ML20055A233

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Transcript of 820630 Public Meeting in Washington,Dc Re Briefing on PWR Steam Generator Problems.Pp 1-80
ML20055A233
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Issue date: 06/30/1982
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NRC COMMISSION (OCM)
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REF-10CFR9.7 NUDOCS 8207150614
Download: ML20055A233 (95)


Text

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COMMISSION MEETING In de.% & ef:

PUBLIC MEETING

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BRIEFING ON PWR STEAM GENERATOR PROBLEMS

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June 30, 1982 pAq7,g:

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AT:

Washington, D. C.

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400 Vi_gi.=ia Ave., S.W. W=#"d"g--", D.

C. 20024 Telachc=e: (202) 554-2345 8207150614 920630 PDR loCFR PT9.7 PDR

1 1

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3

4 BRIEFING ON PWR STEAM GENERATOR PROBLEMS 5

6 PUBLIC MEETING 7

8 Nuclear Regulatory Commission Room 1130 9

1717 H Street, N.

W.

Washington, D. C.

10 Wednesday, June 30, 1982 11 The Commission met, pursuant to notice, at 12 2:00 p.m.

13 14 BEFORE:

15 NUNZIO PALLADINO, Chairman of the Commission VICTOR ;ILINSKY, Commissioner 16 JOHN AHEARNE, Commissioner JAMES ASSELSTINE, Commissioner 17 18 STAFF AND PRESENTERS SEATED AT COMMISSION TABLE:

19 S. CHILK M. MALSCH 20 G.

LAINAS D.

EISENHUT 21 W.

DIRCKS H. DENTON 22 A.

KENNEKE 23 AUDIENCE SPEAKERS:

24 J. LAFLEUR 25 ALDERSoN REPORTING CCMPANY,INC, 4d@ V' AGINI A AV@.. @.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 2@@24(2@8) @@4 884@

DISCLAIMER This is an ' unofficial transcript of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Comission held on June 30, 1982 in the Comission's offices at 1717 H Street, N. W., Wasnington, D. C.

The

' meeting was open to public attendance and observation.

This transcript has not been reviewed, corrected, or edited, and it may contain inaccuracies.

The transcript is intended solely for general informational purposes.

.. As provided by 10 CFR 9.103, it is not part of the forinal or informal record of decision of the matters discussed.

E.xpressions of opinion in Lthis. transcript do not necessarily reflect final determinations or beliefs.

Ho pleading or other paper may be filed with the Commission in any proceeding as the result of or addressed to any'or.tatement or argument s

contained herein, except as the Comission may auth ize.

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1EEEIIEIIEE 2

CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I wonder if we night get 3

started.

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4 The Commission meets this afternoon to receive 5

a briefing from the staff on pressurized water reactors' 6

steam genera tor problems.

The problems with steam 7

generators are of considerable concern to the 8

Commission.

9 The integrity of steam generator tubes is an to unresolved safety issue under review by the staff.

Over 11 several years the staff has been pursuing the technical 12 resolutions of problems associated with steam generators 13 and in the recent past the problems associated with 14 steam genera tors have actually increased in scope.

15 Today I expect the staff is going to provide 16 us an update of steam generator experience and a 17 discussion of future actions that are under 18 consideration.

19 Unless sny of my fellow Commissioners have 20 opening remarks, I as going to turn the meeting over to 21 Mr. Dircks.

22

'R.

DIRCKS:

I think if we had an objective 23 that we would like to express today, it is the bringing 24 together of the number of items that have been pending l

25 in the steam generator area.

This is the first meeting ALDERSON AEPCRTING COMPANY. !NC.

400 VIAGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. 0.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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on steam generators we have had since I sen t down to you 2

the steam generator program document, 82-72.

We have 3

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at least one meeting with the industry on it at a

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4 h gh level and then there have been succeeding meetings.

5 In addition to that, we have had, as you 6

mentioned, the unresolved safety issues tha t have been 7

pending and we have had the various NUREG documents in 8

various draf t forms that have been circulating.

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9 What we would like to do today is to try to 10 bring these various threads together and show you how we 11 are treating the whole problem of steam generators.

12 Harold, do you want to stress any points 13 before Darrell proceeds?

14 MR. DENTON:

No.

A lot has happened since we 15 last briefed you on this topic.

We do have some draft 16 resolutions of USIs underway.

We have draft reactions 17 to the Ginna event.

We have had a lot of meetings with 18 industry.

Many of the new OLs are adopting the 19 recommendations of the Steam Generators Owners Group l

20 going toward taking measures in plant design to minimize I

21 steam generator problems.

22 At the same time, there have been reoccurring 23 and still occurring problems with the steam generators 24 in operating plants.

What Darrel Eisenhut and Gus l

l 25 Lainas will do is walk you through where we are today in ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIAGINIA AVE.e S.W WASHINGTON. o.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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1 developing an overall approach to this area and 2

reviewing the past experience.

3 MR. DIRCKSt Darrell, it is your turn.

4 MR. EISENHUTs Thank you.

5 (Slide presentation.)

6 MR. EISENHUTa If I could have the first 7

slide, please.

If I could have the second slide.

8 (Laughter.)

\\

9 MR. EISENHUIs We are moving right along.

10 This is a simple outline of what we will try 11 to summarize today.

From the overall framework, this is 12 a slight reordering of the slides we sent down in draf t 13 form, and we will go through several areas.

14 We have provided in summary fashion six pages 15 of background summarizing different aspects of what-is 16 going on.

We are not planning to walk through those.

17 However, we can certaj71y discuss any pieces of them 18 that anyona would like to.

19 If I could have the next slide.

l 20 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa I wonder if it might 21 not be useful at the outset to cover that point which 22 you probably have safe ty concerns.

In other words, to 23 what extent are we talking about things which fall 24 within our purview, in other words the public health and 25 safety, and to what extent are we talking about

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l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTCN. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345,

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1 availability of plants and expenditures and so on that 2

the utilities may be faced with?

3 MR. DENTON:

I think our perception in this 4

area has changed.

We used to pre-TMI draw the sharp 5

distinctions between that if it didn't exceed Part 100 6

doses it was not a safety concern and if it did it was 7

something to be fixed.

8 I still think the bulk of the steam generator 9

problems turn out to be economic problems because we can 10 impose sufficiently stringent inspection requirements on 11 maintaining integrity that forces the plant to be down 12 so much that they must make the necessary repairs.

But 13 at the same time, we would like to avoid any more 14 Ginna 's to the extent we can.

So there is a blurring of 15 economic interest and safety interests when it comes to 16 steam generators.

17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

But, Harold, isn't it 18 true that over the last say year or so that we have 19 become to be more sensitive to the point that something 20 which may take a plant out of use and which we thought 21 was, well, that is an economic problem, we now are 22 beginning to get a little more uneasy about that that 23 same problem which may in the past have been looked at l

24 as strictly a utility economic issue, that we now see 25 has maybe a precursor potential safety problem.

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ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE, S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

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MR. DENTON:

That is exactly rig h t, and I 2

think what 1; happening across the board is to try to 3

avoid the original transien t tha t steam generatur 4

failures put on plants and not just rely on the fact 5

that we have assumed such an event in our safety review.

6 MR. DIRCKS:

It is QA in a way.

It is where 7

do the incentives lie in all of this?

I suppose if you 8

are running a coal plant then you just keep running it.

9 Even though you see a lot of procursors going, your job 10 is to keep the plant on the lire.

11 In a nuclear plant I think it would behoove 12 the owners as soon as they can pick up any indication of 13 problems to shut the plant down and repair a small f

14 problem before it knocks the plant out of service f or 15 four or five months.

16 One of the things that is running through my 17 own' mind is that at Ginna maybe one of the lessons we 18 learned with the steam generator problem where the l

19 off-site releases we saw were small that maybe our 20 emphasis should be on the heavy training of operators.

21 As we saw in Ginna, the operators managed to handle a 22 very difficult situation by good training and rapid 23 reflex.

It is like flying an airplane.

I think if you 24 have good trained crews and high capabilities you can 25 handle these problems, o

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE, S.W., WASHINGTON. O C. 20024 (202) $54-2345

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1 It seems to me again on the incentive basis 2

the incentive is to make sure you don't rupture these 3

tubes and take your plant out of line.

4 CHAIRMAF PALLADINO:

The incentive from our 5

point of view is to make sure the tubes don't rupture 6

and put the plant into a condition which could become 7

fairly serious.

8 MR. DIROKSs Yes.

9 MR. DENTON:

And especially avoid multiple 10 tube ruptures.

I think the lesson has been learned by 11 many plants for the OL.

St. Lucie II, for example, is 12 owned by the same power company tha t replaced steam 13 generators at Turkey Point.

So they know how expensive

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14 steam generator replacement can be.

So at St. Lucie II 15 they gone to titanium tubes on the condense r, f ull-flow 16 demineralizers, deserators, new copper in the water 17 treatment system and will operate with very low parts l

18 per million and parts per billion chloride.

All those 19 actions cost them maybe $25 to $40 million in terms of 20 up-front equipment costs, but what they avoid then or 21 hope to avoid by this process is all the denting and 22 wastage problems that occurred 1.1 their other unit and i

23 lei to a very high cost.

24 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

But aside from the 25 economic aspects of the situation, breakage of the tubes l

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, I

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is a breeching of the primary system and I think it 2

deserves considerable attention as a result.

Some of 3

the things we have learned from a situation such as 4

Ginna indicate that maybe the potential for damage of 5

the tubes is even greater than we had thought.

6 When we get to the right point I would like to 7

ask you about some of the assumptions with regard to the

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8 number of tubes that fail and what your current thinking 9

is on thdt.

10 But I do think it represent a breach of the 11 primary system that deserves as much attention as any 12 other breach.

As a matter of fact, the recent 13 experience has shown that that is a more probable cause i

14 of breaching,than other possible situations.

15 3R. DENTON:

I mentioned St. Lucie just 16 because the economic incentives there to have good steam 17 generators is consistent with the safety goal of 18 aborting steam generator tube degradation.

The two 19 d rive the same way.

20 I would suggest that we go back Darrell and 21 let you try to answer that question.

22 MR. EISENHUT:

If I can answer the Chairman's 23 questions righ t away because we weren't planning to go 24 back to that page.

On the slide of safety concerns we 25 tried to summarize very simply what our licensing basis ALDERSCN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VtRG1NIA AVE., S.W, WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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is.

2 We have a design basis accident which is a 3

single double-ended offset rupture of a tube.

All 4

applications are required to analyze that accident, but 5

it is a single rupture double-ended full flow offset of 6

the tube.

7 We also have a design basis that you consider 8

loss-of-coolant accidents breaches in the primary system 9

and you have stasiline rupture accidents, that is 10 breaches of the secondary system, and we do not 11 postulate a steam generator tube rupture coincident with 12 either of those accidents.

The design basis is 13 somsthing in the order of about five gallons per minute 14 leakage.

15 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

What are the two you 16 don't consider?

You don't consider the steamline break 17 and a steam tube break?

18 MR. EISENHUT Or a LOCA and a tube rupture 19 also.

Another way of saying it is you don't assume a 20 steam generator tube rupture with any other accident.

21 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

But you limit your 22 consideration to one steam gencrator tube?

23 3R. EISENHUT:

That is correct.

24 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Do you think that 25 provides adequate protection, or are you giving ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

400 VIRGINlA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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consideration to ---

2 MR. EISENHUT:

Tha t is why, sir, on the botta 3

of the slide it says we are reconsidering multiple tube 4

failures.

5 Could I ask for the slide with the number one 6

labeled " Safety Concerns."

It is the first slide under 7

" Background."

8 Basically the design basis again is one tube 9

rupture.

The other piece of the design basis is that 10 there is actually a general design criteria that-leakage 11 should be very low from the primary system and the 12 likelihood of large leakace should be extremely remote.

13 You evaluate the radiological consequences of that 14 accident to ensure tha t it is within acceptable limits.

15 The other thing you do is for accident such as 16 a LOCA or a main steamline rupture you only assume very 17 small leakage through the tubes.

It is no greater than 18 on the order of five gallons per minute which is just a 19 simple, very small trickle actually of primary coolant 20 into the secondary side.

21 We are reconsidering several pieces of that 22 evaluation.

We are formally reconsidering and will make 23 a technical evalua tion and determination of should you 24 in light of all presen t experience, should we change the 25 design basis?

I ALDERSON REPORT 1NG COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTCN. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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Should we change it to say look at multiple 2

tube ruptures?

3 Should we look at simultaneous or within a 4

simple time frame leakage in each of two steam 5

generators?

6 Should you look at a tube rupture event from, 7

for example, a main stesmiine rupture, that is that the 8

shock of a main steamline rupture fail a weakened tube?

9 Lastly, we are re-evaluating the way we go to about doing the evaluation of how much the radiological 11 consequences are.

The piece there of course was Ginna, 12 as we discussed before.

On C'.nna water was relieved out 13 of the relief valves as opposed to steam with 14 radioactivity in it and that does change the calculation 15 of the model.

So there are some areas that we are 10 evaluating and reconsidering in light of all this 17 information.

18 HR. DENTON:

The point I was making earlier is 19 we do have a report now that has been coordinated at 20 least at the staff level that vraps up our 21 considerations of all of these thing s.

It tries to 22 reflect on the operating experience to date, what 23 industry is doing, where the USIs are headed and come to 24 some conclusion on earh of these issues and have an 25 integra ted a pproach to what future requirements we might ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

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have on steam generators.

That report we think Darrell 2

will tell you will be done here in a few months.

3 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

On these 4

reconsiderations, what form are they taking?

5 MR. EISENHUTs It I could reserve that, it 6

will be swept into our overall program.

7 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Why don't we let you go 8

on for a while.

9 MR. EISENHUT:

If I could go back to this to overall evaluation effort slide 11 What we have tried to do here was in sort of 12 box form summarize and put in perspective the overall 13 effort that is underway.

There are a number of 14 different things going on.

Bill and Harold mentioned 15 some of these.

This goes down the left and I think this 16 sort of summarizes all of the different activity that is 17 underway today on steam generators.

18 Just to mention a couple, there is of course 19 individual plant reviews.

If the plant has a problem, 20 we are going through an individual plant review and in 21 some cases we a pprove restart.

So that series continues l

22 ss it is.

23 Ihere is an unresolved safety issue, A-3/4/5, 24 where we have a technical draft that is undergoing 25 technical review internally.

The task manager for that, l

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400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON. O.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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Jack Strosnider, did a yoeman 's job over some period of 2

time, and we are integrating that in to what I will be 3

discussing in a minute?

4 HR. EISENHUT4 Yes, I will.

I am just trying 5

to identify the elements that I had to consider on how 6

to put this thing together.

7 Recall also that there was a NUREG document 8

vritten by Tad Marsh prior to him coming to the 9

Commission staff relating to how the systems behave 10 following the steam generator tube rupture and it had 11 some recommendations in it for some long-term actions.

12 Then of course there was the Ginna follow-up 13 that followed our briefing the Commission a couple of 14 months ago where de were going to go back to all the 15 offices and back to the region and come up with 16 recommendations following the Ginna event.

17 Then there are a number of other things, such 18 as discussions with the vendors, discussions with the 19 Steam Generator Gwners Groups.

EPRI is their project 20 manager for their efforts.

He have had a dialogue with 21 some foreign countries and foreign governments for at 22 least five or six years and exchanging steam generator 23 information.

The most recently was in the last couple 24 of months.

Last month I believe we had a discussion 25 with one of the ACRS subcommittees and of course we are ALCERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

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getting inf ormation from the research program.

2 We had considered in SECY-82-72-A, B and C.

3 There were several documents associated with it.

We are 4

trying to bring all these together in a more formal 5

coordination effort.

We explored that idea with the 6

industry, with the AIF and with EPBI cf can we do it 7

more in a formal arrangement where we actually share 8

research and maybe we can have better coordination and 9

eliminate some possible duplication.

10 We came away basically thinking that the idea 11 we were exploring really didn't have that much merit and 12 really was not that workable.

Instead we went to a 13 different approach which we believe is going to 14 accomplish the same mission and bring all this together 15 to resolution and bring all the different pieces 16 together to a sat of requirements that we believe are 17 appropriate.

18 It leads us to what I have termed here the 19 final approach.

Well, not final, but sort of what we 20 are doing today and the direction we are heading today.

21 It has of course individual plant reviews continuing.

22 As Harold pointed out, there is quite a large effort 23 being undertaken by the operating license applicants.

24 Many of them are upgrading their plants as much as they 25 can with the current state of the conditions of the ALDERSCN REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

400 VIPGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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plant.

We a re using a number of consultants in those 2

reviews,, quite a number of the national labs, 3

universities, Franklin Research Center, quite a number 4

of people.

5 The industry has several efforts underway.

6 They are not really IDRs, Independen t Design Reviews.

7 They are more a form of design verification that are 8

underway.

For example on the new Model D steam 9

generators, TVA, Duke Power and South Carolina Electric to and Gas have all gotten together and are having a design 11 review program in concert to bring together the state of 12 technology on them and what is the proper resolution to I

13 that.

Another one, for example, is THI-1 which has a 14 form of design review effort where they have brought in 15 a number of consultants and contractors to evaluate the l

16 o ve rall ef f o rt.

17 We generally participate in these.

In fact, 18 Gus Lainas who is here with me is leaving this evening 19 for Pittsburgh to go in for the conclusion of the Model 20 D independent design review.

21 So there is considerable effort underway on 22 plants.

Even though we call them individual plants, 23 they are starting to be brought together in groups where l

24 there is a sharing of the technology back and forth.

i 25 The second box here is we are having a series l

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ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTCN, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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of period meetings with the vendors, EPRI, the Steam 2

Genera tor Owners Group and a number of other groups 3

where we are systenatically and periodically going 4

through the state of technology of the present vendors, 5

what is their la test thinking and how do they view the 6

problem, some of the same questions we have discussed 7

here today.

8 Lastly and more importantly, we are bringing 9

in an integrated set of requirements.

Of all the things 10 going on we are putting together one set of 11 requirements.

What do we really think from a technical 12 standpoint should be the direction we are heading in the 13 way of an NRC requirement for steam generators, if any.

14 It is will include and is being factored into 15 that the work that was done up to this point in USI 16 A-3/4/5.

In fact, as I said earlier, thera is a draft 17 report that has been circulated which is undergoing 18 technical review at this point.

It will be put in in 19 sone fashion in a body, in an integrated body attached 20 to the final report.

21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I guess we had been 22 told tha t was NUREG 0844.

Is that correct?

23 MR. EISENHUT:

There was a draft NUREG 0844, 24 yes.

25 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Do you intend to ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINTA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTCN. O.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

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publish it?

2 MR. EISENHUT It will be published as part of 3

the final report.

We felt we really shouldn't have 4

maybe two or three reports for steam genera tor 5

recommendations and requirements at the same time.

So 6

they are all going to be brought together into one 7

report.

I don't have any idee what the NUREG number 8

will be, but that draft report and the technical 9

evaluation work that was done for that draf t report will 10 be put in as one set and probably as an appendix to the 11 report.

12 There was some evaluation work that was done 13 at Sandia, for example.

That work will be saved intact 14 and attached to the documen t.

15 MR. DENTON:. I don't think we intend to 16 publish the draf t as is.

Once though we decide what the 17 integrated set of requirements are, then we will define 18 the subset of requirements that fall out of A-3/4/5.

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19 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I guess my question 20 probably is more related to at some point you will wrap l

21 up this uaresolved safety issue?

22 MR. DENTON:

Right.

23 MR. EISENHUT:

Yes.

l 24 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

At the moment you have 25 got a package that a t least, although it do esn 't carry ALDERSON REPCRTING CCMPANY. INC.

400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. 0.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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to any need for implementation, it carries I guess the r

2 resolution of that set of; integrated issues.

3 MR. DENTON:

That will form part of the basis 4

for this integrated set, and whatever pieces of 3/4/5 5

ultimately get approved will become't,4e resolution of 3

8 3/4/5.

I,

7 MR. EISENHUT.

Another v,ay,to say;it that may 1

l 8

be helpful is we view.this thing as coming out with, a ?

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9 final product.

It will be a repcct for an evaluation 10 and it will have several pieces in it.

It will hcVe 11 up-front here is an enumera' tion of a list that we call 12 requirements but they have got to get put in some 13 requirement land over he.re to make them really r

14 requirements.

But it ' vill be our te chnicalf t inking ---

15 COMMISSIONER AHfARNE:

This can be another 18 question.

17 MR. EISENHUT: [I I just thought I would

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18 shorteircuit it.

i 19 (Laughter.)

!l 20 MR. EISENHUT: /E rst, we a re going to try to p - -

21 do the technical job and then we will figure out i.-

5 22 sdministratively how to put it into a requirement.

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r 23 COMMISSIO N ER AH E.4R N E :

You are on a schedulef <

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24 then that sometise this fa,ll you. vill be coming down

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3 ALDERSON REPCATING COMPANY,INC, d$3 vtAGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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all of the work that was done on A-3/4/5?

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MR. EISENHUT:

Absolutely, and as well as the 3

same thing for NUREG 651.

In fact, the authors of those 4

two documents, or the draft in one and the final in the 5

other, are participating and we requested their 6

assistance to put this final report together.

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7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

It does seem logical.

8 MR. EISENHUT:

That is right.

As well as for 9

Ginna we have requested the input from the region and i

10 the f olks who did the evaluation.

l 11 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Now you have labeled 12 the top of that box an " Integrated Set of 13 R eq uire m en t s. "

How do you propose going about making

'14 these requirements?

l 15 MR. DIRCKS:

One thing we are not going to do 16 is put them in a NUREG document.

17 (Laughter.)

18 HR. DIRCKS:

We will come up with either a 19 regulatory change or we will come up with, if applies to 20 pla nts, with sort of a schedule for application, or we I

21 will come up with a reg. guide of some sort.

l 22 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Well, so far I haven't 23 heard of something that sounds like a re quire m en t.

24 MR. EISENHUT:

We, haven't through through yet

.' 25 exactly what format it would be.

One of the things tha t p

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we would like to do is we are interacting with the 2

industry to ask them what would be in your mind the best 3

way to make these formal requirements?

Do we have to in 4

fact, or can we get every utility to propose them and we 5

somehow confirm them?

It is still open.

6 C05!ISSIONER AHEARNE:

I imagine you are still 7

1 long way from being clear on what the reqirements are.

8 HR. EISENHUT Cn even what the requirements 9

are, that is right.

We don 't know whether they are 10 going to be formal changes to a regulation.

It will 11 have to evolve.

It will sweep in, however, at least the 12 five elements that I have here; that.is, the lessons 13 from Ginna and other opera ting experience.

An example 14 there is the other continuing loose parts that have been 15 experienced and more than just Ginna.

It will bring in 16 the information that was developed to date on A-3/4/5 as 17 well as what has been loosely called the Tad Marsh l

18 report and the information from the other evaluation 19 areas, the re-evaluation, the multiple tubes, et cetera.

20 They will come together in some formal sense at the end, 21 an that report at the end will be the resolution of USI 22 A-3/4/5.

23 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

And your current 24 schedule for getting there?

25 MR. EISENHUTa Is to have the final report ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. O.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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complete by the end of August.

2 (Laughter.)

3 MR. DENTON:

We are including the latest 4

report.

5 (Laughter.)

6 HR. DENTON:

We have a draft under revi,ew nov 7

and we hope to have an internal staff review completed 8

in a couple of months and get it to the committee to 9

review requirements and interact with them for a period 10 of time.

That is the schedule for when we can get it 11 down to you.

12 HR. DIRCKS:

Say the late summer or early fall.

13 (Laughter.)

14 HR. DENTON:

We are going to get it to you as 15 soon as we can complete it, which is the fall, but I 16 would prefer not to commit to any particular date.

17 HR. EISENHUT:

I think the point is that it is 18 better to say that we are devoting considerable 19 attention and major focus on this to bring to resolution 20 this issue and we hope it is one way to actually bring 21 A-3/4/5, for example, to a resolution as well as these 22 o ther pieces.

We think we now have a framework that is 23 going to accomplish that and I am shooting for the next 24 few months that we will have this thing resolved.

25 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Are you saying that by ALDERSoN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

22 1

this f all we might hope to have a resolution of A-3/4/5?

2 MR. EISENHUT:

Oh, absolutely.

3 MR. DENTON:

By resolution, you know, if you 4

are using the term loosely, what we intend to say is we 5

vill have a technical view on what it would take to 6

properly protect the public against steam generator tube 7

failures and it would consist of all these various 8

actions.

Then we have to somehow convert that into 9

reg ula to ry requirements and then get it implemented 10 before it actaully takes practical effect.

11 MR. EISENHUT:

Resolution on the USI up to 12 date has been the publication of a document that says 13 this is the technical resolution of the issue and I 14 would expect that to be accomplished by then.

15 If I could go to the next slide.

They really 16 at this point sort of just support the main theme of the 17 overview.

This is just a listing of several things we 18 have been doing lately.

There has been considerable 19 activity in this area both by the staff and in the 20 industry.

21 Just pointino out a couple, as I said, we have 22 met with the vendors, we have met with EPRI, we have met 23 with the Stear Generator Owners Group who is in the 24 throes of forming a second Steam Generator Owners 25 Group.

The first one's mission has essentially been l

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wound down.

2 We have issued the Ginna findings as NUREG 3

909.

We sent that to each operating plant in the United 4

States, I believe each operating PWR in the United 5

Sta tes, and we told them to be sure that the lessons in 6

that report are factored into their operator training 7

program.

We did that by just a simple letter saying 8

that this is something they should certainly have in 9

their training program.

10 We issued the Ginna restart, and of course 11 Ginna restarted.

That was an evaluation of NUREG 915.

12 That evaluation was also issued to all the plants in the 13 United States again at this time just for their

(

14 information, not as a requirement but for their 15 information.

16 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

As I recall, none of 17 those had any recommendations in them.

18 MR. EISENHUI:

That is correct.

There were 19 findings of course in the Ginna Report, 909, and it was 20 sim ply issued by a letter from me saying that look at it 21 and you should learn whatever you can from this if it is 22 pertinent operating experience.

23 Representative Markey's staff came to me just 24 rec en tl y.

They have been closely following what is 25 going on in steam generators.

They actually came out to ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIAGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTCN, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

24 1

our office two or three weeks ago and met with us.

2 We have increased use of consultants and I 3

will just sentioned a couple here.

We are using, for 4

example, on TMI-1, we have gone the route of having a 5

contractor hopefully independently verify the approach 6

tha t is going to be done in the lab prior to it being 7

put into the actual plant.

Those are the kinds of a

things that to the extent practical we are trying to 9

have more increased use of contractors.

10 Of course, on saw on the Ginna report that we 11 sent down also and we had I think two contractors 12 independently analyze samples of f ailed tubes.

So we 13 are trying to broaden the base of expertise that we are i

14 using throughout the country.

15 We have briefed the ACBS subcommittee once.

16 We have had the discussion with the critical mass 17 representative.

So there is quite a bit of discussion 18 in the United States and a lot of technical work.

19 We have participated in two IAEA safety 20 missions on Model D steam genera tors and we are closely 21 working with the authorities in those other countries.

22 We participated also in discussions with a number of 23 countries in connection with a recent OECD meeting.

24 COMMISSIGNER GILINSKY.

Now who is in charge 25 of all of this in the staff?

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MR. EISENHUT:

Right now the focal point for 2

trying to bring it together is myself.

I am trying to 3

integrate it together and bring it to some form of a 4

resolution.

It cuts across a large number of technical 5

organizations in the licensing organization.

Gus Lainas 6

has the responsibility of actually bringing all these 7

things together to resolution.

8 There are participants and staff members 9

assigned from esch of the divisions in NRR, from our 10 Research office and there are a number of contract 11 members.

So we are really running it sort of almost as 12 a project itself, bringing it together as a project in 13 an effort to try to bring it to resolution.

14 COMMISSIONER GIIINSKY Is this done through 15 some formal mechanism?

16 MR. EISENHUT Yes.

There are people formally 17 assigned and we have got internal working schedules.

So 18 ve are trying, as I said, to run it more as a project to 19 try to bring this to resolution.

20 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

And as a project, is 21 the project manager you?

22 MR. EISENHUT:

It is really Gus.

I am the 23 official spokesman with the industry and I think there 24 is actually a SECY document.

25 MR. DIROKS:

We started off looking at ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, I

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licensing problems and research problems.

We had Bob 2

Minogue's group involved almost co-equally.

The second 3

mee ting we had was with the industry group and we 4

decided th a t most of it should be focused on NRR.

5 Darrell picked up the lead and he has the authority to 6

call in the people from Research and the other offices.

7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE.

I understand that.

I

~

8 am just following up on Commissioner Gilinsky's 9

questioh.

Darrell's description was ss a project.

10 MR. EISENHUT:

That is correct.

11 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Therefore, although you 12 are at the top of the staff and Harold is then on top of 13 NRR and Darrell is under one section of NRR, I was 14 trying to find out in Darrell's term of a formal 15 structure of a project who is the person at the top of 16 it?

17 MR. EISENHUT In answer, there is a formal 18 person.

He is the fellow behind that screen right now 19 who is the equivalent of the project manager.

20 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Who is that?

21 MR. EISENHUTs Bob Martin.

We are also 22 bringing in a couple of other people dedicated full time 23 in our opera tion.

So there are essentially two project 24 managers.

i 25 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE.

Does Bob work for Gus?

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3R. EISENHUT Yes, he does.

2 CHAIRMAN P ALL ADINO:

So cross off Gus' name 3

and put Bob Martin.

4 (Laughter.)

5 MR. EISENHUT:

Well, I hold Gus accountable.

6 (Laughter.)

7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

That is fine, but with 8

all these people coming in I am sure there is somebody 9

spending most of his or her time worrying about this, 10 and that I guess is Bob Martin.

11 MR. EISENHUT:

It is my pa rasite theory.

All 12 the mangement up the line is are the parasites.

Someone 13 has to be.doing the work day in and day out.

14 (Laughter.)

15 HR. EISENHUT:

But you are absolutely right.

16 The next slide is just a list of the areas 17 that we are looking at recommendations in.

We don't 18 really have any formal recommendations or requirements 19 at this time in these areas over and above the existing 20 ' framework.

But these are the areas we are exploring.

I l

21 only put it here to show that it is a pretty broad based 22 effort.

23 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Let me ask you, what 24 is the sort of thing you expect to have in the fall when 25 You talk about a resolution?

I don 't mean precisely ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

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what the requirements would or wouldn't be, but what 2

might they deal with?

3 MR. DENTON:

Well, as a starter we can always 4

have a rule-making and add a new rule to cover these 5

areas.

We have new rules covering steam generators 6

specifically and we have a lot of general design 7

criteria and regulations that apply.

What we intend to 8

do is develop what we think would make a coherent set 9

and then find the mechanism.

We are trying to formalize 10 our requirements, and the most formal way is to come up 11 with proposed rules in these areas.

12 CHAIRMAN PALLADIN0s It might address 13 inspection frequency and techniques and it might address 14 changes in procedures and it alght address operator 15 training?

Are these the kind of things that you would 16 come up with?

17 HR. DENTON:

That is right.

These are the 18 most likely areas the.t we see.

It would be inspection 19 techniques under one, analysis of response under two and 20 procedures under three.

We are trying to look at the 21 entire area of safety and steam generators.

22 MR. EISENHUT:

That is right.

Should we have 23 any additional requirements in these areas?

24 MR. DENTON:

We have requirements in all these 25 areas to some extent now.

They are buried in the ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

29 1

Standard Review Plan and various reg. guides and rules 2

of the Commission.

These would be do we need additional 3

guidance in these areas.

4 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Now I gather by looking 5

at this list that the chemistry of the second side is 6

not one of the areas that you believe you would end up 7

having a racommendation in.

8 MR. DENTON:

That is a longer-term issue than 9

we may take in this one.

It sure looks as though 10 ind ustry is adopting the Owners Group recommendations 11 and many of the new OLs are moving that way.

There is 12 at least one utility that shipped their steam generator 13 back to tha manuf acturer, for example, and made the 14 types of changes recommended by the Owners Group.

So in 15 some of those areas we may just find a natural move i

16 towards those recommendations.

17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I wasn't saying though 18 tha t I think you ought to.

I am just asking the 19 question.

I look at this list and I don't 20 MR. EISENHUT:

It is an oversight, it was 21 meant to be there and it is intended to be there under 22 No.

1.

In the shorthand of putting it in simple bullet 23 form on one page it is implicitly stated.

1 24 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Where is it implicit?

25 MR. EISENHUT:

It is right between bullet two ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON, D C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

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and bullet three.

2 (Laughter.)

3 NR. LAINAS4 I don't think that that 4

particular slide, you know, is intended to include all 5

of the items that we are looking at, but there are the 6

types of things.

Certainly water chemistry is one of 7

them.

8 As far as this report is concerned, you know, 9

what it will look like, I am not sure what the final to form will be.

But as Darrell mentioned, there are quite 11 a number of efforts going on in A-3/4/5.

What we are 12 trying to do is get them all together in one spot and 13 some will be long-term requirements and some may not be 14 turn out to be requirements at all and then again there 15 may be short-term requirements.

That is what we are 16 trying to do.

17 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

But certainly based on 18 the Japanese experience water chemistry on the secondary 19 side seems to be very germane.

20 NR. LAINAS:

Clearly water chemistry is going 21 to be a consideration, yes.

22 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

It wa sn ' t so clear when 23 I looked at this slide.

24 HR. EISENHUT There are two that I will 25 assure you are on top of our list.

One is water i

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31 1

chemistry and one is loose part monitoring.

2 MR. DENTON:

I think there is a distinction in 3

my mind at least between the plants which are OLs and 4

the plants which are ors.

The OLs really I think 5

finally have gotten the message and many of them that 6

are coming down the pike are adopting every one of the 7

Owners Group's recommendations for secondary water

~

8 chemistry.

9 The plants that are operating te*nd to look 10 more back about how to minimize the effect of where they 11 are.

Many of them had extensive leakage and they have 12 got a lot of tubes plugged and they would like to stop 13 leakage where it is, but don't have the flexibility that i

14 the new plants have in chemistry control.

to CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Recently at Indian Point 16 II they discovered a steam generator shell crack.

Is 17 that part of your consideration?

18 MR. DENTON:

That would be covered 19 specifically for Indian Point in the review, but whether 20 it gets into these recommendations or not, I guess I 21 will ask Gus now it is looking.

We haven't adopted any 22 set of recommendations.

23 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

No, but I meant is that 24 an area for consideration?

25 MR. DENTON:

Yes.

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CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Do other operating 1

2 reactors have a similar kind of steam generator?

3 MR. LAINAS:

Similar type of steam generator?

4 Oh, yes.

5 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Has there been any 6

evidence of this progles here?

7 MR. LAINAS:

Not this kind of a failure, no, 8

not a shell crack.

9 MR. DENTON:

That gets into the history of the 10 program.

11 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I was just wondering if 12 that was something peculiar to the circumstances at 13 Indian Point or whether this might b.e the inception of 14 some new problem?

15 HR. EISENHUT:

Well, there is one extra caveat 16 to that.

Westinghouse has recommended specific 17 inspections at a particular location on 15 other 18 Westinghouse plants, but at this time they haven't 19 pinned down the precise cause of the cracking.

They are 20 thinking it was due to corrosion fatigue from abnormal 21 thermal cycles.

It is still under investigation, but 22 Westinghouse's precaution has recommended at the 15 23 units inspections of those particular areas.

24 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Wha t are the 25 characteristics of those?

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MR. LAINAS:

They way they selected the 15 2

pla n ts?

3 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Yes.

4 MR. LAINAS:

Well, the next bunch of plants 5

that were scheduled to shut down over the next year or 6

so.

7 COMMISSIONER AREARNE:

So it is not that it is 8

a characteristics of one particular brand of steam 9

generator?

10 MR. LAINAS:

No.

11 MR. EISENHUT:

The Indian Point model is very 12 similar.

It is Model 44 or 40.

13 MR. LAINAS:

Model 40 I think.

14 MR. EISENHUT It is the standard Westinghouse 15 nodel stean generator that was used for a number of 16 years.

It is very similar to Surry and Turkey Point and 17 that whole ---

18 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

What you are really 19 saying is that they have recommended that the next set 20 of plants that are shutting down do this inspection.

21 MR. EISENHUT That is correct.

22 MR. LAINAS:

Yes.

23 MR. EISENHUT:

These are, as I said, only 24 areas, and again they are only there to show that it 25 does cover a nuabar of areas like water chemistry.

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The next slide again just sort of walks 2

t hro ugh th e sequence of things we would be doing.

I 3

von 't co through it in detail, except for a couple of 4

points.

5 One, is we will be looking at a value impact.

6 What does it really gain you and what is the impact of 7

doing some things that may be preventive or some 8

additional inspections, additional in-service 9

inspections.

Loose parts monitoring systems we are 10 looking at.

As Harold mentioned, on operating plants it 11 is very difficult to go in and put in full-flow 12 domineralizers and things such as that.

13 We will be working closely with the industry 1

14 on this.

It is very difficult to put it in the space of 15 what does it really gain you from risk standpoints 16 because, just like today, we only have I think a one 17 man-rem total.

If you look at how much is it worth to 18 avoid one man-rem for one tube rupture, most analyses l

l 19 along that line would not conclude much.

l l

20 But again we are looking at it from the 21 standpoint tha t you must prevent multiple ruptures and 22 you must p re ve n t the steam generators from degrading to 23 the point where the frequency or the size or the 24 complication of the numbers of these events increases.

25 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Well, if all you were ALDER $oN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIAGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON. O C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

5 35

/

1 ever going to have to deal with is the Ginna type of 2

release, if that were guaranteed, you might have a 3

different view.

7 4

MR. DENTON.

That is right.

5 HR. EISENHUT:

I think that is right.

6 MR. DENION:

The cost benefit comes from a 7

certain fraction of Ginna's turnout to have higher 8

releases.

So it is not that if they were all to stop at 9

Ginna, the consequence, we wouldn't be nearly so 10 concerned.

But there is a certain fraction there will 11 be other failures along the way that the doses will be a 12 lot higher.

So it is really not the Ginna one.

It is 13 the probability of a much bigger release that we are i

14 trying to prevent.

15 MR. EISENBUT So that leads us back to the 16 comment Harold made in the first place, and that is that 17 the principle primary concern at this point of what you 18 have seen is economics.

It is not that you might 19 prevent anything bigger and more complicated or the l

20 frequency of these things.

i l

21 ER. DENTON:

But applying, you know, the ALARA 22 concept just to the Ginna event we couldn't have 23 afforded the plane trip for the resident inspector there 24 and back if that were the sole criterion.

In other 25 words, if that were the maximum dose that you would ever i

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36 1

get from a steam generator tube rupture and it is less 2

than one man-rem and using $ 1,000 a man-rem, you 3

wouldn't expend very much effort at all.

So you are 4

really worried about this bigger, less likely, but 5

higher consequence category.

6 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

It might not have gone 7

up to TMI aither.

~

8 (Laughter.)

9 MR. DENTON:

There we had the 2,200 man-rem 10 and we would have spent a f ew million dolla rs.

11 HR. EISENHUT:

This basically are just the 12 items we touched upon before.

Notice one more other 13 thing, and that is almost all USIs then they are i

14 completed go out in draft form for public comment.

It 15 is a consideration we have listed on here, but it 16 depends on how it evolved of course whether we would or 17 wouldn't.

18 First, we are trying to develop the additional 19 technical requirements, if any, and we will see how it 20 evolves.

21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Aren't you committed, 22 though, in one way or another to go out for public 23 comment on it?

If you did it just strictly as a USI 24 then you would go out for public comment.

25 ER. EISENHUT No question about it.

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COMMISSIONEC AHEARNE:

Now at the other end if 2

you go on for a rule, you have got to go out for public 3

comment.

4 MR. EISENHUT Yes.

5 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

It seems to me it is 6

going to be a little difficult to find an intermediate 7

ground which is going to be more than the USI and still 8

not go out for public comments since you are bounded on 9

both sides.

I 10 MR. EISENHUT:

Right.

That is why it is on 11 there.

We are having an awful lot of discussions with 12 both the utilities and the vendors as well as the public 13 members and Congressional staffs.

So in essence we are 14 having a lot of public comment interaction already.

15 But, yes, we view at this time it is on there as issued 16 for public comment.

17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I would be very leary 18 of counting meetings because we have run into problems.

19 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

What was that?

20 MR. EISENHUT:

Excuse me?

21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

We have run into 22 problems before of saying, well, we had a couple of 23 meetings and so that is public comment.

24 MR. EISENHUT:

Oh, I wasn't inferring that.

25 That basically concludes what we were planning ALDERSON REPORTING CCMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE, S.W., WASHINGTON D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

38 I

1 on going through.

We have provided a background package 2

of some six slides with a lot of summary information.

3 We weren't planning on going through that unless there 4

were some specifi: questions on that.

5 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Are you ready for 6

questions?

7 MR. DIRCKS:

Yes.

8 MR. EISENHUT:

Yes.

9 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I wonder if I might ask a 10 couple and then I will give my colleagues a chance.

11 Recently the manager for the resolution of 12 unresolved safety issues A-3/4/5 regarding steam 13 generator tube integrity expressed serious reservations 14 about the current strategy for implementing the proposed 15 requirements of NUREG 0844.

I wonder if you could 16 identify more specifically what his concerns are and 17 steps that yoo think need to be taken to address them.

18 I forget his name.

19 HR. EISENHUT:

Jack Strosnider.

20 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Before you do that 21 could you tell ne where tha t comes f rom?

22 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

What is that?

23 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Where did tha t ge t 24 expressed?

25 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

In a letter that was sent ALCERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

39 1

to us, and it was a letter that went from Strosnider to 2

Steve Hanauer.

The letter is rather general and I 3

wasn't sure I understood completely what he was trying 4

to say.

5 MR. DENTON:

Let me try to answer it first.

6 The question we had was whether we would try to move 7

through the staff and get peer review on 3/4/5 separate 8

from or concurrent with this total package.

9 And while I think Jack 's work is very useful, 10 I figured it was better to make it a part of the total 11 approach to the steam generators rather than treating 12 that one in isolation.

Whatever we end up adopting in 13 the area that is addressed by USI 3/4/5 vill be the 14 resolution of 3/4/5.

15 He would prefer to publish it separately.

He 16 spent a lot of time on it.

But I think th a t rather than 17 publish five documents with little pieces that I want to 18 get a total view of the staff on what are all of the 19 things we need to do.

Then out of that would fall what 20 we did and each contribution.

21 I don't think he has a fundamental objection 22 to that.

He is just concerned that his work may get 23 lost and we think it is not going to get lost this way.

24 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Well, as I recall, the 25 letter seems to say don 't take the recommendations l

I l

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piecemeal but do it in an integrated fashion, and I am 2

not sure I know what that means.

3 MR. EISENHUT:

Well, let me try to 4

characterize it a little bit.

Jack has been the task 5

manager on A-3/4/5 at least since the late '70s.

At 6

that time I was the lead assistant director for USIs.

7 A-3/4/5 was basically meant to address the denting 8

issue.

It was principally written as wha t do you do 9

about this phenomenon knohn as denting.

10 We have had this report, a draft technical 11 report principally done by some of our contractors and 12 Jack himself.

It has been in circulation and going 13 through review and concurrence probably for the last 14 year.

15 I agree with some of Jack's points that what.

16 ve need to do is bring the comments together, put them 17 all in an integrated fashion, not lose the work that has 18 been done over the last two or three years on A-3/4/5, 19 get it resolved and let's get the exercise complete.

20 In fact, I have gone the extra step saying 21 that althoagh Jack is one of our principal reviewers on 22 thermal shock, I am still looking for a piece of his 23 time to help me finish this job.

t 24 I have assured the staff and I have talked to 25 Steve Hanauer and we are going to take the piece of ALCERSON REPCRTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGINI A AVE S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (2C2) 554-2345

i 41 1

technical review that is done as A-3/4/5, the evaluation 2

work and append it formally to the report.

We will take 3

those technical requirements that are in the evaluation, 4

put themm through the scrutiny of the review process and 5

I want to be sure that none of those get lost.

They 6

will all be addressed and responded to one by one in an 7

integrated fashion.

8 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Could you characterize 9

A-3/4/5 because he says they were established to be the 10 principal vehicle for resolving the S3 issue.

11 MR. DENTON:

As seen by the staff back when we 12 first started, 3/4/5, and as Darrell said, it was seen 13 back in those days to be denting.

So we laid out a task 14 action plan to approach denting.

Most of the work in 15 the re is denting and it doesn't include in that scope of 16 tha t activity the Ginna experience for loose parts or 17 the vibration problems.

18 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

You say it does or 19 does not?

20 MR. DENTON:

Does not.

So many of the things 21 which have occurred since we initiated that project have 22 changed our focus on what steam generator problems a re.

23 So that I now see A-3/4/5 as a part of the steam i

24 generator problem, but not the total problem.

25 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Co uld you just tell me i

t I

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42 1

whst they are?

2 MR. DENTON:

Well, denting in A-3/4/5, I think 3

denting is the principal focus.

4 MR. EISENHUT:

A-3/4/5 was Westinghouse, CE 5

and BCW.

We broke them into three unresolved safety 6

issues a t the time and we wrote the task action plan to 7

be resolving those things that we knew as problems.

I 8

think the first draft of that we did in about 1977, '77 9

or

'78, in tha t time frame.

We didn 't know of the loose 10 parts problems because there were none experienced at 11 the time.

So when we wrote it we called it resolution 12 of steam generatot problems.

13 My first comment on the draft that we are 14 integrating into this was we either do one or two 15 things we change the tital of A-3/4/5 as resolution of 16 one piece of stess generator experince f rom the '70s, 17 v'hich the industry and we essentially agree is resolved, 18 or we sweep it in and make the entire thing the 19 resolution of steam generator problems as you see them 20 today.

But we have to to recognize that a year from now 21 we may have a new problem.

22 So if we "have the resolution today," it may 23 be unresolved again two or three years from now.

24 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Were you going to go over 25 this paper on the extent of problems?

I mean the table.

ALDERSON REPCRTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. O.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

43 1

MR. EISENHUT:

I really hadn't planned on it 2

unless there were some specific questions.

3 (Laughter.)

4 MR. DENTON:

Do you want to go over it?

There 5

is a lot of information in here and we will be happy to.

6 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Well, why don't we leave 7

it and go to these other questions first.

8 MR. DENTON:

All right.

9 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Can I ask a question on 10 the technical specs for iodine.

Are there plants now 11 that don't have tech specs on iodine?

Is there any 12 recommendation for where the tech spec for iodine should 13 be more conservative in light of Ginna?

14 MR. DENTON:

Yes, there are some in which we 15 think we need to go back and relook at again in light of 16 the Ginna experience.

17 MR. EISENHUTs There are in fact maybe a l

18 couple that don't have what is called an average energy 19 iodine spec like we would do today.

There are a number 20 of others that have an iodine spec that is higher than 21 what we would put on plants today.

22 4e have not systematically gone back and 1

23 backfitted those plants.

There was something in the 24 order of under ten.

Some of those we have pending 25 actions to lower them.

I believe on Ginna we have ALCERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, l

400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345 4

44 m

1 lowered it during th e review.

2 It turns out that most of those that did not 3

have the reduced spec have had steam generator 4

problems.

So one of the actions in improving the steam 5

generator follow-up work on a plant specific basis has 6

been to ensure that they have the right kind of iodine 7

spec.

So it is systematically being picked up.

8 CHAIRMAN PALLADISO:

On a plant-by-plant basis.

9 3R. EISENHUT:

Yes.

10 CH AIRMAN P ALLA DIN 04 I wasn't sure whether it 11 was involved ir. your Item No.

4.

12 NR. DENTON:

That was one where we would just 13 make the changes as convenient in those plants that 14 didn ' t have it and not wait until we have a report.

15 We have also reviewed what is called another 16 Heidelberg report which calculates much greater 17 consequences.

18 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

But that, as I recall, 19 was a multiple tube break ---

20 ER. DENTON:

That is right.

21 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I have a question on one 22 more topic, and that has to do with loose part 23 monitoring.

I somehow get the impression that loose 24 parts are playing a rather significant role in 25 d eg ra da tio n of steam genera tor tubes.

I was wondering ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC.

400 VIRGINTA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON, D C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

45 1

what espability do plants have to monitor for loose 2

parts in the primary system, what do they have with 3

regard to loose parts in the secondary system and do 4

very many plants even have any secondary system loose 5

parts monitors?

6 MR. LAINASs Ginna is the only plant that has 7

a loose part monitoring system specifically installed in 8

the steam generator, to measure those parts in the steam 9

generator.

to CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

On the secondary side?

11 MR. LAINAS:

On the secondary side 12 specifically for tha t.

Now there are quite a number of 13 plants, and I don't know how many, that have a loose 14 part monitoring system for the primary side.

However, 15 depending on where you locate the detectors, it might 16 have capability for both.

17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

You say Ginna did have 18 such a system?

19 MR. LAINAS4 Ginna recently installed it.

I l

{

20 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

It did not have it 21 before?

l 22 3R. LAINAS:

No, it did not have it.

It nad 23 one on the primary system but it took it off a long time 24 ago.

25 CHAIRMAN PALLADIN04 But we seem to be finding ALtERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC,

{

400 VIRGINIA AVE, S.W, WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

t 46

/

/;

1 loose parts in the secondary side df a number'of steam f.

2 generators, and I see,the t is one of yo,ur areas for 3

reconsiderstion.

I 4

MR. LAINAS:

Right.

L 5

CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

It would be nomething 6

that would seem to command some '$ rime a tten tion.

7 3R. DENTON:

It had not baen a regulatory a

requirement and is not today a regulatory requirement 9

for the secondary system.

i 10 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Noj is it a very 11 difficult system and expensive?

It is an external 1

12 attachment or do they actually,have to cut a hole in the 13 steam generator?

14 MR. DENTON:

Let me ask Gus to describe it.

I 15 think they are externally a ttached.

16 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

My question is 17 basically how expensive and ' difficul t it is to put 'in?

18 MR. LAINAS:

Ifdon't think it is too difficult 19 at all.

Ginns put in four around the tube sheet.

I 20 COMMISSIONER AREARNE:

They are external

)

21 attachments?

i

/

g

,t 22 MR. L AI'N AS : 1xternal-attachtents, yes.

'(,'

23 COMMISSIONER AHEARNEr,,'I wasn't really leading

  • g 24 into why not make'it a requireSents.

I am ju.qt puzzled t

25 by, given the difficultias that have shown up, wh y' t

i f

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, ALDERSON RCPORTING COMPANY, INC,

+

400 VtPGl' A WVE., S.W MASHINGTON, O C.

N 200*4 (202) 5{4-2345

47 1

plants haven't put them in.

2 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I shouldn't guess what a 3

utility would do, but it seems to have such a benefit 4

built into the cost tha t they would do it just on an 5

economic basis.

6 HR. EISENHUT:

Let me make sure we leave you 7

with the right snswer on loose parts.

There are a 8

number of plants that have loose part systems on the 9

primary side close enough to steam generators that in i

10 fact two of them, and I am trying to figure out which 11 two, that are on our list of recent experiences in fact 12 detected loose parts in the steam generators with their 13 loose parts systens on the primary side.

14 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I see.

/

15 HR. EISENHUT North Anna I was one of them 16 and Zion I believe may have been the other one.

Uc see

'17 here about six plants.

Six of the s'even plants listed 18 tha t found loose pa rts in f act have loose part 19 monitoring systems on the primary side.

So they do have 20 loose part monitoring systems and sometimes they are 21 capable of detecting problems a'

steam generator.

22 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Ysu are saying there 23 are seven plants that have detected loose parts?

24 HR. EISENHUTs Could I have the back-up slide 25 on loose parts.

r

/*

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48 1

There are seven plants that have detected 2

loose parts froa sur last briefing essentially until 3

today.

4 COM5ISSIONER GILINSKY:

And six of those have 5

monitoring systems?

6 MR. EISENHUT Loose parts monitoring systens 7

on the primary side.

Is Ginna's on the secondary side?

8 MR. LAINAS:

Yes.

9 MR. EISENHUT:

Five on the primary and one on 10 the secondary and one without any.

11 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Do any other plants 12 have loose part monitoring systems of this sort that are 13 close enough to detect 14 MR. EISENHUT I am sure they do, but we 15 haven't done a survey of that cross-cut.

North Anna I 16 was a good example of where the utility was detecting 17 loose parts and in fact that led them to go in and 18 question what was going on in the generator.

So the 19 technology is there.

The largest piece at North Anna I 20 was 95 grams.

21 MR. LAINAS:

In the case of Zion I that loose 22 part was on the primary side.

In the case of the others 23 they are all on the seconda ry side.

As a matter of 24 fact, on Zion I the loose part monitoring system did 25 pick up something very early, but it wasn't analyzed i

ALDERSCN REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 vtRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

49 1

properly as being a loose part.

So they didn't find it 2

as a result of a loose part monitoring system.

3 CHAIRMAN PALLADIN04 How many plants do you 4

think would have the capability of finding loose parts 5

on the secondary side?

6 MR. LAINASs I don't know.

7 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I mean even by the 8

primary side sys' tem.

9 NR. LAINAS:

I understand.

to MR. EISENHUIs More than four or five.

11 CHAIRMAN PALLADIN04 More than four or five?

12 MR. EISENHUTs Yes.

The only point I was 13 making here was of these seven plants five of them have 14 monitoring systems on the primary.

Ginna has it on the 15 secondary and San Onofre has no system.

So if you look 16 at the number of systems alone and if you look at the 17 fact that Zion did detect the loose part and it was in i

18 the lower channel head of the steam generator.

North 19 Anna I did detect the loose part with their system.

You 20 know, you would have to go out and really look at the 21 data to see how much ---

22 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

The reason I attach so l

23 such importance to loose parts is if you are talking 24 about a corrosion rate and you make an inspection and it 25 is "X" percent thinning, you might have a reason to ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W.. WASHINGTON. O C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

50 1

believe tha t by the time of the next inspection you 2

would have a stesdy ra te.

But with loose parts, 3

depending on how they are picked up and knocked against 4

the tubes, it could bring damage between inspection 5

periods and you would have no basis for knowing that you 6

ought to shut down.

7 MR. DENTON:

I think they are a prime 8

candidate for additional regulatory requirements.

Nov 9

whether you would need them all the time or whether you 10 would use them-mainly after repairs or inspection on the 11 steam generator ---

12 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Are these sonic systems 13 o r ultraso'nic?

14 MR. DENTON:

I think they are acoustic.

15 MR. EISENHUT Acoustic liners.

16 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

They are passive 17 systems as opposed to active.

18 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I have two more l

19 questions.

One I need the table on, this table, "The 20 Extent of Problem."

You have Westinghouse, CE and BEW 2i heat exchangers for steam generators, and Westinghouse 22 and CE seem to have a lot of problems to the lef t of 23 denting and BEW seems to have, well, just the one.

It 24 is a little different.

Then you go to the right of 25 denting and you have got B&W has gone some problems but ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W, WASHINGTON, D C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

51 1

the others don't.

2 Is thera sny festars, or has been any effort 3

to see why it is that Westinghouse and CE were having 4

these kind of troubles and BCW wasn 't and vice versa?

5 It se' ems to me if you picked the best of both, why you 6

have got a resolution.

7 MR. DENION:

That is related to the difference 8

in design, the "U"

bend design and the once-through 9

straight tube design.

10 CHAIREAN PALLADINO:

Are all of these due to 11 that?

12 HR. EISENHUT4 Yes.

All the BCW's are 13 once-through long tubes.

Now one thing I should caution 14 on here, there is one other column, one thing that helps 15 to put this in i little different perspective.

The 16 biggest problem in the recent times in the "U"

tube 17 steam generators has been denting, and that is because 18 of an iron oxide build-up at the support plate that to crushes the tube.

20 The BCW plants, a t least one of them informed 21 us in recent discussions, a t least one of the BCW plants 22 underwent a degrading.

It underwent a degrading because 23 the pressure drop across the once-through steam 24 generator had increased to the point where you couldn't 25 get full flow out of the plant.

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52 1

When asked in analyzing why they were getting 2

the pressure drop 3

CHAIRMAF PALLADINO:

I don't know which i

4 pressure drop you are talking about.

5 MR. EISENHUT:

I am sorry.

The secondary side 6

pressure drop through the generator, it was because of a 7

build-up of an iron oxide.

The support plates are 8

different in a BCW steam generator.

They are not a 9

circle around the tube.

So you don't get the same form 10 and the problem doesn't exhibit itself the same.

11 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

You mean secondary or 12 primary?

13 HR. EISENHUTs The secondary side.

The 14 degrada tion is on the primary side.

15 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Are you talking about 16 tubes through baffles?

17 MR. EISENHUT:

Yes, through a different kind l

18 of plate that looks something like a ---

19 CLaMISSIONER GILINSKY:

When you say the 20 pressure drop, the pressure drops on the primary side or l

21 sacondary side?

22 MR. EISENHUT The secondary side.

23 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Because of the baffling?

24 ER. EISENHUT And because of the crud 25 build-up in the steam generator on the secondary side.

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.

400 VIRGINIA AVE., S W WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

S3 1

It is an iron oxide and you may be seeing the same kind 2

of a build-up of corrosion to the point whe re BEW plants 3

are projecting now and BCW has shown us curves where 4

they have stated they projected this for a long period 5

of time, that BEW plants will actually have to derate 6

because of crud build-up in the steam generators.

7 In the "U"

tube steam generators when it 8

builds up it causes a problem denting the tubes because 9

there is a very tight annulus between the tube and the 10 support plate.

That physically does not exist in the ---

11 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

You said support pla te.

12 Do you mean what I call a baffle?

13 MR. EISENHUTa What you call a baffle.

It is 14 the support plate which has the flow holes and the tube 15 holes, that is correct.

16 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Where is the 17 constriction in the B&W flow?

18 MR. EISENHUT:

The material is particles of l

19 iron oxide in the middle of the steam generators and you 1

l 20 look at it as just crud build-up in the generator that 21 in the limit the' flow just can't get through the 22 generator.

23 CH AIRM AN P ALLADINO:

But you haven't gotten 1

l 24 denting there becsuse there is more space?

25 MR. EISENHUT:

That is correct, and you don't ALCERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE, S.W, WASHINGTCN. 0.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

54 1

have tube holes and flow holes in th e B CW.

You only 2

have one kind of hole.

The flow has to flush right 3

around the tube and it doesn't build up in the same 4

place.

The physical geometries make a considerable 5

difference, but you don't see it on the table.

6 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Well, I was going to ask 7

you why does BCW seem to get away without denting and 8

everybody else has denting, and I guess that is the' 9

answer.

10 MR. EISENHUTs That is at least partially the 11 answer.

12 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

If they have good flow 13 and the only way tney are getting flow is by the annulus 14 nround the tube, it seems to me that that would sweep 15 them clean.

16 MR. EISENHUT:

Well, but the crud build-up or 17 the deposits are actually building up between support 18 plates on the tubes.

19 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Oh, on the tubes.

20 MR. EISENHUT It is actually a material that 21 could hang on the bottom of plates.

So it is a very 22 complicated hydraulic phenomena.

23 MR. DENION:

The way I see this whole area is 24 tha t steam generators never got the analytical and 25 experimental attention that reactor cores got.

A lot of ALDERSON REPORTING CCMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINTA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

55 1

theory went into designing cores and flow and keep 2

high-purity wa ter and und e rsta nding hydraulics, but 3

steam generators were designed in a different part of 4

the company and they didn't apply sophisticated 5

three-dimensional hydraulic codes.

6 They evaporate millions of pounds of water an 7

hour and where that crud that is lef t build s up becomes 8

very important.

The industry now seems to understand it 9

fairly well, but many of the plants now going into to operation that haven't picked up all the Steam Generator 11 Owners Group recommendation are still having problems.

12 I understand that North Anna II and Sequoyah I both now 13 have detectable denting even though they are following 14 the Westinghouse recommendations, but they don't have 15 this full complement of titanium tubes and low copper 16 and f ull-flow demineralizers.

And unless you do all 17 these things it appears tha t you are just affecting the 18 rate of ---

19 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Did you say that 20 Sequoyah has seen denting?

21 MR. DENTON:

I think so' aft'er one cycle.

22 MR. EISENHUI:

And North Anna II at it first 23 refueling outage has seen denting.

24 MR. DENION:

Ne,ither of those plants have what 25 I call the Steam Generator Owners Group recommendations ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

56 1

in place as does St. Lucie II, for example.

2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY How do you see it?

3 MR. DENTON:

In the in-service inspection when 4

you inspect the tubes.

5 MR. EISENHUT:

That is correct.

It is a tube 6

that goes through a constriction.

By the time you see 7

the tube starting to be crunched down you infer that the 8

crevice has build up so much that FE O 23 9

volumetrically expands crushing the tube.

What you see 10 on sending a probe through the inside of the tube is you 11 see the tube has already been squeezed down.

So that 12 means in one cycle the crevice has a t least somewha t 13 filled up or the annulus and has started to restrict 14 some of the tubes.

15 MR. DENTON:

That is where our traditional 16 approach has been to calculate the stress and require 17 tube plugging when there is a loss of integrity or an 18 approaching loss of integrity.

19 CHAIRMAN PALLADIN0s Harold, you said 20 something that I want to make sure I didn't get the 21 wrong impression or if I got the right impression.

Did 22 you imply that Westinghouse, CE and B CJ would know now 23 how to design a steam generator that will get them out 24 of all the problems?

25 MR. DENTON:

The Owners Group seems fairly ALDERSoN REPORTING CCMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE S W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (2021 554 2345

57 1

confident that they understand now the phenomenon of 2

denting and th ey actually have data to show where in 3

some plants who have followed their recommendations to 4

the letter in all of their recommendations that they 5

have brought the increase in denting to a halt.

So tha t 6

there was no further degradation.

So based on the 7

experimental data they had in a few cases I think they 8

do undetstand that phenomena wall enough to stop it.

9 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

That is only on denting?

10 MR. DENTON:

That is right, that is denting 11 alone, which has been the focus for many years of'their 12 research efforts.

13 Now each of these other causes has gotten 14 investigated to va rious extents.

Denting was the number 15 attack in all steam generators for a long time, but I 16 think it will not be a problem in the new generation 17 plants where they have had time to pick up these 18 recommendations.

19 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

How about the question of 20 wastage and vibration.

21 3R. EISENHUT Let me put it in simple 22 summary.

Wastage was basically a problem in the early 23

'70s and it had to do with sodium phosphate secondary 24 side chemistry treatment.

Most plants switched from, 25 and in fact I think there are only two plan ts operating ALDERSON REPCATING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIAGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

58 1

today yet on sodium phosphate, but almost all plants 2

switched to what was known as all-volatile treatment.

3 When they switched they cured the vastage problem 4

principally, but when they switched is when they 5

starting getting the dentinc problem.

6 So the numbers of plants in the wastage column 7

has not changed drastically or the extent of degradation 8

even on those has not changed much.

So that I look at 9

that more as a sort of a historical column and we really 10 don't ---

11 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

How about vibration?

I 12 gather that is still a problem or do they understand 13 that well enough?

14 MR. EISENHUT Well, vibration has got two 15 facets.

The new' plants series, the new model of 16 generators called the Model D, of which Maquire is the 17 lead Model 7 in the United Sta tes, have experienced 18 severe vibration to tubes and the plants have not been 19 able to reach and sustain a hundred percent power for 20 any real duration because of the tube vibration problem.

21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Tha t is the same 22 problem tht Sweden and Spain have.

23 MR. EISENHUTs That is correct.

Sweden, 24 Spain, Yugoslavia and Brazil all have Model D generators 25 in operation.

They are all a little different than ALDERSON REPCRTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345 w

59 1

Maquire, different Model D's, D-2s, D-3s, et ceter, but 2

they are all what is known as preheater models, that is 3

the flow in the botton goes into the genera tor f rom the 4

side and goes through a baffling arrangement, and going 5

through the baffling arrangement is where you get severe 6

vibration.

7 You don 't get on Maquire, for example, and 8

they have run tests up to a hundred percent and up to 75 9

percent for different durations, but you apparently 10 don't get much vibration until you get above, something 11 above 50 percent on Model D-2s like Maguire and until 12 you get above 70 percent power on the plants in the 13 other countries which are model D-3s.

The lead Model 14 D-3 in the United States I believe is Summer which is 15 coming down the line.

16 I shouldn't drop it.

There is a lot being 17 done on Model D*s.

There is a flow test being run in 18 fact this sonth in Sweden which is to test the lead 19 arrangement which they hope is the fix to reduce the 20 flow in the generator.

21 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

How many plants are 22 affected in this country?

23 MR. EISENHUTs Well, potentially all Model 24 D-2s and D-3 s.

There is only one D-2.

25 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

That is Maquire.

ALDER $0N REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINlt WE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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Before we go on, what are the restrictions on Maquire's 2

operation right now?

3 MR. EISENHUT We have a formal restriction.

4 Right now I think they are undergoing approval for 5

something like 30 days at 100 percent.

6 MR. LAINAS:

Well, they are limiting 7

themselves to 50 percent power.

8 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Have we limited them 9

to anything?

10 MR. LAINAS:

Pardon?

11 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Have we imposed any 12 limitations?

13 MR. LAINAS:

Well, upon usual agreement.

14 MR. EISENHUTs It is one of the letters where 15 this confirms our understanding that you will not go 16 above 50 percent power pending staff review.

We did 17 'have a formal arrangement 18 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Not go over 50 percent l

l 19 power at all, or for any period of time?

20 MR. LAINAS:

For any substantial period of 21 time.

22 MR. DENTON:

We started out like limiting them 23 to like 50 percent power because they were instrumented 24 and you could record the data.

Then they came in with

'25 various appeals to change and we rejected a few and we ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

61 1

bought a few.

We haven't had any problems enforcing our 2

technical view on what constitutes safe operation, but 3

we are trying to learn from tha t plant at the same time 4

and have permitted occasional operation at higher power 5

levels to see where the onset of operation occurred.

6 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Do they have to ask us 7

to move to higher power levels?

8 MR. EISENHUIs Yes, and we have given them 9

approval to run at windows of time as sort of a closely to followed experimental program, that is, you run for a 11 little while at 75 percent and you shut down and dc an 12 inspection.

So it is a very cautious approach of 13 acquiring data during this period of time.

14 I should say it is not clear how much of a 15 degradation problem you would get and how fast.

And 16 since you don't know that precisely, you can only 17 authorize power in very small increments at various 18 power levels.

We are integrating the experience from 19 the four foreign countries as well as Maquire into a 20 package.

l

(

21 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

You said degradation.

l l

22 Wha t do you actully observe, vibration of the tubes?

23 MR. EISENHUT:

The tubes are actually l

24 vibrating.

25 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Because the tubes go l

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

62 1

through the preheater section?

2 MR. LAINAS:

It is the wear between the tubes 3

and the tube support plate.

4 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

That got very extensive 5

wear, didn ' t it, very rapidly?

6 MR. LAINAS:

Maquire?

7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

The Swedish.

8 MR. LAINAS:

The Swedish did and it resulted 9

in a* failure.

10 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYs Now can you tell me 11 what other plants are affected?

What other ones have l

12 D-2s?

13 MR. EISENHUT:

The only plant in the United 14 States and I think in the world with a D-2 steam 15 generator is Maquire I.

Maquire II has a D-3 steam l

16 generators.

There are four D-3 steam generators in the 17 United States.

l l

18 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY And those are?

19 MR. EISENHUT:

Summer, Watts Bar I, Maquire II 20 and Watts Bar II.

21 COMNISSIONER AHEARNE:

None in operation.

l 1

22 MR. EISENHUT:

None in operation.

1 23 MR. DENTON:

That is the group that has formed 24 that Owners Group and they have gotten consultants for a 25 design review, are reviewing the Swedish test and will l

l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

63 1

be reviewing the design of the baffles, and, depending 2

on timing, these plants will either be limited in their 3

operation or they can install the fix that might be 4

approved by the time they are to go into operation.

5 COM!ISSIONER GILINSKY:

Do you have any sense 6

for where the fix stands at this point?

7 MR. DENTON:

Let me ask Gus.

8 MR. LAINAS:

Excuse me, I didn't hear the 9

question.

10 MR. EISENHUT Where the fix stands today.

11 MR. LAINAS:

The fix?

Okay.

There are two 12 fixes that have been developed by Westinghouse and they 13 are cur.rently being tested, as Darrell pointed out, this 14 month in a full-scale test facility in Sweden.

15 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

This is in Sweden?

16 MR. LAINAS:

In Sweden, yes.

17 MR. EISENHUT Run by the Swedish State Power 18 Board.

19 MR. LAINAS:

Right.

20 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

This is with the diffuser 21 coming in?

22 MR. LAINAS:

It is essentially what both of 23 them will have, th a t is right.

24 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYs What happens af ter 25 this test?

Do we get to observe this test?

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64 1

MR. LAINAS:

Well, I am sure we can go over 2

and observe it.

3 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Well, I am not 4

suggesting that you go or not go.

I am just wondering 5

what it is we are doing or are going to do.

6 MR. EISENHUT4 We are going to evaluate the 7

results of the test because that test is in fact going 8

to be the ---

9 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Who are we dealing 10 with?

Are we dealing with this Owners Group or are we 11 dealing with Westinghouse?

12 MR. EISENHUT We are dealing with 13 Westinghouse and the Owners Group.

14 MR. DENTON:

And with the Swedish Government.

15 MR. EISENHUT:

And with the other foreign 16 governments also.

17 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

What is the next 18 ste p ?

Suppose Westinghouse comes up with something that 19 it is happy with and it decides that the tests bear out 20 that their design is the right now.

They would then go 21 to the Owrdrs Group presumably.

22 COMMIS$10NER AHEARN E:

At the moment, and 23 correct me if I am wrong, in Sweden at least the Swedish l

24 Government has to reach satisfaction, that they are l

25 satisfied with it.

It is not just with Westinghouse.

l ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINTA AVE, S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

65 1

MR. EISENHUrs For the Ringhals plant, that is i

2 correct.

Here Westinghouse is goine to take their lead 3

package.

If it in fact undergoes the test program 4

successfully, they are working with the utilities to 5

develop and propose a lead plant.

A land plant would 6

come in and sa y we want to put this proposed new fix 7

into the plant.

We would review tha t packa ge and 8

approve it, or not approve it prior to them making the 9

repair opera tion.

It is a major down time and a major to repair to these facilities.

11 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

So they would have to 12 first satisfy the Owners presumably and the Owners would 13 then propose or the lead plant would propose the change 14 to us.

15 HR. EISENHUT:

But we are working very closely 16 with them.

In fact, as I mentioned earlier, Gus is 17 going to Pittsburgh this evening for the last day of the 18 design review meeting that is going on in Pittsburgh 19 discussing this with these owners.

So we are closely 20 glued in.

So hopefully we don't have to wait until the 21 very last sinnte, you know, to formally submit it.

We 22 can interact and have input earlier in the process.

23 In answer to the Chairman's question, they 24 certainly hope they don't have to cut into the shell.

25 They are trying to devise and make the thing in pieces ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGIN;A AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

66 1

that they ran put in through the feedwater nozzle and do 2

the repair operation that way.

3 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Now would this apply 4

to Maquire I, too?

5 MR. EISENHUTs Yes, it would.

It would apply 6

to basically all Model D-2s and D-3s.

It would not 7

necessarily apply to D-4s.

I think I earlier said 8

Yugoslavia is a D-3.

Yugoslavia is a D-4.

9 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Where are the D-us?

10 MR. EISENHUT D-us in the United States, 11 there are five of them.

12 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Which are those?

l 13 HR. EISENHUT The laad plant is Comanche 14 Peak, Byron, Braidwood, Shearson Harris and I think that 15 is it.

16 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

What is the problem in l

17 the D-4s?

l l

18 MR. EISENHUTs The D-4 potentially has the l

19 same kind of problem, although it doesn 't have the 1

20 experience of course of the D-2s and D-3s.

But they are i

1 21 envisioning that they have poten tially the same kind of 22 problem with D-4s.

D-4s are not as far along.

The only l

23 D-u in the world I believe is Krsko in Yugloslavia.

24 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

What are its problems?

25 MR. LAINAS:

It is no t clear that they really ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

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67 1

have a problem yet.

2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

We have agreed to do 3

something for them and what is it that we have agreed to 4

do?

5 CHAIRMAN PALLADIN04 With Yugloslavia?

6 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Yes.

7 MR. LAINAS:

Westinghouse has recommended to 8

them to operat6 in a different mode than what the plant 9

was originally designed for.

10 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY Because they are 11 having a problem or what?

12 MR. LAINAS:

Well, they want to make sure that 13 they don't have a problem.

In other words, the only way 14 you can determine whether you have a problem or not is 15 by installing internal instrumentation.

That means 16 physically going in and cutting tubes and sticking 17 instrumentation in.

Now they haven't resolve the 18 results and they haven't run the tests yet on that 19 particular plant to determine if they indeed have a 20 problem or not.

21 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Are they operating at 22 full power now?

23 MR. LAINAS:

They have operated.

I think they 24 are down now making this modification and they will go 25 back up next month.

ALCERSON REPORTING CCMPANY. INC.

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MR. EISENHUT:

I think the highest they have 2

ever operated is at 70 percent.

I think Westinghouse's 3

recommendation is that they have concluded it is 4

acceptable to operate to 70 percent power on main feed.

5 You could in fact use, and I may have the numbers 6

sligh tly wrong, but I think you can use the aux 111ary 7

feedwater system and you can get a little higher, 8

perhaps another 10 percent power.

The question then is 9

can you modify the plant slightly?

10 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY This is why, because 11 auxiliary feed comes in somewhere else?

12 MR. EISENHUT Yes.

It comes in on a 13 different system.

So basically I believe their approach 14 was you could get 70 percent power from main feed and 10 15 percent from aux f eed and hence you would have an 80 16 percent power plant.

17 The proposal then is can you by some minor 18 modifications get 70 percent off of main feed and 30 19 percent off of aux feed.

That is an entirely different 20 mode of operation.

'21 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Would this be in lieu 22 of making these other changes or until it is decided 23 whether or not to make those other changes?

24 MR. EISENHUT That is unclear.

25 MR. LAFLEURs It is in lieu of.'

There are ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTCN, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

69 1

many other changes in the control system that a re 2

required when you start feeding part of the flow in 3

through the auxiliary feed line and part in through the 4

main feed line.

So part of the problem is analyzing the 5

controls to be sure we have them fixed.

6 MR. LAINAS:

I think when you talk about a D-2 7

and D-3 you can make a modification to that which a

Westinghouse is looking at, and that is a physical 9

sodification in the steam generator.

Now when you talk 10 about a D-4 11 COMMISSIONER GILINSKYa In this preheater we 12 are talking about?

13 MR. LAINASa In this preheater section, that 14 is correct, where the feedwater enters the steam 15 generator.

With a D-4 it is a different design and you 16 just can use the same sort of modification for a D-4.

17 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Well, for a different 18 design does it have a different preheater section?

19 MR. LAINASa It has a different preheater 20 section, but the way the water gets into the preneater 21 section is significantly different.

22 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

I must say it would 23 have helped to have some pictures here today.

24 MR. LAINAS:

We didn't bring sny and they are 25 also proprieta ry.

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70 1

COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

You say that Krske does 2

not yet have a problem?

3 MR. LAINAS:

That is the claim right now, but 4

they are going into a modified type of operation.

5 COMMISSIONER AREARNE:

Then is the restriction 6

to 70 percen t for the D-4 because they aren 't sure if 7

you go above 70 percent you might run into a problem?

8 MR. LAINAS:

Yes, that is correct.

9 MR. EISENHUT:

That they might run into a 10 p ro blem based on analyses that have been done by 11 Westingthouse.

12 Now in answer to the other question, what we 13 are doing is as we can fit it into out other high 14 priority efforts, several of our experts are helping and 15 answering some questions for the Yugloslavian 16 authorities.

We have in fact given them several 17 observations and questions that we sent back and they 18 have sent us some information.

19 Of course the way we are looking at it is we 20 are presently doing the review on th e lead D-4 in the 21 United States.

So it is in our best interest to go 22 ahead and see as much information as along as it doesn't 23 detract time ---

24 COMMISS IO N ER GILINSKY:

And the lead D-4 is 25 which one?

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC.

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MR. EISENHUIs Comanche Peak.

2 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

What are we doing with 3

these others, this Angra Dos Reis in Brazil?

Are we 4

involved with these at all?

5 MR. LAINAS:

We are sharing information with 6

them.

7 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

With the Brazilian 8

authorities?

9 MB. LAINAS:

Yes.

10 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY4 A re we ge tting 11 information from them?

12 MR. LAFLEUR Up to now is has been flowing 13 this way.

We are sharing information coming to us from 14 all of these plants.

15 MR. LAINAS:

They have limited their 16 operations so that they don 't get the problem.

They are 17 coming in through the aux feed and of course they limit 18 power.

I think to try to answer your question of do l

19 they or don't they have the problem, the D-4s, or does 20 anybody, the proof is in the inspection results.

When 21 You do an ECT, when you are going to shut the plant down 22 and you are doing an ECT, that determines where you have 23 got the problen or not.

So you have got to build up a l

24 certain amount of operation to determine if you have it.

l 25 So the program that all plants are following l

ALDERSON REPCRTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGIMA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. 0.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

72 1

is to be very cautious, as Darrell indicated, in their 2

increase in power so that you don't run into a situation 3

where you really do have a prob 3em.

4 Now with the way the operation is being 5

proposed for Krsko, the 70/30, is to allow them to 6

operate safely.

They know that 70 percent is, you know, 7

relatively safe, but in this interim period of three or 8

four months they could on 100 percent power.

~

9 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

But you also said, 10 didn't you, that because of the way the D-4 is designed 11 that it would be a lot more difficult to make ---

12 MR. LAINAS:

To perform the kind of a 13 modification like you could on the D-2s and D-3s.

It is 14 not that easy, not that it is easy, but it is just not 15 feasible to do the same kind of modification.

16 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

Now is the D-3 test in 17 Sweden, is that being run on the Ringhals reactor or is 18 that run on a test facility?

19 MR. LAINAS:

A test facility, a cold test 20 facility.

21 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:

I see.

22 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Can I ask you, BCW does 23 not show any vibration problem, yet it shows fatigue 24 cracking, or at least four of them do.

Is that not from 25 vibration or are you just dividing the problem of ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, 0.0 ;0024 (202) 554-2345

73 1

vibration into two separate parts?

2 MR. LAINAS:

It is a dif ferent design.

The 3

BCV is a once-through design.

i 4

CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

I appreciate that, but it 5

is not a vibration problem, fatique cracking?

e MR. LAINAS:

Well, f a tigue cracking in this 7

particular case is because you get increased corrosion 8

up in a particular section of the BCW unit.

It is 9

called an inspection lane, and what it is is just a 10 section through the steam generator in which there 11 aren't any tubes.

So what happens is you experience an 12 awful lot of carryover in that section and then you get 13 deposits up in the tubes up around the 15th support I 14 think it is.

15 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

That wouldn't be fatique 16 cracking, would it?

17 MR. LAINAS:

Oh, this one here?

18 MR. EISENHUT :

We are reading the wrong column.

19 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO I think that says fatigue 20 cracking.

21 MR. EISENHUTs There is a turnove r where flow 22 turns over in the top of the BEW steam generator.

I 23 think it is a high-cycle f a tigue f rom a vibration.

24 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

So you have divided the 25 vibration problem sni not applying it if they don't ALDEASON REPORTING COMPANY,INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345

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'COMMI7sI0FER MEARNE:

I guess th e dif f erenco j

s 4

being~rthe,o ther on<"./is vibration veah ?

Is that correct?

p t

^

5 MR. LAINA,C2 Yas.

If you will notice, the'

+

4: 7 6

vibration wear hEs/not been th a t significan t even in the r,

7 Westinghouse typo.

1, #

1 8

(Commissioner Gilinsky left the Commissioners' 9

table at this point in the proceedings and did' noti.,'

n.

..t 10 return for the rest of the meeting at 3:25 p.m.)-*

17 11 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE

What is the f'

.r '

12 significance of the footnote under, vibration wear?

'\\

/

J 1s* Under Westinghouse,you have a superscript.

/'

14 MR. LAINAS:

Oh, yes.

Well, I had better j

e 15 explain the tabl,e a Jittle bit.

What we did is updat'e 16 this table from'the last time we mado a presentation

/ ^J 17' lazt Cecember.

So where there is a number it indicates 7,.>

1 18 what the :h ange is and' identifies the plants that were s

s 19 changed.

You know, on vibration and wear it showed 3n

'o j

20 increare' of two up t'e t h r e e, and the reason for that was

'l, /

21 be7:r ese of Maquire I and Zion I.

COM3ISSIO.vER AHEARNE:

I see.

22

~

r, i

23

.MR. LAINAS:

And that holds true for tl,e l

24 o t h ers e,

/

25 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:.Do you have any more

/

f f

i ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRCINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON. 0.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345 T

75

i t

1 questions?

'l 2

COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

No.

)

3,.

COMMISSIONER ASSELSIINE:

No.

i I

CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Can I ask you just one 4

e, a

5 more.

I am still curious as to what we are learning 6

from the Japanese experience on better controlled water 7

chemistry.

Is there something there that we could a*v

'E

'8 implement and get out of some of our problems?

/

~

9 MR. DENTON:

We have had several people who r/

~.y 10 have visited Japan and tried to ascertain why does their

  1. 't, experience appear more favorable than ours.

It does

'~'

1 r

,12 look as if they are more careful in their secondary

/

13 water chemistry, but the kinds of things they are doing

'g 14 are the same kinds of things that the Steam Generator

,~

/

15 Owners Group is now recommending.

/ /

16 My sense of the situation is these full-flow s^

17 demineralizers, the aerators careful control of the l*

18 chlorides and a lot of other fine-tuning details ---

1' l

19 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Well, when you say 20 careful control of the chlorides, and I am speaking from 21 impressions I got, that in addition they have got better 22 control of leakage from the outside cooling water and 23 the steam water, the rondensed water, and that they have 24 better materials or different materials.

Is that true?

' ~

MR. DENTON:

I have actually heard two 25

{

4 1

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76 1

stories.

One is that they are having some of the same 2

problems we have and it may be that different units are 3

performing differently.

We have a few units which are 4

performing remarkably well also, and they have some 5

units which perform well and some that are not so well.

6 But I haven't heard that they have got any magic bullet 7

solution that is not in the Steam Generator Owners 8

Group's package of recommendations.

9 Maybe you would like to comment.

10 MB. EISENHUr:

Well, I will only make one 11 other slight comment, and that is it is sort of the 12 operating philosophy.

If you should have even a small 13 leak in the condenser, you can take the approach that I 14 am going to shut down the plant immediately and I am 15 going to really clean out the second system before I.

16 return to operation and try to get as many of those 17 impurities out as possible.

I think there is a piece of 18 that in it also.

19 I don't think it is that they have a magic 20 material.

They just have very tight Chemistry control, 21 a very tig h t discipline on the plant and to date most of 22 their experience has been quite good.

23 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

Let me ask a question 24 on that.

Harold, you said that we have had people who 25 have tried to ascertain information.

My impression was l

ALDERSCN REPCRTINC CCMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGINIA gE S W, WAmpG1CN, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345 3

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.s M-

77 1

that we haven't actually sent anybody over there to 2

specifically look into this question, but there have 3

been people who have been in Japan on other purposes who 4

have picked up informa tion.

Is that correct?

5 MR. DENTONs I don 't k now that we haven 't had 6

people over there in our research arm who have gone just 7

for this purpose.

Perhaps Mr. Lafleur would be more 8

knowledgeable than I am.

9 MR. LAFLEURs I don't recall any mission 10 especially for that purpose.

11 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I would suggest that 12 if, as has been described, that this is really very 13 important and high priority and everything, and the 14 issue comes up every time, that rather than trying to 15 collect various pieces of anecdotal or hearsay or 16 quesstimate information, that we perhaps try to get a 17 focus examination of what is their experience and wha t 18 are they doing differently.

19 MR. EISENHUT4 We did one other thing though.

i i

20 There must have been six or eight of their senior people 21 experts on steam generators that spent an entire day 22 with our staff here going through both ends, their data, 23 their chemistry and their operating philosophy with our 24 steam generator experts.

It is true we didn't visit the 25 plants, but we did spend nany hours with their experts.

l l

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY,INC.

400, VIRGINIA AVE, S.W., WASHINGTON. D.C. 20024 (202) 554-2345

78 1

COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

What I am struck with 2

at one of these meetings or in discussion with the staff 3

when the Chairman asks a question and I ask a question 4

is that there are various pieces that I have heard or I 5

think.

6 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

We better pin it down.

7 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I think it would be 8

useful to pin it down.

9 CH AI <M AN P ALLADINO:

Also, this great 10 attention to water chem'stry and fixing up the condenser 11 if there is a leak, while it may be quite costly, they 12 must find it beneficial or they must evaluate the cost 13 benefit equation such that it comes out that that is the 14 better thing to do.

It would be interestin g to find out 15 what enters into that, what considerations enter into 16 that.

17' MR. DENTON:

I have gotten to be a bit of a 18 skeptic over whether other plants operate better than 19 ours in that quite often the ---

20 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

You mean other plants 21 operate better than 22 MR. DENTON:

That plants in other countries 23 operate better than plants here.

There is certainly the 24 passage of time that has to occur in some other 25 countries before you find out the f ull exte nt of ALDERSCN REPORTING COMPANY, INC, 400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) $54 2345nihba,'

A

79 1

problems but it would be well if we could find 2

definitive inf orma tion.

3 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I am not saying that I 4

know that the Japanece do operate better than ours or 5

that they have better solutions.

All I am trying to do 6

is express a concern that it would be useful to try to 7

pin it down.

8 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

That is right.

9 MR. EISENHUT One other point on the foreign to information though.

To give you a data point, just as 11 Harold was indicating, at least three countries informed 12 me that they have put requirements in for a loose part 13 monitoring system as a result of the Ginna event, since 14 January.

So there is an awful lot of cross-discussion 15 going on.

16 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Okay.

Any other 17 questions?

18 COMMISSIONER AHEARNE:

I have one more 19 question to address to Al with respect to 82-72 A and C 20 I guess it is.

We had a memo on June 23rd from Forrest 21 Remick.

Both the Chairman and I had requested a memo 22 for a draft of staff requirements and I would appreciate 23 if OPE would take another look at that based upon where 24 the staff is now to see whether there might need to be 25 some revision to tha t.

ALDERSON REPORTING COMPANY. INC.

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80 1

CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Anything else?

2 (No response.)

3 CHAIRMAN PALLADINO:

Well, we thank you very 4

much for the exchange.

I do think if we can pinpoint 5

some of the Japanese experience that it would help us 6

evaluate what we hear.

7 Thank you.

8 We will stand adjourned.

9 (Whereupon, at 3:35 p.m.,

th e mee ting to adjourned.)

11 12 13 14 r

15 16 17 l

18 19 I

20 21 22 23 l

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ALDERSON REPCRTING COMPANY,INC, i

400 VIRGINIA AVE., S.W WASHINGTON, D.C. 20024 (202) 554 2345 mJuerdh nn' -

m 3CC'213 ::..ui'"CPZ C3W. 33 C3 This 11 00 c ertif */ tha.O the. Ettachec ;POcdec.ing3 bef::rS Ohe COMMISSION MEETING in the sattar cf:.

PUBLIC MEETING - Briefing on PWR Steam Generator Problems CEC 4 Cf P."Oceeci g:

June 30, 1982 C e c!4 e t lit ". h e r

  • Flace cf Prcceecing:

Washington, D.

C.

were held as herei.: appears, anc cha't. this is the crigi:21 :: acsc:-i thersef fc:- the fila of the C==issic=.

Mary C.

Simons Cfficial.Espertae (!7:ec)

A rri M Official Espcriar (iif 2 Cur e )

l l

1 V

m

COMMISSION BRIEFING JUNE 30,1982 STEAM GENERATOR EXPERIENCE UPDATE l

l DEISENHUT 49-27572

OUTLINE e

OVERALL S/G EVALUATION EFFORT e

RECENT STAFF ACTIVITIES AREAS OF RECOMMENDATIONS e

FUTURE ACTIONS e

BACKGROUND 1.

SAFETY, CONCERN 2.

EXTENT OF PROBLEM 3.

RECENT EXPERIENCE II.

S/G SHELL CRACKING 5.

S/G FEEDRING DAMAGE 6.

INTERNATIONAL EXPERIENCE 1

l i

DVERALL S/G EVALUATf 0N EFFORT ELEMENTS OF FIN AL APPROACH S/G ACTIVITY INDIVIDUAL PLANT '

INDIVIDUAL REVIEWS PLANT REVIEWS

-CONS ULTANTS USI A-3/:4/5

-IDRS NUREG-0651 PERIODIC REVIEW MEETINGS WITH SECY 82-72 LOWUP ENDORS/ N /

EXPLORED SG0G/0THERS VENDORS NRC/ INDUSTRY POLI CY/ STEERING EFFORT S/G OWNERS GROUP

-FORMAL COORDIN ATION INTEGRATED SET l

-PROGRAM DIRECTION OF REQUIREMENTS

-RESEARCH SHARING EPRI

- GINN A

-ELIMINATE DUPLICATION

- EXPERIENCE

~ ~

FOREIGN

- NUREG-0651

~

EXPERIENCE

- RE-EVALUATI ON AREAS ACRS RESEARCH ACTIVITIES

RECEta STAFF ACTIVITIES e RESEARCH PROGRAMS CONTINUE e DRAFT REPORT USI A-3/4/5 9 IIETINGS WITH PWR VENDORS GROLPS (WESTINGHOUSE, COMBUSTION ENGINEERING, BABCOCK & WILCOX) e IEETING WITH EPRl/ STEAM GENERATOR OWNERS GROUP G NUREG-0909 REPORT - GINNA FINDINGS e C0ttilSSION BRIEFING - G!tilA EVENT 9 NUREG-0915 - GINNA RESTART SER S IEETING WIm REPRESENTATIVE t%RKEY'S C0ffilTTEE STAFF 9

INCREASED USE OF CONSULTANTS (BNL, FRC, OHIO STATE, PNL, ORNL) e BRIEF ACRS SUBC0ffilTTEE, STATUS OF GENERIC REQUIREMETRS i

e DISCUSSIONS WITH " CRITICAL MASS" GROUP REPRESENTATIVE e

PARTICIPATED IN 1AEA SPONSORED SAFETY MISSIONS IN BRAZIL AND YUGOSLAVIA (MODEL D WESTINGHOUSE STEAM GENERATOR)

I D.EISEfMfr x-27672

AREAS OF RECOMMENDATIONS 1.0 STEAM GENERATOR IUBE INTEGRITY 0

PREVENTION & DETECTION OF LOOSE PARTS & FOREIGN OBJECTS 9

INSERVICE INSPECTION 4

IMPROVED EDDY CURRENT TECHNIQUES 2.0 PLANT SYSTEMS RESPONSE e REACTOR COOLANT SYSTEM PRESSURE CONTROL e

STEAM GENERATOR OVERFILL 3.0 k N FACTORS 9

CONTROL ROOM DESIGN REVIEW G

ACCIDENT & PROCEDURES 4.0 RADIOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES S

REASSESSMENT OF RADIOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES

- LIQUID RELEASES FROM SAFETY VALVES

- REACTOR SYSTEM ACTIVITY LIMITS S

VENTILATION INTAKE LOCATION 5.0 ORGANIZATIONAL RESPONSE e

IMPROVEMENTS IN COORDINATION AND COMMUNICATION OF NRC OPERATIONS CENTER, REGIONAL AND RESIDENT RESPONSES

FUTUREACTIONS 8

GENERIC REQUIREMENTS BEING DEVELOPED AS A RESULT OF THE GINNA EVENT, AND OTHER EXPERIENCE AND WILL INCLUDE REQUIREMENTS AS A RESULT OF USI A-3/4/5 EFFORT CONSULTANTS TO ASSIST IN PREPARATION OF VALUE/IffACT MEET WITH STEAM GENERATOR OWNERS GROUP

- MEET WITH MARKEY C0tHITTEE STAFF AND CRITICAL MASS GROUP REPRESENTATIVE

- C0ffLETE INITIAL DRAFT

- MEET WITH CRGR

- MEET WITH ACRS

- MEET WITH C0tNISSION

- ISSUE FOR PUBLIC COMfENT

- IMPLEtENT GENERIC REQUIRFJE4TS S RESULTS FR04 RESEARCH PROGRAMS OBTAINED AND EVALUATED 9 CONTINUENRC/INDUSTRYMEETINGS D.EISENHUT x27672 i

e G

BACKGROUND I

s

a 1.

SAFETY CONCERNS e

LICENSING VIEWS SG PROBLEMS PRINCIPALLY ECONOMIC CONCERN DESIGN BASIS - ONE TUBE RUPTURE / MINIMIZE LEAKAGE RADIOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES OF LEAKS / BREAKS WITHIN ACCEPTABLE LIMITS TUBE RUPTURE PLANT /0PERATOR RESPONSE MAY BE COMPLICATED e

ONGOING EVALUATIONS RECONSIDERATION OF MULTIPLE TUBE FAILURES RECONSIDERATION OF TUBE FAILURES IN MORE THAN ONE STEAM GENERATOR CONSIDERATION OF LOCA/MSLB PLUS TUBE FAILURE EVENT RECONSIDERATION OF ACCIDENT DOSE MODELING DEIS ENHUT 49-27672

2.

EXTENT OF PROBLEM PRIMARY SIDE NSSS/NO. OF V!BRATION SECONDARY INIT. SCC IN PLAN TS WEAR SIDE /INIT.

SMALL RADIUS FATIGUE EROSION /

_AEEELIED___ HA11AGiL_P_IIIUjG (FRETT[NG)

IGA / SCC U-BENDS DENTING CRACKING CORROSION W/22(2dF 32 11 2

3 (2) 8 5

7 II)= MINOR III MCGUIRE 1 MCGUIRE 1 ZION 1 NORTH #4NA 2 NORTH ANNA 2 ZION 1 2= MODERATE 7= EXTENSIVE CE/70F8 1

1(l) 1 I) 5= MINOR SAN ONOFRE 2 M1LLSTONE 2 l= MODERATE l= EXTENSIVE

_(1)*

4 8

B&W/8 0F 8 Tlil-1 NOTE:

SOME UNITS HAVE EXPERIENCED MORE THAN ONE FORM OF DEGRADATION

  • 0TSG - PRIMARY S1DE SCC S FM a, ;

ME N5-

3.

RECENT EXPERIENCE A.

STEAM GENERATOR IUBE DEGRADATION (BETWEEN NOV. 1, 1981-PRESENT) 1.

RUPTURES GINNA - SINGLE TUBE RUPTURE (LARGEST - 760 GPM) 2.

TUBE LEAKAGE (10 UNITS)

POINT BEACH 1 ARKANSAS 1 ZION OCONEE 1 CALVERT CLIFFS 1 OCONEE 3 MILLSTONE 2 INDIAN POINT 3 PALISADES SAN ONOFRE 1 3.

LOOSE PARTS (7 UNITS)

GINNA ZION SAN ONOFRE 1 NORTH ANNA 1 DAVIS BESSE RANCHO SECO OCONEE 3 4.

NEW AREAS OF CONCERN (3 UNITS)

TMI-l (SCC OF TUBES IN TUBE SHEET REGION)

PALISADES (U-BENDS CRACKS)

MCGUIRE 1 (PREHEATER SECTION TUBE WEAR)

ANO-1 (DERATED DUE TO PRESSURE DROP) 5.

NEW PLANTS AFFECTED (1 UNIT)

NORTH ANNA 2, DENTING (18 MONTHS)

DEISENHUT x-27672

4.

STEAM GENERATOR SHELL CRACKING EV_ENT - INDIAN POINT 3 0

SHUTDOWN DUE TO TUBE LEAK 4

DURING OUTAGE NOTICED LEAKAGE FROM SG-32 SHELL INSPECTIONS S

LEAKAGE FROM HOLE IN SG UPPER SHELL/ CONE CLOSURE WELD

- THROUGH WALL HOLE 3/16" DIAMETER 8

SUBSEQUENT 100% INSPECTION OF THIS WELD ON ALL 4 SG'S 9

DISCOVERED ABOUT 170 INDICATIONS PER SG STAFF ACTIONS S

STAFF AND CONSULTANTS TO COMPLETE REVIEWS OF STEAM GENERATOR TUBE LEAK AND SHELL CRACK PROBLEMS PRIOR TO RESTART (LATE FALL 1982)

WESTINGHOUSE GENERIC ACTIONS e

VARIOUS CAUSES EXAMINED 4

BEST ESTIMATE CAUSE IS CORROSION FATIGUE FROM ABNORMAL THERMAL CYCLES AND ENVIRONMENTS.

CAUSE OF HOLE STILL UNDER INVESTIGATION f

8 WESTINGHOUSE RECOMMENDED INSPECTIONS TO 15 UNITS S

WESTINGHOUSE CONCLUDES UPPER SHELL/ CONE CLOSURE WELD CRACKS ARE NOT A SAFETY PROBLEM (LEAK BEFORE BREAK) e AWAITING RESULTS OF BOAT SAMPLE ANALYSES AND HOLE AREA MATERIAL ANALYSIS l

l I

DEISENHUT l

x-27672 l

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