Report: Hundreds of Pilgrim tasks downgraded

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COURTESY OF THE CAPE DOWNWINDERS

Report: Hundreds of Pilgrim tasks downgraded

By Christine Legere
Posted Nov 15, 2018

Inspection finds some should have kept higher priority.
PLYMOUTH — Operators at Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station had downgraded the importance of more than 500 tasks on the plant’s to-do list in an effort to reduce its backlog of work, but in a random sampling of 19 of the downgraded items, federal inspectors found nearly half should have kept their higher priority classification.
The latest federal inspection report contained those observations, as well as noting a violation of federal regulations for not following required protocol when problems developed in a filtration system needed when radiation escapes into the plant’s containment building.
Even with those deficiencies, Neil Sheehan , spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said there was no indication of “degrading performance at the facility.”
The 46-year-old plant is scheduled to close permanently by June 1.
The downgrade of condition reports from “adverse” to “non-adverse” for tasks on the to-do list was particularly troubling to Mary Lampert, president of Pilgrim Watch, a nonprofit organization that tracks issues related to the plant.
“I find it disconcerting that you can make a problem of significance insignificant by simply changing a label,” Lampert said. “Out of the 19 sampled, nine were mislabeled, which would lead one to ask how many more they would have found if they took a larger sample.”
In their report, inspectors wrote: “By placing condition reports in a less significant category, less stringent controls are in place to ensure timely corrective actions are made.”
As Lampert put it, “the work is back-burnered.”
Patrick O’Brien, spokesman for Entergy Corp., Pilgrim’s owner-operator, explained how the downgrades happen. “Condition reports are reviewed by a committee to determine the proper classification to ensure the appropriate resources are available to address the issues,” he said in an email.
Sheehan confirmed inspectors identified “a problem relating to the downgrading of condition reports” but he characterized it as “not more than minor.”
After the initial sampling, 40 of the downgraded condition reports were randomly selected from the 500. Inspectors found that all of those incorrectly downgraded, with the exception of two, still had work orders attached so the deficiencies would eventually be addressed.
Sheehan included the inspectors’ comments on the two incorrectly downgraded condition reports whose work orders had been canceled.
“These performance deficiencies were not more than minor because each canceled work order, by itself, could not be considered a precursor to a significant event, and if left uncorrected would not have the potential to lead to a more significant safety concern,” the report says.
The standby gas treatment system at Pilgrim connected to the violation found by inspectors comprises two units that kick in during radiation leaks into the containment building. Their job is to filter out radioactivity before the air is released outdoors from the large stack.
Pilgrim’s system engineer found the leak problem in one unit June 26 and developed a spreadsheet to monitor leak rates rather than fixing the leak.
Operators used the sheet to track unacceptable leakage but failed to notice elevations July 2 and July 14, only picking up on the problem July 17. Inspectors noticed the previously elevated levels during a records check.
When a standby gas treatment system unit is declared inoperable, plant managers are given seven days under federal regulations to address the problem or they must shut down the reactor.
Inspectors said in their report that the seven-day clock for getting repairs done should have begun ticking on both July 2 and July 14. Instead, that happened only after the elevated level was spotted July 17.
The earlier failures to follow protocol resulted in a violation. The shortcoming has been addressed through additional staff training, O’Brien said.
David Lochbaum , former director of the Nuclear Safety Program for the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the blame should be placed on the system engineer, who identified the problem and developed the tracking method, rather than on the operators. “It’s the system engineer’s job to ensure that the system is functional,” he said via email.
Lochbaum compared it to a doctor who has instructed his medical assistants to carry out a new protocol he has prescribed for a patient.
“The doctor is not then relieved of responsibility for the patient,” Lochbaum said. “The doctor is obligated to continue checking in with the patient as a way of avoiding having that patient wind up in the morgue.”
Pilgrim is currently in Column 4 based on federal performance standards, making it the worst reactor in the country, but Sheehan said the plant has been making steady progress in addressing its deficiencies. Of the 156 shortcomings on the list contained in an NRC action letter, 116 have now been addressed to the commission’s satisfaction, Sheehan said.
Longtime plant critic Diane Turco , founder and president of Cape Downwinders, an organization that advocates for immediate shutdown of Pilgrim, accused the NRC of being too easy on the plant, giving it “a slap on the wrist for multiple and repetitive safety violations” through the years.
“Doctoring condition reports and ongoing violation of safety regulations would result in immediate shutdown in any other industry,” Turco said.

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