ML19341C107

Transcript of Commission 810202 Meeting in Bethesda,Md to Discuss Policy Planning & Program Guidance for FY83-87. Pp 1-25

ML19341C107
Person / Time
Issue date:	02/02/1981
From:	NRC COMMISSION (OCM)
To:
References
REF-10CFR9.7 NUDOCS 8103020042
Download: ML19341C107 (27)

Text

_ _ _

NUCLEAR REGULATORY CCMMISSICN

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DISCUSSION OF POLICY, PLANNIG AND PROGRAM GUIDANCE T'OR FISCAL YEARS 1983-87 I'

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'i DATE:

February 2, 1981 pAggg: 1 thru 25 g.

Bethesda, Maryland o

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400 virgird.a Ave., S.W. Wasning--*, D. C. 20024 Talachene: (202) 554-2245 810 30 200'/M '

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I l UNITED STATES OF AMERICA j

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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 4

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DISCUSL

.)N OF POLICY, PLANNING AND PROGRAM i

GUIDANCE FOR FISCAL YEARS 1983-87 5

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Nuclear Regulatory Commission 7

Room P-ll8, Phillips Bldg.

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8 Bethesda, Maryland j

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z, 9i Monday, February 2, 1981 o

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y 10 i The Commission met, pursuant to notice, at 2:30 p.m.

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II I BEFORE:

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I2 JOHN F. AHEARNE, Chairman of the Commission

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VICTOR GILINSKY, Commissioner

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PETER BRADFORD, Commissioner 5

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15 ALSO PRESENT:

d 10 ll WILLIAM DIRCKS,.EDO KEVIN CORNELL, EDO 17 i E. HANRAHAN, OPE 18 l GEORGE EYSYMONTT, OPE 5

L. BICKWIT, OGC P

S. CHILK, Secretary

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19 ;

JOHN DAVIS 6

VICK STELLO 20 :

HAROLD DENTON BOB MINOGUE 21!

RAY SMITH

!l JAMES CUIG1INGS 22 i l

23 24 !

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_ALDERSQtLREPORTING COMP ANY, INC.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

The Commission meets here in the 3l! ouiet environs of Bethesda in our forma % ion left.

Joe is sick, l

4l he suggested we go ahead anyway with this meeting.

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The purpose of it is a continuation of our discussion E

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6 at the Commission level of a proposed revision of the Policy 7

Planning and Programming Guidance.

At the opening session last j

8 week we reached the conclusion that perhaps before committing d

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the necessary resources that are required to modify this document, Y

10 it might be useful to hear from a few of the other peonle most, E

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11 perhaps, heavily impacted, such as the EDO and the office directors 3

Y 12 l Since we did have a fairly extensive review done of

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g 13 l the implementation by the Office of OIA, that it might be useful m

5 I4 also to have Mr. Cummings, and he also has Ran Kelly with him I

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15 who was the basic worker on this particular tr.sk.

j 16 So, what I propose is just to have a general discussion 2

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Vic and g.

17 ; and, perhaps, Bill, you might want to make some comments.

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5 18 Peter ask questions.

Bill?

i-E 19 MR. DIRCKS:

Well, regarding the usefulness of the A

20'; document, it-has the principal use of allowing the staff to get 21 some idea what the Commission is emphasizing in the way of j

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22 l initiatives, and it does aid us in the formulation of the budget i

23 documents which, of course, is our principal concern; this is l

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24l coming up pretty soon.

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Where there are problems in the PPPG is, it may be i

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i inherent in the very nature of the system, is that basically it 1l 2i comes down in a statement of many objectives, goals, and general l

3l achievements that are desired to occur without a compensating 1

4! delineation of items that should be de-emchasized.

There is a great listing of items of "Do more, do it better, achieve more e

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8 6l safety, more of that, more of this."

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But there is never a - at least I cannot detect in g

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reading it - any statement of " Reduce it nere, cut back here in 8

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9 order to achieve this."

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E 10 CHAIR!iAN AHEARNE:

In other words, within a fixed set i_

of resources it ought to stress some things.

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1 2 lI MR. DIRCKS:

Now, we proce'eded to add a sort of z

13 itemization of all the objectives; there are some outlined state-

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E 14 ments in t.he document.

I think we did most of these invariably, I think, did point out they were always asking for an increase, or

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xz it would require an increase of resources.

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3 17 j There is no sense going over them here, I am sure they i

x s are in the files, but a statement such as, " Assign one project s

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I 19 manager for each plant," well, that is an increase, potential N

20 l increase of 40 to 50 staff years.

So, where do we find these i! resources in a constant resource pie?

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l 22 l That is my principal problem with the PPPG.

I don't knog 23 if Kevin wants to add anything to that.

i 24 i CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Kevin?

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25 Perhaps we could hear from the office directors, l

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4 1l starting with John.

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2I MR. DAVIS:

The principal use we made of it is in 3

budget formulation and in different priorities.

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4' However, I will say this, Mr. Chairman, it constitutes 1'

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an extremely " full platter" of things to do, and our resources are N

8 6l pretty well committed.

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one of the concerns I had about it is that it would be

%l 8, reviewed, it would be viewed more as recuirement than guidance.

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9 There was an opinion among some that everything in there I should 21 10 accomplish.

I simply do not have the resources to accomplish z

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g 11 ' everything in there, consequently, we will use it principally 6

12 i to direct the staff.

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13 By the way, I am one of the offices where we are getting E

E 14 pretty wide distribution among the supervisors.

We use it to

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15 l direct attention primarily to priorities.

We found it a useful az l

j 16 document, but it is a somewhat frustrating document because of W

p 17 the belief, here is an expression of those things the Commission x

z 18 has a somewhat personal interest in, so consequently we should be

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i doing this.

Sometimes we just don't have the resources to do it, 19 M

20 at least not in the manner that we would like to.

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l 21j CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

That is not dissimilar, then, to the r

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22 J points that Bill made, that it is a question of resource 23 allocation.

There just are not enough resources to do all the j

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24l tasks that seem to be laid out, either explicitly or implicitly.

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MR. DAVIS:

Right.

As I say, we use it principally i

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i 2i CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Vic?

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l 3l MR. STELLO:

Maybe it is still adding to the thing that l 4j Bill has already described in terms of a constant resource pie, l

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I think he put it.

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n I view it now, as I must in the next six months to a 8

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7 year with the freeze, where we are not going to get the resources n

8 8! that I tried to describe we need consistent with the previous n

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It is going to be extremely difficult deciding on d

9 policy paper.

I how to adjust to the impact of the' freeze as we move forward in 10,

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trying to live up to the commitments, at least the guidance of

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12 ; the Commission; it is going to be e:ctremely difficult to be Z_

S 13 ; able to do the work that is described in here not only with

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14 I the constant resource picture where at least INE has a clear, d

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15 significant reduction in resources for this year.

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So, the impact is going to be very, very large and j

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17 l I don't find the document to be particularly helpful in setting a

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i 18 l up the various priorities in terms of what you are trying to

~c adjust to account for what will be a significant reduction in 19 25 1

20 l resources for the forthcoming year.

21 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

On the other hand, if there were l

22 more focus on prioritization, that sounds like you night find 23 '

it useful.

24 MR. STELLO:

Yes, it would be of significant help to them in trying to understand the Commission's wishes with respect,

25 i

I ji to how to adjust to the reducing resource environment.

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2' CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Harold?

3 MR. DENTON:

My views are a lot like those which have 4! been expressed.

If you ask me whether to continue the effort or e

5 not, I come down and say, "Let's continue the effort to improve A

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6l it."

But I think it is a potpourri of guidance.

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On the one hand it tends to sink the operating principles 7

E that I can instill into each new employee and say, "If you know 8

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9 these ten, you will always be on the right track."

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k 10 We have some of those in there, but it has some i_

5 11 budget implications thrown in there, plus a few other things.

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12 anything that gets 22 pages long is not concise enough for just z

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13 broad policy guidance for an employee; and yet, it does not have 1

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14 enough detail in some of the areas to help me in deciding day-to-I l

15 day priorities.

16 Many of the things we do are not comanageable or 3w balancable.

Issuing a license does not increase safety, yet, l

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that is clearly one of the things we do to begin with, improve l

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safety in the future rather than today.

19 9M 20 So, the document is full, it could be expanded to be 21 better.

As Bill says, it doesn't say in any area, "Dont' do l

l 22 less."

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Also, if it were a planning document for '83 and l

l 24 ; we had focused on just three or four, or five areas from a Budget i

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25, Director standpoint, where we are going to put more effort into i

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this area, or this area, or that area, then formulating the budget i

2i if you knew that was going to be a hundred man-years or $100 3

million, or something, in those three, or four, or five areas, we I

i 41 could make sure that it got in there.

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But by going across the board it really hits almost l

N G' every program saying, " Improve this program."

There are a couple I

7l' of issues I have raised that did not get in there.

One of them R

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is, do we want to have the capability of a model transient in d

9 reactors on a near-term basis.

For example, a week after an 1

z, 10 accident happens it takes big dollars, a lot of program up-z

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11 ' keeping.

I tried to get this addressed and we did not get that 3

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So, I don't really know from this document whether 13 I

l 14 ' you want to have~that kind of capability or not.

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15 So, I guess I end up with the same views as the others 5

g 16 l that it looks a head.

Our program is going to change because d

6 17 I there is going to be another Crystal River or TVA problem.

We 5

18 need to find some system to separate out what the really operating

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19 philosophy of the agency is, and then something about the budget R

20 in '83 and where we want to improve in '83; and some direction 21 about where to cut back.

22 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I recogni::e that there are three 23 secticns to the document.

There is one section which is general 24 policy and that is, when the Commissioners reach an agreement, 25 that is the gensral policy guideline for the agency.

That is i

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8 I; relatively succinct, if undoubtedly not as well written as you l

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2i would like, but it should improve.

3i Then, there are planning assumptions that do focus I

that 4: specifically on the out-years, including the budget year, g

5l do give guidance.

3 6l Now, if things that you want in there are not in there, I

R 7' one of the reasons may well be because we decided they should not f

8l be there.

If we have decided they should not be there, th 2 - - is d

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guidance, fairly explicit guidance.

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E, 10 MR. DENTON:

Well, I am not sure you ever considered

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11 I that particular one.

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y 12 l CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I am just pointing out, if the 5

1 13 j document gets issued and there are a set of planning statements

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14 I ir. there, that is what they are there for.

They are the guidance m

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g' 16 l are the planning assumptions you should be using."

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17 I MR. DENTON:

I am not trying to be critical, you know, u

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18 l of the report.

C 19 ll (Laughter.)

l 20 MR. DENTON:

I think it is the generalities and i

i 21I blends that have not made it a tool that I consult.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I am saying, remember, there are i

23 '

two pieces; and then, in fact, there was a third piece which 24 l was programming guidance, which got down to a very specific i

e item.!

You have to look at the right place for the right 25 program.

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1! Bob?

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MR. MINOGUE:

If I may, I would like to give you two 3I answers, one from the perspective of my previous job, and one l

4{; the current job.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

That is not going to eliminate my h

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6l asking Ray.

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MR. MINOGUE:

I am sure it won't.

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9 I would describe myself as an enthusiast for this i

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Ej 11 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Maybe it will prevent my asking Ray.

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(Laughter.)

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y 13 MR. MINOGUE:

I used it in the preparation of the '82 8

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14 l budget for the office.

I saw it as broad policy guidance that 2

15 was really aimed at the office director rather than something E

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16 ; that is aimed down at the staff.

I in fact did use it as the l

6 17 basis for the first round of planning of the '82 budget.

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18 I went through each branch's programs with that guidance l

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19 as the framework within which we developed these programs.

So, R

l 20 that basically is what I saw it being usable as, as guidance that l

21 would be used in a broad sense by me, as an office directer, to 22. plan the program, and not as guidance for the staff.

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23 Less useful to me were'the budget dollars because in a 24 l sense I didn't do anything with those until the tale ends.

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25 I laid out a program to meet the guidance and then I compared it h

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l 10 1! to the budget dollars.

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I would visualize, in terms of improvements that could 3

be made, I think the coverage of it ought to be broadened because 4

4! if something is not in there, it just isn't done.

Silence on any e

5 subject means, " Don't do it."

I don't think you have quite 5

3 6l reached that point.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

This is the first consideration.

8 MR. MINOGUE:

That's right.

A lot goes on within the d

9 staff that is not reflected here, and hopefully in the future io g

10 version as it becomes "the" basic planning document, it is same-E 11 thing that is addressed.

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12 So, that is basically it with respect to the previous E

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s 14 l In the Office of Research, I must say candidly, I think

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15 this reflects our isolation in the legislative process.

As it is g

16 I written now it is not so ' clearly usable.

Now, what we are doing -

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17 and I think we run it backwards - we have built in a long-range I

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18 plan.

We are trying to back out of that.

The thing that should g

"e; 19 have been in, the PPPG guidance, so when the long-range plan M

20 comes to the Commission we in effect will be suggesting some stuff 21 that ought to be in the program equidance document so that in V

! future years that will become tth vehicle by which we would lay 22 23 on the overall approach to the Ihng-range plan.

e 24 l In summary, I think, speaking for the office directors J

I think it is an

-25 of this agencv, we needed it the first year.

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enormously important document, and the fact that we had some problem I

2l with it the first year should just make people enthusiastic to go I

3 ! back and make it better because we really have to have something l

l' 4l like this.

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COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

When you say problems, do you g

j 6 lnean that the document has in any way actually hurt your ability I

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to get things done?

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MR. MINOGUE:

No, the problems were before we had it.

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9 I think the difficulty was that in areas where the Commission i

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10 either gave no explicit guidance or none could be sensed, partly E

5 11 because of. separation of the agency, you have the independent

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12 chiefs and they are all sort of groping for which direction the

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14 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

But you said we had some 2

15 problems with it in the first year.

E 16 MR. MINOGUE:

Oh, the coverage is not broad enough.

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l 17 i The coverage was not broad enough.

It ought to be sufficiently 5

18 broad t6at if something is not in there explicitly you simply do l

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19 not do it.

It was not broad enough to permit that.

A 20 Now, this version is a significant improvement over 21l the last year, but I am talking about prspective standards.

22 From the perspective of the Office of Research this is so skimpy i

1 23,

it is difficult to use.

In fact, we did not really use it.

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COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

You don't went to follow your i

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principle.

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(Laughter.)

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COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

You don't want to follow your i

2i principle, if it is not in there you don't do it.

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MR. MINOGUE:

No, I would not.

This is also a vehic}e 4

for a dialogue between principal staff and the Commission.

5 If the 0.ifice of Research didn' t answer you back - and they

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6l didn't - there has been no dialogue.

A lot of our stuff is not

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really addressed in here.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I think to be fair,' Bob, in the d

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development of last year's document when all of us who partici-l zo 10 pated, Commissioners and the staff, worked on it, we recognized z

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11 that it was going to be a najor undertaking just to get that 8

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13 The research area would have the agency's money and l

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l 14 where they still become long-range research pl..is, we explicitly I

15 As.cided not to really address it.

y 16 There was, I think, one phrase put in there which Bud e

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Minz(?) worked up just for completeness because he came to us 5

18 and said, "You are not addressing it all, you at least ought to l

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19 l have this in it."

But we recognize that.

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20 MR. MINOGUE:

It is pretty skimpy, we should have

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21 l the balance of the proper interface with industry.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Yes.

23 !

MR. MINOGUE:

The relevance of continued working i

24 h support are some of the issues that are not even addressed here.

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25 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Sure.

Ray?

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jl MR. SM' 4:

I, too, won't use this document as 2

quidance for the budget process - I intend to, though.

I think l

t it was usefit' 'ast year.

As a matter of fact last yepr, without 3 l!

4l exceotion, our entire budget flowed from this guidance.

In icoking at ir this year, and in view of the notion

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M that if it is not in there you are not going to do it, there 8

6l k7 are a couple of things that kind of stand out.

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one, I can't find any place to hang the degraded core 1

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9 cooling specifically in here.

You can get it in a scan of re-i.

.h 10 review of regulations or scmething, but I can't find a very l

Eg jj specific place in continuing the Three Mile Island rulemaking, t

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the long-term rulemaking for things like degraded core cooling.

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j 13 Also, I find nothing on transportation.

I don't know E

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15 But I think all in all it is a useful document and as I think the work that is being done on it here to improve it, 16 a

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j7 I think, is all to the good.

It is much better than not having a2 5

18 It.

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b 19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Jim Cu:renings, did you want to make A

20 any comments?

21 l MR. CUMMINGS:

Well, as you know, we issued a report 22 in December, the first of three reports that were requested 23 '

specifically by the Commission.

The primary purpose of the 24 i report was to address.or assess the agency's use of the PPPG i

25 j during the agency's budget process.

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A secondary scope of that audit was to give some l

2i coverage to the agency's overall response to the PPPG and their

3. perception of the PPPG I

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With respect to the first issue, we found that the i

5 ! Program Office budget request, the EPO recommendation, were 1

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consistent eith the PPPG.

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7' Additionally, we found unanimously from the senior j

8 managers of the agency that they felt the PPPG was a definite d

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factor in improving the agency's budget process.

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10 So, with that primary purpose in mind we look at it i_

5 11 as a plus.

With respect to the other areas, insofar as how it

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12 was perceived and how it was used, we would have to say that z=

5 13 overall senior managers were in favor of it.

Senior managers 2

14 l were saying that while there may not be any surprises in the PPPG, i b

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16 without surprises than no PPPG at all.

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g 17 i Our own opini n of it is that you look at it as a good 5

18 management tool.

It is not as narrow and rigid as an MBO kind I

h 19 of an approach.

On the other hand, it is not a management tool n

20 that is a case by case ad hoc look at how we run the agen=y.

21 So, our opinion is that wa look at it as a good, l

22 flexible document that falls some place between there.

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That is not to say that we didn't see some problems l

24 l on how it was used.

TheissuesthatBobraisedaboutthequestionj 25 f on who is the program manager, what was he supposed to do, there l

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1 were some problems in those areas.

There were some problems with i

2i senior management as to what do we do when there is a void in 3 l the PPPG.

Does that mean that we 44 dress it, or does that mean 4

that we just let it fall by the wayside?

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So, I guess our recommendations are more geared to a e

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6 l more formalized approach to some of those questions.

I think that i l

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pretty much sums it up.

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8 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Vic?

Peter?

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9 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

Jim, if you were asked to I

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10 look at the document in a somewhat different way, that is, to E

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11 look at it and then scan back over what the agency has actually s

d 12 done in the last year and measure the agency's accomplishments z

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13 i under each of the sections stated in the PPPG, is that something E

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14 i daat could meaningfully be done?

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r 15 MR. CUMMINGS:

Well, that is basically what we are

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16 doing, that would be the second phase of our audit ~which will Ec

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coming up, starting probably in June.

In June we are going to 5

l 18 l try to look at FY '81 operations, what did you actually do versus 19 li E

what is in the PPPG.

n 20 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

I see.

21 MR. CUMMINGS:

We have not formu.iated wb't is programmed 22 or planned for that audit yet, but that will be tha second phase of our 23 of our look at thc PPPG.

That is, I think, at page 4

24, report where we lay out the three specific sections.

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!i 25j COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

That is not to say that I did ili 1

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16 1l not read it.

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I il 2I (Laughter.)

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COMMISSIONER BRAQFORT:

I just was skimming.

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Outside of the budget area, two questions.

I ask i

e 5j anybody who has an example to give it.

One, were there any areas I

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6! in which you felt the PPPG actually hindered anything that you a

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g 7' felt was important to do; and the other question, give just a 1.

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couple of examples of times where the PPPG was of significant i

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9l help.

In what instances did you actually look at the PPPG for l

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10 ! guidance on an action that your office was about to undertake, z

5 11 and dit it make any difference in terms of what you did?

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12 MR. DAVIS:

We are in the process of looking at ways z=

13 to improve the qualification of radiography.

One of the questions E

l 14 l as to how to do this, of course - thinking about certification -

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15 is direct approval of radiography by NRC.

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j 16 By going to the PPPG it became very clear that we should W

p 17 i also consider third parties.

Consequently, I believe, it did l

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18 modify our look at this to nut more emchasis on third carties than !

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m5 20 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

I don't remember that specific 21, section, but you don't happen to believe that that. detail didn't h

22 ; come ~ out the ~way it did because of MNSS?

23

• MR. DAVIS:

Oh, no.

It did not specifically speak i

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As a general guidance I j

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MR. DIRCKS:

Well, his point with PPPG's case is valid, 2

it was developed.

3; But it does go back to the process.

So, there is a 4

tendency, I would think, for the offices then to put down what 5, we would like to see and it goes up and goes right back down again.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

There is some iteration.

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The documents that came out, we wers A

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A lot of the words in there are the ili 11 Commissioners'."

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so, the suggested ideas may have originated from the j

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MR. HANRAHAN:

No, we didn't.

23 MR. DIRCKS:

There are suggestiens by the staff where 24lian area should be de-emphasized.

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25j CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Vic?

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MR. STELLO:

There were a couple of areas where there 2l was a need for some policy.

Last year we finished to try to t

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I felt fairly comfortable that v'

were fairly 4! consistent under the PPPG that we had.

There were a number cf 5' areas where policy had to be formulated, for example, on the e

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That is fairly stated in here, and it is pretty signifi-0 i

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9l cant deciding how to cut back the resources.

2 10 The Commission's views on enforcement policy as Z

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It was fairly helpful and persuaded me that I under-3 y

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I think there are 5

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insufficient. revenues.

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17 i CO!1MISSIONER BRADFORD:

What is the most specific case a

2 18 you can give me as an example for that process, any particular 3o I9 ; enforcement action that you were in doubt about which way to go n

20 llon and came back to the PPPG for shedding light on your own i

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enforcement policies?

l 22 MR. STELLO:

I think it was a confirmaticn that the 4

23 Commission intended by its wording here to be very firm, tough 24 ) in terms of dealing with enforcement issues.

i 25 As I read this particular document and the enforcement t

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It was an interim crocess.

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If I have to 2

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15 The resident inspec-ion program is another area where wz l

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I am 23 ' going to need guidance beyond what this gives me to help me make 24 l those decisions because I can't do what this says unless I know 25,

for sure.

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1 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I would guess that one of the I

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MR. STELLO:

Yes, sir.

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I guess I sa:1 the prioritization and d

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process where this is policy direction.

If you develop a program 3

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input from each of the offices, synthesizing that into guidance 20 that runs across the board.

2I That is a very good example of the dialogue process 22 with the staff, all the office views being reconciled.

23 '

CHAI MAN A IEARNE:

Any questions?

Ed?

24l MR.

Ray mentioned a couple of items which, I o

25 guess, are of some it.cu ;s t.

i 21 1l CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

You are, I understand, now getting l

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MR. HANRAHAN:

Yes.

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4' CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

What is your preference, shall we i

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COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: (Inaudible).

7 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

I would certainly fter we j

8 get the comments back.

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COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Well, I tell you, I have grave l

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12 l nothing else, so that there is a common planning base.

I used 5

j-13 to do that years ago in this building.

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You had a lot of success.

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15 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

At any rate, the point is, it g"

16 is like in the Army, you want to make sure that the number of 2

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You want to indicate f

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21l Uhen you start going to more general statements of 22 the sort that are in the first ten pages which portray themselves I

a" 23 ' with policy, announce themselves with policy, I must say reading 24 !

it, it doesn't excite me.

I think the statements end up being l

3 25 gen,y,1 e3,3 e3,7,,,

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find them useful, I would like to hear about it.

2 But my impression is that they orettv much amount to l

3 hsaying, "We are going to obey the law and cooperate with other

's 4 )' agencies," etc., etc.

I, myself, think that the time we spend I

5! on that would be better spent addressing some of the specific e

6l issues we have on our plates.

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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I guess that will be one of the issues 5

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15 COMMISSIONER GILINSKT:

Well, but we do that every time 4.

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We make policy by making decisions, by M

6 17 ! dealing with rules, with cases, with various kinds of issues E

l 18 that come up to us.

There is some value in putting these E

19 j together.

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22 3 through in detail inevitably leads to very vague statements l

23. because we have not really gone through them.

4 24 >

CHAIR 51AN AHEARNE:

There are two aspects, though, of j

25 generating policy.

One is codifying the direction that you are i

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t I going.

You are satisfied of the direction you are going, and so l

1 2; you are now trying to lay that down explicitly in some statement.

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This, after all, is a large operating agency and we e

4 ihave, I think, the responsibility to try to sketch out the i

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direction we believe the agency ought to be going.

Now, it is 3

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Oh, yes, if you think you can m

I guess what I am saying is, I don't think we have l

14f, do it, sure.

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been very successful.

I think just by the experience of having r

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17 ! directly with some of the specific issues that are before us.

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18 CILAIRMAN AHEARNE:

I guess I would like to see if we 2

h 19 can'u make at least one more try.

5 20 l COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

Harold, is this a ridiculous 21 notion or would it be of some help if the Commissioners could i

22 j agree on a number?

23 Assuming that the necessary safety considerationc are 24,

satisfied, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission expects to issue l

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25, five operating licenses, construction permits, within the next l

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ALDERSON REPORTING COMP ANY, INC.

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1i year.

I am pulling the numbers out of the air.

Say that there 2i were some such number, could it be put in this document?

Would i

3l that be a useful step from NRR's standpoint?

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MR. DENTON:

This sort of number was put in on an I

5I operator reactor, I believe.

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6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:

That was back in the years R

7 when the number was 42.

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MR. DENTON:

If we had a certain number of accidents d

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9l and we did assign the resources to match up, in that kind of l

10 j budgetary sense when you do make a specific translation of what E

5 11 ' this requirement means, it has a very pronounced effect on how a

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12 the office assigns resources to it.

=l 13 l CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

We made some explicit assumptions

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14 about when the next construction permit was going to be issued.

2 15 MR. DENTON:

Now, to take a different sort of issue j

16 where you need to decide that you are not going to worry about A

y 17 ! large LOCAs any more.

We have that issue settled and that would 5

18 would have wide-ranging programatic significance throughout.

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20l know what programs to cut out.

21 !

Just to increase safety, as I say, an across-the-board i

l 22 statement, I don't know where to increase safety.

We are always I

23 ' increasing a lot of places.

But any time thcle is a specific 24 l number assigned in here, it does have profound associations with 25, your budget.

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1 1

25 1

CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:

Thank you all, we appreciate your 2l willingness to join us here.

I 3!

(Whereupon, at 3:15 p.m. the meeting of the Commission l

I was closed.)

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NUCLEAR REGULATORY CO.WISSICN This is to certify that the attached preceedings i:efore the 6/

in the :2atter* cf:

DISCUSSION OF POLICY, PLANNING AND PROGRAM GUIDANCE FOR FISCAL YEARS 1983-87 Data of Proceeding: February 2, 1981 Docket flu:::ber:

O Place of Proceeding:

Bethesda, Md.

were held as herein appears, and. that this is the criginal transcripe thereof for the file of the Ccr:::ission.,

M. E.

Hansen Official Reporter (Typed)

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$d;$Ms Official Reporter (Signature) l I

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