Worker Safety and Health and Nuclear Safety Quarterly Performance Analysis (January - March 2008)

Abstract

The DOE Office of Enforcement expects LLNL to 'implement comprehensive management and independent assessments that are effective in identifying deficiencies and broader problems in safety and security programs, as well as opportunities for continuous improvement within the organization' and to 'regularly perform assessments to evaluate implementation of the contractor's processes for screening and internal reporting.' LLNL has a self-assessment program, described in ES&H Manual Document 4.1, that includes line, management and independent assessments. LLNL also has in place a process to identify and report deficiencies of nuclear, worker safety and health and security requirements. In addition, the DOE Office of Enforcement expects LLNL to evaluate 'issues management databases to identify adverse trends, dominant problem areas, and potential repetitive events or conditions' (page 14, DOE Enforcement Process Overview, December 2007). LLNL requires that all worker safety and health and nuclear safety noncompliances be tracked as 'deficiencies' in the LLNL Issues Tracking System (ITS). Data from the ITS are analyzed for worker safety and health (WSH) and nuclear safety noncompliances that may meet the threshold for reporting to the DOE Noncompliance Tracking System (NTS). This report meets the expectations defined by the DOE Office of Enforcement to review the assessments conducted bymore » LLNL, analyze the issues and noncompliances found in these assessments, and evaluate the data in the ITS database to identify adverse trends, dominant problem areas, and potential repetitive events or conditions. The report attempts to answer three questions: (1) Is LLNL evaluating its programs and state of compliance? (2) What is LLNL finding? (3) Is LLNL appropriately managing what it finds? The analysis in this report focuses on data from the first quarter of 2008 (January through March). This quarter is analyzed within the context of information identified in previous quarters to include April 2007 through March 2008. The results from analyzing the deficiencies are presented in accordance with the two primary NTS reporting thresholds for WSH and nuclear safety noncompliances: (1) those related to certain events or conditions and (2) those that are management issues. In addition, WSH noncompliances were also analyzed to determine if any fell under the 'other significant condition' threshold. This report also identifies noncompliance topical areas that may have issues that do not meet the NTS reporting threshold but should remain under observation. These are placed on the 'watch list' for continued analysis.« less