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2011 Conference Information
PSEG Logo
and the Utilities Service Alliance (USA) Presents
The 18th Annual
Configuration Management Benchmarking Group Conference
June 19-22, 2011
Philadelphia, PA

The conference was held at The Sheraton Society Hill
and hosted by Paul Davis.

The Sheraton Society Hill
One Dock Street, (2nd and Walnut Streets)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19106

View Agenda View Program View Announcement View Attendees List View Conference Photos
Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia, PA

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania's largest city, is notable for its rich history, on display at the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall (where the Declaration of Independence and Constitution were signed) and other American Revolutionary sites. Also iconic are the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, immortalized by Sylvester Stallone's triumphant run in the film "Rocky."

Conference Presentations

Monday Presentations


Welcome
Paul Davis, PSEG Nuclear LLC

Paul Davis will provide logistical information about conference activities.

CM and CMBG History
Keith Reinsmith, PPL Susquehanna (CMBG Chair)

This presentation will present a chronology and evolution of configuration management as a practice and review the history and role of CMBG in CM.

ANSI/NIRMA CM 1.0 Revision
Rich Giska, STP Nuclear Operating Company

The NIRMA/ANSI CM Standard has proven to be a cohesive factor for the nuclear industry since it was first issued in 2000. It was revised and re-issued in 2007. Based on the ANSI standard process, the document is scheduled to be reviewed and revised, if necessary in 2012. This presentation will provide an overview of the standard and prompt discussion for the afternoon breakout session.

INPO Update
Carl Faller and Bob Gambrill, INPO

INPO to present an update of engineering Configuration Management activates.

Web link to video presentation

Overview of Updated IAEA documents SR-65 and TECDOC-1651
Kent Freeland, WorleyParsons

The IAEA has been active at providing CM guidance to nuclear entities outside of the USA. In 2010 they issued two documents: Safety Report 65, "Application of Configuration Management in Nuclear Power Plants" and TECDOC-1651, "Information Technology for Nuclear Power Plant Configuration Management." The presenter will provide an overview of these documents and establish the linkage to current USA CM guidance.

Obsolete Equipment
Rob Santoro, PKMJ

The Nuclear Industry is faced with a growing obsolescence challenge of about 20% of all installed components obsolete. This presentation outlines the affects of this increasing challenge to configuration management. Configuration challenges are brought to light in the identification phase of obsolescence. Accurate Master Equipment Lists and Bills of Materials are required to understand the full extent of condition of obsolescence. Finally, when solving these obsolescence challenges, plant changes may be required. This can include Equivalency Evaluations, Design Modifications, and Reverse Engineering. Physical Configuration, Design Requirements, and Documented Configuration may all need to be modified to address these changes.

EPRI Project Status
Ken Barry, EPRI & Lloyd Hancock, LRH Consulting

The presenters will provide the overall status of the project and discuss specifics of the CM Guidance document and the industry AEX/XML integration demonstrations. Specifics of the project's future activities will be addressed. This presentation should prompt discussion for the afternoon breakout sessions.

Monday Breakouts


CM 101 - Training Material
Instructor - Bill Kline, Marathon Consulting Group, Inc.

This session would be based on a 45-60 minute PowerPoint presentation that walks the audience through the fundamental concepts, terms, and examples of Configuration Management (CM), including design and operating margin management. The objective of this breakout is to attract those conference attendees new to the configuration management process and provide them with a capsule summary of the workings of the CM process to provide an understanding of how the different plant organizations contribute to and support configuration control of our design, processes, and equipment. Will discuss industry three ball process model for configuration management, the five functional areas of CM, and using CM to protect design and operating margins.

ANSI/NIRMA CM 1.0 Revision - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Rich Giska, STP Nuclear Operating Company

The breakout will review the standard and discuss its industry role and relationship to other CM guidance documents. Participants for the breakout will be expected to ask specific questions about the standard or provide input to the possible revision.

Obsolete Equipment - Flip Charts
Facilitator – Rob Santoro, PKMJ

The focus of this breakout session is to further explore the areas and situations where obsolescence may impact configuration management. By understanding these impact areas, Sites can be better prepared to address the potential issues that may result. The breakout session will also include a discussion on strategies minimize the obsolescence impact, including proactive approaches.

Drawing Contro - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Mike Stout, Bentley Systems, Inc.

A session around basic CM principles associated with classifying, controlling and maintaining plant drawings. Industry guidelines and good practices will be shared.

Temp Alterations - Flip Charts
Facilitators – Angie Kozak, Bruce Power and Gary Stith, PSEG Nuclear

Proper management of temporary alterations is vital to facility configuration management. This break out session will focus on the various aspects of temporary alterations including terminology, the criteria for deciding the proper change mechanism, i.e., full engineering controls, procedure controlled, maintenance support, pre-engineered alterations, etc. Attendee's should be prepared to discuss how their plant manages temporary alterations, problems related to the removal of temporary alterations, site measures used to monitor temporary alterations, and any problems related to the overdue removal of temporary alterations.

Developing CM Programs for New Build - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Lloyd Hancock, LRH Consulting

This breakout will expand on the morning presentation by EPRI. Specific suggestions will be offered for building a robust CM Program from the ground up. The participants will have an opportunity to ask questions, collect information and lessons learned. The breakout material may also be useful to an existing plant needing to upgrade or overhaul its CM Program.

Establishing a Common Understanding of CM for New Builds - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Lloyd Hancock, LRH Consulting

The need to communicate CM principles and practices to all participants of a New Build project is necessary to ensure short and long term success. With the highly interactive climate brought about by new licensing methods and current technology, the need to understand each participant's role is increased. It is necessary to know the upstream and downstream hand-offs to appreciate the product being delivered. The breakout will cover techniques and practical solutions to providing the needed common understanding.

Incorporating New Builds into Existing Plant Infrastructure - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Mike Hayes, Exelon

The fact that no stand-alone nuclear plants are currently planned, presents today's Owner/Operators with some unique challenges. Do they try to meld the new plant(s) into the existing infrastructure? Will existing procedures be modified to address the new plant or will all new procedures be written? Will the existing SSC numbering conventions be used? Will the Enterprise Asset Management system be expanded to cover the new plant?

Tuesday Presentations


Exemplary Margin Management
Mike Hayes, Exelon Corporate

Margin management has been a hot topic at the CMBG Conference in the past few years. Feedback from last year's conference expressed the desire to see an example of a successful margin management program. INPO has identified Exelon as having such a program. This presentation will provide an overview of Exelon's Margin Management program and should prompt discussion for the afternoon breakout session.

Digital I&C Systems Configuration Management
David Woods, PPL Susquehanna

The proliferation of diverse digital I&C equipment for plant upgrades and equipment replacements has challenged station personnel to develop and implement effective configuration management methods. High level requirements and guidance provided by industry standards are not being effectively translated into practical methods to manage the configuration of digital I&C equipment. This presentation will discuss a current EPRI project to develop a methodology and guidelines to assist station personnel to implement effective configuration management processes and procedures for various types of digital systems and components. This guidance will be based on practical, best industry practices, compliant with industry and regulatory requirements.

This presentation should prompt discussion for the afternoon breakout session.

New Build CM from EPC Perspective
Bob Renuart, Unistar

This presentation will provide the management of CM from the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) perspective. The topics will consist of; CM lessons learned from existing plants, the impact of problems created by breakdowns of CM principles outside of EPC involvement, the need for consistent terminology and understanding of CM by all project participants, and suggestions for improving CM from the EPC perspective.

CM Health PIs
Lloyd Hancock, LRH Consulting

The presenter will review the CMBG efforts to quantify a consistent set of CM Performance Indicators. Results of an industry questionnaire asking for specific indicator values will be presented. This presentation will provide an overview of the CM Performance Indicators and prompt discussion for the afternoon breakout session.

Successes in Transferring Configuration Data from Supplier to Owner/Operator
Presenter John Whitmire, Bentley Systems, Inc.

The presenter will describe successes in techniques used to transfer configuration information from supplier to owner/operator in other industries. Challenges to the data transfer will be identified and the solutions employed to overcome them explained. The presentation will provide an overview of the data transfer process and will prompt discussion in the afternoon breakout of how these processes could be adapted to nuclear plant information.

Tuesday Breakouts


Abandoned Equipment - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Joe Volence, PSEG Nuclear

This breakout addresses the fundamental elements and differences between the Permanent and Interim Abandonment processes.

Interim Abandonment is offered up as an interim, less expensive alternative to Permanent Abandonment using Design Changes when such Design Changes score low with Plant Health Committees in the competition for limited plant finances.

Consider the advantages and disadvantages of these two processes in terms of resources, schedule, implementation, configuration control and physical end product.

Exelon Procedure "Equipment Abandoned Via Operational Configuration Change"
PSEG Procedure "Interim and Permanent Abandonment of Controlled Plant Equipment"

CM Performance Indicators - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Lloyd Hancock, LRH Consulting

The breakout will review the results of the industry survey and give the breakout participants an opportunity to ask questions or offer opinions. Hopefully coming out of the breakout will be a consistent set of CM Performance Indicators that can be published on the CMBG website.

CM PI Survey Results

Digital I&C Systems Configuration Management - Flip Charts
Facilitator - David Woods, PPL Susquehanna and Jack Carey PSEG Nuclear

The proliferation of diverse digital I&C equipment for plant upgrades and equipment replacements has challenged station personnel to develop and implement effective configuration management methods. High level requirements and guidance provided by industry standards are not being effectively translated into practical methods to manage the configuration of digital I&C equipment.

Master Equipment List - Flip Charts
Facilitator - Bobbi Jo Halvorson, Xcel Nuclear

This breakout session is intended to provide discussion on basic CM concepts. It is intended to help attendees share information about the development, maintenance and use of equipment databases. Attendees will be asked to describe their organizations approach to data integrity and 'ownership' of the database, as well as its uses. This will include sharing of information about audit results and feedback from INPO and the NRC.

Margin Management – Flip Charts
Facilitators - Keith Reinsmith, PPL Susquehanna and Mike Hayes, Exelon

The breakout will quantify the attributes of a successful Margin Management program. Mike Hayes of Exelon will be available to provide more details of Exelon's Margin Management program and answer any specific questions the breakout participants may have.

Industry CM Ramifications of the Japan Fukushima Daiichi Plant Event – Flip Charts
Facilitators – Bill Kline and John Parler

This Breakout is intended to facilitate a forward looking discussion to focus on the possible CM implications of investigations and analyses that result from the industry assessment of the Japan Fukushima Daiichi Plant event. Discussion will use INPO Event Reports (IER) 11-1 and 11-2 recommendations and requested information responses as a starting point to collect and categorize the results submitted by participating INPO members to identify any CM related program or process issues that participants need to take back to their organizations for review and assessment. Participants should be able to discuss what actions are being taken at their utility/organization in response to the Japan event and any CM issues identified in the months since the event.

Fundamentals of Maintaining Virtual Plant Information – Flip Charts
Facilitators – Mike Stout and John Whitmire, Bentley Systems, Inc.

This breakout will review the "Virtual Plant" concept and contrast it to the past document-centric methods of maintaining information. The breakout participants will identify the potential barriers in maintaining information in the virtual plant arena and will propose solutions that can be used to address the barriers.

What are Attributes of a Good CM Practitioner? – Flip Charts
Facilitator - John Parler, South Carolina Electric and Gas

Issuance of industry CM guidance documents is predicated on the assumption that the reader has a basic understanding of CM fundamentals and some familiarity with good CM principles and practices. These are but two of the attributes that will be discussed in this breakout. Other attributes will be identified and discussed. Coming out of this breakout, the CM Practitioner attributes can be posted on the CMBG webpage to serve as a barometer and possible improvement path for interested Practitioners.

EPC/Owner Turnover – Flip Charts
Facilitator – Bob Renuart

This breakout will focus on the details of the turnover process, including how to manage modular construction and partial turnovers. Breakout participants representing EPCs will be expected to provide examples of CM breakdowns during the project and possible solutions to the problems. Breakout participants representing the Owner/Operator will be asked to identify their expectations from the EPC during the turnover process.

Wednesday Presentations


V-22 Configuration Management (CM) Challenges
Bruce Oestreich, Director – Rotary Craft Systems Engineering & Integration, Boeing Defense, Space and Security

Configuration Management challenges exist in every industry at every level. An interesting product to consider is the V-22 Osprey – a revolutionary tilt-rotor aircraft currently in production and deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. The intriguing part of this story is not about the tilt-rotor configuration; but rather how two different companies (Bell Helicopter Textron and The Boeing Company) jointly managed the Configuration of the aircraft with a highly capable Customer (Naval Aviation System Command – NAVAIR) as the acquisition service for the US Marine Corps and US Air Force Special Operations Command end users.

This presentation will relate the basics of what CM actually is; why it remains a simple concept yet so difficult to execute successfully; and some lessons learned from handling multiple configurations for multiple Customers that might resonate within the Nuclear industry.

Agenda:

  • CM Challenges – What is CM?
  • Brief Program Overview to calibrate the audience to V-22 CM
  • Complexity at various levels
  • Why is this so hard?
  • Lessons Learned
  • Is anything applicable to the Nuclear Power industry?



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