ML030910364
| ML030910364 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Mcguire, Catawba, McGuire  |
| Issue date: | 03/18/2003 |
| From: | Robert Davis Neal R. Gross & Co. |
| To: | Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation |
| Byrdsong A T | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML030910366 | List: |
| References | |
| +adjud/rulemjr200506, 50-369-LR, 50-370-LR, 50-413-LR, 50-414-LR, ASLBP 02-794-01-LR, NRC-834, RAS 6114 | |
| Download: ML030910364 (157) | |
Text
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Official Transcript of Proceedings eOCKETED USNRC NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2003MAR 20 AM 9: 52 A RU-:a tGS AHD ADJUMJCArIONS STAFF Duke Energy Corporation: McGuire Nuclear Station Units 1&2; Catawba Nuclear Station, Units 1 and 2 Title Docket Number:
Location:
Date:
50-369, 370, 413, and 414 Rockville, Maryland Tuesday, March 18, 2003 Work Order No.:
NRC-834 Pages 1204-1476 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433 1"i p lee=: SEC Y- 03 5sECV-o2a-
1204 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
+
ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD ORAL ARGUMENT f
In the Matter of:
DUKE ENERGY CORPORATION McGuire Nuclear Station, Units 1 and 2 Catawba Nuclear Station, Units 1 and 2 ii11 1I IIIII!
Docket Nos. 50-369,
- 370, 413, and 414
- Tuesday, March 18, 2003 ASLPB Hearing Room Nuclear Regulatory Commission T3-B45, Two White Flint North 11545 Rockville Pike Rockville, Maryland The above-entitled matter came on for hearing, pursuant to notice, at 9:00 a.m.
BEFORE:
ANN MARSHALL YOUNG CHARLES N.
KELBER LESTER S.
RUBENSTEIN Chair Administrative Judge Administrative Judge NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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1205 APPEARANCES:
On Behalf of the Licensees:
DAVID A. REPKA, ESQ.
ANNE W. COTTINGHAM, ESQ.
of:
Winston & Strawn 1400 L Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
20005-3502 (202) 371-5726 (DR)
(202) 371-5950 fax and LISA F. VAUGHN, ESQ.
of:
Duke Energy Corporation 526 South Church Street Charlotte, North Carolina 28202 (704) 382-8134 (704) 382-4504 fax On Behalf of the Intervenors, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League and Nuclear Information and Resource Services:
DIANE CURRAN, ESQ.
of:
Harmon, Curran, Spielberg & Eisenberg, L.L.P.
Suite 600 1726 M Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
20036 (202) 328-3500 On Behalf of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission:
ANTONIO FERNANDEZ, ESQ.
SUSAN L. UTTAL, ESQ.
Office of the General Counsel Mail Stop -
0-15 D21 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C.
20555-0001 (301) 415-8339 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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1206 APPEARANCES:
(cont'd)
ALSO PRESENT:
Michael J. Barrett, P.E.
H. Duncan Brewer Edwin Lyman, Ph.D.
Robert L. Gill, Jr.
Gregory D. Robison, P.E.
Louis Zeller NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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1207 I-N-D-E-X EXHIBITS NO.
DESCRIPTION 1
Letter from Ashok Thadani 2
Revision 2 -
McGuire 3
Revision 2b -
Catawba 4
GIMC 01/29/03 5
Technical Assessment Summary PAGE 1217 1246 1246 1322 1385 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2
(9:08 a.m.)
3 CHAIR YOUNG:
Let's go on the record.
4 We're here this morning to conduct oral 5
argument on the Intervenors' Amended Contention 2, in 6
the proceeding involving Duke Energy's license renewal 7
application with regard to McGuire --
the McGuire and 8
Catawba plants, McGuire Units 1 and 2, Catawba Units 1 9
and 2.
10 On July 10, 2002, we heard argument on the 11 first four parts of that contention. Therefore, this 12 morning we're going to start with 5 and go through 8.
13 However, we recognize that there are some issues that 14 will --
that have arisen as a result of occurrences 15 since July 10th, most specifically the Commission's 16 order in CLI 02-28.
And so we will, then, after 17 completing the argument on subparts 5 through 8 of the 18 amended contention, go back and hear further argument 19 on subparts 1 through 4.
20 We're going to set aside -- try to hold to 21 15 minutes per party on each contention, with some 22 additional time for rebuttal for the Intervenors. We 23 may interject questions as we go.
If we do, we will 24 not hold that against you, and try to move things 25 along, so that we cover everything that the parties NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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want to bring to our attention in their arguments.
2 At this time, before we go into the 3
- argument, let's just have everyone introduce 4
themselves for the record.
I'm Ann Marshall Young, 5
Chair of the Atomic Licensing and Safety Board for 6
this proceeding.
7 Judge Kelber?
8 JUDGE KELBER:
Charles Kelber.
9 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Les Rubenstein.
10 CHAIR YOUNG: And then, let's start with 11 the Staff here.
12 MS. UTTAL: Susan Uttal, representing the 13 NRC Staff.
14 MR. FERNANDEZ: Antonio Fernandez for the 15 Staff.
16 CHAIR YOUNG:
Anyone else? Go ahead.
17 MS. CURRAN:
Diane Curran for Blue Ridge 18 Environmental Defense League and Nuclear Information 19 and Resource Service.
And with me today are Louis 20 Zeller, Director of the Anti-Plutonium Campaign of 21 BREDL, and also Dr. Edwin Lyman, our expert witness.
22 CHAIR YOUNG:
Mr. Repka?
23 MR. REPKA:
I'm David Repka with the law 24 firm of Winston & Strawn, representing Duke Energy.
25 With me today on my left is Lisa Vaughn, Associate NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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General Counsel, Duke Energy.
On my right is Duncan 2
Brewer, a senior manager of the Severe Accident 3
Analysis Group at Duke Energy.
4 Also with me today, behind me, are my 5
colleague at Winston & Strawn, Anne Cottingham; Mr.
6 Michael Barrett, a senior engineer in Severe Accident 7
Analysis at Duke Energy; Greg Robison, Project Manager 8
of the License Renewal Project; and Mr. Robert Gill, 9
the licensing consulting for the License Renewal 10 Project.
11 CHAIR YOUNG:
Thank you.
Before we go 12 into the argument on subpart 5 of the contention, are 13 there any preliminary matters?
14 MS. CURRAN:
Yes, I do have one, Judge 15 Young.
Dr. Lyman has an unavoidable conflict around 16 the lunch hour, and he needs to leave about 11:30, and 17 he will be back here at 2:00. And I'm hoping that in 18 the intervening time I can handle whatever comes up, 19 but there may be some questions that we need to get 20 back to after he comes back.
21 CHAIR YOUNG:
Do you anticipate that any 22 I would assume you'd need him for all the parts of 23 your contention, so we'll just have to adjust for 24 that.
Or do you have any suggestion on particular 25 ones that he would be more critical for?
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1 2
3 4
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1211 MS.
CURRAN:
Dr. Lyman is suggesting reversing 7 and 8.
CHAIR YOUNG:
Trying to get 8 done this morning before lunch?
MS.
CURRAN:
Right.
CHAIR YOUNG: And then we --
okay. We can do that.
MR.
REPKA:
Judge Young, I have one other matter.
CHAIR YOUNG:
Yes?
MR.
REPKA:
Just procedural in terms of how we proceed today.
There are a number of issues that have been raised in the filings to address Board questions.
And there really are overarching issues that go to the viability and timeliness of all of the issues.
And I don't know if it makes sense to start with a discussion of those issues or just address the overarching issues in the context of contention 5. But it --
I think it's clear from our papers that we believe that the Commission's decision in CLI 02-28, coupled with the SEIS, have an effect on the viability of all of the proposed amended contentions.
And we can address that item by item, but we may want to address that first, if that makes NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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sense.
2 CHAIR YOUNG:
You're right.
There are 3
some issues that go across all contentions.
We may 4
also have questions that are of that same nature.
5 With regard to the timeliness issues, why 6
don't you all address those in your arguments on 7
subpart 5.
And if necessary, we'll give a little 8
extra time on that, so that we don't-have to repeat 9
them each time through.
10 But we may as well go ahead and get 11 started on subpart 5.
And after you've raised --
12 after you've argued the timeliness issues, the general 13 timeliness issues, if you want to raise specific ones 14 with regard to the separate subparts, then do that 15 after that, with regard to subpart 5. And then you 16 can just limit your argument to the specifics on all 17 of the others.
18 So when you're making your general 19 arguments, identify them as such, and we'll accept 20 them as such.
21 All right.
22 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
The Staff also has a 23 preliminary matter.
24 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay.
25 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
Your Honor, although the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Staff believes that it is not a matter within the 2
scope of the proceeding, we wanted to inform the Board 3
and the parties that Duke has submitted a license 4
amendment application to irradiate lead test assembles 5
of MOX fuel at Catawba and McGuire. And we wanted to 6
give you all the accession number for ADAMS.
That's 7
It's 030760734.
8 That's it, Your Honor.
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
Thank you.
10 All right.
Then, I think the order of 11 argument would be starting with the Intervenors --
12 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Excuse me.
Are those 13 subassembly --
lead subassemblies going to be in all 14 four units?
15 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
The current license 16 amendment application is for four lead test assemblies 17 at each of the units.
18 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Thank you.
19 CHAIR YOUNG: Anything else? Okay. Then 20 the order of argument on each subpart of the 21 contention would be starting with the Intervenors, 22 moving to Duke, then the Staff, and then any rebuttal 23 by the Intervenors.
24 Ms. Curran, on subpart 5.
25 MS. CURRAN:
Okay.
I think I will be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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brief on my --
I think we have briefed many of these 2
issues exhaustively, and I would like to go over them 3
but save significant time to respond to the arguments 4
by Duke and the Staff, because I really --
I don't 5
think it's useful for everyone to go over what's 6
already been written.
7 CHAIR YOUNG: Okay. And also, if you want 8
to start with your general timeliness arguments.
9 MS. CURRAN:
Okay.
I do --
I agree with 10 Mr. Repka that these overarching issues really relate 11 to all of the individual subparts of the contention, 12 and it would be very difficult not to get into them on 13 a pretty broad level.
14 Part 5, Failure to Take Adequate Account 15 of Uncertainties, is one example.
On the timeliness 16 issue, Duke is arguing that we could have raised this 17 earlier.
We could have raised this when we got the 18 environmental report.
19 I think there's, for us, a significant 20 overarching issue here that NUREG-6427 had an 21 astounding revelation, which is that in the case of a 22 station blackout with failure of both diesel 23 generators and accumulation of hydrogen in the 24 containment, the probability of containment failure is 25 one.
To us, that is a remarkable discovery that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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deserves the most thorough analysis.
2 It is not something to be waived aside or 3
quickly put into an existing analysis.
It is 4
something to be looked at quite carefully, because it 5
affects the overall consideration of, what is the risk 6
of operating this facility?
And
- also, very 7
importantly, what could be done to mitigate the risk?
8 And the issue of uncertainty is one that 9
is --
has come up again and again in the Staff's 10 consideration of the implications of NUREG/CR-6427 in 11 looking at the Generic Safety Issue.
12 And I have copied a couple of documents 13 that I would like to share with the Licensing Board 14 that raised the very great importance of uncertainty 15 in this analysis.
16 CHAIR YOUNG: With regard to any documents 17 that any of the parties have brought, I assume we can 18 treat those as exhibits.
We'll need one for each of 19 us.
And if they are exhibits, we'll need three 20 official copies.
21 If there are any objections, I suppose 22 raise them at this point.
23 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Your Honor, for what 24 purpose is this document being offered?
25 MS. CURRAN:
To support the significance NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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of uncertainty in considering the information in 2
NUREG-6427. This is a memorandum dated December 17th 3
from Ashok Thadani, Director of the Office of Nuclear 4
Regulatory Research, to Samuel J. Collins, Director, 5
Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
6 The subject is RES Proposed Recommendation 7
for Resolving Generic Safety Issue 189, Susceptibility 8
of Ice Condenser and Mark III Containment to Early 9
Failure from Hydrogen Combustion During a Severe 10 Accident. And I --
11 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Your Honor, the Staff 12 would object to admitting this document at this point 13 in time.
It seems to me that what the Intervenor is 14 trying to do is supplement their contention by this 15 late-filed document.
We believe that now is not the 16 appropriate time to be supplementing their 17 contentions.
18 CHAIR YOUNG: The Board will consider this 19 exhibit not in any way to supplement the contention, 20 and we want to draw a very clear distinction there.
21 In the interest, however, of having a complete record, 22 we will consider the document with regard to the 23 arguments made by any party who wishes to --
in this 24 case, the Intervenor.
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documents that they wish us to consider with regard to 2
their argument, we will be open to that in the 3
interest of having a complete record.
4 Before we get too specifically into 5
contention 5, though, we do want to hear your general 6
timeliness arguments.
7 MS.
CURRAN:
Okay.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
And I think you were using 9
this as an example, but --
I 10 MS.
CURRAN:
As an example -- and I would 11 refer you to page 2, in which Mr. Thadani 12 CHAIR YOUNG:
I'm sorry.
Hold on one 13 second.
So given that we are accepting this, we're 14 going to mark this as an Intervenors' exhibit, but 15 we're going to mark the exhibits serially.
So this 16 will be official Exhibit 1 for this oral argument.
17 (Whereupon, the above-referred 18 to document was marked as 19 Exhibit No.
1 for 20 identification.)
21 MS.
CURRAN:
And I would just --
22 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay.
23 MS.
CURRAN:
refer you to the third
,24 full paragraph on page 2, which discusses the fact 25 that there are large uncertainties in the cost-benefit NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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analysis.
But to --
2 CHAIR YOUNG:
Which paragraph?
3 MS. CURRAN:
The third full paragraph, 4
which starts, "The results of the cost-benefit 5
analysis."1 I think there'Is an overarching issue here 6
as to --
well, Duke's perspective is that the way --
7 the only way that NUREG/CR-6427 needed to be 8
considered in Duke's SAMA analysis was to plug in the 9
Level 2 analysis.
10 But in our view, consideration of NUREG-11 6427 means looking again at the SAMA in light of that 2.2 information, and doing a thorough risk analysis that 13 takes that very important information into account.
14 And if you look at the environmental impact statement 15 that the Staff did, this is how the Staff handled 16 NUJREG-6427.
17 The Staf f looked again at the Level 1 18 analysis and made some comments on that. They looked 19 at the Level 2 analysis, and the Staff also looked at 20 the signif icance of that analysis with respect to the 21 costs and benefits of various SAMAs.
And after all, 22 that is the purpose of a SAMA analysis.
23 CHAIR YOUNG:
Could you give us cites to 24 the portions of the EIS?
25 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: While you look for that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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paragraph, would you clearly state the relief you seek 2
from this? Is it more calculations, and what would be 3
the consequences of that?
Would it change the fact 4
that the Staff has acknowledged that they have to make 5
an accommodation for hydrogen control?
6 MS. CURRAN: We seek two things.
We seek 7
disclosure of the underlying information that -- and 8
our overall goal in this intervention is to verify or 9
evaluate the statements made by Duke in its SAMA 10 analysis, and in its RAI responses, and the statements 11 made in the EIS which rely upon that information for 12 their reasonableness and accuracy, and, if necessary, 13 to seek a reevaluation of some of these issues based 14 on a more rigorous analysis. And one of the aspects 15 in which we seek a more rigorous analysis is 16 uncertainty analysis by Duke.
17 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: In that regard, do you 18 have any specific basis, any independent calculations 19 other than what is in this exhibit, to justify this as 20 your basis?
Has Dr. Lyman performed an independent 21 analysis? Have you pointed out specifically anything 22 in the PRA which is defective?
23 MS. CURRAN:
Well, a couple of points in 24 response to your question.
As we state in our 25 contention, uncertainty analysis is a very standard NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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approach for this type of an analysis. And we think 2
it's sufficient to point out that this is a well-3 accepted method for verifying the results of a 4
probabilistic risk assessment and should be employed 5
in this case.
6 But if you are looking for empirical 7
evidence that it matters, one only needs to compare 8
the very --
the broad divergence and the ultimate 9
result.
Tf you look at Duke's analysis, the 10 environmental impact statement, and the GSI analysis, 11 and the ultimate benefit of the SAMA, there is a great 12 divergence there, which indicates a large degree of 13 uncertainty that has not been adequately dealt with in 14 our view.
15 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Okay. As I understand 16 it, this is sort of an interjection into the process, 17 wherein research and the nuclear reactor regulation 18 people are going to determine, through their 19 calculations, their working with the ACRS, their 20 working with the Staff and their management, what the 21 ultimate outcome is of this SAMA being recommended for 22 their further pursuit.
23 MS. CURRAN: So I think you're raising the 24 issue of, isn't the Staff going to resolve this in the 25 course of the Generic Safety Issue? And haven't you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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got what you want by in the EIS the Staff is 2
advocating for the hydrogen igniters.
3 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Yes.
Right on.
I'd 4
love to hear --
5 MS.
CURRAN:
Okay.
6 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
-- all three parties 7
talk about it.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
Did you get the paragraph, 9
by the way, of the --
10 MS.
CURRAN:
Oh.
All right.
The 11 divergence in results -- excuse me for a minute.
I 12 wrote it down.
I can't find the piece of paper.
Oh, 13 here we go.
14 Okay.
In RAI Response Number 4, Duke 15 gives an averted risk value using NUREG/CR-6427 as 16
$264,000.
17 CHAIR YOUNG:
What about in the EIS?
18 MS.
CURRAN:
In the EIS, at page 5-28, and 19 Table 5-8, the EIS gives an averted risk value of 20
$678,000.
21 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
Your
- Honor, for the 22 record, can we clarify which EIS we're talking about?
23 MS.
CURRAN:
Oh, I'm sorry.
That's the 24 McGuire EIS.
25 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
Thank you.
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MS. CURRAN:
Now, I also have another 2
document that I can pass out to the Board and the 3
parties, which is a memorandum from the Office of 4
Nuclear Reactor Research from May 13, 2002, which 5
lists a range of values ranging from $2,000 to more 6
than $3 million.
So, to us, that illustrates the 7
significant range of uncertainty. And if you'd like, 8
I can provide a copy of that document.
9 JUDGE KELBER: In that regard, I'd like to 10 ask you a
somewhat simpler question than my 11 colleagues.
What we're discussing here are the 12 results of sensitivity studies.
And what are the 13 possible benefits of an uncertainty analysis of a 14 Level 3 PRA as opposed to a sensitivity analysis?
15 MS. CURRAN: I'd like to ask Dr. Lyman if 16 he could answer that.
17 DR. LYMAN: Well, in my view, sensitivity 18 studies are useful for exploring various ranges and 19 parameters, but they don't provide you with the 20 statistical confidence that you would need in the 21 assurance of the final results.
22 So, for instance, you know, you can --
if 23 you understand that one parameter could roughly range 24 from one extreme to the other, you can evaluate the 25 sensitivity of the results of that. That doesn't tell NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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you, for instance, what the 95th percent confidence 2
level is in your final result.
So --
3 JUDGE KELBER: And that would be used how 4
in the decision process? To-mitigate any effects that 5
the hydrogen-controlled system was not effective?
6 DR. LYMAN:
Well, just to back up -- and 7
I think in our view the uncertainty analysis is a 8
fundamental aspect of PRA. And I think from-nthe point 9
of view of the public trying to understand any of 10 these widely-diverging results that we've talked 11 about, we need to understand that in the context of 12 the fundamental uncertainties in the calculations.
13 Otherwise, it simply doesn't make any sense to the 14 public, and I think that's the --
15 JUDGE KELBER:
I understand your point.
16 Now, but let me ask, in a Level 3 PRA, any uncertainty 17 spread of less than an order of magnitude in each 18 direction is not believable.
That is a statement of 19 fact about the PRAs that we're seeing. You will have 20
-- the uncertainty is in the exponent, in other words.
21 Now, what good would that do you as 22 opposed to the value of a sensitivity analysis?
In 23 other words, how are you going to discern between 24 these levels?
The ACRS, for example, in discussing 25 this wanted to take the lower bounds.
Why?
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their business. I can't answer for them. But you can 2
take lower bounds, you can take upper bounds.
3 But what good does it do you when they 4
differ by two orders of magnitude? How can you make 5
a decision based on that?
6 DR. LYMAN: Well, I think that's precisely 7
the point or the difference between the sensitivity 8
- analysis, which doesn't allow you to make a
9 statistical judgment about the likelihood of a 10 particular outcome.
So --
11 JUDGE KELBER: But I'm saying -- excuse me 12 for interrupting.
But I'm saying that a statistical 13 judgment on something that spans two orders of 14 magnitude is not likely to come about in any 15 reasonable length of time.
There's no confidence in 16 it.
17 DR. LYMAN:
Well, I think I, a priori, 18 wouldn't be able to make a statement like that.
I 19 think that's why we would want to see those who are 20 capable of doing these studies, to the extent --
to 21 the full technical extent possible, and then perhaps 22 validate your opinion or your intuition.
23 JUDGE KELBER:
- Well, it's more than 24 intuition, and it's more than an opinion.
25 DR.
LYMAN:
Okay.
But in this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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particular --
2 JUDGE KELBER:
I've dealt with these for 3
many years, and I can assure you that I would not 4
believe an uncertainty which wasn't an order of 5
magnitude in each direction.
You need only look at 6
NUREG-1150 to see the uncertainty.
7 DR. LYMAN:
Right.
But we would like to 8
demonstrate that in the particular site-specific case, 9
so that -- again, NUREG-1150 was a very comprehensive, 10 seminal document.
But, again, there are disputes I 11 think within this room about the validity of some of 12 its conclusions after 13 years have elapsed, and its 13 application to site-specific issues and plan updates.
14 I'm just saying I certainly accept that 15 fact, but we believe that, especially given the 16 overall direction of this agency toward well-17 documented risk assessments in supporting all 18 regulatory actions, that it's perfectly consistent and 19 reasonable to request a full-blown uncertainty 20 analysis.
21 And I'd just like to add that in 22 NUREG/CR-6427, part of our contention that this 23 document should be taken into account, that it itself 24 states that we recognize --
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should be accompanied by uncertainty quantification 2
for a more complete risk-informed assessment."
3 So we believe that that statement is 4
something --
again, part of our initial contention 5
that this document should be taken into account.
6 Therefore, we believe that that cautionary note should 7
also be.
8 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Excuse me.
I want to 9
come back to Ms. Curran's answer to my question about 10 context. However, in examining paragraph 3 on page 2 11 of your exhibit, there is a sentence, "Thus, it is a 12 prudent course of action to pursue an enhancement to 13 the igniter system."
This is certainly, in a sense, 14 relief within the context of this hearing.
Now --
15 MS.
CURRAN:
Can I respond to that?
16 Because I have a --
17 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Let me continue.
18 MS. CURRAN:
-- disagreement with that.
19 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Yes, you may.
I'll be 20 quiet in a second.
21 This alludes to a process that NRR, 22 Nuclear Reactor Regulation, with the consulting of the 23 ACRS and the Office of Research, will be doing pretty 24 much what you want.
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committee, publish a fix which is to be applied to all 2
these plants, and then make this adjustment to the 3
current licensing basis.
4 And this would be a public process, 5
subject to review, 2.206.
Or if they go to the 6
rulemaking process for this generic issue, you'll have 7
that ventilation.
Or am I wrong?
8 MS. CURRAN:
Well, you've raised a very 9
important point, and I think that in some respects you 10 are wrong.
First of all, the Office of Nuclear 11 Reactor Research has referred the Generic Safety Issue 12 to NRR.
We have looked at NRR's scheduling document 13 for resolution of this issue.
14 It's completely open-ended. So there are 15 no target dates for resolving this issue in that 16 schedule, and we are concerned that it may not be 17 resolved, or at least not in the near future. That is 18 the concern.
19 Certainly, if NRR does impose this 20 requirement, it would address a significant portion of 21 our concern.
But my next point is that it would not 22 address all of our concern, and this is the reason.
23 The environmental impact statement for this facility 24 is a decision document that is --
it has a number of 25 purposes.
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One, it's being used to evaluate a SAMA in 2
this case.
And if you look at the language in the 3
GEIS that addresses the SAMA, it's very equivocal. It 4
is not committal.
It is much more equivocal than the 5
language you will see expressed by the Office of 6
Nuclear Reactor Research.
7 There is two separate strands of thought 8
that are going on, and the commitment to the 9
importance of the hydrogen igniters is not reflected 10 in the GEIS. And in our view, this may be because the 11 GEIS, relying on Duke, has come up with a risk 12 estimate that is lower than it should be.
13 That's one concern about the EIS.
The 14 strength of the recommendation of the SAMA is weak.
15 But second, and also important -- and this 16 is based on my own experience in dealing with 17 environmental issues over a period of years of 18 operation of a nuclear facility, we can all be sure 19 that some day 10 years, 15 years, 20 years down the 20 line, some licensing decision is going to come up for 21 these two reactors.
And it's going to involve 22 significant environmental impacts.
23 And an intervenor or public citizen group 24 that is interested in what are the risks of this 25 reactor, they're going to pick up this EIS, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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they're going to read it.
2 And they are going to rely on the 3
information that's in there to evaluate something 4
in the future. They may also be told when they try to 5
raise new issues, "That was addressed 15 years ago in 6
the license renewal case for Catawba and McGuire."
7 These EISs are living things.
They go on. They have 8
other roles.
9 And they also --
over a period of time, 10 they are going to be what the public relies on to see, 11 what is the government's assessment of the risk of 12 this facility?
And we would like an accurate, 13 reasonable evaluation that is supported by the kind of 14 analysis, uncertainty analysis, peer review, those 15 kinds of things that give us assurance that the 16 analysis was done reasonably well.
17 So I hope that answers your question.
18 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: What I heard was -- and 19 I'm going to repeat it --
is that the process that the 20 NRC works with in transferring this responsibility is 21 correct.
However, one, you don't like the timing of 22 it.
Two, you don't particularly expect that they'll 23 eventually implement it.
And, three, you find that 24 there perhaps won't be another public opportunity to 25 deal with this issue, as I've sort of.suggested when NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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the implementation of Generic Safety Issue 189 occurs.
2 Did I mischaracterize you?
3 MS. CURRAN:
Well, I -- we --
4 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I didn't --
5 CHAIR YOUNG:
Let me add something, and 6
see if that -- that will encompass everything. You're 7
challenging the adequacy and thoroughness of it, as I 8
understand it, correct?
9 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Yes.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
One thing that I'd like to 11 just get, before we move on too far and run out of 12 time --
13 MS. CURRAN:
Judge Marshall, can I just 14 respond to Judge Rubenstein?
15 CHAIR YOUNG:
Oh, go ahead.
16 MS. CURRAN:
Just one point.
Whether or 17 not what the Staff is doing, its process is correct.
18 I think our view is the Staff has decided to do what 19 it's going to do, and our concern is that one way or 20 another the Staff has to make a decision about the 21 SAMA.
22 The Staff has decided to make it in the 23 GSI process, and it seems to us that at this point the 24 Staff is entitled to do that.
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been addressed, then it becomes a concern that it fell 2
through the cracks.
3 I'm not sure that it's our place to tell 4
the Staf f which way to do it, but it needs to get 5
done.
6 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Well - -
7 CHAIR YOUNG:
Go ahead.
8 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I mean, this 9
invol~ves more plants than the four at issue.
it 10 involves an issue which goes beyond license renewal, 11 and the Staff is --
has to take some sort of an action 12 on it.
And when they do, this will result in either 13 an engineering change to the plans, or a tech spec 14 change if it'Is procedural, and all of these things are 15 subject to public ventilation. And if they go to the 16 rulemaking hearing, you could be a full participant in 17 the rulemaking.
18 MS.
CURRAN:
But I
- think, Judge 19 Rubenstein, your question presumes that the Staff will 20 do it. And it --
I hope that's right, but we have not 21 seen --
we haven't seen a schedule that sets a date 22 for doing it.
And our position as members of the 23 public, if we want the staf f or the NRC to do a 24 rulemaking, that is an incredibly difficult thing to 25 enforce, almost impossible.
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JUDGE KELBER:
Well, let me interject.
2 The Commission, in CLI 02-28, reserved for the Part 50 3
process, which is actually carried out by the Staff 4
but authorized by the Commission, the decisions under 5
GSI 189.
There is nothing we can do, except perhaps 6
individually appeal to the Commissioners to change 7
their minds. But I'm not inclined to do that.
8 It's beyond our power as a Board to 9
consider it further.
The real question that I'm 10 coming back to is still this question of uncertainty 11 analysis.
I notice that Staff guidance says that 12 sensitivity analysis may be used in lieu of 13 uncertainty analyses, where full uncertainty analysis 14 would be impractical or exceedingly complicated and 15 costly.
And I'd like to know whether you feel that 16 that guidance is wrong.
17 MS. CURRAN: I don't think there has been 18 a determination that uncertainty analysis would be so 19 difficult or costly that it can't be done.
And it 20 seems to me that your question is whether the 21 contention is admissible.
If there are merits issues 22 that relate to whether an uncertainty analysis is 23 appropriate in this case, or whether a sensitivity 24 analysis will do, I would think that summary judgment 25 would be appropriate for that type of issue.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1233 CHAIR YOUNG:
I'd like to get us back a little bit to the timeliness issue, and, specifically, the Commission's stated concern that the Intervenors might have raised certain issues earlier had you fulfilled your ironclad obligation to look at all the public records.
And I'm asking this now with regard specifically to the uncertainty analysis. Why was --
why could you not have raised this issue at the outset, in your original contention, as a sort of subissue of that?
And I'm going to state several issues, and if we need to go back over them we can.
But as a sort of subissue of that, you're talking about the PRAs here.
And that's another sort of general issue that applies to several of these subparts.
And there's been a lot of discussion about what was and what was not available publicly early on.
And so if you could give us your take on why one -- or actually whether, and the extent to which, you searched the public records and were aware of the --
or found and used the original IPE, and then the summary revision, the summary of the revision, and any other public documents, which things were not public, and why you needed those.
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And then, on the general timeliness issue, 2
I do understand the Commission has sort of recognized 3
this, and you have certainly made the argument that 4
language in our original -- our order on contentions 5
may have created some perception that there was no 6
need to file an amended contention.
7 But I'd like to get also into any of those 8
general timeliness issues, as well as ones specific to 9
this.
And you may be repeating yourself, but I'd 10 still like to address those concerns, because those 11 are fairly paramount in light of the Commission's 12 recent decision.
13 MS.
CURRAN:
Okay.
I think the first part 14 of our answer is that, if you go back to the beginning 15 of the proceeding, the first thing that we pointed out 16 was that NUREG/CR-6427 had not been taken into 17 account.
And we considered that to be adequate to 18 require --
we wanted to force Duke to take a look at 19 NUREG-6427 with all its implications.
20 And then, Duke filed the RAI response, and 21 we found that it was inadequate to really grapple with 22 the implications of NUREG-6427 for a variety of 23 reasons, which are stated in amended contention 2.
24 So, in our view, we've complied with the 25 process.
We initially flagged this issue.
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report hasn't been addressed. And then, when Duke did 2
address it, we provided a listing of the ways that we 3
considered it should have been addressed.
4 And I guess --
I think there's an implicit 5
question that you're raising, which is we have 6
initially listed all of the ways that NUREG-6427 7
should be addressed. And to us that seems --
it would 8
be like writing the -- anticipating deficiencies that 9
you haven't seen yet, and that we were entitled to see 10 what Duke would do with this information, and then 11 critique it.
12 When you have a total vacuum --
Duke 13 hadn't done anything to address it --
it seemed to us 14 to be appropriate to wait and see what Duke did when 15 it did address the --
and it's kind of a common-16 sensical approach that I would take in preparing a 17 contention, because I think it's very difficult to 18 anticipate deficiencies that aren't there because 19 you're working in a complete vacuum.
20 CHAIR'YOUNG:
What about the issue that 21 the other parties touch on, and I think the Commission 22 also does, about the availability of the PRA and other 23 public documents relating to that?
24 MS. CURRAN:
Yes.
25 CHAIR YOUNG:
And in this --
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MS. CURRAN: Well, I would like to address 2
that.
3
-CHAIR-YOUNG:
context,--the possibility 4
of your having raised the uncertainty issue with 5
respect to the PRA information that was available.
6 MS. CURRAN: All right.- First of all, in 7
terms of what was available, there is the IPE and the 8
9 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Would you put dates?
10 Or maybe perhaps Duke could do it.
I was trying to 11 establish a timeline on when the IPE was published and--
12 when the PRA was published.
13 MS. CURRAN: I'm remembering 1990 and 1994 14 for the IPE and IPEEE, but that may be wrong.
15 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Okay. For the purposes 16 of the hearing, quite a while ago.
17 MS. CURRAN:
Yes, a long time ago.
And 18 those are publicly-available documents. But they have 19 been overtaken by Revision 2 to the PRA.
20 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Which was published?
21 MS. CURRAN:
Well, we have a summary of 22 Revision 2, which went on the public docket in April 23 of 2001.
And this has been an issue in some of our 24 telephone conferences, so we made a copy of this 25 summary, because we thought it might be helpful to the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Board to see what's in it, and --
2 JUDGE KELBER:
Excuse me.
Excuse me.
3 MS. CURRAN-:
Yes.
4 JUDGE KELBER:
Before you go-into that, 5
I'm looking at Table 4-2 in Appendix K, which was 6
available initially when Duke published their 7
environmental impact report.
And I don't see any 8
uncertainty numbers on anything here, regardless of 9
what was in NUREG/CR-6427.
I see no uncertainty 10 numbers. If uncertainty is that important, why wasn't 11 it raised then?
12 MS. CURRAN: We did not know how Duke was 13 going to take into consideration NUREG/CR-6427.
If 14 you look at that document --
15 JUDGE KELBER: But that's irrelevant to my 16 question, because NUREG/CR-6427 is based on the IPE, 17 not on Revision 2, which you were referring to.
18 MS. CURRAN: Judge Kelber, if you look at 19 NUREG/CR-6427, throughout it discusses the 20 significance of uncertainty in its analysis. And it 21 seems to us to have been reasonable to presume that, 22 in taking into account information in NUREG/CR-6427, 23 Duke would follow that methodology and provide some 24 uncertainty analysis, which it did not. But we had no 25 way of knowing how Duke was going to take that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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information into account.
2 JUDGE KELBER:
But if you had looked at 3
Appendix K in the environmental impact statement, you 4
would have seen that there was no consideration there, 5
that they were following regulatory guidance.
6 Now, what would you --
why would -you 7
expect them to do anything else?
8 MS. CURRAN:
Because of the guidance in 9
NUREG-6427 that uncertainty is important.
10 JUDGE KELBER:
NUREG-6427 is not a 11 guidance document.
12 MS. CURRAN: Well, it provides information 13 that certainly indicates uncertainty is important. It 14 doesn't seem to us that we were required to anticipate 15 in advance what Duke's analysis of that document would 16 or would not contain.
17 JUDGE KELBER: Let me return. You had an 18 example of their analysis at hand.
You saw the way 19 they analyzed it. What reasonable person would expect 20 that they would utilize any other attack when using a 21 different set of conditional containment failure 22 probabilities?
23 MS. CURRAN:
A reasonable person who saw 24 the extremely significant revelation in NUREG-6427, 25 which basically changed the entire ball game.
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JUDGE KELBER:
Excuse me.
But I was in 2
charge of some of the initial research done on this 3
sort of thing, and it didn't change the ball game. We 4
anticipated that result long before. We anticipated 5
it during a TMI-2 accident.
6 MS. CURRAN:
Well, certainly, from the 7
perspective of a member of the public, seeing this in 8
print for the first time it was a very significant 9
revelation. And we would have expected it to lead-to 10 significant reexamination of analyses that had been 11 done, because it has a direct effect on the overall 12 risk of this plant and on the effectiveness or cost-13 benefit of SAMA's.
14 So, yes, we would have expected Duke to 15 take a hard look at the significance of this 16 information, harder than it may have before.
17 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Let me broaden the view 18 for a second and back out of the uncertainty analysis.
19 The Commission, in CLI 02-28, at 13, also concluded 20 that the Intervenors' view that their contention 21 involves "not just the matter of Duke looking at the 22 data that's in the NUREG, but actually whether we 23 agree upon the way it was used," April 29th transcript 24 at 873 and 74.
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and now we're going down this path again after the 2
Commission said, "We will not get into those aspects 3
of the NUREG."
In amplification, they further said, 4
"Your Intervenors' original contention-in-this--case_
5 complained of the Sandia study's omission, not 6
specific deficiencies in the way this study was used."
7 Would you please address this?
8 MS. CURRAN:
Well, it seems to me the 9
Commission was addressing the original contention, 10 which was a broadly --
11 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Which is the basis for 12 our amended contention 2
pardon me, our 13 consolidated contention 2, which was narrowed very 14 specifically, and which would have then applied, based 15 on the original bases from the original contention, to 16 your amendment.
17 MS. CURRAN:
Well, I think --
18 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Correct me if I'm 19 wrong.
20 MS. CURRAN:
Well, one reason that we're 21 here today is because, in admitting the original 22 contention, the Licensing Board said that it was 23 admitting --
and I'm paraphrasing --
the question of 24 whether, and to what extent, the values of NUREG-6427 25 were considered.
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And we relied on that contention --
on 2
that interpretation of the contention, and we did not, 3
once we had the RAI responses, go back and say, "Okay.
4 Now they've done it.
Here's all the ways we think 5
it's inadequate."
6 But that's where we are now that --
now 7
that the Commission has clarified that they did not 8
agree with the Board's interpretation of the 9
contention, that's where we are now. That's -- we are 10 in the position of having received Duke's response to 11 this NUREG.
We have now presented our criticism of 12 the adequacy of that evaluation, and it seems to me 13 that we have followed the NRC's procedures to the tee.
14 This is how the process is supposed to work.
15 CHAIR YOUNG:
Do you have anything more 16 you'd like to say about the general timeliness issues 17 and general issues relating to publicly-available 18 information?
And also, there's another sort of 19 general issue, and that is the degree to which station 20 blackout frequency is a viable issue in light of 21 CLI 02-28, given the Commission's statements on 22 whether that was included within the scope of the 23 original contention.
24 MS. CURRAN: And you'd like me to get --
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into, but - -
2 CHAIR YOUNG:
Well, since we're getting 3
into overarching issues, yes. And since also --
that 4
also relates to the timeliness issue, I think, and the 5
publicly-available 6
MS.
CURRAN:
Okay.
7 CHAIR YOUNG:
information, and from 8
your obligation to have looked at that, and what you 9
could and could not have done earlier on.
10 Now, I think I understand your argument 11 with regard to the omission contention, and then 12 waiting to see how Duke and the EIS would address the 13 6427 issue.
But separate and apart from that, the 14 issues of your ability to have obtained publicly-15 available documents and raised issues earlier, and 16 then the scope with regard to the station blackout 17 frequency.
18 If that's oversummarizing --
19 MS.
CURRAN:
Okay.
20 CHAIR YOUNG:
feel free to take it in 21 parts.
22 MS.
CURRAN:
Well, just getting back to 23 your question of what information was available on the 24 public record and what wasn't, I think we got into 25 that a little ways and then we stopped.
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9 10 11 12 13 1243 going to talk a little bit about Revision 2, which the entire PRA is not in the public record.
But there is a summary of the PRA that has been in the public document room for sometime, which essentially contains summary results and a qualitative analysis or a discussion of what was done in the PRA.
And we have --
and there's also a Revision 2b, which is very brief. I think it's four pages, which adds to that.
Now, we have made copies of Revision 2 and Revision 2b that we would like to distribute, because I think it's been a question by the Licensing Board as to what it is that has been available to us, and we'd 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 like to informati looking f
- helpful, like, whi demonstrate to you that this is summary
.on. This is not the kind of data that we are
,or in the PRA.
And if the Board would consider that I would be glad to distribute those.
CHAIR YOUNG: I'll look at a copy if you'd
.le you're talking about it.
MR. REPKA:
At this point, I need to interject.
I'm happy for Ms. Curran to pass out that information.
But with respect to the reference to Revision 2b, what she's neglecting --
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references the summary report on Revision 2, which is 2
a much more substantial document that is also in the 3
public record.
So what she's going to give you is 4
only part of the story.
5 CHAIR YOUNG:
Well, I thought she was 6
going to give us Revision 2.
7 MS. CURRAN: I'm going to distribute both 8
documents.
9 MR. REPKA:
Revision 2 is the McGuire 10 Revision 2 summary report. The Revision 2b, the four-11 page letter you're referring to, relates to Catawba.
12 In addition to -- on Catawba, that letter references 13 the Revision 2 Catawba summary report, which is a 14 separate document in the public record --
15 MS. CURRAN:
Okay.
16 MR. REPKA:
that's equally --
that's 17 equal in volume to the McGuire.
18 MS. CURRAN:
Right.
19 MR. REPKA:
These are the two of them.
20 Each is about two inches thick.
21 MS. CURRAN: We made copies of Revision 2 22
-- of only one, because they're representative and we 23 were trying to conserve resources.
24 Now, the shorter document is Revision 2b.
25 CHAIR YOUNG:
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copies?
If you want to make this an exhibit --
I 2
don't know if it needs to be, because it is a public 3
record.
But if you want to, we need to --
4 MS. CURRAN:
All right.
5 CHAIR YOUNG:
have copies for --
6 MS. CURRAN: Well, we would ask the Court 7
Reporter to mark the McGuire Revision 2 as Exhibit 2, 8
and the Catawba Revision 2b as Exhibit 3.
9 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I don't think we need 10 to mark them as exhibits, because they're public 11 documents.
12 MR. FERNANDEZ: Your Honor, we would once 13 again want to register our objection.
To the extent 14 that these documents are being used to supplement the 15 contentions, we would object to that use of the 16 documents.
So as long as it's clear for the record 17 that these documents are not in any way being used to 18 supplement the contention.
19 CHAIR YOUNG:
And we'll sustain that 20 objection and not admit the exhibit for that purpose, 21 but only to elucidate the parties' arguments.
22 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
Thank you.
23 CHAIR YOUNG:
So Revision 2 would be 24 official Exhibit 2 to this proceeding?
25 MS. CURRAN:
Yes.
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(Whereupon, the above-referred 2
to document was marked as 3
Exhibit No.
2 for 4
identification.)
5 CHAIR YOUNG:
And the Revision 2b to 6
Catawba would be official Exhibit 3.
7 (Whereupon, the above-referred 8
to document was marked as 9
E x h i b i t N o.
3 f or 10 identification.)
11 MS.
CURRAN:
And as I said, Exhibit 2, 12 which is just the McGuire Revision 2, is being offered 13 as an example, because it's very similar to the 14 Catawba Revision 2.
15 And then, just to finish the story of 16 what's on the public record, there is another revision 17 to the PRA, more recent, and that is Revision 3.
And 18 Revision 3 was only completed recently.
That is just 19 for McGuire.
That PRA was only completed recently, 20 and it is not in the public document room, nor is 21 there a summary in the PDR.
22 CHAIR YOUNG:
Based on the original IPE 23 and IPEEE, and Revision 2 and Revision 2b, what could 24 you have done with regard to challenging the existence 25 or level of uncertainty analysis that was done at the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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outset?
2 MS. CURRAN: Well, I think the only report 3
that's really relevant for our purposes is Revision 2, 4
because it was done so much more recently than the 5
And if you look at 6
page 6-21 of the summary of Revision 23,i-t has a one-7 paragraph discussion of uncertainty, and there are two 8
figures that are mentioned.
9 They essentially give the results and one 10 paragraph of explanation, so it doesn't provide very 11 much information to go on.
12 CHAIR YOUNG:
Could you have challenged 13 the inadequacy of this at the outset? And did you in 14 any way?
15 I think I understand you to be saying that 16 your approach was that you challenged the failure of 17 Duke to address or consider NUREG/CR-6427, and that 18 that encompassed issues like this rather than going 19 into the potential subissues that might arise should 20 Duke consider 6427. Am I understanding that right?
21 Is there any other statement that you want 22 to make in terms of whether -- and what you could have 23 done earlier on with regard to this information?
24 MS. CURRAN:
Can you hold one moment?
25 Well, if you look at the summary that's in this -- the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1248 summary of Revision 2 and the summary of the uncertainty analysis in the summary, there just wasn't enough information in there for us to evaluate what Duke was likely to do in considering 6427.
They may have done an uncertainty analysis, and they may have-not----- There-just wasn't enough information for us to evaluate what they had done or would do.
CHAIR YOUNG:
I guess my question was:
could you have, at the outset --
with your original contentions, could you have raised a contention that said the uncertainty analysis that Duke has done, according to the summary Revision 2, is inadequate, because it doesn't give enough detail, it doesn't give the quantitative basis for the results that are given in these two tables --
in these two figures?
And the reason I'm being specific about this is because I think that the Commission has asked us MS.
CURRAN:
Yes.
CHAIR YOUNG:
to look at this. And so your argument that you didn't raise these issues because the primary concern that you had was the absence of any consideration of NUREG/CR-6427, I
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to do is get you to also address the argument or the 2
issue of why you couldn't have challenged the adequacy 3
of this at the outset and how those two things relate 4
to each other.
5 MS. CURRAN:
Well, I guess the answer is 6
we wouldn't have, because we were --
our concern was 7
with the information that was disclosed in NUREG-6427.
8 So BREDL and NIRS didn't see any particular utility in 9
coming --
supposing NUREG-6427 wasn't there.
10 And coming in and challenging various 11 elements of the SAMA analysis, what made it worthy of 12 our review was once we saw that Duke would grapple 13 with this NUREG, as insufficiently as we thought they 14 did attempt to do it, then it became important or 15 something that we felt that we could make a 16 contribution on, that it was worth looking at, because 17 just to come in and criticize the adequacy of the PRA 18 or the SAMA analysis --
well, we may have done it, but 19 it would not have served our purpose, which was to 20 focus on the significance of that NUREG and what it 21 meant.
22 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: But if you step back a 23 little bit in time when the environmental report and 24 the draft SEIS was published, could you not have 25 concluded that, in general, for all sequences, they're NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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not treating uncertainties properly as opposed to just 2
the condition containment failure probability, given 3
station blackout?
Wouldn't this be true of all 4
sequences they dealt with?
S MS. CURRAN: Well, that again gets back to 6
one of our overarching arguments, which is that the 7
Level 2 result that is very significant in NUREG-6427 8
has heightened significance for every other level of 9
the
- PRA, because, of
- course, the conditional 10 containment probability rests on the core damage 11 frequency, which is Level 1.
12 And then, the question of what you do to 13 avoid the accident relates to what are the 14 consequences if it occurs, which is Level 3. So the 15 whole picture then becomes important.
16 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Yes.
But in your 17 perusal of the original documents, your argument would 18 also call into question their entire SAMA calculation 19 methodology.
In other words, if they don't treat the 20 uncertainties correct for this kind of a sequence, 21 then they probably couldn't have done the SAMA 22 properly for any sequence.
And it would have been 23 much better at that time to say, "Hey, you're not 24 doing the calculation properly."
25 MS.
CURRAN:
- Well, I mean, if the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1251 Licensing Board --
I guess the choice is whether to make a ruling that when an intervenor files a contention, like our first contention that says, "You should consider this NUREG," that in-order to get the contention admitted you have to give a recipe-for all the things that should have gone into that consideration.
We have to give instructions to the licensee.
You must consider A, B, C, D. If we have to do that at the beginning, then --
JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: You only needed to say with some sort of a basis to say that this methodology, in the way Duke calculates their SAMAs, is unacceptable, because of these reasons.
Let me ask another question. I'm looking for your response to something Duke wrote. They cite two references in the Federal Register.
The first reference being --
alluding to the fact that, for the purposes of a license renewal action, a Level 1 and 2 should be accepted. And in the second instance, they cite a Federal Register notice that says Level 3 is excluded from the license review action.
And I can give you the references.
It's in the text of Federal Register 28467, 28481, dated June 5, 1996, and 61 Federal Register 66537, 65540, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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December 18, 1996.
2 So as the way I read it is, from the 3
Federal Register, it may be clear.
And I'm looking 4
for a viewpoint.
I did not go back to the original 5
document yet --
that a) Level 1 and 2 calculations are 6
adequate to use in preparing SAMA analyses for license 7
renewal purposes, and b) a Level 3 analysis is not 8
required for a license renewal application.
9 In a sense, if these references are 10 correct, and the sense of them is such, then this 11 precludes this kind of a discussion.
12 MS. CURRAN:
I wonder if, you know, at 13 some point when we have a break, I could take a 14 minute, because I think it's probably important to 15 read the --
I got the --
16 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Duke, do you have your 17 reference?
18 MS. CURRAN: Can you just give me the page 19 numbers again?
20 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Sure. 28467 -- and I'm 21 quoting from what Duke wrote --
28481, June 5, 1996, 22 and 61 Fed Register 66537, 65540, December 18, 1996.
23 I'm not claiming this as correct, and I have not read 24 them in original.
But perhaps they would care to 25 justify them.
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MS. CURRAN:
Okay. We'll come back to --
2 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
At the appropriate 3
time.
4 MS. CURRAN:
I will come back.
5 JUDGE KELBER:
I would like to go back 6
myself to something earlier, a statement about 7
discussion of uncertainties in NUREG/CR-6427.
On 8
page 113, under the general heading of Sensitivity 9
Studies --
note that it's sensitivity studies, not 10 uncertainty studies --
it is outside the scope of this 11 study to perform a fully integrated uncertainty study, 12 as was done for NUREG-1150.
13 They then go on and they conclude, "We 14 recognize that PRA studies ideally should be 15 accompanied by uncertainty quantification for a more 16 complete risk-informed assessment.
However, the NRC 17 has traditionally regulated on mean values, and has 18 required uncertainty studies only when utilities 19 petitioned the NRC for regulatory relief on some 20 issue."
And they then go on to discuss their 21 sensitivity study.
22 I think other than the discussion of 23 uncertainties in the contain code, which is not really 24 germane to this
- question, that sums up the 25 contribution of the authors of this NUREG-6427 to the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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discussion of uncertainties. Namely, they're going to 2
do sensitivity analyses.
3 DR. LYMAN: Well, we'd also like to see a 4
full-blown sensitivity analysis, which we don't think 5
has been provided either.
I mean, I think the - -
6 whether or not --
I think the bottom line is:
do we 7
understand why Duke's original submittal had one 8
conclusion and NRC Staff came to a different 9
conclusion, without understanding the origin of those 10 differences?
We want better explanation of that, 11 whether to call it a full-blown uncertainty analysis 12 or a formal sensitivity study, which they refer to 13 here.
14 And I'm not sure what they truly mean by 15 "formal,"
but it's clearly more than what they 16 provided or what Duke has provided.
I think that's 17 really semantics.
What we want to understand is why 18 these two entities looked at the same data and the 19 same analysis, came to different conclusions.
20 The reason for that lies in the inherent 21 uncertainties in the assumptions.
And whether you 22 characterize that as a sensitivity or uncertainty 23 analysis, I don't think we really care. We just want 24 to get to the heart of the matter.
25 JUGE KELBER:
- Well, that's not an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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unreasonable view. And part of the differences may be 2
in the reluctance of some parties to light a match in 3
a room filled with hydrogen.
Some people will; some 4
people won't.
5 MS. CURRAN:
I think Judge Young has a 6
question pending.
7 CHAIR YOUNG:
If you had something that 8
you wanted to finish with regard to anything on the 9
table, go ahead.
But I do have a couple things that 10 I'd like you to address before we move on from the 11 sort of general issues.
12 MS. CURRAN:
All right.
Well, you had 13 asked a question about the relevance of station 14 blackout.
15 CHAIR YOUNG:
Actually, that was one of 16 the things I was going to get back to.
17 MS. CURRAN:
Okay.
18 CHAIR YOUNG:
Actually, why don't I just 19 tell you.
First of all, what --
I'd like for you to 20 refresh my memory on what, if anything, you said about 21 the PRAs in supporting your original contention 2.
22 And then, second, to focus on what is left 23 that we can admit of this contention in light of CLI 24 02-28, specifically with regard to the station 25 blackout frequency part of the whole analysis, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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with regard to anything relating to the PRAs.
2 So if you could start by just refreshing 3
my memory on, did you have --
did you make reference 4
to the PRAs in the original contention?
5 MS. CURRAN:
I'm sorry.
I don't have it 6
in front of me to refresh my memory, but Mr. Zeller 7
thinks that, if it is not explicitly referred to, it 8
is alluded to in the original contention.
But I'm 9
afraid I can't tell you.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay.
11 MS. CURRAN:
I think we were focused on 12 the SAMA analysis, which is part of the PRA or an of f-13 shoot of it. Whether we discussed other parts of the 14 PRA, I'm not sure.
15 CHAIR YOUNG:
Well, one of the reasons I 16 ask that is because you get into a discussion in one 17 of your recent pleadings about the secrecy and lack of 18 detailed statements required by NEPA, NEPA being an 19 environmental full disclosure
- law, providing 20 environmental cost-benefit information that Congress 21 thought should be provided about each qualifying 22 federal action.
23 And you've made other references in the 24 past to having asked, from early on, for the PRAs --
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trying to remember for myself when that effort started 2
and whether it was mentioned in the original 3
contention.
4 But be that as it may, if you could --
5 whatever you can remember, you can provide. And then, 6
if you could focus on what's left with regard to 7
station blackout and the PRA issues generally after 8
CLI 02-28.
What's left for -- what you would argue we 9
can admit in light of 02-28.
10 MS.
CURRAN:
Well, I think the first thing 11 that is important to point out, that it is not correct 12 that NUREG/CR-6427 is just a Level 2 analysis.
And 13 I'd like to point to two places in that document in 14 which Level 1 issues -- significant Level 1 issues are 15 discussed.
16 CHAIR YOUNG:
You can do that, but I 17 would, again, ask you to focus on CLI 02-28, because 18 the Commission does make some statements about station 19 blackout in that.
And I think that we are bound by 20 that.
21
- Now, I think there is some distinction 22 drawn between the original contention and amended 23 contentions.
But I'm not sure that --
if you're 24 disagreeing with CLI 02-28, if that's the impact of 25 what you're doing, I'm not sure that we have the --
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well, I don't think we do have the authority to take 2
that up.
3 MS. CURRAN: Judge Young, just to clarify 4
for me, what --
I see a number of statements by the 5
Commission here that our original contention didn't 6
address the issue of SBO frequency.
But is there 7
something else more pointed that you're referring to?
8 Can you give me the page citation?
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
Let's see.
Well, in the 10 very end, the Commission said --
makes --
says that 11 CLI 02-17 did characterize the Sandia study 12 inaccurately --
a characterization we clarify above.
13 And then looking up at the beginning of CLI 02-28 --
14 MS. CURRAN:
Are you referring to the 15 statement on page 3 that the Sandia study applied or 16 incorporated long-available published data on station 17 blackout frequencies, and that the Sandia study 18 didn't --
19 CHAIR YOUNG:
All right.
Lower in that 20 paragraph.
"As the NRC Staff said" --
"Thus, as the 21 NRC Staff says, the Sandia study itself included no 22 new analyses and made no findings regarding core 23 damage frequency or station blackout.
It simply 24 assumed that core damage would occur at the frequency 25 predicted in each ice condenser.
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"Licensee's individual plan examination 2
focused on containment failure probabilities, which 3
were calculated through a simplified containment event 4
tree, similar to that used in a Level 2 PRA. We agree 5
with the staff's characterization."
6
- Now, Judge Kelber also points us to 7
page 11, and there the Commission says that you 8
clearly could have raised a specific claim about 9
station blackout frequency in your original 10 contention.
11 Now, they do say next --
indeed, they now 12 do make various such claims.
But these station 13 blackout frequency related arguments are not new.
14 They were not part of the original contention.
15 JUDGE KELBER:
They are new, though.
16 CHAIR YOUNG:
Are new.
17 MS. CURRAN:
Right.
18 CHAIR YOUNG:
They were not part of the 19 original contention.
20 I think I understand Duke at one point to 21 be saying that if something was not in the scope of 22 the original contention, then it cannot be part of the 23 scope of the amended contention.
And so if I'm 24 misquoting or mischaracterizing Duke's argument, 25 correct me.
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But, therefore, continuing - -paraphrasing 2
Duke's argument, if station blackout was not within 3
the scope of the original contention, it cannot be 4
within the scope of the amended contention, such that 5
it would relieve you of the requirement to have raised 6
the issue earlier, because what's in -
to the extent 7
that we find that - -
for example, if we were to find 8
that you were justified in not believing you had to 9
file an amended contention, that that excuses any 10 lateness in your filing of amended contention 2.
11 That excusing would be relevant only to 12 those things that were arguably within the scope of 13 the original contention, because your assuming that 14 you didn't have to file an amended contention meant 15 that it would have been brought within the scope of 16 the original one.
17 So if it was not --
if station blackout 18 frequency was not within the scope of the original 19 contention, I think Duke is arguing then it can't be 20 part of the amended contention.
And that's sort of 21 what I'd like for you to address, in light of the 22 statements on that in CLI 02-28.
23 Now, Duke is not saying anything, so I'm 24 assuming I'm not far off the mark in characterizing 25 that part of your argument, right?
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MR. REPKA:
That's certainly one of our 2
arguments.
3 CHAIR YOUNG:- Right.-
4 MS.
CURRAN:
- Well, the scope of the 5
original contention --
it was general in nature, that 6
Duke had not considered information in NUREG-64270-7 And I think what this question gets around to is, 8
then, what is the scope of NUREG/CR-6427, since the 9
contention itself was so general as admitted that that 10 was all it said.
So --
11 CHAIR YOUNG: The problem here, though, is 12 any arguments you make about the scope of 6427 also 13 have to be in light of the Commission's decision in 14 CLI 02-28, because the Commission spoke on that. And 15 so in order to help us consider what we can do, I'd 16 like for you to focus on how we can do it in light of 17 how the Commission has read NUREG/CR-6427, and spoken 18 on the scope of the original contention as well.
19 JUDGE KELBER:
While you look at it, let 20 me trace the historical --
and it's getting to be 21 historical --
precedence on this.
We originally 22 consolidated a couple of contentions of BREDL and 23 NIRS.
And then we wrote, "Fails to include 24 information from NUREG-6427."
And the Commission 25 accepted the Board's formulation of the consolidated NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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contention, and they say so in CLI 02-17, and they say 2
it very clearly.
3 Then, they go on to say, in 28, that 4
basically --
and I won't rehash what I said earlier~-
5 that this contention was one of omission, and not 6
specific deficiencies in the way the study was used.
7 And they are fairly clear on this, to the point of 8
giving the Board a little kick.
9 So I think with what Judge Young said, and 10 with that kind of a perspective, where do we go from 11 here?
12 CHAIR YOUNG:
And I'm going to interject 13 right here.
Judge Kelber pointed out, and I was 14 thinking this earlier myself, we obviously have taken 15 a long time on this one contention and Dr. Lyman has 16 to leave soon. Many of these issues that we've been 17 looking at are broad issues that apply to all of the 18 contentions, but I still think it might be good for us 19 to start wrapping up on contention 5 in the general 20 issues so that we can move on.
21 Would it be helpful to take a three minute 22 break at this point and then come back and sort of 23 wrap up on that and then move on, or would you rather 24 take full advantage of Dr. Lyman's presence when we'Ire 25 all together?
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MS. CURRAN:
I'Id rather take advantage of 2
Dr. Lyman's presence and respond to the question.
3 I think certainly it's clearly that 4
NUREG/CR-6427 is essentially a Level 2 analysis and I 5
think that's what the Commission is saying in CLI02-6 28, but it's also important to recognize that it's not 7
that --
it's not quite that simple in the sense that 8
there are Level 1 elements that come into NUREG/CR-9 6427 and that are important to consider. And I would 10 like to point those out on the record.
11 One is at page 52 in Table 4.9 where the 12 NUREG addresses the probability of depressurization.
13 Now that is - -
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
What page?
15 MS. CURRAN:
Page 52, Table 4.9 and I 16 wonder if I could just have Dr. Lyman address this, 17 because he's familiar with the technical issue?
18 DR. LYMAN:
This isn't the only current 19 information that's relevant to the outcome.
This 20 NUREG/CR-6427 does not only address station blackout, 21 in fact, what it says about other initiators, other 22 than station blackout are relevant to the ultimate 23 cost benefit analysis associated with mitigating 24 station blackouts.
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broader than the original specification.
2 One example is is the probability of 3
contentional depressurization which is not relevant 4
for station blackout but for other initiators.
The 5
document clearly states that Level 1 analysis is 6
relevant for determining whether this occurs for those 7
other initiators.
8 There are other examples. That's only one 9
of them where Level 1 is explicitly announced, 10 discussed.
11 Unintentional or depressurization that 12 occurs as a consequence of the accident is also an 13 important factor in evaluating the containment failure 14 probability and we believe that that involves Level 1 15 elements as well.
So I've gone on the record before 16 as saying that it simply is not technically 17 appropriate to pull out the Level 2 conditional 18 containment failure probabilities from one analysis 19 and stick them into another without evaluating the 20 entire chain of events and --
21 JUDGE KELBER:
Could you repeat that, 22 please?
23 DR.
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stick them into their own analysis and say that they 2
fully addressed this NUREG, NUREG/CR-6427.
3 As it states on page 29, the best way --
4 this is at the very top of page 29, the best way to--
5 address the integration needs and here integration 6
means integration of all the different aspects of this 7
phenomenon is through detailed and credible Level 1 8
and Level 2 probabilistic analyses specific to each 9
individual plant.
10 So again we feel that militates toward an 11 integrated approach and not simply to starting Level 12 1 analysis in the consideration of how you take into 13 account this document.
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
Why don't you try to wrap up 15 your argument in the next five minutes or so?
16 We've taken an awful lot of your time, we 17 recognize that.
18 (Pause.)
19 MS.
CURRAN:
I think we've said 20 everything, probably several times.
21 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
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those references are and I'm not particularly taking 2
their face value so if you have an opportunity to look 3
at them, I'd be happy to later on, after the break or 4
whenever when it's convenient to respond to it.
5 MS. CURRAN:
Okay.
Sure.
6 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
It's on the bottom of 7
page 20 in their February 7th document.
8 CHAIR YOUNG: Okay, we'll move on to Duke 9
now and I'd just like to raise one sort of general 10 question to ask you to focus on.
A couple of things 11 in the Commission's order that paralleled the 12 discussion I just had with Ms. Curran and that is on 13 page 12, at the bottom of the page, the Commission 14 said the Intervenor's original contention in this case 15 simply cannot be understood as specifically 16 challenging Duke's SBO frequency figures. On page 14 17 at the end of the paragraph that begins on page 13, 18 the Commission says the appropriate vehicle for the 19 Intervenors new challenge was an amended contention.
20 And so the Commission does seem to be 21 drawing a distinction between things that were part of 22 the original contention and things that the 23 Intervenors could raise in an amended contention 24 regarding specific new challenges to the way in which 25 you and the staff and the EIS also addressed NUREG/CR-NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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6427.
2 MR. REPKA:
Okay, I understand.
What I 3
would like to do is come back to that issue. I would 4
like to start with the issue of the uncertainty 5
analysis and the proposed amended contention 5. And 6
then come back to the issue of station blackout 7
frequency because I think that's a little bit of an 8
overriding or a recurring issue and perhaps it's most 9
directly raised in proposed amended contention 3. But 10 I have a note of your question and hopefully I won't 11 forget it.
12 CHAIR YOUNG:
Right.
13 MR.
REPKA:
With respect to amended 14 contention 5, we essentially have three reasons why 15 this proposed amended contention should not be 16 admitted. First, it really is seeking relief that is 17 beyond the scope of the proceeding, a license renewal 18 proceeding at this point.
19 Second, it's an untimely issue.
It's an 20 issue that could have been raised in the original 21 proposed contentions based upon the publicly available 22 information as of November 2001.
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filed.
2 So starting with the first of those 3
arguments --
4 CHAIR YOUNG:
Just to interrupt, with 5
regard to the first of those arguments, I read what 6
the Intervenors are seeking as being --
let's see, 7
looking here, a fuller, more thorough analysis of the 8
issues in order to fulfill the purposes of NEPA in 9
their February 7, 2003 filing, specifically --
- well, 10 in several places, but I'm looking at page 8 right 11 now.
12 So if you could focus there when you're 13 talking about relief on that because that is what I 14 read, at least, in large part if not all of their --
15 the relief they're seeking to be.
16 MR.
REPKA:
I agree with that 17 characterization.
The relief they're seeking under 18 this contention is, I believe, Dr. Lyman referred to 19 it as a full-blown uncertainty analysis and I believe 20 Ms. Curran has stated numerous times that she believes 21 that's driven by NEPA.
22 Let me start by saying that the arguments 23 of the Intervenors on the proposed contention at this 24 point really seem to ignore the fundamental of the 25 SEIS.
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that's available in the license renewal proceeding.
2 In the SEIS, the staff, based upon various analysis of 3
the scenarios of NUREG 6427 has concluded that there's 4
a range of possible cost benefit calculations for 5
SAMA, to address that scenario and have concluded that 6
there is at least a potential cost beneficial SAMA and 7
therefore have referred the matter to GSI-189 for 8
resolution.
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
Let me stop you right there 10 because here's the disconnect that I'm seeing between 11 what you just acknowledged about what the Intervenors 12 were seeking and how you characterized what the staff 13 did in the SEIS.
14 Are you saying that the Intervenors cannot 15 seek a more thorough and complete analysis than the 16 staff has done in the SEIS?
Because I see you looking 17 at what the staff has done as being sort of a bottom 18 line look, rather than a look at the thoroughness of 19 the analysis.
20 MR. REPKA: Yes. Given the result of the 21 staff's analysis, there is no need for any further, 22 more thorough analysis.
The staff has already made 23 the --
24 CHAIR YOUNG:
Forget whether there's a 25 need.
Can --
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cannot challenge the thoroughness of the analysis, 2
whether or not you think there's a need or whether or 3
not you think that it's thorough enough, are you 4
saying that they cannot challenge the thoroughness of 5
the analysis of the EIS?
6 MR. REPKA:
Given the conclusion of the 7
- SEIS, they cannot challenge that conclusion any 8
further.
It would be of no --
there would be no 9
further relief that could be granted in this 10 proceeding.
11 This is a license renewal proceeding. The 12 object of the license renewal SAMA review is to 13 fulfill and look at issues that are relevant to 14 license renewal.
15 The NRC in its part 51 license renewal 16 rule has already looked at the environmental 17 consequences of beyond design basis or severe 18 accidents. That conclusion is documented in Table B1 19 of part 51. The conclusion was that the environmental 20 consequences are small.
21 However, for a subset of plants, including 22 McGuire and Catawba where the issue of potential SAMAs 23 to further reduce those consequences had not been 24 looked at in an EIS, the Commission said that that 25 would be a Category 2 environmental issue and some NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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further look would be required.
That, in fact, has 2
been done.
The relevant inquiry for NEPA, the hard 3
- look, has been accomplished through the General 4
Environmental Impact Statement, the conclusion in part 5
51, the Table Bi and in the SEIs that staff has 6
already prepared.
7 So there has been a thorough ventilation 8
of the issue that's relevant to license renewal.
9 CHAIR YOUNG: That's a conclusion.-_ Can't 10 they challenge your conclusion that it's thorough 11 enough? Cannot they challenge that?
12 MR. REPKA: There is a requirement for the 13 admissability of the contention that says the 14 contention will not be admitted if it would be of no 15 consequence in a proceeding.
And in this case that 16 further analysis would be of no further consequence in 17 this proceeding because the staff has done the very 18 thing that the Intervenors want and the most that they 19 can get in a license renewal proceeding.
If you 20 determine that a potential SAMA to address the 21 scenario may be cost beneficial, therefore, it's being 22 addressed --
they've determined that it does not 23 involve any aging management issue, any equipment 24 aging issue within the scope of part 54, therefore 25 it's a part 50 current licensing basis issue.
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Therefore, it's being addressed through the standard, 2
NRC part 50 regulatory processes.
3 CHAIR YOUNG:- Now they've challenged your 4
take on whether the environmental part of the license 5
renewal proceeding is limited to aging questions in 6
their reply.
So if you could address that al-so.
7 MR. REPKA:
Let me address again and this 8
is cited in our various papers that we have filed.
9 The Statement of Considerations for the NRC's final-10 rule on license renewal part 54, published on May 8, 11 1995, Federal Register, Vol 60 at page 22463, the 12 Commission explains its regulatory philosophy for 13 license renewal.
14 I quote at this point, "given the 15 Commission's ongoing obligation to oversee the safety 16 and security of operating reactors, issues that are 17 relevant to current plant operations will be addressed 18 by the existing regulatory process within the present 19 license term, rather than defer it until the time of 20 license renewal.
Consequently, the Commission 21 formulated two principles of license renewal.
The 22 first principle of license renewal was that with the 23 exception of age related degradation unique to license 24 renewal and possibly a few other issues related to 25 safety only during the period of extended operation of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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nuclear power plants, the regulatory process is 2
adequate to ensure that the licensing bases of all 3
currently operating plants provides and maintains an 4
acceptable level of safety so that operation will not 5
be inimical to public health and safety or common 6
defense and security."l 7
That's the fundamental license renewal 8
principle.
There can be no challenge to say that in 9
a license renewal proceeding you need to look at 10 issues beyond equipment aging or age-related 11 degradation that's unique to the period of extended 12 operation. This issue of whether or not there will be 13 a change to the current licensing basis to back up 14 power to the hydrogen igniters is clearly not unique 15 to the period of extended operation and there's been 16 no assertion by the Intervenors otherwise.
17 CHAIR YOUNG:
Would any SAMA be -- what 18 kind of severe accident mitigation alternative 19 analysis would not be within the current licensing 20 basis? Because I think I understood the staff at one 21 point.
I went back and read some things yesterday, 22 and I think I remember at one point the staff said 23 that the fact that something is part of current 24 licensing basis does not necessarily take it out of 25 the license renewal proceeding if it's relevant to a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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severe accident mitigation alternative analysis.
2 And there seems to be some leeway there 3
that is not altogether clear among all the parties, 4
including the staff.
And so what kind of SAMA-would 5
not be part of CLB?
6 MR.
REPKA:
That's an issue we've 7
discussed internally and the example we came up with 8
was one of hypothetical aging of the expansion valves 9
for the condenser.
If we had done a SAMA review and 10 found that there were some vulnerabilities to that 11 particular equipment due to aging, then the question 12 would be is that something that's an aging issue 13 related to part 54 and does it need to be resolved in 14 the context of license renewal?
15 That was just one example that we came up 16 with where equipment aging would affect the evaluation 17 of SAMA, that is, it is directly involved in the 18 scenarios being analyzed, a concern in the SAMA in the 19 environmental evaluation.
20 CHAIR YOUNG:
So you're saying that that's 21 a limitation on the environmental part of the license 22 renewal inquiry that's not specifically stated in 23 Section 5195 or the appendix that lays out all the 24 environmental issues?
25 MR.
REPKA:
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part 54 in the scope of license renewal. With respect 2
to part 51 it defines a SAMA evaluation that needs to 3
be done for license renewal. That SAMA evaluation is 4
necessarily limited by the scope of the licensing 5
action at issue which is the part 54 licensing action.
6 One can't say through a SAMA evaluation 7
under part 51 for license renewal that I am now going 8
to look at all the issues related to the current 9
licensing basis of the plant.
That would turn on its 10 head the Commission's first principle of license 11 renewal.
So a SAMA evaluation is a focused inquiry, 12 a severe accident vulnerabilities.
It's in addition 13 to the fact that the NRC in the table has already made 14 a generic determination based upon the GEIS for 15 license renewal, the generic environmental impact 16 statement, that the environmental consequences of 17 severe beyond design basis accidents are small.
18 So the determination, the relevant 19 licensing issue here is a narrow one and the scope of 20 the SAMA evaluation, the scope of the NEPA look is 21 necessarily limited.
22 JUDGE KELBER: Let me attempt to rephrase 23 what you've said and see if you agree with it.
What 24 you're saying is that as a result of the SEIS, there's 25 been a thorough ventilation of the issues and if one NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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were presented with a further detailed uncertainty 2
analysis it wouldn't change things?
3 MR.
REPKA:
It would not change the SEIS, 4
that's correct.
5 Now the next question becomes is what is 6
the NRC going to do with respect to the part 50 7
current licensing basis.
That's the issue that's 8
being analyzed in Generic Issue 189.
In the --
9 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
And excuse me.
Any 10 action that would be forthcoming from the conclusion 11 of Generic Issue 189 it would also be open to a public 12 discussion based on the licensing action.
13 MR.
REPKA:
That's correct.
That's 14 exactly what the Commission is referring to in the 15 quote I
just read about its part 50 licensing 16 processes and they would be sufficient to address the 17 current licensing basis issues.
18 CHAIR YOUNG:
What about the open ended 19 aspect of GSI 189?
20 MR.
REPKA:
The timeliness in the time 21 frame for GSI 189 is not an issue relevant to license 22 renewal.
The complaint that there is no schedule is 23 a complaint that's not to be heard in this forum.
24 That should be registered with the NRC, with the 25 technical staff, with the EDO, through a petition for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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rulemaking.
Those are part 50 issues.
2 CHAIR YOUNG:
Well, separate and apart 3
from your argument that their current licensing basis 4
and therefore not part of the aging management 5
- analysis, the case law on looking at whether a 6
contemporaneous rulemaking or other staff procedure 7
will allow a licensing board to sort of defer to that 8
other parallel procedure, I think the case law on that 9
and we've discussed this before, talks about whether 10 there are any expected delays, whether it's expected 11 to go forward in a timely manner.
12 What I hear you saying is that that 13 doesn't really matter in this situation because you're 14 reading the aging management analysis to sort of be an 15 overlay over the part 51 environmental parts of the 16 license renewal.
17 MR. REPKA:
That's correct.
The line of 18 cases you refer to is the long standing line of cases 19 that the NRC won't address in a hearing an issue 20 that's addressed generically through a rule making.
21 CHAIR YOUNG:
Right.
22 MR. REPKA: That would be a part 50 hearing and 23 a part 50 rulemaking issue and in
- fact, the 24 Commission, in general, won't look at those in the 25 licensing process, but as you say there perhaps may be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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a qualifier on that.
2 CHAIR YOUNG:
Right.
3 MR. REPKA: That doesn't apply here since 4
this is different.
This is a part 54 proceeding on 5
license renewal issues which are necessarily limited 6
in scope and not a hearing on part 50 issues.
So as 7
you characterize it as an overlay, I think is exactly 8
correct.
9 One can't look at the decisions here other 10 than through the lens of what the licensing action at 11 issue is and that includes the NEPA issues as well.
12 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
In a positive sense, 13 one can give an accolade to the Intervenors for 14 raising this issue which has bearings on the current 15 licensing basis for the ice condenser plants bringing 16 it to the Commission's attention again in terms of 17 awareness of what's going on in Generic Issue 189 and 18 subsequently you're offering them an opportunity to 19 participate in the process when one comes around to 20 correcting or modifying, if there's no correction 21 needed.
22 MR. REPKA: And I would add to that, Mr.
23 Travers',
the Executive Director for Operations, 24 letter to the ACRS on January 14, 2003 on GSI 189 25 includes a
statement regarding the ACRS' NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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recommendation, but I think it's the same as Dr.
2 Lyman's.
He responds, "as you are aware, the NRC 3
staff has long recognized the treatment of uncertainty 4
is an important element in regulatory decisions and as 5
such, it has long been an integral consideration in 6
NRC's policy and guidance documents overseeing 7
regulatory analyses." It goes on and the implication 8
of the letter is that uncertainty is something that 9
not only will, but necessarily must be raised in the 10 context of resolving GSI 189 issue and whether any 11 backups will be required.
12 CHAIR YOUNG: Just, I want to get further 13 nail down this little analytical circle that we're 14 in.
what the Intervenors say about the issue we've 15 been discussing is that under NEPA there's an 16 obligation to consider new and significant information 17 and their argument, as I understand it, and Ms.
18 Curran, with regard to that, correct me if I'm wrong, 19 but their argument, as I understand it is that since 20 the EIS is required to consider new and significant 21 information, and since the process is directed to a 22 thorough consideration of all the issues sufficient to 23 and I think you even described it somewhere as 24 sufficient to make a reasoned decision.
25 MR. REPKA:
On license renewal.
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CHAIR YOUNG:
Right.
But hold on, let me 2
finish my thought, let me finish my thought here.
3 Their view is that these issues come in under new and 4
significant information that must be addressed in the 5
EIS, sufficiently and thoroughly enough to enable a 6
reasoned decision.
7 What you're saying is that to the degree 8
that GSI 189 takes the issue out of the license 9
renewal proceeding, the need for that thorough 10 analysis that would enable a reasoned decision is 11 taken out of the EIS NEPA part of the license renewal 12 analysis and put into the part 50 analysis.
And I 13 think that their argument is well, but hold on, you're 14 still supposed to do the consideration of the new and 15 significant information in the EIS territory at a 16 level sufficient to enable a reasoned decision there.
17 And so from their point of view, they're saying well, 18 you're wanting to take it out and put it over here in 19 part 50 and let GSI 189 take care of it, but there's 20 no assurance just as the case law looks at whether 21 there's delay or whether there's an end point in 22 sight, they're asking us to look at whether there's 23 any assurance that it will be dealt with there and 24 that there's some responsibility to deal with it in 25 the EIS itself and therefore they can challenge the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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thoroughness of the EIS.
2 And that's a point that I'm not clear 3
where you stand because you see what I'm saying about 4
5 MR.
REPKA:
First and foremost, the 6
analysis has been done. The environmental analysis of 7
new and significant information or of SAMA's, more 8
pointedly, has been accomplished.
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
But then that gets us back 10 into the circle because there you're saying that's a 11 conclusion and that gets us back to the question well, 12 cannot they challenge the thoroughness and sufficiency 13 with which it's been done and then that's where you're 14 out is that's irrelevant because there's no relief.
15 There's no --
it's of no consequence because the 16 relief is going to be taken care of in part 50.
But 17 you're defining it that way in a sense.
18 MR.
REPKA:
- Well, as with any 19 environmental analysis, it's defined by the scope of 20 the licensing action at issue.
The scope of the 21 project.
And the scope of the licensing action at 22 issue here is license renewal.
It's not continued 23 plant operation.
It's not part 50 COB changes.
24 CHAIR YOUNG:
What if there were no GSI 25 189?
Would you say then that they could challenge NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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this in this proceeding?
2 MR. REPKA:
If the determination had been 3
that this issue is --
there is no cost beneficial to 4
SAMA.
That's a conclusion that could have been 5
challenged had there been some basis and specificity 6
to a challenge.
There's a second answer to your 7
earlier question which is a new and significant 8
information. Even as late as today, there has been no 9
showing that there is a significant issue here.- Theo --
10 ranges of averted risk or the benefit, the averted 11 risk benefit is not anywhere in a range that would 12 suggest that this is a significant safety issue.
13 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: What is the context of 14 what we've just been discussing on the original basis 15 for the original contention which was a contention of 16 omission?
And have we not gone somewhat afield in 17 this?
18 MR. REPKA: The contention of omission has 19 been satisfied.
20 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
And addressed by the 21 Committee.
22 MR. REPKA:
Correct.
23 CHAIR YOUNG:
But back to just wrap this 24 up, your answer to my question was if it was found 25 that there was no cost beneficial SAMA, and there was NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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no 189, maybe, but what if the conclusion was that 2
there might be a cost beneficial SAMA and there were 3
no GSI 189, could the Intervenors then challenge the 4
analysis that led to the conclusion that there might 5
be a cost beneficial SAMA?
6 MR. REPKA:
Yes, that's what they did 7
initially.
8 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
However, with the 9
history of the original contention, the consolidated 10 contention, would that be true?
11 CHAIR YOUNG:
What I'm trying to get at is 12 more of a --
13 JUDGE KELBER:
Excuse me. I think what he 14 said --
he said they did that initially.
Is that 15 correct?
16 MR. REPKA:
Correct.
17 CHAIR YOUNG:
What I'm trying to just 18 understand for my own benefit is let's assume there's 19 no GSI 189.
Let's assume that the staff said there 20 might be a cost beneficial SAMA that could be put in 21 place here with the hydrogen igniters.
And you're 22 saying
- well, they could challenge that.
The 23 Intervenors could challenge that, the thoroughness of 24 the analysis with which the staff reached that 25 conclusion.
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resolve the issue?
2 And so my question at this point, we know 3
it is out there. If it weren't out there I understand 4
you to be saying they could challenge the analysis.
5 MR. REPKA:
They could challenge it --
6 CHAIR YOUNG:
And --
hold on, Mr. Repka.
7 Doesn't that get us back to an analysis as is done in 8
the case law of how timely that GSI 189 process is 9
going to be in terms of resolving the issue? And if 10 it doesn't, are you saying that we should not even 11 consider the --
in light of all this case law, we 12 should not even consider the likelihood or timeliness 13 with which we can expect a GSI 189 will be resolved?
14 MR. REPKA:
You should not consider the 15 timeliness of GSI 189.
16 CHAIR YOUNG: Why not?
17 MR. REPKA:
That's not an issue relevant 18 here because that goes to the part 50 COB change 19 issue.
That's not the license renewal issue before-20 us.
21 The license renewal issue before us is is 22 there any SAMA related to equipment aging?
Is there 23 any cost beneficial SAMA and then if so, does it 24 relate to equipment aging that needs to be resolved in 25 part 54?
That question has been answered that yes, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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there's a cost beneficial SAMA.
It's not related to 2
equipment aging, therefore it's addressed in part 50.
3 It's now outside the scope of the license renewal 4
review.
5 CHAIR YOUNG:
But you said if the staff 6
had said there might be a cost beneficial SAMA and 7
there were no GSI 189, that the Intervenors could 8
challenge the adequacy of the staff's analysis.
9 So the question is --
right?
Didn't you 10 say that?
11 MR.
REPKA:
What I want to say, I don't 12 know what I said, but I want to say is they could 13 challenge the analysis with respect to the conclusion 14 that relates to license renewal. Even in that context 15 you still can't in a part 54 context go into a full 16 part 50 COB analysis. The relevant issue that can be 17 challenged is had it occurred, what had been --
has 18 the staff made a correct determination on a SAMA and 19 if not, the ultimate relief can still only be to refer 20 that issue to part 50.
21 We don't, in this forum, ever get into a 22 rulemaking.
This is not a forum for a potential 23 rulemaking.
24 CHAIR YOUNG: Right. But what I'm trying 25 to get you to address is if 189 were not there, could NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1286 not the Intervenors challenge the thoroughness and adequacy of the staff's analysis? I thought you said they could earlier.
MR. REPKA:
They did.
They did in the initial Contention 2.
CHAIR YOUNG:
And you're saying they cannot do it now?
Even if there were no 189 out there?
MR. REPKA:
Because the maximum relief available in this forum has been given.
So that --
CHAIR YOUNG:
Even if there were no 189 out there because the maximum relief here depends on there being no 189.
MR. REPKA:
If there were no 189 because it would still be a rulemaking part 50 issue and their avenue to address that would be to petition for rulemaking through the part 50 process.
JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: The finding of the SAMA being cost beneficial would have to be acted upon by the Commission.
MR. REPKA:
In some way.
JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Yes.
MR.
REPKA: But ultimately it's a part 50 COB issue, not a license renewal issue.
CHAIR YOUNG:
So you're saying the only NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SAMAs that any Intervenor could challenge the 2
thoroughness of the analysis on would be ones that 3
were tied to aging management issues, particular parts 4
that were subject to aging?
Correct?
5 MR. REPKA:
With respect to the relief 6
that would be true.
With respect to seeking further 7
relief.
In part 54, license renewal space, it would 8
have to relate to equipment aging, something unique to 9
the period of extended operations.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
So there's no room for 11 challenging the adequacy of the analysis in the EIS 12 itself?
13 JUDGE KELBER: Provided that the relief is 14 given.
15 MR. REPKA:
The question is what's the 16 outcome of the analysis.
17 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: And the Committee has 18 characterized the nature of the original contention 19 from which the amended contention is derived from.
20 MR. REPKA:
That's correct.
21 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
They said it's not a 22 matter of defined issues within it, but only a matter 23 of omission.
24 MR. REPKA:
But the fact remains the 25 fundamental principle of license renewal is that which NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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I read earlier and no amount of arguing can change the 2
fact that that's still the fundamental principle, that 3
there's an issue for part 54 and there are different 4
issues for part 50 and this issue of early containment 5
of failure and a station blackout event has moved 6
beyond part 54. There's no further relief that can be 7
given in this part 54 proceeding.
8 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Am I reading CLI 02-28 9
at 13 wrong when the Commission says the Intervenors' 10 original contention in this case complained that the 11 Sandia study's omission not specific deficiencies in 12 the way the study was used?
13 MR. REPKA:
That's true both because in 14 the sense that that's exactly what the Commission said 15 and second because that's exactly what the contention 16 was.
It was a contention of omission.
17 JUDGE KELBER:
Getting back to Judge 18 Young's concern and I believe I understand the 19 concern, let me summarize.
20 If in a license renewal proceeding, it is 21 found that a particular severe accident mitigation 22 alternative may be cost beneficial, then --
and it 23 does not relate to aging management, then the 24 Petitioners, in this case, the Intervenors have, as 25 recourse, a petition for rulemaking to the Commission NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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based on the finding in the license renewal 2
proceeding.
Is that not --
does that summarize?
3 MR. REPKA:
That would be true if the 4
staff had not done it themselves.
5 JUDGE KELBER:
I understand that. And so 6
if, in fact, time passes and nothing has happened, 7
they could still petition.
Is that not correct?
8 MR. REPKA:
That's true.
9 JUDGE KELBER:
And with this EIS, this 10 petition would have a rather powerful backing, would 11 it not?
12 MR. REPKA:
It would certainly raise an 13 issue that would have to be looked at is what the ACRS 14 and the staff have already concluded.
15 CHAIR YOUNG: Okay, and my final thing on 16 this, so you're saying that in that circumstance, the 17 fact that there's an EIS based on the major federal 18 action of the license renewal application, that 19 there's no independent requirement that the EIS be 20 thorough and provide a basis for informed decision 21 making on its own and the Intervenors cannot challenge 22 the adequacy or thoroughness of the analysis in the 23 EIS itself.
That's your argument?
24 MR.
REPKA:
No, that's not what I'm 25 arguing.
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CHAIR YOUNG:
That's the impact.
2 MR. REPKA:
No, that's not the impact.
3 There has been --
there is a required environmental 4
impact statement for license renewal.
There's a 5
generic environmental impact statement for license 6
renewal and there's the supplemental environmental 7
impact statement.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
Right.
9 MR. REPKA:
For license renewal.
Those 10 two documents thoroughly look at all the relevant 11 issues related to license renewal.
12 CHAIR YOUNG: That's conclusion and again 13 we get back to can they not challenge that, that how 14 well that's done and that's the bottom line and I keep 15 hearing you say no, they can't, if it involves 16 something that is not identifiable as aging related.
17 And if you're not saying that, I'm not hearing the 18 distinction.
19 MR.
REPKA:
I'm not saying that.
20 Certainly, anything in a generic environmental impact 21 statement is not subject to challenge in this forum.
22
- However, anything that led to the supplemental 23 environmental impact statement could be subject to 24 challenge and in fact, was subject to challenge here.
25 There has been a full evaluation of that issue.
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I know you believe that's a conclusion, but that 2
conclusion could be challenged.
The problem here is 3
for the Intervenors is the maximum relief has been 4
granted.
The conclusion has come out in their favor 5
and therefore, a part 50 issue is being looked at.
6 CHAIR YOUNG: But what if they say, which 7
I think I understand them to be saying that even 8
though it comes out in their favor, it doesn't come 9
out strongly enough in their favor and they would 10 prefer to have a more thorough, more detailed analysis 11 such that whatever happens after this point would have 12 a better analysis for purposes of having a reasoned 13 decision down the line.
14 MR. REPKA: That's an unnecessary academic 15 exercise that's not driven by NEPA and it's not 16 required to meet the NEPA hard look and simply isn't 17 available. If they would like to have that discussion 18 of uncertainties or any other issues related to the 19 SAMA addressed in Contention 2, the place to have that 20 discussion is in the context of GSI 189, not here.
21 JUDGE RU3ENSTEIN:
Let me expand.
Given 22 the publication of the final SEIS, a new contention 23 which would not be derived from it would have to have 24 a basis for being late filed, meet all the appropriate 25 criteria of 2.714, be within the scope of a license NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 4
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1292 renewal hearing, and need not be related to the original or Board consolidated contention, but it must deal with soundly based defects in the new data or the analysis and that new data should be found either in the RAI responses or preferably in the final SEIS.
And when I look at 2 through 8, those are the kinds of standards which I look at on the subparts.
MR. REPKA: And I would add one more.
It would have to meet 2.714(d) and with a demonstration that it would be of some further consequence with respect to license renewal.
JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
That's a given.
CHAIR YOUNG:
Do you have any more on subpart 5?
MR. REPKA:
On uncertainty, that's all I had, but I wanted to address the timeliness issue.
CHAIR YOUNG:
Go ahead.
MR. REPKA:
And then I wanted to turn to station blackout frequency.
MS. CURRAN:
Judge Young, I wonder if we could have a two or three minute break at some point.
It's just been a while.
CHAIR YOUNG: Why don't we let Duke finish their argument on subpart 5. Do you think it might take too long?
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JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Give us an estimation 2
of how much you want to dwell on it if the Board is 3
quiet?
4 (Laughter.)
5 That was a joke.
6 CHAIR YOUNG: Say we've given them five so 7
far.
That would give them 10 more.
Do you think 8
you'll take up the whole 10?
9 MR. REPKA:
I think with questions, we 10 probably will.
11 CHAIR YOUNG:
Can you wait 10 minutes?
12 MS. CURRAN:
Yes.
13 MR. REPKA:
So that's a proceed?
With 14 respect to the timeliness of the uncertainty issue, 15 amended Contention 5, as with all the amended 16 contentions, the appropriate benchmark for comparison 17 is what was available in November 2001 when the 18 initial contentions were submitted.
The claim is 19 being made that there wasn't sufficient information 20 available to make an argument to frame a contention on 21 uncertainty and we simply disagree with that.
22 The fact of the matter is there was 23 substantial information available. Ms. Curran handed 24 out the PRA summary report for Rev. 5 of the McGuire 25 PRA this morning. That's a substantial document, two NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 3
4 S
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 inches thick, double sided.
In addition, she handed out the letter documenting changes in Rev. 2(b) of the Catawba PRA.
That letter references the PRA summary report for Catawba Revision 2.
That document was also on the docket long before November 2001 with substantial information on the PRA.
The particular issue of uncertainty, as with many of the issues could easily have been framed based upon the PRA information that was available.
The uncertainty is addressed, for example, in the McGuire PRA summary report.
Ms. Curran referred to it there herself.
If there were some concern that the uncertainty analysis was insufficient, certainly that could have been articulated at that time.
In addition,, that concern and I think Judge Rubenstein said it earlier, is one that really relates to all of the SAMAs, all of the SAMA methodology.
It's not in any way limited to the SAMA of concern related to NUREG/CR-6427.
So clearly, could have been raised at that time.
Uncertainty is addressed, the specific cites were at 6-21 and I'm looking at I believe the McGuire PRA summary report, as well as the tables NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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referenced there in that section, Figure 6.1-2 and 2
Figure 6.1-3.
3 In
- addition, this describes Duke's 4
analysis of uncertainty really focusing on the Level 5
1 uncertainty analysis. At that time, there was also 6
substantial information available on Level 2
7 uncertainties in NUREG-l1S0 which was published in 8
1990.
So if there was s6me particular concern about 9
how uncertainties should have been addressed, that 10 certainly could have been framed at that time, based 11 on looking at publicly available documentation.
12 I think it's really important to come back to a 13 question the Licensing Board asked earlier in one of 14 our telephone calls that had been briefed and that's 15 the Commission's requirement, the ironclad obligation 16 that a petitioner examine the publicly available 17 information with sufficient care to frame an 18 admissible contention.
That's not a reasonable care 19 standard.
It's not a Duke care standard.
It's not a 20 qualified standard.
It's a performance standard.
21 It's an absolute standard that it is an ironclad 22 obligation to look at the public record with whatever 23 effort is necessary to find an admissible contention 24 and if you haven't succeeded in finding an admissible 25 contention, then the petitioner has failed in that NEAL R. GROSS
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obligation.
2 There are no qualifiers.
There is no 3
"it's too hard", "it's a big document", those things, 4
those considerations really don't affect that 5
standard. The duty, the burden, the obligation is on 6
the petitioner to support and admissible contention.
7 And if they fail to do that, it's nobody else's fault.
8 It's not the NRC's fault and it's certainly not the 9
Applicant's fault.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
What about their argument 11 that these issues did not take on significance until 12 they knew how you were going to address 6427?
13 MR. REPKA:
That argument confuses the 14 narrow issue with really the broader issue.
The 15 broader issue of uncertainty applies to all scenarios.
16 It could have been framed earlier.
There's --
the 17 fact that --
the fact that they didn't know how 18 uncertainties would be addressed is simply not 19 applicable because the NUREG itself talks about the 20 importance of uncertainty analysis, the NUREG-6427.
21 In addition, if that was a particular 22 concern, it could have been raised at the time the 23 original contention of omission was drafted.
The 24 contention could have said NUREG-6427, conditional 25 containment failure probabilities haven't been NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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incorporated and there's no analysis of uncertainty.
2 There is no doubt that the contention could have been 3
written that way in November of 2001.
4 The argument that we can't anticipate, 5
there was no anticipation necessary.
6 (Pause.)
7 That's all I had on the issue of 8
timeliness.
If there are no other questions.
9 I want to address the issue of station 10 blackout frequency because that keeps recurring. The 11 first point to be made about station blackout 12 frequency is it's a Level 1 number. At this point, to 13 argue about station blackout frequency in the analysis 14 of the particular SAMA of concern is just like looking 15 at uncertainties no longer necessary.
We could use 16 different station blackout frequencies. We could use 17 different station blackout contributions to core 18 damage in the Level 1 analysis.
19 However, it wouldn't lead to a better 20 result.
It would lead to no further relief in this 21 proceeding. The fact of the matter is a Level 1 issue 22 on this particular SAMA is no longer viable in light 23 of the SEIS. At this point, if some different station 24 blackout frequencies would make a rulemaking more 25 likely, would make a need for CLB changes more NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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supportable, that's an issue that's got to be 2
addressed in GSI 189.
Again, it's not an issue that 3
needs any further discussion in this proceeding.
4 Now beyond that, the second point with 5
respect to station blackout frequency is again a 6
timeliness argument.
Any challenge to the station 7
blackout frequency either in the amended contentions 8
or now is simply too late.
It certainly could have 9
been made based upon the publicly available 10 information in November of 2001.
There is specific 11 information in the PRA summary reports that were on 12 the docket on loss of off-site power frequency, on 13 diesel generator failure rates, on diesel generator 14 reliability and it would have been very easy to look 15 at station blackout frequencies based upon the 16 information that was available in the PRA summary 17 reports.
18 So arguing that this is only a summary 19 document, without actually looking at the information 20 that was in the summary document is simply something 21 that should fall on deaf ears.
That's not a 22 legitimate argument.
23 I think this morning we heard about the 24 fact that NUREG 6427 includes some information about 25 Level 1 numbers.
So what?
It's just NUREG-6427 was NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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a simplified Level 2 risk assessment.
It had to make 2
certain assumptions about Level 1 numbers.
It made 3
certain assumptions about station blackout frequency 4
based upon the Duke IPEs.
It made certain other Level 5
1 assumptions. That doesn't change the fact that the 6
NUREG was specifically a Level 2 analysis. It doesn't 7
change the fact that the NUREG doesn't provide any 8
independent Level 1 numbers, any independent basis for 9
a contention on station blackout frequency.
10 The station blackout numbers in NUREG-6427 11 don't have any more or less legitimacy than any other 12 and that's, I think, one of the fundamental 13 determinations that the Commission made in CLI 02-28.
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
One of the other things that 15 the Commission said was that on page 16, on 16 timeliness, that because of ambiguous Board statements 17 made in the course of the proceeding, including in our 18 order on contentions, and apparent widespread 19 confusion over the original contention scope, the 20 Intervenors may have had good cause to believe that 21 filing an amended contention was not was 22 unnecessary and that this goes to the timeliness of 23 their amended contention.
24 Hasn't there also been apparent widespread 25 confusion, well, isn't apparent widespread confusion NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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over the original contention scope, doesn't that 2
include apparent confusion over the -- whether station 3
blackout frequency was part of what was encompassed in 4
NUREG or CRS-6427?
5 I mean the Commission is saying when you 6
have this ambiguity and confusion that that may be a 7
reason for finding that something was not untimely 8
because of that earlier confusion. Doesn't that go to 9
the station blackout issue as well?
10 MR. REPKA:
It might go to that issue, but 11 it doesn't here and the reason why is because the 12 NUREG-6427 doesn't make any independent findings on 13 station blackout frequency.
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
But there was confusion 15 about that.
16 MR. REPKA: If there was confusion, it was 17 in the Intervenors' own minds.
18 CHAIR YOUNG: Well, hold on, hold on, hold 19 on.
It wasn't just in the Intervenors' own mind. It 20 was in some of the Board's minds.
I'll take credit 21 for my part in that. There was enough with regard to 22 our -- everyone's interpretation of CLI 02-17, was it, 23 that it prompted you to petition the Commission for 24 clarification and so there was obviously some 25 ambiguity in places other than the Intervenors' own NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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minds about how much station blackout frequency played 2
into the conclusions and the information in NUREG-3 6427.
4 MR. REPKA:
Again, under the circumstances 5
- here, any confusion really doesn't justify the 6
lateness because (a) the NUREG didn't provide any 7
independent station blackout frequency, so therefore 8
couldn't have been a basis to believe that that which 9
was the sole basis for the contention put into play an 10 issue which it had no findings contained in the 11 document.
12 CHAIR YOUNG: Well, there was a statement 13 in there talking about how important station blackout 14 frequency was.
That was one of the two major issues 15 with regard to the level of risk.
I may not be 16 stating it totally correctly but I think you get my 17 drift.
18 And so if the Intervenors thought well, 19 the NUREG-6427 makes a statement like that, obviously 20 station blackout frequency is an important part of 21 that and we've included, by raising a contention about 22 that
- NUREG, that encompasses station blackout 23 frequency. Given the level of ambiguity and apparent 24 confusion, isn't it reasonable that they wouldn't be 25 held to a higher standard than that?
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MR. REPKA:
The standard they need to be 2
held to is whether they looked at the publicly 3
available information with sufficient care to frame an 4
admissible contention and in November 2001, they could 5
have looked at available PRA information. They could 6
have looked at NUREG-6427 themselves and made a 7
determination as to the adequacy of the station 8
blackout frequencies used in the SAMA evaluations and 9
the Duke PRA.
10 Even today, we've seen no indication that 11 there's any disagreement with respect to station 12 blackout frequency. There's disagreement, but there's 13 no basis for what other station blackout frequency 14 might be used.
15 So the relevant time for looking at this 16 issue is what could have been raised in November 2001 17 and it certainly should have based upon the publicly 18 available information at that time.
19 Any confusion that ensued later was simply 20 the result of trying to backfit into the contention 21 something that wasn't properly raised earlier.
22 Not only was it not raised with 23 specificity in November 2001, it was not raised with 24 any basis.
25 And with respect to the basis on the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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station blackout frequency number, we did point out in 2
our filings that because the SAMA evaluations that 3
Duke prepared, both the original and the supplemental, 4
considered both internal and external events unlike 5
Duke, in its SAMA evaluation, actually 6
used higher station blackout contributions to core 7
damage frequency than did the NUREG.
So that just 8
simply highlights the fact that this is an issue 9
that's surrounded in confusion, but has no basis.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
You used a higher station 11 blackout frequency than the NUREG did?
I thought it 12 was lowered --
13 MR. REPKA:
No.
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
From the IPE.
15 MR. REPKA:
The Duke station blackout 16 contribution to core damage frequency in the Level 1 17 analysis is actually higher because it considers both 18 internal and external events.
19 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
But you did take into 20 account modifications to the diesel generators?
21 MR. REPKA:
That's true with respect to 22 the internal events which would be diesel generator 23 failure.
24 But when you put the two together, it's 25 higher than the Level 1 result in NUREG-6427.
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JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I would expect so.
2 MS. CURRAN:
Can I interject, just to 3
clarify something on the record? If we could look at 4
Table 5-5 on page 511 of the EIS.
I'm looking at the 5
McGuire EIS that addressed the SBO frequency numbers 6
at the bottom of that table because I think that might 7
clarify things.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
Table?
9 MS. CURRAN:
Table 5-5 on page 511.
10 MR. REPKA:
I would be happy to have Mr.
11 Brewer respond to that if that's the Board's desire.
12 CHAIR YOUNG:
Go ahead.
13 MR.
BREWER:
In the table that's 14 presented, it does show a decrease between Rev. 1 15 which was the IPE submittal and Rev. 2, but the reason 16 that the number is actually, that we used in our SAMA 17 evaluation is actually higher than the NUREG is this 18 number for Rev. 1 includes both internal and external 19 events.
So that's what we presented in this table, 20 but if you look at what the NUREG selected, it was 21 only looking at internal events, which was a lower 22 number.
And the number is actually substantially 23 lower than what we used in the SAMA analysis for 24 Catawba in like two orders of magnitude.
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used and what they had calculated.
2 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Does this answer the 3
question or do you have a point?
4 DR. LYMAN:
frequency for internal events, two orders of magnitude 6
below that?
7 MR. BREWER:
For the NUREG, the way the 8
NUREG calculated it, they had 9.6 times 10-6 for 9
McGuire and 5.8 times 10-' for Catawba.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
So the difference was made 11 by taking credit for the diesel generators?
12 MR. BREWER:
The difference between Rev.
13 1 of the PRA and Rev. 2 of the PRA is a decrease 14 caused primarily by diesel generator improvements, but 15 there are many other improvements incorporated into 16 Rev. 2 and then again we have incorporated more 17 improvements into Rev. 3.
But if you look at the 18 actual station blackout core damage frequency that was 19 presented in the NUREG, it was a lower value than 20 we've included in our original SAMA analysis and the 21 updated information that we provided through the RAIs.
22 MR. REPKA:
And that's because we've 23 considered more initiators of station blackout events 24 than did the NUREG.
25 So the point of all of that is if you used NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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a NUREG value to do a SAMA cost benefit determination, 2
if you used NUREG level 1 assumptions, level 2 failure 3
probabilities, you would actually come up with lower 4
averted risk benefits than you would if you used the 5
Duke level 1 numbers.
6 The point of raising all of this is to 7
demonstrate that with respect to station blackout 8
frequency, we have an issue that now is not only 9
untimely, it is also no longer viable because it can't 10 lead to any further relief.
But it's also one that 11 since the very beginning has been lacking basics.
12 There has never been any effort in the proposed 13 contentions, the amended contentions to present any 14 different numbers that should be used and to show why 15 the numbers that were actually used are inadequate.
16 So all of the basic applicable contention 17 admissibility criteria are not met.
18 With respect to this, I want to make sure 19 I responded to the Board's questions about the 20 Commission's language in 02-28.
Have I done that?
21 JUDGE KELBER:
I think so.
You better 22 have.
23 (Laughter.)
24 MR.
REPKA:
Well, the ones I highlighted 25 earlier was on page 12.
The Commission said the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Intervenors' original contention in this case simply 2
cannot be understood as specifically challenging 3
Duke's SBO frequency figures.
That's true.
I agree 4
with that.
5 On page 14, I underlined the appropriate 6
vehicle for the Intervenors' new challenge was an 7
amended contention.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
Yes, that's what I was 9
directing you to look at and elucidate us on in terms 10 of what the Commission was telling us.
11 MR. REPKA:
Again, that would be an 12 appropriate vehicle.
The problem here with the 13 amended contention, I believe it's contention 3, on 14 station blackout frequency is that it's not admissible 15 for the three reasons I just articulated.
One, it 16 can't lead to any further relief.
It can't lead to a 17 better determination than the SEIS with respect to the 18 SAMA.
Two, it's untimely.
And three, it lacks a 19 basis.
20 CHAIR YOUNG:
All right.
21 MS. CURRAN: Can we have a minute before 22 Dr. Lyman has to leave and he's just looking 23 through this to see if we can make some kind of 24 response to --
25 CHAIR YOUNG:
Before he goes?
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MS. CURRAN: Yes. We may have to postpone 2
until after, but having a look.
3 (Pause.)
4 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay, go ahead.
5 (Pause.)
6 (Parties are perusing documents.)
7 MS. CURRAN:
Judge Young --
8 DR. LYMAN: Well, the bottom line here is 9
that NUREG/CR-6427 didn't do an external events 10 analysis because they considered it was outside of 11 their scope.
But clearly if they had, then the --
as 12 the IPE results show, the combined internal and 13 external event frequency would have been greater than 14 the one that Duke used ultimately.
15 So what we're asking for is that the 16 reduction in station blackout frequency from both 17 internal and external events be adequately explained.
18 I think that is the heart of the issue that we are 19 concerned about. Since station blackout frequency is 20 so by the information provided in CR-6427, 21 demonstrates station blackout frequencies have been 22 elevated to an extremely risk-significant number. And 23 so what we are asking is that there be adequate 24 numerical quantitative documentation of how Duke's 25 improvements all the way through Rev. 3 of the McGuire NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N W.
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- PRA, for example, have led to such a dramatic 2
reduction in their station blackout frequency for both 3
internal and external events.
4 It's not simply the numerical value for 5
internal events provided in the original NUREG, but 6
it's the logic and the understanding of how the total 7
station blackout frequency has been reduced since the 8
time those numbers were published.
9 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Having received relief 10 by getting consideration of hydrogen control couldn't 11 you participate in the discussions here in the sense 12 that the Board later on in 189, these are all public 13 meetings.
And in looking at the Board's technical 14 limitations on hydrogen control are regards igniters, 15 it's not clear that the staff when considering 189 16 would not perhaps consider inerting of the 17 containment, hydrogen recombiners, combinations with 18 any one of those two or three avenues for better 19 hydrogen control.
Perhaps parity rating.
20 We're very limited in the terms of license 21 renewal on our scope of how we can look at this.
Is 22 it not a better forum to get those kinds of answers in 23 how they deliberate, how they defend before the ACRS 24 and how the ultimate solution is generated?
25 MS. CURRAN:
I think that's really a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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question for a lawyer to answer. I'm glad to do that.
2 I don't want to interrupt Mr. Repka, but it seems that 3
4 CHAIR YOUNG:
I think he's finished, 5
right?
6 MR. REPKA:
Actually, I had one point to 7
make to respond to Dr. Lyman's point.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay.
9 MR. REPKA:
I'll defer.
10 MS. CURRAN:
I think a little while ago, 11 Judge Rubenstein, you said the Intervenors should be 12 congratulated for having --
13 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Surfaced the issue.
14 MS.
CURRAN:
Surfaced the issue and 15 invited to participate in the rulemaking and it really 16 gets to a fundamental characteristic of NEPA here over 17 which you have authority which is NEPA is what they 18 call an action-forcing statute and the thing that 19 forces the action is the public disclosures and you 20 see it happening all across federal agencies where 21 when difficult environmental issues are raised by --
22 JUDGE KELBER:
Excuse me, Dr. Lyman is 23 leaving and there's one question I must ask him.
24 Did you look at pages 48 and 49 of 25 NUREG/CR-6427?
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DR. LYMAN:
In what context?
2 JUDGE KELBER:
In context of explaining 3
the importance of the high-temperature O-rings?
4 DR. LYMAN:
Yes.
5 JUDGE KELBER:
Those
- tables, in 6
combination with the simplified event trees, I
7 performed the arithmetic myself at great mental cost.
8 (Laughter.)
9 And found that I could explain much of the 10 difference between Rev. 2 and Rev. 3.
11 DR. LYMAN:
Yes.
12 JUDGE KELBER: Okay. We've got that.
So 13 your only concern now is about the differences between 14 the IPE and Rev. 2?
15 DR. LYMAN:
Well, we're also concerned 16 about the --
just to jump ahead.
We're not familiar 17 or we haven't seen the documentation to quantitatively 18 explain the increased performance of these O-rings, at 19 least to the extent that they say here.
So that's 20 another aspect of the information and we're still 21 interested in.
22 JUDGE KELBER:
But you're challenging 23 NUREG/CR-6427.
24 DR. LYMAN:
No, we're not challenging 25 that.
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JUDGE KELBER:
That's what I used.
I 2
didn't use any proprietary data or anything else.
I 3
just used what was in NUREG/CR-6427.
4 DR. LYMAN: Right, but that was drawn from 5
6 There's no independent determination of 7
that.
So that's something we would also like to see.
8 Thanks.
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
So you'll be back at 2, 10 right?
Thank you.
11 JUDGE KELBER:
Sorry to have interrupted 12 you, but he was on the verge of leaving.
13 MS. CURRAN:
Well, catch him while you 14 can. Well, anyway, the point here is the way that --
15 the reason why the Intervenors perhaps were able to 16 get the staff to focus on this is because it pushes 17 public disclosure of information.
It gets it out in 18 the public and these are usually on difficult issues 19 or new issues that the Agency hasn't dealt with 20 before.
And NEPA requires the Agency to keep 21 grappling with new issues and not just rely on what's 22 in the past.
23 And it comes up at decision making 24 junctures. NEPA doesn't operate all the time.
When 25 you come to a big decision, you take a look at whether NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N W.
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there's new information and it doesn't have to relate 2
to aging.
It relates to the operation.
Is there 3
something new here that we really ought to think about 4
before we sign on for another 20 years? That's what 5
it does.
6 And that's the reason we're here, is to 7
get NEPA to work.
Is to get the disclosure to which 8
we're entitled under NEPA.
That will help the GSI 9
process and it will also have effects years down the 10 road that we don't even know because I can tell you 11 for certain that some day an issue about ice condenser 12 containments is going to come up and the Intervenor 13 group is going to be stuck with an EIS that may be 14 incomplete and not only that, but the Applicant, when 15 the Intervenor raises a contention saying there's new 16 information, you really should consider it, is going 17 to say, well that EIS was litigated in a hearing and 18 the basis for those statements was well ventilated and 19 you really have to go an awful long way to challenge 20 that. These things become part of the public decision 21 making record that goes on for a long time.
That's 22 why we're here and that's why participating in a 23 rulemaking which may be fine is not anything near the 24 equivalent of the action forcing role of NEPA and you 25 can wait a very long time before we get a rulemaking NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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and I can tell you supposing we petition the NRC for 2
a rulemaking?
Supposing nothing happens on Generic 3
Safety Issue 189 and we wait a year and --
we wait six 4
months and petition for rulemaking. Well, I would say 5
that before we can go to court and enforce that, we 6
probably have to wait a period of years because the 7
courts defer to the agencies on how quickly they 8
address safety issues in their rulemaking process.
9 In NEPA, the court can't force the NRC to 10 order a SAMA.
I agree with that one hundred percent.
11 But the court can force the NRC to grapple with the 12 issue and that is what we're getting at here and can 13 require a thorough analysis that's really based in a 14 reasonable degree of inquiry.
That's what we're 15 looking for.
16 JUDGE KELBER:
Would you propose that we 17 impose a license condition of some sort? Is that what 18 you're actually proposing at this point?
19 MS. CURRAN:
I will say to you that I 20 think the NRC fully has the authority to say in our 21 decision making process, we think a certain mitigation 22 measure is necessary and warranted.
I think the 23 Agency has the authority to do that.
It hasn't done 24 that here, but if the NEPA analysis had a different 25 result, based on a more rigorous analysis, we'd get NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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that kind of decision.
2 JUDGE KELBER:
I want to point out two 3
things. One, a thorough result might, in fact, cause 4
the staff to change their mind.
I, myself, have had 5
severe doubts about the technical adequacy of staff's 6
analysis of the likelihood of detonation.
I know 7
other people, members of the ACRS, who share those 8
doubts. So a more thorough analysis might not work to 9
the advantage of the Intervenors in getting the relief 10 they seek.
11 Secondly, you've referred to something new 12 as one of the principal authors of NUREG-0900 which 13 was published an awful long time ago, the hydrogen 14 issue in ice condensers, among other things, was 15 thoroughly recognized as not new.
The staff moved 16 rather promptly, if I recall, and I think Judge 17 Rubenstein was part of that.
18 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Actually, I made the 19 pitch to put the igniters in before the ACRS.
20 JUDGE KELBER:
Do you remember when?
21 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I prefer not to.
22 (Laughter.)
23 JUDGE KELBER:
So it's not new. What the 24 staff is looking at and what the Applicant has been 25 looking at has been incremental improvements of that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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original step.
It's not a new issue.
2 MS. CURRAN: But, Judge Kelber, can I just 3
4 JUDGE KELBER: It's been around for a long 5
time.
6 MS. CURRAN:
And sort of a clarifying 7
point here? New is also in relation to the original 8
licensing action because the next --
at the next 9
decision making juncture which in this case is license 10 renewal, you look to see if things have happened in 11 the interim and the NUREG and maybe there were some 12 previous studies too that led up to it, but certainly 13 the NUREG puts a point on it. That's a new development 14 that has occurred since McGuire and Catawba were 15 originally licensed.
And that's what's important 16 about it being new.
17 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: but in a sense, I don't 18 want to say you're beating up on the Board, but you're 19 forcefully presenting a case which as an officer of 20 the NRC, I'm bound by what the Commission has set this 21 hearing for and I have to trust that the NRC will 22 continue in good faith to look through 189 at the 23 hydrogen issue.
24 And I also have to assume that in terms of 25 being special to McGuire and Catawba, that it really NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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applies to all the ice condensers and there's great 2
pressure on them to come to some conclusion regarding 3
"the ice condenser plants" regarding hydrogen control.
4 So in a sense, all I can do is sympathize and point 5
out ways in which you can get participation in the 6
process to follow it publicly and recognizing that 7
they may be right moving slowly, but they may be 8
moving slowly because the solution is not technically 9
easy.
It may be that it has to be properly staffed, 10 worked with both the industry and even EPRI and people 11 like that to get a really good answer that won't cause 12 more trouble than just saying the Board should say 13
- mandate, have the hydrogen control systems be 14 immediately implemented and we should put in another 15 diesel.
This may not be a proper solution.
16 So we're limited in our design 17 capabilities in the hearing room.
But I take your 18 point well.
I think you really ought to follow the 19 process.
20 MS. CURRAN: Judge Rubenstein, if I could 21 just respond for a moment.
We are engaged in a 22 process here that's been given to us under NEPA of 23 seeking more disclosure of the basis for the SAMA 24 decision making process and we think that the SAMA 25 recommendation could change if the analysis were NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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different, but supposing the staff remains uncertain 2
about what's an appropriate SAMA for various reasons?
3 That can still be said in an EIS.
But the important 4
part of it is to be assured that the analysis has been 5
as rigorous as possible, leading up to that and that 6
the uncertainty is also disclosed.
But what we have 7
here is a rather half-hearted recommendation for 8
hydrogen igniters and Dr. Lyman was reminding me the 9
ACRS, I think, their recommendation was that hydrogen 10 igniters be voluntary.
So we have kind of lukewarm 11 endorsement and we'd like to see the NEPA process work 12 to clarify some of these issues.
13 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I have a penultimate 14 comment because I'll let you have the last word.
The 15 half-heartedness, I think, is due to the technical 16 difficulty of the issue.
17 I would only add, I think, the Commission 18 has ruled many times that it's not worthwhile to 19 adjudicate an issue plant by plant. This is an issue 20 which embraces all the ice condenser plants and we 21 have given you what you wanted to a large degree by 22 saying this is a worthy issue.
It is now taken, 23 transferred by research to the NRR staff.
It is a 24 generic safety issue and it should continue and I 25 would encourage you to continue it and your NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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participation.
2 Your last word.
3 JUDGE KELBER:
If and when the staff ever 4
gets to speak, they might want to see if they could 5
refer, I believe to a briefing on the issue to the 6
Commission in which some sort of tentative schedule 7
was laid down.
8 I recall this vaguely.
9 MS. UTTAL: I think it only went as far as 10 Research's schedule.
I'll have to check to see if it 11 also talked about NRR.
12 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I thought you were 13 going to say 20/20.
14 MS. CURRAN: I do have a copy of a generic 15 issue management control system schedule from January 16 29th and I'd be glad to distribute it.
It has a date 17 for transfer of the issue from the Research to NRR and 18 then for all the other deadlines, there are dashes, 19 blanks. And I'd be glad to share that with you.
20 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: Did NRR, pardon me, did 21 Research meet the proposed date?
22 MS. CURRAN:
I think they did.
They 23 passed it on around the 17th or the 20th of December.
24 They passed it to NRR and that's where it is.
25 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Okay.
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MS. CURRAN: I think that would be fine if 2
you wanted to give that to us as an exhibit.
3 One thing that I would like to do before 4
we leave you and take a break, I'd just like to make 5
sure that I understand your argument.
6 Here's what I understand you to be saying.
7 With regard to NEPA, that it's triggered by new 8
information. The new information that you're arguing 9
is NUREG-6427.
10 You are arguing that neither Duke in its 11 application or RAI responses, nor the staff in the 12 SEIS, has provided the --
I'm reading from page 8 here 13 of your February 7th submittal, "provided the detailed 14 statement required by NEPA, compiled a reviewable 15 environmental record demonstrating a good faith effort 16 to consider the environmental values NEPA seeks to 17 safeguard, taking a hard look at the environmental 18 consequences of its actions, provided environmental 19 fully disclosure."
20 That, in essence, that you're saying that 21 the analysis provided by Duke and the staff, is not 22 sufficient to meet those requirements.
23 Am I understanding your argument to be --
24 am I understanding your argument correctly?
25 MS. CURRAN:. Yes, with just one small NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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addition which is that there's also --
there's the 2
issue of new information, but it dovetails with the 3
requirement for a severe accident mitigation analysis 4
where none has been done before. That regulation also 5
governs here, but yes, I think you have summed it up.
6 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay.
Then let's take a 7
break --
8 MR. REPKA:
May I respond?
9 CHAIR YOUNG: You can either now or after.
10 We've got to take a break at some point.
WE've been 11 going for over three hours.
12 MR. REPKA:
I'll take that as a hint.
13 (Laughter.)
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
Just seeing how this can 15 always lead to more.
Did you have a two second last 16 word?
17 MS. CURRAN:
Just to respond to Judge 18 Rubenstein on generic versus plant specific, I just 19 want to make the point that I agree this is a generic 20 issue, but the thing about NEPA is that when a 21 decision comes up in an individual case, the Agency 22 has to either make an individual decision to a generic 23 decision, a resolution or something, but it can't drop 24 into the crack which is what I'm afraid may happen.
25 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: I think you just showed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1322 me a schedule that said it didn't fall into the crack, it's been referred to NRR and they will have to make a schedule.
CHAIR YOUNG:
And we'll mark this as --
this generic issue management control system document, dated -- or the run date is 1/29/2003, we'll make that official exhibit 4.
(Whereupon, the above-referred to document was marked as Exhibit 4 for identification.)
And we will break. Now it's really lunch time.
We need to think about a couple of things before we break.
We've spent a lot of time purportedly on subpart 5. We've addressed a lot of broad issues that relate to more than one subpart and I'm saying that with a lot of hope in my heart that when we come back, we're going to be able to move more quickly through the other subparts.
When we come back, we'll hear what you have to say, Mr. Repka and we'll hear what the staff has to say on the general timeliness issues, the other overarching issues and then subpart 5. And then after that, I think what we need to do is start moving fairly quickly through the other subparts.
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there's certain ones that you want to --
I'm looking 2
at you, Ms. Curran, that you want to take a minute in 3
a particular order, that would fit with Dr. Lyman's 4
availability, we can do that, but we do need to move 5
through them more quickly and we appreciate all your 6
answers to our questions on some of these more 7
overarching issues now and we'll try to remember them 8
as we go through the other parts.
9 Can we come back at 1?
Have we got 10 enough? I guess we can go off the record. We'll come 11 back at one.
Off the record.
12 (Whereupon, at 12:04 p.m., the meeting was 13 recessed, to reconvene at 1:00 p.m.)
14 CHAIR YOUNG:
On the record.
Mr. Repka, 15 I think you were going to go next and then we're going 16 to go to the Staff on general issues and Subpart 5.
17 Then we're going to go to Subpart 8 and work 18 backwards.
19 MR. REPKA:
Yes, I was going to make a 20 brief point to respond to something Dr. Lyman said 21 earlier. At this point, I can't remember exactly what 22 it was he said. I wanted to take issue with first the 23 characterization with this issue related to station 24 blackout events and containment failures being new 25 information. I did just want to point out that in for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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example the PRA Summary Report for Revision 2 for 2
McGuire which was dated December 1997 at page 6-15 3
there is a
specific discussion of the early 4
containment failure scenario.
That certainly runs 5
contrary to any suggestion that this was new 6
information in 2001.
7 The second point was some of the things 8
that he was stating about station blackout frequency 9
in looking at the information that he just learned of 10 this morning underscores really the lack of any 11 affirmative information that's been put forward as a 12 basis for the contention. I just wanted to highlight 13 as an example he raises questions about we need to 14 have a hearing to understand the basis for the numbers 15 used. One example if you go to that same McGuire PRA 16 Revision 2 Summary Report, Table 3.1.5-1, there's a 17 fairly specific data on diesel generator reliability 18 which of course is a key component of station blackout 19 frequency.
It provides the number of starts for the 20 diesel generator, the number of start failure and 21 provides a specific failure rate.
22 CHAIR YOUNG:
Which page is that on?
23 MR. REPKA:
It doesn't have a page number 24 unfortunately.
25 CHAIR YOUNG:
What page is it after or NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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before?
2 MR. REPKA:
If you look at the pages that 3
are numbered section 3 and you go to 333, 335 then 4
there's a series of tables.
It's Table 3.1.5-1. You 5
have to numerically follow the tables through.
It 6
says page six of six.
7 CHAIR YOUNG:
3.1.5-1?
8 MR. REPKA:
Yes.
Rev. 2.
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
It says page six of six on 10 the right-hand side.
11 MR. REPKA: That's correct. It's a series 12 of tables on plant specific information on failure 13 rates. This one happens to be diesel generator which 14 is the one relevant to station blackout.
My point 15 being there's very specific information in the public 16 docket as to what inputs Duke used in its PRA and 17 never has there ever been any affirmative basis to 18 challenge any of this much less a recognition that it 19 even exists in the public domain.
I just want to 20 point that out as one example and there are others.
21 CHAIR YOUNG:
- Actually, Dr. Lyman in 22 particular does tend to speak in the terms you 23 described.
Looking at some of the actual contention 24 subparts, they talk about adequacy.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1326 of the perspective on a particular contention.
A lot of the discussion is in terms of we need to see X, Y or Z or we need to know X, Y, Z in order for there to be enough to determine whether something is appropriate.
Whereas the contention subpart may actually talk about the adequacy of the application of RAI responses.
The reason I'm saying this to you is so that you'll know that there are these two perspectives that the interveners have offered and that we are trying to look at them from both perspectives, not just the one that you mentioned.
MR. REPKA:
But I would submit that with respect to the basis requirement for any admitted contention, the burden is on the interveners to provide a basis to challenge. When there is specific information there to simply ask a question and say we don't know and we need to understand X, that's not sufficient basis in our estimation.
CHAIR YOUNG:
The reason I said that to you is so you could respond to the perspective that states for example this one. Failure to take adequate account of uncertainties.
Failure to do something adequately.
Failure to justify conclusion.
You may want to include in your argument whether you see a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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basis for making this statement that there is a 2
failure to do something adequately because we're going 3
to be looking at it from that perspective as well and 4
also the other ones that you argue. Just for your own 5
information.
6 MR. REPKA:
I understand and I believe 7
we've done that in our papers.
With respect to 8
uncertainty, there is information on uncertainty in 9
the original SAMA evaluation. Nowhere is it ever said 10 why that's inadequate.
11 CHAIR YOUNG:
Can we move to the Staff 12 now?
You were finished.
Correct?
13 MS. CURRAN:
I think I've probably said 14 enough.
15 CHAIR YOUNG:
Go ahead.
16 MR. FERNANDEZ: Thank you, Your Honor. In 17 hopes to be brief and to not go over many of the 18 issues that both of the other parties have thoroughly 19 discussed, let me see if I can limit our discussion to 20 three basic issues.
First of all with regards to 21 Contention 5, what is the genuine dispute of material 22 issue of flaw or fact that we are trying to adjudicate 23 here?
The Staff's position in that as evidenced by 24 the intervener's filing was that the Applicant had not 25 addressed the SAMA of having hydrogen igniters within NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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the containment in their environmental report.
At 2
this late date what we have in front of us is an SEIS 3
that actually concludes that that particular SAMA that 4
the intervener was complaining is cost beneficial 5
under the assumption that return fans are not 6
necessary.
7 Taking that into consideration, one must 8
go the step further of given that's the issue that we 9
are trying to address with regards td uncertainties, 10 with regards to PRAs, that the essential issue is such 11 that do we have to have hydrogen igniters or not in 12 the containment. At the end, what the interveners end 13 up with?
The interveners would end up with exactly 14 what they ended up with as is reflected in the SEIS.
15 A conclusion by the Staff that we agree with the 16 interveners and with the Sandia study and all the on-17 going studies and reports that have been generated 18 with the rest of this issue that yes under certain 19 assumptions hydrogen igniters may be a cost beneficial 20 sever accident mitigation alternative.
21 We agree with the Applicant that there is 22 no further relief that can be granted within this 23 proceeding.
The Commission specifically stated it.
24 I would like to if the Board would not mind read from 25 footnote 77, page 22 of the Slip Opinion 02-28.
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don't think the Commission could have stated more 2
unequivocally when they said "Thus the ultimate agency 3
decision on whether to 'require facilities with... "
4 CHAIR YOUNG: Excuse me.
You are reading 5
the footnote.
6 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Footnote 77, Your Honor.
7 CHAIR YOUNG: How far down did you start?
8 MR. FERNANDEZ:
It's the second sentence 9
from the bottom.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
Thank you.
11 MR. FERNANDEZ:
"To require facilities 12 with ice condenser containments to implement any 13 particular SAMA will fall under a Part 50 current 14 licensing basis review.
NEPA does not mandate the 15 particular decisions an agency must reach only the 16 process the agency must follow while reaching its 17 decision."
18 CHAIR YOUNG: What about the intervener's 19 argument that they are not talking about the decision?
20 They are talking about the thoroughness of the 21 analysis that would provide a basis for a decision.
22 MR. FERNANDEZ:
I think that's a valid 23 argument but however you need to look at what 2.714 24 says, Your Honor, in looking at any arguments that 25 they make with regard to that we must be guided by NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N W.
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what the regulations governing this proceeding say.
2 The regulations governing this proceeding specifically 3
say in 2.714(d) (2) "The admissibility of a contention 4
refuse to admit a contention if the contention and 5
supporting material fail to satisfy the requirements 6
of paragraph (d)(2) of the section."
The paragraph 7
(d) (2) specifically says "the contention if proven 8
would be of no consequence in the proceeding because 9
it would not entitle the petitioner to relief."
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
Again if you could address 11 that to the intervener's argument that the relief they 12 are seeking is not the decision but the consequence, 13 the relief, would be a more thorough analysis. That's 14 what I understand them to be saying.
15 MR. FERNANDEZ:
That argument is bit 16 disingenuous to make at this point in time because in 17 the contentions if one reads them carefully the 18 argument that they are making is not specifically that 19 but rather that the information contained in NUREG/CR-20 6427 was not analyzed or was not used in the 21 environmental report by the Applicant.
22 That's not the state of events as we are 23 standing here today.
The state of events really is 24 that the Staff unlike the Applicant initially at least 25 looked at NUREG/CR-6427 and unlike the Applicant NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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concluded that the hydrogen igniters were a severe 2
accident mitigation alternative and under certain 3
assumptions was cost beneficial.
4 It would force the Staff if this Board 5
were to find that the Applicant is correct to say we 6
agree with your conclusion but now go back and redo 7
all of your analysis and come back to us when the 8
actual conclusion, the actual fact that's at dispute 9
here is the ultimate resolution of that fact.
It was 10 resolved in favor of the Applicant.
It's just 11 generating work for the sake of generating work. That 12 was never the intent of NEPA. That's a misapplication 13 of the statute, Your Honor.
14 Let me move on to the second point that we 15 wanted to make.
The interveners made a statement as 16 to what would have been their burden at the outset of 17 this proceeding with regards to NUREG/CR-6427.
Ms.
18 Curran states would we have been expected to state how 19 NUREG/CR-6427 would have impacted all aspects of their 20 application.
21 Actually, Your Honor, the answer to that 22 question is yes.
It's a heavy burden to intervene in 23 licensing hearings at the NRC.
The Commission 24 recognized that when it amended Part 2.
In making 25 those amendments, the recognition was that you as a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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member of the public in taking on this responsibility, 2
the responsibility was heavy and what you were going 3
to do was you were going to go to the public record 4
and look at every document that was out there that was 5
relevant to this proceeding.
Then you were going to 6
determine whether it affected anything in the 7
application.
8 It was your job as intervener to bring 9
that to light not to do a mediocre job and expect to 10 resolve what your general concerns may be through the 11 process of litigation.
Specifically the Commission 12 rejected the notion of a notice pleading standard 13 where you identified some generic concerns with 14 certain issues at the initial parts of the proceeding 15 and then flushed those concerns out as the proceeding 16 went through.
17 That is the deck of cards that we are 18 dealing with.
We're not dealing with anything 19 different.
The burden is heavy.
The Commission has 20 specifically identified it as such. If they failed to 21 meet that burden, it's not the Board's fault.
It's 22 not the Staff's fault.
It may not even be the 23 Applicant's fault but that's just what it is.
The 24 contentions are as they are when they were filed.
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what originally was filed.
I see a lot of arguments 2
being made today that are not even contained within 3
those contentions.
I feel like sometimes we are 4
losing a little bit of focus. The focus should be on 5
the documents that were before the Board when they 6
were originally filed.
Those documents don't 7
represent a lot of the nuisances that they are trying 8
to advance here today.
9 CHAIR YOUNG:
Do you want to give any 10 specifics with regard to Subpart 5?
11 MR. FERNANDEZ:
One specific example is 12 this whole issue that Dr. Lyman was talking about with 13 regards with Level 1 information in the NUREG/CR-6427 14 document. He went on to show you Table 4.9 regarding 15 SBO's and the discussion of that information on page 16 29.
17 CHAIR YOUNG:
Are you on Subpart 5 now?
18 MR. FERNANDEZ: No, I'm referring to what 19 Dr. Lyman was talking about.
I don't know if he was 20 talking specifically about Subpart 5. I know it was 21 in the context of the discussion previously.
22 CHAIR YOUNG:
I just want to know if you 23 are arguing to us on Subpart 5 now or more on a 24 general issue.
25 MR.
FERNANDEZ:
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interveners have today expanded a lot of information 2
that they had originally filed. I would ask the Board 3
to please look at their arguments today in light of 4
what they had stated in the contentions. Their burden 5
was to make the arguments in those documents not here 6
today.
7 CHAIR YOUNG:
Do you want to give us any 8
argument specifically with regard to Subpart 5 on how 9
that subpart meets the contention requirements of the 10 rules?
11 MR. FERNANDEZ:
I would love to tell you 12 how it doesn't meet the contention requirements of the 13 rule.
Specifically, Your Honor, as we argued in our 14 pleading, the arguments advanced by the interveners 15 don't necessarily have a particular basis legal or 16 factual that would allow them in any remedy in this 17 proceeding for the reasons that I stated initially.
18 Also, Your Honor, with regards to the 19 contention, they failed to show how any additional 20 analysis by Duke would resolve any of these issues.
21 Nowhere in their pleading do you see any assertion 22 that any other analysis would be different, would be 23 better, would be more adequate.
24 CHAIR YOUNG:
Let me see if I can focus 25 you on something.
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basis A, the third sentence, "Duke's failure to 2
perform a complete uncertainty analysis fatally 3
undermines the credibility of SAMA results." This is 4
what I'm taking as the basis for the statement that 5
Duke has failed to take adequate account of 6
uncertainty.
7 Then in the next paragraph, the 8
interveners say "The use of uncertainty analysis is 9
essential to a credible PRA for several reasons."
10 Then they give several reasons for their statement 11 that the lack of a complete uncertainty analysis 12 undermines the credibility of the SAMA results.
I'm 13 not sure I follow how your previous statement applies 14 to that part of the basis that has been provided by 15 the intervener.
16 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Without getting into the 17 merits of their argument though, Your Honor, that's 18 just factually incorrect. There was some uncertainty 19 analysis done and some sensitivity analysis.
The 20 licensing merely followed the guidance given by the 21 Staff where when the state-of-the-art for uncertainty 22 analysis doesn't allow you to perform one, it's okay 23 for an NRC licensee to perform a sensitivity analysis.
24 CHAIR YOUNG:
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perform a complete uncertainty analysis and then give 2
reasons for why that's not good enough to have a 3
credible SAMA or credible PRA?
You are disagreeing 4
with what they are saying but they are making a fact 5
based argument.
They are defining what it is that 6
they are alleging is inadequate, namely the failure to 7
perform a complete uncertainty analysis.
8 MR. FERNANDEZ: Your Honor, I'm saying we 9
have to look at the truth of the matter.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
The truth?
11 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Your Honor, the facts as 12 alleged by the interveners are not accurate with 13 regards to that statement.
14 CHAIR YOUNG: And we look at accuracy at 15 this point?
16 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Your Honor, to determine 17 if what they are saying is true, yes.
They can't be 18 misrepresenting what's contained within the 19 application to the Board. It's true that there wasn't 20 an uncertainty analysis done for all three levels of 21 the PRA.
That's correct.
But merely what we are 22 stating right now is that the licensee did not fail to 23 meet any particular requirement as established in any 24 regulation.
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licensee could be faulted for.
There's really no 2
legal basis for that argument. Nowhere does it say in 3
any of the NRC's regulations that you must complete a 4
full uncertainty analysis when you do your per-5 valistic (PH) risk assessment.
6 CHAIR YOUNG:
Is that the standard for 7
contention?
8 MR. FERNANDEZ:
Your Honor, they have to 9
have a legal basis for their argument.
10 CHAIR YOUNG:
Where does it say that?
11 MR. FERNANDEZ: Your Honor, I would refer 12 you to.714 and if you would let me consult I'll come 13 back to it.
Your Honor, can we come back to it?
14 Thank you.
Would it be appropriate to address 15 timeliness now, Your Honor?
16 CHAIR YOUNG:
Sure.
Go ahead.
17 MR. FERNANDEZ: We've addressed timeliness 18 generically at the beginning of all the arguments.
I 19 don't think we have much more to add than what the 20 Applicant has already said that these contentions 21 should and could have been raised at an earlier time 22 in the proceeding.
They were not.
All of the 23 information required to make these contentions were 24 available in the public record at the time that the 25 contentions were originally filed. It wasn't done so.
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Therefore anything filed later on particularly these 2
amended contentions, they are untimely.
3 With regards to the argument by the 4
intervener that their untimeliness is somehow 5
justified by the Board's confusion with regards to the 6
interpretation of the Commission's
- order, that 7
confusion didn't arise until much later in the 8
proceeding.
Documents were available before any 9
confusion would have arisen.
I don't think that 10 confusion can be used for any reason to bootstrap 11 their argument that they somehow are justified in 12 their untimeliness because of the Board's confusion.
13 I have nothing else with regards to timeliness.
I'm 14 going to check on the other one and get back to you, 15 Your Honor.
16 CHAIR YOUNG:
Any other argument?
17 MR. FERNANDEZ:
No, Your Honor.
18 CHAIR YOUNG:
Ms. Curran.
19 MS. CURRAN: I think Counsel for the Staff 20 put in a nutshell what the Staff believes we were 21 required to do back in November 2001 which was to 22 identify and anticipate every aspect in which 23 prospective discussion by Duke of NUREG/CR-6427 was 24 going to be inadequate.
25 JUDGE KELBER:
Excuse me.
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NUREG/CR-6427 had never been published.
They would 2
have gone through the same types of calculations with 3
a smaller set of numbers perhaps but they would have 4
gone through the same thing.
So how does NUREG/CR-5 6427 change the nature of the types of calculations 6
which you claim they should be doing?
7 MS. CURRAN: They would have done the same 8
calculations.
Who do you mean?
9 JUDGE KELBER:
Duke.
10 CHAIR YOUNG: In other words if there were 11 no NUREG/CR-6427, would you be raising any of these 12 issues?
13 MS. CURRAN: I would think so if there was 14 some statement by the Staff.
15 CHAIR YOUNG:
Just from the outset.
16 MS. CURRAN:
If there were no NUREG/CR-17 6427, I can't say for sure but I would say I doubt it 18 because NUREG/CR-6427 really heightened the importance 19 of the SAM analysis in a way that nothing else has.
20 JUDGE KELBER: I'm sorry to contradict you 21 but as one of the authors of NUREG-0900 as I said 22 before that issue was highlighted many years before.
23 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Station blackout was 24 well known to be a dominant sequence in these areas.
25 MS. CURRAN:
And was it known that the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE, N.W.
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conditional containment probability failure was one.
2 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Yes.
It was the 3
dominant sequence that contributed conditional 4
containment failure probability.
When we first 5
started the case, Judge Kelber and I addressed that 6
immediately in a private conversation.
We said what 7
is the most dominant sequence.
It was general 8
knowledge. We didn't even refer to anything.
I have 9
to believe Dr. Lyman and perhaps Mr. Zeller would have 10 been aware of that.
11 MS. CURRAN:
Well, it just seems to me 12 that it emphasizes that it's high time we were here 13 talking about these things.
At any rate, I think I 14 made my point. At some point, I would like to address 15 a question that Judge Rubenstein raised earlier about 16 some Federal Register notices with respect to the 17 license renewal rule.
18 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Fine.
Please do.
19 MS. CURRAN: I think your question was do 20 these statements in rule-making documents show that a 21 Level 3 analysis is not required in severe accident 22 analysis.
23 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
I was paraphrasing 24 Duke.
What they said was in a licensing renewal 25 environment one has to accept Level 1 and 2.
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analysis involving Level 3 is not required.
2 MS. CURRAN:
I read these pages of these 3
notices and that is not how I read it.
4 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN: I'll leave this to Duke 5
to respond to.
6 MS. CURRAN: Okay. Let me just go through 7
it.
8 CHAIR YOUNG: Point us to the pages as you 9
go through it if you will.
10 MS. CURRAN:
I will.
11 CHAIR YOUNG:
Thanks.
12 MS. CURRAN: The main discussion is at 61 13 Federal Register, page 28481 which is a final rule on 14 license renewal, Environmental Review for Renewal of 15 Nuclear Plant Operating Licenses. This is a specific 16 section that addresses accidents. What I gather from 17 this is first of all at the time this was written 18 which was in 1996 the Commission was considering 19 taking generic action on severe accident mitigation 20 alternatives or something related to that but hadn't 21 done it at that point.
22 The Commission also says in this document 23 on this page that the Commissioners think it's 24 unlikely that site-specific considerations of severe 25 accident mitigation alternatives will identify major NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N W.
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3 4
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 1342 design severe accident mitigation measures. Then they go through a discussion as to why that is. One of the reasons they say that is because to some extent they discussed various facts and issues in the generic EIS.
But this is important.
The Commission says we are not going to make a rule here as to how severe accident mitigation alternatives ought to be considered. We're going to do it case by case.
They do indicate that Level 3 considerations come into play.
They say we're going to look in each case to determine whether the consideration of severe accident mitigation alternatives was adequate.
I do not see that as excluding Level 3 issues.
They say maybe there's other ways besides a Level 3 PRA that this can be done and they suggest a couple.
But then they say we're going to look at every case separately because we honestly haven't done the generic study that we would need to do in order to tell you as a general matter what is going to be sufficient and what isn't.
That is why I think it's appropriate for us to be here discussing what are appropriate elements of the SAMA analysis in this case with respect to the implications of NUREG/CR-6427.
MR.
REPKA:
Let me respond to that first by saying that the Duke SAMA evaluations are based on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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all three level, site-specific PRA. Level 1, Level 2, 2
Level 3 PRA is the basis for the SAMA.
We are not 3
arguing that a Level 3 analysis is not required.
We 4
don't have to argue that. Duke has a three level PRA.
5 What we have cited these quotes that you 6
are referring to, Judge Rubenstein, are in the 7
discussion of the Board's question of whether there is 8
any basis to depart from standard NRC regulations and 9
guidance documents. Specifically we discussed this at 10 page 20 of our February 7eh brief.
The point to be 11 made there was that with respect to the PRA and all 12 levels but particularly the third level PRA the 13 contention appeared to be asking for more than the 14 Commission was specifically requiring.
15 What the Commission said in promulgating 16 the rule on SAMAs was that they weren't even requiring 17 a plant-specific Level 1 and Level 2 PRA. There is no 18 regulation that requires a PRA much less holds it to 19 some of the standards that petitioners were seeking to 20 hold our PRAs to.
21 The point was the Duke SAMA evaluations 22 are based upon more than the Commission requires. Now 23 this leads to the question that the Board was asking 24 Mr.
Fernandez which is when you look at this 25 contention, does there have to be some basis for it.
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The answer is yes.
Is there some requirement for an 2
uncertainty analysis?
There has to be.
You can't 3
have a contention that doesn't have a legal basis.
4 Without a legal basis for relief, there can be no 5
consequence in the proceeding.
That's a fairly 6
inherent component of 2.714.
There has to be a 7
regulatory basis for relief.
8 The point again we're making with respect 9
to what the NRC thought it was requiring in a SAMA 10 evaluation.
It was not a plant specific, three level 11 PRA which is what Duke used.
12 CHAIR YOUNG:
It's almost 1:40 p.m.
We 13 have a lot of subparts to go through so I suggest we 14 move on to Subpart 8.
I assume you are going to 15 address what the EIS says about that as well.
16 MS. CURRAN:
We can be brief on this 17 because it gets back to what I said earlier which is 18 that we looked at the EIS to see if the EIS mooted 19 this contention. It seemed to us that because the EIS 20 was so equivocal and suggested that Duke could be 21 right that the EIS doesn't moot the contention.
I 22 will respond to any other arguments that the parties 23 have on this contention but it seems to me that was 24 the main objection that was raised.
25 JUDGE KELBER: The contention states that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Duke incorrectly assumed the need for the air return 2
fans in order to boost the costs.
In other words, 3
they weren't nice.
Is there some independent factual 4
basis for the statement?
By the way, I don't like 5
people to start sentences with however.
Very bad.
6 However the assumption is not justified.
Is there 7
some factual basis for that statement "the assumption 8
is not justified"?
9 MS. CURRAN: We rely on the contention on 10 the Staff's questioning of the assumption.
11 JUDGE KELBER:
There is no independent 12 factual basis.
13 MS. CURRAN:
That seemed to us to be 14 independent of Duke.
That is another independent 15 source questioning that assumption. I believe it can 16 also be found in the Staff documents related to the 17 GSI.
That seemed to us to be sufficient.
18 JUDGE KELBER:
Thank you.
19 CHAIR YOUNG: This is not one of the ones 20 that you are resting a whole lot on this subpart.
Is 21 that correct?
22 MS. CURRAN: I'm not sure I understand the 23 question.
24 CHAIR YOUNG: Let me put it this way. Do 25 you want to make more argument on this subpart?
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MS. CURRAN:
Not because I think it's 2
unimportant but because I think we've already been 3
over the issues.
We do think it's important but I 4
don't really want to take your time by going over 5
arguments that have already been made.
6 CHAIR YOUNG:
Right.
7 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
In the Staff's reply, 8
they state that in their pleading the interveners 9
implicitly acknowledge that the defect that they had 10 complained of had been cured by the Staff's analysis 11 in a draft SEIS. Do you not agree with what the Staff 12 characterized?
13 MS. CURRAN:
That's right because the 14 Staff was equivocal about their position on whether 15 the fans are necessary or not.
If you look at the 16 precise language, that Staff basically hedges what it 17 says about the fans and the igniters.
We considered 18 that not to cure our concern.
19 JUDGE KELBER:
If the Staff's statement 20 doesn't cure your concern, is there an independent 21 factual basis for this assertion that the assumption 22 is not justified?
23 MS. CURRAN: The Staff wasn't very strong 24 about it but the Staff certainly raised a question and 25 that seems to us to be legitimate.
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JUDGE KELBER: The question is not factual 2
basis.
3 MS.
CURRAN:
There's two different 4
questions here.
First, is there independent support 5
for our concern.
Yes, the Staff has provided it.
6 Second, is the Staff's statement presented in a way 7
that cures our concern?
No, because the Staff is 8
equivocal.
I don't think those two issues are 9
inconsistent.
10 JUDGE KELBER: They are because if I were 11 to put myself in the Staff position and many years in 12 the past I have done so, I too would be equivocal 13 because there are questions there that are very 14 difficult to answer.
That's not a factual basis to 15 say that something may or may not be a good thing.
16 It's not a factual basis for saying that the 17 assumption is not justified.
18 MS. CURRAN:
In the EIS, I believe the 19 Staff does go into a discussion of why it being that 20 the fans are less expensive than claimed by Duke.
21 JUDGE KELBER: That's fair but that's not 22 the nature of the contention. The contention is that 23 the assumption that the return fans are essential is 24 not justified.
25 CHAIR YOUNG:
What relief are you asking NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N W.
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for here? I'm asking that with regard to the issue of 2
whether there is any consequence.
3 MS. CURRAN:
I would say that the relief 4
is an analysis by Duke that addresses what the Staff 5
has said and a clearer analysis by the Staff of 6
whether or not the fans are cost effective or 7
necessary.
It is the equivocal nature, first of all, 8
Duke saying that fans are required and the Staff 9
saying being somewhat equivocal about whether they are 10 or not.
We'd like more clarity on that.
11 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
Then the consequences 12 would be that the SAMA has to be considered.
In our 13 context that would have be considered in the generic 14 issue of what are the consequences if they don't do 15 it.
16 MS. CURRAN:
The first consequence is a 17 more accurate disclosure.
18 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
No, that's a result.
19 What are the consequences?
20 MS.
CURRAN:
- Okay, for us that's a 21 consequence but other consequences would be 22 potentially a stronger recommendation for the fans 23 that could affect the resolution of the generic safety 24 issue or a decision that the hydrogen igniters should 25 be used and that the issue of the fan shouldn't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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undermine the use of the igniters.
2 JUDGE RUBENSTEIN:
There's a thread that 3
goes through many of the briefs that a stronger 4
statement or better analysis would result in a 5
different outcome.
I see this almost as bimodal.
6 This doesn't say to the Staff that you have to go back 7
and analyze igniters and air return fans.
This says 8
to me that you have to go back and look at the 9
reliability of your hydrogen control system, the 10 extent of your hydrogen control system.
You should 11 weigh against recombiners.
You should weigh extra 12 power to the igniters.
13 Where we differ is I think it starts a 14 broad process which the Staff is obligated to pursue.
15 They have to look at all the alternatives and consider 16 them both in risk and deterministic space and in back-17 fit costs and follow on with that.
That's where I 18 come across.
I see it almost as bimodal.
They have 19 to go do this analysis. Whether I pound on the table 20 once or thrice, they still have to do it. We're in no 21 position to say recombiners are more beneficial than 22 augmented power to the hydrogen igniters.
It's an 23 unreasonable expectation from this Board.
24 JUDGE KELBER: Let me just make one final 25 remark on this.
It is not clear to me that more and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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further analysis will do the job.
I have considered 2
this problem for many years.
As I think I mentioned 3
some time back in one of our telephone conferences, I 4
have had the opportunity to review a state-of-the-art 5
report issued by the European agency, an arm of OECD.
6 I fear that technically this problem is 7
not solvable at the present state of technology. The 8
Staff has not done a computational fluid dynamics 9
analysis which is at least the initial start nor has 10 Duke. But even if they had according to the state-of-11 the-art report which is just two years old, it would 12 still be equivocal.
Duke has taken a conservative 13 position that in the absence of a good answer to the 14 question they would have the air return fans operating 15 to insure circulation to that appropriate chambers and 16 deflagration without the dangers of transition to 17 detonation.
18 Now some of the Staff have made an 19 argument which on further examination may hold water.
20 There are certain experiments they have referred to 21 which may show that under the circumstances 22 contemplated, there will be no deflagration to 23 detonation.
24 As Judge Rubenstein has said, that's one 25 of the things that under the Part 50 analysis will NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 2 0 2 1 22 23 24 25 1351 have to be looked whether that's known well enough to give the necessary assurance.
I don't think we can require Duke or the Staff to embark on a large scale hydrogen research program.
I wish we could.
There was a time when I could to do and did but we can't do that now.
I don't know what you are asking us to do that we can do. I don't think further analysis at the present state of knowledge is going to be productive.
CHAIR YOUNG: Any more argument on Subpart 8?
MS. CURRAN:
No.
CHAIR YOUNG:
Mr. Repka.
MR.
REPKA:
Just briefly on this contention, as we said in our papers, we do believe this is one that the Commission specifically highlighted in CLI02-28 at page 18 as being one that seemingly has been cured by the SEIS.
We believe that's the case.
With respect to the relevant decision for license renewal that we discussed this morning, there's not equivocal about the Staff's decision. The Staff's decision is based upon the cost benefit SAMA analysis that have been submitted that there may be a cost beneficial CLB change.
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needs to be addressed in the Part 50 license context.
2 That's the decision that they need to make in this 3
context. I would characterize it as a binary decision 4
much as Judge Rubenstein would.
5 Apart from that, I really have nothing 6
further to say. I do also agree with everything that 7
Judge Kelber said.
We do feel that Duke's position 8
with respect to the air return fans is one that will 9
be analyzed in the context of the Part 50 CLB issue.
10 The position is the conservative one from a safety 11 standpoint that powering the air return fans as well 12 as the igniters is more conservative.
13 MR. FERNANDEZ:
The Staff has nothing to 14 add, Your Honor.
15 CHAIR YOUNG: Are you ready to go forward 16 with Subpart 7?
17 MS. CURRAN:
Yes, when Dr. Lyman gets 18 back, we may have another comment about Subpart 8 but 19 we can talk about that later.
20 CHAIR YOUNG:
Okay.
Go ahead.
21 MS. CURRAN:
I would guess that the main 22 issue here is one of timeliness. This subpart of the 23 contention relates to lack of adequate peer review.
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that but for the information in NUREG/CR-6427 this 2
would not have been a significant issue for us.
Now 3
that it is and this information has come out, we would 4
like to see the information in NUREG/CR-6427 5
considered in a thorough way.
One of them would 6
include a provision for peer review.
I'll just wait 7
and respond to other parties.
8 CHAIR YOUNG:
Mr. Repka.
9 MR. REPKA: I have five reasons that.this 10 contention is not admissible. First, we've gotten to 11 the point where we agree that it does seem to be 12 focused on only one particular SAMA, the SAMA related 13 to the scenario of NUREG/CR-6427.
If that's the case 14 like all of the other proposed amended contentions, 15 it's no longer viable because there can be no further 16 relief in the proceeding.
17 How would additional peer review of the 18 Duke PRA lead to a different result with respect to 19 the determination in the SEIS if there may be a cost 20 beneficial change and therefore it must be analyzed in 21 the Part 50 context?
It can't.
So this whole 22 contention can't lead to any further relief here.
23 Second, if this is intended as a broad 24 challenge to the PRA, then it's outside the scope of 25 this proceeding.
There's really no basis in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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regulations or in the scope of a license renewal 2
proceeding to challenge the PRA generally.
It has to 3
be linked in some way to analysis that's relevant to 4
Part 54.
That would have to be through the impact on 5
the SAMA evaluations that are of issue. That leads us 6
back to the conclusion that there can be no further 7
relief.
Just a broad challenge to the PRA for the 8
sake of challenging the PRA is outside the scope of 9
the license renewal proceedings.
10 CHAIR YOUNG: You are getting into Subpart 11 2, right?
12 MR. REPKA:
I'm sorry.
Subpart 2.
13 CHAIR YOUNG:
It is failure to provide 14 adequate support for conclusory results in RAI 15 responses. Contention Duke is not supported its SAMA 16 analysis by publication of its PRA.
17 MR. REPKA:
That argument would apply to 18 that proposed subpart as well because again there's no 19 requirement with respect to publishing the PRA just 20 like there's no requirement to do a peer review in the 21 PRA.
22 The third argument with respect to this 23 proposed contention is like the others which is it's 24 late without good cause.
It really is a contention 25 that is not restricted in any sense to the scenario NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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raised in NUREG/CR-6427 or the particular SAMAs 2
related to that scenario.
It could have been raised 3
based upon the PRA information that was available in 4
November 2001 and it could have been raised with any 5
appropriate basis at that time.
That wasn't done.
6 There was no awareness at the time of the publicly 7
available information and therefore it's late to be 8
raised in May 2002.
It would be late without good 9
cause.
10 The next point we make in our papers on 11 this particular contention is it cites as a basis 12 really only Reg guide 1.174 which was a draft Reg. In 13 particular it cited an appendix to the draft Reg guide 14 that has since been deleted. The Reg guide itself was 15 related to use of PRA to make licensing basis changes 16 which is not what the PRA was being used for in SAMA 17 evaluation.
So really on the face of the documents 18 cited as a basis, there is no support.
The Board is 19 not required to accept at face value a draft Reg guide 20 as a basis for a contention when in fact the draft Reg 21 guide has no current validity or applicability.
22 The last thing that we have said in 23 response to this proposed contention is in addition to 24 all the other infirmities it really lacks a factual 25 basis.
There is a lot of confusion within the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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contention as drafted.
It misrepresents in many ways 2
what was said in the RAI responses about what has been 3
done.
4 The fact of the matter is both the McGuire 5
and Catawba PRAs have been peer reviewed.
They were 6
peer reviewed by the EPRI Nuclear Safety Analysis 7
Center in connection with IPE and IPEEE submittals.
8 That information could have gleaned from the public 9
record.
Rev. 2 of McGuire PRA as stated in the RAI 10 response was peer reviewed by the Westinghouse Owners 11 Group PRA Certification Program.
The Catawba Rev.
12 2(b) was peer reviewed by the same program in the 13 spring of 2002.
14 Given that there is no recognition of the 15 peer reviews that were in fact done.
There is no 16 statement with any specificity as to why those peer 17 reviews were inadequate or what further could or 18 should be done. Given that, there's no factual basis 19 for a contention.
In the end, there is no basis and 20 this contention can lead to no relief in the 21 proceeding.
22 CHAIR YOUNG: Anything further?
23 MR. REPKA:
Not right now.
24 CHAIR YOUNG:
Staff counsel?
25 MR. FERNANDEZ:
We have nothing to add, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Your Honor.
2 CHAIR YOUNG: Ms. Curran.
Do you want to 3
add anything?
4 MS. CURRAN: Yes, I would like a chance to 5
reply. First we disagree with Mr. Repka that there is 6
no further relief available.
The purpose of a peer 7
review is to provide some important analysis.
It's 8
another set of eyes to look at it.
It could change 9
the result.
Again this is going over ground that 10 we've been over before.
If the analysis changes that 11 is substantive relief under NEPA.
A better analysis 12 is a good achievement, a result, a legally valid goal 13 under NEPA.
14 There was an argument about scope that 15 this is a challenge to the PRA, not within the scope 16 of the contention.
That gets us back to another 17 global issue which is what is the allowable scope of 18 this contention. Are we allowed to raise anything but 19 what was said in the original contention? As I said 20 before, we feel that we have followed the Commission's 21 procedures for amending contentions for monitoring new 22 information that comes in from the applicant and 23 critiquing its inadequacies in the form of newly 24 amended contentions.
Obviously the SAMA analysis 25 involves reliance on Duke's PRA.
That goes without NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N W.
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saying.
2 Third, we could have raised this issue in 3
November 2001.
Again we did not generally raise 4
issues in 2001 about the adequacy of the PRA because 5
we were interested in how Duke was going to address 6
6427.
That was our focus.
I believe we are entitled 7
to see what Duke would do before focusing on the 8
inadequacies in that analysis.
9 Mr. Repka points out that we are relying 10 on language that has been dropped from a regulatory 11 guide.
I didn't know this.
It seems to me that that 12 important point here is that peer review is a long 13 established means of assuring the adequacy and rigor 14 of a probabilistic risk assessment.
It's a very 15 commonly used technique.
The applicant refers to it 16 in its RAI responses so I don't think there's a 17 disagreement that it's an appropriate and useful tool 18 in this kind of a study.
19 With respect to whether these studies have 20 been peer reviewed, at the time that we wrote this 21 contention Duke was saying that the Catawba PRA by 22 which I think they meant Revision 2 will be reviewed 23 in the spring of 2002. That may have been done. More 24 importantly Revision 3 was peer reviewed while it was 25 in preparation which we do not consider to be a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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legitimate peer review.
We think that is an 2
inadmissible issue.
3 There is a chicken-and-egg situation here 4
that gets back to second part of the contention which 5
is we haven't seen the PRA.
We haven't seen what was 6
reviewed.
We haven't seen a peer review report for 7
the Revision 2 which really is of interest to us. We 8
would think that would be some of the information that 9
would be disclosed under Subpart 2 of the Contention.
10 CHAIR YOUNG: You say what's been done is 11 not adequate.
What's the basis of that?
Why is it 12 not adequate?
13 MS. CURRAN: As I mentioned at the time we 14 wrote this contention, there was no peer review for 15 Catawba for Revision 2. Duke had stated that Revision 16 3 had been peer reviewed while it was in process which 17 to us on its face appears to be an inadequate peer 18 review.
One should have a peer review of a finished 19 document and then go back and revisit.
It may have 20 been that the Catawba issue has been mooted by a 21 subsequent peer review but it would be helpful to see 22 the documents.
23 JUDGE KELBER:
You made a conjectural 24 statement under discussing the relief.
You say that 25 a peer review could lead to a better analysis.
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