Staff at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will next week begin returning to their offices after months of near-total telework due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ninety-eight percent of the federal agency’s nearly 3,000 full-time employees have been working remotely since mid-March to curb the potential spread of the viral disease. That left a small number of workers on-site at the NRC facilities, including security personnel.
As of Friday, only five cases of COVID-19 had been confirmed within the regulator’s workforce. Most tested positive more than two weeks after they were in an NRC facility.
In an internal memo to staff, Executive Director for Operations Margaret Doane said the NRC on June 15 would begin Phase 1 of its reoccupancy plan, covering the Rockville, Md., headquarters; four regional offices in Georgia, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Texas; and a training facility in Chattanooga, Tenn.
“At the outset, we will remain in mandatory telework status for 2 weeks during which time occupancy will gradually increase as individuals are notified that they will be returning to their NRC worksites, according to the memo obtained by RadWaste Monitor. “If you are not informed that you are included in Phase 1, then you will remain in mandatory telework status and continue to work remotely for the time being.”
The count of personnel allowed into a facility at any given time will be based on the health situation at the local and state levels. First in will be staff performing work that has been deferred because it must be done at an NRC facility, those without outside Internet access, those whose duties are central to the agency’s continuity of operations, and those whose jobs are “more effectively and efficiently performed in an NRC facility,” according to David Castelveter, agency director of public affairs.
Returning workers will be screened as they enter their building, including a temperature check. They will have to wear face cover within common-use areas and generally avoid excess movement around the facility.
On June 21, the regulator will shift to “maximum telework status,” Doane wrote. At that point, staff will need a formal agreement in place with the agency to conduct maximum telework as long as the federal public health emergency continues. Within that framework they would have continued access to flexible schedules, including “24/6” working – under which personnel can work any combinations of hours Monday through Saturday needed to carry out their responsibilities.
Flexibility will be given to personnel in certain situations, such as those among the vulnerable populations for COVID-19, as identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; those who live with vulnerable people; and those providing dependent care.
All personnel are expected to review a 20-minute training presentation before returning to their jobsite, and no later than July 1.
Doane’s memo does not say when the agency expects to return to roughly normal staffing levels at its locations. “It is difficult to estimate time frames as it depends on the state and local COVID-19 conditions at the time,” according to Castelveter. He said, though, the impact on operations from near-total telework has been “minimal and mostly in the deferral of select inspection activity.”
The reoccupancy plan in total covers four phases, 0 to 3, in line with the framework issued by the White House in April. Phase 0 involves implementation during mandatory telework. Phase 3 is near-normal staffing levels at the regulator’s offices.
The Energy Department is also in the early stages of restaffing its headquarters buildings in the Washington, D.C., region, along with its various field operations. A small number of DOE headquarters personnel reported to work on Monday.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has touted its ability to protect its personnel from novel coronavirus 2019 while sustaining its oversight mission for the nuclear industry. Even the resident inspectors for nuclear power plants have remained on the job since March, working from home but visiting their assigned facility every few days.
The agency has provided expedited consideration of regulatory exemptions to assist licensees in continuing operations that could be impacted by the pandemic or pushing back requirements that are difficult to meet at this time.
Among those: Eight nuclear power plants received a temporary break on work-hour limits to ensure there are sufficient reactor personnel in place at all times if others become ill. The agency has approved one exemption for a nuclear decommissioning job: allowing Holtec International to delay some security drills at its Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in New Jersey.
The pace of exemption requests has slowed considerably since March. Only two requests filed in June have been posted to the NRC website, both for “medical, industrial & academic uses of nuclear materials and agreement states.”
NRC Commissioners Sworn In
Meanwhile, one new and one returning member were sworn in Monday to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Serving Commissioner David Wright now gets a full five-year term, through June 30, 2025. Commissioner Christopher Hanson fills a vacancy left by the April 2019 retirement of Stephen Burns, with his term lasting through June 30, 2024.
NRC Chairman Kristine Svinicki swore both into office, following their nominations earlier this year by President Donald Trump. That brings the commission back to its full five-person membership for the first time in over a year, including Commissioners Jeff Baran and Annie Caputo.
Wright is a former energy and water consultant who served in leadership roles at the South Carolina Public Service Commission and National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners. He joined the commission on May 30, 2018, filling the seat previously held by Baran, who in 2018 secured his own full five-year term through June 2023.
Hanson most recently was a Democratic staffer on the Senate Appropriations Committee, with a focus on issues including management of spent fuel from nuclear power plants. Prior to joining the committee, he spent almost six years at the Department of Energy.
With an annual budget approaching $1 billion, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission provides oversight of nuclear power and waste operations around the United States, among other licensed activities. The five commissioners set policy, establish regulations, issue orders for licensees, and determine legal issues.
