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 Hinkley Point Local Community Liaison Council (LCLC) and covers activities associated with the regula-tion of safety at Hinkley Point B Power Station. These reports are distributed quar-terly. Site Inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate normally attend LCLC meetings and will be happy to respond to any questions raised there or subsequently by members of the LCLC. Any other person wishing to inquire about matters cov-ered by this report should contact the HSE, Nuclear Directorate Information Centre on 0151-951-4103.
Routine inspections continued in accordance with our annual plan and no significant nuclear safety issues arose.
The HMNII Site Inspector made the following planned visits during the period:
Work at the site this quarter was dominated by the planned periodic shutdown of Reactor 3. In support of NII's work during this outage, a number of Specialist NII In-spectors visited the site to carry out additional inspections.
Routine inspections have continued throughout the period to confirm that the site is operating in compliance with the conditions attached to the Nuclear Site Licence. In areas where opportunities for improvement were identified, remedial work has been agreed with station management, with the intention of achieving improvements to current station arrangements in those areas.
The planned periodic shutdown of Reactor 3 took place during August and Septem-ber. These shutdowns are planned every three years and allow maintenance and inspections to be conducted which can only be undertaken with the reactor shut-down.
The NII site inspector undertook a number of inspections in relation to this outage. Additionally, NII Specialist Inspectors reviewed the conduct and results of inspection programmes and other matters in relation to the outage. Specialist NII Inspectors vis-ited the site to carry out inspections related to the graphite core; boiler inspections, boiler relief valve modifications and worker fatigue. A separate meeting was held to discuss the results of the concrete pressure vessel inspections and tests. The vari-ous meetings and discussions led to agreement on additional checks of the pressure vessel pre-stressing system and to the definition of conditions that would trigger fur-ther inspections of the graphite core.
At the end of the Outage, NII reviewed the work done and assurances provided by the Licensee and agreed that Reactor 3 could return to service for a further three years operation. A formal Consent to allow this was issued by NII on 2 October 2003.
The Reactor 3 Start Up Meeting was held on 8/9/2003 where the results from the re-actor's statutory outage, together with information on station operations since the Safety Review Meeting on 13/3/03, were considered. HMNII was satisfied with the information provided by BEGL and this contributed to our agreement to allow the re-start of Reactor 3.
On 4/9/2003 the Emergency Exercise Review Meeting was held with staff from the Station and the British Energy Emergency Planning Group. Progress on issues raised at last years demonstration exercise were discussed together with the sce-nario for this years exercise, which will be held in December.
During a reactor outage, many more staff and contractors work on the site and much more engineering work is undertaken, when compared to normal operation. This in-creases the likelihood of conventional industrial accidents and BEGL therefore take steps to prevent such accidents occurring. However, during the Reactor 3 outage, a number of minor accidents occurred, together with two more serious incidents.
The first involved a rigger who was crushed while directing crane movements in the turbine hall. Luckily he only suffered cracked ribs but the accident could have been much worse. The second involved a contractor who fell from scaffolding in the tur-bine hall basement. He suffered a broken pelvis and spent some time in hospital.
NII investigated both these accidents. No regulatory breaches were found. We were also satisfied that BEGL were conducting their own thorough investigations and we are currently awaiting their reports.
The management and recording of some events which occurred on the station dur-ing the period were inspected. Most of these were relatively minor and those of con-cern to the HMNII Site Inspector were discussed with the appropriate company staff. HMNII was satisfied with the actions taken.
On 10/7/03 the 'B' Station took part in a site-wide muster of staff as part of the 'A' Station annual demonstration exercise "ALEX". There was a problem with coordina-tion of the roll-call system between the two sites, thus increasing the time it took to account for all personnel. As a result, NII asked for this part of the exercise to be re-demonstrated to us. This repeat muster was witnessed on 29/7/03 and was com-pleted satisfactorily.
BE submitted safety documentation to NII to justify an increase of the fuel discharge irradiation limit. BE's proposal to increase this limit is the first stage in a fuel utiliza-tion strategy aimed at reducing fuel throughput across its fleet of AGRs.
NII's assessment judged the safety documentation to be adequate and Approval number 18 was issued.
BEGL have constructed a new and improved Access Control Point on the site. This is the building from which response actions in the event of an emergency would be directed from. It therefore forms an important part of the emergency response plan. Inspections of the new facility were undertaken by NII to confirm it was ready for use. These were satisfactory.
Radiographic techniques are used throughout industry, for example to examine welds on pipe systems. Inspection of the safety aspects of these techniques is a priority issue during 2003 for the Field Operations Division of the HSE (commonly known as the Factory Inspectorate). Accordingly, a HSE Specialist Inspector was invited to site to assist the NII inspector in an examination of the practices at Hinkley Point B. The processes and procedures in use on site were found to be well organ-ised and no significant issues arose from our inspection.
The Inspectorate has powers under the Nuclear Site Licence to issue Consents, Ap-provals and Directions. In addition, the Inspectorate uses Licence Instruments to is-sue Specifications and Agreements under the conditions attached to the Site Li-cence.
During this quarter, the following Approvals and Licence Instruments were issued:-
Published on the HSE web site 4 December 2003.