NEA Mandates and Structures

Working Group on Human and Organisational Factors (WGHOF)

Mandate (Document reference):

• The Strategic Plan for the Committee on the Safety of Nuclear Installations (CSNI) [NEA/CSNI/R(2000)3]
•  Summary Record of the 39th Meeting of the CSNI [NEA/SEN/SIN(2006)3]; Note: includes change of name. 
• CSNI Operating Plan (2006-2009) [NEA/CSNI/R(2007)7] 
• Summary Record of the 40th Meeting of the CSNI [NEA/SEN/SIN(2007)1] 
• Summary Record of the 47th Meeting of the CSNI [NEA/SEN/SIN(2010)2] 
• CSNI Operating Plan (2011-2016) [NEA/CSNI/R(2011)2] 
• Summary Record of the 61st Meeting of the CSNI [NEA/SEN/SIN(2017)2] 
• CSNI Operating Plan and Guidelines (2017-2022) [NEA/CSNI/R(2017)17/REV1] 
• Summary Record of the 68th Meeting of the CSNI [NEA/SEN/SIN(2020)3] 
• The Strategic Plan of the Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) 2023-2028 NEA/NE(2021)9/FINAL
• Participant Status of India in the CSNI and its subsidiary bodies: 2018 Update of the NEA Participation Plan [NEA/NE(2018)8], Summary of Decisions taken at the 137th Session of the Steering Committee [NEA/SUM/DEC(2018)2] and official letter received from India on 31 October 2019 confirming its acceptance of Participant Status in the CSNI and its subsidiary bodies
• 2022 Update of the NEA Global Relations Strategic Directions [NEA/NE(2022)18/REV1] 
• Summary of Decisions Taken at the 144th Session of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy [NEA/SUM/DEC(2022)2]
• Mandate of the Working Group on Human and Organisational Factors (WGHOF) [NEA/SEN/SIN/WGHOF(2023)2/FINAL]

Mandate (Document extract):

Extract from document NEA/SEN/SIN/WGHOF(2023)2/FINAL

Background

The Strategic Plan of the Nuclear Energy Agency 2023-2028, identifies “Human Aspects of Nuclear Safety” as a Strategic Programme Area. The goal is to assist member countries in their efforts to ensure high standards of safety in the use of nuclear energy by advancing greater understanding of human and organisational aspects. It includes promoting enhanced safety culture, effective work design and training policies and practices, effective public communication and stakeholder engagement, and a full consideration of the importance of leadership, diversity of knowledge and experience, and gender balance in nuclear organisations.

The Strategic Plan states that “These human aspects have gained greater understanding as the key to informed and sustainable decision-making, central to safe operations, and vital to the long-term viability of the nuclear sector and the social license it must enjoy to operate around the world.”

Furthermore, the complexity of the matters is highlighted: “The NEA has been at the forefront of many of these areas and supports its member countries in addressing these highly complex matters in a comprehensive manner.”

With the aim to contribute to the NEA Strategic Plan, the mission of the Working Group on Human and Organisational Factors (WGHOF) is to improve the understanding and technical basis for addressing human and organisational factors within the nuclear sector in order to support the continued safety performance of nuclear installations and improve the effectiveness of regulatory practices in NEA member countries.

The scope of the WGHOF encapsulates the multi-disciplinary field of Human and Organisational Factors (HOF). Nuclear facilities are not solely technical but rather are part of sociotechnical systems in which the human, technological, and organisational factors dynamically interplay, creating various interactions that have an effect on the system’s overall capacity to perform safely, reliably, and sustainably.

Accordingly, it is the common understanding that, in addition to the technology, the following areas, amongst others, influence system performance and safety:

• human capabilities and limitations;
• work organisation (including staffing and job design);
• workforce development, education, and training;
• operating and emergency procedures;
• design of interfaces, controls and decision support systems;
• design of the physical work environment;
• decision-making and adaptation;
• flexibility and resilience;
• leadership;
• safety and organisational culture;
• learning from experiences, both in the context of success and of error;
• management systems; and
• and the broader environmental context (e.g. financial realities, pandemic, war situations and other emerging safety challenges).

Scope

Consistent with the Committee on the Safety on Nuclear Installations (CSNI) extended mandate for 2023-2028 [NEA/SEN/SIN(2022)5], the WGHOF will address safety aspects of existing power reactors and the emerging safety challenges required to enable safety in design and operation of advanced and innovative nuclear technologies, including the ones used for small modular reactors (SMRs). The WGHOF will further strive to ensure that the issues associated with human and organisational factors are properly and conscientiously considered as the workforce, technology, and our organisations evolve in the development of these new technologies, such as SMRs.

Objectives

The WGHOF will address the challenges identified in the NEA Strategic Plan 2023-2028 [NEA/NE(2021)9/FINAL] and implement the CSNI Operating Plan and Guidelines. In particular, the WGHOF will:

1. constitute a forum for the exchange of technical information and for collaboration between organisations which can contribute, from their respective backgrounds in research, development and engineering, to its activities. In particular, it will constitute a forum for exchange of information and experience about safety issues related to human and organisational factors in NEA member countries, thereby promoting co-operation and maintaining an effective and efficient network of experts;
2. identify and prioritise current and emerging safety issues stemming from human and organisational factors, while considering these interactions in the context of evolving technology;
3. review the state of knowledge on relevant topics;
4. ensure that operating experience is appropriately accounted for in its activities;
5. identify human and organisational factors methodologies and practices, where further work and research is needed;
6. identify those issues which appear most suitable to be addressed by WGHOF in a coordinated way across the international community;
7. facilitate international convergence on safety issues related to human and organisational factors and, where practicable, seek to develop a shared understanding and consensus on important issues;
8. benchmark practices and methodologies currently applied by NEA member countries in addressing safety-relevant issues related to human and organisational factors;
9. work towards increasing societal trust in the nuclear industry.

Working methods

The WGHOF will:

• report to the CSNI and assist the Committee with its work. The WGHOF will provide answers to questions from the CSNI, the Committee on Nuclear Regulatory Activities (CNRA), and member countries. WGHOF’s Programme of work will be approved by the CSNI;
• be led by a Chair, a Vice-Chair and a Bureau designated and acting according to the OECD guidelines. The programme of the WGHOF will be carried out by small task groups (TGs), each set up for performing a specific programme activity under the WGHOF’s supervision. All activities have a co-ordinator or a leader who is responsible for work performance.
• sponsor specialist meetings, workshops, and other means of fostering international collaboration with nuclear and other industries, where appropriate, to further its objectives; and
• encourage close interaction and sharing of experiences and perspectives with other high-risk sectors and closer engagement with academia and civil society to strengthen and inform its work.

Membership

The WGHOF is comprised of experts from nuclear regulatory bodies, license holders, technical support organisations, research institutions and relevant international organisations.

Delegates from non-member partner countries (participants or invitees) may also attend WGHOF meetings (according to the Global Relations Strategic Directions of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy).

Interactions

The WGHOF will collaborate with other relevant NEA bodies, particularly the Committee for Nuclear Regulatory Activities (CNRA) Working Group on Leadership and Safety Culture (WGLSC), other NEA standing technical committees, and international organisations.

The WGHOF will collaborate with and support cross-cutting initiatives proposed to or by other CSNI and CNRA working groups, including the Working Group on Fuel Cycle Safety (WGFCS). The WGHOF will ensure that the CSNI, CNRA, other NEA bodies, in particular the High Level Group on Stakeholder Engagement, Trust, Transparency and Social Sciences (HLG-SET), the Expert Group on SMRs (EGSMR), international organisations, and stakeholders are consulted, as appropriate, when potential cross-cutting work on human and organisational factors is proposed by the WGHOF.

The NEA provides a framework for establishing joint safety research projects. The WGHOF will promote technical exchanges by creating opportunities with relevant projects, and provide them technical support as appropriate. In particular, the WGHOF will engage with the Halden Human Technology Organisation (HTO) Project to streamline and support mutual areas of work.

The NEA has established Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) with a number of organisations, such as the American Nuclear Society (ANS), the CANDU Owners Group (COG), the Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI), the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), the World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO) and other international organisations, to promote international collaboration, particularly in the area of nuclear safety. Accordingly, representatives from these organisations can be invited to participate in NEA’s activities, consistent with the MOUs, in an effort to coordinate their work and to avoid unnecessary duplication.

Deliverables

The deliverables of the CSNI and its working groups include technical reports, proceedings of seminars or workshops, final and interim summary reports from joint projects, state-of-the-art reports, technical or collective opinion papers, brochures and flyers, as well as webinars, technical workshops, and training courses.