Safety culture development in nuclear electric plc

Nuclear Electric plc (NE) has always given the highest priority to safety. However, past emphasis has been directed towards ensuring safety thorough engineering design and hazard control procedures. Whilst the company did achieve high safety standards, particularly with respect to accidents, it was recognized that further improvements could be obtained. Analysis of the safety performance across a wide range of industries showed that the key to improving safety performance lay in developing a strong safety culture within the company. Over the last five years, NE has made great strides to improve its safety culture. This has resulted in a considerable improvement in its measured safety performance indicators, such as the number of incidents at international nuclear event scale (INES) rating 1, the number of lost time accidents and the collective radiation dose. However, despite this success, the company is committed to further improvement and a means by which this process becomes self-sustaining. In this way the company will achieve its prime goal, to ''ensure the safety of people, plant and the environment''. The paper provides an overview of the development of safety culture in NE since its formation in November 1989. It describes the research and international developments that have influenced the company's understanding of safety culture, the key initiatives that the company has undertaken to enhance its safety culture and the future initiatives being considered to ensure continual improvement. (author). 5 refs, 2 figs, 2 tabs