ML20072U259
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l UNI 1ED STATE!! 0F AMERICA
-ATORIC ENEP&f C0t14ISSION IN THE MATITR OF DOCKET No. 50-146 SAXTON NUCIEAR EKPERDEfIAL CORPORATION Appearances George F. Tro* ridge, Esq.
For Saxton Nuclear E:tperimental Corporation i
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'Ihomas F. EnEelhardt, Esq.
-i For the Staff of the Atomic Energy Commission
- INITIAL DECISION-After a full hearing an Intemediate Decision was entered on 10,1 960 authorizing Saxton Nuclear Experimental Corporation January 1
to construct a small pressurized water reactor at Saxton, Pennsylvania, a
for the purpose of carrying on a five-year Research and Development
' Program.: The reactor was constructed and after another full hearing a second Intemediate Decision was' entered authorizing the issuance of a. Provisional Optrating License. Pursuant to this decision,'the Ccanaission issued Saxton' Provisional Operating LicenseLDPR-h' on November 15,.1961.. 'I' s
,4 ant application, which was fin
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3nuary S. % u f-ux. ire W m eerned with Sc"
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including necessary related changes in Saxton's existin8 license and technica.1 specifications, and an extension et the term of the license'. -
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Attached to this. application vere proposed amendments to acccaplish the purposes sought.-- Likewise attached was a Safeguards Report l'
9104190072 910314
- PDR- - FOI A
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-DEKOK91-17
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dealing vith Phase I.
Following a full review of the application by the /IC Staff and by the Ccenicsion's Advisory Comittee on Eenecor Safeguardo, a Notice of Hearing van published in the Federal Register on June 23, 1962 setting forth the following issuest "1.
Uhether there is renconable assurance that the activities to be authorized by the amendment to the provicional operating licence can be conducted without endangering the health and safety of the public and that such activi-tien vill be conducted in compliance with the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended, and the rules and regulations of the Commission.
"2.
Wether the licensee in technically and financially qualified to engage in the activitien to be authorized by the amendment to the provisional operating license in accordance with the rules and regulations of the Commission.
"3 Whether the licensee has furnished to the Comincion proof of financial protection in accordance with Title 10, Code of Federal Regulations, Part 140 ' Financial Pro-tection Requirements and Indemnity Agreements.'
"h.
Whether the issuance of an amendment to the provisional operating licence under the terms and conditions proposed vill be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and safety of the public."
A public hearing unr. ' aid pursuant to this notice on.?J mium in Germantovn, Mw x
1062, at tb a
Sanc, md the /SC St-aff presentted evher nt ne hearing in support of the application.
No other person sought to intervene or make a limited appearance in the proceeding. At the hearing, on the motion of the Counsel for the Comission, the evidence submitted in the two prece6.ing hearinge vas inecrporated in the present record. After the hearing both the Applicant and the Staff for the Comission cubmitted i
3 Proposed Findings and Conclusions.
It appears that there was no material difference between the proposed Findings and Conclusions of the Applicant and those of the Staff.
An indicated, the Saxton project involyce operation of a y
small prescurized vcter reactor for the purpoce of carrying out a five-year Recourch and Dcyclopment Progrca.
The facility is located near the Borough of Saxton in Liberty Township, Bedford County Penn-sylvania. Steam produced by the nuclear plant vill be used to drive a turbine-generator in the adjoining Pennsylvania Electric Campany power plant, but electric generation is only incidental to the plant's primary experimental mission.
The project is a joint effort of the Westinghouse Electric Corporation and Baxton, which is a non-profit corporation fomed by the four operating utilities of General Public Utilities Corporation. Saxton owns, operates and maintains the nuclear plant. Westinghouse, which designed and constructed the facility, is responsible for planning the five-year experimental pro 6 ram and carrying out accociated renearch and developnent work, for provittin
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- a 1 and associatal t;ervices, Provisional Operating License DPR-4 authorized operation of the Baxton facility in two sta6en.
In the first stage of operation, it permitted Saxton to load fuel and to operate the reactor with the vessel head off at power levels up to 200 kilovatts upon a finding i
by the Director of the Division of Licensing and Regulation that the
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facility had been completed with the exception of eight env.oe ated
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systems not required for operation under these conditions. This finding was made by the Director on April 3, 1962. Fuel loading began on April 6,1962, and the reactor reached criticality on April 13, 1962, since vhich time it has been operated at low power for training purposes and low power core parameter measurements.
Operation of the reactor with the vessel head on and at power i
levels up to 20 thercal negawatts is authorized by the existing license only, upon a finding by the Director of the Division of Licensing and Regulation that eiSht specified systems are complete.
Two of these systems, the safety injection system and the pressure control and relief system remain to be ccupleted before the Director can make the finding of completion of the facility.
Phase I of the Research and Develoinent Program has two basic objectives.
The first is to demonstrate reactor operation with chem.
ical shim control. The cecond is to demonstrate operation at specific.
Povers of up to 16 KV per foot of fuel rod with the reactor under chemical chim control. Chemice3 shim control involves controlling chemical neutron poison h-cu reactor at p v acid in C af tn) in the cociant, instew u by mer'.s of tb con-trol rods. Uhen operating with full chemieni shim :ontrol, all of the control rods are escentially withdravn from the core, althou6h the rods continue to be available for fast or e:tergency shutdown.
Higher specific power vill be demonstrated by substituting hl for a regular fuel assembly a special fuel assembly and subassemblies.
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R 5-The special fuel assembly consists of 63 rods with a hollow center into which a 9 rod subassembly may be inserted.
The average enrich.
. ment of the fuel in the-special assen,bly is hi her than the test 6
of the core,- resulting in a higher specific power for this assembly.
The first subassembly to be inserted win have an even higher enrichment, so that at a reactor power level of 20 thermal megawatts this subassembly vin attain the ma::imum allovable specific power of 16 KV per foot. ' The specific power of the remainder of the core during this experiment vi n not exceed 12.0 KV per foot. This subassembly. vill then be replaced by another subassembly having the 1
same enrichment.as the-rest of the special assembly and the reactor l
1 power level win be raised to 23 5 themal megawatts, so that the
- whole special assembly vi n be operated up to a specific power not in excess of 16 KV per foot.- The specific power of the remainder of the core during this experiment vin not exceed 14.1 Kv per foot.
Chemical shim control vin be maintained while these experiments '
are being performed.
In_ addition, a Oe:di wr
'shly with Zircaloy clad fue3-9 nd < 11, be im.um th ;We n.
r >" the nomal stem n.nwel
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subaneamblica in the corc; hovcVer, this sucassembly vill operate atL the same: specific power as'the remainder of the core.
. The principal concern in the use of boric acid neutron: poison for reactivity control is the possibility of hideout or deposit of boron on the core surfaces and subsequent rapid release of the boron to-the cociant -
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stream. Such behavior,cif the total amount and rate of selease vere h
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. sufficiently lar6c, could result in a sudden reactivity increase umd a ecvore reactor transient. Westinghouse has conducted a variety of loop tests to study the effect of dissolved boric acid on corrosion product relence, transport, and deposition.
The results do not sus-Eest any serious problems.
However, it has not been conclusively demonstrated under actual reactor operating conditions that boron hideout and release might not occur in a manner detrimental to the reactor.
Special procedures and limitations have, therefore, been proposed by Saxton and accepted by the AEC Staff to insure against the so called boron removal accident, and these are reflected in the revision of technical specifications applicable to the Phase I
- proEram, i
The technical specifications limit the allovable " unexplained" change in reactivity in the reactor, i.e. the amount of reactivity change which cannot be e::plained by normal changes in core parameters such as fuel burn-up, temperature, boric acid concentration and con-trol rod positions. Since un "ure tained" loss in reactivity m1 ht 6
> boron de*
a cere wurfaces and since rea s
r.dght a W 1 suddenly by 2elease of tht: boron i /th, noeinnt,,
'M total unexplained reactivity loss, including measurement and calcu-lation uncertainties, vill be limited to a value such that its sudden addition vould not result in doma6e to the reactor core.
This limit on the amount of unexplained reactivity is nov estimated by
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Saxton to be about 0 5% c. k/k for a 20 MWt uniform core.
This limit vill be re-evaluated prior to the chemical shim tests using the actual experimentally detemined core characteristics in the analysis.
If the unaccounted for reactivity reaches the above limit, the experiment vill be stopped, and an evaluation vill be instituted to determine if the unexplained reactivity is indeed caused by poison deposition on the core.
An increasing body of evidence supports the conclusion that l
the higher cpocific power planned during the phase I program can be attained with little likelihood of core damage.
This includes the results of fuel perfomance and experiments at Shippingport and Chalk River and of in-pile capsule irradiations of fuel rods for the Carolinas-Virginia program. In all cases the rods vere undamageds and sectioning of the rods shoved the UO to be in satisfactory 2
condition.
i Saxton has requested that for both normal operation and the Phato I program the ninimum burn ar? *nfety factor contained in the
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uw terms of a new burn #
correlation..
,sa Saxton Final Safeguntds Feport d Be current
-j techn' cal specifications for non-experimental operation express the i
minimum burn-out safety factor in terms of a DNB (departure from nucleate boiling) correlation referred to as the Modified Bettis Correlation. Since preparation of the Final Safeguards Report, the Westinghouse Atctnic Power Division has re-evaluated the test data
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i on which the !!odified tettis Correlation van based and has introduced a revised correlation hereinafter referred to as the WAPD Correlation.
For the Saxton reactor, the UAFD Correlation is even more conserva-tive for reactor design and analysis than is the !bdified Bettis Correlation.
Under the nov UAPD Correlation, the burn-out safety f actor for power operation with red control is 2.2 under steady-state conditions at 20 ! alt, compared with a factor of 2.k using the Modified Bettis Correlation. Becalculation of the mininum transient burn-out safety factor under the same operating conditioto indicates that the minimum factor of 1.85 contained in the presently existing technical specifications is still valid.
The WAPD Correlation has been used for all analyses reported
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in the Phase I Sr.feCuards Report.
It has niso been used to re-analyze certain of the possibic accidents associated with normal pover operation of the Saxton reactor which were described and analyzed in the Final Safeguards Report. Account was also taken of the et that shorter scram timen have ectraly been realized in the
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.A u lt, d Safeguards Report All reculta cont..ue to support the conclucion that-tha Sc-ton renetor can be operated reliably and safely.
In addition to re-analysis of accidents previously analyzed in the Saxton Finni Safeguards Report, takin6 into account the new burn-out correlation and shorter scram times, accident analyses have been made for chemical chim operation vith and withou; spiked fuel assemblies. Accidents considered included the boron removal
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accident Wich has previously been described and which, under the limitations imposed by Saxton and reflected in the technical specifications, vould not result in core damage. The /2C Staff concluded that Saxton has considered the consequences of all probable casualties and has ad'iquately demonstrated that the conduct of the Phase I program vii.t not present an undue rich to the health and safety of the public.
St.milar conclusions were expressed by vitnesses on behalf of Saxton.
Saxton's existing provisional operating license expires on December 31, 1962, thirteen and one-half months from the date of issuance of the license. Saxton has requested an extension of the license until September 30, 1963, in order to provide additional time to carry out the Phase I work. The /20 Staff concurs in this request. Part 50 57 of the Commission's regulations pemits the issuance of provisional operating licenses for an initial period up to eighteen months and pemits the extension of the expiration date
'uch licence upon good cause o? wm
" nod cause has been shovn t'n
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don requested by SaHn Saxton'a Anical qualificatione to opero be rm: tor v-re described in its Final Safeguards Report and established in the pro-ecedings last September on the application for a provisional operating license. All of the Saxton personnel described at that time continue to be employed on the project, and the plant organization remains unchanged.
Since September a total of ten Saxton employees have i
.. - applied for and all have received /SC operator licensee.
Conduct of the Phase I program vill be under continual review by both Gaxton and \\1estinghouse.
Westinghouce engineers vill be available an needed on technieni problems, including a graduate engineer acsigned full time to the site for coordinating the Pescarch and Development Procram.
Final authority and responsibility for cafe operation of the reactc,r remaino, however, with Daxton.
It can, therefore, be concluded that Saxton is technically qualified to conduct Phase I of the Pecearch and Development Program.
Saxton's financini qualifications vere also established in the proceedings on the application for a provisional operating license. Saxton's financial requiremente, its contractual arrange-monts with the four0F0 operating utilities, and the ability of these compenies to meet their ccc:nitments to the project vere all con-sidered at that tine.
Saxton presented in this proceeding addi-tional financial data projecting. its financial requiremento through 1 cf 1963 and bringing upito e te M mcial reports of the
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J dditional data aM conc
, na does mis decir> ion, that, aten cont.inues at financially qualified to operate the reactor and to engage in the Phase I program.
Caxton also furnished, by /cendment No.11 to its licence application, a letter frce NELIA evidencing the latter's villingness to increase the amount of 6axton's public liability insurance to
$h.3 million vhen needed. The amount of Ch.3 million is the amount
l 11 of financial protection required by Part 140 of the Commission's regulations for operation of the reactor at a maximum power level of 23 5 megavatts during the course of the Phase I pro 6 ram. Saxton has requested a provision in its license establishing the amount of insurance required at cuecessive levels of pover operation and authorising operation within these successive levels only after filing proof vith the Commission that the necessary amounts of insurance protection are in effect. The purpose of the provision is to avoid higher insurance premiums for the full amount of insursnee which vill ultimately be required until Saxton reaches the point in its program where operation at higher pover levels is planned. The AEC Staff had no objection to the provision and it has been included as requested in the license amendment.
The expert vitnesses for both Saxton and the AEC a6ree that the activities to be authorized by the amendment to the provisional operating license can be conducted without endangering the health m'
- hy of the public and that the consud of these activities
= H al to the Ah me ecurity or to the s
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health and rafety of 'ne publ.ic.
The Ccruiscion's Advi ne s CL "ittee on Reactor Safeguards reviewed Phase I of the Research and Develop:ent Program and the proposed revision of the DNB ratio correlation in 11ay 1962.
Its report to the Commission dated May 12, 1962 concluded:
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"The proposal to reduce the minimum a toady state burn-out safety factor from 2.k to 2.2, in connection with a chance in correlation resulting from a re-evaluation of available turnout data, does not materially affect the safety of the reactor.
"It should te e:rphasized that this reactor is primarily intended for experimental studies and that the production of pover is only incidental. Experiments are to be con-ducted in a step-vise fashion permitting examination of the results of each step before proceeding to the next.
The limits cet on unexplained reactivity loss when operating with boron, results of re-analysis of accidents covered in the final cafeguarde report, and the limited number of test fuel assemblies, give additional assurnnee that the Phase I pro 6 ram can be conducted in the Saxton reactor without un-due risk to the health and enfety of the public."
At the conclusion of its testimony, Saxton presented proposed amendments to its existing provisional operating license and technical specifications which had previously been vorhed out in consultation with the AEC Staff. The amendmento provide for authorization of the Phase I program and establichment of appropriate technical specifica-tions vith respect thereto; for extension of the term of the license to September 30, 1953; and for the previoucly described change in the bur"
+ correlation appl.icable to nomal povo operation. The mts (vith one
,m ' to by Saxton and the N-a:
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AFC Staff c.t %e heari. 3 and incor;orned in the proposed..1en amendment prior to its submission as an exhibit) meet with the approval of the AEC Staff. The proposed amendments wre received in evidence as Applicant's Exhibits 106 and 106(A).
In conclusion, for the reasons set out above, it is found that!
1.
There is reasonable assurance that the actiAties to be autherized by the amendment to the provisional operating license can be conducted without enderq;ering the health and safety of the public and that such activitics vill be conducted in compliance with the Atomic EnerCy Act of 195h, as cmended, and the Rules and Regulations of the Co niscion.
2.
The licensee is technically and financially qualified to engage in the activities to be authorized by the amendment to the provisionai operating license in accordance with the Eules and Regulations of the Cccuission.
3 The licensee has furnished to the Commission preof of financial protection in accordance with Title 10, Code of Federal Eegulations, Part 140 " Financial Protection Requirements and Indemnity Agreements."
"te issuance of an amendment u tbn "rovisional operating
~ reposed vill not nder the to n
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be inimical tt the comon defence and cecurity m a the health and safety of the public.
MUSIFOPS, IT IS ORDEFID, subject to review by the Cx=1ssion either upon its own motion or upon the granting of a petition for review, if any, that the Director, Division of Licensin6 and Peculation of the Atomic Energy Commisnion chall issue to Saxton Nuclear Experimental
- l. Corporation (1) ar. amendment to Provisional Operating License DPR-b in the form of the amendment submitted in the proceeding as Applicant's Exhibit 106 and (2) an amendment to the technical specifications con-stituting Appendix "A" of Provisional Operating License DPR b in the form of the amendment cubmitted in this proceeding as Applicant's Exhibit-106( A).
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that, in accordance with the provisions of Section 2 760 and 2.762 of the Con: mission's Rules of Practice, a petition to review this decision may be filed within twenty (20) days after the date of issuance hereof, or on or before' September 20, 1962; if no such petition is granted by the Ccmission, or if the
. Commission does not direct the record to be certified to it for
. final decision not later than ten (10) days after the expiration of said twenty-day period, or on or before October 1,1962, this decision shall, in -accordance with the Commission's Rules of Practice, become final on October 2, 1962.
E. RiCCs McConnell Presiding Officer Issued:
August 31, 1962 Oermantovn, 11ryland
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