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Local
Companies | Article published October 4, 2002
DAVIS-BESSE
Inspectors hint at 10 violations for
plant
By TOM HENRY
BLADE STAFF
WRITER
OAK HARBOR, Ohio - The Nuclear Regulatory
Commission yesterday specified 10 federal violations it likely will
issue against FirstEnergy Corp. for letting rust nearly eat a hole
through the reactor head at the Davis-Besse nuclear
plant.
Some of the violations contain multiple allegations of
wrongdoing. All are documented in a 33-page report written by the
NRC’s augmented inspection team, the first group of inspectors the
government agency sent to Davis-Besse after the company reported the
plant’s massive reactor-head problem in early
March.
(For more Davis-Besse coverage, go to www.toledoblade.com/davisbesse)
That
inspection team briefed the public about its preliminary findings in
April before returning to the nuclear plant to deepen its probe and
decide which violations should be filed. The report, provided to the
utility Tuesday, was made public yesterday.
Violations
included allegations that FirstEnergy:
Operated Davis-Besse while the plant’s reactor
coolant system was leaking and that the utility failed to remove
highly corrosive boric acid crystals as they built up over time on
the plant’s steel reactor head.
Failed to keep airborne boric acid from building up
on containment air cooler fins, which reduced the plant’s heat
removal capability and reduced the cooler’s air flow, and that it
failed to take action that would have kept air filters from clogging
so often.
Nixed a simple modification that could have
prevented the degradation by vastly improving visual access to the
reactor head, a $250,000 work order the company has admitted it
stopped as a cost-saving measure.
Has provided incomplete and inaccurate information
to the NRC on several occasions.
The severity of each
allegation is still being determined, although nearly every
violation cited in the inspection team’s report was listed as "more
than minor."
No word on a fine or other enforcement action is
expected until early next year, in part because the identified
violations are still subject to more layers of
review.
Davis-Besse’s steel reactor head became so affected
by rust that several NRC officials have conceded northwest Ohio came
about as close to experiencing a nuclear mishap as anything the
nation has seen since the Three Mile Island accident near
Harrisburg, Pa., in 1979.
FirstEnergy officials have
acknowledged for months they expect fines or other enforcement
action to eventually be handed down for their neglect of the plant,
although they remain optimistic about finishing repairs and getting
NRC approval to restart the plant by early December.
Richard
Wilkins, FirstEnergy spokesman, said yesterday the latest NRC report
was "pretty consistent with our own findings" and said it should not
alter the company’s timetable.
The findings will be used as a
basis for determining the penalty, as will any violations which the
NRC’s Office of Investigations might formally cite the company later
in a separate report.
Those investigators are looking for
evidence that could show whether the plant’s history of neglect
resulted from anything willful or deliberate, Jan Strasma, NRC
spokesman, said.
The agency likely will hold off on the
penalty until both reports are finished, Mr. Strasma said. "We won’t
be taking piecemeal enforcement," he said.
(For more
Davis-Besse coverage, go to www.toledoblade.com/davisbesse)
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