ML20034D491

Requests Comments on Us District Court Ruling on Expert Judgement,Including Views on Applicability of Decision Re Potential Use in NRC Licensing of HLW Repository & Rule 703

ML20034D491
Person / Time
Issue date:	11/09/1992
From:	Youngblood B NRC OFFICE OF NUCLEAR MATERIAL SAFETY & SAFEGUARDS (NMSS)
To:	Treby S NRC OFFICE OF THE GENERAL COUNSEL (OGC)
References
REF-WM-1 NUDOCS 9211170174
Download: ML20034D491 (1)

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NOV 0 S gg MEMORANDUM FOR:

Stuart A. Treby Assistant General Counsel for Rulemaking and Fuel Cycle Office of the General Counsel FROM:

B.J. Youngblood, Director Division of High-Level Waste Management i

SUBJECT:

U.S. DISTRICT COURT RULING ON EXPERT JUDGMENT L

An August 21, 1992 memorandum from Dade W. Moeller to Richard K. Major notified the NRC staff and the members of the ACNW of a Federal court ruling on the use of expert judgment. Copies of Dr. Moeller's memo and the court's decision have previously been transmitted to J. Wolf and B. Reamer of your staff.

I would be interested in your views on the applicability of that decision to potential use of expert judgment in NRC licensing of a HLW repository.

I am particularly interested in the discussion of Rule 703, which states that an expert's opinion must have "a sufficient verifiable scientific basis."

Some of the judgments needed to project repository performance over 10,000 years may not be scientifically verifiable -- especially projections of future human activities.

Even though the Federal Rules of Evidence are not binding for an NRC 1itensing board, does the logic underlying this decision offer any lessons we should learn in preparing to review DOE's use of expert judgment in a repository license application?

4 B.J. Youngblood, Director

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Division of High-level Waste Management DISTRIBUTION:

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