IR 05000160/1990003
| ML20028G837 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Neely Research Reactor |
| Issue date: | 08/09/1990 |
| From: | Belisle G, Burnett P NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION II) |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20028G833 | List: |
| References | |
| 50-160-90-03, 50-160-90-3, NUDOCS 9009050103 | |
| Download: ML20028G837 (9) | |
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pM a:p UNITED STATES s
'o NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMisslON o
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REGloN 11 g
,f 101 MARIETTA STREET,N.W.
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ATL ANTA, GEORGI 4 30323
'4,Nor*tNo.:
R 50-160/90-03 Licensee: Georgia Institute of Technology 225 North Avenue Atlanta, GA 30332 t
Docket Nos.:
50-160 License No.: R-97 Facility Name:' GeorgS Institute of Technology Research Reactor (GTRR)
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Inspection Conducted: J-26 to July 3, 1990 Inspector; Y suwF/~
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7. T. BtTrn~ef,t ~
Uare Signed Accompanying Personnel:,G. A,Belisle (July 3, 1990)
Approved by:
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$//Au l l/jffd G. A. Belisle,' chief Date Signed /
Test Programs Section Engineering Branch Division of Reactor Safety
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SUMMARY l
Scope:
This unannounced inspection addressed the routine areas of the operations
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inspection of Class I research reactors and closecut of open items from previous inspections.
Results:
Several operating and surveillance procedures were found to require improve-ment and the licensed operator requalification program did not meet the current requirements of 10CFR55.59.
To address the more significant problems, the licensee stated the following corrective actions would be performed:
Following consultation with other members of the TRTR Organization 'the operator requalification program will be revised to conforn to 10CFR55.59 as appropriate for research reactors.
The new program will be implement-ed by January 1,1991.
(Paragraph 4)
The reactor will be operated by the secondary side heat balance until questions about the accuracy of the primary side heat balance are re-e31ved.
(Paragraph 5.c)
Six of seven open items inspected were closed.
No violations or deviaticns were identified.
9009050103 900822 PDR ADOCK 05000160 l
Q PDC
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REPORT DETAILS
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1.
Persons Contacted I
. Licensee Employees W. Downs, Senior Reactor Operator
- R. Karam Director Neely Nuclear Research Center
- B. Revsin, Associate Director, Neely Nuclear Research Center
- B. Statham, Manager of Reactor Operations i
Other licensee employees contacted included operators, and office person-f nel.
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- Attended exit interview on July 3, 1990.
A list of acronyms and initialisms used throughout this report is provided
in the final paragraph.
2.
Organization, Logs, and Facility Tour (39745)
a.
Organization The facility management organization of the NNRC was as described in i
TS Figure 6.1.
A new Manager of Reactor Operations, a licensed SRO on the GTRR, had been appointed since the last inspection, and a new
Manager, Office of Radiation Safety, reported for duty during the
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inspection.
For the preceding eight months, the associate director
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of the NNRC had also been functioning as the Manager, Office of
Radiation Safety.
b.
Review of Operations Logs
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The reactor operations logs maintained at the reactor console were reviewed for the period from July 15, 1989 to June 21, 1990.
Several entries were selected for followup to obtain more informa-
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tion or clarification.
All were resolved satisfactorily.
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c.
Facility Tour L
Shortly after arrival at the NNRC, a tour of the GTRR was conducted l
with the director of the NNRC to assess visually the condition of l
the facility and equipment.
The facility appeared to be well l_
maintained, with adequate housekeeping and no obvious fire hazards.
Later in the inspection, the inspector witnessed a startup of the reactor.
The startup was performed under the guidance of procedure 2000 (Issued 12/10/85), Reactor Operation.
The initial conditions
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were that all SSBs were fully inserted ('ndicated positions were 0 i 0.5'), the RR was fully inserted, and the SRM was indicating 50 cps.
The RR was withdrawn to 6.5 inches and lef t there for the remainder of the approach to criticality.
The SSBs were withdrawn one-at-a-time in 5' steps so that all blades-banked configurations were created at 5' and 10'.
The reactor was still suberitical at this point and each SSB was sufficiently withdrawn to initiate a negative period trip if it should fall into the reactor with the
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power channels responding.
(This subject is discussed further in paragraphs 5.a and 9.d. ).
Subsequently, criticality was achieved
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with the SSBs banked at 14.5'.
Throughout the process announcements of the reactor starting up, criticality, and power level plateaus were broadcast through the facility.
The inspector noted that the operator at the controls monitored the console instrumentation with care and that it had his full attention during reactivity additions.
Communication and coordination of power level changes between the reactor operator and the experimente*s were effective.
t No violations or deviations were identified.
3.
Nuclear Safeguards Committee Review and Audit Activities (40745)
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The minutes of the NSC for the period from April 28, 1989 to May 24, 1990 were reviewed.
TS 6.2.c requires that the committee meet at least quar-
terly.
Because of the many major procedure revisions and new procedures to be reviewed, meetings were held almost monthly during this period.
Four of the meetings also addressed a leak in the bismuth block cooling
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system.
The NSC was active in specifying and reviewing tests to deter-i mine the heating rate of the block with the reduced cooling.
They were
equally active in addressing the collection and control of the potentially contahiinated water leaking from the block.
In the meeting on August 25, 1989, only one of two violations issued during inspection 50-160/89-02 was reported as being discussed.
Since the other remains open, the NSC will have further opportunity to review it (see paragraphs 9.c and 9.d).
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TS 6. 2. e(10) requires that the NSC perform annual audits of reactor
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operations and operations records.
The audits performed in 1990 concen-l trated on the content and performance of procedures and the status of NRC open items.
These audits appeared to be thorough and productive, but the lack of in audit of the operations log is of concern; since it is the major guide to. the character and quality of reactor operation.
As reported in NRC ' Inspection Report 50-160/89-02, the 1989 audit of the operations log and startup and shutdown checklists was thorough and productive.
No violations or deviations were identified.
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l 4.
Training (41745)
The licensee's current approved requalification training program for operators and senior operators does not meet the requirements of 10CFR55.59.
However, the licensee's recent practice has been to send
licensed operators through the same program as operator trainees.
That program has been successful in preparing candidates for operator and senior operator licenses.
The licensee has agreed to revise the formal requalification program to conform to the requirements of 10CFR55.59 as they apply to research reactors.
The submission of the program and the beginning of training under it will begin no later than January 1,1991.
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The licensee is expected to consult with other members of the TRTR Organi-zation before submitting the revised requalification program.
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This issue will be tracked as inspector followup item 50-160/90-03-01:
Revise the operator requalification program to conform to 10CFR55.59 as appropriate for research reactors.
The NSC had conducted an audit of the retraining and requalification program within the past two years (February 20, 1989), as required by TS 6.2.e(11), and found that the program satisfied the current commitment.
No violations or deviations were identified.
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Procedures (42745)
a.
Procedure 2000 (Issued 12/10/85), Reactor Operation, ws; reviewed in the course of observing the reactor startup discussed in
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paragraph 2.c of this report.
Step A.I.a requires that the SSBs be maintained in a bank with a maximum angle of 5' between the highest and lowest and, with the current core loading, appears to assure the TS 3.1.d requirement that all SSBs be above the minimum withdrawal tc
cause a negative period scram.
However, this procedure should positively enforce that specification for all core loadings.
Furthermore, this procedure does contain a requirement to perform an
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ECP prior to criticality.
The operator at the controls during the observed startup did state that the operations logbook was reviewed
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to obtain the last recorded critical position for a similar core and i
experimental loading.
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l b.
Completed copies of procedure 2002, Weekly Precritical Startup Checklist, were reviewed for the period from January 5,1990 to June 18, 1990.
The procedure provides the acceptable values of high voltage and discriminator settings for some of the radiation moni-toring equipment.
In many instances, the procedure values had been crossed out and new values, from the most recent calibrations, entered.
Although technically correct, the changes made were not done in conformance with the licensee's established procedures for making temporary changes to procedures.
Hence, those changes have
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received no management or NSC review.
The licensee is considering revising the procedure to remove the fixed values and require entry of the values from the most recent calibrations.
c.
Procedure 2015 Reactor Power Calibration, was performed with acceptable frequency during the period from January 25 to June 25, 1990.
The heat balance required by and described by the procedure is ' for the primary side only.
However, each of the completed procedures reviewed was augmented by a secondary side heat balance, which was performed in response to an earlier expressed concern of the inspector (see paragraph 8.c).
The inspector's evaluation of 13 sets of. results, for nominal powers between 1 and 0 MW, showed that the secondary side heat balance consistently indicated the higher power and averaged 10% more than the primary side heat balance.
In response to these results, the licensee has agreed to revise procedure 2015 to formally incorporate a secondary side heat balance and to calibrate the nuclear instruments to the secondary side heat balance until uncertainties in the primary side heat balance are resolved.
This corrective action will be tracked as inspector fcilowup item 50-160/90-03-02:
Operate by the secondary side heat balance.
d.
Procedure 7245, Reactor Shutdown Margin Demonstration, does not achieve its purpose from several aspects.
In the completed proce-dures reviewed, the unscrammable RR was not fully withdrawn from the core, and all SSBs were fully inserted.
The procedure did not correct for the RR insertion or for the insertion of the highest worth SSB.
TS 3.1.a defines SDM in terms of the RR and highest worth SSB being fully withdrawn.
A valid SOM is measured in procedure 7202, prior to performing the SSB scram time measurements.
The preliminary steps of the procedure established a configuration with the highest worth SSB (#3) and the RR fully withdrawn.
Then the reactor was demonstrated to be subcritical with SSB 1 at 15*.
The withdrawn worth of SSB 1 was more than 4%dk/k, which more than satisfies the 1%dk/k SDM requirement of i
TS 3.1. a.
The results of this demonstration were entered into the i
operations log each time scram time testing was performed.
The licensee is e.urrently reviewing these procedures.
No violations or deviations were identified.
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6.
Surveillance Procedures and Records (61745)
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a.
7246, Control Element Reactivity Worth Measurement, was performed in 17-assembly cores on February 5, 1988, January 5, 1989, and I
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November 7,1989, and in a 16-assembly core on May 10, 1990.
The individual SSB worths changed little from measurement to measurement and the observed changes were qualitatively consistent with the changes in core loading.
The measurement method is valid and acceptable.
Nevertheless, the reactivity worths reported in these measurements (3.84 to 5.14%dk/k in the last test) are nnly about l
one-third those recorded in the SAR (10.2 to 15.2%dk/k) for a 14-assembly core.
There are no obvious differences in the shapes of the SAR integral worth curves from those currently being obtained.
The memory of the present staff does not extend to the measurement of the SAR curves.
The validity of the current measurements of reactivity worth, SOM, and excess reactivity are not in question.
The origins of the SAR measurements will be pursued in a future inspection.
b.
Other surveillance activities are discussed in the following para-graphs of this report:
Paragraph Subject 8. a Calibration of Test Instrumentation 8.b D, Cover Gas Analysis 8.c Reactor Coolant Flow Calibration 9.a Isolation Valve Timing 9.c Containment Building Leakrate Test No violations or deviations were identified in the inspection of surveil-lance activities.
7.
Experiments (69745)
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Review of experiments performed and cf the procedures controlling experi-ments is discussed in paragraph 9.b.
No violations or deviations were identified in the inspection o4' licensee experiments.
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8.
Followup of Inspector-Identified and Unresolved Items (92701)
a.
(Closed) Unresolved item 50-160/87-01-10:
Verify that instrument calibrations necessary for operability of safety equipment listed in TS Table 4.1 are performed.
The licensee has identified all five test instruments used in cali-
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brating the instrumentation listed in Table 4.1.
All test instru-ments have currenc calibrations against NIST standards, b.
(Closed) Inspector followup item 50-160/87-08-05:
Justify the f re-quency of cover gas analysis for D concentration.
Recent performances of procedure 4400 (Revision 01, issued February 15, 1990), D, Analysis in Reactor Cover Gas, confirm that the
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measured concentration is only about ten percent of allowable, thus no greater than annual frequency for the test is required.
However, the procedure appears to require some revision to address all of the
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valve manipulations required.
c.
(Closed)1nspector followup item 50-160/88-02-13:
Develop and imple-ment a reactor coolant flow calibration procedure.
The secondary coolant system includes a calibrated flow orifice plate.
The licensee has been performing simultanoous heat balances on the primary and secondary systems to obtain calibrations of the
turbine flow meter on the primary side.
Results to date indicate there is no gross error in the turbine meter calibration.
However, tne secondary side heat balance does indicate about ten percent t
higher power. than the primary side, and the difference is probably assignable to the turbine flow meter.
The licensee has agreed to L
operate by the secondary side heat balance.
See paragraph 5.c for more detail.
9.
Followup of Violations (92702)
a.
(Closed) Violation 50-160/87-01-01 (Violation A):
Failure to provide or utilize procedures.
This violation had five subparts.
Subpart A.2.b was withdrawn by a Region II letter dated August 31, 1987.
Subparts A.1.a A.1.b, and A.2.a were closed in NRC Inspection Report 50-169/89-02.
The remaining subpart, A.I.c, addressed the failure to have a proce-dure to time the closing of the containment isolation valves.
Procedure 7220 (Revision 03, issued on August 25, 1989), Containment Building Isolation Test, provides for the simultaneous measurement of the closing time of the eight active isolation valves.
Accept-able results were obtained when the procedure was performed in April 1990.
This violation is closed in its entirety, b.
(Closed) Violation 50-160/87-01-02 (Violation B):
Failure to
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control experiments per Technical Specifications.
This violation had four subparts.
Subpart B.1 was withdrawn by Region II letter dated August 31, 1987.
Procedure 3100 (Revision 5, issued on October 21, 1988), Experiment Approval Form, was reviewed intensively by the licensee on May 31, 1989.
The reviewers concluded that the procedure, which was actual-ly only a form, was inadequate and that more procedural guidance was needed.
The procedure, 3100, was reissued (Revision 6) on August 8, 1989 with a new title, Instructions for Preparation of GTRR Experi-ment Approval Form.
The inspector reviewed the seven forms completed under procedure 3100 in 1990.
Although some experimenters are
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t still having difficulty predicting post-irradiation radiation levels, the procers appears to be working to control the conduct of experiments.
The following procedures i>>u=d or revised by the licensee in re-
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sponse to the violation were also reviewed by the inspector:
(1) 2012 (Revision 02, issued on February 4,1988), Operating Log Experiment Status (2) 3101 (Revision 01, issued on October 21, 1988), Definition of Experiment Categories
(3) 3102 (Revision 02, issued October 21, 1988), Quality Assurance
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for Experiments
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(4) 3109 (Revision 00, issued October 21, 1988), Instructions for Experiment Approval
Based upon the review of the revised and new procedures, this viola-tion is closed in its entirety.
c.
(Closud) Violation 50-160/89-02-01:
Failote to perform the contain-ment building leak-rate test in accordance with commitments.
Procedure 4000 (Revision 2, issued March 22, 1990), Containment
Building Pressure Test, and procedure 4002 (Revision 00, issued L
March 22, 1990), Reference Vessel Pressure Test, now implement
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tests, which, in concert, satisfy ANS 7.60, Leakage Rate Testing of
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Containment Structures.
The inspector reviewed the tests completed
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in April 1990 and found them satisfactory.
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(0 pen) Violation 50-160/89-02-02:
Procedures did not assure that l
any shim blade not fully inserted was withdrawn sufficiently to cause a negative rate trip when released into the core, as reo';, red by TS 3.1.d.
In response to the violation, the licensee wrote procedtre 7247 (Revision 00, issued January 26, 1990),
Oetermination of Minimum
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Shim-Safety Blade Angle to Generate a Negative Rate Tri).
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inspector's review of the completed procedure confirmed that these measurements were made satisfactorily.
However, no pracedure enforces the TS requirement of suicient withdrawal p aior to criticality.
Procedure 2000, Reactor Operation, was last revised on December 10, 1985.
It does contain a requirement that all SSBs be banked within $* of each other, which assures compliance for the present core and experiment loading, but not for all cases in general.
More positive procedural control is required.
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10.
Exit Interview The inspection scope and findings 'were summarized on July 3,1990, with those persons indicated in paragraph 1 above.
The inspector described
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the areas inspected and discussed in detail the inspection findings.
No dissenting comments were received from the licensee.'
The licensee d.d-not identify. as proprietary. any of the materials provided to or reviewed by the inspectors during this inspection.
The licensee agreed to perform'
I corrective actions, which
'4' il be tracked as inspector followup items:
a.
IFI 50-160/90-03-01:
Revise the' operator requalification program to
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conform to 10CFR55.59 as appropriate for research reactors. (Para-graph 4)
b.
IFI 50-160/90-03-02:
0perate by the secondary side. heat balance.
(Paragraph 5.c)
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/aronyms and Initialisms Used Throughout This Report CFR Code of Federal Regulations cps
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%dk/k unit of reactivity ECP estimated critical position GTRR Georgia Tech Research Reactor IFI inspector followup item MW megawatt NIST National Institute of Standards and Technology NNRC Neely Nuclear Research Center NRC Nuclear Regulatory Commission
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NSC Nuclear Safeguards Committee RR-regulating rod-SAR Safety Analysis Report SDM shutdown margin SRM source range monitor SRO senior reactor operator-
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TRTR Test Research and Training Reactor (Organization)
'TS Technical Specifications
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