ML19319B821

Submits Review of CP & OL Application.If Noted Items Resolved During Const,Facility Should Present No Undue Risk to Public Health & Safety

ML19319B821
Person / Time
Site:	Davis Besse
Issue date:	08/20/1970
From:	Hendrie J Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards
To:	Seaborg G US ATOMIC ENERGY COMMISSION (AEC)
Shared Package
ML19319B814	List: ML19319B813 ML19319B821
References
NUDOCS 8001270282
Download: ML19319B821 (4)

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ADVISORY' COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS UNITED STATES ATOMIC ENERGY COMMISSION WASHINGTON. D.C. 20545 Augus t 20, 1970 3

e Honorable Glenn T. Seaborg Chairman U. S. Atomic Energy Commission Washington, D. C.

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Subject:

REPORT ON DAVIS-BESSE NUCLEAR POWER STATION Dear Dr. Seaborg-

..s At its 124th meeting, August 13-15, 1970, the Advisory Co.Umittee on Reactor Safeguards completed its review of the application by the Toledo Edison Company and The Cleveland Electric liluminating Company for a permit to construct the Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station. A Subcommittee met to revieu the project on May 26, 1970, at the site and in Toledo, Ohio, and on August 4,1970, in Uashington, D. C.

During its ravicw, the Committee had the benefit of discussions with representatives and consultants of the applicants, the Babcock and.

Wilcox Company, the Bechtel Corporation, and the AEC Regulatory Staff.

The Committee also had the benefit of the documents listed, b

The plant will be located on the southwestern shore of Lake Erie ap-proximately 21 miles east of Toledo, Ohio. The nearest population

,centers are Toledo and Sandusky, Ohio, each about 20 miles from the site, with populations in 1960 of 379,000 and 32,000, respectively.

The city of Fremont, Ohio, with a 1960 population of about 18,000, is located 17 miles from the site. The minimum exclusion distance is 2400 feet and the low population zone distance is two miles. Approx-imately 3200 people live within five miles of the site.

Camp Perry, an Ohio National Guard facility, is located on Lake Erie about five miles cast of the site. This installation is used during a short period each year for target practice with small atrts and with 40-mm. anti-aircraft shells armed only with a small destruct charge.

At the Eric Industrial Park, about three to fcur miles east of the site, Cadillac Gage Company is engaged in testing ordnance equipment firing l

120-mm. mortar shells with a maximum range of about two miles. All firing from noth locations is directed into restricted areas in Lake l

Eric. The applicants have proyided studies which demonstrate that none of the projectiles now being fired frem these installations could i

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. '.. :..uBonorable,Glcun T. Scaborg August' 20,Ji970 penetrate the heavy reinforced concrete structures provided to protect

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-the essential portions of the plant. The Committee recommends, how.

cver, that the applicants and the Regulatory Staff make suitable arrange s j

ments to be informed of any changes in these activitics so tpat their 1

possible effect on the safety of the plant may be evaluated.

An area in Lake Erie about ten miles north of the site is used by air-craf t from the Sc1 fridge Air Force Base in Michigan as an Anti-Submarine 4

Warfare practice area and by the Lockbourne Air Force Base at Columbus, Ohio, as an impact area for automatic weapon firing from aircraft. The 3

i applicants have been given assurance by officials of the Department of Defense that military aircraf t enroute to or fro-this arca will not be routed closer than ten miles from the site. The Committec beliaves that j

this arrangcment reduces, to acceptably low levels, the probabilte.y of i

an circraf t striking the plant, but recommends that formal arrangaments

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be made to enable the applicants and the Regulatory Staf f to maintain

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continuing awareness of the operational patterns of military aircraf t in this area.

The Davis-Ecsce plant will include a two-loop pressurized water reactor j

similar to those for the Midland units except that the internal vent i

valves have been cliainated by changes in the clovations of the steam' A

generators to obviate their necd. Since the proposed arrangement elim

• inates the possibility of coolant flow bypass through an open vent valve, g

the Davis-Besse reactor is designed for an initial core power level of 4

2633 iMt as compared to 2452 MNt for the Midland units.

The applicants stated that it will be possible to anneal the pressure vessel if this, should beccme necessa'ry at some time af ter operation is begun.

A suitabic preoperational vibration testing program s'aculd be employed for the primary system. Also, attention should be given to the devel-opeent and utilisation of instrumentation for in-service monitoring for excessive vibration or loose parts in the primary system.

Tbc containment consists of a steel vessel surrounded by a reinforced concrete shield building, with the annular space maintained at a slightly negative pressure and the air from this space exhausted through filters.

This design is si=Llar to that for the Prairic Island, Kewaunee, and Hutchinson Islaed plants, except that the free volume of the steel con-tainaent is much greater, nearly three million cubic feet..The Regula-tory Steff should review the ~ containment design pressure to assure that

an adequate margin of conservatism exists.

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'*' ' 'Honorabid"Glenn T. Seaborg

.31 August' 20, 1970

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• 2 a - Detailed criteria remain to be formulated by the applicants for thc.de.,

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' dCh ' n sign of the penetrations for the. hot process pipes which traverse the annulus between the two containment barriers.

In view of the importance of these penetrations, criteria should be reviewed by the Regulatory Staff to assure adequate conservatism, and the applicants should arrange i

for an independent review of the actual design.

The Cor.mittee has commented in previous reports on the development of systems to control the buildup of hydrogen in the containment which 4

might follow in the unlikely event of a loss-of-coolant accident. The

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applicants are studying various methods of coping with this problem, including purging and the use of catalytic recombiners. The Co=aittee recommends that the primary protection in this regard should utilize a i

1 hydrogen control method which keeps the hydrogen concentration within safe limits by means other thad purging. The capability for purging i

should also be provided. The hydrogen control system and provisions for containment atmosphere mixing and sampling should have redundancy and instru=cntation suitable for an engineered safety feature. The Co=-

mittee wishes to be kept informed of the resolution of this matter.

The applicants have stated that they will provide additional evidence ob-tained by improved multi-node analytical techniques to assure that th?c l'

cmergency core cooling syscca is capable of limiting core temperatures to acceptably conservative values. They will also make appropriate plant

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changes if further analysis demonstrates that such changes are required.

This matter should be resolved during construction in a manner satisfac-tory to the Regulatory Staff. The Committee wishes to be kept informed.

The Committec. recommends that the applicants accolcrate the study of means to prevent ecmmon failure modes from negating scram action, and of design features to make tolerable the consequences of failure to scram during ant'icipated transients. The applicants stated that the engineering design would maintain flexibility with regard to relief capacity of the primary system and to a diverse means of reducing reactivity. This matter should be resolved in a manner satisfactory to the Regulatory Staff during con-struction. The Committee wishes to be kept informed.

The' Committee believes that consideration should be given to the utili:n-4 tion of instrumentation for prompt detection of gross failure of a fuel element. Consideration should be given also to the use of core exit ther=ocouples as an aid to reliable operation and as an additional method of detecting behavior ancmalies.

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- Honorable Glenn T. Scaborg August 20,.1970*

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.The applicants propose batch disenarge of liquid wastes following treat-j ment. Concentrations of radionuclides in the discharge will be kept 2

well below 10 CFR 20 limits with positive dilution being provided from several equipacnt cooling water streams. Plans for operation of waste 4

treatment equipment should be such as to minimise the quantitics of radioactivity discharged, and provisions should be made to achievo rapid dispetsion in the lake.

Other probicms related to large water reactors have been identified by the Regulatory Staff and the ACRS and cited in previous ACRS reports.

J The Comittee believes that resolution of these items should apply equally to the Davis-Besse plant.

x The Cocalttee believes that the above items can be resolved during con-struction and that, if due consideration is given to thase items, the I

Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station can be constructed with reasonable assurance that it can be operated without undue risk to the health and safety of the public.

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Joseph M. Hendrie

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Chairman

References:

Letter fr'om Toledo Edison Company, dated August 1,1969; License 1.

Application, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 of the Preliminary Safety Analysis Report (PSAR) 2.

Volume 4 of the PSAR, dated April 16, 1970 l

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Amendments 1 through 9 to License Application t

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