Text

OI Interview Transcript of Witness, Dated 02/02/2004, Pages 1-155
	ML061460294
Person / Time
Site:	Salem, Hope Creek
Issue date:	02/02/2004
From:	; NRC/OI
To:	;
References
	FOIA/PA-2005-0194, NRC-1306
	Download: ML061460294 (121)
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JL Uwarm-NUCJEAR+ REGULATORY COMMISSION

,()IV7 Interiew Title: Docket Number: Location: Date: (not provided)Salem, New Jersey Monday, February 2, 2004 Work Order No.: NRC-1306 Pages 1-155 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.information in this record was deleted Washington, D.C. 20005 in ýccordance Wai)Freed~rn of inf°rnat_.fl e 1\

J.2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF INVESTIGATIONS INTERVIEW IN THE MATTER OF: INTERVIEW OF (CLOSED)Docket No.(not provided)Monday, February 2, 2004 PSEG Nuclear Training Center Salem, New Jersey The above-entitled interview was conducted at 10:1 5 a.m.BEFORE: Special Agent EILEEN NEFF Senior Special Agent JEFFREY TEATOR APPEARANCES:

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 On Behalf of the W itness-~JEFFRIE J. KEENAN Assistant General Solicitor Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG)80 Park Plaza Newark, New Jersey 07102-4194 Telephone:

(973) 430-7000 FAX: (973) 623-3261 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (10:15 a.m.)2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Today's date is February 2,2004.3 The time is approximately 10:15 a.m.4 Speaking is Special Agent Eileen Neff with the NRC Office 5 of Investigations, Region I. Also present from the same office is Senior Special 6 Agent Jeffrey Teator.7 What follows is an interview e 8 .who is currently employed by PSEG Nuclear as 9 n the Hope Creek is also represented by 10 counsel, who is Jeff Keenan here today, who will describe the purpose of his 11 appearance shortly.12 As agreed, this interview is being tape recorded, and the 13 location of this interview is PSEG's Nuclear Training Center at Salem, New 14 Jersey. The subject matter of the interview concerns the safety conscious work 15 environment and, is being interviewed as a witness in this 16 investigation.

17 There is no potential violation associated with the safety 18 conscious work environment.

Therefore, there is no specific subject of 19 investigation.

20 As explained prior to going on the record, we've talked about 21 placing you under oath. At this point, would you raise your right hand? Do you 22 affirm that the testimony you are about to provide is the truth, the whole truth, 23 and nothing but the truth?24'NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 II 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 orri.tAL AtUENTNEFF:

And, Mr. Keenan, please describe the purpose of your appearance here today.MP,. KEENAN: Yes. My name is JeffKeenan.

I'm Associate General Solicitor for PSEG Services.

I'm representing Rita and PSEG in a dual capacity.

I'm not aware of any conflict of interest.

Should a conflict arise, we'll take a break from the record and best resolve that.PSEGNuclear has a strong interest in understanding our safety conscious work environment, and so we're very much interested in strengths and weaknesses, and we're here to cooperate and help the NRC in their review.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Thank you.Do you understand the purpose of the representative as described?

Yes.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Did your employerrequire you to have an attorney present when you were interviewed by NRC Office of Investigations?

_______ No.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Were you in any way threatened with adverse action if you did not request corporate counsel?SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Will the presence of Mr. Keenan hinder your testimony in any way?SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you understand that you have the right to a private interview with me at your convenience?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433

.es.2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. With that understanding, 3 do you wish to continue with this interview at this time?4 Yes.5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Okay. Please state your 6 full name for the record, and provide your date of birth and SSN, please.7 9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And your home address?10 12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Thank you. Could I get some 13 background information for you in terms of education, a summary of your 14 education?

15 17 18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. Where did you get your 19 degree from? What school?20 21 SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: .- -...'22 right?23 .Thafs correct.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And what year was that?25 V M NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON.

D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 SPECIAL AGENT I 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 historY,.9 SPF-CAL~ AGENTj N-EFF:-ttifliefrae?

fin.I did r i (202) 234-4433 No 1 2 3 4 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19.20 21 22 23 24 25 DIAL AGENT TEATOR: InstanAGENT..at' correct.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.SKr SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Betwe ej w you were working in Engineering, was it on Salem and Hope Creek side, or was it -was -I was responsible fo Jor both Salem and Hope Creek-SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Thank you.SPECIAL AGENT _--.I1n terms are considered to be interchangeable.

However, the official term for the position that I have i;March of 2003.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.And that change occurred in roughly The title change occurred in 2003.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Pro 1WON&That's correct.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So with your on-shift experience 2 as 'njposition, all of that has been at Hope Creek?3 hat's correct.4 SPECIAL AGENT'NEFF:

Okay. Okay. So for this 5 timeframe, we'll look at after you've been on shift from, you know 6 That's going to be a rather large chunk of time.7 But if you could consider that in your -- your on-shift 8 experience, in that large period of time, and on this large topic, the safety 9 conscious work environment, what we're focusing on is when we're thinking it 10 -or the aspects of the safety conscious work environment that we're looking at 11 would be people's abilities to raise concerns, whether they're industrial safety, 12 nuclear safety, radiological safety -people's abilities to raise concerns, the 13 response they get to that concern, and the effectiveness of raising the concern.14 And that would include for you yourself You know, people 15 who raise concerns to you at your level and from you and your level, your peers 16 above. Now that's quite a bit right there. But if we could break it down -- in 17 looking at that, have you seen any changes in this timeframe, since, say, lets just 18 look at the years that you've been on shift. Do you see changes in that 19 environment, that aspect of the environment, for the better or for the worse? Or 20 has it been stagnant, same thing?21 I'm not sure I understand what your 22 thoughts are as far as changes.23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Well, in terms of the kinds of 24 concerns that are raised, let's look at just you in your position as anM the 25 kinds of concerns that would be brought to your attention.

Do you see any NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 changes in the kinds of things that are brought to your attention, in those three 2 categories?

3 -qo, I really don't. I think that the workers 4 that work for me generally will raise --raise concerns, questions, about all three 5 of the elements -- industrial, radiological, and nuclear safety.6 During that -- this period of time, the tools that we have for 7 raising and documenting those concerns have changed. But the basic vehicle to 8 raise a concern still exists. Vehicles -I say plural, because there are multiple 9 -multiple avenues at which an employee can go through to raise a concern.10 And they have always been in place, and actually the -the 11 avenue of the concern -employee concerns group has actually -actually 12 developed, became much stronger during this period of time, and has since 13 adjusted its resources to -you know, to accommodate the change in the 14 organization.

But those avenues have always existed, and my sense is that 15 employees will use them when they want to 16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Are you aware of any hesitanby 17 on the part of the employees that you supervise to raise concerns?18 Not hesitancy in the standpoint that they 19 don't want to raise the concern. There may be occasional hesitancy in not 20 knowing how to use the tool, for instance, to raise the concern, such as how to 21 use SAP to write this stuff down, or where to get the phone number, or how to 22 get the phone number. But once provided with that information, I think 23 employees will raise concerns.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And the tools that you're 25 saying that changed recently would be -- SAP is one?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 $mYes. In 1999 we shifted from a mainframe 2 system to SAP as the primary tool for work management and documentation of 3 concerns and other -- other things.4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So notifications would --5 -6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- be controlled by this process, 7 then.8"loes.9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Or this program, I imagine.10.- Yes.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Okay. And you had 12 indicated that ECP -the employee concerns program got stronger, that was -13 in some way to deal with the changes in the organization?

14: Yes. The employee concerns process 15 developed during the period oftime that Salem Units 1 and 2 were shut down.16. We had a program, but it developed and became a much stronger process during 17 that period of time.18 Now, since that time there have been staffing changes that 19 have ben adjusted based on changes in the organization.

In other words, that --20 there are -it doesn't look like it used to look from a staffing standpoint.

But.21 that doesn't -in my view, doesn't necessarily mean it's any stronger or weaker 22 than it has been.23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. In terms ofpeople that you 24 would supervise raising issues to you, are you aware of any criticism they might Iii NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 have of the system and the effectiveness of raising a concern, how their concerns get addressed?

Yes. There was a general criticism about the tool that we call SAP, and that is that some people have a sense that it is a black hole. They write a notification and it goes into the black hole, which is really reflective of a gap between the outcome of that notification and the communication back to the employee, not necessarily the system itself.So there is a gap there between somebody writing a notification, saying, "I have a concern about something," and it getting resolved, getting resolved in the time -- the timeframe that the employee may think to be reasonable, and then getting the follow up to that employee that says, "Here was your concern, and here's what we did about it. Does this solve your concern?" So, yes, there is alot of discussion among employees that they don't have that sense of getting that feedback, so to speak.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So you're seeing it as a problem in terms of the notification gets input. Whatever corrective action needs to be taken is taken. It's just that that loop isn't closed and the employee who initiated the notification doesn't get that feedback.Doesn't -doesn't always get that feedback.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Are you -I'm sorry.iAnd there is sometimes a perceived timeliness of that feedback or something may take longer than the employee thinks is reasonable, which ultimately raises concern in their mind. They're not acting on it fast enough for me type -- type concern.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 f.o 1 2 corrective acti 3 4 5 If theres critic 6 quickly enoug 7 9 examples of ti 10 11 very familiar 12 generator at H 13 11-4. think?SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you mean timeliness with the on, or timeliness with the feedback?PRWBoth.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So that may be a part of it.it may be that they're not acting -- somebody is not acting h on the concern.That's correct.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Can you think of any iat?Sure. This is probably one that you are vith, and that is the exhaust leaks on the Bravo emergency diesel lope Creek. The -SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Timeframe was mid last year, I 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24~Yes. Yes.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Maybe June or so?I -it all kind of runs together sometimes.

The engine -SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: For me, too.(Laughter.)

1 The engine had been experiencping some exhaust leaks, and they had been -they had occurred for a fairly long period of time, I would say probably a full operating cycle.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Which is what?NEAL R. GROSS Q H COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 would be 18 months. Which there 2 had been some repairs on the engine. I can't -I can't speak to all the details.3 But in -- last year the leaks definitely got worse, and workers started raising 4 questions about, when are we getting these leaks fixed? And why are we 5 continuing to have to run and test the diesel with these leaks? And what about 6 my safety going into the room with these leaks?7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: To do the surveillance 8 tests?9 Exactly.30 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.11 The difficulty that the organization had 12 was understanding what the problem was from a repair standpoint and being 13 able to fix the leaks in the very, very limited LCO time that we have for this 14 particular engine, which is only 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months .15 So there was a balance going on between work management 16 and the extent of the problem, without a-- really, a real appreciation from the 17 worker's level of what they were dealing with every time we ran the engine.18 Ultimately, the leaks were excessive enough that the 19 employees had concerns about being in the room without some type of breathing 20 protection.

As it really turned out, when it boiled down to somebody saying, 21 "Dammit, we're going to fix the leaks," the actual leaks were able to be repaired 22 in a very short amount of time, less than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months .23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did they have to enter an 24 action statement to go in and fix the leaks?25 'Yes. Yes, we did. 'NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well --2 We had to -- to declare the engine 3 inoperable, tag it out, and repair the leaks, and run the engine again.4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: And they were able to do 5 that during the 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months -6 correct.7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- allowed? You made a 8 comment, though, about there was a -- there was a type of balance going on, or 9 it was unknown whether it could be done. Can you -- I want to explore that a 10 little bit.'a The --and I'm talking a little bit from 12 feedback that I received, not from my personal -13 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.14 firsthand experience.

15 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: That's fine, yes.1Te workorders for the leaks went into the 17 work planning process, and the work planning process identified that it was 18 going to take more than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months to repair what was perceived to be the -the 19 extent of the leaks.20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.21 re in the question ofmore than 22 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months , which is the shutdown LCO for the diesel, shutting the unit down, 23 which is an additional transient that you place on the operating unit --24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433.° 1 k.'W I or managing the leaks up until the point 2 that you have a unit shutdown, so that you can go in and repair them, such as a 3 planned forced outage.4 SRt SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: An outage, yes.5 3'So-- so that combination of factors -- one, 6 the planning--

the planned scope, which suggested more than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months , all right, 7 versus the challenge that you put on your reactor, and your overall plant, 8 shutting it down, and managing the leaks and kind of managing the equipment.9 up until the point that you are shut down for some other reason.10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.11 The ultimate -you balance those three 12 elements from a -.from a safety standpoint, and the extent of the leakage was 13 not -I think not as clearly known as it could have been. And the actual, how 14 long is it going to take to fix this problem, was also not as well defned and 1.5 understood as it should have been.16 So you're receiving this -- it's going to take us seven days. Do 17 we shut the unit down to fix these leaks on this diesel, if it's going to take us 18 seven days to repair it? And that was kind of the balancing act that was going 19 on.20 When some folks got together and actually spent some quality 21 time understanding what the leaks were, and how to fix them, and having all of 22 the equipment and materials pre-staged in place, the repairs actually took far less 23 than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months .24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You mentioned something 25 from a safety perspective.

But what about a procedural perspective?

Were there NEAL R. GROSS --COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C, 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 procedures in place that were being violated at that time, which could have 2 forced the issue to be addressed sooner? Do you know of any procedural 3 violations in the sampling that they were getting? Do you know if anything like 4 that happened with this issue?5 Not -- I don't have any firsthand 6 knowledge of--7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Secondhand?

Did you 8 hear of any procedural-type violations in this timeframe with this issue?9 have to be more specific on what 10 types of procedures you--11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Any of them, anything 12 improperf~

t -involving that evolution.

13 .I would not say improper or intentionally 14 improper.

There were certain plans put in place to run the diesel that were not 15 necessarily followed by subsequent operating shifts. There were administrative 16 errors in which an engine had to be run longer than it should have been because 17 a page in a procedure was missing. When they went out to the field to do the job 18 they said, "Well, we don't have the last page," and ended up having to run the 19 engine longer than it normally would have been.20 So I wouldn't necessarily call that type of thing violations.

I 21 would -22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, Im asking the 23 question:

did you see any violations in what was done? Violations of plant 24 procedures?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433* .

1 Not that I -- not that I would consider a 2 violation of a procedure.

I think there was -- there was errors in judgment, but 3 not -- not direct violations of procedures.

4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You're sure of that right 5 now?6 Yes.7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You mentioned

-well, let 8 me ask you this question.

I mean, there is more than one diesel. If they went in 9 and had to begin working on that diesel and it took longer than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months , just by 10 -by taking that one out and not being able to fix it, it would cause a plant to 11 have to come down just because --12 l-, at- s correct.13 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR -one diesel was out?14 That's correct.15 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Really. Okay. I thought 16 you had like four of them, didn't you? Aren't there four diesels?17 We have four emergency diesel 18 generators.

The Alpha and the Bravo diesels both have 72-hour LCOs 19 associated with them.20 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: So this was one of those 21 two.22 That's correct.23 SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.24The Charlie even -25 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: It was the B, all right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 74 (202) 234-4433* (202) 234-4433 S.iThe Charlie and the Delta also have 72-2 hour LCOs. However, for planned maintenance, that extends beyond that. We 3 have a 14-day window, but it has to be specifically planned to the scope of work.4 In other words, if I'm only going in to do a minor repair, I don't get a 14-day 5 window. I get 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months on both the Charlie and the Delta.6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.7 it But if-my plan is to do an 18-month tech 8 spec required license overhaul, I can use 14 days for that window.9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.10 All right? The Alpha and the Bravo don't 11 have that same luxury.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.13 So, yes, at the point that we went into the 14 window, if we did not have the confidence that we were going to recover the 15 diesel in 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months , then the next option is either notification of special 16 enforcement, which you can get a special extension, but there are limits that go 17 along with that..8 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: From the Commission.

19 f hat's correct. Or you implement your 72-20 hour shutdown action statement and you start shutting the unit down.21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Was there anyone -was there 23 some sort of a turning point that got you to this work plan? You had said it 24 really wasn't coming together.

They were thinking it would take longer than 72.25 What was this -- the point that got you to the 72-hour LCO?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON.

D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I .'The point that got us to the 72-hour LCO 2 was a point in which the engine had been broken for some other reason. I don't 3 remember what the reason was. And we were going to have to run it to 4 ultimately declare it operable.5 The maintenance was done on whatever was broken, but the 6 exhaust leaks still weren't repaired.

And the exhaust leaks were fairly 7 substantial.

I mean, when you start -I don't know if you've ever been in a room 8 like this. When you started it, you'd see a cloud of smoke, and in most cases that 9 bit of smoke will linger for a very, very short period of time up near the ceiling 10 and disappear.

And it's not detectable as carbon monoxide.

In this case, we-11 were getting detectable carbon monoxide.12 The operators-we had aplanto have operators wear negative 13 pressure respirators for the particulate

-in essence the -the irritants that come 14 with products of combustion, because the sampling that had been performed in 15 this space didn't identify that the carbon monoxide was above a minimum 16 threshold, which is an OSHA threshold.

17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.18 But the irritants that come along with 19 carbon -- with products of combustion, they can be pretty nasty if you go into 20 a space and you breathe that stuff for a little while. You know, you come out, 21 your eyes are scratchy, and, you know, some -- some people are more sensitive 22 if you're allergic -you know, if you're allergic to dust and stuff like that. You 23 may be more sensitive to it and feel like crap --24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234.4433 1 you know, afterwards.

We had to run 2 this engine because of these repairs, and we had had an equipment operator who 3 chose to -- during a previous run just like the week before -- had gone to check 4 out what he thought was a leak to try to figure out where it was. And he went 5 up on top of the engine without any breathing apparatus, and unfortunately got 6 caught in a big puff of stuff.7 And he ended up becoming -feeling nauseous, and we 8 actually sent him out to Salem Hospital for some observation.

So his actions 9 contributed to the problem, but because of the problem, when we were faced 10 with running it again, there was now substantial concern among the operators 11 that we're going to be the ones monitoring it while it was running.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.13 That second run after this set of repairs 14 were done, that second run was really the turning point, when we ended up -- in 15 order to get the run accomplished, the operators wore self-contained breathing 16 apparatus.

And that was the point at which all of the -I don't want to use the 17 word "technocrats," but the folks that understand how to do repairs on this type 18 of equipment finally woke up, saw the light, and said, "This can't be that tough.19 Let's figure out how to fix this engine and get it fixed." It was the fact that to get 20 near it you had to wear a self-contained breathing apparatus, and they kind of 21 looked at that as not normal, I suppose. Oh, that is not normal.22' SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Had that been a first with these 23 diesels, that people had to wear that kind of-24 .As far as I know, yes. Now, my personal 25 opinion at this point, based on the information that -- that I received from Safety, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 is that the carbon monoxide levels in this space were not substantial

-- were not above the minimum thresholds to have required self-contained breathing apparatus.

And we did have a plan formulated for being in the space as little as possible.

We had modified the test procedure so that the operators were only -- were basically checking the basic things that needed to be checked in order to support the surveillance, and we had, you know, for instance the outside door open and that type of thing.But the actual carbon monoxide levels that were being sampled for would not have required somebody to wear self-contained breathing apparatus.

In other words, it was not an immediately life-threatening atmosphere.

However, there was a substantial concern among many of the workers -SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.-that we could not answer. So there was a decision to wear the self-contained breathing apparatus.

SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Whose plan was that, that the breathing apparatus was used?I don't know specificilly whose plan it was. I- I left -I was on shift the night before, and I left that morning. So I was not involved in -in the final decisions on -on running it with self-contained breathing apparatus.

So I really don't know whose specific plan it was...//(NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I mean, do you know what level 2 it came from? If not individually, was it at operations management level or -3can only --4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- higher?5 P can only speculate, and I'd prefer not to 6 speculate.

7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Youjust don't know where -- who 8 made the decision to run it that way?9 know there were a lot of people involved 10 in the decision.

I know that when I left in the morning, after speaking to my 1 -" a n and asking him as an individual what would he feel 12 comfortable with, if he was the person running the diesel, and he said he would 13 feel comfortable if he was wearing self-contained breathing apparatus.

14 That's when I turned over in the morning, that mg 15 provided this input.16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who was that,yo"17 18 _J' ,His name ist 18 20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Was this a serious answer, or was 21 that a joke? Did you take it that way, it was serious?22 Yes.23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: He meant that he'd be comfortable 24 wearing scuba gear in there?25 Yes. Yes, I did not take that as a joke.NEAL R. GROSS -/COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And then you reported that 2 to your management?

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So that would be who at this 5 particular time?6 7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF_________

8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you -9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And then -I'm sorry. Go ahead, 10 Jeff.11 Sit SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR, Was it verbal, or was it in 12 the log? Did he respond to you when you gave him that input?13 ji-V ] was on the phone with him several times 14 during the course of the night 15 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.16 The engine was not in a condition to be 17 run that night We were still in the -in the repair stage, remove tag stage. But 18 we were -we were working toward what would be -what would be, in 19 essence, a safe way with all of the concerns that we had about carbon monoxide 20 to run the engine.21 And I had met with actually m yMd 22 ote~23 (Whereupon, a cell phone began ringing.)24 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Let's take a short breakL 25 Off the record. It's 10:47.COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON.

D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 (Whereupon, the proceedings in the foregoing matter went off 2 the record at 10:47 a.m. and went back on the record at 10:49 3 a.m.)4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We're back on the record 5 after a brief interruption.

It's 10:49 a.m.6 Okay. I think where we left offwas the explanation was about 7 the people involved in the decision on the gear, wearing the gear. This situation 8 -the raising of this particular concern, primarily by the operators involved in 9 this, it's been reported that it's -- it caused a significant amount of strain maybe, 10 stress, some damage on the union-management relationship.

11 The -- is there something that could have been done better here 12 that some -you know, the ball was dropped at some point? Because the way.13 it's reported it looks as though the union's take would be that they're not 14 concerned for our safety. It's keep everything online. They're not concerned for 15 our safety. Is there something that could have been addressed better, do you 16 think?17 .1 think that the work planning process, and 18 the ability to idehtify how to fix the problem, in a short duration window is 19 probably the weak link in the process. And what I -- what I mean by that is that 20 for a very long period of time, more than an operating cycle, the information that 21 was provided on what it's going to take to fix this problem was that it was going 22 to take well more than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months . Okay?23 And then the problem didn't get fixed during a refueling 24 outage. Okay? We went through a refueling outage, and we started back up, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 and we still had some leaks, some exhaust leaks on this diesel, not as big as they 2 were, but there were still -- still exhaust leaks with the diesel.3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How long was the refuel outage?4 IfTwenty-four days, 26 days, something like 5 that. I don't remember the -= I mean, it wasn't a 60-day window. It was 6 somewhere in the order of 25 to 30 days.7 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

So this is a potential opportunity?

8 Absolutely.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: To fix this?10 We -during every refuel outage we go 11 through a bus window, an outage window of Alpha and Bravo, where we -we 12 have opportunities to do maintenance on the equipment.

All right?13 Now, the scope of maintenance varies. The extent and the 14 duration of the window varies, and it varies from refueling outage to refueling is outage, because the scope of work is not always the same. There are certain 16 required things you have to do during every refueling outage, and that helps to 1.7 drive the duration of the windows.18 But the fact is is that the -- we went into a refueling outage 19 with some leaks on this engine, and we started back up with some leaks on this 20 engine. And I am going to refer back to the black hole quagmire of notifications 21 and SAP. I think that the trail through the documentation was not real clear to 22 people that -- we still had the problem with the diesel, so we ran it some more, 23 and now we have new notifications being written.A NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 And again, planning -- planning the scope of the work and 2 putting together something to repair the engine was perceived as a huge 3 challenge by many in the organization.

4 Now, why is that? I don't know. You know, is it because the 5 people that were planning the work didn't know what they were planning?

I 6 don't -- I don't know that. All right? You know, is it because it wasn't 7 documented clearly? Again, there could be a lot of reasons for that. But the 8 bottom line is that the planning process suggested it was going to take more than 9 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months to fix the leaks on this diesel. Okay?10 So now you -you judge and you weigh, again, the safety 11 consequences from a unit standpoint of taking the reactor plant through the 12 transient of shutdown and startup versus managing the equipment and how best 13 to keep the people safe with the leaks.14 And I think that those two elements tended to be competing 15 with each other to some extent. But -- go ahead.16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Is there also a competing 3.7 interest there -we don't want to shut the plant down over this issue -318 generation?

I mean, you're talking safety and -- of putting a plant through a 19 transient, but also, I mean, was the consideration, hey, we just don't want to turn 20 the plant off for this issue?21 I -- I never personally had that sense. If 22 we had a situation with a piece of equipment that I felt clearly could not perform 23 its safety function, or clearly represented a health hazard to the workers --24 SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I- as ere is no 2 question that I have the ability to make the decision to shut the unit down. With 3 all the sampling that had been done on this diesel, and the levels of detectable 4 carbon monoxide that had been recorded, we were never -never near any-- any 5 levels that are -- from an OSHA standpoint are considered to be hazardous to the 6 worker.7 It was uncomfortable.

It's not the work environment that you 8 want to work in every day. But it -in my estimation, it never -- never put us to 9 the point where we were jeopardizing worker safety.10 Now, there was the unfortunate incident where an operator 11 went up on the engine without the respirator that he should have been wearing, 12 and stuck his face in the area where he thought there was an exhaust leak. And, 13 unfortunately, he took a big whiff of it. That was a -that's an unfortunate 14 situation.

I wasn't involved, you know, from -with it from a supervisory 15 standpoint or a worker standpoint, so I can't speak to what they were thinking 16 at the time, but that certainly inflamed the situation.

17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right. So to answer 18 my question, did you see the way this issue was handled as a generation or plant 19 production over safety -- personal safety type issue?20 No. No, I did not.21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you see -- Eileen 22 touched on it a little bit. Did you see that the way this was handled, that it -did 23 it cause a strain in union-management relationships?

24 Absolutely it did.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11.12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right. For the reasons we've talked about I guess.O WK Absolutely it did. And I'd really recommend that you -- you get the information from the -- the employee concerns investigation, because there is certainly information that I'm not familiar with. But the evolution of ultimately making the decision to run the engine, to declare it operable, with operators wearing self-contained breathing apparatus, did cause some -- some very, very significant rifts between different parts of the organization.

And I'm not just going to say management and union. It raised concerns about our safety group and their technical ability to interpret and establish guidelines and plans and that type of thing. It caused a lot of rifts in the organization, without a doubt.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Were you interviewed during the course of an investigation done by ECP over this issue?SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. When was that around? How long after the incident was resolved?m going to say within a-week or two.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.It was very, very timely.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Ultimately, how long did it take to fix that i- to fix the leaks?Less than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months .NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How-- half that, a quarter of it, or 2 do you know?3 ., I really don't recall. But it was less than 4 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months . We weren't -- we weren't up against the shutdown LCO at the point 5 that we -we had the engine operable again.6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.7 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I'd be glad to get the ECP 8 file together on this issue if-- if it's of interest for you. We can talk about that 9 off the record.10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: All right. Thank you.11 You indicated that you have the authority to commence a 12 shutdown in the -- in the event that you needed to for hazardous conditions, if 13 what you saw was not operable or you perceived it to be hazardous.

Do you 14 recall having to do that? Do you have situations in mind where you've done that 15 recently -operability calls?16 1I have made operability determinations, 17 but not--18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Take it a step further -- to -to 19 affecting plant status. Recently, do you have anything in those -- along those 20 lines?21 No. I have made operability 22 determinations that have put us in short-term LCOs.23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When was the last time 25 that happened?

Can you recall?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERSV' 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 I don't know if-- I don't know that I can give you the last time it happened.

But I can give you another example on a diesel generator.

I don't remember the letter of the diesel, but it was a problem with the jacket water pump.The shift before me had run the engine and had identified a jacket water leak, and assessed it as significant enough to cause the engine to be-I'm going to use the word operable but degraded --SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.which was really putting its operability 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 in question -SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.-- based on the extent of the leak. This had happened late in their shift, and their recommendation was we should declare it inoperable, get it tagged, and get it fixed. And I took the watch that morning, and my -the first thing that I did taking the watch was to go down and-and eyeball the extent of this leak myself, so that I would have some firsthand information on, you know, how big it was and why we think it is consequential enough to fix. Did that and proceeded with tagging the diesel and calling it inoperable.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You were able to do that on your own?Absolutely.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you have to call anyone in your management chain to get their approval to do that?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 i -- I generally call my management chain 2 for their input.3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who did you call for this?4 , It would have bee 5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.6 a IBut that's not necessarily their approval.7 In other words, I have never been in a situation where I have recommended, for 8 instance, that something should be declared inoperable, and I've had somebody 9 above me override that decision.10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Good. What 11 happened with this issue when you called -did you c a nd tell him about 12 what you saw and what you planned to do? Tell me how that went 13 , e tagged it, and we got the maintenance 14 resources.

This was a Sunday morning. We tagged it on Sunday morning, and 15 we had Maintenance people working on the equipment by mid-afternoon.

Itwas 16 -it takes about four to six hours to tag and drain a diesel for work on jacket 17 water. So we started tagging when I took the watch, and by about mid-afternoon 18 we had Maintenance people working on the problem.19 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Before getting into 20 what was done physically to take the piece of equipment out of service, I want 21 to talk about your conversation with Can you go ahead and tell me 22 what occurred during that conversation?

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Can we first get a timeframe for 24 this, too? What period of time is this? Are you in 2003?25 ,. Yes, it would be in 2003.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701

' (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.Again, unfortunately, I can't pin it down.I could if I went back and researched a little bit.The call would have been -- the call is not outstanding in my mind. My night shift peer had already initiated the phone calls.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who is that?V That would have been SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.He had already initiated the calls, so organizationally people were well aware that we had leakage, and that we were in need of repairs. When I came in to take the watch, focus was on getting folks on his shift to start preparing tags to do the work.So when I took the shift, basically I had everything ready to go. We had drums staged, which is something that he focused his folks on, drums staged, hoses ready, everything to drain the equipment, and tags prepared so that we could proceed with tagging in an expeditious fashion.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.So my phone calls were -- were merely validating this is where we are, and we're moving forward, do we need additional resources to be successful?

SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When you spoke tow did you get pushed back from him on your direction where you wanted to go?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Di findicate to you 2 that he did?3 ihOl No. No. There was some confusion later 4 on this issue. We spent all day Sunday -we tagged the machine. The 5 Maintenance guys worked on the machine. It was ready to be run the following 6 day.7 There was -there was a problem with this jacket water pump, a meaning the first time it got fixed it still leaked. And we had to -9 (End of Tape 1, Side A. Beginning of Tape 1, Side B.)10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It's approximately 11:04 am. I 11 just want to go back up one line, because at the end of the tape it tends to cut off.12 You were explaining where the confusion was on the repair.13 _There was some confusion in that the 14 resident who had been contacted on Sunday was not the resident -the NRC-15 resident who was in on Monday. And later in the week my manager, who was 1i. 6tthe time, called me and asked me what -- what did we do on 17 Sunday, because apparently there was this perception that the shift sat around, 18 and Maintenance sat around, and we didn't do anything on Sunday, that worked 19 hadn't actually started until Monday on this job.20 Well, that just wasn't the case. The engine was tagged. There 21 were repairs made -ineffective repairs, but there were repairs made. The 22 engine was released and it was rerun Sunday night and ended up being tagged 23 again on Monday. So this resident came in on Monday with the perception that 24 we had all just sat on our -our butts and didn't do anything all day Sunday.25 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 ,Which wasn't the case.2 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.3 Now -- now, that then led to more 4 confusion in the organization because of some misinformation that had been put 5 out, that then was perceived as folks aren't -- aren't acting in a timely and 6 responsible fashion, which in my judgment they were, but there was this little 7 bit of miscommunication that occurred in the middle.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It sounds like you're saying --9 where was it being put out from -- the misinformation?

10 -.The resident, the NRC resident.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you correct that?13 Yes.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.15 MUM Yes, personally.

As a matter of fact, my 16 boss at the time --- asked me very specifically to contact the 17 resident.18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who are you talking 19 about?20 .21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. And after briefing 22 I hn what you had done, and your crew had done, was he okay with that?23 Ves.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 Yes. Now, there was -there was 2 frustration in the organization because we -- we fixed the pump, and then we had 3 to fix the pump again. Okay? So now -- now the focus shifts from, okay, well, 4 you tagged it out, but now we can't fix things very well.5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.6 .W kay? So that shifts back to your original 7 questions, and that is, where is -you know, what are people -- will people bring 8 up concerns?

And what do they think about the repairs -you know, how you 9 deal with them?10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.11 Il So here this was a situation where we 12 ended up actually tagging the engine out twice to fix the jacket water pump 13 before we actually got it to the point that was working -that it was working.24 And we had had several failures of jacket water pumps up to this point, that it 15 was perceived as, while you guys are doing this, just putting in a new pump, 16 you're not fixing the problem. All right?17 And for an operator to tag and make a diesel ready for 18 maintenance, and then restore that diesel, it's a -it's a hard job.19 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATORK Right.20 You know, and then run the diesel on the 21 back end, it's a hard job. So there's a firstration where somebody repeatedly 22 tags the same piece of equipment several times to fix what one would think 23 would be an easy thing to fix.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. In the end, were you able 25 to fix it in the time period allowed by the regulations and your license? -NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I es. Yes, we were.2 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. All right.3 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

So you entered two separate LCOs 4 for that?5 .This would have been a continuation of 6 the first one.7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It just continues on because it 8 wasn't --9 iWell, this is not necessarily the same 10 diesel as the one we were talking about before.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: No, no, I understood that.12 Okay.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: But when you're saying that it was 14 tagged, it was fixed, it still leaked, and then it wasjust called inoperable

-- again, 15 you have two separate -16 No, it would have been --it would have 17 been the same one from the point that it was originally tagged.18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So you're within the same 19 window.20 That's correct.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And was it fixed within that 22 window in that--23 Yes.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -in 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months on the diesel?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 .In this case, it would have been 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months , 2 because it -- it wasn't a planned maintenance window.3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Did -- you had said that you were 4 looking at the leakage, when you first got on shift you went and personally took 5 a look at it. Was the leak rate changing?

Was this a steady type of a leak? Or 6 was there some sort of a degrading condition there? From what you were 7 briefed on and what you viewed --8. I was briefed on was consistent with 9 what I viewed.10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Why would it be that when you 11 took over the shift it was operable but degraded?12.It-it--

there are several options that we 13 have when we're looking at malfunctioning equipment or equipment that's not 14 working exactly the way the design or the standard says it should be. One is it's 15 operable.16 You may say a piece of equipment is operable.

Let's say 17 there's a local gauge on it that's broken. Whether that local gauge works or not 38 doesn't affect the performance of the equipment, so it's operable, even with this 19 broken gauge.20 Another option is it's operable but it's degraded.

It can 21 perform all of its intended safety functions, but there is some aspect about it that 22 is not working the way it should be.23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.24 the case of a leak-- and I'll use ajacket 25 water pump as an example--

the system is designed for some amount of leakage, NEAL R. GROSS- /COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

" 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 some minimal amount of leakage. If you have more than that, you may 2 challenge the performance of that equipment during its specified design run 3 time. Okay?4 There is -and I'm going to say its a gray area, and it's not an 5 exact science. Whether or not a leak of a certain magnitude is going to 6 challenge the equipment or not challenge the equipment.

7 My personal philosophy is fix the equipment instead of 8 writing up all of these elaborate justifications for why -why you want to leave 9 it that way. In the case of fixing ajacket water pump, its a pain in the neck to 10 tag. It's a pain in the neck to drain. Butifsnotamajorjob, sofixit 11 So we had talked about, is this of a small enough magnitude 12 to be considered operable but degraded?

You know, write up the paperwork for 13 that, or let's fix it.14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: When you say "we," who is this?15 -ý Myself and my outgoing relief.16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: 17 es. And their -their position was we 18 should fix it, so I -and I had no reason to question that, but I did validate it, so 19 to speak, by going down and looking and saying, "Yes, I think we should fix this 20 one. It's leaking more than is reasonable." A drop a minute is reasonable.

A 21 steady stream is not.22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And you were seeing a steady 23 stream?24 *I don't -I don'l remember the specific 25 dtails.NEA.L R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., MW.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 " (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 example.wanted to fix SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Oh, okay. I'm sorry.'m just using that --SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I don't want to assume.I'm just using that as a generalized SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So l psition was he it, too?SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Why would he have not declared it inoperable sooner than ---,e already had.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I thought you said you took over the shift, it was operable but degraded, the shift prior had called it that, and then you called it inoperable.

.,We actually applied the tags to it that would prevent it from running. But at -- the shift had made this recommendation to call it inoperable.

They had offered us the courtesy to go and take a double -- doublecheck, give us their opinion -- our opinion on it.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.agreed with the decision.

So the point at which the equipment was called inoperable was based on the original point at which the first shift found the problem.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And they had started preparing tags for that?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 f 1.2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 ies. They had already -they had actually already prepared the tags. They just weren't in a ready state to be hung yet.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Do you know how long the excessive

-- I'm going to call it -- say excessive, but the excessive leakage was going on beforl hift identified it? Do you know?No. I -- I don't know that it was going on before their shift identified it.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Neither do I. I'm just -SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- asking you to -SMy recollection

-I really don't remember if this was as a result of a run that had just been performed.

I really don't remember that level of detail.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

You had indicated that, in relation to this incident, your personal philosophy is that you're going to fix the equipment Is that different from the personal philosophies of your peers or of your management?

No..SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You don't see it as -you're not pointing that out as, "I'min some way different"?

It's just -o, I'm not -SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -this is the way you address that particular problem.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.3 That is always -- that is always the -- the 4 first desired state. But I'm also a realist, and there are some situations where you 5 may have to balance that with other -- other priorities, organizational priorities.

6 In other words, fixing one piece of equipment to sacrifice another doesn't 7 necessarily get you a net safety gain.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.9 ""Okay. So there are situations where you 10 may not fix something right away, because your focus or your priority needs to 11 be elsewhere.

All right? Do you know what I'm saying?12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, yes, It- let me ask 13 you this question about that, your mentality there -- fix it if it's broke. Have you 14 -, when you've felt that way over a particular piece of equipment, in your mind 15 was the right thing not done, compliance-wise with regulations?

In this 16 balancing act that you're talking about.17 In this case?18 SRt SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: No, in any case where you 19 felt this piece of equipment needed to be tagged out and fixed. You ran into 20 pushback from your management that you felt was inappropriate.

21 22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Or a violation of 23 regulations or your license.24. --my --my managers will ask, or had 25 asked, some very, very difficult questions.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.2 ButI --I can't--I can't think of any--any 3 specific circumstance where the final decision was, in my opinion, the wrong 4 decision.

We're just not going to do it because we -- we want to stay aligned, for 5 example. Or we're not -- just not going to do it because we don't think it's 6 important.

I've never run into that type of- type of response.7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Or there's an engineering 8 evaluation presented which you might not agree with. Has that ever occurred?9 es.10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Can you recall one in 11 particular that stands out?12 -1 don't agree with a lot of things, but that's 13 only because I'm an engineer.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: But like something that 15 you felt was really a reach on -- on reasons why we still think there's a piece of 16 equipment that's operable -- an egregious example, you know, that really stands 17 out.18 1 No. I really can't think of something.

I 19 think that there are situations where operators

-we rely much more on operators 20 to -and I'm going to use the term "babysit," and I'm -- I don't want to -- that to 21 have a negative connotation, but to babysit certain equipment because we have 22 not been able to schedule a window to do the necessary repairs on it.23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Problem equipment 24 es. And I'm sure there has already been 25 chatter about this one, and that is the -- one of our control room chillers.

It has NEAL R. GROSS " -, _COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

..1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 had a known deficiency with what we term "oil migration" between the freon 2 and the oil. And it is attributed to womr seals. The gaps between the seals are 3 bigger.4 The result is that when temperature of the chill water or the 5 cooling water system changes rapidly, and there's a dynamic load placed on the 6 machine, oil migrates fairly rapidly from the reservoir to the freon or the freon 7 to the reservoir.

8 The impact of that is if the oil, for instance, migrates very 9 rapidly back from the freon to the reservoir, the level in the reservoir goes up 10 rapidly, and eventually goes up too high and it covers the bowl gear, and that 11. heats up and the machine trips on high temperature, high -high bearing 12 temperature.

13 If oil migrates too rapidly from the reservoir to the freon, the 14 level drops very quickly and you trip on low oil level. The condition itself is a 15 manageable condition from a -if I was on a Navy submarine, and I had people 16 assigned to watch stations in which most pf the equipment is manually 17 controlled, it's a manageable situation.

38 It's not the normal way the equipment operators tend to and 19 monitor this equipment.

So we actually have asked them to pay closer attention 20 to the equipment, to the extent that they actually have a log that they check every 21 two hours for the oil level to verify if it's rising or if it's lowering, and to take 22 action to correct the condition, either add oil if they need to or take oil out.23 It's a frustrating situation for operators, because we're relying 24 on operators to spend more time with this equipment than they would otherwise NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234.4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 spend. So that can be perceived as lack of timeliness to fix a problem, because 2 the problem has existed for a while.3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.4 ,. iAll right? Now, do I think it's unsafe?5 No. Would I like to see this chiller fixed? Yes. Unfortunately, I have a seven-6 day LCO on this chiller. And unlike the diesel where folks were saying it was 7 going to take us, you know, more than 72 hours8.333333e-4 days 0.02 hours 1.190476e-4 weeks 2.7396e-5 months to fix the exhaust leaks, there 8 has been a tremendous amount of work done to try to come up with a way to fix 9 the chiller in under 72 -- or under seven days.10, That is a much more difficult problem to resolve. So we, as 11 operators, have compensated for this equipment, and it has frustrated a lot of 12 operators.

Do I think the decision is the right decision to manage this 13 equipment?

Yes, I do.14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How long has this been going on?'5 .More than 1 months. Do I think it has 16 a high focus -- high level of focus with the management organization?

Yes, it 17 does.18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Is there a plan to fix it 19 during the next outage?20 .Yes, there is.21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Is the plan in place?22 .,.Yes.23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When is the next outage?24 October.25 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 And there also have been some interim 2 modifications made to the chiller to help -- help it manage itself a little bit better.3 And the modifications were shown to be fairly effective during the fall season, 4 which is one of those periods of time when oil likes to migrate back and forth 5 rapidly.6 Coming up into the winter, we -- we came up into conditions, 7 plant conditions that we didn't experience in the fall, meaning things were a lot 8 colder. So we saw its behavior change in the winter, and we had to learn a little 9 bit more about the behavior of this piece of equipment.

10 Does it frustrate me personally?

Yes, it does. That build --11 tearing down a compressor and replacing it takes as long as it takes. But 12 watching the work -- and we've had other work done on chillers in this past year, 13 seeing the work done on the other chillers, I have no reason to doubt that what 14 the -- what the planning folks and the maintenance folks are telling us is 15 probably fairly accurate for how long it's going to take to actually, in essence, 16 rebuild this piece of equipment.

17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How long are they saying?18 .ESeven or eight days.19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So they'll be tight on the LCO, 20 then.21 : Well, that's -- that's the concern. The 22 likelihood of actually being successful during -- on an LCO is not high. So it 23 would be scheduled during a shutdown period.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: And you don't have to 25 worry about that -- those timeframes.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 .: You do to some extent, if you're in a 2 refueling

--3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Oh, really?4 --outage.5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.6 .._. .There are periods of time when we need 7 to have control room ventilation associated with refueling activities.

So there 8 are windows during refueling outages that are also prohibitive.

9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.10 -But the need to repair the chiller is -is 11 clearly being included in the scope of work. This past shutdown that we had in 12 December that extended for more than seven days -I think it was -the --13 repairing this chiller was -- was on the docket at that time. It was not a planned 14 outage.15 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.16 d, unfortunately, we did not physically 17 have the equipment onsite to do the work. Had we had the equipment onsite, I 18 have no doubt that chiller would have been repaired during that time.19 So that's a frustrating situation.

It's also a difficult situation 20 to manage from the worker's level. The equipment operator who has to go out 21 and monitor that chiller every two hours and has to contend with putting oil in 22 and taking oil out, I mean, and the length of time that the condition has existed.23 That certainly leads to --24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: It's a perception that 25 people might have, right? -.JJ\i~ih~\ i NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 1 Perception.

That's correct.2 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: That there's production 3 capacity generation over --40 4 5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- fixing stuff.6 7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Do you see that in this 8 instance, the way this is being handled, this particular issue?9 .I don't believe that generation of electricity 10 has ever been an influence on whether or not to fix the chiller. The real focus 11 has been on understanding the problem and getting the equipment and the people 12 to do the work more so than if I shut the unit down today, and I don't have the 13 equipment to fix the chiller --14 SR1 SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.1. -- why would I shut the unit down?16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: It wouldn't make any 17 sense, would it?18 9 Right. But I have never had the 19 sense that it was production over -- over repairs. I think there's an inefficiency 20 in our ability to define and implement repairs.21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: There's an inefficiency?

22 23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Just so the record is 24 accurate.25 OW! Right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: We touched on this before. I just 3 wanted to go back a little bit. In terms of operability cost, are you aware of any 4 disagreements between yourself or your peers at the shift manager -- at the shift 5 manager level between yourselves and senior management in terms of the 6 threshold for making prompt operability calls? Are you aware of any 7 disagreements along that line?8 I'm not going to say it's disagreements.

9 There have been philosophy--

different philosophies raised, and the -- I hear this 10 -I don't have the personal, firsthand experience, but I hear this from some of 11 my supervisors who have gone through their interviews with, you know, senior 12 managers in order to complete their qualifications to be a control room 13 supervisor.

14 When you talk about operability determinations, there is one 15 approach which is fairly consistent in my opinion--

and this is my professional 16 opinion -with Generic Letter 91-18 that says if there is a point in which you 17 question the ability of a piece of equipment to perform its intended function, if 18 at any point during your assessment you don't think you're going to be 19 successful in saying, "Yes, it's operable," 91-18 really -- really suggests you 20 declare it inoperable.

21 Now, if you've declared it inoperable, and then you find there's 22 more information that you didn't know about that could substantiate why it 23 really could have been operable, you reverse your decision --24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.25 -- based on further information.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.2 i here is one philosophy that would-- that 3 has been put out that says we don't know enough about our design basis, and 4 sometimes we make our decisions too hastily. In other words, we call 5 something inoperable when we could have -and I'm going to use a 6 colloquialism

-- you know, we could have sharpened our pencil and found more 7 margin, and we didn't. You know, so we would not have needed to have 8 declared it inoperable.

That philosophy has been conveyed by a previous A 9 10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: At what point in time?11 -In the last year.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who?13 Thi I never heard 14 this from his-- his mouth personally.

I've heard it second- or third-hand through 15 people who have, you know, said, "Gee, I went to my interview wi 'and, 16 boy, this is what he said about operability determinations.

And that doesn't seem 17 right to me." That kind of approach.18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who told you that?19 9 Supervisors that had gone off to -to 20 interview with him, you know, through casual conversation.

And that's when, 21 you know, you kind of reground them and say, "I'm pretty sure that that's not 22 really wh as thinking," meaning it's operable as long as you don't know 23 it's inoperable.

All right? Which is kind of the spirit that was being conveyed.24 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433.o 1 Versus if you -- if you have any reason to doubt that it's 2 operable, you should view it as inoperable until you have determined it to be 3 operable.4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Which ofyouu old 5 you they had that type of conversation wi 6 >1Actually, one of the newest ones that I --7 1 had V who -- he is no longer on my shift. He's on a different 8 shift. And it was part of his -- you know, his interviewing process.9 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Any others?10 11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You had indicated it was more 12 than one..- 13 I hear chatter. All right? And 14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Who else did you have to 15 recalibrate on that? You felt it necessary to --16 We've had to recalibrate our whole 17 department on this, not necessarily because of ut we've recalibrated the 18 whole department on approach to operability determinations.

19 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, that's an issue that 20 we -- we'd like to talk about, really. That plays into what we're doing down.21 here.2 2 Sure.23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Not necessarily because it's him.24 What brought that about? Why the recalibration?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 .M We've had a general weakness in this area 2 for many years. Our fundamental knowledge and approach to operability 3 determinations has -- has been weak as a collective group, not because of any 4 one person telling us to do it this way or that way. It's been weak.5 We've had instances where we have missed opportunities 6 where something may have been inoperable and we've missed it. It has shown 7 up in PI and PI--8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: R?9 .--R, PIRS inspections.

10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right. By the NRC.,The Salem PIRS inspection from last 12 spring, I think it was, a year ago, identified a weakness in this particular area.13 And the October Hope Creek PIRS inspection identified a similar weakness, but 14 not to the same extent. A lot of it has to do with the way we document--

assess 15 and document, not necessarily that our conclusions are wrong.16 However, there have been some cases when our conclusions 17 have been questionable.

Diesel jacket water is -- is a great example of one of 18 those cases. We had one situation

-- and, again, I don't remember the diesel, and 19 I was not directly involved in the upfront decision-making.

20 I'm only aware of it because I assumed a shift at some point 21 later where we had actually set up barrels and drums and pumps and things like 22 that to be able to add water to the diesel, you know, to the jacket water system, 23 which appeared to me to be excessive, in my personal judgment.

It was doable, 24 but it appeared to be excessive in lieu of just fixing the diesel.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When was that? That's separate than the one you spoke to us about.Yes, it is. It is separate.SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Can you give us a timeframe for when this one occurred?&VM" ' can go check our records on diesels.SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Where would I go?What should I look for, though? I mean, what -- what's the name of the document?

What's the name of the -where would I go look for that?SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: This is a different jacket water pump leak -SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -as opposed to the one that you came on shift and pronounced it --~es.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- inoperable?

SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Is it the June 2003 timeframe?

Did you enter an LCO for this?IF& 0'1~ e would have entered an LCO at some point. But we carried this particular diesel as operable but degraded for some amount of time, and I say some. I don't remember if it was a day or a week. I really don't remember.

But this particular situation we had barrels set up with water and pumps and hoses, and all kinds of things to be able to make up to the jacket water system to compensate for the leakage that we had.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: 2003 timeframe?

2 Yes, 2003 timeframe.

2003 was not a 3 good diesel year.4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: No.5 SPECIALAGENTNEFF:

Do you know which diesel it was?6 'I don't recall which diesel it was.7 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Do you know who was --8 was following this issue? Who was in charge of it?9 I don't -- I don't recall. My involvement 10 was as an oncomin 11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.12 Several shifts after all the provisions were 13 put in place.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Do you mean the barrels, 1.5 the pumps?16 11 Right. Right. And here -- you know, 17 basically, here's the plan. This is what we're doing to maintain jacket water 18 sufficient for this diesel. Do I think it was the best plan in the world? I would 19 have preferred to see us fix the diesel immediately.

20 I don't know what the circumstances were that led us to this 21 situation at that point in time. I'm just not familiar with those circumstances.

2.2 SPECIAL

AGENT NEFF: What you're offering this as is an 23 example of a missed opportunity.

24 t Yes.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: In terms of operability calls.You're seeing this as a mistake. You would have fixed it quicker, as opposed to putting up with the buckets and the barrels and the --SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- balancing.

My judgment is I -- I don't think it was in the spirit of 91-1g.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right, okay.kay? Now, did it -did it meet the letter of the law? Yes, it did.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. How do you know that?I91- -18 clearly allows you to set up this type of compensatory measures.

Resources were available and dedicated to the actions, and the actions could have implemented reasonably by an operator under any operating circumstance for that diesel. So it would have met those requirements.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Aren't there -- when you go above a certain amount of leakage, though, aren't there numbers there that trip, having to do something to address that? I mean, they measure them. They measure leakage, right? Gallons a minute?SRL SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: If it goes above a certain level, isn't it forget about what comp measures are being taken, don't you have to declare it inoperable?

(202) 234-4433 Well, that's where 98-118 --NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

-1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: 91-18?2 es.3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.4 That's where 91-18 -- there is ajudgment 5 that comes into play. If the ability to manage the -- the degraded condition 6 exceeds the ability of the operator to do it, then the compensatory measure is not 7 an effective compensatory measure. All right?8 Now, in this particular case, I don't recall the amount of 9 leakage or anything else like that.10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.11 en I looked at the situation, yes, we -12 we could manage the equipment with all this stuff set up. And, yes, the 13 operators could do this job.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.15 .Did I--from a-- viewed on whether ornot 16 we are taking timely corrective action, it could easily be criticized as not timely 17 corrective action.18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When you came on shift 19 and saw that, what was set up, what the plan was, did you verbally disagree with 20 that with your management?

Like you came on with this other one -- you -- you 21 come on shift, and I forget the other guy's name.22iII 23 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: ;And then you 24 called, He doesn't disagree with you on that. Did you make such a 25 similar call when you came on shift and saw this?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 .No. No. After I looked at what the 2 operators were being tasked to perform, from a judgment standpoint it was 3 within -- it was reasonable for them to be able to accomplish this. Was it 4 something out of the ordinary?

Yes.5 At that point in time, would I have thrown up the flag and 6 said, "Dammit, this is bullshit"?

No. Because the actions that were in place 7 were reasonable, although not desirable, although not the preferred way of-- that 8 I would like to fix it, there were decisions made before I took the watch. And 9 I asked questions about those decisions and said, "Oh, okay. We can manage 10 this until we get this thing fixed." 11 And the corrective maintenance was being aggressively 1.2 pursued. So had -had I -- had we played the whole situation all over again like 13 in a redo, possibly different people may have gotten to that same point in a 14 different fashion. All right? I can't say that unilaterally we never would have 15 done it this way, because I don't know, even if I was the person in the situation, 1.6 if I had taken that same route. I may have, because I don't know all of the 17 circumstances that led up to the operable but degraded with pre-staged 18 equipment 19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Who did you take the shift from?20 I have no recollection, no idea.21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Why call it a missed 22 opportunity, then, if you agree with what was planned and what was being done?23 The -- I -the perception that it leaves 24 regulators or observers with is a very negative perception.

That's why.25 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433.o 1 Okay? It also places an additional 2 challenge on equipment operators that although it can be managed, it's not the 3 way that I would prefer to operate.4 ,"s there any additional documentation that 5 might be helpful to explain this to the NRC -- operability determinations, logs, 6 corrective actions?7 [wThere probably are.8 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

Especially atimeframe, ifyou can 9 recollect that.1O There probably are. I'm sure we can look 11 in -in SAP and find--12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes. I mean, I --13 .find the timeframe.

14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: And since we're -- it 15 sounds like you're offering to do that.16 Yes, absolutely.

17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Could you locate the 18 operability determinations done on that issue for that timeframe?

19 Yes.20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: And then provide them to 21 us?22 Yes. Again, I -- you know, hindsight is 23 always 20/20.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes, I know.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 B 1 And in every circumstance those coming 2 in Monday morning after watching the game on Sunday can tell you what the 3 quarterback did wrong throughout the game. Okay?4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes, we can do that very 5 well.6 0j7o. you know, looking at a situation like 7 this, and looking at it in retrospect, saying, you know, this really had -this 8 really caused a lot of people to get upset, you know, because the operators were.9 being challenged with this additional responsibility.

10 And it sent the message to them that you would rather have us 11 out here goofing around with pumps and adding water and logs and all this other 12 type of stuff, instead ofjust fixing the equipment.

13 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You're talking about the 14 non-licensed operators

--15 ýYes.15 *16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -when you say 17 "operators." Okay.18 Y_101W Ies. Non-licensed, licensed, it's the same 19 -- same perspective.

All right. You know?20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.21 Because it affects everybody in the 22 organization.

23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.24 "So from a missed opportunity, you send 25 that message once, and the message correcting it or reconciling it takes a very, NEAL R. GROSS l COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 very long time. I mean, that's the bottom line. It takes a very long time to 2 correct it.3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And it's coupled with other 4 ongoing issues -- control room, chillers --5 6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- that you have to look at every 7 two hours and exchange oil on. It seems like there's --9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- a few things that go that way.10 ',Now, these examples, by the way, I -- I 11 would categorize in part as some sins of the past. All right? For instance, we 12 have recently had some very aggressive maintenance done on --13 SPL- SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: We were going to do that 14 -- on diesels.15 SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay, good.16 Okay?17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATORP Yes.18 We just went into a diesel outage last 19 week. The Bravo diesel was showing -- showing its ugly head with a minor 20 exhaust leak. The diesel was tagged, the exhaust leak was located, and it was 21 repaired in a very timely fashion.22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. I'm glad you gave 23 us that example. That's good.24 : Correctly and on the first try, yes. Yes.NEAL R. GROSS K COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: We want to get-- we want 2 to get more -- if there's more to that -- we're going to get your perspective when 3 we get near the end about --4 KJ~i kay.5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- where you are today 6 with that kind of stuff, and maybe seeing a change.7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Exactly. It's-- Ijust--along those 8 lines, though, I need to go back a little bit. You're using words like "past." But 9 going back to this philosophy, difference in philosophies in terms of the 10 operability calls that were being made, you indicated I hadput 11 out at least -- at least to one of the SROs .- at some sort of an interview.

What 12 kind of an interview was this?13 .'That would have been -- in order to" 14 become qualified as a control room supervisor, you not only get a license from 15 the NRC, we also have an internal qualification process which involves, for.16 instance, doing watches under instruction with a licensed operator, and being 17 able to perform in a training environment and an -an on-the-job training and 18 on-the-job evaluation process.19 The types of tasks that the control room supervisor performs 20 -- you know, for instance within our program, not necessarily operating the 21 plant, but, you know, how to -- how to process a surveillance procedure.

22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.23 That type of thing. And that process also 24 includes a -- an interview process witth different people within the management 25 organization.

And it's -- at the control room supervisor's level, it's an NEAL R. GROSS , ......COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 opportunity for, number one, the manager or director or vice president to share 2 their philosophies of operation with the candidate, and also hear from the 3 candidate what the candidate's philosophies of operation are.4 You know, it's sort of a meet and greet, but if's also a-- talking 5 a little bit about, you know, overall operational philosophy.

6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Typically, who conducted that?8 You're indicating senior management.

But would it have been the YNQJevel 9 or level orirector of Ops? You had a pirector of Ops one point.10 ds -- I would have to look at the 13. qual card that they--12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right. To see who signed 13 it?14 ght. The cards have -have changed as 15 our organization has changed. But it includes a number of people in the -- in the 16 management chain.17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So any SRO may meet 18 with any number of senior managers, then. It's not limited to just one? Is that 19 how it works?20 Yes.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When they.re going 23 through -- they're finishing up their qualifications before they can actually act 24 as the SRO on shift, right?25 -That's correct.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: This would be after you 2 get your NRC license?3 jhat's correct.4 SRK SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You guys have your own 5 internal -6 7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. And whaM 8 came back and told you of his conversation with d he explained to you 9 what he heard, had you seen that type of philosophy from others in management 10 at Hope Creek? Had you seen that and heard that yourself?11 'Yes, I had.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: From who?13 Well, this was put out. We had a shift 14 managers' meeting one evening, and this -- this philosophy

-and I could easily 15 have been misunderstanding what was being conveyed through several people.16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You're pretty smart. I 17 don't know, you seem pretty direct. Go ahead and tell me what you --18 It was -- it was kind of communicated that 19 we needed to be -- we needed to be sharpening our pencils and learning more 20 about the design basis of-- basis for equipment before we made decisions on 21 operability.

22 It had to do with jacket water -diesel jacket water. In this 23 particular

--24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Again?25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Again?NEALR.GROSS j I COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBER

\1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (20 (202) 234-4433 2) 234-4433 1 ,.I~mR igain.2 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: It's (inaudible).

3 jn this -- in this -- you know, we've really 4 -we've made a lot of great strides in diesels, please. So in this particular 5 situation, there were a number of questions.

How long does the head tank need 6 to be able to last for without makeup? And what's the basis for that?7 Is it a design number that comes from a specification?

When 8 you -- when you design a piece of equipment, the first thing that the design --9 designer does is looks and says, "What is the regulatory requirement I have to 10 meet?" 11 Then, they actually will write a design spec to specify the 12 equipment to meet the regulatory requirement, and it may also meet more than 13 the regulatory requirement.

A good example -- and my -- my real background 14 is in fire protection.

15 So a good example would be the regulatory requirement says 16 we have to be able to supply whatever for sprinkler systems. Largest system, 17 you have to have pumps that can -can pump the water. Okay?18 So the designer would specify the pumps based on the largest 19 system that he has, and then go to the catalogs and say, "What's a likely pump 20 that will be able to meet this requirement?" Okay? The two don't always match 21 exactly.22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.23 ,So I may end up with a pump that's a little 24 bigger than what I need, because you don't make custom pumps. They come in 25 certain sizes, and you use the one that's the best fit.NEAL R. GROSS /COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 So from a regulatory standpoint, I've got a pump that may be 2 bigger than I need fom a -- supplying the water to the sprinkler systems, that 3 pump could degrade in performance below the design specification, but still be 4 able to meet the regulatory requirement.

5 And it's that hazy area that -it is a hazy area in some cases --6 sorting out what was a design spec and what was the actual requirement.

And 7 this was, in part, the topic of-- of discussion.

How long do we have to be able 8 to retain water in the jacket water head tank for a design basis accident?9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When was the meeting?10 And who was providing the--11 it was a shift managers' meeting.12 Folks in attendance would have been most of the shift managers.

I don't recall 13 if they were all there or not.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.15 WRs there, 16 was really the person doing the talking. And he was conveying to us his recent 17 discussions with'18 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did he say that?19 Yes.20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: And meaning what, the 21 sharpen -we need to sharpen our pencils before making operability 22 determinations?

23 Yes.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 2344433 1"WIknd really understand

-- the sense that I 2 got from some of the discussion was that -- take as much of that margin as you 3 have to, as long as you're still -- as long as you're still within the margin.4 What is the margin? And that -- that's where it --5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. That's where it gets gray, 6 yes.7 .That's where we as operators

-the 8 operators have a set of rules that you operate within. And the way I -- I try to 9 characterize this is the operators operate by a set of rules. Those rules are 10 represented by the procedures.

11 I mean, if something isn't working quite within the rules of our 12 procedures, the engineers are the folks that we would go to, because the 13 engineers are the ones that in essence wrote the rules.14 So if this thing isn't quite working the way the procedure says 15 it should, you ask the engineers and the engineers look at, well, why did the 16 procedure get written that way relative to the original rules that were made?17 And that's the opportunity where you may change the rules. All right?18 But from an operable versus operable but degraded, it's really 19 important to try to take the tact of you have this much margin, do you really 20 want to operate all the way up to the edge --21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.22 -- before you choose to do something 23 about it. And if there's a hazy area in the middle, I think the more appropriate 24 approach would be you call it inoperable.

You know, and during that period of 25 time if it's inoperable and you do further engineering assessment and find that, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON.

D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 2344433° 1 hey, you know what, this was a design spec that is well above and beyond what 2 we needed, here is why we can call this operable, that's okay. But until you 3 really know that, you should be more conservatively calling it inoperable.

4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: That's your philosophy, 5 right?6 KYes.7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: So you're at this shift 8 managers' meeting, and it' ellng you this is -- this is the direction 9 I'm getting from -- from* , 10 Right.11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did people -did the shift 12 managers disagree with what -13 (End of Tape 1, Side B. Beginning of Tape 2, Side A.)14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: This is Tape 2, Side A. It's 15 approximately 11:52 a.m.16 And where we were was talking about the reaction of the shift 17 managers to this operating philosophy that we shared with you at a meeting. We 18 don't know when that meeting occurred.

Was that -you had indicated that this 19 philosophy you became aware of sometime in 2003. It was about a year ago?20 Yes.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So was it in that timeframe?

22 Yes. This is in the 2003 timeframe.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Earlier in --24 You know, it all -- it's all around the 25 challenges that we've had with -- we had with diesels.NEAL R. GROSS (I 1'.COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433.o 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.2 Which, you know, we've had several.3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes, you have.4 ,And pinning thatdown, because we've had 5 several, they all sort of-- sort of go together.

What I can say is that there was 6 a very dynamic response among shift managers at this meeting that this just 7 didn't sound right to us, and that clearly there is some misunderstanding in the 8 philosophy

-- in this philosophy that was being shared.9 And I know me personally

-- my position was I -- I think this 10 is not being understood correctly.

Now, so I'm going to go read Generic Letter 11 91-18 and make sure there's nothing I'm missing here, because the -- it sounded 12 to me as though we. -- the approach was one of operability justification, 13 justifying why something was operable versus determining that it is operable.14 And there's a big difference between those things.15 SR, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.16 So that-- that philosophy was shared, but 17 what I can say is I have not seen that behavior reflected in my peers.18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Or yourself?19 Or myself.20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Did that -22 .There was a lot ofpushback like, what, are 23 you nuts?24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: From the shift managers?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 Yes. So the shift managers, in general, 2 you know, heard this. And people went, "There's got to be a disconnec 3 you've got to go back and talk to -talk t about this, because this doesn't 4 sound right to us." 5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Do you know Aid 6 that?7 1No, I don't. I don't.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What abou 9 response to that?10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did he offer his opinion 11 on where he stood?12 11 I -I really don't recall.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: He's trying to convey to you a 14 message as a group of shift managers, a message from yo erati at, 15 as a whole, you're rejecting.

16 17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What does he say?18 I really don't recall specifically what he 19 said or didn't say. I know that there was a -- there was a pretty strong reaction 20 among several of my peers, including myself, at this particular meeting. And I'll 21 speak for myself. I basically said, "Bullshit.

That's not the way you approach 22 operability determinations.', 23 But I- I really don't recall wh M reaction or action was.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Was he in agreement or 25 disagreement with you?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433

.. I kind of sensed that he was the 2 messenger.

He waS the messenger of the information.

That was the sense that 3 I had from him, not necessarily that that's what he said, you know, that I agreed 4 or I disagreed.

I got the sense that he was the messenger and he wasn't putting 5 himself in a position of either defending or rejecting the information.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It's interesting the way you started 7 the description of this meeting was you said he kind of communicated.

Is that 8 a weak way of -I mean, kind of communicated is he's -- he's sort of saying 9 something but not saying something.

Was he sitting on the fence on this issue, 10 or-.11 really don't know. I really don't know.12 I don't know his interaction with his boss, how they related to each other.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.14 .. And -- and how information was getting 15 from his boss to me. You know, I -- I really can't categorize that. In the years 16 that I worked widW I have never had any reason to question his integrity.

17 He was one of the most operational savvy people I have ever known.18 You know, he just had -- he had a strong plant instinct.

He 19 was born and raised in -- in this business, and he's one of those operator's 2 0' operators, if you know what I mean.21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Conservative in his 22 decision-making?

23 e was conservative.

But he was also --24 I'm going to use the term "a bulldog" from the standpoint of if something needs i.'NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.(202) 234-4433 UWASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 to get done, let's get it done. Okay? So there's conservative in identifying and 2 recognizing what's important

-3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.4 and then his -- his style was, okay, 5 damnmit, let's just get it done. Okay? So sometimes they can be perceived as 6 conflicting with each other. Sometimes people who are bulldogs, you know, 7 they get the perception

-- you get aperception of them that they just forge ahead, 8 don't look to either side, and that's that, which could put them in a non-9 conservative light.10 J~ was really not that type ofperson.

He was very effective 1I1 at getting things done, getting people to do things. But as far as understanding 12 how to operate a powerplant, he -he really did have that operator -that instinct 13 on how to safely operate a powerplant.

14 So I don't know the dynamics betwee d his boss. I --is that's why when I say when -- he had a lot of pushback among shift managers, 16 I really never got a sense of whether or not he was rejecting or supporting the 17 position.

I got the sense that he was the messenger.

18 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

Okay. What aboutwith

-interms 20 [ very conservative in his way of 21 thinking.

I don't even remember was there.22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I was going to ask you, 23 was he there?24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I think you mentioned he was 25 there. , -71 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 .! He might have been.2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: 3 "He might have been A as always been 4 a supporter of operability determination, not operability justification.

In other 5 words, you don't just justify it because you -- you don't want to do something 6 else.7 phas always been a supporter of operability

-- of really 8 being confident that the equipment will perform its intended function.9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So in terms of the shift 10 manager differences, did you have conversations wi about this 11 particular philosophy?

12 .Yes, I have had conversations in general 13 about operability determination, including the language of-- are we justifying 14 or are we determining

-- on more than one occasion.

And he has always been 15 a supporter of-- of making the right call, meaning -- the right call is not simply 16 make power.17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.18 The right call is what's right for the 19 equipment.

20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: However it comes out.21 Right.22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Let the chips fall.23 Right.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So in terms of this direction, then, 2 what response did it get? I mean, I understand what you're saying, as a whole 3 it was rejected.

But in practice --4 4It was a philosophy, not a direction.

In 5 other words, we weren't told, "You will do it this way." 6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.7 [3 kay? It was a -- when you're thinking 8 about these things, you want to keep this philosophy in mind. You want to make 9 sure that you know the full margin that you have to work with before you make 10 a decision.

And in some cases you may never know.11 Now, the philosophy is you want to know the full margin. In 12 my professional opinion, there are some times you may never know the full 13 margin.14 And I'm going to -I'll use the space shuttle as a great 15 example. They didn't understand those 0 rings. I mean, and we blew up the 16 space shuttle as a result of it. All right? Because they took away a lot of 17 margin.18 Now, I don't want to attribute that to the way we operate at the 19 plant. So don't -don't get those two confused.

But if you really don't know that 20 margin, and you really don't have the ability to determine it through analytical 21 methods or testing methods or other methods, in a timely fashion, all right, then 22 you don't use it. You know, you call something inoperable.

23 That's really the philosophy was -- that was kind of conveyed 24 was, you know, use this -- take as much time as you need. Call it operable.

You 25 know, do more studying and testing, which I think was generally not the NEAL R. GROSS f I COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 B 1 philosophy that was put in practice by most of my peers. It tended to make most 2 of my peers a little bit more conservative.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you have any examples?

Can 4 you think of anything that exhibited that to you?5 .We deal with so many of these on a 6 regular basis I -- I -- something isn't just jumping out and saying, you know, 7 "Here's a specific example." But I've had that sense.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So it had -- it had the opposite 9 effect.10. 1 think it did.11 SP, SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: People dug their heels in 12 sort of.13 1 -- digging their heels in is one way of 14 characterizing it. Being more sensitive to the issues is really the way I would 15 prefer to characterize it. People were asking a lot more questions to make sure 16 that they had a full understanding of the issue. It still wasn't necessarily 17 deterring them from calling something inoperable.

But they were asking a lot 18 more questions.

19 It almost was getting more information to try to demonstrate 20 why it's operable with the -- the initial presumption we're not sure.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Asking more questions about its 22 design basis?23 Yes.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Whatever the particular issue was, 25 just- jI/ -.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 ., The technical attributes and what's the 2 purpose of it. It didn't-- hasn't really affected the timeframe

-- the timeframe on 3 which these decisions are made. But it has -- it has caused -- it has in part 4 caused a higher focus on operability screenings.

5 Now, I mentioned earlier that that is a weakness.

It's a known 6 weakness that both Salenr and Hope Creek have, and that is putting together 7 reasonably complete bases for why a component or a system or a structure is 8 being called operable even if there may be some degraded condition about it.9 And I think if ,ou look at the -the PIRS inspection reports, 10 you'll see that as a theme.11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR P-I-R-S inspection reports.12 "Yes.13 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I wanted to get back to one other 15 thing. If that philosophi was more or less conveyed to you and more or less 116 ignored, is what you're saying, it had an effect overall of not being followed, did 17 that cause a problem in itself? Did you get any pushback, any -- any 18 repercussions from the shift managers going this way against senior 19 management's philosophy?

20 jI have never had any repercussions about 21 decisions that I've made on operability.

We have a procedure.

The procedure 22 is fairly clear. It mirrors the concepts and approaches in Generic Letter 91-18.23 And the bottom line is, whatever the philosophy was that may have been relayed 24 through several levels, I've been doing -- performing this function the way I 25 believe the procedure and 91-18 talk to the issue.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433.° 1 So the outcome whether something is operable or not 2 operable, I have never had any negative repercussions.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. What about -- are you 4 aware of any of your peers who would say that would be different for them, if 5 not you personally?

6 I'm not going to say I'm aware or not 7 aware. It's not something that I've had discussion with others on.8 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

Okay. All right. You know what?9 It is 12:06 p.m. Let's take a quick break here.10 Jeff, are you good?11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. Yes.12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: 12:06 p.m.13 (Whereupon, the proceedings in the foregoing matter went off 14 the record at 12:06 p.m. and went back on the record at 1:10 15 p.m.)16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. It's approximately 1:10 17 p.m., and we're back on the record.18 Okay. Just to follow up a little bit on that -- the issue 19 involving the operability calls. I don't have too much more on this. We've 20 covered quite a bit.21 But the way you presented it was that it -- you had first heard 22 this philosophy

-- thdný. .philosophy of-- of you don't know enough 23 about the design basis and you -you could build more time in there apparently.

24 So the -when that message was put out, had that been the first that you had 25 heard that philosophy?

You said it was about a year ago, 2003.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.; N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: A year ago now. You hadn't --3 what were the philosophies that you were exposed to before that time?4 V ery consistent with those in Generic 5 Letter 91-18.6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.7 You know, which really talked to -- at any 8 point -- and I think I've mentioned this -at any point that you -- you suspect or 9 have reason to believe that a component may not be operable, 91-18 really --10 really talks to considering it inoperable until you have additional information 11 that could demonstrate that it is operable, or you've made the repairs that it 12 might need to -to be operable.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.14 Andthat--

that is--15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Prove it's operable as opposed to 16 prove it's inoperable.

17 ut really demonstrate that it's operable 18 rather than trying to justify that it's operable.19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.20 Which is -- is very much the approach that 21 I have been raised in in my time with PSE&G. With 91-18 obviously coming 22 out in 1991, it was a -- somewhat of a different

-it was a different mechanism 23 or tool for assessing and documenting conditions adverse to quality from a --24 from an equipment standpoint.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 Previous to that, we really didn't have that tool. So I really 2 grew up with the tool in hand, so to speak --3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.4 -from an engineering standpoint, and 5 then carried it into operations.

6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.7 , 2 Jnd I wouldn't say that it's a different 8 approach than the business as a whole has ever used. It's simply a vehicle by 9 which to clearly document your assessment on, you know, conditions in your 10 plant that may require corrective maintenance or may not be specifically in 11 conformance with the design documentation, or something of that nature.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. All right. Which came first 13 telling you of his discussion with* *14 meeting with the shift managers?

Do you remember which one came first?15 The = meeting with the shift 16 managers.17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. Okay. All right.18 MIA And by the way, that was a regularly-19 scheduled shift managers' meeting.20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Not a special purpose.21 It wasn't a special meeting, you know, for 22 come in and talk about this subject 23 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And when you mentioned that you 2 found it necessary to recalibrate the individual

-- I think you made mention that 3 it was -- it was more than him as an operator that --4 There was --5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- that were going to be grounded.6 -- chatter, and I'm using the word "chatter" 7 really because I don't remember any specific people that came to me and said, 8 "Hey, you know, this is what so-and-so said." There was chatter among people 9 in the department that had been exposed t for some reason. All right?10 And that's why I -I'm really reluctant to give you names, 11 because the only person that I know that specifically said something to me was 12 j ecause I was responsible for signing his final qual card.13 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.14 But, I mean, I'm just -- I'm recalling 15 general discussion, you know, and most people were kind of in the scratching 16 their head modes like, do you think this is really what he means?17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Are we hearing this right, kind of 18 thing.19 llorrect.20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, was this -- when you say 21 that, was that for you and among your shift? Or was that you and other shifts?22 That was across shifts, because 23 occasionally, you know, as you're going through a turnover, you know, you're 24 turning over with another shift. Somebody may make a comment to that effect, 25 or, you know -- like I said, unfortunately, I hate to say this, but because the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 approach was so inconsistent with the 91-18 philosophy, at least in my opinion, 2 I kind of dismissed a lot of it, saying, "Nay, I'm pretty sure that's not what he's 3 -- you know, what he's referring to," and said, "Let's just go take a look at the 4 procedure and make sure we know what the procedure is telling us to do," that 5 type of approach.6 And that's why I'm -- I really can't come up with any more 7 than I know th4 my final interview with him, made a comment to this 8 effect. But I don't recall other specific people that I could, you know, say, "Yes, 9 this person had the same experience." 10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you have any one-on-11 one discussions with bout his philosophy?

12 JNo.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Are you aware of any 14 situation where procedurally the guidance was to go in one direction and on your 15 shift the decision was made to do otherwise, for one reason or another? You 16 know, you're presented with a situation, the procedure says you -- you change 17 the course, do something, back down, but for some reason that wasn't 18 immediately followed.19 ie had a situation with a reactor feed 20 pump. It had an alarm condition on it, a vibration alarm, and the action in the 21 procedure was to take the pump out of service when it reached this condition.

22 Well, it had -- the vibration alarm had occurred several shifts before, and had 23 been in for a short period of time and then cleared itself.24 And my shift came in and took the watch, and this vibration 25 condition occurred again and hadn't cleared itself. And the control room NEAL R. GROSS , } t COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W. -}(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 supervisor was -- was very -- very concerned about the fact that we had an alarm 2 and the procedure told us to take action to remove the feed pump from service.3 We had -- we had gotten engineering folks involved to assess 4 whether or not the alarm was really indicative of a problem with the pump. Was 5 the pump in serious jeopardy?

And the feedback that we had gotten, and this is 6 over the course of several days when the alarm first came in, up until this point 7 was it does not appear as though the feed pump is in serious jeopardy.

And 8 there were actions being taken to modify the setpoint.9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Modify the setpoints for the 1.0 vibration?

1 AYes. To change the--12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: That would activate the alarm?13 -- limits, right. Which is not -- not 14 uncommon.

Again, you establish

-, establish alarms and thresholds based on 15 normal baseline performance of a piece of equipment.

That doesn't necessarily 16 mean that those alarms are drop-dead points.17 That means that based on the way the equipment normally 18 operates, this would be a -- an alarm that would tell you, "We better go 19 investigate something." Well, the way this procedure was structured, it -there 20 was nothing in between. There was no middle level threshold.

There was a --21 take the pump out of service if you hit this point.22 And all of the indications that we had up to this point from the 23 engineering organization were the pump is okay, we've done a lot of studying 24 on it, doesn't look like there's any -- any reason for serious concern. But it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433.° I placed us in a-- in a very awkward situation, because I had a procedure that said 2 to take the pump out of service.3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What happens if you take the 4 pump out of service then? Just explain what would happen.5 Ron In this particular case, it would have 6 required us to lower reactor power to 95 percent, and then rely on two feed 7 pumps to feed the vessel, which is a less conservative position to be in than if 8 you have three feed pumps feeding the vessel. Because if you have three feed 9 pumps feeding the vessel, if one of them were to trip, the other two can 10 compensate.

If you only have two feeding the vessel, you will take a reactor 11 scram or low level -low water level.12 So ifs a less conservative position to be in, to have one feed 13 pump out of service at that point in time.14 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

Is that your total? Is that what you 15 have in total, three?16 17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: How are you resolving the 18 procedure compliance issue, though?19 ehad been working -- well, that -- and 20 that was the struggle.

That was the struggle.

You have a procedure that says 21 take the piece of equipment out of service, and you have engineering folks 22 saying, yes, the procedure really isn't -the pump really isn't in jeopardy.23 We were working with the engineering folks to modify the 24 procedure.

Unfortunately, the real challenge that we were faced with was 25 obviously, why didn't you take the pump out of service? Okay?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4'5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 resolved?That's black and white procedure compliance.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right. So how was that jBy the end of the day, the setpoint on the-- in the procedure was changed.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It went from where to where? Do you recall?I don't remember the values, no.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Wasthat--

do you seethat as an example of an operability determination versus operability justification?

jgIn this particular case, this piece of equipment falls out of the scope of 91-18.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.'So it gets you into really black and white procedure compliance.

SRit SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Was --And it was viewed as a disregard on the part of the crew to follow the procedure.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Explain that.I Some of the feedback that we got from others was that the crew -the crew just -the operators feel that they can follow procedures when they want to, when it's convenient for them. But if they don't want to, they can not follow them.Well, my personal involvement is is that the -the crew, the operators, had raised the questions several times.NEAL R. GROSS I COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Non-licensed operators or 2 the licensed guys?3 oth.4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.5 Both 6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.7 ou know, this is what the procedure says.8 Why do we still have this pump in service?9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right 10 "And as tookthat to the 11 organization, to the morning managers' meeting and said, "We have a serious 12 conflict here, because this is what the procedure says. I've got engineering, 13 through several communications, saying we don't believe this pump is in 14 jeopardy.

Yet I still have a procedure that has these words in it, and this is 15 presenting a challenge for the shift.16 I also know that lowering reactor power and running with two 17 feed pumps instead of three feed pumps is also a less conservative position to be 18 in. So the issue becomes that of being able to identify conditions in advance as 19 they are developing rather than simply once the alarm occurs, now you're in a 20 drop dead situation.

21 So I kind of characterized the whole thing as our ability as --22 as the operating crews to recognize conditions before they reach the drop dead 23 position, because once you reach that position you need to take the action.24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Who did you take that to?25 You said you -- you took the concern and the issue to --NEAL R. GROSS (if / " COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 Generally, we have a morning managers'2 meeting, and I took it to my boNi And I said, you know, "Here is 3 the -- here is the deal." 4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.5 Operationally, I am not comfortable 6 running with two reactor feed pumps. If I have three, and if the third one is not 7 clearly in jeopardy, based on all of the engineering information that had been 8 provided.

So that -that for me as an individual was a personal challenge 9 between I've got a black and white procedure

--10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.11 MMMD-- that I don't know the bases for the 12 procedure.

I've got engineering information that's telling me that my pump isn't 13 injeopardy.

And running with two feed pumps is less conservative than running 14 with three.15 So my -- my personal approach was to allow the engineering 16 folks to come up with a way to change the procedure in a timely fashion. And 17 looking at the guidance of Generic Letter 91-18, 91-18 allows you a time --18 allows you time to figure these things out.19 So I applied that philosophy, maybe incorrectly

-and this is 20 just me speaking now -- maybe incorrectly to that black and white procedure 21 compliance issue.22 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was the procedure 23 violated?24 Yes. We didn't take the pump out of 25 service.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you have licensing 2 agreement or discussions with them to see if they were in agreement with what 3 you were doing?4 .I don't know that I would have involved 5 Licensing.

6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I'm asking you if you did 7 or not. You don't know if you did? You don't remember if you did?8 JWell, I would not have. It's not a-- it's not 9 a system that falls under the -you know, if I look at 91-18, and I look at tech 10 specs, I took at safety systems, ifs none of the above.11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Is it a piece of secondary 112 equipment, then?13 S.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.1 N Y 16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.r- -17 A KEENANS" ou're talking about vibration monitoring?

18 Is that what you're -19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: No, I'm talking about the feed 20 pumps.21 KEENAN Okay.22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: The vibration

-whatever the 23 setpoint was, has that been changed now?24 o, the pump was fixed.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Has there been any 2 procedural change in terms of if you get to this point again that you have to take 3 action?4 .No, it's still the same.5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Is it the same?6 Yes.7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When you brought your 8 plant how did he respond?9 'I wouldn't characterize it as a plan.10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You characterize it the 11 way you want.12 I would characterize it as I got a procedure 13 that tells me to take a pump out of service.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.15 : This alarm is locked in hard now. It's not 16 -- it's not just momentarily coming and going. It's locked in hard. We need to 17 make a decision of either take the pump out of service. Come down to 95 18 percent, take the pump out of service, run with two feed pumps, or change the 19 procedure so that we can run with this pump with this vibration level.20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And at that point you had an 21 engineering evaluation that told you you didn't have a damaged feed pump, that 22 there wasn't a problem with -23 .That's correct. Well, that there was a 24 problem with the feed pump, but it was not indicative of a -- of being in 25 imminent danger.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So I guess, just so we can 2 understand the way you're explaining it, you're balancing out -- here's my black 3 and white procedure.

If you hit an alarm, you have to power down to 95 percent 4 -- I'm assuming you're at 100. But you're -- in your mind, you're balancing that 5 with, would I rather run at 95 percent with two feed pumps as opposed to three, 6 knowing that the third is not in any immediate danger.7 That's correct.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So you're making your 9 conservative decision based on one versus the other. What about repercussions 10 from that? I mean, as -- in addition to what the operators are now saying is that, 11 you know, you can pick and choose the procedures that you want to follow.12 4111ýr That is certainly the perception, that we 13 -we were picking and choosing.

And I -I certainly will not deny that thatfs an 14 accurate perception.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Did you have to explain that to 16 your shift or to anybody else?17 F Absolutely.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How did you explain that?19 Similarly

--20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How did you address the 21 information?

22 oarly to the way I just explained it to 23 you.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I mean in terms of-- I'm talking 25 about people present. And if you were -- if that's the perception, but you're NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433..

1 making your -- your decision based on a conservative approach, did you try to 2 resolve it with the shift? Did you try to offer an explanation along those lines 3 4 7'Yes.5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- to the operators?

6 Ys 7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.8 .And they had concern that we had a 9 procedure that said to do this.10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So they stuck with the black and 11 white side.12 __Yes.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.14 Yes.15 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: So what was your 16 recommendation when you brought this 17 M Fix the procedure.

18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was he in agreement with 19 that?20 Organizationally, yes. We were -we 21 were moving toward changing the procedure.

22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was he not in agreement 23 with it in some way? Just the way you answered that makes me think there's --24 there's something else.25 .I can't --I can't speak fo00 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, you talked to him, 2 though, right?3 .Right. I didn't take the feed pump out of 4 service.5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Was he in 6 agreement with your decision to do what you were doing?7 M JAt the time, yes.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And that procedure stayed the 9 same you said, right? It's still at the same setpoint level?10 es. Yes.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So you could run into it again, if 12 a similar situation happened?13 Vi Theoretically, yes. Theoretically.

One of 14 the -- one of the things that came out of the whole situation was not negative, but 15 was actually positive.

And that was that one of the reasons we got to that point 16 was that we -- we as -as operating shifts tend not always to look ahead as plant 17 conditions are evolving.18 For instance, there had been a trend on this particular pump 19 for a little bit of time that suggested that this vibration

-- and actually it wasn't 20 really a vibration, it was actually a little displacement

-had been trending 21 upward. We didn't identify this or raise this condition until we hit the alarm 22 setpoint.23 So operationally, Operations could have done a much better 24 job in the way we monitor and trend equipment performance to provide the 25 organization the opportunity to respond in a more timely fashion. Okay?NEALRMGOSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

-1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 We also looked at alarms that we have that have like the drop 2 dead actions to identify those that could be set up with like early warning. You 3 know, you get an early warning, now you want to get the organization 4 mobilized.

So we -- we took the situation and really assessed our own 5 performance in it to say, you know what? We've got to follow procedures.

6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.7 IR ýFhtrere's no doubt about that.8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: That's why you have them.9 xactly. But do we have procedures out 10 there that have information in them -you know, this is just a wild guess on my 11 part.. But it's likely that this -- this procedure was written in 1986, all right, 12 based on a vendor manual and some information

-- you know, the way 13 procedures are written during startup testing.14 We probably have never had to implement this particular 15 requirement in it All right? And we have hundreds and hundreds of 16 procedures.

So are we familiar with every last one step in every procedure that 17 could have this type of a threshold?

Well, you learn about them sometimes 18 when you hit the alarms, but that makes it even more important to take the 19 actions. Right?20 So part of the value that came out of this was a reassessment 21 of our own actions on how we monitor and trend equipment.

And just to give 22 you an example, we recently had to repair the Alpha feed pump, because through 23 this an operator was trending a particular parameter and came in and said, "Hey, 24 this thing is up to" whatever the number was.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433w 1 And the organization was more prepared to go about planning 2 a repair on that pump in a timely fashion, long before we ever hit an alarm point 3 that placed the operators in that situation.

4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Sometimes you're put into 5 situations, though, and you just -- that's just the way it is. And you have to 6 follow procedures.

7 jRight. Right.8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Because you might not 9 have time to go investigate, review, explore, or whatever.10 .Absolutely.

11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Do you know if ECP 12 conducted an investigation into this issue?13 I don't know.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Did you receive any 15 discipline for -- did anybody receive any discipline for how this issue was 16 handled?17 Not that I know of, no.3.8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: No. Did you?19 20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: No?21 .No. As I said, the -the followup was 22 actually very positive.

You know, hey, we didn't follow the procedure, and it 23 wasn't a single individual.

There were several shifts that didn't follow the 24 procedure.

That's significant.

25 It is reflected in the PI&R --NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433..

1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Corrective action 2 program?3 It is reflected in that inspection.

Okay?4 From a -- from an inspection standpoint it was considered one of the --5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: In a finding?6 1 111.06" *7 Yes. One of the more significant findings 7 from that inspection.

The followup from it, at least from my -- my vantage 8 point, is that rather than -- rather than doing the hit on the head, you know, you 9 guys were bad and didn't follow procedure, the approach has been, what can we 10 as operators do better, or do differently, to head offthis type of situation through 11 the way we monitor the equipment?

12 As I mentioned, we -shortly after this, we -we had 13 vibrations starting to manifest itself on another feed pump. And that feed pump 14 has already been fixed. We took the opportunity when we -- we went into a 15 down power situation, and ultimately we took the unit offline for a different 16 reason. That feed pump got fixed, and this was long before the condition ever 17 approached the alarm setpoint.18 So it's a change -- it's a difference in the way people are 19 monitoring and trending the equipment.

So I can't say that the whole situation 20 resulted in negative repercussions.

I mean, I think it resulted in some positive 21 behaviors.

22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: When was this? Do we -I don't 23 think we put a date to it. Was it fairly recently?24 Fall maybe.25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Fall of 2003, then?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1Yes.2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And then you said you had this --3 vibrations on a different feed pump coming in after this first incident.4 jYes, that would have been like December.5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. That were handled in that 6 December outage?7 November outage? We've had a lot of 8 outages this year. I don't remember which one was which.9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. But the secondary feed 10 pump vibration issue was handled differently.

It was addressed more up front 11 than the--12 Well, it was -- it was handled differently 13 from the standpoint of identifying a condition early.14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It was trended.15.is Trended.16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Quicker.17 Identified, raised, got put in the category 18 for forced outage if necessary, planned up for corrective maintenance, and fixed.19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. This situation was -- in 20 general, I had asked if you had any -- where you had a procedure that said do 21 one thing, but in practice you went in another direction.

Is there any others that 22 come to mind?23 No, not that -- that come immediately to 24 mind, no. This one stands out because it -it clearly affected -- it was not an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 individual not following a procedure.

It was -- it was an organization not 2 following a procedure.

Multiple shifts --3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You said it crossed over a couple 4 shifts?5 Exactly.6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yours being one of them?7 Yes.8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.9 Yes. You know, as a matter of fact, the 10 supervisor that-- the control room supervisor that had the watch that day, when 11 we took the watch, early in the shift this alarm came in and stayed in.12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.13 And he was -- he was very clear that this 14 -- this was presenting a problem for the shift, because this is what the procedure 15 says, and Engineering has been out there now -- I'm going to use this term 16 loosely, because it's not intended to be derogatory, but screwing around for three 17 days, telling us why this thing is okay. But we don't have the procedure revision 18 in hand yet, and now this alarm is locked in.19 You know, so part of it developed through an inefficiency or 20 an ineffectiveness on the part of the organization to really focus on and address 21 the issue in a timely fashion to avoid the problem. But part of it also developed 22 because we didn't do anything about it until we actually got the alarm. And 23 that's the point at which the procedure said do this.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: The point where you got the 25 alarm, when it flickered on and off, or the alarm when it stayed on?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 3 Both. Both.2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So nothing happened until the 3 alarm showed up.4 KN -iRight.5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Which would be a different shift 6 than yours.7 9PE That's correct.8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And who is the Ubinvolved 9 here?1 0 j ... .11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: On your shift.12 mRight 13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And you just said that you don't 14 have a procedure revision in hand yet. Were you expecting a --15 Yes 16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: --the procedure?

What were they 17 going to do with that?1.8 There was a temporary modification being 19 developed to change the setpoint based on Engineering's review of the condition 20 of the equipment.

And that temporary modificationdrove a procedure revision.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So at the time it was changed, but 22 not permanently.

Is that what that means?23 : Right. Right.24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So whatever it was, the 25 tolerance was set for higher vibrations and cleared the alarm?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.1202) 2344433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 2344433 1 That's correct.2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. But you just don't 3 remember the numbers on that?4 5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was this a potential 6 reportability issue to the Commission?

7 Under -- reportable under what?8 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I don't know. I mean, if 9 it's -- if it's not working, I mean, should it have been declared inoperable and 10 reported to the Commission?

11No 12 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Why not?13 No. This is not something that -- this 14 particular equipment, from purely an equipment standpoint, is not something 15 that falls under the realm of, for instance, 50.72 or 50.73 or -- or any of those --16 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.17 -- those arenas. Now, from a procedure 18 compliance standpoint, when you look at your tech specs and it says you will 19 operate your plant in accordance with procedures--

20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Individual licenses say 21 that, too.22 .Right. Right. So from a -- from an --23 operate in accordance with your procedures, well, that's -- that's what really 24 comes into question.

So there was a lot of-- of bad judgment involved, more so 25 than -- well, I'll leave it at that. There's a lot of bad judgment involved.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433

-I 1 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: You were going to say 2 something.

More so than what?3 ~o. I don't really think the words were --4 would have conveyed the message.5 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was there -- on this issue, 6 was there any direction provided by upper management to not take the pump out 7 of service?9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: None that you're aware of?10 That I'm aware of.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Was there any hesitancy to -to 12 lower the reactor power to 95 percent that you would attribute generation and 13 production?

14 15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It's not -- that wasn't the concern?16 Ninety-five percent versus 100"-percent 17 with two reactor feed pumps is -- is the same thing.18 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: How?19 If you lose one of the two remaining feed 20 pumps, at 95 percent or 100 percent, you will not keep your unit online. You 21 will experience a reactor scram.22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.23 .Well, experiencing a reactor scram -24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, we're coming from 25 a capacity generation type of question here.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

-1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was it not taken out of service because of that?ipJNo. No, no. There was never any discussion that I am personally aware of that related to electric output between 95 percent and 100 percent that drove the decision-making process that I was involved with.And to be clear, I have never been in a situation where I have been challenged on lowering reactor power if the -- if conditions warranted it versus electric generation.

I have never been challenged with that, and I have been in situations where I have directed lowering reactor power based on conditions, and based on procedural direction.

And I've never had any what I would call negative repercussions on that.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Aren't -- correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I understand, part of people's compensation down here is based on generation at the plant. Is that true?There is a--SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: For yourself.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I know --.. KEENAN:uarterly incentive?

WThere's a quarterly incentive, and there is a -- an end-of-year bonus to which one factor is generation or capacity.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: How much of a factor?.I don't know.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What are the other factors?2 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Can I ask for the record 3 to have that provided to us?4 'Pf KEENA-es, we'd be glad to provide the incentive 5 program.6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.7 1E KEENA:N ut I think, * ,haracterized it, it's one 8 component of a number of items.9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, we'll see --10 .KEENA 4 Nut we'll be glad to --11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- we'll see what the other 12 items are.13 Y KEENAf-'-

provide that to you. Yes.14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Can you -- do you know what the 15 other factors are?16 1 11 1 1,1 -I really don't. My compensation, with 17 or without that bonus, really doesn't affect me in my lifestyle or my way of life.18 I'm not even sure how much it is -- you know, what the percentages are on any 19 given -- and that is the truth. You probably think that that's amazing.20 (End of Tape 2, Side A. Beginning of Tape 2, Side B.)21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It's approximately 1:44 p.m.22 SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: My point would be that 23 -- or could be that some people might take that into consideration in making 24 decisions they make down here at the plant.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 r' At my level, and those that I immediately 2 report to, I have never had that sense -- that -- that whether or not we take the 3 unit offline or reduce reactor power, if required, that we would not do that 4 because it would have some negative impact on a quarterly bonus, quarterly 5 incentive, or an end-of-year bonus. I have never had that sense.6 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: How about a -- can you 7 speak to this. Have you ever heard of or experienced direction from corporate 8 up in Newark regarding operability-type decisions on whether to bring the plant 9 down if there's a problem?10 M The answer is no. However, we do, on a 11 regular basis, have discussions with our corporate

-- corporate part of our 12 structure.

We have folks that are responsible for day-to-day generation of all of 13 the assets of PSEG power.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Nuclear or non-nuke, 1.5 right?16.. Nuclear and non-nuclear.

As well as 17 traders that -- that trade energy. We have had discussions

-- for instance, if we 18 are planning a down power, we do have discussions with our traders for when 19 would be the optimal time, from a business standpoint, to do that, for a planned 20 evolution.

21 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Have you ever 22 experienced

-- while you hit on that, have you ever experienced influence in that 23 area on something that may be unplanned, if it just comes up?24 4 0 l/l o. I have never had influence in that 25 area. As a matter of fact, one of the things that our traders express to us NEAL R. GROSS -COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 2344433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16.17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 occasionally is if we do have a rapid power reduction for some reason, they --they need to know that at some point. For instance, if I have a rapid down power, but I'm not -- the unit is not going to come offline, it is important for them from a business standpoint to get a sense from us on, are we going to stay online or not?All right. So that they can do their planning and forecasting and the stuff that they do. I have never had them attempt to influence my decisions on whether or not to take the unit offline, the rate at which I ascend power, or otherwise.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay. Let's go back to talking about corporate.

Specifically, you know, aL levein, level, people like that. Have you ever heard of them getting directly involved in operational-type decisions down here at the plant?1137 To, not at my level. Not at those that immediately

-- you know, that I report to. I mean, if that has gone on up with the top dogs, I don't know about that. And like I said, I have been involved in circumstances where I have had to direct rapid power reductions.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.And I have never -- I have never had any repercussion when I've had to do that.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right. When you've had to do that, have you had to call the traders, or does somebody else do that?I will call the traders once we're stable.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Is that part of like an admin procedure?

You have to do that?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 J..

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 is 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24-,JRight.SR SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I'm just wondering why, if you're th!I mean, you've got stuff going on in the control room.~Yes.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: How can you take time out of that to call the traders?It's no different than talking to the system operator.

If there is an electrical system emergency, it is important for the people at each of the powerplants to understand the actions that they need to be taking. All right?My call to the generation desk in Newark is a call that triggers activation of emergency reserves that may be necessary for grid stability.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.So it's not an issue of taking time out of, you know, my immediate focus. It's an issue of making sure that the impact that I'm having to everybody else is going to assure that we're all in a stable condition.

Now, if Im not stable, I don't walk -I don't walk out. All right? Do you know what I mean?SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Yes.We -we get stable, we go over and pick up the phone, and we hit the button that says "trading floor." SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 ,6 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 ,WW , -. 1'ýAll right? And we say that we just had a run back, and we're going to be sitting here at, you know, whatever the power level is, and we'll give you a call back, you know, in a few hours when we can provide you more information.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: When did you first start having to do that? Right after deregulation came in --Yes.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- New Jersey?SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Was it done before that?WNo. -- the only people that we -- well, it was done, but we talked to a different group of people. Before deregulation occurred, our obligation was to the folks that we now call.ESOC.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: I believe it's ESOC.ESOC.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: E-S-O-C?Right. Energy Systems -- I don't know what that acronym stands for. They are the people --u..KEENAN:

an -I'd be glad to get that or provide that.-- under deregulation that operate the transmission part of the system. Before deregulation, they not only operated the transmission part of the system, they also directed operation of the generators.

SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: It's a separation.

NEAL R. GROSS -V -, COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 1 ght. So we had the same discussions but 2 to a different entity.3 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.4 Now, does that influence any -- does that 5 influence my decision on whether or not to reduce power or not? No. No. Do 6 I get calls from them saying, "We've got a problem somewhere else in the grid.7 We may need you to take some emergency actions"?

Yes. We have had to take 8 emergency actions to address other grid conditions.

9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Thank you.10 Make sense?11 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes. Yes. I think I'm 12 done with that-13 Thank you.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- that part.15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. While we're on it, have --16 what, if any, effects -other than this change in who you report to, in terms of 17 now it's traders, before it was the other function, what, if any, effect has 18 deregulation had in -- on any decisions made at the plant? What, if any, that 19 you've noticed?20 !Well, there has been an effect on the way 21 we plan for and manage scheduled down powers or even scheduled unit outages.22 Historically, the sensitivity to when you might do a down power or when you 23 might take your unit offline was not as significant as it can be now.24 So, for instance, if I was going to come down in power to test 25 turbine valves--NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: All right.-I might not schedule it for Saturday night, because it didn't matter. All right? Now it does matter, because you-- it's part of your business.We have actually made license changes that affect the frequency at which we might need to take down powers to do certain type of testing. All right? To make it more beneficial, you know, based on the performance of the equipment, you may not need to test it as frequently as you did. And turbine -- turbine control valves is a good example of that.So the -- from a planning and scheduling standpoint, sensitivity to power production is part of that process.SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Have you seen that have an impact on safety here at the plant?I would say no. You know, I -- I don't see a direct tie between the two. I think that there is a -the need to educate a lot of people in how the planning process does work. For instance, when -- when you are taking an outage on a piece of equipment in the switchyard, which is under the jurisdiction of the electric system operator, not under our jurisdiction, the point at which we can make that information public depends on when it's made public out in the electric system world.In other words, we -- we just don't arbitrarily and randomly start talking about this stuff. Understanding all of the legalities of that is important to understanding.how certain decisions get made. So I think there is some education that people could benefit from in general, but I don't think that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 that impact -- that has had really any impact on -- on how we approach work in 2 general.3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. What kind of 4 communication had you had from senior management in terms of working 5 within the deregulated environment?

When you say that you see a need for 6 better education on the planning aspects, is that at the shift manager level or is 7 that at a different level?8 Vell, that's within the -- that's within the 9 work management organization as a whole, which, of course, the operating shifts 10 are a part of.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.12 To understand, for instance -- a good 13 example would be a recent --recent repairs that we made in our switchyard.

We 14 took a breaker out of service for transmission and distribution to do some 15 maintenance.

In the process of taking that breaker out of service, one of the 16 disconnects was found not to be working very well -- extraordinarily difficult to 17 operate, which can present a safety hazard to the operators operating it.18 The challenge that we were faced with was getting ourself 19 prepared to do all of the switching in the switch yard to make it so that we could 20 work on this disconnect, and the amount of perceived time that people thought 21 we had to do -- do that. Okay?22 The perception was the T&D people -- you know, it's like, 23 dammit, we want our breaker back. You know, you guys have to do this now.24 The reality of it was we had as much time as we needed to plan for the 25 evolution, because it was not presenting a grid emergency in any fashion.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 1o ii 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 So once all of the players got all lined up, and recognizing that we -- we don't have to just rush into this willy-nilly and do something that we're really not prepared for, we can take as much time as we need to plan for this evolution, because this was a pretty complex evolution

-- to plan for the evolution and tell the system operator for us to -- to get our plant in a condition that it needs to be in for us to work on this particular breaker. This is what it's going to take us to do this.But, you know, we -- today is Tuesday. Like theoretically we can't do this until Sunday, or we can't do it until next Tuesday, or something like that. So there was initially an- a huge sense of urgency among people that, oh, my God, we've got to do this today.And it was a matter of getting folks educated and talking with the system operator, who then, you know, talked to the PJM. And all the right answers came back. You know, you guys, we're not in a grid emergency.

Take the time that you need, get yourself planned, ready to do this, so you can fix the problem. And the problem got fixed, actually, in a -- in a fairly timely and orderly fashion.So when I say education, it's that type of education.

So that people don't think that they have to make decisions, you know, without thinking about them, but to allow them to do things in a timely and orderly fashion.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.-I'm not sure if that makes sense.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I follow you on- on clarification on the education on the -the planning aspects of it. What if-- we'll break it in two parts. From your level and the individuals that you supervise, what sort of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 communication has there been? When you say that there is, in the deregulated 2 environment, you know, there's more focus on planning down powers and 3 outages -- and sensitivity to power production is a part of this process now. It's 4 -- there's a -- it's a part of your work day.5M.111 S.6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What communications have you 7 had with those that you supervised that keep the emphasis as safety over 8 production and not production over safety?9 .-'m not really sure how to answer that 10 question, other than that throughout our routine training, you know, every five 11 weeks a crew is out here in the simulator.

And the things that we train on 12 regularly are things of abnormal procedure implementation.

And the immediate 13 operator actions that we have for certain conditions require us to lower reactor 14 power or take the unit offline.15 And that -- that approach and that philosophy is consistently 16 part of our training.

In other words, if we have a series of malfunctions being 17 introduced in a simulator, you know, if a circ water pump trips, you're not going 18 to take the unit offline. Okay? But if the circ water pump trips, and then 19 something else goes wrong, and something else goes wrong at that point, there 20 is a point in time where the CRS will be taking the unit offline. And that's the 21 direction, right?22 If conditions are such that the unit should not be online, you 23 take the unit offline. So deregulation or not, that is the training that we have as 24 operators.

Okay?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (2021 234-4433* .

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Now, on a day-to-day basis, you know, running your diesel generators or running your RHR pumps, or whatever, from a safety standpoint a typical part of a brief for running an emergency diesel generator is, if at any point during the evolution the operator in the field feels that the equipment needs to be removed from service, part of the brief is remove the equipment from service. That's -- that's part of the brief, and that's what an equipment operator is authorized to do. So --SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Has this always been the case? Is this a change? Or has this been -This has always been the case. As a matter of fact, we have had situations where -back to those emergency diesel generators again -- where we have actually removed emergency diesel generators from the field locally, because they were -- you know, we had a malfunction, and it needed to be tripped, and it was.And that -- those actions and those recommendations, you know, if an operator calls in from the field and says, "This air compressor is really not running right, I think it needs to be tripped," that recommendation coming from a -a field operator is taken very, very seriously, and the equipment is removed from service.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And consider the same question from between you anc senior managemen-7 om youfjA you/Y M.Q You used to have *irector of Operator 4§ level, I guess including

__O_onsite. What kind of conversations have you had from -- from that level and down to th M vel?NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 (202) 234-4433 I Most of my conversations are with my 2 direct repot who i j I have had some conversations witl~ii 3 a~d we aehgtavnew go anevda d 4 And I've had some limited discussions with them, but I'm really in an assessing 5 them as they are assessing us type mode.6 The philosophy that was shared with me from the day I got a 7 license was ifs your license, and if you see a need or a reason to have to reduce 8 power or take the unit offline, they'll stand behind that reason. They'll stand 9 behind that decision.

They'll support that decision.

All right? There's never 10 been any question in my mind about that at all.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Had you ever been in a situation 12 where you selected to down power or take a -more conservative action and 13 have that challenged by senior management?

14 66 N oN.15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.16 ag*0 17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you have anything else on 18 that?19 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: No. I was going to ask 20 that same question, so -21 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF:

Quick break, okay? Ifs 2:03 p.m.22 (Whereupon, the proceedings in the foregoing matter went off 23 the record at 2:03 p.m. and went back on the record at 2:10 24 p.m.)NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We're back on after a brief 2 break. It's approximately 2:10 p.m.3 To follow up on an area that we talked about before -- and we 4 got very specific in terms of a philosophy that was -- that was apparently 5 forwarded y 1 -1 Words that you used in -when you were 6 beginning to describe that situation were "sins of the past." 7 And what I'd like to do is cover anything that you feel falls 8 into that category.

Is that a multiple of things that we do better now than we -9 than we didn't do then? Have there been changes? Or -10 Yes. There actually have -there have 11 been. The change in organizational structure that was introduced in fall of 2003 12 has been a substantial change to the organization as a whole in a very positive 13 fashion.14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: In what ways do you see that?'5 It is allowing each of the units to be 16 focused on specific challenges and performance of the units, rather than what I 17 would categorize as being distracted by all of the other things going on 3.18 elsewhere, and for me to characterize it at my level 1 9 The organization that we -- the structure that we had, as an 20 example, we had a work management meeting that started at 6:30 in the 21 morning, and it involved both of the -both the Salem and the Hope Creek shift 22 managers, plus the Salem and the Hope Creek work management organizations, 23 plus all of the maintenance people.24 And we spent some time talking about Hope Creek schedule 25 and some time talking about Salem schedule.

And then we go back to some NEAL R. GROSS Aý1 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 Hope Creek issues and some Salem issues. And for me as 2 Hope Creek, while the issues of the business are important

-- for instance, if 3 Salem is having a challenge from an operational standpoint, and they need some 4 resources to help them, that's important for me to know about.5 But it's not the type of thing that I need to be spending 45 6 minutes at 6:30 in the morning sitting in a meeting listening about. Okay? Or 7 at a managers' meeting at 11:00 is when I think they were held, spending an hour 8 over in the Nuclear Services Building, sitting at a table listening about. All 9 right?10 What I really need to be focusing on is my plant and the 11 equipment and the people in my plant. The change that we -- we're seeing is 12 having a tremendously positive impact in my -in my vantage point, because our 13 6:30 meeting is now about 15 minutes long, and it focuses on the plan ofthe day 14 for Hope Creek -- what are the big issues, what are we doing, where are we 15 going. And people are able to focus on their work.16 And the 10:00 meeting is the Hope Creek managers -- you 17 know, Operations, Maintenance, Engineering, Rad Pro, Chemistry, you know, 18 all together -- that are able to focus on the issues of importance and consequence 19 for Hope Creek today.20 Now, there are opportunities where they overlap. All right?21 There may be common issues that both stations need to talk about. But the 22 change in structure is really allowing people in the organization to have a much 23 more clear focus for what they're responsible for and who they're accountable 24 to. 1 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Plus it saves you some time.NEAL R. GROSSI COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12-13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 A W.Ojoverall, yes. So I think that's been very, very positive.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Anything else?1 don't remember the original question.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: We were looking at anything you might be doing differently now as compared to a time period where you were looking at -"sins of the past" is the way you put it. I don't know if there's a dividing line in there for you or -or what you attribute it to. But it looks like for this specific issue it goes to the reorg in September of '03 --~ Yes.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -where you look-- the plants are kept more in line with each other.7j well, by "sins of the past," I would also refer to, you know, some of the decision-making that has caused longer-standing equipment deficiencies.

Well, we've got a backlog of equipment deficiencies that have to be reconciled.

They're not all going to be fixed at once. So that -that's, in essence, a sin of the past that got us into, for instance, having the control room chiller in the condition that it is in. It has taken a long period of time to get to that point.I think that the -the management focus that we have right now, being much more focused on the specific needs of the unit, is allowing us to in a methodical

-slow and methodical fashion, to get our arms around all of these issues that have been out there plaguing us and get them corrected.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I I ~-1 Now, again, is that going to happen overnight?

No. But we 2 are seeing improvements in the overall timeliness and extent of-- as an example 3 -- corrective maintenance in the plant.4 The diesel that I mentioned to you that was taken out last week 5 to fix an exhaust leak -- this exhaust leak had been identified either one or two 6 surveillance runs before, so we're talking about about a two-month period of 7 time. It was identified, it was planned, it was fixed. Okay? Versus 18 months.8 So that -- that's really what I kind of characterize as -- as the 9 sins of the past, many -- some of the decisions that have gotten us to where we 10 are right now..1 SSR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: There's a new 12 management team down here. You have plant managers now assigned to each 13 of the plants where you didn't have before. Have you seen, since the new 14 management has come on board, a change in the philosophy on operability 15 determinations?

16 Absolutely.

17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: How?18 Absolutely.

19 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: For the better? For the 20 worse?21 -'I. For the bet'ter. The -- the focus is on 22 clearly and accurately documented determinations, so that you can understand 23 what the issue is and why -- why we think something is operable.24 It is not -it's not focused on-- don't call it inoperable unless 25 you absolutely have to. I mean, that is -- that is absolutely not the philosophy NEAL R. GROSS I COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

..1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 that I'm -- I'm living in right now. The philosophy

-- and I'li us as 2 the example. You know, his approach is, "If you don't really know, call it 3 inoperable.

We'll fix it." 4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: If in doubt, call it out.6 s 7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: We've heard that philosophy 8 before.9 .1 It's very clear. And he -- he has been very'10 clear with that message. as really only been in the picture for --11 well, gosh, his first day was the day we scrammed two weeks ago, so he has 12 only been in the picture for about a week and a half now. So -so --13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You* is that?14 15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What is the name?17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: That philosophy

-- have 18 you seen that -the one you just talked about, if you don't know, call it inop --19 have you seen that -that getting down to the operators?

20 I think that there is still a gap between, for 21 instance, my level --22 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.23 --and his level and the equipment 24 operators in the field.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Where is the gap, between 2 the equipment operators and the license people?3 v I don't want to say the license people 4 unilaterally, because I would put the -even the control room operators, who are 5 licensed with reactor operator licenses, I think there's a gap between -and I can 6 be more specific.

Between the union workers --7 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: And management 8 -and the supervisors.

9 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right 10

Getting the message effectively to the 11 supervisors, so that they can walk and talk. And, you know, you always hear 12 that in negative connotation.

But its also very positive, because -Ill use an 13 example.14 We had a situation during a refueling outage where we took 15 out one bank of transformers, Bravo bank of transformers, scheduled outage, 16 finished all that work, but *e transformers.

The schedule had us 17 swapping banks to do some other work.18 Well, we finished the second group of work, and we came 19 back and we retagged and did all ofthe switching to paint the transformers in the 20 switch yard. Well, the message that the workers got was, "Well, you guys are 21 just a bunch of stupid idiots. You should have painted them the first time. Now 22 we have to go through all the pain of switching and everything else like that just 23 to paint some transformers." 24 That was what the message was that they had. The reality of 25 it was, from a risk standpoint and an outage risk management

-ORM -NEALPR.GROSS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (20 ) 234-4433..

1 standpoint, schedule-wise it was -- it was more safety significant for us to 2 proceed with the scheduled elements of the outage as they were lined up, 3 because the planning sets up, you know, all of your-- all of your systems out of 4 service at a certain given time.5 It was very significant for us to stick to that schedule, because 6 of the risk assessment that's built into it, and make the decision to come back 7 later to take these transformers out to get them painted.8 All right. So that was a very important decision.

The other 9 part of the important decision is is that paint isn't just cosmetic.

Paint is -- is an 10 important protective feature of the equipment that sits out in the yard.11 Well, those two pieces of information weren't communicated 12 to the workers. All they thought was, "Wow, youguys are a bunch of bumbling 13 idiots. Now we're the ones that have to go back and do all of the switching.

14 You shouldn't have made the decision to clear the first outage, the first channel, 15 before you moved into the second one." 16 So there's a communication and education gap in there. And, 17 you know, I had the opportunity to stand in front of my crew and listen to them, 18 you know, tell me what a bunch of idiots Outage Management was, and then 19 say, "Well, let's think about this, and let's look at the outage logic, the channel 20 swap, the importance of that, and the function of the paint." 21 All right? And maybe one or two operators, you know, they 22 were willing to say, "Yes, okay. That makes sense." All right? Rather thanjust 23 the constant, "Well, this is what you guys told us, and it's not what you're 24 doing." NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202)234-4433 I SK. b I-'.UIAL ALUE;N' TEATOR: There's more work to deal 2 with the union people, then, is what you're saying on --Yes, there is.4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: -- those type of issues.5 Yes, there is.6 SR- SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Well, how about your 7 people? Youknow, the SROs-- is that philosophy on operability determinations 8 getting through to that level?9 l believe it is.10 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.114 Although I think that there is still a 12 challenge among the SROs to actually understand the overall importance.

To 13 do an operability screening or an operability determination takes a little bit of 14 effort.15 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Yes.16 1 ght? And it obviously takes time out of 17 -- out of their day. So to do that, you know, they have to -to say, "Well, why 18 is this important?" And ultimately, realizing the value of it, to be able to 19 translate it into a way of their job, I think that's where we are right now -20 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Okay.21 --is people learning the value of it, 22 realizing why it's so important to make it part of their -- their behavior, in 23 essence. And once they really believe it, that message then gets translated to the 24 next level.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON.

D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 1 And when I say "really believe it," ifan SRO says it's operable 2 and that's all they write is "operable," well, they might be right. But there's 3 nothing there that -that backs up that decision.4 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Where is the backup?5 md the belief is wanting to provide the 6 additional information that explains why they're right. Not that they're being 7 challenged, because they're not right, but taking that additional effort. You.8 know, so it's kind of getting people into that mind-set, because eventually thafs 9 -- thafs what gets communicated to the next level and the next level, combined 10 with actually getting things fixed in a timely fashion. That's what sells it all.13. If component X is broke, operator writes it up today, and in 12 the course of a 12-week planned work week schedule it gets fixed, and the 13 operator knows about it, that's what sells it.14 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR. Right.&A ecause then the operator says, "Yes, the-1.6 process works. They're listening, and I'm getting -- I'm getting stuff fixed." 17 SR. SPECIAL AGENT TEATOR: Right.18 And that's where we are in a -in a-19 getting our arms around -- I think I used the term "black hole" of SAP, getting 20 our arms around that.21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: A very popular tool, it sounds like.22 Learning -you know, getting -really 23 understanding what's out there, the convoluted-processes that some of the things 24 have gone through, to be able to just get it planned and get it fixed.NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 J6. 'L.DA i.L. LL.JL4A &A A &% L I AS~ A*A;IA X£LU) LAU1rJ.1 LU UMCI UU UIUL, 2 or anything you'd like to add?3 J61"W o.4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Ijust have a few closing questions 5 for you. Have I or any other NRC representative threatened you in any manner 6 or offered you any rewards in exchange for your information today?7 MWNo 8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Have you provided this 9 information freely and voluntarily?

10G.11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And is there anything 12 further to add to the record at this time?13 14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. It is 2:25 approximately, 15 and we'll go off the record. I thank you very much for your -- a large portion of 16 your time today on your day off.17 (Whereupon, at 2:25 p.m., the interview was concluded.)

19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433

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