ML120650617
| ML120650617 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Peach Bottom  |
| Issue date: | 02/17/2012 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation |
| To: | |
| Hughey J, NRR/DORL, 301-415-3204 | |
| Shared Package | |
| ml120650595 | List: |
| References | |
| G20120052, NRC-1450, OEDO-2012-0054 | |
| Download: ML120650617 (33) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
10 CFR 2.206 Petition RE Peach Bottom Docket Number:
(n/a)
Location:
(teleconference)
Date:
Friday, February 17, 2012 Work Order No.: NRC-1450 Pages 1-32 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 1
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2
+ + + + +
3 10 CFR 2.206 PETITION REVIEW BOARD (PRB) 4 CONFERENCE CALL 5
RE 6
PEACH BOTTOM 7
+ + + + +
8 FRIDAY 9
FEBRUARY 17, 2012 10
+ + + + +
11 The conference call was held, Michele 12 Evans, Chairperson of the Petition Review Board, 13 presiding.
14 PETITIONER: MICHAEL MULLIGAN 15 PETITION REVIEW BOARD MEMBERS 16 MICHELE EVANS, Director 17 Division of Operating Reactor Licensing 18 JOHN HUGHEY, Petition Manager for 2.206 petition 19 ANDREA RUSSELL, Petition Coordinator for 2.206 20 petition 21 22 23 24 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 2
NRC HEADQUARTERS STAFF 1
JOHN BILLERBECK, Component Performance and Test Branch 2
MOHAMMAD RAZZAQUE, Reactors Systems Branch 3
CATHERINE SCOTT, Assistant General Counsel for 4
Material Litigation and Enforcement 5
6 NRC REGIONAL STAFF 7
ADAM ZIEDONIS, Resident Inspector 8
SAM HANSELL, Senior Resident Inspector 9
10 LICENSEE REPRESENTATIVES 11 JIM ARMSTRONG, Exelon 12 DAN DOLAN, Exelon 13 DAVE HELKER, Exelon 14 TOM LOOMIS, Exelon 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 3
P R O C E E D I N G S 1
(11:00:44 a.m.)
2 MR. HUGHEY: Good morning. This is John 3
Hughey with NRC. We'll go ahead and start the 4
teleconference. I'd like to thank everybody for 5
attending this meeting, and please note that this is a 6
recorded line. My name is John Hughey, and I am the 7
Peach Bottom Project Manager.
8 We are here today to allow the Petitioner, 9
Michael Mulligan, to address the Petition Review Board 10 regarding the 2.206 petition dated January 24 th, 2012.
11 I'm the Petition Manager for the petition.
12 The Petition Review Board Chairman is Michelle Evans.
13 As part of the Petition Review Board's, or the PRB's 14 review of the petition, Mr. Mulligan has requested 15 this opportunity to address the PRB.
16 This meeting is scheduled from 11:00 a.m.
17 to 12:00 p.m. Eastern Time. The meeting is being 18 recorded by the NRC Operations Center, and will be 19 transcribed by a court reporter. The transcript will 20 become a supplement to the petition. The transcript 21 will also be made publicly available.
22 I'd like to open this meeting with 23 introductions. As we go around the room, please be 24 sure to clearly state your name, your position, and 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 4
the office that you work for within the NRC for the 1
record.
2 What we'll do is I'll start off here at 3
Headquarters, then I'll ask for any other NRC 4
participants on the phone, and then we'll move to 5
other participants. So, I'll start off. I'm John 6
Hughey, and as I said I'm the Peach Bottom Project 7
Manager for NRR, and I'm also the Petitioner Manager.
8 MS. EVANS: I'm Michelle Evans. I'm the 9
Director, Division of Operating Reactor Licensing in 10 NRR, and I'm the Peach Bottom Chairman.
11 MS. SCOTT: I'm Catherine Scott, and I'm 12 the Assistant General Counsel for Materials Litigation 13 and Enforcement with the Office of General Counsel.
14 MR. RAZZAQUE: I'm Mohammad Razzaque with 15 the Reactor Systems Branch, NRR.
16 MR. BILLERBECK: This is John Billerbeck.
17 I'm with the Component Performance and Test Branch in 18 NRR.
19 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, and that's everyone here 20 in the room at Headquarters. On the line from the 21 Region, could you please identify yourselves.
22 MR. ZIEDONIS: Sure, John. This is Adam 23 Ziedonis, the Resident Inspector calling from the 24 Peach Bottom NRC Resident Inspector office. And Sam 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 5
Hansell, the Senior Resident will be joining us here 1
shortly, as well.
2 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, thank you very much. Are 3
there any other NRC participants on the phone?
4 MS. RUSSELL: Hi, John. This is Andrea 5
Russell, 2.206 Coordinator for NRR.
6 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, very good. Thank you, 7
Andrea. And then we'll also go ahead and -- Mr.
8 Mulligan, if you would introduce yourself.
9 MR. MULLIGAN: I'm Mike Mulligan, and I'm a 10 Whistleblower. I once had a licensed operator, and I 11 live in Hinsdale, New Hampshire.
12 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, very good. Thank you.
13 Oh, and finally, are there any representatives from 14 the Licensee on the telephone?
15 MR. ARMSTRONG: Jim Armstrong and Dan Dolan 16 from Exelon.
17 MR. HELKER: Dave Helker, Exelon.
18 MR. LOOMIS: Tom Loomis, Exelon.
19 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, thank you very much.
20 It's not required for members of the public to 21 introduce themselves for this call; however, if there 22 are any members of the public on the phone that wish 23 to do so at this time, please state your name for the 24 record.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 6
(No response.)
1 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, hearing none, I'd like 2
to emphasize that we each need to speak clearly and 3
loudly to make sure that the court reporter can 4
accurately transcribe this meeting. If you do have 5
something that you'd like to say please first state 6
your name for the record.
7 For those dialing into the meeting, please 8
remember to mute your phones to minimize any 9
background noise or distractions. If you do not have a 10 mute button, this can be done by pressing the keys *6.
11 To unmute, press the *6 keys again. Thank you.
12 At this time, I'd turn it over to the PRB 13 Chairman, Michelle Evans.
14 MS. EVANS: Good morning. Welcome to this 15 meeting regarding the 2.206 Petition submitted by Mr.
16 Mulligan.
17 I'd like to first share some background on 18 our process. Section 2.206 of Title 10 of the Code of 19 Federal Regulations describes the petition process, 20 the primary mechanism for the public to request 21 enforcement action by the NRC in a public process.
22 This process permits anyone to petition the NRC to 23 take enforcement-type action related to NRC licensees 24 or licensed activities.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 7
Depending on the results of its 1
evaluation, NRC could modify, suspend, or revoke an 2
NRC-issued license or take any other appropriate 3
enforcement action to resolve a problem. The NRC 4
Staff's guidance for the disposition of 2.206 petition 5
requests is in Management Directive 8.11, which is 6
publicly available.
7 The purpose of today's meeting is to give 8
the Petitioner an opportunity to provide any 9
additional explanation or support -- are you still 10 there?
11 MR. HUGHEY: Yes. Can you still hear us on 12 the line?
13 MR. ZIEDONIS: I can hear you guys. This is 14 Adam from Peach Bottom Resident Office.
15 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, thank you.
16 MS. EVANS: Okay, good. All right, we'll 17 continue.
18 The purpose of today's meeting is to give 19 the Petitioner an opportunity provide any additional 20 explanation or support for the petition before the 21 Petition Review Board's initial consideration and 22 recommendations. This meeting is not a hearing, nor is 23 it an opportunity for the Petitioner to question or 24 examine the PRB on the merits or the issues presented 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 8
in the petition request. No decisions regarding the 1
merits of this petition will be made at this meeting.
2 Following this
- meeting, the Petition 3
Review Board will conduct its internal deliberations.
4 The outcome of this internal meeting will be discussed 5
with the Petitioner.
6 The Petition Review Board typically 7
consists of a Chairman, usually a manager at the 8
Senior Executive Service level at the NRC. It has a 9
Petition Manager and a PRB Coordinator. Other members 10 of the Board are determined by the NRC Staff based on 11 the content of the information in the petition 12 request.
13 At this time, I would like to introduce 14 the Board. I am Michelle Evans, the Petition Review 15 Board Chairman. John Hughey is the Petition Manager 16 for the petition under discussion today. Andrea 17 Russell is the Office's PRB Coordinator. Our technical 18 staff includes Sam Hansell, Senior Resident Inspector, 19 and Adam Ziedonis, Resident Inspector for the Peach 20 Bottom Station. John Billerbeck, Office of Nuclear 21 Reactor Regulations, Component Performance Testing 22 Branch; and Mohammad Razzaque from the Reactor Systems 23 Branch. We also obtain advice from our Office of 24 General Counsel represented today by Catherine Scott.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 9
As described in our process, the NRC Staff 1
may ask clarifying questions in order to better 2
understand the Petitioner's presentation, and to reach 3
a reasoned decision whether to accept or reject the 4
Petitioner's request for review under the 2.206 5
process.
6 I would like to summarize the scope of the 7
petition under consideration and the NRC activities to 8
date. On January 24 th, 2012, Mr. Mulligan submitted to 9
the NRC a petition under 2.206 regarding the Peach 10 Bottom Unit 2 and Unit 3 reactors.
11 In this petition request, Mr. Mulligan 12 identified the following areas of concern. Mr.
13 Mulligan requests that the NRC, one, require that 14 Peach Bottom have an outside detailed investigation 15 and root cause performed the Unit 3 safety release 16 valve pneumatic actuators threaded seal failure that 17 was discovered on September 25 th, 2011.
18 Number
- two, perform a
special 19 investigation or equivalent and explain the 20 similarities and differences between the Vermont 21 Yankee and Peach Bottom safety release valve actuators 22 and seal problems.
23 Number three, consider if a Generic Notice 24 is needed. Number four, require that Peach Bottom 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 10 Nuclear Plant be immediately shut down. Number five, 1
require that all Peach Bottom safety release valves 2
seals and actuators be replaced with a design with a 3
sufficient margin of safety before start up.
4 Number six, form a local public oversight 5
panel around every plant. Number seven, four an 6
emergency NRC Senior Official Oversight Panel with the 7
aims of reforming the reactor oversight process.
8 Number eight, form a national NRC oversight panel of 9
outsiders to oversee and report on the Agency's 10 activities.
There should be a
mixture of 11 professional, academic people and capable lay people.
12 The Petitioner also requests that 13 President Obama removed Chairman Jaczko and the other 14 four NRC Commissioners.
15 As the basis for this request, Mr.
16 Mulligan referenced the Licensee Event Report 17 associated with the failure of the Peach Bottom Unit 3 18 safety release valve in September of 2011.
19 The Event Report describes that the safety 20 release valve failed a
surveillance test with 21 excessive leakage attributed to a thermally degraded 22 threaded seal on the actuators; Peach Bottom's plan to 23 upgrade the seals due to vendor information issued in 24 March 2011 regarding Vermont Yankee. The vendor 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 11 information recommended seal upgrades to a more 1
thermal-resistant material.
2 Allow me to discuss the NRC activities to 3
date. On January 31 st, 2012, the Petition Manager 4
contacted the Petitioner to explain the 10 CFR 2.206 5
process, and to offer the Petitioner an opportunity to 6
address the PRB by phone or in person. The Petitioner 7
requested to address the PRB by phone prior to its 8
internal meeting to make the initial recommendation to 9
accept or reject the petition for review.
10 On February 3
rd,
- 2012, the PRB met 11 internally to discuss the request for immediate 12 action. The PRB denied the request for immediate 13 action on the basis that additional NRC Staff 14 evaluation had determined that the failure of the 15 Peach Bottom Unit 2 safety release valve threaded seal 16 was not a common mode failure or an age-related 17 failure, but was isolated to the particular seal 18 installed on the subject actuator in November of 2010.
19 The Petitioner was informed on February 20 10 th, 2012 of the PRB's decision to deny the request 21 for immediate action.
22 As a reminder for the phone participants, 23 please identify yourself if you make any remarks, as 24 this will help us in the preparation of the meeting 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 12 transcript that will be made publicly available. Thank 1
you.
2 Mr. Mulligan, I'll turn it over to you to 3
allow you to provide any information you believe the 4
PRB should consider as part of this petition.
5 MR. MULLIGAN: I have a neighbor with a 6
chainsaw. Is that noise disruptive? Is it all right if 7
I go on, and maybe move into another room or 8
something. It'll take me two seconds. But is that 9
noise disruptive to you, anybody?
10 MR. HUGHEY: No, not on this line. We can't 11 hear a thing.
12 MR. MULLIGAN: Okay, great.
13 I'm going to put a little spot in for CNN.
14 They're having a special on Vermont Yankee this 15 Sunday, February 19 th at 8:00 p.m. I don't think that's 16 a coincidence that I'm here today, and this thing is 17 going on Sunday.
18 What I would say with Vermont Yankee is 19 that, you know, it's the head in the sands kind of 20 philosophy that gets everybody into trouble. It's the 21 idea of problems show up and stuff like that, 22 everybody just kind of turns their head away from the 23 problem, and ignores it. And they know what they're 24 supposed to do, or they might have incomplete 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 13 procedures or processes, and they know they're 1
incomplete, and they default to well, I've got to 2
follow the procedures. And I don't have to tell the 3
whole story and stuff. And I think that's a big deal 4
with the industry; the instincts to, when problems 5
come up everybody kind of just -- everybody puts their 6
head in the sand, that type of thing.
7 You know, I want to recognize that I'm a 8
very lucky person. I live in the United States of 9
America, and I know that if I lived in China, or in 10 Israel, you know, they'd find me in the gutter with a 11 bullet in my head. I know that I live in an 12 extraordinary country with a constitution, and this 13 allows me to talk to my government. And this is what 14 I'm doing today, is talking to my government. And it's 15 quite an amazing thing. A lot of people in the world 16 don't have this privilege as we do as United States 17 citizens.
18 The big picture, well, it says on the 19 response that the seals have worked for 20 years at 20 Peach Bottom, and there's no deterioration in the 21 seals that have been discovered except this one. And I 22 would just say that the seal testing and stuff, 23 pressure testing, that doesn't get you -- that's not a 24 thorough way to evaluate what's going on here.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 14 I could tell you right now that you tell 1
me -- I would say well, what is your basis for that 2
C-- making that statement. You don't provide a basis.
3 What kind of testing, what kind of lab work was done 4
on that seal that failed at Peach Bottom?
5 We know that there's -- Vermont Yankee was 6
supposed to be Buna-n, and actually it is Buna with 7
sulfur impurities and stuff like that, so how do we 8
know that the same thing is not going on at Peach 9
Bottom?
10 You
- know, I'm a
science
- guy, an 11 engineering guy, you know, show me the facts. Science 12 and engineering is about getting the information down 13 on paper and letting everybody see and have an audit 14 whether it's valid information or not. I don't see 15 that kind of science going on here or in a lot of 16 things in the industry.
17 So, I think there's a process system 18 breakdown in maintaining the quality of materials and 19 safety systems. We know that there's hundreds of 20 thousands of parts in each plant. There's millions of 21 parts and components throughout the nation and stuff 22 like that, and if there's a process breakdown, you 23 know, maybe on in a thousand components will show a 24 defect, or you can't see a defect and stuff like that.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 15 And you cycle it through all these hundreds of 1
thousands of parts and components and millions of 2
parts and components nationwide and stuff like.
3 You know, you've got -- if it's one in ten 4
thousand, one in a hundred thousand, you still got a 5
big problem. And my fear is what will these guys see 6
up in the control room if we have a bad accident with 7
the number of errors that could show up.
8 What we know between Vermont Yankee and 9
Peach Bottom is they could stick a new actuator in 10 there with new seals. It could pass the leak rate test 11 and before a year is out those seals could deteriorate 12 to some unknown condition, become thermally affected, 13 become brittle and dry. And we really don't -- you 14 know, science and engineering.
15 You know, I want the facts, what are the 16 facts? Do you have Buna-n in there, or is it just 17 Buna, or is some other crap from China or something 18 like that? What is in them seals and stuff like that?
19 I mean, I think the NRC and Peach Bottom ought to --
20 should have provided us with that information long 21 ago.
22 You know, it's like an artificial hip 23 operation. You go to a doctor, he says I'll throw a 24 metal hip in you, and it'll be good for 40 years. You 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 16 go have an operation, you risk your life, you come out 1
of it you're pretty good after two months. And in the 2
fourth month, you're worse than you ever were. Then 3
you go back to the doctor and he says oh, yeah, you 4
know, we knew that the damn thing was going to rust.
5 We had information it was going to rust. We didn't 6
really know the full quality of the material that was 7
placed in that hip and stuff. You know, we're sorry.
8 That's what's happening here, and it's 9
just not ethnical or moral in a nuclear plant not to 10 know what kind of material properties that are in 11 these plants. You've got regulations that say you're 12 supposed to have these kind of properties, and nobody 13 knows what's going on with seals, at least with 14 Vermont Yankee, and also Peach Bottom.
15 And we know big picture, the NRC should 16 have picked this right up in the beginning with 17 Vermont Yankee, and they should have demanded that 18 those seals, they get sent off to the labs. The NRC 19 should have taken one of them seals and did their own 20 lab work on them seals. And it should have been 21 announced rather quickly to all the plants in the 22 United States what's going on with them seals, and why 23 did those -- why do we have this quality process 24 breakdown that allowed them that material in these 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 17 plants? Questions whether -- you know, it questions 1
whether the rest of the safety release valves. How do 2
we know the other material in there is of adequate 3
standards, all the metal and all that sort of stuff, 4
you know. And like I said, this is new stuff.
5 I would say that every seal or every 6
actuator or valve that's manufactured after 2002 7
doesn't have the -- can't be assured that they have 8
the proper standards.
9 Again, you know, I think Peach Bottom 10 should have been more aware, and the NRC should have 11 been more aware of what was going on at Vermont 12 Yankee. You know, at Vermont Yankee the vendor 13 triggered the whole thing by saying we cannot support 14 Type 1 actuators any more, so that started the whole 15 ball rolling. And then they went into this Type 2 16 actuator, and there was kind of word games being 17 played between the vendor and Vermont Yankee of what 18 actually a Type 2 is. And here we are.
19 So, you know, you start asking what's the 20 extent of the condition, what's the generic 21 implications? How many plants in the United States 22 have defective seals in there? You know, the worst 23 thing you can think about is what if the seal turned 24 to dust? Do we have any actual studies of predicting 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 18 what would happen if those seals disappear in an 1
accident? And like I said, the other thing is, you 2
know, if a process is broken down -- or why their 3
process is broken down, and we don't know what the 4
quality of any of the stuff is in these valves.
5 You know, we make -- I try and make models 6
in my mind. The one model would be that we're at a 7
nuke plant and it only has one diesel generator 8
available and stuff. That's the way the set up is, 9
we've only got one diesel generator. You know, we got 10 two loops recently in the nation. We had them -- they 11 were shut down at the same time, so you have one plant 12 that's got one diesel generator, and that's all you've 13 got to depend upon. And then you've got another plant 14 like a regular plant where you have diverse power 15 supplies, and you've got backups to backups.
16 I think at times the plant with one diesel 17 generator is more safe than the plant with diverse 18 power supplies. I think there's a mental disease that 19 gets involved in this
- thing, mental
- thinking, 20 defective thinking, and it all turns into, you know, 21 well, we've got backups to the backups. Nothing 22 matters. You know, we've got backups to the backups, 23 doesn't matter what the quality of an SRV is because 24 there's so many other things. You know, we've got so 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 19 many backup system it doesn't matter. We've got -- it 1
doesn't matter what the seal material is because we've 2
got backups to the backups.
3 And I think that's a philosophy that's 4
going to destroy the industry if we keep thinking --
5 I'd rather have one diesel generator -- and everybody 6
is smart enough -- these are all smart people to say 7
oh, man, one diesel generator. Can you imagine what 8
happens if you had a failure in that diesel generator?
9 And then you've by hyper fixated on making sure that 10 diesel generator doesn't have a defect, not even a 11 little defect in there. It would be spot perfect 12 instead of this area we've got now where everybody is 13
-- nothing ever matters, risk, regulation, we've got 14 backups to the backup. And we really don't care if 15 there's defects in there because we've got so many 16 backup systems.
17 The history with
-- in regulations 18 maintaining safety system parts, you know. And with 19 this thing here, it started out with asbestos seals, 20 and then it went to silicon, which was worse. Then we 21 went to Buna-n which was even less -- it could survive 22 a less -- not as high a temperature. And then we went 23 to Buna something or other and stuff. And who knows 24 what's really in there. And this Viton stuff that 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 20 Vermont Yankee replaced their seals with with the 400 1
degrees, you know, kind of reminds you -- that's back 2
to that business with the asbestos. At least asbestos 3
-- I know, you know, asbestos is poisonous and stuff 4
like that, but still asbestos is the high-temperature 5
material and stuff like that. How did we end up 6
sliding down to silicon and then the Buna-n, and then 7
we don't care what kind of Buna is in there, or 8
anything will work and stuff. How did we end up -
9 through the history of the last few decades, how did 10 we end up with this reduction of safety? You know, it 11 boggles the mind.
12 Severe reactor accidents, you know, if we 13 had a severe reactor accident without fatality at 14 Peach Bottom, can you imagine, you know, 80 miles from 15 Washington, D.C. You know, it would damage the 16 credibility of the United States worldwide. It would 17 damage the credibility of the utility industry. You 18 know, if you had one at one plant, the other one would 19 be considered dead for a decade, so you destroy a 20 utility. Exelon would be destroyed. There would be 21 price spikes in the United States, there would be all 22 sorts of political stuff going on and stuff like that.
23 So, people say oh, well, there's not a fatality -- we 24 don't have to worry because there will be no fatality, 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 21 you know.
1 I
think a
reactor accident without 2
fatality is just marginally lesser of an accident than 3
one with a fatality. In other words, I think there's 4
-- it's a mind boggling catastrophe for the United 5
States if we ever had a core melt down. You know that 6
that core melt down would create all sorts of 7
investigations. We'd find all sorts of stuff wrong 8
with the NRC, and it would be a circus. And within 9
these utilities, we would retroactively say well, 10 today this behavior is acceptable. After the accident 11 we would think it's a coverup and stuff. It would be a 12 catastrophe for everybody if we had an accident 13 without fatality. It bothers me the NRC spews this 14 stuff out and doesn't put that in a bigger context of 15 well, if we had a melt down it would be a catastrophe 16 all around.
17 We know -- they're talking about in this 18 SOARCA, State-Of-The-Art Reactor Consequence program, 19 they're talking about, you know, these pressurizers, I 20 mean these reliefs work -- cycle 400 times during an 21 accident. They're probably going to fail after 270 22 cycles, you know. The accumulators are sized between 23 one and five cycles and stuff. It's amazing that 24 there's such a difference in this.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 22 Then we know that -- another thing that 1
bothers me with this SOARCA is the actuators 2
themselves aren't analyzed. You don't have any --
3 well, why is that? How come you assume that there's 4
no actuators in this evaluation and stuff? It's the 5
most vulnerable -- it has -- it's the most vulnerable 6
part of the relief -- wink, wink, ignored by the NRC.
7 And this thing talks -- doesn't even talk about what 8
would really happen in the control room.
9 You'd have operators bird dogging these 10 relief valves, the switches, and you would never allow 11 those relief valves to operate on their own, you 12 know. You'd be controlling the reactor pressure by 13 opening and shutting the relief valves. There'd be a 14 person there standing operating the switch. And SOARCA 15 doesn't talk about -- they talk about this automatic 16 action. And I think that's -- there's disconnect 17 between what the procedures say to the operators, you 18 have to be there and operating them, and SOARCA kind 19 of just says oh, well -- probably the actuator won't 20 survive. We're going to have to assume that it works 21 on automatic function.
22 You
- know, you have an engineering 23 evaluation saying one thing and then you're telling 24 the operator -- then you're leaving the operators out 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 23 there naked and they're assuming those valves are 1
going to work. That bothers me. That bothers me that 2
there's such a disconnection between the engineering 3
and the actual procedures at these plants.
4 I think, you know, you can see these guys 5
up there and all of a sudden the valve switch doesn't 6
work because maybe the seal has turned to dust and 7
stuff, you know. And the procedures tell him that he 8
has to manually control those valves. And what is he 9
going to think? What is he going to think there now in 10 that accident when the procedures tell him to control 11 pressure, and all of a sudden the switch don't work, 12 you know. How do we leave a guy like that naked? How 13 do we leave those guys naked without actually 14 absolutely knowing what's going to happen to those 15 valves in the worst accident?
16 At Vermont Yankee when this thing started 17
-- oh, wait a minute, I'm all mixed up. So, we know 18 the -- just recently the inspectors told me that, you 19 know, Vermont Yankee reliefs or seals are -- they're 20 not sure. They had two lab analyses and, evidently, 21 one said that it was Buna-n, one said that it wasn't 22 Buna-n, and they got sulfur impurities. There was a 23 conflict and stuff between the labs.
24 I
guess
- now, according to the NRC 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 24 inspectors, it didn't have that Buna-n stuff in it, 1
and it had impurities in it, so that was the reason 2
C-- I mean that degraded the thermal performances of 3
the seals.
4 You know, two of the four valves failed a 5
leak test, three out of four valves leaked. These 6
valves were purchased in 2002. They were installed in 7
2008. It was the -- one operating period later in 8
2010, they discovered in the May outage that they were 9
leaking. In 2010, the 12/22/2010, it was reported in 10 the LER. There was a tremendous delay in reporting 11 this stuff, and the first LER was incomplete and 12 stuff.
13 You know, what is -- that sort of stuff 14 should have been out there in the industry. This is 15 our problem. This is, you know. It should have been 16 immediately assessed as far as what condition those 17 seals were, and reported to everybody and stuff. And 18 we think that because this has such generic 19 implications, everybody knew that it was generic 20 implications. We don't know what the quality of some 21 of these seals after 2002. Nobody had the skills to 22 say I've got to get this down on paper.
23 Every seal that comes out of these plants 24 from now on after 2010 has to be -- has to go to a 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 25 lab, and we have to know exactly whether they're Buna-1 n, or Buna, or sulfur crap, or whatever it is, you 2
know. That's science and engineering. The same with 3
Peach Bottom, they -- Peach Bottom should have when 4
they had this valve, knowing -- referencing Vermont 5
Yankee, they should have threw it to a lab and --
6 within a month maybe or so, they should have known 7
exactly what they got with Buna-n. We should have had 8
a feeling -- how many are Buna-n material that's to 9
the right standards? How many seals are crap seals, 10 you know.
11 We should be asking how do those crap 12 seals get in the system? How come there wasn't -- how 13 come Target Rock didn't have the capability to test 14 these seals and reject the bad stuff, and keep the 15 good stuff? What's going on with all of sudden a 16 vendor doesn't have -- doesn't really notify anybody 17 in time, and he says he can't support a Type 1, and he 18 goes to a Type 2?
19 How come, you know, it starts off as 20 asbestos, then all of a sudden we go down to this 150, 21 170 degree crap, and now we're going back up to 400 22 degrees stuff with this Viton. I mean, this is 23 insanity. How do we allow this degradation of safety, 24 and then we come back and use stuff that kind of is 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 26 equivalent to the asbestos?
1 These are questions that everybody should 2
be asking, and nobody is asking those questions. I 3
find it amazing in this day and age. Like I said, 4
science and engineering, and documentation. You get it 5
on paper, you let everybody see what's going on, and 6
you even allow your enemies, so called enemies to see 7
it, and they make the response. And it gets everybody 8
-- that energizes people to really find out what's 9
going on under all this sort of stuff. And we have a 10 complete story of -- from 2002 to today.
11 Like I said, you know, everybody is hiding 12 their heads in the holes and playing plausible 13 stupidity. You know, it's plausible I'm stupid, but I 14 know really -- I'm a smart guy, and I know how to hide 15 things. I know how to turn my head away from problems.
16 I know how to follow the rules, and I know they're 17 incomplete, and it gives an incomplete story.
18 And those are the kinds of things that 19 we're going to see this Sunday in CNN and stuff.
20 That's the stuff we worry about in the nuclear 21 industry. This is the stuff we worry about with the 22 new stuff in Georgia coming out and stuff like that.
23 Will you be able to control the quality of 24 the materials going into these plants? Will a bum 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 27 safety release valve, or another kind of valve get 1
thrown into this new nuclear plant and create a 2
scandal later on and stuff like that? That's the stuff 3
we worry about.
4 Like I said, the NRC should have been on 5
the ball. They should have been -- they should have 6
realized quickly in 2010 that there's a process -- a 7
safety system quality process breakdown at Vermont 8
Yankee, at Target Rock, at Curtis Wright, and they 9
should have come down with a hammer, and you should 10 have been banging on -- forcing people to disclose 11 quickly what's going on. And get the information out 12 there, and get the shit repaired, and quickly, and 13 stuff like that.
14 There should be no games with the quality 15 of materials in these plants. You know, this should be 16
-- this is mind boggling that in the safety release 17 valve, people let materials in there that they didn't 18 know the material properties of the seals. Going on a 19 lot. Talked about the diaphragms at Browns Ferry back 20 in 2008 where this fibrous material wasn't in the -- I 21 think it was in the diaphragm, too, and stuff that --
22 how do you maintain quality and safety parts and 23 stuff like that?
24 Is there a problem with that nationwide?
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 28 You know, what's going on with the vendors? How come 1
the vendors -- you know, last March Peach Bottom was 2
told by a vendor that you should replace the actuators 3
and stuff like that. How come we're going through --
4 we went through an outage and they weren't replaced 5
with perfect products that meet the regulations? How 6
does it end up that you operate with bum seals at 7
Peach Bottom?
8 Those are the questions that I have as far 9
as it's not really -- a lot of this stuff I'm not 10 working on in a plant basis. I'm not working on an 11 individual basis to find -- you know, I'm talking 12 about organizational -- I'm doing organizational work, 13 organizational dysfunction.
14 We should be better organizationally than 15 we are, and that should be a concern nationwide that 16 we aren't better organizationally. There are so many 17 flaws in the organization, and these processes that 18 bring us quality. We should be worried and pulling our 19 hair, and fixing what's broken instead of playing 20 games and hiding our heads in the sand.
21 They say Exelon is a better company than 22 Entergy. That's what the rumors I hear. But Exelon is 23 acting much like Entergy was in 2010. You know, 24 everybody playing games and not getting down to the 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 29 bottom -- you know, not doing the testing, not 1
admitting the testing, what's there, why that seal 2
failed. I mean, almost can say are we sitting here 3
doing a replay of the Vermont Yankee seals at Peach 4
Bottom? Is it, you know -- is the same kind of process 5
of only seeing half of the stuff we're really supposed 6
to see, defaulting to well, there's -- we've done 7
fleet testing which we know fleet testing doesn't pick 8
up any of the problems in this. And we kind of default 9
to say oh, we haven't had a problem with seals in the 10 last 20 years.
11 Well, this stuff started in 19 -- 2002, 12 and probably 2010, and there's an association between 13 Vermont Yankee and Peach Bottom. The first time they 14 stick these seals in there the seals fail within the 15 first year. New actuators, the first year they fail.
16 There's two different plants that do that. Alarm bells 17 should be going off big time why that happened.
18 Those are small problems that we should 19 amplify. We should amplify the signal up to a bigger 20 investigation and more concern. And we should all be 21 wondering why that -- why this has happened, why these 22 associations has happened and stuff like that, instead 23 of, you know, being satisfied leak rate testing 24 doesn't show up any problems.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 30 The LER says the event day was last -- the 1
event day for Peach Bottom was last September and 2
stuff, so, you know -- you know, like I said, I wonder 3
have those -- that seal -- science and engineering, 4
you know. We go by facts, science and engineering. We 5
do laboratory
-- quality laboratory testing on 6
products that fail, and we know what's -- why they 7
failed and stuff.
Has those seals showed any 8
deficiencies with the materials?
9 You know, like I said, every seal coming 10 out of -- every SRV seal coming out of a safety --
11 Target Rock safety release valve should be sent to 12 the laboratory, and we should understand how many 13 Buna-n high-quality seals there are versus how many 14 Buna-crap seals there are and stuff like that. And we 15 should understand why the crap seals got into the 16 supply stream.
17 You
- know, like I
- said, document 18 everything, document all the facts, and then we can 19 see them and fix it instead of taking these terrible 20 chances with unsafe components and spare parts.
21 Again, I'd like to -- it's a privilege 22 being able to do this, talk to a Petition Board. It's 23 a privilege to be a citizen of the United States. I 24 live in the best country in the world. Thank you for 25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 31 this opportunity.
1 MS. EVANS: Yes. This is Michelle Evans, 2
again. Thank you, Mr. Mulligan, for your presentation.
3 At this time does the Staff here at 4
Headquarters have any questions for Mr. Mulligan?
5 (No response.)
6 MS. EVANS: Okay. How about in the region 7
at the Resident Office, any questions for Mr.
8 Mulligan?
9 MR. ZIEDONIS: No, we don't have any 10 questions.
11 MS. EVANS: Okay. Also, does the Licensee 12 have any questions for the NRC Staff?
13 MR. ARMSTRONG: No questions.
14 MS. EVANS: Mr. Mulligan, thank you for 15 taking time to provide the NRC Staff with clarifying 16 information on the petition that you've submitted.
17 Before we close, does the court reporter 18 need any additional information for the meeting 19 transcript?
20 COURT REPORTER: Hello, this is the court 21 reporter. I will have a few questions, if it's 22 possible for me to call Mr. Hughey in about 10 23 minutes. Is he at 3204?
24 MR. HUGHEY: That's correct.
25
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 32 COURT REPORTER: Is 10 minutes a good time 1
to call? Is a half hour better, 45 minutes better?
2 MR. HUGHEY: Yes, I think 15 would be just 3
right.
4 COURT REPORTER: Okay. I will have a short 5
list of questions. They're mostly going to be the 6
names of the NRC personnel, just to make sure I have 7
them spelled correctly. And I'll do a quick review of 8
my notes.
9 MR. HUGHEY: Okay, understood. I'll be 10 expecting your call in 15 minutes.
11 COURT REPORTER: Sounds good. That'll be 12 about 12:00.
13 MR. HUGHEY: Okay.
14 MS. EVANS: Okay, thank you.
15 COURT REPORTER: Thank you very much.
16 MS. EVANS: With that, this meeting is 17 concluded and we will be terminating the phone 18 connection. Thank you, everyone.
19 (Whereupon, the proceedings went off the 20 record at 11:44:59 a.m.)
21 22 23 24 25