ML15257A290
| ML15257A290 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Vermont Yankee File:NorthStar Vermont Yankee icon.png |
| Issue date: | 09/14/2015 |
| From: | Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel |
| To: | |
| SECY RAS | |
| References | |
| 50-271-LA-3, ASLBP 15-940-03-LA-BD01, NRC-1872, RAS 28285 | |
| Download: ML15257A290 (28) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee Docket Number:
50-271-LA-3 ASLBP Number:
15-940-03-LA-BD01 Location:
teleconference Date:
Thursday, September 10, 2015 Work Order No.:
NRC-1872 Pages79-105 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
79 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2
+ + + + +
3 ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD PANEL 4
+ + + + +
5 CONFERENCE CALL 6
x 7
In the Matter of: : Docket No.
8 ENERGY NUCLEAR VERMONT: 50-271-LA-3 9
10 ENTERGY NUCLEAR : 15-940-03-LA-BD01 11 OPERATIONS, INC. :
12 (Vermont Yankee :
13 Nuclear Power Station):
14
x 15 Thursday, September 10, 2015 16 17 Teleconference 18 19 BEFORE:
20 WILLIAM J. FROEHLICH, Chair 21 DR. MICHAEL F. KENNEDY, Administrative Judge 22 DR. RICHARD E. WARDWELL, Administrative Judge 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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80 APPEARANCES:
1 2
Counsel for the Applicant 3
Susan Raimo, Esq.
4 of:
Entergy Services, Inc.
5 101 Constitution Ave., NW 6
Washington, DC 20001-2133 7
sraimo@entergy.com 8
9 Paul M. Bessette, Esq.
10 Stephen Burdick, Esq.
11 of:
Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP 12 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue NW 13 Washington, DC 20004 14 202-739-5059 (Burdick) 15 pbessette@morganlewis.com 16 sburdick@morganlewis.com 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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81 On Behalf of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission 1
Beth Mizuno, Esq.
2 Anita Ghosh, Esq.
3 Jeremy Wachutka, Esq.
4 of:
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 5
Office of the General Counsel 6
Mail Stop O-15D21 7
Washington, DC 20555-0001 8
301-415-4126 9
beth.mizuno@nrc.gov 10 anita.ghosh@nrc.gov 11 jeremy.wachutka@nrc.gov 12 13 On Behalf of the State of Vermont and the 14 Vermont Department of Public Service 15 Aaron Kisicki, Esq.
16 Kyle Landis-Marinello, Esq 17 Scott Kline, Esq.
18 112 State Street - Drawer 20 19 Montpelier, VT 05620-2601 20 802-828-1361 (Landis-Marinello) 21 aaron.kisicki@state.vt.us 22 kyle.landis-marinello@vermont.gov 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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82 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 1
1:00 p.m.
2 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Good afternoon, all.
3 This is Judge Froehlich in Rockville, Maryland. With 4
me are Judges Kennedy and Wardwell and the Board's law 5
clerk Nicole Pepperl.
6 Who's on the line for the parties at this 7
point?
8 MR. BURDICK: Good afternoon, Judge 9
Froehlich. This is Stephen Burdick on behalf of 10 Entergy. And I'm also joined by Paul Bessette and by 11 Susan Raimo, who's senior counsel with Entergy.
12 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Thank you, Mr.
13 Burdick.
14 Is the staff on the line?
15 MR. WACHUTKA: Yes, Your Honor. This is 16 Jeremy Wachutka for the NRC staff and I am joined with 17 counsels Beth Mizuno and Anita Ghosh.
18 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Thank you. And the 19 State of Vermont?
20 MR. LANDIS-MARINELLO: Yes, this is Kyle 21 Landis-Marinello and in the room with me is Assistant 22 Attorney General Scott Kline and Aaron Kisicki from 23 the Vermont Department of Public Service.
24 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Thank you. Thank 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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83 you, all.
1 On October 31st in LBP-15-24 this Atomic 2
Safety and Licensing Board granted the petition to 3
intervene and the hearing request filed by the State 4
of Vermont challenging the license amendment request 5
filed by Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee, LLC and 6
Entergy Nuclear Operations.
7 The Board's order admitted two 8
contentions. Contention --
9 THE OPERATOR: Ex --
10 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: I'm sorry?
11 THE OPERATOR: Excuse me. I'm sorry.
12 This is the operator. Do you want to be live in the 13 conference now?
14 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Yes, that would be 15 great.
16 THE OPERATOR: Okay. I'll move you in and 17 I'll introduce you, Judge Froehlich. One moment, 18 please.
19 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Sorry.
20 THE OPERATOR: Welcome and thank you for 21 standing by. For the duration of this conference all 22 participants will be in a listen-only mode. I would 23 now like to turn the conference over to Judge 24 Froehlich.
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84 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Operator, the speaker 1
line are open so that --
2 THE OPERATOR: Yes.
3 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: -- the parties to the 4
-- oh, okay. Thank you.
5 THE OPERATOR: You're very welcome.
6 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Not so we have to 7
repeat ourselves, but was the court reporter with us 8
when we spoke a few minutes ago?
9 THE OPERATOR: Yes, she was.
10 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. Then let's 11 pick up where we left off, and where I was saying that 12 the Board had admitted two contentions. Contention I 13 concerns the necessity for a 30-day requirement prior 14 to the use of a decommissioning trust fund for 15 expenses other than ordinary administrative costs to 16 operate the fund. And Contention V which deals with 17 a legal issue as to whether the LAR is in accordance 18 with the provisions of paragraph 8 of 10 CFR 50.75 19 when a licensee is already exempt from two provisions 20 of 10 CFR Section 50.75(h)(1)(iv).
21 The Board issued an order on September 22 3rd, 2015 scheduling this conference call for the 23 purposes of establishing an orderly way of proceeding 24 with this case and for the issuance of our initial 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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85 scheduling order.
1 Have the parties had an opportunity to 2
review the Board's proposed schedule which provides an 3
opportunity first to brief the legal issues related to 4
Contention V and then addresses Contention I in an 5
oral hearing at after the staff issues the results of 6
it's environmental review?
7 MR. BURDICK: Judge Froehlich, this is 8
Stephen Burdick on behalf of Entergy. Yes, we've had 9
a chance to review the scheduling order.
10 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: And, Mr. Burdick, 11 have the parties discussed among themselves leading up 12 to this telephone conference the outline or the 13 provisions that the Board has set forth in that order?
14 MR. BURDICK: Yes, Your Honor. We've had 15 multiple phone calls and many email communications 16 with various proposals and counter-proposals, so we've 17 discussed this in some detail. I'll just get us 18 started, but other counsel may want to contribute as 19 well.
20 But I
think we have reached some 21 proposals, some agreed upon proposals by the parties 22 to the Board on some issues. We have not reached 23 agreement on other issues and there may be a few 24 issues where we just have a little bit of additional 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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86 discussion on them, but we're ready to discuss these 1
with the Board here today.
2 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: That's good, and I 3
thank the parties for discussing this amongst 4
themselves before today's conference. Hopefully that 5
will make things move along that much more smoothly.
6 Where shall we begin? I guess the 7
overarching approach the Board had decided to take was 8
to proceed first with Contention V, treating that as 9
a purely issue and taking briefs on that and then at 10 some point after the staff issues its environmental 11 conclusions to move forward with the oral hearing on 12 Contention I. Did that generally meet with agreement 13 among all of the parties?
14 MR. BURDICK: Your Honor, this is Stephen 15 Burdick again on behalf of Entergy. I believe all the 16 parties are aligned with that overall process. One 17 area that we did reach agreement on was the trigger 18 point for the hearing on Contention I that we wanted 19 to discuss with the Board. Specifically in the 20 Board's September 3rd order it had included a table 2 21 and a table 3. And the parties are generally in 22 agreement with those two tables, however, those two 23 tables have triggers related to the NRC's issuance of 24 the results of its environmental review.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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87 It's possible that the staff could issue 1
the results of the environmental review prior to the 2
Board concluding its -- or issuing its initial 3
decision on Contention V. So our proposal on that, 4
with which we agreed, was to change the trigger date 5
for table 1 to be the NRC staff issuance of the result 6
of its environmental review or issuance of the initial 7
decision on Contention V, whichever is later. And we 8
thought that that was consistent with the Board's 9
discussion that it would proceed first with Contention 10 V and then would only continue on with Contention 1 11 once it has issued an initial decision.
12 With the same change with respect to table 13 3, although it's a little different. The beginning of 14 table 3 would -- our proposal would be it would stay 15 the same because any new and amended contentions would 16 still be triggered off of the staff's issuance of the 17 results of its environmental review, but in the middle 18 of table 3 where it talks about the Board decision, 19 that that would be changed to the Board decision on 20 new or amended contentions, or again issuance of the 21 initial decision on Contention V, whichever is later.
22 And so that would be the trigger from going from new 23 and amended contentions into the hearing process.
24 So that's the proposal that we had 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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88 discussed and agreed up with respect to tables 2 and 1
3.
2 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: That makes sense.
3 And the Board was not certain at the timing I guess of 4
the issuance of the staff's environmental review, so 5
perhaps at this point I would ask counsel for the 6
staff if there is at this point some projected date or 7
timeline that would give us a little bit of guidance 8
on when the parties and the Board can expect the 9
results of the environmental review.
10 MR. WACHUTKA: Yes, Your Honor. This is 11 Jeremy Wachutka for the NRC staff. The staff is 12 actively working on the safety evaluation, but it 13 doesn't have a projected date for issuance, and so 14 it's uncertain whether the environmental review 15 results to which all of these things are pegged to 16 would happen after the initial decision. It's 17 possible as counsel for Entergy stated that it could 18 be before the initial decision. The NRC staff agrees 19 with also making this ER or initial decision, 20 whichever comes first. I mean, whichever comes later.
21 Sorry.
22 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. I don't want 23 to put you on the spot. I just wondered if the staged 24 of the
- active, I
- guess, preparation of the 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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89 environmental review is more likely to be within the 1
next let's say 120 days, or would it be something 2
longer than that? Would you have a feel for whether 3
this was something that although being actively being 4
pursued is likely to come out within 120 days or it's 5
going to be considerably longer than that?
6 MR. WACHUTKA: Your Honor, I'd be 7
confident saying it would be done within 120 days.
8 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. Thank you.
9 That is helpful.
10 All right. Were there any other -- one of 11 the Board's beliefs, the agreed upon revisions to the 12 schedules, tables, I guess, 2 and 3 from our order 13 makes sense, and that's perfectly acceptable and in 14 the initial scheduling order. We'll revise any tables 15 that are included there to include the provision of 16 the "or" date trigger, the latter of the environmental 17 review or the initial decision on Contention V. And 18 I thank the parties for that agreement and that 19 suggestion to the schedule.
20 Was there discussion among things that I 21 guess have to take place once something is moving 22 towards hearing going towards the dates for the 23 initial disclosures and the staff hearing file?
24 MR. BURDICK: Yes, Your Honor. This is 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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90 Stephen Burdick, counsel for Entergy again. We have 1
certain proposals that have been discussed both with 2
respect to the briefing schedule for Contention V, but 3
that's also linked to the schedule for mandatory 4
disclosures on the contentions. I think given their 5
connection it's -- in our prior discussions before 6
this call it makes sense to start with the schedule 7
for mandatory disclosures.
8 There had been two separate proposals that 9
I think we'd like to discuss with the Board today.
10 One proposal, given the bifurcation of the two 11 contentions and the proceeding first with Contention 12 V and then with Contention I, was to delay the 13 mandatory disclosures on Contention I until after 14 resolution of Contention V. And I note the NRC staff 15 counsel also feels -- or has a view on this, but I'd 16 like their input. But I think the benefit of that 17 proposal was to -- as the Board acknowledges in its 18 September 3rd order, depending on the results of 19 Contention V, that could certainly impact the hearing 20 process for Contention I and to preserve some of the 21 resources that it would take to go through the 22 mandatory disclosure process and the hearing file 23 process.
24 But I guess I'd turn it to NRC staff 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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91 counsel for any input on this specific proposal.
1 MR. WACHUTKA: Your Honor, this is Jeremy 2
Wachutka from the NRC staff. The NRC staff agrees 3
with this proposal. Just reading the initial 4
scheduling order it seems that the resolution of 5
Contention V could resolve Contention I. And so if 6
there may be no need to get into the merits of 7
Contention I, the NRC staff doesn't see the benefit of 8
using the resources to generate a hearing file for 9
Contention I until Contention V is resolved.
10 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. I suppose that 11 the State of Vermont would like to be heard on this 12 issue? Mr. Landis-Marinello?
13 MR. LANDIS-MARINELLO: Yes, thank you, 14 Your Honor. So the state has had some discussions, 15 and we recognize that the September 30th deadline 16 could be a little tight given that we're at September 17 10th now for the initial disclosures. So we have 18 offered to the parties to move that by a couple of 19 weeks. In the latest discussion we even offered to 20 move it as far as November 1st. And we're comfortable 21 with that.
22 We do not think that it should go beyond 23 November 1st. And we can give our reasons for that, 24 but we view a decision to move it beyond November 1st 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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92 as effectively granting a stay and we don't think the 1
parties can show they meet the standards for a stay 2
here. We think it could lead to a very significant 3
delay in resolving Contention I at a later point, both 4
because we'd be starting from square one a few months 5
from now with the initial disclosures. And there's a 6
lot of preparation that can be done in parallel with 7
the briefing of Contention V in terms of preparing our 8
witnesses and getting that moving forward once we have 9
those initial disclosures. And so for that reason we 10 think it's important to have that.
11 And I'll also just flag for the Board we 12 have some indications there may be a dispute about 13 what needs to be in those initial disclosures, and 14 given that, it's critical that these disclosures 15 happen sooner rather than later.
16 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: And I take it from 17 your answer that the State of Vermont is not 18 comfortable with bifurcating disclosure. That 19 November 1st date that you suggested would be a date 20 for mandatory disclosures covering both Contention V 21 and Contention I. Is that correct?
22 MR. LANDIS-MARINELLO: That's correct.
23 Yes.
24 And, Your Honor, if I could just add to 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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93 that. We've put out -- and this is just about an hour 1
ago. We put out to the other parties a proposal that 2
has that November 1 date in there. And so, we have 3
not received a response yet from the parties. It may 4
well be that that is agreeable to all of the parties.
5 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Well, let's give them 6
a chance to chime in now. Mr. Burdick?
7 MR. BURDICK: Yes, Your Honor, this is 8
Stephen Burdick, counsel for Entergy. I wanted to say 9
a few -- we appreciate the parties and the active 10 discussions we've had. We've had some very open 11 conversation with the state and the staff, even this 12 morning. And we acknowledge that the state counsel 13 has provided a revised proposal that appears to be 14 consistent with some of the options that we had 15 discussed.
16 As I began, we ended on two separate 17 options. The first is the one that we had talked 18 about with deferring disclosures on Contention I until 19 the Contention V issues have been resolved. That is 20 certainly our preference, and so we would like to see 21 that option adopted.
22 However, the kind of alternative option is 23 what state counsel had proposed, to defer the initial 24 mandatory disclosures to November 1st, or maybe it's 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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94 even November 2nd, whatever the first barrier day is 1
in November, that as an alternative. If our first 2
option is not chosen, then certainly we would prefer 3
the second option.
4 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. And staff 5
counsel?
6 MR. WACHUTKA: Yes, Your Honor. The NRC 7
staff, we would prefer to bifurcate the disclosures 8
because the way that we currently see it is that 9
depending on the determination on Contention V there 10 might be no need at all for Contention I. And so, to 11 have to prepare for a hearing on Contention I, which 12 might not ever happen, would just be an expenditure of 13 resources that may not need to be expended.
14 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. We'll take 15 this under advisement and come up hopefully with some 16 sort of an arrangement that probably makes no one 17 happy, but addresses the parameters that each of you 18 raised relating not only to the start date, but to the 19 potential bifurcation of mandatory disclosures between 20 the two contentions. Towhead is unless the parties 21 at this point or in the near future can come up with 22 a mutually agreeable proposal that will spare us 23 having to try to divide this baby and do it without 24 your input.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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95 I think, Mr. Burdick, you had mentioned 1
that there was some discussion; or maybe it was staff 2
counsel, as to the scope and content of initial 3
disclosures.
4 MR. BURDICK: Your Honor, I think there's 5
kind of two more items that we had discussed amongst 6
ourselves. Let me first address the briefing schedule 7
for Contention V, which is table 1 in the Board's 8
September 3rd order.
9 With respect to this contention the 10 trigger date for the briefing schedule for Contention 11 V is the Board's issuance of the initial scheduling 12 order, and that time certainly could vary depending on 13 when the Board takes that action, but we expect it 14 would be somewhere in the near term.
15 Entergy is still considering, but expects 16 that it will file an appeal with the Commission on 17 LPB-15-24. And looking at the briefing schedule for 18 that appeal, it overlaps significantly with the 19 briefing schedule for Contention V. And so, we had 20 proposed -- and I'll ask the other parties certainly 21 to make sure I state this correctly, but had proposed 22 that the briefing schedule for Contention V be 23 postponed to -- such that the trigger date would be 24 the last filing related to that Commission appeal.
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96 So assuming we appeal, which as I said, we 1
think is likely, the briefing on that appeal would be 2
completed by October 20. And so, our proposal was for 3
that to be the trigger date rather than the Board 4
issuance of the initial scheduling order. So 5
depending on the timing of the initial scheduling 6
order that would give about a 30 to 40-day delay in 7
beginning of that briefing schedule.
8 We've had discussions with the other 9
parties; and here I'd make sure I characterize this 10 correctly, I believe the staff is in agreement with 11 that. And I think the state agrees to that as well, 12 but it's tied to assuming that the Board agrees with 13 their proposed delay of mandatory disclosures to 14 November 1st or 2nd because of their interest in 15 receiving documents as soon as possible. And so, if 16 there's a greater delay with mandatory disclosures, 17 then they would prefer to move right into the briefing 18 schedule for Contention V. But certainly state 19 counsel can provide their thoughts on that as well.
20 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: I would like to hear 21 form state counsel, Mr. Landis-Marinello on this 22 issue.
23 MR. LANDIS-MARINELLO: Yes, thank you, 24 Your Honor. Mr. Burdick said that correctly. That is 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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97 our position that if we're going to get these 1
mandatory disclosures by the Board's initial September 2
30th date or by November 1st or 2nd, then we're 3
comfortable with a slight delay in the briefing. If 4
there's going to be any connecting of those initial 5
disclosures to a later point, then we think everything 6
should go forward as rapidly as possible.
7 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: So your preferred 8
resolution with this would be to set October 20th, the 9
date that your reply to the potential appeal by 10 Entergy -- that that would be the trigger date, 11 October 20th. And that would be coupled with 12 mandatory disclosures on the 1st or the 2nd of 13 November?
14 MR. LANDIS-MARINELLO: Well, Your Honor, 15 let me be clear. Our preference is the exact schedule 16 that the Board has proposed in all three tables. That 17 is completely acceptable to the State of Vermont and 18 that is our preference on this. We think that's the 19 normal course of things, that you wouldn't have any 20 delay on mandatory disclosures, that parties would go 21 forward and produce that in the normal course.
22 Everything moves forward in the normal course on 23 parallel tracks because there has been no stay granted 24 in this proceeding and that's the fastest way to 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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98 resolve all of the matters. And we think that the 1
parties, all the parties are well-equipped. All 2
parties are represented and have the resources to meet 3
all of the deadlines in the Board's proposal. So 4
that's our preference.
5 That said, we have heard from Entergy and 6
the NRC staff and are amenable to making 7
accommodations to that schedule. And in particular 8
we've offered bumping the date for disclosures up to 9
November 1st or 2nd, and we've offered to have this 30 10 to 40-day delay on briefing Contention V at the 11 request of the other parities providing that the 12 initial disclosures would come in either September 13 30th or November 1st.
14 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. Staff, do you 15 care to be heard on this?
16 MR. WACHUTKA: Your Honor, the NRC staff 17 doesn't object to an extension in the briefing 18 schedule for Contention V. But just for the mandatory 19 disclosures though, the staff doesn't think that this 20 is really normal process because normally you would 21 have just the mandatory disclosures to worry about, 22 but in this case we also have the concurrent 23 Contention V briefing schedule. So that's why we 24 thought that the mandatory disclosures should be 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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99 delayed.
1 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. Thank you.
2 All right. Mr. Burdick, did you say there was a 3
second issue that was also discussed that --
4 MR. BURDICK: Yes, thank you, Judge 5
Froehlich. This is Stephen Burdick on behalf of 6
Entergy. The last area that we had discussed was to 7
see if we could reach agreement on any other of the 8
mandatory hearing requirements, and this is similar to 9
what's been done in many different proceedings, I 10 would say even most proceedings where the parties 11 agree to certain limitations on mandatory disclosures.
12 So we've had a number of conversations 13 about this and proposals and counter-proposals. And 14 so, we have reached some agreement. There are a few 15 topics that we felt were very helpful that we did not 16 reach agreement on, and those are things like 17 disclosures of drafts and elimination of the entire 18 privilege log. And certainly the other parties don't 19 have to agree with all those, but we felt that those 20 have been very useful in past proceedings to reduce 21 the burden of the mandatory disclosures and really not 22 taken away from the value of those documents. But we 23 have had some back and forth and we've reached 24 agreement on some of those typical types of 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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100 provisions.
1 And, Your Honor, I'd be happy to walk 2
through some of those right now, or if it would be 3
more useful I think the parties could try to put 4
together a joint list that's agreed upon and submit 5
that to the Board because they become quite detailed.
6 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: I think that your 7
latter suggestion may be the way to go, not only 8
though with the points that the parties have agreed 9
upon, but those issues that perhaps there is still not 10 agreement on. Perhaps between now and when we set a 11 date for that to come to the Board the parties could 12 work out and maybe come closer on those things which 13 you don't have agreement on at this point.
14 Would it be useful if the parties were to 15 try to work through some of these items and at the 16 same time compile a list of the things that you have 17 agreed to among parties as to the privilege logs or 18 the scope of the mandatory disclosure and submitted 19 that in writing to the Board in a joint document, 20 let's say by next Thursday?
21 MR. BURDICK: Your Honor, this is Stephen 22 Burdick on behalf of Entergy. I think that would 23 certainly be doable to put together that joint 24 proposal and indicate where there's full agreement 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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101 among the parties and where perhaps there are only a 1
couple of parties that agree with it. And I think the 2
non-agreement here is also one of the driving forces 3
for our request for additional time for the mandatory 4
disclosures, that there does seem to be an additional 5
burden here than in other proceedings, and we think 6
that a little more time would make it more efficient 7
for all the parties to pull together the disclosures.
8 Thank you.
9 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: I think that would be 10 helpful, and I think when the Board has that document 11 from the parties we'll be best able to set the 12 schedule and the deadlines for those items in tables 13 1, 2 and 3 that we discussed earlier.
14 Okay. Do the parties feel it would be 15 helpful to the Board to hear those areas of 16 disagreement now, or is that something that can be 17 handled in next week's filing?
18 MR. BURDICK: Your Honor, this is Stephen 19 Burdick on behalf of Entergy. Yes, I think the 20 largest areas of agreement are whether drafts and 21 comments on drafts need to be disclosed, and also the 22 content of the privilege log. We've reached agreement 23 on at least excluding certain information from a 24 privilege log, but our preference would be to exclude 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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102 the entirety of it. So there are some minor 1
differences there. Or I guess those are significant 2
differences. But then beyond that I think there are 3
some minor differences in the types of -- I think in 4
some of the minutia of some of these other 5
requirements, but I'm hopeful that we can reach 6
agreement on most of those other areas.
7 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: All right. Then I 8
think it would be probably best if the parties worked 9
together on a joint document that certainly lists all 10 the things that they agree upon and at the same time 11 those parties who have disagreements with that joint 12 document indicate to the Board where those 13 disagreements are and what their concerns are. And 14 upon receipt of that next Thursday the 17th the Board 15 will take that into consideration and work through the 16 issues dealing with the briefing schedule and the 17 trigger date that we discussed at the beginning of 18 this conference.
19 Were there any other issues that we should 20 be discussing today or that the parties want the Board 21 to have input on leading up to the scheduling order in 22 this case?
23 (No audible response) 24 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Are there any other 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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103 issues?
1 MS. MIZUNO: Your Honor, this is Beth 2
Mizuno with the Office of General Counsel for the 3
staff. And if we are submitting something to the 4
Board on September 17 and our mandatory disclosures --
5 that would be on the 30th, we're looking at what, 18 6
days, which is not -- no, 13. Sorry. I'm not good at 7
math. Thirteen days, which is very, very tight. I 8
mean, we can and we are working towards the September 9
30 deadline, but if we're only submitting something to 10 you on the 17th, you're going to need some time to 11 figure out what you want to do and then you need to 12 draft something. We could be getting very close to 13 the September 30 mandatory disclosure due date before 14 we even hear from you. So would it be possible to 15 move the September 30 due date by a couple weeks just 16 for now so that we can have some breathing room to 17 actually act upon whatever it is that you order?
18 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Ms. Mizuno, I 19 appreciate your concern. I would advise the staff to 20 proceed with the September 30th date that is already 21 scheduled, however, that may be extended once we 22 receive the pleading next week. The staff should 23 begin to think about those type of things that need to 24 go into both the hearing file as well as those things 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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104 that should be disclosed. So I wouldn't just stop 1
work on it. I would be thinking about it, however, it 2
is possible that you may get a little bit of an 3
extension from the deadline set by the regulations.
4 Were there any other issues?
5 MS. MIZUNO: Thank you, Your Honor.
6 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Anything else?
7 (No audible response) 8 MR. BURDICK: Your Honor, this is Stephen 9
Burdick on behalf of Entergy. We have Nothing 10 further.
11 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. Any other 12 concerns from the state or from the NRC staff?
13 MR. LANDIS-MARINELLO: This is Kyle from 14 the state. Nothing further from us. Thank you very 15 much, Your Honor.
16 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Thank you.
17 MR. WACHUTKA: No further concerns from 18 the staff, Your Honor.
19 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. I want to 20 thank the parties for their discussions leading up to 21 this conference and urge them to continue to talk 22 among themselves on all those issues that they can 23 reach agreement. That will go a long way towards 24 making this case move ahead smoothly. It will also 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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105 prevent the Board from imposing deadlines that may not 1
be everything you had hoped for. So I would hope that 2
the parties would spend the next week as they prepare 3
that pleading for the 17th, discussing and trying to 4
reach agreement in as many areas as they possibly can.
5 And I thank you for your efforts in advance.
6 Judges Wardwell and Kennedy, anything to 7
add?
8 JUDGE KENNEDY: I have nothing.
9 JUDGE WARDWELL: I have nothing.
10 CHAIRMAN FROEHLICH: Okay. Then I thank 11 you all for your participation, look forward to your 12 pleading, and we will get an order out very quickly 13 after receipt of the joint pleading. Thank you, all.
14 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 15 off the record at 1:33 p.m.)
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