SRNS Aims for Full Return to Normal Ops This Month

The operator of the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina intends by the end of March to fully resume normal operations following a September 2015 incident that led to the suspension of all nonessential nuclear and non-nuclear work by the contractor.

As work resumed in November, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions facilities were first placed into deliberate operations in which the pace of work was slowed and placed under greater oversight. These facilities — including the Savannah River National Laboratory and H Canyon — were over time individually shifted back to what SRNS President and CEO Carol Johnson on Wednesday called “enhanced operations” — standard functioning, but incorporating lessons learned from the incident.

Only HB Line, a unique chemical processing system used to prepare plutonium and uranium materials for disposal, remains in deliberate operations. “We do anticipate that here in the next couple of weeks that HB Line will exit deliberate operations,” Johnson said during the 2016 Waste Management Conference.

Reports in late February indicated HB Line would graduate out of deliberate operations early this month. SRNS, though, is “proceeding as expected,” spokeswoman Barbara Smoak said by email on Wednesday.

The Sept. 3 incident involved three workers and a first-line manager who were moving plutonium in HB Line. While this is a routine procedure, in this case it involved a non-routine collection of samples for study. While carts built specifically to carry special materials, and prevent any nuclear criticality danger, were available, the workers consciously chose to put the materials into a “pail” that was not approved for this type of work, Johnson said.

SRNS Project Manager Bill Giddings indicated the workers cut corners to meet a self-imposed schedule to complete the project that day rather than have it carry over to the next workday: “Let’s get this finished today and we don’t have to do it tomorrow.”

Johnson said she could not say what personnel actions were taken against the four SRNS workers.

SRNS self-reported the event, then undertook a massive assessment to determine how it occurred and how to prevent similar potentially dangerous breakdowns in procedure. There were multiple causes, according to an SRNS analysis, including a willful violation of procedure by the four workers, an unwillingness to call a “time out” to reconsider their decision-making, and inadequate first-line manager performance and management engagement.

The months-long, and ongoing, efforts to address the failure has been similarly multifaceted, Johnson said. They include management meetings with all 5,300 SRNS workers, reviews of procedures, taking steps to ensure workers adhere to procedures, and heightening managers’ presence in the field, among many others.

Johnson said the cost of the operations suspension has not been determined. SRNS wants to catch up on project milestones, but not at the risk of safety, she said. “It’ll cost what it costs to do this right and safely and meet our objectives.”