Todd Jacobson
WC Monitor
9/5/2014

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is calling on the Department of Energy to strengthen its emergency response capabilities and this week issued its first formal recommendation in nearly two years. The recommendation was prompted, in part, by DOE’s response to a truck fire and radioactive material release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant earlier this year and other emergency response concerns, the DNFSB said in a Sept. 3 letter to Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz that was obtained by WC Monitor.

The recommendation has not been publicly released. “The Board believes DOE’s efforts to adequately address emergency preparedness and response at its sites with defense nuclear facilities have fallen short as clearly evidenced by the truck fire and radioactive material release events at WIPP,” the DNFSB said in its recommendation.

Recommendation Requires Efforts to Strengthen Emergency Response by 2016

The Board called on DOE to take a series of steps by 2016 to strengthen its emergency response capabilities, including creating a “robust” emergency response infrastructure at all of its defense nuclear facilities that is “survivable, habitable, and maintained to function during emergencies, including severe events that can impact multiple facilities and potentially overwhelm emergency response resources.” It also called on DOE to ensure that sites have training and drill programs staffed with fully competent emergency response personnel, are conducting exercises that challenge existing capabilities, and are constantly identifying deficiencies with emergency preparedness and response plans, preparing corrective actions and evaluating the actions.

The Board also said DOE’s emergency management directive should be updated to address severe events, including “ ‘beyond design basis’ operational and natural phenomena events,” the reliability and habitability of emergency response facilities and support equipment, criteria for training and drills, standards for ensuring emergency response exercises adequately demonstrate proficiency, and vulnerabilities identified during independent assessments. The Board said that DOE’s order governing emergency preparedness and response and the implementation of its requirements “must be strengthened to ensure the continued protection of workers and the public.”

WIPP Issues a Tipping Point

The truck fire and radioactive material release at WIPP demonstrated the shortcomings in DOE’s requirements, the Board noted. “The Board has observed that these problems can be attributed to the inability of sites with defense nuclear facilities to consistently demonstrate fundamental attributes of a sound emergency preparedness and response program, e.g., adequately resourced emergency preparedness and response programs and proper planning and training for emergencies,” the Board said.

The Board said it’s important for emergency response guidelines to be periodically updated to take into account lessons learned from accidents, such as those that occurred at the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig and the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant. “The Board is concerned that these problems stem from DOE’s failure to implement existing emergency management requirements and to periodically update these requirements,” the Board said. “DOE has not effectively overseen and enforced compliance with these requirements, which establish the baseline for emergency preparedness and response at its sites with defense nuclear facilities.”