Health and Safety
Executive / Commission
Nuclear
LLC reports
This report is issued as part of the Health and Safety Executive's commitment to make information about inspection and regulatory activities relating to the above site available to the public. It is for distribution to members of the Hunterston A Power Station Local Liaison Committee and covers activities associated with the regulation of safety at Hunterston A Power Station. These reports are distributed quarterly. Site Inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate attend LLC meetings and will be happy to respond to questions raised there by members of the LLC. Any other person wishing to inquire about matters covered by this report should contact the HSE, Nuclear Directorate Information Centre on 0151 - 951 - 4103.
The Site Inspector made three inspection visits to Hunterston A during the period January to March. The visits were on:
28 January - 1 February
26 & 27 February
19 - 22 March
Two of NII's Specialist Inspectors accompanied the Site Inspector during the January inspection to witness the level 1 exercise to demonstrate the site's emergency arrangements. A specialist fire precautions inspector attended the February inspection.
Routine inspection has continued, matters arising have been identified directly to the appropriate members of staff and to the Decommissioning Site Manager for action to be taken.
The improving conditions on site and reduction in reactive inspection activities has allowed an extensive programme of site Licence compliance inspections to be completed this quarter. These included inspections of compliance with Licence Conditions 14, 22, 26, 28 and 36, the last, on Control of Organisational Change being completed in conjunction with the inspection of the proposed new management structure for the site. The outcome of the inspections was generally satisfactory although a significant number of improvements were identified, these have been actioned through the Decommissioning Site Manager and their progress will be monitored by NII.
The annual demonstration of the emergency arrangements, level 1 exercise, was witnessed by NII. The exercise was an adequate demonstration of the arrangements, the teams managing the unexpected loss of facilities well demonstrating both the robustness of the planning and flexibility of the teams. However, both NII and the Licensee identified possible improvements, consequently the Licensee has been asked to review some elements of the exercise including casualty recovery and to identify measures that might be taken to shorten the recovery time.
Following discussions and recognising that there is a significant deviation between the current programme for decommissioning the site and progress that has been made to date, the Licensee is to produce a new base line decommissioning programme that will be made available to NII by the end of the calendar year. Monitoring of progress in the interim, financial year 2002/03 will be to a set of milestones taken from the work programme for 2002/03 rather than by reference to the decommissioning milestone programme.
The successful completion of the deplanting and decommissioning of the graphite tunnels is noted.
A joint inspection was conducted with the SEPA site inspector of matters of mutual interest, the outcome was satisfactory.
There have been a number of incidents on site, none of which required action by NII. The effectiveness of the retaining netting over the reactor glass envelope in both reducing the damage and retaining the glass during storms is noted.
Following completion on an inspection by a HSE specialist fire precautions inspector in February it was confirmed that the site had completed the work necessary to comply with the 'Notice of Steps to be Taken' within the specified time, i.e. by 28 February 2002. A new fire certificate for the premises will be prepared and issued by HSE.
The Inspectorate has power under the Licence to issue Consents, Approvals and Directions. In addition the Inspectorate uses Licence Instruments to issue Specifications and Agreements under the conditions attached to the licence. No legal documents have been issued under the Licence during this period.
Published on the HSE web site 3 December 2002