ML031750066
| ML031750066 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Davis Besse  |
| Issue date: | 06/03/2003 |
| From: | NRC/RGN-III |
| To: | |
| References | |
| Download: ML031750066 (38) | |
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2 PUBLIC MEETING 3 Between U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 0350 Panel and FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company 4
5 Meeting held on Tuesday, June 3, 2003, at 6 7:00 p.m. at Camp Perry, Clubhouse #600, Oak Harbor, Ohio, taken by me, Marlene S. Rogers-Lewis, Stenotype 7 Reporter and Notary Public in and for the State of Ohio.
8 9
10 PANEL MEMBERS PRESENT:
11 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 12 Christine Lipa, Branch Chief, Region III 13 William Ruland, Vice Chairman, MC 0350 Panel 14 Jack Rutkowski, Resident Inspector -
Davis-Besse 15 Jon Hopkins, NRR Project Manager - Davis-Besse 16 Scott Thomas, Senior Resident Inspector-17 Davis-Besse 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
2 1 MS. LIPA: Okay, were just about 2 ready to get started. If everybody could find your 3 seats. Okay, were just about ready to begin.
4 Okay, welcome. Welcome to members of the 5 public for coming to our meeting this evening. Im 6 Christine Lipa, and Im the Branch Chief for the NRC, 7 and Im responsible for the NRC inspection program at 8 Davis-Besse, and we had a business meeting during the 9 day at 2:00 today between our panel, the Davis-Besse 10 Oversight Panel from the NRC, and the FirstEnergy 11 management representative, and the purpose of 12 tonights meeting is to inform you of what we 13 discussed during the day, and then also give you a 14 chance to ask questions of us or make comments.
15 And before we get started, I want to mention 16 that there are copies of the June edition of our 17 monthly newsletter in the foyer today and that has 18 some really good information on the recent activities 19 that the NRC has been doing, and it has some profiles 20 on the resident inspectors, a little bit of their 21 background, and it also has contact information where 22 you can reach our Public Affairs folks in Region III.
23 It has their E-mail address and their phone numbers, 24 so that should be a good reference document for you, 25 and also we have a public meeting feedback form if MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
3 1 you want to provide feedback on how this meeting is 2 going tonight, and if anybody has trouble hearing --
3 I know somebody gave me a motion earlier, just let me 4 know, raise your hand or stop us because we do want 5 you to be able to hear whats going on.
6 We also had a couple of leftover handouts 7 from the earlier business meeting from FirstEnergy 8 and from ours that might be useful reference.
9 Were having this meeting transcribed tonight 10 by Marlene, and that will maintain a record of this 11 meeting, and it will also be available on our 12 website. It usually takes about four weeks to post 13 that.
14 And Id like to start off with some 15 introductions of the NRC folks that are here. On my 16 far left is Jon Hopkins --
17 MR. HOPKINS: (Indicating).
18 MS. LIPA: -- and hes the NRR 19 Project Manager for the Davis-Besse facility, and 20 hes located at our headquarters office near 21 Washington, D.C.
22 Next to Jon is Jack Rutkowski. Jack is the 23 Resident Inspector at Davis-Besse.
24 MR. RUTKOWSKI: (Indicating).
25 MS. LIPA: He just started that MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
4 1 position this week.
2 On my left is Bill Ruland. Bill is a Senior 3 Manager in headquarters, and hes also the Vice 4 Chairman of the Oversight Panel.
5 And then to my right is Scott Thomas. Hes 6 the Senior Resident Inspector for the NRC at 7 Davis-Besse.
8 Also in the audience we have Karen Gladden.
9 Shes a Secretary on the project. She was greeting 10 folks in the foyer.
11 We also have Nancy Keller. Shes our 12 Resident Office Assistant. Im thinking she might 13 not be here right now, but she should be back.
14 We have Viktoria Mitlyng. Shes our Public 15 Affairs Officer in the Region, and we have Roland 16 Lickus. Hes our State Liaison Officer in the 17 Region.
18 So, next well have -- Scott will present a 19 summary of what we discussed during the business 20 portion of the meeting, and then after Scotts 21 summary, well open up for comments and questions.
22 MR. THOMAS: Yeah, Im going to briefly 23 go -- try to condense a three hour meeting into about 24 five minutes, and Ill hit the high points that were 25 discussed during that meeting.
MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
5 1 The licensee discussed completion of the 50 2 pound and 250 pound reactor coolant system leak 3 checks and efforts toward closing out the containment 4 building.
5 They discussed manage -- excuse me, 6 Management & Human Performance Plan Updates with 7 licensees efforts are focusing on demonstrating 8 strong actions taken to address management and human 9 performance issues and demonstrated plans for site 10 alignment and leadership going forward.
11 They also discussed several engineering 12 issues, including the ongoing evaluations regarding 13 Emergency Diesel Generator at loading. ETAP, which 14 is Electrical Transient Analysis Program evaluation, 15 which provides an indication overall, AC, Electrical 16 Distribution System Health, Safety Features Actuation 17 System Cabinet Relay Replacements, High Pressure 18 Injection Pump Modification design and testing 19 update.
20 They also provided an update on the status of 21 their Corrective Action Program. Specific attributes 22 discussed were Condition Report Category Accuracy, 23 Corrective Action Review Board acceptance rate of 24 Apparent Cause Reports and Root Cause Reports and 25 Corrective Action Timeliness issues.
MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
6 1 The licensee provided a Quality Assessment 2 Update which discussed an independent review of the 3 corrective action quality. They noted that 87 4 percent of the corrective actions reviewed were found 5 to be acceptable. They did note some weaknesses in 6 the areas of documenting resolutions and evaluations 7 did not address full scope of identified issues.
8 The remaining issues that the licensee is 9 focusing on included High Pressure Injection Pump 10 Modifications, Electrical Transient -- or the ETAP 11 evaluations, the Safety Features Actuation System 12 Relays Replacement, the Air-Operated Valve 13 modifications, the Seismic and Tornado Loading of 14 Block Walls at the plant, Thermal Overload Bypass of 15 Safety Related Motors and Boron Precipitation 16 Modification.
17 The licensee discussed several restart 18 schedule milestones, which included To Complete the 19 Electric Plant Evaluation, Refill Main Condenser and 20 Feedwater Systems, Perform Testing on High Pressure 21 Injection Pumps 1 and 2, Refill Circulating Water 22 System and Draw Condenser Vacuum, Conduct Mode 4 23 Restart Readiness Review, Enter Mode 3 and Perform 24 the Pressure Test -- NOP, Normal Operating Pressure 25 Test, cool down and perform safety system train work, MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
7 1 conduct another Startup Readiness Review, and then 2 start up the unit.
3 That was a brief summary of the items that 4 were discussed at the 2:00 meeting.
5 MS. LIPA: Okay, thanks, Scott.
6 Okay, so next well hear comments and take 7 questions. Wed like to hold everybody to five 8 minutes each. Thats one of the feedback items weve 9 received from earlier meetings, that some people were 10 going over five minutes, and wed like to start with 11 local members of the public first, and what wed like 12 you to do is we have a sheet there where you can sign 13 in and then state your name clearly for the 14 transcriber and then go ahead and ask us any 15 questions or give us your comments.
16 MS. WHARRY: Good evening, lady, 17 gentlemen of the NRC. My name is Elizabeth Wharry.
18 I live here in Oak Harbor. I am pro-nuclear. Im 19 also the spouse of a FirstEnergy employee. Im also 20 here to say that if there are any pro anti-nuclear 21 people, we can discuss this later in a courteous 22 adult manner. My comments are directed to the NRC.
23 Originally you started out as the AEC, Atomic 24 Energy Commission, and your original intent was to 25 promote nuclear power, and somehow the original MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
8 1 intention has been set aside, and through 2 over-regulation and redundancies, I have seen the 3 decline of an eco-friendly, clean and efficient 4 energy source lost because it has become too 5 expensive to build nuclear plants. Youre losing a 6 phenomenal source of energy. When there -- when 7 theyre running theyre magnificent, and I live six 8 road miles from Davis-Besse, and I lived five air 9 miles from the Perry Nuclear Plant, and never once 10 did I give my safety a second thought. I have 11 confidence in the staff at Perry. I have confidence 12 in the people at Davis-Besse, and I believe in them.
13 If I did not believe in them, I would not have moved 14 this close to the plant.
15 My other concern is the Potassium Iodine 16 pills. Im retired medical field, and I happen to 17 know that if you are in that much contact with 18 radiation, the last thing on your mind is your 19 thyroid. Realistically, your skin bubbles up.
20 Your intestines, your whole innards liquefy.
21 Do you really think that Potassium Iodine is 22 going to protect that?
23 Any source of radiation that powerful is 24 going to wipe out people.
25 Which genius came up with this so-called MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
9 1 magic bullet of Potassium Iodine pills?
2 When I saw that in the newspaper, it was in 3 disbelief, and then I thought somebody was playing a 4 joke, but Ive seen people rush to them, and I keep 5 wanting to say, its not going to do you any good 6 because Davis is not going to have a meltdown. Its 7 not going to go into a crisis, and, as I stated, if 8 youre going to be exposed to that much radiation, 9 death will occur within 30 minutes. Thank you.
10 MS. LIPA: Okay, thank you.
11 MR. RULAND: First, Elizabeth --
12 Ms. Wharry, I guess it is?
13 MS. WHARRY: Yes.
14 MR. RULAND: In 1975, January 1975, 15 President Ford signed the legislation to establish 16 the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and at that time, 17 they separated the old Atomic Energy Commission into 18 at that time was ERDA, the Energy Research and 19 Development Agency, they separated that from what 20 became the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and so by 21 specific act of Congress signed by the President, 22 they separated the promotion component of nuclear 23 power roles from us, assigned it to ERDA, which 24 eventually became DOE, and basically put the 25 regulatory functions with us. That was the will of MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
10 1 Congress and the will of the President, and we 2 continued to implement that.
3 There was some discussion along those lines 4 about separating those roles, and thats the rules of 5 Congress, and, you know, thats where we get our 6 direction.
7 The second question you had had to do with 8 Ki (potassium iodide). Im not a health physicist, but I can tell you 9 that Ki is, as you say, it is not a magic bullet, but 10 it is also the policy of the Commission or the 11 Presidential appointees that run our -- that run the 12 NRC, established the policy after a long and -- a 13 very long debate and at very high levels, and when I 14 say a long debate, over years about the desirability 15 to institute and distribute Ki. Because of the very 16 nature that they focused on its efficacy and 17 eventually the commission decided on the policy it 18 has now. Youre right, its not a magic bullet, but 19 in limited set of circumstances it can provide some 20 protection for somebodys thyroid, and we leave it up 21 to the States to decide to implement it or not, so --
22 and thats our Ki policy. Yes, next.
23 MR. VETTER: Good evening. My 24 name is Jim Vetter, Im a lifelong resident of 25 northwest Ohio, I worked at Davis-Besse the last 17 MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
11 1 years. I have a couple comments I would like to 2 make.
3 The reality of the reactor vessel head 4 degradation events and the criticism weve received 5 from that regarding our failure to prevent this from 6 happening was difficult to accept for us, but we have 7 no one to blame but ourselves. We never should have 8 allowed this to go undetected for as long as it did.
9 I believe the hard working employees at Davis-Besse 10 have recognized this and continued to work very hard 11 to ensure something like this never happens again.
12 A lot has changed at Davis-Besse in the past 13 15 months. A few of the more significant items 14 include the following. Extensive reviews of plant 15 systems and programs have identified many improvement 16 opportunities. Weve improved and continued to 17 improve our plant systems and programs. The 18 material condition of the plant has been greatly 19 improved. Its noteworthy that many of these 20 projects will not result in any additional revenue 21 for FirstEnergy, nor were many of them driven by 22 regulatory requirement. The majority of these 23 projects have come at significant cost to the 24 company, my company, and have impacted duration of 25 our outage. Many of these improvements were done MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
12 1 for one reason, and thats to improve the safety 2 margin of the plant.
3 The third, and, in my opinion, perhaps the 4 most important improvement item is the dedication of 5 the Davis-Besse team to improve focus on safety 6 culture. There continues to be a focus on 7 establishing overriding priority towards nuclear 8 safety. We all understand their focus on safety 9 culture must remain constant. We cant change the 10 past. Well focus on production costs less than 11 adequate attention to nuclear safety. Im proud to 12 be a part of the team that has learned from the past, 13 has and continues to improve the material condition 14 of the plant and has rededicated our focus on nuclear 15 safety. Its interesting everyone in this room has 16 something in common whether youre a concerned 17 citizen, a public official, an anti-nuclear activist, 18 a member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission or you 19 work for FENOC, and that thing I believe we all have 20 in common is we all want to protect the health and 21 safety of the public.
22 Were looking forward to safely returning 23 Davis-Besse to service. Thank you.
24 THEREUPON, the audience applauded.
25 MS. LIPA: Thank you, Jim.
MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
13 1 Anybody else have any comments or questions 2 for us?
3 MR. KOZEL: Good evening. My 4 name is Mark Kozel. I work in the Quality 5 Assessment Group at Davis-Besse. Ive worked there 6 approximately 14 years. I audit in the Operations 7 area. I perform internal assessments in the 8 Operations area, and I would like to speak tonight on 9 significant improvements I have seen in the 10 Operations area. Specifically, I would like to state 11 that Ive seen Operations accept a leadership role at 12 Davis-Besse in regards to safety culture and safety 13 conscious work environment. I assure you I do not 14 take that statement lightly. I remember a year ago 15 when these meetings were held at Oak Harbor High 16 School when this concept was first brought out and 17 realized that that was going to be a daunting task 18 not only for Operations, but also for oversight to 19 determine when success was achieved, and I can tell 20 you its not from any one single event, but its the 21 overall performance that I see almost on a daily 22 basis when Im out auditing Operations.
23 The last meeting there was some anecdotal 24 evidence that was provided by Quality Assurance.
25 Some of that evidence I provided, and whats MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
14 1 difficult is when you have cumulative evidence like 2 this, if you have one or two events, they can kind of 3 be stated as well thats -- that sounds more like 4 management to me or that sounds more like someone 5 doing their job. When, in fact, theres a lot more 6 evidence that goes into the conclusion that quality 7 assessment reads that Operations has assumed a 8 leadership position.
9 I was a graduate in the United States Naval 10 Academy, and I can tell you that we spent countless 11 hours -- probably too many hours trying to 12 distinguish what makes a leader from a manager, and I 13 can tell you that Operations is leading and not just 14 getting the work done or managing tasks and 15 resources.
16 To try to explain this in just a couple 17 minutes that I have I would like to divide it into 18 four areas. One area -- the four areas to go over 19 then would be ownership that Ive seen improvements 20 in, high standards that theyve established, safety 21 focus and finally character and professionalism for 22 leadership.
23 For ownership one of the first things you 24 learn as a Junior officer in the military is if 25 youre in charge, take charge, and Operations has MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
15 1 taken charge in many areas not just in Operations, 2 but, in fact, in many other areas of the plant, 3 equipment reliability, material condition of the 4 plant. Theyve taken charge in cleanliness, 5 housekeeping, radiation protection practices.
6 Theres been -- if you just look over the condition 7 reports, they have generated about 300 condition 8 reports since April 1st, and if you just look over 9 those condition reports you see them challenging 10 people on radiation protection standards, safety 11 standards and also the high expectations for 12 performing work at Davis-Besse. Senior Reactor 13 Operators, I have seen at numerous meetings where 14 they have challenged decision making by managers, 15 directors, it did not matter if they considered it to 16 be a concern or an issue, they were not afraid to 17 challenge upper management on decisions that were 18 being made, and I firmly believe thats taking a 19 leadership role. Also, a questioning attitude. I 20 noticed our NRC Resident Inspector at the meeting 21 this morning, just as an example, almost on a daily 22 basis I see this, there were two concerns that were 23 brought up by equipment operators of activities that 24 were going to be performed today and both of those 25 were good concerns, and when you have proactive MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
16 1 operators like that that are not afraid to bring up 2 concerns, thats a major plus to your organization 3 and safety culture.
4 High standards, they have brought in outside 5 people that benchmarked other organizations and also 6 reviewed industry standards and practices to 7 establish high standards. Every day at turnover, 8 they talk about operation standards. They have a 9 booklet that the operators carry with them, they read 10 out of that a standard and on a daily basis at the 11 turnover meetings and the event-free tool usage as 12 weve seen from our peer evaluators that have come 13 and other plants that I have gone to, I think 14 Davis-Besse does that as well as any site I have 15 seen.
16 Safety focus, probably one of the most 17 important areas is, again, establishing a culture 18 where your personnel are not afraid to bring up 19 problems and to ensure that problems are corrected.
20 A lot of times, again, in these condition reports the 21 300 that theyve generated since April 1st, you can 22 see improvements in processes and procedures that 23 they have suggested and recommended in these 24 condition reports and also the fact on a daily basis 25 theyre rewarding personnel for bringing up these MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
17 1 issues and you foster that safety culture where 2 personnel are consistently bringing up those issues.
3 Finally, character and professionalism, lead 4 by example, lead by your actions, thats seen, and if 5 you interview the Operations personnel as I have, 6 theres a good trust and loyalty between the 7 different levels from the equipment operators all the 8 way up through the levels of management in 9 operations.
10 Now, this is specific to say that Operations 11 is demonstrating a leadership role. Certainly, 12 theres no panacea. Operations still has areas to 13 improve, and there is areas where theres problems, 14 but with regards to the leadership role, I firmly 15 believe that they have succeeded in achieving a 16 leadership role at Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station 17 and once the other organizations come up to their 18 standards, I feel well have no trouble demonstrating 19 to the NRC or any other outside organization that we 20 are ready to restart the plant by demonstrating the 21 proper safety culture and the proper human 22 performance activities at Davis-Besse. Thank you.
23 THEREUPON, the audience applauded.
24 MS. LIPA: Thank you for your 25 comments.
MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
18 1 MR. PATRICK: Good evening. My 2 name is Randy Patrick. Im a Senior Reactor Operator 3 in Operations. I have worked at Davis-Besse since 4 1980.
5 Im going to take a little different slant 6 tonight. We spent a lot of time talking about the 7 success weve had. I feel really good where were 8 at. Of course, I wish we were on-line right now, 9 and well be there soon, but enjoying the success 10 weve had. I feel good about the progress I think 11 weve overlooked. Theres some people and theres 12 some organizations we have to thank for where were 13 at.
14 First of all, I would like to thank the NRC.
15 It may seem kind of funny saying that, but I was at 16 the first public meeting at Oak Harbor High School.
17 I stood in line probably half an hour, 45 minutes.
18 There were two lines there, and I was one of the 19 first people that I had something positive to say, 20 and I think the reason why we had so many people 21 there that had disagreeing opinions about our plant 22 was because people werent educated. They didnt 23 understand what nuclear power is about. They didnt 24 understand the issues at Davis-Besse. Youve 25 provided the forum for the public to have their MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
19 1 questions answered. The public has had to provide 2 input and feel like theyre part of the process, as 3 evidenced in the last few meetings and also tonight, 4 I dont have to stand in line for half an hour, 45 5 minutes to have a chance to talk.
6 Secondly, Id like to thank our elected 7 public officials. A lot of my elected public 8 officials have taken a stance to support the plant.
9 They have done so some parallel paril to reputations in the 10 newspaper and so forth. I have some elected public 11 officials that have taken the low road and just hide 12 away from it. They tell you in the back room, yeah, 13 we support you, but they arent willing to come out 14 in the public and say that, so Im really 15 appreciative of the public officials that have taken 16 the stance and have come out in public and have 17 supported Davis-Besse.
18 Third, Id like to thank the FirstEnergy 19 organization and the FENOC organization. They have 20 provided the financial wherewithal that we can get 21 back on-line with the technical expertise.
22 And last, but most important, I would like to 23 thank my fellow teammates here at Davis-Besse and 24 within FENOC. We have put in a lot of long hours for 25 a long time, were making progress, we have MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
20 1 sacrificed a lot of hopes. I want to thank the 2 families also because they have had to put up with a 3 lot, the hours weve been working, but were on the 4 right path. Were getting things done that we need 5 to. Were looking forward to restart, and I just 6 want to thank all my Davis-Besse teammates. Thank 7 you.
8 THEREUPON, the audience applauded.
9 MS. LIPA: Thank you, Randy.
10 Anybody else?
11 MS. FARIS: Good evening. Sorry.
12 My name is Rachel Faris, and Im a lifelong resident 13 of Port Clinton, and like this lady back here, 14 (indicating), Ive -- Im in support of Davis-Besse, 15 but Ive never even thought twice about it. Many 16 people, if they visit the Lake Erie Islands, they 17 say, oh, dont you worry about that, and you hear a 18 lot of people joke, but its actually never been a 19 concern of mine, never even crossed my mind, and I do 20 have two questions for you.
21 Did I hear somebody say that your advisory 22 body or your administrative body is appointed by the 23 President?
24 And my second question comes from my 25 background in long-term care, because it is one of MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
21 1 the most regulated industries along with nuclear 2 power, and I worked in a nursing home, and I would 3 fear State surveyors when they came in, and I always 4 wondered when they would come in and they would find 5 something, it was the nursing home that would be 6 penalized for that, but I wonder if theres any 7 accountability on the survey team for not finding it 8 sooner or overlooking it?
9 And Im just curious because I worked in a 10 nursing home and the surveyors scared me to death, so 11 I can ask you because I dont work for that group --
12 (laughter), so --
13 Also as a lifelong resident of Port Clinton, 14 I graduated from here and many of my friends have 15 gone away to college and have engineering degrees and 16 other professional degrees and have had to go far, 17 far away to New Jersey and as close as Cleveland and 18 many different places to find jobs, and so I commend 19 FirstEnergy and Davis-Besse, and Im proud that that 20 business is still in this area to provide 21 opportunities for people with professional careers to 22 stay in this area and not have to seek those out in 23 other places.
24 Im a social worker, and I run the Senior 25 Center in Port Clinton and seniors are always wanting MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
22 1 to know more and thyre always very curious, and, of 2 course, were reading a lot about Davis-Besse in the 3 paper, and I said, well, lets see if we can get 4 somebody to come here and tell us about it, and so 5 Richard Wilkins, whos here somewhere, came to my 6 little Senior Center and talked to about 15 or 20 7 people who had a lot of questions, and, of course, a 8 lot of concerns and were very worried, and he did a 9 phenomenal job of explaining it to a layperson and 10 just answered any questions, and they werent easy 11 questions. Seniors arent easy, and he did a 12 really, really good job of answering questions, and I 13 think somebody mentioned just a few moments ago that 14 people who are anti-nuclear power or make jokes or 15 have concerns, I think a lot of times its just 16 because theyre uneducated and uninformed, and, so, 17 again, I thank you, too, for having this opportunity 18 for people to ask questions and become informed 19 because I think thats important, and I think thats 20 it. Thank you.
21 THEREUPON, the audience applauded.
22 MR. RULAND: You had two questions.
23 The first had to do with the appointment by the 24 President, yes, the five commissioners are appointed 25 by the President as they basically -- each term, it MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
23 1 consists of five commissioners. A term expires June 2 30th of every year, and so every year theres a new 3 Commissioner needs to be appointed. The President 4 is -- selects one of the commissioners to be the 5 chairman. The five commissioners who are appointed, 6 their terms run to the end of their term regardless 7 of which administration has -- is in the White House, 8 so we have right now some of the commissioners have 9 been appointed by the previous President, and, in 10 addition, the legislation also ensures that no more 11 than three commissioners can be of a single -- a 12 single party to keep our -- basically to minimize the 13 political influence on the workings of the 14 commission.
15 The second question you asked had to do with 16 accountability, and Im taking that question as a 17 question of accountability for us. First of all, 18 there is one other person that works for the NRC that 19 is a Presidential appointee, and thats the Inspector 20 General. There was an Inspector General law passed 21 several years ago. The Inspector General is 22 appointed by the President and independent of the 23 commissioners and conduct their activities -- and 24 conducts the Inspector General activities independent 25 of what the commission desires. Public reports, if MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
24 1 you go to our website, you can see some of the 2 reports that the Inspector General publishes. The 3 Inspector General conducts investigations of NRC 4 employees as do Congressional Committees and 5 subcommittees hold us accountable to the work we do, 6 so if your answer is whos watching the watchers, 7 theres no lack of people watching us, too.
8 One final comment, we answer the mail. We 9 get letters from citizens as yourself, members of 10 Congress, newspapers, and, by the way, the forth 11 state, the newspapers, frankly, for you hold us 12 accountable and asks us questions, but we answer the 13 mail, so if anybody here wants to send us a letter 14 and ask us what our policy is on -- on frankly any 15 manner we regulate, well get back to you, and we try 16 to -- we have several other processees that are 17 rather public that we afford all members of the 18 public to participate, so I think in that regard we 19 do hold ourselves publicly accountable for our 20 actions, and, frankly, thats part of the reason we 21 hold these meetings, so we have to provide you the 22 answers, and if you dont like them, you can write 23 Congress.
24 MS. LIPA: Yeah, and I would like 25 to add one other thing that was started shortly after MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
25 1 we started the 0350 and after the vessel head 2 degradation was identified was the Executive Director 3 for Operations in the NRC chartered a Lessons Learned 4 Task Force that did -- it was all of the people that 5 had not been involved in Region III or with 6 Davis-Besse, and they did independent looks at a lot 7 of the works that the inspectors had done over the 8 years and developed a series of lessons learned so 9 that we can learn from this to improve our processes, 10 so that was another effort.
11 Does anybody else have any questions for us 12 or comments to make?
13 MS. LUEKE: (Indicating).
14 MS. LIPA: One thing I wanted to 15 mention before you get started, its just the way to 16 contact us. Theres many ways, but we did on the 17 newsletter put how you can reach our Public Affairs 18 and -- thats a good place to start and also on our 19 website has a lot of good contact information. You 20 can send us a letter, an E-mail, give us a call, 21 theres many ways to reach us. Okay, go ahead.
22 Hi.
23 MS. LUEKE: My name is Donna 24 Lueke, and Im a local citizen. My questions are 25 mainly about things that I -- questions that had been MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
26 1 asked or investigations that are ongoing, and we 2 havent heard the results of them, so -- is there any 3 one person that keeps track of all that? I mean, is 4 the chairman of your committees in charge of keeping 5 track of all the investigations of various sorts?
6 MS. LIPA: Well, by 7 investigations, do you mean the Office of 8 Investigation or do you mean inspection --
9 MS. LUEKE: Yeah, Ill just list 10 the ones that I have questions about where they stand 11 right now.
12 MS. LIPA: Okay, and Ill tell 13 you what I can. Go ahead.
14 MS. LUEKE: You know, one is the 15 Kucinich Petition. Another one is the Whistle Blower 16 suit thats in the Courts right now, I think. The 17 most recent one that I read about was from the House 18 Energy and Commerce Committee with the Greenwood 19 Chairs. The -- the follow-up one, the Haber Report 20 as to where that is, and the Inspector Generals 21 report like you were talking about the Inspector 22 General. I know that the previous Chairman of the 23 NRC had sort of disregarded that report.
24 Now that you have a new Chairman has that 25 been revisited or what happened with that?
MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
27 1 So those are just ones that I can think of 2 right now, and I just wondered who keeps track of all 3 those or is it possible?
4 MR. RULAND: The simple answer is 5 we all keep track of them.
6 MS. LUEKE: Okay.
7 MR. HOPKINS: (Nod indicating yes).
8 MR. RULAND: We both as a panel and 9 other members of the staff are involved in a number 10 of these items that you mentioned. Why dont we go 11 down the list.
12 MS. LUEKE: Uh huh.
13 MR. RULAND: The Kucinich Petition, 14 for those who are unaware, one of our regulations 15 allows people to petition the NRC, a member of the 16 public to petition the NRC to take action. In this 17 particular case, Representative Kucinich petitioned 18 the NRC to take action, and that is in-house as we 19 speak, and there is -- I think we have a 120 day 20 clock from the time we get it, and I think that 120 21 days is up on June 10th.
22 MS. LUEKE: Okay.
23 MR. RULAND: So you should see that 24 out -- what the next document will be, will be 25 something called a Proposed Directors Decision and MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
28 1 that document will be out basically for public 2 comment.
3 MS. LUEKE: Uh huh.
4 MR. RULAND: And well then take 5 those comments and factor them in and then well 6 issue a final Directors Decision.
7 MS. LUEKE: Thats very helpful 8 what you just said. I wonder if it would be 9 possible -- I know we cant do it for this meeting 10 but for another meeting to sort of have a summary of 11 where everything stands.
12 MS. LIPA: Well, thats a good 13 suggestion.
14 MS. LUEKE: Is it possible to do 15 that?
16 MS. LIPA: And we usually try to 17 do a summary in our monthly newsletter. I was just 18 looking for a copy of it here, some of these big 19 ticket issues, you have a pretty good list there, 20 Donna.
21 MS. LUEKE: Uh huh. And its just 22 as to wheres -- whens the deadline, whats the next 23 step, thats what I think is confusing.
24 MS. LIPA: And I think we 25 probably have focused a little too much on MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
29 1 Davis-Besse specific, and things that the panel is 2 controlling, but those are certainly things that 3 were involved in to some extent and the agency is 4 involved in, too, so --
5 MS. LUEKE: You know, and I think 6 those are the things we can do the most about.
7 Youre doing the best you can to monitor Davis-Besse, 8 and as citizens, its hard for us to know what you 9 know, but it is important for us to have information 10 on how youre doing your job, so I think that 11 thats -- that would be very helpful, I think, to 12 have those things, and just one that comes to mind is 13 the issue that came out about the -- the rust 14 picture, the infamous rust picture.
15 MS. LIPA: The red photo?
16 MS. LUEKE: Yeah, the red photo, 17 and what happened with that. I think there was --
18 something was being investigated to see if that was 19 deliberately hidden or what happened with that, so 20 thats another --
21 MS. LIPA: Well, well go through 22 the rest of the list here quickly.
23 MR. RULAND: The Whistle Blowers 24 suit, Im not -- I cant give you any comment on the 25 Whistle Blower suit. First of all, Im not familiar MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
30 1 with the suit.
2 MS. LUEKE: Okay.
3 MR. RULAND: And typically we dont 4 comment on things of this nature.
5 MS. LUEKE: Okay.
6 MR. HOPKINS: Let me state, we do 7 follow it, I mean, we pay attention to what happens 8 with the DOL suit. Its not that we dont pay 9 attention to it, but we do pay attention to it, but 10 we cant give you any status because thats DOL.
11 MS. LUEKE: Okay, thanks.
12 MR. RULAND: The Greenwood letter?
13 MS. LUEKE: Thats pretty recent.
14 MR. RULAND: We have that in-house, 15 and were preparing a response, and thats really all 16 I can tell you.
17 MS. LUEKE: Okay.
18 MR. HOPKINS: Well, theres 19 possibility that he will request a hearing. He 20 stated that he would like one, but there has been no 21 date definitively set for any such hearing. If 22 there is one set, you know, then we can tell you, but 23 there is no set date for any hearing today.
24 MS. LUEKE: Okay.
25 MS. LIPA: But I think you MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
31 1 mentioned that there had been -- earlier House Energy 2 and Commerce Committee had started like an 3 investigation or had had an investigator out to the 4 facility and to the NRC, and I dont know the status 5 of that investigation because thats, you know, 6 Congress, but its my understanding that thats not 7 really active right now.
8 MR. HOPKINS: Yeah, he had mentioned 9 possibly June 12th, but that was tentative, and weve 10 never had any closure on that that Ive heard.
11 MS. LUEKE: Yeah, thats the thing 12 that Im concerned about is not having closure on 13 some of these issues before we start, or at least 14 have a status of whats happening with them, and I 15 think we can see just from our discussion here, not 16 all of us are sure where things stand with some of 17 these issues, so -- it would just be really helpful 18 if we could have an update on those.
19 MR. RULAND: I think the next one 20 you asked about was the Haber Report?
21 MS. LUEKE: Yeah.
22 MS. LIPA: Whats your question 23 on that one?
24 MS. LUEKE: She had a report, if 25 theres a follow through report going to be MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
32 1 conducted, and like when --
2 MS. LIPA: We had an inspection 3 that is evaluating the report that was prepared, that 4 was the FirstEnergy contractor prepared that report 5 for them and how FirstEnergy is using the information 6 in her report and doing their own internal assessment 7 so our inspection -- its called our Management &
8 Human Performance Phase III, thats the title of it, 9 but theyre looking at the methods that the utility 10 is using and part of that is this Haber Report and 11 how theyre using that to assess their safety culture 12 and improve the assessments theyre trying to make.
13 MR. RULAND: I think the next one 14 was the IG Report.
15 MS. LUEKE: Yes.
16 MR. RULAND: You had asked about 17 the IGs Report about the way -- basically focused on 18 NRC decision making relative to Davis-Besse and the 19 chairman and signed by, I believe it was all the 20 commissioners --
21 MS. LUEKE: Uh huh.
22 MR. RULAND: -- wrote back a letter 23 responding to that, not agreeing with the conclusions 24 that the Inspector General had, and, as far as I 25 know, theres not -- were not doing anything else MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
33 1 about that matter.
2 MS. LUEKE: So thats the end of 3 it basically?
4 MR. RULAND: As far as today were 5 not doing anything about that. You also asked about 6 the rust picture, Ill assume if you let me, that 7 thats the rust on the bottom of the reactor vessel 8 head, is that --
9 MS. LUEKE: No, there was a report 10 that surfaced that there was a photo that existed 11 somewhere in the NRC offices.
12 MR. RULAND: Okay, Im -- I have no 13 idea. I dont know what picture youre discussing.
14 MS. LIPA: We had the red photo, 15 and we got that during the AIT Inspection last April, 16 and there was a report that came out, I think in 17 February, from a third party that that photo had been 18 shown to an NRC person, but I dont know anything 19 more about that, other than that was being looked 20 into.
21 MS LUEKE: Okay.
22 MR. RULAND: We issued our final 23 red determination, that was -- whats the date on 24 that? I think it was earlier this May -- May 29th, 25 and in that letter we state that the OI MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
34 1 investigations are ongoing, and the reason we didnt 2 issue any violations in this matter was because the 3 OI investigations were still ongoing, so --
4 MS. LUEKE: Okay. Okay. Thank 5 you very much.
6 And just one more quick question, did you 7 decide which method will be used for checking the 8 bottom of the reactor? That was undecided the last 9 I heard.
10 MS. LIPA: I dont know.
11 MR. RULAND: FENOC makes the 12 decision on how they intend to inspect the bottom of 13 the reactor vessel head. Once they decide that, we 14 will -- we will do what we normally do. We inspect 15 that. We ask hopefully challenging questions about 16 why thats good enough and why thats adequate, and 17 were continuing to look at that. Weve not made 18 any final determination about whether their test is 19 appropriate or not, and well continue to engage them 20 in hopefully a healthy debate about the adequacy of 21 that test. Ultimately, the test is designed, as I 22 understand it, to ensure that theres no pressure 23 boundary leakage on the bottom of the reactor vessel 24 head, so -- thats, you know -- we have not only 25 technical experts in the region and in headquarters MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
35 1 that are examining that.
2 MS. LIPA: (Nod indicating yes).
3 MS. LUEKE: Okay, thank you.
4 MR. RULAND: Youre welcome.
5 MS. LIPA: Thank you.
6 MR. RULAND: Anybody else?
7 MS. LIPA: If there is no more 8 local members of the public, its open up to anybody 9 who wants to come up and ask us questions or give us 10 comments.
11 (BRIEF PAUSE).
12 MS. LIPA: Okay, well, while 13 youre thinking -- maybe somebody else has a 14 question, I just wanted to mention that we do have a 15 public meeting planned for June 19th, and that will 16 be in headquarters, but we will have bridge lines 17 available, and the purpose of that meeting is for 18 FirstEnergy to come in and discuss their high 19 pressure injection pump modification that theyre 20 planning on, and then our next months public meeting 21 in July will be July 9th, and that will be at the Oak 22 Harbor High School, and I think thats about it for 23 upcoming events.
24 MR. RULAND: Right.
25 MR. HOPKINS: (Nod indicating yes).
MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
36 1 MS. LIPA: Does anybody else have 2 a question for us?
3 (NO AUDIBLE RESPONSE).
4 MS. LIPA: Okay, well, thank you 5 all for coming.
6 MR. RULAND: Thank you for coming.
7 8
9 THEREUPON, the meeting was adjourned.
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900
37 1 CERTIFICATE 2 STATE OF OHIO )
) ss.
3 COUNTY OF HURON )
4 I, Marlene S. Rogers-Lewis, Stenotype Reporter 5 and Notary Public within and for the State aforesaid, duly commissioned and qualified, do hereby certify 6 that the foregoing, consisting of 36 pages, was taken by me in stenotype and was reduced to writing by me 7 by means of Computer-Aided Transcription; that the foregoing is a true and complete transcript of the 8 proceedings held in that room on the 3rd day of June, 2003 before the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
9 I also further certify that I was present in the room during all of the proceedings.
10 11 IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and seal of office at Wakeman, Ohio this day of 12 , 2003.
13 14 Marlene S. Rogers-Lewis 15 Notary Public 3922 Court Road 16 Wakeman, OH 44889 17 My commission expires 4/29/04 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MARLENE S. ROGERS-LEWIS & ASSOC. REPORTERS (419) 929-0505 (888) 799-3900