Issues Associated with the Development of Nuclear Power Plant “Programm Effectiveness” Indicators for Regulatory Use

Abstract

This paper outlines several data issues related to the development of programmatic indicators for monitoring nuclear power plants (NPP) safety.

The programmatic indicators are used by management to monitor program effectiveness. The development of program effectiveness indicators for the use of regulatory organizations which are external to the “program” requires an entirely different approach than the development of indicators for program internal use. A regulatory agency is required to manage NPPs according to its objective, which is to protect public health and safety, and hence its indicators should reflect this objective. The NPPs, on the other hand, exist for productivity and profitability, and, therefore, their indicators should reflect primarily those goals. A safe plant may not be an economic plant, and the reverse is also not necessarily true; profitability and safety do not coincide at all times. This paper outlines methods for developing programmatic indicators for regulatory use. It is based on work sponsored by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

The methods were developed within the context of one specific US NPP activity, the maintenance program. The method developed included frameworks for a systematic identification and evaluation of candidate indicators, and statistical techniques for indicator validation. The paper presents preliminary conclusions drawn from the methods applied and the data analysis performed. From the methods applied, it is concluded that regulatory programmatic indicators should monitor data related to program outputs (i.e. observable events), rather than data related to program processes (i.e. inputs and throughputs), although it is recognized that process indicators may be more suitable for internal plant management use. As a result of the data analyses, some preliminary statistical correlations of plant safety to plant performance outputs have been identified; these relationships show the potential for developing leading indicators of safety, and for combining regulatory and NPP senior management program effectiveness indicators.