August 16, 2011

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) nuclear safety regulatory infrastructure includes processes for evaluating events to foster continuous improvement. While DOE nuclear facilities differ significantly from commercial nuclear power reactors (particularly in regards to energy and decay heat removal needs during accidents), there are lessons from review of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Therefore, DOE (including the National Nuclear Security Administration) took several actions to review the safety of its nuclear facilities and identify opportunities for improvement in light of the March 2011 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. These actions focused on learning how DOE can better prepare to manage potential beyond design basis events (BDBEs); i.e., events more severe than the events that formed the basis of the design for DOE’s nuclear facilities, such as extremely unlikely earthquakes. These actions included:

Issuing Safety Bulletin 2011-01, Events Beyond Design Safety Basis Analysis, which requested DOE Program and Field Offices to review their nuclear facilities’ capabilities to mitigate BDBEs;
Conducting an analysis of DOE requirements and guidance for safety analysis, facility design, and emergency response as they relate to BDBEs;

Performing a review of commercial nuclear power industry requirements and guidance related to BDBEs; and
Conducting a Nuclear Safety Workshop to discuss the results from the above actions.