ML20057C003
| ML20057C003 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 09/20/1993 |
| From: | NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| REF-10CFR9.7 2.206, NUDOCS 9309240273 | |
| Download: ML20057C003 (64) | |
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMIS SION-I 3:
BRIEFING ON RESULTS OF.2.206 WORKSHOP 4
LOCitiOD:
ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND h3I6'.
SEPTEMBER 20, 1993 PageS:
49 PAGES ND.L R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
. COURT RFPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, Northwest
^
Washington, D.C.
20005 3
(202) 234-4433
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DISCLAIMER This is an unofficial transcript of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission held on September 20, 1993, in the Commission's office at One White Flint North, Rockville, Maryland.
The meetling 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 formal or informal record of decision of the matters discussed.
Expressions of opinion in this transcript do not necessarily reflect final determination or beliefs.
No pleading or other paper may be filed with the Commission in any proceeding 'as the result of, or addressed to, any statement or argument contained herein, except as the commission may Authorize.
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l-1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BRIEFING ON RESULTS OF 2.206 WORKSHOP PUBLIC MEETING Nuclear Regulatory Commission One White Flint North Rockville, Maryland Monday, September 20, 1993 The Commission met in open
- session, pursuant to notice, at 10:00 a.m.,
Ivan
- Selin, Chairman, presiding.
COMMISSIONERS PRESENT:
IVAN SELIN, Chairman of the Commission KENNETH C. ROGERS, Commissioner FORREST J.
REMICK, Commissioner E.
GAIL de PLANQUE, Commissioner NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRf9ERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (202) 2344433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 2344433
2 STAFF SEATED AT THE COMMISSION TABLE:
[
WILLIAM C.
PARLER, General Counsel JOHN HOYLE, Assistant Secretary 3
JAMES TAYLOR, Executive Director for Operations FRANCIS CAMERON, Office of the General Counsel MARTIN MALSCH, Deputy General Counsel for Licensing and Regulations JAMES PARTLOW,-Associate Director for Projects, NRR I
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O NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W 1202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 234 4433 l
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P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2
10:00 a.m.
3 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Good morning, ladies and 4
gentlemen.
i 5
The Commission is meeting at this time to 6
receive a briefing from the staff on the status report 7
of the review of the regulations in practice governing 8
citizen petitions under 10 CFR 2.206.
As the staff 9
observes in their paper, the 2.206 petition process is 10 the primary formal method for a member of the public 11 to request Commission review of a potential safety 12 problem with an NRC-licensed facility outside of a 13 licensing or rulemaking proceeding.
14 We're concerned that this process should 15 be as effective and as practical as possible in order 16 to help resolve safety concerns, but also in order to 17 contribute to the NRC's regulation mission to protect 18 the public health and safety.
The Commission is 19 especially concerned that the public participation 20 aspects of this process be as effective, accessible 21 and credible as possible.
22 As a first step in evaluating the 2.206 23 process, the staff has conducted a public wo'rkshop, 24 led by Francis Cameron of the Office of the General 25 Counsel.
I understand that we're going to hear from NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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Mr. Cameron about the results of the workshop today.
2 Would any of the Commissioners Mr.
i 3
Parler?
4 MR. PARLER:
Mr. Chairman and members of f
5 the Commission, you are correct that Mr. Cameron will 6
give the Commission the briefing this morning on the 7
status of the workshop.
Before we proceed with Mr.
8 Cameron, we have Mr. Malsch, who you know, to Mr.
9 Cameron's left.
Jim Taylor is here because he 10 supported the staff's efforts which the Commission 1
11 also subsequently agreed to and strongly supported to 12 have the workshop.
13 The issues that are raised in the 2.206 14 petitions are principally safety issues which the i
15 staff has to evaluate and respond to.
The support for 16 the effort that we have undertaken of course has to be 17 conditioned on practical realities.
That is we're in 18 an age of resource constraints and anything that we 19 do, changes, has to keep that in mind.
l 20 We're also very pleased to have with us at 21 the table Jim Partlow.
Jim participated in the i
22 workshop throughout the day. He went to great lengths j
23 to explain the way that the process works internally 24 and that added much to the workshop.
He also was i
25 singled out for recognition by one of the participants i
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as having communicated or the ability to communicate 2
with those that are interested in these issues quite 3
successfully, even if the process perhaps needs some 4
retooling or refining.
So, that was a very welcome 5
and good news.
6 Mr.
Chairman, the paper that you have 7
reviewed to, as well as some of your introductory 8
- remarks, have indicated why we embarked on this 9
reevaluation of the 2.206 process.
In essence, it is 10 the process that we have in our regulations for 11 interested members of the public to raise safety 12 issues in contexts other than a formal licensing 13 proceeding or in a rulemaking proceeding.
It is a 14 process which is very important to us as a regulatory 15 agency.
It is also important to interested members of 16 the public that might have these concerns.
The 17 process was established in 1974 with very little said 18 about its objectives.
What was said at-that time was 19 that we're establishing a formal process, formal 20 procedures to enable the public to raise these issues.
21 Obviously-the objectives of the process are to give 22 interested members'of the public an opportunity to 23 raise safety issues, to give the agency the benefit of 24 those issues that have been identified and to present 25 its evaluation.
It, I think, when properly used, adds NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 132ll RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 234 4433 a
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to the credibility and to the integrity of the 2
process.
3 I should hasten to add at this point that 4
there is nothing in the history of the process that 5
I'm aware of which suggests that it has been handled 6
otherwise and in good faith and integrity, j
7 Nevertheless, one of the reasons why the initiative 8
was started to reevaluate the process is because it 9
was challenged.
Questions were raised about it at 10 least on two different congressional hearings.
There 11 was a study by a public interest group which raised 12 questions about it.
There was much focus on the 13 question of the lack of judicial reviewability of our i
14 decisions which was not because of our doing but 15 because of the precedent of a Supreme Court decision 16 that applied generically.
I 17 So, for all of those reasons, it occurred 18 to me and to others of us that it would be a good time 19 to systematically reevaluate the experience, where we 20 stand.
One of the best ways we could think of to do 21 that was through the workshop which was held on July 22 the 28th and I believe was very successful.
~
23 After the
- workshop, there was an 24 opportunity presented under the Federal Recister.
25 notice for comments by interested members of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (2^2) 2344433 w ASHINGTON. D C 20005 (202) 234-4433
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public.
There were 13 such comments that were filed.
2 A number of the comments were filed by participants in 3
the workshop. We have not completed our evaluation of 4
4 these comments which were attached to the paper that 5
you have before you for this briefing.
We will do i
6 that when we come forward with our recommendations to
{
7 the Commission.
i l
8 I have reviewed the comments and I don't 9
believe they introduce any new fundamental issues.
i 10 Perhaps different observations about how particular f
t 11 goals could be reached.
But in any event, we will 12 thoroughly evaluate all of them.
l f
13 There's one thing in the one of the 14 comments that I would like to address at this point, 15 at least as I understand the point and the comment.
16 Since we know, the agency knows that these petitions 17 are not under the current legal doctrine subject to 18 judicial review, we do what we please with the 2.206 19 petitions and the vast majority are summarily denied.
20 The fact is that even though that might be 21 the impression on the outside, when the first judicial 22 decision was received which said that these petitions 23-are not judicially reviewed, the then Solicitor, Mr.
24 Briggs, and I got together and decided we should tell 25 everybody that's involved in this process that rather NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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1 than relaxing our vigilancej et cetera, that we should 2
be even more particularly concerned about the j
3 thoroughness and the accuracy with which we review 4
these petitions.
Indeed, in all of our activities, 4
t 5
process type activities, we view ourselves as the 6
first line of defense and not -- we do not have the 7
thoroughness of our review colored by the availability 8
or the non-availability of judicial review.
As a 9
matter of fact, judicial review of administrative 1
10 decisions typically gives great deference to the 11 administrative decision maker.
12 For that reason, we recognize that and try 13 to do as thorough a job as possible.
14 Now, whatever the recommendations may be 15 that we will come up with to present to the Commission 16 for Commission action, I think, as Mr. Cameron goes' l
17 through the briefing, that there are some areas which 18 would not affect resources at all, that we should give 19 serious consideration to, such as the openness of the 20 process, communicating with the petitioner.
If the 21 petitioner raises an issue and the petition is denied
)
i 22 but we still actively pursue the issue, I do not treat 23 the petitioner as if the petitioner was just another 24 member of the public and had never raised the issue.
25 There is the question of the rationale for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W l
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I some of these decisio~ns, particularly if certain 2
regulations are not complied with, how can we better 3
explain what we're doing. Generally speaking, I think 4
there is a lesson to be learned that we should be more
~
5 open, less adversarial in handling these petitions and 6
proceed more with a spirit of cooperation and to 7
address directly the safety issue that had been raised 8
without worrying about whether the burden of proof has l
9 been met for the particular enforcement action.
10 I might also note that if the Commission 11 as a
result of this briefing or otherwise has 12 particular suggestions that they would like for us to 13 consider when we prepare our recommendations, that we 14 would be pleased to get them and to respond to them f
15 before we set our recommendations up.
Obviously if we i
16 get them after we send our recommendations up, we will f
17 be equally responsive to them.
f 18 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
But not equally happy.
-i 19 MR. PARLER:
I'm happy all the time ~, but 20 particularly happy right at this point because I can l
i 21 turn the proceeding over to Mr. Cameron.
22 CHAIRMAN SELIN: Mr. Parler, may I ask you t
^
23 a question?
Does the 2.206 petition have to outline l
24 a course of action or can it just call attention to a i
25 safety issue without specifically calling for an I
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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enforcement or a particular activity?
r 2
MR.
PARLER:
I think that they are --
3 typically the process calls for asks for an 4
enforcement action.
If something less comes in, even 5
if it's a letter that raises a safety issue, we treat
~
6 it as a 2.206 petition.
So, we're very flexible.
7 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Yes.
The reason I asked 8
that is when we report on how many petitions have been 9
approved, not only do we have to agree with the safety 10 supposition, but we have to agree with the action 11 called for in order to say we've approved the 12 petition.
In my experience, quite a few times we find i
13 merit in the argument but don't believe that the 14 remedy is the appropriate one.
15 MR. PARLER:
That's true and that leaves i
16 at least two results, that you have numbers such as in 17 a congressional hearing a couple of years ago.
Only 18 ten out of 300 some odd were actions taken and that's 19 perhaps misleading.
The second point is that if the 20 specific enforcement action that might have been 21 requested was not taken, then the petition is denied.
22 That leaves the impression that the petitioner did not 23 otherwise raise a valid issue and contributed to the 24 process.
That is something that we perhaps should 25 look at very carefully when we come up with our il NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRtBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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1 recommendations.
2 MR. PARTLOW:
I might point out that in 3
the past year, at the urging of Doctor Murley, we have j
4 tried in responding to these petitions, even though we
~
5 may basically be denying the petition, to point out to 6
the extent that some enforcement action was taken or 7
some other kind of action was taken, that the petition f
8 was partially accepted.
i n
9 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Mr. Cameron?
10 MR.
CAMERON:
Thank you very
- much,
+
11 Chairman, Mr. Parler.
12 I think the Chairman and Mr. Parler have 13 already emphasized the rationale for the evaluation of 14 the 2.206 process.
What I'd like to do is to briefly 15 talk about the format-for the workshop and then get i
16 into the summary of the workshop discussions and spend 17 a few moments on schedule at the end of the briefing.
18 (Slide)
Could we have slide number 4 on 19 the format for the workshops?
I apologize to the i
20 Commission that these slides are not numbered.
I 21 MR. PARLER:
This is the first time we've 22 ever had slide at an OGC presentation, Mr. Chairman.
^
23 So, if you'll bear with us.
As the-learning curve-
{
24 improves, we'll do better.
25 MR. CAMERON:
We've been hanging around j
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (202)2344433 -
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)
1 too much with the technical staff, so we're picking up 2
some bad habits.
But we haven't really mastered.it 3
yet.
4 COMMISSIONER ROGERS: Got the bad ones but 5
not the good ones.
6 MR. CAMERON:
Right.
Thank you.
7 As Mr. Parler mentioned, the first step in 8
the evaluation process was a workshop that brought 9
together the representatives of affected interests to 10 discuss the 2.206 process.
The idea here was to get 11 people with experience in the process together to 12 discuss the process and to see if we could generate 13 some recommendations for improving the process as well 14 as to promote a better understanding of how the 2.206 15 process works.
We had a very knowledgeable group of 16 participants.
They represented diverse interests.
17 There were representatives there from citizen groups l
18 who we would normally think of as petitioners.
We had 19 several representatives from the nuclear industry who 20 had represented or represent licensees in 2.206 j
21 proceedings.
We had a state government participant i
22 and, of course, the NRC staf f.
Jim Partlow was at the 23 table and Jack Goldberg from the Office of General
{
24 Counsel was at the table with us.
We had the General 25 Counsel from the Administrative Conference of the i
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United States, Gary Edles.-
2 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
- Chip, is 3
Appendix A the full list of participants?
i 4
MR. CAMERON:
Yes, it is.
~
5 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Okay.
Thank 6
you.
7 MR. CAMERON:
And I should also add that 8
Marty Malsch was at the table with us from OGC.
9 MR.
PARLER:
That's the full list of 10 participants who were at the table.
There's a longer 11 list of attendees which we have.
12 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Okay.
13 MR. CAMERON: Yes. Thank you, Mr. Parler, 14 for that clarification.
15 We used a background paper that was 16 prepared by the NRC staff to focus the workshop 17 discussions and there were basically three themes in 18 the background paper. One focused on interaction with f
J 19 the petitioner.
A second theme was should we change 20 the focus of the 2.206 process from a specific 21 enforcement action to resolution of the underlying l
22 safety issue.
This is very relevant to the question.
I 23 the Chairman asked earlier on the flexibility to take 24 different actions under the petitions.
The third 25 theme was to possibly establish a priority scheme for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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2.206 petitions and for those petitions'of the highest 2
significance to establish a more rigorous review 3
procedure perhaps, such as an in_upendent internal 4
review or other things like that.
5 We pretty much followed those themes in 6
the workshop and I've divided my presentation on 7
workshop discussions into five areas: perspectives on 8
the 2.206 process; interaction with the petitioner; 9
what the focus of the process should be; independent 10 internal review; and a-last item that was added at the 11 recommendation of several of the participants was the 12 issue of judicial review.
13 Could we have the next slide, please?
14 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Just before you 15 leave that, Chip.
16 MR. CAMERON:
Sure.
17 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
In preparing the 18 background paper, did you try to do any kind of a 19 quantitative sort of all the petitions that-have been 20 received over some years -- I don't know how far you 21 want to go back, but back some years -- to see just 22 what the how many of various types-and how one 23 might characterize them so that we would have a 24 feeling of how many we're talking about.
25 I have an impression, and I may-be wrong NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 234 4433
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1 here, that some of the-issues and solutions may be 2
prompted by a few petitions in which there was great 3
unhappiness with the way they were handled, but 4
perhaps only a few of that particular kind.
I was i
5 just wondering whether you tried to do any kind of a
[
6 sort here of numbers based on the nature of the l
7 petition, what the kind of safety issue was and what 8
the remedy was that was suggested in the petition, 9
just to have some quantitative measures of these.
10 So often when we ask for comments on a
11 papers that represent several years' work, we get I
12 maybe 20 comments from the whole country.
Those 20 13 comments affect our thinking, but it's only 20.
- Now, 14 sometimes they are 20 from organizations who represent 15 nore than one person or one point of view, but I'm 16 just asking whether you had thought to try_to do any 17 kind of a quantitative sort here into bins of various 18 kinds and numbers.
19 MR.
PARLER:
We did not, Commissioner 20
- Rogers, do that for this particular paper.
Mr.
21 Goldberg's
- office, as well as I
believe Mr.
22 Lieberman's office, have background data which may 23 enable that to be done.
To some extent, we did what 24 you're talking about to prepare a
response to 25 congressional questions several years ago, perhaps not 1
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE N W (202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 2344433
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16 1
into the detailed breakout that you were talking 2
about.
3 I think it is correct to suggest that at 4
least those that appear to be the most concerned about I
5 the process and refinements or' changes to the process l
6 are using for their comments their own experience - -
7 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Yes.
Yes.
8 MR. PARLER:
-- in a particular number of 4
9 cases which are certainly only a very small percentage 10 of the over 300 or so cases that we've dealt with.
I 11 will look at the data that we have and try to provide 12 such a
breakout to you and to members. of the 13 Commission.
14 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
I think it might be l
15 helpful in deciding just what course ultimately to 16 take of how many of certain kinds of petitions that we l
17 have received and how we've dealt with them.
It might i
18 just serve to put that in perspective.
I'm concerned 19 about ultimately coming out with-some suggestions for I
20 major changes that really were prompted by only a very 21
'few petitions.
22 MR.
CAMERON:
As Mr.
Parler noted, we 23 didn'.t do that type of analysis for the paper.
But I
~
24 think that the workshop discussions and. also tne 25 written comments raised the advisability of doing what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (202) 234 4433 WASHtNGTON. D C 20005 (202) 234 4433
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you suggested, Commissioner Rogers, and we will do 2
that as Mr. Parler noted.
3 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Thank you.
4 MR. CAMERON:
.(Slide)
Could I have the 5
fifth slide, please, on perspectives on the 2.206 6
process?
7 We started off the workshop discussions 8
with participants' impressions of the process.
Does 9
it work, what are the strengths, what are the 10 weaknesses?
We looked at this from a petitioner 11 perspective, a licensee perspective and the NRC staff 12 perspective. As far as the petitioners are concerned, 13 the fact that most petitions are denied and hearings 14 on petitions are extremely rare means that to them 15 public participation stops af ter the plant is licensed i
16 and there's no opportunity for participation by the 17 public after licensing.
18
- Secondly, petitioners noted that the 19 review appears, the 2.206 review appears to occur
.20 behind closed doors with a licensee with little 21 involvement of the petitioner in that review process.
22 A third point was that there are no 23 criteria to guide the review of the petitions in terms 24 of when a petition should be granted, when a petition 25 should be denied and I'll come back to that point NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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1 later on.
And again emphasizing the fact that most 2
petitions are denied to petitioners means that the 3
process has very little credibility and it appears 4
that. the Commission is not responsive to public 5
concerns.
6 (Slide)
Could I have the next slide, l
7 please?
8 As far as the industry was concerned, the 9
industry believed that the process was working and 10 that there were no significant flaws in the process.
11 The industry representatives were very concerned about 12 costs, not only NRC costs but also licensee costs, and 13 with what they termed over proceduralization of the 14 process.
They were very concerned that adding 15 detailed formal review procedures would divert NRC 16 resources and licensee resources from other perhaps 17 more important issues. They also noted that the 2.206 e
18 process was only one of the many ways that safety 19 issues are raised and evaluated within the NRC and 20 that the Commission muct have the flexibility and the 21 discretion to decide where to direct its resources in 22 terms of evaluating issues.
23 Lastly, the industry said that the number i
24 of denials is not indicative of how well the process i
25 is working.
Rather, we should look to how well the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTER $ AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W f
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1 underlying safety issue was evaluated and the industry 2-participants believed that the staff evaluations <of 3
2.206 petitions were thorough and well evaluated and 1
4 that with the regulatory framework in place within the 5
NRC and also the licensee programs, that you would 6
expect very few petitions to be granted because the i
1 7
safety issues should have already been flagged and 8
evaluated through other processes.
I 9
(Slide)
Could I have the next slide,
{
10 please?
11 Now, the first substantive area that we 12 turned to was interaction and communication with the 13 petitioner.
As far as the petitioner representatives r
14 were concerned, there was little involvement of the 15 petitioner in the process after the petition was 16 submitted.
The perception, as I'noted earlier, is 17 that it's an exclusive NRC licensee review process 18 once the petition is submitted and that there is very.
19 little communication with the petitioner about what is 20 going on in the review process.
21 Now, interestingly enough, the industry 22 agreed that the 2.206 process should be an open, 23 transparent and what they called a user friendly 24 process and both industry participants and petitioner l
25 participants noted a number of steps that the NRC NEAL R. GROSS COURT AEPORTERS AND TRANSCR!BERS t
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i should ensure happens in the petition process.
- One, i
2 that-the petitioner should receive a copy of the i
f 3
licensee response to the petition and that the 4
petitioners should have the ability to respond to that 5
licensee response.
The petitioner should be invited l
6 to participate in any meetings between the NRC and the i
7 licensee on the petition.
The NRC should provide an I
8 update on the status of the petition to the petitioner j
i 9
and note to the petitioner who the petitioner can call 10 for information on the petition and also make relevant j
11 documents available to the petitioner.
12 As was noted by the NRC staff l
13 participants, our procedures do provide for many of i
14 these types of things.
But it was pointed out also 15 that they could be perhaps more uniformly implemented l
i 16 and that the NRC staff could be more proactive in l
1 i
17 working with the petitioner.
18 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Excuse me.
Do 19 the procedures call for the petitioner to get a copy 20 of the licensee response?
21 MR. CAMERON:
I believe that they do.
22 MR. PARTLOW:
Yes.
Let me address that.
23 We have an NRR office letter on procedures.
We i
24 modified it on August 6th, a week or so after this 25 meeting, to clarify several. points.
First, that the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REDORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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21 r
1 petitioner should get a copy of the licensee's 2
response if we asked the licensee for a response.
It t
3 says to encourage the licensee to do that directly and 4
to provide the petitioner with other correspondence 5
having to do_with tne subject.
But if the licensee
[
6 l
does not do it, then the project manager is to ensure 7
that it's done.
8 We've also moc*ified the procedures to 9
require that the project manager be in touch with the 10 petitioner at least every 60 days to tell them the 11 status of their petition and to answer any further 12 questions that they might have.
13 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
These 14 modifications were done recently?
15 MR.
PARTLOW:
Yes, just following the l
16 workshop.
l 17 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Okay.
l 18 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
This is within NRR?
t 19 MR. PARTLOW:
Yes.
20 CHAIRMAN SELIN: So they wouldn't apply to 21 non-reactor petitions?
22 MR. PARTLOW:
No, although that's a good 23 point.
I should certainly share this office letter j
24 with the other offices.
25 MR. TAYLOR:
We'll do that.
NRR gets the l
}
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 234 4433 p
tmm
22 1
bulk of the petitions.
2 MR.
CAMERON:
One last point that was l
3 raised under the interaction with the petitioner i
4 section was the idea of some type of a hearing, a l
5 meeting with the petitioner to review the issues.
As h
6 some of the petitioners pointed out that even if you 7
improve' the communication and availability of i
8 information, there would still be a need for some type
~
9 of face to face discussion on the issues between the 10 NRC,_
the petitioner and the licensee and not i
11 necessarily a formal adjudicatory proceeding, but 'some 12 type of process.
13 One issue that kept coming up during the 14 discussions was that the petitioners would only be 15 satisfied if the desired outcome was achieved and
[
16 nothing less than that would really satisfy them and 17 that's what all the furor was about.
I think several
{
18 participants disagreed with that and stated that the 19 primary concern was not particularly that the desired 20 outcome would result, but that there-be an effective j
21 process, some type of process for-the discussion of l
22 the issues.
From the industry statements and the t
23 comment letters from the
- industry, the industry 24 basically disagrees that there needs to be some 25 formalization of this face to face meeting concept.
NEAL R. GROSS COUitT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIEiERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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r 23:
1 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Was there any ---' you
-t 2
know, one could generalize and say the petitions fall 3
loosely into.two categories.
There's a. set of l
4 petitions that observers sent ir,.
Chey say, "We have f
5 the same information you have end we disagree with j
6 your conclusion. We want you to rethink what you did.
7 But there are also petitions that bring information 8
that we don't have.
It might be safety information,.
'I 9
it might be effect on a particular population.
10 There'd be petitions that say, "You don't realize what 11 an impact, whether it's health, safety, economic or 5
12 disruptive, certain activities at a particular place 13 have on us, the neighbors, or we who live on the 14 transportation routes."
15 Was there any discussion of -- I mean some 16 petitions are, in a sense, second guessing and others 17 are bringing information to us that we may not have 18 had.
Was there any discussion of trying to identify t
19 or treat these differently or is tI 't just a
20 superficial distinction?
l 21 MR.
CAMERON:
- Well, there was a
22 discussion, Doctor Selin, of the whole idea of trying 23 to prioritize categories of petitions so that for some 24 of the petitions, for example, that provide new 25 information, that those might be treated differently.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCR$ERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N.W.
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24 1
There was very little clarity that came out of that
~
2 discussion on priorities.
It was noted by Jim Partlow 3
that NRR at least has a priority ranking scheme that 4
includes not only 2.206 issues but all the safety l
5 issues, I think, that they look at.
But I think that l
6 the priority ranking is something that we have to look 7
harder at and take a look at the comment letters and r
8 see if there's something that comes out of that.
9 So, it was discussed but not as deeply as.
10 perhaps it should be.
11 MR. PARTLOW: Yes.
Mr. Chairman, we don't 12 categorize the petitions the way you described those 13 two, but I think that it happens naturally.
There are 14 those that come in that contain information that may 15 have come out of our own inspaction reports.
There 16 are those that come in that contain aew information.
17 I think it happens without having to write a list that 18 those that present new information get our attention i
19 and probably get a quicker priority to find out what's
?J going on than do those that cover something that's 21 already been covered in an old inspection report.
l 22 MR. PARLER:
Mr. Chairman, I think that
^
23 what we told Commissioner Rogsrs that we would do 24 looking at the ones ti.at we've received over the years 25 and try to put them into categories might help us in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS I
1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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25 1
our recommendations on the particular issue about 2
priorities and the basic thrust of your question, at 3
least as I understand it.
4 MR. CAMERON:
(Slide)
Could we have the 5
next slide, please, on the focus of the process?
6 As we noted in the background paper, the 7
existing focus of the process is on a request for a 8
specific commission action in regard to the license, t
9
- modify, suspend or revoke the license.
But the 10 underlying significance of the 2.206 process is to 11 bring potential health and safety issues to * :he 12 Commission's attention.
There was some belief that 13 changing the focus to elevate the underlying safety 14 issue would allow for more petitions to be granted if 15 additional investigatien was necessary on a particular 16 issue.
The actual outcome in terms of licensee-
]
17 specific actions could be determined later on.
It was 18 believed that this might be a more positive outcome, 19 lead to a more positive perception of the process.
20 It was also noted by some of the 1
21 participants that this would result in less 22 polarization, less adversarialness to the process.
23 But generally there were mixed feelings among the 24 participants on this issue.
Some thought that it 25 would be a good idea to elevate the underlying safety NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPOATERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 AHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W 1202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. 0 -C 20005 (202) 2344433
m 26 1
issue as the focus.
Others didn't think that it would 2
be a good idea.
This one didn't break down into 3
petitioner industry lines.
There were mixed feelings 4
about how to handle this within the petitioner 5
participants and also within the industry..
s 6
One comment that was perhaps relevant to 7
what you brought up at the beginning of the meeting, 8
Doctor Selin, was that a petitioner noted that by 9
focusing on modify, suspend, revoke a license, that 10 often they feel they have to ask for more extreme 11 measure than they ordinarily would when perhaps they 12 could just ask for various categories of electrical 13 wiring to be replaced at a facility.
But I believe 14 that the 2.206 process not only allows for 15 modification, suspension or revocation, but has a 16 general other action to it, so that I believe that 17 under the existing rules some lesser action could be f
18 requested by a petitioner.
I 19 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Chip, along that 20
- line, I can understand how the public would not 21 totally appreciate the 2.206 or enforcement action 22 from the standpoint of just suspending and revoking i
23 because if you read the words, if I had not been told 24 that these words strictly meant enforcement, I would 25 read it more broadly, as you indicated.
It says, "Any
~
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~
27 1
person may file a request to institute a proceeding i
2 pursuant to 20.7 to modify,"
modify enforcement t
t 3
perhaps, suspend and revoke, yes, in my mind, "a
I 4
license or for such other action as may be proper."
5 Then later on it says, "Their request shall specify i
6 the action requested and set forth the facts that i
l 7
constitute the basis for the request."
I 8
So, in my mind, that 's mucia broader than 9
what I interpret to be strictly enforcement.
Now, I 10 know traditionally we've reviewed these as l
11 enforcement, but I think there's a basis in the 12 public's mind to think that this is a broader concept 13 than just some kind of a drastic action that must be 14 taken and thus just raise safety issues.
I 15 Then my observation, as pointed out by Mr.
i 16 Parler, is sometimes we get requests that aren't clear i
17 and because we want to have them addressed, and I 18 commend the process, we throw them in the 2.206 bucket 19 and then they're reviewed as enforcement.
But maybe 20 it wasn't the intention in the petitioner's mind truly 21 enforcement.
They wanted to bring something to our 22 attention.
23 Has any thought been given to another 24 category of this type of thing but is not -- truly we 25 don't view it as enforcement action, that it is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIDERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON. D C 20005 (202) 234 4433
28 1
raising an issue that we should address in some format l
2 without necessarily saying, "Well, this does not 3
result in a suspension or revocation of the license?"
[
4 MR. CAMERON: - Well, I think that one thing t
5 that we definitely have to do is to consider that in i
6 the evaluation now at this point and even perhaps make 7
it more well known that it just doesn't have to be r
8 modify, revoke or suspend.
9 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
I mean a prosecutor gets i
10 a conviction, doesn't get the sentence he asks for.
11 That's considered a
successful
- outcome, not an 12 unsuccessful outcome.
But going a
little more 13 broadly, in our experience, when we appeared before I
14 the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, 15 one of the issues that was raised is that there aren't t
16 any citizen suits under the Atomic Energy Act.
17 They're precluded as opposed to other environmental i
18 rules.
So, it seems that one consideration ought to i
19 be if the 2.206 is in a sense a substitute for citizen f
20 suits, what are the objectives of the citizen suits L
21 and do we have a different kind of recourse, do we 22 provide a different kind of recourse for people that 23 would otherwise be putting in a citizen suit directly 24 against the licensee.
25 MR. CAMERON:
That's a good suggestion, i
l NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS l
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Doctor Selin.
I would point out that we did take at 2
least a preliminary look at the citizen suit provision 3
and compared it to the 2.206 process and found that in 4
some respects 2.206 afforded a broader opportunity for 5-the public than the citizen suit provisions in the j
6 sense that large safety problems could be identified 7
as opposed to ctmpliance with strict emission l
8 regulations.
But I think there may be some food for 9
thought in the analogy to citizen suit objectives.
10 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
If -- go ahead.
11 MR.
PARLER:
Mr.
- Chairman, on the I
12 discussion that has just taken place, as far as 2.206 13 is concerned there has been at least some broad 14 division in the 2.206 process, that is for licensing 15 purposes which was taken care of and addressed in the 16 legislative language in the Energy Policy Act of 1992.
17 As far as 2.206 actions that are related to i
18 enforcement, the Heckler v. Chaney doctrine, at least 19 as I understand it, which leads to the no judicial 20 review opinions in the court decisions is based on the 21 discretionary authority that an agency has for 22 enforcement actions.
~
23 So, these issues would have to be looked 24 at very carefully and in doing so being mindful of the 25 positions that the Commission has taken and also the j
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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30 1
requirements and the directions that the Commission 2
has given to us in looking into this area.
3 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE: I think you just 4
answered my question, but let me make sure.
If you 5
move away from the enforcement emphasis on the-2.206, 6
then you effect the judicial reviewability of it, is 7
that what you ' re ---
t 8
MR.
PARLER:
That certainly is my 9
understanding that that could happen, yes.
10 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Okay.
11 MR.
PARTLOW:
Commissioner
- Remick, 12 concerning another category of requests, I do want to 13 point out that the staff and the Commission receives 14 a lot of requests in letters from people.
They are 15 picked up in the Secretary's tracking system, the 16 EDO's tracking system or NRR's tracking system.
So, 17 those that do represent a legitimate concern or 18 request, they are addressed and they are answered by 19 the staff.
20 COMMISSIONER REMICK: You mean independent 21 of the 2.206?
22 MR. PARTLOW:
Yes.
Even though they are i
23 not labeled as a 2.206 request.
j 24 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Yes.
But my 25 impression is that we put a number of these in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCR!BERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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i 31 1
2.206 bucket, even though they specifically don't 2
mention 2.206.
3 MR. PARTLOW:
That's right.
At times the 4
Office of General Counsel looks at them and says, 5
"Let's work this as a 2.206 request."
6 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
And I'm not
~/
criticizing that because I think the thing should be 8
addressed one way or another.
9 MR. PARTLOW:
Yes, but that's my point.
10 Whether they belibeled that or not, we do address 11 them.
t 12 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Just as we do in 13 rulemaking.
We get requests that sometimes we 14 interpret as a rulemaking request, although they 15 perhaps didn't refer to our regulations.
16 MR.
CAMERON:
That's another important 17 category of requests too, of petitions for rulemaking 18 to address more generic issues.
19 MR. MALSCH: In fact, Commissioner Remick, 20 one of the sort of semi-famous 2.206 cases that we 21 have that went all the way to the U.S.
Supreme Court 22 actually involved a letter written to the NRC which 23 was treated by the staff as a 2.206 petition over 24 petitioner's objection.
25 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
I see.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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32 l
1 MR. MALSCH:
So we have been very liberal 2
in construing papers coming into us as 2.206 I
3 petitions.
l 4
MR. CAMERON:
And there is at least one 5
comment letter that came in that has a
rather 6
extensive discussion on this issue of treating 7
unspecified requests as 2.206 petitions.
8 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
That's in the 9
attachment, one of the letters in the attachment?
10 MR. CAMERON:
Yes, it is, the letter from 11 Susan Hyatt of Ohio Citizens for Responsible Energy.
12 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Thank you.
13 MR. CAMERON:
(Slide)
Could I have the 14 next slide, please?
15 The next discussion area at the workshop 16 was the concept of providing for some type of internal 17 NRC independent review of the staff decision on the 18 2.206 petition. Some of the participants believe that 19 this type of independent review is necessary to remove 20 the perception of bias, the bias resulting from the 21 fact that the NRC staf f who originally evaluated a 22 particular safety issue is the same group of people 23 that the petition is turned over to.
As one 24 participant noted, it would be natural for a bias to 25 result from that type of arrangement.
There were NEAL R. GROSS i
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1 several suggestions made for who'might perform the 2
independent review, the Inspector General, 'the Atomic 3
Safety and Licensing Board panel, the Office' of 4
Commission Appellate Adjudication or some new group i
5 that was set up specifically for this purpose, f
6 Now, the industry participants thought it-7 was unnecessary to institute this type of independent i
8 review.
They point out that the Commission already 9
has the ability to take review of a staff decision on i
10 a 2.206 petition.
Again, there was the concern over 11 the resource impacts in terms of diverting staff and i
12-licensee resources from other more important ideas and 13 also the industry participants did not feel that any 14 bias was specifically demonstrated by the petitioner 15 participants.
i 16 There was in this section a discussion by i
17 Mr. Malsch of a previous independent review of 2.206 i
18 petitions.
This was back when we had two separate i
19 legal offices, the Office of General Counsel and the 20 Office of the Executive Legal Director.
At that time i
21 the Office of General
- Counsel, with technical 22 assistance from the old Office of Policy Evaluation, 23 would undertake a review of the director's decisions.
24 Now, an informal'OGC review still takes place of the 25 director's decisions but with no technical input such i
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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34 1
as was offered by the Office of Policy Evaluation.
2 A significant point that came out in this 3
discussion was statements by a
couple of the 4
participants that if there was this type of 5
independent review that there might not be as much as 6
a call for judicial review by representatives of the 7
public.
8 A last point in terms of indepandent 9
review was the whole possibility of establishing this 10 for priority categories, perhaps the new information 11 categories that we were talking about earlier on.
12 (Slide)
Could we have the next slide, j
13 please?
14 COMMISSIONER R4ICK: Incidentally, going 15 back to Mr. Parler's invitation for any suggestions 16 from the Commission at this point, it would helpful to 17 have at least an outline of the internal review that 18 takes place now on 2.206 petitions because I'm sure 19 there is a review process within the staff.
20 MR.
PARTLOW:
You mean orally
- now, 21 Commissioner?
22 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
No, no, no.
I'm 23 thinking when the --
24 MR. TAYLOR:
We'll provide that.
25 MR.
CAMERON:
Okay.
One of the last NEAL R. GROSS COURT AEPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D C 20005 (202) 234 4433
35 1
topics that we discussed, again added at the 2
suggestion of 'some of the participants, was the whole 3
idea of judicial review.
This has perhaps been the 4
most visible issue in the 2.206 process.
We did 5
discuss this and it still received a lot of support.
6 from some participants in terms of providing 7
accountability to the process.
But it was 8
interesting.
There were some petitioner participants 9
who stated that there would be other improvements to 10 the 2.206 process that might mitigate the need for 11 judicial review or at least would provide a more 12 positive contribution to the process than providing i
i 13 for judicial review.
14 As Mr. Parler already mentioned earlier, 15 the courts give deference to agency decisions in terms 16 of the agency's technical expertise and, as was noted 17 by several participants at the workshop, they believe 18 that the NRC decisions were pretty well reasoned and 19 pretty carefully done, therefore insulating even 20 further those decisions from overturn on judicial 21 review.
I think that this issue underscores the value 22 of the workshop and one aspect at least is that we may 23 have been putting too fine a point on the whole issue 24 of judicial review and when you really examined some 25 of the underlying concerns behind people's positions NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND Tf4ANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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36 i
i 1
on the issues, you may find that there are other ways 2
to address those rather than judicial review.
3-(Slide)
Could we have the next slide, 4
please?
i 5
There were several other issues that were r
6 brought up at the workshop.
One was suggested by the 7
General Counsel from the Administrative Conference of 8
the United States, is that we should explore whether l
9 consensus building techniques might profitably be used 10 in the 2.206 process. And though most of the industry 11 participants at least did not feel that this would be 12 appropriate for an enforcement context, at least one 13 industry participant said that there might be some j
14 types of issues, for example petitions that raise i
15 multifacility issues or that raise unique issues that 16 might be handled through the consensus building 17 process.
18 We talked a
little bit about the 19 experience of other agencies and I provided the 20 Commission with a letter that came in from Gary Edles, 21 General Counsel of the Administrative Conference.
22 They had looked at any agencies that had similar 23 processes.
I think the one notable one was the Food 24 and Drug Administration that has a process where the 25 head of the agency, rather than the staff, handles a NEAL R. GROSS l
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i 37 1
request for action.
But it can include enforcement, 2
it can _ include rulemaking.
It can include almost 3
anything.
It is a perhaps more interactive process 4
than ours is with the petitioner, but as noted in Mr.
5 Edles' letter, they have a significant backlog in 6
terms of responding to these types of petitions.
l 7
As I
mentioned
- earlier, Mr.
Malsch 8
discussed the citizen suit-experience of other 9
agencies and compared it to our 2.206 process.
10 The third area that I have down here is 11 non-compliance with the regulations.
-A couple of the 12 petitioner participants stated that we needed 13 criteria, internal criteria on whether to grant or 14 deny petitions. The specific issue that came up there 15 is that non-compliance with the regulations should be 16 grounds for granting a
petition.
Petitioner 17 participants at the workshop cited that there's a 18 double standard involved here where when we're 19 licensing a plant we reach a conclusion that it's i
20 acceptable for licensing if all the regulations are 21 met, but yet non-compliance with regulations after a 22 plant is licensed is not direct grounds for granting 23 a 2. 206 petition. Again, that's the perception of the 24 petitioner participants at the workshop.
25 One last issue that was raised is that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 234 4433
I 38 l
1 local citizens around a facility should be involved in 1
2 the 2.206 process since it often affects the 1
3 livelihood of people in the town, is that they should'
+
4 be involved in any requested action to shut down that 1
5 facility.
9 6
(Slide)
Could I have the last slide, 7
please?
8 In terms of the schedule, we are in the 9
process of evaluating the written comments that were i
10 submitted as well as the workshop discussions and we 11 plan to submit recommendations to the Commission in 12 late November on what improvements should be made to 13 the process.
14 That's the end of our portion of the 15 briefing.
I 16 CHAIRMAN SELIN: Could you just sketch out 17 a little bit about the dynamics of the conference?
18 Did people go away feeling they had learned something 19 new? Were there any exchanges of views or did people 20 pretty much just come and say what they had to say and i
21 then leave?
22 MR. CAMERON:
No, I believe that people 23 came away from the workshop feeling that it was a very 24 constructive process and the comment letters, I think, 25 reinforce that view. The discussions that occurred on
?
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39 1
the whole idea of communications, I think, found that 2
the industry was pretty sympathetic to some of the 3
concerns that were stated by the petitioners.
In 4
- fact, I got the impression that the industry - was 5
surprised that some of these communication l
1 6
recommendations don't happen as a matter of course 7
more uniformly than they do now.
8 So, I thought that there was a meeting of 9
the minds on some issues and also that even though l
i 10 there might have been disagreement about what should 11 be done, that both sides of the people on both 12 sides of the issue perhaps understood a little bit 13 better the frustration or the views of the other side 14 on the particular issues.
15 MR. PARLER:
Mr. Chairman, a bottom line i
16 question is whether -- I think they're better off in 17 this area having had the workshop than if it were not 18 held.
The answer to that is clear in my mind, having 19 attended the first half of the workshop and read the 20 comments. The answer to that is yes, we're better off 21 having it.
22 MR.
PARTLOW:
I thought it was very 23 worthwhile.
I'd like to give one little example on 24 this matter of communication and whether or not the 25 staff works the petition in the dark.
One of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W
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)
l
I 40 1
petitioners said that.
.They send in their petition 2
and then nothing is heard for months and months and 3
then the answer comes back no.
Another petitioner 4
spoke up to the others and said, "Well, you can't just 5
put it in there and let it lie.
You've got to be 6
active yourself.
Don't depend upon the government to 7
be telling you what's going on, you get in there and 8
find out what's going on.
So, I-thought there was a 9
good give and take on everyone's part.
10 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Commissioner Rogers?
11 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Was there 12 participation by the attendees that were not -- you 13 know, the observers or people not part of the group on 14 your list?
15 MR. CAMERON:
Yes, there was.
We had --
Y 16 after each major discussion area we opened it up to l
17 the public for comment and-we did receive several 18 comments.
In fact, one of the commenters was a utaff 19 person from the Senate Committee on Environment and 20 Natural Resources and provided a very useful function 21 by asking sort of broad summary questions so that we 22 went through the group at the end of each session and 23 tried to summarize the views on the particular issue 24 that was being discussed.
25 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Did you see any NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON. D C 20005 (202) 234-4433 I
41 1
dynamics during this?
I mean a change in people's 2
views on the part of the participants as they 3
discussed matters together such as. we saw in the 4-workshops that you were holding on the decommissioning 5
standards, cleanup standards? There it was very clear 6
that there was a dynamic at work during the course of 7
at least the one that I attended.
8 MR. CAMERON:
Well, I think you could see 9
that dynamic at
- work, Commissioner
- Rogers, as 10 witnessed by some of the points that Mr. Parler and 11 Mr. Partlow and I talked about earlier.
It perhaps 12 wasn't as dramatic as the decommissioning criteria 13 workshops, which is possibly a much more dramatic 14 issue, but also we had a second day there where the 1.5 first day was devoted more to position taking and then 16 the second day got more into a give and take and 17 accommodation on the issues.
18 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
- Well, just in 19 general, it does seem to me that this approach that 20 you're taking here is -- you know, I haven't seen any 21 negatives from trying to have workshops and get in a 22 well prepared way the participation of a
broad 23 spectrum of interested parties.
I hope that it is a 24 process that we will use with increasing frequency as 25 occasions arise because it does seem to me that so far NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCAIBERS 1323 AHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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42 1
the two cases which we've seen seem to me to provide 2
a lot of positive information and perspective to our i
3 processes.
4 So, I'd like to commend OGC for promoting 5
this and your own participation in making it come off.
6 I do hope that we will be able to find 7
some ways to improve the communication aspect. To me, y
i 8
it's something that could be done without great cost.
9 It is just a question of attitude, I think, on our l
i 10 part as to paying a little bit more attention to 11 communicating more with the people that have come to 12 us with something.
13 So, I await your recommendations as -a 14 result of your study here without trying to anticipate 15 them and make comments on what some of the issues are 16 that you're looking at.
But I do think that it is i.
17 important to look at the whole. picture from within 18 some kind of a
framework that puts things in 19 perspective.
I feel that some of the solutions that 20 may be favored by some of the participants may really 21 be there for one or two cases that they've been very t
22 concerned about.
I don't know that, but I'd like to j
23 see a quantitative perspective here and perhaps some 24 cost analysis of various options because doing some.
25 things may be very costly and others may produce i
i NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
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43 1
almost. exactly the same result without being so 2
costly.
3 So, I do think that we have to be mindful 4
of resources and I think that that should be,part of 5
your thinking in coming to us with recommendations.
6 In other words, I'd like all of these issues which 7
clearly have great emotional elements involved in 8
them, people feel very strongly about some of these 9
- things, and those have to be dealt with in a
10 reasonable and responsible way.
But at the same time, j
11 I think we have to put some kind of a -- some measures l
6 12 out there of what it's going to cost us to follow any 13 of these options.
5 14 Thank you.
l t
15 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Commissioner Remick?
16 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Well, I tried to 17 read carefully the Director's decisions on the 2.206 18 petitions and I really have been impressed with the 19 thoroughness of the technical review of those Director 20 decisions.
But it is obvious that we could do more in 21 the communication area with the petitioners so that i
22 they know what is going on.
i 23
-I would appreciate when you evaluate this i
24 to address the question and I don't know if it's right 25 or not, to be putting into the 2.206 baskets things I
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W j
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44 1
which specifically aren't requested that are probably 2
pros and cons.
I'd appreciate. people looking at the 3
alternatives there.
4 I also want to congratulate the staff for 5
the initiative in suggesting the workshops in this 6
particular case and the SECY document I thought was 7
very well written.
It was concise, I thought very 8
even-handed.
I'm sure that the workshop was conducted 9
in a
even-handed way and was quite interesting 10-reading.
So, I congratulate the staff.
Thank you.
11 CHAIRMAN SELIN: Commissioner de Planque?
12 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
I think there 13 were certain individuals or groups that were pushing 14 before this for a judicial review.
Were those groups 15 or. individuals represented at this workshop by and 16 large?
17 MR. CAMERON:
They were.
There was one 18 notable unavoidable absence, Diane Curran, who was 19 involved in Yankee Rowe and also in the writing of --
20 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Sequoyah.
21 MR. CAMERON:
In Sequoyah and the writing.
22 of the Union of Concerned Scientists' report on the 23 2.206 petition process at the last minute could not l
24 make it.
But she had been invited and we were looking 25 forward to her attending.
But I think that' the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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45 1
representatives from the other citizens groups i
2 probably made her points for her, I would imagine.
3 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Okay.
Once 4
again it sounds like communications are at least a 5
part of this problem.
I understand from what you've 6
said that you've already made some modifications in 7
your procedures.
I would suggest that when you come i
8 back to us with recommendations that you. indicate what 9
changes you've already made and how they compared with 10 the past situation so that we can see what action has 11 already been taken to satisfy the workshop 12 suggestions.
l 1
13
- Again, in accordance with what the I
14 Chairman said, the other side of the house should know 15 about all this and be consistent as well.
16 MR. CAMERON:
Yes.
j 17 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
But I thought 18 the paper was very good, the briefing was very good.
l 19 It sounds like you did a wonderful job.
I 20 MR. CAMERON:
Thank you.
And the next j
21 time we come back we'll have our viewgraphs numbered, 22 hopefully.
^
23 COMMISSIONER REMICK: Incidentally,'along 24 that line, there was a Director of the Office of 25 Policy Evaluation as a new activity in 1981 suggested NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (202) 2344433 WASHINGTON. D C 20005 (202) 234-4433
i 46 i
1 that 'as a
courtesy to the Commission that all t
2 viewgraphs should have the title, the presenter's 3
- name, his organization, date and they should ' be
}
4 numbered.
i r
5 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
And there's no
{
6 room left for the substance.
7 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
You know, there are a r
8 couple of things I think are important and this is 9
really responding to the General Counsel's invitation i
10 for some response.
First of all, as Commissioner 11 Remick noted, the NRR Director evaluations are really i
12 quite thorough.
They are handled in great depth.
13 They're argued very carefully.
There's no question l
14 that the staff takes these petitions very seriously.
15 I think the important point there's a lot of i
16 discussion as if right now we have a cheap process and i
17 we're going to make it expensive.
In fact, that's 18 quite wrong.
2.206 is a way to get at the head of the' f
19 line.
The amount of work that goes into this is 1
i 20 really considerable.
We already have a
major.
}l 21 investment.
So, the question isn't so much what else 22 should we do but how can we recoup a littl.,more from f
23 that investment.
'l 24 We have essentially, if you read the 25 Commission principles and the Controller's report, f
i NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202)2344433
47 1
protect the health and safety, do it the most open 2
fashion possible and do it without -- as economically 3
to the licensee as we can. We have a major investment 4
here and the question is what can we do with this to 5
keep it.
i 6
I don't personally have any problem with
~
7 the results.
But you've heard a story I've sometimes
[
8 told about Norbert Weiner giving a lecture and he i
9 writes this very complicated definite integral on the i
t 10 left side and he looks at it and he looks at it and he 11 writes down 2 pi.
Well, all definite integrals come 12 out 2 pi.
But he looks at this and the class looks 13 and they say, "How did you do it?" and he erased the l
i 14 2 pi and he looked again and again and he wrote down 15 2 pi and he said, "See, I did it a different way."
16 The opacity of the process is clearly a 17 problem.
It's-not so much the final results or the 18 documentation, but the dynamics that are gotten that 19 way.
20 The second is, as you've pointed out,
{
21 there are a number of no lose ways to just handle 1
22 things mechanically better than communications, et 23 cetera.
But I do think the opacity has to be given 24 some clear look, some kind of criteria or some kind of 25 guidelines that say -- you know, we sometimes get just NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCn BERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
(202) 234-a433 WASHINGTON. D C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 48 1
bothersome 2.206s which should be dispensed with l
?
competently, but as quickly as possible, and others I
3 that would benefit from some more conversation, l
4 perhaps even a -- not a hearing in the formal sense,
-l i
f 5
but a meeting at which the licensee and the petitioner
=
6 were present or the staff were present so that there f
7 could be some back and forth, f
8 The Yankee Rowe case I hope is unusual.
l 9
I mean an enormous amount of effort went into that.
10 I don't think it's unprecedented and there's no 11 question in my mind that the results were much better 12 for there having been meetings at which people could
[
13 express their points of view rather than just the 1
14 Director or even the Commission going in camera and f
15 issuing the report.
16 The third is I want to make clear, I'm not i
[
17 saying that these should not be enforcement petitions.
18 But there seem to me to be two levels of review.
i 19 First is the safety issue and then the appropriate i
i s
20 action.
It might be useful to investigate ways in l
21 which the safety issue is addressed and responded to j
t 22 and then at the end, the bottom line is still the i,
t 23 same, is the enforcement action approved or modified.
i I
24 But the analogy with a case where you have both a 25 finding and then a sentence I think isn't such a bad j
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 AHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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't
49 1
one.
The key question -- they are enforcement 2
petitions and maybe you want to change that, but I l
3 don't think it's necessary to change that in order to.
I 4
get more focus on the underlying safety issue.
5 I think this was a very good report.
I am 6
cognizant of the fact that General Counsel had to push 7
for awhile to get this workshop approved and I think 8
it's now clear to all of us how valuable the workshop 9
has been.
And, in fact, it's not that we have a bad i
10 process.
We have a very good process which, in spite i
11 of an enormous amount of effort and competence doesn't 12 accomplish all that ought to be accomplishable with 13 that amount of confidence and effort.
I hope this i
14 workshop turns out to have been a big step towards l
15 achieving that.
1 16 Thank you very much.
J7 MR. CAMERON:
Thank you.
18 (Whereupon, at 11:11 a.m.,
the above-19 entitled matter was concluded.)
f 20 l
21 i
22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
CO2) 2344433 '
WASHINGTON. O C 20005 (202) 2344433
i I
CERTIFICATE OF TRANSCRIBER This is to certify that the attached events of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission entitled:
I TITLE OF MEETING: BRIEFING ON RESULTS OF 2.206 WORKSif0P PLACE OF MEETING: ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND DATE OF MEETING:
SEPTEMBER 20, 1993 were transcribed by me. I further certify that said transcription is accurate and complete, to the best of my ability, and that the transcript is a true and accurate record of the foregoing events.
~ /b 41 bCT _. _
I
- J l}
Reporter's name:
Peter Lynch i
i l
i J
5 I
I i
A;n a
9 HEAL R. GROSS covet epontums me raAnscaisses 1333 N000E ISLMS AVINUE. N.W.
(202) N wASMes0100t. D.C 2000m (202) 232 6 1
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COMMISSION BRIEFING-EVALUATION OF THE 10 CFR 2.206 PROCESS SEPTEMBER 20,1993 9
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i 6
WORKSIIOP - JU.LY 28,1993 l
i PURPOSE PARTICIPANTS BACKGROUND PAPER AGENDA Y
4
l PERSPECTIVES ON TIIE 2.206 PROCESS o
" PETITIONERS" PUBLIC PARTICIPATION STOPS AFTER THE PLANT IS -LICENSED REVIEW OCCURS BEHIND CLOSED DOORS e
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