Natural Resources Committee on Feb. 5th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Alghabra. Your time is up.

We go now to the Bloc Québécois, to Madame DeBellefeuille, for seven minutes.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Good day, Mr. McGee. Thank you, Mr. Edwards.

My first question is for Mr. McGee. In fact, I have several questions for you, because I have been eagerly awaiting this opportunity to question you in committee. If you can provide brief answers, that will leave us as much time as possible for questions.

Can you tell me, yes or no, whether there were conditions attached to renewing the operating licence of the Chalk River facility? I am still not clear about this, even after listening to the answers you gave to my Liberal colleague. Were there conditions attached, yes or no?

[Brian McGee]

Thank you for the question.

There were many conditions associated with the renewal of the Chalk River licence.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

In your opinion, were all of the conditions met, in according with licensing requirements?

[Brian McGee]

Yes, they were.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Which authority in Canada is responsible for determining the safety of nuclear facilities?

[Brian McGee]

My primary responsibility is to operate the facility safely and take it well beyond just simple regulatory and safety compliance. We provided feedback and information on the status of the commitments--

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

I think you misunderstood my question, sir, perhaps because of the interpretation. I asked you which agency serves as the nuclear safety watchdog for Canadians and Quebeckers.

[Brian McGee]

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission is mandated to look after the safety of Canadians in this area.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

When the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission determines that you have not met the licensing requirements and that the reactor is unsafe, what gives Atomic Energy of Canada the legitimate right to challenge this finding?

[Brian McGee]

Thank you for the question.

We didn't challenge that fact. When CNSC staff made it clear to us that they believed we were outside our licensing basis--they didn't say we were operating unsafely. I think that's important. In fact, they have said we were operating safely.

When they made it clear that we were outside our licensing basis, I responded to that. I have great respect for CNSC staff. They're competent, capable, credible people in this industry. So I took the only action available to me by keeping the reactor in a shutdown state. I did not challenge that at that point in time. In fact, that's why we kept the reactor shut down at that time.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

When the minister appeared before the committee, it was rumoured that you were the one who had decided to shut down the Chalk River nuclear reactor for an extended period of time because of safety concerns and licensing compliance issues. The minister told the committee that the reactor met operational and licensing requirements and that it was in fact the Commission that decided to uphold the order to shut down the reactor for an extended period of time.I have read different reports of the proceedings and, once again, there are some grey areas. Mr. McGee, were you in fact the one who decided to uphold the order to keep the reactor off line for an extended period of time?

[Brian McGee]

Thank you again for the question.

You asked in the previous question who has the responsibility for determining the licensing basis of a facility, and I answered that it was CNSC staff. So too, then, when the CNSC staff advise me that they believe I'm outside my licensing basis, even though they acknowledge that the reactor is still operating safely.... When I'm outside my licensing basis I have really no choice but to respond to that, both from a legal perspective and as well from a professional perspective, because of the respect I have for their opinion.

This industry is based on everybody being open to challenge, on a questioning attitude. We spend enormous effort training our people and developing a culture in the industry around everybody's being open to challenge and having to have a questioning attitude. So when people with the professional credentials and competency of the CNSC staff say to me, “We think you're outside your licensing basis”, I have to take that seriously and to respond appropriately. And I did: I kept the reactor shut down.

Subsequently, as a matter of testimony, it was made clear, including on December 6, that if we hadn't kept it shut down, the CNSC would have given us an order to shut it down. That's the nuance around this. It's very clear that if we hadn't kept it shut down, we would have been told to keep it shut down.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Excuse me for interrupting you, sir. You have stated on separate occasions that you had proof that had you not brought the reactor back on line, the Commission would have ordered you to do so. I have yet to see the proof to that effect. I don't know if you can supply that evidence to the committee, but it would be interesting to see it.

What concerns me, Mr. McGee, is that in your initial report to the House of Commons, you accepted a fair bit of the blame for the situation. You stated that among other things, the problems stems from a breakdown within your organization in terms of efficiency and reviewing the safety analysis report. You admit that there was a problem. The surprising thing is that when he testified here, the Minister of Natural Resources didn't even reprimand your organization once, either for its lack of organization or for its efficiency problems. You spoke of these problems several times in the course of various meetings, as the reports attest to. I have to wonder why the minister said nothing. I wondered if the minister would have been able to fire someone at Atomic Energy of Canada instead of Ms. Keen. Perhaps the reason was the dearth of leaders at Atomic Energy of Canada. There was no longer any CEO or chairman of the board of directors. You, the Vice Chairman, found yourself managing the crisis along with your colleagues, with no senior managers to be found. Do you think that explains why the minister did not point the finger at you, even though you acknowledged your organization's shortcomings?

[Brian McGee]

You're asking me to speak to what's in the mind of another person. What I can say to you is that I've been consistent since December 11, acknowledging where my performance and the performance of my organization failed to meet my expectations.

I have some of the best people in the industry as part of my team. My job is to provide them with the best leadership I'm capable of providing. It's not my position to make the judgment whether or not it's good enough; it's up to others to decide that. My job is to lead my organization in the best way I can. When it comes to performance issues—and we're not talking about safety and we're not talking about licensing basis; it's about going well beyond that.... That's what this industry is about, and that's what my expectations are all about. When it doesn't happen, then, if I'm going to be acceptable as a leader, I need to take responsibility and accountability for it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Merci, Madame DeBellefeuille. Your time is up.

We go now to Mr. Trost for seven minutes.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to direct my questions first to AECL, and to ask for a bit of a clarification: what were we looking at had there been a potential accident? There are discussions about fuel failure and public harm. In one of the notes you put out, you talked about a worst-case scenario, radiation exposures to workers and to the public, in terms of a CT scan, etc.

Could you elaborate on the worst-case scenario and on what you meant in the letter you posted on the AECL website? What was the potential for a fuel failure? What was the risk for public harm?

[Brian McGee]

Thank you for the questions.

The reactor has operated safely for more than 50 years now, and in the same geographic area. There are no international standards for fuel failures, so what we were responding to was the reality of the situation that one in a thousand is the calculated probability of an earthquake of sufficient magnitude that is calculated to be around six on the Richter scale, centred on the NRU facility. That is a one-in-a-thousand probability, based on the calculations.

For the onset of fuel failures to occur, the following things have to happen: the earthquake has to be centred on the NRU facility; there has to be total loss of the grid, so the electrical power from the power system; and the diesel generators and the battery backups have to fail.

We don't credit any operator action. There's no intervention on the part of the operating staff, so it's not credited at all. That may sound a bit silly, but that's the way safety and accident analysis goes. You assume that your operators are not capable of responding.

So that assumes you've lost power to the pumps and that you have no forced cooling flow to the reactor. Half an hour later, the reactor water starts to boil. A half hour after that you get the onset of fuel failures. You don't get core damage at that point, but you get the onset of fuel failures.

If it still goes unarrested, you'll ultimately get core damage. If you get the most severe core damage accident, the dose to the workers working right at the facility, at the Chalk River site, is roughly half of what we would get if we were to undergo a CT scan.

The dose, the radiation exposure...or let me correct that. That's lingo from the industry. We're talking about radiation exposure to the workers being roughly half of what you would get if you underwent a CT scan. The radiation exposure to a member of the public would be roughly half of the radiation exposure from a cardiovascular diagnostic treatment.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

So again, to bring that into very simple terms, what CNSC was going nuts about was the concern that someone at the plant might receive, in an extreme circumstance, less exposure than a CT scan, and that the general public would receive half the radiation exposure of a cardiovascular diagnostic treatment.

For the lay public then, if something goes wrong, we're talking about stuff in the neighbourhood of X-rays as far as the risk of exposure.

[Brian McGee]

That's correct.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

Okay.

You started to get into--and I found this an extraordinarily curious statement by Ms. Keen when she was in front of the committee--the one-in-a-thousand chance of something going wrong. I didn't fully understand what she was meaning there, because to me there is a difference between a one-in-a-thousand year and a one-in-a-thousand chance.

So perhaps you would elaborate a little bit more--in many ways, I'm asking you to go over the same ground as you just did--on the probability of something happening at the plant. This is a point that needs to be stressed over and over again. What is the probability? It wasn't one in a thousand. There is no international standard of one in a million. What is the probability of something major going wrong prior to these pumps being backed up seismically with the electrical system? What is the probability under the old situation?

[Brian McGee]

Thank you for the question. I'm going to assume that you're asking about what was the probability with no pumps connected to the emergency power supply system.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

Correct.

[Brian McGee]

The way in which accident and safety analysis goes is that we don't go beyond and calculate that chain of probabilities because it's the most conservative number that's used. I don't have that number with me today. We could make it available to the committee, if it's important.

The nature of safety analysis is to look at the worst-case scenario, and that's the one-in-a-thousand probability of an earthquake. But all the rest, the chain of events that occurs from there, takes that probability to a much lesser number.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

Another statement that was made under previous testimony is that the NRU would not currently meet international licensing standards. I find this curious, because I understand other reactors in the world are of similar vintage and design.

In your opinion, if it were to be licensed again today, would it meet international standards? That statement that it wouldn't, was that correct, or is it correct that it would meet international standards today?