U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Region III Office of Public Affairs

801 Warrenville Road, Lisle IL 60532-4351

NEWS ANNOUNCEMENT: RIII-96-72 December 4, 1996

CONTACT: Jan Strasma 630/829-9663

Angela Dauginas 630/829-9662

E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov

NRC STAFF PROPOSES $325,000 FINE AGAINST WISCONSIN ELECTRIC CO.

FOR VIOLATIONS OF NRC REQUIREMENTS AT POINT BEACH NUCLEAR PLANT

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has proposed a

$325,000 fine against Wisconsin Electric Power for violations of

NRC safety requirements at the Point Beach Nuclear Power Station.

The plant is located at Two Creeks, Wisconsin.

"The issues we identified reflect significant weaknesses in

the areas of operations, maintenance, and engineering...which

involve all levels of your organization," said A. Bill Beach, NRC

Regional Administrator in notifying the utility of the fine.

He continued, "While these issues are of significant

regulatory concern, we are also concerned by the inadequate

response (and sometimes lack of a response) by your staff to most

of these issues."

The company was cited: (1) for instances when reactor

operators were inattentive to their duties; (2) for starting up

Point Beach Unit 2 in April with a safety system -- an auxiliary

feedwater pump -- inoperable and for failing to adequately test

the plant's safety injection system; (3) for failing to take

adequate steps to increase the minimum number of pumps required

in the equipment cooling water system; and (4) for violations

associated with the hydrogen burn in a spent fuel storage cask

after it was loaded in May. [Additional details on the

violations are attached.]

Fines of $100,000 each were proposed for the first three

items. A fine of $25,000 was proposed for the violations

associated with the spent fuel storage cask.

Wisconsin Electric has until January 2 to pay the fine or to

protest it. If the fine is protested and subsequently imposed by

the NRC staff, the utility may request a hearing.

The NRC's letter to the utility and the Notices of Violation

are available on the NRC's internet web site at:

<http://www.nrc.gov/OPA/reports>.

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ADDITIONAL DETAILS ON VIOLATIONS

Point Beach Nuclear Power Station

1. Control room inattentiveness

On July 15 an NRC inspector observed on-shift control room

operators viewing a training videotape in the control room. On

July 31 an NRC inspector observed a control room operator leave

his watch station to get a cup of coffee without the required

short-term watch relief by another operator. On August 14 an NRC

inspector observed a control room operator fail to respond to a

control board alarm until he was prompted by a senior reactor

operator. On August 14 the utility found that its on-duty

Technical Adviser left the site in violation of NRC requirements

and that being offsite but nearby had been an accepted practice

for the past five years.

2. Auxiliary Feedwater System operability and Safety Injection

System testing

The utility started up Unit 2 in April with a safety system -- an

auxiliary feedwater pump -- inoperable. The pump provides water

to the plant's steam generators when the main feedwater pumps are

not available. Valves in the pump's discharge line had been left

closed following maintenance, and the utility did not conduct a

required post-maintenance test which would have found that the

valves remained closed.

The testing program to measure the discharge pressure of pumps in

the Safety Injection System did not have the correct pressure

criterion and used gauges which where found to be out of

calibration. The Safety Injection System is one of the plant's

emergency reactor cooling systems. From December 1992 to July of

this year, the gauges were found to be within their required

accuracy only once in 20 calibrations.

3. Inadequate Corrective Action -- Service Water Pumps

Wisconsin Electric did not take adequate corrective action after

determining in April that it needed to increase the minimum

number of service water system pumps required to be operable.

The service water system supplies cooling water to various plant

equipment. There are six pumps in the system. The existing

requirement called for a minimum of two pumps, and the utility

did not take adequate steps to increase the minimum when it

determined that three would be needed in some accident conditions

to provide the desired flow and pressure.

4. Violations Associated with Dry Cask Spent Fuel Storage

On May 28 welding on a shield lid for a loaded spent fuel storage

cask ignited hydrogen gas which had accumulated under the lid.
There was no apparent damage to the cask or the spent fuel, and

there were no injuries. The hydrogen was generated by an

unexpected chemical reaction between a zinc coating inside the

cask and boric acid in water temporarily in the cask.

The company was cited for failing to determine the suitability of

the zinc coating for use in the dry cask storage system and for

failing to take proper action on earlier indications of a gas

build up in the cask.

The company was also cited for failing to appropriately transfer

the weight of the cask shield lid into several procedures and for

inadequate safety evaluations of the rigging used to lift the

cask shield lid and of the procedure to weigh the lid.

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Attachment to News Announcement RIII-96-72

December 4, 1996