ML19022A393
| ML19022A393 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Seabrook  |
| Issue date: | 01/22/2019 |
| From: | Annette Vietti-Cook NRC/SECY |
| To: | Pappas C, Shaheen J, Wood Hassan M US HR (House of Representatives), US SEN (Senate) |
| SECY RAS | |
| References | |
| 50-443-LA-2, ASLBP 17-953-02-LA-BD01, RAS 54765 | |
| Download: ML19022A393 (7) | |
Text
UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION WASHINGTON, D.C. 20555-0001 January 22, 2019 SECRETARY The Honorable Jeanne Shaheen United States Senate Washington, DC 20510 The Honorable Margaret Wood Hassan United States Senate Washington, DC 2051 O The Honorable Chris Pappas United States House of Representatives Washington , DC 20515
Dear Senator Shaheen,
Senator Hassan, and Congressman Pappas:
On behalf of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), I am responding to your letter of January 16, 2019, to Chairman Svinicki regarding the pending applications to amend and renew the operating license for Seabrook Station nuclear power plant. Your letter forwarded a letter you received from C-10 Research and Education Foundation asking you to intercede in a license amendment proceeding pending before the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (the Board), in which C-10 is a party. The license amendment would revise Seabrook's license to add methods for analyzing certain structures that are impacted by alkali-silica reaction. You requested that the hearing before the Board relating to the license amendment application be held before the NRC takes any action on the license applications.
Under agency regulations , the Commission has an appellate role in adjudications pending before the Board . Because the license amendment application for the Seabrook Station is the subject of a current adjudication, the Commission must remain impartial during the pendency of the proceeding. Accordingly, your letter and C-1 O's letter have been referred to the NRC staff.
The NRC staff plans to meet with the public.
A copy of your letter and this response will be served on the participants in the Seabrook license amendment proceeding.
Sincerely,
~u;tu~
Annette L. Vietti-Cook
December 15, 2018 Senator Jeanne Shaheen 506 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510
Dear Senator Shaheen,
I am reaching out to you as a board member of the C-10 Research and Education Foundation (C-10), to ask that you intercede on our behalf with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), over an issue crucial to our intervention in a License Amendment Request (LAR) filed by the owners of Seabrook Station. Please see the attached (11/26/18) letter to NRC Chair Katharine Svinicki, wherein these concerns are delineatedincluding an NRC graphic timeline that highlights the disadvantage to which C-10 believes our standing in the adjudicatory process is placed.
As you know, C-10 has worked for the last 23 years, through our contract with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (for the six Massachusetts towns), and through the contributions of our members, to monitor airborne radiological releases for the towns that lie within the Emergency Planning Zone (10-mile radius) of the Seabrook Station reactor. Because we also follow safety issues that affect Seabrooks operation, we became aware of the degradation of Seabrooks concrete due to a chemical process known as Alkali-Silica Reaction (ASR). After more than five years of research on this issue, C-10 has been granted standing before the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) of the NRC, that will allow us in mid-2019 to present our arguments in opposition to NextEra Energy Seabrook, LLCs (NextEra) License Amendment Request 16-03 (LAR). This LAR outlines NextEras methodology for managing ASR.
Please know that the LARs proposed methodology is an unprecedented approach that has been protected from any independent peer review by the proprietary status granted by the NRC. Because of this arrangement, it has fallen to C-10 to provide the only independent peer review through the testimony of our expert witnesses. It is important to note that C-10 is the only party, private or governmental, who has challenged the validity of NextEras LAR within the adjudicatory framework of the NRC. Furthermore, should LAR 16-03 be adopted by the NRC, it becomes the regulatory precedent for ASR management at any other US commercial reactors found to have ASR.
Only halfway through their current 40-year operating license, NextEra in 2010 applied for a 20-year extensiontheir License Renewal Application (LRA)which would allow continuous operation to 2050.
This fact is important for C-10 because we have serious doubts about the safety of Seabrooks operation even to the end of its current license, due to the compromising presence of ASRand since ASR cannot be stopped once initiated, a license extension seems an unnecessary gamble with the publics safety. At the very least, C-10 believes that no decision on Seabrook Stations qualification for an extra 20 years
operation should be made by the NRC, until we are able to present our arguments in opposition to NextEras LAR.
Through the succession of events and deadlines concerning the LAR, C-10 has become aware of a crucial discrepancy in the timetables for the license extension and license amendmentone that puts our opposition to the LAR at a critical disadvantage. The Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) met on October 31, to review the LAR in the context of NextEras License Renewal Application, and is due to publish its Final Safety Evaluation Report (FSER) this December. As noted, the FSER is a crucial milestone in the LRA timeline. However, the testimony of our experts before the ASLB will take place fully eight months after the ACRS heard testimony on the LAR from NextEra, their contractors and NRC staff. Because C-10 does not have standing within the license renewal process, we are very concerned the NRC will rule on Seabrooks qualification for license renewal before C-10 presents its scientific evidence for opposing the LARwhich should have a direct bearing on the question of license renewal.
Senator Shaheen, C-10 hopes you write to NRC Chair Svinicki, to advocate that no ruling on the NextEras License Renewal Application for Seabrook Station should be made, until the complete adjudication of C-10s opposition to LAR 16-03. Because NextEras current operating license runs for another twelve years, there is no practical reason to rush a decision on extending the licenseand there are very good reasons to wait until C-10s concerns are fully addressed.
We are sending similar letters to other members of our New Hampshire and Massachusetts congressional delegation. We are very grateful to you for your leadership on energy and safety issues. A member of C-10s Board will follow up this mailing with a call to your office. Thank you for giving this matter your attention.
Sincerely, Sarah Doenmez Board Member, C-10 LAR Task Group (electronically signed)
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION In the Matter of )
)
NEXTERA ENERGY SEABROOK, LLC ) Docket No. 50-443-LA-2 (Seabrook Station, Unit 1) )
)
(License Amendment) )
CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that copies of the foregoing Letter from Commission Secretary Annette Vietti-Cook to Senator Jeanne Shaheen, et al. have been served upon the following persons by Electronic Information Exchange.
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Office of Commission Appellate Adjudication Office of the Secretary of the Commission Mail Stop: O-16B33 Mail Stop: O-16B33 n Washington, DC 20555-0001 Washington, DC 20555-0001 ocaamail@nrc.gov Hearing Docket hearingdocket@nrc.gov U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel Office of the General Counsel Mail Stop: T-3F23 Mail Stop: O-14A44 Washington, DC 20555-0001 Washington, DC 20555-0001 Ronald M. Spritzer, Chair Anita Ghosh, Esq.
Administrative Judge anita.ghosh@nrc.gov ronald.spritzer@nrc.gov Jeremy Wachutka, Esq.
jeremy.wachutka@nrc.gov Nicholas G. Trikouros David E. Roth, Esq.
Administrative Judge david.roth@nrc.gov nicholas.trikouros@nrc.gov Krupskaya Castellon - Paralegal krupskaya.castellon@nrc.gov Dr. Sekazi K. Mtingwa Administrative Judge sekazi.mtingwa@nrc.gov OGC Mail Center: Members of this office have received a copy of this filing by EIE service.
Taylor Mayhall, Law Clerk Taylor.Mayhall@nrc.gov Joseph McManus, Law Clerk joseph.mcmanus@nrc.gov
NEXTERA ENERGY SEABROOK, LLC (Seabrook Station Unit 1) - Docket No. 50-443-LA-2 Letter from Commission Secretary Annette Vietti-Cook to Senator Jeanne Shaheen, et al.
NextEra Energy Seabrook, LLC C-10 Research & Education Foundation 801 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., #220 44 Merrimac Street Washington, DC 20004 Newburyport, Mass. 01950 Steven C. Hamrick, Esq. Natalie Hildt Treat steven.hamrick@fpl.com natalie@c-10.org NextEra Energy Seabrook, LLC 700 Universe Boulevard Juno Beach, FL 33408 William Blair, Esq.
william.blair@fpl.com NextEra Energy Seabrook, LLC Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20004 Paul M. Bessette, Esq.
paul.bessette@morganlewis.com Ryan K. Lighty, Esq.
ryan.lighty@morganlewis.com Grant Eskelsen, Esq.
grant.eskelsen@morganlewis.com
[Original signed by Clara Sola ]
Office of the Secretary of the Commission Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 22nd day of January, 2019 2