ML20054D981

Reply to Licensee 820412 Response to Wi Environ Decade 820328 Motion to Compel Licensee Answer to First Set of Interrogatories.Aslb Jurisdiction Should Be Expanded. W/Certificate of Svc.Related Correspondence

ML20054D981
Person / Time
Site:	Point Beach
Issue date:	04/16/1982
From:	Patricia Anderson WISCONSIN'S ENVIRONMENTAL DECADE
To:	Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel
References
NUDOCS 8204230563
Download: ML20054D981 (6)

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r UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 'y l , g , , , ,

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION I

Before the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Wisconsin Electric Power Company POINT BEACH NUCLEAR PLANT UNITS 1 & 2 6 g c) #D

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DOCKET NOS. 50-266 AND 50-301 Operating License Amendment d g '9, ' '$ s.

(Steam Generator Tube Sleeving Program l7 p. V 7 '[' ,

9-DECADE'S REPLY TO LICENSEE'S RESPONSE p? g79 .p?'pyf~0

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REGARDING DECADE'S MOTION TO COMPEL g gr!!,yg  ;/

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[s By filing dated March 28, 1982, Wisconsin's Environmental Decade, Inc. (" Deca de") submitted its Motion to Compel Licensee's i Answer to First Interrogatories Relative to Full-Scale Sle eving (" Motion") . By filing dated April 12, 1982, Wisconsin i

Electric Power Company (" Licensee") submitted its Response to Decade's Motion to Compel Licensee's Answer to First Interrogatories Relative to Full Scale Sl eeving ("Re s pon se") .

, i This filing is to briefly reply to the Licensee's April 12 response.

I INTERROGATORIES 1 TO 4 It is very important to note that nowhere does the Licensee dispute the substance of the serious safety implications of reactor vessel embrittlement. Instead, it devotes its defense to D 503 S

legal maneuvering intended to show that the issue belongs I6 somewhere else.

Too'often in the past, the utilities have fended off serious l

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• citizen concerns by contending that the issue should be dealt with by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (" Commission") elsewhere

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in a different proceeding or under a different code section.

It is our opinion that the Commission has a solemn responsibility to protect the public from the hazards of nuclear power plants, and that, if a citizen concern is asserted to be raised in a wrong f orum, it is incumbent an the Enamission, not the citizen, to find its proper resting spot. Moreover, that proper forum must be one in which the matter is resolved in a timely manner which has not been the case with the generic format, according to every independent critique of the agency.

Therefore, even if, arauendo, this proceeding in the case at bar excluded consideration of embrittlement, the appropriate response would not be to dismiss the complaint, but rather to have the Commission expand the Licensing Board's jurisdiction.

Although the Licensee may have f orgotten, the Licensing Board can never fail to remember that its task is not the exaltation of meaningless legalisms, but rather the protection of the public welfare. To the extent, arguendo, the agency's procedures do not permit it to perform its substantive functions, then its officials are gravely derelict in their responsibilities.

Beyond that, none of the particularized contentions of the Licensee are valid.

First, no matter how many times counsel repeats its claim, Response, at p. 3, it is incorrect to assert that the Licensing  !

Board has alreac; ruled on the relevancy of embrittlement in this phase of the proceeding involving full-scale sleeving. The Board

., 5 in

.W ruling to which counsel makes reference involved a Decade [

v interroragory "an ihn sleevino demonstration procram", Decade's First Interrogatories and Request for Production of Documents to Licensee on the Demonstration Sleeving Program, dated October 24, 19 81, at p.1, and the order of the Licensing Board was limited ,

i to the phase of the proceeding involving " return to power with up i to six degraded tubes sleeved rather than plugged", i.e. the sleeving demonstration program, Memorandum and Order, dated .,

Therefore, no prior Board ruling  ;

November 5, 1981,~at p. 1.  :

controls this situation. ,

Second, any intended allusion to claim that the Decade's  :,

embrittlement concerns are being addressed elsewhere in some ,

"high level investigation", Response, at p. 3, does not comport 4 with any publicly available f acts of which we are aware. The focus of the controverted interrogatories is on core refiguration at Point Beach undertaken to retard embrittlement and the impact-of that reracking on the need for increased cooling--at the same time as sleeving failures may reduce cooling capability following Whatever "high level" efrort a l o s s- o f - c ool an t- acc ide n t (" LOCA") .

is going into loosening present safety standards so that brittle continue operating is irrelevant to the reactors can reconfiguration-type aspect of the embrittlement problem.

Third, it is similarly incor rect to assert, Response at p.

the Decade has not provided any link between 5, that embrittlement and sleeving. The motion provides extensive elaboration accompanied by citation that shows that measures l

' being taken to ameliorate embrittlement may increase cooling

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,o u requirements at the same time that reflood rates during LOCA may i be reduced by the Board contention's statement that sleeved tubes .

may be unsafe and, rupture in an instantarieous pressure reversal. {

r II INTERROGATORY 11 Counsel argues that intervenors must prove their case as a j precondition to securing access to the very information that l would prove their case. Response, at p. 9.

Such a legal precept might make an excellent candidate for a chapter in " Catch-22" or "The Trial", but it certainly would do little to serve the ends of justice.

In individual cases it might be appropriate to request an intervenor to provide some preliminary basis for pursuing a given issue. But it would be an absurdity to insist upon the Catch-22 situation championed by the Licensee, llere the intervenor has provided a preliminary basis in the form of documented problems with transient jumpers in another plant pertorming the same repair operation and employing the same contracting firm. That cannot be properly characterized as an

" unarticulated" and " generalized" claim: it is more than  :

suf ficient justification to pursue this matter in more detail tnrough individual interviews.

Ile r e, too, the critical and tangible importance of insuring the protection of the people of this state from a nuclear catastrophe that could ensue from improperly installed sleeves outweighs the Licensee's contrived and f ar fetched concern about an " invasion" of privacy.

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i INTERROGATORIES 15 AND ,16 All of the general discussion in Part I, supra, applies with j equal force to the Licensee's arguments against consideration of leaking plugs.

In addition and specifically with reference to plugging, the  ;

i Licensee's sleeving proposal contemplates the removal of explosive plugs preparatory to sleeving. Memorandum and Order, 4

dated November 5,19 81, at p. 21.

4 It is quite apparent that drilling out a previously exploded plug inside a narrow 7/8" diameter tube with a wall thickness of only five-hundretns of an inch in the radioactive confines of a ,

steam generator channel. head, followed by insertion of a sleeve, -

1 l is an extraodinarily risky operation.

l The fact that the Licensee desires to engage in such a

maneuver, even though it has not chosen to present any testimony

.l to show that plug removal is necessary to continue operation, strongly suggests that plant of ficials may be in possession of confidential information about extensive plug deterioration atfecting the safety of the plant after returning to service with sleeves.

DATED at Madison, Wisconsin, this 16 th day of April, 1982.

' !NIROME NTAL ECADE, INC.

WIS

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. Director of Publid Affairs k ,

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U.11':UD STRIES OF NERICA EIEAR IEGUIA10iG CD.MISSIO:1

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viisconsin Electric Puaer Compsiy iOI!1T Bf7Cli IRCILAR PIRJT U'JI'lS 1 & 2 r Locket Hos. 50-266 and 50-301 C1;1CIFIOWU OF Si;!NICh i

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1 certify dut trtu and correct conics of the fontgoing doctr:1cnt will h oe servea tnis uay by depositing copies of the sanu in the firct class nuils, f, postage pre-pan and correctly <uldressed, to the following: l Peter a. Bloca, Quin:nn i htonic Safety I, Licennina board i L. S. Utclear Regulatory Cor,taission ]

i.asnington, D. C. 20555 #

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Or. liJin C. pax *On 122) .113t Street 1xas Alanos, Ica :' e xico 87544 Dr. Jerry H. Fline awrtic Safety !. Licensing Board U. S. .;tclear ie:ulatory Conutission Wanairv_ 'un, D. C. 20555 i.xyioting t, Ser .' ice U. S. utclear Fe2ulatory Conmission biasaington, D. C. 20555 rir. Richard tacr:Avin of fice of bzacutive II gal Director U. S. .Ntclear h2gulatory Conmission iJarstington, D. C. 20555 Fa . Brtce W. Cnurcitill S.ua Pittum Potts and 'R>abridtse 100) .1. Street . . W.

Wannington, D. C. 20036

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