Apparent Violations 4, 5 7, and 9, regarding Apparent Violations 4 and 7, we 6 see these differently than the NRC does , in that we do 7 not see a Violation 4, Apparent Violation 4 or 7 , and 8 we do not have any evidence of deliberate misconduct.
9 Relative to Apparent Violation 9 I 10 specifically regarding Billy Johnson, we do agree with 11 the Apparent Violation and we do agree with the 12 deliberate misconduct associated with Billy Johnson .
13 We do not agree with the Apparent Violation No. 9 for 14 Mr .l(b)(7)(C) I, nor do we see any evidence of deliberate 15 misconduct by Mr. l(b)(?)(C) I on Apparent Violation No.
16 9.
17 So, with that, Mr. O'Brien, that concludes 18 our remarks for the day.
19 MR. LEWIS: This is Mr. Lewis .
20 Before you drop off, could I provide one 21 correction of something I said earlier?
22 MR. O 'BRIEN: Sure. And then, I have a 23 few comments at the end, yes.
24 MR. LEWIS: Thank you.
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109 1 presentation on AV 4 . I said that Mr .j(b)(?)(C) 1-- this 2 is what I was told - - I said that Mr. l(b)(?)(C) 3 deliberated about - -
4 MS. ROELOFS: I think Mr. Lewis is trying 5 to speak -- this is Ms. Roelofs -- but he is on mute .
6 MR. O' BRIEN: I ' m sorry, Ms. Roelofs, I 7 missed what you were saying.
8 MR. LEWIS: I am speaking. Can you hear 9 me?
10 MR. O'BRI EN: Yes, I can.
11 MR. LEWIS: Okay. I was saying , during 12 the presentation on AV 4, I said that Mr *l(b)(?)(C) 13 deliberated about the violation, and I meant to say he 14 deliberated about the evolution. So, I apologize for 15 misspeaking.
16 Thank you.
17 MR . O' BRIEN: Thank you very much.
18 Are we okay to move forward, Ms. Roelofs?
19 MS. ROELOFS: Yes , Mr. O'Brien. We had a 20 little issue with the audio at our end. Were you able 21 to hear the entirety of Mr. Rausch ' s closing comments?
22 MR. O'BRIEN : Absolutely correct, yes, I 23 could.
24 MS. ROELOFS: Okay. Thank you for 25 clarifying .
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110 1 MR. O' BRIEN: No problem.
2 Before we finish today , I just want to go 3 over the same thing I went over at the end of the day 4 yesterday, and I'll do it again tomorrow before we 5 finish.
6 And it I s just to remind everybody tha t, in 7 listening to and having these PECs, there are two 8 important points for everybody to walk away with.
9 First, the Apparent Violations that are being 10 discussed are subject to further review and may be 11 changed prior to any resultant enforcement action.
12 That's fundamentally the purpose of the PEC .
13 And secondly, the statements and views 14 expressed -- an expression of opinions excuse me --
15 by the NRC employees at this conference, or the lack 16 thereof, are not intended to be the final Agency's 17 determinations of relief . So, I want to make sure 18 everybody ' s aware of that.
19 And then, before I close, I want to make 20 sure there are no other questions or needs, either 21 from the reporter or anybody else before I close the 22 meeting .
23 COURT REPORTER: I'm good to go.
24 MR. O I BRIEN: Hearing none, I 1 11 say we' re 25 off the record .
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111 1 Excuse me. Go ahead .
2 COURT REPORTER: I was just saying I'm 3 good.
4 MR. O'BRIEN: Is that the court reporter?
5 COURT REPORTER: Correct, sir.
6 MR. O'BRIEN : Thank you very much . My 7 apologies . I talked over you .
8 With that, I' 11 close the meeting and 9 we ' re o ff until tomorrow. And my understanding is 10 tomorrow we'll talk about AV 8, 10, 11, and 12.
11 Thank you, everybody .
12 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 13 off the record at 1 : 28 p.m.)
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