ML20136J040
| ML20136J040 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 01/06/1986 |
| From: | Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards |
| To: | |
| References | |
| ACRS-T-1476, NUDOCS 8601130146 | |
| Download: ML20136J040 (165) | |
Text
ORIGlbAL EW/476 O
Uh11EU STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION IN THE MATTER OF:
DOCKET NO:
ADVISORY CCMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS SUBCOMMITTEE ON STANDARD PLANT DESIGN U
LOCATION:
WASHINGTON, D. C.
PAGES:
1-116 DATE:
MONDAY, JANUARY 6, 1986 l
DOE 8 OER0[0@Yk Jolo:1emove from AORSOffica ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
p0 * * ! Reporters t.
444 North Capitol Street Washington, D.C. 20001 i
8601130146 860106
$3$47["
NADONWIDE COVERAGE PDR
CR25461.0 REE/cjg 1
I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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(/
2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3
ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS STANDARD PLANT DESIGN SUBCOMMITTEE 4
5 Nuclear Regulatory Commission Room 1046 6
1717 H Street, N.W.
Washington, D.
C.
7 "I'
"" "'Y 8
9 The subcommittee meeting convened at 1:30 p.m.,
1 10 Charles J. Wylie, chairman, presiding.
11 ACRS MEMBERS PRESENT:
I CHARLES J. WYLIE, Chairman
(~x C.
P.
SIESS, Member
()
13 G.
REED, Member C. MICHELSON, Member 14 H. ALDERMAN, Staff Member 15 ALSO PRESENT:
16 F. MIRAGLIA, NRR 17 H.
BERKOW, NRR C. THOMAS, NRR 18 D.
SCALETTI, NRR O. LYNCH, NRR 19 20 21 22 23 naso,w, #.
25
PUBLIC NOTICE BY TIIE UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSIONERS'
,y ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS MONDAY, JANUARY 6, 1986 The contents of this stenographic transcript.of the proceedings of the United Stat.es Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS), as reported herein, is an uncorrected record of the discussions recorded at the meeting held on the above date.
No member of the ACRS Staff and no participant at this meeting accepts any responsibility for errors or inaccuracies of statement or data contained in this transcript.
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PROCEEDINGS 2
MR. WYLIE:
The meeting will come to order.
3 This is a meeting of the ACRS subcommittee on standard 4
plant design.
I am Charlie Wylie, subcommittee chairman.
5 Other ACRS members are Carl Michelson, Glen Reed, Chester 6
Siess and Max Carbon.
7 Herman Alderman is the member of the Staff.
The 8
purpose of this meeting is to review the NRC Staff proposed 9
standardization policy statement to the Commission on 10 nuclear sower plants and be briefed by the Staff regarding 11 the status of the policy statement and the status of 12 standardization in regard to nuclear power plants.
gkJ 13 The subcomm'ittee eventually will consider what 14 it wants to present to the full committee and if there is a 15 need for the ACRS to write a letter on the policy statement 16 and what other future activities leading up to that that 17 the subcommittee would wish to consider.
So during the 18 proceedings today, I would ask the members to consider what 19 future activities and whether or not there is a need to 20 write a letter on this subject or on what other activities 21 we should undertake.
22 The rules for participation in today's meetings 23 have been announced as part of a notice of this meeting 24 that was published in the Federal Register on December 17, 25 1985.
It is requested that each speaker first identify
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1 himself or herself and speak with sufficient clarity and 2
volume so that he or she can be readily heard.
We have 3
received no written comments from members of the public.
4 We have received no requests for time to make 5
oral statemen'ts.from members of the public.
6 Do any -- are there any comments that 7
subcommittee members would like to make at this time?
8 (No response.)
9 There are prepared presentations by the Staff 10 and I think we will now proceed with the meeting in 11 accordance with the schedule that has been passed out.
I 12 will call on Frank Miraglia for the first presentation.
I
/ T k/
13.
believe he is going to make the statement.
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
15 MR. WYLIE:
Okay.
I hope you have a bar chart 16 showing the schedule of approval time.
17 MR. MIRAGLIA:
No, sir, I don't.
I will tell 18 you the status as best I can.
19 MR. SIESS:
We can always extrapolate from the 20 past.
21 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir, past is prologue as 22 they say.
I am division director of pressurized water 23 reactor licensing-B.
Within the scope of my 24 responsibilities I do have responsibility for the
(~T 25 development of the standardization policy.
These are O
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1 points that were prepared and discussed with the 2
subcommittee today.
This is very similar in content to a 3
briefing that we had of the full Commission on December 11, 4
1985.
5 Briefly, I will give some background on the 6
development of standardization policy from a chronological 7
and historical perspective.
The need for revising the last 8
statement of policy issued by the Commission on the subject 9
of standardization was in 1978, and it outlined for the 10 subcommittee the standardization concepts that the Staff 11 proposes to retain in the new proposed policy statement, to 12 outline the proposed revisions between the current proposal 13 and the 1978 policy statement.
14 In addition, in the development of this policy 15 statement, the Staff worked very closely with an AIF 16 committee that was established to give the industry views 17 as to what their needs were with respect to standardization 18 in the future.
And-as a result of the input received from 19 the AIF there was strong sentiment to a transition period 20 in the development of the standardization policy and a 21 strong leaning by the industry to the replication concept.
22 In addition, there are some differences in the 23 Staff proposal policy statement as opposed to those 24 auggested by'the AIF, and I will briefly outline each of 25 those for you today.
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1 Historically, the concept of standardization had 2
its genesis back in April of 1972 more than a decade ago.
3 At that point in time, there were many CP applications 4
being brought forth before the Commission and 5
standardization was seen as a mechanism for improving the 6
review process as well as having certain safety benefits 7
associated with it.
In April of 1972, the Commission 8
proposed development of a standardization policy.
9 As a result of that initial policy statement, 10 comments were received and in March of 1973 the Commission 11 announced three concepts that it would use in the context 12 of standardization.
That was the reference design system, 13 a duplicate plant, and manufacturing licensing concepts.
A 14 little later in the presentation, I will go over each of 15 these.
So I will just go through the chronology right now.
16 In August of 1974, the Commission added and 17 announced the replicate plant concept as another concept 18 that the Commission would entertain applications.
19 In 1977, after several years of implementing the 20 initial policy statement, it was reviewed by a Staff task 21 force.
Certain modifications were suggested and the 22 Commission reaffirmed its support of standardization and 23 requested comments from the interested public and industry 24 and any suggested changes on that policy statement.
25 Those were received and that resulted in the ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 August 1978, which is the most recent policy statement on 2
the subject of 1978 issued by the Commission.
3 Since 1978, there are many things that have 4
happened.
In the context of looking at the 1978 policy 5
statement, there is a need to update and revise that policy 6
statement.
That need has been identified by the Commission 7
itself.
Those factors that should be considered in the 8
revision of the policy statement is that we do have some 9
experience, considerable experience in the implementation 10 of the existing policy.
I will give you a feel -- there 11 were 23 preliminary design approvals issued under the old 12 policy statement under the reference concept.
18 cps were f(-)
13 issued and two final design approvals issued.
There were 14 also a number of reviews conducted within the context of 15 the duplicate concept.
Smaller amounts, on the order of 16 four cps, were issued under the replicate concept, and as 17 part of the standardization policy that existed back in 18 1978, there were -- manufacturing license was issued for 19 eight units associated with the Westinghouse design for 20 nuclear power plants.
21 MR. CARBON:
Would you expand a bit on that 23 22 reference designs?
And the PDAs.
I am a little bit 23 confused there.
There were many more plants.
24 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I have a --
25 MR. SIESS:
These were plants that referenced ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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standard design; is that correct?
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is correct.
3 MR. SIESS:
There were 13 standard designs.
4 MR. MIRAGLIA:
If you recall, sir, I have a 5
chart that might be helpful.
6 This may be helpful, sir.
7 (Slide.)
8 Preliminary design approvals included the 9
nuclear steam supply and as a result of a number of I
10 applications from the vendors, they did submit several 11 reference design concepts.
They are listed here under the 12 reference design approval.
Within that context, we did
/
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k/
13 review in'the 1972-77 time frame 13 applications.
Those 14 are listed there.
These from here up are the 15 vendor-oriented systems.
16 Towards the tail end of that standardization t
17 period, it became clear that in order to really implement 18 standardization, you had a couple NSSS systems with a 19 balance of plant.
We had Stone & Webster -- CF came up 20 with a balance of plant standard design, and we did review 21 those standard designs within the concept of reference 22 systems.
23 Now, of those systems that we reviewed, we have 24 issued 13 construction permits for facilities.
Now, if one r^N 25 looks at the list of the construction permits that were
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reviewed within the context of the reference concept, most 2
of those facilities have either been deferred or cancelled.
3 The WPSS 3 and 5 are based on the CESSAR reference design.
4 They are in a deferred construction, a very extended 5
construction.
Palo Verde was a CESSAR reference plant.
We 6
have issued an OL as well as a CP to Palo Verde 1.
Palo 7
Verde 2 was issued a low power license in December of 1985.
8 And Palo Verde 3 is under construction with operation 9
scheduled for later this year.
10 The remaining facilities listed here have been 11 cancelled.
South Texas is a RESAR 41 plant, Westinghouse 12 design that is scheduled for operation, I believe it is l
13 I late 1986, early 1987.
That is under active OL review 14 right now.
15 In addition we do have two final design 16 approvals from this reference concept, one being the CESSAR, 17 F design that was necessary to support the OL issuance of 18 Palo Verde, and then there is the GESSAR 2 review that has 19 been the subject of conversation with the ACRS over the 1
20 last year.
So that has resulted in only one operating 21 license.
Similarly, with respect to the other concepts --
22 MR. SIESS:
Were Byron and Braidwood --
23 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Byron and Braidwood are 24 duplicates.
25 MR. SIESS:
Eut SNUPPS was a duplicate.
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1 MR. SIESS:
Byron and Braidwood was also a 2
duplicate --
3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Of each other.
4_
MR. SIESS:
Why wouldn't that be a replication?
5 It all came in at one time.
6 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It came in at one time, up front 7
saying, these are the plants that we are going to duplicate.
8 It is a question of retiming the review.
There is some 9
confusion as to replicates and duplicates.
There are 10 several subsets of one another.
11 MR. SIESS:
The notation is backwards to me.
It 12 just confuses me all the time.
A/
13 MR. MIRAGLIA:
If one recognizes in the very, 14 very early -- talking of duplicate plant design, saying if 15 you came in with a set of facilities to be built on 16 different sites and sold that as a package, we would review 17 it under that package.
Later on it became a need to say, 18 well, how about the situation where we want to replicate a 19 plant that was already licensed.
That concept was added 20 later.
21 Construction permits under this concept are 22 Byron 1 and 2 and Braidwood.
That came in as a package.
23 The SNUPPS plants include Callaway, Sterling, 24 Tyrone, Wolf Creek.
That was the SNUPPS package.
I think 25 there was a total of six in there.
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1 MR. SIESS:
I thought Perkins was in there with 2
Cherokee.
3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
They were duplicate design under 4
what was called the Duke 6-pack.
Perkins is not shown here 5
because it has been withdrawn.
I guess Cherokee is in the 6
process of being withdrawn.
7 MR. SIESS:
That was the sixth one, I think, in 8
that package.
l 9
MR. THOMAS:
What is shown on the charts are the l
10 ones where the licenses were issued.
11 MR. SIESS:
It was the other -- it was in the 12 original SNUPPS package.
/
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Y/
13 MR. MIRAGL}A:
Cherokee and Perkins w'as a 14 separate duplicate design package.
15 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
They were a separate 16 duplicate.
They were like Byron and Braidwood then.
17 MR. MIRAGLIA:
And Byron and Braidwood were not 18 part of SNUPPS.
I think there was at least one other plant 19 that never made it to CP.
There were originally six units 20 within the SNUPPS.
21 MR. BERKOW:
I think Wolf Creek had two units 22 originally, didn't they?
23 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, I think that is right.
That 24 would be the SNUPPS package here.
r 25 Of those licensed under that concept, back in N_')S 1
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the CP page, three have resulted in operating licenses 2
right now.
That would be Byron 1, Callaway and Wolf Creek.
3 In addition, Braidwood 1 and 2 along with Byron 2 are under 4
active OL review and will be licensed later on in the year.
5 In the replicate concept,'there were only two 6
applications that came forth in the context of a 7
construction permit review.
That was Jamesport 1 and 2.
8 Jamesport 1 and 2 was a Long Island Lighting & Power 9
Company proposal to replicate the Millstone 3 design, which 10 is a Westinghouse facility.
Millstone 3 was just issued a 11 low power license.
And Marble Hill was going to be a 12 replicate of Byron and Braidwood.
That project has been
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13 deferred as well.
14 Then within the manufacturing license concept, 15 we did issue, although manufacturing license was a floating 16 nuclear plant concept, where Westinghouse was in 17 Jacksonville, which is also now a deferred project.
18 Is that helpful, Dr. Carbon?
19 MR. CARBON:
Yes, very much.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
So the Staff did have 21 considerable experience in implementing these various 22 concepts since the early '70s.
23 In addition, subsequent to the accident at Three 24 Mile Island, the Commission has given a lot of
("N 25 consideration to the severe accident considerations and in G
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1 the context of developing severe accident policy statements, 2
recognized a need to update the standardization policy to 3
be consistent with the provisions of that policy statement 4
which was issued last year.
5 In addition, the Gommission has proposed on a 6
number of occasions proposed legislation.
There was a
~~
~ ~
"7 standardization act, licensing act proposed by the 8
Commission-in 1982 which was the result of the regulatory 9
reform task force and the Commission revisited that 10 proposed legislation and in January of 1985, ap' proximately 11 a year ago, resubmitted a revised version of that act to 12 the Congress for their consideration in the consideration kl 13 of licensing reform.
That is currently before the Congress 14 at this point in time.
15 Last, the Staff, in developing all this, has a 16 number of views on standardization that should be 17 considered.
18 The Commission, as a result of this, last May 5, 19 was briefed by the Staff on the standardization 20
-- what its experience has been, and at that meeting, the 21 Commission directed the Staff to go back and reexamine the 22
'78 policy statement in the context with its experience, 23 what the Commission had articulated and was articulating in 24 the policy statement, and bring forth to the Commission a 25 proposed revision to the '78 policy statement.
That is r-)N
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what the Staff has done and in the context of the SECY 2
paper,85-382, which was presented to the Commission in 3
early December, has given the Ccmmission a proposal for 4
revising that policy statement.
5 Within the contents of that proposed policy 6
statement, the Staff is proposing to retain the reference 7
system design.
As I said, the reference system is an 8
application for approval or certification of an entire 9
plant or a substantial portion of a plant.
10 MR. SIESS:
Frank, how do I interpret 11 substantial portion?
Does that mean you will continue to 12 accept NSSS and BOP as separate items like we had under the p_)
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13 old reference designs?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
We got that same question from 15 the Commission.
16 MR. SIESS:
I withdraw it.
17 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Let me answer it this way.
18 Historically, we started from that approach.
As one goes 19 back in time and looks at the application of the various 20 concepts, I think it became clear to the Staff as well as 21 the industry that one needed to match NSSS with a balance 22 of plant.
That led to a number of applications by 23 architect engineers.
24 In about 1976, 1977, we did get an application 25 for a New York utility.
I don't remember which one it was.
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1 But it was a CESSAR 80 plant with a Stone & Webster balance 2
of plant.
It was going to be the first application the 3
Staff would see that married two reference designs, one for 4
an NSSS and one for balance of plant.
5 We never got very far in that review before that 6
was cancelled.
7 Also, in going back and looking at what the 8
industry has been doing with respect to GESSAR, they 9
expanded the nuclear island.
It includes most of the 10 facilities except perhaps the turbine --
11 MR. SIESS:
That is GESSAR 2.
12 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
kJ-13 MR. SIESS:
That goes further than GESSAR 238 NI 14 did?
15 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is correct.
16 MR. SISSS:
The policy statement says in a 17 couple of places that the reference design is really what 18 the Commission is after.
But it doesn't -- it also uses 19 that qualification, the entire plant or a substantial 20 portion.
I would think that what the Commission ought to 21 be really after is all tha safety-related parts of the 22 plant that are not site dependent.
23 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think that is clear in looking 24 at our dialogue with the Commission last month, that it 25 certainly is the thrust of their intent.
I think one ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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reason we the Staff have retained that language of 2
substantial portion or major portion thereof is that the 3
Commission visited that question in developing the 4
legislative proposal that they did in 1982 and retained 5
that kind of language.
In 1985, when they revisited it 6
again, they also had that language in the legislation.
So 7
we preserved those kinds of words.
I think in the 8
Commission's deliberations on this proposed policy 9
statement, we may get further clarification.
10 MR. SIESS:
I noticed the reference to 11 legislation.
That was out of the Commission's proposal to 12 the legislation.
That wasn't something the Congress stuck
(_
13 in there?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
No, sir.
That language has been 15 there.
16 MR. SIESS:
As you well know, GESSAR 2, which is 17 much larger scope, the ACRS or at least some members of the 18 ACRS are still having a problem with interfaces.
Even 19 though the interfaces go --
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I understand that is the case.
21 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think in RESAR the scope is 22 similar to what you see in GESSAR.
It is much broader than 23 we have ever seen in th'e past.
Substantially it is mostly 24 safety related equipment.
CESSAR F is more like the
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25 earlier reference design concept with respect to the NSSS V)
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1 system.
It is not anywhere near the GESSAR.
2 MR. THOMAS:
Right.
3 MR. SIESS:
And CESSAR F does not intend to get 4
severe' accident qualification.
5 MR. SIESS:
I don't even see how it would be 6
possible with that limited scope.
7 MR. THOMAS:
Combustion engineering has 8
requested that CESSAR be approved for severe accident 9
considerations in accordance with one of the open Sundays 10 of the severe accident policy statement.
It would in 11 effect put on the utility applicant the burden of showing 12 that it was acceptable from a PRA standpoint and so on, (3
om/
13 after the utility combined it with a BOP.
14 MR. SIESS:
That is not really an approved 15 reference design.
That is not much more than buying an 16 NSSS and putting it together with a plant.
We don't gain 17 anything from having standard design except you get some 18 paper to put.in your PSAR.
19 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is a review of a substantial 20 portion of the facility with many of the interfaces having 21 to be detined and understood.
22 MR. SIESS:
One concept of standard design is 23 that it has been pre-reviewed and approved by the Staff and
But there is no way that could be 25 pre-reviewed because you don't have it.
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MR. MIRAGLIA:
You would have it in the -- to 2
the extent that we have done the review -- the major 3
portions of the balance of plant.
We would have to go 4
through that process, come before the ACRS and do that 5
portion of the review and clarify what the interfaces are 6
between NSSS and the rest of the facility.
l 7
MR. SIESS:
That is a great big chunk.
8 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
9 MR. WYLIE:
You probably ought to go on down to 10 certification, I guess?
11 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
12 MR. WYLIE:
That puts a new light on it, doesn't
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13 it?
Entirely new light?
14 MR. SIESS:
Is there any way you can certify an 15 NSSS under severe accident policy?
16 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think within the context of the 17 severe accident policy statement, you could get a 18 certification for whatever the scope was, but all that 19 certification then buys you with respect to litigation of 20 the issues is whatever was covered within the scope.
So 21 you pay your nickel and take your choice.
The broader the 22 scope and the more issues you get behind you, the more 23 beneficial the certification would have --
24 MR. SIESS:
If I would take that NSSS and build
(~g 25 a balance of plant around it and I do a PRA and it doesn't v
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,REE (v) 1 meet the severe accident criteria, then I would have to fix 2
it outside the NSSS somewhere, right?
Is the NSSS approved?
3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
If one talks in terms of a 4~
hypothetical, where someone using the system --
5 MR. SISSS:
It is all hypothetical right now, 6
Frank.
7 MR. MIRAGLIA:
But if you would marry it with a 8
balance of plant and elect to take that completed review to 9
certification, then you would certainly broaden the scope 10 for that particular design and that marriage of the NSSS to 11 that particular balance of plant design.
12 MR. SIESS:
That woulo mean a utility taking it 13 to certification?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
15 MR. SIESS:
I guess that is possible under the 16 law, under the policy.
But it-is inconceivable.
17 MR. MIRACLIA:
I think -- as we get later in 18 this presentation, when one-talks about the transition 19 period, I think ycu see the views, as suggested by the 20 utilities and the views by the vendors.
It is a matter of 21 finances and economics as to what choices one chooses, and 22 what options they are willing to explore.
23 MR. CARBON:
If this question should be later, 24 tell me.
You were discussing a moment ago that the 25 Commission is most interested in the reference system, if I ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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understood you correctly.
But I would believe, as a layman, 2
that the utilities might be interested most in a replicate-3-
plan.
4' MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
You are stealing some 5
of my thunder.
I am going to get'to that.
But you are 100
-6 percent correct.
That depends on where you sit within'the 7
industry as to what options are most attractive.
8-As I said, the duplicate plant concept is being 9
retained.
That is for a number of applicants of the same 10 design to be used at different cites.
That would mean up 11 front, saying we are going to build six units, two at each 12 of these three sites.
So it is up front understood that n\\/
13 that this plant is going to be duplicated.
14 Replicate is also being retained.
The 1
15 difference between replicate and duplicate is the timing.
16 We might not necessarily know that it is going to be 17 replicated later.
So it is a different context of timing.
18 Also the manufacturing license, the Staff has 19 retained it.
-There are a number of regulations on the 20 record.
It has been utilized in the past.
I don't think 21 it-is a concept that anyone is going to come forward with 22 in the immediate future, but perhaps in the longer range, 23 there has been discussions and talk within the industry, 24 various concepts being pursued of modular plant designs.
25 So on that basis, that concept is being retained with the ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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20
_REE-1 policyfstatement.
2 MR. SIESS:
There is a further distension on 3
replication you are coming to.
4 MR. MIRAGLIA:
In what sense, sir?
5 MR. SIESS:
I guess the same --
6 MR. MIRAGLIA:
As to the preferred option by the 7
industry?
8 MR. SIESS:
So, whether it has been reviewed by 9
standard review plan --
10 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
11 MR. SIESS:
-- you are coming to that?
12 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
' 0) 13 MR. SIESS:
That is the transition, is it?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
15 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
16 MR. MIRAGLIA:
As I said, we retained the 17 concepts and what I am going to try to briefly go over and 18~
outline are the considerations that are contained in the 19 proposal by the Staff.
20 We have added the severe accident policy 21 statement requirements to the standardization policy.
This
'22 talks in terms of that the plant has to demonstrate that it 23 meets all current regulations, that you should complete a 24 PRA on the facility, you should complete a deterministic 25 review examining the insights that one has gained from ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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looking at.the PRA and that the design of the facility 2
should address to the maximum extent possible the 3
unresolved and high priority generic issues of the facility, 4
so that those elements that were contained in the severe 5
accident policy statement are again referenced in this 6
standardization policy.
7 With respect to design certification, we offer 8
the opt. ion of taking the particular design to Staff review 9_
through a rulemaking process.
Whether that be just a 10 notice and comment rulemaking or an adjudicatory hearing or 11 a legislative hearing, there are a number of options for 12-that.
There is another Commission paper indicating what 13 options one has for certification.
14 But the thrust,-again, would be similar to the 15
_ approach that.is suggested by the legislative package which 16 the Commission proposed.
To take this particular design 17.
through'a rulemaking process and certifying that design for 4
18-a period and what the Staff has proposed is a period of 10 19-years.
20 MR. SIESS:
I may be going backwards, but we 211 were talking about the reference design, whole plant, major f
22 portion.
On a duplicate or replicate, does that have to be 23 on the whole plant?
24 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think it would have to be, yes, 25
. sir, the whole plant.
In fact, the experience in the
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implementation that we had were entire plants.
2 MR. SIESS:
And the qualification would -- there
-3 is also a qualification review process?
4 4
MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
5 MR..SIESS:
So duplicate or replicate includes 6
balance of plant at least out to the site-related factors?
7 MR. MIRAGLIA :-' Yes', ~s ir.
8 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
9 MR. WYLIE:
But the -- okay, but the 10 certification necessarily doesn't; is that right?
11 MR.-MIRAGLIA:
One could, if one had a duplicate 12 plant design that they wanted to certify, it would be that f'\\.
l-13 entire scope.
14 MR. SIESS:
But you said earlier you could get 15 certification on an NSSS?
16 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
Within both policy 17 statements, severe accident policy statement and the 18 standardization policy as now proposed by the Staff, the 19 answer to that question is yes.
20 MR. SIESS:.What about balance of plant?
That 21 sounds silly but is that a major portion thereof?
22 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That would have to go through 23 either a custom review or a reference design review.
They 24 would have to be married together.
25 MR. SIESS:
You can't get a certification on a ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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' balance of plant?
2-MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, if you came in with that.
--3 But it would have to go through the same process and could Il 4
'be married together with the NSSS.
it :.
f7 5
MR. WYLIE:
If you read this policy statement, 6-one. is led to believe that they are looking at the entire 7
plant, in a sense, when you read the reference plant 8
concept.
9' MR. M'IR dLIA:
Yes.
And'in many places within 10 the policy statement and the Commission paper itself is
'll indication of the strong encouragement that the Commission 12 has in going towards total complete design.
13 MR. WYLIE:
It is hard for me to see how you can 14 really do the in-depth detailed review as implied by the
-15 reference plant-certification approached in the FDA if you 16 don't look at the balance of plant, because there are so 17 many interfaces there that have to be considered and 18 reviewed.
19 MR. MIRAGLIA:
What you would have is a 20' certification that has a lot of interface requirements that 21 would have to be met and be subject to review at the point 22 in time when you marry whatever is being certified to what 23 is11 eft.
And that.would perhaps not give you the i
24 advantages of getting a certified design up front.
r 25 MR. WYLIE:
But the words imply they will say
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1 that the detail of review is the same as for the FSAR at 2=
.that level.
And at least the way they are done today, you 3
dig into a lot of things in very minute detail that you i
4' almost have to know the characteristics of all the
~5' equipment in order to do that.
When you do the FSAR, they li do that.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Before you-proceed,.this-
~~
8 question of balance of plant, do you have a definition of 9-what you mean by balance of plant?
10 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I guess what we, the way we 11 define it --
12 MR. MICHELSON:
We have been kicking it around.
13 MR. SIESS:
I used it but they don't use it.
14 They say, "or major portion thereof."
'15 MR. MICHELSON:
I realize the policy statement 16 doesn't.
But I was wondering, when we talk about balance
.17 of plant, what are we talking about?
There is -- for 18 instance, you can write performance requirements for the
-19 interface between a process valve on a-process diagram and 20 an actual valve in the plant because the actual valve may 21 be balance of plant.
It may be supplied by the utility.
22 So you mean the processed valves and so forth as balance of 23 plant or do you mean that they are always within the scope 24
'of the design that you are referring to as the standard 7
25.
' design?
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MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think it would be the balance 2
of plant is effectively defined by the interface 3
requirements.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
So it can be most anything.
A 5
standard design can be nothing more than a set of processed 6
diagrams and some specifications.
That could be a standard 7
design.
8 MR. SIESS:
Frank, you have to make a distension.
9 The term " interface" as we use very glibly here, you are 10 talking about standard designs, not standard plants.
So 11 even if I have got a complete set of drawings before I go 12 out and start to build this thing, I have still got -- I r~')
\\'
13 mean for everything, right down to the river, I have still 14 got interfaces, if you think of it that way.
Because what 15 valve is going to be supplied or what pump is going to be 16 supplied is supplied to rieet an interface.
Head, discharge, 17 et cetera.
That is one kind of, that is an interface 18 between the design and the built.
19 The other interface is between this part of the 20 plant and this part of the plant.
21 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think you are right.
We use 22 the word " interface" and it covers a multitude.
You could 23 have design interfaces as Dr. Michelson was suggesting, as 24 you are suggesting, construction interfaces as well.
/~T 25 Depending upon the scope of what is being carved out, that V
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list of interface requirements could be substantially long 2
for design interface requirements.
Or if the scope is 3
broad enough, the list of interfaces would be muc'. more 4
narrow and only in the context of the construction.
5 MR. SIESS:
When the Staff is reviewing a custom 6
design for operating license, working on the FSAR, does the 7
Staff review these interfaces between the design and what 8
is actually supplied?
9 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think it does.
But it doesn't 10 do it in a dtfferential sense.
We see the NSSS and we know 11 what the aux feedwater system is.
So you know what the 12 design is.
,n 13 MR. SIESS:
Do you look at the pump to see that 14 it meets the requirements that were specified?
15 MR. THOMAS:
Yes.
The answer is, in some cases 16 we do and in others we don't.
A couple of examples of 17 where we do would be the FSAR would address equipment 18 qualification and would give the parameters to which 19 equipment would be qualified.
After the specific 20 components in the systems were qualified, we would review 21 the actual test results and performance of the actual 22 equipment.
23 Another situation would be where the piece of 24 equipment was brought to meet a certain specification and
/~}
25 later on, during the start-up test program, through
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record to ' insure that the equipment performed as advertised.
3 And that would hold true whether it were standard or not.
4 MR. SIESS:
Is that done before the operating 5
license is issued?
Some of that sounds li-ke it might be 6
done during the start-up program.
7
^ ~ ~
~ ~~ R. THOMAS:
Both.
The first example would be M
8 done before.
The second would be done during the pre-op of 9
the start-up test program.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
But it is the case that for the 11 normal process of licensing, at the FSAR stage, the Staff 12 has essentially available all information it may wish
]k-13 concerning the plant.
If you wish to pursue who 14 manufactured the valve, that information is already 15 available.
If he wants the drawings of the valve, that 16 information is available to do the FSAR review.
17 Now in the case of a standard plant, such 18 information may not be available at all.
19 MR. SIESS:
Standard plant design.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
That information may not be 21-available at all.
22 MR. THOMAS:
That is right.
To the extent 23 that --
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Yet the standardization document, fN 25 the SECY paper seems to talk about level of information
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comparable to an FSAR.
2 MR. THOMAS:
To the extent practicable.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
But let's face it, if the only 4
thing covered by the design is -- or by the standard 5
application is the design itself, in other words, the 6
process design and the specifications, you have little of
-7 this.
You have none of this information available to you.
8 MR. THOMAS:
Historically, the Staff has always 9
allowed the standard plant applicant to define the scope of 10 his application.
Let's say that the scope of application 11 included among other things a pump.
In the FSAR, you would 12 get'a description of the performance characteristics ~of the k-
.13 pump,-you would get the qualification -
.the equipment 14 qualification requirements and later on the results.of the 15 equipment qualification tests and later on during the 16 start-up test program you would get the actual feedback 17 performance.
18 Look at that from the standardization point of 19 view, you would get the pump performance specifications 20 specified.
So many GPM at such and such a head.
You would 21 get the equipment qualifications parameters specified.
The 22 actual results of the equipment qualification tests would 23
.have to be provided by the utility applicant.
That would 24 be one form of an interface requirement.
-(N
-25 Finally, the actual performance of the as-built
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would have to be provided by the utility applicant.
- That, 2
again, would be an interface requirement.
So that is why 3
the words "to the extent practicable" are in the policy 4
statement.
MR. SIESS:
Let me ask the question --
6 MR. WYLIE:
Where -- I don't know, I have read 7
this.
I didn't see those words.
Yes, I do.
You are right.
8 It is in there.
I beg your pardon.
9 MR. SIESS:
In terms of paper, let's start with 10 a custom designed.
You have got an FSAR.
It somewhere 11 states what a piece of equipment should be able to do.
12 Does that FSAR also provide enough information on the piece
/%
(. 1 13 of equipment that is actually in the plant that you can 14 determine from the FSAR that that equipment will perform as 15 required?
16 MR. MIRAGLIA:
As part of the FSAR, one of the 17 requirements is a proposal as to what their start-up test 18 program and their preoperational tests would be.
So in its 19 totality, yes, within the confines of the FSAR, that 20 information would be there.
21 MR. SIESS:
The information isn't there in 22 writing but there is a system, there is a procedure 23 described for validating or to show that the interface has 24 been met.
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is correct.
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MR. SIESS:
If I go to the reference design, I 2
will find a page that references the design.
I go look up 3
that and find certain information.
Would that be the same 4
kind of information on the requirements, interfaces, that I 5
would find in a custom FSAR?
And then somewhere else in P
6 the FSAR -- not referencing -- would describe the start-up 7
program, pre-op testing and so forth.
Are you saying that 8
the reference design, the referencedf FSAR, is that a 9
reasonable word --
10 MR. THOMAS:
Well, go ahead.
11 MR. SIESS:
You get one page on the chapter 6 12 that references something.
But the reference FSAR would kl 13 have the same kind of information in it that the custom 14 plant chapter 6 would have?
15 MR. THOMAS:
If you marry together the utilities 16 FSAR that references the reference design, between the two, 17 you should have everything that you would normally have in 18 a custom FSAR.
19 MR. SIESS:
Is it better to look at a custom 20 FSAR and tell us what pages would be deleted and referenced?
21 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think it would be difficult to 22 do in the context of -- it is -- one way of looking at it, 23 if one went back to some of the reference design concepts, 24 it would indicate in there what other -- if this is not in 25 this FSAR, you would have to be referred to a companion ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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FSAR.
2 MR. SIESS:
What I am hearing is that if a 3
person took a reference design NSSS, balance of plant, 4
whatever, the whole thing, and referenced it in the FSAR, 5
together with the rest of his'FSAR, you would have as much 6
information when it came time to review that FSAR as you 7
would for a custom plant?
8 MR. WYLIE:
No.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
No.
There is a real problem.
10 That is not true.
11 MR. SIESS:
I am just asking the question.
12 MR. THOMAS:
Yes.
That is correct.
(
13 MR. MICHELSON:
I disagree.
's 14 MR. SIESS:
Let's challenge it.
15 MR. WYLIE:
Well, you know that Staff requests a 16 lot of information f rom the utility --
17 MR. MICHELSON:
That is not available.
18 MR. WYLIE:
-- that are not in the FSAR and --
19 MR. SIESS:
Don't talk to me.
20 MR. THOMAS:
The question -- the answer is going 21 to be when is it available.
Is it available when you do 22 the review?
Remember, now we are doing -- the reference 23 design concept that -- you are reviewing a design outside 24 the context of a specific application.
That -- you pay a (a~T 25 price for that.
But you may have to defer part of your ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 review to when a utility submits an application for a 2
license that references it.
3 MR. SIESS:
Approval of a reference design is 4
not giving an operating license.
5 MR. THOMAS 4 That is exactly right.
6 MR. SIESS:
Before you give the operating
~
"7 license, you will still send out a list of questions.
8 MR. MIRAGLIA:
The only difference is that the 9
areas that one -- if it is a very broad scoped reference 10 plant, if it covers the whole plant, then the amount of 11 information and what you need to assure that the interfaces 12 have been met is very, very small.
O
\\>
13 MR. SIESS:
I will have to admit that since FSAR 14 started taking up more than one shelf on my bookcase, I 15 don't read them all.
But FSARs used to grow.
That is, 16 they got 100 questions and they started --
17 MR. MIRAGLIA:
They become part of the answers.
18 MR. SIESS:
They started submitting revised 19 pages.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is correct.
21 MR. SIESS:
Would that be true also here?
22 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
23 MR. SIESS:
Would there be -- am I correct in 24 saying that the revised pages, in answers to questions,
(~
25 would not be in the reference document?
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MR. THOMAS:
You are correct.
2 MR. SIESS:
The reference document wouldn't be 3
changed.
This wculd be supplementary information.
4 MR. THOMAS:
It would be in the FSAR.
5 MR. SIESS:
Let's go to chapter 6.
It used to 6
be NSSS.
That had one line referencing GESSAR, RESAR.
7 That would still be true.
The amendments would be coming 8
into the other parta that interface with that.
9 MR. THOMAS:
Right, to answer questions related 10 to interfaces on chapter 6, the questions and answers would 11 go out on the utility's FSAR.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
What is the meaning of an 13 approved reference design?
14 MR. SIESS:
That they can reference it.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
How can you decide that it is a 16 referenceable -- I mean, shere is there defined what 17 additional information must be supplied as a part of that 18 approval or continuancy of that approval.
Clearly you will 19 not approve a reference design without seeing the rest of 20 the information that has to come in later.
You shouldn't 21 because I don't think you have enough informaticn yet from 22 the paper to do it.
23 MR. SIESS:
The Staff could easily say, we will 24 approve chapter 6 and referencing this NSSS but you have 25 still got to provide all the information for our review in
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/- s G
1 your FSAR.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
But then what does the approval 3
of the reference design mean?
4 MR. SIESS:
It says they won't review it again.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, they will review it after 6
they find out what components they finally are going to use.
7 MR. MIRAGLIA:
You have to establish that the 8
interface requirements are met.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
That is the problem I see.
10 MR. SIESS:
Are they part of chapter 6 then?
11 MR. MIRAGLIA:
They are usually articulated in 12 the Staff evaluations.
There is also reference to them in A(_)
13 the design approval itself.
14 MR. SIESS:
Would they appear in the FSAR?
15 MR. THOMAS:
Interface requirements appear in 16 the application for standard design, such as GESSAR.
They 17 are also supplemented by interf ace requirements in the 18 Staff safety evaluation report.
So the two taken together 19 constitute this set of interf ace requirements that must be 20 addressed by a utility applicant.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
They are not all in the FSAR.
22 They are in there only by a number.
It will reference a 23 specification that you have to go and read and you may have 24 to read two more specs that were in turn referenced and get 25 the third and fourth term references.
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MR. SIESS:
The review would have to have the 2
FSAR, the referenced design, the Staff's SER on the 3
refecence design and the ACRS letter and whatever was in 4
the reference design submittal that doesn't come out in 5
chapter 67 6
MR. THOMAS:
I think your last point was 7
redundant.
I think the last one was redundant.
8 MR. SIESS:
You think the Staff's SER would 9
cover --
10 MR. THOMAS:
The Staff's SER and the GESSAR, to 11 use an example.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
You would think there would be a
()
13 list of that in the FSAR,*wouldn't you?
'~
14 MR. SIESS:
I don't know.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, there is a list of the i
16 primary references, but a number of interface requirements 17 appear in secondary references that are not a part of the 18 listing in the FSAR.
You have to chase for them.
19 MR. SIESS:
But the FSAR has no preapproval.
20 The FSAR goes'through the same process a custom plant does.
21 So they have got another document to look at.
Considering 22 it now, they have to look at the FSAR and the SEP and the 23 SRP and.14 or 15 of 100 other regulatory guides and 24 industry standards.
I am not sure one more piece of paper
(}
25 is all that serious.
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As I recall, when we were looking at NSSS 2
reference designs, somebody brought in a couple of books 3
about yay thick which were the interfaces that, say, 4
Westinghouse supplied to the balance of plant.
Is that 5
right?
That there are something --
6 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think there was substantial 7
discussion between the Staff and the vendors, as well as 8
with the ACRS on interf ace requirements.
9 MR. SIESS:
But interfaces existed before there 10 were standard plant design?
11 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
Even in a custom plant, the 12 NSSS designer would provide a series of interfaces through
(~d) 13 the architect engineer; the utility's primary 14 responsibility is to assure that there is that kind of 15 communication in order to get a total plant design.
16 Interfaces are not unique to standardization concepts at 17 all.
18 MR. SIESS:
It is just bringing them into the 19 process?
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
21 MR. THOMAS:
We tend to distinguish between 22 licensing interfaces and interfaces required to implement 23 the design by a utility.
24 MR. SIESS:
The thing is, I doubt if your
(")x 25 reviewer sat down with those volumes of interface
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2 MR. THOMAS:
That is correct.
They are not part 3
of the licensing application.
4 MR. MIRAGLIA:
What you see is the outcome of a 5
lot of those in the --
6 MR. SIESS:
Let me interject something, because 7'
I; don't k.now a better place to put it.
The Staff, I&E 8
particularly, has been doing a great deal of reviewing 9
designs, independent design investigations.
They have been 10 requiring independent design verification programs.
At one 11 time NRR, I believe, was sending out teams to review 12 seismic design.
These were reviewing design and they were 13
' finding errors in design in categories I think you might 14 call interface areas.
Certain pieces of equipment weren't 15 sized right.
Their voltage requirement wasn't met.
16 I asked IEE, that now that we are talking about 17 standard designs, would they be reviewing these designs to -
18-find errors of design, talking about paper now, once and 19 for all, when the standard design came in, rather than 20 having to do.it after the plant is ready to load fuel.
21 They said, no, we won't do any QA or other type of 22 independent review until it is docketed for a license.
23 Now, is that --
24 MR. SIESS:
Does that sound right?
It seems to 25 me that if you have a st:andard design that say 20 people ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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25461.0 38 REE p.
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are, going to use, like the French --
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
if cqe goes back historically and 3
looks at what we did ir. the implementation in the reference 4
design, when we just had a vendor, not a specific 5'
application, we did go back to the vendor and say, what 6
quality assurance program did he have?
And yes, we did 7
look at --
8 MR. SIESS:
I am going beyond the QA prooram and 9
looking at actual physical things.
These IDVP took a whole 10 system and went right down through that system from concept 11 to some point.
12 MR. MIRAGLIA:
They took the translation of
,f--)
(_/
13 design into construction.
All you can do is a 14 programmatic --
15 MR. SIESS:
Not always.
They weren't 16 construction.
They were called design reviews.
17 MR. THOMAS:
But I think in practice --
18 MR. SIESS:
Some of them were done in the AE's 19 office.
20 MR. THOMAS:
For standard designs, you still 21 have the quality assurance program, quality assurance for 22 design, OA for construction and operation, as the utility 23 applicants call it.
We still have independent reviews of 24 the vendor.
But many of the programs you mentioned, the 73 25 IDVP program and most of the others were related to
(_)
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- as-built, after you had the benefit of feedback of as-built 2
information into the design.
That presumably would still
- 3 be the case once a utility took a design and tried to 4-translate it into a plant.
5 MR. SIESS:
That would certainly be true if it i6 were true that the only things they ever found in an IDI or 7
an IDVP were the result of translation from paper to D^
8 physical things.-
I don't believe that is true.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't believe, Chet, that 10 paper is in the kind of detail that you can do a design
-11 review 1with until the details are worked out.
These 12 designs that are reference designs are not detailed designs 13 necessarily.
14 MR. SIESS:
If you start building plants with 20 15 percent of the design completed, that is true.
But I 16 thought one of the points in the standard designs is that 17 you might have the thing 80 percent designed before you o
18 started building it.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
That depends on how you define 20 standard plant.
21 MR. SIESS:
All we have got is standard design.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
I mean what they are defining as 23 a standard plant.
I have heard a number of different 24 definitions there as to what the potential scope is in 25 terms of detail of design.
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MR. SIESS:
I am not sure the French even have a 2
standard plant.
I think some of their plants have had the 3-pumps and valves from the same manufacturing, but I am not 4
sure.
5 MR. WYLIE:
Let me ask a question.
The 6
reference plant approach, you carried it all the way 7
through in this policy statement to the certification.
8 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is right.
9 MR. WYLIE:
It could stop short of certification, 10 right?
11 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes, sir.
12 MR. WYLIE:
But say it went all the way through if )
13 to certification and let's just take the hypothetical case 14 where you do have the total plant, balance of plant, all 15 the way down, you know, to the ultimate heat sink, off-site 16 power, you got it all the way down there and you give a 17 design certification there.
Now, I would assume then, if 18 you do that, and I read the words here where it says that 19 final design is not subject to litigation, that that 20 implies looked at everything.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
22 MR. MIRAGLIA:
What it means is that that final 23 design is not subject to litigation to the extent that the 24 scope is covered.
Certainly if you did do a complete one
/~N 25 and you had all of the answers and that's what was
(.)
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certified, one would still have to marry it to an 2
appropriate site to insure that the site interface --
3 MR. WYLIE:
But it would just be site interfaces.
4 MR. MIRAGLIA:
You are narrowing the scope of 5
issues that are subject --
6 MR. WYLIE:
But this would imply that you have 7
looked at all other details within that scope.
8 Then the statement under final design approval 9
that Cecil pointed out, that an application of final design 10 approval must include, to the extent practicable, a level 11 of detail.
12 Now, if you took that hypothetical case, is that C
1 l
13 appropriate to use those words?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think if one is talking in a 15 hypothetical sense of the end result and thrust, I think in l
16 the Staff's mind it is also going to be, there are always 17 some issues that the certification and the design approval 18 may have certain conditions that must be fulfilled.
19 If we do get down to the gnat's eyelash and do 20 have that kind of certification, then that is what the 21 approval would be for and the certification woule: be for.
22 MR. WYLIE:
I read the policy statement and to 23 me it implies that that is what the ultimate goal is, to 24 try to get a complete plant to come in, eventually, way
( ')
25 down the line, maybe it may not be within my lifetime.
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1 MR. MIRAGLIA:
With respect to the proposed 2
legislation, the ideal would be to get a complete plant 3
design up front and approved through the cartification 4
process, do the same kind of process from a site approval 5
point of view, and hopefully all you would have to do is 6
put the two pieces together and say that the interfaces are 7
met and go and issue your CPOL.
8 MR. SIESS:
Are there any aspects of 9
certification other than legal?
10 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I am not quite sure how to answer 11 that.
My answer to that is no.
I think -- the technical 12 aspect of it is the degree of stability afforded.
One of f'8 i</
13 the concerns expressed by the industry for years is the 14 constant ratcheting, the backfitting, the uncertainty in 15 the regulatory process.
Certainly the certification 16 process is a legal way of addressing that kind of concern.
17 MR. SIESS:
It says, let's go to a public 18 hearing and go through all that process in lieu of having 19 several ASLB hearings.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is correct.
21 MR. SIESS:
That is a purely legal thing.
The 22 idea that you will have a more complete review for a 23 certified plant is valid only to the extent that the public 24 hearing either brings out more or that in preparation for 25 the public hearing you go deeper than you would go, than
)
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-1 say, for an ACRS review.
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is correct.
3-One thing, when I went through the chronology, I 4
said '77-78 we looked at our experience.
And it turned out, 5
I think there were some statistics there, I don't recall 6
the numbers, the number of questions that the Staff asked 7
-on the standardized review were much larger, by 20, 30 8
percent, maybe, than they were in,the custom review.
The 9
point of view is that if one is looking and saying this is 10 a potential application for more than one or more than two 11 facilities, the Staff did tend to ask for a lot more I
12 information.
L 1 13 If one, apportions that over the ultimate, if it 14 it used 10 times, maybe it comes out that you are saving 15 something in the long run.
But we never really realize 16 that because not all of these applications went --
17 MR. SIESS:
You could also accuse the Staff of 18 stretching it out because they knew there wouldn't be 19 another nine.
20 MR. CARBON:
If you have a referenced standard 21 plant and a utility comes in to collect either that plant 22 or a custom plant that is going to look exactly the same, 23 how much Staff effort is cut out, unnecessary, because you 24 already have reviewed the reference design?
By the time y
they get the plant built and in operation, how much less 25 ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 NRC effort is involved in the custom versus the reference 2
approach?
3' MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think if one looks at the 4
amount of review, an effort in its totality, I don't think 5.
there would be much difference.
I think what you are doing 6
is by having these kinds of concepts, you do that review 7
off of the critical path.
So I think it is the same 8
distribution of resources.
9 If you did have a standard design and you did 10 build 10 facilities, there would probably be a net savings.
11 But I think to the extent that we have implemented it, the 12 previous concept, there haven't been enough people availing
)
ss 13 themselves of the standard design to show that kind of 14 savings.
The review was done off of the critical path, 15 before you are really impacting on the licensing decision.
16 MR. CARBON:
I appreciate that.
But what I am 17 trying to get a feeling for is, if the approved GESSAR 2 18 and Detroit Edison could come in and order a plant there or 19 they could come in and order another Fermi 3 as a custom 20 plant, how much less NRR time would be involved }n 21 reviewing the custom plant versus how much reviewing you 22 would do if they came in to build a reference standard 23 plant?
24 I know that some of the standard plant work has 25 been done before.
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for --
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I would have a hard time 3
quantifying.
I think for that particular illustration, I 4
think it would be considerably less.
5 MR. CARBON:
But you still have all the 6
interface reviews.
You have got to get equipm2nt 7
specifications.
You ha,ve got all your lists of questions 8
that you go back to them.
9 MR. THOMAS:
If I may take a crack at --
10 MR. SIESS:
You gain a lot on your CP stage.
11 MR. THOMAS:
If I could take a crack at 12 answering Max's question.
It depends on the scope of your k/
13 standard plant design.
If, for example, Detroit Ed'ison 14 came in and referenced GESSAR, GESSAR is the balance of 15 plant for GESSAR and the service water intake, the ultimate 16 heat sink and the turbine building.
We would have to 17 review those, the utility's specific operating, conduct of 18 operations stuff and the interfaces.
We would have 19 probably already done close to three quarters of the review.
20 MR. CARBON:
Three quarters is out of the way 21 then?
22 MR. THOMAS:
You are talking about a broad scope 23 application.
24 If it were just an NSSS or even more so if it 25 were just a BOP standard design, you don't save an awful ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 lot up front.
2 MR. SIESS:
Let's take a specific example --
3 MR. CARBON:
Just a minute, Chuck.
I don't 4
follow your last comments, if it is a BOP.
5 MR. THOMAS:
If the standard application, 6
instead of being a nuclear island like GESSAR -- if you are 7
talking, for example, about an NSSS, comparing the amount 8
of time required to review a custom application versus an 9
application that referenced a standard NSSS, you are saving 10 less for a single application.
11 MR. CARBON:
How much less?
12 MR. THOMAS:' For single application, the total q
\\/
13 -l Staff time would be more,.because we pointed out, Frank 14 just pointed out to you that --
15 MR. CARBON:
I mean after you have completed, 16 after you have given certification.
17 MR. THOMAS:
A third to a half, probably.
18 MR. SIESS:
Let me take an example.
Take Byron 19 and Braidwood.
I am sure that the amount of time spent on i
20 Braidwood, whichever -- Byron came first.
The amount of 21 time that was spent on Braidwood was a small -- at the 22 construction permit stage -- was very, very much less than 23 if it had been a custom plant.
I suspect that the amount 24 of time spent on Braidwood --
25 MR. CARBON:
But that is different from a
'v]
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reference design.
2 MR. SIESS:
Not that much.
Braidwood simply 3
referenced Byron.
4 MR. THOMAS:
You also had the same applicant.
5 That helped a lot.
6 MR. SIESS:
I am not finished either.
I suspect
~7~
that at the time for the operating license, which Braidwood 8
still doesn't have, that the amount of time spent on 9
Braidwood was not a whole lot less than the amount of time 10 that was spent on Byron because now they got into
-11 construction, construction studies, construction QA, et 12 cetera.
The same company, the same builders, I believe.
13 But, again, I have seen the paper that has been generated 14 on Braidwood and I think it is equally as great as that on 15 Byron.
16 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think if one looked at the SER 17 type of evaluation, their practice was to save because, 18 overall, because of the other issues from hearings and 19 other kinds of things, whether there is going to be that 20 savings, I think you are probably right.
But I think the
. 2:1 SER on Byron also was substantially the SER on Byron 2 as 22 well as Braidwood 1 and 2.
23 MR. SIESS:
But then you still had a lot of 24 other things, and the amount of work you had to do to write 25 that SER was not reduced at the same amount as at the CP ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 stage.
I am just thinking of the paper that was generated.
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think we provided to the 3
Commission some manpower figures on Byron /Braidwood.
We 4
can look into that and see if we can find something to send 5
it to you.
6 MR. SIESS:
But if you are correct about 7
examining the interfaces and the pre-op and all of that 8
stuff, that is not going to change that is essentially 9
still going to be there.
The second time around, you will 10 know better which questions to ask, but you may have more 11 than the first time.
12 MR. THOMAS:
It is more beneficial than the CP
/~T I
\\~)
13 ' '
stage but there would be a savinga for a single plant.
14 That savings is multiplied as you use the design more often.
15 MR. SIESS:
Of course at the CP stage, if you 16 had preapproved sites, that difference would be even 17 greater..
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Question:
In your discussion of 20 GESSAR 2, a few minutes ago, I think you indicated that 21 there was only interf aces to the service water systems.
It 22 was my understanding -- maybe I misunderstood your 23 statement.
It is my understanding that GE does not supply 24 any of the components necessarily for a GESSAR 2 plant and 25 therefore, every component interface has to be looked at.
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1 MR. THOMAS:
I meant to say the balance of plant 2
for GESSAR is the service water, the turbine building.
If 3
I said " interfaces," I am sorry.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
But to me, " balance of plant" 5
means the interface with anything not supplied by that 6
system and all the components could be or maybe only a few 7
of them.
8 MR. SIESS:
What do you mean by supplied?
9 MR. MICHELSON:
GE may not supply any components 10 for the plant.
11 MR. SIESS:
To me, the interfaces --
12 MR. THOMAS:
You are both right.
There are l'3
's /
13 different kinds of interfaces.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
o 15 MR. SIESS:
I am not sure GESSAR is a standard 16 plant.
It is a standard design.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
It is a reference design on this 18 list.
l 19 MR. SIESS:
Basically, the Staff always starts 20 with a design and then has to match it to the -- to what is 21 supplied somewhere at the FSAR stage.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Which means they have to review 23 the interface of every component in that plant with the l
24 GESSAR 2 design.
What we are doing is talking about the 25 difference in workload.
In that regard there is no 1
l 6
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difference in workload.
2 MR. SIESS:
That was trying to say -- the OL 3
stage, it shouldn't be that much dif ference.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
5 MR. SIESS:
They said they don't review every 6
component interface on paper.
They depend on pre-op and 7
testing to show up some of these things.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
This led to the second part of 9
.my question.
If GE did supply the component, does the 10 GESSAR 2/FDA allow you to ask more questions about that 11 component or is it now covered by the previous review 12:
somehow?
13 MR. SIESS:
If that component was specified in 14 the design --
15 MR. MICHELSON:
It was specified as an interface.
16 MR. SIESS:
Then I suspected they should look at 17 it just the same.
18 MR. THOMAS:
It depends on how they want to 19 handle it.
If GE wanted to be responsible for their own 20 qualification program, and included that within the scope, 21 then that review would take place now.
If on the other 22 hand they put -- they allowed the utility applicant the 23 option of choosing whoever you wanted to, to do the 24 qualification part, then it would be done later.
25 MR. MICHELSON:
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is included in the scope, I think, in GESSAR 2, I think it 2
is in the scope.
3 MR. THOMAS:
I believe you are right.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
I think it is within the scope 5
of GESSAR 2.
So if GE supplies a component, you do not go 6
back and look at the qualification aspect because it has 7
been prereviewed.
8 MR. THOMAS:
We would look at the results of it.
9-We would look at the test results.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
You could look at the results.
11 If GE did not supply the component, then you look at the 12 qualification program and the results.
5J' 13 MR. THOMAS:
Exactly.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Thank you.
15 MR. SIESS:
The interfaces are the same as when 16 it is custom or standard.
17-MR. MICHELSON:
It looks like it.
18 MR. SIESS:
The extent to which the Staff 19 reviews the interfaces should be the same.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
The difficulty becomes in 21 articulating that because the review of some of these 22 things are almost implicit in the review itself without 23 really consciously realizing that you are doing it.
24 MR. SIESS:
But if GE said we are going to
(~)
25 supply the main feed pumps and they are going to be such
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1 and such a model that we are manufacturing and here are the 2
qualification records and that is a part of their reference 3
design, that would be reviewed as a part of the reference 4
design approval, would it not.
5 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Correct.
6 MR. SIESS:
And then they would have to supply 7
those pumps?
8 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Right.
9 MR. SIESS:
But if they simply state the 10 qualifications, then you -- okay.
11 MR. WYLIE:
Just another question.
I get hung 12 up a little bit on the reference plant design concept and 13 the duplicate plant design concept that, in the case of 14 duplicate plant concept, you have got a custom plant you 15 are basically going to standardize for a number of 16 different sites.
Is it implied that the detail of review 17 is the same for both of these?
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think in fact, yes.
The level 19 of detail would have to be the same, to get an FEA and a 20 certified design.
21 MR. SIESS:
There is'not that much difference 22 between the two.
23 MR. WYLIE:
It is not really spelled out in the 24 description here as to what level.
e^x 25 MR. THOMAS:
The level of detail would be the U
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same.
2 MR. SIESS:
But there is really no difference 3
between replicate and duplicate.
4 MR. WYLIE:
It is implied that you hear it.
Now 5
you have got a real surefire bunch of plants you are going 6
to build under the duplicate plant concept.
And the 7
reference plant, you are coming up with a design that you 8
may never build anything.
But it was implied that --
9-MR. SIESS:
You got them backwards.
10 MR. WYLIE:
No.
I don't think so.
11 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Duplicate design comes in with an 12 application.
- f,.s\\
13 MR. SIESS:
SNUPPS was --
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
SNUPPS came in and said, we are 15 going to build six units just like these.
Two are here at 16 Wolf Creek, two at Callaway and one at Sterling and one at 17 Tyrone.
18 MR. SIESS:
And replicate comes in and says, i
19 this one is already started.
i.
20 MR. WYLIE:
I was talking about reference design.
21 MR. SIESS:
So reference design is quite i
.22 different.
That is speculation on the part of the guy that i.
23 designs it.
24 MR. WYLIE:
My question was is the level of
~N.
25 design review the same.
The answer is yes, except --
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MR. SIESS:
The scope is not the same.
The 2
reference design could be just NSSS.
3 MR. WYLIE:
I am talking about taking the entire 4
plant.
5 MR. MIRAGLIA:
As I understood the question is, 6
if you have it with an entire plant and you wanted to go to 7
the OL or combine CPOL, you would be talking about 8
essentially FSAR level design information.
9 MR. SIESS:
Suppose Commonwealth came in and 10 said, we want to build another plant and we want to use the 11 same NSSS that we had for Byron and Braidwood but we are 12 going to find another AE, God forbid, and end up with a
-m 13 different balance of plant.
What would that come under?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I am not sure.
I thought I had 15 the answer to your question but you threw a hooker at me.
16 I think if they said they were going to replicate a 17 Byron --
18 MR. SIESS:
I am just going to take part of it 19 now.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Based on what you are saying, I 21 would say it sounds more like a custom to me than anything 22 else.
23 MR. SIESS:
But if Byron and Braidwood had used 24 a reference design NSSS, they could then use that again?
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
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MR. SIESS:
So replication and duplication 2
basically is entire plant?
.3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes..
4 MR. SIESS:
Okay.
5 MR. MIRAGLIA:
May I continue?
6 MR. WYLIE:
Please do.
7 MR. MIRAGLIA:
As I said, we did provide the 8
design certification option and that is within the context 9
of the proposed legislation.
In addition, we have 10 restricted the manner in which changes can be made to the 11 design.
Essentially what we are saying is we will have to 12 meet the new backfit requirements and have to show r's kJ 13 substantial additional proper protection.
It is the new 14 rule.
15 Again, if one goes back and looks at the old '78 16 policy statement, there were different periods of reference 17 ability between duplicate and replicate designs.
There was 18 some overlap.
And we tried to clarify that.
I think that 19 is a minor point.
20 One point that we built into the policy 21 statement is the allocation of the fees for reference 22 designs.
That would require a change of legislation.
What 23 we have said is if the proposed legislative act that is 24 before Congress was enacted, it does allow for the 25 allocation of the fees.
That is sort of a small carrot for i
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1 a vendor to come forth.
2 MR. SIESS:
But if he doesn't sell any, he has 3
to pay it immediately?
4 MR. MIRACLIA:
It would waive the fees and say, 5
you would collect from the people who reference it.
I
-6 think it is for some period of time, if no one comes forth, 7
then he is liable for it later, as opposed to doing it up 8
front or on an allocated basis which is required now.
9 Then we also discuss the terms of --
10 MR. SIESS:
Is manufacturing license gone now?
11 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is still a viable option.
It 12 is still within the context of regulations.
They had to rs
(_)
13 pay a fee for their review.
4 14 MR. SIESS:
The policy statement just doesn't 15 reference it?
16 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It has the concept.
17 MR. SIESS:
And the fees for manufacturing 18 license are still payable up front?
19 MR. MIRAGLIA:
In the policy statement, I think 20 that is correct.
21 MR. SIESS:
It is academic, go ahead.
22 MR. THOMAS:
In the manufacturing license, the 23 applicant is the manufacturer.
So he pays the fees not on 24 the number of units but just for the license.
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
We do address the periods at ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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which final design approval is and design certification 2
would be renewable as well as we did retain the preliminary 3
design approval concept as well.
4 MR. SIESS:
What are your carrots if the 5
certification'is a longer license period?
6 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
The other -- if he doesn't
~~
~~
7 go certification, we ar'e sayi56 five years.
Again, it is 8
encouraging him to go --
9 MR. SIESS:
That starts after the hearing is 10 over, not when the hearing starts.
11~
MR. MIRAGLIA:
The 10 years would be -- we talk 12 in terms of hearing.
I think that might, I think my
_f
(
13 attorney friends got a little upset with me and at the 14 Commission briefing because we kept talking in terms of 15 hearing certification,-certification does not necessarily 16 require hearing.
It requires rulemaking.
But it would be j
17 the. certification from the point of rulemaking.
18 MR. SIESS:
Is the policy setting on what kind 19 of rulemaking?
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
There was a companion paper that 21 was included, but in the policy statement it said, here is 22
.a range of options.
That one was used, and the conduct'of 23 the rulemaking.
It could be a simple notice.
(
24 MR. SIESS:
Is it intended that the Commission
- (])
25 will choose from those options when the time comes or will ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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that be a prestated policy statement?
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think what we articulated, 3
these are the options, they could leave it just as rule 4
making and then make the particular selection at the time.
5-And if we look at the past, that is what they have been 6
doing as opposed to or, they could in the policy statement 7
say, choose one form or another.
8 MR. SIESS:
It would just seem to me, when I 9
look at that complete range, that if I were a vendor 10 intending to get into this business by certification, I 11 might be interested in knowing in advance which way the 12 rulemaking was going.
One of them is six months maximum (3_
\\-
13 and the other one is three years minimum.
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
There are other considerations 15 there, that is correct.
But we just talk in terms of 16 rulemaking options would not indicate the range.
17 MR. WYLIE:
This might be a good time for a 18 break.
~We will be back at five after 3:00.
19 (Recess.)
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
As I said, the AIF put a special 21 group together.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Before you start that, I want to 23 ask a kind of an academic question:
If I started out today 24 with a clean design, with a clean piece of paper to design 25 a reference plant for the purposes of going through the
{}
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reference plant.FDA process, how far into detail must that 2
reference plant design go in order to get an FDA?
Keeping 3
in mind that I think in general in the past you have been 4'
looking at designs that were warmed over from other 5
processes and, therefore, were in great detail, I am going 6
to start from scratch.
The policy pap'er seems to indicate 7
that I have to give you something comparable to an FSAR.
8 But keep in mind that FSAR does not have detailed piping
-9 layout and things of this sort, although those are always 10 readily available to the reviewer.
But if I read the Staff 11 paper literally, it is not clear to me I even have to have 12
-piping ' layout.
Could you tell me where it is defined how A
\\-)
13 Car one goes with a clean piece of paper to develop the 14 level of information that you expect for a reference FDA?
15 MR. THOMAS:
The intent of the paper was not to 16 distinguish between what would be required of an applicant 17 that started from scratch or say GESSAR and CESSAR.
In 18 both cases, the designs have progressed; in the case of 19 GESSAR, to having construction drawings.
In the case of 20 CESSAR, it has now been amended to include as-builts, 21 although when 'the FDA was issued, it just had construction 22 drawings.
- 23 I am not sure that the intent was not to 24 distinguish that, Carl.
The intent was to go as far as you 25 could towards having FSAR level information, again to the ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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extent practicable, recognizing you are reviewing something 2
outside the context of an implementation situation, because 3
you have not actually implemented the design and you don't 4
have the feedback you would later.
That feedback comes 5
later.
If anything goes awry, if there are any safety
'6 implications, there are means for dealing with that.
But 7
the intent was to bring a design up front and review it 8
ahead of time.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
I just was trying to find out 10 how much design do I have to bring to you up front to get 11 an FDA?
What level of detail do I have to bring?
I 12 couldn't find a good definition of that level anywhere.
r^N k -)
13 The closest was saying it has to pe comparable to FSAR 14 level information.
15 MR. THOMAS:
It is very hard to specify that.
16 Again, that is related to --
17 MR. MICHELSON:
I guess I could come to you then 18 without piping layout, for instance?
19 MR. THOMAS:
Practically, we wouldn't take that.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
That is FSAR level information.
21 As far as an FSAR is concerned, it is not there.
22 MR. THOMAS:
One line diagrams that can quote 23 little more than conceptual designs, we would consider that 24 to be PSAR level.
25 MR. MICHELSON:
But occasionally main steam and ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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feedwater, but -- and primary lube.
The.t is about it.
2 That is it.
So I was just trying to search out.
Do you 3
expect to see piping drawings?
4 MR. THOMAS:
We wouldn't expect to see any more 5
than we are seeing in GESSAR or CESSAR.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
They have piping drawings.
All 7
you want to look at.
They are not in the document though.
~~
8 You just ask for them.
But here you can't -- I want to 9
determine how much do I have to do to go through this 10 process.
11 MR. THOMAS:
We would uxpect --
12 MR. MICHELSON:
I want a definition of the scope r^s
(-)
13-of what you expect to see.
14 MR. THOMAS:
We expect PNID.
You go to the 15 standard review plan and see what it requires for an FSAR 16 or see what the guidance is for an FSAR.
You expect to'get 17 that information somewhere.
You would prefer to get as 18 much as possible in the standard design application.
If 19 there is a reason that it can't be provided in the standard 20 design application, then there has got to be a requirement 21 for a utility applicant to provide it.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
So you would give them the FDA 23 with the stipulation that the pioing drawings are subject 24 to review at the construction stage?
(~N 25 MR. THOMAS:
If they are not provided, yes.
\\_)
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MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
2 MR. THOMAS:
If you couldn't make a safety 3
judgment on a system without them, that would have to be an 4-
.open item.
5.
MR. MIRAGLIA:
In dealing with the industry, the li AIF did put together a group.
And one sense of what 'iey 7
provided, that is appended to the' Commission paper that I 8
am discussing, the AIF input, is that there needed to be 9
consideration of the transition period.
I think the 10 industry understands that the Commission is. encouraging a 11 reference design approach, substantially a whole plant, but 12 in the near term they felt that the, if there is going to
'?
13 be a resurgence in the industry, you are not going to get 14 that kind of commitment up front for a totally new design 15 and'that the more likely option to be pursued in the near 16 term is the one of replication.
Taking a plant that is out
'17
-there that has been licensed and operating for a while and 18 saying, I wanted to build one essentially like it, like the 19 one that is out there.
20 So in the policy paper, we have built in this 21 replication provision.
What we built in there is that we 22 would allow the plant to be replicated five years from the 23 date of promulgation of the policy statement.
We also said 24 that we.would consider on a case-by-case basis deviations 25 from some of the provisions of the policy statement.
For
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2 degree that they would have to comply.
1 E
3 The other provision that we put in here is the c4.
standard review plan.
NUREG 0800 is the. revision of the 5
. standard review plan that incorporated all the TMI t
if it was a plant that was 6
requirements and we said that 7
reviewed against all the requirements in the NUREG 0800 8
which is the most recent revision of the standard review 9
pla n ~, that we would consider replication of that plant at 10 any site, if it indeed was an older facility that perhaps
- 11
. preceded NUREG 0800, we would consider replication of that F
12 plant at the same site, to be operated by the same operator,
(-)
13' and'we would have to, it would also have,to be supported by i'
14.
.the design performance and a suitable operating history of f
15
_that particular plant design.
16-1This +as in response to the industry's concern 17 that the most viable option in the near term was that of
'18 replication.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Excuse me.
If I wanted to e
20 replicate a plant, an existing plant -- at the time it was 21-built it had to meet certain of the -- satisfy certain USI 22 situations and so forth.
Since its construction period, of 23 course, a number of new items have come along.
If I go in 24 for replication today, can I ignore those new items and 25 just meet the ones that the original plant met?
_q
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MR. MIRAGLIA:
No, you would have to -- let's 2
take an example of a Palo Verde 4.
It would have to -- you 3
would take that as your point of departure.
You would have 4
to look at the new requirements policy statement and the
'S update of the severe accident requirements, meet the 6
current regulations in USI.
That would establish the scope 7
of the review for replicating that plant.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
But in the process of trying to 9
replicate the plant, I am going to have to make some 10 changes perhaps to satisfy these, in other words, issues.
11 I no longer have a replicate plant then.
12 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Then you would have to at least (J-13 identify what you were going to look at and why you were 14 going to change it or not change it for us to make the 15 judgment as to why it would be a replicate.
We would have 16 to review that on those issues.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
Thank you.
18 MR. SIESS:
Frank, there is something that says 19
-- maybe I missed it -- that the replicate plant has to --
20 well, I am trying to find it.
It will conform to any 21 changes in the Commission's regulations which have become 22 effective since the issuance of a license for the base 23 plant.
Is that what you were talking about.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
rs 25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
You would have to look at all U
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those changes and say, have you upgraded the plant.
If not, 2
why not.
And to make the judgment as to whether it 3
should --
4 MR. SIESS:
Is the judgment a backfitting 5
judgment or is it just --
6 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think what we are saying in 7
this context, that that would be the point of departure.
8 And so as a statement of policy, you would say that those, 9
all of those new requirements would have to be considered 10 and evaluated in this design.
11 MR. SIESS:
Would you consider them in the same 12 sense that the SEP plants looked at changes in requirements 5I 13 since the license or would you -- there is qu'ite a range of 14 ways you can look at an old design against new regulations.
15 MR. CARBON:
And quite a range on how you would 16 consider the cost.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
The decision-making 18 process.
19 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think one would have to make 20 the judgments with a goal of compliance with new 21 regulations.
And I think if there were arguments that 22 could show why this or that change should not be made or 23 perhaps an alternative to that, we would have to use those 24 kinds of concepts and techniques.
Certainly you would say
,25 as part of this, one of the things they would have to do ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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And therefore, you would have the tools to 2
make those kinds.of judgments.
l.
3 MR. SIESS:
For a concept that probably is the
.4-most likely to be exercised in the next few years, there 5
are some very. interesting points of policy you-are making
.6 that it seems to me ought to be in the policy statement.
I 7
would think that if somebody wanted to replicate a plant 8
under this, that those things would be very important.
If L
- 9 your goal is to.make the plant meet all the current 4
10 requirements, I can see a very considerable cost in
'll revising that design and meeting them, plus the fact 12 that --
13' MR. MIRAGLIA:
The best we did on that area is 14 this area about the flexibility.
And I think that is a
.15 time, it is almost time related.
If somebody wanted to do 16 a Palo Verde 4 now, I think he would have'an easier time 17
_trying:to replicate Palo. Verde 4 within the next year or so 18' as opposed to five years f rom now.
4 19 MR. SIESS:
He might have a heck of a' time 2'O getting through the ACRS because there are some people on d'
21 ACRS who don't like that design.
22 But when you say your goal would be to meet the
~
23 current requirements, that is easy to say and it is a nice-
~
24 legally satisfying statement.
But when the SEP plants were
~
25 reviewed and those plants, in terms of time the gap was I
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decades rather than years, the goal there was not to meet 2
-the current requirements.
The goal there was to do what 3
was necessary to provide an adequate level of protection to 4
the health and safety of the public.
And they didn't all 5
even have the benefit of a complete PRA, but they were 6
reviewed pretty much against risk rather than against the 7
requirements.
Those are fairly large extremes of 8
philosophy to say the least, but policy to say the most.
9 And boy, I sure wouldn't want to see a policy statement 10 before I went in to replicate a plant under these rules.
I 11 would sure want more policy established than there is now.
.12 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think what the policy is trying 13 to articulate is that one would have to look at those 14 changes made, certainly they would have to do a PRA on the 15 facility and then they would have to indicate if they 16 weren't complying, either provide the basis for an 17 exemption or an alternative demonstration.
18 MR. SIESS:
That kind of guidance isn't in this 19 policy statement.
20 MR. THOMAS:
Maybe we were too close to it, 21 but --
22 MR. SIESS:
Knowing what you would do, and 23 having a policy statement that tells the next guy what to 24 do isn't the same thing.
r3 25 MR. THOMAS:
There is still the requirement to V
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meet the current regulations.
Going in position is that' 2-you have got to-meet the new requirements.
It would be a
=3 new plant.
It would be a new license.
We have to conclude
~
4 that-the regulations are met.
I think what Frank is saying
.5 is that the'PRA and so on may show that you don't need to 6
meet a particular-regulation and would serve as a basis for
.7 an exemption request.
8 MR. SIESS:
Maybe you ought to change the 9-regulation, if that is true.
10 MR. THOMAS:
I think it depends on the specific 11-application.
In some cases, maybe, yes.
12 MR. SIESS:
How much consideration did you give 13-to the tradeoff between making a significant change in the 14
' plant to meet the current regulations and the possible 15 mistakes that are ' going. to be made in the process of making f
16 that change?
You take a design that presumably has worked 17 pretty good, otherwise somebody might --
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
In the replication, one would 19.
have-to consider the plant that is being replicated, what t
20 its operating history would have been.
That is similar to 21 the information that you talked about in the SEP program.
1 22 It is a body of information that would have to be 23_
considered and would provide insights as to reaching the 24
. judgments that you are talking about.
25 MR. SIESS:
On the issue of NUREG 0800, that is t
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It -- when did NUREG 0800 first come 2
out.
3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
July of '81.
4 MR. SIESS:
So it would be reviewed against the 5
-- suppose a plant had been reviewed against the original 6
SSRP, which has been changed seme.
7' MR. MIRAGLIA:
It would be a non -- you mean 8
previous to.
9' MR. SIESS:
It was reviewed against 0800 as it 110 existed in December 1981.
And as it exists today, or next 11 year, is not the same standard review plan.
So --
12 MR. THOMAS:
What we looked for was a point in
\\
13 time where we could distinguish between the two options.
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
By meeting the current regulation, 15 there is a regulation, 50.34 G, that says, you have to say, 16 if you don't meet the criteria, that you are deviating from 17 the SERP, you have to identify and justify.
That would be 18 a point of departure.
19 MR. SIESS:
So that really doesn't buy them an 20 awful lot to have been reviewed against NUREG 0800, because 21 NUREG -- the changes between '81 and now or '81 and '87 22 might be in some areas greater than the changes before SRP 23 until after SRP.
24 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I don't know if we can make that 25 categorical.
I think the number of changes in that period ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 have been relatively small as compared to, from the 2
original SRP to the post-TMI revision.
3 MR. SIESS:
There are a few that that are very 4
important.
There are some changes that require quite 5-significant changes in certain systems.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
In replicating a plant, how far 7
does one have to go in providing the exact same components 8
as in the base plant?
Does the replicato mean complete 9
replicate?
10 MR. THOMAS:
No.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Where do you draw the line?
12 MR. SIESS:
Paper.
You replicate the paper.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
You would look --
14 MR. THOMAS:
You would look at the licensing 15 safety requirements for a component.
For a particular 16 application, you would have to nave a pump, have to deliver 17 such and such a flow, such and such a head, be able to 18 withstand such and such a temperature, and so on, radiation 19 environment.
To that point, the specific -- the 20 qualification program would have to be the same for both of 21 them.
But the actual component itself could be by two 22 different vendors.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
The conditions, the interface 24 requirements would have to be the same?
25 MR. THOMAS:
Yes.
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MR. MICHELSON:
But the component would be by a 2
vendor of your choice?
.3 MR. THOMAS:
Yes.
4 MR. SIESS:
There is some interest, I hear, in 5
smaller plants; it may all be tied to modular.
Suppose 6
somebody really wanted a 500 megawatt plant.
Do you think 7
it would actually be possible for them to say, replicate 8
Point Beach?
9 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think this policy statement as 10 written would say that would be an option to be pursued.
11 Whether they would do that in that kind of context, I think 12 they are thinking of a different design when they are (3
^~J 13 talking about --
14 MR. SIESS:
It is clearly before NUREG 0800, 15 Suppose it was Wisconsin Electric wanted to build Point 16 Beach 3, because they liked Point Beach 1 and 2.
They are 17 nice size.
Think.have 500 megawatts.
Whatever it is.
18 Practically, do you think it would be something they could 19 do or is it just fiction?
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
One of the points that came out 21 of the Commission meeting is, do we really have a 22 representative view of the industry out there?
And we have, 23 since December-11, written to EPRI, Electric Edison 24 Institute, AIF, and Newmark.
Newmark is the association 25 where senior executives of all utilities say, what do you-ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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perceive to be the range of options out there; which 2
options do you really feel are the ones that you need in 3
the near term?
Trying to get a sense of that.
I think the 4
perception is that in the discussions we had -- and if one 5
"looks at the AIF letter, that in the near term, within the 6
next four or five years, if there is going to be a new 7
order, the sense is that they will try, the utilities would 8
prefer picking a known quantity.
That is how they can meet 9-the substantial level of design information.
It is there.
10 They can do a PRA on that and that would be the right point 11 of the departure to make the decision and try to license 12 that type of-f acility as opposed to a totally new design.
13 MR. SIESS:
So it has to be somebody that wants*
14 a 900 or 1100 megawatt plant?
The last one that was 15-licensed was Bailey, I think.
16-MR. CARBON:
I didn't follow why Chet concluded 17 it had to be a 900 or 1100-megawatt plant.
18 MR. SIESS:
Because they are the only fairly 19 recent plants.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
This wouldn't restrict it.
The 21 option you said about Prairie Island would fall if you 22 wanted to build out to Point Beach.
Point Beach 3 at that
~
23 same site would be within the context.
24 MR. CARBON:
Oh.
So it could. be a 500-megawatt?
25 MR. SIESS:
Yes, it is within the concept.
But ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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from a practical point of view, do you think the review 2
time would be reduced any?
3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
No.
4 MR. WYLIE:
Well, I think --
5 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I am sorry.
6 MR. SIESS:
Do you think the plant would end up 7
looking anything like Point Beach 1 or 2?
8 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think it would be changed.
9 MR. SIESS:
I mean you start with an FSAR that 10 was probably in two volumes.- I don't remember.
And then 11 by the. time you would get through, it would have to be two 12 shelves.
7_(_/
13 MR. CARBON:
The FSAR would look different, but 14 why couldn't the plant look very similee-?.
15 MR. SIESS:
I don't think they would ever get 16 through the process.
17 MR. WYLIE:
It would have to meet current 18 l regulations.
19 MR. SIESS:
It has to be reviewed against 20 current regulations.
He said the goal would be for a new 21 plant to meet current-regulations.
Unless you could 22 justify it on a PRA basis or other basis.
23 MR. CARBON:
But if that plant is sitting there 24 operating, it meets current regulation.
25 MR. SIESS:
No.
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MR. CARBON:
NRC has got to shut it down if it 2
doesn't.
3 MR. SIESS:
It meets the regulations that were 4
in force at the time it was licensed plus generic matters 5
that have come up since then and USI and TMI items.
You 6
look at the SEP plants, there are SEP plants that don't 7
come anywhere near. current regulations and they continue to 8
operate.
9 MR. CARBON:
Is that a correct interpretation?
10 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Not all the requirements were 11 necessarily backfit on all facilities.
12 MR. THOMAS:
That is the point right there.
(3
\\/
13 MR. SIESS:
You don't backfit.
SEP has had a 14 lot of things that weren't back fitted.
Big Rock Point is it is a strange little plant, but it looks nothing like 15 16 it would look if it were built today.
The time required to 17 go through and design what you would leave in Point Beach 18 or what you would add to, I know that would be true.
I 19 just don't believe it would end up looking a whole lot like 20 it.
21 MR. THOMAS:
You probably could generalize and 22 say the further back in time you go, the more justification 23 you will have to provide not to change them.
24 MR. SIESS:
You have got some that have got an 25 OL this year and next year somebody wanted to replicate the
(~)
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same site, that would be -- as you said, Palo Verde 4.
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is a time dependent.
3:
MR. CARBON:
Straighten me out.
Why, if Point 4
Beach 2 is sitting there and it is safe to operate today, 5
why isn't it safe to build another one like it tomorrow?
6 MR. SIESS:
The difference between regulations 7
and standard review plan.
A standard review plan is not a 8
regulation.
9 MR. CARBON:
I question the basic point that if 10 it is sitting there operating -- of course, some of them we 11 let operate because we figure they will shut down on the 12 basis of probability and if there is only one of them, Ak-)
. 13 something like that.
Otherwise --
-14' MR. WYLIE:
A lot of the plants don't meet 15 current regulation but there were measures taken to justify 16 the safety _ level that is deemed adequate to keep operating.
17 MR. CARBON:
I appreciate there will be l-18 exceptions.
But basically, the plants that are out there 19 operating today are considered to be safe.
20 MR. WYLIE:
Sure.
But ycu wouldn't build things 21 today like you did 10 years ago.
22 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is a difference in the i
23 regulatory finding that one is making at the time of l
24 initial license of a facility for a brand new facility.
3 25 Does it meet all the regulations and if not, is it okay?
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1 Do you have exemptions?
Can you make the requisite 2
regulatory findings as opposed to having a plant out there 3
that is operating where you have to make the finding that 4
it doesn't -- continued operation doesn't present an undue 5
risk to the public health and safety?
6 MR. CARBON:
I am wondering if the regulations 7
are correct.
We are concerned about the safety.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
It is no different than a lot of 9
other regulated industries, building codes and so forth.
10 An old building can't meet current codes but you don't go 11 tear it down just because of that.
12 MR. SIESS:
Not even for seismic codes.
l
)
l 13 MR. CARBON:
Sure, you don't.
But I am trying 14 to view it somewhat differently and saying, most of the 15 buildings out there are safe.
And I grant you, building 16 codes change.
But most of the buildings are safe and most 17 of~the new buildings that are put up will be almost 18 identical to the buildings that are there.
And I am trying 19 to extrapolate that and say, if most of the plants, most of 20 the 90 that are operating today are safe and the Commission 21 says they are --
22 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think what Dr. Siess was saying 23 is that your question, Dr. Carbon, was, could it wind up, 24 could there be a Point Beach 3 look exactly like Point 25 Beach 1 and 2.
The end result of that, the answer to that i
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.25461.0 77 EE l-question could be yes.
But in order to get to that 2-decision to show what.the justifications are, what 3
Dr. Siess is saying is that it probably would be easier 4
just to change the facility to meet the requirements as
-5 opposed to trying to justify as to why it doesn't.
That is 6
'why it would look different.
I think that is what you were 7
saying.
8 MR. SIESS:
There'is a slight fallacy in your 1
9 '
-thinking.
This is not terribly facetious.
First you are 10 equating regulation and safety.
And in an area where I am i
J 11 quite familiar like building codes, it would be assuming 12 that the building is safe because of the building code, G
tl'sb
~
13 Sometimes. they are safe in spite of the building code.
14 That comes from somebody that writes building codes.
15 But, no, that is always a problem.
'16 MR.: CARBON:
Yes.
I appreciate what you are 17 saying.
I appreciate the difference between the regulation 18 and safety.
But I guess I am still' left wondering if most 19 of the plant's are safe, why can't we duplicate them?
20 MR. SIESS:
One argument you have to accept is 21 that if I have got 100 plants, I would like for them to be 22 safer than if I had 10.
r 23:
MR. CARBON:
But the Commission set up safety 24 goals and they are not going to change them every year.
.25 MR. SIESS:
And they are not related to -- they i
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s-1 are related to the individual plants, too.
There is a 2
feeling that the more you have, the less likely you are to 3
have an accident.
But that really has more to do with 4
perception than it does with the safety of individuals.
5 But Point Beach 1 and 2 probably don't look 6
exactly'the way they did when they were built either.
7 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is true, too.
'8 As I said, we worked closely with.the AIF 9
proposal.
And there were some differences in what the 10 Staff has ultimately proposed to the Commission and is 11 before the Commission and what was presented in the AIF 12 proposal which is attached.
As far as terms of approval, O
k/
13-we were saying certification should be for~10 years, the 14 other option should be in terms of five years.
The AIF 15 wanted all concepts to be 10 years.
Our choice here in 16 picking the five versus the 10 is consistent with the 17 I attitude of encouraging complete designs, going through the
'18 certification process.
And in order to keep that 19 encouragement, we felt that this differentiation was a step 20 in that direction, as opposed to saying you have got design 21 approval that is good for 10 years; there is no real 22 incentive to go through certification.
Whether that should 23 be three years or seven years, one can pick what the number 24 is.
But we felt that there had to be a difference between 25 certification and the other approvals in terms of approval,
(-)s t.
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in order to encourage these designs to go through the 2
certification process.
3 MR. WYLIE:
That is different from what you said 4
in the statement.
You said that -- at least what I read 5
was that the design certification was justified, 10 years 6
is justified for that on the basis it had a more rigorous 7
review.
~~
8 MR. MIRAGLIA:
In the context that it goes to 9
that next step of rulemaking.
That is another level of a 10 review that going just through Staff approval would not 11 have.
12 MR. WYLIE:
I thought I heard you say the 13 difference between five and 10 is to encourage or give some 14 incentive to --
15-MR. MIRAGLIA:
To bring it through the 16 certification process.
And if I just went through a Staff 17 approval and said the term of approval is 10 years, there 18 is nothing for them to gain from taking the next step of 19 certification which is what they want.
So that is why we 20 differentiated.
21 MR. WYLIE:
My comment is directed to the policy 22 statement where it says the justification was based on the 23 fact that the design certification approach got a more 24 rigorous review.
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is another level.
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MR.- WYLIE:
But is that true?
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think, yes.
Well, it would
-3 depend on the type of rulemaking process.
But even if one 4
takes a simple notice of rulemaking, there is another level 5
of. review beyond the Staf f activity -- the Staf f activity 6
would be taken subject to public comment.
Whether that
~7 would be a notice of comment or a legislative hearing or 8
fully adjudicatory, those factors would be considered.
In 9
that context we are saying it is more rigorous.than just 10 stopping with the Staff approval.
11 MR. WYLIE:
In a way, though, that says that --
12 well, let's just take a replicate plant that was reviewed A
\\_/
13 under the standard review plan and it meets all fo'ur of the 14 savere accident requirements and it has a design level 15 review equal to the design certification approach from a
'16 safety standpoint; it has to be equally safe.
It is hard 17 to -- I will buy what you said.
4 18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I understand what you are saying.
19 MR. MIRAGLIA:
With respect to PDA renewability, 20 they wanted to have the option of renewing the PDA almost 21 automatically.
Staff took a position that the PDA would 22 only be renewable for good cause.
23 Again, the ultimate would be to get from a PDA 24 to an FDA and to certification, again pushing it up and 1
r~s 25 trying to get it through the entire process rather than
(_)
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stopping at some convenient point.
2' Again, as far as the level.of design information 3
for a final design approval or a' design certification, we P
4 used the terms " equivalent to the FSAR."
The AIF took the 5.
- position that'it could be less than.
I think we have 6
discussed'that issue here.
I think all that is 7
representative of-there is a need for further dialogue and 8
discussions between the Staff and the ittdustry to really 9
see if we can get a better definition of those terms.
What
-10 ck) they really mean?
What level of design information does 11
.one need.to do that?
Certainly our thinking is that the 12.
equivalent of the FSAR -- and they seem to be saying that'
.13 there may be cases where they would be justified less.
I 14 guess we are. in a position of saying, you might be right 15 but we won't know until we see it.
So we are in that kind
.16
-of position now.
17 Again, on the application of the cost / benefit "18 balance, we said that we are going to follow the Commission 19 rules.
We. don't have any choice.
They-wanted to only 20 apply the benefit to the lead plant.
Make the cost / benefit l
21-analysis to the lead plant.
We said that is not consistent 22 with the Commission's rules.
23 MR. SIESS:
Frank, it says in the policy
[
24 statement that the renewal will be granted provided the i
25 design is found to comply with the Commission's current 1
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regulations.
That is a very clear-cut statement, I thought.
2 MR. MIRAGLIA:
What we are saying is that if we 3
are going to renew an FDA we would like to have an 4
understanding of where that stands with respect to current 5
regulation.
6 MR. SIESS:
It doesn't say that.
- ~7
-~
MR. MIRAGLIA:
If we followed rigorously the 8
backfit process throughout, that should be the case.
9 MR. SIESS:
But, you know, before, in talking 10
~about replication, you said in relation to current standard 11 review plan that it was subject to evaluation.
This now, 12 it says it must comply with the Commission's regulations.
(3 AJ 13 There is no option there, provided the design is found to 14 comply with the Commission's current regulations.
15 That means a renewal -- it is simply the right 16 to update a reference design to the current regulations and 17 get it approved.
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think if one looks at the terms 19 and conditions, if the Commission has new requirements and 20 has to apply the backfit, I think the difference would be 21 small.
22 MR. SIESS:
I don't bee anything in here about a 23 backfit rule or anything else.
24 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Each of the concepts --
25 MR. SIESS:
Regulations --
(3>
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MR. MIRAGLIA:
Each of the concepts does 2
reference 5109.
Within the body of the policy statement.
3 MR. SIESS:
I am reading page 3 of the policy 4
statement. to the SECY.
Second paragraph from 5
the bottom.
It is the same thing on page 2 for PDAs and 6
page 4 for design certifications.
All three of them say, 7
"provided the design is found to comply with the Commission's 8'
current regulations."
9 MR. THOHAS:
Again, when you issue a license or 10 approval or whatever, you have to make a finding that it is 11
-in compliance with current regulations.
12 MR. SIESS:
The regulations would be GDC?
13 MR. THOMAS:
Yes.
Wha,t that means is, our 14 practice of reviewing licenses has been in effect 15 tantamount to renewing an initial application from scratch.
16 So you have to make the finding that it meets the then-current 17 regulations.
So that means that if the design that was 18 approved previously did not meet the current regulations, 19 you would either have to change the design or you would 20 have to justify an exemption.
21 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Then in the context of if you had 22-a design approval, the only way you could force that kind t
2' of change is to meet the backfit test.
So I think if one i
24 puts those together, the changes would be very small.
25 MR. SIESS:
Since rules have to go under the l
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backfit rule --
j 2
MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
And you have to pass that 3
threshold in order to backfit.
4 MR. SIESS:
I am just sitting here trying to 5
think back five years to what kind of changes in the rules 6
have been made in the last five years or 10 years.
That is 7
an awful long time.
I got a feeling that reference 8
document would end up looking quite a bit different.
9 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think that is probably correct.
10 Going back 10 years, I think --
11 MR. SIESS:
So the stability that is provided, 12 that is a word I have heard used a few times, is really a 13 stability for a five or 10-year period.
And after that --
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
After that point in time, you 15 want to take a fresh look to determine whether you want to 16 do it for another five or 10.
And most probably it is okay 17 as is or it would have some minor changes.
18 MR. SIESS:
In the early 1970s, that would have 19 been a lot of plants.
Right now it is a little hard to 20 visualize.
Five years.
21 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That concludes the prepared 22 remarks that I had, Dr. Wylie.
23 MR. WYLIE:
Okay.
24 MR. CARBON:
I have a general question I would 25 like to ask.
This goes back to a point Glen Reed made gL)
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1 during the intermission.
Some utility people have met with 2
us and said, gee, the industry -- one person used the word 3
" comatose."
I have heard many people say, never again will 4
their CEO bet the company on whether the regulatory 5
requirements will change or not.
And it seems to me that 6
standardization is aimed in large part at revitalizing the 7
industry.
It is aimed at safety, too, but certainly 8
revitalization.
9 It seems to me that there is not the assurance 10 there, the firmness that the utility can look at this and 11 say, gee, we know what is going to be required.
We know we 1.1 can go ahead and do this on firm ground.
G V
13 Can you comment on that?
14 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think the Commission themselves 15 have expressed some of that concern on the December 11 16 meeting.
Their perception was, we want a substantial 17 complete design up front and by retaining some of these 18 other concepts, you are sort of cluttering up what the 19 overall goal of standardization is.
20 on the other hand, they recognized that in the 21 near term, if there is to be revitalization, at least in 22 the context of what the AIF provided to us, they seem to 23 say that revitalization is centered upon having the 24 opportunity to utilize the replication concept.
That is 25 why we had this transition period in here.
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The concern comes, one, what utility executive 2
out there has said that he would replicate a plant?
I 3
don't know of any.
And the Staff's response was, we don't 4
know of any either.
It is just that in reading what the 5
AIF said to us, that seemed to be the most likely concept 6
to be utilized.
7 It all, in my view, is that this here policy 8
statement presents a number of options that provide for a 9
vendor to come forward with a complete design, a reference 10 design concept and it also provides -- and that is more 11 directed towards the NSSS suppliers and in concert with the 12 existing AEs out there to develop such a design.
In fact, D\\_)
13 the EPRI program is working toward that goal on a longer 14 team schedule.
15 That requires a substantial outlay of capital up 16 front and are the vendors and AEs willing to go forward 17 with that not having a solid custom?
The AIF seemed to be 18 saying that the utility is more likely to go on that thin 19 ice again, if he felt that there was some way of taking a 20 design that is out there that has been proven, that is 21 operating, that has a good operating history and using that 22 as his point of departure and saying, you give me the 23 ability to build another one of those facilities, I at 24 least can bound it.
I know what the costs are, I know what 25 the problems are.
I may be able to do a little bit better
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and I have more concrete tangib,les to work with to make 2
-those kinds of decisions.
3' As a result, the policy statement presents both
}
4.-
options available there.
Someone has to take the first 5
st'ep.
I'think what we were hearing from the AIF, to go 6-forth with a policy. statement that just pushes in terms of 7
.a substantially' complete plant design up front is not t
8-something that they are going to see in the near term and 9
that if we -- it would perhaps be more viable to have this 10 replication concept there.
You are right, the utility
'll executives are going to want to have some pretty firm basis 121 to say, you are talking about a substantive outlay of 13 capital here if you decide to build one of these.
_14 MR. CARBON:
And we use the words of the policy 15
' statement-that allows replication, but from the discussion 16 we had 10 minutes ago, I would conclude it doesn't allow
^
17 replication.
18 I have myself a plant there.
I know the 19 maintenance procedures.
I have got the training all set up 20 for it.
I know.thich computers to use.
The plant is safer i-21 the Commission has said it is ' safe.
But we won't let 22 anybody build one of them.
23 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I wouldn't take our answers as 24 hard and firm as you have, Dr. Carbon.
I think it provides
.i 25 the option for that to be considered.
It doesn't predict i-ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 the outcome with certainty.
2 MR. WYLIE:
For certain plants.
3 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is going to be easier to get 4
to that goal.for certain plants than for others.
5 MR. SIESS:
As I -- if I look at this policy 6
statement, de novo, as a new policy statement, I have a lot 7
of problems with it.
It is a cafeteria or whatever you 8
call it, you have got four or five options and you have got 9
PDA FDA option, which I think is stupid.
If I were 10 building a plant, I wouldn't want to start with a PDA, I 11 would want to start with as complete a design as I had that 12 I could get my hands on before I started building it.
And
'O ik/
13 that would contribute a lot to stability to that,,to get it 14 built in five years instead of 10.
15 So I.think the PDA option for anybody in their 16 right mind is silly.
17 But if I look at the policy statement and look 18 only at the changes that have been made in it in relation l
19 to the original policy statement, I see carrots.
I see 20 incentives.
They are little bitty incentives, but each one 21 of them is a move in the right direction.
22 It is a move towards stability, a move toward 23 encouragement.
But when I look at it as a whole --
24 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is not a revolutionary type of 25 change.
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MR. SIESS:
It is still a mishmash.
One from 2
column A and one from column B.
I would say it is 3
wishy-washy.
It is a collection of things that you can 4
choose from, some of which aren't any better than what you 5
are doing.
But if I looked at it compared to the old 6
statement and if I take the enclosure 3, reviewing the 7
significant things, the rulemaking is certainly a 8
contribution towards stability.
The backfitting thing, 9
which some people aren't going to like; the straightening 10 out of'the duplicate, replicate is a housekeeping job.
The 11 fees are an encouragement.
There is a relaxation, clearly 12 some things have been done.
If I look at it that way, it O
kJ 13 makes some sense.
14 MR. REED:
Let me talk and build upon what Max 15 Carbon said.
Utilities, electric utilities and their 16 management are traditionally very conservative people.
17 They financo, try to finance sure things.
They try to live 18 well in their communities in being good neighbors and all 19 these kind of things.
20 Somehow, about 30 years ago, 20 years ago, the 21 utilities got caught up in a glamour chase.
Something new 22 that was going to be, according to what somebody said once, 23 free electricity.
In that nuclear could produce 24 electricity for nothing and the biggest cost would be the r~w 25 cost of the meter.
That was a government person that said L)
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that.
2 Now, glamour and publicity -- I lived through 3 -
all of this, as a utility person.
Glamour and publicity in 4
addition to natural conservatism of a utility, it was easy 5
to catch that sickness.
6 So the utilities caught that sickness and they 7
went out and found themselves bagmen or sole licensee for 8
everything and everybody related to nuclear.
9 They should not have been sole licensees and 10 bagmen for all the designers and all the people in 11 Washington and in the regions with respect to nuclear and 1
12 all its complexities and so on.
(%.
\\-)
13 Nuclear utilities should never be expected to 14 know all the design intricacies.
Okay?
15 In my opinion, what you have told us here today 16 with respect to the policy statement, SECY 85-382, is 17 really a bunch of warmed over complex stew, which you are 18 going to try to bait, let's say, somebody back into a 19 glamour chase.
I don't think they are going to go back into 20 it.
One of the executives said, the utilities, it is 21 comatose.
He meant until we get regulatory stabilization, 22 interaction, interchanges, into upgrading the model A, the 23 model B -- I think the time has arrived.
Keep in mind, 24 when nuclear started, under the Atomic Energy Commission,
(~)
25 as a utility person, I was out thers being encouraged as a V
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young person in the design and operating aspect, encouraged 2
to take the bait and go out and run with it and build a 3
plant, do this and do that.
4 And there was suppott for doing this.
It took 5
the utility out of his normal conservative domicile in the 6
community.
Okay.
We went through that phase in the early 7
1960s and it was very early.
And it was a short-lived 8
phase.
Then we went into the backlash phase, I think, 9
where everybody and everyone was throwing rocks at the 10 bagman utility person.
We are still in that backlash phase 11 where the utilities are a sole licensee and are being 12 slapped by everything and everybody, and they and the 1) people who finance them aren't going to take that any more.
14 They are going to let the industry simmer on down.
15 In my opinion, there is only one way that 16 standardization should move and the way that any potential 17 in the United States cf America for nuclear will happen; 18 that is, to look -- rather than old stew, warming over old 19 stew, replicate, duplicate and all these kinds of things, 20 and leaving the utility as sole licensee, is to look at, we 21 have got 100 plants licensed, somebody said.
We got 22 probably 100 designs of just the PWR.
It is time for those 23 people who did all these things to stand up to their 24 responsibilities of their designed automobile and market it
{}
25 appropriately, as we market air frames.
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In other words, there should be, in my opinion,
~2
-certification of the air frame by the NRC and the NRC 3
should stand up to its responsibilities that it has the
'4 intelligence and the great Staff and all the expertise to 5
stamp it approved, certified.
And that now becomes a 6
marketable product by the designer and he turns it out to 7-the utility, operating company.
And we divorce this sole 8
licensee thing into two parts.
9 MR. SIESS:
You are talking about turnkey now?
l
-10 MR. REED:
It all depends on how much of the 11
' plant, the nuclear plant gets to be under regulation.
12 MR. SIESS:
You don't license an aircraft design.
l 13 You-license an aircraft.
14 MR. REED:
Well, I don't think that it is quite 15 similar.
I don't think you have to have BOP thrown into 16 the same pot.
The utility business doesn't neod to be 17' thrown -into the regulation, safety regulation business.-
18 MR. MICHELSON:
I thought that was your point, 19 though.
l l
'20 MR. REED:
No.
.I think that the engine, this i
L 21 boiling engine, somebody has got to certify it.
l-l l
22 MR. SIESS:
But it works just fine as long as F
23 everything else around it works.
24 MR. REED:
I don't think that -- I don't agree 25 with that, Chet.
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MR. SIESS:
Well, most of our incidents and 2
accidents have come f rom pipes and valves that are well 3
outside the NSSS.
4 MR. REED:
We have things so interwoven that we 5
are not separating safety from utility business.
I think 6
the utilities are willing to run their turbine businecs and 7
buy an uncertified turbine.
But they are not going to buy 8
these uncertified boilers.
9 MR. SIESS:
Mr. Chairman --
l 10 MR. WYLIE:
Yes, sir.
[
11 MR. SIESS:
I don't know what we are going to 12 tell the Commission about this.
Obviously if we tell them
()
\\s 13 they shouldn't issue it, they end up back where they are 14 now, which I don't think anybody would like if they were 15 looking at it from the beginning.
t 16 MR. WYLIE:
Let me ask a question --
l 17 MR. MIRAGLIA:
The Commission -- it might be 18 helpful to summarize the Commission meeting on the lith of 19 December.
20 It was -- the Commission did ask the Staff to go 21 back and poll the industry as to the range of options out 22 there.
The Staff has sent letters to, as I indicated, EEI, 23 EPRI, Newmark and AIF.
And I believe we asked for their 24 views to be submitted 21st of this month.
So that step has
(^3 25 been taken.
1
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In addition, the Commission indicated that in 2
this policy statement, the Staff did respond to the 3
Commission's request to give them a proposal and that the 4
Commission's Staff, in concert with OPE and perhaps the NRC 5
Staff, need to look at this paper and suggest changes and 6
modifications to more capture the views of the Commission.
7 And the Staff has gone -- at least one commissioner -- the 8
Staff has gone as far as it could go without further 9
guidance and dialogue from the Commission.
10 So the Commission at least intends, I think, via 11 OPE and its Staff, to either, in concert with this Staff or 12 perhaps develop a Staff requirements memo, to indicate what kl 13 changes they may want to this proposed policy statement 14 prior to publication for comment.
This would be a proposed 15 statement of policy issued for comment as opposed to final 16 implementation.
17 So the Commission does have the proposed policy 18 statement under advisement and is looking at it in that 19 kind of context.
20 MR. SIESS:
It is -- as a patch-up job, it isn't 21 bad.
What would you do, Frank, if you didn't have a policy 22 statement already out on this and were asked to develop a 23 policy on standard designs for the next 10 or 15 years or 24 20?
/
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think that is one of the things ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 that this here paper tried to capture all of those.
If we 2
are talking about the next generation of future design and 3
what you want it to be 10 years from now, I think you would 4
come up with a much simpler paper that articulates 5
something along the lines in here, but I think you can take 6
some of the other material out.
I think you could strongly
~
7 encourage the complete design of a facility, say you want 8
it certified and be a little bit more definitive in those 9
kinds of options.
10 In doing that, one has to recognize where does 11 that decision and where does that process that may be a 12 viable one 10 years from now, where does that leave us q/
'w 13 today?
What does that mean for guidance for the industry 14 in the near term?
Maybe they have to be structured and 15 formatted in a dif ferent kind of way.
I think that is the 16 issue.
17 MR. SIESS:
You could take care of the near 18 future by revisions to the policy statement, which would be 19 the relaxation or the redefinition on the replication, 20 bring in the severe accident and those about cancel each 21 other out in terms of attractiveness to a licensee, the fee 22 structure, the renewal structure, maybe not even the 23 renewal.
You could clear up the replication issue in one 24 policy statement, which would be a minor addition.
It r^
25 wouldn't even have to be a whole new thing.
Then you could L;)
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'have another policy statement which looked further down the 2
- line, which would put all its emphasis on reference design 3
.and a tremendous emphasis on certification.
I am not sure 4
that certification is a technical issue.
I think it is a
'5 legal issue.
I am not supposed to be a lawyer, though I 6'
have. opinions.
That would be another approach.
7.
The problem with that I see is, if you look at 8
the longer range thing where you would say it would be 9
nothing but reference designs, maybe certified, maybe not, 10 you are now talking about advance reactors, I think, which 11 is another subject.
l _
12 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Well, yes.
That is probably on a 13 different time track as well.
14 The other -- when you separate them.
The other 15
. decision you do, if you are saying in the long-term, then 16 you are going to find yourself in the position of saying, 17 how long do I take duplication and replication as an option.
18 Am I going to give -- is it going to be five years or seven
(
19 years?
And then that option is no longer available.
You
(
20 are going to be forced to make those kinds of judgments.
l 21 MR. SIESS:
That is going to work itself out by i
22 the degree to which you make an update to the present SRP.
23 MR. REED:
Why wouldn't you want to -- if you 24 are going to take a fresh look, not rehash the 1972 policy,
}
it you are going to take a f resh look, why wouldn't you 25 ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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want to_look at where we stand in the industry today after 2
30 years and whether or not the utility will have to say --
3 whether or not the utilities should be sole licensee and 4
the NRC sets back and throws rocks at them.
The 5
manufacturers try to con them into a shabby product.
That 6
has happened.
And then throw rocks at them to get it 7
ratcheted up to something different so they can make money 8
in this decision and so on.
Why wouldn't you want to take 9
a fresh look at the structure of how we finally get to a 10 licensing.
11 I am not going to say that the first hundred 12 reactors haven't given us some lessons.
Maybe that was the
/mkJ 13 only way that we could evolve the business safely and 14 appropriately.
But it seems to me that we should be 15 starting into another phase.
That phase should be in 16 private enterprise America, which I very much believe in, 17 versus socialistic France or some other place, where their 18 system, their structuring would be different.
Why wouldn't 19 we talk about the aircraft-type of structure, to achieve a 20 marketable product that doesn't get recalled in its 21 entirety for rebuilding and isn't an unstable, questionable 22 financial risk?
23 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think those options are there 24 and they have been discussed.
I don't know if this policy r^s 25
-- that is a policy question that goes beyond
\\-)
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1 standardization.
I think it would be -- if you make that 2
kind of policy decision up front, then you would evolve a 3
different standardization policy.
I think that is a 4
judgr.ent that one would have to reach.
DOE has got a S
number of research programs that they are looking at.
6 There has been various --
7 MR. SIESS:
That is under the heading of 8
advanced reactors, though.
9 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Well, as you say, it is kind of 10 hard to distinguish between what is an advanced reactor or 11 improved LWR.
In fact, I think the commissioners see a 12
' relationship to the new design concepts and what about EPRI.
('h
\\-)
13 EPRI has really improved the LWR, GESSAR and RESAR, the 14 Westingho'une advanced design.
There are just advances on 15 existing technology.
16 MR. SIESS:
Were you asked to take a fresh look 17 or were you asked to do a patch-up job?
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think what -- I go back and 19 look at what we were asked to do, in view of what the 20 commission's considerations were on severe accident policy 21 statement and the proposed legislation, to go back and 22 reexamine the 1978 policy statement and determine how that 23 should be changed and that kind of context.
As a companion 24 piece to that would be once that policy statement on I
(~/)
25 standardization is approved, that we should go back and N-ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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look at the regulations to determine what changes would 2
have to be made to the regulations as suggested by that 3
kind of policy statement.
Is that a fair characterization?
4 MR. SIESS:
I would call that a patch-up job 5
rather than a fresh look.
6 MR. MIRAGLIA:
But the Commission has heard 7
about FAA certification and they have looked at it.
In 8
fact --
9 MR. SIESS:
I am trying to look at what the 10 Commission asked you to do, because we advise the 11 Commission.
If we tell you to go back and start over, that 12 is not very binding on you.
You got your walking orders
(>
13 from the Commission.
But we are going to have to give some s
14 advice to the Commission.
15 We have. advised them in the past that they ought 16 to give more thought to something.
And I think for a 17 patch-up job, not using that in the wrong sense, you have 18 brought in the severe accident.
You have put some 19 incentives in there.
You have clarified some things.
I 20 think you have improved the policy statement over what 21 exists now and made it more viable.
But that is by no 22 means a fresh look.
You have mixed up the near future with 23 the incentives for the more distant future to where they 24 don't come through as clearly --
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think the Commission, if one ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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goes back and reads the transcript of that meeting, you 2
will see a lot of that --
3 MR. SIESS:
I tried to but somebody had 4
highlighted my copy and that comes out black on the Xerox.
5 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think you would see the same 6
sentiment being expressed by the commissioners themselves.
7 They see where they want to go in the long-term, and the 8
practical reslities of where the industry is now and where 9
we might be in the next five or six, seven years.
So I 10 think you can see that kind of sentiment.
I think the 11 papers before the Commission for their consideration -- I 12 think if you have some views that you might want to share O
i/
13 with the Commission relative to those points --
14 MR. SIESS:
I got the feeling that they got what 15 they asked for but they didn't ask for the right thing.
16 MR. WYLIE:
You are now polling the industry and 17 you are going to do some more review.
I notice Palladino 18 basically said he wanted this mid-year.
19 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Yes.
I think the chairman's goal 20 would be to try to have some policy statement out before 21 his term is up.
And there was -- I think the sentiment of 22 all the commissioners at that meeting was that the Staff 23 has given them a product and that it needs their 24 consideration, some views and some further guidance, either 25 from the Staff or some sort of cooperative operation ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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between the Commission Staff offices and the Staff to try 2
and evolve something a little bit different.
I think that 3
is --
4 1(R. SIESS:
The Commission has had one meeting 5
to discuss this?
6 !
MR. MIRAGLIA:
Just one meeting on the proposed 7
policy.
8 MR. WYLIE:
It wasn't a very long meeting?
9 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Well, I don't know, two hours.
10 MR. SIESS:
Of which maybe 15 minutes was spent 11 by the commissioners discussing it and the rest of it 12 talking to the Staff.
O)
(s' 13 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think it would be fair to say 14 much of the conversation and questions were along the lines
'15 that the Staff heard from the subcommittee today.
The same 16 kinds of concerns and issues.
17 MR. SIESS:
Should we take that as a compliment?
18 MR. THOMAS:
Absolutely.
19 MR. WYLIE:
Just a matter of clarification.
On 20 the FDA, you say you can renew it for an additional period 21 of not more than five years.
Is that one-time renewal or 22 is that --
23 MR. MIRAGLIA:
That is what we would hope for.
24 MR. WYLIE:
It doesn't say one.
I saw someplace
(
25 else it was written as a one-time renewal.
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MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think the AIF tried to make --
2 distinguish between the one-time and more frequent.
I 3
thought we had said one-time.
4 MR. WYLIE:
It says -- it doesn't say you can't 5
come back in again.
It just says, approval will be renewed 6
for an additional period of time, not more than five years.
7 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I thought we addressed that in 8
the paper.
9 MR. SIESS:
If the original approval'can be 10 renewed --
11 MR. WYLIE:
Thank you, Frank.
I appreciate it.
.12 It has been very helpful.
Any further comments or o(-)
13 questions?
14 I guess for the subcommittee, we need to decide 15 where we go f rom here.
16 MR. SIESS:
Is this scheduled for a full 17 committee?
18 MR. WYLIE:
No.
There is a short report 19 scheduled for this meeting, a question as to whether we 20 want to recommend anything to the full committee or not.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
Did you want to put this on the 22 record yet or --
23 MR. REED:
Charlie --
24 MR. SIESS:
It is just a question of whether it 25 helps in writing it.
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MR. REED:
Is it out of the question for this 2
subcommittee or are we well enough informed on this 3
subcommittee to look into aircraft practice with respect to 4
certification and responsibility and how responsible is, S
let's say, an FAA with respect to approval?
I don't know 6
that we should clone the aircraft industry.
In nuclear it 7
seems to me that the time has come,for the NRC and the 8
designers, manufacturers to stand behind their product 9
rather than dumping it off.
10 MR. SIESS:
The place to start would be to get 11 the proposal that GE submitted for a power worthiness 12 certificate, that has been presented, I think, to the
(,_)
\\/
13 committee.
I know it has been presented to the Congress.
14 And that has been there for about three years now.
GE has 15 been pushing for a power worthiness certificate.
I don't 16 recall the scope of it, whether it was NSSS or something 17 beyond that.
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
The Commission did also ask the 19 Staff to discuss with FAA the potential antitrust 20
-implications of their certification efforts.
So the 21 Commission his at least drawn a parallel between the FAA 22 certification process, perhaps not completely analogous to 23 what you are suggesting, but they did ask the Staff, 24 because the antitrust implications came up in the r~
25 discussion of the design level of detail.
If you get down d'
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,_REE
(
\\
V 1
to -- so there is a sensitivity, at least within the 2
Commission, of the certification process in FAA.
So it 3
wouldn't be a new concept.
The Staff has looked at FAA 4
processes in other contexts with respect to -- I think the 5
committee, maybe not this committee but the ACRS has h'eard 6
about the designated representatives and inspectors and --
7 MR. SIESS:
But there is a difference there.
8 The antitrust they were looking at from the point of view 9
of the standard design specifying components provided by 10 only one manufacturer and then the Commission approving a 11 specified product which then any buyer of the standard 12 design had to use.
That doesn't enter into the FAA.
(Q/
13 Boeing can buy their pumps and valves.from anybody they 14 want.
The FAA then certifies the airworthiness of the 15 final product.
16 I assume that 747s are built with pumps from one 17 manufacturer and some with pumps from another one.
There 18 are thousands of subcontractors out there building airplane 19 parts.
.20 That is a little different level than the --
21 MR. MICHELSON:
It is hard to see how that 22 concept would apply to nuclear unless it were a turnkey 23 proposition, in which case I could see how it might apply.
24 MR. SIESS:
I don't see how the airworthiness f ")
25 certificate applied only to the NSSS helps anybody very i./
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1 much.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
And then only to the design, 3
since the NSSS doesn't construct or start up the machine 4
afterwards.
Doesn't do any testing at all, necessarily.
5 MR. SIESS:
It is the part that gets hot, but 6
because there is something out here that they ignored --
7
~
- -~ MR'.~MICHELSON:
It is hard to see how the idea 8
can apply unless there is turnkey.
9 MR. WYLIE:
Is it the -- what is the feeling of 10 the subcommittee.
We lost one member, so he suggested that 11 we do some further investigation into the FAA-type approach 12 for certification.
(^~e) 13 MR. SIESS:
Well, Charlie, it seems to me that 14 we can advise the Commission.
The advice I wouldn't give 15 to them is, don' t make the. changes, because I think most of 16 the changes are excellent.
Some members of our ccmmittee 17 aren't going to be too happy with the backfitting rule and 18 at least one member of the Commission isn't, but that is 19 besides the point.
That is an obvious issue.
20 MR. WYLIE:
It is fair to say that what we have 21 here may be --
22 MR. SIESS:
What we have here is not going to be 23 changed by the Staff.
They have sent it up to the 24 Commission.
The Commission is considering it.
They are 25 presumably seeking our advice at this time.
So what do we V, w ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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tell the Commission?
As I say, I wouldn't tell them not to 2
do it because I think it has got -- the changes are all in 3
the right direction.
Some people might disagree on the 4
backfitting.
But the backfitting rule is the rule.
5 We could advise tha Commission that, you know, 6
this.is a suitable patch-rp job for this point in time, but 7
that we don't think it is the kind of thing they ought to 8
be doing if they are really concerned about standard 9
designs.
They really should look a little further into the 10 future and not offer such a selection.
They ought to 11 really concentrate on complete plant, get that other major 12 component part out of it.
They probably ought to
/%(-)
13 concentra'te on a complete design, that is an F,DA-type thing 14 without a PDA step in it for the future.
And whether it is 15 certification, I don't care.
I think that is a legal 16 questien and a question of public participation, which is 17 their concern, not ours.
18 We could tell them that this is a good patch up, 19 but you ought to really look for down the line to what you 20 want to see for the next generation of LWRs.
I am not sure 21 you don't want to see it for the next generation of 22 advanced reactors or whatever.
Whatever gets built, three 23.
or four or five years from now, this is the way we would 24 like to go.
rs 25 In the meantime, if there is a reactivation or a d
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replication, that what you got in here is all right.
That 2
is the way to handle it.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
One question in my mind, though, 4
is, what do we mean by a complete design for a future 5
standard plant?
How complete?
What do we have in mind?
I 6
think we have to define that a little bit.
It could mean 7
many things to many people.
8 MR. SIESS:
I would get away from the PDA/FDA.
9 I don't see much.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
I would, too.
11 MR. SIESS:
And if I were going to buy one of 12 these things, I would want to have as complete a design in r~T N2 13 hand as I could before I started.
14 MR. WYLIE:
Would you have a complete and final 15 certified design?
16 MR. SIESS:
I would like to have something I 17 could build, subject to building it right.
Staff is still 18 going to review it.
The Staff is only going to certify or 19 approve a design.
They are not going to approve the plant 20 that is built from it until they are satisfied that the 21 plant is built right and it meets all the criteria.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
You are talking about a 23 construction ready design.
24 MR. SIESS:
And whether it is built right is 25 going to be up to the guy that builds it.
To me that is ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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the only viable way to go in the future.
But for the next 2
few years, where there might be a reactivation or -- I 3
think it is not going to be that much different from that.
4 It might be legally, but the process, in terms of what you 5
change in the plant and how you update --
6 MR. MICHELSON:
In other words, we should really _
7 look ahead to the future as a ser,arate issue from what do 8
you do if you really want to copy what is already in 9
existence?
10
'MR.
SIESS:
But, you know, as a stopgap measure, 11 something that I think if you were doing it that way to 12 begin with, the portions in here that say we are 13 encouraging this or encouraging that wouldn't be there, 14 because they would be more to the future.
The remainder 15 would be replication, duplication, fees.
The renewal, I 16 think, is almost academic unless you are talking about 17 reference designs.
If you don't think there is going to be 18 any reference designs other than GESSAR and CESSAR, which 19 are in the books now, then really the fix up has to do with 20 the replication and duplication and so forth, and really 21 crack down and make reference designs reference designs.
22 Something that would be attractive.
I would include the 23 containment.
24 MR. WYLIE:
The additional reviews being done
{}
25 will be done in the next month or so, I guess?
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MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is difficult for me to answer 2
that one.
The Commission did express at the Commission 3 ~
meeting the need for them to provide guidance, minimum 4
guidance to the Staff as to what changes that they would
-5' contemplate.
l 6
MR. SIESS:
Do you have any idea how the 7
Commission goes about deciding what guidance?
Do they ask 8
OPE to tell them?
9-MR.-MIRAGLIA:
Based upon the discussions, the
~ 10 Commission is working through their assistance in concert 11.
with OPE to develop Staff requirements.
- f..
12 MR. SIESS:
The Commission doesn't sit around
- \\ L 13 and discuss it among themselves.
14' MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think if'there is more than 15 three of them in a room, it constitutes a meeting.
16 MR. SIESS:
They could do it in public like ACRS 17 does.
We write letters in public.
18 MR. MIRAGLIA:
They had a meeting last February 19 and again this past December.
20 MR. SIESS:
Those meetings, as.I said, I didn't 21 read those minutes.
I usually find the Commission's
.22 discussions at-those meetings slightly unfocused.
We.have 23 four or five opinions.
There never seems to be an exchange 24 among the commissioners that would lead to a consensus.
25 MR. MIRAGLIA:
I think at the previous February L
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meeting and the last December meeting, there seemed to be 2'
at least some basic common understanding as to what they 3
wanted.
4 MR. WYLIE:
Well, we have 30 minutes.
Herman is 5
going to check and see.
30 minutes is all we have got on 6
the meeting.
7 MR. SIESS:
I think that is enough to tell them 8
the situation.
I don't know how we could -- if we could
'9 agree, obviously we could write a letter E6 hhe Commission, 10 -
say somethinc like I said, something like whatever we 11 agreed on.
I would think this would be an excellent 12 subject to try to schedule a meeting of the Commission on.
13 I would hope at least an hour devoted just to this and try 14 to get some feedback from the commissioners and some ideas 15 from the committee of when the committee needs to reach a 16 consensus.before they do that or not.
I don't know.
I 17 don't think it is an-issue that requires a consensus so 18 much as advice.
19 MR. WYLIE:
Are you suggesting to recommend to 20 the committee, then, that on Thursday that we give them a 21 report and then recommend that we schedule a meeting with 22 the Commission?
23 MR. SIESS:
I think the Staff has done an 24 excellent job on what I think they were asked to do.
25 MR. WYLIE:
I think so, yes.
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1 MR. SIESS:
I think the committee might disagree 2
with what they were asked to do.
3 MR. WYLIE:
I get a little lost with the numbers.
4 MR. SIESS:
You would have to sit down and 5
diagram the thing to follow it.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
That is not even a half an hour, 7
then.
8 MR. WYLIE:
Is that the last thing on the 9
meeting?
10 MR. ALDERMAN:
Yes.
11 MR. SIESS:
The Staff has patched up a lot of 12.
stuff that isn't ever going to be used.
They know it and 13-we know it.
It was in there.
Short of just leaving it out, 14 it is still in there.
15 MR. CARBON:
I just would like to raise the 16 question, are we in any way premature here?
And the thing 17-I have in mind is the fact that I think the Commission is 18 certainly going in the right direction.
They are trying to 19 get a better feeling from the industry on what it wants to 20 do and intends to do and so forth.
The Commission, the NRC 21 can say anything about standardization that it wants to, 22 but if that is not what the industry is going to do, it is 23 meaningless.
24 I just wonder what that report is going to tell l-([)
25 us.
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MR. WYLIE:
You mean the report that they get?
2 MR. CARBON:
From industry.
3 MR. SIESS:
Who is looking at the industry?
)
4 MR. MIRAGLIA:
It is coming back to the Staff.
1 5
MR. BERKOW:
The-EDO signed the letter.
We will 6
get the comments.
7 MR. MIRAGLIA:
We will get the comments.
8 MR. SIESS:
Where does the EPRI thing stand?
9 MR. WYLIE:
They are a year away, aren't they?
10 MR. MIRAGLIA:
At-least.
11 MR. SIESS:
Standardize the LWR industry.
That 4
-12 says something about what the industry is thinking.
t 13 MR. MIRAGLIA:.The Commission was briefed on the 14 EPRI.
15 MR. SIESS:
But that is not a standard design.
16 That is a standardized set of requirements.
17 MR. THOMAS:
That.is correct.
18 MR. SIESS:
Which is further removed from the 19 plant.
20 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Which will result hopefully in a 21 reference design for a B and a P.
22 MR. CARBON:
Although many representatives of
-23 the industry, ILthink, would say that is a total waste of 24 time.
25 MR. SIESS:
The biggest reason we don't have ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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standard designs now is because the utilities buy them and 2
each one wants the plant the way he wants the plant.
They 3-have all got their own ideas about how they wanted things 4
arranged, how they wanted them done.
5 MR. WYLIE:
They have always built power plants 6
that way.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
8 MR. SIESS:
I don't blame them.
I mean, if I 9
haveLgot-10 fossil fuel plants with a certain control room 10 layout, I would sort of like to have my nuclear-plant with 11' the same control room layout.
I remember when Robinson was 12 being built.
That is the way all them plants were built.
O 13 Just pushbutton.
14-MR. WYLIE:
Suppose we make a report and 15 recommend that they do schedule a meeting, and then in the 16 meantime'we can see what they are doing.
17 MR. SIESS:
I assume the Commission would like 18 some advice from us.
I just am not very optimistic that we 19 could-reach a very clear-cut consensus, but some of our 20 individual opinions might be appreciated by the Commission.
21 With the number of options in here, I don't even know where 22 to start.
I got two options on the reference design.
23 Rulemaking and not.
I got PDA and PDA, that is f3ur.
It 24 is only three.
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PDA or FDA or bypass.
That gives me four more.
2 MR. WYLIE:
You also got whether they were 3
reviewed on the standard review plan or ret.
4 MR. SIESS:
I don't see how anybody could agree 5
on that.
Maybe, Charlie, if you summarize the changes and 6
why they are being made.
That is easy enough to do because 7
they are spelled out both in the original SECY letter and 8
discussion section.
And maybe try to just indicate the 9
options by name, because they are not really that much 10 different from the old one.
We have added a couple.
Added 11 one at least.
And we have added -- you have added the 12 certification.
That only applies to FDA, right?
\\-
13 MR. MIRAGLIA:
Right.
And to reference design.
14 MR. SIESS:
And then you have provided the 15 replication of the two parts.
So you have added some.
16 If I were doing it, I would go about that far 17 and see what kind of questions come.
If you go much 18 further than that, you will get the same questions anyway.
19 MR. WYLIE:
Are you talking about just making a 20 report that way?
21 MR. SIESS:
Yes.
I would try to give them about 22 10 minutes of that half hour report.
Tell them enough to 23 know what questions to ask.
24 MR. WYLIE:
That sounds fair.
Let's do that, 25 then.
{}
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1 MR. CARBON:
Did you end up concluding that we 2
should recommend an hour meeting with the Commission?
3 MR. WYLIE:
Well, we will talk about it.
I 4
guess we will make our report.
5 MR. CARBON:
I have a little reservation on that 6
myself.
7 MR. WYLIE:
Well, we can.
~ ~ ~ ~
~~
8 MR. CARBON:
I am a little worried that we don't 9
have enough --
10 MR. MICHELSON:
I have a reservation on the same 11 point.
12 MR. SIESS:
I don't think we have reached a -- I
,s 13
-hate to go up there and just have five, six different views.
14 They have got that many already, I am sure.
15 MR. CARBON:
I am afraid that is what we have 16 got, too.
17 MR. SIESS:
But on the other heni, I wouldn't 18 want to wait until we had a consensus.
We wouldn't have a 19 consensus until we had written a letter.
20 Now, if it turns out there is a great consensus, 21' we can write a letter.
That is fine.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
There is a desirable step which 23 might be to write the letter and then go talk to the 24 Commission.
25 MR. SIESS:
If you don't hrve -- if you have a
(}
i i
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1 consensus, that is what you do.
2
- MR. WYLIE:- I think we have got to do a lot more 3
work before we write a letter.
'4 MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
I think we 5
wanted to hear from AIF a little bit more and search what 6
other information is available, and we haven't really 7
discussed about whether or not we should make
-8 recommendations concerning what a standard plant scope 9
ought.to be and so forth.
To do that, you would have to, 10 again, do some more subcommittee work.
11 MR. SIESS:
The thing is, we went through that-4 12 so many times, most people.
After all, there is a list in
. (
13 here of how many standard designs were approved.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
But what do we recommend for the
~15 future?. I hope we aren't going to recommend this many 16-options as are in this thing.
17 MR. WYLIE:
Okay.
We would like to thank the 18 Staff.
We' call this meeting adjourned.
19 (Whereupon, at 4:35 p.m.,
the meeting was 20 concluded.)
l 21 ~.
22 23 1
24
/T 25 U
i I
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CERTIFICATE OF OFFICIAL REPORTER
.m 4
l-i t/-
i
-This is to certify.that the attached proceedings before the UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION in the matter of:
NAME.0F PROCEEDING: ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS SUBCOMMITTEE ON STANDARD PLANT DESIGN DOCKET NO.:
PLACE:
WASHINGTON, D.
C.
'DATE:
MONDAY, JANUARY 6, 1986 were held as herein appears, and that this is the original transcript thereof for the file of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
(sigt)
W M
(TYPED)
REBECCA E.
EYSTER Official Reporter
. ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
Reporter's Affilit. tion
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NRR STAFF PRESENTATION TO THE O
SUBJECT:
STANDARDIZATION DATE:
JANUARY 6, 1986 PRESENTER: F. MIRAGLIA O-PRESENTER'S TITLE / BRANCH /DIV: DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF PWR LICENSING-B PRESENTER'S NRC TEL. NO.:
492-9595 l
SUBCOMMITTEE:
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TERMS OF APPROVAL DC - 10 YEARS; ALL CONCEPTS -
OTHERS 5 YEARS 10 YEARS PDA RENEWABILITY FOR GOOD CAUSE YES LEVEL OF DESIGN DETAIL EQUIVALENT TO LESS THAN FOR FDAS AND DCS FSAR FSAR O
COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS BASED ON BACKFIT BASED ON LEAD FOR COMMISSION / STAFF RULE UNIT CHANGES FMIRAGLIA/NRR x27980 0
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USES OF STANDARDIZATION REFERENCE SYSTEM CONCEPT PRELIMINARY DESIGN APPROVALS (13) - GESSAR 238 NI GESSAR 238 NSSS GESSAR 251 CESSAR RESAR-4)
RESAR-3S RESAR-414 BSAR-205 SWESSAR-P1/RESAP-41 L
SWESSAR-P1/CESSAR SWESSAR-P1/RESAR-3S B0PSSAR/RESAR-41
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BRAUNSAR CONSTRUCTION PERMITS (18) - PALO VEPDE 1-3 (CESSAR)
WPPS 385 (CESSAR)
CHEROKEE l-3 (CESSAR)
YELLOW CREEK 182 (CESSAR)
HARTSVILLE 1-4 (GESSAR 238 NI)
PHIPPS BEND 182 (GESSAR 238 NI)
SOUTH TEXAS 182 (RESAP 41)
FINAL DESIGN APPROVALS (2) - GESSAR II CESSAR-F OPERATING LICENSE (1) - PALO VERDE 1 (CESSAR-F)
FMIRAGLIA/NRR x27980
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O USES OF STANDARDIZATION (CONT'D)
DUPLICATE PLANT CONCEPT CONSTRUCTION PERMITS (12) - BYRON 182 BRAIDWOOD 182 CALLAWAY 182 STERLING TYRONE WOLF CREEK CHEROKEE 1-3 OPERATING LICENSES (3) - BYRON 1 CALLAWAY l WOLF CREEK REPLICATE PLANT CONCEPT CONSTRUCTION PERMITS (4) - JAMESPORT 182 (MILLSTON MARBLE HILL 182 (BYRON 182)
MANUFACTURING LICENSE CONCEPT (1) - FLOATING NUCLEA (8 UNITS)
FMLRAGLIA/NRR X27980
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POLICY ISSUE
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(Commission Meeting) 1
, December 4, 1985 SECY-85-382 For:
The Comissioners i
From:
William J. Dircks Executive Director for Operations
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Subject:
STANDARDIZATION POLICY STATEMENT l
Purpose:
To respond to those portions of the staff requirements memoranda dated February 22 and April 5, 1985 which requested the staff to prepare for the Comission's consideration a draft revision to its 1978 standardization policy statement. The draft policy statement is provided as Enclosure 1.
The balance of the staff's responses was provided in a memorandum to the Comission dated March 18, 1985.
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Background:
The initial policy statement of the Atomic Energy Comission (AEC) on nuclear power plant standardization was issued in April 1972.
In March 1973, the AEC announced its readiness to implement its standardization policy utilizing three distinct concepts--the reference system concept, the duplicate plant concept and the manufacturing license concept.
In August 1974, the AEC announced a fourth standardization concept--the replicate plant concept.
On January 19, 1975, the AEC was abolished and its regulatory responsibilities were assigned to the newly-formed Nuclear Regulatory Comission (the Comission).
In July 1977, the Comission issued a statement that reaffirmed its support of standardization and requested comments and suggestions on proposed program changes and other steps it' might undertake to further encourage standardization.
The Comission's most recent standardization policy statement was issued in August 1978. That policy statement described in detail the conditions that must be met for each of the
' standardization concepts, and extended their terms of approval.
Despite the lack of new plant orders, and the numerous cancellations and deferrals of plants already ordered in O
CONTACT:
D. Scaletti, NRR 49-29787
s e
The Commissioners 8*
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recent years, considerable use has been made of standardization since its inception. A sumary of the implementation of the standardization program to date is provided as Enclosure 2.
The Comission recently issued its severe accident policy f
statement which sets forth licensing requirements for new plant designs, both standard and custom.
In addition, the Commission has proposed to the Congress its draft " Nuclear Power Plant Licensing and Standardization Act of 1985" which would provide for the issuance of combined construction permits and operating licenses in a one-step licensing process, early site approvals and standard design approvals.
Finally, considerable additional experience has been acquired i
in implementing the standardization program. Therefore, we believe that it is appropriate at this time to revise the 1978 standardization policy statement to reflect these initiatives.
Discussion:
The draft revision to the 1978 policy statement reflects the applicable provisions of the severe accident policy' statement and the draft " Nuclear Power Plant Licensing and Standardization Act of 1985."
It also reflects the experience we have acquired in implementing the standardization program since 1978 and our current views on standardization.
O The dr ft Paiicy statement id atifi s the rer r nce system design certification as the true goal of standardization, but recognizes that the duplicate plant, replicate plant and manufacturing license concepts are necessary options that should be maintained.
Industry representatives have indicated that the types of applications most likely in the near tenn will include reactivation of deferred plants and replication of previously-licensed plants.
Policies and procedures regarding deferred plants are being developed separately from this policy statement. The staff has included in the draft policy statement two transition options relating to replication of previously-licensed plants. These options address replicationof recently-licensed plants, which have been reviewed against NUREG-0800, and replication of earlier-licensed plants, which have not been" reviewed against NUREG-0800. The staff believes that these transition options should conform with the provisions of the draft policy statement. However, during the transition period.
the staff recomends that the reference period for replication of such plants be extended for five years from the effective O
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The Connissioners '
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..O date of the revised policy statement.
In addition, the staff.
V reconnends that consideration be given to relaxation of the other provisions of this policy statement during this
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4 five-year period if suitably justified.
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Themostsignificantproposedrevisionstothe1978standardU ization policy statement.are outlined below. A more detailed discussion of~these revisions is provided in Enclosure 3.
(1) The four.Jicensing requirements for new plant designs as
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set forth in the Connission's severe accident policy statement have been added.
(2)
Provisions for design certification through rulemaking have been added.
(3) The ability of the staff and Connission to make changes to. approved or certified designs has been made more restrictive. An explanation of the applicability of the backfitting rule (10 CFR 50.109) to each of the options has been added.
The ability of holders of design approvals or certifications to make such changes has been made less restrictive.
(4) The overlap in the reference periods between the duplicate T_
and replicate design concepts has been eliminated.
(5)
Fees required of reference design applicants will be allocated among the applicants for permits and licenses which propose to use the reference design.
Enactment of the draft " Nuclear Power Plant Licensing and Standardizati e Act of 1985" would be necessary prior to adopting thi approach.
(6)
Final ef;gn.f;rovals and design certifications can be renewed once for a duration up to the original approval period.
Preliminary design approvals can only be renewed on a finding of good cause.
To assist the staff in revising the standardization policy statement, the Atomic Industrial Forum (AIF) formed a study group.
As a result of this effort they developed an outline of a proposed policy statement. That outline is provided as Enclosure 4.
The AIF's proposed standard-ization policy is consistent with that proposed by the staff with the exception of four differences addressed below.
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The Connissioners '
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g (1) The AIF proposes that the duration of the approvals for V
all. standardization concepts be ten years. The staff believes that the ten-year approval period should be J,
re. served for ' certified designs; all others should be five years.
(2) The AIF proposes that preliminary design approvals be renewable. The staff believes preliminary design approvals ~
should be renewable by the staff for a period of up to five years only on a finding of good cause.
(3) The staff believes that final design approvals and design certifications should be based on a level of design detail equivalent to that required for a Final Scfety Analysis Report. The AIF appears to suggest that a lesser degree of design detail should be required; however it recognizes the need to further discuss'this issue with the staff.
(4) The AIF proposes that the cost-benefit analysis for staff-or Comission-proposed changes to approved designs be performed on the lead or first unit referencing the given standard design.
The procedures described in the backfitting rule will establish the threshold for staff-or Comission-proposed changes to an approved design.
The Executive Legal Director has prepared for the Comission's
_ N consideration a paper describing several options for design certification rulemaking proceedings. That paper is provided as Enclosure 5.
Finally, the Office of Administration has prepared for the Comission's consideration a discussion of license fees related to the reference system concept. That paper is provided as Enclosure 6.
amJ.Dircks Executiv Director for Operations
Enclosures:
As stated DISTRIBUTION:
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Constissioners REGIONAL OFFICES
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ENCLOSURE 1 q
POLICY STATEMENT ON NUCLEAR POWER PLANT STANDARDIZATION
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- x The Comission continues to strongly support standardization and, while DI maintaining the option for licensing new custom plants, encourages the
,W e use of standard plant designs in all future license applications. The
<cw Commission believes that the use of standard plant designs can benefit public health and safety by concentrating the resources of designers,
^
engineers and vendors on particular approaches; by stimulating standardized programs of construction practice and quality assurance; by improving the E
training of personnel; and by fostering more effective maintenance and improved operation.
The use of such designs can also permit more effective and efficient licensing and inspection pror: esses.
The Commission believes that the true goal of standardiza ion should be the reference system design certificatioc. as outlined in this policy statement. The Commission anticipts that over the long term the majority of new plant applications will incorporate approved or certified reference system de.eigns. However, the Comission recognizes that the duplicate plant, replicate plant and manufacturing license options have also contributed to the progress that has been made in standardization to date and, therefore, continues to endorse the use of these options. Each of the standardization concepts and their terms and conditions are discussed below.
-In addition to the four standardization concepts identified above, the O
Comission has provided flexibility in the application of the replication concept to allow for a transition period. This provision of the policy statement is also discussed below.
1.
Reference System Concept The reference system concept involves an application for approval or certification of an entire nuclear power plant design or major portion thereof outside the context of an application for a construction permit.
4 operating license, combined construction pemit and operating license, or manufacturing license. Approvals are of preliminary design approvals (PDA) granted by the staff in the formsand final de preliminary and final levels of design detail, respectively. Certification is granted by the Comission in the form of design certifications for final i
l levels of design detail only.
i To further encourage the use of the reference system design option, the Comission will not require application filing or issuance fees for reference design approvals, certifications or amendments or renewals thereof.
l The fees that would otherwise have been required of reference design l
applicants will be allocated among the applicants for construction pennits, operating licenses, and combined construction permits and operating licenses which propose to use the reference design.
If no application for a pemit
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Q or license for a facility is filed within the initial term or the renewal period of the design approval and/or certification, any outstanding fees will-become immediately due and payable by the holder of the reference design approval or certification.
In accordance with 10 CFR 50.109, once the initial design approval is issued (i.e., PDA or FDA) the Commission will not require modification to an approved or certified design unless it detennines that such modifications provide a substantial increase in the overall protectio. Jf the public health and safety or the consion defense and security.
However, holders of design approvals or certifications may modify the approved or certified design by applying for an amendment to the design approval or certification.
Any such amendments will only be required to apply to applications for construction permits, and combined construction permits and operating licenses that are submitted after the amendment is issued unless the modifi-cations are required to provide a substantial increase in the overall
. protection of the public health and safety or the consion defense and security.
a.
Preliminary Design Approvals A preliminary design approval is issued by the staff following the completion of its and the ACRS's reviews of the preliminary design.
It deems an entire nuclear power plant design or major portion thereof acceptable for incorpora-tion by reference in applications for construction permits and manufacturing licenses.
It also provides that the approved preliminary design shall be
.O utilized and relied upon by the staff and the ACRS in their reviews of those applications.
However, an approved preliminary design is subject to litigation in individual licensing proceedings on those applications. A preliminary de' ign approval is not a prerequisite for a final design s
approval or a design certification.
An application for a preliminary design approval must include to the extent practicable a level of design detail equivalent to that required for a preliminary safety analysis report.
In addition, it must address the four licensing requirements for new plant designs as set forth in the Consnission's severe accident policy statement.
Preliminary design approvals will be issued with terms of five years.
Not less than one year or more than three years prior to the expiration of the preliminary design approval, holders of the approval may apply for the renewal -
thereof.
The approval will be renewed for an additional period of time of not'more than five years provided the design is found to compl Cossnission's current regulations and a showing of good cause (y with the e.g., good cause may be established by a pending application that would reference the PDA during the renewal period).
The preliminary designs may be referenced in applications for construction permits and manufacturing licenses docketed during the period commencing O
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O with the dock tins date of the prelimiaars desisa approvai appi$ cation and terminating five years from the date of issuance of the preliminary design approval. However, no construction permit or manufacturing license will be issued for applications referencing the preliminary design prior to the issuance of the preliminary design approval.
Further, any changes to the preliminary design that result from the design approval process will be required to be reflected in those applications as well. The expiration of the preliminary design approval will not affect the use of the approved preliminary design in applications for construction pennits and manufacturing licenses docketed prior to its expiration.
b.
Final Design Approvals A final design approval is issued by the staff following the completion of its and the ACRS's reviews of the final design.
It deems an entire nuclear 4
power plant design or major portion thereof acciptable for incorporation by reference in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, combined construction pemits and operating licenses in a one-step licensing, and manufacturing licenses.
It also provides that the approved final design shall be utilized and relied upon by the staff and the ACRS in their reviews of those applications. However, an approved final design is subject to litigation in individual licensing proceedings on those applications. A L
final design approval is a prerequisite for a design certificaticn.
.O An appi4 cation ur a finai design approvai must inciude to the extent practicable a level of design detail equivalent to that required for a final safety analysis report.
In addition, it must address the four licensing requirements for new plant designs as set forth in the Consnission's severe accident policy statement.
Final design approvals will be issued with terms of five years.
Not less than one year or more than three years prior to the expiration of the final design approval, holders of the approval may apply for the renewal thereof..
The approval will be renewed for an additional period of time of not more than five years provided the design is found to comply with the Connission's current regulations.
The final designs _may be referenced in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, combined construction permits and operating licenses, and manufacturing licenses docketed during the period casunencing l
with the docketing date of the final design approval application and teminating five years from the _date of issuance of the final design approval.
However, no construction pemit, operating license, combined i.
construction pemit and operat'ing license, or manufacturing license will be issued for applications referencing the final design prior to the issuance of the final design approval.
Further, any changes to the final design that result from the design approval process will be required to be reflected in O
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those applications as well.
The expiration of the final design approval will not affect the use of the approved final design in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, combined construction permits and operating licenses, and manufacturing licenses docketed prior to its expiration, and operating license applications that referenced the final design approval at the construction permit stage.
c.
Design Certifications A design certification is issued by the Comission following the issuance of a final design approval by the staff and the completion of a rulemaking proceeding.
It deems an entire nuclear power plant design or major portion thereof acceptable for incorporation by reference in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, combined construction permits and operating licenses in a one-step licensing process, and marefacturing licenses.
It also provides that'the certified final design shall be utilized and relied upon by the staff, the ACRS, the hearing boards and the Commission in their review of those applications. A certified final design is not subject to litigation in individual licensing proceedings on those applications.
An application for certification of the final design may accompany the application for a final design approval; however, it must be submitted prior to the issuance of the final design approval.
O Design certifications will be issued with terms of ten years. Not less than one year or more than three years prior to the expiration of the design certification, holders of the certification may apply for the renewal thereof. The certification will be renewed for an additional period of time of not less than five years or more than ten years from the date of renewal provided the design is found to comply with the the Comission's current regulations.
The certified designs may be referenced in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, combined construction permits and operating licenses, and manufacturing licenses docketed during the period comencing with the docketing date of the final design approval application and l
terminating ten years from the date of issuance of the design certification.
However, no construction permit, operating license, combined construction' permit and operating license, or manufacturing license will be issued for l
applications referencing the final design prior to the issuance of the final design approval.
Further, any changes to the final design that result from the design approval or certification processes will be required to be reflected in those applications as well. The expiration of the design certification will not affect the use of the certified final design in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, combined construction pennits and operating licenses, and manufacturing licenses docketed prior to its expiration, and operating license applications that referenced the final design certification at the construction permit stage.
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Duplicate Plant Concept The duplicate plant concept involves applications by one or more utilities
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- for licenses to construct and/or operate a number of nuclear power plants of essentially the same design at different sites.
A duplicate plant design may be referenced at both the construction permit and operating license stages, and in applications for combined construction permits and operating licenses in a one-step licensing process.
Use of the duplicate plant design at the construction pemit stage is a prerequisite for its use at the operating license stage. Although use of the duplicate plant design at the operating license stage is not mandatory, that is, the operating license application may be submitted as a custom plant application, it is strongly recomended. The approved duplicate plant design shall be utilized and relied upon by the staff and the ACRS in their reviews of those applications.
However,~ the duplicate plant design is subject to litigation in individual licensing proceedings on those applications.
l A duplicate plant design may utilize a reference system design for an entire nuclear power plant or a~ major portion thereof. Any portions of the duplicate plant design for which a design certification has been issued shall be utilized and relied upon by the staff, the ACRS, the hearing boards and the Comission in their reviews of applications for construction pemits and operating licenses referencing the duplicate plant design.
In addition, O
any portions of the duplicate plant design for which a design certification has been issued are not subject to litigation,in individual licensing proceedings on those applications.
An application for a duplicate plant must demonstrate compliance with the four licensing requirements for new plant designs as set forth in the Comission's severe accident policy statement.
A duplicate design approval will be prepared to document the staff's approval of the acceptability of the duplicate plant design for referencing in construction permit, operating license, and combined construction perinit and operating license applications.
In accordance with 10 CFR 50.109, once the initial duplicate design approval is issued (i.e., preliminar design approval (PDDA) or final duplicate design approval (FDDA))y duplicate the Comission will not require modification to the design unless it determines that such modifications provide substantial increase in the overall protection of the public health and safety or the canon defense and security.
The duplicate design approval will be included in the safety evaluation report for each license application referencing the duplicate plant design.
Duplicate plant designs may be referenced in applications for construction permits, operating licenses, and combined construction permits and operating licenses during the period comencing with the docketing date of the initial applications referencing the duplicate plant design and terminating on the date of issuance of the duplicate design approval.
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The staff will determine the acceptability of the use of a duplicate plant design in the initial applications proposing to reference such a design during pretendering discussions with the involved utilities.
Subsequent to the docketing of the initial applications, each additional application proposing to reference the duplicate plant design will be subjected to a qualification review. The qualification review will consider the following information:
4 The arrangements made with the developers of the duplicate plant design for its use; A discussion of the compatibility of the duplicate plant design with the characteristics of the proposed site; i
A description of any changes to the original duplicate plant design and I
justification for the changes; The status of any matters identified for the duplicate plant desiga in the safety evaluation report, or subsequently identified by the ACRS or during public hearings on applications referencing the duplicate plant design as requiring subsequent resolution; and 1
Identification of the major contractors, with justification for the acceptability of any that are different than those used by earlier applicants O
using the duplicate plant design.
i 3.
Replicate Plant Concept The replicate plant concept involves an application by a utility for a license to construct and/or operate one or more nuclear power plants of essentially the same design as one already licensed, (i.e. CP or OL).
Thedesignoftheplantalreadylicensed(termedthebaseplant' design)may be replicated at both the construction permit and operating license stages, and in applications for combined construction permits and operating licenses in a one-step licensing process.
Replication of an approved base plant design at the construction permit stage is a prerequisite for its replication 3
at the operating license stage. Although replication of the base plant design at the operating license stage is not mandatory, that is, the
. operating license application may be submitted as a custom plant application.
it is strongly recommended.
An application for a replicate plant must demonstrate compliance with the 3
four licensing requirements for new plant designs as set forth in the 4
Consission's severe accident policy statement.
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h Each application proposing to replicate a previously-licensed plant will be '
f subjected to a qualification review to determine the acceptability of the base plant for replication and to define specific matters that must be addressed in the application for the replicate plant.
In applying 10 CFR 50.109, the Comission will not require modifications to those portions of the base plant design that are replicated once it has issued the initial license for the base plant unless it detennines that such modifications provide a~ substantial increase in the overall protection of the public health and safety or the comon defense and security. A further requirement for qualification is.that the application for a replicate plant must be submitted within five years of the date of issuance of the staff safety evaluation report for the base plant. The qualification review will consider the following information:
The arrangements made with the developers of the base plant design for its replication; The compatibility of the base plant design with the characteristics of the site proposed for the replicate plant; A description of any changes to the base plant design with justification for the changes; The status of any matters identified for the base plant design in the O-safety evaluation report, or subsequently identified by the ACRS or during the public hearings on the base plant application as requiring subsequent resolution; Identification of the major contractors, with justification for the acceptability of any that are different than those used by the base plant applicant; and A discussion of how the replicate plant design will confonn to any changes to the Comission's regulations which have become effective since -
the issuance of the license for the base plant.
4.
Manufacturing License Concept The manufacturing license concept involves an application for a license to manufacture a number of identical nuclear power plants at a location other than those at which they are to be operated.
The application for a manufacturing license must address the four licensing requirements for new plants a set forth in the Comission's severe accident t.
policy statement.
In accordance with 10 CFR 50.109, once the manufacturing I
license has been issued, the Comission will not require modifications to
(
the design unless it determines that such modifications provide a substantial increase in overall protection of the public health and safety or the comon Q
defense and security.
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Q Appendix M to 10 CFR 50 requires that a manufacturing license specify the number of units permitted to be manufactured. The number of units to be specified in a manufacturing license will be that number whose start of manufacture, as defined in the license application, can practically begin.
- l considering the limitations inherent in the proposed manufacturing facility.
'during the ten-year period comencing on the date of issuance of the manufacturing license, but in no event will that number be in excess of ten.
5.
Other Considerations Sections 1 through 4 of this policy statement set forth the tems and conditions for the reference system, duplicate plant, replicate plant and manufacturing license standardization concepts, respectively. The Comission recognizes that situatfons may arise that are not explicitly covered by these four concepts.
Three such situations are addressed below.
Other such situations, which are expected to be few in number, will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
Discussions with industry representatives indicate that the most likely types of license applications that will be submitted in the near future will involve reactivation of deferred plants and replication of plants that have O
been previously licensed.
While the Comission strongly encourages the use of the four standardization concepts described in Sections'l through 4 of this policy statement, it recognizes the need to accommodate these latter types of applications, each of which is discussed below.
The Consnission acknowledges that the reactivation of deferred plants is a viable licensing option.
However, because these plants are based on custom as well as standard designs, and because of the many complex factors involved, the criteria and procedures for the regulatory treatment of these plants as a whole will be a matter of separate consideration apart from this policy -
statement.
The Comission believes that the replication of previously-licensed plants should be subject to the provisions of Section 3 of this policy statement; However, during the transition period, the reference period for replication of such plants will be extended for five years from the effective date of this policy statement..In addition, consideration will be given to relaxation of the other provisions of this policy statement during this five-year period if suitably justified.
Plants that have been recently licensed, that is, those plants that have been reviewed against NUREG-0800, may be replicated for a period of five years from the effective date of this policy statement provided the application otherwise meets the provisions of Section 3 of this policy statement.
Plants so replicated may be located at any suitable site.
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Plants licensed earlier, that is, those plants that have not been reviewed against NUREG-0800, may be replicated for a period of five years from the
. effective date of this policy statement provided that the application otherwise meets'the provisicns of Section 3 of this policy statement and the design performance and operating history of the base plant justifies its replication.
Plants so replicated may be located only on the same site and operated by the same utility as the base plant.
Although some design differences may be encountered as a result of complying with the four licensing requirements set forth in the Comission's severe accident policy statement, the Comission believes that replication of existing designs may offer improvements in public health and safety, and operating costs as a result of operator familiarity and improved maintenance due to the similarity of design.
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ENCLOSURE 2 O
IMPLEMENTATI N F THE STAN AR IZATI N PR GRAM T DATE
. Applications for 23 preliminary design approvals have been submitted for 4
review under the reference syst_em concept.
Preliminary design approvals have been issued for.13 of these designs; one application is still under review; and the nine remaining applications have been subsequently withdrawn by the applicants.
All of the preliminary design approvals that have been issued have since expired.
- Applications for construction permits for 25 units referencing five of i
the preliminary designs have been submitted for review. Construction pemits have been issued for 18 of the units referencing three of the preliminary designs. The applications for the seven remaining units have been subsequently withdrawn by the applicants.
Applications for two final design approvals have been submitted for 1
i review under the reference system concept.
Final design approvals have been issued for both of these designs, however, compliance with the requirements for new plant designs as set forth in the Commission's " Policy Statement on Severe Reactor Accidents Regarding Future Designs and Existing Plants" (50 FR 32138) must be demonstrated prior to the issuance of a construction
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permit for an application referencing these designs.
i Applications for operating licenses for four units referencing one of the i O final designs have been submitted for review. An operating license has been 1ssued for one of the untts; decisions on the issuance of operating licenses for two of the units are awaiting the completion of their construction; and the review of the application for the remaining unit has been deferred at the request of the licensee.
Applications for construction pemits for 15 units have been submitted for review under the duplicate plant concept.
Construction permits have been issued for 12 of the units, and the applications for the remaining three units have been subsequently withdrawn by the applicant.
Seven of the units with construction pemits have been subsequently cancelled.
Applications for operating licenses for six units have been submitted for review under the duplicate plant concept.
Operating licenses have been i
issued for three of the units, and decisions on the issuance of operating n
licenses for the three remaining units are awaiting the completion of their construction.
- Applications for construction permits for six units have been submitted for review under the replication concept.
Construction armits have been issued for four of of the units. The applications for t1e two remaining l
units have been subsequently withdrawn by the applicant. Two of the units j.
with construction pemits have been subsequently cancelled.
Applications for operating licenses for two units have been submitted for review under i
i the replication concept. These units have been subsequently cancelled.
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Q An application for a manufacturing license for eight units has been submitted for review under the manufacturing license concept, and the manufacturing license has been issued. Applications for construction permits for two units referencing the design have been submitted for review. These applications have been subsequently withdrawn by the applicant.
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ENCLOSURE 3 4 -
SumARY OF SIGNIFICANT PROPOSED REVISIONS TO THE C0m ISSION'S 1978 i
STANDARDIZATION POLICY STATEMENT l
1.
Licensing Requirements for New Plant Designs The Comission's licensing requirements for new plant designs, both standard I
and custom, are set forth in its severe accident policy statement.
These
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requirements are sumarized below:
Demonstration of compliance with the procedural requirements and criteria of the current Comission regulations, including the Three Mile Island requirements for new plants as reflected in the construction permit rule, 10CFR50.34(f);
Demonstration of technical resolution of all applicable unresolved safety issues and the medium-and high-priority generic safety issues, including a special focus on assuring the reliability of decay heat removal systems and the reliability of both AC and DC electrical supply systems;
-Completionofaprobabilisticriskassessment(PRA)andconsiderationofthe severe accident vulnerabilities that the PRA exposes along with the insights that it may add to the assurance of no undue risk to public health and safety; and Q
. Completion of a staff review of the design with a conclusion of safety acceptability using an approach that stresses deterministic engineering analysis and judgment complemented by PRA.
All applications for design approvals under the reference system concept, apnlications for construction perinits, operating licenses, and combined construction permits and operating licenses under the duplicate plant and j
replicate plant concepts, and applications for manufacturing licenses under the manufacturing license concept must address these four licensing requirements as set forth in the Comission's severe accident policy statement.
i j
2.
Design Certification through Rulemaking i
Although Appendix 0 to 10 CFR 50 provides the opportunity for the Comission to approve a reference system design in a rulemaking proceeding, no one has taken advantage of that opportunity to date. This approach can contribute significantly to the stability of the licensing process. To further encourage l
the use of this approach, the Comission has outlined in its severe accident policy statement a design certification option for approving a reference i
system design.
Under that option, a design certification would be issued by j
the Comission for a reference system design following the completion of a rulemaking proceeding.
Because of the more rigorous reviews to which these
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designs would be subjected, design certifications will be issued with terms of ten years.
Further, since the design would be approved by the Comission jO foiio ine the compietion of a ruiemania Proceedias it wouid not be subsect j
i to litigation in individual license applications that referenced the design.
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Changes to Approved Designs We believe that standardization will be best served if changes to approved or certified designs are minimized.
Nevertheless, we recognize that there are situations in which such changes are needed or desirable.
Backfitting is defined in 10 CFR 50.109 as the modification of or addition to systems, components, or design of a facility; or the design approval or manufacturing license for a facility; or the procedures or organization required to design, construct or operate a facility; any of which may result from a new or amended provision in the Commission rules or the imposition of a regulatory staff position interpreting the Comission rules or the imposition of a regulatory staff position interpreting the Commission rules that is either new or different from a previously applicable staff position after the date of issuance of the design approval
. under Appendix M, N or 0 of Part 50.
The draft policy paper clarifies how the backfitting rule should be applied to each of the four concepts.
As stated in the rule, the Comission will require backfitting of a facility only when it detennines,' based upon the analysis required in 10 CFR 50.109(c), that there is substantial increase in the overall protection of the public health and safety or the common defense and securtiy to be derived from the backfit and that the direct and indirect costs of implementation for that facility are justified in view of O
the increase protection.
For the reference system concept, the backfitting rule applies after the issuance of the initial design approval, i.e. PDA or FDA.
For the duplicate plant concept the backfitting ' rule applies after the issuance of the initial duplicate design approval, i.e., PDDA or FDDA.
For the replicate design concept, the backfitting rule applies after the date of the initial CP or OL for the base plant.
For the manufacturing license, the backfitting rule applies after the issuance of the first manufacturing license, i.e., based upon preliminary design information or final design information.
Holders of design approvals or certifications may modify the approved or certified design by applying for an amendment to the design approval or certification. Any such amendments will.only be required to apply to applications for construction permits, and combined construction permits and owrating licenses that are submitted after the amendment is issued unless tie modifications provide a substantial increase in the overall protection of the public health and safety or the common defense and security.
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overiap set-en oupiscate -d Repiscate oesign Concepts The Comission's 1978 standardization policy statement permitted duplicate plant designs to be referenced in license applications docketed between the
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docketing date of the initial application referencing the duplicate plant design and a date five years after the staff approval of the duplicate plant design.
It also permitted license applications for replicate plant designs to be docketed within three years of the dates of issuance of the staff safety evaluation reports for the base plants. We believe this overlap is unnecessary; applicants wishing ter reference duplicate plant 4
designs subsequent to their approval could do so without penalty under the replicate plant concept provided the three-year referencability period for the replicate plant concept were extended to five years. Therefore, future
~ duplicate plant designs will be permitted to be referenced in license applications docketed between the docketing date of the initial application referencing the duplicate plant design and the date of approval of the duplicate plant design, and future replicate plant designs will be pennitted to be referenced in license applications docketed within five years of the dates of issuance of the staff safety evaluation reports for the base plants.
5.
Fees To further encourage the use of the reference system concept, we believe
!O that fees that would otherwise be required of reference design applicants should be allocated among the applicants for permits and licenses which propose to use the reference design. Accordingly, we would not require application filing or issuance fees for reference design approvals or l
certifications, or amendments or renewals thereof.
If no application for a permit or license for a facility is filed within the initial term or renewal period of the design approval or certification, any outstanding fees will become immediate'y due and payable by the holder of the design approval or certification.
4 Allocating fees among the applicants for permits and licenses who use a reference design is consistent with the draft " Nuclear Power Plant i
Licensing and Standardization Act of 1985."
It should be noted, however, j
we have been informed by the Office of the Executive Legal Director that approval of the draft Act would be required prior to the Comission adopting this approach. Enclosure 6 to the Comission paper provides a discussion of license fees related to the reference system concept.
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Fees for the other standardiration concepts are those required by 10 CFR 170 for the type of license being requested.
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Renewals of Reference Design Approvals and Certifications io l
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We believe that the standardization policy statement should include provisions for the renewal of final design approvals and design certifi-cations but, in order to provide incentive to holders of preliminary design approvals to proceed with the development of final designs in a timely manner, preliminary design approvals may only be renewed upon a showing of good cause. Accordingly, not less than one year or more than three years prior to the expiration of the final design approval or the design
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certification, holders of the approval or certification may apply for the j
renewal thereof. The approval and certification will be renewed for an additional period of time of not more than five years in the case of final design approvals, and not less than five or more than ten years in the case of design certifications provided the designs comply with the Commission's current regulations.
If no application for a permit or license for a facility is filed within the renewal period, any outstanding f=ct will heccwe due and payable by the holder of the reference design approval or certification.
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. L4 DSS *MM( V 71o1 Wisconsin Avenue Gotheads.MD 20814 4805 Telephone:(3oll654 926o TWX 71082496o2 ATOMIC FOR DC
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s November 1, 1985 Mr. William J. Dircks Executive Director for Operations U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Maryland National Bank Bldg., #6715 7735 Old Georgetown Road Bethesda, Maryland 20814
Dear Bill:
In my May 30, 1985, letter to you, I alerted you to the formation of an executive level AIP Study Group on the Practical Application of Standardized Nuclear Power Plants in the United States and of our intent to provide input to you in your efforts to update the FRC Policy Statement on Standardization.
Since then our Study Group has met four times and has made iterative reviews of the work products of two very active working Working Group on Regulatory Interactions, chaired by Mr. groups, our James Rhodes, Vice President, Virginia Power Compa'ny, and our Working Group on Design Information Requirements, chaired by Mr. Richard
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Priory, Vice President of Duke Power Company.
The combined efforts of these groups are reflected in our enclosed " expanded outline" on the Policy Statement on Standardization which we request you incorporateinthedevelopmentofyourEolicyStatementrevision.
The concepts included in the enclosed " expanded outline" were also recently endorsed by our Polic chaired by'Mr. Wallace Behnke,y Committee on Nuclear RegulationVice-chairmanofC Company.
The enclosed document reflects the collective judgement of the industry and demonstrates the high level of interest in achieving a workable standardization process.
i Sincere
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. Ward, Chairman l
AIP Study Group on the Practical Application of Standardized Nuclear Power Plants in the United States JEN:wbb cc:
Chairman Palladino l
Commissioner Asselstine n
Commissioner Bernthal U
Commissioner Roberts l
Commissioner Zach l
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37 10/31/85 POLICY STATEMENT ON STANDARDTZATION O
(EXPANDED OUTLINE)
I.
INTRODUCTION Introductory section stating the purposes of the policy state-ment and the Commission's endorsement and encouragement of standardization.
Language from the proposed legislation would be included indicating that the use of standardized designs can benefit the public health and safety by concentrating the resources of designers, engineers and vendors on particular approaches, by stimulating standardized programs of construction practice and quality assurance, by improving the training of personnel, by fostering more effective maintenance and improved operations, and because the use of such designs will permit a more effective licensing and inspection process.
The Introduction would explain how standardization will benefit the. regulatory process by allowing a more expeditious and efficient review of the applications and a better understanding of the designs by the staff.
The Commission would be asked to commit to a more disciplined review of standardized plants, and
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not to allow the staff to re-review applications without due cause and authorization.
The need for a well-defined review process would be emphasized, and sention would be made that the staff is cooperating with IPRI and others in the preparation of review guidelines to be used on standard design applications.
This section would indicate that this policy statement will apply to current LWR designs as well as variations of these designs; that it updates, expands, and replaces previous policy statements on the sub proposed legislation; ject; that it is independent of any and that it will lead to the necessary amendments of appropriate NRC regulations.
This section would indicate that the standardization and
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licensing reform legislation, presently under consideration in Congress, is not in conflict but in direct support of this policy statement.
The Commission believes that both a Congressional mandate and this policy statement, and resulting regulatory changes, are necessary to accomplish all of its goals regarding standardization and licensing reform.
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II.
BACKGROUND This section would provide a brief history of standardization, O-with reference to the 1972 and 1978 policy statements, 10 CFR i
Part 50 Appendices M, N and 0, PDAs and FDAs issued, and other applications processed under the umbrella of standardization, e.g., replicate, reference and duplicate plants.
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III.
RECENT NRC ACTIONS This section would summarize recent actions taken by the Commis-I sion paving the way for new applications, e.g.,
completion of TMI-related requirements, emphasis on the resolution of generic issues, backfit rule (SAPS *), ongoing work policy statement on severe accidents on source terms, and safety goal.
The purpose of this section is to provide the bases for the positions stated below and the Commission's endorsement of new i
appli cati ons.
On the basis of the available information and i
the experience gained from the operating plants, the Commission has concluded in the SAPS that existing plants pose no undue
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risk to public health and safety.
Language would be included i
indicating that standard designs will not be subject to t
unnecessary changes by the Commission, and emphasizing the Commission's commitment to provide regulatory stability.
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i Reference would also be made to the legislation proposed by the
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Commission that would allow one-step licensing.
IV.
COMMISSION POLICY i
Reference System Concept i
This section would update the corresponding section in the 1978 Policy Statement, and would eliminate the difference between the FDA-1 and FDA-2.
It would also indicate that, based on th's SAPS may be referenced in applications for a Construction Permitall current F i
i (CP) or Operating License (OL), or combined CP/0L.
i SAPS -
Policy Statement on Severs Reactor Accidents Regarding Future Designs and Existing Plants, July 30, 1985.
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Preliminary Design Approvals This section would update the corresponding section in the 1978
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Policy ' Statement takang into account the guidance contained in the SAPS (summarized in Section V of this policy statement).,
Accordingly, after a PDA is docketed, the preliminary design may be referenced in new CP applications, with the corresponding OL application referencing the approved final design.
The SAPS contains criteria and procedural requirements expected to be satisfied by new designs before they are granted final approval or certification.
However PDA applications will be expected to address these criteria a,nd procedural requirements to the extent that it is reasonably possible.
For example, although the Commission has indicated in the SAPS that it expects PRAs to be'part of the PDA application process, it will not be a prerequisite for issuance of the PDA.
If a comprehensive and detailed PRA is not performed, a meaningful tive risk analysis would be expected instead, limited, quantits-either as part of the PDA design. process or of the CP applications referencing the PDAs will be issued following completion of the staff's (including ACRS) review and would be subject to challenge in individual licensing hearings.
The discussion in the 1978 Policy Statement regarding the O
requirements for extending the lhfe of PDAs active at that time would be eliminated as there are no PDAs active at this time.
Instead this section would indicate that in the future PDAs will'be, issued for a term of 10 years.
Final Design Approvals This section~would update the corresponding section in the 1978 Policy Statement taklng into account the guidance contained in the SAPS (summarized in Section V of this policy statement),
and eliminating the difference between the FDA-1 and FDA-2.
As in the past, a PDA will continue no't to be a prerequisite-for an PDA with applicants having the option to submit PDA-level Information initially and proceed directly with an FDA review.
The FDA may be referenced in OL applications which had made reference to the corresponding PDA at the CP stage and any be referenced also in new CP applications (and combined CP/0L applications).
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Tha SAPS ctntains critoria cud procedural requirements expected to be satisfied by new designs before they are granted an PDA.
If the scope of'the FDA reference design application is limited to' an extent that would preclude the completion of a meaningful,
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comprehensive PRA, the requirement for a complete PRA may be waived.
However the applicant should still perform and submit supplementary ris,k analyses, to the extent practical, to demon-strate-the adequacy of the proposed design.
If a comprehensive PRA is not submitted for an PDA, an-OL or combined CP/0L applicant referencing the approved design would be required to submit a plant-specific PRA.
PDAs will be issued following completion of the staff's (including ACRS) review and would be subject to challenge in individual licensing hearings.
This section would also indicate that in the future PDAs will be issued for a term of 10 years.
l Duplicate Plant Concept This section would update the corresponding section in the 1978 Policy Statement taking into account the guidance contained in the SAPS (summarized in Section V of this policy statement),
and eliminating the difference between the PDDA-1 and PDDA-2.
As indicated in the 1978 Policy Statement, the staff will issue
'O a PDDA if the reference design is only preliminary, or an PDDA, if it is final.
PDDAs and PDDAs will be issued following completion of the staff's (including ACRS) review and would be i
i subject to challenge in individual licensing hearings.
PDDAs any be referenced only in CP applications;de reference to the FDDAs may be referenced in OL applications which had ma corresponding PDDA at the CP stage, and in new CP applications (or combined CP/0L applications).
To be consistent with the previous sections of this policy statement and the SAPS this section would indicate that PDDA applications will be ex,pected to address the criteria and t
proccdural requirements described in th's SAPS to the extent.
that it is reasonably possible.-
Accordin a prerequisite for issuance of the PDDA. gly, FRAs will not be However, if a comprehensive and detailed PRA is not performed, a meaningful, limited quantitative risk analysis would be expected instead either a,s part of the PDDA process or of the CP applications,
referencing it.
The criterla and procedural requirements contained in the SAPS will need to be satisfied before issuance of an PDDA.
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e This section would also indicate that in the future PDDAs and PDDAs will be allowed to be referenced in applications for
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periods of 10 years from the date of issuance.
Manuf acturina License Concept This section would widate the corresponding section in the 1978 Policy Statement takung into account the guidance contained in the SAPS (summarized in Section V of this policy statement),
i To be consistent with previous sections the 1978 Policy Statement would also be changed to require the design to be updated 10 years, instead.of 5 years, af ter its approval.
Replicate Plant Concept This section would q)date the corresponding section in the 1978 Policy Statement takLng into account the guidance contained in the MPS (summarized in Section V of this policy statement).
As indicated in the 1978 Policy Statement,d plant the staff when an applicant proposes to replicate a previously approve would need to determine whether the base plant may be replicated, and the design would be subjec't to' challenge in individual licensing hearings.
Applications for replication O
would be accepten for periods of 10 years following issuance of the SER for the ba'se plant.
To be consistent with the previous sections of this policy statement and'the SAPS this section would indicate that the criteria and procedural requirements contained in the SAPS would need to be satisfied before a design is accepted for replication.
If the scope of the design to be replicated is limited to an extent that would preclude the completion of a meaningful,be comprehensive PRA, the requirement for a complete PRA any waived.
However, plant-specific PRAs would be required from applicants referencing the design.
Standard Desian Certifications This section would formally establish the concept of Standard Design certifications.
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As indicated in the SAPS, the Commission is in favor of offering Standard Design Certifications in addition to the PDA and FDA options.
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The PDAs and FDAs are issued following completion of the strff's (including ACRS) review and would be subject to challenge in individual licensing hearings.
cps and OLs based on standard design approvals would be subaset to any design changes arising from their particular licensing pro-coedings in accordance with the Commission's backfit rule.
Standard Design Certifications would be issued by the Commission The following rulemaking individual hearings. proceedings and could not be challenged in To be consistent with the proposed legislation a standardized plant design or "any major subsystem which repr,esents a discrete element" of the facility would qualify for a Standard Design Certification following the staff's final design review and approval.
The Commission would also indicate its intent to provide the opportunity for a hearing as part of the rulemaking proceeding for a Standard Design Certification.
this hearing the design ma As a result of Commission's,backfit rule. y be changed subject to the Standard Design Certifications would be issued for a period of 10 years combined,CP/0L applications).and may be referenced in CP or OL applicat i
described above is consistent with the SAPS.(The concept of The proposed legislation uses the term " approval" instead of certification, and would empower the Commission to issue such approvals by means other than rulemaking.)
wavel of Detail in Standard Desian Certification Applications Critical to the success of the Commission's standardization policy is the level of information that must be provided in standard design applications.
industry to collaborate with the staff to develop guidelinesThis section similar to those currently available for CP and OL applications.
The Commission would emphasize the need for " essentially com-plete" design information in applications but would stress that the applications should describe what is needed, i.e.
methods,i I
procedures, and performance criteria, rather than spec,ific pieces of equipment.
The guidelines should be conslstent with recent Commission emphasis on regulations that are less pre-scriptive and more performance oriented, and would incorporate some of the characteristics of the SDA concept discussed in the 1978 Policy Statement.
(The proposed legislation indicates that
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standardizcd designs sh:uld be "sufficiently detailed and complete to support licensing.")
These guidelines will also need to describe the inspections and tests that would be O
necessary to ascertain that construction was completed in accordance with the design specifications.
Applicants will provide sufficiently detailed criteria to enable the NRC to complete the safety review of the facility.
The document provided by the applicant a Plant Safety Report (PSR) or Standard Design Report (SDR) Espending on the type of license re facility. quested, would describe major portions of the Design Criteria and Documentation To fulfill the NRC need for design detail, the report should define the major design components and include the results of preliminary engineering to identify:
Design basis criteria Analysis and design methods Functional design and physical arrangement of l
auxiliary BOP and NSSS systems I
Plant phys,ical, arrangements sufficient to ac'commodate systems and components
. Punctional/ performance specifications for components and materials sufficiently detailed to become a part
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of' associated procurement specifications Acceptance / Test Requirements PRA Methodology Required design documentation for systems, structures and components must include sufficient information to enable the NRC to make the safety determination and should include as appropriate:
Design basis criteria Plant general arrangements of structures and components Process and instrumentation diagrams Control logic diagrams l
System functional descriptions Component and procurement snecifications including acceptance test requirementh Construction and installation specifications QA prograa hergency plans i,
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Supporting design documentation such as site data and calculations sufficient to support the abors level of design detail O
Security ALARA/ Radiation Protection Accident Analysis Draft Technical Specifications PRA It should be noted that all designs prepared prior to equipment purchase are subject to refinement and completion once detailed vendor information is available.
From a conceptual and perfor-mance standpoint these details should not prevent the NRC from completing their health and safety determination.
However, to deal with this situation without subsequent licensing proceed-ings, a program of confirmatory audits, performed by the NRC, could be utilitized to review the refinements to detailed design information which are necessary in the process of procurement and installation of plant components.
Probabilistic Risk Assessment To complement the design criteria, a probabilistic risk assess-(PRA) should be prepared as part of COL applications to ment identify significant contributions to risk in the design.
Except in a f ew cases, the evaluation of component failures or equipment outages have been based on generic data, therefore,
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it is not necessary to commit to equipment purchase before performing the PRA.
The completion of a PRA with adequate consideration for major risk contributors will increase the assurance that the design presents no undue risk to the public health and safety.
Acceptance / Test Requirements 1.icensees and their suppliers should define acceptan'ce/ test criteria to assure that designs are properly translated and correctly installed in the plant.
These requirements should be defined early in the licensing process and implemented in a series of readiness reviews based on completion of construction and acceptance / test criteria developed during the design stage.
1 Channes to Standard Desians This section would indicate that standard design approvals and certifications will not be changed unless the Commission determines, based on significant new information, that a
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codificaticn is required to protect the public health and i.*
safety, and in accordance with the backfit rule.
In imple-menting the backfit rule, Appendices M, N and 0 to 10 CFR Part O
50 will be revised to indicate that the cost-benefit analyses will be performed on the first or lead unit for the given standard design.
If the backfit can be justified on the lead
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unit, it will be implemented on all subsequent units referencing that design.
If the backfit cannot be justified on the lead unit, it will not be applied to any unit referencing that design.
The backfit rule becomes effective after "the date of issuance of the design approval under Appendix M, N or 0" to 10 CFR Part 50.
For designs going through different levels of approval, e.g., a PDA followed by an FDA the backfit rule will be con-sidered in effect after the iss,uance of the first approval, in the same manner that a custom plant triggers the backfit rule after.the issuance of the Construction Permit.
For designs applying directly for a final approval, e.g., an FDA without a PDA, the Commission will institute a process by which the applicant for a standard design approval or certification would submit to the NRC prior to the submittal,of the application a complete list of regulations and staff guidance documents (i.e.
SRPs Re Guides BTPs ThislistwIll$eacknow,ledgedinwritnngbythestaffandwilletc.) applicable to th l
serve as the basis for the review of the design.
Changes to these requirements and guidance will need to be reviewed and a? proved by a high level of manage. ment (possibly in a process
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s:,milar to that followed by the GGR) and documented in writing.
The. purpose of this process is to provide discipline
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and stability to the review of standard applications even before the backfit rule becomes effective, and to serve as an incentive to the industry to develop the more detailed applications needed for a final approval.
j Once a Standard Design Certification has been issued, it will not be subject to challenge in individual licensing hearings.,
Any challenge to the Standard Design Certification, whether sought by reason of special circumstances or otherwise, will only be considered in a rulemaking amendment procedure.
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Current regulations - 10 CFR 50.34(g) - require that applications for a construction permit, manufacturing license, and PDA or PDA be evaluated against the SRPs in effect six months prior the docketing date.
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.This secticn would also indicate thst the Cemaission recognizes
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the need to allow standard design holders and utilities to make changes in order.to incorporate such considerations as new technical developments, improvements in the reliability or O,
safety of the designs, or to make accommodations for mainte-e nance,- radiation protection 'or procedural practices at a given utility.
For example, a utility with other operating nuclear power plants may want to change the design of the control room in a standard design plant in~ order to maintain common features with the control rooms in its other plants.
Similarly a standard design holder may want to incorporate new technical
' advances that may improve the performance of the design and thus increase its market appeal.
Chang.es requested by the holders of standard design approvals or certifications, if approved, will apply only to applications referencing the affected standard design and submitted after the change has been approved.
Amendments to Standard Design Certifications would result in rulemaking proceedings and the opportunity for hearings.
Changes req /0L, that referenced a standard design approval o uested by CP and OL holders, and holders of a combined CP certification will be approved by the Commission if it determines that they are in compliance with the appropriate regulations.
Such changes would be limited to the license (s) for which they were requested.
Changes to operating licenses and deviations or variances from Standard Design Certifications O
(exceptions from a rule) may result in the opportunity for a hearing.
Other changen may not re with 10 CFR Part 50.59. quire Commission approval in accordance Renewals of Standard Design As indicated in previous sections, approvals for duplication
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and replication, and all standard design ap cations would be valid for 10-year periods.provals and certifi-The 1978 Policy Statement established life terms of 5 years for the PDAs and 1
FDAs, and for the duplication and replication options.
These periods were selected considering the number of plant license l
applications anticipated at the time, the experience of changes in safety requirements that were then occurring with time, and the relative newness of the concept.
However, it is now apparent that, because of the prevailing depressed market for 4
nuclear plants, the period of effectiveness used to date for the different standardization options limit the ability of O '
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l participants in the overall design of a plant to develop their portions of the plant designs well before the approval for other sections of the desi n terminate (e.g i engineerdevelopingthebafanceofplantdes an architect-O'.
approved nuclear steam supply system design),'gn to mate with an and thus obtain a reasonable return on investment by use of the design in one or more plants.
Considering these factors, the current low order rate for nuclear plants, which effectively reduces the number of units likely to use a specific standard design and the significantly increased stability in licensing req,uirements expected in the future, the Commission considers it appropriate to extend to 10 years the life terms of all standardization options.
In addition, this section would indicate that holders of the approvals and certifications described above may request renewals of such approvals and certifications prior to their The Commission, consistent with the intent of the expiration.
proposed legislation, will renew the approvals or certifications "for an additional period of time not less than five nor more than ten years from the date of renewal."
i V.
COMPLIANCE WITH GUIDANCE IN POLICY STATEMENT ON SEVERE REACTOR ACCIDENTS REGARDING FUTURE DESIGNS AND EXISTING PLANTS On July 30, 1985 the Commission issued a Policy Statement on C
Severe Reactor Accidents Regarding Future Designs and Existing Plants (SAPS) containing the following criteria and procedural requirements that the Commission considers necessary for the licensing of new plants:
a)
Demonstration of compliance with the procedural require-ments and criteria of the current Commission regulations, including the Three Mile Island requirements for new plants as reflected in the CP Rule (10 CFR 50.34(f));
b)
Demonstration of technical resolution of all applicable Unresolved Saf ety Issues and the medium-and high-priority Generic Safety Issues, including a special focus on assuring the reliability of decay heat removal systems and the reliability of both AC and DC electrical supply systems; c)
Completion of a Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) and consideration of the severa accident vulnerabilities the PRA exposes along with the insights that it may add to the assurance of no undue risk to public health and safety; and l
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PRA is not subaitted for an FDA, an OL or combined CP/0L applicant referencing the approved design would be required to submit a plant-specific.PRA.
For standard design ap3rovals of O.
restricted' scope, additional limitations beyond the M aspects may exist.
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O Note:
This section is, except for some introductory and linkage words, an exact paraphrase of sections of the SAPS.
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aAc15TnL1T-c ENCLOSURE 5!
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RULEMAKING OPTIONS FOR STANCARD DESIGN CERTIFICATIONS O
,T With its approval of the Severe Accident Policy Statement, the Cosmfission has cleared the way for proceeding with the certification of standard design,s by rulemaking. As the Comission is aware, the Policy Statement does not require that a design vendor pursue certification beyond the staff's Final Design Approval. The staff at present is uncertain whether vendors will
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request certification by rulemaking, thereby removing from future licensing litigation issues regarding the adequacy of the design itself.1/ The staff believes, however, that vendors are more likely to consider sucE a step if the'rulemaking procedures to be used have been clearly set out in advance.
To this end the staff describes below several alternative methods the Comission could choose to apply in a design certification rulemaking.
A.
- Notice and Written Coments The~ simplest procedure meeting the requirements of the Administrative Proce-
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dure Act is that used for most NRC rules: a notice of proposed rulemaking requesting written coments, review of the coments, and promulgation of a.
final rule.
If this method, clearly the most expeditious, were adopted, the notice of proposed rulemaking would contain the following: (1) availability of the application, staff SER, and Final Design Approval, and ACRS letters, together with other technical material supporting the application, (2) tenns of the proposed rule, i.e., duratton of certification, effect on licensin r
proceedings, (3) specific issues on which comant is requested (if any), 4)
L role of the ACRS in the review process, and (5) the decisional criteria to be applied by the Comission.
Coments would be evaluated by the staff and the ACRS, with assistance from the applicant as necessary.
If substantial technical issues were raised which could.not be resolved on the basis of the existing application and SER, the applicant would be required to develop such information to support the application. This new information would have to be reviewed by the NRC staff and might have to be made available for a second round of public coment if it modifies the application in significant respects. A second round of notice-and-coment could obviously delay the issuance of a final rule substantially.
The initial resource investment for this method would be modest, both for the NRC and the applicant. This consideration might make this approach attractive to an applicant not wishing to comit substantial resources when the market for the design is uncertain. As noted above, however, both the applicant and the NRC might have to commit additional resources
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As the Comission is aware. GE has stated that it will not devote resources to rulemaking at this time, but might consider doing so if a domestic order is received for a GESSAR-II plant.
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The Connissioners '
O to respead to pubiic comeats eaa to support e secoad rouad of a#614.c comeat in some circumstances.
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8.
Notice and Coment with Opportunity to Request Legislative Hearing In this approach a notice of proposed rulemaking would be published requesting written coments as in (A), but would offer the opportunity of a legislative hearing upon request of an interested person or persons. As a condition to granting such a request, however, the requesting persons would be tequired to state what issues they wished to be considered at the hearing, and comit to providing expert testimony on those issues.
If a hearing request were granted, notice of the hearing would be published in t1Ee Federal Register, setting out the details of the procedures to be r-
.fo}) owed and issues to be considered. (Although not an adjudicatory hearing, this process would be very similar to an operatin opportunity for hearing, notice of hearing, etc.)g license notice of The Comission has the discretion to employ a number of fonnats, from the simple hearing and re-cording of testimony to interchanges among those present and a limited right of cross-examination. Since such rulemaking procedures go well beyond the minimum notice and coment requirements for rulemaking, the agency has broad discretion to establish hearing procedures best suited to the matters at issue.
p Following such a hearing, the complete record of the rulemaking would be reviewed, including both the hearing record and any other written comments.
The notice of final rulemakin'g would have to include responses to written connents-and the agency's resolution of issues considered at the hearing.
The resources needed to implement this option would obviously depend on whether one or more hearings were held.
In the absence of a hearing, the resource comitment would be the same as for notice-and-comment.
If a hearing were held, it is likely more issues would be raised in greater technical depth, and both applicant and NRC resources would be needed to resolve these issues and perform a thorough review of the hearing record itself. 2/ Given this potential for a larger resource comitment, this option mTght not be favored by an industry applicant in the absence of a e
clear domestic market for the standard design.
s C.
Notice and Coment with Hearings Absent Request 2/
In this regard, it would be important to impose some limitations on the scope and length proceeding at the outset. Absent any present limits on the hearing, it could easily grow to ECCS-size, i.e.,125 days of hearing and 22,000+ pages of transcript.
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Q This method goes somewhat further than (B) in that the notice of pr,oposed rulemaking would announce the agency's intent to hold informal hearings on
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the proposed certification. The notice would set out the matters a't issue as specifically as possible, the hearing procedures to be used, and request.that all persons wishing to participate in the hearings notify the agency within a -
stated period of time. Written coments would also be invited from those not intending to participate in the hearings. Hearing procedures would be
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flexible,asstatedin(B).
This approach would require a substantial resource investment by the appl'icant~and the NRC. As with the previous alternative, it might not be favored by a potential applicant where a definite market for the design did not yet exist.
D.
0n-the-Record-Proceeding z
The~ agency has the option of conducting rulemaking by formal 6 earings, a
according to the requirements of Sections 556 and 557 of the Administrative Procedure Act. The procedure follows that for licenses, i.e., appointment of a hearing board, use of 10 CFR Part 2 Rules of Practice, fonnal taking of
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evidence, including cross-examination, and board findings and recomendations to the Comission. The Comission retains final authority to accept or reject the board's recomendations in promulgating a final rule.
In this procedure the record consists only:Vf evidence admitted at the hearing; 6' written comments are not solicited or accepted from the general public.
This option would require the largest resource comitment from the applicant and the NRC. While the informal hearings associated with the previous two options-would tend to focus on technical issues, thus limiting the role and associated expense of legal counsel, the formal hearing requires full use of legal representation (in addition to the need for a adjudicatory board chaired by an attorney) to assure that the Rules of Practice are observed.
We do not expect that this option would be favored by an applicant for a standard design certification under any circumstances.
l Role of the ACRS l
In each of the above options. ACRS views would be sought and considered.
ACRS review of the design should be perfonned prior to the rulemaking itself, and the results of that review made available at the time the proposed rule is announced. The ACRS should be given an op record (including comments on its own review)portunity to review the complete and a final ACRS letter on the design should be forwarded to the Comission for its consideration during the l
final rule process.
The ACRS could, either by direction of the Commission or in its own dis-cretion, hold one or more infonnal pubite hearings on the design at which varying technical points of view could be heard. Such hearings would be more l
limited in scope than those suggested in Options (B) and (C) above, and O
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ENCLOSURE 6'
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LICENSE FEES (y%
Currently Part 170 requires full cost recovery (up to a ceiling of
$1,477,100) for review of standard reference designs for a nuclear power
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plant or major portion thereof when the review is conducted outside the context of a CP, OL or manufacturing license application. The fee is billed to the applicant at six-month intervals as the review progresses until the review is complete either by issuance of an approval, withdrawal or denial.
Prior to June 20,1984 (date current rule was adopted), Comission regulations required PDA review fees to a ceiling of $462,100 for each NSSS and BOP and FDA review fees to $533,400 for the NSSS and $551,200 for the BOP. The fees were to be paid in five installments based on payment of 20 percent of the approval fee as each of the first five units of the approved design were referenced in utility applications.
Thirteen PDAs have been granted and none were subject to fees under Part 170.
Two FDAs have been issued to date.
Both were issued during the period of the 1978 fee schedule.
Combustion Engineering has paid $436,720 of $533,400 in review fees for CESSAR-80 (NSSS) since it was referenced only fcur times. General Electric has paid only the application fee
($50,000) since the approved design has not been referenced in a utility application.
O The fee proposal contained in the draft revised standardization policy stateme'nt would not require an application fee or periodic payment of review costs for approval certification, amendment or renewal applications.
Fees designed to recover costs would be allocated among the applicants
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' for cps, OLs and combined cps and OLs proposing to use the reference design.
If no application for a permit or license for a facility is filed within the initial term or renewal period of the design approval or certification, any outstanding fees become innediately due and payable by the holder of the approval certification.
The modification of fee requirements does not deal with the fo'llowing issues:
l.
The current NRC fee policy, based on court decisions, is that
.s specific charges (fees) are assessed for specific services rendered to identifiable recipients. Thus fees are assessed only to the applicant for the service.
Contact:
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W. O. Miller, LFMS/ADM 49-27225 O
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. FEES FOR REVIEW OF PDA, FDA 1978 Rule 1984 Rule Application Fee (NSSS., BOP)
$50,000
$50,000 (preliminary. final)
PDA(NSSS)
$412,100 (excludes appl. fee)*
$1.427.100 (excludes appl. fee)*
PDA(80P)
$412,100 (excludes, appl. fee)*
FDA(NSSS) si,
$483,400 (excludes appl. fee)*
$1.427.100 (excludes appl. fee)*
FDA(BOP)
$501.200 (excludes appl. fee)*
Amendment to PDA. FDA Full cost Full cost e
Payinent 5 installments for first 5 units Payment due at 6-month intervals referenced as work progresses
- Charge based on full costs to ceiling.
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