ALEXANDRIA, Va. – DOE officials and contractor executives agreed during a panel at the recent National Cleanup Workshop that a 2011 Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) recommendation galvanized the DOE complex into further strengthening its safety culture.

   “I think the most significant thing about the recommendation was that DOE took a very broad and deep approach to dealing with it. We found that we needed to build fundamentals into the organization, fundamental expectations for leadership and management behavior, which led to training on those expectations for senior leaders across the Department,” EM Safety, Security and Quality Assurance Deputy Assistant Secretary Jim Hutton said.

   The panelists kicked off discussion by laying out the impact of the DNFSB recommendation, and later explained how DOE maintains safety levels during transition periods, such as management changes. They agreed that DOE strives to ensure workers are comfortable raising concerns without fear of retaliation, and while there’s no “magic metric” to measure safety culture, viewing the “whole landscape” of performance can provide a basis for assessments. They also described improvements in safety after operational work pauses at some DOE sites.

   The 2011 DNFSB recommendation called for the Energy Secretary to assert federal control at the highest level to establish a strong safety culture at the Hanford Site’s Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) and conduct reviews to determine whether safety culture weaknesses were limited to that project. 

   DOE Environment, Health, Safety and Security Associate Under Secretary Matthew Moury noted that the Department went beyond the Board’s recommendation to institutionalize safety culture across the complex.

   “We want it to be a part of the Department’s DNA, something that we do on a day-to-day basis. We have been working in that area significantly,” Moury said.

   Hutton noted that monitoring the behavior of the DOE organization — focusing on “weak signals” and observing interactions — helps transcend day-to-day changes, such as the “comings and goings of management.” 

   One issue discussed by the panelists is how DOE can strike a balance between making sure workers feel comfortable raising concerns without being afraid of retaliation and taking appropriate disciplinary action when necessary.

   Todd Wright, general manager and executive vice president of AECOM’s nuclear and environment strategic business unit, agreed with Hutton that it’s vital to keep the issue separate from the person. 

   “In all cases you want to create an environment where issues can be brought up,” he said.  

   “There’s also a big matter of trust when it comes to this,” said Greg Meyer, senior vice president for operations at Fluor. “When you deal with these kind of issues, you clearly have to deal with them objectively and fairly.” 

   He added: “You have to build trust with the workforce, that they’re confident that you are listening, you get it, and you are in fact trying to improve things.”

   Meyer said that operational pauses led to extra levels of screenings, high-hazard review boards, and special teams that ensured sufficient work planning, identification of all hazards and appropriate controls.

   “It has been very effective to get the message across to the workforce that this is not business as usual,” he said. 

   Employee- or union-led safety committees are “extremely valuable and important,” Wright said, adding that engagement is the “third leg on the stool” with leadership and training.

   Hutton said operational pauses are synonymous with safety culture.

   “When work is stopped because of issues like this that we’re talking about, that is what safety culture looks like,” he said. “That is leaders taking responsibility, even though it is not in their short-term interest, and costs them time, money, et cetera to do the responsible thing that is in the long-term interest.”