[DOE
LETTERHEAD]
October 1, 2004
The Honorable John T. Conway
Chairman
Defense Nuclear Facilities
Safety Board
625 Indiana Avenue, NW
Suite 700
Washington, DC 20004-2091
Dear Mr. Chairman:
The purpose of this letter is to
provide you with a status of two EM commitments identified in the Department’s
Software Quality Assurance (SQA) implementation plan of March 13, 2003. This plan is in response to Board
recommendation 2002-1, Quality
Assurance for Safety
Software
at Department of Energy Defense Nuclear Facilities.
Commitment 4.1.4: Personnel
assigned to SQA positions achieve qualification per the requirements of the
Technical Qualification Program (TQP).
Deliverable: TQP Status Report that includes the identification of at
least one qualified SQA position for each organization that requires qualified
personnel.
Due
Date: September 2004
Status: Each
EM non-closure site has identified a SQA position/person that requires qualification
to the TQP or elected to use a qualified SQA Subject Matter Expert (SME) from
another site until such person is qualified (see enclosure). The enclosure also is an update of the
identified Federal Software Quality Assurance Personnel listing provided in my
letter of January 29, 2004. Qualification cards and supporting
documentation are available at the site offices for each SQA SME. The EM closure sites offices (Rocky Flats and
Ohio) will not maintain a fully qualified SME; SQA services will be provided by
qualified personnel as needed.
The EM portion of this commitment
is scheduled for completion by November 10, 2004.
Commitment No. 4.2.4.3: Complete
the assessment of the processes in place to ensure that safety software
currently used to support the analysis and design of defense nuclear facilities
is adequate.
Deliverable: Reports
to the PSO indicating the results of the assessments, any concerns with the
quality of existing codes, and the actions necessary to address the concerns.
Due
Date: In accordance with the schedules
established in commitment 4.2.4.2, which states “Establish a schedule to
complete the assessment of the processes in place to ensure that safety
software currently used to support the analysis and design of defense nuclear
facilities is adequate”. These schedules
were established in my January 29, 2004, letter to you.
Status: The
EM sites have completed the SQA assessments and submitted the reports to the
PSO. In addition, assessments concerning
EM activities at Idaho and Oak Ridge have been provided to the Board staff. The EM portion of this commitment is
substantially complete. For Oak Ridge,
SQA assessments have been performed on two software codes and additional
assessments are scheduled to be completed by December 2004. EM will provide copies of these additional assessments
to the Board staff upon completion.
EM
Headquarters with support from the Office of Environmental Safety and Health are
currently reviewing the SQA reports for lessons learned. Each site is taking actions to address the
finding, concerns, and observations identified in the reports. The SQA Assessment Reports were provided to
your staff, Mr. Robert Quirk.
If you have any questions,
please call Ms. Patrice Bubar, Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Integrated Safety Management and Operations Oversight, at (202) 586-5151.
Sincerely,
Dr. Inés Triay
Deputy Chief Operating Officer
Environmental Management
cc: Patrice Bubar, EM-3.2
Mark
Whitaker, DR-1
John S. Shaw, EH-1