Fri
Jul 17 2009
08:46 am
TVA: Here's your $10 million, thanks for nothing
By: smalc

Unbelievable, TVA throws another $10M down the drain (or in the pond).

A contractor hired by the Tennessee Valley Authority can’t determine the structural stability at any of the utility’s coal waste facilities

This quote is golden:

“Due to limited record drawings and construction … documentation, Stantec is unable to render opinions relative to overall structural integrity,” the report concludes.

This is the second time TVA has hired a consultant based on name recognition, not experience.

WhitesCreek's picture

The problem is with TVA

Submitted by WhitesCreek on Fri, 2009/07/17 - 9:36am.

As we went over TVA's documents in the falure analysis, we found one striking fact...There are NO engineering stamps on any of the construction and engineering drawings. That means that no certified civil engineer approved them. This is the same thing that Stantec discovered. Frankly we were stunned at this.

This speaks to a debilitating organizational failure of TVA at least as large as the Kingston disaster. I can't build a one acre water retention pond without an engineering stamp of approval. I can't be certain without more information, but I believe that No certified civil engineer would have stamped TVA's plans to raise the Kingston dike without core samples of the dike construction and multiple core samples of the substrate on which it was originally constructed.

TVA says they are taking steps to remedy things but none of those steps will be adequate until they are forced to meet the same regulatory oversight as a private entity where the public safety is concerned. They have all sorts of security police and agencies to protect them, against protesters and terrorists, but very little to protect US against TVA's internal failings.

smalc's picture

Frankly we were stunned at

Submitted by smalc on Fri, 2009/07/17 - 10:06am.

Frankly we were stunned at this.

I am not too stunned. If they were meant to be internal documents and not submitted to any regulatory agency, they wouldn't need to be stamped. In hindsight, they should have anyway. It's a problem with TVA's immunity to any outside regulation.

I can't be certain without more information, but I believe that No certified civil engineer would have stamped TVA's plans to raise the Kingston dike without core samples of the dike construction and multiple core samples of the substrate on which it was originally constructed.

I wouldn't say that absolutely, but it should have been that way. Unfortunately, like lawyers or doctors, or any other expert, you can usually find an engineer to suit your needs. Even AECOM (the alleged experts) did not seem to recognize that it was the effect on the original dike of raising the dredge cells that probably caused the failure, and not the dredge cells themselves.

WhitesCreek's picture

I've talked to two civil

Submitted by WhitesCreek on Fri, 2009/07/17 - 11:30am.

I've talked to two civil engineers and asked about the core samples and if they would have proceeded with a project that was going to exponentially load the dike walls without asking for cores. It may be that they now know about the collapse, but both of them said something to the effect that without verified documentation of the existing structure they would have balked at proceeding. It looks like there were essentially no cores and no "as built" docs.

Going forward TVA needs to make internal changes to require outside oversight.

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