ML20058B984
| ML20058B984 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Clinch River |
| Issue date: | 07/22/1982 |
| From: | Faden M UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS |
| To: | Gilinsky V, Palladino N, Roberts T NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 8207260215 | |
| Download: ML20058B984 (7) | |
Text
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July 22,1982 The Honorable Nunzio J. Palladino The Honorable James K. Asselstine Chairman Comissioner Nuclear Regulatory Comission Nuclear Regulatory Comission Washington, D.C. 20555 Washington, D.C. 20555 The Honorable Victor Gilinsky The Honorable John F. Ahearne Comissioner Comissioner Nuclear Regulatory Comission Nuclear Regulatory Comission I
Washington, D.C. 20555 Washington, D.C. 20555 The Honorable Thomas F. Roberts
@l Commissioner Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555 i
RE: Clinch River Breeder Reactor Plant (Docket No. 50'-537)
Exemption Request under 10 CHI 50.12 Gentlemen:
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) urges the Commission (NRC) to deny the request of the applicants for an exemption, pursuant to 10 CHI 50.12, from the regulations pertaining to the conduct of site preparation activities before a construction ' permit has been issued.
Such exemption is, in UCS' view, unauthorized in law and would be contrary to the public interest.
UCS is not an intervenor in the license proceedings with respect to the Clinch River Breeder Reactor Plant (CRERP).
We will not attempt to duplicate the points made in the extensive memoranda filed by the intervenors Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Sierra Club, with which we fully agree.
We submit the following coments pursuant to the Comission Order of July 9, 1982.
Close readers of these comments may notice that they are remarkably similar to the comments UCS filed on January 18, 1982, when the pricr exemption request was under Comission consideration.
Our views have not significantly changed because DOE's request, and the underlying rationale, has also not significantly changed.
We agree with NRDC and the Sierra Club that under ag reasonable concept of administrative rea judicata, this exemption request should be peremptorily denied.
Much as we might in other circumstances favor a_ Commission precedent that would allow petitioners as many Commission hearinga as they would like, we believe that the applicants here have had ample opportunity to present their case.
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' Turning to the merits of the exemption request, we offer the following observations:
1)
The fundamental questions raised by this request relate to the NRC's credibility as an impartial, effective regulator.
A number of recent events
-including renewed pressure from industry, Congressional and executive branch sources to speed up the issuance of reactor licenses, delays in the implementation of mag 'IMI Action Plan requirements, and the revelation of substantial quality assurance failures at a number of newly completed powerplants-have already combined to rekindle the criticisms raised in mag of the post-Three Mile Island studies about NRC's independence and credibility.
Any move by the Commission to shortcut the normal licensing procedures in this particularly controversial matter, upon as flimsy a record as the applicants have presented, will justifiably lead the public to question whether IEC plans to undertake the in-depth review that this unique project deserves.
DOE's renewed argument that. national energ policy requires that thie N
project go forward as fast as possible is particularly dangerous, becanne it can be used over and over to compromise NRC's entire regulatory regime.
The separation of functions legislated in the Iherg Reorganization Act of 17/4 makes such an argument wholly inappropriate as a ground for IGC decision-making.
- 2) The purpose of this exemption request can only be to ensure that site work begins before the next round of Congressional budget decisions.
As Deputy Secretary Ihvis admitted at the February 16 oral presentation, the Departcant's need is that some tangible activity take place on site before the 3
critical points in the FY1983 Congressional budget cycle.
DOE is clearly not as interested in saving 6-12 months in the licensing process as it is in saving the project altogether from a likely Congressional termination.
While using the NRC to implement this strateg may suit DOE's own political interests, we question whether it forms a permissible basis for av IEC g
actions that deviate from the Comission's customary procedures.
NRC's proper role under the Energ7 Reorganization Act does not include av involvement in the policy decisions about whether and to what extent this project should go forward as a taxpayer-funded activity.
Yet av action by the Commission will, intentionally or otherwise, affect those policy decisions. In these circumstances, the most neutral course of action for IEC, in our opinion, is to hew as closely as practicable to its existing regulations and procedures. The least neutral course of action that we c a n imagine would be to employ an obscure provision of. IEC's rules to bypass the nomal hearing procedures in order to allow this project to get under the Congressional wire.
3)
Congress has not in ag way directed IEC to deviate from the normal licensing procedure.
The applicants' use of the fleeting reference in the conference report on the 1981 reconciliation bill (H. Rep.97-298) to the
" timely and expeditious" completion of CRBRP to justify this licensing exemption is at best misplaced, because that phrase does not carry av implication whatsoever that the normal licensing process should be bypassed.
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In view of the unique legislative history of the reconciliation bill, we believe that av reliance on this language as an expression of Congressional intent verges on the fraudulent.
Those familiar with the 1981 budget process should remember that the reconciliation bill was by all accounts the longest and most complex legislation ever to pass the Congress, encompassing dozens of disparate issues linked only by some connection, however tenuous, with the federal budget.
This legislation was effectively adopted en bloc by a single roll-call vote with no opportunity for amendment ~fn the House of Representatives. The CRBRP was not a major subject of debate in either branch.
The Conference report upon which applicants rely ran more than 1000 pages. To pinpoint a nmn11 portion of the legislative history (rather than the law itself) as a clear expression of Congressional intent to depart from a long-established policy that CRBRP should undergo the entire ' licensing process strikes us as more than simply aggressive advocacy.
4)
To the extent that NRC may properly concern itself with saving the taxpayers money, the taxpayers mayf be better served if the Commission proceeds cautiously on this application.
As the record of declining Congressional 8
support for CRERP illustrates, the future of this costly project is now more in doubt than ever before.
Av action by NRC that creates a false momentum for.this project will carry significant fiscal as well as political implications.
In that case, DOE's recitation of the potential savings of taxpayers' funds to be achieved from shortcutting the licensing process must be looked at in another light.
If Congress reevaluates the wisdom of this project in view of current fiscal conditions and decides not to proceed with it, and this exemption is not granted, fewer tax dollars will have been spent in site preparation and other unnecessary activities.
Here again, the wisest and most neutral course for NRC would be to proceed with the normal licensing D
process.
5)
Any claim thit acceleration of the CRBRP would implement a responsible nonproliferation ?olicy is not worthy of serious consideration.
The cloaking of this profoundly destabilizing project in the rhetoric of benign nonproliferation aims is a last-grasp argument that the Commission A
should sirnmarily reject.
The applicants appear to be arguing that this country's nonproliferation objectives will be more easily attained if we encourage, by action and example, the production and use of separated plutonium.
This proposition virtually refutes itself; in our view, leadership in nonproliferation matters does not mean seeing who can move the fastest toward a plutonium econog.
DOE's position' here goes well beyond the
" faintness of heart mixed up with a little^ greed" that (ir. Commissioner Gilinsky's phrase) characterizes the administration's overall plutonium policy.
It reminds us more of the " black is white, var is race" newspeak that George Orwell described in 1984, in which the ordinary meaning of words and concepts is turned upside down.
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For the preceding reasons, UCS urges the Commission to deny the exemption request pursuant to 10 CHI 5012.
Respectfulbr submitted, Michael E. Faden Iagislative Counsel e
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION COMMISSIONERS:
Nunzio J. Palladino Victor Gilinsky John F. Ahearne Thomas M.
Roberts James K.
Asselstine
)
In the Matter of
)
)'
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
)
PROJECT MANAGEMENT CORPORATION
)
TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY
)
Ex m t R
t under 10 CFR 50.12)
(Clinch River Breeder Reactor
)
Plant)
)
)
i CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that single copies of the Union of Concerned Scientists' comments pursuant to the Commission Order of July 9, 1982 were served upon the persons listed on the attached sheets by deposit in the U.S. Mail, First Class Postage prepaid this 22nd day of July, 1982.
6 Midhael E.
Faden Legislative Counsel
's L
Docketing & Service Section Marshall E. Miller, Esq.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission U.S.
Atomic Safety & Licensing Board 1717 H Street, NW, Room 1121 Chairman U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C.
20555 4350 East West Highway, 4th floor (3 copies)
Bethesda, MD 20814 R. Tenney Johnson, Esq.
Leon Silverstrom, Esq.
Gustave A. Linenberger Warren E. Bergoholz, Jr., Esq.
Atomic Safety & Licensing Board U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Michael D. Oldak, Esq.
L.
Dow Davis, Esq.
4350 East West Highway, 4th floor Office of General Counsel Bethesda, MD 20814 U.S. Department of Energy 1000 Independence Ave., SW, Rm. 6A245 Washington, D.C.
20585 eogge L.
gar, Esq.
Daniel Swanson, Esq.
rvin N.
Shapell, Esq.
Stuart Treby, Esq.
omas A.
Schmutz, Esq.
Bradley W.
Jones, Esq.
regg A.
Day, Esq.
Office of Exec. Legal Director Frank K.
Peterson, Esq.
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission M rgan, ewis & Bocklus Maryland National Bank Building 1800 M Street, NW 7735 Old Georgetown Road Washington, D.C.
20036 Bethesda, MD 20814 Dr. Cadet H. Hand, Jr.
D e to Atomic Safety & Licensing Appeal ega Marine Laboratory n
est of California US uclear Regulatory Commission 1717 H Street, NW, Room 1121 Bodega Bay, CA 94923 Washington, D.C.
20555 Herbert S.
Sanger, Jr., Esq.
Lewis E. Wallace, Esq.
Atomic Safety & Licensing Board James F.
Burger, Esq.
W.
Walker LaRoche, Esq.
Panel Edward J. Vigluicci, Esq.
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Office of General Counsel 1717 H Street, NW, Room 1121 Tennessee Valley Authority Washington, D.C.
20555 400 Commerce Avenue Knoxville, TN 37902 I
e-William M.
Leech, Jr.,
Esq.
William B.
Ilubbard, Esq.
Commissioner James Cotham Lee Breckenridge, Esq.
Tennessee Department of Economic State of Tennessee office of the Attorney General and Community Development 450 James Robertson Parkway Andrew Jackson Building, Ste. 1007 Nashville, TN 37219 Nashville, TN 32219 Lawson McGhee Public Library Eldon V.C.
Greenberg 500 West Church Street Tuttle and Taylor Knoxville, TN 37902 1901 L Street, N.W.
Suite 805 Washington, D.C.
20036 William E.
Lantrip, Esq.
Brooks Yeagar Sierra Club City Attorney Municipal Building 230 Pennsylvania Avenue, S.E.
P.O. Box 1 Washington, D.C.
20003 F.'
Oak Ridge, TN 37830 Oak Ridge Public Library Civic Center Oak Ridge, TN 37820 Joe 11. Walker 401 Roane Street Harriman, TN 37748
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