The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) hopes to receive a briefing in early October from the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) regarding criticality safety at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee.
Board member Joyce Connery, writing on behalf of DNFSB Chairman Bruce Hamilton, indicated in an Aug. 23 letter to NNSA Administrator Lisa Gordon-Hagerty that the board wanted to take her up on the offer of a briefing.
“As you offered, the Board would like a detailed briefing on actions taken to address the specific feedback from the external review of the Y-12 Criticality Safety Program,” Connery wrote. “Specifically, we request that the briefing focus on the roles and responsibilities of the federal staff in conducting oversight of nuclear criticality safety at Y-12, actions taken in light of the results of the external review, and NNSA’s expectations of its field office personnel in ensuring the safety of its federal and contractor workforce.”
In a July 25 letter to Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Hamilton said a DNFSB review identified a number of weaknesses in the program to prevent an unintended nuclear chain reaction at the NNSA’s primary uranium processing facility. The three key findings, according to the board’s report: inadequate maintenance of Y-12’s criticality safety program; failure of operations personnel to participate, cooperate with, and take ownership of criticality safety at the site; and insufficient interface between Y-12’s criticality safety program and support programs. “Based on these three potential safety items, the staff has concluded that Y-12 has an inadequate CSP,” Hamilton wrote at the time.
Consolidated Nuclear Security, the NNSA’s management and operations prime for Y-12, has said uranium accumulations at the site did not pose any threat to personnel or the public. The contractor said it is taking aggressive steps to address nuclear criticality safety, including revising procedures, augmented oversight and training, and monitoring worker performance.
The DNFSB members are scheduled to be at Y-12 on Oct. 1 and 2, Connery wrote. They hope to receive the briefing at that point.
It was not immediately known whether the briefing had been scheduled.
