ML20150D483
| ML20150D483 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Seabrook  |
| Issue date: | 07/05/1988 |
| From: | Selleck K PUBLIC SERVICE CO. OF NEW HAMPSHIRE, ROPES & GRAY |
| To: | Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20150D485 | List: |
| References | |
| CON-#388-6682 OL-1, NUDOCS 8807140018 | |
| Download: ML20150D483 (7) | |
Text
~'
1' h b gu-000EILO uwec ge JL -8 P3 :05 o
Juy I y98Q;alig 3RANC" UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION before the ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD
)
In the Matter of
)
)
PUBL.C SERVICE COMPANY OF
)
Docket Nos. 50-443-OL-1 NEW HAMPSHIRE, et al.
)
50-444-OL-1
)
On-site Emergency (Seabrook Station, Units 1 and 2)
)
Planning Issues
)
)
APPLICANTS' MOTION FOR PROTECTIVE ORDER
_ Introduction and Backaround Pursuant to 10 C.F.R. 5 2.740(c), Applicants hereby respectfully request that the Board enter a protective order governing the conditiona under which the Attorr.49 General for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts ("Mass AG") ma. receive and use certain confidential and proprietary information 1
I concerning Applicants' Vehicle Alert and Notification siren warning system for Massachusetts ("the VANS system" or l
"VANS").
Applicants make this motion on the ground that it is necessary, for the protection both of the privacy interests of the persons involved and the commercial 8807140018 880705 PDR ADOCK 05000443 G
PDR 3563
\\
L
b4 interests of Applicants, to prevent the premature public dissemination of this information.
As specified in the proposed Protective Order annexed to this motion, Applicants seek to protect:
(1) the locations of their VANS staging areas, i.e.,
the six sites where the VANS trucks will be parked; (2) the VANS acoustic locations, i.e.,
the sixteen sites where the VANS sirens would be activated; (3) and all similar information, and documents containing such information, that would enable someone to identify the persons and entities who are cooperating and/cr contracting with Applicants in connection with the VANS staging areas and acoustic locations.
The third category of information would include, for example, copies of leases for the VANS staging areas, correspondence evidencing agreements by private individuals to allow Applicants to use their property as acoustic locations, route information that would enable someone to identify a staging area or acoustic l
location, and other similar data and documents.
Applicants l
have provided this information to the NRC Staff, but have l
requested that the Staff withhold it from public disclosure l
pursuant to 10 C.F.R. 5 2.790.
See Letter of T.C.
l Feigenbaum, May 18, 1988 and accompanying affidavit, attached hereto as Exhibit 1 (hereinafter "Feigenbaum Affidavit").
l On June 16, 1988 the ' Mss AG served VANS-related Il, interrogatories and document requests on Applicants.
Several i
r-s-
of the interrogatories and document requests call upon Applicants to provide confidential and proprietary information of the type that clearly would be covered by the proposed protecti~ order.1 Araument The Appeal Board, in Kansas Gas and Electric Co. (Wolf Creek Nuclear Generating Station, Unit 1), ALAB-327, 3 NRC 408 (1976), examined the circumstances in which the need for a protective order outweighs the "strong public interest in conducting a ratemaking proceeding which is as opea as possible to full public scrutiny."
Before a protective order will be enforced, it must be demonstrated that (1) the information in question is of a type customarily held in confidence by its originator, (2) there is a rational basis for having customarily held it in confidence, (3) it has, in fact, been kept in confidence, and (4) it is not found in public sources.
Id. at 416-17.
Applicants have shown, both on the record before this Board and to the Off-site Board, a rational basis for the protection of this type of confidential and proprietary l.
Interrogatories that could call for such confidential and proprietary information are those numbered 3,
4, 6,
10, 15, 18, 19, and 21.
The document requests that could call for such confidential and proprietary information are those numbered 1, 2,
3, 6 and 7..
4 e
information from public disclosure and have otherwise satisfied the standards set forth in Wolf creek.
Furthermore, this Board's interest in protecting the integrity of these proceedings argues in favor of restricting the opportunity to use the confidential information to alter the very facts being litigated.
Applicants' submissions to this Board, as well as the findings of the Off-site Board in granting h similar but broader protective order,2 demonstrate that good cause exists for entry of the protective order requested by Applicants herein.
The information sought by Mass AG directly or indirectly identifies persons and entities who are providing vital cooperation to Applicants in connection with the VANS system, by leasing staging areas to Applicants and/or by permitting access to acoustic locations.
Protection of this information from public disclosure is essential to preserve the privacy interests of the persons cooperating with Applicants, to protect the proprietary interests of Applicants, and to ensure the integrity of this proceeding.
If the identities of persons and entities cooperating in the VANS system are revealed, those persons may be exposed to harassment, intimidation, economic reprisals, or other 2
See Memorandum and Order (Protectina Information From Public Disclosure), LBP-88-8 (March 23, 1988)
[ hereinafter "Off-site Protective Order").
4 disturbances by members of the public who are not accounta'ble to the parties and this Board for their conduct.
Egg Feigenbaum Affidavit.
As the Atomic Safety and Licensing Appeal Board pointed out in Houston Licht and Power Co_.
(Allens Creek Nuclear Generating Station, Unit 1), ALAB-S T 9 NRC 377 (1979), the possibility of such an invasion of privacy warrants the issuance of a protective order:
"Upon a determination that an adequate showing has been made that public revelation of the identity of a member of the petitioner organization micht threaten rights of association, the licensing board should place a protective order upon that information."
Id. at 400 (emphasis added).
In Allens Creek the Appeals Board required only a showing that public revelation nicht threaten persons' privacy rights.
In these proceedings, however, Applicants' have already made a much stronger showing of possible intimidation and harassment.
As the Off-site Board recognized when it granted an order protecting the identities of persons and entities cooperating in other ways with Applicants, "there is a sianificant orobability that the suppliers' rights to privacy might be invaded absent a protective order."
Off-site Protective Order, slip op. at
- p. 4 (emphasis added).
As that Board went on to note, There is.
. a proportionally small but aggressive minority of Seabrook opponents, including some members of the Clamshell Alliance, who have demonstrated by civil disobedience their willingness to i_ustrate the licensing process by extra-legal means.
They are not 4
parties to the proceeding and are, therefore, beyond the control of the Licensing Board.
If, as we fear, this group would seek to influence the licensing process by interfering with the agreements and expectations between Applicants and the suppliers in the plan for Massachusetts, there is little the Board can do except to deny them the opportunity.
Id., slip op. at pp.
7-8.
The suppliers protected by the off-site Board's protective order have the same privacy rights, and face the same threat of intimidation and harassment, as do the individuals and entities whose identities Applicants seek to protect herein.
Applicants' own proprietary interest in the information sought to be protected is also at stake.
Applicants expended considerable time and money to develop the leases and agreements at issue here.
Public disclosure of this information, with the concomitant risk that persons will be intimidated into withdrawing their cooperation or breaching their leases, threatens Applicants with the loss of that invested effort and money.
Indeed, destruction of yet an'other of Applicants' siren systems could prejudice Applicants' effort to create an efficacious emergency plan.
See Feigenbaum Affidavit.
Finally, the entry of a protective order is essential to "preserve the integrity of this proceeding".
Off-site Protective Order, slip op. at p.
4.
As the Off-site Board expressly recognized, these proceedings involve predictive finding as to the future efficacy of Applicants' plan.
Thus __
persons willing to block Seabrook by intimidating or inducing persons not to cooperate with Applicants possess "a rare opportunity to influence the outcome of the adjudication by changing the facts upon which the prediction must be made."
Id., slip op. at p.
8.
Only by preventing the public disclosure of the information necessary to make such intimidation possible can this Board protect its own deliberations from being rendeled meaningless by the unprincipled acts of outsiders.
Conclusion For the reasons stated above, a protective order in the form attached hereto should be issued.
By their attorneys, l
M opas G.
Dignan, Jr.
Itathryn A. Selleck Jeffrey p. Trout Ropes & Gray 225 Franklin Street Boston, MA 02110 (617) 423-6100
, 1 l
-