Areva NP Inc.’s nuclear operations on Mount Athos Road continue to be safe and secure, federal regulators said Monday.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission held a meeting in Lynchburg to discuss the inspections it conducted at the Mount Athos Road facility from April 2008 through April 2010. During that time period, there were no major issues at the plant, which manufactures nuclear fuel and repairs and refurbishes equipment for nuclear power plants.
“There were no areas needing improvement,” said Mary Thomas, the NRC’s site inspector for the facility. “… We found that Areva Lynchburg conducted their activities safely and securely.”
She said that the NRC would continue to oversee Areva’s work at Mount Athos Road with the minimum number of inspection hours. Additional hours are prescribed for facilities that have safety problems.
Marvin Sykes, branch chief in the NRC division of fuel facility inspection, said Areva’s performance assessments would continue to take place on a two-year cycle “because of the continued good performance.”
Dominique Grandemange, manager of the Mount Athos Road site, said Areva has achieved its safety record by taking a proactive approach toward safety.
“We are all convinced that if we want to be successful … we have to really look at the … low-level events,” he said. “We really have focused on driving the entire workforce to report those low-level events so we can train them, and so we can take care of actions to prevent any significant impact to safety (and) quality at the site.”
He said Areva is still in the process of transferring the fuel manufacturing activities from the Mount Athos Road facility to a site in Richland, Wash. That transfer, which will affect about 150 jobs in the Lynchburg area, should be finished in the fall of 2011, he said.
“It doesn’t happen overnight. It’s going to take all this year and a good portion of next year to get that completed,” Grandemange said. “We are taking it step by step so we don’t run into any safety or quality issues as we go through this transition.”
Roger Hannah, a public affairs officer with the NRC, said the commission would hold a meeting in Atlanta on Aug. 5 to discuss Areva’s plans for decommissioning the fuel manufacturing portion of the Mount Athos Road facility.
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