Gunderson is definitely into self promotion, and not very careful with facts, and in fact gets a few things wrong.
The Bellefonte units are not the only units of that type. WNP-1 and WNP-4 were of the same design, and another unit, Mülheim-Kärlich Nuclear Power Plant in Germany, actually operated three years, but was shutdown because the utility got tired of fighting the state government.
Interestingly, Gunderson states that it is impossible to inspect underneath the reactor, but then he declares what is going on underneath the reactor.
His comments about QA records are apparently flawed. It is doubtful that he knows the details of TVA activities at Bellefonte. "When TVA halted construction activities in 1988,
in response to decreased power demand, BLN 1 was approximately 90 percent compete, and BLN 2 was approximately 58 percent complete."
http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2009/E9-19045.htm
From the same report - "Subsequent asset recovery activities, along with more recent inspections of remaining equipment, resulted in BLN 1&2 now being considered approximately 55 percent and 35 percent complete, respectively."
I would expect that there will be a fair amount of replacement.
In order to complete and operate the plant, the plant and all components will be under QA. They don't need QA documents for components removed and scrapped. If components are sold, then the QA records are transferred to the buyer.
As for engineers using slide rules, Gunderson's statement is disingenous. Engineers used mainframe computers. Industrial companies bought mainframe computers or rented time on them. Bear in mind that much of the technology at the time, aircraft, spacecraft , automobiles, ships, dams, bridges, . . . were built with engineers who used slide rules, but also electronic calculators and computers. An engineering programming language, FORTRAN, existed back then (in the 1960s), and it has been used ever since.
