Management of Safety Requirements in Subcontracting during the Olkiluoto 3 Nuclear Power Plant Construction Phase Contents

The Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority (STUK) concluded in connection with the construction of the Olkiluoto 3 nuclear power plant that the performance of the organisations involved in the project and the interaction between the organisations did not in all respects meet the expectations that STUK has on good safety culture during the construction phase of a power plant. The identified problems had already impeded progress of the project and possibly increased schedule-related pressures during the later stages of the project. STUK considers important that problems during construction and manufacturing will not result in impaired quality of the final products, or even in uncertainty about the achieved quality. For this reason, the performance of the organisations involved in the construction of the Olkiluoto 3 nuclear power plant unit should be improved. In order to identify the needs for improvement, STUK appointed an investigation team and asked the team to present an assessment of the performance of the organisations in the light of certain case studies that were selected as examples. In addition, STUK asked the investigation team to present recommendations for improving the performance of the licensee Teollisuuden Voima Oy (TVO), and the vendor consortium CFS, formed by Framatome ANP (FANP, currently Areva NP) and Siemens AG. Within the project, Framatome is responsible for the reactor island and Siemens for the turbine island. As the construction project proceeds, STUK will assess how these recommendations have been materialized in the operations of the parties. The investigation team also analysed the needs for development in STUK's own operations and issued recommendations for this purpose. The task given to the investigation team is shown in Appendix 1, and the composition of the team in Appendix 2. The investigation entailed interviews of persons in different capacities in organizations (TVO, CFS, FANP, subcontractor, research institute) that have taken part in the Olkiluoto 3 project, as well as a visit to the Olkiluoto 3 construction site and the concrete batching plant. The investigation programme is shown in Appendix 3. Appendix 4 contains a description of STUK's activities as the regulatory organisation for the nuclear power plant construction project. In safety-critical fields the organisations are expected to possess an ability also to manage situations that are difficult to predict. The characteristics of organisations operating with high reliability include a serious attitude towards even small errors, an overall assessment of situations, emphasis on professional competence over organisational status, …