Escalated Enforcement Actions Issued to Fuel Cycle Facilites - B

On January 11, 2010, a Notice of Violation and Proposed Imposition of a Civil Penalty in the amount of $35,000 was issued, to Babcock and Wilcox Nuclear Operations Group, Inc. (B&W -NOG). This action was based on a Severity Level III violation involving the failure of the licensee to declare an Alert in a timely manner as required by Appendix G to their Emergency Plan. Specifically, on July 15, 2009, the licensee failed to declare an Alert for more than 2 hours even though employees were cognizant that during that time, critically controls associated with a band saw reservoir did not exist and that the lost controls could not be immediately reestablished. Although the failure to declare an Alert in a timely manner did not result in any actual consequences in this case, the potential consequences of an untimely emergency declaration could have been significant under different circumstances.

In addition, a Severity Level III problem associated with three procedural violations was identified as a result of this incident. The three violations involved the failure of the licensee (1) to ensure that the band saw's built-in coolant reservoir was disabled and not usable prior to operation of the band saw, (2) to establish controls on the band saw cutting fluid reservoir to prevent process changes which would make a criticality accident possible such as accumulation of cutting fluid or fissile material in the reservoir, and (3) to evaluate an accident scenario or establish appropriate controls preventing the accumulation of high enriched uranium and moderator in the band saw cutting fluid reservoir, an unfavorable geometry vessel. In accordance with the Enforcement Policy, a civil penalty was not proposed for these violations.