Safety culture at the heart of nuclear power - Special report

On January 17, 2024, the safety section (ST4) of the French Nuclear Energy Society (Sfen) devoted a workshop to an exchange on safety culture, based on two cases: the design faults of the Boeing 737 Max, which caused two crashes shortly after takeoff, and the corrosion of the reactor vessel cover at the Davis Besse nuclear power plant in the USA, which was on the verge of causing a serious accident. The following articles by Jean Paries, expert in organizational and human factors (FOH) and aeronautics, and recently Scientific Director of ICSI - FONCSI, and Francois Wienhold, Director of Nuclear Inspection at EDF, present these two events. What they have in common is that they originated in profound and collective failures in the safety culture of two companies, one a designer and the other an operator, which had hitherto set the standard. Discussions focused on the organizational and human mechanisms at work in these cases, as well as the powerful effects of strategic positioning and priorities determined by management. Workshop participants also discussed ways of guarding against such abuses. As far as Sfen is concerned, disseminating and recalling knowledge about such events is part of its mission as a learned society, and aims to help keep the most striking features alive. Etienne Dutheil, head of EDF's nuclear fleet and vice-president of Sfen, reminded us of this at the conclusion of the workshop, a transcript of which can be found here