ML20079J204

Answer in Opposition to Louisa County,Va 821210 Motion for Stay of Proceeding Until Completion of Waste Confidence Rulemaking.Delay Would Be Inconsistent W/Nrc Regulations & Would Prejudice Util.Certificate of Svc Encl

ML20079J204
Person / Time
Site:	North Anna
Issue date:	12/22/1982
From:	Maupin M VIRGINIA POWER (VIRGINIA ELECTRIC & POWER CO.)
To:	NRC COMMISSION (OCM)
References
ISSUANCES-OLA-1, NUDOCS 8212280135
Download: ML20079J204 (10)

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• D7c';mber 22, 1982 Di?NC

. pqi 27 m1:01 UNITEDSTATESOFAbRICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION. -

l-In the Matter of )

) Docket Nos. 50-338/339-OLA-1 VIRGINIA ELECTRIC )

AND POWER COMPANY )

(North Anna Power Station, Units 1 and 2)

APPLICANT'S ANSWER TO MOTION OF INTERVENOR LOUISA COUNTY TO STAY PROCEEDINGS On December 10, 1982, Louisa County (the County) served on a

the Applicant, Virginia Electric and Power Company (Vepco),

motion to stay this proceeding until the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (Commission) has completed its Waste Confidence Rulemaking (the Motion). Vepco urges the Board to deny the Motion for the following reasons:

I.

ARGUMENT

1. The Board has an obligation to proceed expeditiously, at least to the extent it can do so without unfairness to any party. The Commission's Statement of General Policy and Procedure on the Conduct of Proceedings, 10 C.F.R. Part 2, App. A (1982), states:

The Statement reflects the Commission's intent that such proceedings be conducted expeditiously and its concern that its procedures maintain sufficient flexibility to This position is accommodate that objective.

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founded upon the recognition that fairness to all the parties in such cases and the obligation of administrative agencies to conduct their functions with efficiency and economy, require that Commission adjudications be conducted without unnecessary delays. These factors take on added importance in nuclear power reactor licensing proceedings where the growing national need for electric power and the companion need for protecting the quality of the environment call for decision making which is both sound and timely. The Commission expects that its responsibilities under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 and other applicable statutes, as set out in the statement which follows, will be carried out in a manner consistent with this position in the overall public interest.

This policy in favor of expeditious proceedings is reflected in the procedural rules that apply in this case. Section 2.718 r states that A presiding officer has the duty to conduct a fair and impartial hearing according to law, to take appropriate action to avoid delay, and to maintain order. (Emphasis added.)

Section 2.721(d) , of course, provides that an Atomic Safety and Licensing Board "shall have the duties. . .of a presiding officer  ;

i as granted by Sec. 2.718." This preference for expedition is also reflected elsewhere in the Commission's procedural rules.  ;

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See 10 C.F.R. S 2.751a(b) (1982).

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! 2. The County argues that this Board has " discretion" l

to stay this proceeding notwithstanding the Commission's  !

i Statement of Policy, dated November 8, 1982, entitled Licensing And Regulatory Policy and Procedures for Environmental Protection; Uranium Fuel Cycle Impacts, 47 Fed. Reg. 50591 l (Statement of Policy). The County bases its position on the 1

Commission's statement that, despite the Waste Confidence Rulemaking, power reactor licensing "may" continue. Vepco believes that, reviewed in context, this use of the word "may" is nothing,more than a reflection of the Commission's conclusion that the Commission is free to cause reactor licensina to continue. The clear thrust of the Statement of Policy, however, is that the Commission has exercised that freedom by requiring that individual Atomic Safety and Licensing Boards proceed with licensing cases pending the outcome of the Waste Confidence Rulemaking. We say this because the ultimate point of the Statement of Policy, which deals primarily with the Uranium Fuel Cycle Proceeding, is as follows:

Accordingly, the Commission directs its Licensing and Appeal Boards to proceed in continued reliance on the Final S-3 rule until further order from the Commission, provided that any license authorizations or other decisions issued in reliance on the rule are conditioned on the final outcome of the judicial proceedings. (Emphasis added.)

47 Fed. Reg. at 50593.

This clear command would not, in our view, permit a licensing board to stay ongoing proceedings merely to await a final decision in the Uranium Fuel Cycle Proceeding. In light of the linkage in the Statement of Policy between that Proceeding and the Waste Confidence Rulemaking, we believe that licensing boards similarly lack discretion to stay proceedings such as the

! one before this Board merely to await completion of the Waste Confidence Rulemaking.

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This view is supported by the Commission's earlier Notice, not cited by the County, establishing the Waste Confidence Rulemaking. In that Notice, the Commission said During this proceeding the safety I- implications and environmental impacts of radioactive waste storage on-site for the duration of a license will-continue to be subjects for adjudication in individual facility licensing proceedings. (Emphasis added.)

44 Fed. Reg. 61372, 61373 (October 25, 1979).

This constitutes a clear direction to licensing boards to

" continue" to deal with applications such as the one that is the 0: Sject of this proceeding until the Waste Confidence Rulemaking is concluded. It represents another example of what the Appeal Board hac called the Commission's " established policy against withholding individual licenses pending completion of [ generic rulemaking]." See Public Service Co. of Oklahoma (Black Fox Station, Units 1 and 2), 10 N.R.C. 775, 800 (1979).

3. Even if the Board has discretion to stay this proceeding as requested by the County, it should not do so. As shown in the attached Affidavit of Marvin L. Smith, a decision by the Board is required before April 1984 if Vepco is to carry out its program as planned for staring Surry fuel at North Anna.

Affidavit at 4. And it is essential that the Board reach a I

decision in this proceeding, if it reasonably can, before August 1984. Id. Failure to do so, assuming that Vepco can make the showing required to support issuance of the requested amendment, l would create a serious risk that Vepco would lose full core discharge capability at its Surry Power Station in November 1984. l l

This could result in the loss of one or both of these units and l l \

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replacement energy costs as high as $350 million per. year in 1982 t:

dollars'. In addition, a decision prior to February 1, 1984 in the accompanying proceeding on Vepco's request to install neutron- ,

absorbing racks at North Anna Units 1 and 2, while not essential, wouldbertainlybedesirable. Affidavit at 5.

- These target dates, of course, are a year to nineteen months away. Yet, many tasks remain to be performed, including i

identifying the contentions in this proceeding; carrying out  !

discovery with respect to those contentions; publishing and reviewing the required NRC Staff Reports; refining the  ;

contentions and carrying out further discovery, if necessary, in l light of the Staff Reports; preparing testimony; holding the f hearing; submitting proposed findings of fact and conclusions of j law; and preparing an initial decision. As shown in Mr. Smith's Affidavit, proceedings such as this one customarily take from one j i

to two years. A decision by the Board to stay this proceeding l for any significant period of time might well make it impossible ,

to complete it in early 1984. Such a decision would quite  ;

clearly be at odds with Commission policy.

4. The County contends that it would be " wasteful and  !

premature" to continue with these proceedings pending the  !

t completion of the Waste Confidence Rulemaking. That is not i likely to be the case. If the Commission concludes that off-site [

l disposal facilities will be available when the North Anna i licenses expire, then the effort expended by the Board and the ,

i parties between now and completion of the Waste Confidence l l

Rulemaking will not have been wasted. If the Commission i

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I concludes that-it does not have such confidence but that spent J

! fuel may be stored safely on-site after the North Anna licenses l-expire, then the environmental and safety analyses in this proceeding might have to be extended to cover a period beyond the

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operating life of North Anna. _But the safety and environmental effects that the proposal might have during the life of North Anna would still be subjects of this proceeding, and the work that the Board and parties may have done on those issues will not have been wasted or premature.

If the Commission finds that no off-site disposal facility _

will be available and that on-site storage beyond the. operating life of the Station will not be safe, then the work already done

in this proceeding could conceivably prove to have been " wasted and premature." But, in the first place, that outcome is extremely unlikely. It is unlikely in light of the Commission's conclusion in 1977 that it had confidence that off-site disposal i facilities would be available. 42 Fed. Reg. 34391, 34393 (July 5, 1977), petition for review denied sub nom. NRDC v. NRC. 582 F.2d 166 (2d Cir. 1978). It is also unlikely, as a matter of common sense, because on-site storage in pools has been approved as safe in the past and new pools could be expected to be approved in the future if storage beyond the operating lives of f I

a existing units should become necessary. In the second place, the risk that licensing efforts that precede the completion of the Waste Ccnfidence Rulemaking might turn out to be " wasted and The long-awaited adoption by the Congress on December 20, 1982 of a Nuclear Waste Policy Act tends to support this conclusion.

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< premature" was surely a consideration the Commission assessed before it issued the Notice of the Proposed Waste Confidence Rulemaking in October 1979 and directed that individual proceedings " continue."

5.'~ In connection with the County's argument that proceeding now would be " wasteful and premature," it also bears emphasis that, with one exception, every aspect of the subject matter of this proceeding that is mentioned in the County's Petition for Leave to Intervene raises questions about the safety or environmental effects of Vepco's proposal during the operating r life of the North Anna Station. These questions can be explored usefully now even if the scope of the environmental inquiry is later expanded as a result of the Waste Confidence Rulemaking.

For example, the County's Petition promises several contentions about Vepco's analysis of alternatives. The County will no doubt want to pursue a good deal of discovery on these contentions.

That discovery can be effectively pursued now without awaiting the outcome of the Waste Confidence Rulemaking or the publication of the Staff Reports. t

6. To summarize, the delay sought by the County would be inconsistent with NRC regulations and policy, would prejudice 4

i Vepco and would deny to the parties the opportunity to get a good ,

deal of the procedural chores in this case out of the way in the weeks to come. The County makes this unusual request without stating any persuasive reasons why it should be granted.

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II.

Conclusion For the foregoing reasons, Vepco requests that the Motion be denied..

t Respectfully sumitted, VIRGINIA ELECTRIC AND POWER COMPANY By /s/ Michael W. Maupin Michael W. Maupin, Counsel of Counsel Michael W. Maupin James N. Christman Patricia M. Schwarzschild Marcia R. Gelman .

HUNTON & WILLIAMS i P. O. Box 1535 Richmond, Virginia 23212 Dated: December 22, 1982 i

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CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that I have this day served Applicant's Answer to Motion of Intervenor'Louisa County to Stay Proceedings upon each of the persons named below by depositing a copy in the United States mail, properly stamped and addressed to him at the addressf_ set out with his name:

Secretary U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555 Attention: Chief, Docketing and Service Section Sheldon J. Wolfe, Chairman Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Comnission Washington, D.C. 20555 Dr. Jerry Kline Atomic Safety and Licensing Board U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555 Dr. George A. Ferguson School of Engineering Howard University 2300 5th Street Washington, D.C. 20059 Daniel T. Swanson, Esq.

U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555 J. Marshall Coleman, Esq.

Beveridge & Diamond, P.C.

1333 New Hampshire Avenue, NW Washington, D.C. 20036 ,

1 James B. Dougherty, Esq.  !

3045 Porter Street, NW Washington, D.C. 20008 Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555 j

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Atomic Safety and Licensing Appeal Panel l U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C. 20555 By: /s/ Michael W. Maupin Michael W. Maupin, Counsel for Virginia Electric and Power Company DJted: December 22, 1982 i

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA [

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION In the Matter of )

) Docket Nos. 50-338/339-OLA-1 VIRGINIA ELECTRIC )  ;

AND POWER COMPANY ) i (North Anna Power Station, Units 1 and 2) t Affidavit of Marvin L. Smith i On December 21, 1982, there appeared before me Marvin L.

Smith, who, first being sworn by me, stated and affled as I.

i follows:  !

I am Marvin L. Smith. I live at 5707 Hillview Drive,

1. 1 Mechanicsville, Virginia. I am employed by Virginia Electric and j

Power Company as Supervisor, Nuclear Engineering. I am f f i j

responsible for coordinating the activities that the Company is t carrying out to provide interim storage for spent nuclear fuel from the reactors at the Company's Surry and North Anna Power i Stations. I am familiar with the Company's nuclear fuel management plans, including its estimates of future spent fuel l

inventories, and with its plans for shipping spent fuel from I Surry for storage at North Anna.

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2. Based on current fuel management plans, unless Vepco l

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can secure additional storage space for spent fuel from its surry f;

Power Station, Surry will lose full core discharge capability )

i during the refueling outage of Surry Unit 2 that is scheduled to begin in November 1984. If the Surry Units continue to operate I

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as planned, Vepco will lose in 1987 the ability to store even the i

one-third of the fuel cores that would have to be replaced if Surry Units 1 and 2 are to continue to operate.

! 3. NRC does not require Vepco to maintain full core discharg[~ capability. It is prudent to do so, however, because if a unit cannot be operated without maintenance or repairs that 1 require removal of all the fuel from the reactor, and if there is  ;

no place to store the fuel temporarily, the unit must be shut it down. Vepco estimates that with both Surry Units off-line, would incur additional energy costs of $350 million per year in 1982 dollars. Vepco has had to make unscheduled full core discharges on three occasions in the past.

4. Vepco has concluded that the most desirable option available to it for preventing the loss of full core discharge capability at the Surry Power Station in the fall of 1984 and the subsequent loss of r? fueling capability is to ship spent fuel presently at Surry to North Anna for storage there. Accordingly, Vepco has filed a license amendment application with NRC that .

would authorize it to store up to 500 Surry spent fuel assemblies in the North Anna Units 1 and 2 spent fuel pool. l

5. Storage of Surry spent fuel assemblies at North Anna

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would, of course, hasten the day when the North Anna pool would be filled. Thus, Vepco has also applied to NRC for a license amendment authorizing the installation of neutron-absorbing racks t If both of these applications are l at North Anna Units 1 and 2.

approved, the dates for loss of full core discharge capability would be extended to 1990 or beyond for the Surry and North Anna

Power Stations. Between now and 1990, Vepco will have an opportunity to evaluate options for providing additional storage beyond such dates and to implement one or more options.

6. . In order to preserve full core discharge capability at Surry, Vepco must move at least 7 and possibly as many as 15 spent fuel assemblies prior to the beginning of the refueling of Surry Unit 2 projected for November 1984.

7. Several constraints affect the timing of shipments from Surry to North Anna:

l (a) Vepco plans to avoid shipping spent fuel from Surry to North Anna while any nuclear unit at either Station is in a refueling outage. There is only one crane in each fuel pool, and so shipment or receipt of spent fuel during a refueling outage could disrupt and prolong the movement of fuel back and forth between the reactor being refueled and its spent fuel pool. In addition, a refueling outage, which occurs roughly every 18 months at each unit, is a time when certain types of maintenance must be performed. Every effort is made to perform all maintenance during a refueling outage that would otherwise require a special shutdown of the unit. Thus refueling outages are times of intensive maintenance and repair work, and any work that does not have to be done during an outage is not done. Shipment and receipt of spent fuel does not have to be done during a refueling outage.

(b) Refuelings during 1984 are presently scheduled as i follows:

North Anna Unit 1: January 6 - February 17, 1984 )

Surry Unit 1: June 10 - July 22, 1984

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_4 North Anna Unit 2: October 19 - November 30, 1984 Surry Unit 2: November 15 - December 30, 1984 (c) Vepco wishes to avoid shipping spent fuel during December through March due to the high probability that sevebeweatherwilldisrupttheshippingcampaign.

8. Based on the foregoing constraints Vepco has two The first

" windows" during which it can ship spent fuel in 1984.

is in April and May and the second in August and September 1984.

Vepco plans to ship 36 spent fuel assemblies from Surry to North Anna during a four-week period within each of those " windows."

9. North Anna Unit 1 has been off-line for repairs since May 1982. During efforts to restart the Unit in December 1982, the generator was damaged, and it is now estimated that the Unit will remain off-line until April 1983. The Company is reviewing the refueling outage schedule set out in paragraph 7 (b) in light of the longer-than-expected outage of North Anna Unit 1, and I will be changed as expect that the dates shown in paragraph 7(b) a result. But I do not believe that these changes will make a material difference in the time when the Company will need to begin storing Surry fuel at North Anna.

10. Thus, in order to carry out its program for storing Surry fuel at North Anna, Vepco must receive a license amendment approving its proposal prior to April 1984. In any event, it is essential that Vepco ship from 7 to 15 assemblies no lacer than during the August and September 1984 " window," if it is to maintain full core discharge capability at Surry, and so it must have a favorable decision, if one is appropriate, by the end of i July 1984, i

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! 11. The installation of neutron-absorbing racks in the

. North An_na Units 1 and 2 pool should not be done when a refueling outage is going on at North Anna. In addition, it should not be done when spent fuel from Surry is being received at North Anna.

Vepcoeskimatesthatinstallingtheserackswilltakefromoneto two months.

12. It is economically desirable to install the neutron-absorbing racks prior to the storage of any Surry spent fuel at North Anna and before the 1984 North Anna Unit 2 refueling outage is carried out. This would avoid the double handling of about 100 assemblies. Thus, the best time to install the new racks would be during February and March 1984.

Obviously, meeting this schedule is not essential to the Company in the same way that it is essential to receive approval before August 1984 of the proposal to store Surry fuel at North Anna.

But it is certainly desirable.

13. Vepco has reviewed the status of applications filed by utilities with NRC for license amendments authorizing the installation of high density or neutron-absorbing racks, As of ,

March 1982, 58 such applications had been filed by 41 different The utilities. Hearings were held on nine of those proceedings.

time from filing to issuance of a license amendment in contested proceedings ranged from one to two years, though one proceeding lasted 38 months. In addition, there has been one contested proceeding involving an application for permission to store spent The time between filing of the fuel from one station at another.

application in that proceeding and issuance of the initial decision,was 26 months.

[ L$w 4 Marvin L.' Smith Commonwealth of Virginia )

) To wit:

City of Richmond )

Subscribed and sworn to before me in my jurisdiction aforesaid this 21st day of December 1982.

My commission expires: % y /3, /9#I c %deNotary & > >. Public l

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