CASE HISTORY

Specific application of SCWE at the Moab UMTRA Project site began a few years ago when DOE Headquarters began placing emphasis on creating a healthy and mature safety environment for all the workers. The first steps were:

1) SCWE awareness among the management team;

2) A clear vision and support from senior management;

3) Adequate training for managers and first-line supervisors;

4) Establishment of the SCWE charter with objectives and goals;

5) Continuous SCWE emphases with all layers of the organization;

6) Rigorous oversight and assessment;

7) Opportunity for employee feedback.

This process started at the Moab Project in late 2013. Even though the project had a long history of good safety statistics, it was apparent to senior management that the Moab Project safety culture was not as mature as the nuclear reactor organizations. Efforts began immediately to raise the bar and implement SCWE. The first step was awareness and training. Senior management began to discuss the origin and where the foundation of SCWE came from, why it is important and what the lasting benefits will look like if applied correctly. Moab Project managers travelled off-site and joined other managers for a detailed and interactive SCWE training. Moab managers were expected to bring their new awareness of SCWE back to the project first-line managers and ensure the principles were immediately applied. Within a number of months, an outside assessment team performed an audit that included a survey of project employees. The goal was approximately 93 per cent of the workforce employees should react positively that SCWE is being fully applied and they feel empowered and free from retaliation to bring up safety related issues or concerns.

Progress was slow in the beginning, but SCWE improvements began to take hold and project employees began behaving freely and openly with their supervisors and management when they have suggestions and or concerns. These days, employees are quick to understand detriments to sustained SCWE such as over-emphases of production without full safety considerations, or sudden arrival of acclimate weather or other changed conditions in the workplace. SCWE integrates well with integrated safety management and the worker who is trained to both is always better adapted to work safely and to look out for and protect his or her coworkers.

The project has found that an active employee safety committee assists greatly as a core tool in sustaining SCWE. On the Moab UMTRA Project, the employee safety committee is made up of workplace volunteers with management often offering incentives to the employees for their

involvement and leadership. Nascent leadership is one of the benefits of a strong SCWE. The Moab Project employee safety committee has been a nucleus for budding leadership among the workforce. The committee has the choice to invite management or not. They have operated both ways, and, if desired, they pick and choose when and who they want to invite to their meetings.

The interactions between committee members and management have always been viewed as positive. It is important that management act on the committee’s recommendations in a timely manner. In the beginning, the committee demonstrated more patience than reasonable when their recommendations were not acted on quickly enough. Management realized this short coming and corrected this problem. This further empowered the committee members to take their roles seriously and employees outside the committee take notice, and they continue to give more suggestions to the committee members for management consideration.

Sustaining a strong working SCWE requires a plan. The Moab Project SCWE sustainability plan has three focus areas:

1) Leadership involvement;

2) Employee engagement;

3) Learning organization.

Each focus area is defined and associated attributes are aligned. Examples of attributes include demonstrated safety leadership, management engagement and time in the field, open communication and fostering an environment free from retribution, clear expectations and accountability, teamwork and mutual respect, credibility, trust and reporting errors and problems, performance monitoring through multiple means, and a questioning attitude.

For SCWE to take hold and work in a sustained manner, there is a dependence on employees believing that the organization supports continuous improvement and effective resolution of problems, while encouraging the sharing and utilization of operational experiences.

Recently, an outside DOE audit team assessed the Moab Project and concluded that the project had a healthy, functioning SCWE. Now the challenge is to sustain this progress.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Figure 1 is courtesy of J. Goeckner.

REFERENCES

[1] MONIZ, E.J., PONEMAN, D.B., Personal Commitment to Health and Safety through Leadership, Employee Engagement and Organizational Learning, U.S. Dept. of Energy Memo. to Heads of Departmental Elements (2013).

[2] DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, SAF–200 Safety Conscious Work Environment, DOE National Training Center Student Guide, version 1.6, U.S. Dept. of Energy (2013).

[3] DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, Order 442.2 Differing Professional Opinions for Technical Issues Involving Environment, Safety and Health, U.S. Dept. of Energy (2011).

AN OVERVIEW OF URANIUM MILLING PROCESSES, ASSOCIATED WASTES AND ATMOSPHERIC RELEASES³⁰

A. SAM

Radiometrics Laboratory

IAEAEnvironment Laboratories International Atomic Energy Agency Monaco

Abstract

This paper provides an overview of conventional uranium milling operations, extraction of uranium as a by-product from non-conventional resources, wastes generated from milling operations and airborne radioactive and chemical effluents within a wider scope of a high level document that primarily intended to provide non-exhaustive technical information.

1. INTRODUCTION

Before uranium ore can be extracted from a mine, a considerable amount of waste rock and below grade ore has to be removed to permit access to the economic grade ore. The ores are segregated on the basis of assay into waste rock and below grade ore as well as mill quality ore.

The uranium ore is extracted from the mines and then transported to the mill where it is processed. Once at the mill, the ore is crushed and usually additionally ground, and treated with chemical solutions to dissolve the uranium, which is then recovered from the solution to produce a concentrate (sometimes called yellow cake) containing a high concentration of uranium. Tailings are the wastes from the millings processes and are stored in mill tailings impoundments, a specially designed waste disposal facility. Simplified flow chart of uranium ore processing from mining to the production uranium ore concentrate is shown in Fig. 1.

Subsequent sections briefly describe conventional uranium milling processes followed by an illustrative flowsheet example, extraction from non-conventional resources, wastes generated and potential environmental impacts.