ML110330256

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Transcript - 10 CFR 2.206 Petition Review Board Re Vermont Yankee, Telephone Conference on January 26, 2011. Pages 1 - 23
ML110330256
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Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Title:

10 CFR 2.206 Petition Review Board RE Vermont Yankee Docket Number: (n/a)

Location: (telephone conference)

Date: Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Work Order No.: NRC-686 Pages 1-23 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.

Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433 f

c

1 1 / UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3

4 10 CFR 2.206 PETITION REVIEW BOARD (PRB) 5 CONFERENCE CALL 6 RE 7 VERMONT YANKEE

[8 8 .+.+++

9 WEDNESDAY 1i0 JANUARY 26, 2011 L7 12 13 The conference call was held at 9:00 a.m.,

14 Theodore Quay, Chairman of the Petition Review Board, 15 presiding.

16 17 PETITIONER: THOMAS SAPORITO 18 19 PETITION REVIEW BOARD MEMBERS 20 THEODORE QUAY, PRB Chairman, Office of Nuclear Reactor 21 Regulation 22 JAMES KIM, Vermont Yankee Petition Manager, Office of 23 Nuclear Reactor Regulation 24 EKATERINA LENNING, Petition Coordinator, Office of 25 Nuclear Reactor Regulation NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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2 1 NRC STAFF:

2 TANYA MENSAH, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation 3 MUHAMMAD RAZZAQUE, Reactor System Branch, Office of 4 Nuclear Reactor ,Regulation

<5 STACEY ROSENBERG, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation 6 TOM SETZER, Region I, Division of Reactor Projects 7

8 9

10 11 12

`13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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3 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D. I-N-G-S 2 9:00 a.m.

3 MR. KIM: Good morning. I'd like to thank 4 everybody for attending this meeting. My name is 5 James Kim. And I'm the Vermont Yankee Project 6 Manager.

7 We are here today to allow the Petitioner, 8 Mr. Thomas Saporito, to address the Petition Review 9 Board regarding the 2.206 petition dated January 14, 10 2011. I'm the Petitioner Manager for the petition.

11 The Petition Review Board Chairman is Ted 12 Quay. As part of the Petition Review Board's review 13 of this petition, Mr. Thomas Saporito has requested 14 this opportunity to address the PRB.

15 This meeting is scheduled from 9 to 10 16 a.m. The meeting is being recorded by the NRC.

17 Operations Center and will be transcribed by a court 18 reporter. The transcript will become a supplement to 19 the petition. The transcript will also be made 20 publicly available.

21 I would like to open this meeting with 22 introductions. As we go across the room, please be 23 sure to clearly speak your name, your position, and 24 the office which you work for within the NRC for the 25 record.

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4 1 I'll start off. This is James Kim. I'm 2 a project manager for the Division of Operating 3 Reactor Licensing in NRR.

4 CHAIRMAN QUAY: This is Ted Quay. I'm the 5 Petition Review Board Chairman, and I work in the 6 Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.

7 MR. RAZZAQUE: This is Muhammad Razzaque, 8 Reactor Systems Engineer with the Reactor Systems 9 Branch, NRR.

10 MR. KIM: Are there any other participants 11 from headquarters on the lien?

12 MS. LENNING: Yes. Ekaterina Lenning, 13 NRR, Petition Coordinator.

14 MS. MENSAH: Tanya Mensah, NRR.

15 MS. ROSENBERG: Stacey Rosenberg, NRR.

16 MR. KIM: Are there any NRC participants 17 from the Regional Office on the phone?

18 MR. SETZER: Yes, this is Tom Setzer. I'm 19 a Senior Project Engineer for the Division of Reactor 20 Projects in Region I.

21 MR. SPINDLER: Dave Spindler, Senior 22 Resident, Vermont Yankee.

23 MR. KIM: Are there any representatives 24 for the licensee on the phone?

25 MR. DeVINCENTIS: Yes, this is Jim NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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5 1 DeVincentis, D as in David, E, V as in Victor, I-N-C-2 E-N-T-I-S. I'm with Entergy Nuclear Operations.

3 MR. KIM: Mr. Saporito, would you please 4 introduce yourself for the record?

5 MR. SAPORITO: Yes, my name is Thomas 6 Saporito. I am the Petitioner in this proceeding and 7 I'm a resident of Jupiter, Florida.

8 MR. KIM: Are there any other associated 9 members of the public on the phone?

10 Hearing none, I would like to emphasize 11 that we each need to speak clearly and loudly to make 12 sure that the court reporter can accurately transcribe 13 this meeting.

14 If you do have something that you would 15 like to say, please first state your name for the 16 record. For those dialing into the meeting, please 17 remember to mute your phones to minimize any 18 background noise or distraction. If you do not have 19 a mute button, this can be done by pressing *6 key.

20 To unmute, press the *6 key again. Thank you.

21 At this time, I turn it over to the PRB 22 Chairman, Ted Quay.

23 CHAIRMAN QUAY: Good morning. Welcome to 24 this meeting regarding the 2.206 petition submitted by 25 Mr. Saporito. I'd like to first share some background NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W..

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6 1 on our process.

2 Section 2.206 of Title 10 of the Code of 3 Federal Regulations describes the petition process.

4 The primary mechanism for the public to request 5 enforcement action by the NRC in a public process.

6 This process permits anyone to petition the NRC to 7 take enforcement type action related to NRC licensees 8 or licensed activities.

9 Depending on the results of its 10 evaluation, NRC could modify, suspend, or revoke an 11 NRC issued license or take any other appropriate 12 enforcement action to resolve a problem. The NRC 13 staff's guidance for the disposition of 2.206 petition 14 request is in Management Directive 8.11 which is 15 publicly available.

16 The purpose of today's meeting is to give 17 the Petitioner an opportunity to provide any 18 additional explanation or support for the petition 19 before the Petition Review Board's initial 20 consideration and recommendation. This meeting is not 21 a hearing, nor is it an opportunity for the Petitioner 22 to question or examine the Petition Review Board on 23 the merits or the issues presented in the petition 24 request.

25 No decision regarding themerits of this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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7 1 petition will be made at this meeting. Following this 2 meeting, the Petition Review Board will conduct its 3 internal deliberations. The outcome of this internal 4 meeting will be discussed with the Petitioner.

5 The Petition Review Board typically 6 consists of a Chairman, usually a manager at the 7 Senior Executive Service level at the NRC and has a 8 Petition Manager and a Petition Review Board 9 Coordinator. Other members of the Board are 10 determined by the NRC staff, based on the content of 11 the information in the petition request.

12 At this time I would like to introduce the 13 Board. I am Ted Quay, the Petition Review Board 14 Chairman. James Kim is the Petition Manager for the 15 petition under discussion today. Kate Lenning is the 16 Office PRB Coordinator. Other technical staff 17 includes Muhammad Razzaque from the Office of Nuclear 18 Reactor Regulations Reactor Systems Branch; Tom Setzer 19 from NRC Region I, Division of Reactor Projects.

20 As described in our process, the staff may 21 ask clarifying questions in order to better understand 22 the Petitioner's presentation and to reach a reasoned 23 decision whether to accept or reject the Petitioner's 24 request for review under the 2.206 process.

25 I would like to summarize the scope of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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8 1 petition under consideration and the NRC activities to 2 date. On January 14, 2011, Mr. Saporito submitted to

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3 the NRC a petition under 2.206 concerning the safe 4 operation of Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Station.

5 In his petition request, Mr. Saporito 6 requested that the NRC (1) issue a confirmatory order 7 requiring the licensee to immediately bring the 8 reactor in question to a cold shutdown mode of 9 operation; (2) issue a civil penalty against the 10 licensee; (3) remove the licensee employees.

11 responsible for this matter from NRC licensed 12 activities for a period of no less than five years; 13 (4) perform an immediate NRC investigation and 14 inspection of the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Facility to 15 ensure that all nuclear safety-related systems are 16 properly operational in accordance with the licensee's 17 technical specifications and the NRC license.

18 Allow me to discuss the NRC activities to 19 date. On January 19th, you requested to address the 20 Petition Review Board to provide supplemental 21 information for the Board's consideration prior to the 22 PRB's initial meeting to make- an initial 23 recommendation.

24 The PRB met on January 24th and denied 25 your request for immediate action of bringing the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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9 1 Vermont Yankee to a cold shutdown mode of operation 2 because the PRB did not identify any immediate public 3 health and safety concerns that would warrant an 4 immediate shutdown. On January 24th you were informed 5 of the PRB's decision on the immediate action.

6 As a reminder for the phone participants, 7 please identify yourself if you make any remarks as 8 this will help in the preparation of the meeting 9 transcript that will be made publicly available.

10 Thank you. And at this point I'll turn it over to Mr.

11 Saporito.

12 MR. SAPORITO: Thank you, and good morning 13 to everybody on the PRB- staff. I appreciate this 14 opportunity to address the government in this fashion 15 regarding the public issue of nuclear safety.

16 First of all, because this is a public 17 record and there are perhaps people in the public on 18 this teleconference call and certainly the record will 19 be made available to those individuals, the Nuclear 20 Regulatory Commission is the government agency charged 21 by the United States Congress to ensure public health 22 and safety with respect to commercial nuclear powIer 23 plant operations including, but not limited to the 24 Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant.

25 The Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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10 1 licensed for operation by the NRC, the Nuclear 2 Regulatory Commission in Docket No. 05000271 and NRC 3 maintains resident inspectors on site at Vermont 4 Yankee Nuclear Power Plant.

5 With respect to this petition, I 6 respectfully request that a copy of this transcript be 7 forwarded to the NRC's Office of the Inspector General 8 for the purpose of a review by that agency in 9 consideration of whether that agency would conduct an 10 investigation of the NRC's conduct in these 11 circumstances with respect to the PRB's refusal to 12 engage the licensee to bring their reactor in question 13 to an immediate shutdown mode of operation.

14 The concern here is the fact that as the 15 licensee's prior conduct in providing false testimony 16 under oath with respect to underground piping 17 associated with a Vermont Yankee nuclear power system 18 and there were a number of licensee management 19 personnel that were removed from their positions at 20 that facility in connection with that false testimony.

21 So in light of those circumstances and in 22 light of the fact that to date the NRC, by their, own 23 admission, through the preliminary statements made on 24 the record today, has not performed Item 4 for the 25 petition and an immediate NRC investigation and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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11 1 inspection of the licensee's Vermont Yankee nuclear 2 facility to ensure that all nuclear safety-related 3 systems are properly operational and in accordance 4 with the licensee's technical specification and NRC 5 license.

6 To the extent that the NRC has not taken 7 actions as requested under the petition under Item No.

8 4, it's reasonable to understand that the public 9 health and safety is in danger and, it's in grave 10 danger based on the fact that no government inspection 11 has been conducted as requested in light of the 12 issues, safety, issues that we're going to discusswith 13 respect to this petition's initiation. And with 14 respect to the licensee's prior conduct of providing 15 false testimony under oath to a government agency in 16 a proceeding before a government body'.

17 The' other issues for the Office of the 18 Inspector General of the NRC should consider whether 19 the OIG should look into why the NRC resident 20 inspectors who are on site failed or apparently failed 21 to address this issue firsthand and it was allowed to 22 continue. The licensee was allowed to continue in 23 their operation after this event was announced.

24 And the other concern that the NRC and the 25 OIG should look into is at 10 CFR 50.7 issue which is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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12 1 a chilling effect that's in existence at the 2 licensee's facility at the Vermont Yankee plant which 3 prevented one or more licensee employees from timely 4 reporting the issue which is the subject of this 5 petition.

6 With that background, I would like to 7 continue to address the merits of this petition to 8 bring certain information to the PRB's attention which 9 I would like them to consider.

10 First of all, this petition was based in 11 part on a fellow by the name of Marvin Resnikoff, 12 that's R-E-S-N-I-K-O-F-F, who is a senior associate 13 for the Radioactive Waste Management Association. He 14 was interviewed by the newspaper, Brattleboro Reformer 15 on January 14, 2011. He makes several statements.

16 One statement he made was that during the refueling 17 outage in April, Entergy, which is the licensee, knew 18 that three or four relief valves which managed 19 pressure for the feedwater systems had excessive 20 leakage through the thread seal and that all four had 21 accumulator leakage.

22 He also stated that if there was an over-23 pressurization and the valves didn't work, they 24 wouldn't be able to cool down the reactor. If the 25 feedwater pipes burst, it would result in a meltdown.

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13 1 Also, he said had Entergy analyzed this 2 problem in one week, the matter would have become a 3 factor in a gubernatorial election. Whether Entergy 4 withheld this vital safety information because of 5 political motivation or whether the company is simply 6 incompetent, the matter is serious and should be 7 investigated.

8 The licensee, by Mr. Smith, was quoted by 9 this newspaper as stating, "We did the test in April 10 outage. Then the components were replaced." In order 11 to determine reportability of the test failures like 12 this, we need to have some material testing done on 13 the components.

14 The government, being the United States 15 Nuclear Regulatory Commission, was also quoted in this 16 article and Mr. Neil Sheehan, an NRC spokesman emailed 17 the newspaper and stated that with respect to the 18 relief valve is to relieve pressure during the events 19 in which the reactor shuts down suddenly. \The 20 depressurization function is important because it is 21 designed to prevent damage to the system and to allow 22 injection of coolant water into the reactor vessel 23 following an accident.

24 Finally, Resnikoff states that "the 25 condition of the relief valve'violated the technical NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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14 1 specifications and seriously reduced the safety 2 margin." And really, that last statement is the 3 essence and the subject of the initiation of my 2.206 4 petition because these technical specifications for 5 the regulations under 10 CFR Part 50 which the NRC has 6 authority to take enforcement action against a 7 licensee as requested.

8 Now as we already discussed, Issue No. 1, 9 to bring the reactor to cold shutdown, the NRC has 10 preliminarily already'denied that request. Issue No.

11 2 is to issue a civil count against the licensee and 12 that's well within the NRC's authority. Issue No. 3, 13 the cause and removal of licensee employees 14 responsible from NRC licensed activity'for a period of 15 no less than five years. That certainly is within the 16 NRC's jurisdiction and -the NRC has taken that 17 enforcement action many times in the past against 18 other licensees and perhaps this very same licensee.

19 Item No. 4, perform an immediate NRC 20 investigation and inspection of.the licensee's Vermont 21 Yankee nuclear facility to ensure that all nuclear 22 safety-related systems are properly operating in 23 accordance with the licensee's technical 24 specifications and NRC license. And that certainly 25 needs to be done as soon as possible in these NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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15 1 circumstances because of the licensee's past record of 2 providing false testimony under, oath. And the other 3 issues surrounding all the many, many, many failures 4 of safety-related systems at this nuclear facility.

5 Now with respect to the petition and the 6 NRC's regulations, 10 CFR 50.72 is the immediate 7 notification requirement for operating nuclear power 8 reactors. And as we already discussed, Vermont Yankee 9 is a licensee 'of the NRC and they are subject these 10 regulations. These regulations give the NRC 11 enforcement action that I'm requesting.

12 In general, under 50.72, the nuclear power 13 reactor licensee under 50.21(b) or 50.22, holding and 14 operating a license under this part or combined 15 license under part 52 of this chapter and under the 16 Commission makes a finding under 52.103(g) "shall 17 notify the NRC operations via the emergency 18 notification system" and it goes and it talks about 19 declarations of emergencies and non-emergencies. And 20 we're going to talk about non-emergency and the 21 reporting requirements of the licensee in these 22 circumstances. Specifically, did the licensee violate 23 the NRC's regulations under 10 CFR 50.72 and did the 24 licensee violate its technical specifications in 25 failing to timely report this event with respect to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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16 1 these relief valves.

2 The reporting requirements identified 3 under 10 CFR 50.72 specifically talk about one hour 4 reporting requirement, four hour reporting 5 requirements, and eight hour reporting requirements.

6 Under non-emergency events within the one hour time 7 reporting requirements it says it's not reported as a 8 declaration of an emergency class under paragraph A of 9 this section, "the licensee shall notify. the NRC as 10 soon as practical and in all cases within one hour of 11 the occurrence, any deviation from a plant's technical 12 specification authorized pursuant to Section 50.54(f) 13 of this part." There's no mistake about it. It's a 14 "shall" requirement. It's within one hour.

15 The four-hour reporting requirement states 16 that if not reported under paragraphs A or B(1) of 17 this section, the licensee shall notify the NRC as 18 soon as practical and in all cases within four hours 19 of the occurrence of any of the following. And it 20 goes through and names six subparts and under the 21 subparts, subpart XI it states "any event or situation 22 related to the health and safety of the public or on-23 site personnel or protection of the environment for 24 which a news release is planned or notification to 25 other government agencies have been or will be made."

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17 1 That meets the criteria here with respect to these 2 relief valves.

3 And finally the eight-hour report 4 requirement. Paragraph A, B(l) or B(2) of this 5 section, "the licensee shall notify the NRC as soon as 6 practical and in all cases within eight hours of the 7 occurrence of any of the following." And subparagraph 8 Item II says "any event or condition that results in 9 (a) the condition of the nuclear power plant, 10 including its principal safety barriers being 11 seriously degraded or (b) the nuclear power plant 12 being in an unanalyzed condition that significantly 13 degrades plant safety. And then under Section 4(b),

14 the systems to which the requirements of paragraph 15 c.3.4.a of this section applies are and then Item 1, 16 the reactor protection system, RPS, including reactor 17 scram and reactor trip. And Item 5, BWR' or boiling 18 water reactor core isolation cooling system, isolation 19 condenser system and in this particular case, the 20 feedwater coolant injection system. Subsection B, 21 "any event or condition that any time of discovery 22 could have prevented the fulfillment of the safety 23 function of structures or systems that are needed to 24 (a) shut down the reactor and maintain it in a safe 25 shutdown condition; (b) remove residual heat; (c)

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18 1 control the release of radioactive material or (d) 2 mitigate the consequences of an accident."

3 Clearly, the regulation under 10 CFR 50.72 4 requires the licensee to timely report the failure of 5 the systems identified by Mr. Marvin Resnikoff in a

.6 timely manner, either immediately within one hour, 7 within four hours, or within eight hours. And the 8 licensee failed to comply with the regulation.

9 The regulations under 10 CFR 50.72 are 10 inherently embraced within the licensee's technical 11 specifications and are implicitly implied within and 12 embraced within the licensee's NRC operating license 13 for that nuclear reactor. Therefore, the licensee is 14 in violation of NRC regulations and requirements with 15 respect to this incident in failing to timely notify 16 the NRC of a failure of this nuclear safety-related 17 system.

18 And in my opinion, the licensee placed the 19 public health and safety in grave danger because the 20 licensee had failed to timely report this incident and 21 had not determined at the time of occurrence how long 22 the system had been inoperable, how long the nuclear 23 reactor was at power with the system being degraded as 24 it has been identified and whether or not the system 25 could have engaged as designed to mitigate an event NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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19 1 which could have led to a nuclear accident and a 2 release of radioactive particles into the environment 3 and/or subjected the licensee employees to an 4 excessive dose of radiation.

5 So in these circumstances, enforcing that 6 on the part of the NRC is not only needed, it's 7 required to ensure for the health and safety of the 8 public and to protect the environment as a whole.

9 This licensee has a very poor record of maintaining 10 its physical plant at the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power 11 Plant and that's a matter of documented record by the 12 Government's own inspection program, the reactor 13 oversight process.

14 The licensee has a dubious record now of 15 providing false testimony under oath for which 16 licensee managers have been removed from their 17 positions of authority at the facility in question.

18 And to date, the NRC has failed to comply with Item 4 19 of the petition which requested an immediate NRC 20 investigation and inspection of the licensee's nuclear 21 facility to ensure that all nuclear safety-related 22 systems are fully operational and in accordance with 23 the licensee's technical specification and NRC 24 license. And until that inspection is completed, it's 25 my position the public health and safety remains in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE,, N.W.

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20 1 grave danger because who knows whether systems are 2 failing or have been degraded or have simply not 3 timely reported by the licensee to the NRC at this 4 point.

5 This --

6 (Mr. Saporito's phone disconnects.)

7 CHAIRMAN QUAY: Mr. Saporito, are you 8 still there?

9 LOoks like he's dropped off the line, so 10 why don't the rest of us hold for several minutes to 11 give him a chance to reestablish.

12 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 13 off the record at 9:27 a.m. and resumed at 9:28 a.m.)

14 MR. SAPORITO: This is Tom Saporito, the 15 Petitioner, was I cut off or something? Did you get 16 most of what I said or what?

17 CHAIRMAN QUAY: We got a good portion of 18 it. You were just cut off probably within the last 19 three or four minutes, no more than that. All of a 20 sudden the line went dead. So if you could.continue.

21 MR. SAPORITO: Where did I leave off? Can 22 the court reporter give me my last couple of 23 sentences?

24 CHAIRMAN QUAY: Sure.

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21 1 off the record at.,9:29 a.m. and resumed at 9:30 a.m.)

2 MR. SAPORITO: Given the background and 3 history of the licensee and to the extent that Item 4 4 requests the NRC do an immediate investigation and 5 inspection out here to look at all nuclear safety-6 related systems I think the public health and safety 7 at this time remains in grave danger because we don't 8 know what systems are degraded, to what degree they 9 are degraded, if they are operational or not 10 operational and if not, how long they've been non-11 operational. We don't know whether the licensee has 12 failed to timely report any of those issues, whether 13 they are even aware of those issues.

14 We don't know the extent of a chilling 15 effect out there is preventing licensee employees from 16 reporting these types of issues. So to the extent 17 -that the NRC has failed to date and at least since 18 January 14, 2011 when this issue was made public by 19 the newspaper in question, since the NRC has not taken, 20 that as an inspection type of activity, I implore the 21 NRC to do that as soon as possible.

22 I'll remain on the line here to answer any 23 questions and clarify any points that I've raised to 24 the PRB and certainly to take any questions from the 25 licensee or any member of the public that happens to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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22 1 be on this call. Thank you.

2 CHAIRMAN QUAY: At this time, does the 3 staff here at headquarters have any questions for Mr.

4 Saporito?

5 Hearing none, I'll make the same request 6 of the region.

7 -MR. SETZER: No, I appreciate the 8 presentation. No questions from Region 1.

9 CHAIRMAN QUAY: Thank you. Before. I 10 conclude the meeting, members of the public may 11 provide comments regarding the petition and ask 12 questions about the 2.206 petition process. However, 13 as stated in the opening, the purpose of this meeting 14 is not to provide an opportunity for the Petitioner or 15 the public to question or examine the Petition Review 16 Board regarding the merits of the Petitioner's 17 request.

18 Does any member of the public wish to make 19 comments?

20 Okay, hearing none, Mr. Saporito, thank 21 you for taking your time to provide the NRC staff with 22 clarifying information on the petition you've 23 submitted.

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23 1 transcript?

2 (Whereupon, at 9:33 a.m., the 3 teleconference was concluded.)

4 5

6 7

8 9

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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CERTIFICATE This is to certify that the attached proceedings if before the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the matter of: Vermont Yankee Name of Proceeding: 10 CFR 2.206 Petition of:

Thomas Saporito Docket Number: (n/a)

Location: (teleconference) were held as herein appears, and that this is the original transcript thereof for the file of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission taken by me and, thereafter reduced to typewriting by me or under the direction of the court reporting company, and that the transcript is a true and accurate record of the foregoing proceedings.

0] James ajandro Official Reporter Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.

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