ML19340D242
| ML19340D242 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Sequoyah  |
| Issue date: | 12/04/1980 |
| From: | Hendrie J NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | Greenfield M WASHINGTON POST |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 8012290413 | |
| Download: ML19340D242 (5) | |
Text
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CFFICE OF THE COMMISSIONER
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- .o Ms. Meg Greenfield l,72.
c' Editorial Page Editor
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THE WASHINGTON POST R
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Dear Ms. Greenfield:
I feel very strongly that Jessica Mathews' Op-Ed piece on November ll, "Despite Three Mile Island" requires comment.
I hope you will consider the enclosed for equal treatment on a forthcoming Op-Ed page.
If not, please consider it a letter to the editor, c
s, Sincerely, x
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sedM.sendrie
.Comissioner 0
Enclosure:
As stated e
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BECAUSE OF THREE MILE TSLAND In an Op-Ed piece titled "Despite Three Mile Island" on November 11, 1980, Jessica Mathews of the Post editorial staff proposes that because the Nuclear Regulatory Comission recently granted an operating license to the Sequoyah Unit 1 reactor, it is ignoring the lessons of the Three Mile Island accident.
She is wrong.
The NRC moved rapidly after T_hree Mile Island to deal with the causes of that accident.
By the time the President's Comission on the accident published its report at the end of October 1979, the NRC was able to list in its response actions already taken or in progress that conformed to almost all of the recommendations of the President's Comission.
The refining and detailing of new requirements, particularly in the areas of operator training and requalification, operating procedures, plant staffing, safety equipment and instrumentation, radiation monitoring,.
emergency planning,, control room layouts, and use of operating experience continued through the first half of this year. The General Accounting Office and the President's Nuclear Safety Oversight Comittee 'have reviewed the Action Plan and generally approved of it.
Both have some criticisms and questions about the Action Plan, as might be expected for any major new and evolving policy document, and the Oversight Comittee noted the'need for hydrogen control.
But in overall judgment the Oversight Comittee said "In our judgment, the Action Plan constitutes a reasonable resptnse to. the TMI accident."
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. In the 20 months since Three Mile Island, the Comissioners have issued only two full power operating licenses and two low power testing licenses.
No construction permits have been issued. With literally the whole agency concentrating on the lessons of the accident and on improving the safety status of operating reactors, the one crystal-clear point is that the agency is paying meticulous attention to all of the lessons of Three Mile Island.
T e Commission's decision to license Sequoyah, to which Mathews objects h
on grounds of its ability to withstand the hydrogen generated in a Three Mile Island type of accident! was considered very carefully by the The decision to license Sequoyah was taken after evaluating Commission.
recomendations of the NRC staff and the Advisory Committee on Reactor The All the Commissioners voted to approve the license.
Safeguards.
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current best judgment of the staff is that Sequoyah could withstand substantially more h'ydrogen than was produced at Three Mile Island, taking the time scale of that accident and the distributed ignition system installed in Sequoyah into account.
(Mathews is wrong in claiming the Sequoyah containment could not withstand the pressures that were actually generated at Three Mile Island.)
j The ignition system, a new protective measure for hydrogen control, was 1
devised and initial tests were carried out by the Tennessee Valley l.
l Authority for Sequoyah as.part of its independent safety reassessment l
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. after Three Mile Island.
Further testing of the system is going on during the plant start-up period now in progress and the Sequoyah licens'e conditions require early and satisfactory completion of those tests.
If the NRC finds that additional hydrogen control measures are necessary, they will be installed.
The concern over control of hydrogen that might result from fuel rod cladding oxidation in a serious reactor accident is an old one.
Before Three Mile Island, it was thought that 5 percent cladding oxidation was about the limit of core damage that could be sustained without a full core meltdown and NRC regulations required hydrogen control measures for up to that level of oxidation, depending or the particular reactor design.
Tnree Mile Island shows us that water reactor cores are much more resistant to meltdown than had been thought previously. That is all to the good.
But Three Mile Island also. showed that substantial amounts of hydrogen can result when a water reactor core is partially uncovered and overheats for an extended period.
It was clear, after Three Mile Island, that improved hydrogen control Two rulemaking proceedings have been started to revise l
was necessary.
i the hydrogen control regulations and the capability of operating plant containments to withstand large amounts of hydrogen has been examined.
i (Mathews is wrong in stating that the NRC has decided not to to change its hydrogen control regulations and is also wrong in implying that adequate hydrogen control measures will not be required for Sequoyah and similar plants.)
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. In requiring the various new hydrogen control measures, the NRC has taken account of the many other post-TMI requirements that reduce subst5ntially the chances of a THI-type accident.
That does not mean that the new measures are not needed and it does not mean, as' Mathews claims, that the NRC is dealing with Three Mile Island by declaring such an accident can never happen again.
It does mean that the new measures can be installed on expediticus but reasonable schedules, without requiring unnecessary shutdowns or excessive delays for completed plants like Sequoyah.
Regulators, especially nuclear regulators, do not expect everyone will
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There are contrary views on al'most every applaud all their decisions.
Mathews is entitled to hers, but they would be a gcod deal decision.
more useful if she had the facts straight.
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