ML20155G469
| ML20155G469 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 04/29/1986 |
| From: | Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards |
| To: | |
| References | |
| ACRS-T-1509, NUDOCS 8605060141 | |
| Download: ML20155G469 (159) | |
Text
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OT GlNAL l
' O UN11ED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION IN THE MATTER OF:
DOCKET NO:
ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS SUBCOMMITTEE ON THERMAL HYDRAULIC PHENOMENA O
LOCATION:
WASHINGTON, D.
C.
PAGES: 1 - 154 DATE:
TUESDAY, APRIL 29, 1986 onn nrrmt enDV RbnD urnot.um
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PUBLIC NOTICE BY THE UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSIONERS' ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS TUESDAY, APRIL 29, 1986 The contents of this stenographic transcript of the proceedings of the United States 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.
O
P 7070 01 01 1
arysimons 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3
4 ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS S
SURCOMMITTEE ON THERMAL HYDRAULIC PHENOMENA 6
7 Nuclear Requlatory Commission 8
Room 1046 9
1717 H Street, N.W.
10 Washinoton, D.C.
11 Tuesday, April 29, 1986 12 The subcommittee convened, pursuant to notice, at 7..
L_. '
13 1:35 p.m.,
Carlyle Michelson, Cha i rman of the Subcommittee, 14 presidina.
15 ACRS MEMBERS PRESENT:
16 C.
MICHELSON, Ch a i rma n 17 J.
EBERSOLE 18 D.
WARD 19 ACRS CONSULTANTS PRESENT:
20 I.
CATTON l
21 V.
SCHROCK 22 H.
SULLIVAN 23 C-L TIEN 24 COGNIZANT ACRS STAFF MEMBER PRESENT:
/~\\
25 P.
BOEHNERT 26 ACE Fl!DERAI. REPORTERS, INC.
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O(,,2arysimons 1 PROCEEDINGS 2
MR. MICHELSON:
The meeting will now come to 3
order.
4 This is a meeting of the Advisory Committee on 5
Reactor Safeguards Subcommittee on Thermal Hydraulic 6
Phenomena.
7 I am Carl Michelson, the Subcommittee Chairman.
8 The other ACRS members in attendance are Jesse Ebersole and 9
David Ward.
10 Also in attendance are ACRS consultants, Ivan 11 Catton, Virgil Schrock, Harold Sullivan and Chung Tien.
12 The purpose of this meeting is to review the NRC 13 research proposal to revise 10 CPR 50.46 and Appendix K and 14 discuss the future activities of the Thermal Hydraulic 15 Phenomena Subcommittee.
16 Paul BAYNARD is the cognizant ACRS staff member 17 for this meeting.
18 The rules for participation in today's meeting 19 have been announced as part of the notice of this meetino, 20 previously published in the Federal Register on April 14th 21 and April 23rd, 1986.
6 5
22 A transcript of the meeting is beinq kept and will 23 he made available as stated in the Federal Register 24 notice.
25 It is requested that each speaker first identify ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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aarysimons I himself or herself and speak with sufficient clarity and 2
volume so that he or she can be readily heard.
3 We have received no written comments from the 4
members of the public, and we have received no written 5
reauests for time to make oral statements from the members 6
of the public.
7 At this time I would like to make a few comments.
8 First of all, as you are probably all aware, we 9
have a new subcommittee which deals with the thermal and 10 hydraulic phenomena as opposed to iust ECCS, which David 11 Ward was chairman of previously.
12 I feel that this is a new and interesting area and 13 that we as a first step need to sit down and talk among 14 ourselves a little bit about what might be the future 15 functions of such a subcommittee.
16 Fortunately, present today is David Ward, who can l
17 provide a great deal of continuity with all the nast goings j
18 on of the ECCS portion of the activity, which undoubtedly l
19 is the maior portion.
20 So for this afternoon we are coing to just kick 21 around the table the various kinds of things that we think 22 we might be doing in the future so that I can try to 23 prepare a charter for this subcommittee which reflects the 24 desires of the members as to future activities.
OU 25 So with that in mind, I would ask if any of the ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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A(_,2arysimons 1 other subcommittee members want to make any statements 2
first, and after that we will start moving on preparing 3
this new charter.
4 Any statements, anybody?
5 Jesse?
6 MR. EBERSOLE:
I am going to wait until we get 7
into the throes of this.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
This afternoon now we are 9
going to discuss Appendix K and so forth.
That is 10 tomorrow.
But what we want to discuss now is what should 11 we be doing in the future so that I can put together a 12 little bit of a charter.
13 There are two aspects as to what one should do in 14 the future of course.
One aspect is well what would be 15 worthwhile and so forth, and the other aspect is well how 16 much money and time have we got in which to do all of this.
17 I have asked Paul Boehnert to look into the money 18 and time situation a little bit and give you report on what 19 has been allotted for this activity for the coming year.
20 So, Paul, if you will.
21 MR. ROEHNERT:
Okay.
I am passina out a copy of 22 what is the latest information that we have on the full 23 committee's attempt to make a division of its limited 24 resources for FY-87.
And, as I understand, this is subject 25 to ratification by the full committee.
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llhmarysimons 1
If you look down the list here you will see that 2
under thermal hydraulic phenomena we are budgeted at three 3
meetings for FY-87, which is a total of 15 person-days, 4
which I understand comes from the historical attendance 5
record of roughly five or so people per meetino.
6 What I understand is controlling in this is the 7
number of person-days, and that is how I understand it was 8
arrived at.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
Excuse me, does that include the 10 consultants in the person-days?
11 MR. BOEHNERT:
Yes, that includes all in 12 attendance.
/~~ s 13 MR. MICHELSON:
So our meeting today is a eight-14 person-day meeting, for instance?
15 MR. ROEHNERT:
Yes, sir.
16 MR. WARD:
And this also includes -- well, I am 17 sorry, Paul, to interrupt.
18 MR. BOEHNERT:
No, go ahead.
You had more to do 19 with this than I did.
20 MR. WARD:
Well, this also includes, or let's say 21 there is some potential for efficiencies, for example, if 22 we could hold back-to-back meetinos, it miqht be possible 23 to get, you know, more than three or work lonqer hours.
24 (Laughter.)
,- y I'
k 25 I hate to say that.
But I mean it is sort of a ACE. FEDERAL. REPORTERS, INC.
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-(m 3arysimons 1 rule of thumb.
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MR. MICHELSON:
I was just trying to get a feel 3
for it.
4 MR. WARD:
Yes.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
As I understood it, the person-day 6
is kind of the thing you start with.
7 MR. WARD:
Yes, that is right.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
These meetinas tend to run pretty 9
high on person-days.
10 MR. WARD:
But, on the other hand, we have really 11 kind of accounted for that.
These are sort of averages.
12 The ECCS Subcommittee in this area has traditionally been 13 larger, but that is kind of already around into the 14 average.
So I don't think there is any ---
15 MR. MICHELSON:
But, gee, even if you go to a 16 subcommittee where there is only a subcommittee chairman 17 and one member and the federal staff person, and al]
18 meetings are at least a three-person day meeting, aren't 19 they?
20 MR. CATTON:
That is before you start.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
Excuse me?
22 MR. CATTON:
That is before you start.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
That is before you start even.
24 MR. WARD:
Let's see, the person-days doesn't 25 include the staff.
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3arysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
It doesn' t include the staff 2
person attending the meeting?
3 MR. WARD:
No.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
I see.
Just the consultants and 5
the members.
6 MR. WARD:
Yes.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
8 MR. EBERSOLE:
I would like to ask a cuestion.
9 When I look down the list here and the time allocated to 10 each of the topics, I really see here two topics, thermal 11 hydraulic phenomena and decay heat removal systems, which 12 one way to look at them is all other topics lead eventually 13 into those topical areas, decay heat removal and thermal 14 hydraulics.
They all lead into that, and ve have a total 15 two of the decay heat removal meetinos and a total of three 16 of the thermal hydraulic meetings.
17 I don't know where you find the interface between 18 decay heat removal and thermal hydraulic phenomena, except 19 by some arbitrary definition like when you talk about 20 primary system failure and the consequential leakage of the 21 primary fluid and that defines the beginning of a the rma l 22 hydraulic phase or piece of work, which is probably one of 23 the least important sectors of work that we have, and yet 24 it dominates probably, I think in the pant it has been like 25 9/10ths of all research money.
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3arysimons 1 We have a funny imbalance here in the 2
consideration of the importance of the several subcommittee 3
topics and the amount of time we spend on them, and I don't 4
know how to justify that.
5 MR. WARD:
Well, let's see, Jesse, I guess I am 6
not sure.
I sort of didn't want to get into the position 7
of talking about how the committee is allotted the time.
8 MR. EBERSOLE:
I think we ought focus on the scope 9
of thermal hydraulics, Dave.
For instance, does it include 10 secondary hydraulics, secondary thermal hydraulics?
11 MR. WARD:
Well, remember, when we restructured 12 the subcommittees, a sort of a general pattern was to O)
(_
13 separate the technical phenomena issues from plant 14 eculpment issues, and I think that is the attempt that has 15 been made.
You know, to the extent you can draw a line, 16 the decay heat removal subcommittee is coing to concentrate 17 on plant ecuipment and the performance of the systems, the 18 operatino systems in the plants, and the thermal hydraulic 19 phenomena will concentrate on analysis and supportisa 20 research and that sort of thing.
21 MR. EBERSOLE:
Will it include, Dave, the 22 hypothesis that we progressively lose oculpment rather than 23 we have a defined size leak and perceive trouble down to 24 the loss of eculpment line rather than just the loss of 25 fluid line and work out some time relationships here so ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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karysimons 1 that we know in the thermal hydraulics context if we lose, 2
for instance, high-pressure injection or whatever supplies 3
we have of coolant and we progressively perceive the 4
trouble along that line rather than just a straight flat 5
out leakane, which is the way it presently is?
6 Do you know what I mean?
Like component cooling 7
is lost, both trains.
How much time have I got before I 8
start a core melt?
9 MR. MICHELSON:
You are talking about the thermal 10 hydraulics of degraded plant situations.
11 MR. ERERSOLE:
The thermal hydraulics of dearaded 12 systems.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
I would think that that might very 14 well be a part.
But let me, before we cet off too far, let 15 me tell you the reason for approachino it this way.
16 First of all, I just wanted to have this budqet in 17 front of you so you know how much money you have got.
18 MR. WARD:
To put some realism into our 19 discussion.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
Next I think we want to talk 21 about what are all the kinds of things we might like to 22 work on, and then, lastly, we were going to come back again 23 to the budget and say now here is the menu and here is the 24 amount of money and how much can I eat tonicht.
25 Rut this was iust to kind of put money in your ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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)arysimons 1 pocket here first so that you don' t go completely wild in 2
formulating the menu.
3 MR. TIEN:
I have one question, a clarification.
4 This new committee is just simply the change of name from 5
ECCS or actually it is some restructuring done by combining 6
some connittees' functions together?
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
There was also a fluid 8
dynamics subcommittee which is now incorporated in here.
9 MR. TIEN:
I see.
10 MR. BOEHNERT:
That is right.
It combines ECCS l
l 11 with fluid dynamics.
l 12 MR. MICHELSON:
That is why became thermal
)
13 hydraulics.
14 MR. WARD:
And then, in addition, any ECCS issues 15 that are primarily equipment related would probably be 16 assigned to the decay heat removal subcommittee rather than
)
17 this one.
That is sort of the division.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
This is a theoretical treatment of l
l 19 thermal hydraulics and not the treatment of the oculpment l
l 20 associated with it.
l 21 MR. BOEHNERT:
I have one other point I wanted to 22 make with regard to the allotment of meetings, and that is 23 there are two sets of contingency meetings set aside here.
24 If you will note the sixth line down from the top, there 25 are six subcommittees.
It says Chairman's continqency ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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under operating reactors, and there are 10 meetinos there.
2 Then at the very bottom, the last line, there is a total of 3
16 meetings also under contingency.
4 So there is the possibility, and I think good 5
possibility, that if we can make a good case to the 6
Cha i rm a n, we can get more than three meetings a year, 7
dependina on the necessity.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
We could make a good care for the 9
Chairman I think anyway.
10 (Laughter.)
11 MR. BOEHNERT:
The Chairman of the Subcommittee.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
But I think what we need to do now q(,)
13 to make a good case is we need to sit down and start I
14 h talking about what we ought to be doing.
15l MR. WARD:
Yes, but I still think we need to be 16 realistic about this.
In the recent past the fraction of 17 time that we have scent on what would be called 18 continqencies in this sort of layout has been larqer than 19 the 26 out of 87 given here.
So I don't think we should be 20 overoptimistic that some bio black of resources is going to 21 be available.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
I think we had somethinq modest in 23 mind, like one or two extra.
24 (Laughter.)
G i
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25 Also, we have to be realistic as a single ace-17EDERAI. IlliPORTERS, INC.
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2arysimons 1 subcommittee that is not realistic to hold more than about 2
five subcommittee meetings a year as a practical matter.
I 3
So if we do have more than three, it won't he many more 4
than three I think as a practical matter anyway.
5 MR. WARD:
How many have we been holding, you 6
know, let's say combined ECCS and Fluid Dynamics over the 7
last couple of years?
8 MR. BOEHNERT:
I would say it is around running 10 9
to 11 with a couple of DHRS subcommittee ---
10 MR. MICHELSON:
You can't count that.
11 MR. BOEHNERT:
Well, last year I had about 13 12 meeting, and I think 9 or 10 of those were ECCS.
13 MR. WARD:
Is that right.
14 MR. ROEHNERT:
Yes, about every other month or so 15 according to the meeting.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
Well you have got to have more 17 than every other month so get 10 in a year.
18 MR. WARD:
Some two-day ones I guess.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Oh, you mean the number of days of 20 meetings.
21 MR. BOEHNERT:
Yes.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
I was thinking in terms of numbers 23 of meetings.
Yes, it may very well be.
These meetinq 24 numbers, is that inferring days or meetinqs?
25 MR. WARD:
I quess we have sort of smeared over ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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( j.tarysimons 1 that.
It is as if they were single-day meetings.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
So really you are saying we are 3
allowed three days in FY-87 for this activity.
4 MR. WARD:
Yes.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
That does change it because a lot 6
of the meetings in the past have been at least a day and a 7
~ half.
8 MR. WARD:
Yes.
9 MR. SCHROCK:
From the standpoint of your travel 10 budget, it seems more e'fficient to have two-day meetinos.
11 MR. WARD:
Yes, it would be, and I would say that 12 two two-day meetings would be as reasonable as three, you 13 know, at about the same cost.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes. But at most then, if we talk 15 about two-day meetings, we are talking about two in 1987.
16 MR. CATTON:
What about preparation and report 17 writing time, is that included in this number?
18 MR. WARD:
Yes.
That is ground in here.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
I am not sure how that all gets 20 cround in.
21 MR. WARD:
No, it is.
We just arrived at meetings 22 as a parameter that we could use for controlling and 23 budgeting, and all the support and overhead for a meeting 24 is ---
25 MR. CATTON:
Support and overhead is where all ACE. FEDERAL. REPORTERS, INC.
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3arysimons 1 that other is.
2 MR. WARD:
Right, exactly.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, then if you have a meeting 4
in which at least two people are there, and you ought not 5
to have one without at least two people, that means two 6
days, two man-days to be at the meeting and I hope each of I
7 those persons spends about a day thinking about the meeting 8
before he goes or he shouldn't even be going.
You are 9
talking about four man-days, and your average allowance is 10 only five man-days for a meeting.
I 11 MR. CATTON:
But that is in a burden chayge.'
12 MR. WARD:
Right.
)
13 MR. MICHELSON:
Excuse me?
14 MR. CATTON:
That is included in an overhe'ad 15 charge against the meeting.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, but maybe I don' t understand 17 the 15 person days.
If that includes preparation ---
18 MR. CATTON:
No.
s 19 MR. MICHELSON:
It doesn't?
20 MR. CATTON:
This table doesn't.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
I misunderstood.
I thought you 22 said it did include preparation.
23 MR. CATTON:
No.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
It does not.
Oh, okay.
Then no O
25 problem, and I am sorry.
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,3arysimons 1 MR. SULLIVAN:
Dave, does the three days mean that s_/
2 you could have three one-day meeting?
3 MR. WARD:
Yes.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
Or one and a half two-day 5
meetings.
6 (Laughter.)
7 If you can figure that out, or one three-day 8
meeting.
9 MR. TIEN:
How this compare to previous years?
10 What is^the percentage cut?
11 MR. ROEHNERT:
We have been running, what, about 12 110 meetings a year?
.f~
(_
13 MR. WARD:
Yes.
The committee as a whole has been 14 running about 110.
So there is a bigger percentage cut in 15 this area than there is in the committee as a whole.
16 Specifically we'have been charged with taking on -- and I 17 don' t know if you wanted to talk this much about the 18 overall committee work, but I guess we could.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, not unless we have to.
20 MR. WARD:
We have been charged to take on waste 21 management and spend more time.
We have been charged to, 22 or the committee has decided to spend much more time in 23 reviewing operations.
24 So against an decreasing total allotment, we have C>')
's 25 these two other increases and that means some of the ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 16 harysimons 1 traditional areas have to be cut back at least 2
proportionally.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
I think we understand now what we 4
have in our pocketbook to work with.
5 So I would like to next open up the table to 6
discussing the kinds of items that we miaht possibly work 7
on during FY-87.
8 For that purpose, at the Palo Alto meeting Dave 9
had asked that you prepare a list of five items that you 10 thought were perhaps the most important items to be worked 11 on in the coming year, and I think we received back 12 responses from Dave, from Ivan Catton, Virgil I believe
()
13 sent a response and Theofanous and Tien, and if there are 14 others, I don't have them.
15 MR. CATTON:
Did we sent copies of these?
16 MR. MICHELSON:
Of the responses?
17 MR. CATTON:
Yes.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't know.
19 MR. WARD:
Yes, they were in the package, the last 20 item in the package.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
They had come by other means, but 22 we also got them in the package.
23 MR. WARD:
I didn't get Virgil's.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Was I wrong?
25 MR. ROEHNERT:
Let me get it.
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harysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
I thought it was in there.
2 MR. WARD:
Virgil's isn't in the copy.
3 MR. CATTON:
You didn't write one?
4 MR. MICHELSON:
Wait a minute, I may be wrong.
I 5
thought we got one from him.
6 MR. WARD:
I got a report from Virgil on the 7
meeting, but not with the five items.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
You are correct.
I stand 9
corrected.
10 MR. SCHROCK:
I forgot to do that, didn't I.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
So what I did is I went through 12 the responses I had and tried to put together a composite
()
13 lists, and of course in the process I added some items of 14 my own.
15 So what I would like to do now is go through and 16 start discussing this list, which I believe incorporates 17 everything that was suggested by individual members.
18 So let us see where we are at in terms of how we 19 should-view these items for activity next year.
l 20 The first item on my list, which is also included 21 in some of the others is the desirability of continuing to l
22 follow up on the B&W LOCA testing activity.
I think that 23 is primarily the MIST activity now.
l 24 As a top priority line item, the subcommittee 25 feels, I am sure, obligst+d to continue to follow this i
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6707 01 01 18 llhmarysimons1 activity to its appropriate completion, but I would like to 2
present that now as an item for discussion if anybody 3
wishes to have comments on it.
I 4
MR. TIEN:
I think before we get to that 5
individual item, I would like to see perhaps a discussion 6
of what the subcommittee would allocate because there are 4
7 only three meetings, 15 person-days.
What should be the 1
8 emphasis and whether we still go by like project oriented 9
types of presentations and reviews, which I find is not 10 very cost effective.
Perhaps we should go to more, you 11 know, cross-project types and especially emphasizinq more i
12 about the physical phenomena side instead of operational
. ()
13 aspects.
Perhaps we should spend more time on cross-t 14 project type of basic phenomena.
15 There are a few things we find that are still not j
16 very well understood, and perhaps we should emphasize on i
17 that instead of project driven types of things.
Now IST is i
18 a very good example, which is really a cross-discipline 19 facility type of project.
That I think is very good and 20 very important and in fact an excellent example for this 21 committee to pick up.
22 But, on the other hand, there are a lot of 23 individual project review types.
So perhaps we should i
24 scale down those activities and cover only the important 1
25 phenomena that may come out of many, many dif ferent ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 19 harysimons1 projects.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Some of the items on this list of 3
course are purely project oriented and others are more of 4
the type that you were suggesting.
5 I would suggest that we go through the list of 6
what has already been proposed and then open the table for 7
other suggestions.
By that time one will begin to see what 8
all is in the menu and perhaps see if you want to add to 9
it.
I think I understand where you are coming f rom, and I 10 believe some of it will be covered by some of the other 11 items that will be presented.
12 My own thoughts on the B&W business is I don't see
()
13 how we can drop out of it at this point in time 14 ef#!ectively.
I think we have an obligation to see it 15 through because I think the subcommittee has been one of 16 the principal advocates of the work and has some of the 17 strongest interest in it.
18 If we show a lack of interest, I suspect the staff 19 may show an even greater lack of interest and this can 20 reflect all the way through the program.
So I don' t think 21 it'is an item that we should be dropping off on unless the 22 subcommittee feels that that is what they want to do.
23 Keeping in mind, though, that it will require at least one 24 meeting in '87 and probably two, and there goes most of the 25 budget.
But let's think about it.
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harysimons 1 Maybe as we go through some of these items we also 2
ought to talk about well how much time do you think you 3
would have to spend in order to even pay any attention to 4
the item.
Some of these items, maybe one meeting would be 5
all you would have to spend and others would be more than 6
one.
I think this is an item where I would say it would 7
take a minimum of two meetings during the year.
8 From past experience, David, does that seem like a 9
reasonable estimate?
If we are to follow the work, do you 10 think we could do it with one meeting?
11 MR. WARD:
Let me ask one question of John.
I am 12 not sure what you are driving at, but I will try to answer 13 the question.
I guess I suggested at previous meetings 14 that we put together, or we each submit a list for 15 discussion of five items of greatest importance, and I l
16 guess maybe we weren' t very specific about what that 17 meant.
Was this issues that the industry should be 18 addressing or issues that the NRC should be addressing or 19 issues that the ACRS and this subcommittee should be 20 addressing?
And I guess I looked at those as all the same 21 thing,and of course, they aren' t necessarily, but that is 22 now I was looking at it.
23 But there might be a difference.
You know, if you 24 look at them as somewhat dif ferent, I think the committee 25 and this subcommittee has been influential in getting the ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-336-6 4 6
6707 01 01 21 llhmarysimons1 IST program started, but that doesn' t necessarily mean that 2
we have to -- it is started now and it is going, and I 3
think we are reasonably satisfied with how it is going.
4 MR. CATTON:
We didn't start it, but we certainly 5
had a lot to do with directing it and getting it onto the 6
proper path.
7 MR. WARD:
Well, the ACRS doesn't start anything.
8 I am saying I think we were influential in starting it 9
because I remember a letter that Milt Plesset drafted in 10 1980 just before he left the committee, which hit. pretty 11 hard at the need for something, and I think it maybe was 12 just supporting something that was already started
/
\\
! _)
13 somewhere else.
But all I am saying is the committee was 14 influential in getting it directed perhaps along the right 15 path.
16 But, you know, maybe it is not necessary for the 17 committee to follow it now in a lot of detail.
Maybe our 18 proper role is to try to get something else started or to 19 influence things to get some other program that is just as 20 much needed.
21 So even though the IST program, and I think, Carl, 22 you and I agree it is important that it be continued, it 23 doesn't necessarily mean that this subcommittee and the 24 ACRS has to spend a great deal of time on it unless we 25 perceive that it has geared off in a wrong direction or ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 22
(
2arysimons I unless we have got soma evidence of a major problem.
i I
2 MR. MICHELSONt Which is not the case as I see
.3 now.
d
{
4 MR. CATTON:
Well, but with the IST program they 5
are talking about the follow-on.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
That's right.
7 MR. CATTON:
I think this subcommittee should form 8
an opinion with respect to that follow-on and make that 9
statement, and we haven' t done that, but we keep hearing 10 about it.
I mean I have.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
There is some lack of interest on 12 the part of industry.on a follow-on program, as I 13 understand it.
14 MR. CATTON:
But there is strong interest on the 15 part of the NRR, and I am not sure but that it isn't 16 misplaced.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't know yet whether there is 18 a strong interest or not.
19 MR. CATTON:
There is.
They have stated it and 20 they have written a letter.
I think that is the kind of 21 thing that this subcommittee should address.
We should 22 give them some advice as to whether or not it is wise to do 23 that and to spend the money that way with the limited 24 resources, and we haven' t done it.
O 25 MR. WARD:
But that is different than following ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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( ):arysimons 1 the program that is going on in a lot of detail, the review 2
and results.
l 3
MR. CATTON:
Oh, the day-to-day following the 4
program I don' t agree with you. I don' t believe that is a
5 nece ssa ry.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
And we haven't been doing that.
7 MR. WARD:
Well, we don't have the resources.
8 MR. CATTON:
But there is a pivotal point coming, 9
and it is coming soon because they are going to have to I
L 10 start buying eculpment and doing things, and I think that 11 is the kind of thina that this subcommittee should address.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, but to address that would
()
i 13 require about one subcommittee meeting.
I 14 MR. CATTON:
Certainly.
We would have to hear the 15 reasons for doing it and decide whether or not we agree 16 with them.
t 17 MR. BOEHNERT:
Well, you will have your chance 18 probably on the 21st.
i 19 MR. CATTON:
I have already made up my mind.
l 20 (Laughter.)
21 MR. MICHELSON:
That doesn't count as one of the 22 three meetings either.
l 23 (Laughter.)
24 MR. TIEN:
I share very much Dave's point.
I j
25 don't think we should do any even follow-up.
In the last ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 24 m
[v;2arysimons 1 few meetings on IST, I think we still review a lot about 2
their progress and so.
I don' t know whether we should 3
spend a lot of time there.
I remember very vividly about 4
when we started on IST.
I think this committee played a 5
very strong role in that sense to map the direction in how 6
they should go and how the different facilities should 7
coordinate.
8 I think this is the type of thing that perhaps we 9
should more time.
I don't see that perhaps we need one 10 meeting to study IST.
Maybe for the follow-up we may have 11 to spend more time on that, but we can do this just as a 12 tag on in perhaps a few hours of a particular meeting just
(_)
13 to know that everything goes well and also what kind of 14 status is wrong.
I don't think we need to spend a lot of 15 time reviewing some of the computational results or 16 experimental results, unless there is some major problems 17 to be discussed.
18 I am thinking about again with the budgetary 19 environment how to maximize our effectiveness.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
What do the members of the 21 subcommittee think about -- how much time in '87 do you 22 think we need to put in on the B&W work?
Obviously we will 23 follow it.
Does that mean maybe an hour of information 24 along the way or maybe two hours, one at each of two 25 different meetings, but in terms of making a substitute ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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. _ ~
6707 01 01 25 lllmarysimons1 input into the program do you think we need to spend a 2
little time on it?
3 MR. WARD:
I think I sort of agree with what has 4
been said, that at some point maybe a fraction of a day 5
could be spent on gaining an appreciation for how the 6
program is going and what it is accomplishing, but then 7
trying to focus in on any major decisions that are going to 8
be made in the program at some time.
And I think that 9
major decision probably is is there going to be an ongoing 10 program.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Then I think if you believe that, 12 then we have to realistically say the equivalent of about l~ (
13 one meeting in '87 is going to be devoted to this subject.
1 14 Maybe it will be spent over three, but it will take that 15 much effort.
If you are going to get into Phase 2, and 16 there are real decision inputs no Phase 2, it is going some 17 hours1.967593e-4 days <br />0.00472 hours <br />2.810847e-5 weeks <br />6.4685e-6 months <br /> of discussion.
For budgetary purposes I will put 18 down ---
19 MR. CATTON:
It is going to be a major chunk of 20 RES's budget, and they are planning on what they are going 21 to do with it now, and I think we should enter into that.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
If we don' t enter into it, I think 23 they will perceive it as a loss of interest.
24 MR. CATTON:
Well, no, they are just going to go 4
i 25 and do it.
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 26
()2arysimons1 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes,-they'll do it, but they may 2
do cther things as well.
3 MR. CATTON:
As far as the program and the way it 4
is, going now, there are just a few things that at least I l
l 5
am kind of bothered with.
We keep running into these 6
things where they haven't properly built it into their 7
models.
The purpose of the whole program is to have a 8
capability for prediction.
If they are not going to carry 9
over some of these things into the modeling, then maybe we 10 ought to recommend the program be terminated now.
If it 11 doesn't get carried into the modeling that is going to be i
12 extrapolated to the full-sized system, what good is it?
(
13 And I don' t see the mechanism by which that is going to i
14 happen.
15 MR. EBERSOLE:
I would like to make an observation 16 here that already you say, oh, yes, I am going to make a 1
17 major part of this activity of this group the secondary i
18 phenomena, and notably B&W, which is different from the 19 others, because from the primary side they all look alike.
20 MR. CATTON:
Well, but you see, some of the things 21 are ---
22 MR. EBERSOLE:
I am talking about where the LOCA 23 is induced by failure of the heat sink on the secondary 24 side.
i l
25 MR. CATTON:
Okay.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-336-6646
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6707 01 01 27 llhmarysimons1 MR. EBERSOLE:
It is a driven LOCA and not one 2
that spontaneously occurs.
3 MR. SCHROCK:
I wonder if we couldn' t do more at 4
meetings if we somehow did a better job on our preparation, 5
and that might entail more screening of the stuff that 6
comes from the various sources and identification of issues 7
so that we could accomplish maybe in a half a day meeting 2
8 what was previously accomplished in a' day's meeting or even 9
more.
i 10 So often we sit and listen to absolute garbage 11 which ---
12 (Laughter.)
13 MR. MICHELSON:
That is what the subcommittee is 14 there for is to filter out the garbage for the full 15 committee.
I don' t know, are we going to set another 16 mechanism of filtering the garbage to the subcommittee?
I 17 don' t now how you would do it.
i 18 MR. SCHROCK:
Well, maybe we could just say why I
19 don' t you sit down.
We don' t want to hear you?
20 MR. MICHELSON:
Excuse me?
21 MR. SCHROCK:
Just tell them to sit down.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, we certainly can say well, 23 we think we have heard enough of this.
24 MR. CATTON:
For example, each time we have a i
25 subcommittee meeting we get this detailed description of 4
l i
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 28 llhnarysimons1 all the nuts and bolts and how high they were torqued.
We 2
don't need that.
I have every confidence in the fellow 3
from R&W that he is going to put it together the way he 4
said he was.
I have no problem with it if we would just 5
eliminate that.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
That is sometimes the problem.
7 MR. CATTON:
But there are areas that we ought to 8
stick with that ought to have maybe a little more 9
attention.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
But there isn' t any ef fective way 11 of knowing ahead of time what the speaker is really going 12 to say.
The subcommittee chairman tries to establish an q_,/
13, agenda and tries to tell them what the committee is 14 interested in, but what the staff will bring to us is 15 k unknown until they make their presentation.
16 Now we can certainly interrupt the presentation 17 and say this is not what we wanted to hear, but then you 18 may not hear anything that day, in which case you still 19 have lost one of your three days for the year.
So we 20 certainly want to try to establish the text of the meetina.
21 MR. CATTON:
If it is reduced to three days, I 22 think some of that is going to have to be done.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
We certainly will, but we 24 are the screening mechanism, as I understand.
We are
!\\j 25 really trying to bring the information to the f ull ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 29 i
i
()narysimonsI committee that they need to hear because they make the 2
decisions and we don't.
3 MR. WARD:
Yes, but the full committee certainly 4-4 needs the advice of any inpu t f rom the subcommittee, and
-[
5 particularly the subcommittee consultants.
I mean I quess 6
I have a little bit of trouble with too strong a 7
characterization of the subcommittee as just a screening I
8 thing.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, no, I think the suggestio'n 10 was we should do more screening somehow before it even gets 11 to the subcommittee.
12 MR. WARD:
Well, maybe there is some way>
13 MR. MICHELSON:
Basically there is a function of 14 the subcommittee to do the screening before it gets to the i
15 full committee.
16 MR. CATTON:
But we don' t have an opportunity.
17 Usually we wind up here listening.
Now Paul frequently 18 will ask us for our ideas.
I think we just have to be a 19 little bit more conscientious in getting them to him.
For 20 example, I am sure that with our knowledge of the MIST /IST 21 program as it sits right now, each one of us could probably 22 come up with one or two things in that program we feel that i
23 is very important and you just do away with the rest.
i 24 Paul could just say, hey, this is what we want to 1
25 hear about and we don' t want to hear about anything else.
I i
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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d t
6707 01 01 30
()aarysimons1 MR. MICHELSON:
I think that we sort of could 2
identify what we want ---
3 MR. CATTON:
And that would tighten on the meeting 3
4 a great deal.
1 5
MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
6 MR. SCHROCK:
Yes, it would.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Are.you also suggesting that you 8
would like to have time for the consultants to make i
9 presentaticns, because presumably their ideas are brought t
i j
10 in in the process of the meeting.
But if you think that 11 you haven' t been given ample opportunity for one reason or r
12 another, certainly we can easily put you on the agenda for
)
13 10 minutes, 20 minutes or whatever you think it really 14 needs.
15 MR. CATTON:
That has been done.
l 16 MR. WARD:
I think what we are saying is that with 1
i
[
17 fewer resources available we need to try to get into some 18 more -- we don't have the luxury of the mode of operating l
19 that we have had in the past.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
And if you know ahead of time what
(
21 is expected of you, then you will come prepared, and we can 22 more than eight hours out of our days.
c 23
( Laug hte r. )
24 MR. WARD:
Well, maybe we should try to more of a 25 mode of asking the experts, our consultants to review 1-i l
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 31 llhnarysimons 1
written material in advance and to give the subcommittee 2
summary reports.
That might be a more eff'cient way of 3
doing things.
4 MR. CATTON:
Most of us come to these meetings 5
with some kind of preparation, and I have some strong 6
opinions on this Appendix K business.
Probably what ought 7
to happen is if you ask me either to present it or to read 8
it at the beginnina and then direct the staff or whoever is 9
here to address those concerns if you feel they are 10 relevant.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
One mechanism for this which I 12 think was a good idea, and that is that the staff person I) 13 should call the consultant before each meeting and ask do 14 you want time on the agenda to cover a particular item.
15f That is one mechanism.
And if you ask for time, then how 16 much time do you want, and we will put that on the 17 schedule.
That allows you then an ample opportunity to 18 present somethina you need.
19 Now we can also turn it around and the 20 subcommittee chairman can ask you to make a presentation in 21 certain areas.
22 MR. CATTON:
To make an opening statement.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
And you need to know this ahead of 24 time and not on the morning of the meeting of course.
I
,7
(_)
25 think you should know ahead of time what is expected of ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Cmerage 800-33M446
)
.-,=
i
~6707 01'01 32
(~')Tmarysimons1 you.
2 MR. CATTON:
Paul will take care of that.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
We haven' t always used that 4
mechanism perhaps effectively.
In fact, we don' t 'use it a
5 too much.
Pretty much the consultants bring up whatever 6
cuestions they have or make whatever statements they have s
i 7
in the process of other presentations being made, and maybe i
8 that is not always the most effective way.
9 MR. TIEN:
I think the suggestion is a good one, 10 but I think probably you will have a lot of problems in 11 carrying that out because this will require a longer lead 12 time, and you also have to send the materials earlier to 4
()
13 the consultant and then they have to have time to prepare 14 to respond and so on.
I see mechanically some problems in 1
15 terms of how to combine elements of this and with a more 4
16 workable kind of procedure.
17 MR. WARD:
I think that is a good point.
What we 18 are going to hate to do is clamp down on the staff somehow 19 and ---
20 (Laughter.)
21 I mean too often we get trapped in an alleged 22 critical path.
r 23 MR. MICHELSON:
We get the material the day before j
24 the meeting.
()
25 MR. WARD:
We shouldn't be put in that position i
f ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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, _~.
6707 01 01 33
/imarysimons 1 and we ought to resist it.
V 2
MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
I have in the past 3
on some occasions just simply cancelled subcommittee 4
meetings because the material got there the day before the 5
meeting.
6 MR. CATTON:
But tomorrow's meeting is an 7
excellent example of that.
Right now the meeting is going 8
on where they are trying to decide whether the correlations 9
in the codes are any good or not.
The report is nowhere 10 near ready for our review, and yet tomorrow we are going to 11 hear about it.
In a way if tomorrow were one of these 12 three days it would be a waste.
(()
13 MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
14 MR. SCHROCK:
If they are up there talking about 15 it today, tomorrow they are going to come and tell us about 16 it?
17 (Laughter.)
18 MR. BOEHNERT:
One aspect of it.
They are going 19 to talk about this issue of whether or not there should be 20 specific correlations in the reg. quide or a more general 21 approach being taken.
They have set up a review group to 22 pass judgment on these correlations.
That is meeting l
l 23 yesterday and today, and they will discuss it with us f
24 tomorrow.
l 25 MR. MICHELSON:
But you have to also remember that l
l ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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I 6707 01 01 34 carysimons 1 there are times when they are lookinq for.our input to 2
their decision-making process, and you can't expect them to 3
get completed material a month in advance if they are 4
really ---
5 MR. ROEHNERT:
That is why they asked for this 6
. meeting at this time.
7 MR. CATTON:
But if they are asking for our input, 8
we should have somethino to cogitate on to form an opinion.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
But you won' t expect it three 10 weeks ahead of time.
11 MR. CATTON:
If they are asking for my opinion, I 12 would expect it at least a few days ahead of time.
O 13 MR. MICHELSON:
Then you have to also keep in mind 14 they have schedules to meet and they must have a job done 15 by a certain time.
If they have to throw in three-week 16 gaps in there, then that makes ---
17 MR. CATTON:
When it comes to Appendix K, they 18 have been working on it for so long, and the fact that the 19 meeting is tomorrow and we don't have the report is 20 unconscionable.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't disaqree with you in the 22 case of Appendix K.
23 MR. BOEHNERT:
It depends on which report you are 24 talking about.
You have the draft rule and reg. guide.
O 25 You don't have the technical basis document.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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1 i
6707 01 01 35 aarysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
That is right.
2 MR. BOEHNERT:
And that is important.
3 MR. CATTON:
But the technical basis is what is 4
allowing you to make.the change.
l 5
MR. BOEHNERT:
Absolutely.
6 MR. CATTON:
And we are supposed to listen 7
tomorrow without having this technical basis.
1 8
MR. MICHELSON:
What it amounts to is it is an J
9 information meeting.
I 10 MR. SCHROCK:
Is this thick think the draft rule 11 and reg. guide?
-12 MR. BOEHNERT:
Yes.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
But not the technical support i
i 14 document.
15 MR. BOEHNERT:
You don' t have the technical basis 16 document which is about 700 pages long as I understand it.
17 MR. SCHROCK:
And that is the important one.
18 MR. BOEHNERT:
Yes, that's right.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
So it is difficult to say ahead of 20 time that you will always have material three weeks before J
21 you need it, but I think as a generai rule we will have to 22 tighten up on our making sure that we get the in f o rma tion 23 well enough in advance so that you will have time to 24 prepare comments and indicate if you have problems.
O 25 MR. CATTON:
I think if it is a key issue and they ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 80 4 336-6646
l 6707 01 01 36 barysimons I want an input to it, then they ought to do planning a 2
little bit better.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
4 MR. CATTON:
They can't come and expect you to 5
form an opinion and do all these things in one or two 6
days.
You can't.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
That's right.
8 MR. SCHROCK:
Well, they can expect that, and they 9
have a long record of expected that.
10 (Laughter.)
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Having a limited budget, we sure 12 are goino to get a little bit nastier.
O 13 MR. CATTON:
Well, we have to be as eaually mule 14 headed as they are about these things.
15 MR. WARD:
There is a problem that I think the 16 ACRS has across the board with this, you know, do we enter F
17 into the process early or late or both.
And I guess the i
18 neat answer is you would like to do both, but maybe what is
+
19 happening is that we don' t have the resources in this area
.20 or a lot of other areas to do both.
So then what is best 21 to do?
If you enter in early, you can have perhaps some 22 beneficial influence, or you are more likely to have your 23 influence felt perhaps.
But on the other hand, you may be 24 wasting a lot of our resources because you are dealing with 7
l 25 stuf f that doesn' t really come out the other end of the I
i ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 Nat;onwide Coverage 800 336-6646
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6707 01 01 37
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\\--aarysimons 1 tube anyway.
4 2
MR. MICHELSON:
And when it does come out, then 3
you are expected to prepare a letter on it in many cases.
l 4
So you have got to have at least two meetings, one to hear 5
about it up at the head in and get your input in and 6
another to hear about it at the completion.
7 MR. CATTON:
If you just catch it at the 8
completion end, then you get this sort of shrug and say 9
well, what we can do ---
10 MR. WARD:
It is too late to do anything about it.
11 MR. CATTON:
And that is no good.
I think 12 sometimes I would just as soon not hear about it when it is 13 bad and you can do nothing about it.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
But again, we are going to have to 15 be very choosy with what we even deal with because you I
16 really need to deal with things twice, once in the advance i
17 stages of formulation and then the other when they are in 18 the final stages of production.
19 MR. CATTON:
That's right.
l 20 MR. MICHELSON:
If it is a substantive issue like 21 Appendix K and so forth, you really have to get two shots 22 at it.
And, again, you can't cover many subject areas if I
23 you think you have got two shots at it.
The shots may be 24 in different fiscal years, but we are talking about at
(
25 least one meeting then for that kind of purpose.
i ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 38 barysimons 1 MR. WARD:
Maybe that is part of the answer, that i
2 we can' t cover many subject areas and that we iust have to 3
severely prune the issues that we do, and of course that-is 4
one of the things you are trying to get at.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
That is what we are trying to get 6
at today is the various kinds of issues which I think could 7
come up in the thermal hydraulics area and whether or not 8
we even want to deal with them or consider for planning 9
purposes to deal with them.
10 so maybe we have beat the B&W around enough for 11 the moment.
My tentative observation from all of the i
12 discussion is that we really are wanting to follow the O
13 program now more from the viewpoint of information.
14 However, there will be certain key decision-making stages 15 wherein we want to have a more substantive input.
And in 16 considering all matters, it is going to consume the 17 equivalent of about one meeting in fiscal year '87.
18 The next subject on our list is the steam 19 generator overfill problem.
l 20 The first cuestion is of course ---
21 MR. CATTON:
Are we going to talk about Appendix K h
22 and what it is going to require?
23 MR. MICHELSON:
Eventually, although it isn't even 24 on this list because I thought it would be all resolved
-O 25 before '87, but maybe not.
s t
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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ar-6707 01 01 39 aarysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
I don' t know how you are going to do 2
that.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
I thought it would get fixed up by 4
the end of this ---
5 MR. BOEHNERT:
The staff is working to a schedule 6
to have -- in fact, they are looking for ACRS comment by in 7
July.
i 8
MR. CATTON:
Well, I understand that.
But if you 9
are talking about fiscal year '87, and an Appendix K rule 1i0 change as been made, you now have got Westinghouse who has 11 got a b;nch of plants out there tha t ---
i 12 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, we haven't discussed -- that I
13 is a subject area.
14 MR. CATTON:
To me it is Appendix K.
j 15 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
I'll put it down and we 16 will put it on the table later.
17 Let's go through the list of those things people i
18 have already brought up.
That wasn' t on anybody's list.
l 19 The next item that was on the list is steam I
20 generator overfill.
l 21 The first ouestion is what subcommittee within
{
22 ACRS has an interest in following it, and I believe that t
l 23 Paul looked into that and has cot a few words.
24 MR. BOEHNERT:
Last year Dave Okrent's Safety
(
i 25 Philosophy, Technolocy and Criteria Subcommittee dealt with 1
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6707 01 01 40 marysimons 1 this issue from the standpoint of overfill and possible 2
rupture of the steam lines from the load of the water if 3
you overfill the steam cenerators.
4 The committee wrote a letter in March of last year 5
expressing concern that the staff's review on a generic 6
basis was not going to be sufficient to address the 7
concerns the committee had.
8 The staff responded saying they were going to form 9
a new generic issue, and I think it is Title 67-3-1 or 10 something like that, and it was going to address all the 11 concerns related to steam generator overfill.
They were 12 going to revise the scope of this issue to take account of 13 ACRS concerns as expressed in our letter, and that is where 14 the matter sits right now.
15 MR. CATTON:
Which subcommittee?
16 MR. BOEHNERT:
Well it was handled initially 17 through Okrent's Safety Philosophy, Technology and Criteria 18 Subcommittee.
19 MR. WARD:
I quess it hasn' t really been assigned 20 to a subcommittee.
i 21 MR. BOEHNERT:
It has not.
That is where it 22 rested and that is where it is now.
)
23 MR. CATTON:
Because that includes pieces of j
24 eve ry th ing, doesn't it?
25 MR. WARD:
Yes.
4 i
a
{
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~n=,
6707 01 01 41 marysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
It involves basic phenomena, fluid 2
hydraulic phenomena and it certainly involves equipment to 3
some extent and so forth.
So it is one of those that it 4
just.wasn't clear what subcommittee it should go into.
Of 5
course, if Okrent will handle it, then we don' t have to 6
spend any time on it.
7 MR. CATTON:
But it is a thermal hydraulics issue.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
It is pretty heavily in that area 9
because it is steam, condensation, the water hammer 10 phenomena and so forth all associated with overfilling 11 steamlines.
So this subcommittee has to decide the way you 12 want to put it in their charter or are we sure that Okrent 13 will put it in his?
14 MR. CATTON:
In my view, Okrent ought to give up 15 one of his days to this subcommittee to address the thermal 16 hydraulic issues.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Well I am sure he won't do that.
18 I don't even know whether he has got any days.
Does he f
19 have any days?
20 (Laughter.)
21 I don' t know how he gets his days.
22 MR. WARD:
Where do we stand as f ar as i
23 understanding the risk potential of this accident sequence?
24 MR. MICHELSON:,From what I have heard of it so O
25 far, I am not sure we are at the point where we understand
\\
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l i
l m
4 6707 01 01 42
(
barysimons 1 the risk potential.
There are some speculations of what.lt
!,T 2
might be.
j 3
MR. BOEHNERT:
The staff response indicated that --
4 well, I'll read it.
It said:
"The risk resulting from 5
failure of a steamline by overfilling a steam generator 1
6 following a tube rupture was calculated in issue 67.3.1 and 7
found to be of minimal -- and they have got paring --
1 8
(eight man-rem per reactor)" -- close paren.
So they are 9
saying it is a minimal risk issue.
10 MR. CATTON:
That was the steam cenerator tube 11 ruptured and what would get set overboard.
l f
12 MR. BOEHNERT:
Apparently, yes.
O 13 MR. CATTON:
There was no consideration of the I
14 fact that if you have a core that was partially damaged, 15 nothing.
There was a very limited ---
16 MR. MICHELSON:
No water hammer ruptures of'the i
i
.17 piping or that sort of thing.
18 MR. CATTON:
That is right, nothing.
It was just i
19 a clean steam generator tube rupture and what is the dose 20 outside, and it then out they are right, it is small.
!j' 21 There was no ?r a!
,> ation of the increased danger position i-22 of the plant.
i 23 MR. MICHELSON:
So if you view it from that end of l
24 the spectrum, it looks like a non-problem.
O 25 MR. CATTON:
For just a plain steam generator tube ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, lNC.
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r..~.
j s
?
6707 01 01 43 arysimons 1
' rupture, that's right.
~?.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Now if you view it from the other i
3 dnd.of the spectrud wherein-the overfill initiates, for 4
instance, a failure of the auxiliary. feedwater turbine by 5
rupture because water comes= blasting down the pipe when 6
they open the generator to start the turbine, looking at it r
7 from that kind of a viewpoint, I don' t if any risk studies L
8 have been done.
I just don't know.
I haven't seen them 9
that I am sure they are that f ar along.
10 MR. CATTON:
Well, this is the Basdekas cuestion, 11 isn't it?
It is the cuestion he keeps raising.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
In a way, yes.
So whether or not
(
13 this subcommittee should get involved with it or we will i
14 just let Okrent do what he wants to on it.
It does involve 15 phenomena, but to get into it and really get a handle on it 16 would take a fair amount of time.
17 MR. CATTON:
Well, there are not a lot of numbers 18 floating around about what is the probability of the water f
19 hammer occurring given that you have steam generator 20 overfill, what are the differences between the different
.o 21 steam generators, what is the probability that it could 22 occur with one and not the other and what has happened in 23 the past.
24 The plant in Germany, or actually in Switzerland 25 that had the problem was a Westinghouse plant.
They i
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6707 01 01 44
/~)
\\s-.aarysimons 1 overfilled the steam generator and had a water hammer in 2
the steam line that caused cuite a bit of damage.
3 MR. WARD:
Well, obviously, there wasn't any 4
consecuence to the public in that event, but was it close?
4 l
5 I mean was there a little bit of variation in the scenario?
6 MR. CATTON:
It is difficult to find out.
I tried i
7 to find out throuch the foreign office, and I got a lot of i
~
8 double talk.
Then I was going to go and visit the plant, i.
9 but I never got there.
I couldn' t get the permission to go 1
10 soon enough.
So I really don't know.
The incident was in i
11 1969 I guess, '68 or '69.
So it is hard to tell.
I don' t i
12 know.
13 MR. WARD:
It seems to me this is more, at this 14 stage it is more of a systems cuestion than it is a thermal 15 hydraulic phenomena cuestion, unless the whole issue of i
16 whether there is risk or not hangs on some thermal 17 hydraulic phenomena involved, but I haven't heard-enough to 18 know that it does.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
It does I think hana to a certain f
20 amount on the cuestion of phenomena involved.
i 21 MR. CATTON:
I can give you some of the cuestions 22 that you need to address.
l 23 MR. WARD:
I am sure there are cuestions, but I i
24 mean it almost sounds ---
O 25 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, if the system hangs
'l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 45 barysimons1 together, you know ---
2 MR. CATTON:
If having a water hammer and using 3
the steamline doesn't create any safety issue, then 4
probably this whole thing ought to be forgotten and it 5
doesn't really matter.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
Sure.
7 MR. CATTON:
But,-you know, the B&W plants fill at 8
the top, and the cuestion is what kind of mixing process 9
occurs when the level rises up past where the feed ring is 10 and how much do you carry over into the steamline.
It only 11 has to be a few degrees subcooled.
So, depending on the 12 mixing process you may or may not have a problem.
13 The U tube steam generators are different in the 14 way they operate.
There it is main feed.
It is main feed 15 that is going to lead to this problem.
Well, apparently it 16 did one time.
So what is the probability.
I really don't 17 know, and I think the first step is somebody has to take a 18 look at the probability of these things occurring.
t 19 MR. WARD:
That is what I mean.
That why I think t
20 it is a systems cuestion, and what are the consequences of t
21 a chain of events leading to a consecuence.
l 22 MR. CATTON:
Well, the intermediate chain is a l
l 23 thermal hydraulics cuestion.
I guess you have to ask l
24 yourself what is the probability of the overfill I
25 occurring.
If you does and you have a steamline break as a ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationside Coverage 800-336-6M6
6707 01 01 46 marysimons 1 result of water hammer, what is the consequence.
And if 2
the answer to the last one is it is not very high, the you 3
can forget about it.
4 MR. WARD:
But the plants are designed to 5
accommodate a steamline break sup,posedly.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
Here is the kind of problem the 7
plant isn't designed to accommodate, for instance, and that 8
is if I get water in the main steamlines and I open the 9
auxiliary feedwater turbine steam admission valve, I draw 10 the water from the main steamlines into the auxiliary 11 feedwater steamline, and that is a cannon ball running down 12 the pipe and the first thing it hits will rupture because
\\-
13 it has got a full thousand pounds differential driving it, 14 or several hundred pounds.
15 MR. WARD:
Okay.
No, I understand that, but then a
16 l what happens?
t 17 MR. MICHELSON:
Now you rupture the pipe in the 18 vicinity of the auxiliary feedwater turbine, for instance.
19 In some plants the two electric driven are also in the same 20 room with the auxiliary driven, or if they aren't, they 21 aren't protected against a continuous blowdown, and now you 22 don' t have isolation valves left necessarily to isolate the 23 blowdown and you soon overpressurize that room and it blows 24 into the next room, which is where the electric power is
,s
(
)
- 8. /
25 located.
It becomes plant specific as to what is next.
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6707 01 01 47 barysimons-1 Now in the case of TVA, for instance, they 2
designed the auxiliary feedwater room such that if it did 3
rupture there and overpressurized the room, it blows out 4
through a panel to the outside.
5 Now a couple of other plants I have seen also have 6
that provision and other plants I have seen do not have 7
that provision.
So it becomes very plant specific.
But if 8
you get into that situation, it is now a rupture of some 9
portion of the main steamline and loss of all auxiliary 10 feedwater.
And now you have carry your scenario from there 11 to see well, what does that do.
Well, it depends also on 12 what else is in the neighborhood of this eculpment that is 13 getting steamed up now from the unisolated steamline 14 rupture and what ef fect does it have on the plant, and in 15 some cases I suspect it could get very interesting.
But 16 that is an eauipment kind of a search.
17 The thermal hydraulic phenomena comes into well, 18 what is the nature of the overfill, what happens if you do 19 accelerate slugs of liquid down a pipe and into valves and j
20 so forth and will that rupture the pipe, and that is a 21 thermal hydraulic ouestion.
So that is why it is a mixed i
22 bag.
r 23 And I haven' t seen anybody come up with a good 24 discussion of what happens when you overfill a steamline O
i 25 and then start the auxiliary feedwater turbine, which in l
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6707 01 01 48 (3
's itarysimons 1 some cases will come on automatically, the start will come 2
automatically, and in other cases the operator will do it 3
as an inadvertent action.
4 MR. CATTON:
I haven't seen any good numbers on 5
the probability of the overfill, and that is a cuestion 6
that the ACRS has been asking, at least that I know of, for 7
18 months ago or so with that first letter.
That was one 8
of the cuestions in it and it has never been answered.
And 9
the only answer I have seen is one that gives ridiculous 10 bottom lines, that site group at Pacific Northwest.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
It depends on whether you are 12 talking safety grade or not also.
The provisions for
/l k#
13 preventing overfill in some plants is not safety grade.
14 MR. CATTON:
Well, I quess in all the B&W plants 15 it is safety grade now supposedly or will be soon.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
Eventually will be, yes.
I think 17 they have all been asked to put safety grade level controls 18 in.
19 MR. CATTON:
Well, the last time I talked to them, 20 they all are in the process of putting it in.
So it will 21 all be safety grade.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Once it is safety grade, then the 23 probability of occurrence cucht to start to drop 24 significantly.
O 25 MR. CATTON:
You don't even know what it is that l
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6707 01 01:
49
'O
\\ aarysimons 1 is starting to drop.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
That is right.
3 MR. WARD:
It sure seems to me there are some 4
important questions here, and certainly there is a 5
possibility this could be a high risk sequence, but it just 6
doesn't seem to me that this subcommittee is uniouely 7
situated and qualified or interested or something.
8 MR. CATTON:
And there is no other, is there?
9 MR. WARD:
I am not sure.
10 MR. CATTON:
Well, I would think that some of this 11 might go into your Reactor Operations because these are, in i
12 my view, reactor operations cuestions.
i
.13 MR. WARD:
That is not what the Reactor Operations 14 Subcommittee has been doing though.
15 MR. EBERSOLE:
They have just been reporting 16 actual events.
17 MR. WARD:
They have been reviewing events and l
18 experience.
j 19 MR. EBERSOLE:
They are not dealing with the 20 hypothesis of events that haven't happened yet, except f rom 4
21 the standpoint of seeing the precursors.
22 MR. CATTON:
Well, from the standpoint of 23 precursors is where some of this could come.
1 24 MR. WARD:
But if we want to pass this off ---
0 l
25 MR. CATTON:
Who would you pass it off to?
h i
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(
aarysimons 1 MR. WARD:
What about the PRA Subcommittee?
}.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
It is not really a PRA problem 3
either.
If I understand that subcommittee, they are 4
dealing with actual PRAs and the formulation of PRA's.
5 MR. CATTON:
But this is a small piece of a PRA.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
It is a very small piece.
This is-7 eauipment related and it is thermal hydraulic related.
8 MR. CATTON:
Is it too detailed for PRA?
9 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, there is no doubt that you 10 can use PRA techniques, but does this sort of thing belong 11 in the PRA subcommittee as opposed to other subcommittees.
12 I would have thought that it belongs in Okrent's Safety
' ()
13 Philosophy, Technology and Criteria Subcommittee.
t 14 MR. CATTON:
How can this belong there.
This is i
15 not a philosophy cuestion, is it?
I 16 MR. MICHELSON:
Name a better home.
17 (Laughter.)
18 Suggest one.
i 19 MR. CATTON:
It might be that you just don' t have 20 the subcommittee here that should address these kinds of 21 things.
22 MR. WARD:
It could be, that's right.
23 MR. CATTON:
You know the cuestions that Jesse 24 raises all the time like will the valve open or won't it O
25 open, and it is a similar kind of question.
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6707 01 01 51
.narysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
Well we have got a committee for 2
valves.
3 MR. CATTON:
Well, maybe that committee ought to 4
broaden a little bit to include this kind of thing.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
We also have the Committee for 6
Auxiliary Equipment and it could be put there, too, but 7
again it doesn' t seem cuite to fit what I think is going to 8
be the charter for that subcommittee.
I t ha sn' t beer.
9 written yet.
10 MR. EBERSOLE:
Why is it we don't hear that in 11 view of the fact that it is possible in fossil plants, of 12 which we have scads, and yet I never have heard much about 13 it.
Is it that it simply stays in darkness?
14 f MR. MICHELSON:
About what, steam generator l
15 overfill?
16 MR. EBERSOLE:
Yes.
It is probably because they 17 all have big drums.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
Most of them are superheated 19 boilers and so forth, too.
20 MR. CATTON:
Well, a lot of the new ones are, and 21 also they are sunarcritical.
22 MR. EBERSOLE:
That is what a B&W plant is.
It is 23 a superheated boiler.
24 MR. SCHROCK:
How about instrumentation and
,~
\\
l 25 control?
Is that another iswie?
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+
6707101 01 52 O
$_ aarysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
Well, instrumentation and control 2
certainly ought to address the initiator.
l-3 MR. MICHELSON:
The solution-is instrumentation 4
and control.
i 5
MT. WARD:
That is where it was originally, I 6
guess, wasn't it?
7 MR. MICHELSON:
That is where the solution is.
8 MR. EBERSOLE:
Here is why we haven' t heard of an 9
actual event, you know.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
We have heard of overfill ---
11 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well, by the way, Palo Verde found 12 deficient hangers, and they can' t even hold the pipes up 13 without'any water in them.
14 MR. CATTON:
They can' t hold the pipes up without l
15 water?
i 16 MR. EBERSOLE:
Yes.
i 17 (Laughter.)
i
^
18 MR. EBERSOLE:
They found an engineering error in 19 the hanger design.
i 20 MR. MICHELSON:
Since the solution is supposed to 1
21 be in A-47, isn't it ---
22 MR. BOEHNERT:
Then they said they were going to 23 move it to this new issue 67.3.1.
i 24 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, but where will it be ---
I i
25 MR. BOEHNERT:
Well, it probably will be taken up ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 53 r^T
's23arysimons 1 through the Generic Issues Subcommittee.
That is how it 2
got passed off to I think Okrent's subcommittee.
It at 3
least came through there initially.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
How about the Generic Issues 5
Subcommittee, is it dealing just with playing around with 6
the list every six months?
7 MR. WARD:
Yes.
8 MR. BOEHNERT:
They have just been funneling and 9
directing and overseeing that thing.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
Well it isn' t much of an 11 instrumentation and control problem, although that is where 12 the solution will be.
It is straightforward.
The real not 13 so straightforward is will this thing really happen and, if 14 so, what will the scenarios be and have we adecuately 15 accommodated the risk involved with our I&C fix.
16 MR. EBERSOLE:
I think we have to ask, Carl, why 17 hasn't it happened.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I am not poino to try and 19 solve this problem.
I am just trying to figure out who is 20 going to work on it if we are not going to work on it.
If 21 we are to work on it, then it is roughly one of our three 22 days next year would be my quess as a minimum.
23 MR. CATTON:
We have only got two days left 24 because we have already decided that one is associated with 7gV 25 MIST.
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6707 01 01 54
(~)Jarysimons1 s-(Laughter.)
2 MR. MICHELSON:
And we are only on our second one 3
of the list of 12 items that I have here just to give you a 4
flavor of where we are headed.
5 MR. SULLIVAN:
Well, Carl, I think it is an 6
important problem and I haver ' t seen that it has been 7
properly addressed by anybody.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
I think that is probably a fair 9
appraisal.
It certainly hasn't been fully addressed.
10 MR. SULLIVAN:
If we could even make somebody look 11 at it hard to give us a presentation, that would be a plus.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Sometimes it is helpful just to k_)
13 make people think enough about the problems to come down 14 and talk to us, that is right.
It sometimes cets things to 15 happen.
16 MR. CATTON:
Maybe it ought to be broader than 17 steam generator overfill.
Maybe it ought to be steam 18 generator overfill and related secondary side items.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, the next item on my list, 20 which it is related to, is water hammer, and what do we 21 want to do about water hammer?
In a way it is related in 22 part to water hammer.
23 MR. CATTON:
Water hammer has suddenly become an 24 important question.
7-V 25 MR. MICHELSON:
It is a resolved safety issue.
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6707 01 01 55 marysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
I hear you.
2 (Laughter.)
3 But the staff is reconsidering it.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, I know.
5 MR. CATTON:
What occurred at San Onofre leads one 6
to all sorts of conclusions.
The staff has actually 7
started lookina further into it again.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, let's for a moment pass on 9
steam generator overfill and talk about water hammer.
What 10 does the subcommittee want to do on water hammer since that 11 is clearly ---
12 MR. EBERSOLE:
Before you drop steam generator I
13 overfill ---
l 14 1 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I am not dropping it.
I am 15 passing it for the moment and we are going to come back to 16 it because I want to know what the subcommittee wants to do 17 on water hammer.
18 MR. CATTON:
Water hammer enters everywhere, 19 valves, steamlines, everything.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
And it has been resolved, but it 21 is being rethought as I understand it.
22 MR. CATTON:
Yes, but the resolution was not 23 satisfactory.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
I know, but it is being
,\\
(
)
25 rethought.
Now if it is resurrected, I quess we have to ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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-6707 01 01 56
. ' f'T
' - s aarysimons 1 follow the water hammer work.
2 MR. CATTON:
The water hammer that is a result of j
3 valves. closing too fast and things like that I think, in my l
4 view, is a calculable event.
It is water hammer associated 5
with steam bubble collapse that we have to pay attention j
6 to.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
And that is part of what you get 8
into on steam generator overfill.
9 MR. CATTON:
Yes, and you also can apparently get l
10 into it if your check valves fail on the steam generators 11 and you lose the water in the upright and then you turn on 12 the pumps.
i (:)
13 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, one reasonable suggestion is i
14
-- well, first of all, does the subcommittee want to follow l
15 the water hammer work?
i 16 MR. SCHROCK:
I think we should if there is going i
17 to be some work, i
18 MR. CATTON:
You now, if there is no cavitation, 1.
19 you can calculate it.
You know how fast the valves close 20 and what kind of valves.
As soon as you have steam bubbles l
21 that form for one reason or another, then the calculation 22 becomes very difficult because if you assume the maximum j
23 you blow the pipe apart.
So you are caught and it is 4
i 24 another ---
(
25 MR. ERERSOLE:
That is a weird phenomenon.
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/~T (2:arysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
It is very interesting.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
And closely associated with what 3
we call water hammer is the presence of water slugging 4
within a piping system.
5 MR. EBERSOLE:
You know, at Guntersville Hydro 6
down there they have a 100 horsepower air compressor 7
feeding into the vortex of the pump.
They have found no 8
other way to suppress water cavitation from knocks.
9 MR. CATTON:
And that probably saves them 10 replacing the welds and everything else.
11 MR. EBERSOLE:
They have been running for 25 to 30 12 years that way.
It is just a brute force cure.
t 1
13 MR. CATTON:
I don't know where that would fall, 14 but you read the LERs and you find they are continually 15 grinding out the welds and replacing them because they just 16 don't design the inlets right.
Then you can call that a 17 flow vibration, but it isn't.
It is cavitation, cavitation 18 damage to the welds.
19 MR. ERERSOLE:
I have never seen any real 20 treatment of how that does this powerful damage it does.
21 MR. CATTON:
And even the utilities don' t care.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I think we are going to have 23 to get back to our subject though.
24 MR. CATTON:
Well, water hammer I think is an O~'
25 important issue.
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(
Aarysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I mean I don't want to solve 2
the water hammer problem here.
Then we wouldn't have 3
anything to work on.
4 (Laughter.)
5 I think what we want to decide is we are going to 6
work on water hammer as a part of this subcommittee 7
activity and, if we are, I think it would take 8
approximately one of our three meetings in the coming year 9
to work on water hammer.
10 I would suggest this.
If we work on water hammer 11 that we combine it with the steam generator overfill 12 problem as one in the same.
13 MR. EBERSOLE:
That sounds like a reasonable 14 combination.
I 15 MR. MICHELSON:
And also fluid induced vibration 16 and cavitation as all one in the same and devote one 17 meeting roughly to that, allocate one meeting to that.
I 18 MR. CATTON:
I guess the little bubbles from 19 cavitation fatique your welds and the big bubbles blow them 20 apart.
So in a way it is all part of the spectrum.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
And water slugging would also be a i
j 22 part of this same consideration.
23 MR. CATTON:
When you say water slugging, do you 24 mean water carried in the steam flow?
i 25 MR. MICHELSON:
Where you have a water front beinq ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 59 barysimons1 propelled by expanding steam behind it.
2 MR. CATTON:
Oh, okay.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
It is just a cannon ball going i
4 down a pipe perfectly formed and it will literally destroy Y
5 the pipe.
It evades more calculational tyne peaks also, 6
and that is the way to bust the pipe or break the-internals 7
out of a valve or bend them up.
8 MR. SULLIVAN:
As I remember the original water 9
hammer issue was mainly due to the ECC injection in the i
10 steam filled pipes.
And as I remember, they said that was 1
11 resolved, and I can' t remember, Paul.
Can you remember 12 why they said it was resolved?
! ~
13 MR. BOEHNERT:
No.
j 14 MR. CATTON:
They said it was resolved because the i
15 piping systems were designed to take the loads.
But since 16 that period Peter Grif fith's work has shown that you can' t i
17 say that.
And even the consults to the group that made 18 that resolution said that you had better not do that, but 19 they did it anyway.
l 20 MR. SULLIVAN:
Then I believe that the committee 21 asked them to look at operational transients in which you 22 could inject cold water into steam filled places, and they l
\\
l 23 said that they looked at it and it wasn't a problem.
There l
l 24 was no explanation at all of how they did it, what the O
25 results were or how they evaluated the transients.
ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347 3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-3364M6 i
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(-.marysimons 1 As I remember, we recommended that they go back 1
2 and look at it and nothlng every happened.
So I think 3
there are several issues in water hammer.
One is the 4
phenomenon itself and how do you model those phenomena.
5 That is important if you are saying that you can have ECC 6
injection into steam filed pipes to make sure the pipes 7
don't break.
8 Then there is the theory of going back and looking 9
through the transients and making sure that you can inject 10 cold water into pipes that are steam filled, and that to me 11 hasn't been resolved.
12 Then it is the point of things like steam p) t
13 generator overfill and the operational transients that have 14 occurred already.
So that it is probably a fairly large 15 issue if somebody wants to do it reasonably correctly.
It 16 is probably two days.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Other practical areas where it is 18 happening repeatedly is, for instanco, with the IIPCI and 19 RCIC, which 40 back in some cases into the main feedwater 20 line and those check valves are Icaking a little bit and 21 hot water is getting back into these other lines forming 22 steam voids and then they turn RCIC on with a cold water 23 injection and it hits that pipe and low and behold it bends 24 the supports and breaks the snubbers and things of this O
25 sort which so f ar hasn' t ruptured the pipe per se, but it ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347-1700 Nationwide roverage 80tk33MM6
6707 01 01 61 O(_ ;. a ry s imons 1 is a practical problem that still evades solution.
2 MR. CATTON:
You know, the TMI incident with the 3
water hammer, it wasn' t that the water hammer itself 4
damaged anything, but that it ripped all the controls loose 5
in the valves, and that was not a consideration in the 6
staff position.
They did not look at that at all.
7 As a matter of fact, 2ircus, when he made his 8
presentation was unaware of the TMI ---
9 MR. MICHELSON:
It was also a loss of instrument 10 air because it rioped the instrument line loose from the 11 air line ---
12 MR. CATTON:
Right, and then you can' t control the 13 system, and it wasn't that anything had broken, but you 14 lost control of your valves.
l 15 MR. MICHELSON:
You lost control of other systems, 16 too, because of the loss of air.
17 MR. CATTON:
And that was not part of their 18 assessment.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, for the moment in order to 20 proceed with all the other items that we have to discuss, 21 I'll assume that we might want to spend the equivalent of 22 about meeting on this subject in the coming year.
23 MR. CATTON:
So we are down to one meeting left.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, we will have many more here O
25 and we will have to go back and sort again.
ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347 37w Nationside Coverage 800-336-(446
t 6707 01 01 62 arysimons 1 MR. SCHROCK:
We are asking for more meetings 2
already.
3 MR. SULLIVAN:
Maybe after we cet through with 4
this I would like to see us either get a much loftier 5
approach to things and look for resolution of issues or 6
either figure some way that we can force this staff to 7
consider resolution.
And I don't see that that is 8
occurring in a lot of places.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
Are you thinking now of water 10 hammer specifically?
11 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes.
12 MR. EBERSOLE:
How would you like to see a
'-')
13 d resolution characterized of what it really means, because 14 all too often it doesn't mean anything?
15 4 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes, and I think that this i
16 committee ought to, you know, when we take an issue on that 17 we try to address what resolution is.
18 l MR. MICHELSON:
I don' t disagree.
We will see 19 what happens.
20 MR. EBERSOLE:
We probably ought to go back and 21 recharacterize all of the so-called resolutions.
22 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
The next item on the list again 24 cominq from various members, and I am just trying to act as 25 the custodian, is the subiect of the thermal hydraulic ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage so-33(r(4M
6707 01 01 63 m barysimons 1 basis for emergency operating procedures.
2 We have these various emergency operating 3
procedures and there is more than one member and consultant 4
that has questioned whether or not the procedure is 5
following proper steps that would be substantiated by the 6
thermal hydraulic analysis.
7 We really haven't pursued this subject as a 8
subject, and the question is should we pursue it as one of 9
our items.
10 MR. CATTON:
I put that down, and I don' t know 11 who, I guess you did, too, Dave.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Others have as well.
13 MR. CATTON:
One of the reasons I put that down is 14 having followed this a little bit, at the initial stages 15 the people in NRR who were f amiliar with thermal hydraulics 16 were involved.
Then once they had sort of laid down what 17 they thought the EOP should drive somebody to do, they 18 became divorced from it and it wound up totally in the 19 hands of others, and these others are human factors people 20 who have no real appreciation of the thermal hydraulic 21 side.
That has happened some time ago.
i l
22 If you ask now one of the people who is from the i
23 thermal hydraulic side, gee, what happened to this 24 particular EOP, he says well, you know, it is not my O
25 responsibility any more.
It is over there.
There is i
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 8%33MM6
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s 3arysimons 1 nobody any more who is bridging this gap, and I think it is 2
an important gap.
3 MR. EBERSOLE:
That is a standard translational 4
phenomenon.
5 MR. CATTON:
Well, but I think this is one that is 6
important, that somehow somebody has to stand with their 7
foot in both camps.
8 MR. EBERSOLE:
In the last full committee meeting 9
in the operations area they looked at six of these SPDS's, 10 these damn things that NRC made them put on at TMI-2.
They 11 they range in cost from a million to $3 million apiece, and 12 the most expensive are the least effective. By and large O
13 they have little, if any, trust in any of them, and at 14 most plants the operators won't even use it.
There is a 15 very dismal view taken in conjunction with this state of 16 the SPDSs and the associated state of EOP's.
So there is a 17 new investigative effort set up to look at thir whole 18 integrated picture of the SPDS's.
19 MR. MICilELSON:
But that is a mechanics problem.
20 That is a mechanics that doesn' t work, but this is a little 21 deeper than the mechanics.
22 MR. CATTON:
This is another part of it though.
23 If you don't somehow put together the training you are 24 going to give your operators to understand the thermal 25 hydraulic processes, how the EOP's relate to them and show ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347 3700 Natson*ide Coverage M433MM6
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(,2.arysimons 1 this person who this thing goes together, he will have no 2
confidence.
You have to build the tripod for him to stand 3
on.
4 MR. EBERSOLE:
He has got to know what he is 5
doina, Carl, or you are back at TMI-2.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, I appreciate that.
7 MR. CATTON:
And it is a multifaceted thing.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
Now is this something that 9
the subcommittee should be involved in?
There are only two 10 choices on this one, either the Thermal Hydraulics 11 Subcommittee or the Subcommittee on Emergency Operating 12 Procedures, and it wasn't intended for the latter to get 13 into such detailed mechanics.
As I would envision it at 14 least, it was looking more at the emergency operating 15 procedures in terms of how they fit together with each 16 other and so forth, as opposed to going into the details of 17 the thermal hydraulics related to a particular proceduro.
18 MR. CATTON:
Well, I am not sure that the thermal 19 hydraulics is all that heavy.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
But hopefully it is heavier than 21 the basis for our ECCS.
22 MR. CATTON:
But it certainly needs to be a piece 23 that is not forgotten, and I iust get the feeling now that 24 it is.
When you talk to the people who are responsible for O
25 going out and looking at the EOP's, they are a bunch of ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347 3700 Nationwide Cmcrage mn31MM6
6707 01 01 66 O( aarysimons 1 psychologists or human factors people, and I don't think 2
they bridge the gap.
That may be a false perception, but 3
at least it is one that I have gotten.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
What does the emergency operating 5
procedures come to?
That is not listed as an item here.
6 MR. WARD:
Yes, it is, Carl, the fifth one down 7
from the top, plant operating procedures.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Oh, the plant operating 9
procedures.
Okay.
It is allocated two meetings for the 10 year.
I guess it is not inconceivable that that could be 11 put there, except th a t ---
12 MR. WARD:
It seems reasonable to me it could, and 13 I think sort of the idea of that committee I think is to 14 bridge the gap that Ivan is talking about.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
We will just put it in there.
How 16 is that?
17 (Laughter.)
18 MR. WARD:
But there has to be a strong, you know, 19 thermal hydraulic input to that review.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
That subcommittee hasn't held a 21 meeting yet.
So we have to ask its members, but some of 22 them are here.
But I think that would be the way we should 23 go on that one.
24 MR. WARD:
I think so.
25 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
I think I have the sense of r
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347 3700 Nationwidc Coserage 8t433MM4
6707 01 01 67 Os (sjaarysimons 1 the subcommittee.
2 The next item is very closely related to this, and 3
that is this pressurized thermal shock business.
It was 4
suggested that there is a great deal of thermal hydraulic 5
basis for a portion of that and not just a materials basis, 6
and whether or not this subcommittee should get into that 7
thermal hydraulic basis for pressurized thermal shock.
8 I think, first, I asked Paul to talk to Dr.
9 Shewmon to find out what his interest was since he is the 10 other half of this question.
11 MR. BOEHNERT:
I spoke with Paul Shewmon yesterday 12 about this.
Paul was quite succinct and said that he felt 13 that the rule had sufficient conservatism in it that we 14 really didn't need any more work on this.
He said he had 15 not objection to our subcommittee pursuing further issues 16 we saw in this area, but he felt overall that there was 17 sufficient conservatism in the rule and there was not need 18 to follow on.
I 19 MR. EBERSOLE:
But I want to make an observation 20 about his feelings about that.
Every time he gets into 21 thermal hydraulics phenomena per se and away from l
22 metallurgy, he throws up his hands and turns his face and 23 looks the other way and doesn' t want to talk about it.
24 That is always the way he works.
C:)
i 25 MR. MICHELSON:
But he might be right in this f
ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 68 (harysimons1 case.
I don't know.
2 MR. EBERSOLE:
That may be, but that implies an 3
understanding of the thermal hydraulics area, which I don't 4
think he has got.
5 MR. CATTON:
I am a consultant to his subcommittee 6
on some of these things and I have taken a look at some of 7
the questions.
I can't judge the materials side of it, but 8
when I looked at the thermal hydraulics side, it is in poor 9
shape.
And the example that I gave in the report to the 10 committee was that you have your two advanced codes, and 11 your two advanced codes can come up with very different 12 answers and they give you very different probabilities of 13 failures in orders of magnitude.
14 Now is this important or isn't it important?
The 15 materials guy has to judge that.
16 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well, wait a minute.
He has to, 17 but he has to do it against some fairly well and hard 18 defined thermal hydraulics conditions, but I don't think 19 you are going to get that judgmental capacity out at all on i
20 the thermal hydraulics aspects.
I don't think he even
)
21 wants to think about it.
If you give him the boundary 22 conditions, he will go to work.
23 MR. WARD:
This discussion I am hearing seems to 24 be a throw back to six months ago.
We sat in here, and I O
25 am trying to look for my notes two or three months ago, and ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC, 202 347-3700 Nationwide Coverage M3EMA
6707 01 01 69
(
larysimons 1 we had a report from the staff, and I think in particular 2
your concerns, Iva'n ---
3 MR. CATTON:
My concerns were not answered by the 4
staff.
5 MR. WARD:
You really don't think they were?
6 MR. CATTON:
No.
7 MR. EBERSOLE:
They were pitched at the metallurgy 8
very hard.
9 MR. CATTON:
And I couldn't pull them away to get 10 onto the thermal hydraulics.
11 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well, they didn't want to get that 12 out on the table.
A
\\-)
13 MR. CATTON:
But, you see, it goes further than
- . 14 that.
The reason that they get into difficulty is that 15 they can't -- you know, it is a matter of whether you get 16 circulation or not.
And they can't calculate the thermal 17 center well in the steam generator under these 18 circumstances and they can't calculate the void fractions 19 very good on the primary side.
So you can't make a 20 decision as to whether you have the circulation or not.
21 MR. EBERSOLE:
Way back, Ivan, when we were first 22.
taking this.up, and it is particularly bad on the B&W l
23 plants, it was brushed into a corner by B&W saying, oh, 4
24 well, to hell with it all.
It is conductivity bounded and l
/~T V
25 you can lump it all in the conductivity aspects into the Acn-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347 3700 Nationwide Coverage Mn3346M6
- -.... - ~ _ _...
6707 01 01 70 7y(,)arysimons 1 metal so matter what the hell is on the surface.
2 MR. CATTON:
You can do that with the heat 3
transfer coefficient, and it turns out that if you look at 4
all of the information, you find that the heat transfer 5
coefficients in the downcomer are very high.
So further 6
study of the acat transfer coefficient is silly.
It is a 7
thousand or two thousand, it doesn't change anything.
If 8
it is 200, it pushes you way over on the safe side.
9 So I think you can forget that, but the difference 10 between no circulation and circulation is huge, and that is 11 not a heat transfer coefficient any more.
That is whether 12 or not you can calculate your void fractions right, and 13 they can't.
They can't get the void fraction right above 14 the quench front in the core, and the can't cet the void 15 fraction right in the hot leg, and they can't calculate the 16 thermal center correctly in the steam generator, and they 17 keep telling us they are going to work on it.
f 18 As a matter of fact, they told us right here that 19 Theofanous was going to solve the problem for them.
Now 20 Theofanous doesn't have a contract to look at that problem 21 and nobody is doing anything.
22 MR. EBERSOLE:
How could you bound it?
23 MR. CATTON:
When you bound it, you don't like the 24 answer you get., and that is no circulation, you see.
But I 25 haven't seen somebody bring that together.
If you say, 1
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347 3700 Natsonwide Cosenge Mn336-6646 L
5707 01 01 71
. 'r~h
/
t,3 rysimons 1 okay, you have no circulation and you get this ten to the f
2 four increase in the conditional failure probability, is 3
that good or bad.
That is something that I can't address
,4 because I don't know.
5 MR. EBERSOLE:
This is because you have a new 6
source of chilling ---
7 MR. CATTON:
Well, what you are doing is you are 8
putting the cold water into the stagnant surface ---
9 MR. EBERSOLE:
And you have to have a moving heat 10 sink to do it.
11 MR. CATTON:
If you have some flow through the 12 system it turns out that the rate that the water 13 temperature falls is slow enough that the transient is 14 gentle and you don't have a problem.
If you dump the cold 15 water in when this thing is stagnant, you get a pretty good 16 thermal shock, and the difference is, and I can't remember 17 the number, but it was ten to the three or ten to the four 18 difference in the conditional failure probability.
Now is 19 that important?
Well, the PRA people have to address that.
20 I took numbers I could find.
I took the numbers 21 from the guy at Pacific Northwest P&L for particular pieces 22 of of this and put it together and found that already they 23 were in violation of the rule and that they ought to be 24 doing heavy analysis on one of their plants.
25 MR. EBERSOLE:
You are saying high sudden flows ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 233MM
6707 01 01 72
(',Ts_ larysimons 1 are trouble, is that right?
2 MR. CATTON:
No.
No flow and turning on your 3
safety injection is trouble.
4 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well, that is what I mean, high 5
sudden flows after a stagnation.
6 MR. CATTON:
Yes.
The cold water runs down and 7
over the edge and cools the wall very quickly.
Now even 8
so, there is quite a bit of mixing with this process.
It 9
is not near as serious as Westinghouse made out when they 10 did their first analysis.
They just put the cold water 11 against the inner surface.
12 But you take the two advanced codes and they will
(~ ^
13 predict differently.
One says they get the natural 14 circulation, and the other one says they don't, and they 15 haven't resolved their fight and now it has just 16 disappeared.
17 MR. SULLIVAN:
Ivan, I don't know whether this 18 hurts or supports your argument, but Los Alamos is going to 19 fund them ---
20 MR. MICHELSON:
Can you speak a little louder?
21 MR. SULLIVAN:
Los Alamos is going to fund Theo to 22 investigate that.
So I don't know whether you would want 23 to review the results of that finding when it is available, 24 and we don't know how long it is going to take them to do p
25 it.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-336-6 4 6
6707 01 01 73 arysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
Well, I guess if I were to review it, 2
I would like to find out what he is going to do to resolve 3
it because it is a damned tough problem and I think it is 4
going to require certain kinds of experimental effort and 5
not a lot of fooling around with the code, which is I think 6
what was planned.
7 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes, that's right.
8 MR. CATTON:
We just don't have proper flow 9
regimes in these codes.
You would have to do major 10 reworking of pieces of the codes to address this question.
11 But, you see, this all ties into this Appendix K stuff we 12 are about to hear about.
If you read the rule on PTS, it 13 in essence is saying use the NRC blessed codes.
Well, if 14 the NRC blessed codes have these problems in them, where do 15 we resolve the issue?
16 It sort of says, gee, you ought to back up, and 17 when you are going to say it is okay for Appendix K, it had 18 better be okay for this, too, because that is where it is 19 going to be used.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
From the viewpoint of the 21 subcommittee's activities do you wish to get into this 22 question of the thermal hydraulics associated with PTS?
I l
l 23 MR. CATTON:
My own view is that I think we need l
l 24 to look at the code, and in the back of our mind have the
(~T f
25 kinds of requirements for the code that fits the issues we ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationside Coverage 800-336-6646
. _ ~.
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i i
6707 01 01 74
(
barysimons1 know about.
1 2
MR. MICHELSON:
We are talking in the I
3 neighborhood, I am sure, of at least a half of one meeting 4
devoted to this subject.
5 MR. CATTON:
If you could get through this in a 6
half of one meeting ---
7 MR. MICHELSON:
All right, then one meeting I i
8 guess is your estimate.
9 MR. CATTON:
If you look at these codes ---
t i
10 MR. MICHELSON:
Realistically we have already used l
j 11 up all of our money now and we haven't ---
4 12 MR. CATTON:
You are the Subcommittee Chairman and i.
13 you are going to have to make some judgments.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, yes, but it is going to be 1
15 hard to make some of these.
i 16 MR. CATTON:
Let me tell you about these codes.
17 They can't predict the void fraction, right, and the can't 18 predict the component pressure drops, right, as you go 19 around the loop.
Friction factors vary all over the place.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't want to go into all the-21 details today.
22 MR. CATTON: -The bottom line is the only thing i
(
23 they seem to predict is peak clad temperature for tall l
24 skinny facilities.
I think before you can make any
(
25 judgments about things like scalability that we need to l.
ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
l 202 347 3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-3E6646 l
6707 01 01 75
\\arysimonsI have a OA on these codes and we need to know what the hell 2
is-in them or at least tell them that they had better do 3
it.
4.
MR. MICHELSON:
That is a part of the Appendix K 5
comments.
6 MR. CATTON:
As a part of the numerical simulation i
7 of nuclear power plants period, of which Appendix K is just 8
a part.
9 MR. EBERSOLE:
Aren't the codes so rigged though 10 to point at at fuel cladding temperatures and that they are 11 really not oriented toward doing much of anything else?
12 MR. CATTON:
Well, see, that is part of it, and 13 for so long we have used Appendix K and peak clad 14 temperature as the figure of merit for the codes.
15 MR. EBERSOLE:
I don't know if there is anything 16 else.
17 MR. CATTON:
Yes, as an example of where it is 18 not, and you also are going to have to scale these codes a 19 long ways.
All these comparisons are made with tall skinny 20 devices, and they are different.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
I think we have heard enough of 22 the arguments for the moment.
How does the subcommittee 23 feel about PTS and the thermal hydraulic basis for it?
24 MR. EBERSOLE:
I think that we have to do
(:)
25 something.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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76 6707 01 01
(')
s,,larysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
And who is to do it?
I guess we 5
2 are the ---
3 MR. CATTON:
I think we should look at it ---
4 MR. MICHELSON:
Shewmon wont' touch it with a 10-5 foot pole.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. EBERSOLE:
Shewmon saws it off at the 8
metallurgy.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
So if it is to be done, I guess 10 this subcommittee will have to do it, and it is in the 11 neighborhood of at least one meeting in the coming year to 12 the total.
(k l 13 MR. CATTON:
Carl, we can incorporate it into the 14 Appendix K code part of it.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, Appendix K is all done by 16 next year according to the schedule.
17 MR. CATTON:
I don't know how you can say that.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
I am saying it because that is 19 what the schedule says for the moment.
Well, let's carry 20 it for the moment now and go on to some of the others.
21 MR. SCHROCK:
Carl, could I ask is the topic of 22 pursuit of the code development, is that one of the items 23 you have got?
24 MR. MICHELSON:
It wasn't suggested by anybody per
[h
'~'
25 se, but it certainly may be.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202 347-3700 Nationmide Coverage 800-336-6 4 6
- 6707 01 01 77 barysimons1 MR. SCHROCK:
I am sorry I neglected to send my 2
list, but I just wrote down four items and that was the 3
second one that I put down.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
What do you call that?
5 MR. SCHROCK:
Review of code assessment and 6
development.
You know, we have got all these arguments 7
over the years of the code assessment on the international 8
level and we are going to get all this great stuff from the 9
Japanese program and the European program and so forth, and 10 then the codes are going to be fixed and these 11 constituative equations are going to be okay after all.
12 I don't see it coming along, and I think -- you 13 know, especially given the quantity of money that has been 14 spent on code development to date, this comment that Ivan 15 just made is -- I couldn't agree with it more, and it is a 16 terrible commentary on the state of affairs given the 17 investment that has been made.
l 18 MR. MICHELSON:
And a part of Appendix K, of l
19 course, also in that, it is the measure of goodness now of 20 the models and so forth that are going to be used in the 21 future to meet the future Appendix K.
22 MR. SCHROCK:
Well, it relates to it certainly.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
I think it certainly ought to be 24 something that this subcommittee looks at.
25 MR. SCHROCK:
The trouble is Appendix K still is 1
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 78 1
(~%
(,larysimons 1 directed more to large ---
j 2
MR. MICHELSON:
Let's be realistic for a moment.
3 There are at least four vendors, and probably five or six 4
suppliers of these codes, because Exxon and same of these 5
others also produce their own.
What part of all of that 6
picture does this subcommittee wish to look at, keeping in 7
mind our very limited resources with which to look at it in 8
terms of time?
Considering our own package now that we 9
anticipate coming in the future, how do we want to approach 10 it?
Certainly not on a vendor-by-vendor basis, or you are 11 talking about a lot more time than I think we have.
So we 12 have to take a high-level cut somehow at this whole
(_)
13 question.
14 MR. CATTON:
I think when you consider that those 15 codes are used to simulate nuclear power plants, and they 16 are used as the basis of many of your transients and all 17 sorts of things, that maybe you ought to appeal to the 18 Chairman for a few more days to do that.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, that is what I was going to 20 just suggest, that maybe the Chairman ought to tell us what i
21 his views are on this particular question of how we would 22 get the resources -- if he thinks we ought to look at it, l
23 where are the resources coming from.
24 MR. SULLIVAN:
There are contingency meetings, fm l
25 MR. CATTON:
He has enough of them for us.
ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 79 (barysimons1 (Laughter.)
2 There is also rumor ---
3 MT WARD:
It is disappointing that after only 4
less than two hours we are saying already that we have to 5
dig into the contingencies.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. WARD:
That is lazy.
8 (Laughter.)
9 MR. SULLIVAN:
Carl, I didn't attend that meeting 10 in which the topics were asked for, but I wrote down 11 technical topics, and I also put code assessment in it.
12 But code models in terms of condensation, void distribution 13 and modeling of cold water injection and water hammer were 14 all under those technical topics.
That is probably one 15 meeting there.
16 MR. SCHROCK:
And that is really what I mean by 17 development.
I am not talking about new numerics l
l 18 development, but I am talking about the physical modeling.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, the modeling that goes into 20 it which can be fundamental to all vendors of course.
21 MR. SULLIVAN:
Right.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Is it a correct consensus of the 23 subcommittee that we really don't intend to get into the 24 individual submittals of the various vendors at a later 25 point in time to meet these new Appendix K requirements?
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 80
/~T
(,larysimons 1 If they want to come in and meet the new Appendix K and 2
make their submittals, do we even intend to look at those, 3
because those will be cranking in in '87?
4 MR. CATTON:
I think you should.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, you are talking about 6
approximately one meeting for each vendor.
7 MR. CATTON:
Well, look at what Westinghouse is 8
doing.
I took a brief look at that Bash or Park code or 9
whatever it is and it is antiquity, and they are doing 10 things that were done 10 years ago with RELAP IV, and they 11 are not doing them very much different and I don't think 12 they have any intention of making them much different.
And O,_
13 you know that that code can't handle things like the two-14 loop Westinghouse plant.
It can't handle any circumstances 15 where you have a multi-dimensional flow in the core.
It 16 just can't do it.
It cannot handle the two-dimensional 17 flow in the annulus.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
We can tackle that at a higher 19 level and at a higher plane in which we deal with this only 20 as a part of the larger problem.
21 MR. WARD:
But are you concerned about the -- I 22 mean I haven't heard anybody say that they are concerned f
23 about poor predictions of peak clad temperatures and large 24 break LOCA being a preeminent risk to the issue today.
Why G
~
25 the hell do we want to bother with following all this?
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( barysimons 1 Pressurized thermal shock, if there is some i
2 phenomenon there that really has potential for a major 3
accident that-we aren't recognizing because the codes don't 4
have the capability of calculating what is important to 5
that, I mean maybe that is something we ought to be looking 6
at with'the codes.
But just to make better calculations of 7
peak clad temperatures in large break LOCA, which we say 8
isn't very important anyway, what is the ---
l.
9 MR. CATTON:
I hope I didn't give you that 10 impression.
In my view, what I think you ought to do is 11 split off large break LOCA Appendix K from all the rest and a
12 tell them, you can use whatever you want.
We know there is I
13 a lot of conservatism and just not even consider it any 14 more.
15 MR. WARD:
What were you saying then?
16 MR. CATTON:
The other side of that ---
17 MR. WARD:
The submittals that he is talking about l
18 l are exactly that.
19 MR. CATTON:
If they come in right at the front j
20 end and they say this is the code we are going to use for 21 the large break LOCA period ---
f 22 MR. MICliELSON:
Then he is happy.
I 23 MR. CATTON:
--- this it is all right.
But if j
24 they come in and they say this is going to be our reactor
(
25 primary system simulation code, which we will also use for j
l l
l ACE-FEDERAL lREPORTERS,1NC.
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'(
iarysimons 1 Appendix K, then I am concerned.
2 MR. SULLIVAN:
It does bother me, Dave, that if 3
3 you said am I happy right now with the degree of 4
conservatism in the calculations, and do I want to review 5
all the submittals for ECC right now, I would say no, I 6
don't want to hear about any more of that stuff.
I 7
If you are going to change the rule, which is the 8
design base for a plant, and allow them to do other things, 9
and to subtract that margin down to some point as we give 10 them more and more flexibility, where do you want to stop?
f 11 I think that is a question, and it certainly is a part of 4
12 what we are reviewing tomorrow.
13 So it is a calculational capability to put margin 14 in a plant right now.
So if you are asking me, hey, look, 15 do I want to hear any more about that?
No, I don't.
But I 16 am interested in how the vendors end up meeting that i
17 arbitrary requirement that we are putting on.
i 18 You know, GE came in with their case and I think 19 the committee had a fair amount to say about it.
The other l.
20 PWR vendors haven't even come in, and they are the ones 21 with the'high density power.
If is just a question of, you 22 know, the models are one thing, but it is the way that you 23 end up designing the whole plant and the operation of that 24 plant is based on that one calculation.
O 25 So I think it is important that the committee look ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 83
-(barysimons1 at it in some degree.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Now we are talking about at least 3
four such sets of submittals, assuming that each vendor has 4
at least one customer that says yes, I want to leave old 5
Appendix K and go to new Appendix K, and there could be 6
more than four because some of the fuel suppliers also 7
would go through such a ritual if one of their customers 8
says I have changed ---
9 MR. CATTON:
The Westinghouse plants are looking 10 at five to ten percent that they can gain.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, and are we going to review 12 those submittals?
13 MR. CATTON:
And CE is marginal or B&W is 14 marginal.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
In my opinion, it would take in 16 the neighborhood of one meeting to review each submittal.
17 MR. CATTON:
Well, it took us a lot more than that 18 with GE.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I am trying to be very l
20 optimistic about how short we could do it.
21 MR. CATTON:
I can't think of how may submittals
[
22 we had, but I can think of at least four.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
It is just not possible for us to 24 do that.
25 MR. SULLIVAN:
Dave, do you feel like that?
14CE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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!,larysimons 1 MR. WARD:
Pardon?
2 MR. SULLIVAN:
Do you feel like that?
3 MR. WARD:
Yes, but, you know, I think the 4
committee just isn't going to have the resources to look at 5
them.
6 MR. EBERSOLE:
But, Dave, even if we don't, we 7
need to identify the fact that the problem is there.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Maybe this is a part of the list 9
we send to the Chairman that says here are all the things 10 we aren't going to do now that we don't have the money any 11 more.
12 MR. WARD:
I think every issue that has been 13 brought up we all agree, oh, my God, we can't give that 14 up.
Well, you know, that isn't going to work.
I think 15 what we need this group to do is to work through these 16 issues and then put some sort of priority on them.
I mean 17 if this was your money you were spending, which would you 18 put it on first.
19 MR. TIEN:
What is the possibility to get NRC to 20 spend some effort to coordinate this code ascessment 21 effort?
I think it is very important.
Right now there is 22 no coordination really for each one to develop their own 23 models, and many of them don't even really communicate with 24 each other to know there is a better physical model for one O
\\#
25 phenomenon and so on.
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6707 01 01 85 3 *arysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
They are proprietary though, and 2
you can't go ---
3 MR. CATTON:
Are you referring to the vendors or 4
to the NRC work?
5 MR. TIEN:
I was thinking of the NRC vendors.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
Oh, you mean the NRC review.
i 7
MR. TIEN:
Yes.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
That is supposedly being done.
i 9
MR. TIEN:
But can we put more pressure on them to 10 help them do more work instead of we going into all those?
11 MR. WARD:
But the fact that we are having to cut 12 down on work sort of mirrors what is going on in the NRC, 13 that they are having to cut down.
If they don't have the 14 resources and we don't have the resources to properly deal 15 with a new way of looking at Appendix K, maybe it shouldn't 16 even be attempted.
l 17 MR. MICHELSON:
That is a good suggestion.
18 MR. WARD:
Well, I don't know if it is a good 19 one.
I hate it.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I mean it is a good thought,.
21 let's put it that way.
22 MR. WARD:
You should either do these things or i
23 not do them.
i 24 MR. EBERSOLE:
But I think we should call out just 1
I 25 as importantly the things that we don't do as well as the l
t I
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l 6707 01 01 86 I
(harysimons1 things we do so the Commissioners have some idea of the 2
perspective that we are looking at.
4 3
MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
Maybe this is a part of that
-4 research letter this June that is going ---
5 MR. EBERSOLE:
By the way, let me ask something 6
Dave.
You made some very pertinent remarks about where do 7
we find some sort of a rationalization of something less 1
8 than a double ended guillotine break.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
That is a subject coming up later, 10 Jesse.
It is on the list.
I don't want to do it now.
If 11 you will wait a while, we are going to get to that new 12 design basis LOCA.
i 13 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well, we are in the middle of it 14 right now though to a degree.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, it is going to come.
16 Let's stop for a moment now.
There are two 17 groupings of work, one that deals with Appendix K, f
j 18 reviewing code assessments and looking at code models, but t
19 not from a vendor specifics so much as from a basic 20 principle view.
That work I think we agree ought to l
21 continue and that this committee certainly ought to look at i
22 that level; is that right?
i 23 MR. CATTON:
Would you say that again?
l 24 MR. MICHELSON:
Should the subcommittee look at O
25 reviewing code assessment and development from a i
i ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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~. _ _. _ -
6707 01 01 87 (barysimons1 fundamental viewpoint and not from a specific vendor 2
viewpoint and look at Appendix K, which is a fundamental or 3
generic document, and look at code models being used as a
{
4 generic subject, but not specifically the Westinghouse 5
work.
Okay, that is one package that I think we probably 6
believe we should continue on.
7 But the other package is should we be reviewing 8
specific vendor submittals for new Appendix K, and there I i
9 think the consensus seems to be that no, the committee
.l 10 simply doesn't have the resources to do it.
T 11 MR. CATTON:
Carl, wait a minute.
That may be the 12 committee's view, but I think the consultants' view is that 13 they ought to be reviewed.
4 I
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, yes, I think we have heard l
15 the consultants' view, and I am trying now to formulate the 16 subcommittee's recommendations on each of ---
17 MR. SCHROCK:
They ought to be reviewed, but the 18 management is telling us that there aren't going to be 19 resources to do that.
20 MR. CATTON:
But it is our job to tell them what 21 we feel, and I think we feel that ---
22 MR. MICHELSON:
And we also I think feel that it 23 should be done, but it is simply unrealistic in view of the 24 resources available.
That is one area that I think we just C:)
25 can't get into because you are talking at least four and l
i l
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6707 01 01 88
(,larysimons 1 perhaps as many as six or seven sets of proposals for 2
Appendix K, depending on who is the buyer and the seller.
3 MR. CATTON:
Carl, one thing that the committee 4
ought to think about is when Westinghouse comes in with 5
calculations based on their new model to increase the power 6
at some plant five to ten percent, what are you going to 7
do.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
We aren't going to be prepared.
9 MR. CATTON:
Well, I think you ought to say that 10 in your letter, 11 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
I think we have to.
12 MR. CATTON:
Now I don't think there is a problem
'/
13 with B&W or CE, but I understand GE is going to push a 14 little more.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't know what any of the 16 vendors may do in terms of pushing ---
17 MR. CATTON:
Well, CE and B&W I guess according to 18 calculations at least, when you compare Appendix K with 19 best estimate you get about the same answer, and it has to 20 do with loops and so forth, whereas Westinghouse has 21 margins and so does GE.
22 MR. SCHROCK:
Five percent or more for GE ---
23 MR. CATTON:
I heard 10 percent from Westinghouse, 24 and how they are saying approximately five percent, but I
(-
25 suspect the push will be for 10 instead of the five.
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x 6707 01 01 89 E(3_Aarysimons 1 MR. WARD:
Westinghouse is going to propose 2
something, and they are a responsible and technically 3
competent organization, the staff is going to review it and 4
they are going to have fewer resources to review it with, 5
but is there some particular reason why you zero in on this 6
issue as something that the ACRS needs to look over the 7
shoulder?
8 There are all sorts of things going on out there 9
in the industry that the vendors and the licensees are 10 doing and that the staff is doing, and the ACRS isn't 11 looking over the shoulders on all but a fraction of_these, 12 a small fraction of these.
Why is this one being singled 7
C j
13 out?
14 MR. CATTON:
Let me try to answer the question at 15 least from my view first.
Gee, I don't know.
I have been 16 involved with this for 12 years I think, and I have watched 17 what happens.
i 18 i You know, I have watched Westinghouse come in with l
l 19 their EM codes, and the EC codes are a disaster.
It is all 20 right as long as it is Appendix K and large break LOCA, 21 because I think we have all become convinced, and I don't 22 think there is any proof of the amount of margin, but we 23 have all looked at LOFT and other tests that show us there 1
24 is a huge amount of margin.
They are coming in with 12, 13
(
25 and 14 hundred Fahrenheit.
I mean that is 700 degrees away ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationside Coverage 800-336-6646
l 6707 01 01 90 2arysimons 1 from a magic number of 2,200.
Nobody has any real concern 2
about that.
3 But that now is not where the risk is.
The risk 4
is in the small break LOCA and the various kinds of things 5
that can occur.
The things that are important to that are 6
different.
We don't have a rapid blowdown where almost any 7
kind of analysis gives you reasonable results any more.
We 8
have this slow process.
We have codes that were written 9
for something else and they are not adequate to handle some 10 of these kinds of problems.
11 You can't, for example, do a calculation that 12 gives you a good estimate of the inventory you have in the (3
-L/
13 system.
Now you can argue that maybe that is not 34 important.
Well, that is a different kind of argument.
- 1. 5 But if you are going to use calculational tools to argue 16 for or against doing something to that plant and you 17 include all these other transients and the small break LOCA l
18 and everything else in it, then I think you are going to 19 have to look at this modeling, particularly if it leads to
+
20 increasing power.
I think you are going to have to do it.
21 Either that or you are going to have to say I flat don't 22 know what the change is and I don't know what it is going 23 to do to the risk.
1
,j 24 MR. SULLIVAN:
Dave, as far as I am concerned, 25 when Appendix K was first started, as Ivan said, we ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
f 202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-33(>6646
~ - - -, _
6707 01 01 91 (O_2arysimons 1 reviewed the ECC codes and the EM codes to death.
And now 2
we are coming into a modification of Appendix K that 3
greatly changes that whole structure, the way they do the 4
calculations, how they factor uncertainty into those 5
calculations and how they make all of those basic l
6 judgments.
And the codes themselves are drastically i
7 changing.
8 In Westinghouse's case they are going to a brand 1
9 new code to them, the the TRAK COVR Code.
So how they view 10 that code and how they use it and the confidence that they i
11 have in the calculations, not only for the large break LOCA i
12 but, as Ivan said, for the small break LOCA, and they are 13 changing the whole margin that a plant design has in it h
14 based on those codes.
I 15 MR. WARD:
But do you have some particular reason 16 to believe that they can't do that competently?
?
17 MR. SULLIVAN:
I am saying that somebody ought to 18 spend some time reviewing that ---
19 MR. WARD:
But the staff is doing that.
20 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes, and I believe that the ACRS 21 should do it also because of the effects that it could have l
22 in things like small break LOCAs, and what you are doing is
(
23 changing the power density that you have when you started 24 into a small break LOCA and operational transients.
O 25 So I think it is a much bigger review than just l
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 92 harysimons1 looking at the large break LOCA.
If that was it,-then I 2
think I would say okay, if they are not taking all the 3
margin out I am satisfied.
But the effects of what they 4
are proposing to do is fairly large.
I am not saying it is 5
wrong, but I am just saying that it ought to be reviewed.
6 MR. CATTON:
Dave, let me give you an example of 7
the kind of thing that happens.
There were calculations 8
made for I think it is TMI Unit 1, and the calculations 9
showed that during a small break during the refluxing 10 period that the core was covered.
l 11 Well along comes some Italians as part of this i
12 ICAP program and they take a look at the friction factors i
13 and say, gee, the numbers that you are using are nonsense.
14 So they fix them.
The core is not covered.
15 Now if you think the small break is important and i
16 partially uncovery of the core is important, then you had 17 better take a look at these codes.
They are filled with 18 correlations and we don't even know what they are.
19 They have something called a six-pack 20 correlation.
When you don't know what to do, you get a few 21 guys around with a six-pack of beer and you drink it and i
22 you discuss it and you come up wi th a correlation.
It is 23 probably good enough to get you to the next step, but it 24 needs a lot more work before it is acceptable, and that has O
25 not been done.
I like that six-pack correlation.
ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 93
(
larysimons'l MR. MICHELSON:
That is neat.
2 (Laughter.)
3 Well,_I am not sure that this is going to get us 4
much further.
l 5
MR. CATTON:
I was just trying to make sure you 6
had the flavor.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
I personally feel that you are 8
right.
However, it is totally unrealistic to get into this 9
area simply because we do not have the resources with which 10 to do it.
11 MR. CATTON:
But then you have to make a judgment.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, and now we could go into this 13 area and drop all other areas and maybe we would have it 14 and maybe we wouldn't have enough resources.
j 15 MR. CATTON:
I am of the inclination-that a lot of 16 these other things could be folded into this.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Now you are beginning to get to 18 where you are trying to make a three-day meeting out of a 19 one-day meeting and have three three-day meetings, and we r
l l
20 can't play games that way either.
21 MR. CATTON:
The water hammer question is one of 22 condensation and the steam generator overfill and mixing, 23 the PTS question, and the PTS question ties both to the l
24 core uncovery as well.
, O 25 MR. MICHELSON:
You might just say it is an ECCS l
i i
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 94 (y
(,Jarysimons 1 question and ---
2 MR. CATTON:
I didn't say that.
3 MP. MICHELSON:
--- and throw it all into one box.
4 MR. CATTON:
If you can't calculate the inventory 5
i your primary system throughout the loop properly, you are 6
not going to get to the PTS question and you are not going 7
to be able to assess whether the core is uncovered.
So you 8
can call it whichever one you want.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
Right now let me proceed, unless 10 the subcommittee disagrees, and I will proceed on the 11 assumption that approximately one meeting in '87 will be 12 devoted to this general subject of codes and so forth, but
(')i
\\-
13 that we would not get into the review of any new detailed 14 submittals under Appendix K simply because of the resource 15 limitations.
16 MR. CATTON:
Even though your consultants have 17 suggested ---
18 MR. MICHELSON:
Even though, and I will fully 19 recognize that they have.
20 MR. BOEHNERT:
I have noted it.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
It is so noted.
22 Let's proceed on to take a break.
23 (Recess.)
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Let's reconvene the meeting now.
(~h
\\-
25 The next subject that was suggested by one or more ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 95 i
(barysimons1 of the subcommittee members or consultants was that perhaps 2
we need to spend some time in this subcommittee thinking 3
about what a new design basis LOCA might look like instead 4
of the guillotine rupture, and maybe something more 5
realistic should be considered for future application.
So 6
that is the subject on the table and I would like to hear 7
any comments.
8 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well, I had written something down, 9
that we now know of myriads of ways to cause a core damage 10 up to the full melt condition besides large LOCAs, and I 11 think we also know that the probability of a large LOCA is 12 extremely low, at least we are moving in on that.
13 So why don't we approach this by arbitrarily 14 identifying something less than a large guillotine break 15 and simply by declaration, by edicts say that is the 16 largest direct loss-of-coolant rate we are going to name 17 and proceed from that point of view.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
I think for purposes of this 19 meeting what we want to decide is whether or not this is a 20 worthy subject.
21 MR. SCHROCK:
Isn't it a part of the Appendix K 22 idea?
23 MR. MICHELSON:
No.
It assumes the full double 24 ended rupture in the new Appendix K.
25 MR. SULLIVAN:
And still you have to do ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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6707 01 01 96
(_,larysimons 1 sensitivity studies.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
That could be, too, but you still 3
have to if your worse case is your highest temperature is 4
for the double ended rupture, then that is what you have to 5
consider.
6 MR. EBERSOLE:
But the roots of that are in the 7
days when it was thought that the large LOCA was the only 8
real thing that could ever happen to a reactor.
9 MR. SULLIVAN:
The thing that I would like to see, 10 if we were going to do this, is to explore a new design 11 base license amendment.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
What did you have in mind?
I eiean 13 what do you mean?
14 MR. SULLIVAN:
Going to a new approach like safety 15 goal, risk assessment, having the operational transients be 16 an accorded factor, going to more realistic scenarios and 17 considering multiple failures.
There are a lot of ways to 18 consider what is the design base, and I don't think anybody 19 has really sat down and thought about that.
It may not be 20 the ACRS's prerogative to ---
21 MR. MICHELSON:
I think this general subject, the 22 one we are talking about, is whether or not the 23 subcommittee should take as one of its objectives 24 consideration of a new design basis LOCA.
25 I think it is a worthy objective and clearly there ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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~
(_,harysimons 1 is an awful lot of money tied up in that double ended 2
rupture as opposed to lesser size breaks or perhaps a whole 3
new approach to how you evaluate what your design basis 4
should be.
There is a great amount of money involved not 5
only in present plant design but on future design, because 6
present plant design is subject to problems of modification 7
from time to time or problems where they have found the 8
pumps are quite big enough so they can't quite meet the old 9
Appendix K and because for the double ended rupture the 10 temperature is too high.
With a little smaller rupture 11 they could have then met their requirements fine.
12 MR. SULLIVAN:
I have felt like this for several 13 years, and as the years roll on I get stronger and stronger 14 in the way that I feel about it.
15 Go back and look at.what we, the NRC and the ACRS 16 has done to the nuclear industry.
Do you think that all of 17 the research that went into verifying the conservatism on a 18 design basis accident has really improved safety?
And a 19 lot of it is only to judge what that margin was.
We all 20 know that that transient is a hypothetical transient and 21 has it really improved plant safety?
22 And why has the government and the industry, 23 industry following suit after the government, put that much 24 money into a hypothetical accident?
One, was the design 25 base, and we wanted to push the plants closer and closer to ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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('s 1
(_)arysimons 1 the edge of that envelope.
So we forced the vendors to 2
follow suit in trying to push the analytical tools closer l
3 and closer to that edge.
i 4
I am not saying that it is all wrong, don't get me 5
wrong, because a lot of good work has come out of that that 6
gives us the capability to relook at that whole licensing 7
base.
Somebody really needs to do that, to see if we can 8
figure out a way to license plants and leave the 9
flexibility to actually make the plants safer.
10 You know, changing the pressure in the 11 accumulators from 600 to 650 or down to 400 or putting more 12 or less water in it by thousands of gallons, and not
(')
's/
13 gigantic changes, is all of that changing plant safety?
I 14 can't say that it is.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, hopefully changes weren't 16 made if it wasn't improving plant safety.
Now I am talking 17 about changes which you were suggesting as opposed to 18 original requirements.
19 MR. CATTON:
Well, Carl, you know we don't know 20 because this is all based on EM models which are some sort 21 of a fictitious physical space.
So we don't know what it 22 does.
l l
23 MR. SULLIVAN:
Like the combustion system has low-l 24 pressure accumulators, and I guess my gut feeling is that
(
maybe high-pressure accumulators are better, but I don't 25 i
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6707 01 01 99 (Jarysimons1 think anybody has really ever'gone and looked to see.
I 2
know which is better in licensing space without a doubt.
3 Going to low pressure is better and you throw away less 4
water.
But I am saying that somebody ought to take it on 5
to look at the licensing base and to make it more realistic
/
6 with what we know today and that technology that is 7
available to us today.
That has been developed out of the 8
years of study that we put into it.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
Is that what the new Appendix K 10 will do?
11 MR. CATTON:
Not necessarily.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Not necessarily, but that is one 13 of the avenues that a vendor can take and go in with a new 14 Appendix K submittal.
15 MR. CATTON:
I suspect that Westinghouse when it 16 tries for the five to ten percent will do that.
17 aMR. MICHELSON:
Yes, it will do whatever it can.
,j, MR. CATTON:
But if we haven't gone through a 18 p
i 19 review of their modeling or what they are doing, we are i
20 going to be in the same position as before.
21 MR. WARD:
Well, that new approach is going to do 1
22 that, except that it is still going to have the same design
+
?
23 basis of the double ended guillotine.
24
-' MR. MICHELSON:
It,will, still have to have the O
25 same design basis.
)
3 ACE-FEDERAtt REPORTERS, INC.
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()2arysimons1 MR. WARD:
What Harold is suggesting is something 2
beyond that.
3 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes.
4 MR. CATTON:
It will include all of the ones that 5
have risk significance.
6 MR. WARD:
And take a risk perspective on it.
I 7
don't know how it can be done either.
That is why it has 8
to be ---
9 MR. CATTON:
Certainly it would have to be best 10 estimate.
11 MR. WARD:
But the support which you are.saying, 12 when we heard Duke in here several weeks ago talking about 13 how they manage the'UHI system, and I think they said that 14 they tune the accumulator set points to EM calculations.
I 15 MR. CATTON:
That's right.
16 MR. WARD:
Well, you know, that strikes me as a 17 terrible legacy.
18 MR. SCHROCK:
In fact, they are going to change 19 the set points for the removal of UHI.
20-MR. CATTON:
They are going to turn it off.
21 MR. SCHROCK:
They are going to lower the pressure i'
22 for the same reason that Harold said.
23 MR. CATTON:
So UHI never got a really good test 24 of its usefulness even for the large break as a result of 1-G i
\\#
25 Appendix K.
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(_,xarysimons 1 MR. SULLIVAN:
The question to me is that in, what 2
is it, P9, the last plant which is scheduled in is South' 3
Texas, is scheduled to be licensed.
Then from then on 4
until the next plant is in again there is a dead band with 5
no licensing.
6 If we could start now and develop a base, a new 7
base for licensing, even if it was applied to the last set 3-8 of plants coming in, then I think that would be the biggest 9
thing that NRC could do for the nuclear industry.
10 MR. CATTON:
And maybe even a basis for re-11 evaluation of existing plants.
12 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes.
4 13 MR. MICHELSON:
Now the kind of effort that I l
14 suspect that it would take to accomplish what you are about i[
15 to suggest, or have suggested, you are talking about ---
16 MR. SULLIVAN:
A massive effort.
f 17 MR. MICHELSON:
--- a fairly massive effort, and
~
18 certainly not less than three or four meetings a year for 19 probably two or three years to accomplish that kind of an 20 objective.
21 MR. CATTON:
But the potential return is extremely 22 high.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't disagree.
Again, we don't 24.l have those kind of resources within reach.
25 MR. CATTON:
Well, we are trying to give you an ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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2 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, but we have got a lot of 3
other items here, and we aren't going to get them on every 4
one.
Eventually towards the end of this discussion we have 5
to go and weigh those that we really think ought to be 6
worked on against each other because we can't work on 7
everything that really ought to be worked on.
8 MR. WARD:
How do you think this sort of issue 9
should stack up in priority against improving a means of 10 analysis of pressurized thermal shock related transients?
11 MR. CATTON:
Well, I think that in order to do the 12 kind of analysis that Harold is suggesting, you first have O
\\_/
13 to have the faith in your codes and the pressurized thermal 14 shock question would be answered along the way.
15 It all gets back to your ability to simulate the 16 plants.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, that is a part of it, and how 18 you are going to go even further and have to design what 19 this new design basis should look like because you are not 20 going to use an arbitrary double ended rupture as the 21 starting point.
22 MR. CATTON:
Of course not.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
And to think about what that new 24 concept should look like is not a small item.
It is not a O"
25 short thought process I hope, i
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. g,jarysimons 1 MR. SULLIVAN:
If you ask me how I feel about it, 2
_that is No.
1.
3 MR. CATTON:
But that requires the codes first.
4 4
MR. WARD:
I am not sure it requires the codes.
I i
5 mean it seems to me that that is a smaller question.
You 6
might decide that you have to have better codes in order to 7
pursue what Harold wants to do, but I mean it is almost a 8
subsidiary of that.
9 MR. CATTON:
Oh, it is.
Certainly I think the 10 codes are just a tool that you need to do any of these 7
11 things.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Let me argue for the moment that I 13 have limited resources and my only objective is to maximize 14 the safety of those plants already in operation or those 15 coming on line yet.
Now what you have suggested here, will 16 it actually increase the safety as opposed to using the old 17 Appendix K analysis and the old design basis of double 18 ended ruptures and so forth?
i 19 I think what you are suggesting is ways of perhaps 20 finer tuning the system so that you can build it cheaper or 21 operate it cheaper or whatever, but not necessarily are you r
l 22 trying to increase its safety, are you?
23 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
You are trying to increase the 25 safety by doing this?
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 104 arysimons 1 MR. SULLIVAN:
The goal that I have is to take the 2.
focus of research off of things that are not heavily safety 3
oriented, such as all of the residual work on large break 4
LOCA and trying to focus it on something that will allow 5
them to get into research areas that would actually improve 6
the safety of plants and, unfortunately, it is not all of 7
this.
8 If you took my suggestion and then you look down 9
this list, and almost every one of these subcommittees are 10 involved somehow.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, but I don't know how coming 1
12 up with a new design basis for licensing is going to t
i 13 increase safety, given a certain amount of resources to 14 spend, as opposed to taking that same resource and putting
+
15 it on water hammer problems or some of these other items.
16 I am presumably already happy with my design basis, except i
17 that it is ultra-conservative and I ought to take some of 18 the conservatism out of it again.
l 19 MR. CATTON:
But maybe it is not the best design 20 basis for some of the more risk significant statistics.
21 For example, you want to shift your set points to 22 accomplish something else.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
Are you talking about the tech 24 spec set points?
25 MR. CATTON:
Sure.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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l 7070 02 02 105 sarysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, that is another subject.
(_r 2
MR. CATTON:
It might require in some plant that 3
you have to put in a different accumulator because it 4
doesn't operate at the right pressures.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, that is another subject that 6
I am going to come to.
7 MR. CATTON:
I think that is what you are getting 8
at, isn't it?
9 MR. MICHELSON:
The subject on the table was we 10 don't like designing for double ended ruptures and what 11 should we do in lieu of that?
12 MR. CATTON:
That is what this is all about.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
That is the subject on the table.
14 MR. CATTON:
But that is what we are talking s
15 about, what would you do instead.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
What does the set point change got 17 to do with designing or not designing for double ended ---
i l
18 MR. CATTON:
Well the design is there, and what 19 you have done is you have said, gee, I consider a full 20 double ended guillotine down to 40 percent or something, 21 and I do all my analysis and I set the set points on my 22 accumulators and line sizes, and a lot of these things are 23 done based on that and let's back off.
24 If the small break is more risk significant, what l
25 should I do?
i i
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(,Jarysimons 1 Mk. MICHELSON:
Without redesigning the plant.
2 MR. CATTON:
Without necessarily redesigning the 3
plant, what'could I do?
Maybe I want a pump that is a 4
little beefier in some place in order to accomplish 5
something, and maybe I want to. raise the accumulator 6
pressures or I want to change the set points, and maybe I 7
want the flow to be different.
8 See, with the EM models, the way they are set up, 9
you first go through your blowdown and then you have your 10 refill and then your reflood.
And in order that the water 11 that is coming in can be considered as being of value to fill the core, you have to meet a certain criterion.
12 v
13 Well, we know that criterion is probably not 14 right, and we know it from the LOFT experiments.
Also, we 15 are not sure about the break, the guillotine break.
I 16 One thing that a person might do is, gee, let's at 17 least best estimate and tune our system for the large 18 break.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
By " tune" you mean change set 20 points?
21 MR. CATTON:
Sure.
That water in that first LOFT 22 experiment just fell right into the lower plenum.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
I think I understand that one.
1 24 That happens to be another item, but we nill bring it up 25 right now as a part of this one, and tht.t is the question i
l i
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()1arysimons1 of the technical specifications, the thermal hydraulic 1
2 basis for technical specifications and whether or not we 3
should take any time in looking at that.
I think that is 4
part of what you are talking about.
5 MR. CATTON:
I think it is all part of the same 6
thing.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
And you are saying well, do I have 8
to look at that now from the viewpoint of still sticking 9
with the double ended rupture or do I now look at it from
)
10 the viewpoint that I am going to back off from the double 4
11 ended rupture hypothesis and go to some other basis.
12 MR. CATTON:
I think you back off and look at the 13 whole spectrum.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
So the two are kind of combined in 4
i 15 a way.
16 MR. CATTON:
I am not misinterpreting you, am I?
3 17 MR. SCHROCK:
Can I make an observation.
We are 18 trying to apportion a little bit of time to cover a lot of 19 things, and it seems to me that developing a new licensing i
20 basis is something that needs to be done, and I don't think 21 any of us disagree with that.
22 But it probably isn't the ACRS that should develop i
l 23 a new licensing basis.
The ACRS should be urging the
)
24 Commission to make the staff do that and to develop the
(
25 plan to do that.
And then eventually it would come back to a
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()arysimons1 the ACRS to review what the plan is and to go on with it 2
from there.
3 RM R.
WARD:
I think that is right, but I think the 4
argument here, cc what Harold is proposing'is the ACRS 5
conceivably could do some original thinking about how this 1
j
'6 should be approached.
I mean rather than just telling the 1
7 staff to develop a new licensing basis, we say ---
8 MR.'SCHROCK:
We can give some conceptual input.
9 MR. WARD:
Yes.
I think that is a reasonable i
10 case.
11 MR. SCHROCK:
I do, too, i
}
12 MR. CATTON:
I think you almost have to do that.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
We don't have the resources to do 14 the work, and every one of these is from that viewpoint.
15 Everything we have talked about today is from that 16 viewpoint of do we spend time to try to generate interest, 17 and to generate interest you have got to know enough about 18 the subject to articulate it accurately and it takes time, 19 and that is the time we are talking about.
I 20 We are just talking about the time it takes to 21 generate some concepts enough so be able to articulate them t
l 22 and present them as possibilities and get somebody's 23 interest because the staff just doesn't respond to orders.
I 24 We can't order them anyway.
The Chairman might get quite l
25 interested if you articulate it well enough and in enough i
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/~
(,garysimons 1 detail and it is something that he might be interested in, l
2 and then he would get'it done.
But, no, we don't do any of i
3 this ourselves in detail.
We just can't.
The Chairman on j
i 4
high is the one I am talking of.
j 5
MR. CATTON:
The Chairman on high?
i-l 6
MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, the one on high.
7 (Laughter.)
8 Not our lowly Chairman, but the one on high.
9 (Laughter.)
10 MR. SULLIVAN:
Carl, the fact is that unless f
11 somebody starts showing interest in this, I can't see it i
12 being done.
The ACRS could do some original thinking and
)
13 show that we have interest and call a meeting on the i
14 staff's plan for new licensing and see what they say.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, they will say we don't have
).
16 anybody to talk on the subject.
l 17 MR. CATTON:
Well, then you write a letter to the I
l 18 Commissioner on high.
i 19 MR. MICHELSON:
I wanted to get the consensus of l
20 the subcommittee ---
21 MR. WARD:
I think Carl's point is that we have to 22 do enough groundwork and information gathering and l
23 discussion and interviewing experts or whatever to develop 24 some sort of a concept.
25 MR. MICHELSON:
Enough development so that you can i
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-(harysimons1 get somebody interested in doing it.
You know, you have to 2
make sure you send out letters based on some amount of 3
homework and not just off the top of your head, and it is 4
that homework that we are talking about here, and the 5
subcommittees generally do that homework for the full 6
committee.
7 MR. CATTON:
$1.5 billion having been spent, I 8
think it deserves something.
9 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't disagree with you.
10 MR. WARD:
What do you mes.n?
Are you saying that 11 there is a resource there which can be tapped?
12 MR. CATTON:
No, it is gone.
That money has been n
13 spent.
I think if you start drifting away, the wonderful ss 14 S1.5 billion will just have been flat out wasted because in 15 a few years the people who were involved are gone.
16 MR. WARD:
So you mean there is a resource there 17 that could be tapped for this.
18 MR. CATTON:
Yes.
If you are trying to get expert 19 opinion, the people who run the tests and have done a lot 20 of these things are still around and still remember them, 21 and it is disappearing very fast.
I mean the blowdown heat 22 transfer series that was run at GE is already long gone, 23 and I think they have even thrown away the data by now.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
But the key question at the moment l
25 is does this subcommittee want to pursue, for instance, the i
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7070 02 02 111 J(harysimons1-issue of a new design basis for licensing, for the thermal 2
hydraulic design basis?
3 MR. SULLIVAN:
This is the subcommittee that did 4
all the review work for the design basis.
Now I don't know 5
whether it is our charter to undo it or now.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
Oh, no, we can undo whatever we 7
wish.
i.
8 MR. WARD:
That is the question.
Do we want to 9
make it a charter?
Now certainly if it is something that l
10 could contribute importantly to the safety of the plants, I
j 11 there is no reason we shouldn't be considering this.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Assuming for the moment that we 13 were to decide that, yes, we ought to pursue this, what
{
14 kind of time allocation are we talking about in order to 15 pursue it at even a minimum level?
What do you think it 4
16 takes to do this job at a minimum level on a yearly fiscal 17 year basis?
How many meetings do you think it would take 18 to approach this problem, keeping in mind that it is pretty i
(
19 fuzzy, that this is a pretty nebulous question that would
(
[
20 take a lot of talking and a lot of research and pursuing 21 and whatever?
22 MR. CATTON:
It would probably take several i
23 meetings just'to really get focused.
I 24 MR. MICHELSON:
I would certainly say, and I said C:)
25 it a little while back, at least four or five meetings a ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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()iarysimons1 year to focus this question and get something to happen on 2
it, because I don't think there is a great interest out in 3
the industry.
Sure, they would like to get rid of double i
4 ended ruptures, but if it is going to be any big effort 5
they don't want to get rid of it.
So whatever we do has to 6
be on good foundation or we won't accomplish anything.
7 Are we willing to go forward in proposing four or 8
five meetings a year on this subject?
I doubt that the 9
full committee would be too much interested in having our 10
'87 meetings spent that way.
11 MR. CATTON:
I guess if we can't convince our a
12 Subcommittee Chairman to go forward in a positive way, you 13 are probably right, they won't be very interested.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I am just asking as a 15 spokesman now for the subcommittee and I haven't heard 16 their view yet.
Do we want to pursue it, and I also was 17 asking well, what do we think it means if we decide we want 18 to pursue it and what minimum level would be reasonable to 19 propose?
If four meetings a year a minimum level or could 20 we do it with two a year or one a year?
21 MR. SULLIVAN:
I guess the way that I would try to 22 approach it is to appoint some consultants, some staff and 23 some members of the ACRS to try to get together and develop 24 something, and then maybe present it to the subcommittee O
25 and see if we could work it out and find out what the ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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("1
(, arysimons 1 positive and negative points are and then try to push it 2
on.
Something like three meetings a year might get it 3
started, and if you can get it started, it might take off 4
by itself and then you wouldn't have to do anything else.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
I will put down an estimate 6
of three meetings a year if we decide to pursue this.
7 MR. CATTON:
I think getting out from under what 8
Appendix K and the EM models has done to plant tech specs 9
is probably extremely important and would be extremely 10 valuable to do so.
It impacts everything, all the way from 11 how you train your operators on the simulator to how you 12 run your plant.
O>
N-13 MR. MICHELSON:
Do you realize we have to retrain 14 operators if you no longer have the double ended rupture to 15 worry about?
16 MR. CATTON:
Yes.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
You know, you have blown their 18 minds and there is something very simple now to think 19 about.
I don't know what this substitute is going to look 20 like, but it is certainly a not much simpler thing that 21 just chopping the pipe and pulling it apart.
The operators 22 understand that, although they will say you are crazy and i
23 it could never happen, but at least they understand what 24 you are talking about.
I don't know what we will come up
/~)
i
\\#
25 with next.
1 I
i ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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()larysimons1 MR. WARD:
But then something does happen and they 2
are not trained for it because we have spent all the time 3
training them for this.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
I know.
I am just trying to be 5
the devil's advocate for a moment.
6 MR. SULLIVAN:
But if you go to a simulator and 7
you watch an operator go through this, man, they can go 8
through a large break LOCA, you know, they know exactly 9
what to do.
I have actually seen somebody go through that 10 and those guys are good.
11 MR. EBERSOLE:
Maybe they have such an investment 12 in that capability that they don't want to shake it up.
/
(_
13 (Laughter.)
14 MR. SULLIVAN:
That's right.
15 MR. EBERSOLE:
That is like how to recover from an 16 airplane that has run into a mountain.
17 MR. WARD:
It seems to me that even planning on a 18 meeting or two on this issue in the next year might be a 19 way to look at it to sort of try to got the idea out where 20 other people will think about it.
21 I guess Harold's proposal for maybe having 22 somebody develop some proposals or something for the larger 23 group and maybe inviting in staff, EPRI and other people 24 who might have ideas on it, you know, give them a lead time O
k' 25 and say we are interested in doing this and what are your ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 115 A(_)arysimons 1 thoughts on it.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
I think it sounds like a good 3
idea.
How about a couple of our contingency meetings for 4
that purpose?
5 (Laughter.)
6 Dave has suggested exactly what we need to do as 7
a modest start on the problem.'
8 (Laughter.)
9 MR. CATTON:
Somebody like Jim Surmack, who used 10 to express extremely strong views about having to design to 11 Appendix K while doing it in order to get a plant licensed.
12 MR. WARD:
Yes.
I could see that we could compose 13 a letter to go out to a number of different people saying 14 we are interested in developing ideas on this, and we are 15 going to plan to have a subcommittee meeting in month "X"or 16 something and we would like you to develop your views and 17 present them to us, or something like that.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
I think that is a great idea as at 19 least a way of starting to see if it would be worthwhile to 20 go into it in greater detail.
21 MR. SULLIVAN:
Carl, I am only familiar with some 22 of the parts at how this propagates through the system, but 23 the containment analysis is done with a double ended cold 24 leg break, and all the heat transfer and everything on ---
O 25 MR. MICHELSON:
The physical supports, the pipe ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC, 202 347 3700 Nationwide Coverage Mn33MM6
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q,,iarysimons 1 whips and all the other stuff.
2 MR. SULLIVAN:
The containment pressure goes up to 3
some level and then you say, but what is the release from 4
the containment?
Well, that is calculated as the maximum 5
pressure held there for three days with the fission product 6
inventory of the core as a percent released into the 7
atmosphere ---
8 MR. WARD:
A quarter of the iodine is ---
9 MR. SULLIVAN:
--- and that leaks out at the 10 design leak rate of the containment.
I can't imagine a 11 containment sitting there for three days at that maximum 12 pressure, and that is ;he way the site boundary is.
So we 13 have done is we propacate this thing all the way through, 14 you know, pipe whip, et cetera.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't disagree, but I think we 16 need to discuss in detail to see where the real pressure 17 problems are and whether some of these could be alleviated 18 by more realistic assumptions and supported on a 19 probabilistic and risk basis of some sort to be acceptable.
20 For the moment we will put down two meetings in 21 the coming year and see what the budget looks like when we 22 get all done with all the other items we still have on this 23 list and then we will play it back again.
4 24 HR. SULLIVAN:
I guess the Chairman has got a few 25 problems to resolve.
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[
7070 02 02 117 (harysimons1 (Laughter.)
2 MR. CATTON:
That is why he is Chairman.
3 MR. MICHELSON:- Okay.
The question of the -- and 4
now this needs to be sorted out from the discussion we just 5
got finished with.
There is this question of assuming that 6
the situation remains as it is, do we want to spend any 7
time looking at the thermal hydraulic basis for tech specs 8
as they presently stand to get small, and I am thinking now 9
of smaller changes in tech specs and not the big new design 10 basis kind of approach, but just taking what we have today, 11 is it possible to look at the thermal hydraulic basis of l
12 the tech specs and maybe they are unrealistic.
13
.MR.
CATTON:
Well, a lot of them are EM model 14
- based, i
I 15 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, and therefore they may be i
{
16 unrealistic, and do we want to spend sometime in this j
17 coming year looking at this thermal hydraulic basis for i-18 tech specs?
19 MR. CATTON:
I think that should be a part of the 20 two meetings.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, it can be if you want to put 22 it in that pot, but I think they are getting a little bit 23 bigger.
24 MR. WARD:
Is that related, do you think, to the j
25 operating procedures?
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(~N
(_,larysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
It is more related to operating 2
procedures perhaps than it is related to trying to 3
formulate new design bases.
The assumption here is you do 4
not change your design basis, but rather look at your tech 5
spec limits to see if they are reasonable limits in terms 6
of the thermal hydraulics of the situation, and you justify 7
changing pressures on the accumulators or temperature 8
limits or excursion limits or whatever you happen to be 9
dealing with without changing the real design basis for the 10 plant.
11 MR. CATTON:
I am not sure that I would be in 12 favor of a meeting ---
O
(/
13 MR. MICHELSON:
It is a fine tuning arrangement.
14 MR. CATTON:
--- of fine tuning a double 15 guillotine break, and that is what you are suggesting.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
That is what this in a way amounts 17 to is at least the effects of guillotine breaks, yes 18 MR. CATTON:
Because supposedly the guillotine 19 break is such a low probability thing anyway even if you 20 find --
21 MR. MICHELSON:
Not all tech specs are controlled 22 by the guillotine break, but a lot of them are.
23 MR. CATTON:
Certainly, but if they are Chapter 15 24 transients that are based on EM modeling ---
25 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
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.(,parysimons 1 MR. CATTON:
'I think we ought to take the whole 2
thing as a package.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay, and just put it as a part of 4
the previous discussion?
5 MR. CATTON:
Certainly.
I mean you can shift your 6
design basis within it and you could, if you choose to, 7
leave it, but you could at least consider the small break 8
LOCA and the tech spec limits as they come out of Chapter 9
15 and see what the new investment modeling will do to-10 them.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
If it the consensus of the 12 subcommittee that that is the way to go on that item?
13 MR. CATTON:
(Nodding affirmatively.)
l 14 MR. WARD:
That seems reasonable.
15 MR. SCHROCK:
(Nodding affirmatively.)
16 MR. MICHELSON:
I see two nodding of heads.
17 I think that is reasonable.
18 Now there is another different kind of subject i
19 area that has come up in relation to the use of isolation 20 valves under very severe loading conditions.
Now this l
21 would be the case of a containment isolation valve at such 22 time as you get a large break LOCA inside of containment.
23 It is a case of a pipe outside of containment that breaks 24 and the isolation valves have to close in order to isolate
(:)
j 25 the break or you have a LOCA outside of the primary l
l ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 120
()nrysimons1 containment.
2 For such cases there are various analyses that 3
have been performed to verify that the valves will operate 4
under these conditions, but these are very crude analyses 5
and oftentimes paying little or not attention to the 6
thermal hydraulics and only attention to some very simple 7
calculational techniques that are used for motor operated 8
valves.
9 One way of getting at this thing in a clear 10 fashion of course is to do a test in which you simulate the 11 accident condition and see what the valve will do.
Those 12 are very difficult and very expensive tests and they simply
\\_e 13 haven't been done for most kinds of valves.
They have been 14 done in a few very special cases such as main steam 15 isolation valves for a somewhat different reason.
16 The question on the table then is whether or not 17 the Thermal Hydraulics Subcommittee wishes to get involved 18 in looking at this problem.
19 Now there are two choices, the Thermal Hydraulic 20 Subcommittee or the Reliability Assurance Subcommittee, one 21 of those two.
22 Now the Reliability Assurance Subcommittee look 23 more at the mechanics of operation, but this thing here 24 falls in the two regimes and it can go either way.
O 25 MR. CATTON:
It has another part to it, too, I ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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(,jarysimons 1 think, containment performance criteria.
It is all one 2
package again.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, it is related criteria, but 4
it is not establisned in the criteria.
5 MR. CATTON:
But if I have certain containment 6
performance criteria, I can ask myself whether or not that 7
isolation valve will work, and if I don't know, I can test 8
it.
But if I don't start with some kind of a containment 9
performance criteria, I don't know what to do with the 10 isolation valve.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
So in a way I guess what you 12 are suggesting is should the containment performance 13 criteria be in this subcommittee, and I think that is 14 already being handled by another subcommittee.
15 MR. WARD:
No.
We have put together a Containment 16 Requirement Subcommittee which is intended to ---
17 MR. MICHELSON:
To take care of that.
18 MR. WARD:
Yes.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
So would that be the logical 20 place?
These isolation valves aren't always containment 21 isolation of course.
They are a mixed bag.
I personally 22 recommend that this committee not be involved in this 23 subject simply because ---
24 MR. CATTON:
It might be too early.
When the O
25 containment requirements are laid down, then it would be ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC, 202 347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 8533MM6
7070 02 02 122
,O
(,)arysimons 1 the time for this subcommittee.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, it may not be a containment 3
isolation valve in the sense of the gas space of 4
containment.
A reactor water cleanup isolation valve, for 5
instance, is there to take care of breaks, but it happens 6
to be at the containment boundary but doesn't see 7
containment as such, but it called a containment isolation 8
valve anyway but it would have little relation.
9 I would suggest that we don't do it, and I would 10 look then for recommendations as to where we would like to 11 see it put, and I will just talk to the subcommittee 12 chairman for that.
13 I don't think the containment people really want 14 to get into something like this.
So I would suggest the 15 Reliability Assurance ---
16 MR. CATTON:
Is the containment requirements the 6
17 structural end of it, or are they going to look at the 18 containment loads as well?
19 MR. MICHELSON:
I assume they are looking at the 20 containment loads and how you get what the loadings will be 21 by what happens inside the containment under various 22 circumstances, including I think severe accident 23 circumstances.
24 MR. CATTON:
So part of it might go under Class 25 Nine.
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7070 02 02 123 (barysimons1 MR. MICHELSON:
There is a Containments 2
Requirements Subcommittee.
3 MR. CATTON:
They are going to hold one meeting.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
Class Nine and PRA together 5
is going to hold one meeting, too, for that matter.
6 MR. WARD:
Well, there is something screwed up 7
there in this table.
8 MR. SCHROCK:
You have two Class Nine.
9 MR. CATTON:
Well, there is Class Nine/PRA and 10 then Class Nine.
11 MR. WARD:
I am not sure what that one is.
12 MR. CATTON:
What it might mean is that PRA is one 13 part of it and the Class Nine, you know, there is the 14 phenomena end of it, what happens, and then the other guys 15 put it together.
16 MR. WAPT:
I don't remember what we meant there.
17 It might have been that was supposed to be a joint meeting,-
f 18 but I don't remember what that is.
I think that is a l
19 mistype.
20 MR. CATTON:
It it is the front end and back end i
l 21 of the action and they typically treat them separately.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I assume it is the consensus l
23 of the subcommittee that we will not handle this problem 24 ourselves, and it is only a question of where do we
(
I i
25 recommend putting it.
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l t
7070 02 02 124 (harysimons1 MR. CATTON:
I thought you had a Valves 2
Subcommittee.
5 3
MR. MICHELSON:
We do.
4 MR. CATTON:
I would think that is where it i
5 belongs.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
That is what I would recommend.
7 MR. CATTON:
Now you are going to ask yourself 8
whether a valve will open or not under certain conditions.
r j
5 j
9 So if the Containment Requirements group tells you want the i
10 requirements are, then your valves group should certainly 11 be able to address the question.
i 12 MR. MICHELSON:
I think that is what I would 13 recommend.
Unless I hear to the contrary from the 1
i 14 subcommittee, we will recommend it to Charlie Wylie to put t
15 in his charter.
i j
16 MR. SCHROCK:
Reliability Assurance?
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
i l
18 MR. CATTON:
Which one of these is the valves?
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Reliability Assurance has the 20 valves from the operational as well as environmental.
21 MR. CATTON:
So that is where the valves go.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
23 MR. BOEHNERT:
By the way, Carl, he did agree that 24 he would be happy to take that on.
(:)
l 25 MR. MICHELSON:
I did have Paul pursue with him as i
1 ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC, 202 347 3700 Nationwide Coverage 800-33MM6 i
7070 02 02 125 l'(,);arysimons 1 to what he thought, and they would be happy to pick it up 2
since it was one that I didn't think we would want to pick 3
up.
4 Another subject that has come up, and we are 5
getting down now to the two or three left that are more of 6
a fine structure that I think fit into what we have already 7
talked about.
One of them is the question of the goodness 8
of simulator verifications for emergency operating 9
procedures.
10 We use simulators to verify the procedures, but 11 there is at least one member or consultant had a question 12 about how good are these simulations.
If they are not good Ok/
13 enough, of course, then you wonder if we should be using 14 them for verifying emergency operating procedures.
15 MR. CATTON:
At one time there was an effort by 16 Research,to look into this, and they picked two or three 17 simulators around the country and got the best code 18 predictions they could and compared them.
And as far as I 19 know, that is all in a clocked hat and nobody is really 20 doing anything.
It gets back again to the codes of course, 21 assuming the advanced codes are good.
22 I think you have to do it, but we handle it in 15 23 minutes and we can recommend that they do it.
24 MR. MICilELSON :
I thought the key question here 25 was not the goodness of the codes, but the goodness of the ace-FEDERAL. REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 126 (harysimons1 simulation and to what extent they use the codes in setting 2
up the simulator.
3 MR. CATTON:
Yes, but you see when you put the 4
simulator together and Singer installs it, and Singer 5
installs it with a package of codes, and that package of 6
codes is nowhere near what the so-called advance codes are 7
because of time.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
That's right.
9 MR. CATTON:
So what you need to do is to tune it 10 a bit to match the advanced codes.
I am not sure that this 11 has been done.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
I am not even sure that they have 13 simulated the code in use at the time of design 14 necessarily.
I thought they had to do some simplifications 15 in order to make their hardware reasonable.
16 MR. SULLIVAN:
The data comes from the design base 17 codes, which are now the EM codes.
18 MR. CATTON:
Well, Chapter 15.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
They put in fairly simply f
20 drafts of what they think is happening, and that is 21 programmed into the simulator and not the actual equations 22 and so forth necessarily.
23 MR. WARD:
Well, there are generations, and I 24 think that describes the earlier simulators.
The later l
25 ones have sort of fairly mechanistic modeling, but there is i
i ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 127
(\\arysimons1 some question about how far, you know, off normal 2
situations those mechanistic models can carry it.
I mean, J
3 for example, most plants will tell you that they train "4
their operators and they'have validated their procedures 5
for the bleed and feed operation.
That is the one I was 6
thinking of.
But yet when we ask people how successfully 7
they have calculated feed and bleed for a plant with TRAK 8
or with RELAP they sometimes kind of throw up their hands 9
or there is great difficulty in calculating that in sort of 10 transit with the big codes.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, and yet it is on the 12 simulator, but it is in a simple-minded form there.
13 MR. WARD:
That's right.
Now it might not make 14 anpdifEIrence.
First of all, the simulator's codes even
~,
15 by the ANI standard don't have to be better.
Usually if a 16 parameter goes in the right direction, that is good enough i
17.
for the simulator for meeting the simulator's standari, and.
18 ther,a're rather broad as far as validation of the simulator 19 codes against the bid codes.
There are pretty broad 20 toler,ance bands.
21 The_ question'is is this seriously impacting the i
s 22 training that l's being given to operators?
23 MR. MICHELSON:
Is this something we want to look 24 into or not I think is what was meant by this.
25 MR. SCHROCK:
I think the Human Factors
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7070 02 02 128 (harysimons1 Subcommittee should get into this.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, it isn't a human factors 3
question, you know.
4 MR. CATTON:
But the question is are the 5
simulations that they are being trained to any good.
I 6
think that is the first question.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
8 MR. CATTON:
And that means you need to make a 9
comparison between what the simulator produces for an event 10 with what one of these advance codes produces for an event.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
For instance?
12 MR. CATTON:
Now the more recent simulators, there 13 is already some data available, and there were a couple of 14 reports out of Brookhaven that addressed this question.
I 15 think the Human Factors Subcommittee ought to take a look 16 and some of their people decide, gee, if there is that much 17 difference, and typically the difference is in the rate of 18 change of something, and the rates of change really never 19 match very well.
Well, if the prediction is slower than 4
20 what it really is, this is a problem as far as the reaction i
21 of the operator is concerned, and I think that is a human l
22 factors question.
23 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, the goodness of the 24 calculation of course is not a human factors question, but
(
25 the effect of the goodness upon the operator is a human ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, lNC.
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7070 02 02 129 tarysimons 1 factors question, yes.
2 MR. CATTON:
We certainly, I think, have some 3
opinions probably here already with respect to how good the 4
simulator calculations are relative to a TRAK calculation t
5 or something.
We know that they are not very good, but now 6
is this difference important.
That is something that comes 7
to, you know, how much time do you have, how fast are 8
things changing and what kind of recorders do you have in 9
the control room.
I mean if it is an instantaneous 10 recording and things are changing sloa, well maybe it is 11 all right, but if it is changing fast, maybe it is not all 12 right.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, the question on the table 14 then is is this something we think we want to spend any 15 time on in the next year, and do we want to look into this 16 any further than ---
17 MR. CATTON:
I think what we need to do is ask the 18 Chairman of the Human Factors Subcommittee whether he would 19 like an opinion of this subcommittee on the voracity of the 20 simulators.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, ask him.
22 (Laughter.)
23 MR. CATTON:
If he does want that opinion, then we 24 certainly need to take a look.
I know they are improving.
! O 25 MR. MICHELSON:
How much time would it take to ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
202-347-3700 Nationwide Coverage 80 4 336-6646 i
~
i s
7070 02 02 130 (harysimons1 take a look at a question like this?
Could this be a one-2 hour subject at a meeting?
3 MR. CATTON:
It can't be one hour because when you
]
4 bring the Singer guys in to tell you what they are doing, 5
the first thing is they believe what they are doing.whether 6
it is right or wrong.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
You are talking about meeting them 8
to accomplish this kind of examination?
.f i
9 MR. CATTON:
I don't know.
I know we have had 10 Singer in here before and the guy stood right up in front 11 of us and told us, look, it's great.
The previous utility 12 who bought it really liked it, and to him that was a basis 13 for goodness.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
4 15 MR. CATTON:
And then Edison bought it.
This was 16 when San Onofre was being reviewed.
I mean the guy from 4
17 Edison says, gee, so and so thinks it is really great.
The 18 people who buy the simulator results are not typically the 19 engineering staff but they are the operations staff, and 4
20 the operations staff, all they really care about is that 21 they have got a simulator and the NRC has said it is okay.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, that is the main thing.
23 MR. CATTON:
If NRC says it is okay, they don't 24 seem to really care what it does as long as NRC likes it.
J 25 And I am not sure what we do about that, but that fits into l
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,I
7070 02 02 131 (harysimons1 this whole package of the interface of human factors and 2
thermal hydraulics.
3 I think it belongs in the iluman Factors 4
Subcommittee.
5 MR. SULLIVAN:
I am not sure.
I agree that a part 6
of it belongs in human factors.
7 MR. CATTON:
Well, see, somebody has to make the 8
judgment well, gee, if the pressure is decaying at so many 9
pounds per second, pounds per square foot per second versus 10 something else, is that going to make the operator do 11 something funny or wrong, and I am not sure that I could 12 come to that conclusion.
13 Also, if you have those kinds of rates of change, 14 depending on the kind of recorder you have got, whether he 15 can look at it over a period of time or whether he has it 16 instantaneous, all of these things come into play.
17 MR. SULLIVAN:
I think the real question, Ivan, is 18 two parts, and I think you have got one of the parts fine.
19 MR. CATTON:
That's nice.
I 20 (Laughter.)
21 MR. SULLIVAN:
You need to be able to tell them 22 that this thing is good over wide ranges of transients, and 23 I don' t know how a human f actors guy make that decision.
24 MR. SCHROCK:
I agree.
O 25 MR. CATTON:
I look at the results from the two ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 132
()iarysimons1 Brookhaven reports.
One of them made comparisons with a 2
boiling water reactor simulator and one of them with a 3
pressurized water reactor, and in both cases when you 4
looked at the figures in front of you the general trends 5
were all right.
But this is one of the more modern 6
simulators, and I think if I were making a judgment based 7
on the figure, I probably would make the same one whether 8
it was a simulator the better calculations.
9 On the other hand, I may be reading something into 10 the way an operator would think.
I don't know.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I think the subcommittee has 12 heard the views of the consultants as to what the problem 13 might be and how it might be treated.
Now how does the s-14 subcommittee want to handle it?
Do we want to do any of 15 this or turn it over to Human Factors all of it or part of 16 it?
What would be reasonable?
17 My own view is that part of it is a human factors 18 problem, and that would be fine if you wanted to divide it, 19 but there is a very important segment of it, which is 20 thermal hydraulically related, and it would be my judgment i
21 that it would consume in the neighborhood of one meeting in 22 the following year to get into this e aestion and understand 23 it, and does the committee wish to spend that kind of time 24 on it?
C:)
25 MR. CATTON:
Maybe we could get Human Factors to ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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p, - +-+
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t 7070 02 02 133 (larysimons1 give us one of their four meetings to address this.
2 MR. SCHROCK:
Isn't the answer that it deserves 3
doing, but it is unlikely to have high enough priority to 4
make it?
i t-5 MR. MICHELSON:
That is what I guess I said in a 6
lot of words.
7 (Laughter.)
8 Is that the feeling of the subcommittee that we 9
would pass this up because of resource limitations, 10 although it does deser9e doing?
11 MR. WARD:
I think in addition to the training, 4
i 12 there is the emergency procedure part of the issue, too.
I 13 mean I think the simulators are being used to validate i
14 emergency procedures.
15 MR. MICHELSON:
That is part of it.
16 MR. WARD:
Now whether they are being stretched l
17 beyond their real capability is a question.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
And I think that is a thermal 19 hydraulics question and not a human factors question.
20 MR. WARD:
No, that is not a human factors
[
21 question.
i 22 MR. MICHELSON:
That would be a part of what one 23 would look into if we decided to devote resources to this i
24
. issue.
I would say, though, that the minimum resources in O
25 order to make any substantive progress on this would be 4
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 134 (harysimons1 about one meeting.
This doesn't mean that you do it all in 2
one meeting, but it means that a part of a meeting is 3
devoted to it and then the next time a part is devoted to 4
it.
=5 MR. WARD:
I could look at it this way.
Maybe the 6
sort of expertise this subcommittee has could take some 7
sort of preliminary look and decide whether it has got a 8
concern over whether simulator modeling, whether there is 9
potential for a serious problem with simulator modeling of 10 off-normal situations.
If it thinks there is, then-it 11 might refer to the human factors in the Procedures 12 Subcommittee to look into it further or something like 13 that.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
But to even arrive at that 15 conclusion I think is going to take a portion of a 16 subcommittee meeting.
17 MR. WARD:
Yes.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't know the answer at all, 19 and I haven't even heard any of the arguments really of 20 what all is involved on this.
21 MR. WARD:
Well, I don't know either, but maybe a 22 fraction of a meeting that is well focused could permit 23 this subcommittee to come to some conclusion or opinion on 24 whether this ---
25 MR. MICHELSON:
So what I can do is assume that we ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 135
/m(,larysimons1 will allocate about a half of a meeting sometime to this 2
subject at which time we would decide what to do next, if 3
anything, on it.
4 MR. CATTON:
I guess it is if the voracity of the 5
simulators addresses all of the questions.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
I will put down for the moment 7
that we will think of ---
8 MR. CATTON:
If it looks like they are reasonable, 9
whether it is EOP's or training doesn't matter.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
I will put down for the moment 11 that we think in terms of a half a meeting as the sort of a 12 minimal effort.
\\~/
13 MR. CATTON:
I am not sure where we are going to 14 get any information on this.
The work that was being done 15 in this area just sort of disappeared.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
Well that we will find out when we 17 ask the staff to come in and talk about it, or the industry 18 or whoever is prepared to come in and tell us.
If nobody 19 is, then I think that is a different kind of ---
20 MR. TIEN:
EPRI has some effort in this area.
21 MR. CATTON:
That is Bill Sun, and they are doing 22 artificial intelligence.
They are not looking at 23 simulators.
They are looking at artificial intelligence.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, let's not get too deep into t
25 this subject.
Let's stay at the high plane.
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[
7070 02 02 136 (harysimons1 Harold, did you have a comment?
2 MR. SULLIVAN:
Call Westinghouse and tell them to 3
come in and say that their process for developing it is 4
good and see what happens.
That is about what you would 5
end up doing from the state of the knowledge that we know 6
right now.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I don't think anybody is 8
going to come in and tell us how lousy it is.
Is that what 9
you are saying?
10 MR. SULLIVAN:
No.
Ask them how good it is and 11 how us how good it is.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
I think if we are to make any k-13 contribution, though, we will have to spend enough of our 14 own time to see if we believe what they tell us.
15 MR. CATTON:
But the start might be the people at 16 Brookhaven, and I don't recollect who it is, but I suspect 17 that it is Wolfgang Wolf.
18 MR. SULLIVAN:
Yes, it is.
19 MR. CATTON:
At least he sent me copies of the two 20 reports.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
Did you write that down?
22 (Laughter.)
23 I didn't see you scribbling on that one.
24 MR. BOEHNERT:
For Wolf, no, I didn't.
/~T 25 MR. CATTON:
Wolfgang Wolf.
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4 7070 02 02 137 k,sharysimons 1 MR. BOEHNERT:
Yes, I know.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
We will ey to set up enough time 3
on a subcommittee sometime to get tarted on this question 4
and then see where the committee would like to go.from 5
there.
6 Another subject then on the list of suggestions 7
was the emergency operating procedures for severe accidents 8
and to what extent do we want to get involved in 9
considering that kind of an issue, or can we turn this all 10 over to the Severe Accidents Subcommittee?
11 MR. EBERSOLE:
Well the staff has said they are 12 going to make a special effort now to get into this.
13 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I am not sure they said that 14 for severe accidents.
15 MR. EBERSOLE:
No, they didn't.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
I am talking here about severe 17 accidents, accidents beyond the design basis now only.
18 MR. EBERSOLE:
The folks who are even working on 19 that haven't gotten into that yet.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
We wave our hands about what we 21 would do if we over got into this or that situation, and 22 now the question is to what extent are there operating 23 procedures and to what extent have the operators been told.
l 24 MR. EBERSOLE:
We have never really gotten an
(
25 answer to the simple question of if you are in a ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 138 (barysimons1 catastrophic core melt event can you turn on the water or 1
2 must you leave it dry, and the IDCOR people are still 3
working on this.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
So there is a mechanistic aspect 5
to the question, and that is operating procedures per se, 6
and then there is a thermal hydraulics aspects as to what 7
does thermal hydraulics tell you that you should be doing 8
in severe accident cases.
9 MR. CATTON:
Well, let's back up one step from 10
'that.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
12 MR. CATTON:
If the thermal hydraulics are going
-13 to tell you what to do as your next step, you first have to 14 make sure that you are measuring the things that you 15 should, and we all know that Reg. Guide 197 quits, or that I
16
-the instrumentation is only qualified for the large break 17 LOCA.
It is not qualified for the severe accident.
So if 18 you are going to have all kinds of aerosols and everything 19 else in your containment, a lot of that instrumentation is 20 jut not going to work.
l 21 MR. EBERSOLE:
I think you have gotten into the 22 quality of phenomena here that closely approaches the 23 seismic issues.
I I
24 MR. CATTON:
Well, Reg. Guide 197 was supposed to 25 measure these things, but somewhere a statement about its l
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(,Jarysimons.1 qualification got watered..
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Do we want to get into this issue 3
at all, or do we think somebody else ought to get into 4
this?
5-MR. CATTON:
I suspect with the recent incident 6
that maybe we should.
7 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, after we find out what.it is 8
the maybe that will affect our Chairman's whole program for 9
the year for all I know.
That may be the Chairman's 10 contingency fund blown right there.
11 MR. EBERSOLE:
Why isn't this an integral part of 12 this separate effort on beyond design basis accidents, the 13 IDCOR program, that there be put into that an operational 14 concept against which you calculate?
I don't see how you 15 can avoid it.
16 MR. CATTON:
I don't know.
17 MR. MICHELSON:
Shall we just say that Class Nine, j
18 if there is anything done, that we would expect the Class 19 Nine Subcommittee ---
20 MR. EBERSOLE:
To be absorbed within it.
4 I
21 MR. MICHELSON:
All right, that is reasonable.
22 MR. EBERSOLE:
And you could add that they had 23 better damn well get started.
t i.
24 (Laughter.)
(:)
25 MR. MICHELSON:
Another subject on our list that l
l i
l ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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()4arysimons1 was suggested is this whole question of these technical 2
integration centers and how do they work and so forth, d
3 We will undoubtedly within the next few months be s
4 getting more information about how this works and we will 5
have some understanding.
The question in my mind is 6
whether or not we need to allocate any particular amount of 7
our future subcommittee time to understanding in depth how 8
the technical integration center concept works.
9 We would have to do that I think, and if you don't 10 like what you see and you want to make constructive i
11 suggestions, you will have to spend some time looking at it 12 in depth.
Is this an area that we want to get into or not?
13 MR. SCHROCK:
Well we would have to review the 14 program of research and thermal hydraulics domain, right?
15 MR. MICHELSON:
As a part of another subcommittee 16 activity we will spend a total of two meetings looking at 17 all the.research programs.
18 MR. BOEHNERT:
We have one now.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
One meeting will be spent looking 20 at it.
21 MR. BOEHNERT:
One meeting per year.
22 MR. MICHELSON:
So about I guess maybe a half an 23 hour2.662037e-4 days <br />0.00639 hours <br />3.80291e-5 weeks <br />8.7515e-6 months <br /> or that at the very most.
This subject might not even 24 be able to get a half a hour on that.
25 MR. CATTON:
Well, one thing you could do in that ACE. FEDERAL REPORTERS, lNC.
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7070 02 02 141 (harysimons1 regard is request that your consults send you something in 2
writing about their views on technical integration centers 3
and what they ought to contain.
4 MR. MICHELSON:
But to do that you have got to be 5
told what they are.
6 MR. CATTON:
Some of us already have views on what 7
they ought to be and sort of know what they have in mind.
8 You know, we have had several presentations and, at least 9
as nearly as I can tell, what they plan is another big 10 integral facility and there may be some things hanging off i
11 of it, which I don't think is the way to go.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
I don't know if I agree with i
13 that.
I didn't get the impression that it is another 14 integral facility.
15 MR. CATTON:
We have heard it here several times, 16 at least on three occasions.
j 17 MR. MICHELSON:
The technical integrations center 18 per se was only supposed to be a center of expertise and 19 not necessarily a set of separate facilities.
20 MR. CATTON:
I hear you, Carl, but I don't believe 21 that is what they have got in the back of their mind.
4 22 Every time we have heard about it here, we have seen a 23 drawing of a four-loop Westinghouse or something plant.
24 And I think what the NRC needs to do in their technical 25 integration center is to have this facility that can test ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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,r y
(,)arysimons 1 that isolation valve you are concerned about.
2 MR. SCHROCK:
They have this jargon of continuing 3
experimental capability which goes along with this 4
discussion.
They talk in fact about more than one loop 5
capability.
They talk about having the capability of 6
simulating all three types, that is a U tube PWR, a once-7 through boiler PWR and a BWR.
So it would be a lot of 8
experimental equipment.
9 MR. CATTON:
But I didn't hear a discussion of a 10 system where they could test PORV's.
11 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, another aspect of this 12 question is not just the goodness of having such centers,
[D t/
13 but rather does the subcommittee wish to follow the 14 operation of such centers by period information, meetings 15 or whatever, which we have done in the past for certain 16 other kinds of facilities.
17 This is now presumably the focus of all thermal 18 hydraulics work.
It is in one place somewhere, and 19 presumably I guess it is still in Idaho, and do we want to 20 spend any of our subcommittee effort on closely following 21 the work as a focused subject as opposed to just hearing 22 maybe about it in bits and pieces from time to time?
23 MR. CATTON:
I think I would like to hear what 24 they have in mind.
It has been a moving target.
25 MR. MICHELSON:
I am saying once established as ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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'()iarysimons1 another part of this question, that once established, 3
t 2
whatever it is, do we want to spend, or do we think we are 3
going to be spending any amount of time following it?
4 MR. TIEN:
I think we should spend some amount of 5
time in the formation stage to really make sure of their 6
charge and exactly how they are going to set up, and that I 7
think is very important.
And after it is established, I 8
think maybe just some information we will need to follow up 9
closely the operation part.
10 I think perhaps since they are allocating a lot of 11 money on this particular thing, we have to get into it in 4
12 terms of our views about their formation and their charge 1
13 and responsibilities and so on.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
They are putting most of the I
15 thermal hydraulics work into one basket, as I understand 16 it, and I think th13 cubcommittee really ought to input to 17 that formation.
I don't disagree with that, and I think 18 that also it ought to be monitoring it on at least a half a 19 meeting a year basis perhaps, but I want to get the views 20 of the other subcommittee members as to how much time do we 21 really think we want to put into this thing.
22 MR. CATTON:
You know, with the LOFT program one 23 of the things that happened with it I think needs to be 24 avoided.
When the LOFT first got set up the LOFT program O
25 was run very well, but gradually things got included and ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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()sarysimons1 budgets went up and it was just.a lack of control that it 2
got out of hand.
In that sense I do think you need this 3
review, critical review.
If it is a major yearly 4
expenditure as part of the research review, it needs to be 5
reviewed and it needs to be critically reviewed.
6 MR. MICHELSON:
Is that the view of the 7
subcommittee as well?
I think to do that takes at least a 8
half a day of meeting a year.
9 MR. CATTON:
The thermal hydraulics is all in one i
10 !
place and it probably means a site visit.
12 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, whatever.
You are talking 12 about ora meeting a year that is burned up in that sort of 13 activity.
14 MR. SULLIVAN:
I guess there are two parts of it.
15 One is to make sure that we understand what they are doing, 16 but there are a lot of complex management issues, and how 17 that is set up and the responsibilities that you give that 18 center and what they delegate to somebody else and how they 19 do it, and I don't think anybody has ever really resolved 20 all of that.
21 MR. SCHROCK:
I think you are right.
22 MR. SULLIVAN:
And I don't know if it is the 23 ACRS's job to that.
24 MR. MICHELSON:
I that is about all the time I am O
25 going to be able to spend on that subject as such.
ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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(
arysimons 1 The next problem I have now will be thtpt we have f
2 allocated seven and a half days of meetings herre'of things 3
that we really thought needed to be done and couldn't put 4
anywhere else and we have got to cut that in half now.
5 Now the way that it went is that essentially
- 6 everything got one day.
7 B&W LOCA, finishing on that was one.
8 The combined steam generator, water hammer, et i
9 cetera was one.
10 Thermal hydraulic basis for pressurized thermal 11 shock, one.
12 Technical integration centers, one.
13 The basic code models, Appendix K, review of code 14 assessment and all that thing rolled into one, one day.
t i
15 We have two days down for developing a new design 16 basis LOCA or design basis for licensing.
17 And we have a half a day down for looking at the l-18 goodness of simulation verification of emergency operating 19 procedures.
l 20 That is what I have on my list.
That was without i
21 asking for any more from the floor, by the way.
22 MR. CATTON:
Does that TRC which we just 23 discussed?
24 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, the technical integration
, ()
l 25 center was one.
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l 7070 02 02 146 C \\arysimons 1
(,j So I have now seven and a half.
2 MR. SULLIVAN:
Do you want a suggestion?
3 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
4 MR. SULLIVAN:
Throw out PTS.
i 5
MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
i 6
MR. SULLIVAN:
Throw out the technical integration 7
center.
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, and pick up from Ward should a
9 be your next suggestion.
10 (Laughter.)
11 MR. SULLIVAN:
Go to the Chairman for ---
12 (Laughter.)
w 13 MR. SULLIVAN:
--- new design basis accidents.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
15 MR. SULLIVAN:
AnJ1 leave the rest of it.
16 MR. MICHELSON:
Then we could cover the rest of it 17 within I think some reasonable approach here.
18 That would be one suggestion.
Do any of the other 19 consultants have any suggestions?
20 MR. CATTON:
The PTS is covered elsewhere.
So I 21 think that is a reasonably good thing to do.
22 MR. SCHROCK:
Where is it covered?
I 23 MR. CATTON:
If you address the question of the 24 codes and void fraction you are really addressing that
(
25 question.
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'O
(,Jarysimons 1 MR. MICHELSON:
In a way you might, but not 2
specifically directed towards this question.
3 MR. CATTON:
I am not sure you need to address it 4
specifically.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, I'll tell you, I wouldn't 6
mind dropping the PTS one just because there is some strong 7
indication on at least some people's parts thatLit is 8
already taken care of but they want to hear more about it.
9 MR. SULLIVAN:
Carl, there is one other thing, and 10 I am not sure where it fits in your scheme here, but we 11 should review the thermal hydraulics part of the research 12 budget, and I consider that to be a high priority item to O
/
13 me.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, the subcommittee as such 15 hadn't planned on bringing that to the subcommittee for 16 review.
It is reviewed as a part of the research
[
17 subcommittee, but I am the only one that sits on that from 18 here for that purpose.
19 MR. SULLIVAN:
But, Dave, we have always r, viewed l
20 the research budget.
t i
21 MR. WARD:
Yes.
22 MR. SULLIVAN:
Is that not the plan any more?
23 MR. BOEHNERT:
We have a meeting on it.
1 24 MR. MICHELSON:
Do we have one?
Where?
25 MR. BOEHNERT:
Here.
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[harysimons1 MR. MICHELSON:
Oh, you have got one allotted.
2 Oh, that is one of the three though.
3 MR. BOEHNERT:
One of the three is allotted for 4
safety and research.
5 MR. MICHELSON:
If you do it that way, then we 6
have an even bigger problem.
I hadn't planned on this. You 7
now, safety research, the review is going to be one meeting 8
a year, as I recall.
9 MR. WARD:
That is for the Research Subcommittee, 10 but the idea is that the other subject matter subcommittees 11 will be generating information in the course of the other 12 work that is going on to feed into that.
O~
13 MR. MICHELSON:
But they don't have to hold 14 meetings explicitly for that purpose.
15 MR. WARD:
Well, it is up to you.
It seems to me 16 that it wouldn't be necessary.
I mean the budget is 17 getting kind of small.
18 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
If one-third of our time 19 were devoted just to worrying about the budget, we wouldn't 20 have much time to worry about all these other subjects.
21 MR. WARD:
It strikes me that if you add on at 22 appropriate meetings that you are holding to cover the 23 topics you are talking about, if you add on some time, a 24 little bit of time to review the budget and the key issues, 25 that that is where you would get ---
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(,)arysimons1 MR. MICHELSON:
Okay.
Well, I think that is the way it should be done.
I would assume that we wouldn't 2
3 have a meeting just for the purposes of the research budget 4
simply because we don't have that many meetings available.
j 5
I think we could fit it in.
We can just put in a little 6
longer day is one way of doing it.
7 (Laughter).
8 MR. SULLIVAN:
But, Carl, I do think it ought to 9
be looked at as a coherent unit.
10 MR. MICHELSON:
Well, that is another 11 subcommittee.
It is my understanding that the Safety 12 Research Subcommittee is supposed to look at it as a total s
13 package.
14 MR. SULLIVAN:
No, I mean the thermal hydraulics.
15 It is still a significant part of the research budget, and 16 it is the only time in which the ACRS has a chance to tell
[
17 the staff of research that they are going in the right 18 direction or they are not.
I 19 MR. MICHELSON:
I'll tell you, I think you are i.
20 right and I am going to add a half to this list making now 21 eight meetings we are really talking about and trying to 22 pare down eight meetings.
23 I think you are right, the equivalent of about a 24 half a meeting a year is going to be absorbed in discussing 25 the research budget situation and I think it is l
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()arysimons1 unavoidable.
Therefore, we are dealing with eight meetings 2
and we have to pare it to three, and I have to have 3
suggestions for eliminating over half of what we have got 4
on this total list or maybe picking up a couple and 5
eliminating -- we have still got to eliminate at least 6
three and if I can pick up two.
I have had suggestions on 7
two, and I am sure when I get down to talking details that 8
nobody wants to ignore the technical integration center 9
formation or operation.
l l
10 MR. CATTON:
That is where all the money is going 11 to shove to.
l 12 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, that is where all the money 13 is going, you know, and I think that we want to have a 14 fairly detailed tie to that.
l 15 MR. SULLIVAN:
Well, let me tell you why I thought 16 we ought to take it out, which is if we got a good, strong 17 input on the budget, then that would almost dictate all of l
18 our comments to the thermal hydraulic integration center, 19 but that is a personal judgment.
20 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, but the problem is that with 21 a half a day total a year available to work on the budget 22 aspect, and if that is considered the budget aspect, you 23 are not going to get very far into the technical 24 integration center.
O 25 MR. SULLIVAN:
But the technical integration ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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(1arysimons1 center is supposed to implement what research wants done.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, that's right.
3 Do we have any other suggestions on things that we 4
might eliminate just to get this thing pared down?
5 I think one of them we could eliminate of course 6
and make a big inroad is just not worry about any new 7
design basis for licensing and let somebody else worry 8
about that.
I have two meetings down here over the year 9
devoted to that subject.
Now it is a nice interesting new 10 area to think about, but that makes it also a time 11 consuming area to work on.
12 MR. CATTON:
But that is the culmination of $1.5
(~
13 billion.
14 MR. MICHELSON:
Don't disagree with progress, 15 There is a need for it.
16 MR. WARD:
I guess my comment on that is that 17 there are a lot of other people worrying about the Appendix 18 K improvements.
Well, I mean there are a lot of other 19 people worrying about the technical integration centers and 20 this, that and the other thing.
But nobody else is 21 worrying, and don't know whether this is true or not but it 22 is my perception, nobody else is thinking about a new 23 design basis for emergency core cooling systems or for 24 containment, and maybe that is the sort of thing that the O
25 ACRS ought to be doing.
Instead of echoing or monitoring 26 or ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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7070 02 02 152
~.
- k,s)2arysimons 1 auditing, maybe we ought to try to steer things in the 2
directions we think they ought to go.
3 MR. MICHELSON:
Can we get two extra days a year 4
for that?
5 (Laughter.)
6 Or is that to be our total thrust, since two days 7
for that and a half a day on the budget, you know, that is 8
two and a half days there.
That is about the only thing we 9
could do for the year if we don't get more time.
That 10 makes it tough.
11 MR. WARD:
The technical integration centers are 12 supposed to be more than research.
Supposedly they are r~s
(.)
13 going to be a center for NRR's activities.in that subject 14 area, too, aren't they?
15 MR. MICHELSON:
I think it is a center of 16 expertise available to the agency.
17 MR. WARD:
Yes.
18 MR. SCHROCK:
They are also supposed to develop 19 documentation that is respectable to make the result of the 20 research more applicable and useful.
21 MR. MICHELSON:
I think the concepts are good if 22 carried out right.
23 MR. TIEN:
You can combine maybe the TIC with 24 review of the research budget together because that is Gk-)
25 probably very closely tied in the direction, and have one ACE FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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(,s,larysimons 1 meeting to combine both.
So you cut half of the TIC.
2 MR. MICHELSON:
I can cut a half that way I think, 3
but that doesn't help me a lot.
It also then means that we 4
will have to cover technical integration centers.
5 Now I only have one suggestion for deletion, and 6
that is the PTS.
7 MR. WARD:
Could I make a suggestion?
8 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes.
9 MR. WARD:
Could we each take that list home 10 tonight and come back and give you -- we could each give 11 you our own concept of an ordered list, our own priority 12 list.
(');
\\-
13 MR. CATTON:
A ranking.
14 MR. WARD:
A ranking.
Can you put that together 15 and ---
16 MR. MICHELSON:
I will rewrite it on a piece of 17 paper and we will get you a copy here momentarily.
18 MR. WARD:
--- and see what the consensus is.
19 MR. MICHELSON:
Yes, and see what the consensus 20 is, although we just have three members to deal with and 21 the consultants.
22 Let me scribble this down.
Mine is off the 23 original list.
So it is not quite reproducible, but it 24 won't take but a moment to give you one.
Right now it
\\'
25 appears that it adds up then to about seven and a half ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
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./m
(
)arysimons 1 meetings a year.
2 Now these will be highly abbreviated titles, but I 3
am sure with all of the discussion you will know exactly 4
what each title means.
5 MR. WARD:
Let's see, while you are writing that 6
down, I will say something off the record.
7 (Discussion off the record.)
8 MR. MICHELSON:
If there isn't anything else, I 9
will recess the meeting and then give you a copy of this 10 just as soon as I finish copying it down here, 11 Anything else that we want on the record?
12 (No response.)
[s-13 The meeting is recessed.
14 (Whereupon, at 5:10 p.m.,
the subcommittee 15 recessed, to reconvene at 8:30 a.m.,
Wednesday, April 30, 16 1986.)
17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 O'
25
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CERTIFICATE OF OFFICIAL REPORTER O
This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION in the matter of:
4 NAME OF PROCEEDING: -ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS SUBCOMMITTEE ON TIIERMAL HYDRAULIC PHENOMENA
. DOCKET NO.:
PLACE:
WASHINGTON, D. C.
i DATE:
TUESDAY, APRIL 29,-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 b
v (TYPED)
MARY C.
SIMONS Official Reporter ACE-FEDERAL REPORTERS INC.
Reporter's Affiliation, O
-