ML19323E820
| ML19323E820 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 08/03/1978 |
| From: | NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| REF-10CFR9.7 NUDOCS 8005270276 | |
| Download: ML19323E820 (90) | |
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UNITED STATES l'i)m, Ih NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
$. %^ inM [n E W ASHINGTON, D.C. 20555 e
'+.....#
May 9, 1980 OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY mMTSSION DETERMINATION GARDING PUBLIC DISCLOSURE UNDER THE GOVERNMENT IN THE SUNSHINE ACT OF:
Transcript of Discussion of Budget Reclama:
NRR, RES, I&E gust 3, 19/_6 The Commission previously determined that the subject transcript should be withheld from public disclosure until the Commission's.
FY-80 Appropriation became law.
Following enactment into law of the Commission's FY-80 Appropriation, the Secretary of the Commission, upon the i
advice of the General Counsel, determined that the subject transcript should be rpleased i p.ts entirety.
l l
e.J i% 'm Samuel J./
- 2. x Secretary of the Commission f
8005270S %
3RIGPl'Ir.,L n
N U CLEAR REG ULATO RY CO MMI'SSI O N IN THE MATTER QF:
CLOSED MEETING BUDGET MARKUP /RECIAMA NRR - RES - I&E (FY 80 Budget) s Place - Washington, D. C.
Date - Thursday, 3 August 1978 Pages 1-89 Teoohone:
("CO) 047-37CC ACI FIDE 3.4.I.3.Z70RTI25,INC.
j OfBaalReporzers Lu Norm C: sited Streer Wcshing;en, D.C. 2CCC1 NATICNWICE COVIitAGE. CAlLY
i 2
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA y
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2
3 CLOSED MEETING BUDGET MARKUP /RECLAMA NRR - RES - I&E 6
Room 1130 7
1717 H Street, N. W.
Washington, D. C.
Thursday, 3 August 1978 9
The Commission met, pursuant to notice, at 10:30 a.m.,,
10 BEFORE:
jj DR. JOSEPH M. HENDRIE, Chairman 12 PETER A. BRADrORD, Commissioner
()
33 RICHARD T. KENNEDY, Commissioner 94 JOHN F. AHEARNE, Commissioner 15 PRESENT:
16 SAMUEL CHILK, Secretary 7
L.' BARRY T. LEGEASEY 18 R. BOYD S. LEVINE 19 E
R. M TTSON 20 J. DAVIS T. MURLEY 21 D. DENTON V. STELLO 22 W. DIRCKS 23 L. GOSSICK 74 ice Federal Reporters, Inc.
S. M AUER 25
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i 0744.01..I 3
gsh i
PR0CEEDINGS 2
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Ve ry good.
If we can come 3
to order and start looking at our preliminary marks.
3 4
I guess the first -- since they seem to be at the 5
. table -- the first parties here are NRR.
Harold?
6 MR. GOSSICK:
As you recall the budget mark for 7
NRR that the Commission came down on when we last met was 8
158 versus 189 that had been recommended and you asked, 9
of course, that Harold come back and indicate what he could 10 do with that. And further, to see what the additional impact might be in the event the Commission decided to go 12 further and just number in the vicinity of 100 spaces instead 13 of the 158, and also, where, if possible, dollars could
)
14 be used instead of people.
t 15 So those are general points that Harold is prepared 1
16 to address.
17 MR. DENTON:
I passed out two sets of information.
18 I want to discuss first the impact of the mark of 774 If 19 I coul,d have the first slide and just briefly start with the 20 changes that the Commission made from the EDO marks and 21 Just run through them quickly.
And then I have backup 22 information on each one.
23 There was a. decrease of 11 in the operating reactor 24 unit, 2 in safeguards, 5 in case work, 10 in technical 25 projects, 2 in advanced reactors. and 1 in training, for a i
i
3744.01.2 4
gsh I
total decrease of an EDO mark of about 31 and $70,000 was 2
put back in for safeguards and $150,000 for technical 3
projects.
4 So let me go now to the impact on each decision 5
unit.
6 For the decrease of.11, if we process the same 7
amount of outstanding items that we propo'se to process, we 8
would have to have an additional 10 percent increase of 9
efficiency over the 20 percent that we already assume.
If to you recall, we had assumed.12 man-years per amendment, down f rom.15 that is currently in practice.
12 So in order to absorb this cut, we have to assume 13
.1, if we don't realize that additional efficiency, would i) 14 mean some increase in the backlog of operating amendments 15 during that year.
Perhaps 60 to 100 amendments will be 16 added to the list.
17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE How big is the list now?
18 MR. DENTON:
The list now is about 1300 actions 19 total.- These were items I discussed in the first presentation.
20 I was sort of taking o.ff from the first one to this one.
21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
So you might add 60 to the 22 list of 15007 23 MR. DENTON: Yes.
I thought the cut or the assumed j
l 24 efficiency of 20 percent over our present practice was 25 pretty ambitious and I think to achieve the 10 would really i
i 744.01.3 5
gsh I
be pushing our capability to devise better ways of doing 2
business.
3 So I see when I talk about an even bigger cut, 4
I would not propose to affect this unit.
I think 205 is 5
about the minimum that we can realistically hope to achieve 6
without having a big backlog occur.
7 And if during the year we find that we're just not 8
able to act on all the imporant ones, we might be able 9
to reprogram internally and let some of the lower decision 10 units slide a bit.
11 But I think, in f act, with the 774 mark, altogether, 12 I think it's a doable mark.
It stretches.
13 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
You think the 774. is doable?
')
14 MR. DENTON:
Yes, sir.
The safeguards mark was 15 the reduction of 2 people.
Slide.
16 (Slide.)
17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
I just have to comment.
18 He just said 774 is doable.
That might close the discussion.
19 (Laughter.)
20 MR. DENTON:
That's fine with me..
Probably the 21 group that is going to have the most difficulty is the 22 reduction of 2 in safegu'ards.
There.was some feeling that 23 overhead was perhaps high in the way the group was structured, 24 two branches and so forth.
But they supervise a large 25 number of consultants and other people.
i 744.01.4 6
gsh I
When you look at overhead in terms of the total 2
number of people in this unit, it's not really excessive.
3 What we think may happen if we're not able to achieve the 4
kinds of efficiencies, we hope that the implementation of 5
some of the regulations dealing with guard training and 6
qualifications, may take longer than we had hoped for.
7 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
On the other hand, hopefully 8
there will be some improvement in the general safeguards 9
posture of the agency, which will -- af ter all, this is a 10 year and a half from now longer and over that time, maybe 11 we can work that problem out.
12
.MR. DENTON:
The impact -- we had asked for more 13 dollars to implement the IAEA arrangements.
I J 14 (Slide.)
15 With the 70,000 -- I don't have a separate sheet 16 on this.
What we think it will do is if it comes into 17 being, we will be able to develop guidelines and we will be 18 able to implement the guidelines on the pretest basis, but l
19 we would not with the present funding be able to extend it 20 to the several hundred plants that might eventually be 21 included.
But it would get the program off on a test basis.
22 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Let's see.
Harold, what does 23 that -- if I look at the out-years, the office request was 24 for a big chunk of technical. assistance money in '80 and 25 then dropped a f actor of 2 on the request to '81, and went l
l744.01.5 7
gsh I
practically to peanuts in '82.
2 MR. CASE:
That reflects the IAEA work primarily 3
in '80, and guard training.
4 MR. STELLO:
At the present time, we're relying 5
very heavy on using dollars to supplement what we have through 6
laboratoriesen 7355 guard training contingency planning, 7
the IAEA work.
8 According to the present schedules for those 9
activities, that particular workload should have essentially 10 been accomplished so that our reliance on a lot of dollars 11 to augment what we do should substancia11y decrease in the 12 out-years.
13 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Is there an implication that 14 there's about a third of a million dollar difference here in i
15
'80 between the office request and the current mark?
16 Is the implication that some -- all or some part 17 of that should roll forward to '817 18 MR. DENTON:
I think it is for the IAEA part.
With 19 the current mark, we would only get the test part going and 20 it would take roughly the same funds sometime if it was 21 to be extended to all plants.
22 So I would propose that the cut in that set-aside 23 would show up again in '81 or '82 in order to fully implement 24 it.
Isn't that correct, Vic?
l 25 MR. STELLO: We're really betting on if the treaty r__
744.01.6 8
gsh I
comes in, how forceful we're going to be in implementing all 2
that's required by the treaty.
Behind that big activity s.
3 is getting all the work together and all of the f acilities 4
that we have to transmit over to them.
5 And it really depends on when that hits us and 6
what kind of schedule we want to give the IAEA for getting it 7
done.
If we don't get it in '80 and we can't get it in '79, 8
the only thing we have left is to push it off into '81.
9 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
How much of the 360 is IAEA?
10 MR. DENTON:
All the set-aside was for IAEA in I;
this decision unit.
12 DR. HANAUER:
300 total was IAEA and it was all 13 in the 1980, wasn't it, Vic?
()
14 MR. STELLO: Yes.
15 DR. HANAUER:
Originally, it.was planned to do all 16 of that work in 1980.
17 MR DENTON:
So that would imply about 230 should 18 be in the out-ye ars.
19 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Well, maybe the '81. safeguard 20 total ought to go up then to 800, which would be a plus 21 230.
We'J1 be reviewing it again next year, but at least 22 at this point --
23 MR. DENTON:
That's what we had requested.
That l
24 would permit, we think, full implementation of the program if l
)
25 it passed.
l t
744.01.7 9
gsh I
(Commissioner Bradford enters the hearing room.)
2 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
If it was at '817 3
MR. DENTON:
Either year.
We had a:ked for it 4
in '80, thinking we could do it that year.
But '81 --
5 MR. CASE:
John, if you're going to talk about the 6
out years, there was no SEP cut this year. It's not on 7
Harold's slide, so I really don't understand the basis for 8
your reductions in the out-years in the SEP.
9 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
That was a compromise between 10 my trying to kill it and --
11 (Laughter.)
12 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
That was the average of zero and 13 one.
\\' T/
14 (Laughter.)
!5 MR. CASE:
My argument would be obviously some work 16 has to be done on the reactors other than the first of that
!7 one?
I would argue -- that being true, I don't think anyone 18 would disagree with it.
Might as well keep the level the 19 same and get them done. Depending on how much you have to 20 do, you would do the larger number in '81, '82.
21 I would keep the level the same and do more reactors 22 it it's commission's view to move in that direction rather 23 than cut down the number of people and string out the program.
24 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I'd sure like.to be able to
(
)
25 show -- let's see, how many decision units have we got?
744.01.8 10 gsh i
140 or something Like that?
Gee, I'd like to have one that 2
appears to be going down at some time.
3 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
You have to be sure of the 4
right one.
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay.
We'll keep that in mind.
6 MR. DENTON:
The next slide was on casework.
7 (Slide.)
8 MR. DENTON:
Of which there was a cut of 5, and 9
that's not a big percentage in terms of the effort we put 10 into this.
It might mean that the impact, to the extent
.11 there was some, would come in a CP schedule which 12 would be slightly larger, but it would just be 5, a 2 13 percent change in schedule.
()
14 So not a big card to identify.with any accuracy a 15
_ impact of a cut of 5.
16 On technical projects --
17 (Slide.)
18
-- the Commission mark was 10 less than the EDO 19 mark.. I think what this tells us is that we would take this 20 10 -- out of all the various categories of technical projects 21 in categories As and Bs, we will concentrate on, those of 22 r3Jor significance and.maybe pick up 1 or 2 to reduce our 23 topic ^ai report efforts a little bit, reduce our NMSS assistants 24 by 10 --
25 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
What's that going to do?
11 744.01.9 gsh I
Cause NMSS to pick up the work?
2 MR. DENTON:
We were budgeting 27 people.
I think 3
we cut it by 3.
4 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I know, but what does that 5
do to NMSS?
6 MR. DENTON:
It would stretch out their schedules 7
a 1Lttle bit, this area, for things we review, and some of 8
the same impact if we had done -- our casework.
9 But I think 3 out of, essentially, 30 was not 10 a very big impact on their schedules.
11 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I don't have any idea.
12 MR. DENTON:
I think what it comes down to is we 13 just do things not quite as f ast, so it's proce ssing --
14 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Harold, the essence of what 15 you're saying on. technical projects, isn't it that rather 16 than there being some identifiable subelement in technical 17 projects, that you would just cut out completely or move 18 out three years -- you would take.whatever reduction there 19 is and sort of spread it over the whole technical projects 20 a,rea ?
21 Now whether it's
.7 man-years here or 1.3 there, 22 or 2 people or 3 in the NMSS.
For fiscal '80, at this 23 Juncture, is getting sort of well down in the noise, I would 24 think.
)
25 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY 10 percent is somewhat more a
l
744.01.10 gsh I
than noise, usually.
i 2
MR. DENTON:
It's 10 percent of 30 in this case, m
3 or 27.
So it's 3 people at the maximum out of 30.
And like 4
in all the. subdecision units, some of the effort is more 5
important than others.
6 So we would continue to provide NMSS full service 7
in those reviews that we thought were most important. But there 8
might be a uranium mill pond somewhere that wasn't urgent, 9
and we would do that one on a little slower schedule.
10 (Commissioner Bradford leaves the hearing room. )
So what I did on these 10 was cut out each one 12 of the little subunits, one, two, or three people.
The
~
13 advance. reactor. mark was.a decrease of two.
)
14 (S lide. )
15 What we would do is devote the effort that 16 is available to reviewing the operation of Fort St. Vrain 17 and put the remaining effort into reviewing the.FFTF 18 start up and testing and there would be some delays in our 19 review of these rejected HIGRs and GCFR plants.
20 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:.How many of these 14 man 21 years are actually devoted to Fort St. Vrain?
22 MR. DENTON:
That's an operating reactor which is 23 not in DOR.
It's being handled by the subgroup and I think 24 it's 2 or 3 man years.
25 AR. BOYD I would say two professional man-years,
744.0!.11 13 gsh I
and then you weigh whatever is in budgetary purposes, 2
the support that you have, and take it from there.
3 MR. DENTON:
Thatwasnotamajorimpactedcept 4
on future advanced reactors.
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Let's see.
When is.FFTF due 6
to start up?
7 MR. BOYD It's scheduled to be completed in theory S
at the end of Fiscal '78.
9 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
End of Fiscal '78.
10 MR. BOYD:
In theory.
.11 COMMISSIONER ~ AHEARNE: In theory.
Was it originally 12 supposed to start up in '757 13 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Can you provide any late
)
14 enlightenment? John, what do you think?,
1 15 Is the damn thing going to be running by '807 16 (Laughter.)
17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
By '80 it ought to be.
18 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Well, that's only a year away.
19 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
A year and a half ?
20 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
A year and two months.
21 MR..MURLEY:
Mr. Chairman, they loaded sodium in 22 the secondary system last month and they're about a month 23 ahead of schedule, I'believe.
They intend to load sodium 24 in the primary system this fall and the schedule is, I believe 3
25 they go critical a year from now. And for the last three years c
e
744.01.12 14 gsh 1
I think they've been pretty much on schedule.
2 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
How.did the secondary sodium 3
loading go?
4 MR. MURLEY:
Fine.
I think all three loops are 5
tilled with sodium.
6 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
That's a f airly good sign. If 7
they had kept the secondary piping clean enough, they can 8
load sodium without anything having it be a real crummy 9
mess.
10 It's a fairly favorable indication about the state 11 of things at the construction site.
12 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Could I just ask one question 13 on the last chart, which you haven't turned over yet, which 14 is. training and correspondence?
15 (Slide.)
16 It said reducing the total to one man year, brining 17 the training to. a level of about 2.5 percent of total 18 manpower.
19 How does that equate with the ratio of the rest 20 of the agency?
21 MR. CASE:
I don't.think there's any way to find i
22 out.
I've asked that question.
The statistics ere kept 23 that way.
24 MR. GOSSICK:
I can't give you an answer, i
25 Commissioner Kennedy.
,744.01.13 15 gsh I
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY It ought to be easy.
It's 2
only to try to find out how many man-years of training are 3
in each one of the pri cipal offices.
s 4
They must have something.
5 DR. HANAUER:
It's around.
It's just not at 6
the table.
7 (Simultaneous discussion.)
8 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Well, let's ask him again.
9 MR. BARRY:
I will get that inf ormation for you.
10 MR. DENTON:
If we had our druthers, we would 11 prefer a level of 4 percent as being one week per man.
12 MR.CAS Es It's my estimate it's quite low.
I'll 13 try to check and see if I can't find out.
(
I4 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY If we can get some estimate --
15 MR. BARRY:
Some agencies, it was specifically 16 articulated in the budget.
You know, they want so many people 17 and they didn't do that as a matter of percent.
In other 18 cases, they did it as a matter of percent. It was done both 19 ways, and we do have a training process.
20 MR. DIRCKS:
Rather than look at projections, we 21 can get you passed --
22
.MR. DFNTON:
Overall, I thought the biggest 23 impact of the Commission mark would be to put more pressure 24 on the operating reactor unit to find improvement and gain 25 that extra 10 percent.
The rest of the mark could be scattered
744.01.14 16 gsh I
among the units and as a small percentage of any one unit, 2
it's hard to identify it.
3 Now going to the question of how we would arrange 4
it if we were to go to 716 instead of 774 ---
5 (Slide >)
6
-- I think is an entirely -- confronted with a 7
different task.
This is one, Commissioner Bradford, you P
asked about.
9 What I have got on the first slide is how I would 10 propose to allocate the additional cut of 58 in order to 11 reach a 716 mark.
And from looking at this, you can tell 12 I wouldn/c propose to cut the three units that we had 13 discussed, because as I showed on the earlier tables, they 14 assume certain efficiencies on top of the efficiencies 15 already assumed.
16 I think it would be unrealistic to assume we could 17 achieve a 50 percent increase in processing the OR amendments 18 and so forth on top of the 3240 that's in there.
19
~
So what I want to do now is walk you through the 20 units where I would propose to take the people from in order 21 to achieve the 716.
22 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Before you do that, Harold, 23 let me ask a question I should have asked a while ago.
24 In terms of the license amendments and the backlog, 25 what is their significance in terms of what's really going on l
l l
- w
744.01.15 17 gsh I
out there in the world?
What's involved in those amendments?
2 Is it a matter of -- are they safety-related 3
types of amendments?
If all the amendments were issued, 4
would there be a significant increase in the power levels 5
at which reactors could operate?
6 What do'we gain by making sure that we get that 7
backlog cleared up?
c 11 8
MR. DENTON: I think it's a potpourri from issues 9
that we think are important, and they are the ones that 10 we have worked on and processed, the ones where the licensee 11 is spending more money than he thinks proper and he wants 12 to relocate or discontinue sampling, which to him is just 13 an economic incentive.
)
14 So, obviously, D.OR has processed those that, in its 15 judgment, have a high safety significance.
But let me ask 16 Vic to. maybe give his views on how they do vary.
17 MR. STELLO:
There are some amendments in there 18 which do related to power level, and those we generally 19 can get out on time. Those are the ones we manage to work 20 with, when we are, in fact, derating some for some reason or 21 another.
22 But as a general characterization of the outstanding 23 amendments, they all are "saf ety related."
That's our 24 business, by definition.
25 MR. DENTON:
Or environmental.
.,. +
'744.01.16 18 gsh MR. STELLO:
If you recall on the last presentation, 2
we tried to break those up and analyze them as to where
~ ~'y 3
they come from. And you recall, we broke them up into 4
five different groups as to those that evolve from 5
regulations that the Commission passes that require us to 6
do something, or we have an event or an operating experience 7
in a facility where something undesirable happened in one 8
facility and it's clear it can or will. happen in others.
9 The channel box problem is an illustration where 10 it was a safety problem.
We had to derate a bunch of of 11 BWRs, and we had to go and take the action, first to derate 12 them, get the. problem resolved, both with the vendor and 13 the utilities, and then take another action to allow them 14 to come back up to power when they fixed and repaired them.
15 Those are.the kinds of activities that we're 16 talking about.
It evolved from generally things that directly 17 or indirectly are caused by an NRC action. And it could have i
i 18 been caused because of something that happened in a f acility j
19 or ' by some deregulation, the whole spectrum.
20 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Okay.
So when OMB is to 21 take the most likely place from which the question would come, 22 comes to you and says, okay, internal NRC. considerations 23 aside, obviously, you want to get rid of your backlogs.
You 24 are caught up on the paperwork. But in terms of all the 25 priorities facing the administration and the country, why are
744.01.1 7 19 gsh I
these license amendments important?
Who's going to be be tter 2
off and in what ways?
What kind of an answer do we give m
3 them?
4 MR. STELLO:
The safety of the nuclear power plants 5
is my business -- that's.what I'm doing.
And these actions, 6
in principle, the bulk of them are for that purpose.
7 So in order for me to continue to assess the 8
safety of the plants involved, requirements for one reason 9
or another, I have got to implement them.
I have got to 10 do what's needed for safety.
11 That's what I believe I'm doing.
It might be 12 an arguable point, but that is my view.
13 MR. DENTON:
But for the ones that go to Commission
.)
14 action, such as in-service inspection, we don't attempt any 15 risk assessment or any look at the work, because that has 16 alraady been done in the.way of proclamating a regulation.
17 In terms of the ones where we're initiating action, bec ause 18 of our operating experience or research results, that calls 19 for a judgment as to what the risk reduction potential is 20 in taking that action.
21 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: What was the breakdown again 22 as between thosa which are in response to Commission 23 initiation and those which are the licensee's own?
Obviously, 24 the ones which are responding to Commission initation are 25 going to be more clearly safety related, consistent with 4
~ ~
+~---
744,01.18 20 gsh I
its response.
2 MR. DENTON:
I think there were like 600 in total 3
of that category, approximately half of which we had s
4 processed.
5 So like 300 would be in the backlog total.
6 MR. CASE:
We'll get to the numbers, Commission 7
Bradford.
8 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Well, le t's see.
Out of 17.77 9
amendments, there were 343 that have been -- let's see --
10 that are labelled plant unique license amendment actions.
Il 12 13 i
14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
{
l
21 CR 8743 MIMI t-2 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
The split is 75 environmental, y
mta 1 2
268 safety-related, generic review and manpower total for the balance --
3 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
How do you classify it if 4
5 somebody comes in and says, I think I can operate my plant at a level f 20 or 30 megawatts higher than you're currently 6
allowing me, I'd like a license amendment?
Is that safety-7 related or environmental amendment?
8 MR. DENTON:
That's safety-related.
9 10 1-COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
For classification purpose, 11 that is safety-related.
12 MR. DENTON:
Because it requires a relook at the
^
13 safety aspects.
ja Let me look at the 75 on the environmental list.
We 15 have reassigned all of those from DOR to DSE internally, and so 16 that backlog of 75 will be cleaned up by the time '80 rolls 17 around internally.
So hopefully, by '80 we would not have a 18 backlog, except just due to the ones of that year.
19 MR. STELLO:
Commissioner Bradford, let me make 20 clear, it's possible that the environmental restrictions on the 21 plant can in fact impose a derating.
That derating is a result 22 of an environmental requirement.
If it is, then it is derated i
23 because of environmental requirement.
24 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
And in that case, the amend-Ace-Federal Reporters, Inc.
25 ment --
f
22 mtb 2 MR. STELLO :- They have to file an amendment, ask for j
relief, because it's a license condition to get that license 2
condition changed so that they can up the power in the plant.
3 i
' l It could be a limit on the Delta T across the condensor or the 4
maximum temperature in the discharge canal, or whatever.
For 5
whatever reasons are there, they would have to derate; that 6
would be an environmental amendment, and we process those as we 7
w uld license amendments.
We don't make a distinction in terms 8
of our workload if it's environmental or if it's safety.
If 9
10 the licensee is asking us for an amendment and he comes in and 11 he says, my power plant is going to have to be derated, we try 12 to the best of our ability to be responsive and give him the 13 service to allow that plant to operate if in fact we can justify
~
34 it, either on the basis of safety or environmental.
15 We do our best to take those actions and avoid any 16 delay in getting it done either way.
I don't have an arbitrary 17 classification system that says if it's environmental and it's 18 derating a plant, I put it at the bottom of the pile.
I don't 19 do that.
It will get processed quickly.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
If you had to classify -- I 20 21 guess perhaps I've been somewhat misled by the safety-related versus environmental-related.
If you had to classify the 22 amendments in terms of primary purpose -- let me try to get 23 24 some idea of the categories. they would fall into.
Some would-m c.eaonen, enc.
I 25 have as their primary purpose, especially the one's in response l
mIto 3-23 i
to Commission initiatives, improved safety.
Some would have j
2 improved plant efficiency or improved operating levels, plus 3
savings.
~
MR. DENION:
But we would not initiate those.
4 MR. CASE:
All of those would be in the category of 5
6 licensee requests :
increased power level, efficiency, don't do this inspection because it's not. necessary for safety 7
reasons.
8 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
And then there are some that 9
would also have as their purpose diminished environmental 10 11 impacts.
Any other categories, primary purpose categories?
MR. STELLO:
I think se have tried to cut these amendt 12 13 ments in a variety of ways.
We have tried, for budget purposes,
j4 in two different ways.
You have the source of where the requirements evolve from, and I think you have that particular 15 16 breakdown in front of you.
We have also tried to take another cut at how they apply by reactor class, whether they are unique 17 to the 'eactors.
And I think there are about 343 that are r
18 19 licensee-unique on the plants.
The rest of them fall into 20 generic categories and are either broad, across-the-board, relating to all kinds of reactors, PWRs and BWRs, or they are 21 22 just vendor type oriented.
There's an area ECCS model which would only affect one vendor type, General Electric type 23 24 reactors, Westinghouse, whatever --
e Feneras Recoewes, Inc.
But I think -- I don ' t perceive CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
25
24 mto 4 -
any other categories.
Does anybody else?
3 MR. CASE:
I don't really see the category, your 2
last category, improved environmen'.
3
'N MR. HANAUER:
There's one other --
4 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I'm assuming there is an 5
environmental category that's like a safety category.
That is, 6
it might be Commission-initiated amendment, which -- for some 7
reason, am I wrong about that?
8 MR. CASE:
I don ' t know o f any.
We evaluated FES.
If 9
10 they determine that to be acceptable, if they stay within that, 11 we have no requirement to make them less than whatever is going to be acceptable in the FES.
12 MR. DENTON:
Unless you are putting radiation into 13 routine releases into that category.
They tend to get set by ja 15 EPA and water quality standards and so forth, so they don't change as fast.
But I could see where they could be in that 16 j7 category.
MR. HANAUER:
I would suggest there's one more cate-18 19 gory, which is similar to the very first one you said, which is 20 initiated by the Commission, but not as a result of a regulation 21 change, but as the result of something we learned from operation 22 r from research, where we decide a certain class of plants, or just usually it's a class of plants nas to look at something tha b 23 24 we didn.'t look at before, or in a diff erent way from the way Aco Federal Reporters, Inc.
l 25 we looked at it before.
And it's Commission-initiated, but it's
mto 5, 25 g
not as a result of a new regulation; it's a result of something 2
(Inaudible. )
3 MR. DENTON:
I take it that the real thrust is some-4 what like in the SEP program:
What's the net effect on the risk if we do them all or if we don't do them all?
We have just 5
6 not gotten to the point where we're able to apply that very,
7 exactly, and different people perceive different ones differently, 8
and it's sort of the process that ccmbines the staff judgment, 9
the ACRS judgment, and other parties as to which ones are the 10 operating experience ones, in order to reach a level where 11 something is required of that without a real formal risk 12 assessment.
13
.Only ones like ATWS get up to the point where we.put 34 the time and attention into it and try to quantify the real 15 risk and savings possible.
16 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Why don't you go ahead with the slide?
I may want to come back to this, but I've taken you 17 18 rather far afield.
19 MR. DENTON:
What I wanted to do in the next slide 20 is just show in summary fashion the impact of the 58 additional cuts.
21 22 (Slide.)
23 And then I'll go into each one in more detail as you l
24 desire.
But in order to find the 58 additional slots to cut, a Feestas Geoarters, !nc.
25 I went through all the subunits in these icwer priority tasks l
mth 6 26 1
see if they were ones where I could still maintain a viable t
2 program, but still put less effort into it.
And this table 3
shows the total impact of that 5.8.
It means that we would 4
reduce about 30 percent of our level of effort in the standard 5
plan reviews, which tends to stretch out the schedules same 6
am unt for the standard plants.
7 The early site review effort is the area I had to use as the damper to absorb the 58 after I had made all the cuts 8
everywhere else that I could.
And I had to reduce it by two-9 10 thirds, which -- and the reason I cut standard plant reviews 11 different than early site reviews is, standard plants are 12 referenced even by customer applications.
Early site reviews
^
13 tended to be done early in the process before there was a plant, 34 and perhaps stretching out early site reviews wouldn't have 15 quite the impact that it would at standard plant reviews.
16 But I want to point out that these twc areas are two j7 of the areas that we have been touting as an eventual solution 18 to some of our problems.
19 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: We now know -- (Inaudible. )
20 (Laughter. )
MR. DENTON:
We have reduced the level of efforts in 21 22 licensing improvements a few people.
We cut back about 50 23 percent in the standard review plan and audit calculations.
We 24 reduced the advanced reactor level of effort to only Ft. St.
Wederal Maporters, Inc.
Vrain and FFTF.
We reduced training a few more people down to 25 J
mto 7 27 l j
two percent of the total staff, and we reduced standard support 2
a little.
3 Maybe it would help if I just walked through the derivation of these a little.
4 5
(Slide.)
6 As I said, early site review is the one area that we 7
took probably the biggest cut in.
It was sort of a damper to absorb the effects of the others. And I hit standards.
Early 8
site reviews we reduced from 16 to 5, standard plant reviews fro n 9
10 48 to 33, and licensing improvements I cut from 12 to 10, in 11 order to get the total cut in case work of 28 that was necessary 12 In the technical projects area --
13 (Slide.)
14
-- I reduced by 10, reducing it all in the technical 15 projects, the level of effort in the categories A and B.
What 16 I'm reducing here is the level of effort through revising the 17 standard review plan and audit calculations done in DSS by about 18 half, in order to pick up ten.
i 19 (Slide. )
20 And advanced reactors in '80, I'm making a similar 21 cut to have just the maintenance activity on those two plants 22 and no capability to review advanced reactors in any different l
23 design if they were to arise.
~
I 24 (Slide. )
wFeoeres Reporters, Inc.
25 In training and correspondence, I cut an additional
-w
mto 8 28 5 people out of that area to get down to two percent of the j
effort in training, in each one of the directors' offices.
2 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I noted that you reduced the 3
standards by 28 percent.
What's the actual effect of that?
4 (Slide.)
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
You dropped it from 10 to 7' man-6 years?
7 MR. DENTON:
I think it means that we are just less g
effective.
9 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I guess 11 to 8.
10 11
.MR.
DENTON:
It means that it will feed back eventually 12 in ' 81 and ' 82 into our reviews, because a large amount of the 13 standard effort that goes into preparing Reg Guides and so
~~
14 f rth makes the licensing reviews simpler in later years.
So 15 it would go to the effectiveness of our review in '81,
'2, and 16
'3, would be my estimate.
17 Roger, would you like to quantify it?
MR. MATTSON:
I recall that the 11 requests compares 18 19 to a current level on the order of 20.
So there's already a 20 rather significant reduction.
You recall also that we talked to you about whether we would reduce our participation in the 21 standards efforts, and the Commission reacted rather negatively 22 to that.
We decided not to do that to any great extent, to 23 24 review it and make sure we haven't got any fat, but not across-W-Foneral Reporters, Inc.
25 the-boards to cut it back.
29 i
mto 9 1
On cutting from 20 to 11 and 11 down to 8, we would 2
start to slow down considerably our participation in the review 3
and approval process for the Office of Standards Development 4
major work projects, and we would, at 8, have to cut into the 5
national standards participation.
There's no way we could have 6
a viable standards program in the Office of Standards Develop-7 ment that was in any way related to the licensing process and 8
continue 6 or 7 man-years in the national standards program.
9 MR. DENTON:
I'm not advocating any of these cuts.
10 (Laughter.)
11 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I'm not suggesting you are.
12 MR. DENTON:
We tried to avoid the Washington Monument 13 syndrome by cutting 58 out of operating reactors or safeguards,
14 or one of the high priority units.
And we had considered care-15 fully whether there was any further cuts in any of those ones 16 that we could handle.
And I think, when you take the efficie'ncy 17 we had already assumed, and then the additional efficiency 18 imposedIby your mark in those areas, it would be really unrealis-19 tic to expect any more improvements in those top three cate-20 gories.
So they had to come out of the bottom of the ZZBs, 21 and none of the units down there are units you can completely i
22 cut to nothing.
There 's no activity I can find that we would do l
m 23 so.
In each area it was just a nickel and a dime to try to come 24 up with 58 total.
LaJederei Recorters, Inc.
25 So I think the 58 -- the 716 would result in the kind
30 mts 10' j
of chaos and confusion we havs in the process today, actually.
2 We'd be switching reviews back and forth.
We would just not 3
be doitng,.the kind of jcb I think we ought to be doing.
And it
[]
would not have -- and the big impact would be in the early site 4
5 review in the standard plants area that we're trying to get on the track of as an ultimate solution.
6 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay.
Questions?
Dick?
7 CO M SSIONER M M :
No.
Peter, you were M M ng 8
about some further questions or --
9 10 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I have no objection, obvi-11 ously, to go ahead to OMB and say:
Here's what we feel we need 12 in order to get our house in order.
This is the way we have
's 13 marked it up, and cut it every which-way.
But it seems to me 14 it's incumbent on us at that point to be able to say why it's 15 so important to OMB that our house be in order, why life in a 16 little disarray here and there at the NRC is in fact less 17 tolerable to tliem than whatever other disarrays that they're 18 confronted with throughout the Federal Government.
19 Obviously) we're in no position to assess other agencies.
But it seems to me you have to be able to relate the 20
. difficulties that individual branches or decision units that we 21 22 have will be having, to something that's important on their
, m, v
23 agenda.
That's a link that in some ways is as much our respon-24 sibility as yours to make.
But these things have to be thought co Federal Esporters, Inc.
25 of in terms of what concrete difference they make out there.
31 mt'e 11' MR. DENTON:
I think it makes the difference in two j
areas.
When we are unable to review a plant like Diablo or 2
3 issue a license or decide to issue a license when it's finished,
)
the cost to the public of sitting undsed is considerable, and 4
5 we ve not really tried to convert those kinds of delays into dollars.
But they obviously run hundreds of thousands of dol-6 lars a day in cost to the public.
7 d de oder area is in terms of t$ng to quantHy 8
the residual risk that is unsolved, that we would be getting to 9
10 if we had reduced the backlog, and we have not been able to do 11 that very well.
12 I think they are the two areas, either direct cost 7
13 due to our inability to meet the schedules otherwise and would 14 run up the cost in plants -- and at one time industry groups 15 were estimating that the kind of problems we have today were 16 adding s'amething on the order of $50 to S60 million a plant, which is ultimately borne by the taxpayers.
j7 I'm n t trying to quantify, convert this into dollars.
18 And I'm not at all sure that it's NRR's function to do so.
What j9 you really have to do is to tell us what the situation looks 20 liLe fr m y ur p int f view.
And then it may be, though, that 21 22 somewhere within the agency it would be a useful exercise to 23 translate what NRR is telling us are the specific consequences 24 into -- maybe OPE is the place -- into some assessment of what
@ Federal Caporters, fric. '
25 that really means.
32 mt') 12, CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I think it would be useful -- it y
2 sounds like it would be a useful exercise.
I think NRR has to 3
participate in it.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Oh, yes.
I didn't mean to 4
exclude them.
And in fact, I'd be delighted to have them do it.
5 But it does ask them some questions that may have an economic 6
and other dimension to them.
7 MR. DENTON:
Like what is the cost of a 30 percent 8
9 slip in the time required to review a standard plant.
It's a 10 question we don't have an answer to handy.
11 CHAIRMAN HFNDRIE:
Yes.
12 Other at the moment?
COMISSIOER BRADFORD:
No.
13 34 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
John?
15 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Harold, are these mainly 16 pr fessionals that you're adding --
MR. DENTON:
The budget is total people and has 37 verhead reflected into it.
But I think, A1, putting the budget 18 z9 togehher, we were trying to keep a very low overhead of.like 10 percent on the new additions.
20 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
How rapidly do you think you 21 22 can expand, that is, hire competent people, get them in, mesh
'L-them aboard?
23 24 MR. DENTON:
We have gone through one growth period fan-Federal Reporters, Inc.
25 of about this percentage in the past, and you really have to
mta 12 33 3
work at it to do it efficient.ly. I would hope that we could 2
begin -- perhaps there's some system whereby we can begin in 3
' 79 to hire against the ' 80 ceiling and spread the impact at.
But it would involve a big effort, especially in some specialized 4
5 areas, to find --
COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
I would expect one of the 6
issues OMB. some people will raise is that even at your 7
reduced number, you're planning on expanding by about 25 percent 8
s.2 on BU in one year.
9 10 MR. DENTON:
I think that's about the ma.ximum we could 11 do.
12 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Highly competent and trained 13 people.
They will raise the question.
ja MR. GOSSICK:
It takes an amount of recruiting effort.
15 But we get sort of ahead of time, as soon as we see generally 16 what's going to come out of Congress.
And 25 percent, I would 17 say, stretches, but can be done.
COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
That 's all I have.
18 19 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Thank you very much. ' Why don ' t we 20 just move on.
I MR. GOSSICK:
Are we going to take research next?
21 22 CHAIRMAN HEEDRIE:
Yes.
Let me ask the Commissioners :
23 What's your appointment schedule look like across the noon 24 hour2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />?
We are running an hour behind.
I don't feel badly about m FewW Reorms, lm.
j j
23 it.
I think the NRR discussion was an important one.
StO 14 34 1
We have got research, I&E, ELD, ACRS --
2 MR. GOSSICK:
ELD cancelled.
Howard changed his mind.
3 He's going to live with what he has been offered.
~.
4 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Staff changes mind.
We only have 5
research and I&E, 6
We will adjourn until 2:00.
Okay, we'll see you at 7
2:00.
We'll reconvene at 2:00.
3 (Whereupon, at 12:50 p.m., the meeting was adjourned, 9
to reco'nvene at 2:00 p.m. the s ame day. )
10 1 11 12 N
13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 1
21 22 k'
23 24 WeFeemW Rewwn. tx.
25 t
i
CR 8744 35 MELTZER:jwb 1
AFTERNOON SESSION 2
(2:15 p.m.)
3 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Why don't we go ahead.
4 Research?
5 MR. GOSSICK:
Okay.
The Commission asked, in 6
particular -- coming back to decide, first of all, if 7'
Saul was going to reclama anything, to come back and 8
discuss that -- but specifically, to address the dollar amounts, 9
or the level of contingency in the 3-D Program.
I think that 10 is the one that Commissioner Bradford asked for.
He asked Il several questions with regard to that.
12 There was also an area with regard to this joint 13 effort on BWR between GE, EPRI, and NRC on how we arrived at 14 that, and why we should do that jointly; and secondly, how 15 we arrived at the dollar amounts.
16 And then thirdly, the Commission asked, you know, 17 af ter we decided that we just had to make a large dollar 18 reduction in the overall budget'and tap Research for $10 mil-19 lion, what were all of the gold watches that would appear if 20 they were forced to come up with such an impact statement.
21 (Laughter.)
22 MR. GOSSICK:
Sol is ready to take those two 23 questions.
24 MR. LEVINE:
I have a few Washington Monuments.
a Fwww Rmo,mes. f m j
25 (Laughter.)
jwb 3-2 1
MR. LEVINE:
We are not going to reclama the 2
Commission, mark. but I would like to make a few points about 3
where we are.
I am worried about our budget size in '80, and s
4 in '81 also.
5 We have almost no flexibility in the budget at the 6
level we are getting, and we normally have had flexibility 7
which has permitted us to respond to urgent user requirements th at:
a come up during the year.
We will probably not have that without 9
really slowing down in other areas significantly.
10 We also have, in '80 and '81, large funding forward 11 for early funding for 3-D.
While we have confidence in our 12 overall estimate, the early-year funding can change,the first 13 two-year funding can change somewhat.
14 In '80, we will be running LOFT operations with 15 nuclear heat, and God knows what we can find there.
So I 16 argued for -- this will be a very unique experience -- I argued 17 that we really will be very tight,in '80 and '81.
I just want 18 you to know that.
19 About '81, I think, while we want to show a decrease 20 in our budget in '81, we have told you during the budget 21 review that we plan to program our budget down.
We think a cut 22 in '81 of $10 million 3: too much.
I would 3:ggest more like 23 a S5 million cut.
24 I think '82 is all right.
La>Feew3 Roo,mn. imt j
25 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Say that last, again?
l 1
37 jwb 3-3 1
MR. LEVINE:
In '81, you cut us $10 million below 2
'80.
I think that's too vast a cut, too large a cut for that 3
one year.
4 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Of course, you were increased 5
S40 million in one year -- $10- of the $13 --
6 MR. LEVINE:
$10 million is inflation, and $13-is 7
LOFT.
There is $23 million that s nonprogrammatic increase 8
so the real programmatic increase is $12 million -
'79 to '80.
9 MR. BARRY:
The Commission really didn't cut you 10 in the out years.
11 MR. LEVINE:
Whoever did.
t 12 MR. BARRY:
It was a combination of a BRG/EDO 13 recommendation.
Okay?
The Commission really hasn't addressed 14 the out years.
You asked us to take a look at it, which we 15 have.
We met on Friday -- the panel, headed up by Steve, and 16 some of my people, and Bill looked at it, and I looked at it, 17 and I guess, Lee, you've looked at it, haven't you?
18 We put some money back in in '81.
We've increased 19 it.
It still goes down, but we've got about $4-or $5 million 20 back into the budget for '81.
21 If you look at your '81 column number, the number 22 you will see is 179, 273.
23 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
My only point I was trying 24 to make is that if you really find that coming down $10 million
> Federal Repo,ters, Inc.
l 25 is too sharp, in one year, the normal budget reaction will be:
l l
.g
jwb 3-4.
38 1
Well, reduce the increase in the previous year which is so 2
much larger, and that will smoothe it out.
3 MR. LEVINE:
I have already addressed that matter.
4 MR. BARRY:
We upped that number 185.2, and in ' 81' 5
where you see the number 172.7.
We've upped it to 177.4.
6 So.though it does taper down, it doesn' t taper down as much.
7 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Are you looking at the one 8
marked August 2nd?
9 MR. LEVINE:
I'm suggesting that the 185.323 10 ought to be more like 190 is what I'm suggesting.
Il COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:,This is EY '81?
12 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Let's talk some more about the 13
'80 program.
14 MR. LEVINE:
These are just opening remarks.
I 15 would like to make another remark about SAFER people.
It is 16 very hard to find an obvious formula to decide how many people 17 you need in the management section projects.
That has always 18 been one of great difficulty.
19 On an overall office basis, we are running about 20 one man per million dollars, counting overhead.
SAFER is 21 much higher than that.
It is about 1.6 e.r so.
SAFER does not 22 have aty big projects like LOFT o; TJ 23 which require much fewer -- like a quartee of a man per million 24 dollars.
Am-Federal Reporters, Ir.c.
25 It is multi-discipline.
It encompasses all the
jwb 3-5 39 1
disciplines of RSR, plus the environmental disciplines, and 2
the health disciplines, and the safeguards disciplines, so it 3
has a multitude of disciplines, and a multitude of projects s
4 to manage.
5 It also has a very large coordination effort within 6
the offices of NRC.
It has to coordinate heavily with 7
Standards, NRR, and NMSS, and with all those disciplines, 8
while RSR coordinates principally with NRR -- somewhat with 9
Standards, but mostly with NRR.
10 '
Now, I'm not going to ask for the snount of people 11 back, but I am going to tell you we are going to try to do 12 everything we can to improve our efficiency by consolidating 13 contracts -- but it is going to be very difficult.
14 I suggest the trend is going to be:
As we close 15 down big projects in RSR, that they are going to need more 16 people per dollar, too.
Because if you look at the real 17 work that is going on in RSR and SAFER, they are very busy 18 and they are being criticized for not being responsible enough 19 to user offices, which has some effect on their performance, 20 of course, and it has some effect on the BRG's perception of 21 their performance.
22 It is just a matter of:
There are not enough 23 people there.
We will go with it for one more year, and we 24 will try to see what we can do by improving efficiency and
,ce Federc3 Reporters, Inc.
25 coming back in '81 with a better story, if we can.
~
jwb 3-6 1
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay.
2 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Sol, embedded in your Fast l
3 Breeder Reactor Program, do you have any vision of the future 4
of what is going to be coming on, and what you are preparing 5
for iti 6
MR. LEVINE:
We have sort of been holding level for 7
the last couple of years.
We have converted our program from 8
one that was principally directed toward LMFBR, to make it 9
more generic in terms of gathering --
10 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
You are going up about 10 11 percent in the coming year.
12 MR. LEVINE:
And that is almost level.
)
13 Most of that is in the gas-cooled reactor.
It is 14 coming from congressional pressure to put more money in the 15 gas-cooled reactor.
The breeder is essentially level.
The 16 breeder program was converted, a year or so ago, to address 17 generic questions in fast reactor safety that would be appli-18 cable to any kind of fast reactor -- gas, or sodium.
19 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
You have got what kind of 20 an inflation factor built in?
21 MR. LEVINE:
6 percent.
22 MR. BARRY:
In the breeder, that is all that is in 23 there, 6 percent inflation.
j.
l l
24 KR. EANAUER:
And one setaside -- the loop design, m FeestC) Reporters, Inc.
25 the 500K for the loop design; nothing but inflation in that.
l 41 jwb.3-7, t
i MR. BARRY:
Yes, you're right.
2 MR. LEVINE:
And we see it -- We're projecting some 3
growth in '81 on the basis that, during '80, there might be a
.s 4
decision to go with the breeder, so that is the basis for 5
that growth in '81, the out gears.
6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Is there any indication 7
that there is actual interest in gas-cooled reactors, outside 8
of Congress, in the rest of the country?
9 MR. LEVINE:
Yes.
There is a group of utilities 10 that have been formed -- the " Gas-Cooled Reactor Associates,"
11 or something --
12 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Yes.
13 MR. LEVINE:
And that includes GA, and so on.
They 14 are going to try to set up an arrangement with DOE to get a 15 reactor started.
The question is:
What is the probability 16 that that will occur?
17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
I would say it is very 18 little.' I think the driving impetus really is coming from the 19 company that used to make the gas-cooled reactor, and I think 20 the general sense is that, unless there were a restoration to l
21 'the previous forecast growth curve for power -- the previous 22 five years ago growth curve -- the market just is not going to 23 be there.
24 As a result, there is little chance of the DOE bce-Fede,0 Reporters Inc.
25 putting in the funding.
42 jwb 3-8 1
MR. LEVINE:
That is right.
2 MR. DIRCKS:
We got the latest letter forecase from 3
DOE I think dated July 31st, and they had a footnote against 4
the gas cooled.
It just said that heavy U.S.
financial commit-5 ment was required.
So they just are slipping that thing out 6
of the forecast.
7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Right.
8 MR. LEVINE:
But there is heavy congressional pres-9 sure for us to do work in this area.
10 MR. HANAUER:
On the other hand, when the Commission 11 was briefed by the gas cooled people a few weeks ago, after 12 the briefing I asked them how much federal money was required 13 to make these programs go.
For the gas-cooled thermal reactor, 14 the estimate was a minimum of $3-or $400 million of federal 15 money.
For the gas-cooled breeder, it was higher.
16 MR. LEVINE:
And that is what the problem is going 17 to be.
18 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
And I'm sure that the congres-19 sional pressure might fade rapidly with those numbers:.
20 MR. LEVINE:
Yes, but it is also coming from OMB, 21 too.
They want us to show a little bit of increase, so we are showing a little bit of an increase.
22 23 The= Senate authorization bill -- our authorization 24 bill in the Senate for '79 adds a million-and-a-half dollars Ace-Federse Reporters, Inc.
l 25 in gas-cooled research.
l
]wb 3-9 43 I
CHAIRMAN H2.NDRIE:
If that authorization bill goes 2
through as it stands, it is going to be a bit of an inconven-i.
3 ience because they have mandated that the assignment is for 4
people and dollars, and the amount, we think, is excessive 5
to keep a reasonable level in the gas program.
And, you know, 6
it is just going to be --
7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Is that also an appropriation?
8 MR. BARRY:
In the House.
The House appropriation 9
supported tae House authorization.
10 MR. LEVINE:
But nobody put in the extra money for 11 it.
12 MR. BARRY:
And then they cut us on top of that.
)
13 MR. LEVINE:
So it is money we will have to use --
14 (Simultaneous discussion.)
15 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay, did you say anythin>J about 16 what our options are, or should be, if we $5 cts this 195 for 10? !
17 MR. LEVINE:
That was the second subject I was 18 going to talk about after I tried to answer the questions.
19 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Are there other questions,,
20 then?
21 MR. LEVINE:
The questions -- we have some a priori 22 questions.
23 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I see.
I see, you are in the 24 middle of those?
co Federd Reporters, Inc.
25 MR.-LEVINE:
I was just going to start those.
jwb 3-10 44 1
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
It seemed to be that things a
2 were running down.
I was looking for some place for the 3
meeting to go.
4 (Laughter.)
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
If you have something in mind, 6
why make haste.
7 MR. LEVINE:
I have two things in mind, and I will 8
start them now.
First we got the three questions asked -- I 9
believe all from Commissioner Bradford:
10 What is the NRC's share of the proposed BWR 11 Cooperative Countercurrent Reflood Program?
Why are we putting 12 up 42 percent, and GE and EPRI presumably putting up somewhat 13 less?
14 And the answer is:
In all the contracts we have 15 negotiated with industry -- of which there have been two or 16 three -- the principle is that we go in at one-third each, 17 but in practice it has come out differently.
The reason being, 18 that th vendor has always contributed his facilities -- either 19 steam supplies or equipment, or both -- and in this particular 20 case, for instance, GE is building $3 million worth of' stuff 21 that we are not involved in.
22 We will -- the program we are talking about is to 23 pay the operating cost for the experiment.
So when you start 24 trying to negotiate all this out, this is the way it has come co Federal Reporters, Inc.
25 out.
jwb,3-ll; 45 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
If you took GE's cost which does j
not appear in the 3-way split, and add that, and then divide 2
3 by three --
MR. LEVINE:
They have the largest share.
4 (Commissioner Kennedy enters the meeting.)
5 MR. LEVINE:
I was going to give you the numbers 6
that we are projecting for the counter current reflood program.
7 We are projecting a cost of $14 million, plus $3.million of g
GE's money, which would make it $17 million.
Of that, if we 9
10 just go with the three (?)
percent, we will put up $5.8 mil-11 lion, GE will put up S6.5 million, including that $3 million, 12 and EPRI will put up $4.7 million.
Now the reason we cannot get EPRI higher than that, 13 say, to split it with us, is that EPRI simply will not go ja above a one-third share, by order of their Board of Directors.
15 16 You can try to change that, if you wish.
It will be difficult.
17 But that is the history of the way this thing has 13 g ne.
}9 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
What makes it important for ns to put up a substantial share of the project at all?
20 MR. LEVINE:
That's the second question:
"Why 21 don't we ask GE to do it all?"
22 And our answer to that goes like this:
Everybody l
23 24 feels that there is some confirmatory information needed on l
Ace Federd Reporters, Inc.
25 core spray distribution -- when they start spra.ying the water 1
jwb.3-12 46 1
on top of the core, how does it really go?
2 This experiment that GE is building will address 3
that answer, only.
But we are also interested -- and so is 4
NRR -- in counter current reflood information.
That is, how 5
does this spray go down through the core while the core is 6
sending steam in droplets up?
And we need that information 7
for our best-estimate code so we can determine what the margins 8
are between the evaluation model codes and the best-estimate 9
codes.
10 So we have a heavier interest in that, and GE has 11 a light interest in that -- a lighter interest in that.
So 12 that is the reason for us getting involved in this.
13 Now there is no question that one could ask them 14 to do the whole thing.
Whether they would or not is another 15 matter.
16 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Is there any relationship 17 between the amocnt of effort necessary to generate the informa-18 tion that is especially useful to us, and our share of the 19 project?
20 MR. LEVINE:
Well, the way the project is -- we're 21 thinking about the project.-- we will use all the information 22 that comes from it.
23 COMMISSIONER 3RADFORD:
Right.
But you have named 24 a couple of dispute items that are especially important to us, Sco-Feder:t Reporters, Inc.
25 and probably less important to the others.
jwb 3-13 47 1
MR. LEVINE:
Well, one is important -- well, these 2
matters are all important to everyone.
It is only a question 3
of degree.
Everyone would certainly like to understand core 4
spray distribution better, and that is a rather -- somewhat of 5
an uncertainty in our evaluation models.
6 In terms of best-estimate models, we would all like 7
to understand counter current reflood much better than we now 8
understand it.
So I would say that, for instance, NRR and GE 9
have a very heavy interest in the core spray distribution.
We 10 and GE and EPRI have about an equal interest in the counter 11 current reflood.
But NRR has not asked them to do the 12 counter current reflood experiment -- but it would be done.
13 One could ask them to do it.
14 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Suppose that GE and EPRI 15 refused to put any money into this exercise.
What level of 16 priority would this entire experiment have on our side?
17 MR. LEVINE:
It would still be a high-priority item 18 because'it's been an outstanding issue for some years.
There 19 are a number of our consultants who keep raising this question.
20 It relates principally to the following:
21 If you have a small, cross-sectional area which 22 you are trying to get steam -- water down through, and steam
'~
23 and water are coming up, it is possible for the steam and P
24 water that are ccming up to levitate that water and keep it cm Fooero Coporters, Inc.
25 from coming down.
The question is:
When you have a 12-foot l
l
48 j
jwb 3-14 i
1 core, is that possible?
You can.make a simple calculation, 2
based on the small model, which says it will levitate all the 3
water, and nobody believes it.
But there is no data, and one 4
would like to have some data.
So it is a rather high-priority 5
matter in terms of estimating what really happens.
6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
For present licensing 7
purposes, we -- what do we assume happens?
S MR. LEVINE:
In counter-current reflood -- who's l
9 here?
Does anybody know that answer?
10 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
We assume the water gets down 11 the channels and cools the channel boxes.
12 MR. LEVINE:
But one doesn't know that very well, 13 because one can make calculations.
But say it doesn't get 14 down the channels.
15 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
What we are trying to do is 16 ascertain which is true, thus confirming --
l 17 MR. HANAUER:
Confirmatory, in that way.
We assume i
18 that -- with this very le;ge core, that we can go down around 19 the edge, even though this levitation occurs in the center, 20 and that seems like a pretty good bet.
21 But, like so many " pretty good bets," it needs
(
22 confirmation, which is why we are willing to put some money
('-
23 in this program, and then we can get the data we need, and it 24 is publicly available, and all that good stuff, without our m-Feder0 Repo... Inc.
25 having to have done it ourselves.
l l
jwb 3-15 49 1
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
What would be the conse-2 quences of finding that in fact the.12-foot --
3 MR. HANAUER:
If the water doesn't go down at all, 4
then the GE reactor is in considerable trouble, and a number 5
of them would have to be derated.
That's the worst result.
6 MR. LEVINE:
There are other core cooling systems.
7 This is one of the redundant systems, so it is not a total 8
failure question.
9 MR. DENTON:
We discussed this at some length, i
10 I before La,,, commented to Saul on it.
I think our views go like 11 this:
Part of this GE experiment we have requested that they 12 do, and that is the part --
core spray distribution 13 they're doing, we consider we need that for licensing.
14 When Saul asked us:
Would we support not doing 15 the EBTF and cancelling the multitest facility -- what was thad 16 MR. LEVINE:
Multipurpose test facility.
17 11R... DEUTOy : Multipurpose test facility.
Ne asked 18 the staff to review this and said -- and what the answer is 19 back from the people who use these ' odes are:
yes, we can c
20 go along and turn down the level of effort into LOFT research I
t 21
'the way Saul has proposed, but we need confirming information 1
22 in several specific areas, and this was one of those specific 23 areas where the staff felt that if it were not going to get 24 any more research done in this area.
hm-Federna Mooorters. Inc.
25 They wanted to get this as part of the final wrapup i
l w
o"-
4
jwb 3-16 50 and be satisfied that all bases had been touched.
j 2
MR. LEVINE:
One area is PCC bypass, and the other is counter-current reflood.
3, MR. DENTON:
And I think Saul agreed we would extend the 4
l
- - - - - -count to do something in these areas to allow the staff to concur e
6 with him that no further big facilities needed to be built, providing the small ones could confirm certain discreet elements 7
where the margin was still not certain.
8 But the only part that we needed for licensing --
9 10 continual licensing -- is the part that we are requiring 11 GE to do on their own, and they are paying for that part.
So 12 what we are getting is the piggyback confirmatory research that 13 might be done at some other facility.
y This seems to be a very reasonable way to get that 15 piece of information.
16 MR. LEVINE:
It seems to be to our best advantage 17 to get it this way.
CHAIRMAN RENDRIE:
You get something else out of it, 18 19 too, Peter.
If GE does it in response to a Commission request, 20 they will go off and set up the experiment.
We will have 21 access to it in a reasonable way.
They won't slam the doors 22 n us, you know, and pull the shades, and not let us see any-(
thing until they publish a report.
We can control that, and 23 24 they won't try to do that.
co Feder0 Reporters, Inc.
25
.So we would have reasonable access to the experiment.
jwb 3-17 51 1
But it would be a GE -- scrt of total-GE thing.
Now you take 2
that information and you have to have confidence that it's 3
sound stuff, and there's no implication here that there will m
4 be any sort of deliberate cheating.
But just, you know, did 5
the people who put the experiment together and took the data 6
think of all the things that we might have thought about?
7 For instance, being one of the proprietors of the 8
experiment gives you an access.
You put your contract people 9,in there --
%?
10 MR. LEVINE:
And our code people, who are the 11 ones who would use the table --
12 CHAIRMAN EENDRIE:
Code people, who would work 13 along with it.
And the extent to which it can have a status --
14 more nearly, NRC produced -- indepe.ndently produced co~nfirmatory 15 information -- well, it's not quite that, clearly; but it is 16 also clearly a cut different than information produced essen-17 tially solely by the vendor and presented to us, and on which 18 we had a chance to make a couple of trips to look at the cnd #3 19 apparatus.
20 21 22 23 24 ice-Federal Reporters, Inc.
25
52 l
4 MELTZER 1
MR. LEVINE: And it gives us very real control Dnvid 1 2
over the design and operation of the experiment.
We have 3
the final say-so.
~
4 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
But if thau were the only 5
consideration, we would not have to put up 42 percent 6
of the, cc,s t.
7 MR. LEVINE: On the other hand, if we had to 8
do it ourselves, we'd have to pay the whole cost. Tha t's 9
another side of it. You can argue about the percentage.
10 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:. How does this work out in 11 the licensing process?
12 GE presents the informationnin support of a
~
13 license application from a particular utility?
14 MR. DENTON: Yes.
15 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Probably several applications.
16 MR. DENTON: Well, classas of facilities of a 17 general type where this information exists.
Well, GE 18 provides this same information through each of the 19 vendors.
20 MR. LEVINE: They also publish a technical 21 report under this contract which is made publicly available 22 as part of our program, so it comes in in two ways, as a
<7 V
23 research project report and as -- then it comes in through 24 the vendors through the. licensing process.
Ace-Federet Coporters, Inc.
25 MR. DENTON: But I think what we were able to do l
53
! david 2 for research was define what areas we think additional 2
conformatory data.or knowledge is necessary to close out 3
lot of ECCS questions, and we have identified three areas 4
to Sad and then we met with him to see how he proposed to 5
answer those three through arrangements such as this 6
and some change in the 3D program, and so forth, and we agreed 7
with him that that's a reasonable way to get the answers.
With his agreement to provide that kind of 8
9 information, my staff was able to say:
we see no need for 10 further major facilities, because these three areas are 11 the only three areas where we have any question concerning 12 the degree of margins and that we would support no further 13 big facilities going on.
14 We were dealing with GE earlier on this facility 15 under discussion.. In an entirely separate context they were 16 proposing to build and demonstrate to us the core spray 17 distribution issue, apart from any ECCS issue.
18 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Supposing you had in a i
19 licensing proceeding, someone raises the question that you 20 both have been discussing, that is:
what would happen to 21 the spray coming down.
Will it get through one or get 22 through?
i 23 MR. DENTON:
We think our codes are sufficiently 24 conservative to predict the core temperatures.
La FWwW Reorwrs, lm.
25 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
kay, but after the
54 dovid3 experiment is done, the same question comes up.
Does y
the staff put in a witness who testifies based on this 2
experiment?,
3 MR. DENTON:
Yes.
MR. LEVINE:
Yes,.or sometimes our consultants 5
testify.
Either way.
6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
And GE would also have a 7
Witnessbe available or EPRI one available to the utilities, g
to the future applicants?
9 MR. DENTON:
Yes, that is correct.
10 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD :
I haven't really thought jj through at all the conflicts and. implications of this, but 12 I think it's somewheres -- someone in ELD has --
13 MR. LEVINE:
And the Commi'ssion has too.
The matter 9
1 15 came before the Commission, I guess, different members.
g COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Yes, there are Commissions and commissions.
g l
COMMISSIONER KE!CTEDY: Only one of us.
18 i
39 MR. LEVINE:
Only one, that's correct.
COMMISSIOliER KENITEDY:
Victor is not here.
'~
20 MR. LEVINE:
And it was decided with certain 21 ways of running it with our control and observersi et cetera, 22 it was okay. -
23 l
24 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
This one, or this was
,ce-Federet Rooorten, Inc.
25 the Westinghouse-BWR arrangement?-
55 devid4 I
MR. LEVINE:
It was a policy paper covering 2
general arrangements with industry, not each one.
But each 3
one is considered separately by the Commission.
And this 4
will come back to the Commission if we get the organization, 5
will come back to the Commission when we are prepared to let 6
the contract.
7 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
In the context of a specific 8
contract with legal implications of a contract spelled out 9
by the ELD.
10 MR. LEVINE:
Yes.
II MR. MURLEY:
I might make a point on that.
But 12 along with the contract approval, theCommission will have to I3 specifically make a waiver of conflict of interest.
- Now, I4 that was done for the past two contracts.
15 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Not a findingthat there 's 16 no conflict, but a waiver?
17 MR. MURLEY: That's right, and there ere certain 18 guidelines under which this can be done.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Other questions and comments?
20 Exploration?
21 MR. LEVINE:
There's another answer to a third 22 question.
23 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Yes.
24 I
MR. LEVINE: How is the 40 percent contingency for Les Feder0 Reporters, Inc.
25 7
the 3D project cost estimate developed, and isn't 20 percent I
s
ve david 5 or more normal estimate?
2 Well, we estimated the cost by providing a 10 percent contingency on the scope of the project and 30 percent 4
general contingency on the overall.
5 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
That much isn' t clear.
6 MR. LEVINE:
Now, the reason for that we have 7
found when you're early on on a project of this magnitude 8
that the scope isn' t really -- you can't pin down the i
9 scope and our estimate is that the 10 percent contingency is 10 reasonable.
The project is very largely defined but s
11 not quite fully defined.in terms of scope, so we have 10 12 percent contingency for that.
13 The 30 percent contingency is not abnormal for 14 projects of this kind.
Most of our costs on this project 15 are associated with developing and furnishing very complex 16 new kinds of instrumentation which is still underway.
The 17 development -- we're furnishing some already, but the 18 development-of some is still underway.
19 We have a lot of code analysis to do, and one i
20 can't estimate precisely the number of runs that will have to 21 be made.
It depends on what happens in the experiments.
22 So, I think a 30 percent general contingency is reasonable-23 for this kind of a project.
24 po..p% g po,,,,,, ine, COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I.s there a rule of thumb 25 that you use on research contracts?
59 david 6 j
MR. LEVINE:
Tom, what we use on --
2 MR. MURLEY:
For a construction concept in the 3
early stages of conceptual design, 30 percent is right.
4 We don' t have any construction responsibilities for this 5
project, but our contract in this case, Oak Ridge recommended 6
30 percent.
7 MR. LEVINE:
For the instrumentation.
8 MR. MURLEY: Mainly because we're building 9
instruments and agreeing to furnish them to Germany and 10 l Japan tha thave never been built before.
11 MR. LEVINE:
And we also have to make up for 12 failures, things that failed during the program.
We'll have 13 to furnish replacements.
14 One needs a sizable contingency.
15 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
If we only allowed to --
16 instead of 30, 20 or 15 percent and in fact that it turned 17 out to be the right number, what would happen?
18 You'd have to reprogram back to us?
19 MR. LEVINE:
We're funding the thing not on a 20 total estimated cost basis, but on a per year basis.
So, 21 we'll come in every year and tellyou what we think we need that 22 year, and a contingency will be taken up in that way, s_
23 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I don't think that answers your 24 question, does it?
Am-Federal Reporters, Inc.
I'm trying to figure out -I 25 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
l I
58 dDvid7
]
MR. LEVINE:
It sort of says the contingency would 2
be whatever it comes out to be.
3 MR. GOSSICK:
What would your situation be if they n
4 knocked the contingency allowance down here --
5 MR. LEVINE:
It wouldn't affect 80 at all, because 6
the contingency is in the out years.
7 MR. GOSSICK:
Then why isn't 80?
8 MR. LEVINE:
Because we can now estimate our 80 costs 9
quite well.
10 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Wait a minute, you've got four 11
'80 costs --
12 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
The better estimator they 13 are, the less justification I would think there would be for 14 30 percent contingency.
15 MR. LEVINE:
Tom, can you do better than I am with 16 this?
17 (Laughter.)
l GOSSICK:
I think you lost 30 percent.
18
__}R.
~
19 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY.
If your estimates are so closeg 20 why do you need the 30 percent contingency is his question.
21 (Laughter. )
, 22 MR. MURLEY:
May I explain how the costs are 23 estimated?
24 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Yes.
,ce-Feeer0 Reporters, Inc.
25 MR. MURLEY:
We have the scope now that's fairly
59 david 8 I
well defined, because it's going to be the appendix to an 2
international agreement.
We sent out these scopes to 3
our.three laboratories; Los Alamos is going to be doing 4
most of the computer analysis, plus something called the 5
Stores Land, which is very highly developmental.
Idaho 6
is providing most of what I call off. the shelf hardware. It's i
7 stuff they provided for LOFT in semi-scale already, and Oak 8
ridge is doing the very highly developmental work.
9 They came back and wrote back their estimates 10 for us including various contingencies and various II escalation rates.
12 We put them on a common basis, and it turned out 13 that it was a $50 million estimate without contingency.
14 But it did include escalation.
So we, that is, my-staff 15 and I added the 40 percent on the basis that Saul mentioned.
I6 That's our estimate for the total cost of the project I7 through about fiscal '85, I believe it comes, or '86.
18 Now, if you were to cut back the total amount that I9 you gave us, okay.
In fiscal '80 you would have a severe 20 impact because we are planning on that money, that 13.1 21-plus I'll probably have to reprogram some from -- I don't 22 know'quite where yet.
That would affect our delivery of l' x 23 instruments to German and, Japan.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
In the 13.1 or whatever for kmJeonenportws,Inc.
25 fiscal
'.80, how much of that do you' regard as contingency?
4
---e4-
60 david 9
]
MR. MURLEY:
There's about a million is all in 2
that year.
3 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
A million?
4 MR. MURLEY:
Yes.
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
OUt of 13.l?
6 MR. MURLEY:
Yes.
7 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
So the fiscal '80 estimate 8
has a one part in 13 or about seven percent contingency is 9
your best guess at this time.
10 MR. MURLEY:
Yes.
And the reacion for that is as 11 Saul said, we know in fiscal '80 what we're going to delivery.
12 As we go further out in the out years, it's not as well
(~
13 defined.
It's fuzzier andi.we start to get into the more 14 highly developmental instruments that Oak Ridge is --
15 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Are you going to regard your 16 fiscal '81 request, for instance, as having a substantially 17 larger contingency in it?
18 MR. MURLEY:
Yes.
'l 19 CHAIRMAN:HENDRIE:
And '82 perhaps more?
20 MR. LEVINE:
Yes.
21 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: So I'm sure I understand, if youi 22 got 40 percent :ontingency on the total package which is over 23 a -- what is it?
three to four year period?
~
24 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
More than that.
tee Federd Reporters, Inc.
25 MR. MURLEY:
At'least six years.
~
61 flcvid10 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
' And you've only got 7 percent contingency on that piece of the package in the first year.
3 The percentage that's contingency in the succeeding years must 4
be a good deal more than 40 percent.
5 MR. MURLEY:
Yes.
5 MR. LEVINE: But that's why I said the contingency.
7 Since you're asking for the money on a per year basis.
8 When we come back for our '81 budget, we'll have a much 9
better handle on that ' 81 budget, and we'll ask for some 10 contingency associated with that.
The amount of contingency 11 we'll ask for there will depend on how confident we are in 12 being able to estimate that year's budget.
That's what I r;
13 was really trying to say before.
14 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
And we're not authorizing --
15 MR. LEVINE:
You're not authorizing 40 percent 16 contingency.
17 CEAIRMAN HENDRIE:
To an extent we are, because 18 we're doing '81
'82.
On the other hand, we're going to redo 19
' 81 next year, so we 'll get a crack. at it.
0 C
COMMISSIONER KENNEDE: More important, you' re committing l 21 money now which isn' t going to turn in the hardware.
In 22
'80 you're going to be talking about hardware --
(-
23 MR. LEVINE:
The '.80 money will turn into hardware.
24 Right?-
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
In ' 81, maybe ' 82.
m-Federd Reporters, Inc.
25 MR. LEVINE:,Mostly in '81.
I
62 devidll 7
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
So ths hardwarc that you aro committing, the 13.1 --
2 MR. LEVINE:
Well, there's analysis in that too, 3
l not just hardware.
4 5
JOMISSIONER KEMDY:
Hell, whatever de hardware component of that.is, in 1980, the contingency that will 6
really apply to it won't appear until your 1981 budget, 7
because only then will you really know what it's really going 8
to cost you to deliver that hardware.
9 10 Isn'.t that right?
jj So, what we're saying is, to get back to Peter's 12 question, is what you are buying now is a contingency commitment a year or two years from now and you don't know
~
13 14 what that's going to 'be, and that's not in this number.
MR. LEVINE:
That's right.
15 16 MR. MURLEY:
Just one point on this --
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: But having cummitted yourself to
- 7 18 spend,that kind of money, now you have also committed yourself 19 to come X amount of contingency in those succeeding years.
20 MR. MURLEY:
right.
MR. LEVINE:
But we don't know exactly what it's 21 22 going to be.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: That's X, but it's there, wha ve U
23 24 it is.-
1 Eco-Federal Reporters, Inc.
25 MR. MURLEY:
We wanted to be fair and open and tell you that we think it's a $70 million and not a 50 million,
63 dnvidl2 and that's why we even got into the discussion.
y COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Saul, is your money 2
3
" ~Y88# "UU*Y?
MR. LEVINE:
Yes, it's no-year money.
4 It could come out much less, 30 percent.
5 I have one more subject to discuss, if you're 6
ready.
7 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Please go on.
8
'Ihis is the inpact an cur pham of the 10 $$illicn MR. LEVINE:
(Distributes documents..to the Commission members.)
10 cut that you asked As to censider. I have listed the prcgram elements and here l
.g much you wouk.d take out of them.
In systems engineering and ccde development, both involved reductions in our program on 13 improved safety research, one, to accelerate semi-scale 34 f r $2 million and a half million in code.
The other part of 15 16 the half million dollars in systems engineering is some operational safety research where we will just slow things 37 18 done, water hammer and safety valves.
39 I'm sure we'll hear screams from NRR.
In IOFT 20 will slow down 'some fuel procurement which will cause a We 21 potential delay in LOFT testing.
22 COMMISS IONER.EENNEDY:
Nhat does that mean, potentini I
23 delay?
24 MR. LEVINE:
Well, what we're not certain of is co Federd Reporters. Inc.
25 the rate on which LOFT fuel will fail and require: replacement.
64 devidl3 1
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: What's the worst case?
2 CEAIRMAN HENDRIE:
The core is shut.
3 MR. LEVINE:
The whole core is shut.
~~
4 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
And what would tnis $1 million 5
do to offset that problem.
6 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Not a hell of a lot.
7 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: That's exactly the point, not g
much,is the answer.
9 MR. MURLEY:
A core costs about $3 million, 10 three to 3-1/2 million, and this would -- what we would do 11 is defer it enough months that we could defer the payment, 12 because we only have to pay on delivery.
I really can't 13 tell you --
14 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: So if you didn' t have that million 15 dollars, it really wouldn ' t do anything except defer payments.
16 MR. MURLEY:
No, it would defer delivery.
17 CEAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Slow down the delivery of fuel, 18 hence the schedule, if you needed the fuel.
19 MR. LEVINE: We would just tell them to keep it 20 until we can pay them for it.
21 MR. MURLEY:
We are planning right now one core l
22 every year, which is one core --
23 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: How much of this fuel are they 24 going to manufacture without your commitment or funds to the
.ceFs6mj Roomn. f mL j
l 25 manfacturer of the. fuel?
In other words, you tell me all you have-to do
I 65
~~
david 14 is tell them to keep it.
We won't pay you for it.
2 MR. LEVINE:
Or delay the manufacturer the 3
last --
~ 4 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: That's different.
)
Which is it?
6 MR. LEVINE:
I think it's the latter.
7 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: You tell them not to manufacture.
8 What's the manufacturing time?
9 CHAIRMM HENDRIE :
At the end of the string.
10 MR. MURLEY:
I'm not sure I understand the total 11 question.
They don' t start until we give them authorization.
12
~
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY: That's right.
13 MR. MURLEY:
but we don't necessarily have the 14 total cost of the core in hand at the time, because there 15 are progress payments an'd termination charges.
We could stop 16 them at any time and they'd say fine, pay us termination 17 charges.
18 What we can do is delay delivery.
19 MR. LEVINE:
We have been able to do this in the 20 past and asked them to deliver this portion of the. core 21 next year, and it's working.
22 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
All right.
Larry, are
~
23 MR. BARRY: Arc we buying our cores based on havinc
_.~ _ _,.
co-Federd Reporters. Inc.
a spare available at all times?
25 MR. LEVINE:
Yes.
66 dnvidl5 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Actually, it's more than that, isn't it? You have got not only a machine.
You've got a spare core that it one that is actually available, and 3
you have got one which is in process.
4 MR. LEVINE:
In process.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
So, you really have two plus cores in being at all times, except at one point, and that is when the one core is used up and is being removed, at which point you only have two cores, one that you're taking out of storage and putting. in a machine, and the other one is coming out of the plant going to storage.
jj Right?
MR. LEVINE:
Yes.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
That's the least you ever g
get to.
MR. LEVINE:
Is that right, Tom?
g MR. MURLEY:
That's generally right.
We have one g
on hand right now, for example, as a spare, and we have one tha t 's into design and will soon go into fabrication.
g MR. LEVINE:
And there's one in the reactor.
MR. MURLEY:
And there's one in the reactor.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
That's right.
g MR. MURLEY:
Now, we are planning on the basis 24
. that we will damage a core every year, one core a year, m.Federd Coporters, Inc.
and we'll have to replace it, so we think we're into an 25
67 1
dcvid16 1
equilibrium situation, and we budgeted for that.
2 If anything goes wrong, like we fail at every 3
test instead of every other test, then we ' ra in trouble, and 4
we haven' t budgeted for it.
We wculd have to do something.
5 MR. LEVINE:
In site technology we are suggesting 6
reluctantly a million dollar cut in which the seismic 7
safety margin --
8 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Back to the code 9
development.
I'm sorry, it's peanuts, but it says it will 10 be delayed how long?
11 MR. LEVINE:
Until we get the money.
12 See, this half million dollars --
13 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
You don't develop it 14 instantaneously.
15 MR. LEVINE:
This half million dollars is associated, 16 with a $2 million cut in systems engineering.
It was a 17 combined project in which we accelerate semi-scale 18 conversion to do alternate ECCS research, have it done fast.
19 It's already planned, this would put more shif ts on to get 20 it done faster.
We would have to make some code 21 modifications to precalculate these conditions before we 22 run the tests, so the $2-1/2 million goes together, 23 Site technology, seismic safety margins program 1
s 24 will be slowed down, and this would apply some information Lee Federet Reporters, Irc.
25 needed for NRR and their systematic evaluation program.
j t
@y dsvidl7 Thoro might ba come lag thsro.
Advanced converters we're suggesting a 2
milli n dollars cut in gas and this would delay not 3
resolution, but it would delay gathering data on the graphite oxidation problem for Ft. St. Vrain.
5 Safeguards, $800,000 cut, which would make us unresponsive to a number of NMSS requests, sabotage our 7
spent fuel shipping casks, theft of SNM in transit, design feature 8
in facilities which could erhance effectiveness of material 9
Control and development of performance indicators for effectiveness of material control and accounting systems,
j)
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
As.for this one and the g
next two which total $3-1/2 million, if you were to take 13 these cuts and distribute them in this way, what would 34 NMSS's reaction be?
Would they then reprogram some of their 15 wn m ney in their tech assistance programs to cover some 16 vart of this?
j7 In ther words, I guess the question I have is 18 what priority are they placing.
They're the user.
You're 39 20 MR. LEVINE:
I have not disciussed this with g
NMSS.
22 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
How can you cut out some 23 i
l #'
f the work you're doing for them, if we don't --
24 WFederd Reporters. Inc.
MR. LEVINE:
All the work we're doing is for them.
25 ld essentially all the safeguards work we are doing is for them.
l
CR8744 MIMI/pv 69
- 5 1
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I guess we need to know what 2
their reaction to this would be and --
3 MR. LEVINE:
You realize I am not recommending we 4
take these cuts.
5 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I understand that.
But since 6
you said if we,took $10 million out of here, this is what you 7
would do, I guess we would need to know what that would do to 8
them since it would not do anything to you.
Isn't that right?
9 MR. LEVINE:
Yes.
10 COMMISSIONZR KENNEDY: Can somebody tell us the answer?
II MR. LEVINE:
I cannot give you the answer.
I2 MR. DENTON:
At least one area where we would be con-13
.cerned about the cut in NRR7 That's seismic s e
margin. That' s 14 part of the SEP program, the major source of difficulty 15 of the NRR impact.
That is the one I would least like to see.
16 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Suppose it we?;e cut, Harold.
17 Go to my other question.
Now, looking at your own program sup-18 port mo'ney, how much of it would you feel you would divert-from 19 other purposes into this program because of its priority, to 20 recover from a cut against research?
21 MR. DENTON:
I think we would largely make up a cut 22 somehow.
23 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
In other words, you place that l
24 in a sort of Class A priority?
DFederC) Reporters, Inc.
j 25 MR. DENTON:
TN t is correct.
l
pv2' i
70 I
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I would like to know the 2
answer to that given by NMSS for $3-1/2 million, which is one-3 third of the total cut.
4 MR. GOSSICK:
I will find out.
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Good.
6 Other questions?
7 MR. LEVINE:
Well, there is a second sheet, which 8
covers $2 million in waste management.
I guess you want to hear 9
about that?
10 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Yes, that is part of my $2-1/2 II million.
12 MR. LEVINE:, Half a million in risk assessment, in 13 which we would be delaying a significant amount of work related 14 to looking at standardized plants and development of human-error 15 accident risk.. assessment, and studies of the application of. risk 16 assessment techniques-to high-level waste and spent-fuel 17 isolation.
18 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
(Inaudible.)
(
39 (Laugh ter.)
20 MR. LEVINE:
I did not hear what you said.
21 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
It is a quarter of a percent.
22 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
There seems to be a universal 23 tendency to take cu'es in the standardization program.
24 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Remember the gold watches?
m4.o.ra Ceoon.<s. inc.
25 (Laughter.)
W 71 1
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Other comments, John?
2
. Dick?
3 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
No.
m
~
4 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
No.
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Peter?
6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
No.
7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Sol, what is the OMB attitude 8
in general, to the research program?
9 MR. LEVINE:
They have given us very good support.
10 We have given tnem two kinds of briefings every year.
One of 11 them is sort of a informal briefing, where we get into great 12 detail, much more detail than in the Commission briefing, almost 13 as much detail as in the BRT review.
And then, we have the 14 formal briefing.
15 They have given us very good support.
They always 16 cut us a little bit, but they generally support us very strongly 17 They set aside in fiscal '78 $50 million for EBTF, 18 which we are not asking for now -- excuse me, fiscal '79, which 19 we are not asking for now because we have appropriated that work 20 in the 3-D program.
21 So, in a sense, we have saved some $50 million.
M COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
You say they have set aside in '79?
~
23 MR. LEVINE:
Based on our thinking that we want --
24 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
It was in the budget?
- F.eers reoo,ters, Inc.
25 MR. LEVINE:
It was not shown.
It was somewhere in m
72 1
the background.
They had it set aside for us.
2 COMMISSIONER AEEARNE:
It is not in this 3
1567 l'-
4 MR. COOPER:
That amount is not shown in our budget i
5 in NRC or any other specific budget.
But in the overall figures 6
for the budget, it is included in the president's res arve.
.I 7
COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
I guess the gist of my ques-8 tion there was:
I was just' wondering if they basically give you 9
strong support but give you a 10 that's a different --
11 MR. LEVINE:
I guess that is essentially what it has 12 been.
13 MR. BARRY:
That is what has been taking place.
14 MR. LEVINE:
And that is one of the things that 15 bothers me about our overall budget.
Between their cut and.the 16 congressional cut we are likely to get, we will be lower in '80 17 than we were in '79, and we really should not be.-
18 Don't forget, you have to subtract inflation and i
19 picking up a half a year --.it is about $12'million.
20 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
You started with 40 and take 21 out --
22 MR. LEVINE:
We went from -- it's about 35.
- (
23 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
It is $156 million.
t 24 MR. LEVINE:
I am talking about program support dol-Am-Feder:2 Reporters, Inc.
l 25 lars, and that went from $150 million to $185 million, which is
~
l*Wo 73 1
S35 million.
2 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
What are the 2sst of the 3
moneys?
g 4
MR. LEVINE:
People and equipment costs.
5 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
$10 million in equipment?
6
- .;n. T.EVINE
That runs-relatively constant.
So, 7
the real increase in program support is $35 million.
And of 8
that, S23 million is not growth.in programs; it is inflation 9
and picking up a half a year fall-off.
There is only $12 mil-10 I, lion on top of that, and we will probably lose that.
And I do Il not think we can afford it.
12 But if you have a hard problem, we will try to live 13 with it.
14 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay, I suggest we go on and hear 15 the next office, if we may.
16 Lee will have an answer back on this other thing.
XX 17 Now, let's see, with regard to I&E, we asked the 18 question, didn't we, and you were prepared.to go inspect some-19 body this afternoon, rather than coming down here, actually?
20 MR. DAVIS:
Oh, surely.
21 What we were asked was to assess the impact of a cut 22 in our fiscal year '80, projected strength from 139 to 727, and i
~
23 from 739 to 715.
24 What I would like to do this af+.ernoon, first, is to am.sens c oo m n.ix.
j 25 really give a few remarks as background and then move into those
pv6 74 1
areas where we have analyzed our decision units to see where we 2
could accept a good cut or where the impact would be.
+
3 If you will notice from the first page of the hand-4 out, I&E believes that we have a very austere request, as it now 5
stands, with 739.
We have no growth in fiscal year '78,
'79.
6 Our only increase in '80 is for continuing program.
and that 7
recognizes efficiencies.
And our gross projection, of course, 8
is using NRC workload figures.
9 The fiscal year '80 request of 739 does recognize 10-these anticipated efficiencies from the resident inspection pro-11 gram.
If we did not have those efficiencies, did not recognize 12 those af ficiencies, our request would be somewhere on the order 13 of about 750-755.
14 You asked this morning, Mr. Chairman, for a decision 15 unit where there was a reduction.
Our decision unit on train-16 ing does forecast a reduction from '78 to
'80, and '80 is a 17 reduced value in there from 18 in '79 to 14 in fiscal year '80.
18 Also recognizing the austere nature of the budget 19 process over the last few years, I&E has reduced its overhead i
20 for better management.
We have separated our indirect overhead i
21 and had a budgeted reduction in each year of our proposed budget 22 in this indirect overhead.
We are also projecting a decrease t
23 in our direct overhead.
24 Any further reduction in our overhead, we believe, p4www neo,wn. ix.
]
25 will have a direct impact on our mission performance.
l
75 PV7 1
The vendor program, which was a matter of some con-2 cern to OMB last year, remains constant through fiscal year 1980.
3 Our projection from '78,
'79,
'80, at 29, because it is still 4
in an unevaluated stage.
5 So, we believe,in developing our '80 budget we have 6
recognized deficiencies, we have recognized the austerity which 7
is placed upon us.
We have no new initiatives.
We intend to 8
implement nothing new in 1980 which requires additional man-9 power resources.
10 In addition, we have budgeted no reserve for new work.
11 If NRR does get the increase which is under consideration for 12 them, at least a portion;of the work product of that increase 13 will probably be requirements on licensees, which we would be 14 called upon to inspect.
We have not considered that in our 15 budget projection. -
16 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
But would that mean more 17 inspection time necessarily?
18 MR. DAVIS:
It may or it may not.
But we have not 19 projected it all.
It probably would.
If ther: is more to 20 inspect, it would generally take more time.
21 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Or would it simply mean that 22 c.3uld be one more thing which would be checked within an already 23 established given amount of time, inspection time?
24 MR. DAVIS:
Well, it would mean you would have to --
ice-Federal Recorters, lnc.
25 since our time is fairly severely scheduled now, it would mean l
l i
e.,
76 1
some redistribution of that time to absorb that.
2 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Which would mean no more peo-3 ple.
4 MR. DAVIS:
Or maybe some more people.
5 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Yes.
There are two options.
6 MR. DAVIS:
Yes,' sir.
Replace something else with 7
this, or get more strength.
Right, sir.
But we have not ana-8 lyzed that in this budget.
9 Currently, we are engaged in an effort with NRR, 10 1 really, under Dr. Hanauer to look for some agency efficiencies.
J 11 NRR and I&E, in some instances, have been performing similar 12 work but from very different perspectives, and we are attempt-13 ing to identify some method whereby at least a portion of that 14 work can be accomplished once to serve both purposes.
15 The major impact of this will be in '79, but there 16 would probably be some spillover of this in 1980.
We hope to 17 be able to accomplish it by five to 10 man-years of work which 18 NRR has'been able to do with only small incremental increase in 19 I&E manpower.
20 We believe if our budget iscreduced further than it 21
'is now, that we will lose any flexibility in this particular 22 area of working with it.
23 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
An equivalent of another five 24 man-years?
Are you just shifting it?
ka FMed Rwornn. lm.
25 MR. DAVIS:
No, sir.
We think that this is work that
pvb 77 I
they have done and we have done from two very different per-2 spectives, but we hope to be able to-do it once to serve both 3
efforts.
4 COMMISSIONER KENNEDv' hell, then, the increase in 5
your own manpower to take this up will not equate with the loss?
Eight, sir, it will hot equate.
7 And of course, I&E has been studied over the years, 8
and essentially all the studies have ended up recommending more.
9 We have sought to respond to this recommendation for more by 10, decreased efficiencies.
We do think we have increased signifi-Il cantly, afficiencies, and, of course, any reduction in t.he pro-12 grammatic impact of a new budget cut means less for us at this 13 point in time, which is counter to those recommendations.
14 I think another matter, if we step back and look at 15 the perception of the budget, that a large increase in NRR and 16 no or very limited increase in I&E might create a certain per-17 ception to those outside the agency.
I' Such budget action may raise concerns about the 19 priorities of the agency.
Those unfamiliar with the basis of 20 the NRR increases may believe that the agency is more interested 21 in licensing actions than they are in assuring that the licensee 22 is complying with requirements placed on them, which is, of 23 course, a perception matter.
24 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Did you notice any real rush ka-Fede,C) Rooorters, Inc.
25 to draw the opposite conclusion last year?
I
.pv10 78 1
MR. DAVIS:
I am sorry, sir?
2 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Did you notice any real rush 3
to draw the opposite conclusion last year?
4 (Laughter.)
5 MR. DAVIS:
No, sir, I did not.
6 CCMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
That does not belie his state-7 ment, though.
8 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Over two years' time, I think 9
we come out about right.
10 I (Laaghter.)
11 MR. DAVIS:
Very well, then, lastly, of course, the 12 739, which we did budget very tightly, is what we need to do the 13 job.
14 But in light of your interest in where we would cut 15 if we had to cut, the next chart shows our basic budget, the 16 overview.
17 And then the third chart shows those decision units 13 from which we would.have reductions.
19 We would first reduce in the safeguards area by five 20 positions.
The basic impact of this:
They would all come out 21 of our high-enriched uranium facility inspection,, reduces the 22 manpower assigned to that particular effort by about 15 percent.
23 The basic results of this, or impact, would be to compromise i
24 our react-capability; that is, responding to things,to events sco-Federal Reporters. Inc.
25 when things go wrong.
n
pvil 79 1
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
We always respond to events 2
when things go wrong.
3 MR. DAVIS:
Yes, sir, we always do something when 4
things go wrong.
5 COMMISSIONER-KENNEDY:
So, tell me what it means.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. DAVIS:
It may make a necessary change in thresh-8 old.
We now have an extremely --
9 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Have a bigger thing to go 10 wrong?
11 MR. DAVIS:
Yes, sir.
We respond to about anything 12 now.
13 And so, consequently, this would cause us to adjust 14 our threshold to respond.
15 Another thing, of course, is --
16 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Tell me what that means, in 17 real terms.
18 MR. DAVIS:
Okay.
We respond now to any --
19 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
And what it is affecting, the 20 perception you were talking about?
21 MR. DAVIS:
It is mainly perception.
22 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Perception, or real?
i 23 MR. DAVIS:
Mainly perception.
We respond now -- as 24 I say, we have a very low threshold response to events, allega-tee Federal Reporters, Inc.
25 tions, or anything that goes wrong in the industry.
Basically, I
pv12 80 I
to build confidence for the agency.
2 And if we reduce our high-enriched uranium inspection 3
force by about 15 percent,'we will have to begin, we believe, 4
not to respond to some type of allegations, events.
5 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Such as?
6 MR. DAVIS:
Such as an allegation of -- well, not 7
respond.very promptly.
We will pick them up in the next inspec-8 tion when we go out -- an allegation that the " guards are not 9
properly trained," this type of allegation. Rather than go out 10 i on a special effort, we would wait and pick it up -- perhaps 11 pick it up at the next inspection, depending on the allegation.
12 But it is a lot of perception, but we think a lot of 13 our effort in I&E is to build the perception that we are pro-14 tecting the public in this agency.
I think our effort is very 15 noticeable for that, and we do respond to things which we would 16 have a hard time justifying on a real technical basis as to 17 whether there is a problem or not.
18 The next thing we would do in that particular area is 19 to stretch or extend our inspection frequencies.
What this i
20 would do would be to lower.our knowledge of plant conditions and 21 thereby decrease our confidence in the correction of licensee 22 actions.-
23 At the current time, we routinely inspect these 24 facilities on a semiannual basis for some conditions, on an ree recec coponen, toe.
25 annual basis for other cond:.tions, with slide inspections.
But l
e 81 1
there would be a reduction of five in that area.
2 The next reduction we would make would be five in our 3
fuel facilities and material safety inspections.
This reduces
~
4 by about 14 percent the staff assigned to materials inspections.
5 In fiscal year 1979, the Commission directed that we eliminate 6
our backlog of overdue inspections and by removing these five 7
people from our staff for that particular effort, it would 8
eliminate our efforts in backlog reduction and permit the back-9 log to accumulate.
10 In this particular area, we would not programmatically 11 extend the. intervals of-inspection, since they are quite lengthy 12 at the present time.
13 In reactor operations --
14 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Let's put those two statements 15 together and see what I come up with.
16 It is going to extend the backlog, but it is not 17 going to extend the time between inspections; is that what you 18 are say'ing'i 19 MR. DAVIS:
Now, what I am saying:
We have a pro-20 gram which defines the time between inspections, and we would 21 not programmatically say, rather than see a licensee once every 22 years, extend it to once every seven years.
23 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I see.
I 24 MR. DAVIS:
They are joined, of course.
So, once
- ce Feder^3 Repo,ters, Inc.
25 every six years, which defines if they are overdue.
I pv14 82 1
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
They are certainly not due 2
until every six years.
3 MR. DAVIS:
Right.
But we would not change our pro-4 gram and say it is now okay to be overdue.
5 The next reduction will be in our reactor operations.
6 Currently, we have about -- we spend or have a goal of 20 percent 7
of what we call " independent inspection efforts," which means 8
that when our inspectors are on site, 20 percent of their time 9
on site is not laid out in the inspection plan to look at 10 1 specific items, and consequently, they use this 20 percent goal 11 time te look at those areas which are of technical interest, to 12 fol?aw leads, to exercise technical judgment, to seek soft areas
]-
13 in the licensee's operation.
14 We actually spend about 17 percent of our time doing 15 this at the present time.
This is very professionally satisfy-16 ing to our individuals.
We do identify problems by this particu-17 lar effort.
We believe that this effort has contributed a great 18 deal to-the lack of dissent in I&E because it does give pro-19 fessional satisfaction.
20 But if we were to reduce this, it would'te one area 21 we would reduce, of course --
22 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
What is the relationship 23 between this effor t and the effort of operating reactors in their 24 own field work, NRR operating reactors?
ice-Feder0 Coporters, Iric.
25 MR. DAVIS:
NRR, when they go out and look at plants?
i
pvl5 83 1
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Yes.
2 MR. DAVIS:
They go out, as I understand it, to 3
determine whether those requirements which you are placing on 4
a plant suit the plant.
5 Then, when we go out, we determine whether'the 6
licensee is meeting the requirements placed on them.
7 Now, one of the areas we are looking at, as I men-8 tioned, as a manpower saving, under Dr. Hanauer, is some way to 9
do this with one effort.
10 The next area we would reduce in reactor operations, 11 there would be some reduction in the depth of the inspection.
12 Here again, we would inspect -- stretch inspection intervals.
13 We would examine the impact of this reduction on our resident 14 manning schedule.
We would reduce, and it may even eliminate, 15 our ability to cooperate wi.th NRR in seeking these agency 1-6 efficiencies.
17 It would reduce our ability to inspect new require-18 ments which may result from an NRR staff increase.
19 The last chart is merely a summary of the options 20 which lay out what I previously discussed, a 739 going with:the 21 current budget.
We do believe that is an austere budget.
It 22 does permit us to perform our program as described.
It does 23 recognize efficiencies which we'have now.
It involves no new 24 initiatives regarding utilizing manpower.
- ce Federd, Recorters, Inc.
25 The meduction by 12 to 727 would reduce our I
Pvi6 84 I
high-enriched uranium inspections, would reduce our flexibility 2
to absorb any new workloads, and it would permit our backlog 3
materials inspections to again grow.
4 The no-growth of 215 would do all of the above, plus 5
reduce our reactor inspection flexibility and, over the long run, 6
may be somewhat counterproductive if we could not cooperate with 7
NRR in seeking these dfficiencies.
8
. We do strongly urge that we proceed with the 739 in 9
I&E.
10 I CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay.
11 Questions?
12 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Yes, I have got a couple, 13 if I could.
14 John, are you maintaining this senedule tha t you 15 people put out last year on moving into the resident instructor 16 program?
17 MR. DAVIS:
We will be fully implemented in 1981.
18 Now, the character of the program has changed some-19 what from our original thoughts.
We will not have an i$spector 20 at each site.
We will not have inspectors at reactors in early 21 construction.
We will have-one at each operating site and at sites 22 23 in test and start-up and at late construction.
24 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
When you say you wi'l not haver ace Federst Repo,ters, tric.
25 one at each site, you mean you will not have it at the site in
pvl7 85 1
the early, but once it is in operation?
2 MR. DAVIS:
Yes, sir, we will have one at each site 3
where there is an operating reactor when fully implemented.
4 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
And the schedule on which you 5
will be moving into that is?
l 6
MR. DAVIS:
It will be completed in '81.
We will 7
have one at each of those in '81, and then, as each new site 8
becomes operating or enters into the proper state --
9 MR. GOSSICK:
Tell the Commission where we are in
'78.
1 10 MR. DAVIS:
In '78, we will have 20 reactor sites 11 manned.
12 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
You n.9ntioned in your brief 13 dercription there that earlier OMB was interested in the vendor 14 progrmn.
As I read McIntyre's letter --
15 MR. DAVIS:
They are still interested in it.
16 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
They are still?
17 Pardon me for going back over material which I am 18 sure yo& have covered earlier, but if you would just take a 19 1 minute to tell me, how are you coming on the two reports that 20 OMB appears to expect?
21 MR. DAVIS:
OMB has the draft report on the vendor 22 inspection program right now.
In fact, they commented to us 23 yesterday on it, and we reacted to their comments.
That report 24 should be in the hands of the Commissioners this month.
c.-peere neoonen, inc.
25
86 1
The other report on the resident inspection program 2
is due in '80.
Thus, we have about a year.
That particular 3
letters misses a letter.
There is another letter.
4 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
A later letter?
5 MR. DAVIS:
There is an earlier letter which sets' 6
a different date, which the author of that letter was not aware 7
of, but we talked with the author.
8 COMMISSIONER'AHEARNE:
I know the signer of this 9
letter.
OMB is not --
10 MR. DAVIS:
That is what we were currently informed, 11 that they were not holding us to the evaluation letter, the 12 date on that letter.
13 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
From their comments on the 14 vendor inspector paper, do you detect any shifting of their 15 extreme opposition to it?
16 MR. DAVIS:
I would say maybe a slight degree of 17 softening.
They have asked us a question which we hope to be 18 able to. respond to to show some real benefits.
19' In other words, they want to see some hard-number type 20 things.
21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
It appears to me that is what 22 they said last year.
^
23 MR. DAVIS:
Well, they would like to see some -- we 24 gave them some,- but we gave them examples, and now they are co.Feder:1 Keoorters, Inc, cnd45 25 seeking something more than examples.
87 2744.01.1 gsh I
COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
As I recall last year, 2
their attitude was, you can't prove it has any value s 3
therefore, you should have zero people in it.
~
4 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: My God.
If that becomes the --
5 well, so long, fellows.
6 (Laughter.)
7 COMMISSIGNER AHEARNE: As I recall from last year, 8
at least there was some impression on the OMB side that the 9
previous head of I&E had made an agreement that if the 10 supplemental number was given, that then that 715 would be
.Il held to as a constant number "or several years into the Ic future.
~
13 MR. DAVIS:
In developing this budget, it was 14 held -- let's see.
It was held to the second year.
We ' r e 15 in the third year from the 71 S.
16 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Several of you means more 17 than one?
18 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:
Except that at least the l
19 impression I got from two individuals that were a party to 20 that agreement was that that would hold through at least '80.
21 And I was just wondering what your reaction was?
22 MR. DAVIS:
Well, as they were developing the budget 23 the budget was severely cut within our own office by our l
24 direc tor, Dr. Volgenau.
And in looking at the manpower 25 figures, lookiig at the growth, particularly in the area which i
88 744.01.2 gsh I
absorbs much of our effort -- that is test and start-up --
2 he believed that the figure that we ended up with of 739 3
is very austere.
4 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: I guess all I'm really saying 5
is that I think you should expect when you go over with 6
the number that's above 715, and vendor inspectors included, 7
an automatic reduction to get to the 71 5, because there are 8
some people over there who really believe that there was an 9
agreement at 715.
10 That's all I have.
11 MR. GOSSICK:
We're kind of pressed on the other 12 side, of course, by the GAO, you kno',', who's coming out with 13 a report for vendor inspection.
~
14 MR. DAVIS:
Every study we've come out with asks 15 for more -- not we come out withs everybody comes out with 16 except OMB.
17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: I'm personally much more 18 sympathetic to your 739-type number.
19 MR. DAVIS:
It is a growth recognizing efficiency.
20 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE All right.
Can you report to 21 us the word from the f ar reaches of Silver Spring?
22 MR. GOSSICK:
Right.
I talked to Dr. Smith and read 23 the items off that were listed here --
24 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Thank you, John.
25 MR. GOSSICK:
Cliff's attitude is that these are
o 89 744.01.3 gsh I
items or matters that he wants to see done.
He feels that 2
they're important to him.
He does not feel, however, that 3
he has, you know, adequate tech assistance money to sort t
4 of reprogram and do it or do some part of it if the 5
research dollars get cut because he feels that he's got his 6
tech assistance dollars staked out o: items that he needs 7
on a near-term basis.
8 These are looked at as perhaps somewhat longer 9
term, but items that he supports and thinks are important to 10 his program.
Il CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Ok ay,
I'll tell you what I think 12 we ought to do.
We ought to take about a two-minute stretch 7-f 13 because if I don't get up and walk around the table, I'm 14 going to slide right under it and go to sleep.
And that's 15 not a very good condition in which to make a mark-up.
16 And then we ought to cut down the poker game to 17 us, the comptroller, the EDO, the secretary, and the budge t 18 review group, contingent, and thank everybody else very much, 19 and cut it up.
Okay?
20 (Whereupon, at 3:35 p.m., the hearing was adjourned. )
21 22 23 24 25