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 Heysham Power Station available to the public. It is for distribution to members of the Heysham Local Community Liaison Council and covers activities associated with the regulation of safety at Heysham. These reports are distributed quarterly. Site Inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate attend LCLC meetings and will respond to any questions raised there by members of the LCLC. Any other person wishing to enquire about matters covered by this report should contact the HSE, Nuclear Directorate Information Centre on 0151-951-4103.
The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) site inspectors made visits to Heysham on the following dates during this quarter:
|
Heysham 1 |
Heysham 2 |
|---|---|
| 1, 10,11, 23, 24, 30 July 2003 | 1,10, 22, 23, 30 July 2003 |
| 3, 4, 16, 17, 18, 19 September 2003 | 8, 11,19 August 2003 |
| 10, 17, 18,19, 23 September 2003 |
Other members of the NII, including specialist inspectors visited the Heysham site during the period, as follows.
A specialist HSE fire surveyor and the site inspector completed an inspection against Fire Certificate Regulations. Inspections of radiography arrangements against Site Licence requirements and the Ionising Radiation Regulations were completed by the site inspector and HSE radiological specialists.
A specialist inspector attended site to review events involving electrical equipment. The NII site inspector and a superintending inspector attended the station annual review of safety meeting. A specialist inspector attended site to review matters relating to the implementation of Technical Specifications at Heysham 2. Other NII specialist inspectors attended site to review provisions for process fire safety and provisions for worker radiological protection in parts of the station fuel route.
As part of our routine work we inspect for compliance against the requirements of the Stations' Nuclear Site Licence Conditions and the arrangements made under them, the Health and Safety at Work Act and other relevant safety legislation. We sample activities on site that may affect safety, and in this report include details of the following matters.
The NII Heysham 1 & 2 site inspectors attended the Emergency Planning Consultative Committee meeting which took place on 19 September 2003. The meeting included discussion of the local arrangements for responding to a radiation emergency at the Heysham site. It was agreed that further discussions on this subject would be held outside of the main meeting, with members of the ND Emergency Planning Group representing NII at these meetings.
General Fire Precautions
An inspection was completed by the NII Site Inspector and HSE Fire Surveyor to review the fire precautions at Heysham 1 under the Fire Certificate (Special Premises) Regulations 1976. We were not entirely satisfied with the fire precautions in place and a Notice under Regulation 8 stating the 'Steps to Take' has been issued.
Shortfalls against the regulations were found in some of the buildings and plant areas inspected mainly in respect of emergency lighting, fire alarms and fire doors. We have emphasised that a full site review must be completed by station staff to identify any further shortfalls. We found evidence that the station is not inspecting and maintaining fire safety equipment to the required standards and require greater priority to be given to this area in the station's overall business plan. We have advised that the necessary improvements must be in place by 1 February 2004 and will be completing a further inspection.
NII/Environment Agency Joint Inspection
A joint NII/EA inspection took place on 3 September 2003. The inspection focused on matters of joint interest to nuclear safety and environmental safety. In particular we completed reviews of operations, significant events and environmental safety related plant maintenance. It was noted that a number of the events were in breach of environmental safety authorisations. We also completed a plant inspection with an emphasis on the management and control of gaseous discharges and looked forward at the station's improvement plans. The joint inspection confirmed that NII's nuclear safety and EA's environmental safety expectations for Heysham 1 are harmonised.
Reactor 1 Extended Refuelling Outage
An extended refuelling outage was completed on reactor 1 enabling further progress to be made on the replacement of corroded cast iron pipework. The work is required to re-establish the infrequent seismic safety case for essential cooling water systems and the tasks identified for the outage were completed successfully. We are carefully monitoring and inspecting this work to ensure the modification process is properly controlled, replacement pipework systems are engineered to appropriate standards and the project resourced to ensure completion by the agreed date of December 2003.
Radiological Protection / Ionising Radiation Regulations
Inspections were completed at Heysham 1 by the NII site inspector and two of HSE's radiological protection specialists. The inspections focused on the station's arrangements and procedures for using radiography equipment to complete examinations of nuclear safety related pipework. We completed inspections focusing on method statements, contractor's local rules and the actual radiography set up on site. We identified a number of areas for improvement associated with control and supervision of the radiography contractor, monitoring of radiation levels, use of shielding and use of visible/audible warnings. The licensee addressed the issues to our satisfaction prior to commencement of the radiography and stated the improvements would be applied corporately within BE.
General Fire Precautions
Following completion of the inspections carried out by a HSE fire surveyor to review the station compliance with the requirements of the Fire Certificates (Special Premises) Regulations 1976, it was judged that the station have made progress in addressing the areas for improvement identified from the surveys. However, because of emergent issues the fire surveyor has agreed to allow further time to complete the necessary work under the regulations. The work must now be completed by 31 December 2003, although station hopes to complete the remaining work before this date.
Process Fire Safety
A follow up to the February 2002 NII inspection of nuclear fire safety arrangements was completed. In general we found the station have made satisfactory progress in carrying out the required work, which we intend to re-inspect in March 2004 following its completion. At this stage progress has been made to improve equipment, plant, procedures, operating instructions and safety documentation.
Station Annual Review of Safety Meeting
The annual meeting to review matters potentially affecting safety at Heysham 2 was attended in July. During the course of the meeting consideration was given to a wide range of station matters, with them describing the options identified to resolve any safety issues raised. A small number of actions were recorded from the meeting for station to provide additional information to NII.
We also respond to non-routine matters arising on site that may affect safety, and in this report include details of the following matters.
As part of our inspection activities at the site we investigate safety related events that occur and follow-up those which are perceived initially to have the potential to be more significant, we particularly examine the licensee's response to such events. From our inspections in this quarter we are satisfied that events which occurred were relatively minor, and response by the stations has been in accordance with appropriate arrangements. We summarise our response to the selected events as follows.
Fuelling Machine Incident
The NII site inspector completed an investigation into a fuelling machine incident, categorised at INES 1 (Anomaly) on the International Nuclear Events Scale. Following a routine maintenance task on a pressure transmitter clean CO2 leaked from the fuelling machine as it was being purged. The incident would have been more serious if reactor gas had been present in the fuelling machine. The root cause of the incident was a maintain technician not complying with work instructions and not completing the final system pressure integrity checks. We were satisfied with the station's response to the incident, which had identified a number of specific recommendations and reinforced the overall need for improvements in human performance at Heysham 1.
Availability of Essential Electrical Equipment
The NII site inspector and a specialist inspector visited station to inspect revised plant configuration control measures following the declaration of an essential electrical inverter to be unavailable. The inspection identified areas for station to improve provisions for this and similar equipment in the future, and station has agreed to revise the arrangements to address points raised by NII.
Radiological Shielding in the Station fuel Route
The NII site inspector and a specialist inspector visited station to discuss the discovery by station of deterioration in the performance of some of the probes used to detect changes in the level of the zinc bromide solution employed to provide shielding in viewing windows present in the station fuel route. Station has confirmed that no significant change in the solution levels has actually occurred, and therefore no reduction in the extent of operator shielding provided has resulted. The shielding solution in one of the windows has been replaced as part of the normal station routine to ensure ongoing functionality. Station's consideration of this event and options to improve the radiological protection provided is continuing.
The following regulatory documentation was issued during the quarter:
Published on the HSE web site 4 December 2003