By NICK SCHWELLENBACH
As the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan continues to unfold, POGO, like many others, is concerned about the effectiveness of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) oversight of nuclear power here. The NRC's internal watchdog, the NRC Office of Inspector General (OIG), has questioned the aggressiveness of the NRC’s oversight as well. Case in point: an FY 2009 NRC OIG investigation close-out memo on the “Adequacy of [NRC] Staff’s Handling of Generic Safety Issues” that POGO obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
The OIG looked into this matter because the “lengthy review process caused the OIG to question the effectiveness of” the NRC’s system for managing generic safety issues.
The NRC’s “generic safety issues” are safety problems that the NRC has identified as applicable to a wide-range of nuclear power plants. According to the memo:
generic issues are potential safety concerns involving the design, construction, operation, or decommissioning applicable to several, or a class of, NRC licensees, certificate holders, or other entities regulated by or subject to the regulatory jurisdiction of NRC.
The OIG found that the NRC’s Generic Issues Program, which is used by NRC to analyze and recommend solutions related to generic safety issues, “does not clearly assign ownership for each issue to a particular NRC office and is not transparent to NRC senior management or the Commission.” Also, the safety issues were not always “well-tracked.”
The generic safety issues examined dealt with “steam generators, adequacy of fire protection, external power impact on reactor safety, debris impact on core cooling, and core cooling piping voids.” The OIG gave the NRC credit for significant progress on steam generators because it was implementing an action plan on the issue.
At the time of the close-out memo, the NRC was revising their management guidance to improve the Generic Issue Program’s “timeliness and effectiveness,” according to the OIG memo. The OIG also said the proposed revisions “would address the specific areas OIG identified as problematic.” The OIG also “did not identify evidence to suggest that staff purposely delayed resolving generic issues.”
To give you an idea how long these generic safety issues have been around, POGO did a report on the NRC in 1996 focused on this subject. But even then, the generic safety issues POGO looked at were old: many had been around since the late 1970s and early 1980s with unimplemented changes at dozens of power plants after decades.
Nick Schwellenbach is POGO’s Director of Investigations.
"Jaczko: The NEI Patsy"
(Winning industry friends and keeping them happy)
Jaczko's Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Has a 'subtle' approach to nuclear fires:
Waive violations and fake interim measures.
Have good intentions. That's what Jaczko admires.
Make repairs in the future. Why be bothered now
When it's more convenient to tackle them later?
Don't burden the industry. Don't cost them money.
"Baby needs shoes" for that poor operator.
So it's a gamble. But they rarely have fires.
What's ten a year if nobody gets hurt?
Won't all of the backups work like they're supposed to?
If they don't, like Japan's? Then they'll sound the alert.
What's going to trigger Jaczko's own Fukushima?
An Inhofe tornado, or earthquake? Or Jaczko? We'll see.
Maybe skimping on rules that he's not enforcing?
You thought he had a list of who gets off scot-free?
To the industry lobbyists, Jaczko's a dream.
As for strict regulating? What fabulous luck.
"These things run forever with little attention…"
Who'd believe that but some dumb hockey puck?
Bob Carlson
www.politicalboondoggles.com
On Twitter @PBoondoggles
5/12/11
To 'US Nuclear Regulator Lets Industry Help With the Fine Print'
To 'NRC Waives Enforcement of Fire Rules at Nuclear Plants'
To 'SourceWatch: Nuclear Energy Institute'
To 'Safety Reviewers Raise Questions About
Construction of New Nuclear Fuel Plant'
To 'Quick Guide to Nuclear Plant Safety: What Could Go Wrong?'
To 'NRC grants Entergy 20-year renewal
for Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant'
To 'The Nuclear Energy Institute's:
Nuclear Regulatory Commisione Verses'
To 'Nuclear Malfeasance Verses'
To 'Inhofe's Tornadoes and Floods Verses'
Posted by: pboondoggles | May 22, 2011 at 02:07 PM