All Reports

Since the Office of the Inspector General's previous review of TVA's risk program in 2003, TVA has enhanced its Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) capabilities in the following areas: risk identification and assessment; management tone; strategic decision-making support; commitment to ERM staffing; and promotion of an ERM culture.

The Office of the Inspector General's review of TVA's compliance with the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) of 2002 determined that TVA had improved (1) tracking of security weaknesses, remediation actions, and incidents and (2) measures to ensure appropriate personnel complete role-based security training.

We reviewed the contractor's processes and key controls for tracking and accounting for costs used in invoicing TVA for its work. Based on the review, we believe the contractor's system increases the risk of improper billing. Specifically, the system used for TVA billings (1) has limited design documentation and prescribed controls; (2) requires significant manual data entry; (3) increases the hours spent to prepare project invoices; and (4) results in numerous adjustments which, according to TVA management, have totaled more than $1 million.

Based on concerns expressed to the Office of the Inspector General, we initiated an inspection of TVA's easement with the Tishomingo County Development Foundation (TCDF). The objective of the review was to determine whether easement payments were made in accordance with the agreement. We found that while TCDF was not in compliance with amended easement payment provisions, the payment provisions were recently amended for the second time to provide the developer, Pickwick Pines Marina (PPM), an opportunity to develop and operate the marina.

We reviewed certain Browns Ferry Unit 1 (BFN U1) operating issues that have occurred since the restart in May 2007. We found the operating issues were primarily caused by improper installation of a fitting during the restart project and another fitting during initial construction, original plant design errors, failure to identify the correct root cause of a previous issue in a timely manner, and failure to identify a missing wood support during walkdowns.

We audited $19 million of costs billed to TVA for subcontract services on the Browns Ferry Unit 1 recovery project. We determined the costs billed by the subcontractor for providing professional and technical support personnel were fairly stated and in accordance with the terms of the subcontract.

We performed an interim audit of costs billed to TVA by a contractor for providing (1) modification and supplemental maintenance services at TVA nuclear plants (operating unit work) and (2) construction services for the restart of Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant (BFN) Unit 1. The scope of our review included $492.4 million of craft labor costs billed by the contractor through October 29, 2006, which had not previously been audited including: (1) $214 million for modification and supplemental maintenance services and (2) $278.4 million for the BFN Unit 1 services.

While TVA has taken several actions to better protect social security numbers (SSNs), we found opportunities to further protect or reduce the usage of SSNs that will lower the risk of exposure. TVA's Information Services has several initiatives under way to improve protection of SSNs. We are recommending several actions to further protect SSNs. Management agreed and has initiated corrective actions.

We initiated a special project to determine if (1) TVA's policies, procedures, and practices for handling lost or stolen computer equipment were adequate; (2) those policies, procedures, and practices were followed; and (3) the lost or stolen computers contained sensitive or restricted information. We found:TVA's policies, practices, and procedures for maintaining an accurate inventory of computer equipment were not adequate.

We audited $22.1 million of costs paid by TVA to a contractor for construction and modification services at TVA facilities. In summary, we foundAn estimated $20.8 million billed by the contractor for craft augmentation labor using hourly billing rates was inflated by approximately $619,000 because the contractor's billing rates included (a) overstated payroll tax costs and (b) calculation errors; andThe contractor billed TVA $25,658 for subcontract services it had not incurred.