ML20126B659
| ML20126B659 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Millstone, 05000496, 05000497  |
| Issue date: | 11/05/1992 |
| From: | NRC |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20126B256 | List: |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 9212220162 | |
| Download: ML20126B659 (76) | |
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10 NRC 11 ElablG_
l MEETING TQ_ggCEIVE_9_QMMENTg_QN 12 EQRIHEART __t!TI LI_TI_EE '
i 13 EEEF_QRM A NC E_EN HA_N_QEM gET_ER QG R AM 14 15 East Lyme Community Center 16 East Lyme, Connecticut 17 November 5, 1992 18 7:30 p.m.
19
- -2 0 NRC Members Present:
21 Jacque Durr,' Paul Swetland, Randy'Blough, -
22 James Wiggins, Lawrence Doerflein, Dave Jaffe 23 24 i
l 25 I
l 9212220162 921209 PDR T ADOCK 05000245 7 png
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l 1 MR. W1GGINS: Good evening, my name in Jim '1 k i 2 Wigginn. I represent the Nuclear Regulatory 3 Commission. I work out of the office in King of 4 Prussia, Pennsylvania. That office overseau nuclear 5 planta and other type of activities that occurr in the 6 northeantern part of the United Staten. With me I 7 have other individuals that are from the NRC office 8 that are here to hear from you this evening, and hear 9 your comments with regard to a plan t.h a t t. h e utility 10 that runn the M111ntone station has put together in 11 order to enhance its performance.
12 What I would like to do before we start f'
13 the meeting is to introduce the people here from the 14 NRC staff, and that are up at the table. We will talk 15 a littie bit about the background in terms of why wo 16 are here, what we are i n t.o r e s t ed in doing, why we came 17 here to hear your commentn. We will talk to you about '
18 what we have done to date with regard to the 19 Enhancement Program that the utility has offered, .and 20 talk-a little bit about the format-for this: meeting, 21 set ;up some rules and-guidelines to make sure that 22 people can have a fair and adequate opportunity to 4
23 speak, and we can keep the meeting moving.. I would
( 24 like to thank you for coming out on this poor night.
! 25 I think that shown that there is intercat in the
3 o
7 1 community about what is going on at-the plant, ka 2 So first let me start by introducing 3 the-NRC staff. We will go around the table.
4 MR. DURR: Jacque Durr of the engineering 5 department in the branch of reactor safety. I have a 6 staff of engineers who go to the various power plants 7 in the northeast and do safety inspections to make 8 sure that the plants are complying with rules and 9 requirements and regulations.
10 MR. SWETLAND: My name is Paul Swetland. I 13 am the Senior Resident Inspector here at the Millstone 12 Station. I work for the NRC. I have a staff of five t'
33 inspectors who do daily oversight of the utilities' 14 activities at Millstone.
15 MR. BLOUGH: Good evening, my name is Randy 16 Blough. I am Chief of Projects Branch 4 in NRC Region
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17 1. I manage the inspection programs for Millstone, d
18 Haddam Neck and several other facilities in the 19 northeast.
20 MR. DOERFLEIN: My name-is Larry Doerflein.
s 21 I am a-Project Section Chief in the King of Prussia 22 office. I am respons'ible for the. managing of the 23 inspection program at the Haddam Neck and Millstone
( 24 sites.
25 MR. JAFFE: Good evening, my name is Dave
L 4 's 1 Jaffe. I ,a m senior project manager in the office of-
- 2 Nucioar Reactor Regulation. We are involved in the 3 licensing process for the Millatone unit, including 4 such things as issuing license, relief from code, and 5 other administrative activities.
6 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you. For your 7 information there are several other individuals in the R audience we would like to recognize. Thene 9 individuals work either in the local area or work for ,
10 the State of Connecticut. Mr. Thomas Benedict and Mr.
11 Ed Woollacott are commissionera for the public utility 12 control. -Mr. Ben Scoloway from the State of
{ 13 Connecticut is here; and a representative of the 14 Waterford Emergency Manager in alno here.
.15 With that, let me briefly go over what 16 it is we are here about this evening. What we want to 17 discuas, we-want to-receive-comments on is comments on 18 the plan that has been put together by the Northeast 19 Utilities organization to enhance ita* performance at 20 principally the Milletone Station, but-also there is 21 some applicability to Haddam Neck.
22 Let's first go over why this plan came- ;
23 to be from our perspective at least an.a*Tederal 24 regulator. In out, in the NRC's 1991 overall
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25 performance assessment for the Millstone Station we T
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' 5 1 noted declines in the performance in several areas at
( ;i 2 the plant, although overall the plant performed well 3 and plant operation was considered to be safe there 4 were some trends that we saw of declining performance 5 in some of the fundamental basic areas that are 6 important to operating a nuclear power plant. In 7 addition, there were other issues that were emerging
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R at the facility that we were aware of that we thought 9 demanded the Northeast Utilities' continued increased 10 attention. These included a significant increase in 11 the number of concerns raised by the worke*s at the 12 station that were at least in the minds of the wor kers 13 not being dispositioned the way they thought they 14 should or to their satisfaction. And that represented 15 a concern to us. There were many of these concerns 16 that were important to us. We didn't understand why -
17 they were being dispositioned the way they were.
18 In addition, there were a series of 19 technical problems identified both by the utility 20 staff and NRC staff at the facility that raised some 21 questions with regard to the adequacy of certain 22 programs at the facility.
23 As a result of those performance i 24 problems the utility elected to form four internal 25 task groups to look over various aspects of how they
6 1 did business. These task forces completed their 2 assignments and reported back to the company in the 3 latter stages of 1991. And the company discussed the 4 results of those tasks reviews with us in September 5 and Octobet of 1991. We looked at that as we look at 6 a number of internal assessment activities that go on i
7 in each station. We concluded they were rather 8 thorough reviews. There were a number of 9 recommendations that came out. And the 10 recommendations seemed to be worthwhile. However, 13 both the NRC staff and eventua))y Northeast management 12 concluded there was a need for a more integrated I
13 effort to resolve these recommendations. To build on 14 their findings, and develop some integrated approach 15 the company engaged the assistance of an external 16 consultant to help him develop that plan. And they 37 did so, and that plan is what is called the Northeast 18 Utilities Performance enhancement Program that was 19 prepared through the spring of 1992, and was provided
- 20 to the NRC in June 1992 as the staff had requested.
21 We have subsequently gotten another 22 submittal in October of 1992 that basically brought 23 the program to completion, desclibed the complete 1 24 program. So as of October 1992 we have a complete 25 program description for that Performance Enhancement 1
1
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'. .i 1 Program. The program is basically conducted or was J
2 conducted or is being conducted by'the utility in 3 three phases.
4 The first phase which has been 5 completed to date was-designed to determine =the '
6 underlying causes of Northeast Utilities' performance j 7 deficiencies at the station. Phase II was designed to '
8 develop Action Plans for those programs that were 9 found in Phase I. And the third phase was to work 10 through the Action Plans and conduct a validation 11 effort to make sure that whatever actions they did 12 take were effective in solving the programs they were i
13 origina))y going after solving.
14 That is a brief description of what the 15 Performance Enhancement Program is. Again, the 16 Performance Enhancement Program is particularly aimed 17 at problems identified by the utilsty and by us as 18 applied to the Millstone Station, .and in addition some
'19 programs at the corporate office. However. as you 20 might suspect there are.certain issues;among those 21 actions that are generic to the entire company's
'2 2 operations, so there is some applicability to Haddam 23 Neck. And the company has indicated to us that^the 24 Haddam Neck facility is also being looked at, and the
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25 Acti on Plans are also being applied to Haddam Neck.
8 1 That is basica))y the background on the Performante 2 Enhancement Pl an.
3 Let's talk about. what we a the Nuclear 4 Regulatory Commission have done with this plan to 5 date. We have been asked as'a staff by the five 6 commissioners of the agency to review this plan'and to 7 perform an acceptance review. We have been asked to 8 accept the plan, in other words, look at jt, and 9 decide whether it is a worthwhile plan. We have in 10 order to do that., and oversee that review, in order to 11 receive the performance at the facility in a more 12 detailed manner we have organized a panel. We call it f- 13 the M i l l s t.on e Assessment Panel. Which is run out of 14 the King of Prussia office principa))y, although there 15 is a significant involvement from our headquarter's 16 office. In t'a c t , the people you see up here at the 17 podium are part of that panel. -There are some others -
18 that weren't able to make it today.
19 Since that panel was established we 20 have met with-Northeast in-a public isrum. '*In - July we
- 21 discussed activities that we had planned to undertake .
22 to review their Performance Enhancement Plan. 'A s part 23 of that review, we, the NRC, provided to Northeast
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24 Utili ti es a list of approximate 1'y 23 performance I
25 concerns that we had at Millstone. We used our I
1 l
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'.i i 1 assessment tools that we have been using over time in kJ 2 the nystematic performance. We used our inspection 3 reports to develop a set of circumstances. We 4 provided those to Northeast Utilities-with the intent
-5 of asking the company to tell us where the Performance 6 Enhancement Plan addresses these particular issues.
7 The company responded in August of 8 1992. In order to look at the appropriateness and 9 adequacy of that response and to take a more careful 10 look at the company's enhancement plan this panel, 11 which all of us here are a member of, chartered a 12 review team, NRC technical empl oyees. to determine if-
, -i I 13 that plan actually addressed the underlying cause of 14 Northeast Utilities' problems; contained Actions Plans 15 which were reasonable methoda of obtaining the 16 performance improvements desired, and whether that-17 plan contained a comprehensive and reasonable-18 independent verification and validation program that 19 ensured-t' hat the; plans would be ef f ective. Th a t ~t e a m 20 has conducted its initial review of Hillstone and 21 Iladdam, in addition Northeast Utilities' corporate 22 office.- 'The.results of that team are currently.under 23 review, and when'their efforta are complete we wi))-
(_ 24 release the results of those efforts.
25 In addition we had determined'quite
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1 early on in our review that we were interested in 2 obtaining comment, and those people in the general 3 public that were affected most by the operation of'the 4 facility, and made a determination to hold a meeting S such as the one today to give an opportunity to the 6 public in the area to provide any comments they would 7 have on the Utility Performence Program and the 8 Enhancement Program. We sent copies of the Northeast 9 Utilities' Performance Enhancement Plan to the S t a t. e 10 and to local governments within the emergency plan 11 zone and around Millstone and Haddam Neck in late 12 September asking for written comments.
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13 In addition, we placed copies of t.h a t '
14 plan in several libraries around Millstone and Haddam 15 Neck sites so they would be availab.le for the public 16 to review. And we indicated that we would be 17 interested in receiving comments in writino,_or if the 18 person so chose they could come to this meeting and 19 provide the comments orally. To make sure people
-20 would have some better chance of knowing-that.-this 21 meeting was going to be taking place we went a step 22 beyond what we would-normally do for an NRC meeting.
23 We would typically prior to meetings issue press j 24 release, those press releases go to local media 25 outlets, newspapers, but certainly it is up to the
- 11 1 newspapers and media to make the determination whether ki; 2 to run the story. Not all press releases make it into 3 the newspapers. We actually went out and purchased 4 advertising in papers that we thought from our point-5 of view served the local area or areas where we 6 thought there would be some interest. So that is what 7 brings us to this meeting here.
8 Following this meeting we will take the l 9 oral comments we receive, and any wri t t en comments l 10 that we would get, and we will consider them as we 11 complete our acti vi ti es to determine whether the 12 Performance Enhancement Plan is acceptable to the NRC.
\ 13 The results of that entire review will, as I said earlier, he made public when they are complete. And 14 15 that should happen sometime early next year. We will 16 at least be in the position to comment where our 17 conclusions are. That is basically background for 18 this meeting.
19 Let-me take a brief minute to go over some ground rules and some mechanica. .As I said, ~ the 20 21 purpose of the meeting is to solicit comments ~on the.
.22 Northeast Utilities' Performance Enhancement' Program.
23 We really did not come here prepared to address issues 24 beyond that. There are normally comments in any area 25 about what is going on at the facility that are about-
12 1 problems that are associated with the program directly 2 or peripherally. We did not come here prepared 3 specifically to address all those issues. We have 4 determined the best way to approach it to identify 5 people, ask them to come up, ask them to provide'their 6 comments, .but to maintain a ground rule that we will
'7 look at a five-minute limit for that individual in a 8 given time that that person is here. I may ask that 9 the person and the presentation bring the current 10 comments to an end so we can move on to the next 11 person. If there are some residual comments an 12 individual may have, you are certainly free to remain e
I 13 around and get back in the key again, and come back 14 and talk again. It would be helpful as we go through 15 this to ask you to, if you are interested in making a 16 comment, and you haven't already provided your name on 17 a card, to do so. We will use those cards to call 18 people to the mike. We are trying to make sure it-in 19 an orderly progression. Again, we are god ng 'to try to 20 limit people to five minutes' per round 'on the 21 dincussion.
22 In addition, we are not here -with the 23 ' intent to take up your comment time with our answers
] 24 to the questions. If it is a short answer we can 25 provide we will try as best we can to do that. If
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13 i 3 not, we think it is better to just allow more peop.le J
2 to have an opportunity to speak. Let's move through.
.3 As you see the-meeting is-being 4 transcribed. The reason we are transcribing it is to 5 convenience to ourselves. We want to listen to the 6 comments. We function better if we concentrate on the 7 comments rather than write down what they said.- The 8 transcript is for our benefit. It is not a legal 9 record or anything like that, but we do intend to take 10 a copy of the transcript and provide that copy to the 11 same libraries that we provided copies of the 12 Performance Enhancement Program. If anyone would~like 13 to refer to the proceeding they can go to the 14 libraries and do that.
15 As a matter of courtesy we would ask 16 that anyone who would seek to make a comment, we would 17 ask you that you behave courteously to the speaker,-
18 and allow the speaker to get through with their 19 comments without a lot of disruption. That would be l
l 20 helpful.
I 21 In terms of the timing of the meeting,
-22 as we had advertised we intend to be here'from 7:30 to 23 10:30. We can remain a little later, but there is- a g 24 hard and fast end time of 11:00 tonight. That is 25 because we have to get out of-the-room, and allow the a
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1 custodial staff to clean up and set up for whatever is .
2 going to occur here tomorrow. So basically we 3 couldn't go much beyond 11'even if we wanted-to. And 4 we will go as long as there is interest up until that 5 time.
6 With that, I think we are ready to.
7 start. And we can have~the'first speaker.
8 MR. JAFFE: As Mr. Wiggins indicated, 9 approximately five minutes per person that wants to 10 address the panel. To help you in that regard I am ,
il going to let you know when you have about one minute 12 left. We have ordered this approximately in the order i 13 that the people have arrived. We will have Joe i 14 Carter, followed by Paul Blanch, Denny Galloway and 15 Jay Sullivan.
16 Mr. Carter, do you. care to address the 17 panel?
18 MR. CARTER: I wanted to be a lot later 19 because the whole thing can stop right here. 1rou -
20 gentlemen have some very impressive credentials,-but I .
21 think you are a terrible waste of taxpayers' money. I 22 was' laid off from Millstone-Point ~1n-1987 when I 12 3 sinformed my employer'that I-had contracted leukemia.
24 The reasons stated on my layoff slip was I was' unable
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25 to meet physical requirements even though Ithad been e
15 i 1 on-site for the'past 10 years. When I notified money J
2 counters in King of Prussia, Mr. Wiggins, of my 3 situation, -a n d where the corruption was on-site-and 4 who the corrupt people were the first response.I got S w a s a -l et ter in 1990'which stated that I would have to 6 submit my claim in writing within 30 days to the 7 Department of babor. I submit, sir, that is a cruel 8 joke.
9 MR. JAFFE: Mr. Carter, would you please 10 help us in telling us how your comments relate to the 11 matter at hand right now, that is the Performance 12 Enhancement Program?
13 MR. CARTER: I am saying when 14 representatives of NRC are notified of the hazard of 15 that ball over there that to going to go nothing is 16 done, you guys sit on your hands. Northeast, how are 17 you going to cover your butt? I have documentation 18 that is going to bury the whole panel. Now, I would 19 love to have about an hour to continue this.'
20 :M R . JAFFE: You have more time. Do you care 21 to specifically address the Performance Enhancement
-22 Program?
l 23 MR. CARTER: When I aat down with the l
l 24 hearing officer the 1st of September I got my job back 25 after five and a half. years, after being run out of w
16 1 that place for being honest I got-hack on site within- 'i 2 a week. I was railroaded out again after talking with l 3 Mr.-Swetland, within 10 days of talking to Swetland I l 4 was bounced again on a bogus charge which I now have 5 in the process. I am persona nongrata at Millstone 6 Point.
7 And where it deals with you ,
8 apecifica))y is that you are not doing a damn thing ]1 4
l 9 except covering your tracks and trying to sound j 10 impressive. The net result of what you guys do is 11 waste my taxpaying money. As I said, when I contacted ;
i 12 the NRC in July of '87 and don't get a response 1 l I 13 until'92? I thought I recognized Dempsey here.
- 14 Special Agent Judy Idy out of the New Haven branch of -
l 15 the FBI requested that I talk to Doug.Dempsey. I took 16 Dempsey a copy of a transcript that had been produced 17 by the security department of Northeast U t ili t i e s in 18 Berlin in July of '87, and'his first response, which 19 is typical NRC behavior was, A, he lost part'of the 20 document in a Northeast copier. That'isthow inept 21 your whole outfit-is. I had to retrieve pages of my
-- 2 2 '. document from a Nor.theast copier. Th e n of hin 21 n t. a f f and your stati related to thene identical 22 problem-for PWR's. It it were a licennee making thin 23 type of falne ntatement there would be criminal a c t. i o n 24 brought againnt. the licennon and individualni hocaune 1
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25 there in accountability for thin agency, -th e - NR C , I
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' 23 1
y i 3 don't expect any action an a renuit of thin
&J 2 intentional falso ntatement.
3 To further demonstrat.e the 4 ineffectivenens and total dierogard for nuclear nafety
=5 by the NRC, I have pleaded with them to determine if 6 these water level measuring devicen are considered 7 " operable" as defined by the plant licensee. The NRC 8 han absolutely retuned to even respond to my written 9 requentn, which include requests to the chairman, i:
10 becaune I believe they know that the responne to this 11 question may renult in the temporary shutdown of many 12 nuclear plantn.
' The Millstone Unit I reactor level 13 14 measurement problem in one of the mont significant 15 nafety problema identified over the past few yearn.
16 This is t. h e most vital i n s t.r u m e n t used during accident 17 conditions and is required by the plant technical f
18 o p e c i f i c a t. i on s . M111 stone's action wan to 19 immediately declare these devices inoperable, and they 20 determined that the problem must be resolved" prior to 21 restart. After designing, installing anditenting a 4
( 22 technical solution to this vital issue,'the"NRCithen 23 decided to insuo a violation'because I personally
, 24 authorized a contractor to commence work prior to 25 formal issuance of a purchase order.
l i
24
- 4 1 Thin in like a fireman rinking his life '
k 2 naving 10 people from a burning butiding, only to have !
-3 -the i tre inspector innue a violation to him t.ecaune -
4 his fire hose had not been tested in the lant 30 dayn. j 5 This in the only enforcement action takenshy the NRC 6 on thin innue while 36 other boiling water react.orn 7 violate their license requirements and the-NRC refupon t
8 to requent any operability d e t e r m i n a t. i o n ,
9 The reason I am bringing thene points ' t 10 to the public attention in to demonntrat.e that. the NRC 11 han no real interent in nuclear saftey, but is only '
12 interented in their public image. The NRC holds each 13 licenne and individual renponsible for ialne ,
14 ntatements and wrongdoing but it appearn that no one 15 in willing to require any accountability of the NRC.
16 I am not alone in my viewn, and, in 17 fact, many NRC technical and management personnoi have 18 expresned t. heir frustrations to me with respect to 19 thin ineffective regulatory climate and actual
! 20 coverupa of significant safety issues.
2 .1 Whdie the PEP program at NU will have 22- some benetits in areas requiring additional 23 documentation, I believe that it completely-minsen the~
J 24 target, which is inspire the NU individuals
! 25 renponsible for nuclear safety.
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25 1 It in t. h e NRC that denparately needs a k ;i 2 Program to Improve Mangement Performance to review all 3 potential safety innues and establish-a priority for 4 resolving those major inauen. They need to 5 concentrate less on the perfection of paperwork and f) aggrenively addreno the real natety programn. Do we 7 have any organization which will require a program for 8 the NRC or have they already achieved perfection as 9 they profenn?
10 1 pray that the new administration will-11 recognize the potential vital contribution of nuclear 12 power and' provide nome real leadornhip and direction f
5 13 for the. Nuclear Regulatory Comminnion and the rent of 14 the induntry. Thank you very much.
15 MR. WIGGINS: Thank you for your comments.
I f> Can I ask a question before you leave?
17 MR. BLANCH: Yes.
18 MR. WIGGINS: On the basic topic of the 19 meeting you indicated that you believe that the' PEP 20 ought to focus more on building morale, building 21 leadership; in that an accurate characterization?
22 MR. BhANCH: -That is my biggest problem with ' ,
23 the entire' Performance Enhancement Program. 'I realize -
l i
g 24 it in a small part of the program. An I said to Mr.
25 Ellin laat May, I believe that the entire program '
1
26 -
1 needn to be baned on a foundation, very strong 2 foundation based on trunt and integrity, without that we will have no improvement in performance in my 3
4 opinion.
5 . MR. WIGGINS: In there in your mind any 6 specific things it ought'to-have in it that it doenn't 7 have in order to approach thone problomn?
8 MR. I\ l, A N C li t There have been a lot of 9 studien done by varioun tanks forces within Northeant 10 Utilities which have identified positive and negative 11 anpnets of things that contribute to morale and 12 performance. There are various lints around. I don't i 13 have the namen of thene tanka forcen, but I think 14 there were nome very talented people that undertook 15 thin effort to look at the ponitive-negative thinga 16 with renpect, to morale, how it could be improved.
l l
17 Obviously there are very many human resource studien 18 how to and the affect of morale.' No, -
i m p /r o v e A n o r a l e ,
19 I am not asking we get a 50 po cent pay raise. I 20 think'the employees need recognition. They need*to 21 have total trust and confidence. I am not an expert.
22 I know there are ways'to improve morale, and it is not 23 by rewarding our directors and additional bonus for a .
g 24 Performance Enhancement Plan that doen very, very 25 little for the morale of the working employees, my
27
- i 1 employeen.
ka I had a question really along 2 MR. B l.00 G il :
3 the same linen. You said earlier in your statement ;
4 that the PEP had already contributed to demoralizing i 5 employees. I wondered how, in what way in your 6 opinion.
7 MR. BLANCil: It in my belief, and my opinion 8 may be somewhat biased, I admit that some of the 9 people I have talked to, for inntance, this reward 10 program that was announced for the directora, and 11 above, who will get a bonus that in extremely 12 demoralizing to working people.
13 Dome of the people I have talked to are 14 ieeling that they are, again, perusing a lot of 15 meaninglenn paperwork just to provide the 16 documentation which will demonstrate to the public, 17 and to the NRC that our performance is, in fact, 18 improving. Performance to me in the increase in our 19 safety othic, and how nately we can operate thene 20 . plants, not how much paperwork we can produce /~not how- F 21 much documentation we can produce. We spend hundreda
[2 2 < of millions of dollarn every year,~ taxpayer's,.
23 ratepayer's dollara producing documentation which has .
24 little or no benetit. We have many programs that I
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25 see contribute little to nuclear safety'as compared'to~
2R 1 t. h e cont of running thone programn. *l 2 MR. B h00 Gil Thank you.
3 MR. WIGGINH: Thank you.
4 Donald W. Delcore, Sr. followed by 5 Danny Galloway and Jay Bullivan. +
6 MR. DELCORE: My name in Donald De1 Core, Dr.
7 I reside at 4 Grinwold Drive,-Uncanville, Connecticut.
8 1 am here on behalf of mynolf, and I don't represent 9 any particular entity. I think an_a former employee 10 of Northeant Utilition and one who han I guenn been 11 involved enough ta be able to speak reanonably and 12 knowledgehble about the offecta of enhancement t
13 programa, and what they should con t.a i n , I think t.h a t 14 it in important to note that, an Mr. Blanch did, t. hat' < >
lb I think probably the m o n t. important anpoet. of any 16 Enhancement Program and I think a major e r.p h a n i n in 17 t.h a t program should be on trust. And I w i l' 1 touch on 18 that in a few minuten to g i'v e you nome idean. I don't 19 believe this particular program in doing much. ~
20 The other'innue, and there'are 21 , banically two innuen involved, one of them in 22 intimidation. And I think' people generally feel 23 intimidated, and become intimidated upon any ni tuation' ' -
( 24 where they determine the discrepancy t o b e ,- they 25 become aware of a discrepancy, and.at that poi n t. they
- 29 i
g- ; 1 are intimidated t. o the point. that ii they have-seon h .J 2 other peoplo beforo them being chantined, being itred, 3 any iorm at a)) of any kind of intimidation or 4 dincrimination being dinplayed upon them, cert' inly it 5 chillo them to the point that they will not corn e 6 forward with the innuen that nood to come forward t. o 7 unhance nuclear safety.
A And i think that in tho pant becauno T 4 rained many, many innuon in the past, and, in fact, am 10 a victim of thone circumntancon, I bo11ovo that. the 11 people who are there now have to neo nome puninhment, f 12 and nome change in the oryanization, both the plant
! 13 admi n i s t.r a t i on , and the corporato administration, no 14 that they can again regain the confidence that if they 1S came forward with a problem, and nomebody i n t.i m i d a t e d 16 them, dincriminated against t. h o m , haranned them, 17 whatever, that they would fool tho,preneure for doing 18 that to a pornon, and could be thomnoivon fired or 19 nome form, nomo particular form of punishment put to 20 that. At thin point I don't think any of that han 21 taken place; and nurely over over the l a n t riou'r y e a r N ,
22 possibly livo yearn that I am awaro.of, there have 23 boon an enormoun amount of people that have'come 24 forward and ident.ified harannment, -intimidation, 4
I have,'an Mr. '
25 d i a c r i m i n a t. i on of all norto and formn.
30 '
1 Hullivan so eloquently pointed out, watched the 2 Nuclear Regulatory Comminaion ait on its hands.
3 In cloning I would like t.o point out, 4 A, I think the Performance Enhancement Program needs 5 to be applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commisalon no 6 that they better accomplish their job, and hopefully 7 Senator.Lieberman in this state who han n'relatively 8 good closeness to the president-elect Clinton would 9 possibly be able to exercise some of t h a t. pressure, 10 and get the NRC to knuckle under and start doing their 11 job.
12 As far as the enhancement program at 13 Millstone one of the inaues I think in very, very 14 important, and that you should hear, la that I have 15 communication, I continue to have communication with a 16 number of people who I formally worked with, and who I 17 formally have known as work acquaintances at 18 Millstone, and many of them have come to me in my 19 recent communications with them,* and said, "Donny, 20 nothing as changed. We have-this great-big 21 Performance Enhancement Program that is coating the i 22 ratepayers, and the individuals within the company 23 enormous amounts of money and nothing has changed. We
- 24 still don't have any confidence in the people who 25 -kicked you out of.there, and who are responsible for i
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l
._ j
-31 1 intimidating other people." I personally have had' k ;i 2 calla from a number of people who have been 3 intimidated and I personally routed them to agencien 4 and individuals who I believe who can support them and 5 help t h e m i u.i t h o u t the public disclosure that I 6 auffered through the NRC.
7 So, gee, I think you need to' do your 8 job. I am not trying to publicly criticize you. I am 9 just saying that the Nuclear R e g u l a t.o r y Commission has 10 to take a position to pretect the whistle-blowers, has 11 to t.a k e a position to abnolutely without q u a n t. i o n 12 assure that there are no chilling effectn at these 13 planta no thene people don't h e s i t.a t e t. o come forward.
14 When they don't see any action by the Nuclear 15 Regulatory Commission, and they don't see'any 16 puninhment to those who inflicted it on the people in 17 the pa s t. they are going to come forward. I npent 13 18 years at that plant I have been in the nuclear plant
.19 at 30 years. I am a supporter for nuclear power. My i
l 20 nupport for nuclear power has waned ~very,'very 21 strongly against nuclear power because of'the 22 nonregulation that I see going on at the Nuclear' 23 Regulatory C o m m i a s'a o n , especially in ny particular ?
g 24 nituation. Thank you for your time.
25 MR. WIGGINS: Can I ask a question?
l l
l
32 .
1 MR. DELCORE: Sure. -
2 HR. WIGGINS: You mentioned in your 3 discussion you said that you need to see change I 4 think you said in the plant in the corporate 5 organization. It -was unclear to me whether you were 6 suggesting change in behavior or changing, an actual 7 physical change of people. How sharp'is your view?
8 MR. DELCORE: What you are saying to true in f
I 9 both cases. There needs to be some changes in l
l 10 management all the way up that ladder, and changes in Il the attitude of some of those people. L think once l
12 that is accomplished, and as Paul pointed out, once I
13 you start to begin t.o bring back the t.r u s t in people, 14 the rest of the programs will take care of themselves, 15 and everything will get back to normal.
16 I have been in this business for a long 17 time, while I' haven't been a-manager in a civilian 18 nuclear program, I was a manager in the Navy nuclear
^
19 program for many, many years. ~The key is trust and 20 communication. And unfortunately When I first went to
- 21 Millstone I had the trust and I had the' communication.
22 But at some point around 1987-I saw them putting money 23 first and cutting corners. And, incidentally, while I j 24 am up here, and in response to your. question it is my 1
25- . understanding from talking to two or three people that-l , . - , . . . . - - , . , _ - - _ . . , .. ,, . . . _, , _ _, _ , , _ ___ ,
33 1 Unit 2 in going to go on the 11ne on the 22nd of f .;i 2 December come hell or high water. And there are going 3 to be changen in peraonnel if t.h o n e people can't get 4 the plant on the line by the 22nd of December. Let me 5 tell.you thin, I went through thin in 1988, I watched 6 people have acheduled when that plant wan going to
- 7, come iorward. I brought up n orn o problemn witb 8 radiat. ion monitorn in the control room. That wan the 9 beginning of my demise.
10 In my opinion nothing han changed from 11 1988, becaune the name thing in still going on. And I 12 think you need to look at that, and addronn that. We i
i 13 have a Performance Enhancement. Program. It. doenn$t.
14 seem to be doing anything. 1 think it in important 15 you people look into that.
16 MR. JAFFE: Denny Galloway.
17 MR. GALLOWAY: My name in Denny Galloway. I <
18 am from the Department of Environmental Protection 19 radiation control. I want to say any time there in a 2a problem with performance we are naturally concerned.
- 21. And we are happy to see the NRC in happen take a r, 22 interent in thin innue. Wo . unde rn t.and there2are some 23 improvements, and we hope there are more improvements -
24 in the near future. That in all I have to nay.
4 25 MR. WIGGINS: Thank you.
. ...:....=-.-.~.-.. - - _ - -_
M 34 1 MR. JAFFE: Mr. Jay Sullivan.
2 MR. SULLIVAN: Hi, I have been following >
.3 thin nuclear inaue for quite a while. Recently when 4 they tried putting a low level waate dump in town, 5 come to find out that the high level waste dumps were 6 becoming chock full over at Millstone I decided to 7 continue following this.
8 Now, I have been really surprised at 9 how many diiferent panela did I have t. o go ta that to 10 tell me that there is only a little fragment of this 11 problem that they can tackle, and that all the other 12 piecca lie with another panel or another committee, i'
13 and I have been involved with this Unit 2 fuel pool 14 design change. And we were down in New Haven today at 15 a prehearing conference on thin danuo. And they are 16 trying to narrow this down to ket readinga and nuclear 17 fuel pool. This wasn't even supposed to b6 there. ~ ~
18 And over the years they havv added more and more 19 nuclear material to what la now a stockpile of spent 20 fuel pools, And I don't feel that a Performance
- 21. Enhancement Program that la just designed to make 22 everybody feel good la going to do anything. Okay if 23 it is not going to protect the public safety, if they 24 are going to still continue to release radiation at my
{
l l
25 children'a school when school da in seaaion, if they * "
l l: .
m 35 l i 1 don't tell me when these radiation releases are going (J on so that if I choose I can leave town this is j ust a 2 .,
3 sham. 1 ieel that my rights are being violated. 'I 4 feel this in a nevere abuse of power- . Okay.- And T S . feel that you are part of the people that -are supposed t 6 to be protecting the citizens from thin abuse of power 7 n o t. making me feel good about it.
8 Home of the questions that-1 asked I 9 haven't been able to get much of an answer. Ilow the 10 heck do I get out down by Ocean Beach when the wind in I
11 Slowing out of the southwest if there is an accident? i 12 There in no way I can get out without being nent right 13 through -the radiation cloud it thin ever did happen, 14 if thene guyn don't have it together anu ntart.
15 releaning radiation. Okay, 1 feel that. an evacuation 16 plan that telin me that they might send my children 17 home, they even night send them to Wetheraffeld, thuy 18 might keep t'hom at the school. I don't know what they 19 are going 'to do. They say. don't call, don'=t go to the 20 school. They might send me.to Wethersfield. They 21 night send my' kids home. I can't imagine going to 22 Wethersfield on an evacuation plan and finding out 23 they did something else with my kids. I feel'that the 1 24 whole issue has to be consolidated instead of creating l '
25 all these ditferent committees to do a little< piece.
, .-,,---,.,.._.._...,--..,-._..,..m.,..._
. . , , ., . . , , - . - , , . , . , , _ , , , . . . , . . . . ._,_,,._,_---4._ - _ . , ~
3 f3 1 They need to get one King of Prunnia to deal with 2 thin, addrenn all theno innunn at the name timo and 3 not np1 inter them.
4 1 fool Northoant. can run a competent h plant over there. I know many people that work over 6 t.h o r o . I fcol confident what I hear irom t.hom.
7 Unduly burdoning them, Northeast U t.111 t i o n w i t. h a))
8 thin wante. It in n o t, a fininhed technology until you 9 do thin job and get t.h i n want.e somewhere nafe, 10 reprocean i t. , put it away.
11 One of the thingn I have been looking 12 into with all of thio defonno divernification, can't
( 13 t, h e y g e t, nome of thene contractorn to detinn and build 14 nomething for thin nuclear wante? I know E l) in 15 atarting to get involved in t h a t. . Are you guyn 16 involved in trying to take care of thin wantu that.
17 wann't nupponed to happen? We are now arquing about 18 kof factorn, and thingo like t. hat about something that 19 nhouldn't even;have been here. I' fool that'you have 20 t. o addronn all thone innuen and not aplinter them out.
21 And I_ feel that we can get together on thin, and make 22 that a nato.placo. I live here, but I don't,like to 23 go nailing or;be out around that p l a n t. When'they are 4
24 releasiny radiation. I fcol I should know that.. If I ,
-l 25 fuel it in a hazard to be there or my children I can '
!.l l
37 i 1 leave, take them out of nchool. If the wind is J
2 blowing at the nehool I don't w a n t. them releaning it 3 at my kido, if I can pull them out of school I will do i 4 it. I don't know when they are doing it. I nood the 5 information. Why can't we be provided it? Can 6 somebody tell me that? Why can't we be informed when 7 they are releaning radiation at me, or when t.h e s e 8 batch releasen are going on so I can leave town for a 9 day? In there something wrong with that?
10 MR. W1GGINS: Nothing wrong with it.
Il MR. SUhb1 VAN: With being involved as to 12 when they are releaning information, and radiation, 13 and what direction the wind in blowing, if it in 14 blowing at me or nomebody eine they can leave town if J$ they want. That io periormance. Make it sate for un.
16 Don't make it a feel good thing going around the plant 17 and not do anything to protect the public internat.
18 You have a major nuclear waste pit nitting on an 19 entuary on bong I sl and -Sound . Do you plan on <1oi ng 20 that? There is another panel or board that;is 21 eventually going to clean up this waste. Until you do 22 it nuclear power in not controlled, it in only.
23 contained. The whole object of nuclear power in to 24 control it. 10,000 yearn in a long time. Countless
{
e 25 civilizationn have disappeared in 10,000 years which
l 38 1 would put that stuff in a half life. Ilow do you
- 2 expect that world to go on? The United Staten han 3 been here for 200 yeare, and now you have to keep 4 nomething. Who in going to do this? When are you
,, 5 going to get started on it? -When is somebody going to 6 get their heado out of the aand and do something?
7 MR. WIGGINS: Let me take a second and see 8 if I understand what you are saying and how it applien 9 to what we are doing here tonight. I guean 1 heard a '
10 comment with regard to nhould there be nome type of Il mechanism to notify the pubide of releanen. I annume 12 you are talking about planned releanen of --
a 13 MR. DULLIVAN: Planned releason.
14 MR. WIGGINS: It should be no mystery to 15 anybody here that the nuclear power planta do releane, 16 planned releases. Certainly if there are accidental 17 releanos that are made they are reportable to un. If 18 it in of a high enough level to be a public problem 19 there are emergency planning provisionn to take care 20 of it, which bringa me-to the next statement"you made.
21 Yoi rought to Idght a concern with' regard to -
22 emorgency planning provisions. You talked about 23 = evacuation from Ocean Beach. You talked'about the 24 evacuation of the people. I guean you are saying
{
25 there may be a difference between plann for people l l
_ . _ _ ~ _ _-. _ _ . .- -_, _ - - _ _ - - -__-. _
39 1 living in the community, and the plann for the school k ;i 2 children in the community, such that individuals could 3 end up in two difforent places.
4 HR. SULLIVAN: There is that, that la part
~5 - of it.
6 MR. WIGGINS: You brought up a concern about ,
7 the waste, nuclear wante situation. ' Tha t' i s 'cl ea r to 8 me what your pointo are. Do you have anything eine 9 with regard to the Enhancement Program itself?-
10 MR. SULLIVAN: I am more concerned to it 11 really an Enhancement Program? Doon it addrens all 12 the nafety issue or just a feel good thing to make 13 people feel good about what they are doing and keep us 14 public in the dark no we don't know what in going on?
15 hecause 1 feel that my rights are being compromised 16 here. I live about three milen went of that. So 1 am 17 in jeopardy, and I believe that there abould be-water 18 evacuation boats. There could be one down by Ocean 19 neach where they have-that Alewife. program. ' Th e r e 20 should be large amounts of people out^of,there. They 21 have ferry boats. They have the Navy down there.
22 They need to get those~ people out. If it was*an 23 easterly wind they need someplace at Black Point to-24 get those people out.
4 25 And we are talking about-flawed' plants
1 40 1 that don't work. We are talking about bunes t.h a t '
(
2 aren't at the nchool that couldn't be brought there if 3 there was a plant-emergency, because nobody would 4 drive them into that cloud. In order to have an 5 evacuation plan that worka you have to have buses at 6 the nearent n e h o c410 , and teachern that could drive 7 them to get the kids out of there. I know they are 8 out of there. Not that somebody would drive a hun 9 into radioactive cloud and bring them home. That 10 alarm goes off you hear that guy gurgling over the PA 11 system every Saturday or once a m o n t. h . You can't 12 underntand what that thing in saying. If there was an t
13 actual emergency people would think it was just a 14 tent.
15 MR. WTGGINH: We can opend a lot of time 16 going over how emergency planning provisions work 17 that--
18 MR. SULLIVAN: I want to know you are doing
,19 your job to protect my interest.
20 HR. WIGGINS: There is more than you and us 21 in this dasue here.
22 MR. SULLIVAN: Excuse me? s 23 MR. WIGGINS: There are a number Uf parties ' ~~
(
24 involved in the emergency planning process.
25 MR. SULLIVAN: I know, they are al)
- 41
-1 f r a g in e n t e d , a different panel for them. Is nomebody kJ 2 in charge of thin whole mean or in it delegated out to 3 a million people?
I 4 MR. WIGGIN8: We don't need to get into that S today here, that.wasn't the purpose of t h e ,-m e e t i n g .
6 Are there any other comments you have with regard to 7 -the plan?
8 MR. SULLIVAN: I think they are doing a 9 reasonable job. I think Northeast is doing a 10 reasonable job. Try to prove the performance of those 11 -plants, I think they can be run safely if they are not 12 t. a k i n g all this nuclear garbage. They nhouldn't have 13 to be renponsible for t. h e nuclear wante. You have a 14 nite t h a t. isn't safe. It should be taken care of.
15 They abould be making canistera at Ell to contain this 16 no we have a future, to prove nuclear power in safe, 17 that it could be be controlled, not just contained, 18 controlled for.a long time, 10,000 yearn.
, ,1 9 MR. CIIAIRMAN: -Thankoyou very much.T We-have 20 no further cardn. Any other individualamin the 21 . audience that would be interested in-speaking?
22 A VOICE: I was curious why his first question wasn't answered why you can'*t+let the4 -public -'
23 24 know there will be a release?
(
25 HR. WIGGINS: Let me see if there are'any
-- - - - - - - - - _ - _ . - ~ . - - . _ . - - - - . - . _ - - . --
42
- 1 other comments, and maybe we can try to respond to -
2 that. I was going to take that an a comment on the 3 program.
. 4 MR. CARTER: I would like to make one 5 statement, if there are any questions, call Chernobyl.
6 Thin in not a cane of if, it in when. .
7 MR. WIGGIN8: In answer to the question ,
8 about public notification of releano let me give you 9 the straight answer and tell you right now you 10 probably aren't going to like_it. I will t. e l l you 11 what the rules are. We have taken some shotn here 12 t.o n i g h t from people, that in fine. People are due !
I their opinion about things, including how the utility 13 14 performa and how we do our job. And we take what you 15 say seriously. You may or may not believe that..
16 There are a number of un that are sitting right here 17 that take our jobs seriounly, and take public 18 criticinm aeriounly. We don't chove it off. I will 19 juat state that, 'and leave it at that.
20 in term of the question about-public 21 notification of releasen, let's - atart at'the_'high end, 22 and work down to the low end. Again, if the release 23 is of^a nature that is a significant health.h~azard, a g 24 nigr.1fichnt hazard to the people in the area those 25 releasen are high enough they start in the-emergency
._...--.a.- -
43 i 1 procean. There are reporting requirementa that.
rkJ i
2 utilition have that require them to tell it to un, 3 tell un what in going on, require them to t.a l k t.o the 4 ntate no the state can talk to your local people. And 5 your local management, your local emergency personnel, 6 police, f~ i r e people can be engaged in actionn needed 7 to provide reasonable annurance of protection. That 8 in real high end-type stuif.
9 you get down into the lower end of it, 10 thene plants are given a 11conne to operat.o. That in 11 how the legal system han been given to un by Congrenn 12 as the framework that. we operato under. Part of that I
13 licenne includes limit.n of releane. If the releanen 14 are w i t. h i n thone limita there are no requirements that 15 we have that. they notify un an the release in 16 occurring or notify anyone eine. They junt aren't 17 there. The requirements aren't. in the regulations, 18 they aren't in the licenne. There are requiremento 19 for reporta over broad periods of time. Six months 20 there in a semi-annual report that in available to 21 you. All you have to do in go to the local public 22 library and read that.
I don't understand"vky'they e MR. Si!L LIV A N :
23 j 24 can't delay the stuff until the wind changen, if it in
~
25 blowing at my kids school I can't accept that. I know~
44 + ;
1 how much they can release without having to report. it :
2 to the public. I nure wouldn't want to be around it.
3 HR. WIGGIND: They have to report 'releanen 4 that they make on at leant a semi-annual basin in a b componite report to us. And that report in made !
6 publicly available. That in really not renponne to 7 t. h e concern you have. The concern you have as I ft u nd e r n t.a nd it in if they are ready to make a release ,
9 you would like t. o have nome vehicle where you would <-
10 know that in about t. o occur; in that not the case?
11 MR. 8tlLLJVAN: That would he a nice way to 12 t e n t. out the planning nyntem to noe if i t. really works i
13 it people choose if they want to leave, test i t. out, 14 don't just say it workn.
15 MR. WIGGJNS: That part in n o t. one of the 16 requirements that we place on-any plant. That in junt 17 not in our not of requirements.
- 18 MR. DEhCORE: The real answer to nio 19- question, in terms of a boiling water reactor they are 20 discharging all'the time, 365 daya a year. They are '
21 discharging every day. You can'_t avoid it.
22 MR. WIGGINS: For-one of the units,t yes.- ,
23 HR. DELCORE The other units discharge,_the 24 boilern alwayn discharge.
-(
25 MR. S tiL LI V A N : I learned something.' They l'
l'
' 45 1 have been keeping that information from me for how
',k 2 many years?
3 MR. -WIGGINS: It is not a secret. The type of release is not, the type of release that is made
$ and the amount that is released in most is not 6 expected to have a significant public health hazard.
7 MR. SULLIVAN: You are saying that is an 8 allowable limit of the amount of poison you can put in 9 somebody's coffee?
10 MR. WIGGINS: There is an allowable release il at power plants.
12 MR. SULLIVAN: Is there any way it can't be 13 released more often so I can leave?
14 MR. WIGGINS: It is not required.
15 MR. SULLIVAN: What are you guys doing?
16 MR. WTGGINS: It is not needed.
17 MR. SULLIVAN: If you can't change-the 18 rules--
19 MR. WIGGINS: It is not needed.
20 MR. SULLIVAN:- I think 1t-is needed'"you are 21 afraid you are_ going to panic the public.
.22 . MR. BLANCH: May-I try to respond'in n' 23 positive manner?
g 24 MR. WIGGI 1: 'Yes.
25 MR. BLANCH. Again, I am one of the'first ,
46 1 persons who werewi.111ng to criticine the Nuclear -
2 Regulatory Commission. I hope this gentleman will
'L3 believe what I said. I have been with Northeast 4 Utilities over 20 years. I worked on Millstone Unit 5 1 ,- Unit;2 and Unit-3. Approximately 15, 18 years ago 6 Millstone Unit 1, which is the only plant that ever
,7 releases any significant amount of r a dioa c ti vi ty into 8 the atmosphere, and it is in the form primarily of 9 noble gas activity, which does not have any harmful 10 effect, low concentrations.
11 Back in the mid '70's I believe it was 12 a significant modification was made to Millstone Plant 13 the form of an off-gas system, which I'believe 14 4ed tv- amount of radioactive material that was 15 r 4ed fi om the plant by a factor of at least a 16 thousand, probably greater than that. Even prior to 17 that modification there was no measurable radiation 18 down wind except under certain wind conditions. Once ,
19 -inca-while Electric < Boat picked up some on - their i 20 radiometers. It was very, very insignificant.dt .
R21 If this-gentleman is really concerned 22 about radiation, the amount that-is-released and its
-23 affect is immeasurable with respect to t'h e general 24 public under normal conditions. There are no
{
25 instruments that can measure any of this radiation,
I 47.
[g i 1 gaseous radiation ou tfs i d e of the plant boundaries - i 2 during normal conditions. If he has really a concern 3 I think he needs to study the effects of radiation, 4 and the amount of radiation actually being' released.
5 As I say, if.there is criticism to come out of-this 6 meeting I will be the first one to come forward. As 7 far as the dangers of the radiation due to the noble 8 gases being released from the plant I personally don't-9 see any danger. I hope that comforts him a .l i t t l e 10 bit.
11 MR. SUbbTVAN: What about all the nuclear 12 fuel pools? 3 have been t o.l d by Northeast: officials 13 they have do, they have filtering systems when they 34 get out of the pools they release to the atmosphere.
15 The problem is you are going to keep more and more 16 there. They are going to keep releasing a little. Is 17 that how they are going to get rid of it? When are 18 they going t:0 finish the job of controlling: the atom?
19 When are you going to finish your job of controlling 12 0 - the atom? Are you' going to let-it--Geak"out~somehow, 21 and tell everybody it is safe?
- 22 MR. WIGGINS: Any other-comments?"r 4 23 Sir, state your name so'we can 24 recognize you.
(
25 MR. FONTAINE: Raymond Fontaine. I retired
l 4
48 -l l
fron. Northeast Utilities about two and a half years -l
~
1 2 ago after 21 years in Unit 1 here in Millstone. For 3 the first six years I was in the operations 4 department. And then I was never nuclear trained so I 5 went into the-maintenance department as electrical 6 maintenance, and then later maintenance technician l 7 doing paperwork.
l 8 No 4, you are talking about morale. In 9 the beg)nning when you wanted to do something repair a 10 job or whatever, made out a little one-page 11 maintenance request, gave it to the mechanics, 1
l 12 electricians, out they went, did the job. And you
(
13 tested equipment, okay. That was it. You would file '
, 14 the paper away. Now, if something goes wrong the l
15 operationn deparment has to make out a work order, 16 which is several pages, that goes down to the l
17 maintenance department, another work >out order is made +
18 out. The last I knew there was not three pages, but' 19 four pages of each page Then you:have~to-go get the~
L 20 control room to sign it, approve of it, get equipment 21 tagged out, which is' logical, a safety thing,ebut 22, getting pretty involved to do-your job over there. .
23 'That-is one of the reasons that I '<
{
24 decided to leave. It was just getting, the paperwork 25 was getting too involved. And-if you are talking 1
e
49 I.
, 1 about morale and trust, all right, you call.a guy up kJ at 2:00 in the morning, night like ~ this, raining, 2
3 snowing, whatever. He gets up. !!e comes in. He 4 figures, well, he can get that job done in a half an 5 hour. 'Ph e n you have to wait for !! P - t o check out'the 6 area, which I go along with, some areas are hot, 7 radiation, everything else, some areas are pretty 8 clean. You go in with your street clothes on, no 9 problem. But then a lot of times you have to wait for 10 security to come in and unlock the gate or something, 11 and let you in. Now, if they t r u s t. you enough to come 12 in and repair a piece of equipment, vital equipment, 4 13 no matter what it is, some of these guards in the 14 security department, some of them can even write their 15 own name, and some of them are n o t. too smart, a s.d I am 16 talking from experience. So then you have to wait for _
In the meantime, whatever is broken down 17 these guys.
18 is just sitting there. And then, well, then you have 19 the whole job done, ard in and out of your work 20 clothes, and everything-else. And then beforeGyou can
.21 go home, maybe five, 6:00 in the m o r n i n g , ~ ~y ou Th a v e to 22 finish all of this paperwork, be c a u s e ~.a s ' th ec 'old story 23 goes "That is the way the NRC wants~dt.* ~
- 24 The NRC is the boogeyman of nuclear
~
25 energy or so-called boogeyman. The same way with-the
50 y
-1 security department. You want to go in somewhere? .
2 "Oh, you can't go in there." "Why not?" "Well, the 1
3 NRC regulations say you can't go in there, their 4 rules." " bet me read the rule book." "Oh, no, you 5 can 't :see that, .that is security." You are beating 6 your head against the wall over there.
7 It is a good' place to work. I enjoyed 8 it. I enjoyed every year I was there. And it is just l 9 getting where a lot of these men who.-are very devoted i
10 to the company, Northeast Utilities, are getting very 11 4incouraged, because I have talked to them recently.
12 And you are going to lose an awful lot of good people .
k 13 over there with a lot of knowledge. What it is going 14 to do, it is going to hurt the plant, because you are ,
15 going to have t. o get new people in there to replace 16 them. And these people don't know where all the
~
17 little nitty-gritty corners, and everything else are.
18 And so I think if you maybe try and cut i
down some of this. paperwork that everything has :to be l 19 20 documented. You can't go to the men's roomEwithout 21 being documented'almost. And i t ' i s jus t ng e t' ting 'on t 22 of hand. The definition of an elephant is a mouse i
23 built to government specifications. And the same way 24 here, then the paperwork goes up to nuclear records.
[
25 And they microfilm it all. And then it gets sent up
~ Si -
-'~ ~
i 1 to Berlin. That is another added coat.
li( J 2 And then another thing about the public 3 iear you abould do more to educate the public on -
4 nuclear energy. You mention you work at a nuclear 5 power house the first t.hing people think of is the big .
6 mushroom cloud. That la what they figure thin thing 7 is. It is not. It da controlled power.
8 And I don't know if you any of you 9 people read the Hartford courant, that is the paper 10 that I get every day. Whenever something happena 11 either at Millatone or at Haddam Neck it is always on 12 the obituary page, seems that either they hate 1 13 Northeast. Utilitien or they just. don't understand 14 nuclear power, but that seems to be where they put it 15 all the t.i m e .
16 And I think that Northeast Utilities, 17 and NRC could do more to uducate the general public, 18 because the people who work there know what it is. 1 19 <mean, they work with it all the time, respect it.- And 20 because I have been in every part of that: plant,-
21 radiationwine, and everythi'ng else, I am not aware of
- 22 it, but I respect,it. It never killed me, and so I'
.23 think that :t o do more for the'public and the" morale of
( 24 the people working there, do more about making it
^
25 easier for the person to do his job, not to hinder
52 1 him, because you have to go through so many different "
2 channels, and everything else, to get your job done.
- 3 And if this gentleman back-here who was" i
l 4 concerned, if he looks in his phone book there is a 5 section in there, South ern 'New - Engl a nd > Telephone' phone 6 book, two or three pages which tell what to do in a l
l 7 nuclear power emergency within a 10-mile radius. 'And 8 also there are the alarm systems mounted on strategic
, 9 power line poles around which give an alarm in case.
I I 10 Also, 1 guess there are radio stations, and stuff, t
! 11 that will inform the public.
i l
12 So if you want the morale over there, i
k 33 all through Millstone, and other plants to improve put i
l 14 more trust in the workers. They are going to go-out 15 and do a job. Let them do it. Don't hinder them with 16 a bunch of rules and regulations, you can't do this or
- - ~
17 you can't do that. Let them do the 1ob, and get the 18 plant running. I have b e e n th r o u g h every kind of 19 shutdown over there and-we have always managed-to get ' '
20 it going again. We never killed anybcdy.--
That is not true. '
21 MR. CARTER:
22 -
MR. WIGGINS: Excuse me.- Wait. Werare .
23 interented'in what you said. Let we see it'1T^can
( 24 understand the thrust of the comments that you made, 25 -basically something that I-think may be-meaningful t or '
. .. ~_ . . - _ . . _ . -. - = . . .
53 i 1 what we are here tonight. -You" talked of a lot of ks 2 paperwork, and a lot of interfaces you have to go 3 through in order to get work done. It sounds'to me 4 the concern you are addressing something along'the Si sline the efficiency of the' work process,-and thenfact 6 it is hard to get work done with all the 7 admi.nistrative things that have to be done, a 8 motivating influence in the work force.
9 MR. FONTAINE: Right. It wouldn't reduce 10 the efficiency it would just speed up the repair of 11 whatever the job has to be done.
12 MR. WIGGINS: Thank you. Any additional I
13 comments?
14 MR. SULLTVAN: I would like to comment on 15 that a li t tl e about the warning. i was outside I 16 believe Monday they fired off a test siren in East 17 Lyme here. I couldn't-understand a word he:was i
! 18 saying. You'~can't even hear. You-are lucky enough to 19 hear somebody saying this is-a : test.- Then that'is 20 great. If it is an actual. emergency you-can hardly 21 hear it. How do you know if they say it'is at e s t' or 22 not? The other thing-about this emergency =,
23 instructions in the-yellow-page front of theaphone
! 24 book, two and three of the yellow pages. I flipped 25 through 32 pages of yellow index. What are people l
54 -
1 going to do when that says two and three and it is on .
2 33 and 347 <
- 3 MR. WIGGINS: Back to that siren, can you 4 give-us an approximate address or location?
+ 5 MR. SULLIVAN: I was in East Lyme by'Mr. P's 6 Package Store.
7 MR. WIGGINS: Do you have a street?
8 MR. SULLIVAN: Flanders Road'by Travel 9 Lodge, and I believe they fired it off Saturday. I 10 could hear it from where I was in Waterford, but over '
11 there I couldn't hear it. All I could hear is a bunch 12 of gurgling, barely make out somebody's name and -
I l 13 " test."
14 MR. WIGGINS: Do we know where that is?
15 Flander. Road by the Travel Lodge in 16 East Lyme. Any other comments?
17 MR. CARTER: I have a couple of responses.
18 One about the Hartford Courant and where they publish.
19 If a story l e ' pro Nort'he a s t' Uti li tie s it=is written up -
20 by Sue Kinsman and it gets front page coverage 21 statewide. If it is negative, if it is negative'1;t *
~2 2 gets written up by a cub-reporter, in ay. case it was 3'
23 Ellen Nachashema, and'gets buried in SectionoD page
{
24 six local news and bulletin. As far as --
25 MR. WIGGINS: *So what should we take away '
55 i 1 from that? Surely you don't expect us to control .the la 2 editorial part of a newspaper, do you? ;
I 3 MR.ICARTER: I am stating that NRC, '
4 Northeast Utilities is in collusion to bury the truth l
.5 of what is going.on with~the attempt <by. Northeast l 6 Utilities to monopolize the energy system in New 7 England. And in' answer to.Mr. Sullivan's. question 8 about escape routes, you won't see an escape route in 9 New London because Northeast Utilities which just 10 acquired Seabrook, which is as hazardous as this dump 11 over here, Northeast is not going to provide an escape 12 down here because there is none at Seabrook. And J-1 13 Seabrook, gentlemen, in your backup for the north when 14 this place does go. So don't expect --
15 MR. WIGGINS: I don't understand that point.
16 1 don't understand how Seabrook is the backup for j 17 Millstone. I don't understand that. Can you-tell me '
l l 18 what that is?
+19 '
MR. CARTER: I am sorry you don't understand 20- that:since you,Mr.~Wiggins, are such'anrofficial in l
21- the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
1 22 MR. WIGGINS: . -Can you' restate =1t why'it is a 23 backup for it?
24 MR. CARTER: What I am stating is that 4
'i 25 Northeast Utilities is very aware of the hazards at
56 -
1 Millstone Point. They are aware of the corruption in -
r 2 management and labor and they are quite happy with it, 3 because this place is making money for them, enough 4 money to buy off politicians and attorneys _and 5 newspapers. I said I wanted to respond to some'of the 6 questions. I would love Sue Kinsman to publish my 7 story on the front page of the Hartford Courant. I 8 attempted to get a reporter from the Hartford Courant 9 this past week and was threatened with arrest if I 10 didn't leave. And Sue Kinsman told me at that time il that she would attempt to corroborate some of my 12 allegations. I would love some response. Thank you.
13 MR. WIGGINS: Any further comments?
14 MR. BENEDICT: In your opening comments you 15 said that the NRC would issue a response and 16 evaluation of the DEP. Can you give us an approximate 17 time frame?
18 MR. WIGGINS: Early next year, very early.
4 19' MR.-BENEDICT: January, February?--i '
20 MR. WIGGINS: In that timo frame.'"That.is ,
21 .what I would~ anticipate. I don't say thalito~suggest 22 we already know'the answer.- That would be.what I 23 would think to be the-' earliest tinwr we would"be in'a g 24 position to say that we accepted the plan if we
~~~'
,25 accepted it. Our normal process isrif we'had=some %
-57
.g_; -1 questions or problems with what has been offered to us AJ 2 by the utility there would be a deliberative process 3
3 that would go over time, and it would delay 4 acceptance, just like any other licensing act. But E
.S e our schedule, the schedule we'are internally keeping 6 for our reviews assuming the reviews come up favorably 7 would indicate a report early ne'xt-year, January, 8 February.
9 MR. WIGGINS: Yes, sir, Mr. DelCore.
10 MR. DELCORE: Is there going to be some kind 11 of a response? You took our name and address.
12 MR. WIGGINS: There wasn't an intent to k 13 respond individually, no. What we would intend to do 14 is to take the t r a n s c r i p t. , and to review it. There 15 are some good comments that have been provided here, 16 and we, as I said earlier, have provided some issues 17 to Northeast Utilities in a letter, and we asked, 18 ~"Here are our issues as we nee them, tell us how your_
.19 plan addresses those?" What we determined was to 4
.20 decide whether.,there were no issues we vould_ propose 21 or do some looking ourselves. Certainly when we issue r22 a report on our acconta plan what we happened;here 23 would be considered, here is what we looked at, here 24 is what we included.
{
25 MR. DELCORE: The reason I ask I--
58 '
1 MR. WIGGINB: You don't have to worry about--"
2 that. We have done this type of thing before. We are 13 . going to put the transcript in the libraries where we ~
4 put the plan. We are going to put our report in the 5 13brary also. Hopefully"the Idbraries will keep'it.
6 We have gone out beyond normal. You know we have the 7 document at the library. We went beyond the five 8 libraries so these attendant documents would be 9 available. If you can't find it if you want to see it 4 10 if you get in touch with us we will try to make 11 arrangements.
12 MR. BLANCH: I would like to make another 13 constructive comment.
14 MR. WIGGINS: Sure.
15 MR. BLANCH: And this relates to 16 performance, not o r. l y performance at our nuclear power 17 plants,-but also comments within the Nuclear -
18 Regulatory Commission. All of us are working by 10 19 CFR 19 to bring issues of deficiencies forward to 20 either management or to the NRC's attention? We have 21 a legal obligation to bring these issues' forward, and 22 we-bring them forward with the understanding -that 23 there will be no retaliation for-bringing: any of these
- t'
{
24 issues forward, no matter how small or big these 25 issues happen to be. We are provided supposedly 1
p '-
' 59 1 protected under 10 CFR Title 57. If you are working k ;;
2 for another manpower licensee it is 30.7.
3 I have had many discussions with 4 members of the U.S. Congress and Senate about this, and also the Inspector General. The process
-5 6 paperworkwise looks real good. It says if you
~7 perceive that you have received harassment, 8 intimidation, retaliation or bringing forth a safety 9 concern one may, and I stress the word "may" go to the 10 federal department or U:S. Department of Labor, not an 11 absolute requirement.
12 The reason that that provision was put 13 in there is for those people who have suffered damage 14 as a result of being terminated from their employer.
15 Only the Department of Labor has the authority to 16 reinstate them. That is a reason that provision is 17 put in there. There is no requirement to go to the 18 Department of Labor.
-19 In my situation I perceived *and'w13cged 20 I had been retaliated against, but I did not suffer-21 any punitive damages from a result of being demoted 22 other than I had de'initely received r e t a l i a t i'o n . I 23 was told by what's his name1 here, Mr. Raymond here, go 24 to the Department of Labor. Well, the Department of
(
25 babor investigated my situation, even though-they do
60 ,
1 not-have profensional inventigatorn, they are not ,
2 trained. They happened to find in my favor that 1
'3 won, in fact, retaliated againnt !or raining a nafety 4 concern.. And then after that decinion came down'from 5 the Federal Department of Labor, Northeant. tit i l i t i o n 6 decided to appeal thin.
7 Thin wan about two and a half yearn 8 ago. That whole proconn han ntill n o t. been acted on 9 by t. h e 11ecretary of Labor. I am still hanging in 10 lin.bo waiting for a decinion trom the Secretary of 11 Labor 1o sign a document. She refunen to do no even 12 after Senator 1ieberman han cent l o t, t o r n . Thin f
' 13 procoon doen not work. Congrena han recognized it 14 doen not wor 3. .
1S The energy bill junt. nigned by 16 President. Bunh within the l a n t. two weeks, part of a 17 provinion of the now energy bill which in one-stop 18 licenning wan a provinion which ntrengthened the 19 provinion for whintle-blowern. It lengthened the time 20 from 30 dayn to I believe it in now 180 days. 3.Homeone
-21 -han to apply to the-Dopartment of La bor . ',
22 The mont important provision I Unuld 23 advocate to both Benator Lieberman and other
_j 24 congrenamen and also in the Innpector General 'i n to
. 25 require tho-NRC to i n v e n t. i g a t e thone particular
. 61
. 1 . allegations of retaliation against individuals. It
- k. a, 2 does happen. This is the only regulation that I am 3- aware of within 10 CFR that the NRC sends it over to 4 another totally ineffective bureaucratic agency called 5 the Department of babor,.which will never: do anything.
6 Why can't the NRC enforce its own regulations? It is 7 only NRC internal policy that provides them~from 8 looking into retaliation? Yes, I got big 9 investigation because retaliation in the investigation -
10 was so severe. Three years later I am waiting for a 11 decision from the NRC and Department of Labor.
12 The point I am trying to get at, if we fi 13 want to st op this chilling effect, and people to come 14 (;orward with safety concerns, let's make the process 15 work. If they do receive retaliation let'the NRC come 16 in and investigate that retaliation in a timely 17 fashion because of apparent pressure from the NRC. '-
18 This provision of the energy bill that was recently
~19- adgned, the provision 4that required-the-NRC: to
-420 investigate was removed from the bill. N o w ,- I don't 21 know who removedJit. *Itnwas probably-somebody, a 22 utility lobbyist or NRC. influenced. We no longer have.'s 23 that-provision. The~NRC still~-has no.responsibili~ty- -
j 24 by their internal policy to investigate retaliation. ._
25- MR. WIGGINS: That-is not true. .I can
62 '
~
I understand that you may disagree with how things 2 transpired in your case, and how things transpire in 3 . general. The statement you"made is not true. '
4 MR. BLANCH: They investigate some.
5 5 o -MR. WIGGINS: The sta temerf t' you*just 'usde ci s 6 not true. The NRC, there arefprovisions as Mr. Blanch 7 says, regulations that talk to how we deal with those 8 that we regulate, not the individual who feels 9 aggrieved by the company. We have as you said, t h e r e' .
10 are two regulations they cited 50.7, 30.7. Those 11 regulations say that a company, a licensee of the NRC-12 cannot retaliate in terms of harassment, 1
i 13 discrimination for one of its employees, contractors, 14 whatever, the reason that that individual brought up a 35 safety concern, either to them or to us. That is 16 basically what it is getting at. That is what the 17 rule is.
18 Now, where do we come out? What the
'1 9 NRC. contract'is looking'at'the. utilities tempany, if 20 the individual is subject-to intimidation'ornt.,
21 discrim-ination or retaliation there is another' federal 22 agency, the Department of Labor, that makes*that-
, 23 individual whole. That is their purpose to"make -the l
(
24 individual whole. The NRC deals with the company 25 saying if you are found to have-exhibited this type of
- 63 1 .an act you violated our requirements and you-go after
y i
&J 2 the company. There are two investigations that-take s3 place. It is not in our regulatory authority to 4 require a company to do anything with regard to any
,5 employees. We can't order a reinstatement.=-It is 6 illegal for us to do that. 110 w e v e r , if the act that 7 occurred is a violation of our requirements that'the 8 company committed We would go after the company. We would investigate acts that we believe -- we would -;
9 10 investigate instances that we believe were more likely 13 than not the result of retaliation and intimidation.
12 We don't do them all. We make a judgment in terms of 13 what is the case we have at hand. And the test we 14 provide is given the information we have is it more 35 likely than not that the retaliat. ion and 16 discriminatory act occurred?
17 As you accurately said our process is 18 to tell the individual he has-personal rights with the 19 Department.of Labor. .And the Department of Labor acts 20 first with the individual, then we come to the ,
21 individual. I-understand your concerns aboutt how long 22 the process takes. You have~to understand _we are 23 required to-investigate cases of r e t a l i a t-i on , and 24 intimidation, but it is those cases that we find that
(
25 it passes more likely than not.
64 -
'l MR. BLANCH: It might take four yearn while 4 2 the guy in losing his house. In conclusion, I would 3 like to nay as a result of having to comply with 4 federal regulations in bringing forth aafety concerna
, 5 there are literally hundreds of victima out'there who 6 have sacrificed their entire life, and the NRC han 7 failed to provide any nrotection whatsoever-for any of 8 these individuals I am aware of. There are some cases 9 gojng on out in Palo Verde out in Arizona right now.
10 The individual is waiting for a Department of Labor 11 decision, probably w i .1 1 take years. The individual in 12 probably going through hell, and dentroying his life, 13 probably costing him or her 50, 100,000 to go through 14 the court nystem to protect themselves an-a result of 15 raising safety concerns required under law. What the 16 NRC needs to do is get that procean otraightened out.
17 MR. WIGGINS: Th e -proce ss is close to what 18 you jual described. An I said, if there is a case 19 that an individual feels thatra di'scritmina tory :a c t 20 occurred <against him or herselfewe ask or~werinform 21- the individual that the individual wri te to the 22 Department of Labor. And you-are.right;our^procons is 23 if that individual goes to-the Department of Labor, we 24 wait for the Department of Labor to conduct the
{
25 i n v e s t i g a t. i nn . However, we do-act at a point earlier' f
65
'g 1 than you are suggesting. We act substantially-befor.e d .;
2 the Secretary of Labor decision in some way. We would 3 act in an area directly, which is the first area of 4 review. We would would write what is termed a 5 chi 111ng effect letter. We write the utility, this 6 thing happened, the record came out with this 7 conclusion. -
8 MR. BLANCH: Tell me why that doesn't have a 9 chilling erfect of all the other individuals in your ~
10 organizat. ion? I understand what you are saying in 11 true too, that. you wait until the actual Secretary of 12 Labor process works through it could be a long period
- 13 of time. You have in other forums described your 14 feclings with regard to that.
15 MR. WIGGINS: Yes, sir.
16 MR. DELCORE: A comment on that. I think in -
17 the case of Sullivan and myself there were letters, 18 seven or nini letters going back and forth of chilling 19 effect, and nothing has-been-done. I think-that is 20 important to point out.
21 , MR. WIGGINS: Nothing has been d o n e *'i n terms 22 of what?
23 MR. DELCORE: Some restriction to the
{ 24 licensee so that<he doesn't do that anymore. I think 25 level one, two or three penalty I believe.
l l
^~
66 .
1 MR. WIGGINS: You-are talking enforcement. ".
2 action?
- 3 ' MR. DELCORE: Some enforcement action ~ yes.
'4 '
MR. WIGGINS: 4'believe'that is accurate.
5 MR. DELCORE: I know it is accurate. .
6 MR.'WIGGINS: Again,'if t-hat +1s the$ riDht 7 thing to do when it is time for it"to occur it will 8 occur. But I understand your comments about the time 9 it takes for the process to work.
10 MR. DELCORE: It is a huge deterrent. The ^
11 guy in forced to settle. He in going to be ruined 12 financially if he doesn't. What he is saying, what I f
i 13 tried to point out to you before, it removes the 14 trust, 15 MR. WIGGINS: Even at that point, although 16 it may not be very visible the Department of L a b o r',
17 you know how the process works, the Department of 18 Labor first tries to negotiate a settlement 'between 19 the parties. The.way they do' business doesn't
'r20 -necessarily first~end up at a. finding :on 'one: rside or 21 the other. -They first try to negotiate a settlement.
22 We know thatsthat. happened. Wetget informed *of the 23 outcome of those cases. Even in those cases in which -
24 there is a negotiated settlement we'still look into
{
25 it. The NRC still looks into it. We look to -- I
- 67 -
i 1 tell you how it works, we get a negotiated s e t' t 'l e m en t .'
fa We get documents 2 We get the settlement agreement.
3 from.the Department.of Labor. -The;way,we do it in 4 King of Prussia, we have the liason concerning tho' 5 .-Departwent of Labor,:whatever field notes. exist,-case 6 officer, Department of Labor, we-try to find out where 7 that individual was --
conclusions on the merits.
8 Sometimes there are no conclusions. We try to find 9 out what was learned in the i nves ti ga ti on . Then we 10 make our own determination what to do. Even in the 11 tace of s e t t. l e m e n t between two parties if in the 12 information we can collect from the individual, the
{ 13 Department of habor case in our mind, if it is-more 14 likely than not that a discriminatory act occurred we 15 will atill pursue that with the licensee. You can 16 make the detail if we make the more likely than not 17 ca)) correctly. That is the process.
18 MR. DELCORE: Its effect on what we are 39 considering, performance enhancement is-very 20 detrimental to the trust, performance of the -
21 Performance Enhancement Program. What happens is 22 those people who sense that chilling effect they don't
~
23 see all this peripheral stuff happening,'and-- -
g 24 consequently it destroys any credibility that you may 55 try to come forward with on a Performance Enhancement
68 '
That. is what my point is.
~
1 Program.
2 MR. CHAIRMAN: Your point has a lot of 3 merit. At least the people that understand what is '
4 going on are the parties involved, which are the
+5 company, t h e = N R C "a n d the individual. .-B u tt h a t 6 individual's peers, what they. feel or don't feel with 7 regard to Mhat is going on would be a concern. :That 8 is what we attempt to try to get to in the chilling 9 etfeet letters. You may suggest'that we are not 10 ultimately totally offective. You may be correct.
11 You understand that is why we send those letters.
12 MR. DELCORE: The ensuing investigation.that 13 is conducted on that person's behalf by your 14 organization further intimidates.
15 MR. WIGGINS: Intimidates?
16 MR. DELCORE: The individuals who are at 17 that particular site, because essentially.they are 18 questioned at the site. It really magnifies again the 19 c h iel l-i n g problem,+and it magnif.ies'the distr'ust-that 20 the individual b e g i n s - t o h'a v e : w i t h ' t h e whole' system.
21 My comments s t r i c t 1'y are related'to performance 22 enhancement and the' trust.. n w 23 MR. 'WIGGINS' Thatois an interesting
- point -i d:
24 if we go to investigate, and do the investigation 4
25 on-site that may have a chi'lling effect.
- 69 4
i 1 MR. D E12C O R E : Yea, I have been telling the
- d;J 2 Department of L&bor and NRC that for five years. It 3 has an adverse effect. I have talked to the FBI.
4 They come to my home. I talk to OSHA. They deal with S me away-from the site. They dealt with me in -a common 6 ground site in a library. Nobody knew we were 7 talking. I think that is very, very important. I 8 think that is one of the effects that the Nuclear 9 Regulatory Commission can do to enhance again the 10 trust innue.
Il MR. WIGGINS: That la a good point. I 12 understand your point. I see where you are r ing J
l 13 from. It probably wouldn't do us much good to have 14 any more of a detailed discussion. Anything else?
15 MR. THEMING: Yes, sir. Jim Theming, 16 T-h-e-m-i-n-g. I would like to speak in support of
- 17 the Performance Enhancement Plan. I think they have 18 hit the nail on the head with a lot of issues, 19 specifically I think the one most important thing they
~ ~
20 have identified a di-lemma that really h i t s - h o m e ~, 3 and 21 that is that a lot of managers at the site of 22 Northeast Utilities are very outstanding technical 23 people, that doesn't necessarily make them very good 24 in terms of managing people. I think we'have seen
{
l 25 evidence of a lot of individuals here this evening,
~
L
p 90 .
1 and I think the fact that they recognize that they
(. --
2 have thone problema in very good. I think maybe they 3 could have ntated it a little more clearly inalde the 4 plant, but it.in detinitely in there.
4
,5 "2
. 14 wanted to just-nay one more thing',~and 6 that in not really stated'in the plan, and it han to 7 do with NU'n posi tion within the industry. I-know I
8 back in 1987 they were trying to contain conta. And u
l- 9 perhapa we are heading more towards a middle of'the 10 pack approach to renolution in the i n d u n t. r y , perhapn l
11 the goal of thin program in to become more of an
(
12 induntry leader. Thone are the only commento I have.
tt l
13 Thank you.
I 14 MR. WIGGINH: My nenne of the m a t t. o r in we 1h are about done with the m e e t. i n g . 80 if that in, 16 unlenn there in anyone that han a.norioun objection ~--
17 MR. SULLIVAN: 3 would like'to ask one more ~ '
is quention.
[
19
. MR. WIGGINS:- " O tri c k l y .-
20 MR. SULLIVAN: 11would like'to know what the .
21 NRC in-doing about the decomminnioning of the Yankee -
-22 Row.
23 -
MR. WIGGINS: The-pace-of the g
24 decomminaioning in not our~ decision. 'W e w ou l d nt 25 hanton it.
i i
' 71 1
l i
1 A VOICE: What is the schedule? !
- k J _
l 2 MR. WIGGINS: We don't have a schedule. :
l 3 They have asked for what is called a decommissioning 4 order. That is what takes the plant formally from an e
S operating status to--what they have mow, posistien?only 6 license. They aren't allowed to operate the facility.
7 A formal decommissioning order which requires a~ renew 8 of plan. I don't have any first-hand information what 9 the plan has it in or schedule.
10 MR. SULLIVAN: Do they still plan to return 11 to? Whether this is just going to be signed or 12 whether something is going to be done about that? I T
13 believe.if you would look into that, and pursue, find ..
14 out what the cost is, the total cost of nuclear power 15 you would arrive at after you decommissioned. Is that 16 too much of a figure?- Would that make the whole thing 17 a bad gamble to begin with:11 you did decommission 18 this? Is thwt why'there is a problem doing-that, it 19 .would.make nuclear power totally uneconomical?
20 MR. WIGGINS: The whole issue of 23 -. decommissioning is one several hours long. The' Yankee
. 22 Row plant they have applied for a decommissioning 23 order. In that application you will'get much1df the
- 24 information you just asked for.
25 '
MR. SULLIVAN: I understand there ,are~other
+As -+2 & e a- o. ..mL,.A h- e a y
^'
l 72 .t l l
l 1
1 plants around the country that have been lett, and ~'
e i
2 they haven't been cleaned up. Is there any emphasis 3 being placed on this to do.what was supposed to be 4 done in the first place when they are done instead of 5- just leaving these-giant grave stones? -
6 MR. WIGGINS: The emphasize is^to make sure t
7 the p 1 r. n t activity is appropriate. There i s no i
8 emphasis to apply any extensive pressure to clean it 9 up immediately. You have to understand when you are 10 looking at a nuclear pcwer plant like Yankee Row with 11 a long operating history it may be best not to do 12 anything quickly. You have to look at the plan.
{
f 13 MR. DURR: I know a little bit about 14 decommissioning, but not a great deal. You have to 15 understand there are multiple ways that plant can he 1
{- 16 returned back to the environment. One is entombment, 17 you are content-making a tombstone out of this. I
- i 18 wouldn't use that analogy, but it is-similar to that, 1,
19 or they can restore it to--its original-priestine f
20 condition. But so until they decide how they: intend-n 21 to do that f a ci li tyJ; and it-could be-entombment-as Mr.
22' Wiggins pointed out, or it could be restore the site, 23 until they make a submittal, and:we approve-it,:'nobody ?
{
24 can answer your question.
25 MR. SULLIVAN: Are _ there - any
- cdst
. 73 i 1 projections being drawn up on this?
(a 2 HR. WIGGINS: Again, you'nhould firnt try to 3 nee if the answers to your questions are in their 4 application f o r decchimi s sion ing .
- 5 . MR. SULLIVAN - I um trying to.underntand- -
6 what nappens to this area.
7 MR. WIGGINS: If you want to use that-for a 8 moment, if you want to use Yankee Row for a moment.
9 MR. BULLTVAN: I believe it doen tie in with 10 Performance O i a n c e m e n t Program.
Il MR. WIGGINS: We are not prepared to.dincuss 12 decomminaioning, tie didn't do any homework to have k 13 any relevant annwers to it. We don't know what.
14 Northeast Utilition han in mind for these plans.
There are various options that are forenouable or 15 16 doable. ke don't-know anything more about i t. .
17 MR. SULLIVAN: I feel you have-to complete - 4 18 the technology, You have to finish it. You have to 19 not just contain ite you have -to control is t +and put it 20 back to the way it was, or just say, hey,-. financially 21 < wesare just going to leave-it, we-are g o i n g ' t o'a'g o
~ - '
22 broke if we have to clean it up. All the benifit of m
23 nuclear power la going to be liability in the-future.
g 24 Everi kilowatt is going to wind up costing an 25 ast ronomical amount of money when it is finally naid' *u +
f
.- . - - , , , . . _ . , _ .-_ . _ . ~ . _ . -
74 '
1 and done, and nobody in willing to face up to that 2 innue, and you are aplintering into fragmento. I want 3 to get to address the<real innues, and work on the 4 real probletsu instead of just trying to create all 5 thin confusion.
6 MR. W I G G I N !1 : Thank you. I appreciate an I 7 nald everyone coming out here to provide comments. I 8 think we have gotten nome good comments. We have had 9 neveral of t. h e n e types of meetings in other instancen.
10 Thin in one of the better onen in terms of the 11 qualition of nome of the comments we have g o t t. e n . W e '-
12 wi11, an I said, study the tranneript, make sure we 4 13 got the comments an they were provided, consider them 14 in what we are doiny here, and, an I mentioned in 15 renponne to nome questions, we will come o u t. in 16 writing with our conclunion, and that will be made 1 */ available to you. You can see how thin all came out.
18 There have been a number of comments 19 here udth regard to how we'do'our job, how'thecNRC D
20 doen ito job overall, how nome of the individuals'here
~
21 do their job. I think we'have elected not to addrenn 22 that for a couple reasons, one, it wasn't-the purpone .
23 of the meeting; secondly,"we' don't need-to get into a
- 24 debato like that in thin forum. I will tell you for 25 the benefit of those that are'here, there were issuen-
l
. ,s l l
l l
'n 1 rained with regard to what we do, and we are doing on fs The innuen we have heard we 2 certain technical innuen.
3 know what those concerns are. We take the concernn 4 neriounly, and take them what we believe they are, the 6 dinagreement-with the decinionn we have made for'what l
-l 6 han to occur in the induntry. We think we made thone 7 decinionn in a way that in in the bent interents for ,
8 all involved, to include providing a reanonable level 9 of prot oc t.i on to the public in the arean in theno 10 plants, and at the name time remaining within our 11 regulatory and n&stutory limited authorities. We hcVe 12 to work within the rulon that are entablished for us i 13 by Congrenn and by our own regulationn. We have to 14 behave by thone regulationn aino. An I naid, wo 15 didn't come here to defend ournelven. So we are not .
16 going to really get into a largo discunnion about why 17 we think what we are doing in acceptable, and why 18 maybe your viewn we don't agree with. Let'n leave it 19 at that.
20 Again I appreciate the time andzeffort , ;
>21 of the people that have come here. I thank"you'for 22 your attention and interest-in the matter. Thin will 23 clone-the meeting, thankn.
24 9:30 p.m.
4 25 wm . y -- re.+-.--,dm-~-.-,..m. , . - - - - . , - - - , . ,
76 ..
i 1 C E R T I F 1 C A T E 2
3 1 hereby certify that I am a Notary Public, ,
~4 in and for the~ state of-Connectfuct, duly commissioned 5 and qualified to adminiator oaths.
6 1 further certify that the foregof~ng honring 7 wan taken by me atenographically and reduced to 8 typowriting under my direction, and the foregoing in a 9 true and accurate transcript of the hearing.
10 Witnoan my hand and neal as Notary Public 11 thin 12th day of November, 1992.
12 13 14 c/
_____)fWI !!!n : *'
15 Notary Public ~
16 My Commission Expires:
17 November 31, 1997 '
18 19 20 21 22 23 g 24 25
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