Introduction - doe-hdbk-1188-20060004

DOE-HDBK-1188-2006

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 Purpose

To serve as a reference for Department of Energy (DOE) environment, health and safety

(ES&H) terms and their definitions. . This Glossary should be used as a reference for ES&H

terms embedded in any DOE document, such as Directives, rules, policies and standards, to

ensure consistency in definition and use.

1.2 Background

As a part of DOE's effort under the National Performance Review to eliminate unnecessary,

duplicative and burdensome requirements on its contractors, "New Series Directives" (3-digit

directives) were developed through a streamlining and binning process, including most ES&H

Directives (policies, Orders, notices, manuals and implementation guides). A Glossary was also

developed to serve as the central repository for terms and definitions. With the Glossary it was

agreed that all New Series Directives would cease to have a definitions section. However, to

prevent the Glossary from becoming a very burdensome document with potentially hundreds of

pages of terms, it was decided that certain specialized program areas, such as the safeguards

and security program, would maintain their own glossaries of terms. In addition, a term would

be omitted or not included if it fit into one of the following four categories:

1) Term is defined in a federal law or statute; or the Code of Federal Regulations.

2) Terms were used exclusively in DOE Technical Standards that are not a part of the DOE

Directive System.

3) Terms with a definition commonly understood in Government, i.e., supervisor, division,

performance appraisal, etc.; however, some exceptions were made, i.e., Secretarial

Officer, Department Element, etc.

4) Commonly used terms that have many meanings.

This so-called DOE Glossary was frozen on May 16, 1996, and put on the DOE Explorer

System (predecessor to the Directives Web Page). The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety

Board expressed concerns about the absence of crucial terms and definitions in the New Series

Orders. Subsequently, DOE agreed to embed terms critical to the understanding and

implementation of an Order in the Order so that there would not be a need for a user of an

Order to derive terms and definitions from another document. These critical terms would also