Bechtel studies reports of flaws

Wednesday, July 16, 2003 | 11:08 a.m.

A Department of Energy contractor is studying 22,000 documents linked to the high-level nuclear waste Yucca Mountain repository program in an effort to find the root of numerous flaws detected by reviewers.

Top Yucca contractor Bechtel SAIC is reviewing all scientific records before the DOE submits a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, expected in December 2004, officials said Tuesday.

Bechtel is addressing "numerous and varied problems," Nancy Williams, project manager for Bechtel SAIC in Las Vegas, said during a teleconference between Washington and Las Vegas, part of a quarterly review between DOE and Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff.

The company is trying to bring the scientific data on the project up to standards after several questions about the work, and a Department of Energy order to correct the work.

Bechtel has instituted a detailed checklist of technical, scientific and quality control issues for managers to follow on the first-of-a-kind repository project proposed for Yucca, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, Williams said.

After training and audits are completed in August, the Quality Assurance process is expected to be in place by Sept. 30 to assure scientific information is top quality, she said.

The checklists for managers are the basis for consistency in the project and to deliver a comprehensive and detailed license application, Williams said.

When asked if Bechtel has a written plan to confirm its data, Williams said that the checklists served as a way for managers to ensure that the information is solid.

"Checklists are lessons learned, reflecting the struggles with past data problems," Williams said.

It will take up to 200 hours for a team of up to 10 experts to complete a review of repository risks, Williams said. That review is expected to be finished by December, she said.

For other information, reviews could be completed by March 2004.

The entire Bechtel review is expected to be ready by December 2004, Williams said.

In addition to gaps in the voluminous data gathered at the mountain in the past 20 years, the NRC had noted for years that the Yucca project could not qualify its scientific information under rigorous Yucca Quality Assurance reviews.

The Yucca Quality Assurance program is designed to preserve data that have been collected over years that support the department's conclusion that Yucca Mountain is a safe place to bury the nation's most radioactive waste.

The DOE filed a "corrective action" report after it issued a "stop-work" order on March 4 detailing the problems Bechtel has to fix in its procedures.

The stop-work order was focused on scientific review procedures and did not bring the project to a halt.

That stop-work order will not be lifted until there is a quality assurance process in place, Kerry Grooms of the DOE's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management said on Tuesday.

R. Dennis Brown, DOE's quality assurance director who issued the stop-work order, said that it will take time for Bechtel to make sure its efforts are working.

"It could be months," he said.

The flaws listed in the corrective action report violated the Energy Department's Quality Assurance Requirement Document, which is required by federal law.

However, although the DOE is making progress in organizing and reviewing its information, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is looking for outcomes, field representative Robert Latta of Las Vegas said.

"I don't think any of those steps outlined accomplish that," Latta said.

After five years of discussion between the NRC and the DOE, Latta said there is still an issue for the Energy Department to address in assuring the information before asking for a license.

At the end of the meeting, the NRC and the DOE agreed that some progress had been made. Four of six sticking points had been settled, including audit schedules, evaluation of training, surveys and retesting software for computer models.

External independent reviews of the proposed quality assurance program and supporting information from the program were still under discussion.