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HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate

British Energy Generation Ltd - Dungeness B Power Station

Quarterly report for 1 January to 31 March 2007

Contents

Foreword

This report is issued as part of the Health and Safety Executive's commitment to make information about inspection and regulatory activities relating to the above site available to the public. It is for distribution to members of the Dungeness Site Stake-holder Group (SSG) and covers activities associated with the regulation of safety at Dungeness B Power Station. These reports are distributed quarterly. Site Inspectors of HM Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (part of the Health and Safety Executive's Nuclear Directorate) attend LCLC meetings and will be happy to respond there to questions raised by members of the LCLC. Any person wishing to inquire about matters covered by this report should contact the HSE, Nuclear Directorate on 0151-951-3484/3290

This report will be placed on the HSE website at
http://www.hse.gov.uk/nuclear/index.htm

Nuclear Directorate
Health and Safety Executive
Redgrave Court
Merton Road
Bootle
Merseyside
L20 7HS

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Inspections

The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) Site Inspector visited Dungeness B on the following dates during the quarter covered by this report:

Other NII inspectors with specialist technical expertise also visited Dungeness B and other British Energy establishments during the period to support the Site Inspector by performing inspections on specific aspects of the Licensee’s arrangements and nuclear safety case. The Superintending Inspector also attended site to attend a meeting.

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Routine matters

Routine planned inspections are carried out throughout the year and enable NII to judge whether a Licensee is complying with the conditions attached to the Nuclear Site Licence, the Ionising Radiations Regulations, and other relevant statutory provisions on a sampling basis.  Compliance with the following Licence Conditions was inspected during the period:

In general the station’s arrangements were found to be satisfactory. In those areas where improvements were identified, satisfactory commitments to address the issues were made by the station. These commitments will be tracked and closed out as part of normal regulatory business.

Meetings attended

The site’s Annual Review of Safety was attended in February. The HMNII Superintending Inspector also attended this meeting. The station presented its intentions for next year and made commitments to enhance its safety performance.

Meetings were held to discuss progress made of both the Data Protection System (DPS) Replacement project and the Fuel Plug Unit (FPU) Project. Meetings were also attended to discuss the station’s progress against closing out actions placed on it following the NII team inspection of LC 28: Maintenance, Examination, Inspection and Testing in September 2006.

A meeting was attended to review the forward plan for the 2007 Level 1 demonstration which is due to take place in May 2007.

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Non-routine matters

As part of their planned inspection site inspectors examine safety-related events that have occurred and the Licensee’s response to them. Generally the Licensee’s internal system for following up events is robust and the appropriate actions are implemented.  More noteworthy events followed up during the period include the following:

Leak of carbon dioxide gas

This incident occurred on 26 March 2007. During routine plant monitoring, elevated levels of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) were detected in the basement of reactor 22 and in the gas circulator hall. A site incident was declared to muster staff and establish an emergency response. The levels of CO2 indicated a small leak. The CO2 did not contain any radioactive material indicating that it was from a source upstream of the reactor. A methodical approach was used to survey potential sources of clean gas and a 3” diameter pipe lying in a trench on the north side of the reactor was identified as the leak source. The pipe was isolated and the leak ceased. No personnel were affected by the leak. The scene was attended by the NII Site Inspector during a routine visit to site. Some degradation of the material condition of some pipe supports was seen. The station has been requested to provide proposals to remedy this and minimize the possibility of further similar occurrences in other underground pipe work.

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Regulatory activity

Under Health and Safety legislation the Site Inspector, or other HSE Inspectors, may issue formal notices to secure improvements to safety. No such notices were issued during the reporting period.

The Inspectorate has powers under the Licence to issue Consents, Approvals and Directions. In addition the Inspectorate uses Licence Instruments to issue Specifications and Agreements under the conditions of the Licence.  These are all called Licence Instruments. Licence Instruments issued during the period were: