Prepared by Oscar Shirani for NRC OIG, dated 3/20/03

Prepared by Oscar Shirani for NRC OIG, dated 3/20/03

As a result of the NRC Confirmatory Letter to ComEd on November 12, 1996, Shirani was assigned by ComEd to perform many technical audits of NSSS and Architect Engineering (A/E) firms such as General Electric Nuclear Energy (GENE), Sargent & Lundy, etc.

At the conclusion of these audits, in December 1997, NRC praised the ComEd’s efforts for the oversight activities of the NSSS and A/E vendor audits that ComEd conducted. ComEd QA Managers complemented Shirani for a well-done job on behalf of the NRC.

In one of the above design control audits, the design audit of the GENE, San Jose, CA resulted in the Stop Work Order (SWO) on August 29, 1997 by Shirani. This was presented as the GENE’s Quality Assurance Program Breakdown in the Design Control Processes (violation of 10CFR50 Appendix B, Section 3 and ANSI N45.2.11, GENE, and ComEd QA Program) for all the 54 sample design analysis selected by Shirani for the ComEd BWR structures, systems, and components. GENE was the claimer of the six Sigma Program, but its design control processes and implementation failed by 100% in the control of design analysis samples selected by Shirani’s design audit. How NRC found nothing wrong with those GENE’s Design Record Files (DRFs) during its inspection of GENE QA Program in the same year of 1997?

90 days prior to the GENE audit, Shirani (as a usual method that he adopted for most of his complex audits) requested to get the population of the design analysis that GENE had performed for all the ComEd’s Structures, Systems, and Components (SSC) for the past three years. GENE was not accustomed to this approach and told ComEd that it would provide the analysis that it has prepared for any other regulatory and NUPIC audits. Shirani indicated that this is not a GENE’s option. Based on Shirani’s persistence, GENE provided the population index of its performed calculations for ComEd BWRs for the past three years. Shirani selected 15 DRFs from the population index of the 70 DRFs that GENE faxed to him. 15 DRFs that Shirani selected contained 54 Reactor Design Analysis for the ComEd BWR nuclear reactors. Shirani selected 5 Technical Specialists related to his selected samples and pertaining to the scope of the needed expertise (i.e. thermal analysis expert, fatigue analysis expert, structural/mechanical experts, etc.). Shirani asked ComEd to fund their time and budget. GENE upon receipt of Shirani’s samples declined to provide him what he wants. GENE indicated that it could provide the summary reports of the selected samples. Shirani refused and indicated that he is not interested in the summary reports, but rather the calculation analysis that was the basis for the summary reports and the summary reports are the final product and do not have any details to audit. GENE told Shirani that he has to provide GENE $5000 for his special and abnormal request, because GENE has to gather those calculations from its scattered locations, boxes, files, microfishe, etc. Shirani agreed and ComEd Engineering per Shirani’s request paid $5000 to GENE. Shirani told GENE that we have the right of access to any of the ComEd files per our safety related procurement documents and we don’t have to pay for this fine, but we will pay you not to delay this process any further. Shirani’s audit approach unlike the NRC’s approach was a performance based audit and reviewed the actual analysis and not the procedures and talking to mangers. Shirani as usual trained his technical staff a few days in advance to all the applicable design Codes and his own customized design audit training course (this course will be offered as a Tutorial in its short version at the ASME-PVP Conference this year at Cleveland, Ohio on July 20, 2003 per ASME President’s request). Shirani stayed close to his audit team every minute and when issues came up, he was part of all the discussions of the subject issues. Shirani’s technical experts were carefully selected by him and were the subject matter experts in their field of studies. Shirani states that review of the NRC audit reports indicates that NRC’s audit process is not as robust and consequently allowed problems to remain undetected.

On September 1997, NRC Regions I and III made several telephone calls to ComEd to acquire more information about the SWO and technical issues, but NRC never performed any follow-up audit of GENE to investigate this issue. Why?

It is unknown to Shirani whether NRC received complete and accurate responses from Com Ed to its inquiries or not. Shirani believes that NRC should have taken more serious steps to investigate this issue, because it involved a SWO of the largest NSSS supplier of BWRs in the world and it was the first SWO on the GENE’s history on the core of its business (Design Control failure) by any utility customer.

ComEd and GENE sent representatives to the NUPIC Meeting on October 1997 and provided false confidence to the NUPIC Members about the GENE’s corrective action program. ComEd prevented Shirani to attend the NUPIC meeting to avoid "war" as claimed by ComEd. ComEd and PECO carefully selected the team leader of 1998 NUPIC audit of GENE from PECO and specifically excluded the ComEd design findings for follow-up after 15 months passed the SWO and 12 months after Lifting of the SWO by ComEd. PECO Team Leader, Tom Dey and his boss, William Texter attended the NUPIC Audit of GENE on September 1998 and talked privately to Shirani a night before the audit’s entrance. Messrs. Dey and Texter not only changed Shirani’s previously assigned audit responsibility from Design Section to Parts Evaluation, but also told Shirani that GENE had specifically asked them that ComEd’s 12 design findings were still open and could not be selected for this NUPIC Audit scope for the follow-up. Note that ComEd had lifted SWO on November 19, 1997, but NUPIC could not perform any follow-up in its September 1998 and was told by GENE’s managers that issues were still open. GENE told Dey and Texter that this has been agreed with ComEd management. (Note: this time, 1998, Helwig was employed by ComEd and not by GENE, but still had its influence on his last employers, PECO and GENE and of- course on ComEd’s Bastyr and Bastyr’s boss, Tom Joyce who were straining Shirani at every step of the way)

Shirani’s August 1997 GENE audit findings were modified from 21 to 12 and the impact statements of audit findings on design and operation of plants were removed by ComEd not to alert the NRC for a potential shutdown of its troubled nuclear plants (i.e. state of stresses in all the 54 selected design analysis was found to be indeterminate, output of the safety related computer analysis used in the actual design of ComEd BWR SSCs were found to be unreliable). Note that this GENE audit was conducted per NRC’s confirmatory letter and ComEd had three of its six nuclear plants on the NRC’s watch list and had 50.54(f) letter to respond to.

Shirani upon performing most of these design audits in 1997, cited ComEd Engineeing on Jan. 1998 with a Level I Finding (Quality Assurance Program Breakdown of Criterion VII of 10CFR50 Appendix B on the suppliers control) which made many of his managers angry with him. NRC on its response to Shirani’s allegation calls this issue vage and indicated that the licensee informed them that there no Level I findings of any kind or any audit and NRC considers this issue closed. What kind of investigation is this by NRC? It looks like ComEd is resolving my issues and not NRC. ComEd is famous for falsification of records.

On August 29, 1997, Shirani was ordered by ComEd SES Director not to discuss the details with the other NUPIC Members, otherwise GENE could sue ComEd if its proprietary data (!) gets to the hands of its competitors. SES was still part of the QA Dept. at ComEd prior to the arrival of Oliver Kingsley from TVA and GENE’s Helwig to ComEd (November 1997). This ComEd and GENE’s mutual team tactics for saving face discouraged any potential Part 21 for the GENE’s inadequate design analysis for all other utilities. Some of the calculations that Shirani’s audit cited were selected by the ComEd Engineering VPs and by the recommendation of Sargent & Lundy Engineering Managers (i.e. Tom Barringer, etc.) for an expedited evaluation for operability concerns by GENE within 24 hours after Shirani’s 6 member audit team returned to ComEd on August 25, 1997. For example one of the cited 54 calculations’ results were changed and the actual SSC Pressure/Stress value were found to be within only 0.53 psi of the allowable pressure. This was at the time that GENE had not yet been engaged with the ComEd’s Power Uprate Projects. Shirani has been very familiar with many SSCs that were fully loaded without the application of Power Uprate. Shirani is raising a potential operability/Part 21 concern for many ComEd/Exelon’s SSCs after the introduction of Power Uprate Projects at many Exelon nuclear plants which have not been subjected to any audits nor were allowed by ComEd to be audited since 1998 and the records are clearly indicates this fact. This is violation of 10CFR50 Appendix B, Criterion VII that states: "The effectiveness of the control of quality by contractors and subcontractors shall be assessed by the applicant or designee at intervals consistent with the importance, complexity, and quantity of the product or services".

At the GENE Audit’s Exit Meeting on August 22, 1997, GENE’s General Manager of Engineering, David Helwig challenged all the Shirani’s 21 design audit findings and claimed that the NRC audited the same calculations in just a few months ago and NRC had in fact praised the GENE’s Design Record Files (DRFs). I wonder why?

Shirani’s SWO was lifted by the new Nuclear Officer, Oliver Kingsley on November 19, 1997 upon his immediate arrival with no basis and clear violation of 10CFR50 Appendix B, Criterion XVI. Kingsley immediately hired Helwig from GENE on December 1997 and fired all the Shirani’s bosses and supporters of the SWO in a few months later (i.e. Ed Netzel, Kombiz Salehi, Jack Brunner, Lon Waldinger) and started the prolonged retaliation against Shirani for him to leave. ComEd stopped three of the Shirani’s promotional opportunities from 1998 to 2000 and downgraded his grade level to its hiring date of 1990’s grade level without notifying him on Jan. 2000.

When Shirani made his allegation with NRC and identified the people who got fired, he was told by NRC on November 1, 2001 that he couldn’t make an allegation for others who got laid off by ComEd. It is surprising that NRC told Dr. Landsman the same story when Landsman was trying to protect Shirani on December 2000.

Shirani who was responsible for maintenance of GENE’s QA program on the ComEd Approved Supplier List (ASL) till his last day at ComEd nuclear was not allowed to perform the follow-up audit of GENE for almost two years (May 1999) despite his repeated requests for the follow-up of the famous SWO. NRC was sleeping. Why?

When Shirani was preparing for the May 1999 follow-up of 1997 GENE Audit Findings, he was threatened by his Managers, Russell Bastyr and Dale St. Claire not to look into the GENE’s Power Uprate Project. Shirani’s boss, Bastyr could not deny this fact at Shirani’s court hearing with DOL ALJ on 12/19/2002. ComEd has contracted the Power Uprate project to GENE for most of its nuclear plants since 1998 with no QA oversight of GENE and this was confirmed by Bastyr at his deposition on 11/4/2002 and court hearing on 12/19/2002. (this is a clear violation of 10CFR50 Appendix B, Criterion VII).

On March 2000, Shirani issued a potential Part 21 Finding in his audit of Holtec International for its failing to report the holes found in the samples of their neutron shielding material from its approved supplier, NAC International. Holtec had written a Safety Related Purchase Order invoking NAC’s 10CFR50 Appendix B Program. NRC endorsed Shirani’s audit results and the McGraw-Hill and Spent Fuel Articles published this news after interviewing with Shirani, stating that Shirani slapped Holtec for failing its obligation to its Part 21 Program.

On May 2000, Shirani, as a member of NUPIC Audit of Holtec/Omni Fabricators identified significant welding violation of ASME Code Sec. III and IX against Holtec and gave them a 24-hour clock window for Holtec to issue SWO on its QA Program otherwise Shirani would. NRC had endorsed Holtec’s QA Program just a few months prior to Shirani’s audit. Shirani informed Dr. Ross Landsman, NRC Region III about this issue on Jan. 19, 2001 over the phone. NRC was falling sleep again and did not listen to Dr. Landsman. Why?

After the May 2000 NUPIC Audit results were published, Shirani was requested by the DSQG/NUPIC Chairman to lead the NUPIC Audit of Holtec/U. S. Tool & Die (UST&D) on June/July 2000. Despite the ComEd’s resistance to let Shirani be the lead auditor of this audit, Shirani convinced its Dresden Nuclear Station Managers that ComEd should oblige with NUPIC’s request for its own benefit not to delay the loading of casks. Shirani then was allowed to lead the audit, but ComEd tried very hard to get Shirani and its two technical welding experts’ focus on other matters during the audit. That was the reason that Shirani extended the audit to July 2000 and requested no interruption of him and his two technical experts until he is done with the audit. This audit resulted in 9 Findings. This audit documented that NRC and NUPIC audits of Holtec and UST&D in 1999 found no findings with Holtec/ UST&D and in fact, NRC documented in its inspection report that UST&D QA Program is in full compliance with the regulations. NRC was sleeping again or was not interested to embarrass itself any further. Refer to Dr. Ross Landsman’s testimony (attached) in this regard (for both Holtec/Omni and Holtec/UST&D audits by Shirani). Dr. Landsman concluded that NRR was not interested. NRR sent its same team of 1999 audit for investigation and concluded that the issues were not significant. Dr. Landsman told Shirani that he did not agree with NRR’s premature investigation and did not sign on the closure when was asked by NRR to endorse the results for Region III. Dr. Landsman could testify to this matter himself. Dr. Landsman told Shirani that he as a government agent is willing to unfold the whole story when he is approached.

Shirani told his Manager, Bastyr to allow him to perform the follow-up audit of UST&D on behalf of NUPIC regarding the nine (9) findings and could not solely rely on the "sounds reasonable" statement that his boss, Bastyr wrote to UST&D when he received their corrective action response to the findings. Bastyr made budget excuses and refused to allow Shirani for any follow-up audit of UST&D despite Shirani’s repeated requests. Bastyr also falsified the QA Records, Corrective Action Report (CAR), dated August 4, 2000. Refer to Exelon and Shirani’s Court Exhibit No. 46 (attached) that Dr. Landsman also testified that it was false. Why NRC is not interested to truly investigate this falsified record, despite Shirani and Landsman’s request? NRC in response to Shirani’s allegation in this matter stated that Shirani had not requested for SWO and accepted the UST&D’s response in October 2000 letter to UST&D (this was Bastyr’s response and not Shirani’s). This is the ComEd’s response to Shirani’s allegation and NRC has accepted it at its face value without any investigation and closed this issue. Why? Shirani requests that you discuss this matter with Dr. Landsman and find out that ComEd had even falsified the QA Records to give wrong impression to NRC about this audit results and was successful in this regard. Shirani strongly believes that NRC does not want to embarrass itself for his sham audit of UST&D in 1999 and since Shirani highlighted this NRC’s weakness in his audit report, NRC want to ignore Shirani’s issues to save its own face and its Exelon partners.

Shirani after exhausting all the avenues within ComEd to perform the follow-up of the UST&D Audit findings was repeatedly refused by Bastyr. Shirani decided to unfold everything to NRC’s Dr. Landsman at the Holtec’s Sponsored Symposium on November 30, 2000. Refer to Dr. Landsman’s Testimony at Shirani’s DOLALJ Court hearing on December 17, 2002.

Dr. Landsman approached Shirani at the symposium on 11/30/2000 and said that he needs Shirani’s Audit report immediately to slap some hands at NRC. Landsman was shocked that ComEd, HUG, Holtec, and UST&D all hide the findings from NRC and him for more than four months after the NUPIC July 2000 Audit. Dr. Kris Singh, Holtec CEO told Shirani not to send the report to "that trouble maker, Landsman". Dr. Singh stopped his long-term friendship with Shirani after that meeting.

On December 2000 and Jan. 19, 2001, Dr. Landsman approached NRC to protect Shirani, but heard that Shirani has to come forward himself. When Shirani found that ComEd conspired to remove him from nuclear to finance to only clock him out after 180 days, and got rid of him on October 26, 2001, he approached NRC for protection, but NRC told him that he came too late! Why Shirani did not get any help from NRC despite all the warnings by Landsman?

Dr. Landsman called Shirani on Jan. 19, 2001 and asked why didn’t he issue a SWO against Holtec/UST&D for June/July 2000 NUPIC Audit? Shirani replied that he had asked for the SWO and Bastyr and CAP Group refused any SWO and if he insisted like the 1997 GENE Audit, he would be fired by Kingsley and Helwig who have ruined his life since 1997 GENE’s SWO. NRC in its response to Shirani’s allegation stated that Shirani had not requested for the SWO on his audit. My response is that Bastyr finally signs the audit report and Shirani could not have done that in his audit report.

Shirani has met NRC and NRR more that 5 times and talked to them over the phone many times since November 1, 2001 and gave them his 25 pages Report on December 3, 2001. Shirani’s report has documented 9 safety alert allegations. Shirani has provided numerous follow-up letters to clarify some of his technical allegations, but NRC has not fully provided adequate technical expertise to address his issues and many are well above 180 days window of investigation for public safety concerns.

NRC has been dancing around Shirani’s technical issues for more than 15 months and closed some of his technical allegations with no concrete evidence of a reasonable investigation. All the NRC's response has been a desktop review of the Exelon's provided false information to mislead NRC.

Shirani strongly believes that NRC does not posses an adequate expertise and resources to address his issues.

NRC has dropped the ball in pursuing its published NUREG 0040 for the nuclear suppliers’ audits. NRC does not perform regular Utility audits either like in the past. Why? Do we want more Davis Besse’s?

Shirani would go on the records today and publicly announces that he does not accept the NRC's responses to any of his allegations against Exelon Corporation, Dry Cask Storage Structural Integrity, Seismic Valve issues, Exelon SES' Independence from Production, Zion Part 21 Allegation and all the rest that NRC has prematurely closed.

Exelon has falsified records and also did not include Shirani’s Audit Findings at the Zion Station in their audit report. The Zion Finding that Shirani issued in 1995 should have been reported by ComEd as a Potential 10CFR Part 21, but ComEd has falsified records and excluded his findings from the audit report and introduced another 10CFR Part 21 subject related to the material bolt issue instead of re-machining of Bonnet Body Valve minimum wall thickness issue. Shirani had explained all the details of this Part 21 issue to the NRC. NRC did not even catch Exelon/ComEd's mixing of the subject matter. Part 21 Bolt issue has nothing to do with the re-machining of bonnet body minimum wall thickness. Why NRC is ignoring this allegation?

NRC accepts the Exelon’s response for moving SES from QA function to the Supply (a production department), despite the requirements of 10CFR50 Appendix B, Criterion I. NRC claims that it has accepted this practice for one of the Entergy plants, Waterford III (i.e. one out of 103 nuclear plants) and that is why is accepting the same for Exelon. What is the basis for this NRC’s action? Are we making fun of the code requirements or we simply do not understand them?

Shirani called Mr. James Heller, Senior Investigator at Region III on September 1, 2002 to provide him some more information. Mr. Heller left a message for Shirani on September 5, 2002 (Shirani has kept the message) that he does not need to come anymore to Region III and the investigator has finished his investigation and the report is going to the enforcement staff for final decision. Shirani asked Heller roughly when this would be done? Heller indicated about 7 weeks. Up to date (3/20/2003) Shirani is still waiting for NRC’s investigation results.

Shirani states: "It is very bothersome to me that I have applied for more than 40 jobs at all the NRC offices around the country and I did not receive any responses. When I sent many requests, then the same fabricated words "you were qualified, but not among the most qualified candidates." Appear. Shirani used to think that NRC is like his ally, because he served the public safety in his nuclear audits, but was not protected by NRC when he just did his job so well.

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