Rockwell Lab Earns ‘Good’ Rating in New Federal Report : Energy: U.S. agency cites two ‘deficiencies,’ but notes improvement in other areas. The firm wins award fee of $1 million.
Rockwell International earned a performance rating of “good” and an award fee of more than $1 million for its management of federal energy research at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory during the last half of fiscal 1991, according to a report obtained from the U.S. Department of Energy.
The agency’s latest report card on Rockwell--which runs the government’s Energy Technology Engineering Center at the field lab southeast of Simi Valley--cited two “notable deficiencies,” including Rockwell’s lack of an environmental monitoring plan.
But the report, which covered the period from April 1 to Sept. 30, 1991, also praised the firm for “noticeable improvement” in such areas as industrial hygiene and fire protection. Under a complex scoring system, Rockwell earned enough points to improve upon its “satisfactory” rating of the prior six months.
Even so, the latest appraisal, like the preceding one, was more critical than those in past years, reflecting the Energy Department’s growing focus on environmental and safety concerns. Before 1991, Rockwell regularly received higher numerical scores and ratings of “excellent” or “very good.”
“There’s no question the Department of Energy has increased the amount of emphasis they place on” environment and safety, said Clark Gibbs, Rockwell general manager at the center.
“I think they’re probably a bit more critical” than in the past.
At the center, an enclave within the 2,668-acre Santa Susana complex, Rockwell develops equipment for energy systems, including non-nuclear components of atomic power plants. Of the center’s current-year budget of about $37 million, about one-third is devoted to upgrading pollution controls and cleaning up low-level radioactive and chemical contamination from past work with nuclear fuel and test reactors.
The Energy Department pays Rockwell’s costs and an award fee, or profit, based on performance. According to the latest appraisal, Rockwell was eligible for up to $1.45 million in award fees and received $1,006,599. This, along with nearly $900,000 for the prior six months, brought Rockwell’s total award for fiscal 1991 to about $1.9 million.
Under an Energy Department policy that took effect last year, at least 51% of a contractor’s evaluation is to be based on performance in the areas of environment, health and safety. The department’s San Francisco office, which oversees the center, is giving 55% weight to environment and safety.
The latest evaluation criticized Rockwell for its continuing failure to prepare an environmental monitoring plan. The plan would outline a program for taking samples to test for chemical and radioactive contamination.
A related complaint--also cited as a “notable deficiency”--involved Rockwell’s failure to test an adequate number of air, soil, water and vegetation samples on and near the site.
Such testing fell off sharply two years ago after community pressure caused the shutdown of the last nuclear operation at Santa Susana--a heavily shielded workshop known as the “hot lab.” With closure of the hot lab, company officials decided there were no funds nor any particular need to maintain routine radiological monitoring.
However, Energy Department officials said the monitoring plan is required and is long overdue.
Gibbs said Rockwell had not prepared the plan because the department had not funded the work, despite company requests. Although the funds had “not been forthcoming, . . . this time, they socked it to us in this award fee evaluation,” Gibbs said.
In recent weeks, however, the agency has provided about $250,000 and Rockwell will prepare the plan, Gibbs said.
Bob Le Chevalier, the Energy Department’s site manager at the center, acknowledged that specific funds for the plan only now have been provided. However, agency officials believe Rockwell “could have done a little more within existing budgets than they were doing,” Le Chevalier said.
The report gave Rockwell high marks for its response to the findings of the “Tiger Team”--a squad of agency safety and environmental experts who conducted an extensive inspection of the center last spring. Although it found no immediate danger to the public, the Tiger Team identified numerous problems, including faulty electrical installations that “presented an imminent danger” of severe electric shock to employees.
The report said Rockwell had filed a thorough action plan to deal with the Tiger Team’s findings.
“We got beat up by the Tiger Team in the safety area, particularly in electrical safety, and we brought on board a safety engineer who has been quite effective,” Gibbs said. The Energy Department “recognized that, and that was gratifying,” he said.
