(16b) Process Safety Systems: Accomplishing Hazardous Work Safely

UCOR, located in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, is The Department of Energy’s premier cleanup contractor, working to remediate contaminated buildings and land to give back to the government or make available for private reindustrialization. Simplified, the process is often referred to as D&D. It includes deactivating and demolishing defunct reactors, nuclear weapons facilities, and their supporting processes and structures. This work scope deals with many hazards on a daily basis including radiological, lead, mercury, chemicals, beryllium, asbestos, electricity, buried piping, shock sensitive chemicals, pyrophorics, sodium, stored energy, lack of configuration control, etc.

Many of the structures were built in the 1940’s and modified over time, often done in secrecy behind the veil of a secured facility. As a result, it is not uncommon to encounter “unknowns”. Dealing with these is a complex process that takes a plethora of resources including work planning, multi-disciplinary expertise, and personal protection equipment. Needless to say, safety is our top priority!

We have developed robust programs and processes to ensure the safety of our workers, the public, and the environment. Our programs and processes include conduct of operations, conservative decision-making models, situational awareness, safety culture, behavior-based safety, corrective action management, and the tracking and trending of leading and lagging indicators which drive strategic goal setting.

All of this is important and necessary to execute our mission. However, it must be underpinned by an element of pinnacle importance, which is building a relationship based on trust and mutual respect with our workforce. After all those are the individuals who, on a daily basis, safely execute high hard nuclear work.

The speaker, whose career spans 40+ years all over the United States, has led some of the safest teams who, in parallel, have also completed some of the most dangerous work that has ever excited in nuclear demolition!