ML20132F525
| ML20132F525 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 09/25/1985 |
| From: | Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards |
| To: | |
| References | |
| ACRS-T-1449, NUDOCS 8510010346 | |
| Download: ML20132F525 (174) | |
Text
I GRIGINAL d*3*f UNITED STA5bS OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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v In the matter of:
ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS Advanced Reactors Subcommittee Docket No.
O a
G Location: Uashington, D.
C.
Date: Mednesday, September 25, 1985 Pages:
1 - 128 gy:
ACRSOFFICECDPY
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lo \\oggggyegglSOFibe Court Reporters f]/
1625 I St.,
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Suite.921 Washington, D.C.
20006 (202) 293-3950 8510010346 850925 PDR ACRS T-1449 PDR
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1 UNITED STATES OF. AMERICA 2
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION t
l' 3
4 ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS 5
ADVANCED REACTORS SUBCOMMITTEE 6
7 Nuclear Regulatory Commission Roora 1046 8
1717 H Street Washington, D. C.
9 to Wednesday, September 25, 1985 11 The subcommittee convened, pursuant to notice, 12 at 8:30 a.m., J. Carson Mark, Acting Chairman, presiding.
13
]
ACRS MEMBERS PRESENT:
14
~
J. C. MARK, Acting Chairman 15 C. SIESS 16 ACRS COGNIZANT STAFP MEMBER:
17 M. EL-ZEFTAWY 18 19 NRC STAFF AND PRESENTERS PRESENT:
20 T. KING F. GAVIGAN 21 K. HERRING C. ALLEN 22 24 25 W
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2 h
~1 PROCEEDINGS 2
MR. MARK:
This meeting will now come.to order.
3 This is a meeting of the~ Advisory Committee on 4
Reactor Safeguards, Subcommittee on Advanced Reactors.
5 I.am Carson Mark, acting as Subcommittec 6
Chairman.
The other ACRS member present today is Chester A
7 Siess.
8 Max-Carbon, who has been the Chairman of this' 9
Subcommittee, regrets that he'can't be here because he has to had some business in China recently.
11 The purpose of the meeting is to discuss the 12 proposed policy for the regulation of advanced nuclear 13 power plants.
14 Medat El-Zeftawy is the cognizant ACRS staff 15 member for this meeting on my right.
16 The-rules for participation in this meeting have 17 been announced as part of the notice of the meeting 18 previously published in the Federal Register on September 19.
the 10th, 1985.
20 A transcript is_being kept and will be made 21 available as stated.in the Federal Register notice.
-It is 22 requested that each speaker, particularly Mr. King, first 23
-identify himself.or herself and speak with sufficient 24 clarity and volume so that he or she can readily be heard.
25 lha have received no written statements from O
3 R
I members of the public and no requests for time to make x_;
2 statements at the meeting.
3 Before proceeding with the meeting, I would 4
suggest that members of the staff, and particularly anyone 5
planning to speak, might be more comfortable if they-would 6
grab one of the chairs on the far side of the table over 7
here so that we can see each other.
8 (Mr. King joins the ACRS members at the table'.)
9 I believe we are going to hear something about the 10 work of the fast reactor group in NRC, the advanced reactor j
11 group, and also about some work that is going on in other 12 agencies.
But our primary purpose is a. war and possibly 13 make comments on the announced policy that the Commission Ld 14 is presumably about to consider.
15 In the draft policy as we had it from, and I have 16 forgotten just how long ago, February, on that there were-I 17 think it was comments from various sources.
These la generally objected to the original proposal to say advanced 19 reactcLa will be safer than present reactors.
That I think 20 has been modified at least in the revised policy.
21 They also seemed fairly uniformly to complain 22 about a tendency, or which they took a tendency of being 23 somewhat prescriptive, and urging that the final policy not 24 have such a property.
25 I guess in reading through what people said and in pl v
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i looking at the' policy as we have it, I was a little 2
. questioning that there was no reference at all to the 3
Commission's plan to issue a safety goal and that advanced 4
policies would be expected to conform to that, advanced 5
reactors would be expected to conform to that, and that 6
that perhaps would have been a way of saying how safe 7
things need to be rather than dictating that they a
necessarily be safer.
9 I mention that only so that you I believe, Mr.
10 King, can have it in mind when your comments come down to 11 discuss the policy itself.
12 Do you have any comments, Dr. Siess?
13 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
As I understand it, the advanced 14 reactor group -- is that the proper name?
^
15 MR. KING:
Yes.
16 MR. SIESS:
--- will be, at least for some time 17 to come,'the portion of the NRC that would be implementing 18 this policy.
19 MR. KING:
Yes.
20 MR. SIESS:
I understand also, and please correct i
21 me,-that the advanced reactor group has not played an 22 active part in developing this policy.
23 MR. KING:
I don't think that is totally true.
24 MR. SIESS:
You have?
25 MR. KING:
Yes, we have.
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MR. SIESS:
Okay.
That may simplify things, 2
because as I read the policy I find a lot of words that I 3.
~just don't understand.
That is, there are words like 4
" simpler," there are words like "more reliable," " inherent 5
safety margin" -- and these are all good words if I could 6
look at the definitions in the dictionary.
7 But one thing I am interested in is what those 8
words mean to the people that will be implementing the 9
policy, and I would hope that you can give us some examples Ic
-of what, or define those in some concrete way, an inherent 11 safety margin, and how that differs from a non-inherent 12 safety margin, or how it differs from a PRA safety margin.
13 And, frankly, I don't understand from reading the
~
14 policy statement what is an advanced reactor.
And, again, 15 I think you could give some examples of what is an advanced 16 reactor and what is not an advanced reactor.
Now is Fort 17 St. Vrain an advanced reactor, is PIUS an advanced reactor, 18 is Clinch River an advanced reactor, is WAGR an advanced 19 reactor?.
' 20 Do you think you can do this in the process?
21 Otherwise, I just have a problem.
There are words here, 22 and I read the public comments and I saw about as many 23 interpretations of the words as you could get.
I am not 24 quite sure what a policy statement means in the NRC.
It is 25 just a piece of paper until somebody starts doing something bU
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2 We have spent in the committee a great number of
-3 man-months in connection with the policy statement on 4
severe accidents chiefly trying to find out what it means, 1
5 and I guess trying to project some concrete examples of 6
what the policy means, and I think here we-have somewhat 7
the same thing, except on a different time scale I guess a
and maybe even a different philosophical level.
9 So to the extent that you could work some of this 10 into your presentation, it would be helpful, and the other 11 is I think I will have some questions as you go along.
12
.Could you tell us briefly somewhere of what input 13 the advanced reactor group and other people in the NRC staff have had as input?
14 15 MR. KING:
Well, maybe I ought to give you the 16 history of the policy statement.
l-17
!!R. SIESS:
Let me explain my problem.
We see is policy statements of various kinds.
The severe accident 19 policy statement of course is being developed clearly i
20 within the EDO's staff, and we have give and take with the l'
21 EDO staff, NRR and Research on what they are doing and so I
l 22 forth.
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23 But policy statements that come out of OPE, we l'
l 24 don't.know how they are being developed because OPE doesn't 25' talk to us.
They talk to the Commission.
That is their l
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l' mission as I understand it.
So here we are sort of in the
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2 dark as to the background.
We see a piece of paper and 3
have no idea of what the input has been, and to this point 4
.in time the ACRS has had none.
So we don't'see the policy 5
statement until it gets to a certain level, and yet we are 6
supposed to Comment on it.
So again a little background 7
helps, or at least it would help me.
8 MR. KING:
All right.
Would you like the 9
background now or when we get to that subject?
10 MR. SIESS:
Whenever the Chairman permits.
11 MR. MARK:
As it would best fit in your plans.
12
_MR. KING:
All right.
MR. SIESS:
Do you want to give some previous --
13 14 whatever you want.
15
!!R. KING:
I was going to in the first part of the 16 presentation to sort of update you on what we have doing 17 and where we see ourselves going in the advanced reactor 18 area and then come to the policy statement.
19 MR. MARK:
It is just fine for you to proceed as 20 you like.
21 MR. SIESS:
Whatever chronology that will help 22 make sense and be most intelligible.
23 MR. MARK:
And include items of that sort when you 24 get to the statement and what you picture as the 25 interpretation of that statement.
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1 On Dr. Siess's point as to what is an advanced 2
reactor, there is certainly an open question from the words 3
that we have.as to when or whether a light-water reactor 4
might be viewed as an advanced reactor even though there 5
are reactors for the immediate future very probably.
6 There is also no reference in connection with 7
.anything I noticed of a heavy-water reactor as to whether a
that is advanced or in mind or anything else.
9 So I guess with those questions in our mind, it to would be best for you to go ahead, Mr. King, and follow 11 your own plans.
There is only two of us.
So it won't take 12 you more than twice as long to present a sentenced as you i3 had thought.
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14 (Laughter.)
is I forgot to mention that if you would be more 16 comfortable talking from the table, but you are okay with 17 the viewgraphs, you are probably better off up there.
Ihi\\jn'tlookatyourviewgraphs,but 18 MR. SIESS:
19 at some point would you tell us who constitutes the 20 advanced reactors group in terms of numbers of people and 21 disciplines, and also where you are going to end up in the 22 reorganization?
l 23 MR. KING:
All right.
Why don't I start off by 24 doing that.
25 Currently the advanced reactor group consists of I
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four professional staff people, myself as the Branch 2
Chief.
My background is mechanical engineer by degree.
I 3
spent most of my time in the liquid metal fast breeder 4
reactor area working for DOE, first at headquarters and 5
then out at Hanford on FFTP and then came to URC three 6
years ago on the Clinch River project.
7 The other three professional members of the group 8
are Cardis Allen, who probably most of you know, Pete 9
Williams, who has a long history of experience in the gas-s 10 cooled reactor area, and Stephen Sands, who is the junior 11 member of our group who has experience at FFTP working for 12 Westingthouse.
He came from the nuclear Navy and has a 13 little bit of experience with Fort St. Vrain.
14 In the new organization we are going to end up as 15 a section in the division headed by Themis Speis.
Our 16 Branch Chief will be Carl Neil.
I don't know what the name 17 of the branch is going to be or the name of the section, 18 but we will retain our function as advanced reactor 19 activities.
20 MR. SIESS:
You are over in the Division of 21 Technology and not in one of the ---
22 MR. KING:
Currently we are in the Division of 23 Safety Technology.
24 MR. SIESS:
But you are not in one of the project 25 directorates?
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MR. KING:
No, we are not in one of the vendor 2
divisions.
3 I expect our number of people in the advanced 4
reactor area won't increase and won't decrease.
It will 5
stay about the same level of people.
Now we draw on other 6
members of the staff as necessary when we get into areas 7
where we need their expertise, and we have had meetings a
already with the advanced reactor designers where we have.
9 brought in other members of the staff from engineering or to the Division of Systems Integration or wherever we need 11 help.
12 The first part of the talk is going update you on 13 what we have done since February, which was the last time la we talked to the subcommittee.
And we have got a better 15 definition how of where we are going and what the concepts 16 look like that currently we are calling advanced reactors 17 and that we have committed to do some interaction with is those designers.
So I thought I would just bring you up to 19 speed in those areas.
20 The first part, I will be talking about what we 21 are done since February of '85.
22 (Slide.)
23 Our major milestones have been in March the 24 Commission issued the proposed policy statement on the 25 regulation of advanced reactors.
That was issued for O
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public comment.
2 We received from DOE a formal plan and schedule 3
for review of an HTGR.
We received that in April, and we 4
received a similar request for liquid metal reactors on 5
July 1st.
6 We have answered both of those requests.
The 7
HTGR, we have responded in July and we just recently 8
responded this month on the liquid metal reactor committing 9
to interact with DOE and follow that plan.
~
10 The other milestone on this slide is in August the 11 HTGR folks transmitted formally what they call their top-12 level regulatory criteria, and I will talk about those in a 13 little more detail as to what they are.
That is sort of
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We have had a lot of 16 discussions and meetings and briefings, but that is the 17 formal one.
18 (Slide.)
19 As far as briefings on issues, we have had on the 20 HTGR in May a briefing on their concept selection status 21 and their method for selecting design basis accidents.
22 Then in the latter part of July there was another 23 briefing on how their concept selection methodology, which 24 is how they have gone through.
They started out with four 25 concepts.
They were looking at how they have evaluated b
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i those and they are narrowing it down to the one concept I 2
will present a little later.
3 On the liquid metal reactor side we have had two 4
technical briefings, one on the station blackout criteria 5
they plan to apply to their plants, and the second for the 6
SAF'R plant, which is the Rockwell design, what they would 7
propose to use for their tornado design basis.
a We have also had discussions on, not formal 9
meeting, but some sort of informal discussions on trying to io identify the key issues we would like to interact on in FY-11 86 in looking at their PSID outline.
That is their 12 preliminary safety information document, which is the i3 primary document they are going generate and we are going
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14 to review here as part of looking at conceptual designs and is future plans and schedule, sort of some working meetings in 16 that area.
17 MR. MARK:
Is their idea of a tornado design basis is in any way different from the way tornadoes are viewed at 19 present?
20 MR. KING:
Yes.
21 MR. MARK:
Do they have more wind or less wind?
l 22 MR. KING:
They want less wind.
What they would 23 like to do is the way tornadoes are applied to light-water 24 reactors.
The country is broken up into three regions and, j
25 depending on what region the plant is in, they have to take O
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the tornado that has a frequency of occurrence of 10 to the 2
minus 7th and apply that wind and that translational speed 3
to the plant.
4 What they are proposing to do is they want to 5
stick with the 10 to the minus 7th, but call it instead of 6
the frequency of the tornado, call it the frequency of 7
exceeding 10 CFR 100 guidelines,.which would then take a 8
tornado of more frequent probability, a less severe' tornado, and then add to it the frequency df causing damage 9
10 to the plant and releasing radioactive material that would 11 exceed 10 CPR 100 guidelines.
12 The staff had trouble with that.
13 MR. MARK:
I can see that you might.
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14 MR. KING:
We gave them a number of alternatives is and considerations to think about and they are going back 16 and thinking about those.
17 MR. SIESS:
That just seems strange to me that 18 somebody is coming in with an advanced reactor design and 19 they want to hassle around with tornado criteria.
20 MR. KING:
Well, we' asked that question, you know, 21 why are you doing this.
And they said well, it is to save 22 money.
Ilow much are you saving?
They said well, one 23 percent of the plant costs they figured.
24 MR. SIESS:
Oh, that is ridiculous.
25 MR. KING:
And we said is that really worth it, o
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I and they felt it was.
That issue is certe.:;nly still open 2
and there will be further discussion on it.
3 MR. MARK :
Well, very interesting.
Go on.
4 MR. KING:
All right.
5 (Slide.)
6 HTGR top-level criteria.
I mentioned we got a 7
formal submittal in that area ---
8 MR. SIESS:
Incidentally, would the advanced 9
reactor policy help you at all on the tornado issue?
10 MR. KING:
No.
That is one area where we called 11 in other members of the staff because my staff has no 12 expertise in tornadoes.
i3 I mentioned we had received a document on HTGR top-14 level criteria.
What the HTGR designers are proposing is 15 trying to extract from the current body of regulations that 16 NRC uses those criteria that really are the most important 17 or the things that the other criteria are trying to strive is to meet, and they primarily deal with radiation releases 19 and protection to the public.
20 What they are proposing is highlighting the 21 guidelines, the criteria of 10 CPR 20, 10 CPR 50, Appendix 22 I and 10 CPR 100, site boundary dose guidelines, the EPA 23 protective action guidelines and the safety goals.
They 24 would like to use these to help guide their design and i
25 would like un to agree that, yes, these are the most
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-1 important things in your design and all the other features
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2 or systems of your design are really focused toward making 3
sure you stay within these top-level goals or criteria.
l-4 That is not to replace the existing body of 5
regulations, but it is to try and focus when we get into a 6
safety issue or design review, to focus on what we are 7
really trying to accomplish.
And they want us to agree 8
that, yes, this is what we are really trying to accomplish.
9 We have that document under review'now and we-10 expect to get an answer.
11 MR. SIESS:
In that list, the part 100 item, that 12 then is essentially the present DBE dose limit approach?
13 MR. KING:
Yes.
mq 14 MR. SIESS:
Now I guess,to use the word " source 15 term" here doesn't have too much meaning if we talk about 16 IITGR's and LMR's because the current source term doesn't 17 really apply to those, does it?
18 MR. KING:
No.
What we use is an issue that has 19 to be decided.
20 MR. SIESS:
But in addition to the part 20 routine 21 releases and the part 50 ALARA, you have now got, not only 22 for advanced reactors, but for existing reactors, we have l
23 got the design basis accident approach and the severe 24 accident approach, the later not being quite as well i
25 defined.
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1 MR. KING:
Yes.
2 MR. SIESS:
And if you think that is an 3
understatement, it is.
The proposal is to maintain that 4
dual health and safety basis, design basis accidents at one 5
level and severe accidents at some other level?
6 MR. KING:
No.
7 MR. SIESS:
No?
8 MR. KING:
In the HTGR-the proposal is to include 9
in the design, include in the selection process of design to basis accidents all those accidents that they feel need to 11 be analyzed.
In other words, there wouldn't be a look at 12 anything beyond that.
13 MR. SIESS:
My point is that the DDE approach is, n
14 and I guess prescriptive isn't the word, but ---
15 MR. KING:
It is deterministic.
16 MR. SIESS:
It is non-mechanistic, deterministic, 17 fairly straightforward, clear-cut and you end up with is certain features in the plant which are necessary to limit 19 the DBE doces, et cetera.
But if you go safety goals with 20 the PRA type approach, you don't find the same 21 requirements.
22 MR. KING:
That is correct.
23 MR. SIESS:
Now are you saying that the safety 24 goal risk type approach will dominate over the DBE 25 approach?
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MR. KING:
In the HTGR area what the designers are 2
proposing is a probabilistic selection process for design 3
basis accidents.
In fact, I have got a viewgraph coming up 4
on that in a little bit.
And we hava only had a very 5
cursory presentation on that subject.
But basically what 6
they plant do is through a PRA type approach select 7
accidents, anything that has a frequency of 5 times 10 to 8
the minus 7th or greater the plant will be designed for.
9 MR. SIESS:
But the acceptance criteria will be 10 what, safety goal type stuff or core melt?
11 MR. KING:
The acceptance criteria wil'1 be this 12 list.
As it turns out ---
13 MR. SIESS:
I know, but the 10 CPR 100 ---
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I 14 MR. KING:
As it turns out, the protective action is guidelines seem to be the thing that is most restrictive.
16 What the HTGk folks want to do is not exceed the PAG's at 17 the site boundary for any accident that is in their design is basis envelope, and they are hoping if they do that to 19 minimize or eliminate the need for offsite evacuation 20 planning.
21 As it turns out, trying to meet that requirement 22 is more restrictive than trying to meet any of these 23 others.
So that really turns out to be the limiting thing, 24 at least in the presentations we have seen so far.
25 MR. SIESS:
And where doen probability comes into l p o
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I that?
2 MR. KING:
Probability comes in in selecting the 3
accidents.
4 MR. SIESS:
In selecting the accidents.
And once 5
you have selected the accidents, then you will have 6
prescriptive guidelines?
7 MR. KING:
Yes.
And then you will have dose a
limits that you have to meet, fixed numbers.
9 MR. SIESS:
See, I can think of examples in light-10 water reactors where requirements to meet part 100 site 11 boundary doses for DBE's turn out to be unimportant if you 12 look at the last two things there.
But you have still got i3 the site boundary doses up there as one of the top-level
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15 MR. KING:
Yes.
These overlap.
These aren't all 16 mutually exclusive.
But those are the ones that seem to ---
17 MR. SIESS:
Actually the third and fourth bullets 18 are just two ways of looking at doses?
19 MR. KING:
Yes.
Now the liquid metal side of the 20 house has taken a different approach at least from what we 21 have heard to date.
They are going the more deterministic 22 mechanistic way, the traditional way of selecting design 23 basis accidents and not doing it on a probabilistic sense.
24, MR. SIESS:
The present way is non-mechanistic.
25 MR. KING:
Or non-mechanistic.
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1 (Laughter.)
2 MR. MARK:
The people to whom you refer as "they" 3
are DOE or DOE plus the gas-cooled ---
4 MR. KING:
It is DOE plus their contractors, which 5
-includes Gas-Cooled Reactor Associates, GA-Technologies ---
6 MR. SIESS:
GCRA is working through DOE.
7 MR. KING:
Yes.
8 MR. MARK:
Now when you come to the liquid metal, 9
it will be again DOE plus Rockwell?
10 MR. KING:
Yes.
Two designs are being pursued in 11 the liquid metal area and both funded by DOE.
One is a 12 Rockwell design, primary lead, and the other is General 13 Electric.
Later on there are some viewgraphs that list all 14 the participants in those particular designs.
15 MR. MARK:
Yes.
Anyway, it is DOE plus such a 16 group, and the difference in approach to accidents or i
17 design basis accidents, the one being probabilistic, which is is what is referred to here.
Is that a difference amongst 19 people in DOE or a difference amongst as between the 20 contracting groups?
21 MR. KING:
!!y understanding is it is more a l
22 difference between the contracting groups.
l 23 MR. MARK:
The Gas-Cooled Associates think that is 24 how they would like to see it done.
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Yes.
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1 MR. MARK:
Them plus whoever else.
Okay.
2 MR. SIESS:
Do you have any intent or hope of 3
getting the top level criteria down to one set rather than 4
dealing with two different sets?
5 MR. KING:
What do you mean by two different sets?
6 MR. SIESS:
Well, you said the LMR people are 7
-coming up with a different approach.
Is there any hope of 8
ending up with a single approach to public health and 9
safety?
10 MR. KING:
I have talked to" DOE about this a 11 little bit.
12 MR. SIESS:
I mean in the end it is going to be 13 NRC that sets the criteria for public health and safety and 14 not DOE.
15 MR. KING:
That is right.
16 MR. SIESS:
And my question I guess was then does 17 NRC expect to take one of these two approaches or a third is' approach and end up with a single approach to critoria for 19 public health and safety, or are you just going to deal 20 with whatever the applicant comes in with?
21 MR. KING:
At this point we are going to deal with j
22 whatever the applicant comes in wita.
Taat is our plan.
23 MR. SIESS:
It seems to me that that is a policy l
24 matter that is probably more important than anything I see 25 in the advanced reactor policy.
21 R
L,.,1 1
MR. KING:
As part of the policy they are 2
encouraging this early interaction and encouraging 3
innovative ways of doing designs and looking at 4
regulations.
5 MR. SIESS:
Well, that is design, but we are 6
talking top-level criteria, which.is something the industry 7
has proposed.
And as I understand top-level criteria, it I
8 is a sort of a performance criterion set, which is what 9
this is, and NRC is going to be evaluating designs and 10 approving designs and issuing licenses based on some set of 11 criteria relating to public health and safety that 12 presumably they can explain to the public.
I don't quite 13 see how NRC can end up with two sets of criteria.
p, i'"
14 MR. KING:
Well, maybe I gave a bad answer to that 15 when you said that the first time.
No are not going to i
16 come up with two sets of criteria.
17 MR. SIESS:
It is your intent to end up with one.
la MR. KING:
Our intent is to end up with one and a 19 develop a framework that would be consistent.
20 MR. SIESS:
Now you are willing to look at what 21 anybody proposes, but when you end up you are going to have 22 one set.
l 23 MR. KING:
We are going to have one set.
Now, as 24 I said, these criteria are not being proposed to replace i
25 what is currently the NRC process or criteria that we use F=?
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i in reviewing a plant.
They are really proposed from the 2
standpoint of trying to get agreement that this is really 3
what we are shooting for in terms of the ultimate goal of 4
the design.
5 MR. SIESS:
Well, I have no objection to some 6
criteria that would replace what we have got because the 7
set we have got now has gotten to be pretty messy.
It has 8
evolved and, you know, part 20 goes back God knows how far, 9
.and part 100 in the EPA guidelines is two ways of looking 10 at the same thing.
The safety policy and safety goals and il severe accident policy is another way of looking at stuff 12 we thought we had built in.
13 MR. KING:
Our intent is not to ---
14 MR. SIESS:
In fact, I don't see anything holy or is much less good about the present set of criteria because 16 because we have them.
17 MR.. KING:
Our intent is not to throw those out l
18
.though and not to start with a clean sheet of paper and 19 develop some new regulatory process of criteria.
It is to 20 build upon ---
21 MR. SIESS:
This is a great time to do it though.
22 I mean here you have got a bunch of prescriptive criteria, 23 and that may be an overstatement, but there is a bunch, I 24 know that, and they are fairly prescriptive.
25 liow if you really wanted performance criteria, you O
23 1
would look at your. prescriptive criteria and say now what 2
level of performance do these prescriptive criteria 3
achieve, and say that is either acceptable or not or maybe 4
we want it better or maybe not.
I think the decision is 5
that level-is okay, we don't want them safer necessarily.
6 And then say, all right, if this is what all of our 7
prescriptive criteria have achieved, can't we state that 8
achievement as a performance criteria and let people work 9
at it from there.
Now that is what performance criteria 10 are, isn't it?
Il MR. KING:
Yes.
I have no objection with what you 12 said.
I don't look at our ---
13 MR. SIESS:
But you say you really don't want to 14 change the current part 20 and part 507 15 MR. KING:
These type of criteria we consider are 16 applicable to any plant, whether it is an HTGR or liquid 17 metal reactor.
We have no intention of coming in and 18 changing these.
~
19 The thing we are going to change are the 20 prescriptive criteria that have been developed for light-21 water reactors that now don't apply or need to be changed 22 for a different type of plant.
That we figure is our main 23 mission to go and identify those and week them out and put 24 in something that makes sense for a liquid metal plant or 25 an llTGR.
C L
24 r~
(_)T 1
MR. SIESS:
Now when you used the word 2
" prescriptive criteria" there you meant in terms of design?
3 MR. KING:
In terms of design.
4 MR. SIESS:
And I am talking about criteria.
5 Well, let's go ahead and I will try and focus my comments 6
somewhere else.
7 You see, just the fact that you said one of those a
governs suggests that they don't all necessarily still need 9
to be there.
The EPA protective guidelines will protect ~
10 the health and safety of the public and maybe we don't need 11 part 100.
12 MR. KING:
One of them governs if you choose to 13 apply that in a certain way.
If you choose to say my site
()
14 boundary dose guidelines are never going to exceed the EPA 15 PAG's, then that governa, and light-water plants don't 16 choose to say that.
But the HTGR folks ---
17 MR. SIESS:
I am talking about what you choose and I
18 not what they choose when you end up with your final set of 19 top-level criteria, l
l 20 MR. KING:
If we chose to say that you have to l
21 meet those, then they would govern.
22 MR. SIESS:
Why is that a top level and we talk 23 about the bottom line on a PRA?
It seems to me they are 24 the same thing.
One is at the top and one is at the 25 bottom.
(O
_/
r 25 m
t,)
1 MR. KING:
Maybe this is a circular process and r
2 they come back to the same thing.
3 (Laughter.)
4 MR. SIESS:
I will buy that.
We are back where we 5
started from I think.
6 (Laughter.)
7 (Slide.)
8 The HTGR top down approach.
This is just a short 9
-description of how the HTGR folks have gone through their 10 design selection process.
They started with four concepts 11 a year ago and they are now down to one.
They way they 12 evaluated those concepts and end up with their one is 13 basically starting with top-level goals on their design, mm I) 14 things like availability, the cost advantage they want to is meet, the frequency of probability of a loss of the plant, 16 meeting certain dose guidelines and enveloping 80 percent 17 of the U.S. sites in terms of tornado and earthquake and 18 that kind of thing.
19 MR. SIESS:
Did they give up on California?
20 MR. KING:
I am not sure what they give up on, but 21 their SSE is.3 G.
So there are probably parts of
~
22 California that they are going to give up on.
23 MR. SIESS:
Maybe part of the eastern, too.
24 MR. MARK:
Maybe they are going to keep out of the 25 tornado zone.
lr
26 O)
(_
1 (Laughter.)
2 MR. KING:
But, anyway, they went through and 3
looked at their designs from the standpoint of how well 4
they meet these top-level plant goals that they have and 5
ended up selecting the one which we will get here in a few 6
minutes.
7 MR. SIESS:
Now the 10 to the minus 5 loss of a
plant, that is dictated by economic considerations?
9 MR. KING:
Yes.
10 MR. SIESS:
And not by considerations of the 11 health of the system?
12 MR. KING:
That is right. It is not public health 13 and safety, but economic loss.
-]
14 MR. SIESS:
No, I didn't mean public health and is safety.
There is some thinking I sense that our core melt 16 probability for light-water reactors should take into 17 account the fact that another TMI would shut all the plant's is down, and it would be an economic loss far beyond the 19 single plant.
20 MR. KING:
Yes.
21 MR. SIESS:
Now is that thinking at all in here, 22 do you know, or is that just simply the loss of investment 23 to one utility?
24 MR. KING:
That is the loss of investment to one 25 utility.
That is the number that they have arrived at that (l
tj A
l
27 1
they feel is acceptable.
2 MR..SIESS:
And not the trauma of the public.
3 MR. KING:
Not the trauma of the public.
4 MR. MARK:
Nor of the industry.
5 MR. KING:
Nor of the industry >
6 MR. SIESS:
One causes the other.
7 (Slide.)
I 8
MR. KING:
We have already hit on this, the.HTGR 9
method for selecting design basis accidents, a 10 probabilistic' approach where they have a cut-off in terms 11
.of probability and uncertainties are factored in by looking i
12 at the uncertainty range on the frequency, and if the i
13 uncertainty range causes it to fall below the cut-off, then
'2 14 it gets included in the design basis accident envelope.
- 15 MR. SIESS:
Now this is the frequency of an 16 accident and not of an initiator?
This is what, frequency 17 of a core melt?
18 MR. KING:
No, frequency of an initiator.
19 MR. SIESS:
This is the frequency of an initiator?
l l
20 MR. KING:
Yes.
j 21 MR. SIESS:
And it only deals with frequency and l
22 not with consequences?
(
23 MR. KING:
Well, consequences are looked at ---
24 MR. SIESS:
Could you give me an example?
i 25 MR. KING:
Maybe I should have brought another fm
(_J i
e a-
l l
i 28 l
l
,o-
' (,)-
i viewgraph.
When they look at the initiator and they look 2
at the sequence that leads to a release, they calculate
-3 what that.means in terms of site' boundary dose rates as far 4
as staying below their protective action guidelines at the l.
s site boundary.
6 MR. SIESS:
I thought you said earlier that this L
7 was selecting the accidents, but calculating the l-8 consequences to where they. met the protective action 9
guidelines was another step.
This was a substitute for 10 selecting DBE's.
11 MR. KING:
This is a method that they are using to 12 select their design. basis accidents.
13 MR. MARK:
And "X" is tentatively pointed at as 5
~
times 10 to the minus 7th?
14 15 MR. KING:
That is the number we have heard 16 verbally.
We have received nothing formally on this.
That 17 is why-I put an "X" in there.
f 18 MR. SIESS:
But I am still conftised because one
~.
19 thing I hear you saying is that the plant will be designed 20 and sited in such a way that there is less than 5 times 10 21 to the minus 7th probability of naving an accident that 22 will exceed the protective action guidelines.
Now that 23 would-be a top-level criteria.
But this says selecting accidents and the other is
_24 25 a bottom line.
This is the beginning when you' select the s
- _ _,.. - _ _. - -. _., _ - -. ~., _. _.,,,.. -. - - _ -, -.. _. -. _ -
l 29 l
3 I
accidents.
a; 2
MR. KING:
I don't think I said before that one of 3
the top-level criteria was the 5 times 10 to the minus 7th 1
4 of exceeding PAG's.
5 MR. SIESS:
You didn't, but explain again what j
6 this means. -I.said does it include consequences, and you l
l 7
said yes.
This says includes all accidents which have a 8
frequency of say 5 times 10 to the minus 7th or greater.
Now if there are 20 such accidents that have that 9
l 10 frequency, then the probability of an accident that would L
l 11 exceed the protective action guidelines is 20 times --
12 well, I am trying relate the selection of the accidents to lt.
13 the acceptability criteria, and I don't see what the
~ 14 relation is.
I am missing something.
15 MR. KING:
I will explain it as I understand it.
I 16 They will go through a PRA type approach and identify a 17 number of accidents.
18 MR. SIESS:
A PRA on a plant design.
19 MR. ' KING:
On a conceptual design.
20 MR. SIESS:
Okay, difficult, but I will buy it.
-21 MR. KING:
All right.
And there will be a range l
22 of uncertainties associated with it in terms of probability
.y:
23 of each of those.
Any of those accidents that are 5 times 24 10 to the minus 7th, or whatever the final number is they
_25
. choose, or more frequent they will. include in their design pmt d
1 l
30
,m i)
I basis.
m 2
MR. SIESS:
Now suppose you can change the design 3
slightly and eliminate an accident and now what happens?
4 MP. KING:
Then it will drop out.
I am assuming 5
it will drop out, but we haven't gotten to that point yet.
6 MR. SIESS:
So it is no longer a design basis 7
accident that you designed for.
8 MR. KING:
If you do something to the design that 9
now makes it less probable, it is no longer a design basis 10 accident.
11 MR. SIESS:
So everything that is left is a design 12 basis accident?
13 MR. KING:
Everything that is left is a design J
14 basis accident.
Now when they take ---
15 MR. SIESS:
And somehow I can get from that to the 16 probability of exceeding the PAG's?
17 MR. KING:
Well, when they take that accident and is they calculate what the consequences are, they look at that 19 and see does that exceed the PAG's or doesn't it exceed the 20 PAG's.
If it exceeds the PAG's, then they know they have 21 to do something in their design to make sure it doesn't 22 either by changing the accident frequency or mitigating the 23 release.
In that sense it brings in consequences.
24 MR. SIESS:
I guess what I am confused with is 25 right now design basis accidents is something you take as a O(m
31 n
L,,j 1
basis for design and after you design'you analyze ~it.
2 Anyway, okay.
~
3 MR. KING:
What this viewgraph represents ls 4
probably a half hour or an hour presentation on this 5
subject that we have received.
6 MR. SIESS:
Which we will get sometime I guess.
7 MR. KING:
We eventually are going to get a formal 8
submittal on this.
We are going to get further briefings 9
on it, and in fact one of the questions I am going to have 10 for you is what are the issues that you would like to get 11 plugged in on later on, and this may be one of them.
12 MR. SIESS:
What is the second item up there?
13 MR. KING:
Oh, that is our uncertainties.
Like I l, ;
14
-said, there is an uncertainty range when they come up with is a frequency of an accident.
There is an uncertainty r
16 associated with that.
If the uncertainty causes that 17 accident to fall within the band of 5 times 10 to the minus 18 7th, then that accident is included.
19 MR. SIESS:
Five times 10 to the minus 7th in the 20 band, and I assume that the 5 times 10 to to the minus 7 is 21 some kind of a point estimate.
22 MR. KING:
23 MR. SIESS:
So what I don't know is that once I 24 have stated a point estimate what I then do with 25 uncertainties.
Now if you are saying that the 5 times-10
. V
32 I) i to the minus 7 is a 90 percent confidence limit, then that 2
is affected by uncertainties, but the point estimate 3
isn't.
The point estimate is a point estimate.
4 MR. KING:
Is it a point estimate with a band of 5
uncertainty around it.
6 MR. SIESS:
I don't know how uncertainties are 7
included.
8 MR. KING:
All I am trying to say is that when you 9
come up with a number for the probability of an accident, io there is some uncertainty associated with that number.
If 11 you take the extreme end of the uncertainty band and it 12 causes that number to be less than 5 times 10 to the minus 13 7th, then it is included in ---
('_J' 14 MR. SIESS:
Now wait a minute.
The extreme end of 15 an uncertainty, if it happens to be log normal, is infinite 16 at one end, if it is normal, it is infinite at both ends, 17 and in either case you have to know the distribution and 18 nobody has come up with a distribution yet.
They have just 19 come up with estimates of a distribution.
So you can't 20 talk about the extreme ends.
You can talk about five L
21 Percentile if you know the distribution.
22 MR. KING:
Yes.
23 MR. SIESS:
And then 5 times 10 to the minus 7th 24 at 95 percent confidence is tremendous, but ---
~
25 MR. MARK:
It is definable.
O I
l
33'
)p 1
'MR. SIESS:- It is definable, but incredible.
s,4
-2 There is something missing there.
3 MR. MARK:
I was going'to remark on the same 4
point, but not as deeply as Chet has, that we are going 5
sometime, if that viewgraph remains as it is, to need a 6
half hour or an hour presentation on Item 2.
7 MR. KING:
I suggest we schedule a session 8
sometime on this whole subject of how they are selected and 9
how the certainties are treated.
10 MR. SIESS:
Well, that is.a major item and the il
,other major item is the. uncertainty of a PRA based on a 12 conceptual design.
It has uncertainties on top of 13 uncertainties.-
We have enough trouble with PRA's when they
_q 14 have got an actual plant sitting out there.
15 MR. KING:Yes.
16 MR. MARK:
Or a tornado.
17 MR. KING:
Well, the main reason: I made this 18 viewgraph up was to let you know that there is a different 19-method they are using to try and select design basis 20 accidents.
I didn't intend to defend it or explain it in 21 detail because it hasn't been explained in detail to me
~
22 yet. But the concept that they are using the probabilistic 23 approach is what I wanted to get across.
24 MR. SIESS:
I think you hit a point that very 25 clearly we would like to hear more from somebody on later,
34
'()
i and I don't think an hour is going to be long enough.
2 (Laughter.)
3 MR SIESS:
Depending on who is here, the i
4 unsophisticated are going to tend to take longer and the 5
sophisticated will take even longer.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. MARK:
If you have both Okrent and Lewis here, a
you had better give it two hours.
9 (Laughter.)
10 MR. KING:
All right.
We will schedule some time 11 in'the next year.
In fact, it might be fairly soon since 12 this is one of the first topics that we are going to hit.
13' MR. SIESS:
It is an important. issue.
14 MR. KING:
It is an important issue.
~
MR. SIESS:
It is philosophical in its policy and 15 16 it can help a lot in our thinking about these things.
17 MR. MARK:
And it is not clear that it is wrong.
is It is just clear that it is difficult.
19 MR. SIE$S:
It is not wrong.
20 MR. KING:
It is different.
That is the point I 21 wanted to get across.
22 (Slide.)
23 All right, LMR station blackout criteria.
We had two technical sessions fon ligtjid metal reactors.
One was 24 25 on what they proposed to use for station blackout
35 R
L_)
I criteria.
I listed the five main ones here.
2 What they are proposing to use is consistent with what the staff has developed in terms of the policy in a 3
4 draft reg. guide for station blackout.
We didn't find any 5
problem in the station blackout area with the liquid metal 6
reactors with what they are proposing to use.
7 MR. MARK:
What do they mean by blackout?
Do they 8
mean blackout or loss of offsite power?
9 MR. KING:
Loss of offsite and onsite AC power.
10 MR. MARK:
Loss of all AC power.
Il MR. KING:
Loss of all AC power, except credit is 12 given if there is a dedicated diesel or power supply that 13' is not connected in with the normal emergency diesel l2 14 generators.
The staff gives credit for that as well in 15 their application of this to lient-water reactors.
But 16 with the natural convection capability of liquid metal 17 reactors, they can go well beyond eight hours, which is the is maximum the staff is requiring in light-water plants.
19 MR. MARK:
You are counting on batteries?
20 MR. KING:
Batteries'are assumed to be available.
21 (Slide.)
22 MR. SIESS:
This is simply looking at the 23 differences in what has to be accomplished in the blackout 24 period in the LMR versus an LWR?
25 MR. KING:
Yes.
O]
Im
l 36
()
1 MR. MARK:
Yes.
2 MR. SIESS:
And the eight-hour figure in the last 3
bullet is one of the carryovers from the light-water i
- l 4
reactors?
5 MR. KING:
That is the requirement that is applied 6
to light-water reactors.
The LMR's-were evaluated to see 7
that they could meet that requirement.
They could go well 8
beyond that.
9 MR. MARK:
But this does' imply convection cooling?
10 MR. KING:
Natural convection cooling.
11 (Slide.)
12 Tornado design basis, we already talked about that-i3 with the SAFR people. We are trying to explore different 14 ways of applying the tornado, and that is still up for 15 discussion..
16 Now I just want to-take a few minutes on the
~
17 status of the DOE HTGR and LMR concepts.
la (Slide.)
19 Back in February you heard a status report on 20
' these from the DOE and their contractors.
At that time in 21 the HTGR area they were looking for at four concepts.
They 22
'have now selected their concept, a 350 megawatt thermal 23 modular design, which I will describe in a little more 24 detail here in another viewgraph.
25 MR. SIESS:
They are now down to just that one?
i, 4
-.y.
,_,ew w
~e
,-gg.i.
r.-.
.--,..,,--,,--,m-y,--
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,%.m.--%~,w,,.,v._we,----,-,,,,,-,.,..,,,y-----.--,,3.
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37 1
MR. KING:
Down to just that one.
2 MR. SIESS:
PCRA has dropped the big one 3
completely?
4 MR. KING:
The big ones have been dropped 5
completely.
6 DOE is looking at two liquid metal reactors, one 7
they call the power reactor inherent safety module prism, 8
-for sho rt, a 425 megawatt thermal modular plant, and the 9
second one is the sodium advanced fast reactor, and that is 10 the Rockwell.
11 MR. SIESS:
Do you call that SAPR?
12 MR. KING:
That is called SAPR.
13 MR. SIESS:
That meets the policy statement.
y~q
'2 14 (Laughter.)
15 MR. KING:
By definition.
That is a 900 megawatt 16 thermal. modular design.
17 MR. MARK:
In the HTGR and perhaps in the small 18 liquid metal there is quite a bit of factory kind of-19 construction.
20 MR. KING:
We are trying to get as much factor 21 type construction as possible.
22 MR. SIESS:
That is the essence of modular.
23 (Slide.)
24 A little more detail on the HTGR concept.
25
'The designers organizations are listed at the top, f*?
V.
1 38 I
i GA Technologies with Stone and Webster, Bechtel, Combustion 2
Engineering and GE supporting them.
GCRA is not really a 3
design' organization.
They are sort of the utility voice in 4
the whole' thing.
So I didn't list them up there.
3 It is a 350 megawatt thermal and 140 megawatt 6
electric modular design with the reactor vessel and steam 7
generator located below grade.
8 It is a steel reactor vessel concept.
9
~It has a steam generator external from the 10 vessel.
n It is an annular core with prismatic fuel blocks, 12 which would be very similar to the Fort St..Vrain fuel 13 blocks.
s u
One steam generator and one loop per module.
15 One turbine generator for every three or four 16 modules.
17 They are proposing.a confinement building only and 18 no containment.
I think that is an issue we may want to 19 have a separate session on someday.
20 A passive decay heat removal system.
21 We are proposing a non-safety grade balance of 22 plant, and exactly where we draw the line between safety 23 and non-safety is not too clear yet, but things like the 24 steam system and feedwater system we are proposing would 25 not be safety grade.
O
39 F~7 L_J 1
And a 40-year module lifetime.
2 MR. SIESS:
Now have they settled on the 3
prismatic?
4 MR. KING:
Yes.
5 MR. SIESJ.
And they have dropped the ---
6 MR. KING:
They have very recently dropped the 7
pebble bed.
8 MR. MARK:
Has Fort St. Vrain got a containment or 9
confinement?
10 MR. KING:
A confinement.
11 MR. SIESS:
But the ACRS said the next one had to 12 have a containment because it was expected to be bigger and 13 not as cood a site.
I will have to go back and look at
?"l kd 14 that letter sometime.
It is a different committee now.
15 (Slide.)
16 MR. KING:
This is just a cross-section of the 17 modular concept with the reactor vessel over here and the 18 steam generator separated from it, the circulator, the 19 shutdown circulator, the control rods coming from the top, 20 a prismatic fuel design, all below grade.
21 MR. SIESS:
Walk away from it.
22 MR. KING:
Pretty much walk away.
We haven't seen 23 yet what the response would be to an anticipated transient 24 without scram.
I can't really say that that is walk away 25 because I haven't seen how the design behaves under those LD
40
()
i conditions.
But for decay heat removal and station 2
blackout, for example, it is pretty much a walk away 3
design.
4 MR. SIESS:
Are they proposing a backup scram 5
system like' Fort St. Vrain has?
6 MR. KING:
Yes.
The balls or something equivalent 7
to the balls drop.
8 MR. SIESS:- It is redundant and diverse.
9 MR. KING:
Redundant certainly.
How diverse, we to haven't'gotten to that level of detail.
11 MR. SIESS:
Fort St. Vrain is pretty diverse.
12 MR. KING:
Fort St. Vrain's is manual and that is 13 pretty diverse.
14
-MR. SIESS:
Well, it wouldn't have to be, but I 15 mean it is div'erse.
16 MR. KING:
It is diverse, yes.
17 (Slide.)
is This is their core design.
It is an annular 19 concept with the center section just graphite blocks, the 20 fuel out here in the shaded section and then more graphite 21 reflector around the outside and the control rods just 22 inside the fueled region.
Then these are the reserve 23 shutdown system, and that is the backup where the balls go 24 in.
25 MR. SIESS:
What led to the annular, coolability?
O
41 I~~j i
L_
1 MR. KING:
Maybe I ought to let DOS answer that.
2 It was a combination of looking at the economics.
The 3
annular allows them to put in a higher power density so 4
they can get for the same sized vessel more power out of it 5
that led to better economics.
There are tradeoffs on 6
refueling.
Pebble bed has online refueling, but it is 7
complicated and a lot of piping versus the normal 8
refueling.
9 MR. SIESS:
How much of it is safety related 10 then?
Is was mostly economics..
11 MR. KING:
I was not involved in the selection 12 process.
13 Frank, can you say how much of the design was 14 selected for safety reasons versus ---
15 HR. GAVIGAN:
My name is Frank Gavigan from DOE.
16 I manage the LMR designs and the HTGR designs.
We just 17 made the selection of the prismatic fuel, DOE made the 18 selection with the cooperation of GCRA and the reactor 19 designers.
20 The major reasons for selecting prismatic fuel 21 versus the pebble bed were at least three.
22 One was cost, on the basis of cost.
Our cost 23 estimates prepared by all the members of the team showed 24 that the prismatic fuel would come in at something like, 25 oh, a considerable margin over pebble bed, $100 to S200 per f1 v
r l
l 42
,m
!)
i kilowatt.
s 2
The second reason was again some of the major 3
accidents we considered, especially in leakage of water.
4 The prism had a major advantage over the pebble bed.
The 5
shutdown margins were far larger and it was able to respond 6
to major accidents in a better way>
7 A third reason was that in DOE we are now getting a
involved in what we call a prioritization or evaluation 9
process where we are trying to limit in the next couple of to years the number of converter concepts that we will be 11 funding and reviewing and developing.
12 That requires us to set a deadline for when we 13 will make that decision and presently it looks like 1988.
14 That means that if one were to move toward the pebble bed is decision, we would have to put in place agreements with the 16 Germans on obtaining their technology, anticipating that 17 would take one or two years to get an agreement and is considering the patent rights and royalty rights it would 19 take a long time for us to get it in place.
20
!!R. SIESS:
The question was why did you choose 21 the annular core, and not why did you choose the prism.
22 HR. GAVIGAN:
Oh, sorry. I don't know the details 23 on why we chose the annular core.
24 MR. SIESS:
The question was is it safety related?
25 MR. GAVIGAN:
No, I don't think so.
I think it O
v
43 F"1
(_J 1
was power density related, as Tom said, and cost related.
2 MR. SIESS:
I thought it might radidte decay heat 3
a little better to the outside.
4 MR. KING:
I think the annual tends to keep down 5
the centerline fuel temperature, the temperature 6
distribution across here versus ---
7 MR. SIESS:
Yes, that is what I was talking about.
8 MR. MARK:
What is the uranium enrichment in this 9
fuel?
10 MR. KING:
Seventeen percent or 18 percent, low 11 enriched.
12 MR. SIESS:
Is there still a converter?
13 MR. KING:
Yes.
c_
f'"
14 (Slide.)
15 This is just a rough idea of decay heat removal on 16
.this design.
The ultimate means of decay heat removal is 17 radiation conduction and radiation of the heat out to the la reactor vessel, which is then radiated to a reactor vessel 19 cavity cooling system which is cooled by natural convection 20 of air.
It is a totally passive system where air comes in 21 and comes down and outer annulus and then up an inner 22 annulus next to the vessel and out a stack at the top.
23 MR. SIESS:
How far have they gone on selecting 24 the insulation?
25 MR. KING:
I can't answer that.
pq
()
l 44 rn.
(_)
1 MR. SIESS:
I mean that is Port St. Vrain's 2
biggest problem, is insulation that takes up water.
3 MR. KING:
That is in the vessel.
See, their 4
problem is insulation between the PCRV liner and the 5
reactor, which is inside the reactor vessel.
6 MR. SIESS:
But you have no internal insulation?
7 MR. KING:
No internal insulation, and I don't a
think there is even going to be external. insulation.
9 NR. SIESS:
Good.
It has nothing to do with to safety, but it helps to get them operating.
11 (Slide.)
12 MR. KING:
All right, to the liquid metal 13 reactors, the prism concept.
14 Here the lead designer is GE, and they have 15 helping them Bechtel, United Engineers, Byron-Jackson and 16 Foster-Wheeler.
17 The prism concept is a 425 megawatt thermal and is 133 megawatt electric modular design, pool type LMR with 19 the reactor vessel located below grado.
20 It is a homogeneous core design with oxide fuel, 21 but they are still evaluating metal fuel, and that decision 22 hasn't been finalized yet.
21 It is one loop per module.
24 It has got one turbine generator for three 25 modules.
l t
n-t
I 45 P_J 1
One novel feature is it uses the guard vessel not s
2 only as a guard vessel but as part of their containment 3
boundary.
These plants do have containment, but it is a 4
novel.
It is a different shape than the normal 5
containments that you are used to in a light water reactor.
6 It has passive decay heat removal and shutdown 7
systems.
8 It is non-safety grade balance of plant, and again 9
where you draw the line there has not yet been defined.
10 It has got a 40-year module life.
Il This concept utilizes the idea of a demonstration 12 test to facilitate licensing and private sector 13 acceptance.
As part of their plan they.want to build one
'J 14 module and actually run it through its paces, not just for is normal operation and economics, but safety tests as well.
14 MR. SIESS:
All the way to LOFT type 17 demonstration?
18 MR. KING:
The test program hasn't been defined 19 yet, or at least I haven't seen it.
I don't know whether 20 it is going to go to the point of actually losing the plant 21 like LOFT did or whether it will stop short of that.
They 22 will do enough that you can demonstrate that these inherent 23 safety features work and you will actually gain some 24 experience as far construction costs and operation.
25 (Slide.)
pq v
46
(
1 The plant layout typically looks like that.
They 2
have got three of then grouped together that feed to a 3
steam generator building and a turbine building.
They are 4
figuring for a 1200 megawatt site and nine of those 5
modules, and the reactor is down here.
This little circle 6
is where the reactor is down below grade and they have a 7
common refueling machine that runs back and forth.
You a
have got one down being refueled and the others are
~
9 running.
10 MR. SIESS:
Do they have to have nine to make it 11 economical?
12 MR. KING:
I don't know.
Do you know, Frank?
Do 13 they have to have nine modules to make it economical?
O MR.G[VIGAN:
Obviously it is more economic with
\\s 14 15 nine reactors, but there are utilities one foresees out 16 there who would be interested in a clumping of three and 17 then adding three in clumps in time.
18 MR. KING:
There are a lot of economic arguments 19 to go modular.
You only have to build them a little bit at 20 a time and not tie up all your capital.
If you have one 21 down for refueling, the others are still running and that 22 kind of thing.
23 MR. SIESS:
Inherent in that approach of course is 24 complete and stable standardization.
25 MR. KING:
Yes.
47 pa q_j 1
MR. SIESS:
If you build three and five years 2
later want to build another three and five years later want 3
to build another three, they have got to be pretty much the 4
same.
5 MR. KING:
All of these plants, the HTGR and the 6
two LMR's, their long-range plan is to request standard 7
plant approval from the NRC and actually get that design 8
certified by rulemaking process and then just build that 9
. plant, standardization.
10 MR. SIESS:
Because if you are going to have a 11 mobile refueling rig, you can't change some things anyway>
12 MR. KING:
Right.
13 (Slide.)
0,,'
k ~}
/
14 A cross-section of the prism concept.
The core is down here is a pool concept.
The pumps in the vessel are 16 going to use EM pumps. fAnd its ultimate decay heat removal 17 again is passive with air inlets and outlets that come down -
an annulus and then up along the reactor' guard vessel to 18 19 cool the reactor which radiates its heat and conducts its 20 heat out through the sodium pool and radiates it out 21 through the vessel and guard vessel to this air cooling 22 system, a totally passive system.
23 MR. SIESS:
Can I interject a thought while it 24 hits me.
The advanced reactor policy doesn't address spent i
25 fuel or reprocessing, does it?
P~
N_-
t l
l
48 1
MR. KING:
It certainly does not address 2
reprocessing.
It addresses spent fuel.from the standpoint
-3 of you want to be able to cool it in walk away type and 4
inherent type ---
5 MR. SIESS:
The LMR concept, does it involve 6
reprocessing?
7 MR. KING:
The concepts that are being presented a
do not have onsite reprocessing associated with them at 9
this point.
10
'MR. SIESS:
If not onsite, then the transportation 11 issue has to be addressed somewhere.
?
12 MR. KING:
Yes.
Maybe I will let Frank say i3 something about that.
14 MR. GAVIGAN:
Both of these concepts are pursuing 15 the idea of onsite reprocessing and offering to a utility 16
.the capability of building a reprocessing refabrication 17 facility the the reactor itself as well as looking at an 18 alternate offsite reprocessing furnished by the
'i9 government.
They are looking at it from an economic 20 viewpoint, a proliferation viewpoint and marketing l
21 viewpoint, and that is the ---
i l
i 22 MR. SIESS:
When you say both, you mean the two 23 LMR conccpts?
24 MR. GAVIGAN:
Correct.
25 MR. SIESS:
What about the HTGR?
f()
L 1
i
49 1
MR. GAVIGAN:
HTGR is once through.
2 MR. SIESS:
What do you do with the stuff that 3
comes out of it?
4 MR. GAVIGAN:
You store it until who knows.
5 MR. SIESS:
Until somebody comes up with a policy
.6 on HTGR fuel.
MR. GAVIGAN:
Perhaps.
7 8
MR. MARK:
You say it goes in at 17 percent.
9 MR. KING:
Yes.
10 MR.' MARK:
And what does it come out as?
11 MR. KING:
I don't know.
We are still in the i
12 preconceptual stage right now.
We have moved from 16 13 concepts down to one.
The next two years for HTGR's will
_,7 2
'14 be detailed development.
15 (Slide.)
i 16 All right, the last concept, the SAFR concept.
17 The lead designer is Rockwell with Bechtel and 18 Combustion Engineering assisting in that design.
19 A 900 megawatt thermal 350 electric modular 20 design, a pool type LMR.
This one has the reactor vessel 21 and steam generators above grade.
l 22 It is a homogeneous core design with metal fuel as 23 the reference, and they want to retain the capability to 24 also use oxide fuel.
So they are really looking at two j
25 designs.
Jm V
I
()-
1 This has two loops per module.
l 2
One turbine generator per. module.
3 Again, the reactor guard vessel also doubles as a
'4 containment boundary.
5 It has passive decay heat removal and shutdown 6
systems.
f
.7 A non-safety grade balance of plant.
8 And they are looking for a 60-year module 9
lifetime.
10 MR. MARK:
Why is this one above grade and others 11 are belowT 12 MR. KING:
.I think part of the reason is this one 13 is not using a common refueling machine that has to go over 14 all of them.
Well, they are using a common crano that is i
is going to go above all of them.
16 Maybe Frank would want to say something.
17
!!R. GAVIGAN:
I think the major reason wan that is most of the.other concepts that go below ground intend to l
19 utilize seismic isolation approaches, especially the GE
(
20 prism concept.
For this one I believe they found out that 21 that was too difficult a concept to count on and it was l
t l
22 easier to go above ground and there was no real cost-t t
23 benefit for going below ground versus above ground.
This 24 was a decision that was made just recently.
l 25 MR. SIESS:
The prism and the SAPR have quite I
($)
s I
l l
I l
51 7,1 f
L_j i
different thermal efficiencies.
2 MR. KING:
Yes.
I 3
MR. SIESS:
What does that?
l 4
MR. I'ING:
Part of it is the operating conditions 5
that they chose.
I think the prism is a lower temperature, 6
outlet temperature, a lower temperature system.
I imagine 7
the rest may have to do with the number of feedwater 8
heaters and all that that they have.
9 MR. SIESS:
It is the balance of plant.
10 MR. KING:
The balance of plant which I am not 11 familiar with.
12 MR. SIESS:
I mean the prism is working down in an' 13 LWR at 31 percent and the other one is up IITGR or LMPBR.
y,/l k"
14 MR. KING:
Part of the lower temperature concept is is to have a lot of margin between where you are operating 16 and where you get into sodium boiling or fuel temperature, 17 fuel cladding temperature problems.
18 MR. SIESS:
And they are both pools, pool type?
19 MR. KING:
Both pool types.
20 (Slide.)
21 This shows a cross-section of the SAFR plant.
The 22 pumps are in the vessel, the core is located down here, 23 they have a decay heat removal system again with the 24 ultimate one that is cooled by air along the outside of the 25 guard vessel, a natural convection passive type system.
Inb
=.
52 (m-)
i That is all I wanted to say on where the concepts
/
2 stand at this point.
We really haven't gotten into 3
reviewing these in any detail.
We expect in FY-86 to start 4
looking at the major issues and then in FY-87 the PSID's 5
will come in.
6 We will talk here about the future plans and 7
schedule next so you can see what the time frames are.
8 (Slide.)
9 DOE's overall plan is over the next two to three 10 years to have us conduct a review of the conceptual 11 designs.
12 That will include ultimately a review of the 13 preliminary safety information document with when that
,/
k
')
14 review is complete us writing an SER and issuing what we is are calling a licensability letter, that letter that will 16 make a statement on what we feel about licensing these 17 plants.
is Then the long-term plans are in 1989 through the 19 late 1990's.
The are planning to pursue standard design 20 approval and certification of the design through 21 rulemaking.
22 All of our planning is concentrating on the first
)
23 two to three years at this point.
24 (Slide.)
25 This is our near-term milestones that we have got
()
l l
I
53 P)
(_
1 lined up.
2 For the HTGR on October 8th we have got a meeting 3
on their design status and then we will get into more 4
detail of their selection of design basis events, and that 5
will be followed by a formal submittal in that area.
6 Liquid metal reactors, tomorrow we have got a 7
meeting on the decay heat removal requirements, and then in 8
October a meeting on their SAFR crane design.
They have 9
got a common crane that goes across all their modules that to they want to talk about what should the requirements be for 11 that.
12 And in November a meeting on the SAFR safeguards 13 and security and their safety test.
IL" 14 The near-term things we have scheduled right ---
15 MR, SIESS:
Leave that up there.
It strikes me as 16 a little incongruous that we are talking about fairly 17 radically different designs, clearly advanced reactor la designs at the conceptual stage and there are clearly some 19 very interesting policy and criteria questions, and yet I-20 see crane design.
Now crane design is nothing new and 21 nothing conceptual, and it seems to me that there are 22 certain things that are just so simple and so 23 straightforwa'rd that they ought to be able to get them out 24 of the way, and why should they be that much different for 25 an LMR than for LWR where we have been going through I
v l
s 54 n
(_)
i cranes, single failure proof cranes, et cetera, et cetera 2
now for about 15 years.
3 Is there any distinction in your review between 4
these sort of simple, non-advanced reactor issues and the 5
real advanced reactor issues, or are they just getting all 6
mixed up and you are taking whatever comes in?
7 MR. KING:
It is sort of a two-way street here.
8 We have identified those issues that.we feel are key safety 9
issues that advanced reactors use that we want to talk to about.
Cranes was not one of those.
11 MR. SIESS:
I would think not.
12 MR'. KING:
The designers have selected a number of 13 things they want to talk about.
Now a lot of our issues
. t, 14 are the same, but there were a few that the designers is selected because they had some particular concern in that 16 area that they wanted to talk about, and cranes happened to 17 be one of those for the SAFR design >
18 MR. SICSS:
It sounds like a diversion.
19 MR. KING:
I don't know whether it is a diversion 20 or whether they really have something there.
We haven't 21 had the meeting yet, so I can't say what the issue is.
22 MR. SIESS:
I can see that safeguards and security
.23 could be a different type of issue for these because of the 5
24 different types of fuel.
But the crane just struck me as 25 being something that people ought to---
Y.)
55 f
L, 1
-MR. KING:
That was put on the list at their 2
request.
3 MR. SIESS:
All right, you-are going to stick with 4
your crane criteria'and let's get on with the business of 5
designing advanced reactors.
6.
MR. GAVIGAN:
This is a specific issue for the 7
SAFR ddsign.
It is not a divers' ion.
Part of the design 8
requires a maintainability approach to remove components 9
from one of'the modules, and with an overhead crane it 10 passes over the neighboring reactor systems, and the 11 question is how is that handled in the licensing process, 12 not the design of the crane, but the process by which the
~
13 crane'is used and what it does to the other modules.
rj<
14 MR. SIESS:
But I don't really see how it is that is much different from cranes in light-water reactors that 16 lift heavy loads over all sorts of things.
17 MR. KING:
Well, they want to be able to lift 18 heavy loads over these operating modules, and normally a 19 light-water plant or an LMFBR doesn't do that.
20 MR. SIESS:
I can see the. point.
21 MR. KING:. Anyway,'there aren't many that I would 22 categorize ~as these sort of side issues.
23 MR. SIESS:
Instead of single failure proof, you 24 can make.it double failure proof or triple failure proof.
25
.The thing is~if you get the'right peoplo on it, Iml V
t
56
/~y
(_j 1
that can be escalated to take more time than some of the 2
other things.
3 MR. KING:
And I hope that doesn't happen.
4 MR. SIESS:
I know, bat ---
5 (Laughter.)
6 MR. KING:
Cardis is going to handle that one.
7 MR. ALLEN:
We will get the right people.
8 (Slide.)
9 MR. KING:
This is sort of an outline of the major 10 issues that we are going to be interacting on and the il tentative schedule for that for the HTGR conceptual design 12 review.
i3 The top-level criteria we have received, we hope
.O~
^/
1.s next month to respond to that.
15 Bridging methods, that is submittal from HTGR 16 designers that describes how they are going'to go from 17 these top-level criteria, the relationship between those 18 and the standard URC regulations and review process.
We 19
' expect a submittal on that next month, and next month we 20 also expect a submittal on what they call lower-level l
21 criteria, which_would be their general design criteria.
i 22 Then the key issues we have identified that we i
23 want to interact on in FY-86 before the PSID comes in.
Are 24 there. criteria for accident selection and evaluation, the 25 question of module control and their decay heat removal
..O
57 R)
(_
1 scheme, containment versus confinement question, the 2
reactor shutdown design methods, their fuel -- I had fuel 3
in there back when I thought things were on pebble bed, but 4
now that they are going close to Port St._ Vrain, that may 1
5 not really be much of an issue any more -- in-service 6
inspection, water / air ingress accidents, of Course core 7
support structure design and the last one I call issues 8
related to standard plant approval.
9 MR. SIESS:
Let me as!; you a couple of questions 10 about containment versus confinement.
11 The confinement, I guess it is not as clear now as 12 it once was in my mind what the difference is.
A few years 13 back containment meant that you held everything inside of
(',,
'~
14 containment period, and confinement meant you held it only 15 temporarily and did some filtering, although Fort St. Vrain 16 doesn't even have filters.
It just lets it out.
17 MR. KING:
Well, they have filters, but they also 18 have blow-out panels if it gets too much pressure and they 19 will just let it out.
20 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
But that distinction has gotten 21 blurred as we begin to look at severe accidents because now 22 our thinking says we have got the stuff out in there and at 23 least in the BUR's we are talking about releasing it 24 through a filtered path.
25 MR. KING:
Yes.
lm)
V,
58
,a(,)
1 MR. SIESS:
And now it becomes simply sort of a 2
degree.
I have a difficulty separating the concept of 3
venting from a BWR in a severe accident from venting from 4
an HTGR in a severe accident.
And yet one of those designs 5
we would say has a containment and the other one we would 6
say has a confinement.
7 So it seems to me that at one time we could say, 8
oh, well, no matter what the PRA tells us, containment is 9
defense in depth and we want a containment.
And yet when I 10 look at the severe accident approach, which is a form of 11 top-level criteria, and it would be coupled to some kind of 12 a safety goal, a quantitative one, the distinction is i3 blurred.
~3 i
)
14 So the words are not as simple as they were
\\/
is before.
16 MR. KING:
I think you are right. They are heading 17 toward each other in terms of what they ---
is MR. SIESS:
I can still argue defense in depth no 19 matter what PRA or top-level tells me, but.then that is not 20 being consistent, you see.
21 MR. KING:
I guess the thing with the containment 22 is you have got that ability to bottle everything up if you 23 so desire and you check the leakage periodically.
24 MR. SIESS:
We are not even sure of that.
As we 25 look at severe accidents and approach higher pressures and
i 59 P)
(,
I temperatures, the containment is going to leak.
So it is 2
not necessarily all bottled up in there, and some severe 3
accident scenarios say the containment can't hold it and 4
some of them say you couldn't build a containment that 5
would hold it.
As long as there is heat in there, it is 6
going to produce pressure and you have got to cool it some 7
way.
8 Again, you know, that decision, at one time I 9
would say well, you could ignore your top level or you 10 could add one that says defense in depth, which I am sure O
11 we are not going to throw out, not the words anyway.
12 MR. KING:
No.
13 MR. SIESS:
The concept has changed.
14 MR. KING:
The scheduled for the submittal of the 15 PSID is September of '86, and a PRA on the conceptual 16 design will come in at the same time.
And we have 17 scheduled about nine months to review those documents and
.l 18 are hoping by September of '87 to be able to issue a 19 licensability letter on the llTGR design.
20 MR. SIESS:
Now you have got an item up at the 21 top, lower-level criteria, including GDC's.
22 MR. KING:
Right.
23 MR. SIESS:
The decision has been made to develop 24 GDC's for advanced reactors?
25 MR. KING:
The designers would like to develop bv
60
()
1 GDC's for advanced reactors.
The GDC's would be for the 2
3 MR. SIESS:
Why not for the'LMR's?
4 MR. KING:- There are going to be GDC's for the 5
LMR's.
We haven't gotten to that viewgraph yet.
6 MR. SIESS:
Now the GDC's would derive then from 7
the top-level criteria?
8 MR. KING:
The GDC's would state requirements on 9
the designs that are needed to meet those top-level 10
- criteria, 11 MR. SIESS:
You see, we have got same GDC's on 12 LWR's that when you start looking at PRA type things they 13 don't seem to be as important as they were when you looked
'l u
at design basis events.
And I guess if your top-level 15 criteria are going to be those five things you had at the 16 beginning, you are going to run into the same type of 17 issue.
Maybe it will be clearer since you are developing 18 them from all five of those top-level criteria, or whatever 19 the top-level criteria end up being.
20 I am still not sure you could take all five of 2i those.
I guess you can envelope them.
22 MR. KING:
They certainly overlap.
23 MR. SIESS:
Now overlap isn't always good if it 24 fuzzes up the criteria.
25 MR. KING:
Excuse me?
m
\\_
61 1
MR. SIESS:
I think the overlap fuzzes up the 2
criteria rather.
I would hope that top-level criteria o
i 3
could be simple, and I don't think they are going to be.
4 Maybe that is just wishful thinking that they could be 5
simple.
We thought the safety goal was going to be simple.
6 MR. KING:
Well, we are trying to take what the i
7 main criteria are today and find out which of those are 8
controlling and use those to guide the design.
I think 9
that is the concept behind the top level criteria.
10 (Slide.)
11 All right.
The long-term schedule for the HTGR is 12 to submit their PSAR in 1989, requesting our preliminary
-13 design approval in'1991, FSAR in 1993, final design
'2 14 approval in 1995 and to request certification of the design is in 1998.
Those dates are from the DOE proposal.
16 MR. MARK:
On that slide before this last one, the 17 very final item was a final PRA or is that PDA?
la MR. KING:
PRA.
19
'(Slide.)
i 20 Down here?
21 MR. MARK:
That is what it looks like.
22 MR. KING:
PRA.
l 23 MR. MARK:
Now that means the design is going to 24 be absolutely complete, including the nature of the 25 breakers and the switches?
l
62 l()
i MR. KING:
No, no.
Maybe that is a bad ---
2 MR. MARK:
What is a PRA then?
3 MR. KING:
It is a PRA on the conceptual design.
4 I put the word " final" in because we may get some 5
preliminary versions of that before September of '86.
6 MR. MARK:
Does it make any sense to do a PRA on a 7
conceptual design?
8 MR. KING:
I think it will give you some insight 9
as to what the accident scenarios are, sort of a relative 10 look at their probability and consequences.
11 MR. SIESS:
The bottom line won't mean anything.
12 MR. MARK:
It won't mean anything.
A PRA uses 13 numbers.
14 MR, KING:
A PRA uses numbers.
is MR. MARK:
And a conceptual design doesn't.
16 MR. KING:
What do you mean "doesn't"?
I mean it l
17 will have numbers in terms of consequences and in terms of 18 fuel temperaturea.
The numbers will have some uncertainty 19 associated with them.
20 MR. MARK:
Yes, indeed.
j
-21 MR. KING:
And the level of detail that the PRA l
22 can go into won't be as great because you won't have the 23 number of breakers and that kind of thing worked out yet.
24 HR. MARK:
I am glad I am not having to do it.
25 MR. SIESS:
Well, I wouldn't mind doing it, but I j
63 n(_,j 1
just wouldn't want to defend it.
2 (Laughter.)
3 MR. MARK:
What is the reliability of a pump in a 4
conceptual design, 100 percent maybe?
5 MR. KING:
That depends.
If it is a pump or a 6
circulator that has been used before, you probably have 7
some numbers on it.
If it is something new, you are going 8
to have to work up numbers.
9 MR. SIESS:
I think you can get insights from it.
10 MR. MARK:
Maybe you will get some insights ---
11 MR. SIESS:
And they might be as good as the 12 insights you get from a completed design.
13 MR. MARK:
I expect to think about it in the same mq.
bd 14 way that I think about present PRA's.
15 MR. SIESS:
Yes.'
16 (Slide.)
17 MR. KING:
All right.
The liquid metal reactors.
IB I have put one schedule together that covers both prism and 19 SAFR because a lot of the issues are the same and the dates 20 for submitting PSID and PRA are the same.
21 Again, in FY-86 we plan to interact on what we 22 call the key issues.
And for the LMR's, we listed those as 23 station blackout, decay heat removal, sodium leak 24 accommodation and the question of containment and 25 confinement.
Now in this case they are going with V) h
_ _ ~
64
()
i containments, but they are low pressure and different 2
design.
We are going to look at that.
3 Reactor shutdown systems and metal fuel.
We 4
looked quite a bit at oxide fuel in the Clinch River 5
review, but we haven't looked at metal fuel.
6 Multiple module control and their criteria for 7
accident selection and evaluation.
8 Service inspection and issues related to standard 9
plant approval.
10 Their safety test plan, and certainly for the GE 11 design whose is planning to have a safety test facility.
12 And the PSID and the PRA are scheduled for a 13 December of '86 submittal and we have a year scheduled to C
14 write an SER.
15 MR. SIESS:
What is PSID?
16 MR. KING:
Preliminary safety information 17 document.
It is sort of like a mini-PSAR.
18 MR. SIESS:
Let me ask you a question that seems 19 quite logical, but it must may not have an answer.
The NRC 20 staff has been through a safety review of two HTGR designs, 21 one of them all the way to approval and the other one 22 pretty far along.
23 The NRC staff has also been through a review of a 24 liquid metal reactor design to a pretty advanced stage.
25 What do you see as the differences as you now
()
i l
65
~~l
(_j i
start the process over with these " conceptual designs"?
2 MR. KING:
The differences in design?
3 MR. SIESS:
Will we really be having different 4
criteria?
I get the impression we won't.
There will be 5
some.new criteria.
6 MR. KING:
There will be some new ones.
7 MR. SIESS:
Safety goals, whatever that means, and d
protective action guidelines didn't exist when the HTGR 9
reviews were made, but part 100 and part 20 did.
Tnis to isn't a whole new process.
11 MR. KING:
No.
12 f1R. SIESS:
Now what I am getting at is do you see 13 major differences in how the reviews are going to be made m.
f]
14 and do you see that they are going to lead to significant is differences, not in plant details, but in plant cetups?
16 These are different plants.
17 MR. KING:
They are different plants and they are 18 trying to do things in a more inherent passive nature, 19 which I think will lead to less requirements for safety 20 related systems and lors requirements for onsite AC power 21 and less requirements for active decay heat removal 22 systems.
23 MR. SIESS:
Less review or just less 24 requirements?
Are there going to be some' things that maybe 25 the staff doesn't have to look at?
66 O(_)
i MR. KING:
Hopefully.
2 MR. SIESS:
If the balance of plant is not safety 3
related, do you think you can convince yourself somewhere 4
that you don't have to look at balance of plant.?
5 MR. KING:
I think we will have to look at balance 6
of plant to Convince ourselves that, true, it is not safety 7
related and it doesn't feed back in and affect the safety a
functions of the plant.
9 MR. SIESS:
The PRA ought to tell you something of 10 failure modes and effects analysis and systema interaction.
11 MR. KING:
We are going to have to look at those 12 things.
If we conclude the balance of plant is truly not 13 safety related, it would be my intent to not go further and 14 look at the design and pose requirements or do anything on is the design the balance of plant, other than, you know, 16 there may be some interface type requirements that we will l
l i[
have to put down because we don't want them to go change 18 the balance of plant that will now affect the assumptions 19 you have made on your safety systems.
I 20 But ao far as getting into the details of the 21 balance of plant, I would propose we wouldn't do that.
l i
22 MR. GIESS:
I think what they would like to do l
23 would be able to just draw a line and say nothing over on 24 this aide can have any effect on tnis side.
25 MR. KING:
True.
O
I l
67 l
1 MR. SIESS:
Do you think that is possible?
l 2
MR. KING:
I think it is possible.
I do>
r 3
MR. SIESS:
Do you think it is possible for them l
l l
4 to do?
5 (Laughter.)
6 MR. KING:
Well, we will find out.
7 MR. SIESS:
I mean it has to be both possible and
}
8 convince somebody.
l 9
MR. KING:
Yes.
But I think the idea is a good l
l to idea and I think it is possible.
They are talking about a il fence between the way the construct the non-safety grade 12 and the way they construct the safety grade type 13 materials.
So it leads into construction type differences
{
(yy1 i
'~
I4 as well as design type differences is what they are talking 15 about for utilizing the non-safety grade balance of plant.
l 16 MR. SIESS:
It seems to me that that concept is 17 probably the most important thing that is coming up here.
la Again, you aaid what things we might want to look at, and I 19 think the top-level criteria on how they are going to be 1
20 used and this basic concept of being able to draw a line 21 and really separate out balance of plant, becauce I know 22 this has given the ACRS and I think the staff real problems 23 in looking at the standard designs that we are looking at 24 now, like GESSAR II, of trying to understand the so-called i
25 interface question because balance of plant isn't easily l
b U
l
68 i
ll
(
(_/
i separated out.
l 2
MR. KING:
Right.
l 3
MR. SIESS:
The balance of plant in LWR's la 4
frequently the initiator, and that concept at whatever 5
levela, it can be brought to the ACRS and I think it could 6
be extremely important.
7 MR. KING:
Okay.
8 MR. SIESS:
Decause if that can be acttled,'it 9
sure makaa a big difference from there on out.
10 MR. MARK:
Dut it will have to be clearer or put il more clearly than it was in the case of GESSAR.
12 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
GESSAR has got a very fuzzy --
13 well, but UESSAR never claimed that balance of plant la not I)
N' 14 aafety related.
It la just that la going to be left to the is individual applications, you see.
They never claimed it la 16 not safety related.
So the problem persists all the way 17 down until the plant gota built.
18 But if it can be demonstrated that there la a line 19 that can be drawn and an envelope put around one system and 20 any nothing outcide of that can have any effect -- well, it 21 could have an effect an an initiator as long an it docan't 22 have an effect on your recovery, right, or your walk away?
23 MR. KING:
Right.
24 MR. MARK:
Well, the interfaces will have to be 25 rather clearly identified.
O
69
)
1 MR. SIESS:
Oh, yes.
It will have to be a solid 2
line or plain or envelope there.
3 MR. KING:
Hopefully it will be easier to identify 4
that interface in these designo since they are starting out 5
to purpoacly design them that way.
6 MR. SIESS:
There are still going to be issues 7
because their balance of plant can initiate an accident, 8
and defense in depth says I may not want to ignore it.
I 9
am just talking about the way things have come up in the to past.
11 So the balance of plant can initiate an accident, 12 but you can walk away, and then maybe you can ignore the 13 initiator.
But, you ace, what is being lost there is the c_
14
. defense in depth of not having accidents in the first place 15 as well as not having them progress or protecting the 16 public after they occur.
So that la an aspect of balance 17 of plant.
18 To say it is not safety related, in that for 19 mitigation or for prevention, you know, that is a thought.
20 MR. KING:
Yes.
It certainly could be an
-21 initiator and its performance feeds back into the safety 22 related system, and there are going to have to be come 23 controla on the interface requiremento because you don't 24 want them to put anything out there.
i 25 MR. SIESS:
Because defence in depth, among many
70 (O_)
1 of its definitions, is an extremely non-mechanistic and 2
almost subjective idea at times that says I don't care, I 3
still want it.
4 MR. MARK:
I have been struck by something here 5
which I believe Chet has addressed more specifically.
6 Staff review complete two months after submittal, all the 7
way down the page.
I think that is admirable, s
(Laughter.)
9 How are you going to manage to do that?
I guess to it is because there are so few people in the advanced 11 reactor group that you can move that fast.
12 MR. KING:
Well, we are certainly going to have to i3 call on some of these issues on outside help, whether it is 14 contractors or whether it is other staff members.
15 MR. MARK:
I hope you are not ---
16 MR. KING:
This is a goal, let's put it that way.
17 I can't guarantee it.
18 MR. MARK:
That is a marvelous goal.
I don't i9 remember anything ever having been settled in two months os 20 Clinch River.
21 MR. SIESS:
Or anything else.
22 (Laughter.)
23 Anything, you name it.
24 (Laughter.)
25 MR. KING:
That may be a naive goal, but
(
71 n(,)
I nevertheless that ---
2 MR. MARK:
Oh, it is a great goal.
I had felt 3
that perhaps if there was only the four of you doing it, 4
you might manage that.
5 MR. SIESS:
I thought it was a typo.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. KING:
In sorae cases it will be just the four 8
of un and in a lot it won't be.
9 MR. SIESS:
Some of un get cynical in our old age.
10 (Laughter.)
11 (Slide.)
12 MR. KING:
The long-term schedule for the LMR's, 13 again, late 1980's or early 1990's for the PSAR and going 14 through the preliminary final design approval and 15 requesting rulemaking to certify the design.
16 We are not concentrating so much on doing anything 17 for that.
We are concentrating on the first two or three 18 years.
l l
19 (Slide.)
20 Resources.
Back in February we hadn't gotten to 21 the point where we had identified in detail what our 1
22 resource necda were.
We didn't know what we were going to 23 have in FY-86 in terms of resources.
We are to the point 24 now where we have identified the resources in detail.
25 The first line shows what we are estimating will
72
('
' )\\
(_
i be needed for outside technical assistance in the fiscal 2
years that the reviews will be going on.
3 We have received that money, and NRR will have 4
that money as technical assistance money.
Where we plan to 5
allocate it is Brookhaven and Oak Ridge vill get major 6
portions of it, and the undesignated is we are planning to 7
go out and see if we can get a few thinkers to help us.
8 MR. SIESS:
You talk about conceptual review and 9
that is why it tapers off.
10 MR. KING:
Yes, review of the conceptual design 11 over the next two or three years.
12 HR. SIESS:
And then it picks back up.
It is 13 going down in '88.
So it has to come back up somewhere.
14 MR. KING:
Yes.
This is just to review the is conceptual design, the three that DOE have preacnted.
16 MR. SIESS:
Now it says no support from Research.
17 That is because you don't expect to be able to get it, j
is MR. KING:
Currently Research advanced reactor 19 money is zero in '86 and '87, 20 MR. SIESS:
But does that mean that you wouldn't 21 like to have it if you could get it?
22 MR. KING:
Oh, I would like to have it if we can 23 get it.
24 MR. SIESS:
You could think up some good research 25 Projecto.
O
73
]
1 MR. KING:
I can think up some research.
2 Basically our technical assistance money is going for 3
review and analysis.
We are not doing any research with 4
that.
5 MR. SIESS:
With your four-man staff, it is it I
6 even possible for you to start thinking of what research 7
needs might be so somebody could start planning them?
8 MR. KING:
It is possible to certainly think about 9
those.
10 MR. SIESS:
You haven't got very much time for 11 thinking in there.
j 12 MR. KING:
We won't have much time to think, but
- 13 if research would get some money, I think we could r
14 certainly find some key areas where we could use that 15 money.
16 MR. SIESS:
It is better the other way, for you to 17 think of the needs and then use that as a basis for getting 18 the money.
But that is not the way the Congress works.
19 MR. KING:
And the manpower in NRR that we are 20 expecting to use is listed here on the bottom.
21 (Slide.)
22 Okay.
The next couple of viewgraphs are some 23 detail on the guidance we are developing to give to l
.24 Brookhaven and Oak Ridge in terms of what they will be l
l 2$
doing with their FY-86 money in the next fiscal year.
( (-
f I
74
(
1 It is probably not worth going through these in 2
any detail.
1 3
(Slide.)
4 It is basically support the review of the designa, 5
the base technology programs and do some independent 6
analysis for us on the performance of those systema.
7 MR. SIESS:
Is the llTGR fuel, the graphite and so a
forth generally similar to what ---
9 MR. GAVIGAN:
Yes, ao Fort St. Vrain.
10 MR. SIESS:
So all of that previous work on the 11 graphite -- it is a different enricament, uot a loL o f u.e 12 vak nidge and Brookhaven stuff applica there.
13 MR. GAVIGAN:
Right.
14 (Slide.)
15 MR. KING:
Now I will get to the final slide in 16 this acetion, which is propoacd interactions with ACRS.
17 We wanted to get some feedback from you on items la you felt you would like to get involved in.
19 What I had proposed here on the alide in '86 was 20 to achedule a ocasion with you on the 21 containment / confinement innue for both IITGR's and LMR's and 22 have the designer present their design and their rationale, 23 and that will include what the source term in that we are 24 baning that containment upon, and then solicit your 25 commenta and feedback on that.
m.
m
r 75 I
7~3 f
q_J 1
MR. SIESS:
What in SSST?
l 2
MR. KING:
Site suitability cource term.
That is 3
what source term are they going to use'for ---
4 MR. SIESS:
Yes, I remember it.
5 MR. KING:
--- for sotting the containment 6
designs.
7 Then the second item was the design baals accident 8
onvelopes for the HTGR and LMR's getting into thia 9
probabilistic approach for the IITGR's and then the the 10 LMR's and talk about the approach that they are planning to II UBo.
12 MR. SIESS:
Now that clearly would involve the 13 balance of plant.
,y 14 MR. KING:
That would include looking at the 15 balance of plant.
16 MR. SIESS:
But you don't have on here the top-17 level criteria.
18 MR. KING:
No.
If that is comothing ---
19 MR. SIESS:
I think that ought to como in fairly 20 carly because of your GDC are going to develop from that 21 and everything else is to develop from it.
22 MR. KING:
Okay.
I wrote throo others down that I 23 don't havo on here for this morning's discussion, top-loval 24 critoria, the question of balance of plant for the designs, 25 and I guess I do have the other one, which in the accident p
(_-
~.
76
()
i selection process which I have aircady got on this slido.
2 MR. SIESS:
That in on thero.
3 MR. KING:
That would make a total of four itomo 4
that wo should schedule comotimo in FY-86 to talk about.
5 MR. SIESS:
I am not sure they arc indopondent, 6
but that will como out as you as you got into it.
7 HR. KING:
Yoo, it is a living list and we can a
expand it or shrink it or whatever, but I would like for 9
planning purpouco to have an idea of what the topics are to and then I can work with Mod to schedule thoso.
And I il pronuma wo are talking about the subcommittoo and not the 12 full committoo on thcoo inouco at loaut for starters.
- )
MR. SIESS:
I can't speak for either the temporary O
k/
14 Chairman or the permanent Chairman, but I would auspect is that we wouldn't want to got through '86 without coming to into the full committoo at least onco.
17 MR. KING:
On those innuca.
is HR. SIESS:
Yes.
The main reason for the 19 subcommittoo in to nort of define the issuon and 800 what 20 la worth bringing up.
But subcommittoon are too small to i
2i got a full apoctrum of input from the ACRS.
22 MR. KING:
Okay.
Wo should start with the 23 subcommittoo and then schedulo the full committoo.
24 MR. SIESS:
Yea.
25 HR. MARK:
Ianuco such as containment /confinomont
77
]
I and the colection of design bania accidents and the thing 2
like the handling of tornadoos are all going to have to 3
como in front of the full committoo.
4 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
Well, the tornado thing might bo 5
at a lower level.
6 MR. MARK:
Well, if it in to be a Change, it will 7
have to go before the full committoo.
8 MR. SIESS:
You.
But the features here, the top-9 lovel critoria are very important becauno it la an attempt 10 now to bring in savoro accidents into the criteria in a 11 more specific way and thoro will be PRA brought in more 12 specifically.
13 The 01z0 of thono reactora la important, the m,I 'i 14 coparation of balance of plant in a passivo naturo, the is inhoront safety features and all those nico thinga aro 16 going to be the important things, which la not the same as 17 anying that that in what the committoo is going to bo is concerned with, but that la what I think they ought to be 19 concerned with.
20 I really think as soon as you atart getting 21 anywhere on top-level critoria in bringing thoso diffurent 22 approachen from the different groups, that in one thing tho l
23 full committoo han got to hear about.
24 MR. KING:
Okay.
I think probably Octobor or l
25 November then we could schedule a concion on top lovel i
78
()
i critoria and what they mean in termo of interfacing with 2
the normal regulatory procoon.
3 MR. SIESS:
I think that in policy.
High-level 4
policy decisiona are involved in that.
There in a lot more 5
importance in what you do with top-level critoria in this 6
advanced reactor policy statomont.
7 MR. KING:
It la policy, depending on how wo uno l
8 the top-level critoria.
9 MR. SIESS:
Oh, you, or what they are.
10 HR. KING:
And what they arc.
11 Okay.
In FY-06 I primarily concentrated on the 12 major inouco that we just talked about.
i3
'87 in when we trill be underway with the PSID 14 reviews.
What I was proponing there was wo would schedule is como ocoolona where the doulgnors and the staff would como 16 down and describo the donigns to you, the ayatema and the 17 accident analynia and solicit your foodback, and then is hopefully at the end of that procoon after the staff innues i,
a report on the review of the PSID, to solicit a lotter 20 from the ACRS on the design that wo would attach to our 21 final reuponse to DOE on tho liconnability of thono planto.
22 HR. SIESS:
You n00, you are asking for approval 23 of a concept, and I was trying to define what really in 24 involved in the concept.
Sono of it in in here and como of 25 it -- woll, there aro whole pagon of concept type thingo,
()
I
=
l l
79 n
L_J 1
but there are cortain ones that are going to be the 2
important ones.
One clearly is the sizo and one clearly is 3
the separation of balance of plant.
4 M". KING:
llopefully in '87 in the nine to twelvo i
5 months that we are doing the review of these PSID's we will 6
have opportunity to procont the design and if you raise 7
inaues we can schedulo consions on those and nort of a
parallel what we did on Clinch River in looking at the PSAR 9
perhaps not in as much detail, but at least hit the major 10 syntoma and the major uafety aspects of the plant.
II In '87 that would be complete for the llTGR and in 12
'88 it would be complete for the two LMR's.
13 At this point that is what I am going to plan on i
r ']
14 for future interaction with the subcommittoo and the full i
l is committoo, and I will work with Med to schedule thoso.
l l
16 Liko I said, it la a living list and we can add to l
17 it and subtract from it au things go on.
la Okay, that la all I wanted to say before we got l
19 into the policy statomont.
20 MR. !! ARK:
Lot's lot you uit down for a whilo.
21 MR. KING:
Take a break, all right.
22 MR. MARK:
We will start up at 20 to 11.
23 (Roccan taken.)
24 MR. MARK:
The mooting will continuo.
25 Do you want to go ahoad.
F:s k.
I 80
()
1 HR. KING:
All right.
The final section la to 2
talk about the policy statement.
3 (Slide.)
4 I think maybe to act the stage, I will give you 5
the background of the policy statement.
6 After the cancellation of Clinch River, certainly 7
designs with inhoront safety characteristics were started a
to be promoted, both IITGR and LMPDR and PIUS, and it got 9
the interent or the attention of the Commionion.. They 10 asked for a couple of meetings and briefings from the staff 11 on what we were doing in the advanced reactor area.
I 12 think the first one was in November of '83 and the accond i3 one was around January or February of '84.
\\>
The staff went down and told them what we were 14 is doing in the Roccarch side and the NRR side, and out of 16 those two meetingo came a requent by the Comminaion to OPE 17 to draft the policy statement on advanced reactors.
18 OPE did that, and after they drafted it, they sent 19 a copy to the staff to look at.
The staff mado comments on 20 it and OPE redrafted it, or a couple of cyclon like that 21 where wo looked at drafts, and finally it went to the 22 Comminaion.
It stayed there for a long time before any 23 action was taken on it.
24 Finally, the Comminaionero took action, and they 25 or their staff membero poroonally rewrote novocal acetiono i
n a
i
l i
81 1
of it and issued it for public comment in March of '85.
2 The comments were received and in approximately 3
July of '85 OPE put together a summary of the public 4
comments and asked the staff, specifically me, to redraft 5
the policy statement and work up responses to the six 6
questions that had been included at the end of the first 7
policy statement.
8 So I did that this summer, gave it back to OPE and 9
they circulated it to Research and it came back to the 10 staff through normal channels for review.
We got some 11 comments from Research and we incorporated some of their 12 comments.
13 We finalized the draft and sent it back to OPE,
'-)
14 and they in turn put it into the form of a SECY paper, 85-15 279 and sent it to the Commission, and that is where it to sits today.
17 In redrafting the policy statement we tried to 18 retain as much as possible, the wording that the 19 Commissioners has put in the public comment version, and we 20 made changes where we felt that they were legitimate due to 21 the questions raised in the public comments or where we 22 felt that things just needed to be clarified if they 23 weren't worded too clearly in the original version.
24 So that is where it stands today.
It is at the 25 Commissioners, and I don't know what their current schedule u
l
82 (6
_)
i is for acting on it.
They were supposed to have an affirmation vote last week I believe and that never came 3
off and I don't know what the current schedule is for doing 4
anything with it.
5 Ken Herring has been my contact at OPE on this, 6
and I saw his just walking ---
7 MR. HERRING:
Ken Herring, OPE.
The only thing I a
would like to add to what Tom said was that we did not 9
circulate it to Research.
We went through the EDO's office 10 and the policy statement itself was looked at by not only 11 Research but also CRGR and anybody else that the EDO 12 thought was appropriate.
And what we got back after the 13 EDO office worked further with Tom was a staff position il signed off at the EDO level.
So it wasn't just OPE going 14 is to just Research and NRR separately.
What we got back was 16 looked at by the EDO.
17 Right now it is up before the Commission.
18 MR. MARK:
You also don't know what their 19 intentions are as to schedule and when they are going to 20 act on this?
21 MR. HERRING:
It was put on for affirmation last 22 week, but then Commissioner Bernthal and the Chairman are 23 out of town and things like that for the next couple of 24 weeks.
So I haven't seen anything back in writing.
I have 25 talked a little bit to one of the assistants.
O)
~-
s 83 1
MR. MARK:
But it is expected that within the next 2
few weeks'they will probably ---
3 MR. HERRING:
I would guess from what I know right 4
now, yes, that within the next few weeks we should know t
5 something.
6 MR. MARK:
And they will either want to revise it
-l l
7 or-adopt it.
8 HR. HERRING:
Right.
9 MR. KING:
Okay, with that background, let me 10 first talk about how we currently plan to implement the 11 policy statement, assuming it stays close to the version it 12 is right now and then talk about the public comments.
^
13 (Slide.)
k2 14 For implementation there are two things I wanted 15 to talk about, our plan for review and then the technical 16 approach that we plan to apply to the review of the 17 advanced reactors.
18 The_ plan for review is basically to become 19 familiar with the concepts under evaluation.
That is 20 currently going on.
21 To interact with the designers on the criteria, 22 the major' issues and the supporting base technology 23 program, and we see the primarily the designers are going 24 to propose their designs, their criteria and their 25
' technology programs and we will review those, and that will
. y/
i
i 84 r~x, lu,/,
1 include independent analysis.
2 And the designer is responsible for developing a 3
complete set of analytical tools and base technology.
4 We are going to document any criteria or guidance 5
that comes out of the review of the major issues.
6 We are going to perform a safety review on a PSID 7
and issue an SER and licensability letter when that is all 8
done.
9 That is our basic approach to the review.
10
-(Slide.)
11 Technically we plan to build upon the LWR 12 framework where practical.
That means use LWR GDC's if 13 they would apply to a light-water reactor and use things
(,)
14 like 10 CFR, the applicable portions of 10 CFR 50 and 10
\\-
15-CFR 100.
16 Develop new criteria and guidelines for the i7 concepts where that is needed to address the is characteristics of the design which are different from 19 LWR's and address unique safety characteristics of the 20 design.
21 And as part of that we will consider giving credit 22 for the inherent safety characteristics incorporated into 23 the design.
24 We will back off on onsite AC power requirements, 25 for example, if they are not needed for safety functions.
O V
85 p' 7 L_j 1
The general principle we are planning to apply is 2
that advanced reactors must be at least as safe as current 3
generation LWR's.
That is certainly a judgment type 4
evaluation that will be based upon things like looking at 5
the equivalency of defense in depth of LWR's, previous 6
experience, R&D programs, the application of TMI and USI 7
issues if they apply and then comparison against the 8
Commission's safety goals, 9
MR. SIESS:
Excuse me.
Let's leave that up for a 10 minute.
Could you give me your definition of defense in 11 depth?
That is not facetious.
There are three around that 12 I know of.
13 MR. KING:
Multiple barriers to radiation release R
E-d 14 and multiple ways of performing a safety function is 15 basically the way I look at it.
16 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
I had mentioned that earlier in 17 connection with containment versus confinement.
Have you 18 thought much about whether containment versus confinement 19 can be argued on purely defense in depth trials?
That is 20 multiple barriers.
21 MR. KING:
Yes.
I think it can be argued on those 22 grounds.
I think the biggest uncertainty will be how much 23 additional containment or confinement capability do you 24 want to put in to take care of unknowns.
You can certainly 25 argue the knowns, the estimated releases, the site boundary L-)j J-
86 x_j i
dose rates and make a comparison of whether containment or 2
confinement, which is adequate and which is the better way 3
to go, and what do you want to do to take care of the 4
unknowns I think is the biggest question I have in my mind 5
right now.
6 MR. SIESS:
What do you consider to be the safety 7
goals, qualitative and quantitative?
When you are making a a
comparison against a safety goal presumably you would be 9
using the quantitative safety goals?
10 MR. KING:
The Commission's safety goals.
11 MR. SIESS:
The quantitative safety goals.
12 MR. KING:
The quantitative safety goals.
13 MR. SIESS:
Would the core melt criteria be (x
\\-
14 applied here as a primary safety goal in the same way that is they end up applying it for light-water reactors, which 16 isn't settled yet, that whatever is done for light-water 17 reactors would be applied here?
18 MR. KING:
We would intend to apply it equivalent 19 to the way it ends up being applied for light-water 20 reactors.
21 MR. SIESS:
Even though the consequences might be 22 significantly different?
23 MR. KING:
Yes, but the consequences we feel would 24 be addressed in looking at the other societal individual 25 risk goals that address consequences.
-Protective action o
L
4 87 1
_ guidelines address consequences ---
2 MR. SIESS:. Yes, but right now there is some 3
thinking that no matter what the societal individual risk 4
goals are, that something ought to be done about core melt 5
probability.
It.is separate.
6 MR. KING:
I think whatever is decided upon.for 7
LWR's, that is what we would intend to apply here in terms 8
of a numerical _ probability of a core melt.
9 MR. SIESS:
And if somebody came up with a design 10 where the core could melt and there would be absolutely no 11 risk to the public, you would still apply it as it would be 12 applied for LWR cases where there is some residual risk to 13 the public, or have you thought about that?
14 MR. KING:
Well, I haven't thought about that
~
15 extreme, no.
I guess I would be surprised if somebody 16 could come up with a design like that.
17 MR. SIESS:
You think that maybe by the time you la get that-far the safety goals will be clarified?
19 MR. KING:
I hope so and how they are to be 20 implemented.
21 MR. SIESS:
Oh, I hope so, too.
You know, the 22 policy statement has two aspects to it and I would like to 23 keep them separate and you may have difficulty.
But one 24 thing the policy statement does is say how the NRC is going 25 to approach the review, and to some extent the mechanics, p
u u_
88' (x
(_)
i the early interactions, et cetera, et cetera.
2 The other part of the policy statement indicates 3
what are desirable characteristics of advanced reactors.
4 MR. KING:
Yes.
5 MR. SIESS:
I wouldn't exactly call it a laundry 6
list, but it is a list,that has the phrase "some or all."
7 MR. KING:
Yes.
8 MR. SIESS:
Are you going to address that list at 9
some point here?
I haven't had a chance to look through i~
10 your slides.
' 11 -
MR. KING:
You mean what do we think of the list?
i2 MR. SIESS:
- Yes, 13_
MR. KING:
I don't have any specific slide on that (j,
14 list, no.
15 MR. SIESS: -You know, the "all" bothered me 16 because I guess it is not quite clear to me how we can have 17' I think the words are -- the least' equipment is one item in is the list where that phrase occurs, and then a little later i9 I see redundancy and diversity.
.20 MR. KING:
I am not sure you can have all of those 2i at the same time.
22 MR. SIESS:
And yet the policy statement says 23 "some or all" which at least implies that all would be 24 better than -- that all is possible and there is at least 25 some suggestion that all would be better than some.
7m
\\_)
89-R L,j 1
MR. KING:
Yes.
There is certainly implied that 2
.the more you have the better it will be.
I don't think h;
3
-there has been any attempt to sort those out as to which 4
ones you can have and which ones you can't have.at the same 5
time.
I think it was just sort of a list thrown out there 6
to give an idea of the kinds of things we are thinking 7
about without really getting into the details of how you 8
apply them and which ones are sort of contradictory.
9 MR. SIESS:
Now does the policy statement say that to you have got at least one of those to be considered?
11
' MJR. KING:
It says some or all, which implies at 4
12 least one.
13 MR. SIESS:
So if somebody came in and didn't have 14 any.of those, you would tell them to go home and come back 15 again?
l 16 MR. KING:
We would tell him he is not an advanced 17 reactor.
18 MR. SIESS:
He is not an advanced reactor, even if 19 it was a gas-cooled or a liquid metal reactor?
20 MR. KING:
I think.if somebody came in with 21
_another Fort St. Vrain, we would not consider that an 22 advanced reactor.
23 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
What about CANDO?
24 MR. KING:
I don't know enough about CANDO to 25 answer that.
v
8 90
(,
~
MR. SIESS:
What about a duplicate of the French-1 2
German LMFBR?
3 MR. KING:
The SNR-300?
4 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
5 MR. KING:
That would probably be an advanced 6
reactor.
7 MR. SIESS:
And would it qualify in having at a
least one or some of these features?
9 MR. KING:
As far as I know, it would.
It would 10 have an inherent property for decay heat removal, for 11 example.
12' MR. SIESS:
And CANDO you just say you don't know?
13 MR. KING:
I don't know much about CANDO.
So I l]'
14 can't answer that.
15 MR. SIESS:
So really your main inherest in the 16 advanced reactor policy is in what it tells you of how you 17 should go about your review?
18 MR. KING:
I think there are two main things.that 19 come across to me in the policy statement.
One is let's do 20 this'early interaction and let's not wait until a PSAR 21 comes in.
The.other is to encourage these inherent safety 22 characteristics be put in-designs and using that list as 23 examples of what we are talking about.
24 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
25 MR. KING:
Those.are the two main things I see the s
91 1.
79 5_,
. policy statement does.
1 2
MR. SIESS:
" Encourage" is a good word.
How does 3
the NRC encourage something?
4 MR.-KING:
By saying all right, you are 5
accomplishing your features or your safety functions in 6
this fashion, and we can give you relief over here on these
'7 other requirements that we would normally apply.
8 MR. SIESS:
In actual physical ---
9 MR. KING:
Physical tradeoff's, correct.
10 MR. SIESS:
Is there any sense of expedited review 11 as a carrot?
12 MR. KING:
Well, I think as a by-product the 13 review probably will be expedited.- If we get involved 4 ";
e -
early and resolve a number of these issues early, that is 14 is going to speed things up later on.
16 MR. SIESS:
Because innovation usually leads to s
17-extended review, unfortunately.
18 MR.' KING:
That remains to be seen.
19 MR. SIESS:
You are encouraging innovation.
20 MR. KING:
Yes.
'21 MR.'SIESS:
Juul I guess if I was sitting' out there 22 and wanting to innovate, I would consider one of the major 23-tradeoffs to be review time.
24 MR. KING:
Well, I think that is:part of getting i
25 involved in this process early.
If it is an advantage to
92
._ k-.s,/
1 the designer and he doesn't sink a lot of money getting to 2
the preliminary design. stage not know whether certain of 3
his features are acceptable or not acceptable, it is more 4
efficient.
5 MR. SIESS:
That is why I wouldn't have tried an 6
innovative approach to tornado design.
7
'MR. KING:.Well, maybe that is why he brought it a
up'early in the game here.
9 MR. SIESS:
Yes, I think so.
10
'Okay, thank you. 'That is helpfu1.
~
11 MR. KING:
All right.
The policy statement ---
12 MR. SIESS:
The thing that bothers me I guess is 13 that defense in depth is awful nice, but it can also be
~
14 used to cover anything you want.
For anything you can't is find an engineering or rational basis for, you_say it is 16 defense in depth.
I don't object to that.
Sometimes that 17 is judgment and sometimes it is intuition and sometimes it is
'is just orneriness.
19 MR. KING:
There is a lot of judgment involved on 20
.this plan as well as probably on the other plan.
.21 MR. SIESS:
The important thing is that it be. good 22 judgment.
23 (Slide.)
24 I guess, as I said earlier, we redrafted the 25 Policy statement to provide better organization and 4
93 F'j 1
g i
clarification in trying to use some of the existing words 2
that were in the March version of the policy statement, but 3
maybe reorganize them to be a little more clear and not 4
jump around so much.
5 And then incorporated public comments where we 6
felt they had a legitimate point and we needed to clarify 7
or modify something in the policy statement.
8 And we provided answers to the six questions that 9
were at the end of the policy statement.
10 That is basically what the redraft did.
11 The main points included in the redraft were to 12 still encourage early interaction.
We encouraged the list of features and characteristics.
Those two things were in i3 y.
L-the original statement and they are in the latest version.
14 15 These last three things were things we added that 16 weren't in the original version.
17 We encouraged early discussion on the use of is proven technology or technology development programs and 19 their effect on regulatory requirements.
That came about 20 because of some members of the staff were concerned that 2i here were plants that want to proceed down the path of a 22 standard plant design and approval.
Yet, none.of those P ants have ever been built or operated before.
l 23 24 Should the NRC grant standard plant approvals for 25 a plant where we have no operating experience ---
Hj t
v
94 O.
i na 81ess:
whee wou1a de aa exame1e or a 2
technology that required a development program?
3 MR. KING:
Reactor shutdown systems, for example, 4
and how reliable are the control rods, the self-actuated 5
shutdown systems, the inherent feedback characteristics and 6
what technology programs are going to be done to show those 7
things really work the way they say they are going to work.
MR. SIESS:
Okay.
8 9
MR. KING:
Our thought is we need to identify those areas and talk about what is being done to resolve 10
~
n concerns like that if we are going to go down the path of a 12 standard plant approval. prior to getting one or more of these plants on line, 13
,(d i4 MR. SIESS:
It is a demonstration'of effectiveness and reliability.
is MR. KING:
Yes.
16 MR. MARK:
Speaking of new technology, in the HTGR i7 18 module design, does it have water-cooled bearings?
MR. KING:. I think the circulators are going for 39 20 magnetic bearings.
Is that right, Frank?
MR. GAVIGAN:
We have developed a backup new 21 reliable water bearing, but nevertheless we are going 22 toward the development of magnetic bearings for this new 23
. 24 design.
MR. MARK:
And that will tend to keep down the 25
k 95 y'
I water that ---
2 MR. GAVIGAN:
It will eliminate the water if you 3
go magnetic.
4 MR.- MARK:
--- at Fort St. Vrain.
5 MR. KING:
Right.
6 MR. MARK:
It sounds good.
7 MR. KING:
The next point we included in the 8
redraft was making a statement that advanced reactors must 9
provide the same degree of protection to the public and the 10 environment as do current generation light-water reactors.
11 MR. SIESS:
Let's take a minute on that.
12 MR. KING:
Yes, let's take a minute on that.
13 MR. SIESS: -The ACRS is on record, I am quite r-E2 sure,'in the last letter we wrote on the implementation of 14 15 the safety goals as saying-that we think-future reactors 16 ought to be safer than existing reactors.
17 Now I have to qualify that because I think it was is said in'the context of core melt probability, and what you
- 19 have on the slide is very carefully worded in terms -of-the 20 same degree of protection to the public and the 21 environment.
So they are not contradictory, that is the 22 ACRS might be satisfied with a lower. core melt probability, f
23 which might not be interpreted as being safer.
I don't 124-know.
- 25
'But there certainly seems to be thinking in terms b
.=
96
,([
t of a top level criteria of a significantly lower core melt 2
criteria and a core melt probability of 10 to the minus 4.
3 That is what I gathered from what we discussed earlier this 4
morning.
Is that correct?
5 MR. KING:
You would certainly end up with 6
Probabilities of core melt much lower than 10 to the minus 7
4 in these designs.
8' MR. SIESS:
You have no objection to them being 9
safer, but you are not going to~ require it.
io MR. KING:
That is true, and the reason we put n
this statement in the policy was the March version of the 12 policy statement, nowhere in there did it come out and say i3 that these plants had to be more safe than the current i4 generation of light-water reactors.
15
-They encouraged it and thought if you put in these inherent type features in the laundry list of features,'
. i6 17 that you would end up with plants that are more safe.
But i
is it never came out and said we are going to require it.
MR. SIESS:
But I was much encouraged by.the 39 20 criterion that was proposed by the HTGR people, and I
don't know whether it was in the LMR or not, that for 21 22 Protection of the plant investment they wanted 10 to the minus 5.
Now is that also in the LMR proposal?
23 24 MR. KING:
No.
l MR. SIESS:
Because now that automatically takes 25 i
l I
i 2
97
]
1 care of ---
2 MR. KING:
Maybe Frank wants to say something 3
about that.
4 MR. GAVIGAN:
The 10 to the minus 5 criterion that 5
you saw for HTGR was declared by the government as what it 6
is that we want that design to meet.
We managed the LMR 7
designs differently.
Each of those designers comes up with 8
his own criterion'for investment protection.
Each of them 9
has a requirement somewhat like that, but they are slightly 10 different, and I don't remember the exact numbers now, 11 MR. SIESS:
Well, I thought that was encouraging 12 because ---
33 MR. KING:
That would say you are not going to y3 LJ have a core melt.
14 15 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
Well, if I owned a plant, I wouldn't want to have a core melt.
16 17 MR. MARK:
I wonder is the core melt the same is disaster in an HTGR that it is in a light-water reactor?
19 It is harder to do it of course.
20 MR. KING:
Yes, but if you get the temperatures 2i that melt the core in the HTGR, you have got big troubles.
22 MR. SIESS:
You haven't got much else in there.
23 MR. KING:
You would have to get very high 24 temperatures.
25 MR, SIESS:
Well, severe core damage I guess is a l
L-m]
i) l
= -
98
(
)
i better term than core melt, anything that is going;to cost
.2 you a billion dollars to recover from.
3-MR. KING:
Yes.
4 MR. SIESS:
And you wouldn't have to recover from 5
it.
You would just lose your plant investment.
Yo-could 6
Probably fill it up with concrete and walk away from it.
7 MR. KING:
Yes.
MR. MARK:
And that is what they have applied the g
9 10 to the minus to in the HTGR specs.
jo MR. KING:
Yes.
11 MR. MARK:
So that would include core melts.
You 12 can't have core melts 10 times and still keep your
~ investment or even once, i3 r
s-14 MR. SIESS:
This is something that is going to 15 have'to be discussed by the ACRS to be sure we know what we 16 meant.
17 MR. KING:. But at the current time the staff did is
.notLsee any guidance from the Commission that said advanced 39 plants must be more safe than ---
MR. MARK:
I can't find the thing in the policy 20 21 statement just immediately where it says how safe they need to be.
22 MR. SIESS:
The safety goal.
23 24 MR. MARK:
It is in the policy statement somewhere, 25 Q
t
99
]
i MR. KING:
Yes.
I will find it for you.
2 MR. MARK:
Does it say at least as safe?
3' MR. KING:
It uses those words that are on the
.viewg'raph.
5 MR. MARK:
Well, in the viewgraph it doesn't say 6
at least.
7 MR. SIESS:
The same degree of protection to the a
public.
That is at least as safe.
9 MR.. KING:
It is on page 4, right under the 10 paragraph-that entitled " Commission Policy."
11 MR. SIESS:
Actually it doesn't say at least.
It
.12 says the same.
It doesn't say better would be acceptable, 13 but I am'sure that is not the intent.
I Le 14 MR. KING:
Require the same degree of protection.
l MR. SIESS:
But you would accept more?
15 16 MR. KING:
We would accept more.
We would 17 encourage more.
is MR. SIESS: 'Those words are not what you mean.
19 They must be the same.
20 MR. KING:
If it has more, we are not going to l-21 tell'them to take some out.
That is true.
22 MR. MARK:
Well, they are going to require the 23 same degree.
That really should say they should be at 24 least as safe.
25 MR. KING:
I agree.
We should have put that-
. O].
Im
100 m
( jf i
'least" in there.
2 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
3 MR. MARK :
Which is not requiring that it be more.
MR. KING:
Right.
4 5
The last item was a change we made that states 6
that the licensing guidance that we are going to develop 7
for advanced plants will build upon the' Criteria and a
regulations developed for LWR's.
9 MR. SIESS:
As applicable.
MR. KING:
As applicable, that is correct.
in n
MR. SIESS:
And Fort St. Vrain can tell you what that means.
12 (Laughter.)
13
~
I am sure Pete is well aware'of the problems.
34 MR. KING:
Well, it is no different than what we 15 did on Clinch River.
We retain what we felt made sense to 16 17 retain and we developed new ones where necessary.
is MR. SIESS:
The record is not-quite as good on applying light-water reactor criteria to Fort St. Vrain.
i9 MR. KING:
I will ask Pete about that.
20 MR. SIESS:
They have been-trying to answer 21 questions about light-water reactors for years now and are 22 having trouble.
They just tried to respond to the steam 23 El-24 generator _ questions and had some difficulty.
h5 MR. KING:
They are tied up now in equipment O
101
.-g
.LJ.
i qualification. problems.
2 MR. SIESS:
Yes, I know.
3
.(Slide.)
4 MR. KING:
All right, let's talk about the public 5
comments..Twe'nty sets of comments were received.
Seven 6
represented utilities, six from vendors, two from national 7
labs and five others.
8 The main points raised in the public comments 9
were, one, they would like to see a reduction in the 10
' prescriptive nature of the NRC regulations.
il They want to just encourage greater inherent 12 safety or safety margin than provided in LWR's, but not 13' require it.
y,
~kU They would like to see GDC's developed for 14 is advanced reactors, and some people would like to see those
'i6 less prescriptive and there were some' comments on whether L17 they should be a generic set or some felt a specific set is for-each reactor concept ~was_the way to go.
19 They made the point that NRC should not favor any
'20 design or design feature or design approach over another.
21-
'And that the NRC should not require a prototype 22 demonstration plant.
23 MR. SIESS:
In that second bullet, inherent safety 24
'and safety margin are not the same thing and it wasn't 25 intended to be.
,t-s w
i-
r 102 i
MR. KING:
They weren't intended to be the same v) 2 thing, no.
3 MR. SIESS:
Most of the GDC's are not too 4
descriptive.
There are a few that are.
5 MR. KING:
There are a few that are.
6 MR. SIESS:
And I assume our experience with those would be taken into account.
You are going through the 7
process now of revising GDC-4 because it got to be a little a
9 too prescriptive by interpretation I think.
1o MR. KING:
Yes.
The GDC itself is fairly general in and could apply to any plant.
12 MR. SIESS:
But 55, 56 and 57 o.n isolation valves was an example of quite prescriptive ones that turned out i3
(_/
not to be too good.
i4 MR. KING:
Yes.
15 MR. SIESS:
But they did have an escape clause in 16 17
- them, is MR. KING:
As necessary or ---
MR. SIESS:
Other demonstrated basis or i9 20
'something.
.There has been a feel I think in the GDC's of 21 non-prescriptiveness.
MR. KING:
22 MR. SIESS:
And I think there was a pretty strong 23 24 attempt.
'MR. KING:
But there are GDC's like, for example, 25
,n
103 I
the GDC's require a containment building, and now we have a 2
design that doesn't.want to have a containment building, 3
and that is an' area where we would have to look at-for 4
change.
5 MR. SIESS:
What I. guess bothers me more about the 6
GDC's than anything else is the number of them,.which tends 7
to be prescriptive in itself.
If you had real top-level 8
criteria, you wouldn't need 57 or whatever it is.
9 MR. KING:
Possibly.
10 (Slide.)
11 Next.I wanted to talk about ---
12 MR. SIESS:
Wait a minute.
One more thing on the i3 GDC's.
Was the comment of generic versus specific that w-'b, u
fidea that you would have GDC's that would apply to any 15
-advanced reactor and not separate ones for, say, gas-cooled s
'16 and liquid metal Cooled?
17 MR. KING:
No, I.didn't ---
is MR. SIESS:. Is.that what~they meant by generic 19 versus' specific?
20 MR. KING:
Most of the comments were generic for a 21
. reactor type, for an HTGR of a generic set, an LMR generic 22 set.
23 MR. SIESS:
Fine.
24 MR. KING:
The next few viewgraphs were to 25 describe what the staff position was on the public.
qq y
J
104
()
i comments, the five main public comments that we received, 2
the first one being they would like to reduce the 3
Prescriptive nature of the NRC regulations.
4 There certainly are prescriptive regulations and 5
criteria.
However, we feel that under the current system 6
there still remains a lot of flexibility for accommodating 7
different designs and giving credit for features where credit is due.
I think Clinch River was a good example of a
9
- that, io MR. SIESS:
Are you thinking as far down as n
regulatory guides when you say that?
12 MR. KING:
- Yes, MR. SIESS:
You know, reg. guides started out i3 fh xf being simply a codification of a staff position that had
.y 33 been developed over a period of time through multiple a
reviews and give and take with licensees or applicants, and u
that of course would have little application to this is because we don't expect to have 20 years of licensing these i9 things.
20 Later on of course reg. guides became something else.
They became-an expansion, amplification and 21 22
" clarification" of regulations or GDC's, which then brought 23 in that prescriptive aspect.
MR. KING:
They all have that disclaimer in the 24 front that says this isn't the only acceptable way to solve 25 v
105 I
1 r~1 l
t_;
i the problem.
This just happens to be the one the staff l
2 wrote down and decided was okay.
3 MR. SIESS:
That is a cop-out.
4 MR. KING:
Well, in one sense it is.
5 MR. SIESS:
That is a loophole, but only if you 6
have plenty of time to get the thing licensed.
7 MR. MARK:
Not all applicants thinks the staff a
reads that part.
9 MR. SIESS:
Well, sometimes it becomes how much 1
to time do you want to spend on it.
ii MR. KING:
I think part of our job is to make sure 12 the staff does read that part.
I think part of our job is 13 to recognize and help the rest of the staff realize that we 7
.y LJ are dealing with a different animal here, and not just hand 14 15 them a report and say give me your comments, but to make 16 sure they understand what this plant is and what the unique 17 features of these plants are.
is MR. SIESS:
Well, if there are 14 people reviewing 19 the same-aspect of 14 different plants, you need that kind 20 of stuff to get some consistency in the picture.
But if 21 you have got people reviewing one HTGR standard design and 22 one LMR standard design, I am not sure you need that 23 codification position.
You simply reach it and express it 24 in your SER or your license.
25 So I am just wondering have you serious concern
,bl v
106
()'
.i about the existing reg. guides being applicable to an 2
advanced reactor even if the GDC was the same.
3 MR. KING:
I agree.
MR. SIESS:
Okay.
4 5
MR. KING:
The GDC could apply, but the reg. guide 6
may may.
7 MR. SIESS:
I would not envision a new set of reg.
~
guides coding out for advanced reactors, and I wouldn't 8
9 consider many of the old ones being applicable in reactor o
io specific areas.
They might in siting the meteorology ---
u MR. KING:
Our intent is not to ---
12 MR. SIESS:
I am thing of something I am going to s
be looking'at next month.
33 MR. KING:
--- not to write new reg. guides or new-ja j
regs, whatever, for advanced reactors. We feel at this 15 Point it doesn't warrant that kind of resources.
16 37 MR. SIESS:
You see that automatically reduces the is level of prescriptiveness.
MR.-KING:
True.
Like I said, we felt those i9 u
20 Portions of existing criteria and regulations which apply 21 to the designs will be retained, and by the very. nature t
22 that you would retain those, they are going to tend to be 23
~the non prescriptive ones anyway.
So we are going to end i-up with a set that we retain and they are going to tend l
.24 toward the non-prescriptive nature, 25
.i l
p
=
107 P(J 1
And we are going to have to develop new criteria 2
to address the unique features of these plants.
The intent 3
is to develop these criteria, one, for the design in question, the conceptual design in question and, two, in 4
5 the GDC area for both HTGR and LMR we are going to look at 6
the generic question of what should be the GDC's for HTGR 7
modular HTGR and what should they be for modular LMR.
8 MR. SIESS:
What is the opposite of prescriptive?
9 MR. KING:
Non-prescriptive.
10 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
Well, some people say 11 performance criteria are the opposite of prescriptive 12 criteria, and I was pleased to see you see non-13 prescriptive, because that is not the same thing.
EU La u
MR. KING:
No.
Reliability goals could be.
15 MR. SIESS:
That is, if you say non-prescriptive 16 criteria, then you will make some kind of, and I won't say 17 ad hoc, but de novo review to decide whether the criteria is have been met.
Performance criteria say that a certain 19 performance standard has to be met, and then you have to 20 say how do you determine whether it.is met.
21 MR. KING:
That is right.
22 MR. SIESS:
And that requires another body of 23 rules somewhere to determine how performance will be met.
24 MR. KING:
Yes.
25 MR. SIESS:
So you don't necessarily mean p.s 6
V
108
,m i
performance criteria when you say less prescriptive.
(_)
2 MR. KING: ' Not necessarily, no.
3 MR. SIESS:
I am pleased at that because 4
performance crit'eria has been tossed around a lot without 5
people realizing just what performance criteria involve in 6
showing that performance criteria have been met.
7 MR. KING:
At this point we haven't really settled 3
in on what we mean by non-prescriptive.
We are hoping the 9
designers -- in fact, they do have ideas as to what they jo would like to see as the criteria, and we would want to ti look at those, and eventually we are going to have to make 12 a judgment.
The idea will be to hopefully state the safety function and what you are trying to do, but not describe i3 O
N./
how you have got to do it.
u MR. MARK:
Chet, if you were taking on the job of 15 writing a new set of general design criteria, would you not 16 37 expect that the same statements that you might set up for is the HTGR would cover the LMR?
19 MR. SIESS:
I would have to look at all of the criteria.
I am sure there are some that are pretty 20 21 Specific to LWR's that would be pretty specific ---
22 MR. MARK:
That got in there.
MR. SIESS:
Yes.
23 24 MR. MARK:
But if you had an ideal set of general 25 design criteria, why should they not apply to reactors O
v u
109
-- 1 J
'i entirely across the board?
2 MR. SIESS:
I think it is theoretically possible.
3 I mean you could start with a safety goal and say that is 4
your criteria.
Now if you meet it, you get a license, but-5 now you have to go, how do you meet it, and now you start 6
getting more and more specific.
7 Prescriptive says if you do it the way I say, it a
will be assumed that you meet the criteria, and you have 9
decided what it takes to meet it.
10 With performance criteria you have got to tell li somebody not how to do it, but how to prove that they have
~
12 met the performance criteria, and that frequently is more
~ 13 difficult.
And with your prescriptive criteria, you don't L-A 14 have to prove you.have met it.
You do that by fiat.
15 MR. KING:
Inspection.
~
16 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
So there is not all that much 17 great advantage to performance criteria.
I have dealt with is the problem in regulating the safety of buildings and you 19 come out with the same results either way.
The British 20 building code has one paragraph as the law on building 21 safety, and it says buildings shall not fail under the 22 loads to which they are subjected.
It is_a little more 23 than that, but it is not much more.
But then they write a 24 70-page code that says if you design the building this way, 25 it will be deemed to satisfy the performance criteria, and
- p v
a ---
110 I,)
i that is what people do.
2 In this country we simply write the code and say 3
design it this way.
And if you can see much difference in 4
how things get designed, I can't.
They look alike.
So, 5
you know, it is not that simple.
It just gives more room 6
.for argument, and that is what you can afford to do with 7
standard plants, is have more time to argue.
So you can be a
more performance and less prescriptive and work it out once 9
and for all on the standard plant.
10 MR. KING:
And hopefully starting early will give is us more time to look at this and come up with something 12 before the designer gets too far down the road.
MR.'SIESS:
And it permits the innovation and it 13 i4 permits somebody to come up with a better answer than you have.
15 MR. KING:
A large part of what we are encouraging 16 n
is get the feedback from the designers and what do they think makes sense to use.
18 (Slide.)
j9 20 All right.
The second major public comment was they didn't want to require greater safety than is required 21 22 in light-water plants.
We have written that now into the Policy statement'that we are not going to require greater 23 24
. safety.
We are going to encourage it, but not' require it because we couldn't really come up with a basis for 25
111 G
- _f i
requiring greater safety.
2 MR.'SIESS:
Could you come up with a basis for 3
saying that at the same level of safety more of it should 4
be inherent?
I mean right now it says no basis to require 5
greater safety or greater inherent safety.
Now the greater 6
modifies safety, but could you find a basis for saying that 7
at the level of safety we want more of that to be inherent 8
and less to be provided by operator action or additional 9
equipment?
-10 MR. KING:
Again, we couldn't find a basis to say 11 it has got to be done in a more inherent fashion.
What we 12 said was we think that is a good way to go and we are going 13 to encourage that, but we are not going to require it.
]'
\\
'e 14 MR. SIESS:
That is one of the ways you would like 1
15 to see it done, but if somebody comes up with another way 16 and it is not inherent ---
17 MR. KING:
We are not going to throw that out.
We is will look at that.
~
MR. SIESS:
Okay.
19 20 MR. KING:
And again the dose guidelines question, 21 we are not proposing changes to 10 CPR 20, 50 or 100 safety 22 goals.
23 MR. SIESS:
But it does say it has to be different 24 than what we have now, but it doesn't have to be safer.
25 MR. KING:
To be considered an advanced reactor
7 112 h
i
.it has got to be different, and we are encouraging the y
2 inherent way to go, but it doesn't have'to be.
p fl' 3
MR. SIESS:
Now I guess you have answered one of L
4 the questions I raised at the very early stage, the L
5 advanced light-water reactors that are being looked at are 6
not advanced reactors.'
7 MR. KING:
We. don't consider them at this time to 8
fall in the advanced category.
The plants we consider 9
right now that are included in my branch are the two LMR's, 10
.the HTGR and PIUS.
11
,MR. MARK:
PIUS is light-water.
12 MR. KING:
PIUS.is light-water.
Its different.
13 MR. SIESS:
And the result of that decision is a
that those new designs are-being reviewed ~in the old way..
1 15 MR. KING:
In the old way against each of the old I
l'6 requirements and by a different group.
My group doesn't L
i7 have anything to do with those.
There are probably some-18 that are in a gray area, too, that may come in.
Maybe an
[-
- i9 advanced light-water design may be not quite so
~
20 evolutionary and~it may be more radical and it may end up 21
-in my: group in the future.
But.at this point-the three h
- 22 that"I mentioned are the ones that are covered by the 23 advanced reactors group.
2.s All right, the third comment was about developing
- 25
.a new set of GDC's for advanced reactors.
We are going to-
.h 4
._A
113
,+
i develop GDC's, but we are going to build upon light-water
~
[
2
.GDC's where it makes sense to do that.
3 We will develop principle design criteria 4
-4 specifically for each of the three concepts, but we are 5
also going to look at in a generic sense GDC's for a mo'ular HTGR and for the LMR.
d 6
- 7 MR. SIESS:
Do you expect ACRS interaction on s
8 that?
9 MR. KING:
I envision when we get to the PSID to stage we will be reviewing the PDC's for each of the 11 concepts.
Whether you want to review the. generic set we
~
'12 come:up with,'I think we are certainly agreeable to.that.
13 I hadn't really thought that far yet.
ps 14 MR. SIESS:
I think that is something we ought to is think about.
The ACRS wants to be involved in the 16 development'of GDC's.-
- 17 MR. KING:
Okay.
MR. SIESS:
I believe that the ACRS was involved 18 19 in the development of the current set of GDC's, and I know 20 we were strongly involved in a proposed set of GDC's for
- 21 fuel reprocessing-plants some years back.
So I think
~
-22 historicallyLthere has been some, but that doesn't necessarily mean there would be in the future, but I-think 23
-24 that is one of the questions.
' 25 MR. KING:
Okay.-
t.s s.
,.____.,,...,.,.,__.__...-,,_..m...-,
c 114
- ()
i MR. MARK:
It seems to me in this you have spoken 2
several times of GDC's for one reactor' type and GDC's for 3
another reactor type.
But you are also going to bring in L4 with you some of the GDC's for LWR's~perhaps exactly'as 5
they are written, but not all, not the whole list.
6 MR. KING:
True.
7 MR. MARK:
I think it would be an interesting g
question for you'to at least have in mind to is to what.
9 extent could the design criteria that you think of be
-10 similar for both types?
I think it is imaginable that you in could write a set of GDC's that would apply to each type if 12 they are not prescriptive.
MR. KING:
Are you talking about one'that would i3
(~'/)
s_
i4 cover advanced LWR, HTGR and LMR?
MR. MARK:
Possibly, and in any event, you see, i
15 you are going to.take something from the past and move it g
u forward, and then-in adding things it would be at least 18 attractive.'that they not be any more different than they need to be.
i9 MR. KING:
I think certainly probably a large 20 2i' number of the criteria if we develop a set for HTGR and.LMR
'would be the same.
22 L
- 23 MR. MARK:
Yes.
24 MR. KING:
Some will be different.
Sodium fires 25
. won't'show up in the HTGR criteria.
O
=..
115 f
1 MR. MARK:
Is-that a general design criteria, 2
sodium fires?
3 MR. KING:
Accommodate of sodium fires.
4 MR. MARK:
I know you will need somewhere to 5
discuss sodium fires.
Whether it is in that package or-6 not, I don't know.
7 MR. KING:
I agree there might be a large a
percentage of them that might end up being the same or probayly will be the same.
We will have to see how.that 9
io ends up.
11
~(Slide.)
12 The. fourth comment was NRC shouldn't. favor any i3
. design or design feature or design approach over another.
n' Ik2 14 Our intent-is we are going to-encourage inherent is
. safety, but we are not going-to favor.one over the other.
16 We don't intend to write a report that compares the two
.s -
17
'LMR's. top the HTGR to PIUS or to anything else.
~
is lie are going to review each design on.the merits 19 of that design.and.how well it meets the criteria we come 20 up with.
We are not going to get into the position of
~
21 endorsing one design or one feature over another.
22 MR. SIESS:
Let me go back to this relative safety 23 question.
In the proposed policy statement in.the first 24 paragraph there are the words " defining an advanced 25 reactor."
5 lf [
v.
4
J 116 f
.i MR.. KING:
Yes.
-2 MR. SIESS:
First.it says "significantly 3
different, and to varying degrees provide more margin prior
-4 to exceeding safety limits and make more use of simplified 5
inherent cn: passive means to~ reliably accomplish their 6
safety functions."
g 7
Now if you want more-margin, is that different 8
from wanting safer reactors?
9 MR. KING:
No.
I think the intent is with this
~
10 Policy statement to' push for safer reactors and encou' rage it safer reactors.
12 MR. SIESS:
So the policy statement does say in the definition of-an advanced reactor that it~ is one that-i3
.is safer and more about' safety is provided by inherent or 34 15 passive means.
MR. KING:
Currently when we look at putting
-16 plants into the advanced category we look at do they L.
i7 la accomplish their safety functions using there inherent or safer means.
We fully expect that those are going to lead' i9 L
i 20
-to safer' plants.
MR. SIESS:
Now this doesn't say that advanced I
21 f
. reactors have to be safer, but it says ---I am sorry.
It 22 L
doesn't say that future reactors should be safer, but it 23
(
-24
.says that to be considered an-advanced reactor it should be safer.
Is that a correct reading now?
25
+
117 1
MR. KING:
Let me read the words here.
2
. MR. SIESS:
Did you find them?
3 MR. KING:
Yes.
4 MR. SIESS:
Those are all "and's" and not "or's".
5 MR. KING:
We have the caveat in there to varying 6
degrees.
7 MR. SIESS:
Yes, I know, but ---
8 MR. KING:
We fully expect the advanced plants 9
will be safer.
I agree this definition may tend -- you 10 sort of have to make a judgment before you categorize it as 11
.to whether it is safer or not it. sounds like.
t 12 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
You see, what I am getting is i3 you said earlier in response to a comment that you could S
LJ 14 have no basis to require it.
'15 MR. KING:
That is right.
16 MR. SIESS:
And certainly this doesn't require 17 that they be safer in order to get a license.
18 MR.1 KING:
Right.
19 MR. SIESS:
It simply says they should be safer in 20 order to be called an advance reactor.
And, as I 21 understand it, the definition, or the reason for defining 22 advanced reactor is to specify those reactors which will be 23 reviewed under.the procedures that are outlined in here.
~
24 MR. KING:
Yes.
25 MR. SIESS:
Now if somebody came in with an HTGR.
w W
m m
118
()
i like Fort St. Vrain or Fulton or Summit and didn't have 2
more margin than existing Fort St. Vrain or more inherent 3
than Fort St. Vrain, and I am not comparing it with light
~
4 water reactors now, that would not be considered an 5
advanced reactor, which you said earlier.
6 MR. KING:
Right.
7 MR. SIESS:
And it could be licensed presumably.
MR. KING:
It could be licensed presumably.
3 9
MR. SIESS:
I sound like a lawyer, but something
-10 is bothering me here.
Sounding like a lawyer bothers me ii enough, but ---
12 (Laughter.)
MR. KING:
There may be some room for improvement i3 on these words.
I can see your problem.
ja MR..SIESS:
Well, actually the problem, and I 15 don't know whether you are going to solve it or not, but I 16 17
.am trying to decide what we are going to take to the full is committee and whether we are going to tell the full committee that.the Commission policy says advanced reactors 39 don't have to be any safer than existing ones, or whether 20 it says they do have to be safer, which I think will be 21 sort of a major issue with the full committee.
.22 MR. KING:
I think later on it clearly says they~
23 don't have to be any safer.
24 MR. SIESS:
Now could you find those words?
25
.O G
a
119 9-1 MR. KING:
Yes.
Those are on page in my copy, page 4, under the. paragraph titl'ed " Commission Policy'"
2 3
MR. SIESS:. Okay.
And of course those are not 4
inconsistent because this is what the Commission intends to 5
require.
6-MR. KING:
Right.
7 MR. SIESS:
And the other only related to whether s'
they were advanced reactors.
9 MR. KING:
Yes.
.The other related to a 10 definition, but I guess I can see the definition may sound 11 a little contradictory, but it wasn't intended to be.
12 MR.-SIESS:
This foreign advanced reactors are 13 going to require the same degree -- in fact, there is says-L-'
1~
to be an advanced reactor it has to have more.
So.they 15 have got to have m. ore to get into this category, and once 16 in the category you-won't require any more.
-17 (Laughter.)
18 MR. KING:
The intent was to require they do 19 things-in a different way 20 MR. SIESS:
Maybe I have gotten into this wrong 21.
somehow,.but that is what it seems to say now, and I think 22 you need to think about it a little bit.
23 MR. KING:
I appreciate your comment.
24 MR. SIESS:
I am not sure which one to put to the
.25 full committee.
' pj.
v
l..
120 1
h i
MR. MARK:
As we discussed earlier, the phrase "at 2-least" may very.well be in this place we are reading from.
3 MR. KING:
'Yes, I agree.
4 MR. SIESS:
I think we would all take a great deal 5
of comfort from the fact that-the industry has come up with 6
a pretty good level to protect its investment, and that is 7
going to take care.of a lot of our concerns about the a
Public health and safety.
9 (Slide.)
10 MR. KING:
The last item had to do with a n
prototype demonstration plant.
The policy does not require 12 such a plant.
It does say we consider that certainly to b'e an acceptable way to demonstrate.the features, but it is 13 34 not a mandatory-way.
MR. SIESS:
Just how much comfort would you get 15 out'of that?
16 MR. KING:
How much comfort do I get out of that?
17
-is MR. SIESS:
Yes.
You know, if somebody built one-and melted it down, or built one and cut off everything and i9 20 walked away from it and it survived, you know, it wasn't usable, but it survived, would you be happy?
I mean this 21 22 is the'way LOFT started out, you know, and 15 years later and a million dollars, that is the way it ended up, and 23 there was an awful lot that went on in between.
24 MR.. KING:
I personally think the idea of a 25 O
m-121
.-i
,,)
i demonstration concept is good, but it doesn't answer all 2
your questions.
You are only testing a certain specific 3
set of accidents under a certain specific set of decay' heat 4
or radiation influence on the components and that kind of 5
thing.
You need to be about to extrapolate your data or 6
somehow be able to translate that into looking at the whole 7
life cycle of the plant and does it demonstrate the plant 8
is safe for its 40 years or 60 years.
9 MR. SIESS:
I mean you build one and test it that to way and somebody will say what if.
11 MR. KING:
You have got to ask the what'if's and 12 look at the test program to see if that addresses the what i3 if's.
RLd 14 MR. SIESS:
It-just sounds like a good idea until is you do it.
16 MR. KING:
I think it certainly.is better than 17 just looking at a report that says everything is going to is be okay, because you do get some hard data.
In fact, on 19 Clinch River we required natural circulation tests before 20 we would accept their analysis.
We did the same thing on 2i FFTF.
And now here they are talking about a whole 22 dedicated plant.
I think it is a good idea, but by itself 23 it doesn't answer all your questions.
24 All right, that was the end of my prepared 25 Presentation.
Now if you wanted to ask anything.
hj V
122
-( ).
i MR. SIESS:
Mr. Chairman, I think the presentation 2
has been excellent.
It has really covered the territory 3
and I am out of' questions.
4 MR. MARK:
I have a couple of questions that came 5
to mind on reading SECY-85-279.
I will mention them if you 6
are willing to put a'little note in your copy.
7 I am worried on page 2 of the clean stuff.
g MR. SIESS:
Is that-what you are looking at, the 9
one called Attachment B?
to MR. MARK:
Attachment A.
11 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
I am sorry.
12 MR. MARK:
. going to keep the public informed of its judgment on the known and unknown safety i3
~
aspects," and that strikes me as somewhat unclear.
u MR. SIESS:
What is Attachment A?
15 MR. MARK:
Attachment A is the background I guess.
16 17 MR. SIESS:
That is part of the Federal Register is notice.
MR. KING:
I think'so.
i9 20 MR. SIESS:
And the policy is Attachment B, right?
21 MR. KING:
The policy is Attachment B, yes.
22 MR. SIESS:
That is the statement of considerations or something?
23 21 MR. MARK:
Right.
MR. KING:
I didn't write Attachment A.
25
! O i
123 79
+
y 1
MR. MARK:
Well, whoever wrote ---
2 MR. KING:
Is. Ken here?
There is Ken.
Who wrote 3
Attachment A?
4 MR. SIESS:
Is that the policy statement or what?
1 5
Legally what is it?
Oh, well, I shouldn't ask it that way.
6 MR.. HERRING:
It is the introduction that goes in 7
with the Federal Register notice, and the first short blurb 8
that goes in front of'it and then the policy statement 9
would follow.
10 MR. SIESS:
Does it tend to be a summary?
11 MR. HERRING:
Yes, a very short summary and then 12 the whole policy statement would follow that.
13 MR. SIESS:
As far as policy it doesn't govern.
.rg 14 MR. HERRING:
No, actually you will find that that
.15
.is basically a cut and paste from what is in the policy 16
. statement ~anyway.
17 MR. SIESS:- I didn't hear all of that.
r
.18 MR. HsdRING: -That is a cut an'd paste from what is i9 in the policy statement anyway.
I mean it is not new-20 thought.
21 MR. SIESS:
Oh, okay, that is helpful.
22 MR. MARK:
Well, perhaps I should be pointing at 23 you then instead of poor Mr. King.
24 MR. SIESS:
Well, if it is cut and paste from the 25
' policy statement, it must be in the policy statement
124 I
es()
somewhere.
J i
l 2
MR. MARK:
I think it appears somewhere else, 3
too.
But I am really troubled.
The judgment on unknown 4
safety aspects, how are you going to develop it?
5 MR. SIESS:
Where are those words?
MR. HERRING:~
Basically the way I read the policy 6
7 statement, what that is referring to is there are certain things you are going to know about and you are going to 3
9 dismiss as it goes along.
And then there are certain jo unknown things that you know about them, but you don't know ii their behavior exactly.
So you would just let the public 12 know what are the unknowns that you still require further information on and that you are trying to sort out.
13
(_)
I mean I never read that the way I think you are i4 reading it, if you don't know it, how can you say anything is about it.
16 i7 MR. MARK:
I think it can be read that way and it is shouldn't probably appear that way.
And if you want to say i9 informed of its judgment on all known safety aspects, you 20 have covered the field as much as you possibly can..
21 I had another thing.
I guess Attachment A is just 22 the first two pages.
Is it?
No.
23 Oh,-in the previous experience, which is page 3 24 now of still Attachment A -- I am not sure if I have got it 25 on page 3, but somewhere in that section there is a qLJ
125
]
1" reference to the fast flux test facility as part of -- oh, 2
yes, it is on page 3 in the middle paragraph, third line.
3 Reviewed but not licensed.
i 4
EMR. KING:
Right.
-5 MR. MARK:
I understand that, but I think it would 6
do with.a slight explanation, however.
it wasn't that it 7
wasn't licensable.
It was a DOE reactor which didn't.
2 8
require a license or an URC ---
9
~
MR. KING:
It could be read the wrong way that it to wasn't, safe enough and didn't get a license.
11 MR. MARK:
It could be read that it couldn't get a 12 license.
13
'MR. EKING:
Okay.
14 MR. MARK: -And that I think appears maybe again-15 later, too.
16 Then just as a matter of taste, on page 7 of that 17 same opus it sounds a little bit superfluous. to say this is early interaction may be in the form of meetings or written 19 material.
Why don't you just delete that sentence.
It 20 sounds Kind of vacuous.
21 MR. KING:
We could.
I just wanted to give a 22 little definition.
23 MR. MARK:
You could add of course it might be on 24 the phone.
25 (Laughter.)
- Jm V
1
(
1
.. - 2L
126
,m( )
i MR. KING:
No, I was just trying to put a little 2
definition in of what interaction meant.
It could be 3
deleted and not affect the policy statement.
4 MR. SIESS:
It hardly seems worthwhile elevating 5
that to commission policy.
6 MR. KING:
All right.
I can't argue with that.
7 (Laughter.)
MR. MARK:
I think -- oh, yes, the not licensed j
g 9
comes up again in the underlined copy, which won't of io course appear as it appears here.
11 MR. KING: 'The underlined is the same as the 12 policy.
It just shows how the changes were made.
MR. MARK:
Yes.
Well ---
33
,im N/
MR. SIESS:
I cannot find that reference to i4 unknown safety problems in the policy statement itself.
i3 MR. KING:
I don't recall it being in there'.
16 MR. SIESS:
I think Ken invented that one, 37 is (Laughter.)
Can somebody tell us what we can expect to see in i9 NUREG "XXX"?
20 MR. KING:
When you expect to see it?
21 22 MR. SIESS:
What is in it and whether, for 23 example, it is something that the ACRS should have before it comments to the Commission on the policy statement.
24 MR.-HERRING:
What we are proposing to do is to do 25 (v~)
127 1
the same' thing that was done, for example, in safety goals 2
where all you publish in the Federal Register would be just 3
that short blurb of the summary and policy statement, and
~
4 the summary of the public comments and stuff would be 5
contained in the NUREG as a separate document rather than 6
publishing it along with the ---
7 MR. SIESS:
So the NUREG will be this document, a
the public comments and the. responses to them?
9
'MR. HERRING:
Well, it wouldn't include the whole 10 stack of public comments in their entirety.
It would be'
.11 just'a summary of the public comments and what the 12 Commission thought about them and the. policy statement, and
'3 then separate in.the Federal Register would just simply be i
f]
L~
14 the policy statement.
15 MR. SIESS:
We have that, don't we?
16 MR. HERRING:- No.
We are proposing that after the 17 Commission decides what it wants to do with it ---
18 MR. SIESS:
We don't have the summary, 19 MR. HERRING:
Well, yes, you have the pieces, the 20 basic pieces that exist, or you should have had.it.
21.
MR. SIESS:
That is what I was looking for.
I l
'22 have got the public comments.
23 MR. HERRING:
Okay.
There was a' memo dated I 24 believe it was July'3rd or somewhere in there with the 25 summary of public comments.
That is another piece of it.
l. [
i
(_)
i l
i
128 O-i an. x1so=
rue secr gaver doe #'e nave that in
.2 there.
3 MR. HERRING:
Right.- We had already sent it to 4
the commission.
'5 MR. MARK:
The SECY paper has Attachment D.
6 MR. HERRING:
Attachment D are answers to specific 7
questions.
That is another piece of it.
MR. MARK:
And that won't be in the policy 8
9 statement either.
io MR. HERRING:
Right.
What we are proposing is ii that not be included.
In the Federal Register notice will 12 just simply,be the policy statement and the background will l
l be contained in the NUREG.
i3 MR. SIESS:
I don't think we need it.
14 MR. MARK:
Well, I guess our meeting is over, 15 isn't it, except we may want to chat for a minute with Mr.
16 I
17 King.
l i.
is MR. SIESS:
I guess we need to decide what we want i
to do with the full committee.
i9 MR. MARK:
Yes.
20 The meeting is adjourned.
21 (Whereupon, at 11:58 a.m., the subcommittee i.
22 i
23 meeting adjourned.)
j' 24 25
- g
.j
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1 CERTIFICATE OF OFFICIAL REPORTER 2
3 4
5 This is to certify that the attached proceedings 6
before the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the 7
matter of: ADVISORY cob 21ITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS 8
9 Name of proceeding: Advanced Reactors Subcommittee 10 11 Docket No.
12 P1 ace: Washington, D.
C.
18 Date: Wednesday, September 25, 1985 14 15 were held as herein appears and that this is the original 16 transcript thereof.for the file of the United States Nuclear 17 Regulatory Commission.
18 (Signature) g g%
(Typed Name of Reportifer)
Mary C ?Simons 20 21 22 23 Ann Riley & Associates. Ltd.
v 24 25
~
NRR STAFF PRESENTATION TO THE O
SUBJECT:
STATUS OF ADVANCED REACTOR ACTIVITIES DATE:
SEPTEMBER 25, 1985 PRESENTER:
T. L. KING O
PRESENTER'S TITLE / BRANCH /DIV:
CHIEF, ADVANCED REACTORS GROUP., DST PRESENTER'S NRC TEL. NO.:
301-492-7347 SUBCOMMITTEE:
ADVANCED REACTORS O
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- COMMENT, DOE FORMALLY TRANSMITTED TO NRC A PLAN AND SCHEDULE 4/26/85 FOR REVIEW 0F AN HTGR, DOE FORMALLY TRANSMITTED TO NRC A PLAN AND SCHEDULE 7/1/85 FOR REVIEW 0F TWO LMRs.
NRC COMMITTED DOE'S PLAN FOR THE HTGR REVIEW, 7/11/85 7
(
TRANSMITTAL OF HTGR TOP LEVEL REGULATORY CRITERIA
-8/16/85 FOR NRC APPROVAL.
NRC COMMITTED TO DOE'S PLAN FOR THE LMR REVIEWS, 9/13/85
()
G MAJOR TECHNICAL INTERACTIONS ACCOMPLISHED (2/85 - 9/85) 5/31/85 - BRIEFING ON CONCEPT SELECTION STATUS HTGRs AND METHOD FOR SELECTING DESIGN BASIS ACCIDENTS
~
7/31-8/1/85 - BRIEFING ON CONCEPT SELECTION METHODOLOGY (TOP DOWN APPROACH)
AND CONCEPT SELECTION STATUS 8/8/85 - BRIEFING ON LMR STATION BLACK 0UT CRITERIA LMRs Q
\\v' 8/29/85 - BRIEFING ON SAFR TORNADO DESIGN BASIS HAVE ALSO HAD DISCUSSIONS ON THE IDENTIFICATION OF KEY ISSUES, THE PSID OUTLINE AND FUTURE PLANS AND SCHEDULES,
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HTGR TOP LEVEL CRITERIA REPRESENT CRITERIA FROM THE EXISTING BODY OF NRC RULES, REGULATIONS, CRITERIA AND GUIDELINES WHICH DEFINE A STANDARD FOR PROTECTION OF THE PUBLIC.
ALL OTHER RULES, REGULATIONS, CRITERIA AND GUIDELINES THEN HELP ENSURE THE TOP LEVEL CRITERIA ARE MET, 10 CFR 20 - PERMISSIBLE LEVELS OF RADIATION IN UNRESTRICTED AREAS.
10 CFR 50, APPENDIX I - ALARA, O
10 CFR 100 - SITE B0UNDARY DOSES FOR UNRESTRICTED AREAS, EPA-520/1-75-001 - PROTECTIVE ACTION GUIDELINES.
NUREG-0880 - SAFETY G0ALS.
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O HTGR TOP DOWN APPROACH START WITH TOP LEVEL PLANT G0ALS AND USE THEM TO GUIDE SELECTION OF BEST CONCEPT.
FOR EXAMPLE:
80% AVAILABILITY 10% COST ADVANTAGE OVER C0AL
<10-5 PER YEAR CHANCE OF LOSS OF PLANT
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MEET 10 CFR 20, 50, 100 MAINTAIN OFFSITE RELEASES LESS THAN PROTECTIVE ACTION GUIDELINES ENVELOP 80% OF U.S. SITES 4
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1 UNCERTAINTIES-ARE INCLUDED IN THE ESTIMATIONS,
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AUTOMATIC SHUTDOWN AND MAINTENANCE Or SUBCRITICALITY, o
AUTOMATIC INITIATION AND MAINTENANCE OF CORE AND STRUCTURAL
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350 MwT MODULAR DESIGN o
TWO LIQUID METAL REACTORS:
POWER REACTOR INHERENT SAFETY MODULE-(PRISM), 425 MwT MODULAR DESIGN O
S0DIUM ADVANCED FAST REACTOR (SAFR), 900 MwT MODULAF DESIGN i
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O HTGR CONCEPT I
DESIGNERS - GA TECHNOLOGIES /SaW/BECHTEL/CE/GE, o
350 MwT (140 MWE), MODULAR DESIGN, WITH REACTOR VESSEL AND o
STEAM GENERATOR LOCATED BELOW GRADE, o
STEEL REACTOR VESSEL, o
EXTERNAL STEAM GENERATOR.
ANNULAR CORE DESIGN WITH PRISMATIC FUEL BLOCKS SIMILAR TO FSV.
o o
ONE LOOP PER MODULE.
o ONE TURBINE-GENERATOR PER 3-4 MODULES.
O CONFINEMENT BUILDING ONLY (N0 CONTAINMENT),
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PASSIVE DECAY HEAT REMOVAL SYSTEM, t
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NON-SAFETY GRADE B0P, o
40 YEAR MODULE LIFETIME.
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AIR-COOLED REACTOR CAVITY COOLING SYSTEM
O PRISM CONCEPT DESIGNERS - GE/BECHTEL/ UNITED ENGINEERS / BYRON-JACKSON o
/F0 STER-WHEELER 425 MwT (133 MWE), MODULAR DESIGN, P00L TYPE LMR WITH REACTOR o
VESSEL LOCATED BLOW GRADE.
HOMOGENEOUS CORE DESIGN WITH 0XIDE FUEL VS, METAL FUEL SITLL o
UNDER CONSIDERATION.
o ONE LOOP PER MODULE.
ONE TURBINE-GENERATOR PER 3 MODULES.
o REACTOR GUARD VESSEL USED AS CONTAINMENT BOUNDARY.
o PASSIVE DECAY HEAT REMOVAL AND SHUTDOWN SYSTEMS.
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NON-SAFETY GRADE B0P.
o 40 YEAR MODULE LIFE.
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o 900 MwT (350 MWE), MODULAR DESIGN, POOL TYPE LMR WITH REACIOR o
VESSEL AND STEAM GENERATORS AB0VE GRADE.
HOMOGENE0US CORE DESIGN WITH METAL FUEL AS REFERENCE WITH o
CAPABILITY RETAINED TO ALSO USE OXIDE FUEL.
o TWO LOOPS PER MODULE.
o ONE TURBINE-GENERATOR PER MODULE.
REACTOR GUARD VESSEL USED AS CONTAINMENT B0UNDARY.
o PASSIVE DECAY HEAT REMOVAL AND SHUTDOWN SYSTEMS, o
o NON-SAFETY GRADE B0P.
o 60 YEAR MODULE LIFETIME.
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HAVE NRC CONDUCT OVER THE NEXT 2-3 YEARS A REVIEW 0F THE HTGR AND LMR CONCEPTUAL DESIGNS:
PSID SER AND LICENSABILITY LETTER t
1989 THRU LATE 1990s PURSUE STANDARD DESIGN APPROVAL A o
CERTIFICATION OF THE DESIGN THROUGH RULEMAKING.
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. O NEAR TERM PLANS HTGR 10/8/85 MEETING ON DESIGN STATUS AND SELECTION OF DESIGN BASIS EVENTS, LMRs MEETING ON DECAY HEAT REMOVAL RE0llIREMENTS, 9/26/85 4
10/11/85
~ MEETING ON SAFR CRANE DESIGN, MEETING ON SAFR SAFEGUARDS & SECllRITY PLUS 11/20/85 SAFETY TEST PLAN, IT IS EXPECTED THAT FORMAL SUBMITTALS ON VARIOUS HTGR AND LMR DESIGN ISSUES WILL BE RECEIVED IN THE NEAR FUTURE,
' O
SlfEARY CF REVIEW PLAN FOR HTGR CONCEPTilAL DESIGN STAFF REVIEW ITEM SCHEDULED SUBMITTAL-COMPLETE o
TOP LEVEL CRITERIA 8/85 10/85 o
BRIDGING METHODS 10/85 12/85 o
LOWER LEVEL CRITERIA, 10/85 12/85 INCLUDING GDCs o
INTERACT ON KEY ISSUES:
CRITERIA FOR ACCIDENT 10/85 2 MONTHS SELECTION / EVALUATION AFTER SUBMITTAL (INCLUDING SEVERE ACCIDENTS)
V MULTIPLE MODULE CONTROL FY 86 DECAY HEAT REMOVAL CONTAINMENT / CONFINEMENT REACTOR SHUTDOWN FUEL ISI WATER / AIR INGRESS CORE SUPPORT STRUCTURE ISSUES RELATED TO STANDARD PLANT APPROVAL 0
REVIEW R&D PROGRAM 9/86 6/87 o
FINAL PSID 9/86 6/87 o
FINAL PRA 9/86 6/87
7
- O 4
SilMMARY OF LONG TERM HTGR LICENSING PLAN
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1989 o
SUBMIT PSSAR 4
1991 o
PDA REQUESTED
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1993 o
SUBMIT FSSAR 1995 o
FDA REQUESTED O
o D'ESIGN APPROVAL REQUESTED VIA RULEMAKING 1998 s
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StfNARY OF EVIEW PLAN FOR LMR CONCEPTllAL~ DESIGNS -
STAFF REVIEW ITEM SCHEDULED SUBMITTAL COMPLETE o
INTERACT ON KEY ISSUES:
STATION BLACK 0UT FY 86 2 MONTHS AFTER SUBMITTAL DECAY HEAT REMOVAL (SHRS)
NA LEAK ACCOMMODATION CONTAINMENT / CONFINEMENT REACTOR SHUTDOWN METAL FUEL MULTIPLE MODULE CONTROL-n CRITERIA FOR ACCIDENT SELECTION / EVALUATION (INCLUDING SEVERE ACCIDENTS)
ISI ISSUES RELATED TO STANDARD PLANT APPROVAL o
REVIEW R&D PROGRAM FY 86/FY 87 o
REVIEW SAFETY TEST PLAN SUMMER 1986 1/87 o
FINAL PSID 12/86 12/87 o
FINAL PRA 12/86 12/87
9 O
SUMMARY
OF LONG TERM LMR LICENSING PLAN SAFR
~
PRISM o
SUBMIT PSSAR 1989 1991 o
PDA REQUESTED o
SUBMIT FSSAR 1992 1995 o
FDA REQUESTED 1996 H
O o
DESIGN APPROVAL REQUESTED 1996 VIA RULEMAKING l
O
~
O NRR RESOURCES REQUIRED OUTSIDE TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE:
FUNDS REQUIRED:
FY 86 FY 87 FY 88 HTGR.
650 K 550 K 0
LMR 600 K 600 K 200 K 1250 K 1150 K 200 K FUNDS ALLOCATED:
BNL 600 K 550 K 50 K ORNL I400 K 350 K UNDESIGNATED 250 K 250 K 150 K 1250 K 1150 K 200 K NRR MANPOWER:.
FY 86 F_Y 87 FY 88 PSY 3.7 5.7
3.2 ASSUMPTIONS
NO SUPPORT FROM RES.
NO CHANGES IN SCOPE OR SCHEDULE FROM WHAT HAS BEEN REQUE BY DOE.
O BNL - FY 86 TASKS I)
HTGR DEVELOP ANALYTICAL CAPABILITY FOR AIR / WATER INGRESS ACCIDENT ANALYSIS FOR MODULAR CONCEPT, DEVELOP ANALYTICAL CAPABILITY FOR MODELING RELEASES FROM THE REACTOR BUILDING AFTER BLOWDOWN ACCIDENTS, ASSIST NRC IN EVALUATING WHAT SH0llLD BE USED~FOR HTGR SSST, O
ASSIST NRC IN REVIEWING DOE BASE TECHNOLOGY WORK ON GRAPHITE OXIDATION, PREFORM INDEPENDENT ANALYSIS ON THE MODULAR CONCEPT IN THE FOLLOWING AREAS:
o EXAMINE A RANGE OF AIR / WATER INGRESS ACCIDENTS AND THE RESULTING FP RELEASE, STRUCTURAL GRAPHITE DEGRADATION, o
EXAMINE A RANGE OF BLOWDOWN ACCIDENTS AND THE RESULTING SITE BOUNDARY DOSE RATES, O
O BNL - FY 86 TASKS (CONTINUED)
II)
LMR ADAPT SSC TO PRISM /SAFR, ADAPT COMMIX TO PRISM /SAFR, DEVELOP ANALYSIS TOOLS TO MODEL INHERENT REACTIVITY FEEDBACKS IN PRISM /SAFR, ASSIST NRC IN EVALUATING WHAT SHOULD BE USED FOR LMR SOURCE TERM (SSST PLUS DBAs, BDBAs).
ASSIST NRC IN REVIEWING DOE REPORTS ON LMR SAFETY ISSUES.
ASSIST NRC IN REVIEWING DOE BASE TECHNOLOGY WORK ON O
' Mas-PERFORM INDEPENDENT ANALYSIS ON PRISM /SAFR IN THE FOLLOWING AREAS:
o RANGE OF PIPE BREAKS FOR AFFECT ON CORE TEMPERATURE, o
RANGE OF DECAY HEAT REMOVAL SCENARIOS (I.E., ASSUME CERTAIN COMPONENTS / SYSTEMS OUT OF SERVICE),
o RANGE OF REACTIVITY INSERTIONS, o
RANGE OF SEVERE ACCIDENT (LOHS W/ FAILURE TO SCRAM, LOF W/ FAILURE TO SCRAM, REACTIVITY INSERTION W/ FAILURE TO SCRAM),
o NA FIRE IN CONTAINMENT TO EVALUATE CONTAINMENT DESIGN BASIS, O
4 O
ORNL - FY 86 TASKS l
DEVELOP CALCULATIONAL TOOLS FOR THE MODULAR CONCEPT TO ANALYZE:
o REACTIVITY INSERTION TRANSIENTS, o
LOSS OF FLOW TRANSIENTS, o
LOSS OF HEAT SINK TRANSIENTS, o
DEPRESSURIZATION ACCIDENTS, INCLUDE CAPABILITY TO CALCULATE FUEL TEMPERATURE, LOOP TEMPERATURES, INHERENT REACTIVITY FEEDBACK, FP RELEASE, (WILL BE DEPENDENT ON DESIGN DETAIL AVAILABLE.)
ASSIST NRC IN EVALUATING WHAT SHOULD BE USED FOR-THE HTGR i
SSST AND SOURCE TERMS FOR DBAs, BDBAs, ASSIST NRC IN REVIEWING DOE BASE TECHNOLOGY WORK ON HTGRs.
ASSIST NRC IN REVIEWING DOE REPORTS ON HTGR SAFETY ISSUES.
PERFORM INDEPENDENT ANALYSIS ON MODULAR CONCEPT IN'THE FOLLOWING AREAS:
o RANGE OF DEPRESSURIZATION ACCIDENTS.
o RANGE OF DECAY HEAT REMOVAL SCENARIOS (I.E., ASSUME CERTAIN COMPONENTS / SYSTEMS OUT OF SERVICE).
o RANGE OF REACTIVITY INSERTIONS.
o RANGE OF SEVERE ACCIDENTS (LOHS W/ FAILURE TO SCRAM, LOF W/ FAILURE TO SCRAM, REACTIVITY INSERTION W/ FAILURE TO SCRAM),
ASSIST NRC IN THE REVIEW 0F THE CONTROL SYSTEM AND STRATEGY Q
FOR THE MODULAR CONCEPT.
.O PROPOSED INTERACTIONS WITH ACRS 1
~
FY 86 o
PRESENT PROPOSED CONTAINMENT / CONFINEMENT DESIGN AND DESIGN CRITERIA, INCLUDING SSST, FOR HTGR AND LMRS.
o PRESENT PROPOSED DESIGN BASIS ACCIDENT ENVELOPES FOR HTGR AND LMRS, INCLUDING HOW THEY WERE SELECTED.
FY 87 o
PROVIDE DESCRIPTION OF KEY HTGR AND LMR SYSTEMS, BASED UPON PSID.
o PROVIDE STAFF EVALUATION OF HTGR CONCEPT, o
RECEIVE ACRS LETTER ON THE HTGR CONCEPT.
FY 88 o
PROVIDE STAFF EVALUATION OF LMR CONCEPTS.
o RECEIVE ACRS LETTER ON LMR CONCEPTS.
s PURPOSE TO RECEIVE ACRS FEEDBACK REGARDING THE SAFETY OF THE PR0 POSED
]
CONCEPTS.
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INTERACT WITH DESIGNERS ON CRITERIA, MAJOR ISSUES AND o
SUPPORTING BASE TECHNOLOGY PROGRAMS, DESIGNERS TO PROPOSE, NRC TO REVIEW (THIS WILL INCLUDE INDEPENDENT ANALYSIS),
DESIGNER IS RESPONSIBLE FOR DEVELOPING COMPLETE SET OF ANALYTICAL TOOLS AND BASE TECHNOLOGY, DOCUMENT CRITERIA AND' GUIDANCE REGARDING MAJOR ISSUES, o
PERFORM SAFETY REVIEW 0F DESIGN VIA PSID REVIEW, o
o ISSUE SER AND LICENSABILITY LETTER, O
O TECHNICAL APPROACH
~
o BUILD-UPON LWR FRAMEWORK, WHERE PRACTICAL.
o DEVELOP NEW CRITERIA AND GUIDELINES FOR EACH CONCEPT WHICH:
ADDRESS CHARACTERISTICS OF THE DESIGN WHICH DIFFER FROM LWRs.
ADDRESS UNIQUE SAFETY CHARACTERISTICS OF THE DESIGN, o
CONSIDER GIVING' CREDIT FOR INHERENT SAFETY CHARACTERISTICS INCORPORATED INTO THE EcS1 O
o ADVANCED REACTORS MUST BE AT !. EAST AS SAFE AS CURRENT GENERATION LWRs, EVALUATE EQUIVALENCY WITH LWRs IN DEFENSE IN DEPTH, PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE.
SUFFICIENT R&D PROGRAMS, APPLICATION OF TMI AND USI ISSUES.
COMPARIS0N AGAINST THE COMMISSION'S PROPOSED SAFETY G0ALS.
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PROPOSED COMMISSION POLICY STATEMENT o
REDRAFTED BY NRR T0:
PROVIDE BETTER ORGANIZATION AND CLARIFICATION.
INCORPORATE PUBLIC COMMENTS AND PROVIDE RESPONSES QUESTIONS AT THE END OF THE POLICY STATEMENT.
MAIN POINTS INCLUDED IN REDRAFT:
o ENC 0URAGES EARLY INTERACTION BETWEEN NRC AND REACTO DESIGNERS ON LICENSING CRITERIA.
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ENC 0URAGES~CERTAIN FEATURES AND CHARACTERISTICS BE INCLUDED IN ADVANCED DESIGNS.
ENCOURAGES EARLY DISCUSSION ON THE USE OF PROVEN TECHNOLOGY OR TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMS AND T AFFECT ON REGULATORY REQUIREMENTS.
STATES THAT ADVANCED REACTORS MUST PROVIDE THE S OF PROTECTION TO THE PUBLIC AND THE ENVIRONMENT AS D0 CURRENT GENERATION LWRs.
STATES THAT LICENSING GUIDANCE FOR ADVANCED REACT BUILD UPON THE CRITERIA AND REGULATIONS DEVELOPED F LWRs.
OV PUBLIC COMMENTS
~
o COMMENTS RECEIVED FROM 20 PARTIES:
7 UTILITIES 6 VEND 0RS 2 NATIONAL LABS 5 OTHER o
MAIN POINTS RAISED IN PUBLIC COMMENTS:
REDUCE PRESCRIPTIVE NATURE OF NRC REGULATIONS, ENC 0URAGE GREATER INHERENT SAFETY / SAFETY MARGIN THAN PROVIDED IN LWRs BUT DON'T REQUIRE IT, O'
NEW SET OF GDCs FOR ADVANCED REACTORS SHOULD BE DEVELOPED:
o LESS PRESCRIPTIVE, o
GENERIC SET VS. SPECIFIC ~ SET FOR EACH REACTOR
- TYPE, NRC SHOULD NOT FAV0h l,itt
<;JIGN, DESIGN FEATURE OR DESIGN APPROACH OVER ANOTHER, i
NRC SHOULD NOT REQUIRE A PROTOTYPE DEMONSTRATION
- PLANT, O
COMMENT RESOLUTION 1)
COMMENT:
REDUCE PRESCRIPTIVE NATURE OF NRC REGULATIONS STAFF POSITION:
EVEN THOUGH A LARGE NUMBER OF EXISTING CRITERIA AND REGULATIONS FOR CURRENT GENERATION LWRs ARE PRESCRIPTIVE, THERE STILL REMAINS MUCH FLEXIBILITY FOR THE TREATMENT OF TRULY DIFFERENT DESIGNS, THOSE PORTIONS OF EXISTING CRITERIA AND REGULATIONS WHICH APPLY TO THE DIFFERENT DESIGNS SHOULD BE
- RETAINED, BY THEIR VERY NATURE THEY WILL TEND.T0 BE NON-PRESCRIPTIVE, WHERE NEW CRITERIA ARE NEEDED THESE CAN BE DEVELOPED f
FOR THE DESIGN IN QUESTION,
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BE CONSIDERED, REACTOR DESIGNERS ARE ENC 0URAGED TO SUGGEST THE NEW CRITERIA THEY WOULD LIKE TO TO APPLY, O
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COMMENT RESOLUTION (CONTINUED) 2)
COMMENT:
DON'T REQUIRE GREATER SAFETY THAN LWRs STAFF POSITION:
NO BASIS COULD BE DEVELOPED TO REQUIRE GREATER SAFETY OR DESIGNS WITH GREATER INHERENT SAFETY, RATHER, THESE WILL BE ENCOURAGED BY GIVING CREDIT IN THE DESIGN, DOSE GUIDELINES IN REGULATIONS AND PROPOSED SAFETY
()
G0ALS DEFINE AN ACCEPTABLE LEVEL OF SAFETY IN A GENER SENSE AND ADVANCED REACTORS SHOULD MEET THESE,
/
o O
O COMMENT RESOLUTION (CONTINUED) 3)
COMMENT:
NEW SET OF GDCs SHOULD BE DEVELOPED FOR ADVANCED REACTORS STAFF POSITION:
GDCs WILL BE DEVELOPED BUT WILL BUILD UPON LWR GDCs.
GDCs WILL BE DEVELOPED FOR EACH REACTOR CONCEPT REVIEWED AND MAY BE EXPANDED TO A' GENERIC SET FOR EA
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REACTOR TYPE, P
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O COMMENT RESOLUTION (CONTINUED) 4)
COMMENT:
NRC SHOULD NOT FAVOR ANY DESIGN, DESIGN FEATURE OR DESIGN APPROACH OVER ANOTHER STAFF POSITION:
THE STAFF WILL ENC 0URAGE THE USE OF SIMPLIFIED DESIGNS THAT RELY ON INHERENT SAFETY CHARACTERISTICS BUT-WILL NOT F'AVOR ONE OVER THE OTHER.
O THE STAFF WILL PROVIDE AN OBJECTIVE EVALUATION OF EACH DESIGN.
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O COMMENT RESOLUTION (CONTINUED) 5)
COMMENT:
NRC SHOULD NOT REQUIRE A PROTOTYPE DEMONSTRATION PLANT STAFF POSITION:
A PROTOTYPE DEMONSTRATION PLANT WILL NOT BE REQUIRED, O
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