ML061380008
| ML061380008 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Monticello  |
| Issue date: | 03/22/2006 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation |
| To: | |
| Davis, J A, NRR/DLR/RLRC, 415-6987 | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML061380006 | List: |
| References | |
| nrc-931, TAC MC6441 | |
| Download: ML061380008 (57) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION CORRECTED TRANSCRIPTS
Title:
Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant License Renewal Public Meeting: Evening Session Docket Number:
50-263 Location:
Monticello, Minnesota Date:
Wednesday, March 22, 2006 Work Order No.:
NRC-931 Pages 1-57 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 PUBLIC MEETING TO DISCUSS 1
DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT 2
FOR 3
MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT 4
6 7
Held 8
Wednesday, March 22, 2006 9
7:00 p.m.
10 11 12 Monticello Community Center 13 505 Walnut Street 14 Monticello, Minnesota 15 16 17 18 Transcript of Proceedings 19 20 21 22
2 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I N D E X 1
Page 2
Welcome and Purpose of Meeting (F. Cameron/
3 R. Franovich).................... 3 4
Overview of License Renewal Process (J. Davis)... 17 5
Results of the Environmental Review (C. Quinly)... 22 6
Results of the Severe Accident Mitigation 7
Alternatives Review (R. Palla)........... 33 8
How Comments Can Be Submitted (J. Davis)...... 41 9
Public Comments:
10 George Crocker.................. 44 11 John Conway.................... 48 12 Chuck Hostovsky.................. 52 13 Closing/Availability of Transcripts......... 55 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
3 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 1
7:00 P.M.
2 CHIP CAMERON: If everybody could take 3
their seats, we'll get started with tonight's 4
meeting.
5 Okay. Good evening, everyone. Thank you 6
for coming out tonight. My name's Chip Cameron. I'm 7
the Special Counsel for Public Liaison at the Nuclear 8
Regulatory Commission, the NRC. And welcome to the 9
NRC's public meeting tonight.
10 And what we're going to be talking about 11 tonight is the NRC's Environmental Review as part of 12 its evaluation of an application that we received 13 from Nuclear Management Company to renew the 14 operating license at the Monticello facility.
15 And I'm going to serve as your facilitator 16 tonight, and my role generally will be to try to help 17 all of you to have a productive meeting.
18 I just want to cover a few things about 19 meeting process for you before we get into the 20 substance of tonight's discussions, and I'd like to 21 tell you a little bit about the format for the 22 meeting, go over some simple ground rules with you, 23 and just introduce the NRC staff and our expert 24 consultants who are going to be talking to you 25
4 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 tonight. In terms of format, it's going to be a 1
two-part format.
2 The first part there is going to be some 3
NRC presentations where we're going to give you some 4
information on the license renewal process generally 5
and specifically on the findings that are in the 6
Draft Environmental Impact Statement that the NRC 7
prepared.
8 The second part of the meeting is an 9
opportunity to listen to all of you, any comments, 10 recommendations, concerns that you have about the 11 Draft Environmental Impact Statement but also about 12 license renewal in general.
13 The NRC staff will be telling you that 14 there is an opportunity to submit written comment on 15 these issues, but we wanted to be here tonight to 16 meet with you in person, and anything that you offer 17 tonight will carry as much weight as written comment.
18 We have Sheila Smith with us tonight, who 19 is our court reporter, and she's taking a transcript 20 of the meeting, and that will be our record and your 21 record of what happened tonight, and it will be 22 available to anybody who wants to have a copy of it.
23 Ground rules, very simple:
24 After the NRC presentations we'll go out to 25
5 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 you to see if you have any questions about what was 1
said; and if you do, just give me a signal, I'll 2
bring you this cordless microphone, introduce 3
yourself to us, and we'll try to answer your 4
question.
5 I would ask that only one person speak at a 6
time, for the obvious reason that we want to give our 7
full attention to whomever has the floor at the 8
moment but also so that Sheila can get a clean 9
transcript and so that she knows who is talking at 10 the moment.
11 I would ask you to just try to be to the 12 point, concise, so that we can make sure that 13 everybody who wants to talk tonight has an 14 opportunity to do that.
15 I don't think that we're going to be 16 pressed for time, so we have a little bit more 17 flexibility tonight than we do sometimes.
18 And when we get to the comment period, I 19 also just would ask you to be to the point. But, 20 again, we have flexibility there.
21 If you want to make a comment, we do have a 22 yellow card back there to fill out, but if you didn't 23 fill one out and you're listening to what is being 24 said and you want to comment, just let me know when 25
6 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 we get there and you can make a comment.
1 In terms of who we have doing presentations 2
for you, let me introduce them to you and give you a 3
little bit of their background so that you can know 4
what their expertise and qualifications are.
5 First of all we're going to go Rani 6
Franovich, who is right here (indicating). And Rani 7
is the Chief of the Environmental Branch for License 8
renewal, and Rani and her staff do all of the 9
Environmental Reviews on license renewal 10 applications.
11 And Rani has been with the NRC for about 12 fifteen years in various positions, as a Resident 13 Inspector at the Catawba Nuclear Power Plant 14 in North Carolina.
15 And the Resident Inspectors are our eyes 16 and ears. They actually work at the plant, they're 17 at the plant seeing that NRC regulations are being 18 complied with, they live in the community surrounding 19 the particular facility, and we have residents at 20 every licensed reactor, including Monticello.
21 Rani got her Bachelors in psychology and 22 also a Masters in industrial and systems engineering, 23 both from Virginia Tech. Okay? And she's going to 24 just tell you a little bit about the overall license 25
7 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 renewal process.
1 We'll then focus on the Environmental 2
Review process, and we have Jennifer Davis with us 3
tonight, and Jennifer is the Project Manager for the 4
preparation of this Environmental Impact Statement 5
and for the Environmental Review, and Jennifer works 6
for Rani.
7 And Jennifer has been with us at the NRC 8
for about four years now, and she's an archaeologist 9
by training and her major was in historic 10 preservation. And that was at -- the Bachelors 11 degree from Mary Washington College in Fredricksburg, 12 Virginia.
13 After that I think --
14 We'll go for questions after both of you 15 are done, because it's on process.
16 So we'll have those two; then we'll go on 17 to you for questions.
18 And then we're going to get to the 19 substance of the Draft Environment Impact Statement, 20 and we have Crystal Quinly, who's right here, who is 21 the team leader for the preparation of the 22 Environmental Impact Statement.
23 And Crystal works for Lawrence Livermore 24 National Laboratory operated by the University of 25
8 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 California in Berkeley -- Livermore, Livermore, 1
California, on the West -- still is on the West 2
Coast, I guess.
3 But at any rate, Crystal has been with 4
Lawrence Livermore more for seven years; she has a 5
Bachelors degree in environmental science from Cal 6
State, California State.
7 And then we go for questions on that.
8 And then we're going to go to Mr. Bob Palla.
9 Mr. Robert Palla, who's right here, he is with the 10 Division of Risk Assessment in our Office of Nuclear 11 Reactor Regulation at our Headquarters in Rockville, 12 Maryland.
13 Bob is a veteran at the NRC, 25 years, and 14 he has both a Bachelors and a Masters in mechanical 15 engineering from the University of Maryland, and he's 16 going to talk about something we call severe 17 Accidents mitigation alternatives, and he'll tell you 18 about that.
19 And then we'll go on to you for questions.
20 And after that we'll hear from you on 21 comments.
22 And with that I'm going to turn it over to 23 Rani.
24 RANI FRANOVICH: Thank you, Chip.
25
9 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 And thank you all for being here. I know 1
it's your time, but it's very important to have the 2
public participate in our Environmental Review 3
process, so we appreciate you being here.
4 I hope the information we provide tonight 5
will help you understand the process we're going 6
through and what we've done so far and the role you 7
can play in helping us to ensure that the Final 8
Environmental Impact Statement from Monticello 9
license renewal is accurate.
10 I'd like to start off by briefly going over 11 the agenda and the purpose of tonight's meeting.
12 We'll explain the NRC's license renewal 13 process for nuclear power plants with emphasis on the 14 Environmental Review process.
15 Then we're going to present the preliminary 16 findings of our Environmental Impact Statement, which 17 assesses the impacts associated with extending 18 operation of the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant 19 for an additional 20 years.
20 Really, the most part important of 21 tonight's meeting is for us to receive any comments 22 that you might have on our Draft Environment Impact 23 Statement.
24 We also will give you some information 25
10 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 about the schedule for the balance of our review, and 1
we'll let you know how you can submit comments on our 2
Draft Environmental Impact Statement in the future.
3 At the conclusion of the staff's 4
presentation we will be happy to answer questions.
5 However, I must ask you to limit your participation 6
to questions only and hold your comments until the 7
appropriate time during tonight's meeting.
8 Once all questions are answered, we can 9
begin to receive any comments that you have on the 10 Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
11 Before I get into a discussion of the 12 license renewal process, I'd like to take a minute to 13 talk about the NRC in terms of what we do and what 14 our mission is.
15 The Atomic Energy Act is the legislation 16 that authorizes the NRC to issue operating licenses 17 to commercial power plants.
18 The Atomic Energy Act provides for a 19 40-year license term for power reactors. This 20 40-year term is based primarily on economic 21 considerations and antitrust factors, not on safety 22 limitations of the plant.
23 The Atomic Energy Act also authorizes the 24 NRC to regulate the civilian use of nuclear materials 25
11 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 in the United States. In exercising that authority 1
the NRC's mission is threefold: To ensure adequate 2
protection of public health and safety; to promote 3
the common defense and security; and to protect the 4
environment.
5 The NRC accomplishes its mission through a 6
combination of regulatory programs and processes such 7
as conducting inspections, issuing enforcement 8
actions, assessing licensee performance, and 9
evaluating operating experience from nuclear power 10 plants across the country and internationally.
11 The regulations that the NRC enforces are 12 contained in the Title 10 of the Code of Federal 13 Regulations, commonly referred to as "10 CFR."
14 As I mentioned, the Atomic Energy Act 15 provides for a 40-year license term for power 16 reactors. Our regulations also include provisions 17 for extending plant operation for up to an additional 18 20 years.
19 For Monticello the operating license will 20 expire September 8th, 2010.
21 Monticello is owned by Northern States 22 Power Company, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Xcel 23 Energy, Inc., and is licensed to operate by Nuclear 24 Management Company, LLC.
25
12 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Nuclear Management Company has requested 1
license renewal for Monticello. As part of the NRC's 2
review of that license application we have performed 3
and environmental review to look at the impacts of an 4
additional 20 years of operation on the environment.
5 We held a meeting here in June of 2005 to 6
seek your input regarding the issues that we needed 7
to evaluate. We indicated at that earlier scoping 8
meeting that we would return to Monticello to present 9
the preliminary results documented in our Draft 10 Environmental Impact Statement. That is the purpose 11 of tonight's meeting.
12 The NRC's license renewal review is similar 13 to the original licensing process in that it involves 14 two parts, an environmental review and a safety 15 review.
16 This slide really gives a big picture 17 overview of the license renewal review process, which 18 involves those two parallel paths.
19 I'm going to briefly describe those two 20 review processes, starting with the safety review.
21 You might ask what does the safety review 22 consider?
23 For license renewal the safety review 24 focuses on aging management of systems, structures, 25
13 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 and components that are important to safety as 1
determined by the license renewal scoping criteria 2
contained in 10 CFR Part 54.
3 The license renewal safety review does not 4
assess current operational issues such as security, 5
emergency planning, and safety performance.
6 The NRC monitors and provides regulatory 7
oversight of these issues on an ongoing basis under 8
the current operating license. Because the NRC is 9
addressing these current operating issues on a 10 continuing basis, we do not re-evaluate them in 11 license renewal.
12 As I've mentioned, the license renewal 13 safety review focuses on plant aging and the programs 14 that the licensee has already implemented or will 15 implement to manage the effects of aging.
16 Let me introduce Dan Merzke, the Safety 17 Project Manager.
18 Dan, if you wouldn't mind standing up.
19 Dan is in charge of the staffs safety 20 review.
21 Thank you, Dan.
22 The safety review involves NRC staff's 23 evaluation of technical information that is contained 24 in the license renewal application. This is referred 25
14 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 to as the safety evaluation.
1 The NRC staff also conducts audits as part 2
of its safety evaluation. There is a team of about 3
30 NRC technical reviewers and contractors who are 4
conducting the safety evaluation at this time.
5 The safety review also includes plant 6
inspections. The inspections are conducted by a team 7
of inspectors from both Headquarters and the NRC's 8
Region 3 office near Chicago.
9 I believe a representative of our 10 inspection program is here today.
11 Bob Orlikowski, are you here? Bob, stand 12 up.
13 Bob is a Resident Inspector at Monticello.
14 Thank you, Bob.
15 The staff documents the results of its 16 review in a Safety Evaluation Report. That report is 17 then independently reviewed by the Advisory Committee 18 on Reactor Safeguards, ACRS.
19 The ACRS is a group of nationally-20 recognized technical experts that serve as a 21 consulting body to the Commission. They review each 22 license renewal application and safety evaluation 23 report; they form their own conclusions and 24 recommendations on the requested action; and they 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 report those conclusions and recommendations directly 1
to the Commission.
2 This slide illustrates how these various 3
activities make up the safety review process. I 4
would like to point out that the yellow hexagons on 5
this slide indicate opportunities for public 6
participation.
7 Also, the staff will present the results of 8
its safety review to the ACRS in a public meeting, so 9
members of the public would be able to attend that.
10 The second part of the review process 11 involves an environmental review. The environmental 12 review, which Jennifer will discuss in more detail in 13 a few minutes, evaluates the impacts of license 14 renewal on a number of areas, including ecology, 15 hydrology, cultural resources, and socioeconomic 16 issues, among others.
17 The environmental review involving scoping 18 activities and the development of a draft supplement 19 to the Generic Environmental Impact Statement for 20 license renewal of nuclear plants, also referred to 21 as the GEIS. The GEIS forms the basis for 22 plant-specific environmental reviews.
23 The Draft Environmental Impact Statement 24 for Monticello has been published for comment, and 25
16 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 we're here tonight to briefly discuss the results and 1
receive your comments.
2 In September of this year we will be 3
issuing a final version of this Environmental Impact 4
Statement, which will document how the staff 5
addresses the comments that we receive here today at 6
this meeting or later in writing.
7 So the final agency decision on whether to 8
issue a renewed operating license depends on several 9
inputs: inspection reports and a confirmatory letter 10 from the Region 3 administrator; conclusions and 11 recommendation of the ACRS, which are documented in a 12 letter to the Commission; the Safety Evaluation 13 Report, which documents the results of the staff's 14 safety review; and the Final Environmental Impact 15 Statement, which documents the results of the 16 environmental review.
17 Again, the yellow hexagons on the slide 18 indicate opportunities for public participation. The 19 first opportunity was during the scoping period and 20 the meeting we had in Monticello back in June 2005.
21 Many of you may have attended that meeting.
22 This meeting on the Draft Environmental 23 Impact Statement is another opportunity.
24 No contentions were admitted to a hearing, 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 so that is not applicable here. That concludes my 1
presentation on the NRC and my general overview of 2
the license renewal process.
3 Chip, you indicated you wanted to go on to 4
Jennifer's presentation before we open the floor for 5
questions?
6 CHIP CAMERON: Yeah, I think because it's 7
process-related too, and I think that will be a good 8
backdrop, too, for further questions.
9 RANI FRANOVICH: Okay. So with that, 10 Jennifer?
11 JENNIFER DAVIS: Good evening. My name is 12 Jennifer Davis, and I'm an Environmental Project 13 Manager on the NRC staff.
14 My responsibility is to coordinate the 15 activities of the NRC staff and various environmental 16 experts from the National Laboratories to develop an 17 Environment Impact Statement, or EIS as we call it, 18 associated with the license renewal for Monticello.
19 The National Environmental Policy Act of 20 1969 requires that Federal agencies follow a systematic 21 approach in evaluating potential environmental 22 impacts associated with certain actions.
23 We're required to consider the impacts of 24 the proposed action and also any mitigation for those 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 impacts that we consider to be significant.
1 We're also required to consider 2
alternatives to the proposed action, which is license 3
renewal here, and that also includes the no-action 4
alternative.
5 The National Environmental Policy Act and 6
the Environmental Impact Statement are disclosure 7
tools. They are specifically structured to involve 8
public participation, and this meeting tonight 9
facilitates the public's role in our process.
10 So today, or tonight, we are here to 11 collect your public comments on our Draft EIS.
12 The NRC staff developed a Generic 13 Environmental Impact Statement, or GEIS, as Rani was 14 discussing earlier, that address a number of issues 15 common to all power plants.
16 The staff is supplementing that Generic EIS 17 with Monticello-specific supplement which addresses 18 issues that are specific to this site.
19 The staff also evaluates the conclusions 20 reached in the GEIS to determine if there's any new 21 and significant information that would change any of 22 those conclusions.
23 Now I'd like to provide a little more 24 information about the GEIS.
25
19 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 In the mid 1990s the NRC was faced with the 1
prospect of preparing site-specific EISs for each 2
nuclear power plant that requests license renewal.
3 After assessing the impacts associated with 4
license renewal, the NRC decided to classify 5
environmental impacts into two categories.
6 The staff identified 92 different impacts, 7
called issues, that could possibly occur at a plant.
8 The staff then determined which of these issues were 9
common to all plants and that had the same impact 10 level. The NRC called these Category 1 issues and 11 made the same or generic determination about their 12 impact from the GEIS.
13 During the review of the 92 issues, the 14 staff identified 23 issues for which it could not 15 make a generic determination. Evaluation of these 23 16 issues would be done on a site-specific basis. These 17 are referred to as Category 2 issues.
18 The staff prepares an EIS for each plant 19 that requests license renewal, and that impact 20 statement takes the form of a supplement to the 21 General Environmental Impact Statement, or GEIS.
22 The supplement evaluates all issues 23 pertaining to a specific site and addresses each 24 relevant Category 2 issue on a site-specific basis.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 The NRC did not rule out the possibility 1
that the generic conclusions may not apply to a 2
specific plant. If new and significant information 3
is found during the review that contradicts the 4
conclusions in the GEIS, then the staff would perform 5
a site-specific analysis on that issue.
6 Back in June of 2005 the NRC review team 7
conducted a site audit, gathered information from the 8
public, state, and local officials, public interest 9
groups, and other federal agencies in order to 10 produce our draft supplement for Monticello, and 11 today we're here to discuss that Draft EIS.
12 I might give you a quick minute to read 13 this slide. This slide shows our decision standard 14 on the environmental review. Simply put, "Is license 15 renewal acceptable from a environmental standpoint?"
16 This slide shows important milestone dates 17 for the environmental review. The highlighted dates 18 indicate opportunities for public involvement in the 19 environmental review.
20 We received NMC's application requesting 21 license renewal of Monticello on March 24th, 2005.
22 On June 2nd, 2005, the NRC issued a Federal Register 23 notice of intent to prepare and environmental impact 24 statement and conduct scoping.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Two public meetings were held in the 1
Monticello area, in fact in this room, on June 30th 2
as part of the scoping process.
3 The scoping period ended on August 2nd, 4
2005, and a Scoping Summary Report was issued on 5
October 7th. This report addressed all comments 6
received from all sources during the scoping process.
7 If you would like to review the Scoping 8
Summary Report, we have copies available at the back 9
of the room on one of the back tables.
10 Comments received during the scoping period 11 and that are within the scope of the environmental 12 review are located in Appendix A of the 13 Draft EIS.
14 The Draft EIS was published on January 15 23rd, 2006, and we are currently accepting public 16 comments on the draft until May 4th.
17 Today's meeting is being transcribed, and 18 comments provided here carry the same weight as 19 written comments submitted to the NRC.
20 Once the comment period closes, we will 21 develop the Final EIS, which we expect to publish in 22 September of this year.
23 All comments received will be considered, 24 and a response to each of the comments will be 25
22 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 provided within the Final EIS.
1 And now I'd like to turn things over to 2
Crystal to discuss the Lab's role in the 3
environmental review.
4 But before that are there any questions on 5
process, safety or environmental?
6 CHIP CAMERON: Questions on the process 7
before we go into the actual findings in the Draft 8
EIS? Anybody have a question about how this is all 9
done?
10 (No Response.)
11 Okay. Crystal Quinly is going to tell us 12 about the Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
13 CRYSTAL QUINLY: Good evening. As Chip 14 said, I work for the University of California at 15 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
16 The NRC contracted with us to provide the 17 expertise necessary to evaluate the impact of license 18 renewal at Monticello.
19 The team consists of nine members from 20 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Pacific 21 Northwest National Laboratory in Washington, and 22 Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois.
23 The expertise we provide for the Monticello 24 license renewal and for alternatives are shown on 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 this slide: atmospheric science, socioeconomics, 1
archaeology, terrestrial ecology, aquatic ecology, 2
land use, radiation protection, nuclear safety, and 3
regulatory compliance.
4 For each environmental issue identified an 5
impact level was assigned.
6 For a small impact the effect is not 7
detectable or too small to destabilize or noticeably 8
alter any important attribute of the resource.
9 For example, the operation of the 10 Monticello plant may cause the loss of adult and 11 juvenile fish at the intake structure. If the loss 12 of fish is so small that it cannot be detected in 13 relation to the total population in the river, the 14 impact would be small.
15 For a moderate impact the effect is 16 sufficient to alter noticeably but not destabilize 17 important attributes of the resource.
18 Again for example, if the losses cause the 19 population to decline and then stabilize at a lower 20 level, the impact would be moderate.
21 And for an impact to be considered large 22 the effect must be clearly noticeable and sufficient 23 to destabilize important attributes of the resource.
24 The final example is if losses at the 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 intake structure cause the fish population to decline 1
to the point where it cannot be stabilized and 2
continually declines, then the impact would be large.
3 When the team evaluated the impacts from 4
continued operations at Monticello, we considered 5
information from a wide variety of sources.
6 We considered what the licensee had to say 7
in their Environmental Report.
8 In June, we conducted a site audit during 9
which we toured the site, interviewed plant 10 personnel, and reviewed documentation of plant 11 operations.
12 We also talked to Federal, State, and local 13 officials as well as local service agencies.
14 Lastly, we considered all of the public 15 comments received in the Scoping Summary Report dated 16 October 7th, 2005, and issued responses. These 17 comments are listed in Appendix A, along with NRC's 18 responses.
19 This body of information is the basis for 20 the analysis and preliminary conclusion in this 21 Monticello Supplement.
22 The central analyses in the Monticello 23 Supplement are presented in Chapters 2, 4, 5, and 8.
24 In Chapter 2 we discuss the plant, its 25
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 operation, and the environment around the plant.
1 In Chapter 4 we looked at the environmental 2
impacts of routine operations during the 20-year 3
license renewal term.
4 The team looked at issues related to the 5
cooling system, transmission lines, radiological, 6
socioeconomic, ground water use and quality, 7
threatened or endangered species, and accidents.
8 Chapter 5 contains the assessment of 9
accidents. And at this point I'd like to make a 10 distinction: environmental impacts from the routine 11 day-to-day operation of the Monticello plant for 12 another twenty years are considered separately from 13 the impacts that could result from potential 14 accidents during the license renewal term.
15 I will discuss impacts from the routine 16 operations; Mr. Palla will discuss impacts from 17 accidents in the next presentation.
18 Chapter 8 describes the alternatives to the 19 proposed license renewal and their environmental 20 impacts.
21 Each of these issue areas are discussed in 22 detail in the Monticello supplement. I'm going to 23 give you the highlights, but please feel free to ask 24 for more detail if you have any questions.
25
26 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 One of the issues we looked at closely is 1
the cooling system for the Monticello plant. This 2
slide shows the layout of the cooling intake and 3
discharge structure.
4 The issues that the team looked at on a 5
site-specific basis include water use conflicts, 6
entrainment and impingement of fish and shellfish, 7
heat conflict -- I'm sorry, heat shock and 8
microbiological organisms.
9 We found that the potential impacts in 10 these area were small, and additional mitigation is 11 not warranted.
12 There are also a number of Category 1 13 issues related to the cooling system. These include 14 issues related to discharges of sanitary waste, minor 15 chemical spills, metals and chlorine.
16 Now, recall that as Category 1 issues the 17 NRC has already determined that these impacts were 18 small.
19 The team evaluated all information we had 20 available to see if there was any that was both new 21 and significant for these issues. We did not find 22 any, and therefore we adopted NRC's generic 23 conclusions that the impact of the cooling system is 24 small.
25
27 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Radiological impacts are a Category 1 1
issue, and the NRC has made a generic determination 2
that the impact of radiologic release during nuclear 3
plant operations during the 20-year license renewal 4
period are small; but because these releases are a 5
concern, I want to discuss them in some detail.
6 All nuclear plants release small quantities 7
of radioactive materials within strict regulations.
8 During our site visit we walked down the 9
systems and looked at the effluent release and 10 monitoring program documentation.
11 We looked at how the gaseous and liquid 12 effluents were treated and released as well as how 13 the solid wastes were treated, packaged, and 14 shipped.
15 We looked at how the applicant determines 16 and demonstrates that they are in compliance with the 17 regulations for release of radiological effluents.
18 We also looked at data from on-site and 19 near-site locations that the applicant monitors for 20 airborne releases and direct radiation and monitoring 21 stations beyond the site boundary, including 22 locations where water, milk, fish, and food products 23 are sampled.
24 We found that the maximum calculated doses 25
28 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 for a member of the public are well within the annual 1
limits.
2 Now, there is a near-unanimous consensus 3
within the scientific community that these limits are 4
protective of human health.
5 Since releases from the plant are not 6
expected to increase on a year-to-year basis during 7
20-year license renewal term and since we also found 8
no new and significant information related to this issue, 9
we adopted the generic conclusion that the 10 radiological impact on human health and the 11 environment is small.
12 There are two terrestrial species and one 13 aquatic species listed as federally threatened, 14 endangered, or candidate species that had the 15 potential to occur at Monticello or along its 16 transmission lines.
17 A detailed biological assessment analyzing 18 the effects of continuing operation and relicensing 19 of Monticello was prepared and is included in 20 Appendix E of the Monticello Supplement.
21 Based on this and independent analysis, the 22 staff's preliminary determination is that the impact 23 of operation of the Monticello plant during the 24 license renewal period on threatened or endangered 25
29 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 species would be small.
1 Last issue I'd like to talk about from 2
Chapter 4 is cumulative impacts. These are impacts 3
that are minor when considered individually but 4
significant when considered with the other past, 5
present, or reasonably foreseeable future actions, 6
regardless of what agency or person undertakes these 7
actions.
8 The staff considered cumulative impacts 9
resulting from the operation of the cooling water 10 system, operation of the transmission lines, releases 11 of radiation and radiological material, sociological 12 impacts, ground water use and quality impacts as well 13 as impacts to threatened and endangered species.
14 These impacts were evaluated to end of the 15 20-year license renewal term, and I'd like to note 16 that the geographical boundary of the analysis was 17 dependent on the resource.
18 For instance, the area analyzed for 19 transmission lines was different than the area 20 analyzed for the cooling water system.
21 Our preliminary determination is that any 22 cumulative impacts resulting from the operation of 23 the Monticello plant during the license renewal 24 period would be small.
25
30 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 The team also looked at these other 1
environmental impacts. All issues for uranium fuel 2
cycle and solid waste management as well as 3
decommissioning are considered Category 1. For these 4
issues no new and significant information was 5
identified.
6 Between 2002 and 2003 Monticello generated 7
about 4.8 million megawatt hours of electricity.
8 The team also evaluated the potential 9
environmental impacts associated with the Monticello 10 plant not continuing operation and replacing this 11 generation with alternative power sources.
12 The team looked at the no-action 13 alternative -- that is, the unit is not relicensed.
14 New generation from coal-fired, gas-fired, 15 coal gasification, new nuclear, purchased power, 16 alternative technology such as wind, solar, and hydro 17 power, and then a combination of alternatives.
18 For each alternative we looked at the same 19 types of issues -- for example, water use, land use, 20 ecology, and socioeconomics -- that we looked at for 21 the operation of Monticello during the license 22 renewal term.
23 For two alternatives, solar and wind, I'd 24 like to describe the scale of the alternatives that 25
31 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 we considered, because the scale is important in 1
understanding our conclusions.
2 First, solar: Based on the average solar 3
energy available in Minnesota and the current 4
conversion efficiencies of photovoltaic cells and 5
solar thermal systems, between 8,000 to 21,000 acres 6
would be required to replace the generation from the 7
Monticello plant.
8 Regarding wind power, wind turbines have 9
average annual capacity factors of around 30 percent.
10 As such, at least 2000 megawatts of wind power would 11 have to be developed to replace Monticello's 600 12 megawatts. This would require about 90,000 square 13 acres of turbines to replace the generation from 14 Monticello.
15 Due to the scale of the reasonable 16 alternatives, the team's preliminary conclusion is 17 that their environmental effects in at least some 18 impact categories reach moderate or large 19 significance.
20 For the 69 Category 1 issues presented in 21 the Generic EIS that relate to Monticello, we found 22 no information that was both new and significant.
23 Therefore, we have preliminarily adopted the 24 conclusion that the impact of these issues is small.
25
32 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 The team analyzed the remaining Category 2 1
issues in this supplement, and we found the 2
environmental effects resulting from these issues 3
were also small.
4 During our review the team found no new 5
issues that were not already known.
6 Last, we found that the environmental 7
effects of alternatives, at least in some impact 8
categories, reach moderate or large significance.
9 Now I'd like to turn it back to Chip and 10 see if there's any questions.
11 CHIP CAMERON: Okay. Crystal, let's see if 12 there are questions for you on the findings in the 13 Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
14 Any questions at this point?
15 And I think we will be hearing some 16 comments about some of the findings.
17 (No response.)
18 Okay. Let's -- we're going to go a special 19 category within the Draft --
20 Thank you very much, Crystal.
21
-- within the Draft Environment Impact 22 Statement, and that is severe accident mitigation 23 alternatives, and Mr. Bob Palla is going to talk to 24 us about that.
25
33 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Bob?
1 BOB PALLA: Yeah. Good evening. My name 2
is Bob Palla. I'm with the Division of Risk 3
Assessment at NRC.
4 I'll be discussing the environmental impacts 5
of postulated accidents. These impacts are described 6
in Section 5 of the Generic Environmental Impact 7
Statement, or the GEIS as we know it.
8 The GEIS evaluates two classes of 9
accidents, design-basis accidents and severe 10 accidents.
11 Design-basis accidents consist of a 12 spectrum of postulated accidents that both the 13 licensee and the NRC staff evaluate to ensure that 14 the plant can respond without undue risk to the 15 public.
16 The ability of the plant to withstand these 17 accidents has to be demonstrated before the plant is 18 granted a license.
19 Since the licensee has to demonstrate 20 acceptable plant performance for these design-basis 21 accidents throughout the life of the plant, the 22 Commission has determined that the environmental 23 impact of design-basis accidents is of small 24 significance.
25
34 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Neither the licensee nor the NRC is aware 1
of any new and significant information on the 2
capability of the Monticello plant to withstand 3
design-basis accidents. Therefore, the staff 4
concludes that there are no impacts related to the 5
design-basis accidents beyond those discussed in the 6
GEIS.
7 The second category of accidents evaluated 8
in the GEIS are severe accidents. Severe Accidents 9
are by definition more severe than design-basis 10 because they could result in substantial damage to 11 the reactor core.
12 The Commission found in the GEIS that the 13 risk of a severe accidents is small for all plants, 14 and by this I mean the probabilistically-weighted 15 consequences.
16 Nevertheless, the Commission determined 17 that alternatives to mitigate severe accidents must 18 be considered for all plants that have not done so.
19 These alternatives are termed "SAMAs," meaning severe 20 accident mitigation alternatives.
21 The SAMA evaluation is a site-specific 22 assessment. It is a Category 2 issue, as explained 23 earlier.
24 The SAMA review for Monticello is 25
35 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 summarized in Section 5.2 of the GEIS Supplement and 1
is described in more detail in Appendix G of the GEIS 2
Supplement.
3 The purpose of performing the SAMA 4
evaluation is to ensure that plant changes with the 5
potential for improving severe accidents safety 6
performance are identified and evaluated.
7 The scope of the potential improvements 8
that were considered included hardware modifications, 9
procedure changes, training program improvements --
10 basically a full spectrum of plant changes.
11 The scope includes SAMAs that would prevent 12 core damage as well as SAMAs that would improve 13 containment performance given that a core damage 14 event were to occur.
15 The SAMA evaluation consists of a four-step 16 process, listed on this slide.
17 The first step is to characterize overall 18 plant risk and leading contributors to risk. This 19 typically involves extensive use of plant-specific 20 probabilistic safety assessment study, which is also 21 known as the PSA.
22 The PSA is a study that identifies the 23 different combinations of system failures and human 24 errors that would be required for an accident to 25
36 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 progress to either core damage or containment 1
failure.
2 The second step in the evaluation is to 3
identify potential improvements that could further 4
reduce risk. The information from the PSA such as 5
the dominant accident sequences is used to help 6
identify plant improvements that would have the 7
greatest impact in reducing risk.
8 Improvements identified in other NRC and 9
industry studies as well as SAMA analyses for other 10 plants are also considered.
11 The third step in the evaluation is to 12 quantify the risk reduction potential and the 13 implementation costs for each improvement.
14 The risk reduction and the implementation 15 costs for each SAMA are typically estimated using a 16 bounding analysis.
17 The risk reduction is generally 18 over-estimating by assuming that the plant 19 improvement is completely effective in eliminating 20 the accident sequences that it's intended to address.
21 The implementation costs are generally 22 under-estimated by neglecting certain cost factors 23 such as maintenance costs and surveillance costs 24 associated with the improvement.
25
37 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 The risk reduction and cost estimates are 1
used in the final step to determine whether 2
implementation of any of the improvements can be 3
justified.
4 In determining whether an improvement is 5
justified, the NRC staff looks at three factors:
6 The first is whether the improvement is 7
cost-beneficial. In other words, is the estimated 8
benefit greater than the estimated implementation 9
cost of the SAMA.
10 The second factor is whether the 11 improvement provides a significant reduction in total 12 risk. For example, does it eliminate a sequence or a 13 containment failure mode that contributes to a large 14 fraction of the plant risk.
15 And the third factor is whether the risk 16 reduction is associated with aging effects during the 17 period of extended operation, in which case, if it 18 was, we would consider implementation as part of the 19 license renewal process.
20 The preliminary results of the Monticello 21 SAMA evaluation are summarized on this slide. Forty 22 candidate improvements were identified for Monticello 23 based on review of the plant-specific PSA and 24 dominant risk contributors at Monticello as well as 25
38 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 SAMA analyses performed for other plants.
1 The licensee reduced the number of 2
candidate SAMAs to 16 based on a multi-step screening 3
process. Factors considered during the screening 4
included whether the SAMA is applicable to Monticello 5
due to design differences, whether it has already 6
been addressed in the existing Monticello design 7
procedures or training program, and whether the SAMA 8
would involve extensive plant changes that would 9
clearly be in excess of the maximum benefit 10 associated with completely eliminating all severe 11 accident risk.
12 A more detailed assessment of the risk 13 reduction potential and implementation costs was then 14 performed for each of the 16 remaining SAMAs. This 15 is described in detail in Appendix G of the GEIS 16 Supplement.
17 The detailed cost-benefit analysis shows 18 that ten of the SAMAs are potentially cost-beneficial 19 when evaluated individually in accordance with NRC 20 guidance in performing regulatory analysis; seven of 21 these SAMAs were cost-beneficial in the baseline 22 analysis; three of the SAMAs were cost-beneficial 23 when alternate discount rates and analysis 24 uncertainties are considered.
25
39 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Now, it's important to note that some of 1
the SAMAs address the same risk contributors, but in 2
a different way.
3 For example, one of the SAMAs considered 4
involves installing a direct drive diesel injection 5
pump as an additional high-pressure injection system.
6 This would improve the ability to cope with station 7
blackout sequences.
8 Several other sequences also address 9
station blackout events.
10 In such instances implementation of one of 11 these SAMAs could reduce the residual risk to a point 12 that one of the -- one or more of the related SAMAs 13 would no longer be cost-beneficial.
14 Because of this inter-relationship between 15 SAMAs, we would not expect that the implementation of 16 all ten SAMAs would be justified on a cost-benefit 17 basis; rather, the implementation of a carefully-18 selected subset of the SAMAs could achieve much of 19 the risk reduction and would be more cost effective 20 than implementing all of the SAMAs.
21 Subsequent to submitting the license 22 renewal application NMC has implemented six of the 23 candidate SAMAs and has re-assessed the benefits of 24 the remaining SAMAs.
25
40 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 These SAMA were implemented based on the 1
risk reduction potential and not because they are 2
aging related, because they are not.
3 The implementation of the six SAMAs reduces 4
the benefit of the remaining SAMAs such that only one 5
SAMA remains potentially cost-beneficial.
6 This one SAMA involves modifications to the 7
containment vent system such that operation of the 8
system will not rely on the availability of support 9
systems.
10 This one SAMA does not relate to managing 11 the effects of plant aging during the period of 12 extended operation, and accordingly it's not required 13 to be implemented as part of license renewal.
14 Notwithstanding this, NMC plans to further 15 evaluate this potentially cost-beneficial SAMA for 16 possible implementation under the current operating 17 license.
18 This completes my presentation, and I'll 19 take any questions you might have.
20 CHIP CAMERON: Anybody, questions on the 21 SAMA process?
22 (No response.)
23 Okay. Thank you very much, Bob.
24 And now Jennifer Davis is going to conclude 25
41 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 our presentations with a summary on how to submit 1
comments and some other issues.
2 JENNIFER DAVIS: Thank you, Chip.
3 Turning now to our preliminary conclusions, 4
we found that the impacts of license renewal are 5
small in all areas.
6 We have also preliminarily concluded that 7
the impacts of alternatives, including the no-action 8
alternative, may have moderate to large environmental 9
effects in some impact categories.
10 Based on these results, it is the staff's 11 preliminary recommendation that the adverse 12 environmental impacts of license renewal for 13 Monticello are not so great that preserving the 14 option of license renewal for energy-planning 15 decisionmakers would be unreasonable.
16 This slide is just a quick recap of 17 significant milestone dates.
18 We issued the Draft EIS for Monticello on 19 January 23rd of this year. We're currently in the 20 middle of our public comment period, which is 21 scheduled to end on May 4th of this year.
22 We will address public comments and make 23 any necessary revisions to the Draft EIS and issue a 24 Final EIS in September of 2006.
25
42 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 This slide here identifies me as your 1
primary point of contact with the NRC for this 2
Environmental Review.
3 It also identifies where documents related 4
to our review may be found in the local area. The 5
Monticello Draft EIS is available at both the 6
Monticello and Buffalo Public Libraries.
7 Additionally, documents related to the 8
review are also available on the NRC's website at 9
www.NRC.gov.
10 Additionally, as you came in you were asked 11 to fill out a registration card at our reception 12 table. If you've included your address on the card, 13 we will be happy to send a copy of the Final EIS to 14 you.
15 If you did not receive a copy of the Draft 16 Environmental Impact Statement, we have copies in the 17 back of the room. You're free to take them.
18 If you did not fill out a card and you want 19 a copy of the Final Environmental Impact Statement, 20 please see Jason, who is standing in the back of the 21 room.
22 Now, in addition to providing comments to 23 us here at this meeting, there are other ways in 24 which you can submit comments for our Environmental 25
43 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Review process.
1 You can provide written comments to the 2
Chief of our Rules and Directives Branch at the 3
address listed on the screen.
4 You can also make comments in person if you 5
happen to be in the Rockville, Maryland, area.
6 Additionally, we have established a 7
specific e-mail address at the NRC for the purpose of 8
receiving your comments on the Draft EIS, and that 9
e-mail address is MonticelloEIS@NRC.gov.
10 All of the relevant addresses are listed in 11 your handout.
12 All of your comments will be collected and 13 will be considered.
14 This concludes my remarks, and I want to 15 thank you again for taking the time to attend our 16 meeting.
17 CHIP CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Thank 18 you, Jennifer and Crystal, Bob, Rani.
19 I think we'll go on to the second part of 20 the meeting at this point.
21 And this is the opportunity for the NRC 22 staff to listen to any comments that you might have 23 that they should consider and evaluate in finalizing 24 the Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
25
44 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 And that's why it's called a "draft" is 1
that it's not going to be finalized until we hear 2
from the public and have a chance to evaluate the 3
comments.
4 And we're going to go to our first speaker 5
tonight, who is Mr. George Crocker, who is right here 6
(indicating).
7 And George is the Director of an 8
organization called the North American Water Office, 9
which is based here in Minnesota, and we're going to 10 have an opportunity to hear from him.
11 George, would you like to join us up here?
12 GEORGE CROCKER: Thank you, Chip.
13 In my experience environmental impact 14 statements are usually decision-informing documents.
15 What I've reviewed is a rationalization for 16 a decision that's already made.
17 I realize there's nothing I can do or say 18 to make this better, because I don't think you care.
19 So this is sort of a fool's errand that I'm 20 on; and not really liking being a fool, I'm going to 21 make it short.
22 Your significance levels -- small, 23 moderate, large -- appallingly subjective. Rational 24 people looking at the same facts could come to 25
45 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 dramatically different conclusions about what's 1
small, about what's moderate, about what's large.
2 Small means not detectable, not noticeable?
3 By whom? Using what?
4 Let's just look at how we monitor for 5
radiation releases as an example.
6 Acknowledging that the radionuclides are 7
released, where do they go?
8 You haven't a clue. Your monitoring 9
doesn't tell you where they go. Your monitoring says 10 where you don't find them, but you're not looking for 11 where they are.
12 They're out there. You let them go.
13 And all you have to define what happens 14 after you release them are some calculations and some 15 modeling that tell us nothing about where they go.
16 Well, the Bier VII says that there's no 17 such thing as a safe dose. You acknowledge that 18 you're releasing radionuclides, and it is absolutely 19 untenable to conclude, with no data and only 20 calculations, that none of them are inhaled or 21 ingested by humans.
22 You have no scientific basis, no factual 23 basis, no data to support such a contention. You 24 have calculations and dispersion models, and that's 25
46 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 all you have.
1 Where do they go?
2 So you don't look for where they are, you 3
don't find them, and therefore it's not detectable, 4
therefore it's small.
5 You see, quite arguably what this means is 6
that while you're looking at this as a dispersion, 7
dilution being a solution, what another I would say 8
more rational person could argue is that what you've 9
created is a very efficient distribution mechanism in 10 which the maximum number of people can have the 11 opportunity to get enough of it inside of them to 12 cause the cancers.
13 And it turns out that we don't have the 14 cancer registries on a county-by-county basis to 15 really allow us to come to those conclusions because 16 of the way they're compared.
17 But if you look at it the way it could be, 18 you will see elevated concentrations of particulate 19 cancers in communities that are in close proximity to 20 the reactors.
21 But you don't look at that, so it's small.
22 Small compared to what? Small compared to 23 background?
24 Well, you see some of us now finally 25
47 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 understand the difference between background 1
radiation and the insult when the radiation is 2
ingested or inhaled. Entirely different things.
3 Background is background. Why do you think 4
your thigh bones are so big? It's to keep the 5
background out.
6 But once it's inside of you each 7
radionuclide becomes very, very efficient at causing 8
the destruction that ultimately leads to the cancer.
9 Small. No facts. Conjecture. Subjective.
10 Wind, 30 percent capacity factor? I don't 11 think so.
12 Go look at the Minnesota Department of 13 Commerce website for their wind maps and see what 14 kind of capacity factors they come up with.
15 When you have a decision-making process 16 like this one in which there is no even attempt to 17 make a reasonable simulation of 600 megawatts of 18 baseload to compare it with and then come to the 19 conclusion that alternatives such as wind have 20 moderate to large impacts while a reactor that 21 creates waste that must be managed for 240,000 plus 22 years with routine emissions that aren't managed and 23 that's small, you're sick. That is sickness.
24 That is also behavior, institutional 25
48 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 behavior that is typical of failing institutions.
1 And the real tragedy here is that the 2
technology you are managing is so terribly 3
unforgiving.
4 CHIP CAMERON: Thank you, Mr. Crocker, for 5
taking the time to come down and talk to us tonight.
6 And we're going to go our next speaker, who 7
is Mr. John Conway, who is the Vice President at 8
Monticello Generating --
9 Yes, please.
10 JOHN CONWAY: Good evening. My name is 11 John Conway. I work for the Nuclear Management 12 Company. I am the site Vice President at the 13 Monticello station here in Monticello.
14 And I'm here today to give Nuclear 15 Management Company's position on the NRC's Draft 16 Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement and 17 provide a few additional comments regarding the 18 Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant.
19 Nuclear Management Company supports the 20 conclusions contained in the Draft Supplemental 21 Environmental Impact Statement.
22 The rigorous audits and inspections 23 conducted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have 24 led to a report confirming our own conclusions that 25
49 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 continued operation of the plant will have minimal 1
impact to the environment.
2 The Draft Impact Statement supports the key 3
elements of our mission at the facility, namely, the 4
safe, reliable, and economical operation in that 5
order of priority, with safety of the public, our 6
employees, and the environment being the top 7
priority.
8 We value and expect our organization to be 9
both a good neighbor and a responsible steward of the 10 environment in which we operate.
11 Our 500 highly-experienced and well-trained 12 employees take great care in their daily activities 13 to ensure that the environment is well protected.
14 We feel fortunate that the location of the 15 Monticello plant rests on the banks of the 16 Mississippi River within close proximity of the 17 Montissippi County Park and the Lake Mariah State 18 Park.
19 The site is home to a wide variety of 20 wildlife, aquatic species, and plant life. Our 21 efforts have made the site a safe and sound habitat 22 for many years, and it remains our commitment to 23 maintaining that for the years to come.
24 The Monticello plant has been extremely 25
50 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 well maintained over it's lifetime, ensuring it can 1
operate safely for at least an additional twenty 2
years beyond the original operating license period.
3 Approximately every two years, we perform a 4
refueling and major maintenance outage in which we 5
typically carry out over 2500 individual maintenance 6
and inspection activities. This is in addition to 7
the ongoing maintenance, inspection, and rigorous 8
testing activities that are performed routinely 9
during the period of plant operation.
10 We have continued to invest in a wide range 11 of equipment improvements to take advantage of 12 technology and materials to ensure future reliable 13 and safe operation, and this is relevant to the aging 14 management aspects of the license renewal process.
15 As we move forward, we will continue to 16 upgrade and improve the equipment, the technology, 17 and the training to the employees of the station.
18 In conclusion, the Monticello plant has 19 been a productive contributor to the energy needs of 20 the State of Minnesota and a valuable asset and good 21 neighbor to the surrounding communities and 22 environment.
23 But we remain committed to operating 24 safely, reliably, and economically, primarily being 25
51 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 focused on being a good neighbor and a good steward 1
of the environment.
2 As I mentioned previously, it's the safety 3
of the public, our employees, and the environment 4
that remain our highest priority.
5 I and the rest of the employees at 6
Monticello look forward to serving the community in 7
that regard for many years to come.
8 That concludes my statement.
9 CHIP CAMERON: Okay. Thank you very much, 10 Mr. Conway.
11 Is there anybody else that would like to 12 make a statement tonight?
13 (No response.)
14 We do have some students here from 15 St. Cloud State University, and we welcome you 16 tonight.
17 Are there any questions that any of you 18 have about the process, anything that you heard 19 tonight?
20 And we'll be available after the meeting to 21 talk informally if you want to do that, but I just 22 thought if you had any questions that I think we have 23 the time to entertain them.
24 CHIP CAMERON: Yes?
25
52 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 CHUCK HOSTOVSKY: I thought it was going to 1
be a presentation on --
2 CHIP CAMERON: Let me get you on the mic 3
so we can get you on the transcript.
4 CHUCK HOSTOVSKY: I thought there was going 5
to be a presentation on the dry cask nuclear storage 6
technology.
7 Or is that included in the SAMAs?
8 CHIP CAMERON: No --
9 Well, let me -- license renewal, as Rani 10 Franovich talked about, looks at particular things, 11 the passive -- aging of passive components, plus the 12 Environmental Review covers a number of things.
13 But I think that because of the fact that 14 the spent fuel storage situation is an every-day 15 operational issue, it's considered another aspect.
16 So maybe we can at least tell you what the 17 framework is for that.
18 Rani, can you talk to us a little bit about 19 that?
20 RANI FRANOVICH: Actually, I'm not very 21 well versed on what it takes to license one of the 22 dry cask storage facilities, but I can tell you that 23 the license renewal process focuses on aging 24 management of the system structures and components of 25
53 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 the plant.
1 It's a separate process to license dry cask 2
storage, so it's not part of tonight's meeting or the 3
staff's review of the license renewal application.
4 CHIP CAMERON: And Mike, do you want to add 5
something for perhaps the --
6 RANI FRANOVICH: Dr. Masnick is a member of 7
my staff.
8 CHIP CAMERON: Okay. Dr. Mike Masnik.
9 DR. MIKE MASNIK: As Rani said, it's 10 really not part of this process, but I do know a 11 little bit about the dry cask storage.
12 Our regulations allow for two ways in which 13 a licensee can effect dry cask storage on a site.
14 They can apply for a site-specific license 15 under Part 72 of our regulations, which allows them 16 to build a stand-alone facility on their site, and 17 it's separately licensed from the nuclear power 18 plant.
19 There is also another provision in the 20 regulations that allows them to request a general 21 license.
22 And you have to understand that under their 23 current license, which is the Part 50 license, they 24 already can store spent fuel on site.
25
54 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 So we have a provision under this general 1
license in which if they use an approved cask design, 2
then they can build a pad and basically put the fuel 3
in the dry cask storage containers.
4 So our activities associated with the 5
general license is primarily licensing the casks, and 6
what we do is we have a very rigorous licensing 7
procedure that looks at a number of accidents and 8
whether or not the cask will retain its integrity 9
through the period of time in which it's licensed.
10 The casks are licensed for a period of 11 twenty years; at the end of the twenty-year period 12 they would have to re-certify that the cask was safe 13 to store any longer period of time.
14 CHIP CAMERON: And the other process is a 15 specific license --
16 DR. MIKE MASNIK: That's correct.
17 CHIP CAMERON: -- that a particular 18 facility can follow.
19 But in this case they're using the general 20 license.
21 DR. MIKE MASNIK: Right. Right. In the 22 case of Monticello they're pursuing the general 23 license option.
24 CHIP CAMERON: Okay. And Mr. Conway I 25
55 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 think wants to add something here, and, again, he's 1
the Site Vice President at Monticello.
2 JOHN CONWAY: Although dry fuel storage is 3
outside the boundaries of the meeting, public meeting 4
here tonight, we have members of the staff from the 5
Nuclear Management Company that would be happy to, 6
within certain constraints, answer any questions 7
regarding the dry fuel storage campaign at Monticello 8
after the meeting.
9 CHIP CAMERON: Okay. Thank you for that 10 offer, Mr. Conway.
11 Are there other issues, other questions 12 that any of you might have at this point?
13 (No response.)
14 Okay. And we're here after the meeting, 15 so whatever you want to discuss...
16 Okay. And we're going to go Rani.
17 Do you want to --
18 I think we're done with the formal part.
19 Do you want to close this out and we can go to the 20 informal discussion?
21 RANI FRANOVICH: Yeah.
22 CHIP CAMERON: Okay.
23 RANI FRANOVICH: In closing, I just wanted 24 to take the opportunity to thank you all again for 25
56 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 being here. It really is important that the public 1
participates in our review process, and it really 2
enriches the quality of our product. So thank you 3
for being here with us tonight.
4 Again, comments can be received until May 5
4th. That's the close of our comment period.
6 The point of contact is Jennifer Davis or 7
the e-mail address that you saw on the slide.
8 And I also wanted to let everyone know that 9
we have these NRC Public Meeting Feedback forms. You 10 may have picked one up as you came into the meeting.
11 If you have any ideas or suggestions on how 12 we can improve our public meetings, maybe the way we 13 can present information a little bit better, please 14 jot that down on this form. Postage is pre-paid, or 15 if you'd like to just hand it to a member of the 16 staff on your way out, that's fine, too.
17 And again, thank you very much for coming, 18 and we really appreciate your input.
19 Good night.
20 CHIP CAMERON: Thank you.
21 (Whereupon, at 8:15 the proceedings were 22 adjourned.)
23 24 25