Inside NIRMA - Spring March 2018 Issue

Leading the way in Nuclear Information and Records Management 

Inside 

magazine 

Connecting IT with Operational and 

Engineering Technology for Asset 

Performance Modeling 

Chronicles of NIM: 

A Retrospective on Information 

Management in Nuclear Power 

Visit us at: NIRMA.org 

Meet the 

NIRMA Board 

Members 

Issue # 01, Spring 2018

Contents 

Feature Cover Stories 

5 

Connecting IT with Operational and 

Engineering Technology for Asset 

Performance Modeling 

6 

13 

Chronicles of NIM: A Retrospective on 

Information Management in Nuclear Power 

Meet the NIRMA Board 

PLUS 

4 

7 

8 

18 

19 

NIRMA Publication Goes Digital 

SavantX Delivers on the Nuclear 

Promise 

You Can Do That With 

Microfilm? 

Nominating Committee News 

Controlled Unclassified 

Information, From the NRC 

Inside NIRMA NIRMA.org Spring 2018 3

NIRMA 

Publication 

Goes Digital! 

in every issue 

FROM YOUR PRESIDENT—9 

FROM YOUR VP—10 

SECRETARY NEWS—11 

TREASURER’S REPORT—14 

RIMBU NEWS—12 

PDBU NEWS—16 

INDUSTRY NEWS—17 

NIRMA CONFERENCE—20 

Happy New Year, and welcome to the new Inside 

NIRMA digital magazine. 

Each new year offers the opportunity to set goals, 

start fresh and embark on new adventures. And for 

NIRMA we’re kicking off 2018 with a brand-new look 

to our publication. 

Our new digital magazine will be emailed to all 

NIRMA members three times per year (March, June 

and October). While some may miss receiving the 

hard copy edition, there are many other opportunities 

that now exist with the digital publication. This 

includes the ability to link to other websites and 

videos. It also helps us become more environmentally 

friendly. Think of all those trees we save by not 

printing the editions! 

With the redesigned Inside NIRMA, we’re 

streamlining some of our content and will include 

some new features (Meet the NIRMA Board). It also 

enables us to provide more options to our advertisers 

and supporters. 

As always, we welcome 

your feedback and are always 

looking for good stories to 

share with our membership. 

Should you have feedback or 

would like to put pen to paper 

for an article for our next 

edition, please contact us at 

DevereauxInc@outlook.com. 

We hope you enjoy the new 

look and we’re excited to start off another great year 

in this dynamic industry. 

4 Spring 2018 NIRMA.org Inside NIRMA

CONNECTING IT WITH OPERATIONAL 

AND ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY 

FOR ASSET PERFORMANCE 

MODELING 

By Bhupinder Singh, Chief Product Officer 

and Anne-Marie Walters, Global Marketing 

Director, Bentley Systems 

s operations technology (OT) leverages the 

Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) with sensors on 

operating equipment and assets producing an 

enormous volume of big data, there is a need for 

improved security, information sharing and data management. 

This, in turn, is driving an unprecedented convergence with 

IT. However, organizations are struggling to make use of the 

data from their OT and IT systems, causing them to miss 

opportunities to improve asset performance. This is due, in 

part, to the fact that the digital engineering models developed 

during the engineering phase of capital projects, are typically 

not playing a role in operations. 

What if owner-operators could use these models in 

operations? Imagine how a digital engineering model—the 

engineering technology or ET of an asset—could help operations 

and maintenance people forecast problems, do better 

planning, and improve performance. It is now possible for 

companies to converge their IT, OT and ET – and seamlessly 

integrate process and information flows between them – to 

enable asset performance modeling to deliver actionable 

intelligence for decision support through an immersive 

environment for visual operations. 

The Digital Engineering Model 

Nuclear facilities have a mandate to maintain the licensed 

design basis. This is essentially the engineering model of the 

plant, and depending on each facility’s digital transformation 

progress, the model may be partially or completely digitized. 

There’s a staggering amount of information related to assets – 

detailed component specifications, precise geo-location, 

configuration management, fabrication details, cost 

information, predicted lifetimes, recommended maintenance 

and repair information. Today’s engineering technology 

makes it possible to bring all this information together within 

the federated digital engineering model, making it possible to 

track, access, and share across plant disciplines. Optimizing 

this information through operations and maintenance systems 

across the entire asset lifecycle is key to reducing OPEX. 

Digital engineering models bring together critical 

information in a virtual 3D environment. 

The Beginning of IT/ET/OT Convergence 

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is driving a 

convergence between operational technology and information 

technology. Digital engineering models can accelerate this 

convergence and add the visual representation of the real 

world needed to aid decision making; this can have farreaching 

impacts on safety, productivity, efficiency and 

operations. 

Making the Leap to Asset Performance Modeling 

Taking the convergence of IT, OT, and ET one step 

further, it’s now possible to enable real-time asset 

performance modeling, which ensures that assets are safe, 

reliable, and efficient over their operating life. Asset 

performance management software can enable companies to 

develop both operational and asset strategies for improving 

reliability and maintaining asset performance and predictable 

production. Using a common data environment (CDE), companies 

can collect, consolidate, and analyze data and turn it into 

actionable intelligence. 

See Bentley on page 14. 


A Retrospective on Information 

Management in Nuclear Power 

By Eugene Y. Yang, Principal Consultant, 

KISMET Consulting, Inc. 

his column takes a look back on 

information management (data, 

documents, and records) in the nuclear 

power industry. I have been fortunate 

to either be employed by or consulted to many of 

the utilities and power plants in the U.S., 

seeing where things were and how they evolved 

over the past 35+ plus years. The plan is to 

make this a regular column in the Inside 

NIRMA magazine. 

You know the story that you tell 

your children on how tough you had it 

growing up (“I had to walk five miles to 

school everyday, in the snow, winds howling, 

wind chill in minus 20’s…even in the spring… 

and it was uphill there and back!”)? You 

think you have it rough today? 

Scanning documents at 100 ppm, 

processing “born-digital” documents 

and records, uploading them into an 

electronic repository, so that you can 

view them in less than five seconds in a 

web browser, smartphone, or tablet 

(“Five seconds! Man, that’s SLOW.”). And 

then there are the times when the 

technology folks sound like a John 

Wayne movie (“We have to figure out how to 

build a cyber defense so Apache Tomcats don’t 

take our Red Hat!”). 

Well, back in the day, at the start of 

my career, all this processing stuff was 

paper-based. I found myself helping the 

plant folks navigate the nascent use of 

computers in data, document and 

records (“…in howling winds, freezing 

temperatures.” Hmmm. Actually, for 

plants under construction, it was the 

truth!). 

My first job in the nuclear power 

industry, in 1983, was with a southernbased 

utility. Computerization occurred 

with mainframes and minicomputers, 

accessed through monochrome or color 

terminals. Even then, however, there 

was a need to envision integrated 

systems, linking plant control systems, 

management systems, and administrative 

systems. I had the opportunity to cut 

my teeth on “information systems 

architecture” – conceptualizing business 

and system architectures that sought to 

provide the path forward from current 

implementations to holistic integration. 

Back then, it was a fundamentally datadriven 

exercise; paper-based records 

were stored on shelves, in banker boxes, 

file cabinets, desks, floors, etc. At that 

time, there were three stations: one in 

construction, another in startup, and the 

third one in operation. For a young 

engineer in IT, it was great to be able to 

get into the battles of mainframe vs 

mini, integration vs. standalone, and 

plant vs. plant. 

Three Mile Island caused the 

industry to address the need to have 

accurate record indexes, available to a 

wide audience, accessible in near realtime, 

and have it redundantly stored. 

One of the interesting reactions to these 

requirements was the use of Tandem 

Non-Stop systems, fault-tolerant 

computer systems (used for ATM 

networks, banks, stock exchanges, and 

other similar commercial transaction 

processing applications requiring 

maximum uptime and zero data loss). 

The thinking was that Tandem 

computers provided that redundant, 

“we’re always going to be up” that 

would allow access to records in case of 

another TMI incident. 

Did you know there used to be 

word-processing pools? Wordprocessing 

computer equipment (think 

Wang; IBM Displaywriter) was so 

expensive, you could only justify having 

them by centralizing the resources. We 

would type up our drafts in the 

mainframe-based terminal text editor, 

print them out, then hand the printout 

to the word-processing staff to type it. 

Then we would “stet” or otherwise 

redline in a vicious cycle to get the final 

document. (Some luddites in our office 

wrote their stuff out WITH A PEN, and 

then handed it to word-processing. 

Hah. I was “modern”.) 

But, then the emergence of the 

microcomputer. I was an early adopter 

of the Apple II+ and educated my way 

through spreadsheets using VisiCalc. At 

the office, we got our first IBM PC, 

shared among our section of 16 people. 

It had 256K RAM, a 5 ¼ “ floppy drive, 

and a whopping 10 Mbytes of awesome 

hard drive. Pretty much processed 

words and spread sheeted budgets with 

that puppy. Later, at another position, I 

actually had in my desk my own Iomega 

10 Mbyte cartridge disk (think Banquet 

fried chicken dinner packaging…hmm, 

hungry…). I was being “efficient” by 

not clogging up the drive on the PC. 

Eugene has been a member of NIRMA for 

over 32 years. At the time he joined, 

NIRMA had only been in existence for 10 

years. He would love to hear about the early 

days from others, so please email stories and 

anecdotes to him at 

eugene.yang@kismetconsulting.com. 


SavantX Delivers on the 

Nuclear Promise 

By Ed Heinbockel, 

President/CEO, SavantX, Inc. 

rtificial Intelligence (A.I.) and Machine Learning 

(ML) are increasingly transforming business 

intelligence. The development of the SavantX 

Platform and advanced analytics spans a number of 

years and two successful pilots at Diablo Canyon Nuclear 

Power Plant. The Platform was optimized using station data 

for the volume and variety of unstructured nuclear data with 

worker input and guidance using the tool to solve outagerelated 

challenges. 

“If we had used the old way, it would have taken us days or weeks, 

and we would not have seen hidden trends.” 

Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant Senior Engineer 

Station data coupled with SavantX A.I. helps Deliver on 

The Nuclear Promise by making all data easily retrievable, 

revealing relationships that point to safety and efficiency 

improvements, and significantly improving processes, not 

just automating processes. 

Swimming in a Sea of Data 

SavantX’s lineage includes open source intelligence 

gathering tools for the Defense Intelligence Agency. So, the 

base technology was an obvious fit to help nuclear power 

stations swimming in unstructured data locked away in many 

structured databases find what they needed to safely, 

efficiently and effectively operate. This operational 

experience demanded the development of new and novel 

technologies. For instance, the platform had to be selfhealing 

and autonomous in its learning and adapting to new 

data without dedicated personnel keeping the platform 

operational and current with the latest data. 

The SavantX platform offers state-of-the-art data 

visualization as well as a new take on ML for highly scalable 

A.I. apps. SavantX is focused on solving real-world problems 

through smart A.I. and autonomous, higher dimensional ML. 

See SavantX on page 15. 


YOU CAN DO THAT WITH 

MICROFILM? 

New technology provides easier, faster and 

affordable scanning solution to access 

microfilmed information 

By Matt Anderson, Vice President of Marketing, ST Imaging 

dvancements in microfilm scanning equipment are 

helping shape the way professional record managers 

access their microfilm records. Users of older, 

antiquated reader/printers are in a constant struggle 

of balancing the requirements of file retention with the 

advancement of the digital age. Now, in the time it would 

take someone to look up a single document, that individual 

can now scan an entire roll of microfilm and store it for fast, 

future retrieval. 

In-House Conversion 

While converting old microfilm to new digital files has 

been available for many years, the cost or concern over 

security has not allowed many organizations to convert their 

microfilm archives. This forces record managers of nuclear 

plants to use decades old reader/printer technology, many of 

which are in need of repair or are unrepairable because of a 

shortage of parts. The new FlexView from nextScan allows 

for secure, in-house conversion from a desktop device. 

Recognizing this dilemma, nextScan determined that the 

record managers needed a solution that not only delivered 

production level image quality and processing results, but 

was affordable and within a simple easy-to-use platform. 

With the new FlexView roll film scanner, the scanning 

process is easy. The operator loads the film spool onto the 

scanner, similar to the way of loading the film on a reader/ 

printer. Once the film is loaded, the scanning process can 

begin. nextScan’s proprietary LuminTec Stroboscopic LED 

light line technology freezes the motion of the film and 

creates archival quality images while allowing for a top speed 

of over 300 pages per minute (PPM). The line scan camera 

ensures not a pixel is missed while the entire roll is captured 

electronically. This LED strobing light has never been 

offered on an affordable desktop scanner. The compact 

design, similar to ST Imaging’s ViewScan 4, makes it the 

perfect size to fit comfortably on a desktop. 

Viewing Your Electronic Documents 

A roll of microfilm has been converted to a digital file, now 

what? A simple retrieval method is required to accelerate the 

file lookup process. Developed specifically for microfilm, 

See nextScan on page 16. 

FlexView Roll Film Scanner 


From the President 

 

 

 

 

am excited about my new role as NIRMA president and 

looking forward to working with each of you. I would like 

to introduce the 2018 Board of Directors: 

Janice Hoerber, Vice President 

Lona Smith, Secretary 

Anita Beren, Director of Infrastructure 

Rebecca Wessman, Director of Technical Programs 

Our 2018 Business Unit directors are: 

 

 

 

Chris Boudreaux, RIMBU 

Sheila Percy, Membership and Marketing 

Tammy Cutts, Professional Development. 

2018 is bringing additional organizational changes for 

NIRMA as well. You may have noticed that our newly elected 

Treasurer, Denise, is not listed with the introduction of our 

2018 Board. Denise has resigned from the NIRMA Board. 

Denise felt that due to her increased work scope with her 

current employer she could not effectively dedicate the time 

necessary to adequately fill the NIRMA position. Thank you 

Denise for your time and contributions to NIRMA. We wish 

you the best in your new assignments. 

The board considered several options of how best to fill this 

Board vacancy. The Board is pleased to announce the 

resolution achieved during the Face-to-Face February board 

meeting. Anita has graciously accepted the vacant Treasurer 

position. Anita’s Director of Infrastructure duties will be split 

between the Treasurer and Secretary, Lona. Anita will continue 

to be the Board Sponsor for PDBU and Vendor Program. 

Lona will be the Board Sponsor for the M&M Business Unit 

and the Secretary responsibilities. This coverage aligns with the 

NIRMA By-Laws, Article 7: 

Article 7 

Officers 

SECTION 1. DESIGNATION OF OFFICERS 

The Officers of the corporation shall be a President, a Vice 

President, a Secretary and a Treasurer. The corporation may 

also have one or more Vice Presidents, Assistant Secretaries, 

Assistant Treasurers, and other such Officers with such titles as 

may be determined from time to time by the Board. An individual 

may only hold one office at a time. 

Cathy Lang our publicist for the past 25 years has resigned. 

Please join me in extending a warm thank you and show of 

appreciation for her years of service and dedication to NIRMA. 

Cathy has played an integral role in NIRMA and will be missed. 

I would like to introduce and 

welcome Neal and Sandy Miller of 

Devereaux Consulting, Inc. to the 

Michelle Smith 

NIRMA team. The Millers have 

accepted the role of NIRMA Publication Specialist Team. As 

publication specialists, Neal and Sandy will create, edit and 

publish our Inside NIRMA magazine, which will now be 

distributed electronically three times per year. 

We have an exciting year ahead of us with many 

opportunities for the membership to work together to ensure 

that 2018 is a successful year for NIRMA. 

The Spring RIMBU meeting, hosted by South Texas Project, 

was held on March 6-7, 2018, in Sugar Land, Texas at the 

Hilton Garden Inn. Laura Williams of American Nuclear 

Insurers (ANI) presented on Decommissioning and she will be 

presenting at the NIRMA Conference. 

The following are key reminders that each of us can 

contribute so that we will help ensure our success in 2018. 

Distinguished Recognition 

Each year the NIRMA Board solicits the membership to 

identify those individuals who have demonstrated leadership 

and dedication to the Association. If you have someone that 

you would like to nominate for recognition this year, please 

submit your nominations to any Board member or Sarah 

Perkins, NIRMA Administrator at nirma@nirma.org. 

LinkedIn or Facebook or Monthly Emails 

Sheila welcomes ideas and suggestions for updates to 

LinkedIn or Facebook and the monthly emails. If you learn 

something or have read something that is of interest to our 

members, please communicate this information to Membership 

& Marketing (M&M). We need everyone’s help to keep current 

with what is happening. Sheila’s contact is 

Sheila.Pearcy@wipp.ws. 

2018 Call for Nominations 

If you are interested in running for the Board of Directors, 

contact Cedric Jones at CJONES5@entergy.com or Shana 

House at SHouse@ameren.com. 

2018 Conference 

If you would like to present or you want someone else to 

present, please contact Janice right away. The conference 

planning is underway. Likewise if you have ideas and 

suggestions, Janice would love to hear from you. Contact 

Janice at JHoerber@ameren.com. 


Get Ready for NIRMA’s 42 nd 

Information Management 

Conference 

By Janice Hoerber, NIRMA Vice President 

he 2018 Nuclear Information Management 

Conference will again be held at the beautiful JW 

Marriott in Summerlin, Nev. There will be three new 

training opportunities on Saturday, Aug. 4. A full 

agenda of conference speakers and presentations will begin 

Sunday through Tuesday (Aug. 5-7), and the NIRMA 

Business Unit meetings will follow on Wednesday (Aug. 8). 

We are delighted to have Tim Powell, Chief Nuclear 

Officer at South Texas Project Nuclear Operating Company, 

to kick off the conference with a keynote address on Sunday. 

ASME and ANI (American Nuclear Insurers) will also be 

among the guest organizations to speak at this year’s 

conference. 

Consider Presenting at NIRMA! A Call for Papers 

We invite you to participate at the conference as a 

speaker in the technical program. Consider your experiences, 

your lessons-learned, or expertise that you can share with 

peers at the conference. If you would like to take advantage 

of this opportunity, please submit a 100-150 word abstract of 

your presentation by an extended date of March 30, 2018 

via email to me at jhoerber@ameren.com. See the 

Conference Page on NIRMA.org for more information. 

NIRMA has a rich history of serving its mission in the 

nuclear industry for four decades, but it also has given a 

platform for many attendees to get out of their comfort zone 

and advance their career skills in speaking and presenting 

before an audience. I encourage you to take advantage of the 

professional development opportunities that NIRMA has to 

offer, including running for the Board or participation in one 

of the three NIRMA Business Units, by planning an extra day 

(Wednesday, Aug. 8) in your conference travel. These 

opportunities continue to be an important aspect of NIRMA 

as we prepare a new generation for managing nuclear 

information and quality records. 

Pass the Torch 

Whether you are new in your career or nearing the final 

years, there is no doubt that you are affected by the digital 

transformation going on around us. The way we work and 

the skills we need will be dramatically different. The future 

“record” of valuable information will continue to evolve with 

technology advancements. Are you ready for exponential 

change? I invite you to watch this inspiring video and then 

challenge yourself to embrace the future and become more 

involved with NIRMA. 

We have a great obligation to the industry that has served 

many of us well. Pass the torch, prepare the next generation 

for an exciting future. Share the regulations and the “why” 

from the past, then get ready to help NIRMA drive the 

changes needed to embrace new technologies while 

maintaining core business for the quality of records. 

NIRMA Exhibitor/Vendor Events 

We are planning some big things for the NIRMA 

Exhibitor/Vendor area this year. It will be open for business 

one full day Monday, Aug. 6 (with setup Sunday afternoon). 

We are planning 

activities, raffles, and 

refreshments in the 

Exhibitor area to ensure 

the conference attendees 

make the most of 

networking with each 

other and to engage with 

our Exhibitors. After the 

technical sessions for the 

day, we will kick into a 

BEACH THEME for 

the evening extravaganza 

in the Exhibitor room. A 

special prize will go to 

the BEST attire for the 

Beach party, so dig out 

those Hawaiian shirts, flip-flops, and whatever else you can 

imagine for a fun time. 

We still have availability for more Exhibitors/Vendors 

at the Conference, as well as creative new Advertising 

packages to offer, so reserve your spot soon on 

NIRMA.org! 


News from 

the 

Secretary 

he most recent news is 

Lona Smith 

that the newly reorganized board met in February in 

Summerlin, Nev. Our Board meeting was a 

brainstorming, planning, reviewing, revising and 

decision making whirlwind. The board established our 

2018 BOD Goals, Budget, and Strategic Plan, as well as the 

Sponsorship Levels and Opportunities. The 2017 

Treasurer’s report of actuals vs budgeted was reviewed and 

the AD01 was also reviewed and approved. Plus, we 

managed to squeeze in a short meet and greet with our new 

Publications Specialists. 

The weather was wonderful – not that we saw any 

daylight…. The resort is still lovely as ever. The Palm 

Tower walkway down thru restaurant row is looking much 

different. Those that frequented the Irish establishment 

will have to find new haunts. The hotel continues to make 

many improvements – be prepared for some changes. 

As per our normal course of business, I would like to 

now bring to mind all of our accomplishments for 2017. If 

I left something out, please let me know. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2017 Accomplishments 

Secured contracts through 2020 to hold our annual 

conference with JW Marriott, Summerlin, Nev. 

Approved TG23, TG18-2017, TG23-2017 

Retired WP-01 and WP-04 

Revised By-Laws 

Achieved Partnership with the Nuclear Plant 

Digitalization Conference 

ICRM will now administer the exam process for 

NIRMA’s Nuclear Specialist designation 

August 2017 held our Annual Conference!!! 

• There were 30 First-Time Attendees at the 

Conference 

• 19 CMP Credits awarded 

• Eliminated the hard copy Resource Guide 

• Implemented the conference app – CVENT 

• Set the 2018 Nominating Committee: 

 

 

Cedric Jones, Entergy 

Shana House, Ameren 

NIRMA Contact Information 

Sarah Perkins 

NIRMA Administrator 

245 Sunnyridge Ave., #41 

Fairfield, CT 06824 

203.345.7237 

Email: nirma@nirma.org 


Regulatory Information 

Management Business Unit 

(RIMBU) News 

By Chris Boudreaux, RIMBU Business Unit Director 

he 2018 RIMBU Spring meeting 

was held on March 6-7, 2018. 

RIMBU Meetings are a great 

opportunity for NIRMA 

Members to participate in the efforts of 

the team to discuss emerging topics for 

our industry and develop technical 

guidelines to establish best practices. In 

addition, this is a great opportunity to 

network with peers in the nuclear 

industry, to exchange ideas around 

technology and process, and perhaps 

find some new ideas that would work 

for your company. The main topics of 

discussion at this year’s Spring Meeting 

were: Decommissioning, Electronic 

Signature, White Paper on Sustainable 

Long Term Storage of Records, and 

Migration to the Cloud. 

Upcoming NIRMA ANSI Audit: 

As an ANSI Approved Standards 

Developer, NIRMA undergoes periodic 

audits to verify its procedures and 

standards-related activities are in 

compliance with the ANSI Essential 

Requirements that govern ANSI 

Standards. A pre-audit conference call 

was held with ANSI staff in January. In 

February, NIRMA prepared and 

submitted a documentation package 

associated with the processing of the 

2015 Reaffirmation of the ANSI/ 

NIRMA Standard for Configuration 

Management. We expect to receive 

initial results of the audit in late March 

or early April. Updates on the status of 

the audit will be provided in future 

RIMBU reports. 

Decommissioning White Paper: 

With the recent decommissioning 

projects and impending projects on the 

near horizon, RIMBU decided that a 

focus was needed to provide guidance 

on improving the decommissioning 

process related to information and 

records management (IRM). This 

means examining the effectiveness and 

efficiency of managing information and 

records throughout all phases of 

decommissioning. In January 2017, 

RIMBU assembled a working group 

with the goal of creating a 

“Decommissioning Playbook” for IRM. 

This “Playbook” is to provide guidance 

on delivering a consistent and repeatable 

process during the planning and 

implementation in executing the 

decommissioning of a plant. 

Thus far, RIMBU has drafted a 

White Paper in order to understand the 

scope and magnitude of this issue. This 

White Paper includes the following: 

An examination of record and 

information types needed during 

the various phases that constitute a 

decommissioning project. This 

involved reviewing regulatory and 

standards decommissioning 

documentation from the NRC and 

the International Atomic Energy 

Agency (IAEA). Tables were 

assembled that listed the identified 

record and information types 

against the phase in 

decommissioning, that information 

was needed. 

Lessons learned could be gleaned 

from decommissioning efforts from 

the past or are currently 

underway. Certain case studies 

from ongoing and past 

decommissioning projects were 

reviewed. The primary messages 

from these case studies are: 

• Determining what records were 

needed (“what’s in; what’s out”) 

• Determining how the retention 

schedule is applied 

• What condition were the 

records – physical, category, 

accuracy, completeness, etc. 

• The condition would then 

dictate scope, risk, and 

ultimately, cost 

The primary lessons learned are: 

• Too many records that must be 

culled 

• Lack of records 

• Unchecked or inaccurate 

records 

• Wrong interpretation of records 

What’s Next 

RIMBU will ready the White Paper 

for the review cycle with the BU/ 

membership and ultimately to the Board 

for approval. 

Status of Technical Guidelines: 

• TG’s 5 and 16 sent to NIRMA 

Board for Approval 

Click here to visit the 

NIRMA website. 


In our newest column, we will meet NIRMA President, Michelle 

Smith. Michelle is the Electronic Records Management and 

Automation, Document Control and Training Support Supervisor at 

South Texas Project Nuclear Operating Company where she is 

responsible for the development and implementation of the ERM&A 

strategic plan to automate real-time support for electronic, end-to-end 

submittal, storage and retrieval of STP required records. 

Michelle has been a member of NIRMA since 2007 and has 

served in several leadership positions (Director and Co-Director of 

RIMBU, BOD as secretary ) before becoming President in 2018. 

Michelle also has involvement in Women in Nuclear as Program 

Director and Treasurer. 

Michelle and spouse Anthony, have seven children together, I guess 

you can say they are the Brady Bunch of Angleton, Texas. Michelle has 

two girls and Anthony has five boys. Michelle loves traveling and 

spending time with her three grandchildren. In her spare time, she loves 

to bake from birthday to wedding cakes and she even enjoys teaching her 

grandkids to bake. 

Question: NIRMA will host its annual conference in 

August. Besides the conference itself, what are you most 

looking forward to doing in Las Vegas? 

Answer: I have 

been attending the 

NIRMA 

Conference since 

2007. I have found 

the conference to 

be very rewarding. 

It has allowed me 

to build lasting 

relationships with Industry peers and we have ventured to 

the strip to take in a show or two. I love looking for the 

mom and pop restaurants to have a good home cooked meal. 

Contrary to what most people say, I can come to Vegas and 

not play the slots. 

Q: What is your favorite all time movie line? 

A: I love watching Hallmark movies, I can camp out all day 

on the couch watching movie after movie, but my favorite 

movie line is from Pretty Woman, when Richard Gere’s 

character says “I told you not to pick up the phone,” and 

Julia Roberts character replies with “Then stop calling me.” 

Q: Dogs or Cats? Why? 

Michelle Smith and 

her husband, Anthony 

A: As a child growing up we always had pet dogs, but in the 

early 80’s a co-worker gave me a black Himalayan cat and I 

named him spooky. 

Q: If you could meet anyone from history, who would 

you meet and why? 

A: I would have loved to meet Daniel Williams, the first 

open heart surgeon because he made such an awesome 

contribution to the world. 

Q: What was the first live concert you ever attended? 

A: When I was eighteen, I attended a Frankie Beverly and 

Maze concert. I remember having such good seats, that I 

could see the sweat on his forehead. 

Michelle enjoys decorating cakes in her free time. 

Here is one of her special creations. 

Q: What holiday would you invent to get the day off 

work? 

A: Michelle’s day. I can truly say that I was able to have 

Michelle’s day once in my lifetime. It was wonderful, I spent 

the day in Houston, shopping and eating with friends. 


Bentley 

Continued from Page 5 

To move to asset 

performance modeling, 3D 

digital engineering models 

across all disciplines are integrated with the IT and OT 

systems used for asset performance monitoring. As the 

operating baseline for infrastructure assets, digital engineering 

models bring together schematics; engineering analyses; 

network models; 3D models; functional components, 

catalogs, and specifications. With the power of cloud 

computing companies can run complex simulations to 

explore the benefits of alternative decisions. This enables 

owner-operators to optimize processes for the day-to-day 

running of assets, balancing capital and operational costs and 

maximizing production capability. 

For example, nuclear plants can manage asset performance 

far more effectively when they have digital engineering 

models that intelligently bring together all infrastructure data. 

When IT and OT systems connect with this ET data, teams 

can view the asset performance history, see all failure alerts, 

geo-coordinate to the exact positioning within the 

infrastructure asset, and drill down into the 3D digital 

The V-Model represents project lifecycle processes, including IT, OT, and ET. Digital engineering 

models create the digital twin, or digital replica of the physical assets. 

Anita S. Beren 

NIRMA Treasurer 

Financial Holdings: 

12/31/17 

Checking Account $ 8,478.54 

Investment Account $ 130,793.38 

TOTAL $ 139,271.92 

engineering model to determine the cause of the alarm. Then 

they can refer to the manufacturer’s degradation data, access 

maintenance and repair data information, and take corrective 

action. Operational performance can be optimized by 

including data such as population, meteorological trends and 

forecasts, and usage and demand patterns to plan for 

efficiencies in distribution and energy usage. 

Bentley’s AssetWise leverages the convergence of IT, OT, 

and ET information to help companies optimize asset 

performance, supporting an asset strategy of regulatory 

compliance, operational efficiency, and risk mitigation. Built 

on a hybrid cloud-computing platform that leverages a 

common data environment, AssetWise facilitates the 

interoperation of multiple data sources, providing operations, 

maintenance, and engineering with accurate and reliable 

information, when it is needed, to make informed decisions, 

from capital planning through proactive asset maintenance. 

For additional information about AssetWise, visit 

www.bentley.com/AssetWise. 


SavantX 

SavantX’s A.I. extends results to 

Related Terms, such as different 

Continued from Page 7 terms, same meaning. Thus 

making the platform forgiving if a search term is misspelled 

or abbreviated. 

The capabilities that SavantX delivers encompass a broad 

scope, not the least of which is facilitating knowledge transfer 

and retention. The Patent Pending Technologies that drive 

SavantX allow for revealing hidden relationships and trends 

in the data which aids in having 

actionable information that a 

plant can use to help safeguard 

against repeating undesirable 

conditions/ incidents. 

Making Search Easy 

The overarching goal behind 

the technology is to make ALL 

station data quickly findable… 

by bringing the “consumer” 

search experience to the 

Enterprise. An easy-to-use User 

Experience (UX) utilizes natural 

language queries to return 

relevant results. A state-of-theart 

data visualization tool allows 

users to interact with the data 

and gain much more relevant 

information than a run-of-themill 

search tool would allow for. 

The SavantX Platform ingests all 

station databases directly to include attachments. The 

attachments are processed to make them machine-readable. 

Image files are OCR’d. All data is then searchable residing in 

a single data store or corpus continually updated with the 

latest documents. 

Results are quickly returned to the user and automatically 

ranked with smart (A.I. enhanced) user-controlled filters. Key 

terms are identified, and relationships highlighted at the 

passage level from disparate data stores, disambiguating and 

enabling rapid navigation with large return sets. A discovery 

feature provides an interactive user experience of the search 

results so that users unfamiliar with the principal terms/ 

concepts/relationships in a specific knowledge domain can 

instantly see and navigate to actionable information. By 

computing relationships in higher dimensions, SavantX is 

able to reveal 2 nd , 3 rd ,4 th , and 5 th party relationships. 

Making Operational Experience On-Demand 

The initial focus for SavantX was to help the nuclear energy 

market solve their intractable problem of turning tens of 

millions of records across many datasets into critical insights 

to maximize safety and efficiency. The Company continues to 

innovate and apply its technologies to new applications and 

domains to include the Department of Defense. 

This Next Generation Search & Discovery Platform built 

especially for the Nuclear Power Industry to deliver on the 

Nuclear Promise will be at the upcoming 2018 NIRMA 

Conference where SavantX will be both exhibiting and 

presenting. In the meantime, you can learn more at 

http://www.SavantX.com. 

SavantX screenshot from operating nuclear power station databases 

presenting the BIG PICTURE of >100,000 results. 

About the Author: 

Ed Heinbockel 

Co-Founder, President, & CEO of SavantX, Inc. 

Ed Heinbockel has over thirty years of hands-on experience 

in the management of high-tech companies, with a proven 

record of success in building leading-edge software products 

in both public and private companies. 

Ed has been a technologist since the eighties building teams 

around emerging technologies – from producing the first CD 

and DVD-ROM entertainment titles - to next-gen training 

simulations for three-letter government agencies and the 

DoD. Ed notched a successful IPO and is now on his third 

successful start-up. 

Ed was named to Newsweek Magazine’s Century Club of 

the top “100 people to watch in the next millennium.” He 

was also named as one of Executive Excellence Magazine’s 

“Top 100 Thinkers of Our Time.” 

Ed holds an engineering degree and an MBA from Cal 

Poly, San Luis Obispo. He holds several pending patents as 

co-inventor in Enterprise Search and Machine Learning. 


Professional Development 

Business Unit (PDBU) News 

By Tammy Cutts, PDBU Director 

reparations for the 2018 NIRMA Conference are 

underway, and the PDBU has some fantastic 

opportunities for you this year. Before I talk about 

those, I’d like to introduce myself to those who may 

not know me. I am the (Nuc) Records Analyst for Pacific 

Gas and Electric Company in California, working at the 

Diablo Canyon Power Plant in Avila Beach. I spent one year 

as a clerk scanning records before my promotion to analyst 

nearly 12 years ago. In 2016, I joined Anita Beren as the codirector 

of PDBU and took over as director this year with 

her appointment to the NIRMA Board of Directors. 

Professional development is a component of my annual 

review at PG&E, and PDBU is working to provide 

conference attendees with opportunities to check that box if 

it’s a part of yours. Briefly, the following training sessions are 

planned for the conference. More detailed information about 

each will be coming in the future, so watch for that as you 

plan your conference attendance. 

AIIM 

Jesse Wilkins of AIIM, Director, Professional 

Development will be leading the Modern Records 

Management, (MRM) Specialist course. The MRM course 

gives you a thorough understanding of how to best automate 

the way digital information is managed in support of business 

goals and objectives. The course covers the entire lifecycle of 

nextScan 

nextScan’s Virtual Film archive 

creates an environment not 

Continued from Page 8 unlike that found on reader/ 

printers. It is like you are scrolling through a roll of 

microfilm but at the speed of the digital age by going directly 

to any individual document instantly. Utilizing these 

advancements dramatically cuts down the time it takes for 

retrieval! 

The other critical element of digital documents is having 

the ability to enhance the captured images. The Virtual Film 

software allows users to adjust and edit images if the quality 

of the microfilm images themselves are less than optimal. In 

addition, many rolls of microfilm were filmed under less 

than ideal conditions. Previously, a user could only duplicate 

the file up to the quality provided. By utilizing new software 

technology, the user is able to access easy on-screen controls 

to adjust lightness/darkness, sharpening, and contrast of 

scanned images. 

records and provides the skills needed to 

position records managers as business 

enablers. 

Records Management University 

Offered by Mitch Farbstein, Vice President of Sales for 

Feith Systems, this NIRMA one-day training session will be a 

unique combination of six one-hour long sessions from his 

Records Management University series, covering many of the 

essential elements of records management. 

RIM Tech 

Bruce Miller is President of RIMtech and will offer 

Managing Electronic Records with Microsoft SharePoint®. 

This seminar is a comprehensive review of Electronic 

Document & Records Management System (EDRMS) 

project implementation for Microsoft SharePoint. IT 

attendees will learn the essential recordkeeping science they’ll 

need to understand, and how to achieve successful 

SharePoint adoption. 

Other professional development opportunities available 

for you to consider are the professional certifications of 

Certified Records Analyst (CRA) and Certified Records 

Manager (CRM). This CRA certification is obtained by 

With these enhancements, information that may have 

been lost forever might be salvageable. Those images now 

have a chance to be saved in the file format of your choice, 

whether PDF, JPEG, TIFF, and dozens more, for quick 

access for many years to come. 

Storing Converted Files 

See PDBU on page 18. 

Digital images captured by the FlexScan are sent to a 

server or Ribbon Storage Device (RSD) for quick and easy 

retrieval using Virtual Film. Now, when a request is 

received, instead of heading to the microfilm collection, any 

record manager can access the RSD, select the roll and 

document, and receive the file instantly! 

Working with analog microfilm documents can be 

challenging. The team at nextScan continually strives to 

make working with those documents that much easier. 

Learn how nextScan conversion scanners can help in your 

facility by creating quicker and accurate information 

exchange. 


Ameren Workers 

Departing for 

Puerto Rico 

Crews from Missouri, Illinois will help 

accelerate power restoration effort. 

NEWS PROVIDED BY 

Ameren Corporation 

ST. LOUIS, Jan. 25, 2018 / 

PRNewswire/ -- A total of 76 Ameren 

line workers and support personnel 

from Missouri and Illinois fly to 

Puerto Rico tomorrow morning. Their 

mission will be to repair energy 

infrastructure and ultimately help 

restore power to the citizens of Puerto 

Rico due to the catastrophic 

destruction of electric infrastructure 

following Hurricanes Irma and Maria. 

Ameren and other U.S. energy 

companies who are members of the 

Edison Electric Institute (EEI) are part 

of a contingent of 1,500 additional 

personnel arriving from the United 

States, increasing the total number of 

power restoration workers in Puerto 

Rico to more than 5,500. Ameren 

crews will be deployed for three week 

rotations. Equipment from Ameren, 

including trucks and trailers, left by 

barge from Norfolk, Virginia, earlier 

this month and is scheduled to arrive 

tomorrow. 

"This restoration mission is a 

massive, unprecedented mutual aid 

effort," said Warner Baxter, chairman, 

president and CEO of Ameren 

Corporation. "We wish our coworkers, 

who volunteered for this 

assignment, and other crews from 

across the industry safe travels as they 

do extraordinary work to bring the 

power back to the citizens of Puerto 

Rico." The island has been sectored 

into seven regions for purposes of the 

restoration. Ameren co-workers will 

work in the Carolina Region, located 

on the northeast coast immediately 

east of San Juan. Read full article here. 

House Passes Bills Supporting 

Neutron Reactor, 

Radiation Study 

Feb. 15, 2018—The U.S. House 

of Representatives passed two bills 

related to nuclear energy research and 

development. Earlier this week, the 

House passed H.R. 4378 supporting 

the construction of a versatile reactor 

-based fast neutron source and H.R. 

4675 to increase the understanding of 

the health effects of low-dose 

radiation. 

“This research reactor, a Versatile 

Neutron Source, is critical for the 

development of advanced reactor 

designs, materials, and nuclear fuels. 

This type of research requires access 

to fast neutrons, which are currently 

only available for civilian research in 

Russia,” said Rep. Randy Weber (R- 

Texas). 

The Nuclear Energy Research 

Infrastructure Act, sponsored by 

Weber, was introduced in November 

of last year. The bill would authorize 

construction of a fast neutron 

research reactor to be operational by 

Dec. 31, 2025. This new user facility 

would provide fast neutron 

irradiation capabilities which could be 

used to help develop new reactor 

designs, new fuel designs, and study 

ways to improve nuclear fuel 

fabrication and reactor performance. 

Rep. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) 

introduced the Low Dose Radiation 

Research Act of 2017 (H.R. 4675) in 

December of last year. Marshall said 

the bill will, among other things, 

direct the Department of Energy to 

carry out basic research on low dose 

radiation. 

“Currently, there is ample data 

that demonstrates the harmful effects 

that high-dose 

radiation has on 

the human 

body,” Rep. 

Marshall said. 

“Yet, as it 

stands today, there are few 

measurements or studies seeking to 

understand low-dose radiation’s 

effects. This absence of evidence does 

not give the medical community or 

government regulators the ability to 

accurately assess and make the very 

best decisions for their patients.” 

NEI Vice President of 

Governmental Affairs Beverly 

Marshall said the industry welcomed 

passage of the two bills and looked 

forward to working with Capitol Hill 

to secure their swift enactment. 

“NEI appreciates the hard work 

and strong congressional support for 

these two bills and we hope the United 

States Senate will do their part to get 

these bills to the president’s desk,” 

Marshall said. 

“Having an American fast neutron 

research reactor will help researchers 

to discover new ways to improve 

nuclear power plant performance 

without relying on resources in foreign 

countries. 

“The Low Dose Radiation 

Research Act will improve our 

knowledge about the impact, if any, of 

low radiation doses, to better shape 

policies and programs which ensure 

safety in a science-based and costeffective 

manner. 

Article reprinted with permission of 

Nuclear Energy Institute. Read full 

article here. 


Nuclear operators urged to 

tackle growing threat from 

cyber attack emails 

In October, the United States Computer Emergency 

Readiness Team (US-CERT) warned of an advanced 

persistent threat activity targeting energy sectors including 

nuclear power. The alert followed investigations by the 

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal 

Bureau of Investigation (FBI). 

"Since at least May 2017, threat actors have targeted 

government entities and the energy, water, aviation, 

nuclear, and critical manufacturing sectors, and, in some 

cases, have leveraged their capabilities to compromise 

victims’ networks," US-CERT said in a statement. "DHS 

assesses this activity as a multi-stage intrusion campaign by 

threat actors targeting low security and small networks to 

gain access and move laterally to networks of major, high 

value asset owners," it said. 

In July, consultancy group PwC reported “suspected 

state actors” had used fake emails to penetrate the 

administration systems of multiple U.S. nuclear plants, as 

part of a cyber intrusion campaign codenamed Nuclear17. 

In September, cyber security firm Symantec said it believed 

a sophisticated cyber espionage group known as Dragonfly 

was behind a recent wave of cyber attacks on European 

and U.S. power generation companies. Targets reportedly 

included personnel working for power generation 

companies and manufacturers of plant control systems. 

Article reprinted with permission of Nuclear Energy Insider. 

Read full article here. 

Inside NIRMA Magazine 

Wants Your Photos! 

With the 2018 launch of the new Inside NIRMA magazine, 

we would like to have some real "work pictures" to use 

(with permission) for backdrop shots, etc. We are 

interested in photos of people in your workplace 

performing tasks, particularly around records 

management, document control, engineering and IT, as 

examples. Other areas are also welcome! Be sure to 

obtain permission for use from the persons involved. No 

company or individual names would be included. Please 

email photos (JPG format preferred) to 

DevereauxInc@outlook.com. 

Nominations 

needed! 

NIRMA elections will occur in July and we 

need your HELP! Please send your 

nominations to the nominating committee 

members, myself (SHouse@ameren.com) 

or Cedric Jones 

(CJONES5@entergy.com) by April 30, 

2018. The committee is required to 

submit the list of nominees to NIRMA 

Secretary Lona Smith by May 8, 2018. 

PDBU 

Continued from Page 16 

Board Elections: 

Two board positions will be filled. Please consider 

nominating yourself or other individuals whom you 

consider qualified to fill these leadership positions. The 

nominating committee will then contact nominees to 

obtain the required supporting documentation. Factors to 

include in your consideration of nominees are length of 

time as a NIRMA member, committee activities, 

leadership positions held, service to NIRMA, professional 

qualifications and the desire/ability to serve on the Board. 

The term is three years. 

Service Awards: 

Shana House, 

Nominating 

Committee 

Nominations for annual Exemplary Service Awards are 

also being accepted. If you would like to nominate 

someone for their outstanding service to the association, 

please contact Sarah Perkins, NIRMA Administrator at 

nirma@nirma.org. 

completing parts 2-4 of 

the CRM exam cycle. The 

CRA can be a first step to 

obtaining the CRM or it 

can stand on its own, based on your professional goals. 

Meanwhile, we continue to make progress on having the 

NS exam offered electronically through Pearson VUE. 

The Nuclear Specialist (NS) designation can be obtained 

by holders of either a CRA or a CRM. The new Federal 

Specialist designation will require the CRM. 

I am also seeking one or two co-directors to assist me 

with the PDBU. For additional information about the 

above, the PDBU in general, or if you are interested in 

becoming a co-director, please contact me at 

tammy.cutts@pge.com. 


ImplementIng presIdent’s 

Order to Protect 

Controlled Unclassified 

Information 

By Marianne Narick, Senior IT/IM Manager and Records Team Lead, NRC 

Background 

he NRC is hard at work developing policies and 

procedures to implement Executive Order 

13556, dated November 4, 2010, “Controlled 

Unclassified Information” (CUI). This Order 

established the CUI Program to standardize the way the 

executive branch handles information that requires 

safeguarding or dissemination control (excluding 

information that is classified under Executive 

Order 13526, Classified National Security 

Information, or any predecessor or successor 

order; or the Atomic Energy Act of 1954). As the 

CUI Executive Agent (EA), the National Archives and 

Records Administration (NARA) is developing and 

issuing policy and phased implementation guidance for 

the CUI Program with the consultative support of the 

CUI Advisory Council. The NRC along with many other 

Federal departments and agencies is a member of the 

Advisory Council and as such is providing input to 

NARA for consideration and resolution as appropriate, 

any disputes, complaints, and suggestions about the CUI 

Program. 

Identify, Review, and Define Categories 

The CUI Executive Order prescribes a bottom-up 

approach, in which each department and agency is 

required to: 

•Identify all Sensitive but Unclassified markings 

being employed in their particular department or 

agency, such as “Official Use Only,” “Pre- 

Decisional,” or “Sensitive”; 

•Identify the authority for those markings, i.e. law, 

regulation, or government-wide policy; 

•Review those markings to identify any areas for 

consolidation across the Executive branch or the 

elimination of redundancy; and 

Specifically define all categories, subcategories, and 

markings that the department or agency would like to 

continue to employ. 

NARA Leadership 

NARA led an interagency process to establish 

Executive branch-wide definitions and taxonomy 

of categories of CUI. The taxonomy and 

standardized definitions are published in a public 

CUI registry to increase transparency and ensure 

consistent application across the Executive branch 

of Government (see CUI Registry - Categories and 

Subcategories here ). 

On November 14, 2016, the CUI Rule became 

effective, but NARA has instructed Federal agencies to 

make no changes to existing processes at this time given 

the phased implementation approach underway. 

Future updates will be posted as more information 

becomes available. 

Editors 

Neal and Sandra Miller 

DevereauxInc@outlook.com 

Advertising 

Neal.F.Miller@gmail.com 

NIRMA Headquarters 

Sarah Perkins 

NIRMA Administrator 

245 Sunnyridge Ave., #41 

Fairfield, CT 06824 

nirma@nirma.org 


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The new FlexView, though small in size, is mighty 

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With dimensions that allow for the scanner to be 

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too! Able to scan at up to 300 FPM, the FlexView 

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Visit www.nextScan.com for more details and to download a brochure. 

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Inside NIRMA - Spring March 2018 Issue

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