January 26, 2011
AECL making progress
on "safety culture"
by Terry Myers
Atomic Energy of Canada
Ltd is making progress on improving its “safety culture,” company
officials told members of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission last
week.
“We're changing our view of ourselves,” said vice-president and chief
nuclear officer Hank Drumhiller.
But members of the commission said that, while they're pleased to see
progress, they remain skeptical.
“This is an excellent report, but words are just words,” said
commissioner Alan Graham.
“I'm concerned that (putting) words into action are going to be a
problem.”
Last week's meeting was the first time AECL has appeared before the
safety commission since the restart of the NRU reactor in August.
The focus of the meeting was an update on the progress of AECL's
“corrective action plan” to address the “organizational (root) causes”
of the 15-month shutdown of NRU following a heavy water leak in May
2009.
In a report to the safety commission later that year, AECL said the
problems with NRU were the result of low standards and “less than
adequate management oversight.”
“Historically CRL management did not ensure high standards for
operation and that strong barriers were in place to prevent events,”
the report said.
“The organization’s culture had evolved to being complacent and
unchallenging, where 'bad news' was often not communicated.”
Compelling argument
In his update to the commission last week, Drumhiller said the shutdown
of NRU had provided AECL management with “a compelling argument that we
need to improve.”
The focus of AECL's response has been the “Voyageur II” program, which
has looked at both improvements in “equipment reliability,” and “human
performance” issues like problem identification and encouraging a
“strong questioning attitude” among staff.
Drumhiller said the result of the improvements can be seen in things
like the refuelling of NRU prior to its restart.
The fuel rod flask used in the refuelling is an old piece of equipment
and the original response from staff was that it was “not possible” to
expect it to operate “flawlessly” for three weeks.
“We challenged the organization” to make it work, and when the time
came, it did indeed work flawlessly throughout the refuelling period,
Drumhiller said.
Things like that have prompted people to come forward with more things
that need to be fixed around NRU, he added.
“People are identifying more problems because we are demonstrating our
ability to fix things,” he said.
Drumhiller said that as a result of better work practices, the company
is making headway in “reducing the backlog of work” to be done on NRU.
Better planning and preparation have allowed AECL to get twice as much
work done in planned monthly outages as it had previously.
The company is also gearing up for an extended month-long shutdown at
NRU in May.
“We'll be doing actions that have been postponed many years,”
Drumhiller said.
In their report, CNSC staff said they “came away with a positive
impression” of AECL's progress.
But some commission members said they weren't convinced.
Commissioner Graham said AECL has “probably the worst record of any
licensee” the CNSC deals with, and that the commission has heard the
same promises about improved performance before.
“In the past there hasn't been the leadership to make some of those
things happen,” he said.
As far as the Voyageur II program, “I look at the logo today and it's
half a canoe.”
“I feel we're only getting half the story.”
Dr. Moyra McDill agreed, saying “we have some new acronyms, some new
programs” in AECL's report, but the commission has heard it all before.
McDill pointed to one comment in the staff report on its “verification”
of AECL's plan: “No formal process could be demonstrated to CNSC to
guarantee the continued effectiveness of the action into the future.”
“That's kind of an alarming statement to read,” she said.
But Drumhiller said the commission will see that AECL follows through
on its program.
“Where's the proof? The proof will be in the updates we give in future.
You'll see it's taken hold,” he said.
Drumhiller said AECL has made progress on things like its “safety
culture” and the need for a “questioning attitude,” but there's still
work to be done.
“We've made progress but we're not where we need to be.”
Elder agreed, saying this was only the first six-month update on AECL's
progress.
“Organizational changes, human performance changes come slowly. You can
roll it out but it won't come overnight,” he said.
“To date what we've seen is encouraging.”
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