TWINNING PROGRAMME ENGINEERING GROUP

The TPEG was created and put in operation with the aim of assisting the Commission when the European Union decided to develop and harmonise through the Phare and TACIS Programmes its assistance to Eastern European and CIS countries for the improvement of safety of civil nuclear facilities in those countries

The EU set up the Master Plan as a programming tool and decided to obtain the necessary assistance from the TPEG. The latter would assist the Commission in the implementation of the Phare and TACIS programmes calling for safety improvement of civil nuclear power facilities, with due consideration to the radwaste and fuel cycle aspects, the decision-making remaining under the responsibility of the EC.

The contract was to be implemented through work orders, each one independently scheduled according to its own specific needs and circumstances, which were issued by the Commission periodically. Within the framework of the contract the TPEG had to ensure on the request of EC the following activities:
Programme and Master Plan
The purpose of the Master Plan was to define, in a consistent pluriannual approach, the actions to be undertaken on the different types of nuclear facilities of Soviet design, regardless of the country concerned and whether the origin of the funding was EC or otherwise.
The idea was to define the safety modernisation measures required at each type of reactor and to monitor the implementation of the modernisation measures implemented at each NPP, regardless of the source of funding (i.e. NPP Operator’s own funds, TACIS or other international donors), thereby maintaining an inventory of the modernisation measures required. The EC undertook to ensure that the Consultant would be kept fully informed of all significant bilateral activities included in the G24 sphere of action.
The IAEA ‘Safety Issues’ books, the so-called green books, were a principal information source for setting up the Master Plan.
The projects were split into 13 groups, corresponding to IAEA classification, namely:

integrity of the primary circuit
I&C
accident analysis
training
seismic stability
fire protection
confinement/containment
maintenance
system analysis
waste and fuel cycle
emergency planning
RBMK
licensing activities
The purpose was then to make use of the Master Plan for the planning, definition and preparation of the TACIS Annual Programmes, selecting the specific actions to be performed under the annual budgets of the EC.
The relevant tasks which were requested from TPEG during the contract were:

Discussions with the Eastern participants regarding their domestic programmes, needs and priorities, in order to identify complementary actions.
Discussions with main actors in both East and West on their roles in the implementation of the Master Plan.
Development of a methodology for defining the roles of the main actors in both East and West, by type of reactor, and the interfaces between actors.
Preparation of programmes of required short and long term actions for each type of reactor.
Assistance for preparing the annual programmes and budgets.
Control and proposal for updating of the programme taking into account the results obtained from the implementation of the various projects implemented at the NPPs.
Implementation of the Programmes
Two types of activity were essentially involved: project definition and project follow-up.
The main tasks involved under project definition were:

Establishment of guidelines for common quality assurance specifications and common project procedures to ensure the consistency between the contractors in charge of the projects and the final user.
Identification of the detailed technical needs and identification of the projects to be undertaken. Breakdown of the projects into appropriate work packages.
Writing of Terms of Reference (ToR) including: the appropriate Q.A. and project procedures, and discussions of the ToR drafts with the Beneficiaries up to their final endorsement.
Estimation of specific budgets.
Preparation of bid lists, i.e. lists of pre-qualified organisations to be invited to tender.
Preparation of Calls for tender.
Technical evaluation of tenders using evaluation criteria agreed with the EC.
The main tasks related to the projects follow-up were:

Technical follow-up of the contracts, including the checking of compliance with the contractual Project Quality Plans and the Contractors’ Quality Assurance Manuals, together with review of project progress reports.
Co-operation with the Eastern partners for mobilisation of necessary resources for projects follow-up agreed by the Commission.
Assistance for some subcontracting negotiations with Russian Institutes. Coordination of workplans of the various consultants.
Joint follow-up with the Eastern partners of general progress of the programme and interfaces between contracts.
External audits of Consultants.
Analysis of the generic studies performed by engineering organisations/groups and discussion with the TSOG.
Co-operation with Eastern partners in integrating the results into the national programmes.

The contract was signed on 03.11.93, came into force on this date and TPEG began the activity linked to this contract immediately. The contract ended on 03.04.1997.
The contract was implemented on the basis of work orders.
The Master Planning defined the actions to be undertaken in a pluriannual basis, while the annual Programmes defined on a yearly basis the specific actions to be implemented via the TACIS and PHARE programmes.
The TPEG activities carried out were a continuation of those started in Contract 22114. Master Planning was an ongoing activity and was continued under Contract 23631.
ToR preparation was also an important activity of the contract. TPEG was charged with the preparation of a significant number of ToRs for TACIS nuclear safety projects.
The TACIS programmes were systematically defined on a yearly basis and the TPEG activities involved project definition and project follow-up.