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Chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Gregory Jaczko, gave a speech last week to utility decision makers outlining three key areas of responsibility that energy companies must take to ensure the success and safety of the US nuclear energy sector. We have published excerpts from his speech, which could soon act as an informative benchmark to the industry at home and abroad.

Gregory B. Jaczko, Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission spoke last week to directors of the Institute for Nuclear Power Operations (INPO), members of the National Academy for Nuclear Training, and the Goizueta Business School at the Goizueta Directors Institute in Atlanta, Georgia.

It was there that he explained to utility companies that the future success of nuclear energy rests in their hands.

Jaczko outlined three areas in which energy companies can “make a significant difference in promoting nuclear safety and security.”

Here are some excerpts from his speech:

“The challenge for you – the leaders of the utilities that own many of the nation’s nuclear plants – is to ensure that our nation never again experiences an accident like Three Mile Island – that no iconic image like its cooling towers ever again enters the public consciousness. With that mind, I would like to discuss today three areas in which I think your leadership.

Knowledge Management

"The first issue is knowledge management. With 104 operating reactors, the United States has the largest commercial nuclear industry in the world. That provides the industry and the agency a wealth of operating and regulatory experience from which to draw to determine how to best advance nuclear safety.

"But since most reactors have been in operation since the late 1960s or early 1970s, the first generation of nuclear workers – the workers who first operated these plants and weathered the industry’s early growing pains – is now beginning to retire.

"With their retirements, these employees take with them a tremendous amount of knowledge and experience.

"The industry needs to work hard to ensure that their long-time employees, as they retire, pass on their range and depth of knowledge to the next generation.

"No one wants to relearn forgotten lessons by reliving the mistakes of the past.

"As Ben Franklin observed, “experience is the best teacher, but a fool will learn from no other.”

“…In the coming years, it is critical that you emphasize the importance of knowledge management issues to your chief executive officers and chief nuclear officers. As I’ve said, the retirement of that first generation of nuclear workers poses challenges, as will the potential construction and operation of new reactors that employ different technologies and designs.

"These challenges are certainly distinct, and not as severe, as those that the industry faced in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

"The industry today has much a broader employee base and decades of operating experience that it didn’t have before, and the potential for new reactor construction at this point pales in comparison to the market explosion of a generation ago.

"But the challenges of today are real and significant.

"I understand that the industry has taken some significant steps to address these issues, and it should continue to do so aggressively. I often meet with hundreds of employees during my visits to nuclear plants.

"They are dedicated professionals, but the industry won’t continue taking full advantage of their knowledge and experience without sustained leadership from you.

Safety Culture

"Highly trained and qualified workers are necessary for safety, and today’s workers are as well trained and qualified as ever, due in no small part to the work of INPO.

"But good training isn’t enough on its own to ensure safety, unless workers demonstrate a consistent commitment to safety in the way that they approach their important responsibilities.

"In recent years, the critical role of safety culture has become increasingly recognized in many areas, including most recently with regard to the Gulf oil disaster.

"The safety culture issue has a long history in the nuclear field. In fact, the term “safety culture” is reportedly to have first been used in the nuclear context – in the 1987 report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Nuclear Energy Agency on the Chernobyl disaster.

"But going back even further, you can read in the Kemeny Commission Report on the Three Mile Island accident the concern about complacency, the need for a questioning attitude, and other factors that we would associate today with the concept of safety culture.

Need for open channels of communication

"I’ll share with you a story from a few years ago that illustrates this point.

"At a to-remain-nameless nuclear power plant, an employee raised a safety concern through an anonymous channel.

"The site vice president at this plant took these concerns very seriously.

"He desperately wanted to hear from the employee to find out more about the safety issue, to ensure that it was resolved.

"So he called all the plant’s employees together as a group and asked the anonymous tipster to come forward to identify him or herself. Now, there are a couple of different ways to look at this situation.

"If there were really a strong safety culture at this plant, the concerned employee would have good reason to come forward so that he or she could be congratulated for identifying an issue that, if left unchecked, could potentially lead to an unsafe working environment.

"On the other hand, if the safety culture at this plant was not so strong, the site VP's actions could in and of themselves be seen as intimidating and retaliatory.

"And if we focus for a quick moment on the fact that the concern had been raised anonymously, I think we have our answer as to the situation in this particular instance.

"First and foremost, this story demonstrates how important it is to have a strong safety culture.

"Here you have a real safety issue in question, and the employee who identifies it only feels comfortable in alerting the plant managers anonymously.

"This situation isn’t even the worst-case scenario where an employee doesn’t even feel comfortable raising it anonymously.

"The NRC has sound rules and strong oversight programs in place, but the simple fact of the matter is that the agency can’t be everywhere.

"The licensees that we regulate always will have the primary day-to-day responsibility for ensuring that their facility operates safely.

"That is why it is critical that our licensees focus on cultivating the type of open, collaborative organizational culture where employees feel comfortable raising questions and issues.

Tone of safety from top to bottom

"The second point that story highlights is that for an organization to develop a strong safety culture, managers and employees at all levels of the organization must demonstrate a consistent focus on safety and security.

"This isn’t just about the engineer on the ground who is responsible for spotting the issue in the first place, or even his or her supervisor who should be encouraging employees to come forward with possible concerns.

"The very top ranks of an organization have to make clear that their primary focus remains on safety and security.

"And when I refer to the top ranks, I don’t mean just the chief nuclear officer (CNO) of the plant, or even the chief executive officer (CEO) of the utility.

"The tone for a strong safety culture has to begin with the board of directors, the people in this room to whom the CNO and CEO ultimately answer.

“…For potential new reactors, we have to be concerned that operators may place too much faith in the new technologies that they deploy.

"There is no question that the industry has made a lot of progress in developing and enhancing nuclear safety technology over the last several decades.

"The new reactor designs that the agency has received increasingly rely on passive safety technologies so that even when engineering and human failures occur, the inherent design of the reactor can mitigate problems.

"But passive safety only goes so far.

"A generation ago, plant designers and operators had tremendous confidence in the resilience of the plants’ engineering designs.

"Events, however, have repeatedly made clear that highly qualified and trained people are absolutely necessary for assuring safety.

Public Outreach

"The final issue that I would like to discuss is public outreach.

"Few civilian technologies – if any – have the ability of nuclear energy to attract public attention and elicit public concerns.

"Three Mile Island is a testament to that. The iconic image of Three Mile Island’s cooling towers still has a hold on the public perception of nuclear power.

"That image pervades the popular culture, including the hit television show The Simpsons.

"I believe that that it is important for both the NRC and the industry to be pro-active in reaching out to the public and explaining what each is doing to ensure safety and security.

“… Through open and transparent decision making, the agency tries to build public confidence that we are meeting our mission to protect public health and safety.

"But it is not the agency’s responsibility to make the industry’s case, and it is not the agency’s responsibility to explain away less than stellar performance by licensees.

"We license a plant that meets our safety standards, and we work to ensure that the plant continues to do so after it receives its license.

"Dr. James Schlesinger – a former Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission under President Nixon – said it well: ‘It is not our responsibility…if a utility encounters unanticipated costs because of a failure to do its job properly, failure to comply with the procedures, or because of a change in the law.

"We are sympathetic; we understand your problem, but it is your problem.’

"And Chairman Schlesinger spoke on behalf of an agency – unlike the NRC – charged in part with promoting nuclear energy.

“…The best way for the industry to move forward is not to look to the NRC to advocate on its behalf – that’s not our job – but for the industry to pro-actively reach out to the public.

"By listening and engaging the public, you can address some issues, mitigate others that might not be readily resolved, and build the trust to make future discussions even more productive.

"There are too many views on too many issues to expect consensus as a matter of course – that is true for the agency and for the industry.

"But it’s important to remember that public confidence is not the same thing as public agreement or public acceptance.

"The public can have confidence in an institution without always agreeing with it.

Conclusion

"I’ve put forward three challenges for you.

"First, to recognize and act on the importance of capturing and passing on the rich experience and knowledge held by long-time employees who are leaving the industry. Don’t let that invaluable resource seep away.

"Second, make safety culture one of your highest priorities, and keep it always at the forefront of your words and deeds.

"Third, elevate the importance of – and emphasis on – continual and effective public outreach, making it a standard part of your planning and management.”