ML030830591

From kanterella
Jump to navigation Jump to search

License Amendment, Implement Boiling Water Reactor Vessel and Internals Project Reactor Pressure Vessel Integrated Surveillance Program
ML030830591
Person / Time
Site: Monticello Xcel Energy icon.png
Issue date: 04/22/2003
From: Padovan L
NRC/NRR/DLPM/LPD3
To: Denise Wilson
Nuclear Management Co
Padovan L
References
TAC MB6460
Download: ML030830591 (13)
v • d • e


Text

April 22, 2003 Mr. David L. Wilson Site Vice President Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant Nuclear Management Company, LLC 2807 West County Road 75 Monticello, MN 55362-9637

SUBJECT:

MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT - ISSUANCE OF AMENDMENT RE: BOILING WATER REACTOR VESSEL AND INTERNALS PROJECT REACTOR PRESSURE VESSEL INTEGRATED SURVEILLANCE PROGRAM (TAC NO. MB6460)

Dear Mr. Wilson:

The Commission has issued the enclosed Amendment No. 135 to Facility Operating License No. DPR-22 for the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant. The amendment consists of changes to the Technical Specifications (TSs) in response to your application of September 19, 2002, as supplemented February 28, 2003.

The amendment does the following:

  • relocates TS Surveillance Requirement 4.6.B.2, Reactor Vessel Temperature and Pressure, and the associated TS Bases to Section 4.2 of the Updated Safety Analysis Report
  • implements the Boiling Water Reactor Vessel and Internals Project reactor pressure vessel integrated surveillance program at Monticello
  • demonstrates compliance with the requirements of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 50, Appendix H, Reactor Vessel Material Surveillance Program Requirements A copy of our related safety evaluation is also enclosed. The Notice of Issuance will be included in the Commission's biweekly Federal Register notice.

Sincerely,

/RA/

L. Mark Padovan, Project Manager, Section 1 Project Directorate III Division of Licensing Project Management Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation Docket No. 50-263

Enclosures:

1. Amendment No. to DPR-22
2. Safety Evaluation cc w/encls: See next page

ML030830591 Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant cc:

Jonathan Rogoff, Esquire Commissioner General Counsel Minnesota Department of Commerce Nuclear Management Company, LLC 121 Seventh Place East 700 First Street Suite 200 Hudson, WI 54016 St. Paul, MN 55101-2145 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Adonis A. Neblett Resident Inspectors Office Assistant Attorney General 2807 W. County Road 75 Office of the Attorney General Monticello, MN 55362 445 Minnesota Street Suite 900 Manager, Regulatory Affairs St. Paul, MN 55101-2127 Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant Nuclear Management Company, LLC Mr. Roy A. Anderson 2807 West County Road 75 Executive Vice President Monticello, MN 55362-9637 Nuclear Management Company, LLC 700 First Street Robert Nelson, President Hudson, WI 54016 Minnesota Environmental Control Citizens Association (MECCA) John Paul Cowan 1051 South McKnight Road Chief Nuclear Officer St. Paul, MN 55119 27780 Blue Star Memorial Highway Covert, MI 49083 Commissioner Minnesota Pollution Control Agency Jeffrey S. Forbes 520 Lafayette Road Senior Vice President St. Paul, MN 55155-4194 Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant Nuclear Management Company, LLC Regional Administrator, Region III 2807 West Country Road 75 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Monticello, MN 55362-9637 801 Warrenville Road Lisle, IL 60532-4351 Nuclear Asset Manager Xcel Energy, Inc.

Commissioner 550 15th St., Suite 1000 Minnesota Department of Health Denver, CO 80202 717 Delaware Street, S. E.

Minneapolis, MN 55440 Douglas M. Gruber, Auditor/Treasurer Wright County Government Center 10 NW Second Street Buffalo, MN 55313 March 2003

NUCLEAR MANAGEMENT COMPANY, LLC DOCKET NO. 50-263 MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT AMENDMENT TO FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE Amendment No. 135 License No. DPR-22

1. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (the Commission) has found that:

A. The application for amendment by Nuclear Management Company, LLC (the licensee),

dated September 19, 2002, as supplemented by letter dated February 28, 2003, complies with the standards and requirements of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (the Act), and the Commissions rules and regulations set forth in 10 CFR Chapter I; B. The facility will operate in conformity with the application, the provisions of the Act, and the rules and regulations of the Commission; C. There is reasonable assurance (i) that the activities authorized by this amendment can be conducted without endangering the health and safety of the public, and (ii) that such activities will be conducted in compliance with the Commissions regulations; D. The issuance of this amendment will not be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and safety of the public; and E. The issuance of this amendment is in accordance with 10 CFR Part 51 of the Commissions regulations and all applicable requirements have been satisfied.

2. Accordingly, the license is amended by changes to the Technical Specifications as indicated in the attachment to this license amendment, and paragraph 2.C.2 of Facility Operating License No. DPR-22 is hereby amended to read as follows:

Technical Specifications The Technical Specifications contained in Appendix A, as revised through Amendment No.

135, are hereby incorporated in the license. The licensee shall operate the facility in accordance with the Technical Specifications.

In addition, the licensee shall revise Monticellos Updated Safety Analysis Report as authorized by this amendment and in accordance with 10 CFR 50.71(e).

3. This license amendment is effective as of its date of issuance and shall be implemented within 60 days.

FOR THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

/RA/

L. Raghavan, Chief, Section 1 Project Directorate III Division of Licensing Project Management Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation

Attachment:

Changes to the Technical Specifications Date of Issuance: April 22, 2003

ATTACHMENT TO LICENSE AMENDMENT NO. 135 FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE NO. DPR-22 DOCKET NO. 50-263 Replace the following pages of the Appendix A Technical Specifications with the attached revised pages. The revised pages are identified by amendment number and contain marginal lines indicating the areas of change.

REMOVE INSERT 122 122 146 146

SAFETY EVALUATION BY THE OFFICE OF NUCLEAR REACTOR REGULATION RELATED TO AMENDMENT NO. 135 TO FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE NO. DPR-22 NUCLEAR MANAGEMENT COMPANY, LLC MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT DOCKET NO. 50-263

1.0 INTRODUCTION

By application dated September 19, 2002, as supplemented February 28, 2003, the Nuclear Management Company, LLC (NMC or the licensee), requested changes to the Technical Specifications (TSs) for the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant (MNGP). The February 28, 2003, supplement provided additional information that clarified the application, did not expand the scope of the application as originally noticed, and did not change the staffs original proposed no significant hazards consideration determination as published in the Federal Register on October 29, 2002 (67 FR 66012).

The proposed amendment would do the following:

  • demonstrate compliance with the requirements of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR), Part 50, Appendix H, Reactor Vessel Material Surveillance Program Requirements The BWRVIP RPV ISP was submitted for NRC staff review and approval in Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) Topical Reports BWRVIP-78, BWR Vessel and Internals Project, BWR Integrated Surveillance Program Plan, and BWRVIP-86, BWR Vessel and Internals Project, BWR Integrated Surveillance Program Implementation Plan. The BWRVIPs letters of December 22, 2000, and May 30, 2001, provided additional information to the NRC to establish the technical basis for, and proposed implementation of, the BWRVIP ISP. The NRCs letter and safety evaluation (SE) of February 1, 2002, to the BWRVIP approved the proposed BWRVIP ISP. However, the NRCs SE required BWR licensees to provide plant-specific information if they wish to implement the BWRVIP ISP for their facilities. NMCs September 19, 2002, application, as supplemented February 28, 2003, addressed the plant-specific information required in the NRC staffs February 1, 2002, BWRVIP ISP SE.

2.0 REGULATORY EVALUATION

Appendix H to 10 CFR Part 50 requires nuclear power plant licensees to implement RPV surveillance programs to monitor changes in the fracture toughness properties of ferritic materials in the reactor vessel beltline region . . . which result from exposure of these materials to neutron irradiation and the thermal environment. There are two specific alternatives for the design of a facilitys RPV surveillance program, as described below, which may be used to address the requirements of Appendix H to 10 CFR Part 50.

The first alternative is to implement a plant-specific, RPV surveillance program consistent with the requirements of American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) Standard Practice E 185, Standard Practice for Conducting Surveillance Tests for Light-Water Cooled Nuclear Power Reactor Vessels. In the design of a plant-specific RPV surveillance program, a licensee may use the edition of ASTM Standard Practice E 185 which was current on the issue date of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Code to which the reactor vessel was purchased, or later editions through the 1982 edition.

The second alternative provided in Appendix H to 10 CFR Part 50 is to implement an ISP. An Appendix H requirement for an ISP is that the representative materials chosen for surveillance for a reactor are irradiated in one or more other reactors that have similar design and operating features. Appendix H,Section III. C.1, Requirements for an Integrated Surveillance Program, gives the following five specific criteria which licensees must meet in order to get NRC approval of their ISP:

a. The reactor in which the materials will be irradiated and the reactor for which the materials are being irradiated must have sufficiently similar design and operating features to permit accurate comparisons of the predicted amount of radiation damage.
b. Each reactor must have an adequate dosimetry program.
c. There must be adequate arrangement for data sharing between plants.
d. There must be a contingency plan to assure that the surveillance program for each reactor will not be jeopardized by operation at reduced power level or by an extended outage of another reactor from which data are expected.
e. There must be substantial advantages to be gained, such as reduced power outages or reduced personnel exposure to radiation, as a direct result of not requiring surveillance capsules in all reactors in the set.

As noted in Section 1.0 of this SE, the NRCs letter and SE of February 1, 2002, issued to the BWRVIP, approved the proposed BWRVIP ISP. This SE partially addressed some of the criteria cited above. Where the NRC did not fully address the criteria, the SE identified the specific information which licensees must submit to the NRC to implement the BWRVIP for their facilities as follows:

[L]icensees who wish to participate in the BWR[VIP] ISP must provide, for NRC staff review and approval, information which defines how they will determine RPV and/or surveillance capsule fluences based on the dosimetry data which will be available for

their facilities. This information must be submitted concurrently with each licensees submittal to replace their existing plant-specific surveillance program with the BWR[VIP]

ISP as part of their facilitys licensing basis. The information submitted must be sufficient for the staff to determine that:

(1) RPV and surveillance capsule fluences will be established . . . based on the use of an NRC-approved fluence methodology that will provide acceptable results based on the available dosimetry data, (2) if one methodology is used to determine the neutron fluence values for a licensees RPV and one or more different methodologies are used to establish the neutron fluence values for the ISP surveillance capsules which represent that RPV in the ISP, the results of these differing methodologies are compatible (i.e.,

within acceptable levels of uncertainty for each calculation).

The NRC staff required this plant-specific information to ensure that each facility could meet requirement C.1.b. from Section III of Appendix H and to confirm that each licensee could effectively use shared data as part of the BWRVIP ISP for monitoring RPV embrittlement for their facility.

3.0 TECHNICAL EVALUATION

NMCs application of September 19, 2002, as supplemented February 28, 2003, addressed the information required in the NRCs February 1, 2002, BWRVIP ISP SE. NMC made the following commitment to the NRC in its supplemental letter of February 28, 2003, responding to an NRC Request for Additional Information:

The NMC commits to revise the MNGP USAR to state that fluence calculations will be performed in accordance with RG [Regulatory Guide] 1.190 [Calculational and Dosimetry Methods for Determining Pressure Vessel Neutron Fluence] for matters regarding fluence on the vessel and internals. The USAR will be revised during the next scheduled update after a RG 1.190 calculation is completed.

The NRC has concluded that this commitment to modify the MGNP USAR is sufficient to address both items (1) and (2) from the NRCs February 1, 2002, SE as follows:

Item (1) NMC will use an NRC-approved methodology for determining MNGP RPV neutron fluence values which is consistent with RG 1.190 and will provide acceptable results based upon the available dosimetry data.

Item (2) NMC will use an NRC-approved methodology for determining fluences which is consistent with RG 1.190 when testing RPV surveillance capsules under the BWRVIP ISP.

The NRC has concluded that any two (or more) different fluence methodologies will provide compatible results provided that the best estimate fluence values are within each others

uncertainty bounds. In addition, NMC provided the following commitment in its February 28, 2003, submittal regarding when it will perform an updated RPV fluence analysis for the MNGP RPV:

The NMC commits to performing fluence calculations using [a] methodology in accordance with the RG 1.190 within 12 months following the final approval by the NRC for use of the RAMA [Radiation Analysis Methodology Application] Code.

The RAMA Code is a discrete-ordinates neutron transport calculational code being developed by the EPRI to evaluate BWR vessel and internals fluences. Based on the NRC staffs discussions with EPRI, the NRC staff expects EPRI to submit complete RAMA Code documentation by no later than December 2003 for NRC staff review and approval. Therefore, allowing adequate time for NRC staff review of the RAMA Code, the NRC staff found this commitment by NMC to be acceptable. This is because the current RPV fluence calculations for MGNPs RPV are expected to remain conservative with respect to the actual, accumulated RPV neutron fluence through the expected date of fluence recalculation consistent with the commitment above.

NMCs license amendment request is consistent with the NRC staffs understanding of the decision given in Commission Memorandum and Order CLI-96-13. Accordingly, NMC provided the following revised Section 4.2.3.2 of the MGNP USAR incorporating the BWRVIP ISP into the MNGP licensing basis:

Additional surveillance specimens will be removed from the Monticello RPV in accordance with the Boiling Water Reactor Vessel [and] Internals Project (BWRVIP)

Integrated Surveillance Program (ISP). The removal schedule developed by the BWRVIP ISP is included in the BWRVIP-86 document. The technical basis for the ISP is discussed in BWRVIP-78 . . . .

The NRC staff concludes that the information provided in the revised MNGP USAR is adequate to document NMCs intent to appropriately implement the BWRVIP ISP as the method for MNGP complying with the requirements of Appendix H to 10 CFR Part 50. As part of the implementation and documentation of NMCs intent to utilize the BWRVIP ISP for this purpose, NMC shall modify the MNGP USAR as noted in Section 3.0 of this SE and as stated in its February 28, 2003, submittal.

Deleting TS SR 4.6.B.2 from the TSs is acceptable since the SR 4.6.B.2 does not meet the minimum requirements of 10 CFR 50.36(c)(3), Surveillance requirements, for inclusion in the TSs. The SR pertains to RPV material test specimens and the associated program for monitoring RPV embrittlement and for establishing pressure-temperature curve limitations.

In addition, the licensee made associated changes to the TS Bases. The NRC staff has no objection to the licensees changes to the TS Bases.

4.0 STATE CONSULTATION

In accordance with the Commission's regulations, the Minnesota State official was notified of the proposed issuance of the amendment. The State official had no comments.

5.0 ENVIRONMENTAL CONSIDERATION

The amendment changes a requirement with respect to the installation or use of a facility component located within the restricted area as defined in 10 CFR Part 20 or changes an inspection or a surveillance requirement. The staff has determined that the amendment involves no significant increase in the amounts, and no significant change in the types, of any effluents that may be released offsite, and that there is no significant increase in individual or cumulative occupational radiation exposure. The Commission has previously issued a proposed finding that the amendment involves no significant hazards consideration and there has been no public comment on such finding (67 FR 66012). Accordingly, the amendment meets the eligibility criteria for categorical exclusion set forth in 10 CFR 51.22(c)(9). Pursuant to 10 CFR 51.22(b), no environmental impact statement or environmental assessment need be prepared in connection with the issuance of the amendment.

6.0 CONCLUSION

The Commission has concluded, based on the considerations discussed above, that: (1) there is reasonable assurance that the health and safety of the public will not be endangered by operation in the proposed manner, (2) such activities will be conducted in compliance with the Commissions regulations, and (3) the issuance of the amendment will not be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and safety of the public.

Principal Contributors: M. Mitchell L. Lois Date: April 22, 2003

Retrieved from "https://kanterella.com/w/index.php?title=ML030830591&oldid=2668691"