The Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster.
April 26, 1986 was a significant day in the Northern Hemisphere. Yet few will remember why. It was the day that Reactor No. 4 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant experienced a melt down, an explosion, and subsequent massive nuclear fallout. Much has been written about the causes of the melt down. A number of writers who have spoken to witnesses and seen public records attribute it to a group of electrical engin- eers who were experimenting with this poten- tially highly unstable reactor, by shutting it down to test run-on of the turbine.
Because the instability was well known, many safeguardselectrical and mechanicalwere built into the reactor to prevent people from shutting it down. The Chernobyl nuclear station is depic- ted before the melt down in Figures 3-1 through 34. These pictures are publicity photographs, which were given to visitors at Chernobyl. From these pictures, the plant has every appearance of being a well-designed, modern engineering fa- cility. Nevertheless, despite the safety systems built into the design of the plant, No. 4 reactor was shut down and each safeguard was overrid- den by the electrical engineers. The con-
sequences, as shown in Figures 35 and 36, are well known. The real question here is not why the reactor exploded but the ethical question of what ethical and moral codes were the engineers working to that enabled them to knowingly override warnings of disaster in pursuit of their experiment.
*By Dr. Peter J. Rutland, Waiariki Institute of Technology, Rotarua, New Zealand
Figure 3-1.
Figure 3-2.
Chernobyl Atomic Station control room.
Another critical point is that the technology of the nuclear plant had a significant impact on the result of unethical behavior. Had this sort of be- havior hap-
pened in the nineteenth century, the resulting ef- fect would have been nothing like the scale of the Chernobyl disaster. The early twentieth cen- tury concepts of ethics were generally of the kind that encouraged ethical attitudes and beha- vior in business, but if they did not exist it was not considered to be devastating.
Figure 3-3.
Figure 3-4.
Another interior view of the Chernobyl Atomic Station before the disaster.
Figure 3-5.
Picture of Chernobyl Reactor Building No. 4 after the dis- aster. (Source: Russian
Figure 3-6.
The Elephants foot, the once liquefied radioactive core of the Chernobyl reactor. (Source: Russian Research
Center Kurchatov Institute.)
This approach is totally unsatisfactory today as is evidenced by the chemical plant disaster in Bhopal, India, AIDS-tainted blood transfusions in France, and mad cow disease, since the scale of technologies is different not just in level but in kind. Technological systems are in place, as are human systems, such that the injection of unethical behavior at the higher levels can pro- duce unmitigated disasters. Figures 3-7 and 3-8 show the temporary solution to the Chernobyl problem, construction of a massive concrete sar- cophagus to encase the highly radioactive re- mains of Reactor No. 4, a temporary solution at best. A sarcophagus may successfully entomb an Egyptian king for centuries but not a decay- ing mountain of nuclear waste.
Figure 3-7.
Construction of the sarcophagus to entomb the Chernobyl reactor. (Source: Russian
Research Center Kurchatov Institute.)
The large-scale, interconnected, technologically advanced systems of the twenty-first century present a potentially huge ethical problem. The Internet has already demonstrated that. Al- though very intelligent people operate these sys- tems, they are capable of causing disasters if there are no ethical guidelines to be followed. Guidelines must exist and must be followed. Many of the science fiction stories intelligent people devour on film are based on the unethical villain capturing a worldwide system which he or she can then turn to advantage by wreaking havoc on the poor unsuspecting good people of the world. Fortunately, Captain Kirk or Batman or 007 always arrives to save the day. Such su- perheroes don't exist in reality, but the potential villains do.
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Figure 3-8.
The finished sarcophagus in winter 1986. (Source: Russi- an Research Center
The degree of smartness or intelligence in the operations of the large-scale systems is increas- ing geometrically. Not because each individual is getting much smarter, but because computer technology is advancing so quickly that robotic, voice-responsive software systems can control the systems when given instructions by people. Agreed, these people are likely to be very intel- ligent also, and one could well argue that this is itself a safeguard against disaster. But
Chernobyl, the Exxon Valdez, Bhopal, and other disasters do not support that theory. Large sys- tems operated by super-intelligent software packages designed and manipulated by the smartest people can be a recipe for disaster if the smartest people are not ethical.
Ethical Challenges in Engineering, Construc- tion, and Project Management
Undoubtedly the myth of amoral business per- sists and indeed a common observation is that the phrase business ethics is an oxymoron. But such a view is dependent on the subjugation of personal interests that insist on business people acting under the guidance of a moral philosophy that is often contrary to business itself.
The nature of projects themselves present many ethical concerns (1). First, in the project initi- ation and feasibility stage, there are concerns about such things
as falsification of estimates, invalid requests for proposals that are really only an effort to obtain project ideas, and concerns about the ethical re- sponsibilities of external consultants.
When the project progresses to the planning and organization stage, many more areas of ethical concern arise. Bid rigging is a frequent problem area and involves divulging of confidential in- formation to some bidders in an effort to influ- ence the amounts of the bids or to give some bidders an unfair advantage over other bidders. In other cases, the bidding process itself is little more than a sham because the bids are wiredthe winner is predetermined.
Low balling is another major problem with con- tractors attempting to buy the project by bidding low in the expectation of recovering any costs via subsequent change orders, contract renegoti- ations, or simply by cutting corners.
Bribery is another big problem area, particularly in international project work. This is discussed in some detail in Chapter 13.
Another ethical dilemma exists with firms de- claring their capability to perform while not truly being able to do so.
Also, in this stage the problem of falsified es- timates, both of cost and schedule, may rise, as may problems of discrimination in hiring. In the implementation and execution phase many additional concerns may arise including padding of expense accounts, using substandard materials, compromising health and safety standards, and withholding information from clients, owners, or superiors, etc. The list goes on and on.
Finally at project closing, problem areas such as failing to honor commitments to project person- nel, failure to recognize or admit project failure, and sloughing off to protect one's position can occur.
Ethical dilemmas are common for engineers, project managers, and construction managers. Among those identified in discussions with a number of project professionals are:
being offered gifts from contractors or vendors pressuring to alter status reports with backdated signatures or faded documents to mask reality of project status
compromising quality
falsifying reports of charges for time and expenses
lowering the quality of communication with co- workers and management and clients
abusing power and openness and transparency of information
Ethical Codes and Personal Values
Many organizations do have ethical codes in written form, which provide a useful framework for the ethics in decision making. Six such codes appear in the appendix of this book: the codes of AAES, NSPE, the Project Management Insti-
tute (PMI), the Association for the Advance- ment of Cost Engineering (AACE Internation- al), the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), and the Institute of Electrical and Elec- tronic Engineers (IEEE). These codes are typical and like most others are concerned with rela- tionships between co-workers, dealings with outside interests, conflicts of interest, and deal- ings with clients and with the community. The NSPE Code of Ethics for Engineers and the AAES Model Guide for Professional Conduct have been discussed in Chapters 1 and 2. The PMI Code of Ethics for the Project Management Profession deals with the standards of personal professional conduct, operations at work, rela- tions with employers and clients, and responsib- ilities to the community. AACE International, like PMI, is heavily concerned with project management and construction management, in addition to engineering in general. AACE's Can- on of Ethics is similar in content to the NSPE