Maintaining And Improving Nuclear Safety And Security Culture In Adverse Conditions

Maintaining and Improving Nuclear Safety and Security Culturein Adverse ConditionsMosa Rasweswe, Isabel Steyn, Mologadi Kekana: South African Nuclear Energy Corporation;Karen Kaldenbach: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL);Claire DeRosa, US Department of State, Partnership for Nuclear Threat ReductionAbstractAll nuclear facilities need to maintain constant attention to nuclear safety and nuclear security culture. The South African Nuclear Energy Corporation (NECSA) has devoted time and attention to both issues, working with international partners to continually strive for improvement. Since 2018, NECSA has been working with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory to promote nuclear safety and security culture via a cooperative program sponsored by the US Department of State’s Partnership for Nuclear Threat Reduction. This safety and security culture program focuses on very practical training with a concentration on specific characteristics of culture - namely beliefs and attitudes, principles, management systems, and behaviors of both leadership and staff members. By helping all staff understand their personal accountability in supporting and promoting a good culture, ownership, responsibility, and growth is fostered within all organizations. During the start of the coronavirus pandemic in early 2020, NECSA management promptly established a disaster management team to make critical decisions about operations and to procedurally navigate issues during the pandemic. This paper will describe how NECSA managed the pandemic to maintain essential operations while keeping staff safe and maintaining a strong safety and security culture.