E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co., 723 (1957)

E. I. DUPONT DE NEMOURS & COMPANY , 723 ing and stores employees, but excluding office clerical, employees, pro-' fessional employees, guards, watchmen, and supervisors as defined in the Act.

[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication.] E. I. DuPont de Nemours & Company (Savannah River Plant) and Local Union No. 1909, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case No. 11-RC-986.

December 11, 1957 DECISION AND ORDER

Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Richard H. Frahm, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.

Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a threemember panel [Chairman Leedom and Members Bean and Jenkins].

,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 organization involved claims to represent employees of the Employer.

3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representation 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 represent a unit limited to the electrical maintenance employees at the Employer's Savannah River plant.

It contends that these employees are entitled to separate representation as a craft group within the meaning- of the American Potash Company 1 craft bargaining principle. The- Employer asserts that its maintenance employees are not true craftsmen but are ,instead a heterogeneous grouping of operating and servicing, specialists trained primarily to perform the particular functions required in its extraordinary type of manufacturing process. It therefore moved to dismiss the petition on the ground that these employees do not meet the craft standards of the American Potash decision and that, in any event, the Board ought not permit separate representation of craft employees 1 American Potash & Chemical Corp., 107-NLRB 1418.

119 NLRB No. 99.

in the basic atomic energy industry? There is no history of collective bargaining in this plant.

The Employer's Savannah River plant manufactures fissionable material for the Atomic Energy Commission. It occupies 315 square miles and employs approximately 1,000 production employees and 2,416 maintenance employees. Plant operation is divided into 9 production areas, including 2 separation plants, 5 reactor plants, a heavy water plant and a raw material plant. Each area, functioning as a plant in itself, is an integrated unit of manufacturing groups which .are administratively designated as production, works technical, works ,engineering, and general services divisions. Because of the extremely hazardous nature of the operations, each area is at least 21/2 miles ,distant from any other area and is 5 miles from the outer perimeter of the overall site.

The electrical maintenance department is included within the works engineering division together with mechanical maintenance, instrument maintenance, and power departments. Mechanical maintenance employees perform the physical, mechanical work of keeping the buildings and equipment in repair; instrument maintenance employees are responsible for the normal operation of measurement and automatic control apparatus which guides and operates the production process, and they are principally concerned with measuring variables, such as fluid control rate,...