The contractor that operates the U.S. Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina has mismanaged security incident reports over the past two years, with problems ranging from late submission of documents to the federal agency to providing incomplete information when they are delivered.
In one instance, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) was supposed to close out a report by October 2016, 90 days after starting the documentation. However, it did so in November 2018 – 762 days after the deadline, according to an Aug. 20 letter from the DOE Office of Enforcement, a branch of the Office of Enterprise Assessments.
The letter was sent to SRNS President and CEO Stuart MacVean and came in response to worries that the contractor does not have a stable program in place to address the site’s incidents of security concerns (IOSCs): any actions or events that pose a threat to the Energy Department’s protection program. These concerns include two years in which Savannah River Nuclear Solutions failed to submit timely incident reports.
During a review of the contractor’s IOSC program, the Office of Enforcement evaluated 21 Category A reports submitted from fiscal years 2016 through 2018. Category A incidents could include impacts to nuclear materials, firearms, or security. The letter did not provide details of specific incidents.
Of the 21 reports, eight were submitted past DOE’s mandatory five-day notification period. And 16 “significantly exceeded the 90-day closure period,” Kevin Dressman, director of the Enforcement Office, wrote to MacVean. In addition, when final reports were submitted, several did not include important information, such as chronological sequences of events before and after the incidents.
Following the review, officials from the Office of Enforcement visited Savannah River from April 2-4 of this year to gain a better understanding of the contractor’s IOSC program. Officials interviewed key personnel and reviewed relevant documents. They found that SRNS had made progress in providing timely and complete documentation, but still had some issues. These include the IOSC program being driven by individual workers, rather than being “based on formal processes and procedures,” Dressman wrote. The agency took issue with this because the contractor as a unit is supposed to implement procedures, rather than just a handful of employees.
Savannah River Nuclear Solutions is a partnership of Fluor, Honeywell, and Stoller Newport News Nuclear. The company manages some 5,300 employees at the 310-square-mile site near Aiken, S.C. The contractor is in the middle of a $1.5 billion contract extension that runs from Aug. 1, 2019 through Sept. 30, 2020, which follows its initial 10-year, $8 billion deal that ended on July 31.
Work under the contract includes general site cleanup, building deactivation and decommissioning, and technology development to assist liquid waste treatment at the site. Other missions include processing and storing nuclear materials, tritium production for the U.S. Department of Defense, and management of the Savannah River National Laboratory.
Spokeswoman Barbara Smoak said Wednesday via email that the contractor agrees that there was a negative trend in its IOSC program “that resulted in less than adequate adherence to reporting guidelines as well as challenging processes and procedures that inhibited timely closeout of IOSC reports.”
She did not state what may have led to that downward trend, but added that the company has refocused attention on the program to more quickly close out reports. She added that the Enforcement Office has not reported any closure issues since April 2019, after SRNS instituted steps including establishing a tracking system for reports.
