Steven E. Farkas

Create mathematical models of nuclear power plant mechanical, electrical and I&C systems for risk analysis and justifications for new maintenance intervals. Perform risk assessment studies on plant protection systems, refueling strategies, and at-power versus shutdown repair decisions with CAFTA and RISKMAN. Co-authored and presented ASME paper ICONE12-49519, "Transition Risk Method and Example." Writing CAFTA and RISKMAN V&V packages. I routinely build short cuts and preprocessors for the risk assessment calculations using MS Access and Excel VBA modules.

Papers that I have co-authored in the risk assessment area include the following.

· WCAP-15887, “Probabilistic Risk Analysis of the Slave Relay Surveillance Test Interval Extension for Beaver Valley Power Station, Unit 2,” December 2002

· ASME Paper ICONE12-49519, "Transition Risk Method and Example," April 2004

· WCAP-16196, “PRA LPSD Transition Risk Notebook,” October 2004

· WCAP-16494, “Process for the Resolution and Disposition of PRA Peer Review Findings with Respect to MSPI,” November 2005

· CN-RRA-05- 38, “Calculation of Level 2 for Fort Calhoun Station,” December 2005

· CN-RRA-05- 40, “Calculation of Level 2 for Vogtle Electric Generating Plant,” February 2006

In the last two years, a majority of my billable time has been on power-grid related topics. I have co-authored several documents and professional society papers related to the grid in the context of PRA.

· WCAP-16316, “Lessons Learned from the August 14, 2003 Loss of Off-Site Power Events in North America,” January 2005

· WCAP-16304, “Strategy for Identifying and Treating Modeling Uncertainties in PRA Models: Issues Concerning LOCA and LOOP,” March 2005

· ANS paper, 138079, “Lessons Learned for the 14Aug2003 Grid Event,” September 2005

· EPRI TR-101759, “Frequency Determination Method for Cascading Grid Events,” January 2006

· WCAP-16565, “Considerations for Risk Informed Modeling Grid Covered Loss of Offsite Power Events (PA-RMSC-0211),” June 2006

· WCAP-16567, “Risk Management of Emergent Power Grid Conditions (PA-RMSC-0211),” June 2006

In addition, in 2003 I provided official comments responded to by the NRC (see ADAMS Accession Number ML033530400) on NUREG-1784, “Operating Experience Assessment - Effects of Grid Events on Nuclear Power Plant Performance.” Similar review and acknowledgement in EPRI RS-1009187, "Treatment of Time Interdependencies in Fault Tree Generated Cutset Results." During the first three months of 2006, I participated as the owners’ group representative on the Nuclear Energy Institute task force responding to NRC’s Generic Letter 2006-02, “Grid Reliability and the Impact on Plant Risk and the Operability of Offsite Power.”

Designed and coded the relatively complex Reconciliation process within a standard Visual Basic 6 client server system. The process required the development of ORACLE 8i stored procedures. The process reconciles payments for 60,000 to 150,000 shipments handled by the Strategic Alliance Partner. The Visual Basic code uses ADO, custom ActiveX DLLs, and the FileSystemObject. After initial deployment, I served as a code fixer for all of the modules communicating between the external client and the Strategic Alliance Partner. I also repaired and enhanced the project bug-tracking tool (an MS Access 2000 application). The role is as a senior developer. In addition to straight development work, that roll also translates into providing others with advice and debugging services for their development work.

Created the backend and HTML back-up for the Flash 5 web site. Acts as the system administrator for the off-site web server. Evaluated off-site ISPs and had his choice implemented by the project manager. Worked with the Flash developers to coordinate HTTP messages between the database and the user interface. The site runs IIS5 on a Windows 2000 Server. The backend is an application of custom Visual Basic 6 webclasses ActiveX DLLs, ADO, ASP, and HTML, as well as a MS Access 2000 database file.

Senior participant in a four-person team to build a web site that mimics a foreign government Election Commission site. The web pages were created from a user manual description and screen captures of the actual site. We manipulated images with Microsoft PhotoDraw and PhotoEditor. Some of the pages were based on XML files saved by MS Word and MS Excel. The actual site was unavailable during this project. A project constraint was to use only HTML, image maps, client-side JavaScript, and that the pages run with IE5.5 from the "file system" (as opposed to being served by IIS). In addition to approximately one dozen HTML pages, I created a JavaScript/client-side -cookie based security system that requires a log-in for certain pages only once per session.

Install a new menu system for the web site. The implemented solution uses ASP to read menu information from a SQL Server 7 database. It then creates an HTTP response that mixes the menu information with client-side JavaScript commands. The client is also sent a JavaScript file that I adapted for NS 4.08/IE5.5 and this particular web site. The menu, on each page, is a set of JavaScript objects created by the client. Revised stored procedures to allow users to set up calendar events that span multiple days. Install an ASP based security system that requires a login for certain pages only once per session.

Run performance tests for the County Clerk of Courts Portal. Select the test tool, create the test scripts, run the tests, evaluate the results, and recommend corrective actions. Troubleshoot Visual Basic source code for team members as needed. The primary business of this client is to manage the information and business processes necessary to support the daily operation of a courthouse as it relates to Image Retrieval and Display (e.g., case documents such as a traffic ticket) for key stakeholders such as attorneys.

This job requires knowledge ASP, ADO, Index Server, File System Object, DCOM, NT Security, JavaScript and SQL to automate features of a Department of Energy ASP/HTML web site running on a WinNT box with an IIS Web Server. The ASP primarily runs SQL commands and renders the resultset as HTML. The job included migrating the web site from an in-house server to a DellHost.com machine and becoming the NT and IIS administrator of the new machine.

I also designed (gathered user requirements and created documentation) and helped build an intranet site for the same DOE office. For that project I used Visual Basic 6 web classes, ASP, JavaScript, HTML, DCOM over HTTP, as well as ActiveX DLL/EXE COM objects. The intranet site presents data based on SQL commands from Visual Basic COM objects and renders the resultset into HTML with either ASP or web classes.

While with Data Systems & Solutions and its precursor, SAIC, I applied knowledge of the nuclear industry in creating web sites and client-server applications with Visual Basic. In general, the job required involvement in various parts of the life cycle for numerous applications. The projects were either new development or substantial re-writes of existing code. I had to gather end user requirements, design the software, program the software, test the software, document the software, install the software at the client site, and provide user training for the software. Customers frequently called for advanced advice after my training classes.

Since 1998, I have built two complete intranet web sites and I delivered a web interface to an existing client-server application.

The two web sites were built on WinNT Servers using IIS. The target browsers were a mix of IE 4+ and Netscape 4.x. The pages arose from ASP calls to ActiveX DLLs written with Visual Basic 6 as well as HTML template files. One site delivered pure HTML to the client. The other project included JavaScript for the client in addition to the HTML. The two web sites employed multi-tier architecture, i.e., a GUI (HTML and JavaScript), business logic in ActiveX DLLs, a data access component with an MTS interface, and the data source itself. Both sites run SQL statements. One site used a mix of Access MDB files and ORACLE 7.x tables; the other site used MDB files only.

The web interface relied on ASP and ADO with OLE DB to open legacy text and DBF files. That data customized the GUI drawn by JavaScript on a mix of IE 4+ and Netscape 4.x browsers.

Since 1997, I have updated or created several Visual Basic applications that facilitate engineers running probabilistic risk assessment calculations. These applications take statistical information on the reliability and availability of power plant equipment and mold it into estimates for Three Mile Island type events at other nuclear power plants. In particular, STEIN forward projects the thickness of steam generator tubes based on eddy-current test data taken during outages. These applications were written or altered with Visual Basic 6, 5, 4, and 3. All but STEIN rely on the CAFTA API. All use parts of the Win32 API. They access or persist data either in BTrieve, Access MDB, or DBase style DBF files, the latter two with SQL statements. More recent products employ ActiveX controls.

The following briefly describes small projects I was paid to create as an independent contractor or as an Entergy employee while also a full time employee of Entergy (see next section).

Software Development Skills Summary

Develops with: Visual Basic 6, VB.NET, ASP.NET, HTML, VBA in Excel, and VBA in Access.

OOP: ActiveX EXEs/DLLs. Projects employ knowledge of nuclear quality assurance (10 CFR Part 50, Appendix B), software quality assurance (SQA) and ISO-9000 -3.

Database: Fluent with SQL statements handled by ADO and DAO. ADO via OLE DB and ODBC gateways into Access MDBs, ORACLE tables as well as XML. Experienced with ORACLE PL/SQL stored procedures.

Project Highlights	Platform	Language	Year
Church Contribution Accounting	NT 3.51	VB-4 (16-bit), MS Access 2.0 SQL	1996
Insurance Policy Management	NT 4.0; Win 3.1	MS Access97; VB-4 (16-bit), MS Access 2.0 SQL	1999; 1996
Welfare Agency Case Management	Win 3.1	FoxPro 2.5/2.6	1995- 1996
EOOS to Plant Scheduling System Interface (for Entergy)	NT 3.51	MS Access 2.0	1995
Fuel Shuffle (for Entergy)	NT 3.5.1	Fox Pro 2.0	1994
Providing software training to beginning & intermediate students	Win 3.1, DOS, Mac OS	Word 6, Excel 5, FoxPro 2.6, PowerPoint 4, Lotus 123	1994