ML19337A607
| ML19337A607 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | River Bend  |
| Issue date: | 08/05/1980 |
| From: | Draper E GULF STATES UTILITIES CO. |
| To: | Seidle W NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION IV) |
| Shared Package | |
| ML19337A606 | List: |
| References | |
| RBG---8723, NUDOCS 8009290326 | |
| Download: ML19337A607 (3) | |
Text
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GULF STATES UTILITIES COMPANY 4
DOS? 0 8 81 c E 9 0 # 2331 GEAVYONT
~IXaS 77704 AREA cCoE 713 934 3643 August 5, 1980 RBG - 8273 File G9.5, G15.4.1 Mr. W. C. Seidle, Chief 1'
Reactor Construction & Engineering Support Branch U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Region IV Office of Inspection & Enforcement 611 Ryan Plaza Drive, Su te 1000 2
Arlington, TX 76011
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Dear Mr. Seidle:
J River Bend Station Docket Nos. 50-458, 50-459
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Gulf States Utilities (GSU) hereby submits its third annual status report on the progress of the environmental studies of the effect of the Alligator Bayou culvert cross-ing.
This report is in response to Request 3 of your Inspec-i tion Report 78-04 dated May 26, 1978.
Please find attached a.recent summary of study results from our consultants, Loui-siana State University (LSU).
To date, no conclusive short-term or long-term environmental impacts associated with the culvert crossing have been identified.
The final report on 1
this matter will be submitted to you by July 31, 1981 as per our previous commitments.
Sincerel,,
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%A-E. L. Draper Vice President - Technology
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ELD /JWC/mb Attachment 4
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LOUIS T AN A STATE UNIVERSlTY AN D AG RIC U LTU R A L AN D M ECH ANICAL COLLEGE B ATON ROUCE. tOUISI AN A. 70803 Center for Agricultural Sciences And Rural Development LOUISI AN A AGRfCULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION sCMOO6 OF FOntsTeV ANO
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July 30, 1980 Mr. James E. Booker, Proj ect Engineer River Bend Station Project Gulf States Utilities Company Lock Drawer 2951 Beaumont, Texas 77704
Dear Mr. Booker:
This letter is to summarize our progress and preliminary conclusions on the special floodplain studies of the LSU Phase II Interim Ecological Monitoring Program at the River Bend site.
The basic objective of our floodplain studies is to evaluate the aquatic environmental effects of the earthen fill and 14-culvert configuration for the river access road crossing of Alligator Bayou.
Two major, interrelated issues are being considered:
(1) whether or not movements of fishes along Alligator Bayou and the floodplain are significantly hindered and (2) the extent to which spawning and/or nursery habitats are affected.
Kindly refer to our previous summary letter (dated July 31, 1979) for discussion of approaches to sampling, limitations of possible conclusions, and changes necessitated by the first year's experience.
We had intended to increase our efforts at monitoring of culvert passage during the 1980 high-water period, but this was not possible because devices needed to hold our trap nets were not installed by the advent of backwater encroachment.
Breakdown of our electrofishing equipment in March 1980 unfortunately prevented the detailed assessment of relative abundances of large fishes on opposite sides of the access road during this year's flood.
However, visual observations and incidental. captures of adult fishes with fine-mesh gear suggested the occurrance of concentrations of larger fishes i
(especially shad and herring) south of the access road, as was observed in 1978 and 1979.
Our plans to intensify sampling of fish eggs, larvae, and early juveniles in floodplain habitats were implemented in 1980. We established a series of transects above, near, and below the access road, consisting of stations over m
the Alligator Bayou channel and along the floodplain margins (both near the river e.nd valley wall).
Half-meter diameter plankton nets were pushed in each station while sufficient water was present (ca. I meter or more), and fine-mesh dipnet samples were taken in the extreme shallows.
This array of stations
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- :kcr July 30, 1980 Page 2 was visited weekly or more frequently from late March through mid-May.
On several occasions plankton samples were taken concurrently in the main river channel, and on a few visits sampling was conducted during both ciay and nigh t.
Since all collections were replicated the ultimate result was several hundreds of samples.
They will form the basis for a thesis by Brian E. Boyer on the distribution and relative abundance of early stages of fishes in the Miss asippi River floodplain near River Bend.
As of this writing only a few trips' worth of samples have been processed.
They indicate, as expected, that many riverine fishes use the inundated floodplain as their primary (if not exclusive) spawning and nursery habitat.
The preliminary results suggest that there may be rather complex patterns of distribution within the floodplain, depending upon river stage and time of collection. There seems to be a tendency for some of the stations below the access road to be more productive (in terms of catch per effort) than those above, but as yet there is no clearcut evidence of drastically reduced spawning / nursery function of the upper floodplain.
However, since flood stages once again were high enough to afford direct access from the river to the swamp above the access road no strong inferences can be made.
A formal report on the special floodplain studies, due later this year, will incorporate the details of the 1978-80 work summarized in this and last year's letter.
Assuming there will be no great surprises in the as yet unprocessed collections of fish eggs, larvae, and juveniles, we anticipate that our conclusions will be very similar to those listed in the July 1979 letter.
If it is felt that further investigations of the access road effects are warranted, we recommend that greater attention be given to direct monitoring of culvert i
passage. This will entail the expense and effort of installing the bracket-i like devices to allow fish sampling in the culverts. The question of produc-tion of fish larvae and juveniles in the upper swamp area could also be addressed by monitoring the drift of such stages through the culverts.
In any case, we feel that there should be a discussion sometime soon of the priorities of the access road evaluations, in light of the increased frequency of overbank flooding above the road.
Sincerely yours, W
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Jh J n V. Conner Principal Investigator cc: James Cook, GSU Licensing, Beaumont Mark Walton, GSU River Bend JVC/cf
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