MANAGING THE 'GAPS' IN A REGIMEN OF CONTROL - OPERATIONAL DECISION MAKING IN NUCLEAR POWER

摘要

Nuclear power performance has significantly improved over the last thirty years. This improvement has been based on a philosophy of control. That is, for each issue that must be managed to achieve safe performance, a pre-determined constraint must be established, In addition to the barriers that were designed into the plant, a large range of programs, processes and procedures have been developed to direct the activities of anyone associated with the plant. The premise is that following pre-determined procedures, in a diligent way, will support ongoing plant safety. But what if an issue arises for which there is no procedure? For serious situations, emergency procedures exist to guide operations personnel to place the plant in a safe state. However, the vast majority of issues are much more mundane and form a part of the daily life in the plant, In these cases the nuclear industry has been encouraging the use of an 'Operational Decision Making' (ODM) process. This paper will review ODM as practiced within the context of the governing paradigm of control. The paper will show the strengths of the process and areas for development. ODM is an important tool for managers within the complex socio-technical system that is nuclear power today. This paper summarises key points from a research thesis completed by the author to meet the requirements of an MSc program in 'Human Factors and System Safety'.