NRC NEWS

 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

 2443 Warrenville Road

 Lisle IL 60532

 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov

No. III-05-031 June 16, 2005

CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663 

Viktoria Mitlyng (630) 829-9662 

NRC TO MEET JUNE 22 WITH WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CO. TO DISCUSS

APPARENT VIOLATIONS AT HEMATITE, MO., FACILITY

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet June 22 with officials of Westinghouse

Electric Co. in Lisle, Ill., to discuss apparent violations of NRC requirements at the company's former

fuel fabrication facility in Hematite, Mo.

The meeting will be at 1:30 p.m. in the NRC's Region III Office, 2443 Warrenville Rd., Suite

210, in Lisle. The meeting is open to public observation. At the conclusion of the business portion of

the meeting, NRC officials will be available for questions and comments from members of the public

attending the meeting.

An NRC inspection at the Hematite facility, conducted January through April, identified three

apparent violations of NRC requirements for assuring that uranium used in nuclear fuel processing is

properly controlled and stored to preclude any accidental nuclear reaction. 

The information discussed in the June 22 meeting will be used by the NRC in determining what

enforcement action, if any, should be taken. Enforcement actions may include issuance of a Notice of

Violation or possible fines against Westinghouse. 

The Hematite plant processed and fabricated fuel for nuclear power plants from 1974 until

operations ceased in 2001. Westinghouse is performing limited decommissioning activities at the site,

including surveys and removal of processing equipment and piping, ventilation ducts, and other

material contaminated with low-enriched uranium.

NRC inspectors found that components containing uranium residues were not properly stored,

that equipment and components were not properly analyzed before being stored, and that the plant's

procedures did not include necessary controls for handling and storing uranium-contaminated

components.

"The NRC imposes strict requirements for surveying and storing equipment containing uranium

fuel residues," said James Caldwell, NRC Regional Administrator. “Although Westinghouse failed to

meet these requirements, our inspectors determined there was no possibility of an accidental nuclear

reaction at the Hematite facility.”
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Caldwell noted that since these apparent violations were identified, Westinghouse has taken

steps to correct the deficiencies and assure that uranium-contaminated equipment is properly evaluated

and stored during decommissioning activities.

The meeting between the NRC staff and Westinghouse, called a predecisional enforcement

conference, is an opportunity for Westinghouse to provide its perspective on the apparent violations

and to offer any other information that they believe the NRC should take into consideration in making

an enforcement decision. No decision on the apparent violations or any enforcement action will be

made at the conference. Those decisions will be made later by NRC officials.

The inspection report describing the apparent violations is available from the Region III Office

of Public Affairs or from the agency's online document library (known as ADAMS): 

http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams/web-based.html - use accession number ML051600009 in the

search box to locate the report. For assistance in using ADAMS, you may contact the NRC Public

Document Room staff at 800/397-4209.

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