British Energy Generation Ltd Hartlepool Power Station report - Q2 2009

Local community liaison council quarterly report for 1 April to 30 June 2009

Inspections
Routine matters
Non routine matters
Regulatory activity

Foreword

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 Hartlepool Power Station Local Community Liaison Council and covers activities associated with the regulation of safety at Hartlepool Power Station. These reports are distributed quarterly and are also available on the HSE's web site at http://www.hse.gov.uk/nuclear/llc/index.htm. Site inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate usually attend LCLC meetings and will respond to questions raised there by members of the LCLC.

Nuclear Safety Directorate
Health and Safety Executive
Redgrave Court
Merton Road
Bootle
Merseyside
L20 7HS

Inspections

The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) Site Inspector made inspections at Hartlepool Power Station on the following dates during the quarter:

20 - 23 April 2009
18 - 21 May 2009
15 - 18 June 2009

On 22 April an NII team led by the Superintending Inspector witnessed the Level 1 emergency exercise “Cronus”. On 16 and 17 June the site inspectors for Hartlepool and Heysham 1, accompanied the Superintending Inspector, toured the plant and attended the Annual Review of Safety meeting.

Routine matters

Inspections at Site:Inspections are undertaken at site as part of the process for monitoring compliance with:

the conditions attached by HSE/NII to the nuclear site licence;
the Health and Safety at Work etc Act (HSWA) 1974 and
regulations made under the HSWA for example the Ionising Radiations Regulations 1999 and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999.

This entails monitoring licensee's actions on the site in relation to incidents, operations, maintenance, projects, modifications, safety case changes and any other matters which may affect safety. The licensees/operators are required to make and implement adequate arrangements under the conditions attached to the licence in order to ensure legal compliance. Inspections seek to judge both the adequacy of these arrangements and their implementation. In this period routine inspections of Hartlepool Power Station covered:

Management of operations including control and supervision - this included aspects of conduct of operations within the control room and parts of the fuel route.
Emergency Preparedness - see below.
Maintenance inspection and testing of plant - in particular the planning and preparation for the next statutory outage on unit 2 and also inspected the progress with the company's Equipment Reliability project.
Radiological Protection - in particular the radiological categorisation and control of some of the fuel route areas.

In general the arrangements made and implemented by the station in response to safety requirements were deemed to be adequate in the areas inspected. However, where improvements were considered necessary, satisfactory commitments to address the issues were made by or are being sought from the licensee, and the site inspector will monitor progress during future visits. Where necessary, formal regulatory enforcement action will be taken to ensure that appropriate remedial measures are implemented to reasonably practicable timescales.

Both reactors at Hartlepool have operated well since the major repairs to the BCUs. There have been issues on the conventional plant side that have resulted in loss of generation but it is a credit to the engineering effort that went into the design and construction of the BCU repairs that they have performed as expected.

The station demonstrated its emergency arrangements to an NII team with support from Office of Civil Nuclear Security (OCNS) site inspector. This was a demanding exercise and included security aspects as well as reactor plant faults. We identified a number of areas for improvement and these will be re-demonstrated to the NII during a shift exercise in September 2009.

The Annual Review of Safety meeting was held which reviewed the last year's performance and gave the company the opportunity to commit to the NII improvements they will be implementing over the next year and beyond. The NII were satisfied with the progress made in returning the plant to operational service following the Boiler Closure Unit repairs but looked forward to the station consolidating these improvements over the next year and building on the Nuclear Professionalism initiative to deliver safe and reliable power production.

Non-routine matters

Licensees are required to have arrangements to respond to non-routine matters and events. NII inspectors judge the adequacy of the licensee's response including actions taken to implement any necessary improvements. There were no reportable events during the period.

Regulatory activity

Under Health and Safety legislation NII Site Inspectors, and other HSE Inspectors, may issue formal documents to ensure compliance with regulatory requirements. Under nuclear site licence conditions HSE/NII issues regulatory documents, which either permission an activity or requires some form of action to be taken; these are collectively termed Licence Instruments (LI). In addition inspectors may issue enforcement notices to secure improvements to safety.

No Licence Instruments or enforcement notices were issued during the quarter.

Changes to HSE's nuclear directorate

The Government has put forward proposals to change the status of HSE's Nuclear Directorate (ND) to that of a Statutory Corporation under the auspices of the HSE. This is intended to enable ND, as the independent nuclear regulator of safety and security, to better meet the challenges of a changing nuclear industry over the coming years. The changes are to provide the nuclear regulator with greater flexibility and increase the accountability, transparency and openness of nuclear regulation. The Government are proposing that the statutory changes needed to bring this about will be made by a Legislative Reform Order (LRO).

This builds on the outcome of the Government initiated review of the UK's nuclear regulatory regime, led by Dr Tim Stone. The Summary Recommendations and the Government's response were published at the end of January 2009.

A public consultation, run by DWP and DECC, on the LRO was launched on June 30th for a 12 week period, which gives the opportunity for stakeholders to comment on the proposals.

These new arrangements will not change the substance or standards of regulation or compromise the independence of the nuclear regulatory body, and will not affect the decisions it takes or the international obligations the Government requires it to meet.

Subject to the outcome of the consultation and Parliamentary approval, and if the Parliamentary timetable permits, the aim is to bring the new body into being during 2010.

An internal change programme is currently operating within ND to ensure that the ND is ready to operate as a statutory corporation from spring 2010.

This programme does not in anyway compromise the current regulatory activities of ND.