ML20009A669

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Transcript of 810617 Commission Meeting in Washington,Dc to Discuss & Vote on OL for Facility.Pp 1-30
ML20009A669
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Site: Sequoyah Tennessee Valley Authority icon.png
Issue date: 06/17/1981
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NRC COMMISSION (OCM)
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ML20009A670 List:
References
REF-10CFR9.7 NUDOCS 8107130459
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{{#Wiki_filter:, e, .m. i .-u 5 v~.- ND~~-*U RIGUI.ATORY CObOCSSOCN ~ ,.m 'OG / f COmiISSION MEETING In de MilLM" Cf: DISCUSSION AND POSSIBLE VOTE ON I OPERATING LICENSE FOR SEYUOYAH-2 CATE: June 17, 1981 PAGZs: 1 - 30 A=. Washington, D. C. 9 AL.DICL%.Y REPORTLYG 4 0 0 7 *. g d-a Ave., 5.*4. ~4 ashing =n, O. C. 20024 d Tal.aph::e: (202) 554-2245 8107130459 810617 PDR 10CFR PT9.7 PDR ~

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1 i l I' UNITED STATES OF AMERICA i 2i NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION i I 3i i 4; l l g 5 y Discussion and Possible Vote on 3 6; e g Operating License for Sequoyah-2 R 7I i n 8! n d I 9l d I 5 10 l z i = j 11 ! Room 1130, 1717 H Street Northwest, I 12, Washington, D.C. 5 g 13 l Wednesday, June 17, 1981 = E 14 I E l = 2 15 ' The Commission met at 2: 44 p..n., pursuant to notice. I x I = l j 16 l BEFO RE : l A l 17 JOSEPE HENDRIE, Chairman. E i E 18 JOHN AHEARNE, Commissioner. C t 19 ! PETER BRADFORD, Commis s ioner. 5 i f 20 i VICTOR GILINSKY, Commissioner. i 21 ! Present for the Office of General Counsel: i 22 l Leonard Bickwit, Esq. l i l M. Malsch, Esq. l 23 ' i Present for the Office of the Secretary: 24 > S. Chilk I l 25 ! 3 I s i 1 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC. l-L. j

I l l 2 I 1 Present for the NRC Staf f: l 2) H. Denton i I 3l H. Shapar i l 4! C. Stahle l I e 5 D. Quick i 3 N l 3 6! D. Rathbun m R R 7i R. Mattson i s 8 8! n I u 9l i. h 10 i E l 11, 2 t 3

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I 3 i i I l P ROCEEDINGS 2' CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: If the Commission could come to i 3l order, please. 4l We meet this afternoon to continue our discussion of I e 5 the operating license application for Sequoyah Unit 2. Let me 8 i j 6l ask if the Staf f would like to bring us up to date since our 1 E I 7l last meeting on this subject a week ano. -2 3l 5l Harold, I see there are a couple of pages here which d i 9 I take it represent viewgraphs you would like to lay hands upon z o I y 10 l and talk about. z E $ IIl MR. DENTON: Well, I'm not sure we need viewgraphs, 3 y 12 l but let me describe the two pieces of paper. One labeled 5 l g 13 ' " Status of Construction Items" shows that since our last meeting, = i

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E I4 l the number of open items on the I&E punchlist has been cut about { 15 ' in half. And if you'd like to go into that, Don Quick is here =. g 16, from the region to describe their progress in completing the w U. - i 17 plant. tr 3 18 [ CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Why don't we hear from Mr. Quick. r s I9 s Don? E 20l MR. QUICK: Since our last meeting on June 9th, we i i 21 have had tour inspectors at Sequoyah consistently, throughout j i 22 f the weekend and so forth. TVA has been very cooperative in I i 23 ' ]t getting the completed packages to us for verification, and i as indicated on this 24 ) the inspectors have managed to close out i 25, handout that you have. t i i 1 .) ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INu. i

4 i I Eight of the 10 original items that we.re listed on 2I the " prior to fuel load list" -- actually 12 of the items that i I 3j were listed on the Laitial criticalicy list. This number is i 4l in error here. There was one more closed out late yesterday I 5 afternoon. And one of the two items prior to full power. For g S l i -g 6; a total now of 22 outstanding items as license conditions. R \\ 7l I have with me, in the event that any of you would l ~c j 8l like to go into any of the details of the items remaining, I d 9! have the reports on the :emaining items which are, for the most E l 10 i part, final reports, and lack only the implementation of the E h Il f corrective action ".o one degree or another. 3 j. 12 ; We have indicatior.s that TVA expects to have the l = i, -a 13 :- completed packages to us for at least 50 percent more of the g = m i 14 remaining items within the next week. t ( 15 l COMMISSIONER AHEARME: How long do you expect it will i = s j 16 ; take to finish these two items that have to be completed prior i d 17 to fuel load? E t c g 18, MR. QUICK: One of the two items deals with security, C i l l9 which happe ts to be compensatory measures cf stationing guards M 1 20 l at the containment personal airlocks. That item has been t fconnittedtobyTVAtooursatisfaction. The only thing we are 21 s 22 ' waiting on, on that, is the written word. The residents have l I l 1 23 ' already verified that they have implemented the interim recuire-l l i 24 j ments, so we can close that item out as soon as we get the f 25, written piece of documentation from TVA. I i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. 1

1 ~ t l 5 1 - The second item deals with the remaining preoperational I, 2i tests to be completed, of which there are six tests that are in 3i progress now, and only one additional test which is the 4 engineered safety feature integrated functional test, which is s 5 to be conducted this ccming weekend. 'E j 6, Those tests will or should be all completed by mid to R i 7 the latter part of next week. Nj 8l COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: So that -- we got a memo from d d 9l Harold. You mention a fuel load date of June LSth. That i = \\ y 10 l could not possibly be -- E l j 11 MR. QUICK: No. The current projected fuel load date 3 y 12 l now would be approximately six days following the start of the = i g 13 integrated engineered safety features test, which would put fuel = z g 14 ' load -- assuming that there are no problems with that test E g 15, would put fuel load on the 27th, a week from Saturday. t g 16 That completes my presentation, unless you want to go m i 17, into any specific items in more detail. E i r M 18 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Comments? e 19, MR. DENTON: The second item I wanted to mention was n i i 20 j a few changes in the license frcm the one provided last time. 21 We have provided this time a license for low power and a license i i 22 l :or rull power. There are just four changes, I think, : rom l) 23 l what were in the previous versions. l I' 4 24 i One reflects the commen' you made, Mr. Chairman, ll 5 I 25 l regarding tne emergency support facilities, the need to clarify l t 4 1 ii ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. I

{ 6 1. what the requirement was. I 2i Another reflects the fact that'a report has been 3 received from the Licensee, so we have deleted a previous I 4l requirement. I g 5i And then in two areas, we have added a requirement that S ] 6l certain control room design changes and one other minor change g, 7 be completed prior to going above 5 percent power, and they are s j 8 described in the sheet labeled " License Revisions." d 9 CEAIRMAN HENDRIE: Let me ask a question about the ze r 10l' ice condenser hydrogen ' control system, that requirement which h z= j 11 l was set up at the time we went ahead with Sequoyah Unit 1 for 3 i y 12 ) January 31, ' 82 as the time to provide assorted things. How is c. i = 13 that program going along, and does it look as though there might = m 3 14 ' be a need to extend the January 31, '82 date to allow orderly h I 2 15 conclusion of the program, including all the elements we think x 4 = i j 16 ' now ought to be in it? A p 17 MR. DENTON: Let me ask Roger Mattson to respond to

== 1 18 ' that. I consider it a very tight deadline. We have been workir.; I 19, toward it, but he would know more the exact status today than I j. M 20 ' do. 21 : MR. t1ATTSON : We are scheduled in the next couple i. 22 of weeks to sit down with the people involved for the several [ i-23 Licensees who are in that program, to discuss how it's going. i i 24 You will recall that we gave the Licensees some i i 25 ' responsibility ror picking some of the parameters to be i i

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l l 7 i j investigated. For example, which event sequences to analy:e, in i 2l addition to the S2D sequence. We would like to hear what their 3 thoughts are and whether they have made any progress, whether 4l there has been any philosophy that's evolved. L 5l We have done some thinking ourselves and test. the... e I. ~ N N 6, progress daat's been made. e I mf7 I think it's been everybody's understand' ig that Igl the schedule was tight. I would like not to relieve that i d i g 9; pressure at this point, but I think we all have to understand Y I E 10 l that we may end up, come next fall, with most of the answer, but i_ l not all of the answer. 5 11 E g j2 I If that's the case, I assume we would be allowed to z _= i s 13 ! make a technical case that they had done enough to justify f E 14 l continued operation with the distributed ignition system, but d i u o there was more that we wanted to do. E 15 = \\ E i I think one must think of a continuum of learning as we T 16 ; ?s 17 ' progress along the road towards the degraded core rulemaking, to d E 18, which this interim system will eventually tie, that speaks to = u 5 19 ' some flexibility in this area. l 5 We are continuing to watch to make sure we haven't 20 done anything counter to s afety with the distributed ignition l 21 l 22 j system. We haven't learned of anything. We continue to answer l 23 questions that have been raised on the system. Progress is l t t being made. l 24j 9 I COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: I gather you feel, then, it 25 I I ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. l

o i 8 l l I I j would be premature to be talking about sliding the schedule at 2l the present time? i 3 l' MR. MATTSON: Yes. I have no hard evidence that we i I 4 should slide it at this point. e 5 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: No hard evidence? N 3' 6 j MR. MATTSON: Well, I may in a couple of weeks. R

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COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Well, let me ask you this : e i g 8l If you are-talking about a certain amount of work, and d I 1 x 9 ! you'd like to see it done earlier, that's one thing, but one. z i o i y 10 l thing that concerns me is whether the way the program is laid z i = l II l out is very much tied to the date when it is to be completed, 3 y 12 l and by tying it to a rather early date, we may be leaving some ~4 I ~ 13 things out, or are not looking at some things as carefully as we h 14 ! might otherwise. + E 15 j Would perhaps a date a little further on allow us = l g 16 to do it -- I don't know, more sensibly, or gather some other s ( 17 things in that one might like to see in the programs? E l 18;; j MR. MATTSON: That's possible, but I think we view j c ii b 19 ; this as two programs. One to write off, if you will, on the i s I A i l 20 l distributed ignition system against a somewhat arbitrarily chosen j l f 21 ! design basis for the distributed ignition system, a sort of I l 22(logicalstoppingpointbetweentheolddesignbasisandperhaps 23 ] some different design basis ) in the future, with the whole i l 24 in-parallel research program involving a number of pecole in i 25 l industry and a number of research dollars by NRC on the l l l i i l i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. l i

l 1 9 l. degraded core rulemaking. I 8 s 2 It might be that one ought to look at these two things 3 as a package in deciding whether the dates have been set right 4 or not. You may be thinking f putting more in distributed 5l ignition system research package than we were. g 9 j 6 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Well, I didn't have anything R i 7l specific in mind here, except that we would be putting together

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9; presumably to a number of reactors. Does this program give us 2 i oy 10l' enough time to really settle on that? z i = j 11 l MR. MATTSON: Well, there are people who are raising I y 12 l that question, including people on my staff, and it's too early 5 i j 13 l for me to advise you whether to delay it or not. We simply m i g 14 haven't seen a report back from these people as to what progress 9 i 5 g 15 ; they have made at this juncture. f j 16 ; We are due to receive that in a few weeks, and we d 17 can certainly get back to you after we hear it, and answer the E 5 18 question better than I am able to do today. I i { 19 I would not remcVe the pressure at this point. I think 20 ' there needs to continue to be pressure on people to produce } 21 l a second wave of answers to this question, and within a year l t i 22 of the first wave of answers, that the technology will continue i 23 ' to progress if sufficient pressure is kept oi. 24 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: I certainly want tc see a l l 25 i second wave of answers. i I i 3 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC.

I j 10 i i I COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: If Joe is willing to trust us, i 2i why don' t we wait until he can come back to us some other time? 3 I guess at a time he might be better able to -- 1 4f COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Just to pursue this a little I g 5 further, to meet a January deadline means settling with the 9ag 6s Staff some time before that, means completing a research program, U l M 7 probably at the end of the summer. n 8l MR. MATTSON: October is roughly the timeframe. 0 9 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Is the end of the research ~ I i ~ 10 ! program? z Il MR. MATTSON: Yeah. Well, that's when we expect to B ( 12 j have the information we need to give a final approval to the ? y '3' distributed ignition system. Given our past proclivity to look = x 5 14 for confirmatory research even after we have approved a design, E g 15 l one might guess that the research program would extend beyond = g 16 that, especially if there is something more to learn about 4 y 17 hydrogen ignition systems in preparing to reach conclusions N l -{ 18 ; about the degraded core rulemaking, or whether they belong on j r l i 19 ' the shoulders of only these Licensees, or need to be shared = 20l among some other Licensers. For example, the MaIk III contain-i;- i 21 ! men ts, i 22, COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: They are not involved at this 23 point, are they? i i l 24] MR. MATTSON: I don't believe so, no. 1 i 25 ; COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Because we may well feel that _ ALDERSON REPORTING C_OMP ANY, INC. _ _

I j 11 I the system is satisfactory for continuing with reactor operatio... 2I but at the same time feel that one really needs to look at the 3 problem further. i 4j In fact, I would guess that that's where we are leading. 1 g 5l MR. MATTSON: There definitely will be more information 5 j 6l needed for the degraded core rulemaking than there will be for a a i 7< aS l final approval of the distributed ignition system for ice A j 8i condensers. O 9 Certainly there will be a need for more information z 9 I g 10 ! on Mark III containments than there is for ice condensers. Not 3 II l more, but different information. t "E 12 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: And I would guess there would be 5 g 13 even questions about the behavior of the igniters that we would = m 5 I4 still want further work done on? t i .{ 15 l MR. MATTSON: Reconfirmatory research, perhaps, that = i g 16, can't be done between new and October, even though a lot of -A l l g 17, this is analysis, what one expects for hydrogen and steam for E t 18 ;l the various event sequences, and how important are those event } l = i. 3 I9 l g sequences to the risk at a particular plant. Can you look at 20} the same set of sequences for one station as another station. 2I CHAIRMAN HENDRIE : Well, there are several plants { l i 22 ! that are all tied to this research program, both Sequoyah units, i 23 ' the :1cGuire license is tied to it. i i l 24 MR. MATTSON: D.C. Cook, American Electric Power. i a l i 25 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Cook is in it. So far they have F i l j ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC. i.

72 I not benefited from any directions from us in this regard. 2l Well, for the time we are building up conditions in a i I 3l number of licenses that relate to this program, I would say 4l you ought to try to let - the Commission as soon as you see a' I g 5l clear need to adjust the date, let the Commission know about it -- E 0! MR. MATTSON: We would hope to have the Office of ) cE 7-Policy Evaluation, perhaps its consultant, attend the meeting A i i 8' s j where we can get a report on what progress has been made on d 91 x ~. the research program. 2 o 0" 10!' CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: I think the Commission would be 3_ l 5 II ! inclined to go along with any reasonable adjustments there 3 l E 12 l that would improve the information flow, the ultimate information E 4 d 13 ' . low. g-f I4 i N j COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: Harold, looking at the schedule-3 15 ' j which you sent out, are the steps that you -- the start-up g i d I6 l sequence, are there specific functions that are done at the 10 -A 17 g percent, 30 percent? Are those the actual break points in start-i i { 18li up? c8 t 2 I9 l - CHAIRMAN HENDRIE : That's the way I understand it. E l 20 l MR. DENTON: They are certainly close to that. Let j~ t-f il 2I i me ask Don, who may have looked at their actual prog ram. This 3 22 was provided by TVA, and I look it to be illustrative, but not 23 ' necessarily the exact time or power level. i- 24] MR. QUICK: I have not looked at the detailed scheduta i-l i l' ) 25 ) to be' able to give you dates or anything like that, but there are ; i l 6 l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. I

13 1l hold points at each power level plateau. I 2' COffiISSIONER AHEARNE: 10 percent is an explicit power 3 level plateau. i 4l Mit. DENTON: This is a typical type. e 5 COMMISSIONER-AHEARNE: I noticed that the low power E l D i 3 6; license you have brought in this proposal is 5 percent, and I si 7 wondered what is the -- if 10 percent is a specific plateau, s j 8 what is the -- is there some strong reason for other than d

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historical for~having lowepower be 5 percent, rather than 10 ioy 10 percent? El 11 MR. DENTON: The 5 percent was originated by the Staff 3 y 12 l last year, and it was intended to permit a minimum amc.unt of Ej 13 testing and minimize the fission product inventory. I don't i xg 14 i think it has any particular tie or value different than 10, or -- i 2 15 { COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Wasn't that originally tied z = y 16 ; to Sequoyah l's schedule of tests as just a way of getting the m d 17 thing going as early as possible, and 5 percent allowed them z 7 i si 18 i to do some of the natural circulation tests? 19 MR. DENTON: That's right. The original thought was t 20 to be able to complete these tests, such as natural circulation, 21 you had to have some power, and I think the power in the core i i that was considered maybe necessary was on the order of 3 percent, I 22 I i. i 23 and rather than cry to prejudge exactly the power level, we l 24 rounded it off to 5, and then took a look at what risks were 25 j posed by 5 percent operation compared to full power, and concluded A ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.

i ) i I 14 1 that they were acceptable, for certain classes of plants. 2: COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Now that was a way of keeping ? 3l things going, and that attained a certain status. It was applied i 4) to a number of reactors. 5l CHAIR W HENDRIE: Other ccmments? e E I -7 i 3 6! Harold, what else? e i E 2 7! MR. DENTON: That completes our planned presentation. -n 8 8.i CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Okay. You've got draft licenses d = 9l before us at both 5 percent and full power, so I take it the I E 10 ; Staf f is prepared to go on full power license at this point. 5 5 11 ; MR. DENTON: That's right. i 3 ~ d 12 ': CHAIRMAN EENDRIE: That you haven't retrenched since z t O i i 13 l last week, then. i E A 14 ' Well, I continue to favor that option. Vic, have you t 2 15 ! changed your mind? x = i 16 i COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Kell, I thought we should have B A y 17 approved low power a couple of weeks ago, and I haven't really i x E I at ---well nothing has been submitted since then, except what 18 ; c L l C l l I 19 ; we have seen today, and I would still go with the low power 5n 20 l approval and expect that the plant will get full power approval i. 21! soon,. because among things 'it's the second of two units, and so 22

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i, 23 But, you know, theotherdayweapprsvedinthemorning[ i McGuire at low power. Everybody thought that was a great event. l 24j F

i 25j COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

No, that's not quite accurate, I-i e t a 4 1 -. A. LDERSON RE.P OR. TIN G COM P ANY. INC.. -..

I 15 1! that everybody thought that was a great event. I 2l COMMISSIONER 'GILINSKY : Well, most people did. i 3l In the af ternoon, we dealt with Sequoyah, and somehow i 4! doing the same thing with Sequoyah, which is almost an identical \\ s 5i plant at the same stage of completion, seemed to pose problems. n D i j 6' It seemed tt be a perfectly natural thing to go ahead to proceed R { 7. with, and in due course the next level will be approved, assuming i j 8! everything goes smoothly, as I expect it will. d i n 9j COMMISSIONER AEEARNE: I think you are joining me in i c i y 10 i my other positions, and I felt that there aren't that many z I 5 11l differences between contested and uncontested plants. <3 i d 12 l COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: I'm not sure I follow you. E = 5 13 At any rate, I would today approve the plant at 5 E A 14, percent, with the full expectation that it will be approved at = E 15 full power very soon. E_ i ? 16 ; CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Well, the dif ferences that lie 1 5 A ( p 17 between us on this matter are how much longer the Commission x = 1 18 l ought to continue this 5 percent, full power double-barreled

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j I l C 19 ' look ac these olants where the cases are not contested. i 3 l 20 ' McGuire,as a centested case, is somewhat different. j i i 21 There we have Appendix 3 recently revised, which says that the j t t I 22 h Commission will look at an initial decision of a Board. If it 1 J 23 j is a icw pcwer decision, an initial cecision that deals with i 24 i low power, we will look a' i

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s 1 25 f be opportunity, unless the Commission invites that they do so, i, 6 4 i ALDERSON REFORTING COMPANY. INC. I

l 16 j 1 1 ! for parties to comment to the Commission. I 2i on the other hand, if the initial decision is for full 3 power, approval of full powSr operation, as the McGuire decision I 4 was, and Appendix B says t: tat parties will have 10 days in which e 5 to make comments to the Commission. And so our configuration - S i j 6l when we dealt with McGuire the other morning was that the comment R 7! period either was ending that day or it just ended the night n j 8l before, and so the Commission could not have a chance to look at u I 9l the comments. It was just simply inappropriate that we consider Z l 5 'O I the full power matter, let alone take action on it in advance z = 11l of being able to give careful consideration to parties ' comments. B l i j-12 So I think there is a dif ference in kind between the q-i g 13 ; McGuire situation last week and here for Sequoyah Unit 2 where = m 14 ; it is uncontested. g t y 15 ! g Now the process which we began last -- I guess early = g 16, last fall, of allowing units to go ahead and load fuel, do low -s N 17 ' power testing and operation as a way of getting them on down a E l -[ 18 i

ched 11e which they would eventually have to traverse anyway, j

i = h 19 a sty of getting them started on that earlier than otherwise M I t 20 : would have been practical, as I think a good idea. l. I 21, It's my own view that for the long term -- and I had lI 1 f really expected that Sequoyah 2 would be the place that we 22 f l t 23 ' made -he transition back to a single review, briefing and review 24 by the Commission in uncontested cases. You and I dif fer on 25j this. And I guess maybe we will continue to dif fer. But I i 1

i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC.

17 i i I think a transition back to single Commission look at the plant 2l is appropriate, and I would much prefer to take it here than I 3I down the line. i 4l Nhy don't we see how Peter and John stand? If their g 5l positions have changed -- Peter has a proposition here that ? 3 6, offers a transition. It doesn't do it with regard to Sequoyah 2, R i oS 7l but offers a transition. I'd like to know how people feel about i j 8{ that. Why don't we sample the opinion. d 9I John, have you changed your mind? z. o I 10 ! COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: No, but I note that on Appendix z 1 = i j ll 3, we were committed to try to get a license review of a full 3 I 12 ! ocwer license within aoproximately 30 days of the licensing E I a 1 13 board decision. 5= m -5 I4 ' Now in this particular case we got on the 3rd of June U 15 the NRR Director's decision and recommendation that Sequoyah 2 g 16 be given this full power license. It's the same kind of a plant, A ( 17 identical plant to one that we had already given a full power e 18 l license to. It doesn't seem to me that then two weeks is too ? I h 19 ; short a time to be able to reach a full power decision, if we R 20 l are planning on being able to at least on a similar basis reach 21l a preliminary review decision.on the contested cases. l I 22 j So I still think daat i would go ahead and give the f I I 23 full power license to Sequoyah 2. j i 24h CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Or authorize the Director to issue items are completed,! 25 the full power license when all the checklist i. i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC.

1 i 18 I i 1l and so or.. There is always that understanding. 2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Well, Peter has an interesting 3 proposition. Why don't we.let him present it? 4 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Let me see if the lowered humidity i e 5: today has changed his view from last week. What would you do E j 6l today with regard to Sequoyah 2, Peter, and then we can talk R 7i about this more. 5 I 8i COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: Well, the long and short of it o I 9! is that I would, with regard to Sequoyah 2, still propose to i =g 10 l issue the 5 percent license today. E 11 l I agree with you that one wants eventually to move 3 i j-12 to a one-step process. As I have suggested in this couple of E I j 13 ! paragraphs I have circulated, rather than move to it by having = 14 f the Commission act on 5 percent and delegate full power, I'd m 3h[ 15 ; suggest that at the time we do make that decision, the sensible E l f 16 l way to do it is to delegate the 5 percent decision and have z p 17 the Commission still sign off at the point at which the plant x = 5 18 is to go to full power. = H i 19 l One of the things that holds me back from feeling 5 l 20 l that we are cuite there yet is that the last plant that reached s 21l what I would have said is a similarly perfunctory or pro forma l t, t 22 state was Salem, where in midwinter we signed of f on everything _l i 23 except emergency preparedness, and held juri. li ction over that I t 24 l in anticipation of what we assemed would be a f airly routine 25j FEMA. clearance. And, of course, the emergency preparedness d l .l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC. I

19 j l 1l part did turn out to be routine, but in the six weeks er so 2) between our initial sign-off and what we assumed would be the I 3 perfunctory final sign-of f, there are some fairly serious i 4[ problems in fire protection that came up. i g 5j I think I'd like to have one or two plants where 5 i j 6: this croposed perfunctory and routine process actually works i U i 5 7j in a perfunctory and routine way before I would be comfortable U i A 8' with letting go of the ultimate decision. d 9l My proposal here solves the problem differently, which 2 c i y 10 l would be by keeping the ultimate beyond 5 percent decision 5 i II l with the Commission and delegating the other one. I really 3 I I2 ! think that's the better way to deal with it. 4 i g 13 ! CHAIRMAN EENDRIE: I must say if the Commission i z 14li decided on anything other than a speedy return to a single review g c .R 15 and then authorized the Director to issue the full power license, t g 16 i which I would be glad to vote for, given an opportunity, then I A y 17 think the proposition you make is in fact a very reasonable one. i i e 18 It allows the Director to go ahead and permit the unit to load j 19 i fuel and carry out those minimum risk low power operations when s R 20 he judges they are ready, and then some time during that low 21 ; power testing will come an appropriate time for the Commission l l 22 ' to have a discussion of the case and it will have a considerable i I i 23 benefit rhat we won' t have to sit here and do much nit-picking f i 24 about pre-load and pre-criticality checklis t items. Those l I l 25 will sort of automatically have been dealt with, and the J t ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. l

? 20 l l l Commission can then sit down and discuss with the Staff more i 2i s ubstantive matters related to full power operation. I i 3! So I think it has considerable merit. I only wish 4) that it had come up in time to be adopted so that it could have i e 5l been applied in this case. 9 4 i g 6 COMMISSIONER AEEARNE: Can I ask a couple of questions? R 7) CEAIRMAN HENDRIE: Please do. A 8! COMMISSIONER AEEARNE : First, just to go back to d 9l Salem, Peter, should I infer that you believe that the Staf f z i c 10 i would not have uncovered those? E I, j ll l COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: No. In fact, the Staff did 3 i N I2 ; uncover them. No, but that's the kind of matter -- Ea i g 13 ! COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: No, I understand the other = m 5 14 l point. I just wanted to make it clear on the record. I l E 15 ! g i wouldn't have agreed if the implication was that it only came E i j 16 i up because we had held final approval. 1 s y 17 i COMMISSIONER 3RADFORD: Oh, no, on the contrary, it's l N i l { 18 just that it was a matter that seemed to be important enough { i l C i b I 19 ! to come before the Commission. l g C i 20 i COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: In your proposal, you have, "It l 'r 21 ! is our intention to acve towards elimination of the two-phase 22 ll sign-o:: by delegating the 5 percent decision," and eliminate t l 1 23 the Start or going to the contested and che boards. t i 24 Would you then -- would that be a modification of i i 25 j Appe:idix 3?- Another rule change? l l i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. t

j j 21 i l I COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: Yeah, that's right. 2l COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: To modify Appendix B to allow I 3l the board decisions to issue a two-stage decision. The board i 4! then would issue a 5 percent power, or would the Board issue a g 5! decision, and then on the basis of that decision, the Licensee s l i -g 6; could go to 5 percent prior to our review? R M 7 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: In effect, I think what it M i j 8l would do would be to restore immediate ef fectiveness up to 5 I d i d 9l percent. i l o i g 10 l COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: I guess I would prefer that z E Q 11 l perhaps to be a little more clear then on that. 3 i I I2 l COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: Yeah, this was really circulated = 3 i 13 g j ust as a possible --- = 5 14 : COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: The other question I would x j 15 ; have, since looking at this schedule that TVA has proposed, it [ E j 16 l would appear that the 10 percent plateau would be a more useful M i l item for them to be able to reach than 5 percent, would you have 17 g 1 4 1 i = 3 10 l a problem with this particular authorization for Sequoyah being 8 19 ! 10 percent? l g n i l 20 [ COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: Well, I hadn' t thought abcut it l 21! at all, and I don ' t have the ability perhaps that some of the l i !4 [ 22)!rest of you do to translate the 10 percent into safety implications i 23 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: The 5 percent has attained a l 24 certain status as a level with which risks are -- i 25 ! MR. DENTON: The reason 5 percent doesn't show on this f i I 'l I ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC. I 1

22

1. chart, being Unit 2, they have checked out the plant and the 1

2j procedures and they are checking out the operators who weren' t l 3 experienced on Unit 1 -- i 4l COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: 5 percent is normally a plateau, g 5: I take it? N 6l MR. DENTON: For initial test of the first unit, yeah. R 7 So that's where the low power tests were done at Unit 1, so A i j 8! that the procedures have been checked out, the cperators were d i d 9l checked out on Unit 1, and the simulator has been checked now i Og 10 to replicate the results that were seen in Unit 1, so we are not z= i j 11 l requiring a repeat of those tests in Unit 2. We are requiring j 12 1 the operators to be trained on the simulator. = g 13 l So in this case you don't have the 5 percent plateau, = I 5 14 lI and that shows why after zero power testing they go to 10 percent. m b i E 15 l COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: My feeling about it is that x I g 16 { just because we have done 5 percent, and because it's not our i j 17 intention to delay them any days at 5 percent, anyway, I would 2 1 i 5 18 propose that we do 5 percent here just in the interest of getting s f 19 ! it done today and getting en with the job. If, in fact, it g A i 20 i makes sense to look at 10 percent for the second unit of two-l 21l unit plants or multi-unit sites in the future, I suppose we 22 l could modify the practice. j i 23 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: I could also point out that i 24 we nced not delay it today to put 10 percent in. 25 COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: No, except as I say, I just I i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC. l

l 1 1 l 23 j t f 1 never have looked at a 10 percent proposition before, and I i 2 just haven't thought about it until 10 minutes ago, t 3 CHAIIU!AN HENDRIE: I guess -- l 1 4; COMMISSIONER 3RADFORD: If I thought it made a difference s 5 in terms of time, then I'd be perhaps a little more interested. 6 1 N 6 But in fact, it's~our'.incention to proceed on a schedule such n 7l that they don't get stuck at 5 percent, anyway. So it really n f 8 8l shouldn't matter. n d 9 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: The timing propositions in a 2 5 10 l practical standpoint work this way: Fuel load starts -- let's z= l j 11 l see. They've got to do that integrated safety injection test. 3 I g-12 ; In order to do that, they've got to pull down Unit 1. E I a 13 i MR. DENTON: That's correct. g = z i g 14 ! CHAIR 2iAN HENDRIE: That means this weekend, because I I 2 15 : daresay they are using enough electricity down on the system x l g' 16 i so that they don't want to pull Unit 1 down during peak load z r 17 times on weekends. I b l x ? = l E 18 ; Okay, so they're constrained to the weekend for that i i = 1 l H 3 19 ' test. Fuel load starts about a week later, for Monday, 7th. 5 i l 20 Six weeks probably minimum to get to a point where one would 21 ! prepare to go to develop discernible nuclear heat takes us i 22 through to about the 10th or 12th of August. L i 23 ' Now what we would like to have sc=e confidence in as i l 24 we act today, assuming we are going to go this low power route, l l is that before the 10th or 12th of August by an appropriate margin;l l 25 ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC. ~

1 24 l 1 there is a Commission available to consider full power operation 2l and authorize the Director to go on ahead. 1 3 I assume that that will be the case. I see no i i 41 particular difficulty with that. So it looks to me like there i I g 5l that the Commission could, the first week in August, have a E l 6l briefing by the Staff and be pr(pared to clear the way to full l 7; power license. That means the plant simply would not be held i j 8l up at all in its start-up sequence. d d 9! Now if you haven' t got a set of Commissioners around z, l o i g 10 l by August, why, I'm not sure that 10 percent helps a great deal. E j 11 l It's worth another week or two, and that's about all. If we're i j y 12 i going to pick out a place where if there is going to be a hold-up 5 l s 13 ' on the Commission side, it would be useful for the plant to be E l mg 14 and still be short of full power, why, it would be nice if u 1 e 2 15 ; they could get on semewhere, well, at least above the point 5 i j 16. where you can go on automatic feedwater control. .And th a t ' s, I w d 17 suppose, somewhere around 15 percent. 30 percent would be a E G 18 ' level at which you could really exercise the steam side of F i 19 ' the plant in a pretty good way and shake most _ things down, but E 1 20l that's getting well away then from what we have characterized 21 as low power. t 22 So the timing configuration and the intents stated here 23 at the table are such that I don't see a great merit in 10 percenti 24, vs. 5. 25 What we would approve today at 5 percent amounts I ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

l I l 25 I h I 1 simply to a fuel loading criticality at zero power permission 5 2i for this unit in view of its start-up schedule, and the intent 3; of the prospect is the Staff would be in before that, explain 4, to the Commission how it's gone, the Commission would presumably, l 5j all things going along well, authorize full power before the unit e A9 i j 6! would need it. R 7 So I wouldn't object to 10 percent, John, but it A l j 8l doesn't seem to be really pressing basis for arguing with it. i d 9l There is a certain tradition of practice established in the last zoy 10 10 months in favor of 5 percent. 2 { 11 MR. DENTON: From the standpoint of learning a9out 3 Y 12 the plant, it is useful to get up to a high enough level to = 1 j 13 ! produce power and have all the systems functioning. So in terms = m g 14 of coming back with hard engineering data from che operation of b 15 ' the plant, it would be useful to get above the 30 percent type 5 g 16. plateau. M l 17 ' CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Well, since I'm willing to go to x= l u 18 100, I'm willing to go to 30, 35, 40, 45, so make me an offer. j g l c 19 l COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: I think we have the 5 percent 5 20 solution, Joe. 2If CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Yeah, that's right. As I slide i l l l 22 l back down the power level, looking for a place where a majority l 23 of the sitting Commission forms, why, I think I get back down to l l 24, 5 percent before I hit that point. I 25 Let me ask --- I think the proposition here to move ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

26 !towardeliminationofthetwo-phaseCommissionsign-offby 1 l l i 2 ! delegating the 5 per:ent decision to the Staff at some near 3 point, hopefully, seems to me to be a very desirable one, and I 4l wonder if we could not in authorizing 5 percent operation at I t i g 5 Sequoyah 2, to use either this language in Peter's suggestion, [ I 6l or equivalent language to memorialize that intention. R l 7l I take it that would be all right with you, Peter, I ,n i q l 8l since you suggested it as a way. Vic? d d 9 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: It sounds reasonable to me. I I i 5 10 l must say if we were to -- as I guess we would have to --modify j 11 l Appendix 3, and if we were delegating returning to immediate W I j 12 ; effectiveness, the 5 percent level, I think I would like to see r g 13 l the Commission's time somewhat extended, since that would not I m 14 impact on the plants. But with that comment, I think it's a g c = j l r 15 : perfectly sensible direction to go in. a f l =. t i 16 ! CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Now tha you've been advised, why, l g 1 x p 17 I guess it's fair enough if I ask you what you think, Len. 5 18 l MR. BICKWIT: I really wasn't planning to make a 19 ' comment. My -- if you want one from me, I see absolutely no g R l 20 ! problem with issuing this kind of language. l i j 21 i What I was checking out was what the past precedent I I 22 had been with Commission documents in the case of uncontested l 23 licenses, and the precedents vary. You have never issued anything 24 3 called an order, but you have issued something that's the 25 functional equivalent of an order, and you could issue either l i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.

r ,t. 27 j i I j that or an order which included this language. 2 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Let's see. It seems to me we 3 have done at least one of the uncontested cases in written form. i 4l MR. SICKWIT: Yes. You have always done it in written i 5 j form, but in some cases it's been by a memorandum from the N 8 { 0l Secretary, in some cases it's been by something that was N I b 7l equivalent to an order. t s2 8 n CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: You're right. Uo have. I'm glad de 9i }. l you told me that, because I was about to say I think you wanted E g 10 a memo and I wanted the order. I was almost prepared to ngue = 4 II ! reverse positions. 3 i 12 l f MR. BICKWIT: Is it becoming clear uhy I wasn't 9 i 13 t g preparec to make a comment? i 3 14 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: The frailties of the Commissioners M 15 ' h are not an excuse for as splendid an officer as the General = 16 g Counsel not to know everything. 17 d COFD1ISSIONER BRADFORD: In fact, there is a reason why = l w IO ! he should. l 8 19 ;i CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: That's right. If you didn't, why, i n 'O ' you may just as well be a Commissioner like the rest of us and i 21 ll fumble along. 22 Well, what would you prefer here? 23 COSD1ISSIONER GILINSKY: If you want to move forward 24 ! on it, as I suppose you do, you would issue an order or 25 instruction to the Staff -- I suppose an order, as far as the l l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

ri I 28 I uncontested reactor cases are concerned, and one would have to 2I prepare a proposed rule to modify Appendix B, and so one would 3 issue an instruction that a rule be prepared by those who do. these 4 things. Or you could simply announce our intention to proceed I 5j in this direction. E 6 MR. BICKWIT: Yeah, I don't see any reason why in the 3 i

  • E 7

order you need to instruct those who would prepare such a O proposal. d i y 9li COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: No, that sounds more like a 2= y 10 l Staff requirement. z= I Q 11 ;I CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Co we want an order with regard 3 N I2 l to this language? It wouldn't seem to me to be necessary. Would 5 13 l 5 you prefer one, or would you settle for a Secretary's memorandum? z 5 I4 Af ter all, we have a text in hand, and I can ask you r 9= l j 15 j is this the approximate text that the Secretary should use to l = l j d I0 i report the results of this meeting. You know, that follows i w l N I7 ' Sam pretty closely, we'll not tend to argue about it subsequently. z= w g 18 Okay, the proposition I'll put to the house, then, is e I9 s that the Commission authorizes the Director to issue a 5 percent a 20 license to Sequoyah Unit 2 as soon as he judges all the last-minute-21 items are checked off. This action will be memorialized in a i 22

memorandum from the Secretary which will note, as Peter's l

23 ' language proposes here, in limiting operation to this level, we 24 are adhering to our post-TMI review practice of a two-phase t' 25 Cc= mission sign-off, one for 5 percent and one for full power. i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC. i

V l 29 1' Sequoyah 2 is the sixth plant reviewed pursuant to this 1 2l process; provided that it completes its license requirements I 3 and no safety occurrences arise, it will be permitted to move i 4-from 5 percent to full power on schedule without delay. g 5 And then the section about the intent to change the 0 j 6l review practice in the future. It is our intent to move toward R l 7' elimination of the two-phase sign-off by delegating the 5 percent

j 8l decision to the Staff and the boards in the reasonably near d

9j future, if experience justifies such a step. In the meantime, z l 0 i 10 ; it is the practice that applies to all units, and it shoulu act be E I, j 11 ! taken as expressing p_rticular concern recarding ' safety at 3 p 12 l Sequoyah. 5 l l 13 ; If that's agreeable as the intent of the Commission i = Z l g 14 ! here, I will ask you to please vote aye. l t l E 15 l COMMISSIONER AHEARNE: Aye. l 6 j 16 : COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: Aye. A N 17 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: Aya. a= } l8 l CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Aye. P 19 f You may record that as 4-0, Mr. Secretary, and 12 20 l' you don't have this text, why, I'll forward you mine.

Okay, 21 you've got one.

i 22 ' One other comment I guess I'd make, and that is I I 23 think with regard to the future practice, I think it would be a i 24 good change. Certainly for uncontested cases, because it does I i 25, then bring the Commission into discussion with the Staf f at a j i i I i t I l -., ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC._ _,

30 i l i ! time when you are not having to argue about what may be relatis ly 1 2I mundane punchlist items and ycu are speaking to che essential 3 issue, which is full power, and not a quite risk-free low power 4: limited operation. g 5! So that's certainly a step that I recommend the 0 l j 6l Commission implement with despatch. l R t 7l With regard to contested cases and how it works e l 8! vis-a-vis Appendix B, I think it would be fair to say one ought I d i 9l to think a little bit about that before you run too hastily to a 3 i 10 l' rule change that counsel offers in the course of trying to draft z j 11 what that language ought to look at, will think of assorted 3 I I 12 ' details that don't come to me here at the moment at the table 4 13 I that may be useful for you to discuss, and it may be that you a = j II l ultimakely decide to come out that Appendix 3 and its 30-day m 1: j 2 15 i review shorter time for low power is not a bad configuration. E i, j 16 i But certainly for uncontested cases I think this is much better w ( 17 for the future. a= i 18 Any other comments people would like to make? E I l ~ 19 l All right. I thank you for coming. 4 Jay, you can at least put the uranium in the machine 20 21 and the intent here is clearly to keep a step ahead of you. i 1l So you can surprise us and beat six weeks, why, we'll see if 22 23 we can surprise you and keep up. 24 Thank you. 25 (Whereupon, at 3:35 p.m., the meeting was adjourned.) { ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC. 2,.

, c..- - A NUF-*LT.daLANET COMC35~CN Z I*ai3 La TO Certif'( Chat the aC04ched, pr0ceeci::31 before the m COMMISSION' MEETING r 4-woe saw.a. Discussion and nossible Vote on Operating License for -w Sequoyah-2 g g w e. _c.2.** c a =.d_e June 17, 1981 ~ Cccket !D-Her: .s t. 4 C ....=.. c.,..s. _4 - - - Washington, D. C. e.

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