ML19341C358
| ML19341C358 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 01/26/1981 |
| From: | NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML19219A664 | List: |
| References | |
| FRN-44FR70408, REF-10CFR9.7, RULE-PR-60 SECY-80-474, SECY-81-048, SECY-81-048A, SECY-81-48, SECY-81-48A, NUDOCS 8103030102 | |
| Download: ML19341C358 (84) | |
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In 1:be.%2232* cf-DISCUSSION AND VOTE ON SECY-8l FINAL RULE TO 10 CFR PART 60 -
DISPOSAL OF HIGH-LEVEL RADIOACTIVE ITASTES IN GEOLOGIC REPOSITORIES -
LICEUSING PROCEDURES
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January 26, 1981 PAGES:
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1 UNITED STATES OF ANERICA 2
NUCLEAR REGULATORY CONNISSION 3
4 5
DISCUSSION & VOTE ON SECY-81-48 6
FINAL RULE TO 10 CFR PART 60 7
DISPOSAL OF HIGH-LEVEL RADIOACTIVE WASTES IN GEOLOGIC 8
REPOSITORIES - LICENSIWG PROCEDURES 9
Nuclear Regulatory Commission 10 Room 1130 11 1717 H Street, N.W.
Washington, D. C.
12 Nonday, January 26, 1981 13 14 The Commission met, pursuant to notice, at 15 16 2:05 p.m.
17 18 19 BEFORE:
20 21 JOHN F. AHEARNE, Chairman of the Commission 22 JOSEPH HENLHIE, Commissioner 23 VICTOR GILINSKY, Commissioner 24 PETER A. BRADFORD, Commissioner 25 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.
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1 STAFF PRESENT:
2 3
L.
BICKWIT 4
W.
DIRCKS 5
S. CHILKS 6
D. EISENHUT 7
J. DAVIS 8
J. HARTIN 9
P. C05.' LL A to H. ; hNEKE 11 H. CUNNINGHAM 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 1
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24 25 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202D 554 2345
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DISf**1 VTT u
This is an unoMd ad =1
- ansc=dpc of a =nec1=g of de E=1:ad States N"-7==- ZaSulatory C-saion held on. January 26, 1981 f.s tha Canunf.asion's officas ac 1717 E Sc:aec, N. W., Wash 1=g mn, D. C.
Da masc 1=g ua.s open en public. at==ad=ae=- and observard m.
Dia. - -- --d?c has une bean-reviawed, cor=nc=ad, or adicad, and.
it may connais d*=e-m-=ed me.
na ------d c is i=e-d-d solaI7 for ganaral <*#c==stional puzposes.
As providad, by 10 CZE. 9.103, i: is not part of the formal or <*** mal racari of d d atm of the ma=:a:s disc =ssed.
Izpresatons of opd d m is -h c=ans. ';c du see sacassarily raflac: final dee=~~e:1ons or baliafs.
No plandt.=g or ochar paper may be. **' =d v1=h. de CommcLss1=n. i= any p scaed1=g as -h rasul= of or add..assed, to any stacamanc or arg= mar:: c="*'d_ad harmin, ezcape as the Commisaton =ay an=ho*'. a.
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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Th e continuing saga of Can We 3
Get ont Eart 60, and In What form continues.
4 Bill, we have in front of us an advance copy that 5
is lis ted e.s 81-48 A, and since it arrived so recently, I 6
doubt whether all of us, in fact perhaps any of us have had 7
the chance to understand what it is.
So perhaps you might 8
discuss it, and tell us what is in it.
9 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I dissociate myself from 10 those who do not understand what is in 48-A.
11 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I think Commissioner Hendria 12 would like to explain it.
13 MR. DIRCKS:
What it does, it brings up to date 14 with the objectives of the Executive Order 1204 in meeting 15 the criteria of the new regulations.
It is more, I don't 16 va n.t to characterize it as boiler plate, but maybe I would 17 for want of a better term.
It is a procedural aspect that 18 we can incorporate into the procedures of this rule.
19 The other items are typographical items, beginning 20 on page 2.
t 21 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
As far as the procedures, we 22 are required to make a final determination.
23 MR. DIRCKS:
Yes.
24 MR. CUNNINGHAM:
The Commission has determined I
25 that it will voluntarily comply with the Executive Order, l
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1 and in that sense you have committed yourselves.to.make a 2
finding.
That commitment was made in the action plan.
3 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
We have to take some kind of a 4
formal vcte.
5 HR. BICKWIT:
I have not seen the procedures that 6
the staff has proposed.
Are these procedures on record 7
anywhere?
What is the nature of the procedures?
8 HR. DIRCKSs The Regulations Coordinating 9
Committee, chartered by ADO, sent to the Commission a paper, 10 which is before you now, outlining in detail the schedule 11 for the accomplishment of the five-year systematic review 12 that the regulations call f or by the action plan and the 13 Executive Order.
14 It discussed the required findings.
It does not 15 at this point have procedures, those are still in the 16 development by that Regulations Coordinating Committee.
17 This will be the second paper that is before you that 18 contains one of these finding sheet.
The proposed Part 51 19 also has a finding sheet of this same format.
20 CHAIHHAN AHEARNE:
In teresting, but that does not 21 answer the direct question.
l 22 HR. BICKWITs Under those procedures, you would l
23 have a formal determination by the Commission with respect 24 to new regulations or new important regulations.
25 HR. DIRCKSs Yes, the Executive Order says that l
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the Commission must make the following eight findings.
2 HR. BICKWIT:
Then, it seems to me that if the 3
Consission wants to abide by the Executive Order, and these 4
proposed procedures, you would make a formal determination 5
and vote on it.
6 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
All right, so that item 1,
7 after we have had a chance to read it to see whether we are 8
willing to take the vote that these have been met.
9 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY Those eight findings are 10 set anywhere?
11 HR. DIRCKSa Yes, in the fact sheet.
12 COHNISSIONER GIIINSKY :
I see.
13 CHAIRHA!! AHEARNE I have four, but I guess it 14 should be eight.
15 HR. DIRCKSs There are eight.
16 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKIa One says, "The regulation 17 is understandable to those who must comply with it."
It 18 should be understandable.
19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEa That is a tough finding.
20 What is - your pleasure, gentleser ?
21 COHNISSIONER BR ADFORD:
I think that we would have 22 to do that last.
23 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
Yes.
24 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY:
What is the plan for 25 evaluating the regulation af ter its issuance, and it has ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
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1 been developed?
2 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
The second cycle of the 3
periodic and systematic review process.
4 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Is this a rhetorical 5
question?
8 (Laughter.)
7 COMMISSION 2R BRADFORD:
Back in 1986.
8 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
On Pat's birthday.
9 (laughter.)
10 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Peter wants to valt until we 11 are finished.
That probably seems to be reasonable, unless 12 when we come to vote on it we can conclude there are other 13 changes.
14 CONHISSIONER HENDRIE:
That could be infinite 15 series.
16 CHAIREAN AHEARNE:
Go ahead, Bill, and describe 17 the rest of the paper.
18 MR. DIRCKS:
The rest of it is a summary of 19 essentially changes that have been agreed to as minor 20 modifications, and we can go down through them if you want 21 to.
If you want to, we could go down through these.
22 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Let me make a suggestion.
23 The Commission has not met on the base pape r 81-48, which 24 was a rewrite and comparative text, trying to pull together 25 everybody's assorted suggestions.
What you have here in the l
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1 48-A paper are corrections on the base paper.
2 I think we ought to turn to the base paper, and 3
just keep this thing at hand, and when we get to the l
1 4
appropriate pages we can include this in.
5 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
You are not ready to take the 6
base paper?
7 CONHISSIONER HERDRIE:
I have a few nits, and a 8
problem.
9 CH AIRMAN-AHEARNE:
All right.
I see your reason 10 for wanting to go to the base paper.
11 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I must say that I don 't see 12 auch in the 48-A changes 1
13 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Before we turn to that, are 14 there any major substantive issues outstanding that anybody 15 wants to raise before we turn to the 48 and 48-A that we 16 will not get to as work through the papers.
17 COHHISSIONER BRADFORD:
No.
I think we will get 18 them all.
19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Okay.
20 All righ t, if we start with the base paper 48 --
21 This revised pape r, by the way, is supposed to capture 22 changes as of when?
23 HS. CAMELLO:
Changes as of 24 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
In other words, the A that you 25 have.
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NS. CAMELLO4 The A is to capture the minor i
2 typographical errors that we have noticed since we submitted 3
48 a few days ago.
There were several of those.
4 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Does it capture the changes There were a couple of agreements struck between 5
that 8
varicus commissioners that we all agreed to.
Did it attempt 7
to capture those?
8 MS. CAMELLO:
We tried to capture those.
9
' COMMISSIONER HENDRIEa It pretty well gets the 10 ones that I was involved in.
I don't think that it 11 necessarily gets all of Peter's.
12 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
All right.
13 COEHISSIONER HENDRIE:
Again, I think the best var 14 to get through it is to page through the document, and just 15 take them as they come.
18 CHAIREAN AHEARNE:
Why don 't we start with 17 enclosure A, if anybody has any objection or questions.
18 What is the first page that someone has a question or 19 objection to?
20 MS. CAMELL0s In the body of the paper itself, 21 beginning on page 2, we did try to get some pending changes, 22 so that you would have a guide through the paper, and know 23 exactly what changes were made and why they were made.
24 CHAIBHAN AHEARNE:
Page 2 of the staff paper?
25 MR. DIRCKS:
Ye s.
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9 1-COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Why don't we charqe l
2 through, sweep through and pick up everybody's complaints.
3 I have one on the first page.
4 Cra ig, do you really want your name on this?
5 VOICE:
Yes.
6 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEa All righ t.
7 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
What is the first page in 8
enclosure A that someone has a problem with?
9 Page 2?
Page 3?
Page 4?
Page 5?
10 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
Page 5 there is a change 11 there.
12 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I don't have a problem with 13 it.
14 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
There has to be a change 15 because one of the negotiated settlements was to treat -- to 16 say that ce would take no more than two sites, one of which 17 must he cther than salt.
18 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEa That is in there.
I don't 19 have any objection to it.
20 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I think you are right.
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Try page 6.
22 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Page 6?
Page 7?
23 COENISSIONER HENDRIEa Tilt, page 6.
That is why 24 I said, try six.
You were leaving it for seven.
That was 25 clever work, John.
I can see why you are chairman.
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ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINlA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
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(General laughter.)
2 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
What is your problem, Joe?
3 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs A minor one of language.
4 Starting at the bottom of page 5, and going through this 5
little bit about whether or not the Atomic Energy Act might 6
allow us to require alternatives to be presented.
We say, 7
starting at the bottom of page 6, "The Consission recognizes 8
that under AEA consideration may indeed be appropriate where 9
necessary and desirable to protect. health," etc.
10 It seems to me that at that point one ought to say 11 what is in the last sentence of this change.
Namely, the 12 Commission cannot say at this point that an examination of 13 alternatives would be essential for this purpose, and thsn 14 go to say, "We anticipate, however, that the fundamental 15 licensing inquiry," etc.
16 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEs It is okay with me.
17 CCHMISSIONER HENDHIE:
I would strike "in time,"
18 please.
19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Vic?
20 COMMISSIONER GTLINSKY:
I as not sure I followed 21 tha t.
22 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
The last sentence up there 23 of the first pa ragra ph on, it just dangles out at the end.
24 It says:
"Cannot say at this point that an examination of 25 alternatives would be essential for this purpose," and you ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC,
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can't tell whether this purpose means general applicable 2
standards eutablished by so on and so on, the environmental 3
review, or whether it is the AEA.
I think we ought to get 4
the last sentence up to the thing that applies.
5 MR. MARTINa Doesn't the "however" come out in the 6
first full sentence, if you do that?
7 COMHISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes.
8 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Your point is that "this 9
purpose" really refers to the health and safety provisions o 10 the Atomic Energy Act.
11 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Just so.
If I am wrong, 12 why then. wha t I propose may or may not be right, but then 13 You will also have to explain to me what the paragraph 14 m ea r.s.
15 ER. DIRCKSs You are just moving the sentence.
16 MS. CAMELLO:
Hoving the sentence would be fine.
17 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Would it be consistent?
Does 18 "this purpose" refer back there?
19 HS. CAMELLO:
Y e.;.
20 COHEISSIONER GILINSKI:
1 vonder what Peter has to 21 say.
t2 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I think it is all right.
23 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
You think it is all right?
24 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Yes.
25 CHAIRMAN AREARNE:
Anything else on page 6?
ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
12 CONHISSIONER BRADFORD:
Nothing on page 6, John, 1,
2 but I try to shuffle the various papers and fit them in 3
where they belong, it seems to me we charged past a point on 4
page 3 where I had suggested a change, and then you 5
suggested a modificaton to that.
You modification is fine.
6 This was the first of the attachments in your January 23 7
meno.
8 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes, before comments, right.
9 CONHISSIONER BRADFORDa Your changes are fine with to me.
11 CHAIRHAN AREARNE:
All right.
12 Vic, do you agree?
13 COHNISSIONER GILINSKYs Yes.
14 CHAIRHAN AHEARNEs Joe?
15 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I don't have any problem.
16 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEa All right, so that would be 17 added before comments.
18 HR. DIRCKSa Which one?
19 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
It is a JA change to a PB 20 edition.
21 CHAIBHAN AHEARNE:
This is Peter's memo of January 22 23rd, to which I responded on Friday.
23 Sam, is there a copy?
24 MR. CHILKSa Ye s.
25 CHAIPHAN AHEARNE:
SECY does have the change,.and l
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rou can get it from them.
2 HR. DIRCKSs We don 't have it.
3 COHNISSIONER BRADFORD:
You do have the change 4
there.
5 COHNISSIONER HENDRIE:
I will give you mine.
6 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Let's move back to page 7.
7 COHH'ISSIONER HENDRIEs On page 8 we begin to pick 8
up this new stuf f.
9 COHNISSIONER BR ADFORD s Yes.
10 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
This is a different enclosure.
11 This new stuff is enclosure B, and this is still enciesure 12 A.
13 COHHISSIONER HENDRIE:
I am sorry, the page in 14 48-A which has been added to is, in fact, out of 48.
15 CORRISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is right, even though-18 it says B.
17 CHAISHAN AHEARNE:
It says C, struck to B, but it 18 is really A.
19 COHNISSIchER HENDRIE:
Then stricken to A.
20 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
Is that correct, Pat?
21 HS. CARELL0s Yes.
It is actually enclosure B of 22 48-A that refers to enclosure A to 48.
It is all perfectly 23 clear once you follow the construct.
24 HR. DIRCKS:
This is our new policy of writing 25 everything in plain English.
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(Laughter.)
2 COHHISSIONER HENDRIE.
You want to add in there, 3
after saying, " DOE can request an exemption from the testing 4
a t depth requirement," "or it may decline to include, in 1
5 which case we reject, in which case they are entitled to a l
6 hearing on the denial, and would at that time have an j
7 opportunity to persuade the Commission --
8 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYs Could we change that 9
language a little bit.
10 COHHISSION ER BR ADFORD :
First of all, would 11 someone tell me why it needs to be in there?
12 HR. CUNNINGHAHs Yes.
The requirement for in situ 13 characteriration, which was added recently, appears in Part 14 51.
It says your environmental report will describe in situ 15 characterization, and that is how the requirement was 16 imposed.
17 Part 51 has the standard exemption language that 18 most of our parts, which says that you can request an 19 exemption as authorized by la w.
The language which was 20 added to the basic paper here that says that DOE may request 21 an exemption does not specify how they do that.
22 They could come to the Commission before submittal 23 of the environmental reports, and request an exemption from 24 th'e requirement to include that material.
The Commission t
25 might say, " Wait, we are a t such an early stage here, we are 1
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1 not prepared to grant that exemption.
We want the in situ 2
testing described."
3 I think under the way Part 60 is structured, 4
however, the DCE could refuse to do it, and insist upon an 5
adj udica tion.
That is what this additional language is 6
there for.
7 CAAIRNAN AHEARNEs So you are saying that ther 8
would have a formal hearing on our requirement for them to 9
do an in situ test for site characterization prior to the 10 license application?
11 MR. CUNNINGHAHa If they decline to provide that i
12 information.
If they say it is not necessary, they could 13 adjudicate whether it is necessary, and-they would entitled 14 to test that in an adjudication, unless it is the 15 Commission 's intention to say, "The only way you get an 16 exemption is by requesting one pursuant to Part 51 before 17 You ever submit the report."
18 CONMISSIONER GILINSKYa You are not saying th a t 19 there would be a formal. hearing unless DCE vanted one, are 20 You?
21 MB. CUNNINGHAHa No.
There would be a formal 22 hearing only if DOE refused to accept the initial refusal of 23 the Commission to exempt them from that requirement.
- g CHAIBMAN AHEABNE Wo uld that hearing be separate 25 from the hearing on the --
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HR. CUNNINGH AH a No, tha t would be part of the 2
hearing on the construction authorization.
3 CHAIRHAN AHEARNEa I see.
,4 HR. CUNNINGHAN:
Ihe staff would take the position 5
that the application is inadequate, and the selection should 6
be denied, and they would want a hearing on it.
7 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
Yes.'
8 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKYs I don't know, but the g
language " entitled to a formal hearing" struck me as a bit 10 hard.
If DOE comes in and asks for a hearing, I can't 11 imagine that we wouldn't hold a hearing.
12 COHNISSIONER BRADFORD:
It seems to se to lay out 13 a singularly undesirable pathway for everyone involved.
I 14 would just strike.
If DOE requests an exemption, and we 15 deny it, and they think the Commission is behaving 16 unreasonably, they can come back again.
The Secretary of 17 Energy, presumably could as to meet with the Commissioners.
18 The Lord only knows what methods are available to 1g them.
But it is ridiculous to have the disagreement persist 20 to the point that they would go to the point of filing an 21 application, have us turn it down, and then contest that 22 issue separately in the formal hearing process at th a t 23 time.
It is just not something that I would invite them to 24 do.
25 I think I. agree with you that it is a theoretical ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
I 17 1
path that is open to them but it does not mean that I would 2
sketch out in here as being something that we would 3
contemplate reasonable men doing.
4 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE.
Len, do you have a comment?
5 HR. BICKWITs I did not grasp why you had to have 6
it.
It seems to me that you could leave that sentence out, 7
and it would follow automatically from the licensing process 8
and the hearing arrangements associated with it.
9 HB. DIRCKSs That true, I don't disagree.
This 10 would tend to spell out the possible procedural ways in 11 which the exemption question could be addressed.
12 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
I would join anybody who would 13 like to strike that out.
14 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I will.
15 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
If people agree we don't 16 really need it, I think Peter's point is a good one.
It may 17 indeed be a path which is open, but it seems peculiar to 18 sketch out one among what may be several possible cumbersome 19 and undesirable paths in the regulations as though there 20 were some underlying reason.
21 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY You will then have to do i
i 22 something with the previous sentence, too?
23 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs I think you put a period 24 after " requirement," and then it reads just as it did i
25 before.
"In such a case, DOE may request a exemption from ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, I
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in situ testing at depth requirements."
Then you go on 2,
down, " DOE like any applicant - "
3 MR. MARTIN:
The decision is just to make no 4
changes to the page 8 in the paper.
5 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD This is assuming that 6
there are no other changes on that page.
7 CORNISSIONER HENDRIE I don't think so.
8 CHAIRNAN AHEARNEs Pat, is that the only change ?
9 HS. CAMELLos I believe so.
10 COREISSIONER HENDRIE:
That was the only change, 11 and in fact the subsequent pages 9 through 13 in 48-A are 12 just there because the retyping ran over to the next page.
13 So you can tear out and throw away five or six pages.
14 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
There are no other changes in 15 pages 9, 10, 11, and 127 16 COHNISSIONER BRADEORD:
Have you gone by page 127 17 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
No.
18 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD4 Is this only with regard 19 to 48-A?
20 CHAIRHAN AREARNE:
Yes.
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Now 48-A is clear to page 22 14-23 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Are there any other changes on 24 97 On 10?
l 25 Page 11, Peter had a proposal, and I had a ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
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counter-proposal.
2 COHNISSIONER BRADFORD:
I even have a 3
counter-proposal,.Tohn.
4 CHAIBHAN AHEARNE:
All right.
5 COMMISSIONER BRADFORDa This actually tended to 8
respond to all of the changes that you. had made.
Item 2 is 7
the one that responds to this one.
8 CHAIBHAN AHEARNE:
Peter, that I had made, the 9
point that I felt it was appropriate to go to our policy 10 once they have submitted a license application.
I think 11 what you are proposing is once they have submitted the site 12 characterization report.
13 CONNISSIONER BR ADFORD a Tha t is right.
That is 14 why I said, while I accepted most of your changes, I had net 15 accepted what I thought was the major one.
18 We had talked about this at a previous session, 17 and the staff had had no problem with the formulation of 18 holdi-g open meetings af ter the site characterization report 19 was submitted for that site.
20 That is, it did not make sense, and no one was 21 suggesting going to open meetings on all sites after a site 22 characterization report were received for the first on'.
e 23 But the proposal that I understood the staff to have not had 24 difficulty with was site-by-site once the characterization 25 report was in.
The meetings regarding that site i
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subsequently would be for the most part open meetings.
2 I think the formulation that was standard in the 3
Reactor Licensing Process was that you had to get the office 4
director's approval to have meetings that were not open, and 5
that is perfectly acceptable to me.
6 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
It was acceptable, or not 7
acceptable?
8 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
It was acceptable,to me.
9 I had thought ths t formulation was acceptable to 10 the staff, I have forgotten what meeting it was now, but two 11 or three meetings ago.
12 MR. DIBCKSa I would not think that it was exactly 13 what we had in mind.
The whole purpose of the site 14 characterization program was to get a process going Dy which 15 data would start being collected, nnd the NRC staff would 16 have the opportunity to participate in almost a 17 developmental learning process.
We anticipated that we 18 would have a staff assigned to these sites, and looking at 19 shafts as they are being developed, developing positions, 20 looking for research concepts to feed back into the 21 program.
22 We did not anticipate a formal process by which 23 transcripts would be kept, or formal hearings would be 24 held.
25 WR. MARTIN:
That is exactly it.
It is an ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 8 m M R0m DC@CETRL RR FT5Ft3 HM PE 1
21 1
informal process.
There would probably be hundreds of 2
opportunities to have discussions on the shape of the 3
research program, and how measurements are being made, and 4
how data is being gathered.
I certainly did not visualize 5
formalizing all that into transcripts of meetings, and so 6
on.
7 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
How about after the license 8
application is filed?
l 9
MR. MARTIN:
That is what I had in mind.
10 I thought the thing that Hanrahan and I agreed to 11 up here was more or less in principle what I had in mind.,
12 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes, that is what I had tried 13 to pick up in my comment, it was the last OPE proposal.
14 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
I wonder if there is not 15 some middle way.
It dcas seen awkward to have a requirement 16 that our man is assigned to some site, and to put a notice 17 in the Fede al Register every time he is going to talk to 18 somebody.
19 COENISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is certair'v.9, t what 20 I had sind.
21 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKYa At the same time, there 22 will be occasions when there are more formal meetings.
23 Because this is a subject on which there are so many 24 concerns, local concerns and suspicions, I think we probably 25 ought to lean over backwa rds to have those meetings ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE, S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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accessible to the public.
2 We ought to distinguish between certain levels of 3
informal data gathering and exchange of views, and perhaps 4
more formal meetings which I as sure will take place.
5 MB. MARTINa To date, most of the meetings we have 6
had with DOE that lend themselves to structure, like th ey 7
are going to brief us on what they are doing on cannister 8
development or something like that, most of those have been 9
open.
10 CONNISSIONER GIIINSKY:
Well, perhaps the 11 statement ought to simply indicate that the Commission 12 encourages the staff to arrange for these meetings to be 13 open, I hate to say, where appropriate.
14 ER. HARTIN:
I have no problem with that where it 15 lends itself to it, but if it is a discussion.
16 CHAIBHAN AHEABNE:
That I have no problem with.
17 In fact, I think that it is certainly necessary that as the 18 process continues that there be periodic discussion meetings 19 between the staff and DOE in an open forum.
But during this 20 development stage, between the site characterization report 21 and the license application, there does have to be a lot of 22 interaction just making sure everybody understands what kind 23 of information is around.
That just not lend itself to any 24 kind of a formal structure.
25 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY Nevertheless, there are ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC.
400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON 0.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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bound to be meetings of a dozen people around a tabla, and 2
papers have been prepared..
3 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
That is right, and those would 4
be appropriate.
5 COHEISSIONER GILIdSKYa How would you phrase 6
that?
We can simply say that we are encouraging.
7 MR. HARTINs Periodic progress reports, or status 8
reports.
9 COHNISSIONER GILINSKYa In an open public 10 mee ting ?
11 HR. DIRCKSa The day-to-day work on the site, our 12 engineers and technical people will be in pretty close 13 day-to-day working relationships, and this procedure would 14 not hold up.
It would be too cumbersone.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE4 Periodic status reports held in 16 public meetings?
17 MB. HARTINs Yes, and briefings.
18 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
The distinction I had'in 19 mind, when we talked about it before, was that obviously the 20 day-to-day meetings on the site between the NRC people and 21 the DCE people cannot be public.
There is just no way that 22 they could be.
23 The meeting whose primary focus was on issues that 24 were expected to arise in the course of the licensing 25 process, wha t should be in the application, meetings that ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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were focused primarily on the license from the time of th e 2
site characterization report on ought to come under the open 3
meeting policy.
4 It does not mean that you can't get an exemption 5
from the Office Director, but the thrust from that point in 6
time on for those meetings should be toward public 7
meetinos.
8 MR. MARTINS One is these periodic status reports 9
that we can develop into a public meeting forum.
I.think we 10 can talk about when we get to a point where we are 7oing to 11 formalize a set of requirements that must go into a license 12 application.
'l think that migh t be appropriate.
13 COHNISSIONER GILINSKYs What if we said, "The 14 Commission encourages holding open meetings," and we leave 15 it to the discretion --
16 MR. HARTIN:
Such as periodic status report.
17 COHNISSIONER GILINSKYs Yes, leave it to the 18 discretion of the Director.
19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEs Fine.
20 Joe?
21 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
I guess I would be happier 22 with something stronger than " encourages."
I would r,ay 23 something like "The Commission intends that, follosing the 24 issuance of the site characterization report, meetings whose 25 primary focus is the forthcoming license application should i
ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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be public."
2 CHAIBRAN AHEARNEa All the meetings?
3 COEHISSIONER GIIINSKY:
It seems to se that if you 4
say "The Commission encourages," the burden is on those who 5
vant the meetin' not to be open.
6 CHAIRMAN AREARNE:
I think Vic's thought is about 7
the best that we can get.
8 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
This would go at the end of 9
the proposed language in 48.
The proposed language sayss 10 "In addition, the provision of NRC's open meeting policies 11 set forth at 43, the Federal Register," so forth and so on, 12 "will be applied to the licensing to the extent 13 practicable."
Then it says, "Under this policy, generally 14 all meetings conducted," etc., etc.,"and the review of the 15 license vill be open to attendants."
16
'Ihen what you would say is, "The Commission 17 encourages the director to --
18 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY
'Je could say "strongly 19 encourages."
20 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
" Encourages the director to 21 provide for open meeting forums prior to the license 27 application to the extent reasonable or practical," or 1
23 s omething lik e that.
24 MR. MARTIN For example, periodic status 25 reports.
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COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
"For example, period status 2
reports," would be a good way to characterize it.
3 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
,I would strongly encouragh.
4 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
If we say, "strongly 5
encourage," we get closer to Peter's intent.
6 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Pat, do you have that?
7 MS. CAMELLO4 I don't quite have it.
I will have 8
to go to the transcript.
9 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
All right, Peter, do you have 10 any rebuttal?
11 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I will sa ve it for later.
12 COHHISSIONER HENDRIE:
He can draft up his own 13 language.
14 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Anything else on page 117 15 Page 12?
Page 13?
Page 14 16 COMMISSIONER HEP 1RIE:
Now we have got problems.
17 I don't see anything wroc/ with the 48-A corrections on page 18 14, since they seem to be of an editorial nature.
This is 19 simply correcting the text.
There are other pieces at page 20 14, however.
21 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Speak up.
COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Starting at the botton, 22 23 "and then reflectcf in the rule," this is a place where we 24 simply refe to the immediate effectiveness proposition.
The 25 first is the place in the supplemen tary inf ormation that l
l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTCN. O.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
27 1
refers to it.
2 Hy problem is gcing to come really over on page 3
32, when we get to the rule itself, and the amendments to 4
2.764.
5 CHAIREAN AHEARNE:
So is mine.
6 CONHISSIONER HENDRIE Where we have the LWA sort 7
of proposition i!! place, and I had thought we were looking 8
for something such as an adapted version of Appendix B that 9
is like the reactor case.
10 What I suggest is, why don't we wait until we get 11 to page 32 and get to the guts of the matter, and then 12 whatever we decide to do there, we can coee back and make 13 page 14 consistent.
14 CHAI3 NAN AREARNE:
Any other comments on page 147 15 CONNISSIONER GILINSKY What does it say, "It is 16 further provided that even if no hearing has been held"?
Is 17 this dealing with the theoretical possibility that there 18 aight not be a hearing ?
19 HR. HARTINs That is right.
20 CONNISSIONER HENDRIEs At the operation stage.
It 21 is mandatory at the construction authorization, but it is 22 optional at the loading stage.
CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
You say that it is mandatory at 23 24 the construction?
25 COHNISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes.
l
\\
i l
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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE4 Then why does it say, "If no 2
hearing has been held, MSS will not issue a construction 3
authorization "?
4 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEt I don't know.
I didn't 5
pick that up, I must say.
6 Am I correct in assuming that construction 7
authorization is mandatory?
8 MR. CUNNINGH AN :
No, it does not refer to a 9
construction authorization on page 14.
10 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Page 15?
Page 167 11 I assume, Pat, on the 48-A 15 and 16, are these 12 additional changes, or just~ retyped to take acccunt of some 13 shifts of space?
14 MS. CAMELLO:
Yes, just retyping.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Page 177 Page 18?
Page 19?
16 Page 20?
Page 217 Page 227 17 CONNISSIONER BR ADFORD:
On page 20, maybe the best 18 way to handle this is the same way we are the other one.
We 19 do still have a difficulty on the physical security.
20 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
The last time when we were 21 here, you and Victor reserved.
Have you reached a 22 conclusion.
23 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
I am perfectly comfortable 24 with the language that OGC has proposed with regard to it.
25 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
That is what Joe and I came out l
l l
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in agreement with.
2 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
Okay.
It is not the i
3 language that I think is in this paper?
4 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
No, because it was still held 5
in abeyance.
6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
All right.
7 CHAIRMAN AH"ARNEs You agree with the OGC 8
language, which Joe and I had agreed to ca Janua ry 6.
9 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
Yes.
10 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Do you have any objection?
1;
- CUNNINGHAM:
Staff told you at that meeting 12 that we could _
_ with that.
13 CHAIRMAN AHEAnt-V',
do you agree with that?
14 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY s Yes.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Peter?
16 COMMISSIONER BRJ-DFORD:
All right.
17 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
So that you can pick that up.
18 Back to page 22.
Page 23?
19 MR. BECKWIT:
On page 22, I think that is what you 20 sean, but I just want to raise the issue.
The reference 21 here is tha t certain things can't be changed without an 22 amendment to the construction authorization.
In the past 23 you have been the phrase "without approval of the 24 Commission."
25 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs That is a good point.
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MR. BICKWIT:
If you mean the amendment p ro ce ss'.
2 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE We mean approval of the 3
Commission, and if we find one tha t. has been submitted for 4
approval that we think is of a magnitude to require amending 5
the construction authorization, we can then make that 6
determination.
But the essential thing is the approval of 7
the Commission.
8 HR. BICKWITs I guess my question is, does the 9
permit read that certain provisions cannot be changed 10 without the approval of the Commission, thereby allowing the 11 Commission to give its approval and not change the terms of 12 the authorization.
Or, does th e permit read as an absolute 13 requirement, which as a result could not be changed without 14 an actual amendment?
15 CHAIRMAN AHEABNEa How could you go through the 16 first hearing process, Len?
How could you go through the 17 hearing process, and embed in it, here are a set of 18 requirements which are of sufficient significance that ther 19 can't change without approval.
20 MR. BICKWIT:
You make that a provisioni in the 21 permit.
J2 CHAIRMAN AHEABNE:
Once having established those 23 through a hearing process, you could change those outside of 24 the hearing process?
25 MR. BICKWITs I think so.
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COMMISSIONER GILINSKY s What is the difference 2
between having Commission approval without an amendment, and 3
with an amendment?
4 MR. BICKWITs About a year's difference.
5 COHNISSIONER HENDRIEs Minimum.
6 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Because of whether you 7
have hearings or not?
8 HR. BICKWITs Yes.
In one case, you are coing to 9
have an opportunity for a formal adjudicatory hearing, and 10 in the other case you will not.
11 COMNISSIONER GILINSKY:
You talk about a year, but 12 the fact is that you can change the f ormat of these hearings 13 if you.vanted to do so, it would not be a year, and it could 14 be a day.
15 MR. BICKWIT:
Under our rules, it will come out to 18 about a year now, if you want to fiddle with them.
That is 17 another story.
18 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
If there is a way to make 19 it come in a day, why. haven 't we done something about it in 20 the assorted proceedings now underway.
21 MR. BICKWIT:
I don 't think you could have a 22 normal construction permit in which you set all of the major 23 features changed by the approval of the Commission.
What 24 you have oot here is not a normal construction permit.
What 25 you have got is an authorization that we are using to decide ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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whether ultimately a materials license will be granted.
2 It is possible that the requirements of the Act 3
with respect to amendments do apply here, but it is not 4
entirely clear that they do.
I think they do if you regard 5
this as a partial initial decision under the Act, therefore, 6
as a part of a materials license.
7 If you treat this as something less than that, 8
then it is not clea to me that you need to go through the 9
amendment process when you are changing terms of the to construction authoriza tion.
11 COHNISSIONER GIIINSKY Doesn't that depend on the 12 level of detail of these requirements?
13 In other words, if you are talking about some 14 pretty fundamental features of the repository, then it seems 15 to se you do have to have amendments if you are going to 16 change those.
If you are talking about oth9r more detailed 17 requirements, tnen amendments may not be called for.
18 ER. BICKWIT If you are treating this as not a 19 part of the license under the Act, but rather as simply the 20 Commission's devised mechanism for ultimately reaching a 21 decision on the materials license, then the statute does not 22 apply to this in the way that it applies to construction 23 permit amendments.
If that is your concept, the statute leaves the 24 25 Commission free to determine what kind of procedures it ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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vants to use to change the terms of that authorization.
2 That is not to say that from a policy perspective, you might 3
not want to decide that where it is a basic change that you 4
vant the full adjudication, and when it isn't that you 5
don't.
6 I am just saying that it is not legally required.
7 COHNISSIONER GILINSKYa If it comes out that the 8
construction permit says that the waste will be deposited 9
between 600 and 800 feet below ground, or whatever, and the 10 change is to go to 1200 or 200 feet, it seems to me that you 11 have got to have an amendment.
12 MR. BICKWITs If you put in the permit tha t you 13 can go,.however you can go to 1200 feet, you get the 14 approval of the Conaission, then legally you don 't have to 15 have an amendment.
You may want an amendment, and you may 16 vant to go through the normal procedure, but you don't have 17 to have one.
18 MR. CUNNINGHAH Let ne point out that as written 19 the rule currently contemplates amendments to the 20 cor.struction authorization.
In 2.105 it calls for noticing 21 of such amendments if they involve or may significantly 22 affect the health and safety of the public.
1 l
23 MR. BICKWIT:
Tha t is right.
24 MB. CUNNINGHAN:
There is a clear contemplation 25 tha t significant changes will be pre-noticed, and the ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, NTLMDEG /YlL Etti NN, D.@. 64 #TWO 520 2345
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adjudicatory process will be offered.
2 MR. BICKWIT:
That is right, but what was agreed 3
to last time was changes in these basic conditions that are 4
going to be part of the authorization will be subject,to 5
Commission approval, and we never really got to the 8
Commission's sentinent as to what Commission approval 7
seant.
8 CHAIRMAN AHEABNE:
There are two categories, and I 9
think you and Victor talked about two different things.
10 Although you addressed the same items, it seems to se Vic 11 was saying, what if they come in with a proposal to change a 12 feature which they had not really discussed at length in the 13 hearing process, such as going to a significantly different 14 depth, for example.
So the hearing process really did not 15 review the adequacy of that, and now they come in and say, 18 "We want to change it."
Versus what I think you were 17 discussing, a case where the hearing process has covered 18 this range, the decision is in a narrow band of it, but it i
19 is saying if they do end up vanting to go outside of that 20 band, to come out for Commission approval.
21 NH. BICKWIT I guess I am saying tha t you can 22 phrase the concepts any way you.want to in the 23 authorization.
24 CHAIRMAN AREARNE:
You point, though, is quite 25 vell taken.
There are two significantly different ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 veRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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approaches.
2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
I guess I don't understand 3
how you get around these changes having to be amendments, 4
even if they are major changes.
You seem to be saying, no 5
matter how big the change.
6 HR. BICKWITs I au saying that you can put into 7
the authorization the requirements that these are to be the 8
provisions unless changed by the Commission, subject to 9
whatever process you want to put in there.
Therefore, you 10 are not changing the terms of the authorization when that 11 change is made.
You are simply implementing the language of 12 the permit as written.
i 13 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa But the word " amendment" 14 triggern a requirement of the law, isn't that right?
15 MR. BICKWITs If you actually amend it, my feeling 16 is it doesn 't in this case, because it is not 17 COHNISSIONER GILINSKYa Even if you use the word 18 amendment?
19 3R. BICKWITs Yes.
20 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Even if you describe the 21 change as an amendment to the license?
22 MR. BICKWIT:
Yes.
23 COMMISSIONER BRADF0BDs Are you saying that we 24 could grant the construction au thoriza tion without a hearing 25 altogether?
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HR. BICKWIT:
Yes.
2 COHEISSIONER BRADFORD:
I suppose when one accepts 3
that conclusion, then you can do almost anything you want.
4 CONHISSIONER GILINSKYa What is the reason for 5
that?
6 HR. BICKWITs Because this isn 't a license.
The 7
statutory requirement for the granting of a materials 8
license is for the granting of a license to receive vastes.
9 You can treat this as part of a license --
10 COHEISSIONER GILINSKYa You are distinguishing 11 between the construction of the f acility and receiving the 12 wastes?
13 HR. BICKWITs I an distinguishing between those 14 two.
It is clear that you must have a license for the 15 latter.
16 CONNISSIONER GILINSKYa I thought we were saying 17 just the opposite a moment when we were talking about the 18 operating stage not having a mandatory hearing provision.
19 ER. BICKWIT:
You put it in the rule that there 20 had to be a mandatory hearing, and I as saying that you did 21 not have to.
The Commission's view was that there would be 22 a hearing.
I as saying tha t it was not required.
CONNISSIONER GILINSKY:
Leaving aside whether a 23 24 hearing is required or not, it seems to me a major change is 25 sade in the license.
If a hearing is not required, it is t
1 ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, l
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not required.
2 MR. BICKWIT Certainly any change in the terms of 3
the license is an amendment to the license, or an amendment 4
to the authorization, I as saying, it is not the kind of 5
amendment which is referenced in the statute, and therefore 8
you can apply your own procedures to it.
7 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Okay.
8 HR. DIRCKSa That is what you have done in 63.
9 3R. BICKWIT:
You have just made determinations 10 which seen to se are reasonable determinations, but they are 11 not the only reasonable determinations.
12 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
What does does 63 say?
13 3R. DIRCKSa The underlined portion.
14 CHAIRMAN AREARNEs Now, 63 talks about prior 15 approval from the Consission.
18 MR. MARTIN:
That is right.
17 COHNISSIONER BRADFORDa I must say that it had nct 18 occurred to me that that would be anything different from an 19 amendment to the construction authorization.
20 3R. BICKWITs My feeling is that this is what the 21 Consission had in mind, but I didn 't know that.
I felt that 22 it had to be tested.
23 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Since we are talking here 24 about features which are essential to the protection of the 25 public health and safety --
These are pretty f un dam en t al.
ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, FMhTJEmo Ni1JE2nXIfYt"JREfa RBL FrFA3 dF5F41 GPMgrr)
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- 58. CUNNINGHAM:
I think the staff was thinking in 2
terms of amendments.
3
- 38. BICKWIT:
That is what I thought the 4
Commission meant, but the Commission does not have to mean 5
that, and they ought to decide what they mean.
6 COMMISSIONER BRADFORDa I meant tha t.
7 CHAISMAN AHEARNE:
I guess I would have to admit I 8
did not think through reopening and holding another lengthy 9
hearing.
10 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa I am not sure I understood 11 all this.
Len seems to be saying, these are amendments, but 12 not necessarily ones that require hearings.
13 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Under the statute.
14 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Under the statute.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
If that is true, then we are 16 a rg uing about how the words look, and not what they mean.
17 ER. BICKWITs It seems to me that if you use the 18 word " amendment" in here, you are going to indicate the 19 normal amendment process.
20 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes.
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I think we mean "without 22 approval of the Commission" here.
23 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
You mean, without necessarily a 24 hearing.
Peter means, I ga ther, with a hearing.
25 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD :
If you look at it in terms ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, l
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of the way Victor phrased his example, that is, the permit 2
is issued, you might
.ve a condition that is stated that it 3
was the view of the Commissio*. that you had to be between 4
600 and 800 f eet.
That was at e of those conditions that was, 5
felt to be so essential that you had to have approval of the 6
Commission to change it.
You can write that auch 7
flexibility in at that point, or you can make it between 500 8
and 900 feet, if you felt that you had to do it that way.
9 But what you are string is that if you are going to to go cutside of whatever engelope we draw up for you at the 11 time we issue the constructit n authoriration, then that is 12 significantly enough differest, and will be based on 13 evidence difference from what the public had a crack at, and 14 what all the interested parties had a crack at on the first 15 go-round.
You do have to subject that to a hearing test is again.
17 CHAIRMAN AHEABNE:
Yes.
18 The problem that I an having, Peter, and let me 19 see if I can phrase it.
Witlout us saying this, I think 20 there would have had to have'been such a process that you 21 d es cribed.
If after having 3 aid out, here is what is 22 authorized in the constructisn, and they want to do 23 something different, then the y would have had to come back 24 just as you have described.
l 25 But I though t what we were trying to do was imbed j
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the concept that there may ba come features that we want to 2
narrow even more, and if ther want to modify within this 3
broader construction, they still have to come back and get 4
a pp ro val.
5 COMMISSIONER BRADF01Da My concern in raising this 6
quastion originally was that in reactor construction permits 7
there has been this difficult) that no one has ever had to 8
r:ome back no matter how great the change.
9 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
'e s.
10 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
What I was trying to do 11 was to state clearly here that there would be some 12 conditions based on which you sould have to come back.
It 13 was precisely because the perfectly logical assumption that 14 one would have to come back that you were making did not 15 seem to me to hold, based on past agency practice, that I to suggested we have a category of conditions that would 17 require coming back.
18 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes.
1g COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Isn't the reason because 20 these conditions tend not to get written in the construction 21 permit?
22 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD4 That is right.
23 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
What you are really doing 24 here is saying that, yes, we vill lay out those conditions 25 that will flow f rom th e hea ring.
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CHAIBMAN AHEARNE:
Once you do that, there is no 2
need, is there, to talk about not coming back f or a pprcval --
3 MR. DIRCKSs Those are the conditions in the 4
license.
5 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
They are the conditions in the 6
license.
7 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa I understood Peter to be 8
saying that there will be conditions in this license, and 9
not a further narrowing of the conditions of the license.
10 CHAIBEAN AHEARNE:
I think I am going to have to 11 think about the right way to phrase this to make sure that 12 we do what is necessary, and not do what is not wise.
13 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa In writing the license, 14 one has to think, what are the conditions under which you 15 would reopen the licence, or what are the boundaries that 16 have been covered in the hearing beyond which it is a new 17 ballgame.
18 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
That is exactly the jg point.
20 COMMISSIONEB GILINSKY:
Otherwise, you can run a 21 hearing on A, and do B, and there is nothing tha t prohibits 22 it.
It may never have been considered in the hearing.
23 CHAIRMAN AREABNE:
I think at the stage that it is 24 now written, it may go beyond just saying that the license 25 will have specific conditions in it.
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COMMISSIONER GIIINSKYa That is what I took to be 2
the intent.
3 C HAIRM A N AHEARNE:
Joe, do you have any comments 4
on this?
5 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE4 Yes.
In principle, at a
least, it should be possible to distill from the hearing and 7
the decision of the board some general propositions which 8
you would regard as fundamental in the determination that 9
had been made, assuming that it was a positive to determination.
11 You would say, "We are going to write these down 12 in the license, and any change in these things will require 13 r eo penin g the hearing," and so on.
Certainly you can do 14 that in principle.
I am sugge s ting that you allow more 15 flexibility than that by using the phrase "with approval of 18 the Commission."
17 What I have in mind is the following:
If the 18 things you write into the license are going to be such that 19 you have to stay within them, or the hearing reopens, you 20 will drive the draf ting of those things in the direction of 21 more general and broader limits than would be the case if 22 you were simply asking DOE to come back and get an approval 23 from NRC for some adjustment.
24 You could, for instance, include a little more 25 detail in you license conditions, be a little more specific ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
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43 1
with them if you wanted to know about changes in those 2
specific items, but didn't feel you necessarily would have 3
to go to hearing on everyone of then.
I don 't know whether 4
I can make a good example or not, but let me try.
5 The hearing is probably going to produce the 8
result that there ought to be an overpack, some kind of an 7
overpack cannister, with certain properties.
Whatever you 8
are going to say about it in the license, if you are going 9
to reopen the hearing for any adjustment on Lt, you are 10 going to have to phrase it'in terma of what would be an 11 appropriate overpack.
12 If it is with approval of the Commission, you can 13 say that it will be a coppar overpack of minimum wall 14 thickness 2.7 inches, and sealed with seven bolts, because 15 that was the standard desion.
If it turns out that a 18 titanium overpack with three bolts is just as good, and 17 meets the same objectives, if they can come back and shcw 18 Tou why that is so, and you can approve that change without 19 having to reopen the whole hearing, you have more 20 flexibility then, and you f eel a little more able to be more I
21 specific about the things you write in.
I think that from l
22 our standpoint that that might be desirable.
23 Certainly, under the way I would propose it, a 24 change or some adjustment in those things that are written 25 in the license is proposed by DOE, and indeed a ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
u4 1
determination would have to be made here as to whether it 2
were of a magnitude that required reopening the hearing, f
3 1.e.,
an amendment to the authorization, or whether it was 4
an adjustment that could simply be approved by staff, and if S
the Commission vanted to nod over it, it could.
i 6
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Would you add a sentence 7
here saying that the Commission will determine which of 8
these changes are so significant as to require a public 9
hearing?
10 COHNISSIONER HENDRIEs Yes.
It could be that 11 whichever var we go here, that it may require a few more 12 words up here in the supplementary information in order to 13 clarify this point about, is everything in the license 14 inviolate without reopening the hearing; or, could some 15 things be simply approved.
I think we may need a little 16 more description in here.
17 len, you were starting to nod.
Do you think so?
18 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD a I can't completely let jg this sort of description of the license go by, because what 20 ve have been talking about up to now I thought were two 21 different types of conditions.
Class A conditions, which are the ones references 22 23 in this section, as being the ones that you can vary without 24 amending the license.
Then a second category of conditions 25 that would also be in the license, but would not be stated l
l A6DERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
45 1
in that particular section, with regard to which the 2
Commission could say whatever it thought prudent.
On some 3
of them, we might want notification of change, but no prior 4
approval.
With some, it might just be stated in there as 5
regard to what the Commission expectation was, but not even 6
a notification requirement.
7 COENISSIONER HENDHIE:
All right.
8 CONNISSIONER BRADFORD:
It is with regard to the 9
limited class of conditions that this requirement of prior 10 approval was ever intended to a pply.
That is what was 11 intended to keep us out of the straitjacket that your 12 example suggested in which everything that appeared in the 13 license --
14 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
You would put down the more 15 specific ones with the notifica tion requirement, and then 18 leave it up to us to say, " Hey, wait a minute.
Don't do 17 that unless we check you off on those for which we would 18 like approval rights.
19 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is right.
It is not 20 even inconceivable that you would condition the same 21 requirement two different ways, that is, with regard to 22 Victor's depth example earlier.
You might say, "If you are 23 going to go outside of 600 feet or 800 feet, you have tc get l
24 approval.
since we expect you to be at 700 feet, we would j
25 like to know it if you are going to go outside of 750 or ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
46 1
650."
2 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes.
3 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
It was never my 4
expectation that every condition that was stated in the 5
license ought to automatically fall under this requirement 6
for prior Commission approval, i.e.,
amendment.
7 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes, I see.
8 If we adopted that configuration, I suspect that 9
it might be useful to have a few lines explaining that in 10 this section.
11 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I suggest that it is absolutely 12 necessary, because I doubt as the years go by that there is 13 going to be very much of a memory around this Commission of 14 the subtle differences.
15 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes, just to nail it down.
16 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY:
You and Hendrie can be 17 consultants on the meaning of this document.
18 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
What a fate.
39 MR. MARTIN:
Is it the intent that we have certain 20 kinds of conditions that are so important that there would 21 have to be an amendment, and then others.
From my 22 standpoint, I would certainly want to have a category of 23 conditions you can lay on that are subject to change later.
24 I can think of dozens of things that could require 25 change, and certainly we wouldn 't want to have the lesser ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
47 1
kind of license conditions fall in the cracks here.
2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
We are talking here about 3
a small number of essential elements.
4 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Pat and Jack, do you think you 5
have followed this discussion so that you can write such a 6
modification?
7 MR. MARTIN:
That is why I brought this up.
The 8
idea is that you may have two categories, one of which are 9
so essential, and others which may be approved without to reopening the hearing.
11 MS. CAMELLO:
But you would still want prior 12 notice.
13 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes, prior approval.
14 MS. CAMELLO:
Tha t is what I mean, prior 15 approval.
16 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
If you go Peter's way, you 17 have a class A kind, and you can't tinker with those without 18 an amendment to the construction authorization, which I 19 think we are inclined to think means reopening the hearing.
20 MR. MARTINS Correct.
l 21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Those would presumably tend l
22 to be few in number, and perhaps generally phrase, but would 23 set down essential safety features, probably ont each for 1
24 the waste form, the overpack, etc.
l 25 Then there would be a batch of, what shall we call ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, l
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48 1
them, type B specifications, and for those we would want 2
notific_ation from DOE before any change was implemented.
3 The point in phrasing it notification is that we can then 4
decide whether we want to tell them, "Please don 't do that 5
until we think about it and agree with you."
Or, we simply 6
say, "Ckay, you have' notified us, that is good enough."
7 MR. MARTINS I don't like that idea because that a
results in us never getting around to deciding that we don't 9
like it.
10 For example, there will be a monitoring program 11 that there will have to be some consensus over several 12 decades of time, and I would certainly like to approve 13 changes to that monitoring program to make sure that 14 everybody agrees with the program, so that when 15 decommissioning time comes, we are all agreed on it.
16 I would certainly.like to have a number of things
- 7 like that laid out, where they have to come back and get is approval to change them.
I guess I have seen too many cases 19 where we get notified of things, at least in tne licensing 23 cases I know of, but never get around to really raising the 2.
issue.
22 Maybe there could be a third category of things 2's that they should notify us about, anu those could be written
(
- 4 in the license also.
- 15 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
There is no reason why the ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
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49 1
categories that has been talked about here needs to reopen 2
the license.
In other words, you can have those which 3
reopen the license, as we talked about a few moments ago, 4
those that regelre approval, those for which notification is 5
required.
You may not want a third category.
6 ER. MARTIN:
In that second category, you can word 7
them any way you want to.
8 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Hight.
9 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEt Len, can.you set it down to the var Peter arranged this thing.
In the version we talked 11 about here, the notification was just to avoid having things 12 that you put in the license that you said, " Don 't enange 13 thel: without approval," to avoid the question, "should they u
no to hearing or not."
15
' CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I think you can specify that.
16 COHNISSIONER GILINSKY:
Another way to say is, the 17 license will state the limits of the validity of the 18 license.
19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I would want us to spell that 20 out a little.
You are righ t, that is what is being i
21 discussed, but you want to spell it out.
22 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
You could add the word 23
" fundamental."
l CHAIBMAN AHEARNE:
I think if you have the two 24 25 categories, it is adequate.
l l
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HS. CAMELLos There wouldn't be a problem in just 2
adding language to the supplementary information to indicate 3
that C describes both categcries, and that they would be
)
4 identified later?
5 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I would think that that 6
would be enough, wouldn't it?
7 HR. BICKWITs The categories being those that 8
require approval by amendment, and those which require -- I 9
am not sure on your second category, is it notification or 10 approval?
11 MB. MARTIN:
I prefer approval.
12 CONNISSIONER ER ADFORD:
Jack prefers approval.
I 13 am not sure that you have to distinguish between the second 14 and third categories at this point.
In other words, each of 15 these conditions at the time they are imposed in the license 16 vill have their specific terms, limits, or what-have-you, 17 vritten into them then.
18 All I was ever trying to state here was that there 19 would be some features considered so essential that if ther 20 were change, it would require reopening of the license.
l 21 MS. CAMELL0s You have a tended amendment here, 22 even COMMISSIONER BRADFORD Even though it said prior 23 24 appproval --
25 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
But this needs to be ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
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amplified to get an indication that we contemplate both 2
kinds, otherwise we will not have not noted our purpose.
3 MR. BICKWIT:
Then there is a residual category, 4
as I understand, that would require neither notice nor 5
amendment?
6 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
You mean neither approval?
7 MB. BICKWIT I think different people are talking 8
about whether there are two categories and a residual, or 9
three categories and a. residual.
10 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
You mean there are some 11 residual things that would be in the license tha t they could 12 change and we wouldn't care about it?
13 5R. BICKWIT:
Where you would not even notify, 14 yes.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEAREE:
Why would they be in the 16. license?
17 MR. BICKWIT:
That is what I am trying to 18 understand.
19 MR. MARTIN:
There is no residual category.
20 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I don 't see why there should 21 be.
l 22 MR. BICKWITs Okay.
l 23 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
That is what a license is, 24 it says what you can do.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Except th a t what Len was 25 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
52 1
describing is a residual category is a residual category 2
that we stricken from the license.
I think it is your basic 3
reactor CP.
4 CHAIRMAN..HEARNE:
That has been a debatable 5
issue.
6 MR. BICKWIT:
There are certain things under our 7
regulations which don 't have to get approval or where you 8
don't even have to notify the Commission when you want to 9
change them..If you.want to exclude that category, then you 10 are down to, I think, three categories.
11 There will always be notification at the very 12 least.
The re will be approval of some, and there will be 13 amendment approval of some.
If that is the concept, it will 14 be easily drafted.
15 CHAIRHAN AREARNE:
I would think so.
16 MS. CAMELLO:
If that is the concept.
17 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Page 237 Page 24?
Page 25?
18 Do you have a change to page 25, pa t ?
19 HS. CAHELLO:
It is rather difficult to cali 20 changing a "shall" to a "may" a typographical error.
It 21 certainly was an oversight.
It was some debate at one time 22 among the staff as to whether it should have been "may" or 23 "shcll."
Everyone wanted "may," but for some reason the 24 paper that was used during the debate did not reflect that.
25 So we made the change here.
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CONHISSIONER BRADFORD:
Does anybody have the 2
o riginal?
Was this originally the Hendrie/Gilinsky, or the 3
Hendrie/Bradford?
In aar case, this comes directly from a 4
modification agreed on among the commissioners.
5 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE _ Yes, I have that some 6
place.
I don't remember what I wrote there.
7 COHEISSIONER GILINSKY:
Why sculd you write 8
"may"?
Didn't we agree on "shall"?
9 COREISSIONER BRADFORD:
I think that we agreed on "may" here.
to 11 COHHISSIONER GIIINSKY:
It is not consistent with 12 what we did elsewhere.
13 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
What I wrote down is, "The 14 director may fini the environmental report to be not 15 complete," etc.
16 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa Why would you say " mar"?
17 Nevertheless, isn't that inconsistent with the agreement 18 tha t there has to be --
19 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
No, it is the way one 20 normally writes regula tions.
21 MS. CAMELLO - The language that is reflected nov 22 on page 25 picks up on the language of Commissioner 23 Hendrie's memo of January 9th, which is the enclosure G of 24 48.
It is written in the margi's.
25 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE.
Yes.
ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC.
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)
1 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
What I wrote in the margin 2
was dictated to me over the telephone by the staff, who 3
said, "Here is the way we ought to do it."
I said, "That 4
sounds pretty good," and I wrote it down.
5 (General laughter.)
6 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
You told me to say "may,"
I 7
said "ma y. "
We agreed to "may."
You vent back, and you 8
could not type it "may," you typed it "shall."
9 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY I did not look every word to because agreed that in situ testing was required.
But 11 elsewhere we just vent over language saying that if the in 12 situ testing has not been done, the director will deny the 13 license.
14 MR. MARTIN:
But isn't the issue here that we all 15 agree it ought to be done.
I think we agreed once before 16 that it doesn 't necessarily have to be all complete by the 17 time you accept tha application, but it has to be complete 18 bef ore you act on it.
This would make it mandatory that you 19 turn it down.
20 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
So you are saying that it 21 is not inconsistent with the requirement that in situ 22 testing is mandatory.
23 MR. MARTINS Right.
24 MR. DIRCKS:
This says "may" in regard to the site 25 characterization data.
You remember when we talked about ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIM""* *V5. S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 564-2345
55 1
four, and if you are talking about three to five, or 2
something like, you don't have to bring all sites across the 3
finish-line at the same time in the same condition before 4
your construction authorization expires.
There should be 5
enough in there to allow for a meaningful comparison, but 6
not the full-blown --
7 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
We said that there had to 8
be three sites and at least two, media.
let's just stick to 9
that number.
Suppose they come in one at a time?
10 HR. DIRCKSs As they will be.
11 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Suppose the first one 12 comes in, does that need to have site characterization 13 data?
14 ER. DIRCKS:
The first construction authorization, 15 or the first site characterization?
16 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
This is a instructicn 17 permit?
18 HR. DIRCKS:
Yes.
19 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYs For a particular site?
20 HR. DIRCKS:
For a particular site.
We said, 21 "Before you do that on a particular on a pa rticula r site, 22 -you have got to do site charactarization on a couple of 23 sites."
But we did not say that you had to complete in 24 every detail the same amount of data on every site.
25 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Does he have to have the ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
56 l
1 characterization for the site for which he is applying?
2 HR..DIRCKS:
Yes, he would have to have that, but 3
you would not have to say, if you are talking about three or 4
four sites and doing site characterization on three or four l
5 sites, you would not have to do all three site 6
characterization studies, or four site characterization 7
studies in the same detail for all four sites.
You can say, 8
"We have enough now to allow to allow a construction 9
authorization to go forward.
We have enough data in the to material collected."
11 CH.A IEN A N AHEARNE:
This isn't to say that if all 12 the information is not there on all the sites, the director 13 can say, "dere is the date by which you must have it all."
14 CONHISSIONER GIIINSKY:
I hope this is not going 15 to happen, but suppose you get site characterization on one 16 site.
You start the application going.
You are not getting 17 the other data.
This one looks okay.
You get a request for 18 an exemption because this one looks okay, and it would take 19 a lot of time to do the others.
Wha t happens then?
20 MR. DIRCKSs You have to institute testing on all 21 the sites, but you don ' t say th at they have to dig the 22 tunnels and shaft to the same degree of completeness as they 23 have on one.
24 MR. MARTIN:
You have to do it sufficiently to 25 make some comparison.
i l
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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
So you would go with the 2
language?
3 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
I guess I agreed to that 4
before.
5 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes.
6
?OHNISSIONER GILINSKY:
I am not sure that it is 7
not inconsistent, at least I hope that it isn 't.
8 COMNISSIONER BRADFORD:
There is one little piece 9
of archeo.'.ogy that needs to be done.
The draf t that the 10 Commission actually ag reed, the word " required" appeared in 11 the third line between " include" and " site 12 characterization."
If you turn to the third from the last 13 page of SECY paper I can show you where it has gone.
14 What has happened is that the Xeroxing has chopped 15 it off.
It was my insert to Joe'c draft, and apparently 16 when it went down to the staff all that got left on the 17 paper was the caret mark and the line, and the words 18 themselves disappeared.
19 It is very clear what happened if you use the 20 81-48 paper, and just look at the third page at tne end of l
21 it.
22 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Ye s.
23 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEa You are right.
What are 24 the words?
25 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD "Be required."
ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 CO2) 554 234S
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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
So you would go with the 2
language?
3 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa I guess I agreed to that 4
before.
5 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes.
6 COHNISSIONER GILINSKY:
I am not sure that it is 7
not inconsistent, at least I hope that it isn't a
CONNISSIONER BRADFORD:
There is one little piece 9
of archeology that needs to be done.
The draft that the 10 Commission actually ag reed, the word " required" appeared in 11 the third line between " include" and " site 12 characterization."
If you turn to the third from the last 13 page of SECY paper I can show you where it has gone.
14 What has happened is that the Xeroxing has chopped 15 it off.
It was my insert to Joe 's draf t, and apparently 16 when it went down to the staff all that got left on the 17 paper was the caret mark and the line, and the words 18 themselves disappeared.
19 It is very clear what happened if you use the 20 81-48 paper, and just look at the third page a t the end of 21 it.
22 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Yes.
23 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
You are right.
What are 24 the words?
25 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
"Be required."
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58 1
COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Pat, do you have that?
2 MS. CAMELLO:
Yes.
3 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Peter, do you agree to that?
4 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Yes.
5 VOICE:
There is another change on page 257 e
CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
What you originally told Joe to 7
put in was environmental report.
8 VOICE:
Fine.
9 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
That is what we had agreed to.
10 Is page 25 all right?
11 Page 26?
Page 277 Page 287 Page 297 Page 30?
12 Pat, your modification does wha t?
13 MS. CAMELLO:
Again that is a typographical 14 error.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
All right.
Page 317 Page 32?
16 COMMISSICNER HENDRIE:
Tilt.
17 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
At page 32, ve have the initial 18 decision issue.
19 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Somehow I thought we were 20 to do an adapted Appendix B here, rather than an LWA.
21 MR. BICKWIT:
We had proposed Appendix 3 itself.
22 There waF some resistence to that.
My interpretation was 23 that what you wanted something on the order of the LW A.
24 CHAIRMAN AREARNE:
I think that is what the 25 majority of us felt.
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COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
An LWA is --
2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Where do you see LWA?
Are 3
you characterizing it?
4 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Joe is characterizing it.
5 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
This thing isn't quite an 6
LWA either.
If you recall, for a reactor under the LWA 7
regime the board could treat the environmental issues and 8
the site related safety issues, and issue a partial initial 9
decision, sayinga "We think that it is all right to start 10 building up to some point, while the rest of the proceeding 11 grinds on with the other safety related matters."
12 The applicant was able to start digging up the 13 ground, and doing that construction when that decision 14 became effective 10 days af+er the board's proposition.
15 What you are proposing here is that the licensing 16 board will make a determination, and the appeal board 17 process will then grind all tne way to its final 18 conclusion.
Then the Commission review will take up, and 19 either will review or will not review, if we review our 20 review will come to a final conclusion at least with regard 21 to wha
- are called " site suitability," etc., issues, if 22 those are separated out, and lead the thing.
If they are 23 not sepa rated out, then it is the whole basket that goes 24 through this process.
25 People keep saying, we don't do very many waste l
1 l
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repositories, so it is not something that people will be all 2
practiced running a hearing, so the hearing is likely to be 3
a fairly lengthy one.
Then people say, "Well, you know this 4
will be the first one of these the appeal board has ever 5
seen, and they are not going to do anything shoddy and 6
swift.
They are going to take a long time."
7 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I would like to go on record 8
that even on those that they see quite frequently, they 9
still do not act shoddily.
10 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Nor swif tly.
11 It looks to me as though we are looking at a 12 process which simply is going to run on embarrassingly 13 long.
It would not surprise me a bit to see the appeals 14 boa rd take a year after an initial decision by a licensing 15 board to work through what will be before it.
16 CHAIRM%N AHEARNE:
I thought that it could be more 17 like two.
18 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Conceivably it could be 19 two, particularly if they decide to have some oral 20 presenta tions, and so on.
The Commission, I suspect, will 21 want to take review at least to show that its hand has been l
22 on this object, and it is not just standing back and ducking i
23 while it whirzes overhead.
! don 't know how fast the 24 Commission will move, but it will be hardly less than a 25 couple of months, I would think, and ptobably a little l
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longer than that.
2 For a proposition that has already been fought 3
through a lengthy hearing, and produced presumably a 4
positive decision if there is going to be anything b uil't,
5 people are going to be pretty ticked about not being able tc 6
make any move for another, I don't know, a year and three 7
months to two years and a half, while the appeal procedure 8
and the Commission work through.
9 That is why I had said, why don't we adopt the 10 appendix B procedure we use for reactors to this process.
11 let the licensing board grinds its way through the 12 proposition, and come to an initial decision, or a partial 13 initial decision, if we separate lead with the site 14 suitability issues.
15 Then, let's do the same thing we do for reactors, 16 give the appeals board 60 days to scratch its head over any 17 stays to effectiveness of that decision that are proposed,
18 or consider on its own motion whether there should be a 19 stay, and make a recommendation to the Commission.
Then let 20 the Commission ponder upon it for something on the order of 21 a month, and then let it go forward, or a part of the 22 construction go forward, if we think that a ppropria te, while 23 the rest of the appeal process and the Commission final l
24 review work themselves out.
25 The reason that I think that ought to be done is, I
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one the one hand I recognize the Commission's feeling cf 2
need to have its hand on that decision that allows 3
construction to start, rather than just having it start by 4
automatic operation of the board decision and then the 5
director automatically signing off.
6 On the other hand, stop and think what we are 7
coing to have at that time.
We are going to have a site, 8
and it is going to have two shafts already dug into it, two 9
because the Bureau of Mines or the mine 'afety law requires s
10 two and not one shaft.
At the bottom, down at depth, there 11 is going to be a chamber, and various drifts off from it 12 with various kinds of experimental apparatus in it, and so 1
13 on.
It is not what I would call really a pristine and 14 untouched site at that point.
15 If, indeed, you authorize construction to go 16 ahead, there isn't any great and profound, and irrevocable 17 change that is then going to take place, which you are going 18 to feel bad about if in the course of the appeal process 19 something you had not foreseen subsequently turns up and 20 causes you to further condition the license, or whatever.
21 I would be very much against a process which left 22 us unable to authorize the project to go forward, at least 23 in part, for times much greater than, let us say, 90 days 24 af ter an initial decision of the board.
25 MR. MARTIN 4 May I point that there are at least ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.
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three different versions before the Commission.
The one in 2
the main paper here was the version submitted by staff in 3
December, which was briefly discussed at a Commission 4
m ee ti ng.
The General Counsel proposed an alternative by 5
memo of January 19.
6 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
- Yes, 7
HR. MARTIN:
That memo moved, Commissioner 8
Hendrie, in the direction that you are seeking.
The General 9
Counsel's version was then subsequently modified in 10 to Commissioner Bradford's memo of January 11 23rd.
12 HR. BICKWIT:
General Counsel initially suggested 13 Appendix B.
14 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
What you have in the GC 15 meno, I think, is more like the LW A.
16 CHAIBMAN AHEARNE:
Yes, we do know those pieces.
17 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Let me find Appendix C.
18 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
You read this 19 two-and-a-half year process, I gather, in the words "Until 20 review by the Commission has been completed."
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes.
22 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Suppose. it said something like "until Order of the Commission"?
23 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Then, so far as the 24 25 language of this regulation, you would not be constrained in ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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sy view to track all the way through the whole appeal in the 2
Commission review process, but in fact it would mean just 3
that.
The director can't go anywhere with the beard's 4
decision until he gets an okay from the Commission.
If the 5
Commission then chose to adopt some procedure like the 6
reactor Appendix B procedure, it cou?.d do so.
7 We could either do that, or we could spell out in 8
a little more detail what we contemplate.
Ordinarily, I am 9
sort of philosophically not in favor of spelling it out much 10 more than is absolutely necessary in regulations 11 themselves.
Since we do have a procedure set down in the 12 reactor case, it is at least worth talking about, whether it 13 would be usef ul to have a little more indication here of 14 what that Commission approval means.
15 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Frankly, I wanted to put is the Commission more squarely in the path of the decision 17 than Appendix B puts us in the reactor case, simply because 18 it is one of a kind.
I think here the Commission needs to 19 be doing more than having its finger on the choke point.
20 CHAIBMAN AHEARNE:
You in the past had proposals 21 on the appeal board.
Would you have any comments on Joe's 22 concern to bring in the appeal board in this process?
COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY I don ' t k now.
I have 23 24 always favored the two-step adjudication process.
I am not 25 sure that this is the righ t vehicle to redo our appeal ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.
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process.
That is more or less your suggestion.
2 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I was just trying to get some 1
3 mechanism.
I think I agree with you on that I don't see the 4
Commission involved in just taking a quick look.
I think 5
there has to be more direc'c involvement.
This would mean to i
6 me that there are two major reviews, and I did not see a 7
third.
8 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY :
In somewhere along the way 9
ve decide to ~go to a two-step adjudication process, i t will 10 immediately also apply to this case, since in whatever rule 11 ve write we vill have an indication of what happens to all 12 the pzinding cases.
Is I don't think that it doesn't make sense to have 14 an rppeal process that just runs on for years while we are 15 building things, and all the important decisions that relate 16 to it.
You are really just tidying things up for the court, 17 which is why I would like to see it compressed.
I am not 18 sure that to try something f or this particular case is the 19 vay to go about doing it.
20 I think that by saying "By order of the 21 Commission," you put the Commission squarely in it.
22 CHAIBMAN AHEARNE:
Yes, and you leave open tae 23 particular set of procedures that would then be followed.
24 COMMISSIONEB GILINSKY:
Right.
(
25 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Which might not be bad at this
[
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stage.
2 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I have not heard any rush 3
of acclaim for the proposal I circulated on Friday, unless 4
it sounded somewhat like what Joe was talking about.
5 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I will tell me what 6
bothered me about your Attachment 3, Peter, and that was, if 7
the Atomic Safety and Licensing Appeal has completed its 8
review of all issues raised on appeal or its own motion with 9
regard to radiological suitability, environmental 10 suitability of the site, safety, and so on and son.
11 What yours does, it seems to me, the Commission, 12 in fact, can authorize a portion of the construction to go 13 forward, but not until the appeal board has ground all the 14 way through, and we have then ground on their report with 15 regard to these site suitability issues, safety, 16 radiological safety, radiological safety, and 17 environmental.
Then, of course, the safety and 18 environmental acceptability of that portion of construction 19 to be undertaken.
20 I am not sure to buy you a whale of a lot, because 21 it seems to me tha t the hard arguments in this case are the 22 site suitability ones, rather than arguments about whether a 23 copper overpack, or a stainless steel overpack is precisely l
24 the righ t one.
25 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
It only buys you time, 1
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Jie, if you structure the proceeding from the beginning with 2
an eye toward having those issues decided first at each 3
stage.
4 You are quite right that if everything reaches the 5
appeal board at once --
6 COHNISSICNER HENDRIE:
But if that turns out to be 7
75 percent of the storm fury and litigative energy in the 8
case, yes, it is a. help to have it up front, but not a whale 9
of a lot.
10 C HEISSIONER BRADFORD:
On the other hand, how 11 could you start construction in any serious way without 12 having made those three findings for the agency in any 13 case.
Is there a more limited set of findings that you 14 would suggest one could make?
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I think the argument is whether 18 the appeal board has to go through that in complete detail.
17 COHHISSIONER BR A DFORD 4 There would be no point in 18 having the appeal board continue to work on it after the 19 Commission had authorired construction.
20 CONHISSIONER HENDRIE:
They do under Appendix B on 21 reactors.
22 CONNISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is what we are trying 23 to avoid, I thought.
That is on " th e risk of the applican t" 24 theory that really just doesn't have much applicability in I
25 this context.
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CHAIRMAN AREARNE:
I was trying to avoid the 2
appeal bcard from doing that for my purposes.
3 My concern with Peter's proposal is that it would 4
not really lead to a significant removal of that second 5
tier.
6 COHNISSIONER HENDRIE:
It is not framed to remove 7
the second tier review.
It is aimed like the LWA provision, 8
to try to take the case --
9 CHAIF5AN AHEARNE:
I understand what it is aimed
,10 that.
11 COHHISSIONER HENDRIE:
Let's take some issues in 12 the hearing, and push those up front.
13 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEs I understand that.
I just 14 don 't believe, whether it is a single administrator or a 15 commission at the time this comes up, but whatever is the 16 agency, I don't see the agency authorizing going ahead with 17 the construction of the first high-level waste reccsitory 18 without a substantial review.
19 I think you are automatically going to have two 20 leng th y reviews.
I don't believe that it is appropriate to 21 build in a third.
22 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
If one could be sure that 23 the Commission would, in fact, go at this the way the appeal 24 board does now, in the sense of taking what would be a 25 20,000 page or so record and reading it, then there would be ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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a lot of merit to what you are saying.
But I don't s.iink 2
that we can be confident enough that the Commission vill 3
have so little else before it in whatever year this comes up 4
tha t you would get the kind of review that we normally do 5
get from the appeal board.
6 I think it is clear to all of us that there are 7
two ways, perhaps, to save time here.
One is to try and put 8
aside some of the issues before one can start construction, 9
and that is my approach.
The other is to put aside the 10 review, and that is your approach.
11 I must say, considering the overall times involved 12 here, I am not sure that the saving of tinc at the outset 13 makes all that big a difference.
That is, one does not want 14 to stretch out time once construction is started, but 15 whether it starts in January of one year versus January of 16 another, at the end of this decade, probably does not make a 17 big difference over the span of time that we are talking 18 about for the vaste storage.
19 I am all for start.ing it as soon as one reasonably 20 can.
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE4 I think l't makes a lot of 22 different to the project people who would hope to build it, 23 and so on.
The process we contemplate is one which seems 24 very, very lengthy at best.
25 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I don't feel that this would be ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
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a year.
I feel it would be much more like an antitrust 2
case.
3 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD4 It takes time in an 4
antitrust case, or at least wha t takes a staggering amount 5
of time is the initial decision of the huge trial.
6 CHAIBMAN AREABNEs The appeal board review have 7
tended to take --
8 COHNISSIONER BBADFORDs I am thinking of antitrust 9
cases in general, and not just this agency.
10 CHAIBHAN AHEABNE:
I think in our case we do have 11 to look at agency practice, because it is a function of how 12 f amiliar is the system with the particular type of case.
13 This would be the one.
14 COHEISSIONER BR ADFORD s I should think, though, if 15 the Commission at the time the application comes in sayss 16 "We want this case structured in a way that issues relevant 17 to an early construction authorizrt1on are decided first, 18 and reviewed expedit!.ously."
We have nevet laid that. kind 19 of a charge on the appeal board with regard to antitrust 20 cases.
In fact, I thini there is probably some tendency to 21 put the antitrust cases to one side when the press of work 22 gets too heavy.
So if the system is charged the other way, 23 I think tha t those issues could move separa te.
24 I don't hold this out as having the potential to 25 save years, it clearly doesn't.
But I don't it loses much i
1 ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. O.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
71 1
compared to cutting the appeal board out, and I al reluctant 2
to do that for other reasons.
3 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Victor has solution te defer 4
action.
5 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa Suppose we said, "Until 6
Order of the Commission," and then say that the Commission 7
will find with respect to radiological site suitability, and 8
environmental site suitability, and whatever else it feels 9
sufficiently confident, it agrees that construction may 10 begin.
That way you would be a t least spelling out what the 11 Commission's Ceder has to deal with.
12 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEs That would be fine.
13 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
You are not saying one way 14 or the other about the appeal board at this time.
15 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKYs Right.
16 Picking up your points, the Commission Crder would 17 have to say more than it is okay.
18 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
I think in the interest of 19 progress this may be as well as we are going to do.
20 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs I would like to suggest a 21 procedure.
I would like to see that written dcwn before we 22 try to decide one way or the other.
I would also like a 23 chance for the collective legal and technical staffs tc 24 scratch head over it, and ree what they like or don't like l
25 about it.
I don't want to decide today.
ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.
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CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
It leaves the issue open.
The 2
advantage of it is that it moves the rule forward.
3 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs A procedural rule which 4
comes down finally and leaves a void between the steps -- It 5
sayss Here a :e steps one, two, three, four.
Then it gets 6
to step 42, and then says, "Well sometime thereafter there 7
vill be a decision, and we are not going to explain in this a
procedural rule how we get f rom step 42 to the end."
9 COMMISSIONER BRADFORDs That is not what it says.
10 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
No.
11 CHAIRMAN AHE4RNEs After all, Joe, in the next 12 five years, long before this would have to be resolved, 13 there might actually a little more understanding of the 14 process.
All the giants of the earth are not walking around 15 at the acaent.
16 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I an unprepared to agree 17 with that.
18 (General laughter. )
19 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY:
I think also once an 20 initial decision comes down, I think this whole issue is 21 going to be reviewed by the Commission.
The' Commission is 22 going to have to deal with it, and since the rule says --
23 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
It may be that the 24 formulation "o-are heading toward is one that can do it, 25 but I would to see it draf ted, and people scratch their ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
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head.
As soon as we can come back to it, let's come back to 2
it.
i 3
Before you leave tha t point, I thought it was very 4
helpful, remember back when we were doing the policy 5
statement that turned out to be Appendix B fer reac' tors, one 6
of the concessions we made to our late colleague was that 7
the Commission would either do something, or say why it was 8
unable to do something in a certain number of days.
I think 9
that on balance that is probably a useful prod to have in 10 the language, and I wonder if it is possible to consider 11 some similar provision here, not 20 days, but some 12 proposition.
13 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I was very strongly in favor of 14 it at that time.
15 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
I was not wild for it the 16 last time around.
I guess I can't point to any situation in 17 which it has made any difference.
18 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
We have ye t to have an 19 Appendix B case before us.
20 MR. BICKWITs We had a small one up recently.
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
You mean the Zero Power 22 situation?
23 MR. BICKWIT Yes.
24-COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
It was a useful prod in 25 tha t case.
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COBHISSIONER BRADFORD Was it?
2 HR. BICKWITs It was to our office.
3 (General laughter.)
4 COHNISSIONER HENDRIE:
That is right, it moved 5
him.
6 COHHISSIONER GILINSKY:
But the fact is, there is 7
going to be no lack of pressure.
8 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Len, you will try to draft 9
something for us?
10 HR. BICKWIT:
Yes.
11 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Page 327 Page 337 Page 34?
12 page 35?
13 Those of you who have a page 36, which I don't --
14 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD s Not 1.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
What is page 36?
16 F,S.
CAMELLO:
I don't have a page 36 either.
17 Whatever it was, it has remained the same.
I can find an 18 earlier page 36.
19 (General laughter.)
20 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
Under the assumption, which we 21 vill trust you to verify, that 36 is as it was.
22 Page 37?
Page 38?
Page 39?
23 Does anybody have any changes in the remaining 24 pages on the issues?
25 MS. CAMELLO:
Page 36 deals with Part 21 solely.
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COMMISSIONER HENDRIE Other than definitions.
2 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Ra ther than counting out avery 3
page, does anyone have any --
4 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
You still ove se a staff 5
guidance meno, but that would not be part of this anyway.
6 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEs Which staff guidance meno is 7
that?
8 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is the one where we 9
indicate to the director that at any point in the process 10 that calls for his approval in the rule, he is to consult 11 with the Commission.
You, I think, were no t in f avor of it, 12 but the other two were.
13 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Was I?
14 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
You were as long as it was 15 not put in the rule, but was made the subject of a staff 16 guidance meno.
17 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
So you are in favor of having 18 the director come back up to the Commission every time he 19 has to do his job.
20 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs Well, he would be doing 21 that at six-month intervals, I think.
22 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
No.
23 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Don't they send you things 24 every six months?
25 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
No, we changed that.
We ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY. INC.
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76 11 changed it to where the director can request information 2
ftom DCE whenever needs to.
3 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Yes, but expect to get sort 4
of a six-month regular repo rt, don't we?
5 MS. CAMELLO:
There are ssei-annual reports that 6
DOE has to sake on the progress of site characterization.
7 COHNISSIONER HENDRIE:
He can always go and ask 8
for things in-between, we allowed that.
But the regular 9
flow, sort of the formal reporting, as it were, of the to project will come in the semi-annual reports.
He will write 11 a letter back saying, " Wishing you lots of 1r.ck," or 12 whatever is appropriate.
I think it is not inappropriate 13 that he come and brief us on what the semi-annual report 14 was, how things are going, and what he is writing back.
I 15 don 't find tha t a problem.
He may find it a problem, but it 16 belps to keep the Commission informed of what is going on.
17 CHAIBMAN AHEARNE:
Correct me if this is wrong, 18 Peter, but my impression was that you were going beyond a 19 briefing on the semi-annual reports.
Whenever the director 20 was going to give his approval to something to the DOE, he 21 should first consult with the Commission.
22 COMMISSIONER BBADFORD:
There are not that many 23 points in here, I think, where the director's approval is 24 called for in the rule.
But you are quite right that on
(
25 those occasions where it is called for, my point was, in i
I l
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essence, that he shou? d brief the Commission as to what it 2
is that he is approving on a consultative basis.
3 I guess we would stop him if the majority 4
disagreed, but 5
COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY:
Are you saying that he 6
would send up a note saying, "I intend to approve the 7
following," and would in so many days.
8 COHNISSIONER BRADFORD:
The only thing I can 9
resember of f-hand that I know that this would cover is the 10 approval of the site characterization plans.
What other 11 situations are 'here in there that explicitly call for the 12 director 's approval ?.
13
- 55. DIRCKS:
Is that during the site 14 characterization phase?
15 COMMISSIONEF BR ADFORD:
I think in the rule 16 itself, what is there beyond the site characterization plan 17 that explicitly calls for the director's approval?
18 MR. MARTINa That is a major event.
It really not 19 approval, it is comment.
That is what I understood, that we 20 would come down and give you a briefing on what action we 21 would intend to say.
That should not be a problem.
There 22 are not many of them, three or four.
23 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is right.
24 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE I think you would want to 15 come and keep us informed anyway about their progress and ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
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what they were reporting, and what you were planning to say 2
back by way of written comments representing the agency.
3 3R. HARTIN:
I think we discussed that.
4 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
I think the point I was trying 5
to make is that as the future time develops, I think the 6
administrative reponsibility for the flow of information is 7
something that has to be worked out by the then Commission, i
8 or the then head of the agency, and the then staff.
9 I don't think that it is a good idea to try to pin I
10 down at this stage administrative reporting arrangements.
11 Certainly if it were tomorrow, I would certainly expect them 12 to come in and tell us what they are doing.
13 C0hMISSIONER HENDRIEs Pindown is a peculiar i
14 word.
This is a staff directive we are talking about 15 vriting.
16 COHHISSIONER BRADFORD:
That is exactly right.
1
{
17 COHNISSIONER HENDRIE:
Which we would publish at 18 this time, and that would stand as sort of a Commission to 19 Bill or John when they get a repository project going.
At 20 any time, our successor commissions can send down another 21 staff meno saying, "We thought it over, and never mind.
We 22 don't want to hear about it," or whatever.
I 23 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I want to reiterate that I was 24 not saying that whoever is running the agency would not want 25 to hear about it.
It is just it did not seem to me that we ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345
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were attempting to pindown, knowing that we are not going to 2
be the ones sitting here hearing about the comments.
We 3
were still putting into place an administrative procedure 4
that was hot going to affect us.
5 COEHISSIONER BRADFORDs The only point in that 6
same category was that we agreed that the technical rule was 7
to speak to some extent as to the criteria for what was in 8
these sites.
9 CHAIRHAN AHEARNE:
Wasn't that in the staff 10 correspondence?
11 COHHISSIONER BR ADFORD:
If it already has been, 12 fine.
13 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
I think so.
I know one went 14 out in the last week.
15 COMMISSIONER BR ADFORD:
Okay.
16 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Do you have anything else, 17 Peter?
18 CONNISSIONEh BRADFORD:
No.
19 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEr Jae?
20 COMMISSIONER HENDRIEs Item 1, my recommendation 21 is that on page 76 of the Enclosure A, about six or seven 22 lines from the bottom, that you take out the old English 23 spelling of full-time, " additional f ull-time inspectors,"
24 unless it means something other than full-time.
25 The second thing is with regard to our extended ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, j
Ci3 VIREINiA AR @,We WSIN8 TON, @,@. EiO4 q@ 020@00
l 80-81 1
discussions about the immedicte effectiveness aspect.
It 2
seems to me that we are not going to be able to enunciate 3
that section without some suggestion or idea of what the 4
appeals board is or is not going to do in the process.
5 What I recommend is that counsel and assorted 6
legal authorities scra tch their heads, and see what they 7
would recommend to us.
8 CHAIRMAN AREARNE:
It is possible, however, to 9
leave 42 open.
I think your point is that you would advise 10 against th a t.
11 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
I would advise against 12 that.
It seems to se a bad thing to do to issue a final 13 procedural rule, which does not in fact tell you how you get 14 from the.beginning to the end.
15 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
Any other comms2ts?
16 COMMISSIONER BBADFORDa It has been pointed out to 17 se that if I were to adhere honestly to the spirit of my 18 agreement with Joe on the language on page 63, we should in 19 fact drop the word " explicitly."
You had talked me out of 20 that one before~, and you should be permitted to keep it.
21 COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
Thank you, Tom.
You saved 22 a terrible miscarriage' of justice in language.
23 Take out explicit?
24 MS. CAMElL0s I have it.
COMMISSIONER HENDRIE:
May I have the name of the 25 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345
o 82 1
typist who keeps typing back in --
2 CHAIRMAN AHEARNEs No, you may not.
That does not 3
extend to your preroga tives.
.4 Any other comments?
5 (No response.)
6 CHAIRMAN AHEARNE:
The meeting is adjourned.
7 (Whereupon, at 4.10 p.m.,
the meeting adjourned.)
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON DmC 20024 (202) 554 2345 q
1 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the i.. %
COMMISSION MEETING in the matter of: Discussion and Vote on SECY-81-48-Final Rule to 10 CFR Part 60 - Disposal of IIigh-Level Radioactive Wastes
- Date of Proceeding: January 26, 1981 Docket liumber:
Place of Proceeding: 17ashington, D.
C.
were held as herein appears, and that this is the original transcript thereof for the file of the Commission.,
Patricia A.
Minson Official Reporter (Typed)
... n.)
r, 4./h a. d. u_N_ _ =
Official Reporter (Signature) y l
I
..s l
V
SECY-81-46A Jan. 26, 1981
?s g-j RULEMAKING ISSUE (Affirmation)
For:
The Commissioners From:
William J. Dircks Executive Director for Operations
Subject:
FINAL RULE 10 CFR PART 60
" DISPOSAL OF HIGH-LEVEL RADI0 ACTIVE WASTES IN GEOLOGIC REPOSITORIES-LICENSING PROCEDURES" (SECY-81-48)
Purpose:
To forward to the Commissioners for their approval, infor-mation implementing the Commission's policy to support Executive Order 12044 Minor page modifications to SECY-81-48 are also enclosed.
Discussion:
In accordance with its announced policy to support the basic objectives of Executive Order 12044 to improve government e
regulations, the Commission has directed the staff to develop appropriate procedures, including procedures designed to implement the criteria for the approval of significant new regulations set out in section 2(d) of the Executive Order.
This paper requests the Commission to make a formal deter-mination that the final procedural rule 10 CFR Part 60 satisfies the criteria for the approval of significant regulations set out in section 2(d) of the Executive Order.
The attached fact sheet (Enclosure A) which contains information relating to these criteria, has been prepared to assist the Commission in making this determination.
The Regulatory Flexibility Act (5 U.S.C. 601) applies only to rules for which a notice of proposed rulemaking was issued on or after January 1,1981. The proposed rule for 10 CFR Part 60 was issued on December 6,1979; thus, requirements of the Act do not apply to the final rule for Part 60.
3ECY NOTE: This paper is NOT identical to advance copies which were distributed toWmmission offices on January 26,1981. Pages 21 through 24 of Enclosure B
Contact:
(referred to on page 2 of the basic staff paper) have C. Ostrowski, SD been added.
443-5981
%<Q
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~
1 f%9'O h
January 21, 1981 Q
SECY-81-48 RULEMAKING ISSUE (Affirmation)
For:
The Commissioners From:
William J. Dircks Executive Director for Operations
Subject:
" Disposal of High - Level Radioactive Wastes in Geologic Repositories--Licensing Procedures" (SECY-80-474 and lupple-ments SECY-80-474 A-D)
Purpose:
To forward to the Commissioners for their approval a copy of the subject rule in final form which includes all changes, in compara-tive text, made in the rule as a result of Commission meetings on SECY-80-474 and its supplemental papers, SECY-80-474 A-C.
This paper presents only changes in the rule and its supplemeni.ary information.
Corresponding changes in the staff analysis of public comments (Enclosure B of SECY-80-474) will be compiled and forwarded to the Commission after all related outstanding issues have been resolved.
Discussion:
On October 17, 1980 the final rule 10 CFR Fart 60 was forwarded to the Commissioners for their approval for publication (SECY-80-474).
The Commissioners were first briefed by the staff on November 26, 1980 at an open meeting on this paper.
At that meeting, Chairman Ahearne announced that r.egular meetings between the Commissioners and the staff would be scheduled every two weeks until outstanding issues were resolved.
In response to issues raised at these regular meetings, a number of changes and clarifications in the rule were proposed by the staff and submitted to the Commissioners as SECY-80-474 C (12/9/80), SECY-80-474 D (12/11/80) and an untitled paper (presented at the 12/22/80 meeting).
In addition to SECY-80-474 per se, Commission discussion also included consideration of several internal memos and a letter from DOE relating to the final rule - 10 CFR Part 60.
Tnese include chronologicaily:
(1) a memo from Leonard Bickwit, Jr. (0GC) to the Commissioners dated 12/10/80 and herein submitted as Enclosure B: (2) Commissioner Bradford's 12/18/80 memo to Chairman Ahearne and Commissioners Gilinsky and Hendrie (Enclosure C); (3) Edward Hanrahan's (OPE) 1/6/81 memo to the Commissioners (Enclosure D); (4) the 1/6/81 memo from Leonard Bickwit, Jr., (OGC) to Chairman Ahearne, and Commis-sioners Gilinsky, Hendrie and Bradford (Enclosure E) and (5) the T
~ 3 fd
1/6/81 letter from Mr. Worth Bateman (DOE) to Chairman Ahearne g
(Enclosure F).
Proposed revisions to the rule yet to be discussed 3 Eg at a Commission meeting on SECY-80-474 are included in the 1/9/81 memo of Commissioner Hendrie to Chairman Ahearne and Commissioners Gilinsky and Bradford (Enclosure G) and ir two memos dated 1/16/81 from Commissioner Bradford to Chairman Ahearne and Commissioners Gilinsky and Hendrie (Erclosures H and I).
pg p
Contact:
SECY NOTE: This paper, which is identical to Advance copies, which Colleen Ostrowski, 50 were circulated to Commission offices on January 21, 1980, 443-5981 g
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