ML19341A520
| ML19341A520 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 07/10/1979 |
| From: | Gamble D NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTOR & AUDITOR (OIA) |
| To: | NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTOR & AUDITOR (OIA) |
| Shared Package | |
| ML19341A503 | List:
|
| References | |
| FOIA-80-516, REF-QA-99900400 NUDOCS 8101260173 | |
| Download: ML19341A520 (3) | |
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UNITED STATES (8
',j NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION WASWNGTON, D. C. 20555 b
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MEMORANDlI4 FOR:
File FROM:
David H. Gamble, Investigator, DIA J
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SUBJECT:
INVESTIGATION - MICHELSON REPORT Gerald R. Mazetis, Section Leader, Section A Reactor Systems Branch (RSB), Division of Systems Safety, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR) was interviewed in his office on July 2, 1979.
Mazetis said he did not have time to check his records; however, he offered the following information from memory.
Mazetis said he did receive a copy of Michelson's report from Sanford Israel, another RSB Section Chief, sometime in 1977 or 1978.
Mazetis said Israel then had one Babcock & Wilcox (B&W) plant to review and he (Mazetis) had one or two. He said that he recalled Israel having mentioned to him that Advisc y Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) member Jesse Ebersole had been asking questions in certain areas (i.e., along the lines of concern addressed by Michelson). Mazetis believed that it was a while later when Israel received the handwritten copy of the Michelson Report from Ebersole. Mazetis believed that Israel gave him a photocopy of the report because Israel wanted to let him know what issues would be discussed in later ACRS meetings on his (Mazetis') plants. Mazetis recalled that when Israel gave him the report, Israel said that he (Israel) and RSB Chief Thomas Novak would be looking at it.
Mazetis said that he might have glanced through the report, but he did not remember reviewing it in detail.
He said he had intended to check back with Novak and Israel to see what was happening with the report.
Mazetis said he believed he had Michelson's report before the ACRS asked the staff a number of questions on Pebble Springs which included the issues raised by Michelson. Mazetis recalled that the staff forwarded the questions to the licensee and B&W prepared responses.
He said that Scott Newberry of his staff, who was responsible for matters relating to B&W plants, reviewed the licensee responses. Mazetis said he had not given Newberry a copy of the Michelson Report and did not provide him I
with a copy in connection with this review. Mazetis said he assumed that he would have mentioned the report's existence to Newberry and the fact that Israel was checking into it.
Mazetis said he never discussed the report with or passed copies of it to anyone else.
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JUL 101979 Mazetis believed that Israel and Novak accompanied him to the ACRS meeting on Pebble Springs in case the topics covered by the Michelson Report arose. Mazetis said he did not discuss with Novak and Israel whether the B&W responses were sufficient in light of the Michelson Report. Mazetis was not certain that Novak and Israel had reviewed the B&W responses; but he said he assumed they had because they went to the ACRS meeting.
Mazetis said that he believed that, if the Michelson Report had come to the staff differently, it would have been handled differently.
He believed that if it had come in formally, it would have been assigned by NRR Director Harold Denton and given a priority rating -- thus making it a recognizable work package of a particular group in NRR. Mazetis said that, as it did come in, it was never a recognizable work package.
Mazetis said that he, for example, had other work to do which Denton had assigned a priority; therefore, the Report could not be adequately addressed. Mazetis said that the staff frequently receives informal
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questions from ACRS members.
He said sometimes they ask a staff member questions in the hallway and often the response is merely a case of providing a clarification.
l Mazetis said that, when he received Israel's January 10, 1978, memorandum addressed to "RSB Members," he had the Midland (another B&W plant) operating license application to review. He said that they were in the right stage to ask the questions highlighted by Israel, and he believed they did ask the questions of Midland.
Mazetis said that, although they' began asking such questions, it was never decided that these issues were ones of legitimate concern.
He said this decision would have had to have been made at the Division level. Mazetis said that issucs are not forwarded to the Regulatory Requirements Review Committee for them to decide whether they are significant enough to require "backfitting" to other plants unless the staff makes such an affirmative determination first.
At the conclusion of the interwiew, Mazetis located his copy of the Michelson Report in his cabinet in a file entitled " Pebble Springs." In thumbing through the report he observed that he had marked various passages. Mazetis thus concluded that he must have read the Report; however, he noted that his marks were only on the first eighteen or so pages.
NOTE: Later review of the Report revealed that Mazetis had marked pages intermittently through page 48 of the second part of the two-part Report.
i DJ'stribution:
vCIA Subject 79-51 l
OIA Reading l
Fortuna Reading LStrickler DGamble i
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