Union Carbide & Carbon Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 9, 1953

102 N.L.R.B. 1175 (N.L.R.B. 1953)

CARBIDE & CARBON CHEMICALS COMPANY 1175
Jr Is ORDERED that the certificate issued by the Board on May 25,
1951, to the American Newspaper Guild, CIO, as the exclusive bar-
gaining representative of the employees in the editorial, advertising,
circulation, business, and maintenance departments, including mail-
room employees, of Telegraph Publishing Company, Nashua, New
Hampshire, be, and it hereby is, rescinded.
CARBIDE & CARBON CHEMICALS COMPANY,1 A DIVISION OF UNION CAR-
BIDE & CARBON CORPORATION (OAK RIDGE K-25 PLANT) and INTER-
NATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF ELECTRICAL WORKERS, LOCAL 760, AFL,
PETITIONER. Case No. 10-RC-1914. February 9, 1953
Decision and Order
Upon a petition filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a hearing was held before Karl W. Filter, hearing
officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free
from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.2
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain
employees of the Employer.3
3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section
9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act, for the following
reasons:
The Petitioner seeks to sever from a present plantwide unit all
hourly rated employees in the Employer's electrical-maintenance de-
partment. The Employer and the Intervenor contend that only a
plantwide unit is appropriate, in view of the integration of operation
and uniqueness of the manufacturing process, and long bargaining
history on a plantwide basis existing in this plant.
The Employer operates the K-25 atomic energy plant at Oak Ridge,
Tennessee, under a contract with the Atomic Energy Commission.
This plant utilizes a large number of buildings on a 600-acre tract, the
main building being U-shaped, approximately half a mile long, and
The name of the Employer appears as amended at the hearing.
s At the hearing the Employee moved to dismiss the petition on the ground that the
Board has already determined the issues involved in this case in its decision reported in
Carbide c Carbon Chemicals Corporation , 88 NLRB 437 ( 1950 ), and because of the
Integration of operations and the uniqueness of the manufacturing process in the plant
involved For reasons appearing in paragraph numbered 3 herein, this motion is granted.
I United Chemical Workers, Local 288, CIO, the Intervenor, was permitted to intervene
on the basis of its contract interest.
102 NLRB No. 121.
1176 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
occupying an area of 60 acres. The entire plant is engaged exclu-
sively in the separation of uranium 235 from other uranium isotopes
by the gaseous diffusion process .4 The process was described at the
hearing as the largest and most continuous operation in the world.
The process depends upon a series of thousands of interconnected
parts, permitting no interruption in the flow of gaseous material from
end to end, driven by thousands of electrically powered pumps, ener-
gized by tens of thousands of motors, making use of more electric
power than any other plant," and regulated by an elaborate, complex,
and unique system of electronic controls.
These controls consist of, first, a central control room wherein elec-
trical and electronic instruments record powerloads, pressures, flows,
valve positions, and all alarms, as well as the status of recirculating
water and air. All major recordings and meterings appear in the
central control room. There are also subcontrol rooms where fur-
ther details are recorded on various instruments, and individual con-
trol centers located throughout the plant, which likewise are equipped
with instruments for alarms and meters for the detection of trouble.
Major difficulties are detected in the central control room and isolated
in the subcontrol and individual control centers. Like the process
itself, the entire system of controls is powered or functions by elec-
tricity.
The uncommonly extensive use of electricity to power the large
number of motors, instruments, and alarms requires a great amount of
maintenance work, especially in the electrical maintenance field.
The Employer has two types of such maintenance, prescheduled and
emergency. The first is planned in advance. It is generally under-
taken to alter or replace equipment for the purpose of increasing its
output or productivity. An example of this is the cell-rebuilding
program, wherein certain units or sections are detached from the
process stream, the lines of production are temporarily diverted to
other channels available for that purpose, and each particular cell is
overhauled without interruption to the plant's continuous process.6
A prescheduled maintenance program of this type may extend over
a period of many months.
The emergency type of maintenance is concerned with unpredic-
table breakdowns or failures. A motor fails to operate, a transformer
4 The process of gaseous diffusion is one whereby a gaseous uranium compound is cycled
and recycled through thousands of porous barriers , thus enabling the lighter isotope U 235
to escape through the pores and separate from the heavier isotope U 238. See Atomic
Energy Development, 1947-1948 , issued by the United States Atomic Energy Commission,
p. 14.
S The plant has its own power -generating division It is also connected directly with
the Tennessee Valley Authority whence it receives large quantities of electric power.
6 Cf. National Tube Company, 76 NLRB 1199 , where the bricklayers sought to be severed
were engaged largely in relining furnaces temporarily detached from the production
purposes.
CARBIDE & CARBON CHEMICALS COMPANY 1177
is burned out, a transmission line is broken, or various other break-
downs or failures occur, all of which need immediate repair or re-
placement. In the repair or replacement of most of such breakdowns,
more than one of the maintenance crafts in the plant are involved.
A maintenance job, though participated in by several craft groups,
is usually directed by one supervisor. This type of maintenance,
like the process itself, goes on continually?
The record in the instant case, unlike the earlier case involving this
plant,' shows that the employees sought to be severed by the Peti-
tioner are skilled craftsmen, such as the Board generally grants sep-
arate representation. But it also shows that these craftsmen, like the
other maintenance craftsmen employed in this plant, have received
special training at the Employer's plant irrespective of their previ-
ously acquired skills, to enable them to work on the apparatuses,
mechanisms, and implements especially devised and constructed for
this plant. They work closely with the process-operating employees,
the work of the two groups being highly coordinated.
Upon the entire record in this case, we believe that the integration
of operations in this type of atomic energy plant and the close rela-
tionship of the maintenance electricians to production ° are such as to
make it impracticable and unfeasible to sever the employees involved
in this petition from the plantwide unit. Coupled with the history
of collective bargaining in this plant 1e which, although not neces.
sarily controlling, the Board believes in the instant case to be highly
significant, we find that the unit requested by the Petitioner is in-
appropriate." We shall, therefore, dismiss the petition.
Order
IT is HEREBY ORDERED that the petition filed herein be, and it hereby
is, dismissed.
' The plant is in continuous operation 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
° See footnote 2, Supra.
° Cf. Ford Motor Company (Maywood Plant ), 78 NLRB 887.
10 The Intermenor was certified in 1946 following an election held pursuant to an agree-
ment executed by the Employer , the Intervenor , and the Atomic Trades Labor Council, a
division of the Metal Trades Council , AFL, which included the Petitioner among other
AFL craft unions. ,In September 1947 the Council filed another petition seeking the same
plantwide unit. In November of the same year the Intervenor won the election and again
was certified . In July 1949 the Petitioner and several other craft unions filed separate
petitions which were consolidated for hearing . On February 1, 1950, the Board dismissed
these petitions , finding that the record failed to establish that any of the groups sought
were sufficiently homogeneous to warrant separate representation . ( See footnote 2,
supra .) On April 18, 1951, the Atomic Trades Labor Council , AFL, Including the Peti-
tioner herein , again petitioned for a plantwide unit. In an election held pursuant to an
agreement executed by the Employer , the Intervenor, and the Council , the Intervenor was
again selected , and has continued since then to represent the plantwide unit.
n Cf. National Tube Company, supra; Cora Products Refining Company , 87 NLRB 187;
Weyerhaeuser Timber Company , 87 NLRB 1076 , The Permanente Metals Corp ., 89 NLRB
804.