ML20042A479
| ML20042A479 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Allens Creek File:Houston Lighting and Power Company icon.png |
| Issue date: | 03/17/1982 |
| From: | Newman J HOUSTON LIGHTING & POWER CO., LOWENSTEIN, NEWMAN, REIS, AXELRAD & TOLL |
| To: | Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel |
| References | |
| ISSUANCES-CP, NUDOCS 8203230474 | |
| Download: ML20042A479 (8) | |
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March 17, 1982 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
,02 0 22 /"a S BEFORE THE ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD In the Matter of
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HOUSTON LIGHTING & POWER
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Locket No. 50-466 CP COMPANY
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APPLICANT'S RESPONSE TO'INTERVENOR DOHERTYsScrm r m,
MOTION FOR POSTPONEMENT OF THE G
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I, On March 10, 1982, intervenor Doherty filed a motion requesting the Board to postpone, until at least April 26, the additional hearings on TexPirg contention 31 presently scheduled for the week of April 12, 1982.
In support of his request Mr. Doherty alleges that, in light of his other obligations and the length of the Quadrex Report for the South Texas Project (STP Quadrex Report), the Board has not permitted him sufficient time to complete discovery on the remaining liniited issue.
Applicant opposes this motion; Mr. Doherty has failed to provide sufficient grounds to justify another delay in the completion of this proceeding.
II.
Mr. Doherty asserts first that the time for preparing proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law conflicted s
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with the period during which he had to conduct discovery on TexPirg 31.
In..its Order adopting a schedule for the completion of discovery and additional hearings on TexPirg 31, the Board was aware of, and specifically discussed, the due dates already established for filing proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law by Mr. Doherty and the other intervenors.
Applicant believes that the Board's schedule was extremely reasonable in light of the limited nature of the issue to be considered in the reopened proceeding.
Even accepting Mr. Doherty's assertion that he could not begin preparation on the Quadrex issue until his proposed findings were filed on February 13, 1982, the Board's schedule gave him over four weeks to complete discovery on a limited portion of a single contention.
Further-more, there has been no change in circumstances since the Board issued its January 28 Order, which would provide good cause for a modification of the existing schedule.
In addition, the record was reopened in this proceeding at Mr. Doherty's own request.
Having sought and obtained an crder reopening this hearing, and potentially delaying the 4
issuance of an initial decision on this application, Mr.
Doherty has obligated himself to proceed diligently to complete his hearing preparation.
The Board ~ej esj and the Commission--
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Board Memorandum and Order dated March 9, 1982.
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Statement of Policy on Conduct of Licensing Proceedings, CLI-81-8, 13 NRC 452 (May 20, 1981).
have recognized that delays in the completion of the licensing proceedings such as this one are not in the public interest.
If Mr. Doherty had outside obligations (i. e., the Bar exam) which interfered with his ability to fulfill his obligations as a party, he should have informed the Board in advance of the impending conflict so that it could consider this fact in its deliberations on Mr. Doherty's earlier request.
III.
For the above-stated reasons alone, Mr. Doherty's motion should be rejected.
However, his motion raises an additional, important reason why Mr. Doherty's request for additional time should be denied.
On page 2 of his filing, Mr. Doherty explains that his review of the lengthy STP Quadrex Report, and his preparation of interrogatories based upon it, require a commitment of substantial time and effort to explore all of the individual allegations of Brown & Root design deficiencies discussed in that document.
This explanation reflects a misconception on Mr. Doherty's part regarding the scope of the reopened hearing on TexPirg 31, and the relevance of the STP Quadrex Report to this proceeding.
As the Doherty motion recognizes, the reason why the Board directed additional hearings as a result of the STP Quadrex Report is that:
If problems due to Brown & Root's actions or inaction were encounter-ed at the [STP] despite HL&P's i
supervison, the Board most certainly wants to know what specific correc-tive er preventive procedures HL&P will follow to assure that these problems will not recur at Allens Creek.
(January 28, 1982, Order at 3).
Applicant does not believe that the Board intended it (or the Staff) to examine ir. this proceeding each of the individual design deficiencies allegedly encountered at STP by its former architect-engineer for that project.
The question whether the STP is being safely designed and con-structed is a matter properly before the Licensing Board in the STP proceeding, and that Board will hold hearings on the validity of the Quadrex findings concerning the STP design in late 1982.
It would be entirely inappropriate -- indeed impossible -- to litigate those questions first in this proceeding.
The only rational approach for purposes of testimony to be presented at the April 12-15 hearings is to assume that the alleged problems or deficiencies in Brown & Root's engineering activities at STP, referred to in paragraphs (a) through (o) of Doherty's December 7, 1981, " Renewed Motion" for additional evidence on TexPirg 31, did exist and then to examine what new circumstances exist, or what steps have been taken, to prevent the recurrence of similar concerns at the l
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ACNGS.
The Applicant's evidence at the upcoming hearing will consist of.. testimony by a responsible HL&P executive as to the Applicant's present organization to review the ACNGS design, and testimony from Ebasco explaining how that company is organized to prevent problems which, for purposes of the hearing on TexPirg 31, will be assumed to have existed
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Applicant noted in its December 14, 1981, Response to Doherty's motion for additional hearings on Quadrex matters, that the STP Quadrex Report was prepared by an independent consultant, and that the validity of parti-cular Quadrex findings could not be determined until Applicant and Staff analyses of Quadrex were completed.
Obviously, prior to that time, any assertions as to the validity of particular Quadrex findings would be both speculative and temporary.
Applicant has served on the Board and parties a preliminary Bechtel Power Corporation
" Assessment Of The Findings In The Quadrex Report" dated March, 1982 (Assessment).
That Assessment, which presents the interim, independent conclusions of Bechtel, finds, inter alia, that fully two-thirds of the Quadrex findings relate to matters that would either have been resolved by previously on-going B&R review efforts, or would have required no further action.
(Assessment, S 5.0, p. 5-1).
The Assessment further concludes that many of the Quadrex findings "were not as serious as had been perceived by Quadrex."
(Id. at 5-2).
In addition., although large numbers of Mr7 Doherty's interrogatories ask whether independent STP Quadrex findings constitute unreported S 50.55(e) deficiencies, the Assessment concludes that there is but one potential unreported S 50.55(e) deficiency (Iji. at 5-1), and even that has not been firmly established.
Applicant is not suggesting that Bechtel's preliminary Assessment should be treated as dispositive on any of these matters.
However, these conclusions demonstrate that, as Applicant stated earlier, any responsible inquiry into the validity and effect of particular Quadrex findings for STP must await completion, late this year, of the on-going Quadrex reviews.
And most importantly from the standpoint of the Board's responsibility in this ACNGS proceeding, it need not consider, let alone determine the merits of any Quadrex finding for STP.
O at STP.
Any other approach, apart from interfering with the ordered preparation for hearings in the STP proceeding, would engage the Board in an irrelevant exploration of whether or not specific design problems exist at another plant and in meaning-less comparisons of the design parameters of two entirely different power plants, engineered,by two different A-E firms.
It is precisely such exploration and comparison which Mr. Doherty pursues in the hundreds of interrogatories which he has served on Applicant.
This discovery -- burdensome to Mr. Doherty as well as Applicant, and proceeding from a misconception as to the scope of TexPirg 31 -- accounts in sub-stantial part for the predicament in which he now claims to find himself.
It should not be a basis for delaying the up-coming hearings.
Mr. Doherty's motion should be denied.
Respectfully submitted, fl OF COUNSEL:
ack R.
Newmhnl LOWENSTEIN, NEWMAN, REIS David B.
Raskin 1025 Connecticut Ave., N.W.
AXELRAD 1025 Connecticut Ave., N.
Washington, D.C.
20036 Washington, D.C.
20036 J. Gregory Copeland Scott Rozzell BAKER & BOTTS 3000 One Shell Plaza 3000 One Shell Plaza Houston, Texas 77002 Houston, Texas 77002 ATTORNEYS FOR APPLICANT HOUSTON LIGHTING & POWER COMPANY
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BEFORE THE ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD In the Matter of
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HOUSTON LIGHTING & POWER COMPANY
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Docket No. 50-466,
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(Allens Creek Nuclear Generating
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Station, Unit 1)
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CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that copies of the foregoing Applicant's Response to Intervenor Doherty's Motion for Postponement of the April 12, 1982 Hearings were mailed, first class, postage prepaid, or hand delivered */ this 17th day of March, 1982.
- Sheldon J. Wolfe, Esq., Chairman Susan Plettman, Esq.
Atomic Safety and Licensing David Preister, Esq.
Board Panel Texas Attorney General's Office U.S.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission P. O. Box 12548 Washington, DC 20555 Capitol Station Austin, Texas 78711 Dr. E. Leonard Cheatum Route 3, Box 350A Honorable Frank Petter Watkinsville, Georgia 30677 Mayor, City of Wallis P. O. Box 312
- Mr. Gustave A.
Linenberger Wallis, Texas 77485 Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel Hon. Leroy H. Grebe U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission County Judge, Austin County Washington, DC 20555 P. O. Box 99 Bellville, Texas 77418 Docketing and Service Section Atomic Safety and Licensing Office of the Secretary of Board Panel the Commission U.S=
Nuclear Regulatory Commission U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, DC 20555 Washington, DC 20555 Atomic Safety and Licensing Appeal Board U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, DC 20555
James M. Scott, Jr.
- Richard Black, Esq.
13935 Ivy Mount U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Sugar Land, Texas 77478 Commission Washington, DC 20555 William Schuessler 5810 Darnell John F. Doherty Houston, Texas 77074 4327 Alconbury Street Houston, Texas 77021 Stephen A. Doggett, Esq.
P. O. Box 592 Rosenberg, Texas 77471 TexPirg Att:
Clarence Johnson Bryan L. Baker Executive Director 1923 Hawthorne Box 237 U.S.
Houston, Texas 77098 University of Houston Houston, Texas 77004 J. Morgan Bishop Margaret Bishop Carro Hinderstein 11418 Oak Spring 609 Fannin Street Houston, Texas 77043 Suite 521 Houston, Texas 77002 W. Matthew Perrenod 4070 Merrick D. Marrack Houston, Texas 77024 420 Mulberry Lane Bellaire, Texas 77401 Wayne Rentfro P. O. Box 1335 Brenda McCorkle Rosenberg, Texas 7"471 6140 Darnell Houston, Texas 77074 V. O.
" Butch" Carden, Jr.
City Attorney City of Wallis P. O. Box A East Bernard, Texas 77435 kl px~-
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