Jekyll-and-Hyde procurement practice: Problems presented by inconsistent implementation of EPRI NP-5652

The Guidelines for the Utilization of Commercial-Grade Items in Nuclear-Safety-Related Applications was issued by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) as a final report (EPRI NP-5652) in March of 1988. The very first paragraph, 1.1.1-Issue, states that A challenge the nuclear industry faces is to establish a consistent guideline for the utilization of commercial grade items. The lack of specific implementation direction in existing documents has resulted in inconsistent interpretation, implementation, and enforcement. From a vendor's perspective, the challenge that the EPRI guidelines were supposed to meet still exists because interpretation, implementation, and enforcement of the guidelines themselves is anything but consistent from customer to customer. This paper discusses some case histories of inconsistent application and interpretation of the EPRI guidelines and outlines one vendor's attempts to put procedures into place that encompass the variant interpretations