Formation of Safety Culture among Students of Atomic Specialties in Universities of Ukraine

S. V. Barbashev, V. S. Kirov, Ya. O. Komarova, V. P. Kravchenko

Odessa National Polytechnic University,
1, Shevchenko av., Odesa, 65044, Ukraine

DOI: doi.org/10.31717/2311-8253.19.2.10

Abstract

Currently, in nuclear power engineering, the concept of safety culture is one of the essential elements that underlie the safety management system.
Safety indicators are reflection of effectiveness of safety culture during operation of nuclear power plants.
It is shown in the article that the operational indicators of Ukrainian nuclear power plants, such as the number of accounting violations, installed capacity coefficient, the ratio of carrying the nominal electrical load, which assesses the state of safety and safety culture, are below the world average.
Human factor is of great importance in ensuring an adequate level of safety of nuclear power plants, the willingness of staff to recognize safety as a top priority and to be committed to safety culture in their actions.
One of the reasons of the safety culture level reduction at nuclear power plants is insufficient training of personnel, so training of the future specialists in  nuclear industry should be already started in univerisites.
The authors believe that mastering the principles of safety culture in higher education institutions should be part of the overall modern process of ensuring and managing safety, which is recommended by the relevant safety guides of the International Atomic Energy Agency and documents of the World Association of Nuclear Power Plants. Besides, it will increase the efficiency of the results of the implementation of the relevant programs of the State Enterprise “National Nuclear Energy Generating Company ‘Energoatom’”.
To this end, it is proposed to include the discipline “Safety Culture in Nuclear Power” in the curricula of universities. Study the discipline will help students (future employees of nuclear power plants) to create concept of thinking which is based on the concept of safety culture aimed at unconditional compliance with safety requirements.

Keywords: nuclear energy, safety, safety culture, training in universities.

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