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The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission recently completed an investigation into security practives at the South Texas Nuclear Power Plant. The NRC found one minor safety violation and identified some issues that could affect the safety of hte work environment. Houston Public Radio’s Laurie Johnson reports.
The NRC report says overall the security program at the South Texas Project adequately protects the public health and safety. The only violation was a problem conducting security searches on emergency vehicles leaving and entering the plant. NRC Deputy Director of Reactor Safety Roy Caniano says the inspection also unearthed some communication problems between the security team and other personnel departments.
“The security organization does have subsets of teamwork issues and of course our concern is that, if again, if it is left unchecked, you know it could eventually lead into overall performance issues. And again that is something that we are going to continue monitoring.”
After the NRC completed their inspection, South Texas Project officials conducted an internal investigation and made a number of changes to communication and management within the security department. Caniano says the NRC will be back for further investigation, but pointed out they are just a regulatory committee and do not have the jurisdiction to affect change.
“We’re not going to stop here. But you need to keep in mind, I think this has been discussed on a couple of occasions, you know you’re ultimately responsible for the overall program there.”
STP officials say they are confident in the safety of the facility but know they are not where they need to be when it comes to internal communication. They plan to implement a security oversight committee to hold them accountable to changes in the security system. The South Texas Project is located about 90 miles south of Houston. Laurie Johnson, Houston Public Radio News.
