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Nuclear Health and Safety: Savannah River's Unusual Occurrence Reporting Program Has Been Ineffective

RCED-90-53 Published: Dec 20, 1989. Publicly Released: Feb 20, 1990.
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Highlights

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Energy's (DOE) Unusual Occurrence Reporting (UOR) program at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.

Recommendations

Recommendations for Executive Action

Agency Affected Recommendation Status
Department of Energy To better ensure the reporting of all significant events to DOE headquarters under the DOE UOR program, the Secretary of Energy should require the Savannah River Operations Office to establish formal written procedures for: (1) reviewing and analyzing the contractor's internal reports; and (2) evaluating the contractor's internal reporting system to ensure that it is compatible with the objectives of the DOE UOR program.
Closed – Implemented
Directive Implementation Instruction (DII) 5000.3, Occurrence Reporting and Processing of Operations Information, was issued by the DOE Savannah River Office on December 28, 1990. This document requires that DOE representatives be involved in the review of occurrence reports prepared by contractors.
Department of Energy To better ensure the reporting of all significant events to DOE headquarters under the DOE UOR program, the Secretary of Energy should revise the DOE UOR order to more clearly specify which reactor-related events should be reported to DOE headquarters as UOR.
Closed – Implemented
The existing SR Order (SR 5000.3) was not revised due to cancellation of DOE Order 5000.3 by issue of new DOE 5000.3A. A new SR document, Occurrence Reporting and Processing of Operations Information, DII 5000.3, was released on December 28, 1990. This document implements the requirements of DOE Order 5000.3A.

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Topics

Accident preventionContract oversightGOCOInternal controlsNoncomplianceNuclear facility safetyNuclear reactorsReporting requirementsSafety regulationSafety standards