ML20127L673
| ML20127L673 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 01/21/1993 |
| From: | NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| REF-10CFR9.7 NUDOCS 9301270255 | |
| Download: ML20127L673 (89) | |
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMIS SION l
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Title:
sRztr1NG av NUxARC ON zNDuSTRy Rsv1sw OF NRC REGULATIONS AND REGULATORr PROCESS 1
1 Location:
ROCxv1LLs, MARYLAND hat 6; JANUARr 21, 1993 PagES:
85 PAGES l
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I-COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRISERS 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, Northwest I'<
Washington, D.C.-
20005 (202) 234-4433 j
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DISCLAIMER io 1 0 This is an unofficial transcript of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission held on January 21, 1993 in the Commission's office at one White Flint North, Rockville, Maryland.
The meeting was
{
open to public attendance and observation.
This transcript f
has not been reviewed, corrected or edited, and it may contain inaccuracies.
I
)
The transcript is intended solely for general informational purposes.
As provided by 10 CFR 9.103, it is i
i not part of the formal or informal record of decision of l
the matters discussed.
Expressions of-opinion in this transcript do not necessarily reflect final determination 1
j or beliefs.
No pleading or other paper may be filed with i
i the Commission in any proceeding as the result of, or addressed to, any statement or argument contained herein, j
except-as the Commission'may authorize.
i
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- 4 i
NEAL R. GROSS 4
i COURT RE*oRHR$ AND TRANSCR10ft$
A~
1323 RMo06 ISLAND AVfHUf M.W.
f (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C.
20005 (202) 232 4600 1
1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BRIEFING BY NUMARC ON INDUSTRY REVIEW OF NRC REGULATIONS AND REGULATORY PROCESS i
PUBLIC MEETING 3
Nuclear Regulatory Commission One White Flint North Rockville, Maryland Thursday, January 21, 1993 The Commission met in open
- session, pursuant to
- notice, at 2:00 p.m.,
Ivan
- Selin, Chairman, presiding.
1 COMMISSIONERS PRESENT:
IVAN SELIN, Chairman of the Commission KENNETH C. ROGERS, Commissioner.
FORREST J. REMICK, Commissioner JAMES R. CURTISS, Commissioner E. GAIL de PLANQUE, Commissioner NEAL R. GROSS COURf REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N.W.
(202) 234-4430 WASHINGTON. D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433.
2 STAFF AND PRESENTERS SEATED AT THE COMMISSION TABLE:
S AMUEL J. CHILK, Secretary WILLIAM C.
PARLER, General Counsel EUGENE McGRATH, Chairman and CEO, Coned Co. of NY, Chairman of the Board, NUMARC E.
LINN DRAPER, JR.,
President and COO, AEP Service Corp., Vice Chairman of the Board, NUMARC JOE COLVIN, President and CEO, NUMARC OLIVER KINGSLEY, JR.,
President, Generating Group, TVA, Member of the Board, NUMARC WILLIAM CAVANAUGH, III, President and COO, CP&L Co.,
Member of the Board, NUMARC RONALD WATKINS, President and CEO, Nebraska Public Power District, Member of the Board, NUMARC NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS
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P-R-0-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2
2:00 p.m.
3 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Ladies and gentlemen, 4
we're very pleased to welcome members of the NUMARC 5
Board of Directors and its President and CEO, one 6
pers,on, to this afternoon's Commission meeting.
7 NUMARC representatives will brief the 8
Commission on an industry-wide initiative to reduce 9
nuclear generating costs while still ensuring high 10 levels of safety.
11 First of all, I d like to thank NUMARC for 12 its response to the Commission challenge to provide 13 specific examples of changes to NRC regulations and 14 regulatory practices that the industry believes are 15 appropriate.
NUMARC has provided these specific 16 examples based on the industry's knowledge and 17 experience in the operation and management of 18 commercial nuclear power plants and the maturity of 19 the nuclear technology.
We appreciate these efforts.
20 I think you've fully lived up to the admonition to be 21 analytical and to keep the anecdotal material to as 22 low a level as possible and really have provided very 23 solid support for most of the recon.nendations.
We 24 support what you've done to date and we hope you will o
25 continue to provide your views to the Commission.
In NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIDERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
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other words, that this not-be just a one shot 2
operation, but a fruitful way to continue to operate.
3 In this
- area, your work focused on 4
identifying places where the industry believes less 5
regulation would be desireable.
We'd also be 6
interested in the possibility that from here on in you 7
broaden a little bit to get industry views on areas 8
where NRC regulations need to be more profound in the 9
sense of providing clearly stated objectives which 10 will permit the development of criteria and 11 alternative implementation strategies.
12 In addition, we'd like to encourage you to 13 present views where existing regulations or regulatory 14 guidance might be amenable to risk base and our 15 performance based approaches.
In other words, not 16 just looking for specific places where things might be 17 relaxed, but even taking a broader looking saying i
18 where one set of approaches might be substituted for 19 another set of approaches. We hope you don't consider 20 this to be your task-to be done at this point.
It 21 looks to me, and I think to my colleagues, as a 22 fruitful start that we'd like to see continued.
23 At this same time, the Commission would 24 also welcome the views of interveners and of public 25 interest groups on these important regulatory issues.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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Our interests are not one sided.
We're interested in 2
both ef fective and efficient regulation and would like 3
to open an invitation to all parties that have 4
recommendations in either direction to feel free to 5
make such recommendations.
As you know, we believe 6
the public has a strong role to play in implementing 7
clear and better balanced regulations.
8 During today's
- briefing, NUMARC will 9
provide the Commission a summary of the initial 10 results of their review of existing regulations and 11 practices as well as your conclusions and 12 recommendations.
13 I understand that copies of the briefing 14 mLterial are available at the entrance to the room.
15 Commissioners, any opening remarks?
16 Mr. McGrath, would you be chairman for the 17 NUMARC group today?
18 MR McGRATH:
Okay.
Good afternoon, 19 Chairman Selin and Commissioners.
I'm Gene McGrath, 20 I'm Chairman of Consolidated Edison of New York and 21 Chairman of the Board of Directors of NUMARC, the 22 Nuclear Management Resources Council.
23 I'd lixe to thank you for inviting us here 24 today and I'll introduce my NUMARC colleagues who will 25 participate in this session.
We've kept the numbers NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISt.AND AVENUE. N W.
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down by our longstanding policy of not having anymore 2
briefers than we can fit in one car.
And as Chairman, 6
3 I get to drive the car.
4 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Based on the cars I've 5
seen this week here, you could have had about 15 or 6
20.
7 MR. McGRATH:
With me at the table today 8
are Joe Colvin, who is President and CEO of NUMARC, 9
and four members of the NUMARC Executive Committee 10 Board of Directors.
Linn Draper, our Vice Chairman, 11 is President and Chief Operating Officer of American 12 Electric Power Service Corporation. Bill Cavanaugh is 13 President and Chief Operating Officer of Carolina 14 Power and Light.
Oliver Kingsley is President of the 15 Generating Group of Tennessee Valley Authority and Ron 16 Watkins is President and CEO of Nebraska ?ublic Power 17 District.
18 Linn, Joe and I will make brief remarks 19 and all of us will participate in the general 20 discussion session.
21 As you know, all of the energy companies 22 represented at this table own and operate nuclear 23 power plants.
Nuclear energy is an important part of 24 the fuel mix in our service areas and it's an 25 important contributor to the fuel mix and energy NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N W (2T) 234 4433 WASHINGTON. D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
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security of our country.
2 We're here today because we're very 3
concerned about the continued viability of nuclear 4
energy in the face of escalating costs.
We must take 9
5 action to regain control of those costs and we must i
quickly if weire going to preserve the nuclear 6
act 7
option.
8 Many factors contribute to the rising 9
operating and maintenance costs at our nuclear plants.
10 In our individual companies in our industry, we're 11 working hard to identify and address them.
- However, 12 industry analysis and experience shows that two key 13 contributors are conditions that relate to the 14 regulatory environment.
15 First, we're affected by the regulations 16 and regulatory processes themselves, this year 17 quantity and variety and the manner in which the 18 regulatory staff interpret them.
19 Second, the industry is affected by the 20 manner in which we ourselves respond to those 21 regulatory processes and implement them in our own 22 operations.
These conditions didn't come about 23 overnight. They're a function of the evolution of the 24 modern regulatory era that began more than a dozen 25 years ago following Three Mile Island.
Regulations NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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proliferated and power plant staffs swelled 2
dramatically, all in the interest of increased safety.
3 Indeed, an already safe energy option has been made 4
even more safe as a result.
5 As part of the continuing evolution, it's 6
time now to step back and take a fresh look at where 7
we've come and-what we.'ve done.
We've got several 8
hundred reactor years of experience in plant 9
operations and both the ' industry ' and the regulatory 10 community have reached respectable levels of maturity.
11 Just like we do periodically in our businesses and 12 professions, we've got to factor that experience and 13 maturity back into the process.
We've got to examine 14 the structures and procedures we've created and 15 evaluate whether'they're still doing what they were 16 intended to do or whether they're still in place only I
17 out of inertia.
18 From a
perspective informed by our 19 collective knowledge, we've got to assess whether_ the 20 costs of these incidents actually. achieve 'the 21 commensurate safety' benefit, or that safety. might 22 actually be compromised by some of.the well 23
' intentioned improvements wa're putting in. place.
24 As you know, the nuclear utility industry.
has undertaken just such an evolutionary examination 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
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in the form of a comprehensive effort to regain 2
control of rising costs.
The issues we'll describe 3
today demonstrate our commitment to maintain today's 4
high level of safety while reducing costs.
5 Before I outline those efforts, I'd like 6
to describe the time frame we're working with.
It's 7
a very short time frame.
The situation which we find 8
ourselves has evolved over time as I've described.
9 Unfortunately, while the process has been 10 evolutionary, our response to it cannot be.
We simply 11 don't have the luxury of time.
12 As we meet here today, energy companies 13 are facing planning decisions related to future 14 generation.
As you know, new capacity projects have 15 very long lead times.
While not for a moment 16 sacrificing safety or reasonable process, we must move 17 quickly on cost control opportunities that will ensure 18 the nuclear remains a part of the planning horizon.
19 As an industry, we're taking aggressive 20 action in three board areas.
First we're addressing 21 the first contributor I mentioned earlier, the impact 22 of NRC regulations and regulatory processes and the 23 manner in which they were interpreted by the NRC 24 staff.
25 When you addressed the NUMARC Board last NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE. N.W.
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June, Mr. Chairman, you asked the industry to identify i
2 NRC regulations and implementing practices that have i
3 unnecessarily increased costs without a commensurate 4
safety benefit and you asked us to identify specific 5
opportunities for changes and improvements.
Last 6
month you received the industry's initial response to 4
i 7
your very welcome request in the form of a letter that 8
identified many such opportunities.
The letter was 9
accompanied by detailed recommendations cnd supporting j
10
- analyses, shortly, Joe Colvin~will discuss some of j
~
11 the specifics.
12 We believe that many changes can be 13 implemented expeditiously without the need for further 14 analysis or study.
One of our goals is tc make the 15 most efficient use of both NRC and industry resources, 16 thereby immediately reducing unnecessary costs while 17 maintaining or even enhancing the safety of our 18 plants.
19 Joe Colvin will also give some thoughts on 20 fundamental changes to the regulatory framework.
21 I
want to emphasize that with this i
22 initiative we're not trying to run away from our own 23 responsibility for driving up plant costs.
While our 24 analyses show that changes in the regulatory arena are 25 warranted and desireable, responsibility for those i
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N.W.
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1 changes also resides with the industry itself.
2 Regulations and the way that NRC staf f apply them do, 3
in fact, have a significant impact on our resources, 4
but so too does the way we respond and implement them.
5 Accordingly, the second major area the industry is 6
addressing focuses on the way we as licensees interact 7
with the regulatory process.
8 Linn Draper will describe our efforts to 9
improve the manner in which utilities, individually 10 and collectively react and respond.
11 After Linn's presentation, I will be back 12 to describe the third major thrust of our efforts, 13 which is also industry centered.
14 Now Joe Colvin will discuss some specific 15 opportunities we've identified in the area of 16 regulation and regulatory processes.
17 Joe?
18 MR. COLVIN:
Thank you, Gene.
19 Good afternoon.
20 The first area I would discuss centers 21 around instances where regulatory requirements have 22 unnecessarily added to cost without a commensurate 23 safety benefit. As you indicated, Mr. Chairman, we've 24 made available as a handout the executive summary to 25 our December 21st letter to you and in the detail NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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attachments to that letter we've provided specific 2
data, the supporting information and specific examples 3-of where we think'the regulatory process or regulatory -
4 requirements -have unnecessarily increased _ costs 5
without a commensurate safety benefit.
6 We've identified:
eight issues in_
7 particular where we believe prompt action can-and 8
should be taken to affect - changes that would have 9
near-term payback both in terms-of reducing the 10 unnecessary expenditures it cost as well as increasing 11 the ability of both.the NRC and the industry to better.
12
. focus our' respective resources-lon issues.more 13 important to safety.
14
'We've taken a
look at that data 15 conservatively.
We believe the cumulative impact of-16 positive action on the attachments 1 through-8 to our 17 letter would result in a net. savings ~of about $250' 18 million per year ~ for the -industry _ with no : negative -
19 impacts on safety.
We believe we'need prompt action 20 on these issues because many of the requirements just 21 don't make sense given the experience we've gained and 22 the maturity of the. regulatory process._-In. addition 23 in some cases -to being burdensome and _ unnecessary, 24-
.they distract both licensee-and NRC focus:from issues-25-of more importance.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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For example, there are a number of routine 2
and periodic reporting requirements imposed upon 3
licensees by the regulations and by the technical 4
specifications that are either duplicative, capable of 5
being combined with other reports or, in some cases, 6
clearly unnecessary. We believe consolidation of the 1
7 reports could save the industIT approximately a
8 quarter of a million dollars per plant on an annual 9
basis.
10 We need to act also because many of these 11 requirements provide conflicting or confus.ing 12 regulatory guidance.
The recent revisions to 10 CFR 13 Part 20 to incorporate the latest radiation protection 14 concepts were appropriate to update the regulations to 15 be consistent with today's knowledge and experience.
16 However, other NRC regulations contained radiation 17 standards and criteria and those have not yet been 18 updated. The results will be duplicative programs and 19 the potential that confusing information will be 20 disseminated to off-site agencies in the event of a 21 radiological release during an emergency.
22 The industry is ready to assist the NRC in 23 making the necessary revisions to associated 24 regulations and regulatory guidance documents in a 25 planned and coordinated manner in order to avoid such NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND **'NSCRIBERS i
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unnecessary challenges and to achieve appropriate 2
consistency of NRC requirements and the implementing 3
guidance.
Issues such as these are for the most part 4
administrative matters that can be quickly remedied to 5
eliminate a needless regulatory burden on licensees.
6 We also need expedited action because some 7
of the requirements provide no safety benefit or, in 8
fact, they'd be counterproductive to safety, as Gene 9
indicated. For example, a comprehensive review of the 10 security requirements of 10 CFR Part 73 would 11 demonstrata that the elimination of many of these 12 requirements would not have a detrimental impact on 13 the security of a nuclear power plant.
In fact, 14 elimination of some of the requirements, such as 15 locked doors in vital areas, could enhance the overall 16 safety of the plant by facilitating the response to 17 emergency conditiins by key plant personnel.
18 In some of the cases, the industry and the 19 NRC have been discussing and even debating these 20 issues for many years and have not yet brought even 21 relatively simple issues to closure, even in instances 22 where there has been clear agreement. Utility.and NRC 23 management need to explore more efficient and timely 24 resolution of the inevitable differences in 25 professional opinions to ensure that beneficial NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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chenges are not unnecessarily delayed.
2 Perhaps the best example
+o illustrate 3
this concern is the issue cf the emergency diesel 4
reliability.
In this
- case, industry average 5
reliability has been greater than.98, well above the 6
.95 target of Generic Issue B-56, which was initially 7
raised as a
concern in 1977.
This has been 8
substantiated by industry performance data since 1983.
9 In our view, no additional data or analysis is needed 10 to reach the conclusion that further requirements at 11 this area are not necessary and would be a needless 12 drain on industry and NRC resources.
13 In another case, the industry and the NRC 14 have agreed since 1984 that accelerated testing of 15 diesel is contributing to premature wear and greater 16 reliability and should be eliminated.
Elimination of 17 accelerated testing has the potential to further 18 improve diesel reliability and save the industry the 19 cost of multi-million dollar overhauls on diesels. We 20 believe that expedited steps can and should be taken 21 to provide immediate relief from accelerated testing.
22 Now, what is necessary to bring many of 23 these issues to prompt and final closure is the 24 continued leadership and involvement of the Commission 25 and senior NRC management. The nuclear power industry NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 3
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1 encourages the Agency's commitment to address these 2
issues and others like them and we ask the Commission 3
to continue to provide the leadership to initiate 4
expedited positive action on these issues in order S
that both industry and NRC can make the most effective 6
use of our resources.
7 We have witnessed the positive leadership 8
of the Commission with respect to the industry's 9
concerns regarding the SALP process.
We are 10 encouraged that the NRC is reevaluating the SALP i
11 process and we are ready to respond to the Commission 12 with additional industry input as requested.
13 In Attachment 12 to our
- letter, we 2
14 requested a thorough reevaluation of the SALP process.
t 15 As requested in your response, a group of senior 16 industry executives met with senior NRC staff last 17 Friday to discuss specific examples of the problems we 18 continue to experience with the SALP program.
In our 19 view, that meeting was a very beneficial first step.
20 We agreed with what the senior NRC staff believes SALP 21 was intended to
- achieve, that is an integrated 22 assessment of performance and feedback to the utility 23 conducted in a way so as to achieve an active dialogue 24 between the parties so that we fully understand both 4
25 the strengths in your view that the -licensees have, as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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well as the areas you believe that need improvement.
2 All of the industry participants agreed 3
that the NRC feedback, even if subjective opinion, is 4
extremely valuable.
However, none believe that this 5
was being ef fectively achieved by the SALP program as 6
it is currently being implemented.
7 Another area where we see continued 8
Commission leadership and which you commented on in 9
your opening remarks, Mr. Chairman, was the Commission 10 leadership and direction in the development of new 11 concepts for future regulatory activity.
We 12 acknowledge that an equivalent or improved level of 13 safety may be achieved by a different regulatory 14 approach.
For example, the Commission has long 15 recognized the need for a regulatory threshold and for 16 increased emphasis in performance-based regulat-i on.
17 This is embodied in your principles of good regulation 18 and, as you have discussed at length with the NRC 19 staff and the
- ACRS, the various approaches of 20 implementing the safety goal policy risk-based and 21 performance-based regulation.
22 In our letter, we identify actions that 23 can be taken, as well as industry resources that can 24 be tapped to assist in the development of a well-25 defined action plan that we believe will establish an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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explicit regulatory threshold-that can:be used during 2
the review of existing regulations and the 3
promulgation of new regulations.
4-The nuclear power -industry is ready.to 5
work with the Commission and'the NRC staff to ensure.
6 that we are effectively and efficiently utilizing both 7
of our resourcer.
We-want'to ensure that the'NRC 8
obtains the full benefit from focused and constructive 9
industry input.
10 Commissioner Curtiss has suggested-that 11 consideration be given to the establishment of a-12 mechanism similar to the approach-we've used.in; 13 developing implementation guida'nce for the maintenance 14 rule.
In that case, the industry and the staff each 15 worked independently and shared the results of each 16 other's efforts in a public setting.- A key to making 17 that work was-the management oversight of the process 18 and regular meetings between senior.NRC management and 19 industry senior executives.- In that way, the problems 20-were clearly defined and discussed at-length so that-21 solutions could be identified that would resolve the-22 underlying concerns.
We believe. that a similar 23 process could be beneficial'in this area.
24 We - have identified ' in our December 21' 25 letter to you an initial set of issues which we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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believe can and should be addressed expeditiously. We 2
will continue to review other areas and identify 3
additional opportunities for regulatory improvement.
4 Success will be achieved if the Commission, senior NRC 5
management and senior utility management remain 6
committed to providing the leadership necessary to 7
affect such a broad paradigm shift throughout the NRC 8
and the industry on the whole.
9 With that, Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, 10 I'd like to introduce Linn Draper who will discuss the 11 second area of our initiative.
12 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Before you go on, I'd 13 like to make a
couple of remarks about your 14 observations, Mr. Colvin.
15 First of
- all, on SALP, SALP clearly 16 doesn't fit the statement of, "Can we do the same job 17 a little cheaper or with less problem without any 18 impact on safety." A discussion of SALP has a lot of 19 pros and cons rather than an ability to show that some 20 new procedure will be just dominate the old procedure.
21 What we intend to do on this, the senior staff is 22 meeting next week.
SALP is going to be a topic.
23 They'll brief the Commission and we'll probably have 24 a public meeting in which either at that meeting or 25 soon thereafter NUMARC will be asked to comment when NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCA18ERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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the staf f decides what recommendations to make to the 2
Commission.
3 So, I think we ought to set that aside 4
from this prccess because there it's pros and cons.
5 Here, I think in a number of places you've just said 6
there are no cons, we should just do this without phy 7
law.
So, that's a somewhat different process.
- Also, 8
it's more controversial.
I think you're just going to 9
find there are more fundamental differences between 10 the commission and parts of the industry than on some 11 of the other topics that you've brought up.
12 The second is that -- on the maintenance 13 work, one of the reasons we worked in parallel wasn't 14 because it was an optimum procedure, it was because we 15 didn't trust you and so we didn't want to be left 16 em}
handed if what the inuustry worked on ended up 17 not sing satisfactory.
However, the project worked 18 out pretty well and I think a fair amount of mutual 19 trust was developed and we might be able to find on 20 future jobs where it's not us versus you, but what's 21 the most efficient way to get to an agreed objective 22 that we can even be a little more efficient.
23 MR. COLVIN:
Yes, sir.
24 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Obviously, many jobs 25 don't meet that description, but in this case that did NEAL R. GROSO COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIDERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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work out quite well as you had said.
2 The third thing is that the EDO has for.med 3
a regulatory reform task group under Mr. Sniczeh's 4
direction.
They have worked up a charter.
First of 5
all, they're supposed to listen to what you have to 6
say and what anybody else has to say and start off 7
with some recommendations on actions sc that we don't 8
end up just with a big study and no follow-on.
That 9
which is found worthy will be implemented and that 10 isn't will be discussed and maybe something will come 11 out of that as well.
12 The second is that they intend to take a 13 look at the regs.
themselves, the
- rules, the 14 regulations, the implementation so that we're not in 15 the position of d(r1tnding entirely on the industry we 16 regulate for suggest'ons, but are generating those 17 ourselves.
We want to be in position to respond to 18 your recommendations, but to generate some on our own 19 part.
20 Third is that they're not going to stop 21 just with a paper, but go on and take a look at the 22 resources and the results because as we of ten discuss, 22 sometimes the documents look good.
The Soviets had a 24 wonderful constitution for 40 years, but not much 25 justice.
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results as well, both in terms of have we seen j
2 improvements in safety since certain regulations went 3
in or as implemented either by the staff or by the 4
industry as the implementation consistent with what 5
must have been in mind when the regulations were drawn 6
up.
7 They will look for opportunities for 8
reducing prescription.
They will look for 9
opportunities for stating objectives and leaving more 10 flexibility on how they're carried out.
There were 11 too many times when a surrogate is put in that says, 12 "There are a number of different ways of achieving 13 this objective, liere 's one,"
and the surrogate
{
14 becomes a prescription in itself rather than just 15 saying, "This is a sufficient but not necessary way of 16 doing things."
And, of course, eventually, although 17 it might take awhile, they'll be looking for places f
18 where there are performance measures rather than 19 process measures.
But that's hard.
That will take 20 awhile.
21 Finally, and here I'm not sure whether we l
22 might not do this more in a cooperative basis, I find 23 that both your work and our work on reports is useful, 24 but it doesn't go far enough.
It basically says, "The 25 reports are given, but can we reduce the frequency?"
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Sooner or later we have to get to the data elements 2
and not just the whole report and say, "liere 's the 3
same data, liere's the same piove of information 4
that's asked for two or three times,"
Instead of 5
concentrating on reports which are m ally packages of 6
data ele -
as to get down to the basic data and 7
say, "Wh h do we use?
What do we use, but we ask for 8
it in multiple fashions and what are the basic 9
information elements that we need?" and then to go 10 back and say, "Are there affinities, clusters of 11 packages to go into this?
We haven't done this yet.
12 You haven't done that in your report."
It's a lot of 13 work, but it's pretty straightforward.
It doesn't 14 take a huge amount of imagination to see if we're 15 asking for the same bits of information in ditferent 16 uses.
17 So, the Commission staff is, in fact the 18 Agency staff has organized itself to receive your 19 report and to take more the initiative on its own, 20 So, if things aren't implemented, I think it will be 21 because there's a conscious decision that they're not 22 a good idea rather than true lack of orders at issue
~
23 to respond.
24 I'm sure there are others things one could j
25 say to your remarks, but I just wanted to say that 1
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84 i
i there has been a kind of a dialogue struck on-some of I
2 these points.
j 3
Mr. Draper, would you --
4 DOCTOR DRAPER:
- Thanks, Mr.
- Chairman, 5
Commissioners.
i
\\
6
- Joe Colvin alluded to a paradigm ' shift i
I 7
which is an essential element'of our. efforts within 4
8 the utility industry.
We as the operators of nuclear j
i 9
power plants face many of the same-challenges that _you il 10 do.
The industry L is. focusing its efforts through i
11.
NUMARC in reviewing ways to improve _ the. manner in il 12 which utilities carry out their responsibilities, from 13 implementation of regulations to individual 14 interactions between plant staff and NRC inspectors.
i 15 This is a
key 'part of our.
efforts because l
16 unfortunately a culture has developed _ within our i
17 companies in - which our personnel routinely commit l
18 resources in response to NRC staff requests, often 19 without question.
i I
20 Our preliminary re"lew-. leads-us to 21 conclude that our personnel have acquiesced to these i
F 22
_ types cf requests to. avoid - confrontation, adverse i
l
.23 publicity or poor numerical SALP ratings and that we l
24.
as managers have allowed this to happen.
The blame.-
L I
25 falls on_us, the licensees,- for-failing to apply our NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS.
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operational expertise and to consider the cumulative 2
impact of our responses, for failing to challenge 3
those requests that we have determined have no 4
commensurate safety benefit.
5 As part of our overall efforts, we are 6
committed through NUMARC to assist. utilities in 7
effectively carrying out their responsibilities as NRC 8
licensees to properly evaluate new and existing 9
regulations and interpretations to ensure that there 10 is an appropriate balance between the resources 11 required and the level of safety benefit achieved.
12 We are also committed individually to 13 bring out culture changes in our organizations.
At 14 the annual INPO CEO Conference in November, each U.S.
15 nuclear utility CEO committed to go back to his 16 organization and to create and sustain a climate in 17 which our people are permitted to respond 18 appropriately when pressured to commit resources to 19 something that isn't justified in terms of additional 20 safety commensurate with its implementation cost or 21 its impact on plant operations.
22 We agreed to continue to provide you, the 23 Commission and the NRC senior management with frank 24 feedback on the regulatory impacts at our plants.
25 Furthermore, we recognize our obligation to 3
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communicate through NUMARC the-unified industry 2
positions on such matters.
But most importantly we 3
committed to - maintain our personal interest and 4
involvement-in these efforts.
l 5
What will be the results of the commitment 6
if we are successful? First, nuclear generation costs l
7 should be able to be better managed with-reasonable 8
assurance that regulatory driven cost increased yield 2
9 commensurate safety increases.
Second, the overall 10 safety and reliability of our plants will improve as-11-the cumulative effect; of unnecessary. regulations is
+
12 better managed and - as we progress toward the_ more 13 effective regulatory environment Joe Colvin described.
14 Is this going to be' easy'for us? No, but 15 that should nc, deter us from proceeding.
We should 16 anticipate that there-.will be
= professional 17 disagreements between licensees and NRC ntaff, as well l
18 as between the.different offices of the NRC itself.
l disagreements.
and any I-19 We can minimize these 20 deleterious effect that might result if we have a 21 clear understanding of the scope.and objectives' of our 22 efforts and the understanding and support of the 23 resident inspectors, project managers, regional staf f, 24 headquarters-staff and so forth..
25 For
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alternative approach to a staff recommendation or when 2
our analysis shows that a staff recommendation does 3
not yield safety benefits commensurate with its 4
implementation cost, we must be able to discuss theso 5
matters openly and professionally.
The NRC needs to 6
recognize the necessity for changes in programs, 7
procedures or staffing levels ao our efforts improve 8
the process, efficiency and cost effectiveness.
9 Most importantly, we need the continued 10 commitment and leadership of the Commission in 11 providing a clear vision throughout the agency of the 12 regulatory environment of the future.
13 Let me turn it back to Gene for a few 14 additional comments.
15 MR. McGRATH:
Thanks, Linn.
16 In today's presentation we discussed cost 17 control opportunities that relate to the regulatory 18 environment on the regulatory side and on the utility 4
19 side.
I'd like to briefly describe the third key 20 thrust of the industry's try to control costs, an j
21 effort that goes beyond the-regulatory arena.
That's 22 our aggressive reevaluation of basic-operating 23 practices.
24 For example, over the past several years, 25 most of us have moved toward streamlining and NEAL-R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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simplifying our company's operations and l
2 organizational structures.
And, as we expected, we 3
found that most of the time simpler equals better.
l 4
The simpler organization or procedure winds up costing 5
- less, functioning more efficiently and just plain 6
working better.
In a nuclear operation, better 7
usually equals safer.
8 So, in many cases we're achieving i
9 increased safety and lower cost not through regulatory 10 flat or a prescription, but through actions that 11 reside exclusively with us as managers.
12 We're committed to intensifying our 13 efforts of integrating knowledge and experience, 14 including sharing with each other the best business 15 and operating practices and the most valuable lessons 16 learned at our plants and in our companies.
I believe 17 we've made some good progress in this area at the 18 annual IllPO CEO Conference in licvember.
There were 19 presentations by CEOs and senior executives and we 20 heard from guests like Commissioner Curtiss.
Among the utility heads there was extensive sharing, not 21 22 only about problem areas but about specific 23 improvements many have realized from practices like 24 benchmarking a particular operation against the best 25 companies in that discipline.
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The CEOs who attended agreed that if the 2
nuclear option is going to continue as a vital part of 3
our nation's energy
- future, the industry's cost 4
control initiatives must be implemented and they 5
agreed that two factors are essential to implementing 6
them throughout the industry within each utility, 7
leadership and personal commitment.
They pledged to 8
provide both.
9 During the past several months, NUMARC has 10 been encouraged by the Commission's attention to the 11 industry's concerns about cost control.
You have 12 shown a keen awareness of the scope and seriousness of 13 the problem and a growing understanding of its 14 urgency.
We're confident you will provide the 15 commitment and leadership needed to address it 16 expeditiously and effectively, including priority 17 consideration and resource allocation.
18 Although ever mindful of our separate and 19 serious responsibilities in this area, we look forward 20 to working with you in an environment of continuing 21 candor and cooperation.
Working together, we can 22 preserve the vital contribution of nuclear energy in 23 the-best interests of our customers and in the best 24 interest of our country.
25 At this point we'd be happy to. discuss NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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anything that's on --your minds, any aspect-of the 2
industry's efforts as well as examples from specific l
i 3
companies and plants.
Feel free = - to direct your l
4 questions to any one of us.
i i
5 Thank you.
j t
6 CHAIRMAN-SELIN:
We'll go down the line.
7 For 'the
- record, I
should have said i
1 8
something right at the beginning.
Two points.
The 9
first is we don't believe that the main reason costs-10 are out of control is regulatory.- It seems to me we
-11 want-to make sure-that our. contributions are well
~
12 thought out but that the main job of controlling costs 13 is the industry's responsibility. -
Nothing that we 14 said should - seem that we're willing-to take major 15 responsibilities for these changes.
16 The second is that we're all cognizant 17 that a lot of what we do is' sort of aimed at the worst l
j 18 performer of the 40 some utilities that are'in this 19 business.
To the degree that the industry as a whole 20 can reduce this or we can work out ways to sort of 21-make sure that the fellows who are running really.well.
22 don't get subject to the same kind of heavy regulation 23-that. people aren't, there could be some overall 24 savings.
But I think there's attention to excellenco 25-which has' been so' controversial l n the past.
It i
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really could reduce overall regulatory costs by 2
putting the weight only at those performers wto need 3
that kind of regulation.
4 Commissioner Rogers, would you like to 5
start?
6 COMMISSIO11ER ROGERS:
Yes.
I think this 7
is a
very important new development in the 8
relationship between the industry and the 11RC.
It's 9
being forced by the question of cost and the future of 10 the industry, on the part of the industry.
But it's 11 also timely in terms of NRC's development that we look 12 at what we do and take stock.
Even if there were no 13 question of a threat to the industry, it seems to me 14 this is a salutary activity that we should engage in 15 from our point of view just as a matter of good 16 practice.
17 So, I think that the two are coming 18 together and I think that that can bring benefits to 19 all, but I think it's very important to understand 20 that safety has to be very clearly maintained and 21 addressed at each stage of this process.
It's going 22 to be very easy to develop a considerable public 23 concern about diminution of regulatory requirements 24 leading to a less safe rather than an equivalently 25 safe or even safer operation.
I think that as you NEAL R. GROSS
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folks proceed, you really have to address that in a 2
public way.
E assert that that's our responsibility 3
and we're going to be looking at it, but I think you 4
have to address the public concerns that may be 5
directed towards your initiatives.
6 The kinds of things that you're doing, the 7
way you've emphasized different aspects of addressing 8
this overall problem I think are very interesting.
9 They're quite dif ferent though in their implications, 10 in my view.
I think that the address of specific 11 regulations and what might be improved with respect to 12 them that Mr. Colvin touched on seems to me to be, 13 while subject to some professional disagreement, a 14 little bit less controversial or less difficult to 15 deal with than the kind of paradigm shif t that Doctor 16 Draper was talking about.
I think that I'd like to 17 say some words on that because it seems to me that i
18 this is a time to identify more clearly a much more 19 profescionally nature relationship that I think has 20 evolved and has further to go between the industry and 21 the NRC, between the regulatory and the industry.
22 Some years ago it seemed to me coming into 23 the regulatory business that there was what I would 24 call an almost knee jerk reaction of the industry to 25 regulatory initiatives of alr.ost any kind.
If they NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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a 5--
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came from the regulator, they are probably going to 2
lead to trouble and they probably ought to be stopped.
3 I don't think that's the case today, although I 4
wouldn't say that there isn't some element that seems 5
to possibly creep up from time to time in the 6
relationship of that sort.
7 I think that what we have to recognize is 8
that we have to base everything that we do here in how 9
you respond to NRC initiatives in a very professional 10 way.
I think these things have to be documented in 11 terms that professionals agree upon, even if they may 12 not agree upon the final result, that they agree that 13 the way it's being approached is not, Well, we want 14 to cut costs, so therefore this looks like a good one 15 to get rid of," but that there really can be a clearly 16 demonstrated area that NRC should legitimately be able 17 to look at from a professional basis and the industry 18 professionais should be able to look at.
19 So, what I'm saying here is that I think 20 that there's some subtleties in the relationship 21 between the NRC and the industry that have to be 22 worked at very carefully because while it is, I think, 23 important for the industry to make it very clear when 24 they have a
very good professional basis for 25 questioning an NRC initiative, that that then be dealt NEAi, R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 f' ODE ISLAND AVCNUE, N W.
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with in a very professional way.
But it's important 2
to try to avoid anything that looks like a
3 standardized approach that is an initiative that 4
either NRC should oppose just because we're suspicious 5
of it or an initiative from NRC that you ought to 6
oppose because it's going to lead to more problems.
7 I think that we have to move away from that and I 8
think we've moved a great deal away from it in the 9
last decade, of that kind of an approach.
I 10 But I think what's called for here is a 11 full recognition and a constant reevaluation of a new 12 kind of professional relationship that _ safety plays a 13 very important role in, but cost is also a factor 14 between the utility industry and the NRC.
It seems to 15 me that that's where the biggest difficulties are 16 going to come in carrying it out.
I think that 17 because there are personal relationships that-are 18 involved here between the regulator and the regulated 19 industry ard that we just have to find a new paradigm 20 for that professional relationship.
It seems to me 21 that's going to be the most difficult one to deal 22 with.
23 DOCTOR DRAPER:
Could I respond to that, 24 Commissioner?
I couldn't agree with you more and I 25 hope that the words that I said didn't give the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE (SLAND AVENUE. N W.
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impression that it was our objective to. become j
2 confrontational or adversarial in any way.
I simply 3
meant that both at the dealings with the NRC people at 4
the staff level at our plants and your staff and at f
5 the CEO level, that we do need to take a careful and 6
organized look at things that are occurring because 7
particularly on our side of the fence in the 8
interactions with the NRC, there has developed at the 9
plant level over a long period of time an inclination 10 to do what is suggested simply because it is 11 suggested.
12 I think that that practice has developed 13 in large part because of the very high capital cost of 14 a nuclear plant.
In the days that the plants were 15 under construction, people had a
very clear 16 recognition that a day's delay was a million bucks, 17 and that sort of thing is a great incentive to do what 18 is necessary to get the plant finished.
The plants 19 are still expensive.
They are still expensive to 20 operate, but we have to look at all the costs that are 21 attendant to that plant's operation and give a
22 professional evaluation of whether or not something 23 makes sense.
As the Chairman suggested, there are a 24 lot of ways to do things and simply because one is put 25-out as a surrogate, it doesn't mean it's the best one.
l NEAL R. GROSS
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It's that sort of thing that I would like to convey 2
that we will be taking a look at.
3 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
- Well, I
fully 4
subscribe to the notion that very often, and Mr.
5 McGrath cited it, that simpler is better, safer and 6
possibly cheaper.
I think that's generally true, but 7
we have to make sure that the safer is very clearly 8
demonstrated when we go to the simpler.
9 DOCTOR DRAPER:
No question.
10 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
That's all I have.
11 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Commissioner Curtiss?
12 COMMISSIONER CURTISS: I'll just be fairly 13 briaf in my comments here and commend you for the 14 presentation.
I've had a chance to look at the eight 15 specific issues that you've raised here and it's 16 obvious that you've put a good deal of thought and 17 attention into areas that might be pursued for further 18 regulatory relief.
And I think from my perspective, 19 you make some reasonable suggestions in areas that we 20 ought to take a look at.
If the recommendation 21 survives scrutiny by the staf f and by the public, with 22 the appropriate opportunity for interested members of 23 the public to comment, these are issues that, as I 24 say, in many respects strike me as reasonable areas 25 for further improving the regulatory process.
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There is one exception that I'll come bach 2
to and discuss just briefing having to do with B-56 3
because I have some questions about what you're 4
proposing there and I'll come back to that in a 5
minute.
6 My own personal view ir : bat these issues 7
can and perhaps should be addressed in a fairly 8
expeditious fashion, consistent with an opportunity 9
for the public to take a look at it, comment on what 10 you're suggesting here, but in the long-term, and I 11 think Commissioner Rogers has alluded to this as well, 12 in my view the more fundamental questions having to do 13 with the regulatory process and the issues that you 14 raise in one of your long-term initiatives in this 15 package, suggestions about regulatory thresholds and 16 the use of performance-based and results-oriented 17 regulation are really the area that, in my view, is 18 the most fruitful to pursue for long-term inquiry by 19 the Agency.
20 I will say that the process that we 21 established in the context of implementing the 22 maintenance rule was not, in my view, so much a
~
23 function of the fact that we didn't trust you, 24 although there may have been some who didn't, but 25 rather that the maintenance rule represented a
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s j
1 fundamentally different way of regulating for the J
2 Agency.
l 3
Recognizing
- that, we.
felti at the 4
i 4
Commission level that it was appropriate to have i
i I
5 senior attention both from the Agency and within the -
a 6
industry conducted in a-fully open public process to 4
7 ensure that the concept of performance-based I
j 8
regulation reflected in that rule, which is really, as i
j 9
I say, the first time that that had been adopted in 1
l 10 such a comprehensive way, was actually-carried out in F
11 the development of the implementing guidance.=
12 In that respect, there may in fact be some
]
13 areas here, particularly in'these longer term areas, i
l 14 where we're talking about the potential for-t j
l 15 fundamentally different ways
-of regulating' 16 performance-based and risk-based regulation where 17 applied selectively and perhaps not across the board, 4
18 but applied selectively and for that reason that.it 19 may be worth-considering that kind of an arrangement j
20 in this context as well.
~
21 The one area that I wantad.to come back 22 to, B-56, let me just=ask you a couple'of questions-
[.
'23 because you know I have a special interest in B-56 and 24 probably suspected'that I'd ask-you a' question about i
25
'it.
There are really two aspects of that issue that t
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you raise, one having to do with accelerated testing 2
and the second having to do with the question of the 3
commitments to a specified reliability level.
Let me 4
take the accelerated testing issue first.
5 Could you expand upon what it is that 6
concerns you on accelerated testing and in particular-7 focus on the question of how pervasive the problem is, 8
to what extent the 1984 generic letter has provided a 9
vehicle for relief, and what, in your view, needs to 10 be done beyond that in the accelerated testing area?
11 MR. COLVIN:
Yes, sir, and I do_ recognize 12 your interest in the B-56 issue and as a result-13 brought Bill Raisen, our Technical Division Vice 14 President here in case I get too far abroad.
15 In the accelerated testing issue area, 16 we've had basically agreement both from a scientific 17 perspective, from an analysis and data standpoint that l
l 18 accelerated testing required by' technical 19 specifications is, in fact, causing some reliability 20 problems with the diesels.
It's been recognized by 21 the Commission, by the industry, as I said, since 22 1984.
23 What we requested from the Commission and 24 what we believe the Commission gave direction to the 25 staff to do was in fact provide expedited relief from NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
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accelerated testing.
The recommendation that we had 2
was to provide that through a generic letter such that 3
it could be put in place by the industry in a very 4
easy and expeditious manner, and that is through a 5
generic letter the Commission can then provide the 6
industry the opportunity to-submit changes to 7
technical specifications where they currently exist 8
and to have those changes be approved at the NRC 9
project manager level without requiring a complete 10 reevaluation and reanalysis on an individual plant or 11 plant specific basis.
So, we think that that is an 12 issue that can in fact be given relief and done in a 13 fairly simple manner.
14 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
And the problem 15 with the 1984 generic letter is that you have to get 16 toch spec relief in order to obviate the accelerated 17 testing requirement?
18 MR.
COLVIN:
Under the current 19 requirements, the technical specifications, you would 20 have to submit a license amendment for a technical 21 specification change that then would have to be 22 reviewed by, as we understand it, the branch or the 23 various entities involved and could potentially 24 involve a hearing on that particular issue.
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might be a more expeditious approach to be taken.
2 Secondly, this is addressed within the new 3
standard tech specs and tech spec improvement program.
4 There is some consideration that the staff has 5
indicated to utilities that in order to grant relief 6
from accelerated testing that one would have to agree 7
to other changes within your diesel programs, which 8
also has been a consideration in some utilities, not 9
going forth and requesting the license amendment in 10 that area.
11 CO!O4ISSIONER CURTISS: Okay. Well, at the 12 risk of not getting you or me in over our heads, I'll 13 turn to the second aspect of the issue, the question 14 of the reliability level for the diesels that's 15 addressed in the Station Blackout Rule in the 16 submittals, just a comment and a question.
17 I will say that, while the industry at 18 large is to be commended for the average reliability 19 that you have achieved of
.98, I think is the figure 20 that you've cited actually, two comments.
- One, 21 that is an industry-wide average figure and doesn't l
22 reflect instances where diesels may not be achieving l
23 the.95 or the.975 numbers and there have in fact 24 been some instances, I think, where diesels on an 25 individual plant basis haven't achieved the levels L
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required in the submittals.
2 Secondly, in comparing the.98 to the.95 3
and
.975, recognize that tnose later numbers are 4
individual plant numbers and not industry-wide average 5
numbers, so we're talking a little bit about apples 6
and oranges here.
7 I guess the question that I have here, and 8
I'm not unsympathetic to the argument that we ought to 9
take advantage of the steps that have been taken 10 particularly in the context of the maintenance rule to 11 see if we can't address the diesel generator 12 reliability question in that framework, let me just 13 ask you if you're prepared to comment on it at this 14 coint.
If we were to establish an approach whereby in 15 the guidance implementing the maintenance rule we were 16 to establish a requirement that there be a goal under 17 A-1 of the maintenance rule that reflects the.95 or 18
.975 numbers that individual licensees are committed 19 to, is that an approach that in your view would being 20 about an effective harmonization of those two 21 initiatives?
22 MR. COLVIN: We have taken a look at that.
Given the fact that we do have a maintenance rule and 23 i 24 the fact that the diesels, when you screen for risk 25 significance, always screen, that they are a risk-NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1
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significant system and obviously that's why we havo a 2
station blackout rule, because of the contribution 3
that the diesels provide.
We are in the process of 4
evaluating that right now and in fact are considering 5
placing as an examplo within the industry's 6
implementing guideline on the maintenance rule to 7
address the diesel issue directly.
8 I think it's clear that each utility, as 9
you indicated, has a commitment as part of the station 10 blackout rule to either a.95 or.975 reliability.
In 13 addition to that, we as an industry took an initiative 12 for every utility to implement trigger values on the 13 diesels to give us not only a
measure of the 14 reliability so we would not drop below the target 15 reliability, but also to provide the specific actions 16 that each utility would take when you have a single 17 diesel that gets either a single trigger exceedance or 18 perhaps a double trjgger exceedance.
19 One of the concerns we have with focusing 20 on the diesels specifically, Jim, as you indicated, as 21 I heard your recommendation, was that we would put the 22 diesels under A-1 within the maintenance rule.
They 23 would always remain in A-1 with the goal.
I think 24 that that is an area that I'm not sure we would 25 believe is correct treatment for the diesels, because NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENVE N W.
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then the same argument would apply to ECCS systems, 2
RHR, et cetera, so on and so forth.
3 The way the Commission has structured the 4
maintenance rule is that certain things would go into 5
A-1 and as their performance was acceptable and 6
continued monitoring, only when there were potential 7
problems or failures of that equivalent maintenance 8
preventable functional failures would then that move 9
back, would then be forced into A-1 and then it could 10 go back into the standard monitoring.
So, I'm getting 11 a little bit too specific at this point, but it's 12 something we are considering, we believe is a correct 13 treatment.
The diesels are very important and we 14 believe they ought to have the appropriate focus 15 within the maintenance rule.
16 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
We can talk about 17 that in more detail when I think you come back to 18 brief us on the maintenance V&V effort later this 19 nonth.
20 MR. COLVIN:
Yes, sir.
21 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
I would note, 22 perhaps, for you to think about between now and then, 23 that the diesels may be unique in that they are the 24 only component or only system that has a regulatory 25 requirement of a quantitative nature and that's what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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distinguishes them from ECCS or aux feed or what-have-2 you.
There's a specific requirement that you've 3
alluded to in the submittals that addresses diesel 4
reliability.
5 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Do you have more to say 6
about diesels specifically?
7 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
No.
Differont 8
subject.
Go ahead.
9 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
I've been somewhat 10 concerned from a different point of view on the way 11 diesels have been handled.
I don't think the 12 statistics are competent, to put it simply, and I 13 would suggest that you think about the following line 14 of reasoning.
The reason I bring up this line of 15 reasoning is that it also would address this whole 16 question of excellence in reducing the range, and that 17 is to take the overall testing -- you know, we have a 18 very small sample for each particular diesel in each 19 particular plant and the conclusions that are drawn 20 from the sample are really hard to support on a 21 statistical basis, but we do have a large sample for 22 the diesels throughout.
23 So, a reasonable approach would be some 24 form of testing, whether it's the accelerated testing 25 or another
- version, which gets industry-wide i
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statistics that could be held with a large degree of 2
confidence, even though one cannot conclude that each 3
plant is meeting its own -individual spccification.
4 You take these as the a priori probability of failure 5
and then you look and say, "Given-that before we test 6
an individual plant we believe the overall reliability 7
is.975 that you start," and that's your a priori 8
probability and then you say how is that.affected by 9
the individual test.
=10 Then the second question is. what makes 11 sense on a plant -basis' to test the hypothesis that.the 12 diesel and the plant differs from the' industry-wide.
13 population by more than a certain margin, and there
)
14 are ways of doing that that haven't been done in this 15 piece.
So far it's pretty straightforward.
16 The part that bothers me the most is that 17 when you have reasonable confidence that a given 18 diesel was outside of-an acceptable bound and some 19 work is done,-how do you convince yourselves'and us 20 that you've - fixed it?
In other 'words, what's the 21 testing procedure? -If you find a diesel, if youLtest 22 it, if you have some confidence.that it's not within 23 the band where you want it ' to. be and then you do 24 something to it, how do you convince yourselves and us 25 that you've-rixed it from a testing point of view.
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mean, a series of four out of ten or what-have-you is 2
very unsatisfactory from a statistico point of view.
3 And it's not unique to diesels, but an 4
approach that uses the overall testing and then tries 5
to find out how can we test an individual diesel 6
within this population is what I think makes sense and 7
there's not enough of that in what I see.
8 Mr. Cavanaugh?
9 MR. CAVANAUGil:
Chairman Selin, I would 10 also submit that while we're looking at the diesels we 11 take a look at the requirement that certain licensees 12 have to essentially completely tear down their diesels 13 every fueling outage, no matter how many hours, no 14 matter what the reliability is.
In my opinion, when 15 you do that you potentially are reducing the 16 reliability of those diesels as well as you're driving 17 up the cost, and I also believe you're impacting your 18 shut-down risk.
19 CHAIRMAN SELIN: That's a reasonable point 20 of view.
I guess what I'd like to summarize is you've 21 made a pretty ef fective argument that B-56 doesn't 22 exactly achieve what we want to achieve, but the 23 conclusion that therefore we should drop it I don't 24 think is called for.
25 I think the right conclusion is, if this NEAL R. GROSS l
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isn't quite getting what we want, is there a better 2
way to get, namely, high confidence that the overall 3
population is working well, reasonable confidence that 4
no particular diesel is too far outside that 5
population, and then once -- if that confidence isn't 6
given, what to do about it, which covers both the 7
testing and the maintenance approach.
8 In other words, I think there's a lot more 9
work to do in diesels than just say, "Well, we have 10 some problems with the statistics both in B-56 and the 11 overall approach, so let's just drop that."
12 MR.
COLVIN:
- Well, certainly, Mr.
13 Chairman, we'll take your comments into consideration 14 and have some further discussions with you.
15 If I could make two points, one is we do 16 collect industry-wide reliability and availability 17 data and each utility is committed to report that on 18 a quarterly basis to INPO and INPO collects that and 19 analyzes it and provides that back.
20 From B-56 closure issue, B-56 was to 21 address diesel reliability to a.95 level.
I think 22 all the statistics indicate that on average the 23 industry has been maintaining far in excess of that 24 and we are analyzing it from a statistical basis. The 25 single and double trigger exceedance levels were in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCHIBERS 1123 RHOOE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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fact statistically based to come up with an approach 2
not to dissimilar from what you've described, so we 3
will take that into consideration and certainly have 4
some additional discussions with the staff.
5 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
I could respond to your 6
responses, but I think from the point of view of pure 7
simple mercy we'll go on to the next.
8 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
I'll be mercilesa.
9 Let me respond to them.
Actually --
10 MR. COLVIN:
You're going to force me to 11 call Bill Raisen up here in about 30 seconds.
I'll
-j ust 12 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
13 comment.
I won't ask a question.
Between the issues 14 or reliability and unavailability, what our AEOD 15 Of fice is telling us is unavailability is probably the 16 bigger problem and perhaps for the reasons that Mr.
17 Cavanaugh referred to, tearing down diesels during a 18 period of time when events like Vogtle demonstrate 19 that we really do need those diesels available.
20 In my view, the Maintenance rule in 21 paragraph 3 in particular will go a long ways to 22 addressing the unavailability question.
23 Then the remaining issue is what sort of 24 reliability concerns do you have? My only observation 25 there is that I think the Chairman raises some fair NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBE ~tS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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questions about the statistical issues which will 2
arise whether or not we have a rule because you're 3
proposing to implement initiative 5-A as the vehicle 4
for evaluating diesel performance from a statistical 5
standpoint, but maybe this would be an issue that we 6
can pursue in more detail when the maintenance 7
briefing is scheduled for later this month.
8 I did have one final question that I 9
wanted to ask.
It had to do with the backfit issue.
10
- You, I think, are aware that I have raised the 11 question in the past about whether the backfit rule 12 needs to be reexamined in particular from a
13 perspective that arises in the context of three of the 14 suggestions that you've made here.
15 Most of your recommendations for action 16 here in the eight areas that you've identified call 17 for relief from existing requirements, straightforward 18 sort of garden variety.
Eliminatu a requirement.
19 Don't go forward with an initiative. Delete something 20 from the regulations, reporting requirements, what-21 have-you.
22 There were three recommendations, fitness 23 for
- duty, Appeno J,
and Part 21, commercial 24 rededication, as I read them, and I confess I may not 25 have read them carefully enough, were a little bit NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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more complicated from a backfit standpoint in that 2
they would have us eliminate some requirements, 3
replace those requirements with a different approach, 4
maybe 7 performance-based approach as you've suggested 5
in the context of Appendix J.
And the question has 6
arisen, or I should say I've raised the question about 7
whether in a
case like that given the current 8
requirements of 50.109, the backfit rule, which in 9
particular requires you to demonstrate that you have 10 a cost beneficial change, first, and secondly that 11 will lead to a substantial increase, protection of the 12 public health and safety.
It's that latter point that 13 I guess in my view has stood in the way of making 14 changes that we may all agree are reasonable.
15 Appendix J and fitness for duty are two good examples 16 that have gotten hamstrung over exactly this issue, 17 but that under a fair and I think objective reading of 18 the backfit rule as it's currently constituted 19 couldn't be permitted absent an exemption unless we 20 could determine that there's a substantial increase in 21 protection.
22 Now, take my description of the backfit 23 rule as a given.
I don't want to debate whether I've 24 described it right, but simply ask you the question if 25 that's what the backfit rule provides, in cases like NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
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this how would you propose to proceed with these 2
initiatives where additional requirements might be 3
added on the books in order to effectuate what you 4
have in mind that could not in turn meet the current 5
backfit rule?
Would you amend the backfit rule?
6 Would you exempt these requirements from the backfit 7
rule?
What is your current thinking on that issue?
8 MR. COLVIN:
Well, the honest answer is 9
that we haven't given it the thought that we need to 10 and haven't taken into account some of the questions 11 or tried to come up with the answers to the' questions 12 you have.
We have done some evaluation of that and 13 have had a number of interactions with the NRC Office 14 of General Counsel staff and the legal community 15 within the industry on that issue.
I think at the 16 root of that issue comes back to part of your 17 constraint on our answer, which is a question as to 18 whether it does or does not apply.
I think we need to 19 get that out and have some interactions on that, talk 20 about that and then go forth.
21 The industry and the Congress put a lot of 22 effort into putting in place the backfit rule, as well 23 as the Commission and staff, to provide the checks and 24 balances on that process.
We think we still need to 25 have those checks and balances and appropriate and we NEAL R. GROSS i
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need to figure out a mechanism to affect the changes 2
- needed, not be limited by virtue of the literal 3
reading of the rules.
4 We have analyzed both the exemption and 5
the Commission has taken a
position that the 6
Commission can exempt a regulation from the backfit 7
rule, it could do so.
I think that thct can open a 8
number of things, other things, to question.
So, 9
we'll take a look at that and continue to have some 10 interactions.
11 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
I would pose that 12 question a
little differently from the way 13 Commissioner Curtiss posed it.
I for one would not 14 accept the policy that needed broad scale exemptions 15 from a rule and we're talking about a continuing 16 process.
So, in my opinion, you can't handle that 17 through exemptions.
18 On the other hand, it's not so clear to me 19 that if you reduced the cost then you don't increase 20 the safety that you're bumping up against the backfit 21 rule.
So, there really is the rule is not as 22 artfully drafted as it might be, but there really is 23 a reason to address Commissioner Curtiss' question 24 directly on the face of it, which is if you have a 25 series of actions which are demonstrated not to reduce NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W j
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safety whatsoever and reduce cost, can those be 2
squared with the backfit rule because that's basically 3
what a lot of these steps call for.
4 I personally would not countenance a whole
.4 5
range of exemptions.
It's fine when you have one here 6
or --
7 MR. COLVIN:
No, sir.
I think nor would 8
the industry propose that.
I was trying to respond 9
to --
10 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
Yes.
Just an 11 observation.
Given the history that led up to the 12 adoption of the most recent version of-50.109 in the 13 mid ' 80s, two comments. One, a literal interpretation 14 of what the backfit rule provides is probably a good 15 thing in my view, and I say that not just as a' lawyer 16 but because there was a long and painful experience 17 where the backfit rule was ignored by the Agency prior 18 to the most recent modification and it's been applied, 19 I think, in a balanced way but in accordance with the l
20 letter of the backfit rule as it's currently written, l
l 21 I think that ought to be a constraint.
I j
22 Secondly, the backfit rule, I think, given l
23 the circumstances at the
- time, was in fact a
24 reasonable approach to address the problem that 25 existed, which I won't recite here in' terms of what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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i I
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the problem was.
But the examples that I've cited =
2 here indicate that talking about issues like this i
3 which are different from the kinds of concerns that 4
i
}
4 led to the adoption of the backfit' rule may suggest i
5 that the backfit rule as it's currently = structured, 6.
reasonable at.the time but as it's currently i
7 structured in the light of these kinds of l
~
8-considerations, might itself deserve reexamination and.
9 perhaps-modification to address an' issue : that we j
10 didn't anticipate back in the mid-1980s.
11 That's all.
2 lI' 12 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Commissioner Remick?~
13 COMMISSIONER. REMICK:
I-thought-you-14 handled that very adroitly, Joe.
It is an excellent l
l 15-question.
16
-All three of you talked about' addressing i
i 17 the regulatory issue, but you certainly have a number
~
3 1
j-18 of external influences that I would. clascify as j
19 regulatory or - quasi-regulatory.
- Y o u - h a v e ~ u t'i l i t y.
]
20 commissions.
INPO.is not a regulatory organization, 21 but has some of the same impacts.
You must have. OSHA I
-22 and many-state.and government organizations that -I i.
i 23 can't even dream of, I'm sure.-
24 First question, to what extent do they.
[
25 influence your resources compared to the'NRC? And the-NEAL R. GROSS I
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second question, are you doing anything~to address 2
those type of influences like you are doing to address-3 the influence of the NRC on your resources?
4 MR.
McGRATH:
- Well, I'll start while 5
everyone else is thinking.
6 We have no lack of --
7 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
I don't like the 8
implication of that.
9 MR.
McGRATH:
We have no lack of 10 investigators and agencies looking at our operation.
11 I one time visited a plant and I counted 28 different 12 groups auditing the plant manager and his operation.
13 So, that hasn't been one of our problems.
14 We're looking at all of those areas 15 because when you look at any.one group incrementally 16 it doesn't sound like it has the impact that you see 17 when you look at it in total.
18 As far as a comparison between the NRC and j
19 others, the NRC presence is there all the time.
INPO 20 certainly isn't there all the time.
So, the NRC's 21 influence is more pervasive.
There's also good 22 reasons for that.
We do work with INPO and we work 23 with the state regulators and we work with the 24 auditors and everybody else to try to make them s
25 sensitive to the tension between them doing their job i
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and then taking the time away from the management that 2
the management could apply to safe operation of the 3
plant.
There's always that balance that we try to --
4 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Now, when you "we,"
5 are you talking individual utilities or NUMARC?
6 MR. McGRATH:
Well, both in some cases.
7 With the state PUCs, it's the individual. utility.
9 Any others have comments?
10 MR WATKINS:
I'd like to address that and 11 I think I'm in a unique position to address that 12 because as a political subdivision of-the State of 13 Nebraska, we are not subject to OSHA regulation and we 14 do not have a PUC that regulates us.
- Yet, in a 15 general sense, we are, as far as cost is concerned and 16 in the impact of regulation, we are seeing information 17 at our plant very typical of the rest of the industry.
18 So, in our particular case, we can definitely say that
.L ?
it's not OSHA and PUC that is a problem.
20 COMMISSIONER REMICK: - Could you put it in 21 perspective?
Are we 80 percent of your resource.
22
-demands, are we 60 percent?
23 MR. KINGSLEY:
I'11 respond to that and 24 say you're somewhere on the order of probably 60 to 75 25 percent.
We do have insurance, special inspections.
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We do have the INPO evaluations which are on usually 2
an 18 month cycle, and we have the accreditation 3
process which you're very familiar with.
But the 4
difference with the NRC is that you're there.
.There 5
are a number of special inspections.
The TVA is-not 6
a good example because we have had our plants on the 7
trouble list and special recovery.
But we have a 8
large number of special inspections and you have to 9
prepare for those.
You have to run dry runs and that 10 is a significant drain our resources.
11 MR. CAVANAUGH:
Commissioner Remick, I 12 would say this with regard to INPO, having sat on the 13 Board of INPO for the last number of. years and also 14 having been subject to - their evaluation.
I think 15 INPO, first of all, has been very instrumental in 16 helping the industry improve its performance over the 17 last number of years.
But with INPO, as with NRC,_
18 there are various ways you can meet a criteria.
You 19 might apply one way to meet an INPO criteria.
It 20 could be very expensive.
You would meet it very well, 21 but it would be very expensive.
I think_there that 22 INPO offers us a resource in terms of those within the 23 industry who basically are doing the right job.
They 24 have the best practice and they are meeting the 25 criteria with the least amount of resources and cost.
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COMMISSIONER REMICK:
But I read you in 2
areas where you feel that there are savings from 3
demand on your resources in which there's not a 4
compensatory improvement in safety, you are addressing 5
those whether they are INPO or whatever?-
In other 6
words, you're directing your efforts more broadly than 7
just the NRC.
Is that correct?
8 MR. CAVANAUGH:
Yes.
9 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Were you going to 10 say something, Joe?
11 MR. COLVIN:
Yes, sir.
I was just going 12 to comment that as part of the NRC's regulatory impact 13 survey that was done in 1989, the NRC staff did a 14 survey of utilities to assess the amount of management 15 time at each utility that was affected by NRC, INPO, 16 the insurance agencies, state regulatory agencies, so 17 on and so forth.
I don't remember the exact 18 statistics, but it came out with some conclusion of 19 about 25 percent of the management's time, management 20 supervision time at the plant was responding to 21 outside agencies or authorities.
The'NRC was the 22 major contributor to that, at least based upon that 23 assessment.
Obviously we could take a look at that 24 and it might assist in the answer to your question.
25 COMMISSIONER REMICK:
Okay.
Thank you.
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One, I want to compliment you on the paper 2
you did send in identifying the various suggested 3
areas.
That was very helpful to me because the 4
examples help one focus in on areas of possibilities 5
for looking where we might consider some changes.
I 6
did pull out the NUREG document that you referred to 7
on reports and requirements and it's 183 pages of 8
reports and requirements.
But I must admit as-I go 9
through there at the level within the Commission that 10 I am, I can't identify specific areas where there 11 might be overlaps.
So, I think these are areas out in 12 the plants where you know you're getting duplicate 13 requests and so forth that you_can be specifically 14 very helpful in identifying or raising questions about 15 is this data really needed.
I agree with the Chairman 16 that we need to address what are-the-data 17 requirements, not necessarily the reports.
I-think 18 that's a much better approsch.
But it is kind of eye 19 opening to leaf through 183 pages with many, many 20 requirements on each page, an average.of seven or 21 eight per page, somewhere between 1200 and 1500 22 reporting and recordkeeping requirements that are 23 imposed upon you.
24 It's my own feeling that probably when we 25 go through this process that it's questionable whether NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND A\\"*NUE, N W.
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t i
61 a
l 1
in many of the cases.it's the regulations;that are l
2 perhaps the biggest problem, although-I certain 3
support the efforts toward more performance-based and -
4 risk-based regulations.
But
-I-doubt i f -_ i t ' s - t h e i.
5 regulation itself.
It's:probably the implementation l
l 6
through regulatory _
- guides, inspection
- modules, e
7 personal-interpretations or your reaction'to them out s
8 in the industry.
I think that's what we.re going-to' 1
9 find.
Those are a little bit more diffuse. in 10 attempting to get our hands on in many cases.
But my'.
-11 guess would b'e that the regulations in general perhaps i
12 aren't as _ big _ a - problem as thel various means of 13 implementing or outdated-implementing them.
i 14 So, therefore, once again, I urge that you
{r f
15 make us aware of-those.
I for' one welcome people 16
. standing up-in a professional manner and' differing :
)
17 with us when we :are proposing doing something' or -if 18 we're already_doing something.that you.:think from..a-19 technical and professional-standpoint does not make 20 sense.
I certainly encourage' you to.do it.
You 21 should-be able to do it without--fear of retributionL 22 and I think through: thatLall of us can attempt.to
~
23' improve the process, make it a more. efficient process 24 while, I believe, it-can indirectly affect safety..
25 Back in 1963, I wrote an article in --
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Nuclear News, something like operating reactors within i
2 the myriad of federal, state and local regulations and 3
the bottom line was there every minute that somebody 4
who's supposed to be responsible for the safety of 5
that facility is spending time on other activities, it 6
detracts from safety.
I thought it was very bright at 7
that time, but looking back I was pretty naive.
But 8
at that 1963, it was also perceived as a problem and 9
probably never adequately addressed.
10 So, I encourage you to continue.
I know 11 our staff is very sincere.
They've met now with a 12 number, perhaps all the Commissioners to get our input 13 and they're very sincere in approaching and they're 14 very optimistic that there are things that should be 15 done and they seem to be enthusiastic because they 16 feel that it will also improve our efficiency and 17 perhaps improve safety while we're doing it.
18 So, I compliment you on the activity and 19 I agree it's ongoing.
It will have to continue for a 20 long time and we'll have to work together to identify 21 these.
Thank you.
22 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Commissioner de Planque?
23 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE: Yes.
I was very 24 pleased to see your report.
I appreciate -- can very 25 well appreciate all the work put behind it, especially NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE N W.
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in the detail and - the specifics that you've ; put 2
forward.
I think there's a great deal of material 3
here.
It's very timely and-I assume our group that's--
4 performing their regulatory review will indeed be 5
going through all of these items.
6 I
also noticed the same thing that 7
Commissioner Remick did.
Especially here-in your-
-8
- report, a
lot of.
your-suggestions deal-with'-
9 regulations and rules.
It does seem to me in talking 10 to many of you, either'at your facilities or here, 11
'that the real problem is in the implementation, more 12 so than the regulations in the-rule.
I'd like to ask 13-you' a question along those lines.
Do-you have any 14 feel for the proportions?
I didn't see-much in here' 15 in terms of implementation, just the rules, and it's-16 easier to get at-those than it-is at
-the 17 implementation.
But any feel for the proportion of 18 the problem?
19 MR. McGRATH:
I'11.let Joe answer that, L
20 but I would'like to.make a. general comment.-
In:my I
21 experience, if the audience-you're talking 7 with. is 22-responsible for a particular aspect, they. don't.see
-23 themselves as the problem.
All.right?-
So,.-I'm sure-l 24 if we went to the inspector.out in the field, he would 25 say - it 's..- not the inspection, it's that-regulation.
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Right?
That's kind of a human nature thing.
So, I 2
think we need to, as Chairman Selin said earlier, we 3
need
-to really look carefully at our own j
l 4
responsibility and we're trying to do that from an l
5 industry point of view, and honestly look at what our 6
problem is.
7 When I go around my company and meet with 8
various groups, inevitably the group I'm meeting with 9
is not the problem, it's someone that's not in the 10 room.
And I've met with everybody, so ~I guess I'm the 11 problem.
But I think we need to look at it honestly 12 and each of us has a stake in this tt'.ng.
13 Joe may have more statistical information.
14 MR. COLVIN:
Well, I was just going to 15 comment.
We haven't done an analysis to look at the 16 proportion.
We do recognize, I
think as the 17 Commission has recognized, that that is a large 18 portion of the problem from our view.
We did do a 19 quick look to try to convince ourselves that in fact 20 that was true and if you really look at Title 10 of 21 the Code of Federal Regulations and what governs a 22 utility day to day in the operation of one of their 23 plants, there are only 93 regulations or major parts 24 that, in fact, govern that.
NA, without takinglinto 25 account the impact or the burden that any one of those NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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65 1
applies or trying to measure that as compared to the 2
number of requirements or just documents such as 3
regulatory guides, generic letters, bulletins, staff 4
positions, et cetera, that in fact then take that rule 5
or part of a rule and then broaden it out and to 6
implement it, each one of those is certainly open to 7
interpretation.
8 So, we are going to try to work on all of 9
that and identify those areas.
There is a little bit 10 of that in the package that we presented.
In fitness 11 for duty, for example, there are some things specific 12 to rules and there are a few things that are really 13 interpretive issues, but for the most part, you're 14 correct, the focus was on the regulations themselves, 15 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE: Well, and I know 16 it's much harder to quantify and get your arms around 17 the implementation problem, but you do intend to go 18 down that route as well?
Okay.
19 I have some more general or philosophical 20 questions.
You mentioned earlier that one of the key 21 problems is that issues, even if there's agreement on 22 both sides, are not always brought to closure in a 23 timely or in an effective manner.
You mentioned that 24 this needs senior management and Commission attention.
25 But could you elaborate a little more on what you see NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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i 66 i~
1 as the problem there?- Is it_ staff resources?
Is it i
i j
2 resistance to doing something? Could you just tell_us 3
a little more of what happens in between?
4 MR. COLVIN:
Well, Iecan give you some l
'5 examples perhaps, but it seems to.me that the real i
6 issue is that-there is a difference of opinion and' i
7 probably a_ valid difference'of opinion between various 8
either offices within the'NRC, between NRC and another i
9 federal agency, or between the industry and any one of a
j 10-all o'f those.
In many. cases, that's driven'by some
]
11 scientific uncertainty, i;
i 12 I think the' issue that we have to' deal 4
i 13 with in managing a utility or managing a' company is i
j 14 that you've got to take all that into account and make 15 a decision and get on with the business at hand.
Many 16 of the issues that we've been dealing with in the l
17 regulatory arena we've _ dealt with for an - enormous l-18 number of-years and we just-haven't brought-them.to f
19 closure 'or, in - many cases, we haven't kept them.
1
[
20 closed.
once we've solved the problem, then it i
j 21 reopens at some later' time.
So,-that's what we're 22 really trying to get at and.: I think -- we need to ~
3 23 given all the facts and:the data,_we need to then go 1
l-24 on and make a decision.
[
25~
Now, the Commission and ' the staff have j
i:
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done this in a number of areas.- The severe accident 2
arena is one where we could probably study the 3
phenomenological issues related to severe beyond 4
design basis accidents for the next 20 or 30 years.
5 The Commission has taken and the staff has taken and 6
made the decisions necessary to move on in that arena.
7 But there are many other examples, perhaps, where we 8
ought to be able to bring these to closure.
And some 9
of these things ought to be fairly easy, in our view, 10 to close and maybe we need to look at the 11 prioritization as was indicated and try to raise those 12 up and take some of these things and put them to rest 13 that should be easy to do with management involved on 14 both sides.
15 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
So you think 16 it's mainly the idea of getting the attention at the 17 proper levei to see that it's carried out?
18 MR. COLVIN: I don't think it's a matter--
19 let me be clear.
I don't think it's a matter of 20 resources.
I think it's a matter of raising it to the 21-high enough level where the issue can be decided and 22 a decision carried forth.
23 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:.Okay. Moving on 24 to the security area, which is one that I've been very 25 interested in, I agree with your observation that-NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RH00E ISLAND AVENUE. N.W.
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security at plants abroad is somewhat different.than 2
it is here.
I will just tell you a_ funny anecdote.
3 I saw a difference and that was Super Phoenix where 4
4 after going through with the plant, my assistant said 5
to me, "We went through more doors per hour and more 6
check points per hour than we ever have anywhere."
I 7
thought it was an interesting quantity, but didn't 8
know if it translated into SI units.
9 I've seen a lot of differences among the 4
10 plants in the U.S.
My main question has to do with 11 not so much those differences, but how do you as 12 NUMARC deal with a wide diversity of opinion on an 13 issue among utilities, wide differences in how 14 security is handled?
I'll give as an example 15 differing opinions on SALP, not that I want to get 16 into SALP, as we agreed earlier.
But how do you deal 17 with it as a group if you've got a-large diversity of 1
18 opinion in coming forth to us with a recommendation?
19 MR. COLVIN:
Well, let me start and then 20 I'm sure that members of our Executive Committee and 1-21 Board will correct me and add to my comments.
22 First of all, we typically use a senior 23 level working group on an issue where we believe there 24 is a large diversity of opinion, a highly contentious 25
-issue, a difficult issue to come to grips with.-
_I 4
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69-fitness for duty is probably a 1
mean the issues 2
perfect example of that issue where we as industry had 3
many programs in place in the fitness for duty.
The 4
industry had taken a number of initiatives, but we did 5
not have random testing across the industry.
The 6
Commission, in its establishment of the fitness for 7
duty rule, in developine, ur response to that, we had 8
to get the senior management of the industry together 9
and try to look at the issue of principally random 10 testing.
Through the leadership of.Phil Clark, who 11 chaired that working group, we actually provided the 12 Commission a set of industry comments that articulated 13 the industry's view. Although they might have been in 14 a particular individual utility's case perhaps still 15 opposed to random testing because of some bargaining 16 unit agreement or other agreement, the industry as a 17 whole supported that fitness for duty drug testing.
18 So, we have a process that from that 19 working group then leads us to the Executive Committee 20 of NUMARC and to the full NUMARC Board of Directors 21 which is, in fact, either the Chief Executive of ficer, 22 the Chief operating officer or the senior nuclear 23 executive from every utility that--operates or i
24 constructs nuclear plants.
So, we have in effect as 25 that Board the industry to make that decision and we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 HHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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have the processes that lead us to conclude that.
2 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
But there still 3
can be some minority views.
4 MR. COLVIN: Oh, there are always minority 5
views, even perhaps within the NUMARC staff on these 6
issues.
7 The one point that Gene alluded to though 8
or made -- I shouldn't say alluded to, actually made 9
was this issue of within the various companies.
When 10 we go to work on security, if we set up a security 11 workir g group that included no one but corporate 12 security managers, ws would not have any problems with 13 security.
I think that's a given.
As a result, we 14 set up a working group that consisted of a wide 15 diversity of people, senior executives, middle level 16
- managers, plant operations people and security 17 individuals that had that expertise to look at what 18 was really needed and that's where we develop the 19 recommendations that we provided to the Commission in 20 this paper related to security.
21 We also have on formal industry positions 22 or policies an 80 percent rule where we take a vote on 23 an issue of the full Board and if 80 percent or more 24 conclude that that's what's best for the industry, 25 then that in f act is the industry position and all the NEAL R. GROSS CoVRT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W.
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1 utilities agree to support it.
2 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
I have a
1 3
specific question in the security area.
You talk 4
about doing a current assessment based on federal 5
intelligence gathering agencies of the real or the 6
potential threat.
Do you feel that NRC is not up to 7
date in this area?
Do you have information otherwise 8
that leads you to make that comment?
9 MR. COLVIN: The basis for the comment was 10 that the industry has in its briefings of the various 11 agencies, including the NRC, has been told that there 12 is not and has not been in the United States a 13 credible terrorist threat against a nuclear power 14 plant.
We, prior to the submittal of this document, 15 we in fact had briefings with the Federal Bureau of 16 Investigation on exactly that issue and, based upon 17 those briefings, we made the recommendation that we 18 believed it would be beneficial for the Commission in 19 its evaluation of the design basis threat, which is 20 what we requested, that the Commission ensure that it 21 got the full briefing of the federal family to have 22 the proper background on which to base any changes 23 that might exist, so it was really coming from that 24 perspective.
25 COMMISSIONER de PLANQUE:
Okay.
I have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N.W.
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just one last comment.
Sometimes it's easier to 2
ensure that rules that are not really useful for 3
safety and raise costs are stopped in the very 4
beginning and I think of the draft proposed rules that 5
go out and some hue and cry at some of the issues that 6
show up in the proposed rules.
And I realize there's 7
the phenomenon of once it's in print it has a life of 8
its own, but I for one would say that I think 9
extensive comments on those proposed rules are very 10 important. They certainly are to me when I would make 11 a decision on something, so I would strongly encourage 12 really thorough review and comments as extensive as 13 possible at that point.
I don't feel because it's in 14 print it's necessarily cast in concrete.
I know it is 15 difficult at A t point, but I would encourage that.
16 I would just like to reiterate that I 17 commend your effort, as do my fellow Commissioners.
18 I think this is a wonderful step.
Thank you.
19 CHAIRMAN SELIN: I know have some specific 20 comments I would like to make.
well, they're general 21 First of all 22 specific comments. I mean, they're specific, but they 23 cover more than one piece.
First of all, it's 24 important as we go forward with this to realize when 25 we talk about performance measurements we use two NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISt.AND AVENUE. N W.
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quite different senses.
The first is the performance 2
of the industry as a whole, like diesel reliability, 3
et cetera, where it is possible to make arguments as 4
has been made in the fitness for duty that since the 5
overall positive testing has been below a certain 6
level we should relax the pieces.
I think those are 7
important arguments and we havE"'t really thought 8
about that very much as opposed to the performance of 9
a given train in-a given plant where, as long as the 10 total reliability of a train is quite high, you 11 shouldn't have to do a lot of prescriptive things.
12 I
would be very interested in our 13 developing in a full open fashion with everybody 14 having a chance to comment some elaboration of the 15 first approach, whether it's in diesels as the 16 overall reliability goes up we should be relaxing the 17 tests on a given plant to see if they're far off 18 because the a priori assumption is that they're like 19 everybody else -- or whether it's in fitness for duty 20 or even the security.
21 And so, in each of these measures, the 22 fitness for duty, the security, diesel generator, 23 containment lead testing, dedication of commercial 24 grade items, not the others, I think there's room to 25-go back and take a look at industry experience overall NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND t VENUE, N W.
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and say'the yield just can't be very high,__because
^
2 we're doing-so.well in these places that therefore it 4
3 would be safe to relax.some of_these standards or'the:
e i
4 yields would be high because the overall.: performance 4
5 isn't high.
6 The reason I say that, first of all, Lit's 7
obviously better statistics to use the full' universe.
8 But second, it would encourage you the : industry to 9
move in a direction that puts a_ lot of pressure. on the i
10 laggard performers.because they'lli mess it up ' J for l
11
-everybody.
In other- -words, if the-overall 12 probabilities aren't high because you havelfive or ten.
13 plants that aren't performing, that's going to raise-14 the cost to everyone.
As you know,_'I'm very-
-l 1
15 interested-in the industry doing some --_I don't.want 16 to say self-policing, but. encouraging people to get up 17 to the better performance level.
18 The second po' int I'd.like to~ make is that 19 following up on Commissioner -Curtiss' -arguments, 20 you're basically arguing that we. review-the backfit 21-rule for tech specs.
If we're going to do that, that 22-might not be a bad time 1to review the language of-the 23 backfit rule so that the change:which reduced cost and 24 has zerosimpact on; safety in the small:be positively-25 looked at in the sense that'something that frees up NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCR!8ERS -
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resources would, in the large, probably improve safety 2
because you're not going to spend all that money in 3
dividends.
Some of it you'll reinvest elsewhere.
4 Conversely there are other places you'd like to do s
5 something, but you don't have enough money.
6 So, I think if, in fact, we end up 7
following your suggestion to review the backfit rule 8
from the point of view of the tech spec, we might 9
consider reviewing it from a somewhat broader sense, 10 as I just said.
As I understand the history of the 11 backfit rule, there was a certain feeling that the 12 industry wanted to put the burden of proof on the 13 Commission to really show there was an improvement in 14 safety before we could put in a rule.
That's going to 15 backfire on you because there are places where there's 16 no improvement of safety in the small, but there's a 17 dacrease in cost.
If the suspicion of the 18 Commission's desire to write rules all the time were 19
- abated, maybe we could get back to what we really want 20 to do, which is to get a lot of safety but on an 21 efficient basis.
22 The third point is just to repeat my point 23 about reports.
I don't think you can get very far by 24 looking at whole recorts.
I think you have to get 25 down to the data elements.
That's how you find NEAL R. GROSS l
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Guplication, et cetera.
This is an admonition to the 2
staff more than it is to NUl4 ARC.
3 The fourth is I'm upset about the sort of 4
cozy sense of this meeting.
I want to make it clear o
5 that for purposes of discussion, we're sort of 6
agreeing because you've done a good job.
But, in 7
fact, a lot of these things aren't clear and we have 8
to make sure that all points of view -- upset is the 9
Wrong word, but I'm concerned -- all points of view 10 are thoroughly vented c'n this.
I mean there s.ay be 11 traps in changing the backfit rule that aren't obvious 12 to the Commissioners because we were looking at it 13 from one point of view.
Where we can unequivocally 14 reduce costs without affecting safety we'll move as 15 quickly as we can, but where tradeoffs are involved, 16 even if they're judgments about which scenario is more 17 likely, I would like to make sure we can package this 18 broadly, get broad public comment and carry it out.
19 Not to go through adjudicatory hearing on each of 14 20 changes in the FFD, but not to just go ahead.
It's 21 really important that these small changes not add up 22 to an unexamined change in policy as opposed to a 23 determination to carry out what are, in fact, our 24 principles of good regulation, which is not to impose 25 costs inadvertently.
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77 1
The last general comment, and I realise 2
that this could conceivably be taken as a compliment 3
by Mr. Colvin and I don't intend it as such.
But I am 4
impressed in the time that I'm here with the 5
improvement in NUMARC's performance in trying to meet 6
our objective, where instead of getting either 7
platitudes or the anti-SALP stuf f, which I consider to 8
be a little more reflex than some of the other things, 9
you do seem to be doing quite a bit better job of 10 pulling together on specifics and truly, controversial 11 or not, examining issues and Kaeting things on what I 12 would consider our grounds, analytical, substantive 13 grounds.
I hope that continues, not only in these 14 areas but in particular on applying to 80/20 rule to 15 your operations.
If 80 percent of the people think 16 that the other 20 aren't doing something right, you 17 get the other 20 pulled up.
18 Now, as far as specific goes, on the FFD 19 you basically come up with a whole lot of different 20 ways for shaving little pieces of our rule which we 21 make a pretty good argument don't make sense.
Now, is 22 there a way to go further?
Is there some kind of 23 overall measure that you would like to see considered 24 that as long as the overall testing is below a certain 25 level things happen one way and then when and if it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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gets above that level it happens another way?
Your 2
arguments are loosely based on overall figures.
3 You're basically anying the standards apply to the 4
nuclear operators are tougher than those that are 5
applied to pilots and a lot of other people.
6 But we might, for a second stage, even 7
think about going further and trying to come up with 8
explicit criteria for tying overal2 performance to 9
measures.
I personally would be interested if, upon 10 reflection, you have something to say in that regard.
11 I even feel the same way about security, although 12 there it's harder to see exactly what we might do.
In 13 other words, as some of these reviews are gone 14 through, when would we know that we'd gone too far?
15 You know, you have to think of that in advance.
- Now, 16 in some of these cases, you're arguing there are 17 internal inconsistencies and for those you don't need 18 performance measures.
But in others you're just 19 saying the threat isn't that bad.
We've never had an 20 incident, a serious incident.
Do we have to have a 21 serious incident before we go too far or are there 22 ways to measure, short of a terrorist getting into one 23 of the plants, that performance is appropriate?
24 Diesel generators we've talked about 25 already.
Radiation protection is pretty clear on the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE, N W..
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face of it. Routine and periodic reports we've talked 2
about.
Containment leak rate testing, it's not clear 3
to me that you're actually proposing a performance 4
rule or just proposing that we follow a performance 5
rule.
Do you have a specific recommendation as to 6
What the rule ought to look like or is it just that we 7
ought to --
8 MR.
COLVIKi We're in the process of 9
developing some recomir.sndations for the Commission and 10 would submit those through the normal processes, 11 through a petition for rulemaking in those areas'to 12 provide the industry's views on how that might be 13 accomplished.
14 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Okay.
So --
15 MR. COLVIN:
Yes, sir, we are --
16 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
-- this is basically an 17 advanced notice that in principle you'd like us to be 18 looking towards this, but we're not -- I mean if we 19 said, fine, there's not a thing to implement from your 20 point of view --
l 21 MR. COLVIN:
We have not provided that as 22 yet to the commission.
We have that issue as well as 1
23 perhaps one of the two,.the next ones you're going to 24 come to, which in fact we are preparing a formal 25 petition for rulemakings for the Commission's.
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consideration.
2 Cl! AIRMAN SELIN:
On the toch spec?
3 MR. COLVIN:
on the tech spec and also on 4
the Part 21 issue.
4 5
CilAIRMAN SELIN: See, the Part 21 to me is 6
the most bothersome of all because it's clear that 7
we're doing something wrong, but it's not clear 8
exactly what to do about it.
It seems to me that we 9
ought to be systematically putting PRA-type 10 calculations into these procurement decisions and also 11 be -- of all the places, this is the one where you 12 would think that we could have some empirical rules
~
13 and to see whether rules are too tight or too loose 14 based on what kind of results are coming out of these 15 safety-based tests compared to the commercial-based i
16 tests.
But nobody has recommended this. Nobody has 17 said, "As long as rejection rates are below such and 18 such on the commercial base, we don't have to go to 19 safety-based or vice versa."
4 20 It seems to be that here's a quantitative 21 problem with a qualitative solution.
You know, Mr.
22 Brons has given some horrible examples, but you.can 23 always find horrible examples.
What I'm looking for 24 is more systematic guidance that says we should relate 25 our procurement requirements more directly towards the NEAL R GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCA1BERS 1323 RHODE (SLAND AVENUE, N W.
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1 risk analysis or towards some kind of overall 2
performance analysis.
If anything, here would be a 3
place to take industry experience on procuring nuts, 4
bolts, fasteners, whatever it is and say, "Here's a 5
case where we really do feel safety-based procurement 6
is called for.
Here's another case where it can't 7
possibly be high enough yield.
8 So, what I'm really saying is I don't 9
think we're to the point where there's something we 10 can say, "Here's a clear improvement."
You've made 11 very strong arguments in the fitness for duty that 12 here are 14 steps which are just sort of silly or so 13 far out of line with what everybody else is doing that 14 it's almost a prima facie case to carry it out.
But 15 in this area where there's much more money to be saved 16 if done right, but much more risks to be implied if 17 done
- wrong, we I
think need to follow up on 18 quantitative tests to say how much more testing versus i
19 how much safety improvement.
20 You're basically very clear on the 21 standard tech specs and then on the longer term 22 pieces, other than the SALP stuff,.I think those are 23 fairly self-standing arguments.
24 Commissioners Rogers wanted to add a
25 point.
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_____________.m..
i 82 1
COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Yes.
It just i
I 2
occurred to me that it seems as if there is a change j
3 in your view towards how acceptable non-prescriptive 4
regulation is versus prescriptive regulation, although 4
5 that may not be correct.
What we're dealing with is 6
more emphasis on performance-based regulation where we l
1 7
have quantitative measures that might be applied and
)
8 I'd just ask you to think but not necessarily respond j
9 at this point as to whether in any areas of regulation 1
10 that are dealt with in qualitative ways whether a non-11 prescriptive approach is equally acceptable to you to l
12 a prescriptive approach.
i 13 I think this is an issue that some years i
f 14 ago I know I discussed with a number of your CEOs who 15 were quite uncomfortable with non-prescriptive 16 regulation because they felt that it opened the door I
17 to arbitrariness on the part of inspectors and others.
4 18 I wonder as you go through this process of i
19 looking at regulations whether you might find it l
20 useful to review your position on that and see whether 21 in fact it is possible and maybe even desireable to 22 consider non-prescriptive regulations in any ' areas 23 that are not immediately amenable to a
purely 24 quantitative measure, performance-based measure.
I'd 25 simply throw that out as a suggestion because I think NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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we are learning a great deal about these matters that 2
through looking at specific cases that I don't think 3
we'd over get to by arguing about generalities.
But 4
it does seem to me that maybe some generalities are-5 starting to emerge here with respect to the virtues of
~
6 non-prescriptive regulation outside of those areas 7
that purely can be addressed by a
quantitative 8
performance-based statement of regulation.
9 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
That's what a staterent 10 of principios and a surrogate do for you.
You know 11 that if you do the surrogate you're home free absent 12 some extraordinary situation, but it still leaves you 13 the flexibility of proposing some different approach 14 to meeting a specific objective.
15 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
I just wanted to 16 say, although I didn't initiate my remarks, I think 17 your hard at work here in identifying these issues is l
18 very, very useful.
It's most timely and most helpful 19 to the whole process.
20 CHAIRMAN SELIN: Mr. McGrath, did you want 21 to have any wrap-up comments?
22 MR. McGRATH:
You know there is obviously 23 a
big difference between new regulations and 24 regulations that have been in place for ten years.
I 25 don't know that we as a group have benefitted as much NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHDDE ISLAND AVENUE. N W, (202) 234 4433 WASHINGTON, O C. 20005 '
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from our experience with existing regulations, do they 2
do what they were intended to do a..d do they do it 3
efficiently, and we're gaining a lot of knowledge. We 4
need techniques and I think we need to feed that back.
5 We need to have the receptiveness to feed that back 6
into the process to fine tune the regulations and 7
perhaps make them more efficient.
I think that's one 8
of the points we wanted to make.
9 CHAIRMAN SELIN:
Just in following up, 10 it's really something I said at the beginning, but I'd 11 like to, in summing up, bring up this point.
I f we ' re 12 going to in fact reopen the backfit in order to do the 13 tech spec question, in order to take a look at the 14 case where cost can be reduced with no impact on 15 safety in the short-term, et cetera, we ought to be 16 thinking whether it's a change in the reg. or not 17 about substituting one package of regulations or tests 18 for another one.
These are all sort of unilateral, 19 can you change this rule without hurting things.
20 In the longer run, there's not much sense 21 in imposing a performance-based rule if you don't also 22 withdraw the prescription rule at the same time.
So, 23 not so much in the short run, but if we do succeed in 24 moving to performance-based rules and moving to PRA-25 based analysis and emphasis and dropping the arbitrary NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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distinction between safety related and non-safety 2
related and just say, "It's cafety related insofar as i
3 it adds to risk," then we need to be able to look at i
4 larger clusters of reg. guides and practices than just 5
stand alone procedures.
Also with the stand alone 6
procedures, you're always at the risk that the cost is 7
small and the benefit is small and therefore if you do 8
them one at a time, you start a trend but you don't 9
realize you've started the trend until it's too late.
10 Anyhow, obviously we're all pleased with 11 this work.
We don't want you to go away feeling too 12 encouraged because although we'll follow up on this, 13 we do want to make sure that all parties have a fair 14 view not just in the detail, but we have a large 15 enough package to get some comments so that we do need 16 to do that.
That's why I want to get a large enough 17 package so we can get the comments all at one time and 18 not have what amounts to a rule change for each of 50 19 different pieces.
20 We hope you'll follow up on this work.
21 It's been very -- I.think just very rewarding.
22 Anything else?
23 Thank you.
24 (Whereupon, at 3:41 p.m.,
the. above-25 entitled matter was concluded.)
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVENUE. N W.
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CERTIFICATE OF TRANSCRIBER This is to certify that the attached events of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission entitled:
TITLE OF MEETING: BRIEFING BY NUMARC ON INDUSTRY REVIEW OF NRC REGULATIONS AND REGULATORY PROCESS PLACE OF MEETING: ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND DATE OF MEETING:
JANUARY 21, 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.
$0h font C
/
Reporter's names PETER LYNCH t
NEAL R. GROSS COURT RipotTERS AND TRANSCRittR$
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20005 (202) 232 4 600
4 i
NUCLEAR MANAGEMENT AND RESOUect$ COUNCIL
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'77e.he pieg.' Nw. $ste 300. Wesw r:n DC 20006 3?R (200 E U ' F )
I Joe F. CoMn s,u.x-4 a cw December 21,1992 j
i e eru k
i The Honorable Ivan Selin l
Chairman i
i U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D. C. 20555 j
Dear Chairman Selin:
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At the June 25,1992, NUMARC Board of Directors' meeting you discussed the status of the Commission's review of NRC regulations whleh have unnecessarily t
l increased costs to licensees without a commensurate safety benefit. You requested j
specific examples of changes to NRC regulations and regulatory processes that the industry believec were appropriate based upon the industry's knowledge and experience i
in the operation and management of commercial nuclear power plants and the maturity j
of the nuclear technology. The purpose of this letter is to provide you with our initial response and, because of the importance of this matter, to request expedited Commission action in the areas identified.
l The Executive Summary (enclosed) provides a brief description of the initial j
results of our review. Attachments 1 through 8 discuss specific issues where we believe inunediate action can be taken without further study or analysis. Attachments 9 through 11 address longer-term issues where efforts need to be commenced in the near future to I
effect positive change in the needed time frames. In addition, we ask the Commission's i
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consideration of the industry's comments on the Systematic Assessment of Licensee l
Performance (SALP) program, which were submitted on October 20,1992 (copy l
included as Attachment 12), where we believe significant changes are also warranted.
We will be forwarding information on other issues for your consideration as our evaluations continue.
l We look forward to working with the Commission and the NRC staff to address l
these matters, which are of crlilcal importance to the industry. Because cost control is
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an urgent problem to the industry, we would like to meet with the Commission in early l
January to discuss these and related issues to facilitate their timely resolution.1 I
Sincerely, 4
i-f h4 Joe F Colvin i
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m, EXECUITVE
SUMMARY
Nuclear energy is a key component of our national electrical energy supply mix.
However, the avaliability of nuclear energy in the future is at risk due to contmually escalating nuclear generation costs. In order for nuclear energy to remain a viable energy source in the future, the impact on generating costs of the regulatory enviro in which it currendy operates must be renaml4 To assure the continued safe and reliable operation of nuclear energy plants in a cost effective manner, the overall regulatory environment, including the practices of the NRC and its licensees, must reevalueted to ensure that they serve their intended purposes effectively. That will enable licensee resources to be redirected to safety-significant or operationally.important issues, or for unnecessary costs to be reduced.
The NRC bas acknowledged that it has the responsibility to require only those measures that reasonably contribute to an adequate level of nuclear safety and has initiated actions to review its regulations to eliminate unnecessary requirements which do not provide corresponding safety benefit. In an address to the NUMARC Board of Directors, NRC Chairman Selin described the status of the initiative that the NRC has undertaken and,in recognition of the nuclear energy industry's knowledge and experience in the operations and management of nuclear power plants, requested tha the nuclear industry provide specific examples of regulations and regulatory processes which have unnecessarily increased costs to licensees without a commensurate safety benefit.
De industry has conducted an initial review of existing regulations and regulatory processes to identify such areas. The results of that initial review, and associated recommendations for Commission action, are the subject of this submittal and summarized below. The primary propose of this response is to identify areas and provide data where expedited actions can be taken on important near term issues the NRC and the industry. In addition, this response identifies several longer-term issues where timely action needs to be taken in the near future. In each area, recommendations were developed to facilitate npeditious Commission action to climinate or modify those regulations or practsces that do not serve their intended purpose.
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NEAR TERM ISSUES De following near term issues are regulations and regulatory processes that unnecessarily increase costs without corresponding safety benefit and where sufficient data exist to take immediate action to correct the situation without further study or analysis.
FitnewFor. Duty (FFDi - (Attachment 1)
De nuclear er industry has acquired three years of asperience in the regulations, ne industry has concluded that the cunent implementation of regulations often exceed what is necessary to provide reasonable assurance of freedom from drugs or alcohol, or are in conflict with related requirements in other NRC regulations. Based upon this arperience and the knowledge gained from implementing.
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the requirements, the industry has developed a number of recommendations for the modification of those regulations. Rose recommendations fall in two major categories:
- (1) where implementation experience has identified areas where clarification is warranted or changes should be made to more effectively achieve the intended purposer and (2) where modification is appropriate to elladnate conflicts with related requirements established in the access authorization regulations, or to bring the nuclear power industry's FFD program into alignment with programs in other comparable industries.
De major FFD issues of concern are described in At9= ant 1. The appendices to Attachment 1 provide copies of prior correspondence describing other issues of importance. De 14 major issues addresse.d are the following:
Reducing the rate of random testing to 50 percent of the total plant work force for all personnel who have unescorted access;.
Modifying the definition of " suitable inquiry" to include a time period for updating that is consistent with the access authorization rule; Modifying the rule's application to personnel who have infrequent or periodic unescorted access; Extending the refresher training interval from annual to biennial and eliminating the 6May retraining requirement; Modifying the rule to be consistent with the access authorization rule for persons responsible for administering FFD testing programs; Authorizing an " alcohol only" for cause test in speci6c circumstances; -
Modifying the requirement for subminion of FFD data from indMdual sites to the utility and from semi annual to annual reporting; Eliminating the second breath test for alcohol when the first test is -
negative; 2
Modifying the preaccess testing requirements to allow eculvalency for personnel who have been subject to random testing with a the past 60 days; Extending the FFD program audits from annual to biennial; l
Modifying the rule to clarify FFD record retention requirements; Clarifying requirements for follow-up testing after a first confirmed positive i
drug testt Deleting the requirement for licensees to audit HHS-certi6ed laboratodes; 1
and Eliminating three unnecessary proposed changes to Part 26 resulting from NRC staffs perceived FFD program shortcomings.
Security - (Attachment 2)
Seven revisions to 10 CFR Part 73 have been recommended.
b;ing the regulation into line with the current security environment, which has rignificantly since the design basis threat concept was initially promulgated i recommended changes will also reduce unnecessary administrative burdens ass with the implementation of these requirements.
1 First, the industry is recommending that the design basis threat be reassessed to l
correctly relate to the current radiological sabotage threat. Even though signi5 ca i
terrorism has been experienced in other countries, security requirements for overseas plants are far less prescriptive than NRC requirements. De Conunission is st i
encouraged to avail itself of the cunent assessment by federal intelligence gathering l
agencies of the terrorism potential at U.S. commercial nuclear power plants.
j De industry is also recommending the removal of the following six administrative i
l requirements that have proven to provide no measurable bene 6t to safety:
l the requirement to maintain vital area door locks; l
posting a guard at any containment entrance to monitor access of j
personnel and material; the requirement that all vehicles be escorted by a member of the security I
organization while in the protected area; i
the requirement that armed, on-duty security guards be searched before re.
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entry into the protected area; the requirement for security events to be reported before confirmation: and j
the requirement for quarterly submittal of safeguards events logs.
4 Elimination of these portions of the regulation could be done immediately to eliminate
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unnecessary, unrealistic, or overly burdensome requirements.
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Emereenev D!esel Generator (mO) RahMllev. (Attachment 3)
Generic hsue B 56. EDG Reliability, was identi5ed by the NRC in 1977, and an objective was established of improving EDG reliability to a level of 0.95. Industry pedormance data demonstrates that an average EDG re to maintain either a 0.95 or a 0.975 reliability level, based upon the coping assessment conducted as pan of the implementation of the station blackout rule, la light of this demonstrated perfonnance and the industry program for monitoring and maintaining EDG reliability that has been establish 6d nad efectively implemented in order to ensure that industry performance continues to escoed a reliability rate of 0.95, the inoustry recommends that Generic hsus B-56 be closed and tha. no further rulemaking or othe t
regulatory action be taken.
The industry has implemented an initiative to address NRC concerns regarding an individual EDG that exhibits poor performance. However, many licensee technical specifications still require that accelerated testing programs be conducted, notwithstanding conclusive evidence that accelerated testing is detrimental to EDG performance, reliab!11ty and availability. Continued accelerated testing is unnecessa and requires the significant expenditure of limited industry resources without any measurable added benefit to public health and safety. Expedited relief from current accelerated testing requirements is requested.
Radiation Protection - (Attachment 4) 10 CFR Part 20,
- Standards for Protection Against Radiation." was issued in May 1991. To date, many other NRC regulations and regulatory guidance containing radiation protection standards and criteria prunanly applicable to nuclear power plants (e.g., Part 50) have not yet been revised to be consistent with the current revisions to Part 20. IJeensees will be required to maintain and operate with a dual system of radiation protection concepts and methods until such tims as standards and guidance are made consistent with the revised Part 20, which wiu result in impacts unique to' nuclear -
plant licensees without any appreciable beneSt to public health and safety. Hav different systems for computing dose projections if an emergency were to occur could potentially lead to confusion of off site ofBelais and the public. Currently, an NRC.
generic letter is being developed to provide guidance to licensees on making applicatio for needed conforming changes to technical specifiestions. This approach win impact-industry and NRC staff resources during the preparation, submittal, review and associated inuance of license amendments. The draft generic letter should be inued for public comment as soon as possible and NRC priorities established to assure timely implementation of the proposed actions. Further, the industry recommends that the NRC pursue expedited rulemaking to allow licensees to defer the changes to technic speciDcations until 10 CFR Part 50 and related regulatory guidance are updated.
L L
n Piecemeal or uncoordinated effons in rulem*Ma!, development of guidan implementation of requirements pose unnecess 1
guidance must be revirr4 in a planned and coordinated manner to c
throughout NRC radiation protection standards. Schedules should be l
provide for correct, effective and effielent implementation.
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_ Routine and Periodic Reports to NRC. (Attarhment 5)
As a result of regulations or as part of technical specifications, licensee currendy required to submit a large number of routine and periodic re l
Many of these repons are duplicative or request information that is ne
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could be eliminated or reduced in scope without any impact on safety or l
ability to analyr.e safety significant information.
l nc industry recommends that the' NRC develop a set of criteria for data i
j collection and review all reporting requirements in relation to those criteria. H subsequent elimination or rcstructuring of certain reports would result in reporting requirements that are properly focused on information tha i
l thus necessary to be reported. Current ongoing activities, which are addre L
reporting requirements but without the benefit of l
l is consistently applied in determining the need for pertinent information to b 4
i 10 tt K Part 50. Annendir 1 Containment taak Rate Teuine. (Att i
De NRC is currendy considering a revision to 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix J.
l which contains both clarifications of cairrent requirements and new requiremen will, in some cases, unnecessarily increase occupational exposure and co increase utility implementation costs without a corresponding increase in saf industry recommends that leak rate testing requirements be established on performance basis, similar to the approach being taken in the NRC j
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4 nndientinn of Commereimi Grade Items - (Attachment 7)
I ff De current provisions of 10 CFR Part 21 relating to the dedication of commercial grade items for use in safety related applications, and the associ reponing requirements for manufacturers, suppliers, and sub tier suppliers l
ineffective and cause unnecessary delays in obtaining equipment or replacemen needed for use as basic components. These provisions, therefore, may ina 4
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the potential to adversely affect safe operation of nuclear power plants as well as unnecessarily increasing casu.
De industry recommends that Part 21_be revised to make it more practicable and to assure that it does not inadvertendy interfere with safe plant operations. Changes to Part 21 are proposed in three areas:
the replacement of the existing definition of commercial grade items with a more practicable de6aition; the inclusion of a nexible generie proosas for dedication of commercial grade items for safety-related use; and the clarification that the antity F.;ie.. Ling the dedication of a commercial grade item is responsible for discovering, evaluatlag and reporting deficiencies pursuant to Part 21 requirements.
ne industry intends to file a petition for rulemaking to request that Part 21 be appropriately modified, as described above, to accommodate the current procurement emironment in a way that will not adversely impact plant safety.
Adontion of 1meroved Standard hhnlemi Enaciflendant. (Attachment 8) 4
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ne NRC and the nuclear industry efforts to develop _ improved standard technical specifications have now been completed and those technical specifications are no to be implemented. However, under current regulatory requirements, licensees electin to adopt the improved standard technical speci6 cations must obtain a license amendm pursuant to 10 CFR 50.91. Because of the nature of the current liccasing process, significant and unnecessary resources must be expended by licensees and the NRC on duplicative license amendment reviews to enable the standard technical speci6 cations be adopted.- his impedes the achievement of the goals to irnprove plant technical specifications.
De industry recommends that a new section be added to the regulatory process for license amendments to facilitate the adoption of the standard technical specificetions.
ne industry intends to file a petition for rule =*iag that will recommend an additional subsection be added to i 50.91 to establish a new regulatory process for the adoption of the improved standard technical specifications. De proposed additions would provide a stmetured, predictable and administratively efUcient process that would promote the -
l adoption of the improved standard technical specifications.
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IDNGER TERM ISSUES
%e following are longer term issues where efforts need to be commenced in the near future to effect positive change in a timely manner:
Indeoendent Knent Fuel Starsee Inten11mdant (TMFitg). (Attachment 9)
Physical security requirements for ISF$is, as speci6ed by 10 CFR Part 72, impose an excessive burden on licensee resources with no commensurate safety bene 8t because they do not reflect probable effects of credible acts of radiological sabotage. Umited licensee resources are unnecessarily spent procuring, operating, maintaining, and testing security equipment that provides marginal safety beneSt.
Current activities are underway in the NRC to revise the safeguards requirements for ISFSis. In doing so, the industry recommends that the NRC ensure that it realistically evaluates credible security threats and establishes required security measures accordingly. 'The revised requirements should be applied on a consistent basis for al!
ISFSIs, regardless of whether the facility is under the jurisdiction of the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation or the Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards. -
The review schedule of the likely consequences of radiological sabotage to ISFSis and the revisions to the physical security provisions of Part 72 to make it consistent with credible threats should be accelerated in order to reduce the significant resource burden that current regulations impose without realistic justification.-
Rerulattom Marcinni to Rmfety. (At:schment 10)
The NRC is cunently underiaking efforts to identify, assess, and eliminate regulatory requirements that have a marginal importance to safety and yet impose a significant regulatory burden on licensees. De review currently includes the following regulations:
10 CFR Part 50, Appendix J Contaimnent leak Rate Testing 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix R Fire Protection 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix B - Quality Assurance 10 CFR 50.44
. Combustible Gas Contro!
10 CPR 73.55 - Security.
10 CFR 50.49 - Environmental Qualisation Post-Accident Sampling Systems (NUREG 0737 and Regulatory Guide 1.97) 10 CFR 50.54(f) - Requests for Information :
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The regulations should initially be prioritized in terms of cost impact ai The NRCs safety goal policy statement and Prin l
based and/or performance based approaches to the regulations, in add should consider not only the regulations themselves but also the associat i
documents and processes that effect the haplementation of the regulations. An l
expeditious plan of action, including milestones and schedules, sho i
the modification or elimination of these regulations to enable unwarranted burd industry or NRC resources to be atiminated promptly. The goal should b j
i all necessary changes by 1995, i
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Rerulatory Threshold - (Attachment 11)
In recent years, the Commission, the Advisory Cn=mi ee on Reactor Saf tt and the NRC staff have become interested in various concepts, such as risk ba perionnance based regulations, that have been developed to impro l
of the Commission's safety goal policy (SGP). These activities have promise b l
not yet met with success because of the broad and detaued considera l
Methods must be established to effectively implement the objectives of the S and apply, where appropriate, the concepts of risk based and/or performan regulation. These methods should include extensive j
and deterministic, conservative analyses that formed the basis of many of the am i
regulations.
Extensive interaction among the industry, the NRC and the public will be i
necessary to establish a new regulatory threshold. However, based on the experience gained since the cunent body of regulations was adopted,it is j
take the time and expend the resources to examine the status quo and assess how re and public safety can be achieved in a more efficient and effective manner.
l Systematic Assessm nt of Ucentee Perintmance (SAT P) Prorram. (Attachment 12)
On October 20,1992, the industry submitted its views on the SALP program in response to the Commission's request for public comments. A copy of those com is attached. The industry believes that it is in the public interest that an effective and '
i efficient regulatory process, based on objective criteria, be established and *d=M ere t
fairly. The manner in which the SA1.P program is currently administered and u i
should be an important component of the NRCs review of whether the current NRC i
regulations and the associated regulatory environment that have developed i
serve the public interest.
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Conduxion The industry intends to continue to provide its views to the Co==Iulon a reviews regulations and regulatory activities in order to eliminate unnecessa l
associated with NRC regulation while continuing to assure the current high le l
safety. Additional information will be compiled and presented as the ind i
j mature.
In an equally important effort, the nuclear industry is reviewing ways to the manner in which utilities react to and implement NRC regulations and reg 4
processes. As a result of working within the curre i
accede to an NRC staff demand or expectation, regardless of whether it is trul l,
ncccs:ary or provides a signiscant bene 61 to the overall safety of the plant.
viewea on an overall cost basis, the total impact of these decisions is very signific 4
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The industry intends to analyze this situation to astist utilities in more effec carrying out their responsibilities, both as NRC licensees to operate the and to their ratepayers to provide electrical energy at the lowest reasonable cost.
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Furthermore, the industry latends to review the extent to which utility personnel, knowingly or unknowingly, contribute unnecessarily to costs. 'Ibe use of external resources to conduct regulatory work and the effectiveness of special issue groups on regulator issues will also be evaluated. Because licensees bear the ultimate j
responsibility for day to-day plant operations, decisions regarding the most commitment of resources can only be made by the licensee.
j h is expected that this introspective evaluation will be performed both throu 4
f the industry and individually within each utility. As results are compiled, informat will be provided to the Commission for its consideration, where appropriate.
The actions being initiated through these activities are vital first steps to controhg the increasing costs of nuclear generation, without compromising pub l
safety. Though the responsibilities of the NRC and its licensees are much are complementary. Effective communication and interaction between the NR industry is necessary to effect the positive changes the public interest requires.
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