ML20198G103

Provides Addl Guidance on Compliance W/Ts LCOs & Action Statements

ML20198G103
Person / Time
Issue date:	07/14/1997
From:	Lieberman J NRC OFFICE OF ENFORCEMENT (OE)
To:	Beach A, Miller H, Reyes L NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION I), NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION II), NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION III)
References
EGM-97-013, EGM-97-13, NUDOCS 9708130296
Download: ML20198G103 (6)

Text

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\...../ July 14, 997 EGM 97-013 MEMORANDUM TO: Hube't J. Miller, Regional Administrator

-Rt.gion I Lu'.s A. Reyes, Regional Administrator Region II A. Bill Beach, Regional Administrator Region III Ellis W. Merschoff, Regional Administrator Region IV

{ Roy Zimmerman, Associate Director for Projects,NRR Thomas T. Martin, Associate Director for Ins)ection and Technical Assessment, NRR Eliza)eth Q. Ten Eyck, Director, Division of Fuel Cycle Safety and Safeguards, NMSS Donald A. Cool, Director, Division of Industrial and Medical Nuclear Safety, NMSS John T. Greeves, Director, Division of Waste Management, NMSS FROM: James Lieberman, Director Office of Enforcement

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SUBJECT:

ENFORCEMENT GUIDANCE MEMORANDUM - COMPLIANCE WITH TECHNICAL SPECIFICATION LIMITING CONDITIONS FOR OPERATION AND ACTION STATEMENTS The purpose of this memorandum is to provide additional guidance on compliance with Technical Specification (TS) Limiting Conditions for Operation (LCOs) and ACTION statements. The Enforcement Manual (Manual) currently provides guidance of how to cite against the TSs for inoperable equipment in Section 8.1.1.b. This guidance supplements the existing guidance in the Manual.

Allowed Outaae Time (A0T) Backaround Technical Specifications for operating reactors include Limiting Conditions for Operation (LCOs) that specify the lowest functional capability or performance levels of equipment required for safe operation of the facility. )(

Each individual Lc0 includes both an APPLICABILITY and ACTION statement.

inferred, the APPLICABILITY statement specifies when the LC0 is applicableAs n-(

(e.g., MODES 1, 2, and 3). For the current construction of many Technical Specifications (TSs), the ACTION statement prescribes remedial measures

]/V required under designated conditions in a narrative paragraph format. Many ACTION statements first identify the time necessary to restore the piece of y 9708130296 970714 C PDR p ., w . -

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Multiple Addressees inoperable equipment (commonly referred to as the allowed outage time (A0T)),

and then identify the time necessary to take other action, such as compensatory measures or shutdown, in the event that compliance with the LCO is not restored. For improved Standard Technical Specifications (STS) (i.e.,

NUREG-1430 through NUREG-1434), the ACTION statements are written in a matrix format and are separated into discreet parts: Conditions, Required Action (s),

and Completion Time (s). Conditions typically describe ways in which the requirements of the LCO can fail to be met. Specified with each stated Condition are Required Action (s) and Completion Time (s). The Completion Time is the amount of time allowed for completing a Required Action. An ACTION statement remains in effect until the condition no longer exists or the unit is not in a MODE within the LCO APPLICABILITY. While the term "A0T" is not  !

used in improved STSs, the term and concept of "A0T" is being used for the purposes of this guidance.

' Upon discovery of a failure to meet an LCO, a violation does not necessarily exist based solely on the failure to restore the equipment to operable status within the A0T. A violation would exist when an LCO is not met and all necessary actions have not been completed within All applicable com)1etion times. This is important to emphasize because STSs may have more tian one Required Action and Completion Time for a Condition.

A0T Examoles The following two examples illustrate the use of Completion Times with different types of Conditions and changing Conditions.

TABLE 1 ACTIONS CONDITION REQUIRED ACTION COMPLETION TIME A. One pump A.1 Restore pump to 7 days

. inoperable. OPERABLE status.

B. Required B.1 Be in MODE 3. 12 hours1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br /> Action and e.asociated MQ Completion Time not met. B.2 Be in MODE 4. 36 hours4.166667e-4 days <br />0.01 hours <br />5.952381e-5 weeks <br />1.3698e-5 months <br /> Example 1:

When a pump is declared inoperable, Condition A is entered. If the pump is not restored to OPERABLE status within 7 days (the A0T), a violation does not exist. Instead, Condition B is entered and the Completion Time clocks for Required Actions B.1 and B.2 start. A total of 12 hours1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br /> is allowed for reaching MODE 3 and a total of 36 (not 48 hours5.555556e-4 days <br />0.0133 hours <br />7.936508e-5 weeks <br />1.8264e-5 months <br />) is allowed for reaching i

l

Multiple Addressees MODE 4 from the time that Condition B was entered. If MODE 3 is reached within 6 hours6.944444e-5 days <br />0.00167 hours <br />9.920635e-6 weeks <br />2.283e-6 months <br />, the time allowed for reaching MODE 4 is the next 30 hours3.472222e-4 days <br />0.00833 hours <br />4.960317e-5 weeks <br />1.1415e-5 months <br /> because the total time allowed for reaching MODE 4 is 36 hours4.166667e-4 days <br />0.01 hours <br />5.952381e-5 weeks <br />1.3698e-5 months <br />. A violation exists if the pump cannot be restored to OPERABLE status after 7 days and the unit is not placed in MODE 3 within the next 12 hours1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br /> or a violation exists if the pump cannot be restored to OPERABLE status after 7 days and the unit is not placed in MODE 4 within the next 36 hours4.166667e-4 days <br />0.01 hours <br />5.952381e-5 weeks <br />1.3698e-5 months <br />.

Example 2:

A pump in a two train system is declared inoperable and Condition A is entered. Before Condition A expires, a second pump is declared inoperable, in this case, Condition A is not re-entered for the second pump. Instead, LC0 3.0.3 is entered, since the ACTIONS do not include a Condition for more than one inoperable pump. The Completion Time clock for Condition A does not stop after LCO 3.0.3 is entered, but continues to be tracked from the time Condition A was initially entered. While in LCO 3.0.3: if either one of the inoperable pumps is restored to OPERABLE status and the Completion Time for Condition A has not expired, LC0 3.0.3 may be exited and operation continued in accordance with Condition A with the original Completion Time applicable.

Again, a violation does not exist unless all actions are not completed within All applicable Completion Times.

LCO Backaround The previous discussion addressed compliance with TS ACTION statements based upon discovery of an inoperability or degraded condition. However, there has also been a long-standing recognition of the need to also consider potential enforcement based on the total duration that the condition may have existed (i.e., from the time of occurrence), where it can be readily determined, and the extent to which the licensee should have identified the condition earlier.

In order to address the issue of potential enforcement for a pre-ex!' ting condition, it is necessary to make a clear distinction between comp!!ance with the TS ACTION statements and compliance with the TS LCOs. This distinction is evident in the general TS usage rules, as they are presented in the improved STS:

LCO 3.0.1 - LCOs shall be met during the MODES or other specified conditions in the Applicability, except as provided in LC0 3.0.2.

LCO 3.0.2 - Upon discovery of a failure to meet an LCO, the Required Actions of the associated Conditions shall be ' met, except as provided in LC0 3.0.5 and LC0 3.0.6. If the LC0 is met or is no longer applicable prior to expiration of the specified Completion Time (s), completion of the Required Action (s) is not required unless otherwise stated, in other words, the determination of whether an ACTION statement (LCO 3.0.2) is met is based on when the condition is discovered. Once discovered, the question is whether the actions to be completed are completed on time.

Multiple Addressees Therefore, while a licensee may be in compliance with the ACTION statement of a 15 based upon the discovery of the violation, a licensee may not be in compliance with the TS LC0 (3.0.1) based on when the violation occurred.

The following guidelines should be used for cases where the time of occurrence can be established and the licensee should have discovered the condition sooner:

1. I' 'he time between the occurrence of the condition and the discovery of th6 iondition is greater than the A0T for that condition, then the licensee should be cited for a failure to satisfy the TS LCO. If the licensee otherwise satisfied the TS required action (s) from the time of l discovery of the condition, the citation and enforcement correspondence should acknocledge this.

2. If the time between the acn ttence of the condition and the discovery of the condition is less than the A0T for that condition, and upon discovery the required actions are completed within the A0T or the shutdown track is satisfied, there is not an LCO violation. This would be true even if the time between the accurrence of the condition and the completion of risquired actions is greater than the A0T. However, there may be a root cause issue outside of the TS issue warranting appropriate e :rcement action.

3. If the time between the occurrence of the condition and the completion of required actions is less than the A01, then there is no violation.

The purpose of this guidance is to emphasize the importance of licensee's taking appropriate actions upon discovery of inoperable equipment, rather than focusing resources to attempt to determine when the condition occurred, to the 1xtent that a licensee might choose to shutdown the plant in a less than an orderly fashion, solely to comply with the TS.

In determining whether to make a citation against the LCO, consideration should also be given to other citations, such as root causes that may focus the corrective action. If there is a clear root cause violation, the 100 violation and the root cause violation should normally be combined into one escalated issue or problem. However, depending on the regulatory and technical significance (i.e., actual and potential consequences, including risk considerations), there may also be cases where the significance dictates more than one escalated action, one for the LC0 violation and one (or more) for the root causes. For example, depending on the total time the equipment was inoperable and other factors determined by the root cause evaluation, enforcement discretion may be warranted to increase the amount of the civil penalty based on a substantial increase in risk due to the excessive duration of the inoperability and/or increase the severity level above Severity Level Ill.

Multiple Addressees 30Exanles The following examples illustrate these guidelines. (UseTABLEIasthe applicable 15 for these examples.)

Example 1:

U)on discovery of an inoperable pump, Condition A is entered. The licensee is a)1e to restore the pump in 7 days and 3 hours3.472222e-5 days <br />8.333333e-4 hours <br />4.960317e-6 weeks <br />1.1415e-6 months <br />. Therefore, the licensee was able to comply with the TS ACTION statement. During the root cause analysis, the licensee was able to determine that the violation occurred 7 days and 9 hours1.041667e-4 days <br />0.0025 hours <br />1.488095e-5 weeks <br />3.4245e-6 months <br /> prior to discovery because of not following a procedure required by and 10 CFR Part Drawings." It '..50, further Appendix determined B, Criterion that the licenses V, " Instructions, should haveProcedures, identifie this condition at that time. In this case, the time between the occurrence of

" the violation and the time of discovery of the violation was 7 days and 9 hours1.041667e-4 days <br />0.0025 hours <br />1.488095e-5 weeks <br />3.4245e-6 months <br />...a time greater than the A0T of 7 days. Therefore, a violation of the TS LCO would be warranted. Citations against 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix B, Criterion V and Criterion XVI, " Corrective Action" should also be considered.

Example 2:

U)on discovery of an inoperable pump, Condition A is entered. The licensee is a)1e to restore the pump in 7 days and 3 hours3.472222e-5 days <br />8.333333e-4 hours <br />4.960317e-6 weeks <br />1.1415e-6 months <br />. Therefore, the licensee was able to comply with the TS ACTION statement. During the root cause analysis, the licensee was able to determine that the violation occurred 6 days prior to q

4 discovery because a procedure was not properly followed. It is further determined that the licensee should have identified this condition. In this case, the time between the occurrenco of the violation and the time of discovery of the violation was 6 days...a time less than the A0T of 7 days.

Therefore, a violation of the TS LCO for the pre-existing condition would not be warranted. However, enforcement action for the root cause (i.e.,

i Criterion V) and the failure to identify (i.e., Criterion XVI) should be

, considered.

In summary, when an inoperable condition is discovered, the TSs should be reviewed to determine if a violation of the TS ACTION statement has occurred

based on t'ne .tj,me of discoverv. The next step would be to determine if the time of occurrence can be established and to determine if the licensee should have discovered the condition sooner. The time between discovery and occurrence should be compared to the A0T to determine if a violation of the TS LCO has occurred.

These issues will be included in the Enforcement Manual in a future Change Notice.

If you have any questions, please contact Renee Pedersen at (301) 415-2742.

cc: E. Jordan, DEDE H. Thompson, DEDR

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