RE: DOE/NRC Rad. Con. Performance Indicators

["Kanter, Seth J(Z55008)" <SKANTER@apsc.com>]

Larry,

Just a personal note, the use of performance indicators can be a 
double edged sword.  That is, if you set to restrictive a limit on 
skin contaminations, you may find a disparity between the number of 
reported occurrences versus the number of actual occurrences (you may 
want to lock the door on your personnel decontamination facility). 
 (Granted, numerical calculations are usually the easiest method to 
measure the performance of your program, so you may want to carefully 
examine your final criteria with this in mind).

We applied this type of criteria to the our reporting of Personnel 
Contamination Events (PCEs) (skin contaminations) by dividing them 
into two reporting categories: normal and significant.  Only the 
significant PCEs are reported and tracked outside of the department. 
 In this way, incidental contamination events, with low radiological 
significance are separated from those of a higher radiological 
significance.  Of course, you have to determine what is/isn't 
significant.

Some of the other indicators that we use are:

Collective Radiation Exposure
Contaminated Area (square footage)
Personnel Contamination Events
Low-level Solid Radwaste Volume
Mixed Waste Generation and Volume
Radworker Practices
Training


Of course, many of these many not be applicable to you, but this 
should give you a flavor of what we're doing.

With respect to frequency of tabulation/evaluation of these 
indicators, we analyze them monthly and provide a report to 
management.  (We also develop corrective actions, etc., if 
warranted).

At times we have thought of offering a financial award based results, 
however, we have a budget to purchase and distribute "ALARA" rewards 
such as pens, hats, tee shirts, coffee cups, etc. to workers and/or 
groups that contribute towards our achieving these goals.  We do have 
one our indicators, LLW Volume, tied to an overall company incentive 
that is paid out annually.

If you want any more detailed information, you can contact me 
off-line.

Regards from the Desert Southwest,

Seth Kanter
Health Physicist
Radiological Engineering Section
Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station
(602) 393-5106


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From: 	Larry_R_McKay@RL.gov[SMTP:Larry_R_McKay@RL.gov]
Sent: 	Friday, July 25, 1997 1:15 PM
To: 	Multiple recipients of list
Subject: 	DOE/NRC Rad. Con. Performance Indicators

     Ladies & Gentlemen:

     If you use performance indicators (e.g., positive whole-body 
counts,
     skin contaminations) to measure the performance of your 
Radiological
     Control Program, would you please send a short reply to this 
message
     to let me know:


     - Which indicators you use
     - What frequency you tabulate & evaluate the indicators
     - If financial award is based on the results.


     A brief description will be fine.  Thank you in advance for your 
help,
     and maybe one day I will have the opportunity to give you some 
input.

     Regards from the Pacific Northwest,

     Larry McKay
     larry_r_mckay@rl.gov