ML20211D861
| ML20211D861 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 12/10/1986 |
| From: | Stello V NRC OFFICE OF THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR FOR OPERATIONS (EDO) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| TASK-PII, TASK-SE SECY-86-368, NUDOCS 8702240156 | |
| Download: ML20211D861 (17) | |
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POLICY ISSUE secv-86-368 December 10, 1986 TheCommissione(rsInformation)
FOR:
FROM:
Victor Stello, Jr.
Executive Director for Operations
SUBJECT:
NRC ACTIVITIES RELATED TO THE ' COMMISSION'S POLICY ON THE REGULATION OF ADVANCED NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS PURPOSE:
To inform the Commissioners of the staff's plans and activities related to the review of three Department of Energy sponsored ad-vanced reactor concepts.
SUMMARY
The Department of Energy (00E) currently has under development three advanced reactor concepts:
350 Mwt Modular High Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor (MHTGR) 425 Mwt liquid sodium cooled Power Reactor Inherently Safe Module (PRISM) 900 Mwt liquid sodium cooled Sodium Advanced Fast Reactor (SAFR)
In 1985 NRC was requested by DOE to review these conceptual designs at the preapplication stage to assess their licensability.
To date a number of interactions have taken place between the staff and DOE and its contractors to plan for the NRC review, to familiarize the staff with the.three concepts under development and to identify and discuss key issues associated with these concepts.
Preliminary Safety Information Documents (PSIDs) have also been prepared by DOE and its contractors on each of the three designs and submitted to NRC for review in September, 1986 (MHTGR) and November, 1986 (PRISM and SAFR).
CONTACT:
Thomas L. King, NRR X-27014 l
hojaaj 6 86121o 86-368 PDR
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The Commissionsrs The staff review of the three PSID's has just been initiated. The product of this review is to be a Safety Evaluation Report (SER) on each of the three concepts that will provide guidance on the licens-ing criteria applicable to the designs and an assessment of the po-tential of the designs to meet these criteria.
Currently, the lead staff responsibility for the review rests with the Safety Program Evaluation Branch (SPEB) in the Division of Safety Review and Oversight (DSRO), NRR.
Support from the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research is being provided.
Technical assistance from National Laboratories is also planned.
In the NRC reorganization-effort currently underway the lead responsibility for these reviews is to be transferred from NRR to RES.
The staff schedule for performing the reviews of the three advanced concepts is as follows:
Staff prepared Commission Papers i
on key issues:
Paper to Commission Standardization 4/87 Severe Accidents 6/87 Containment 6/87 Staff SER on each concept:
Issue SER MHTGR 1/88 PRISM 4/88 SAFR 4/88 l
The above schedule is contingent upon the review effort receiving sufficient resources as summarized below:
FY87 FY88 I
-NRR and RES Staff 10.0 PSY
- 7. 7 PSY
-NRR and RES Contractor Assistance 1900K 1200K Currently, there is a possibility that full funding for this review effort may not be possible in FY1987.
This would result in approxi-mately a six month slip in the SER completion dates.
l BACKGROUND:
On October 9, 1986, the Department of Energy and its contractors briefed the Commission on three advanced reactor concepts under de-velopment by the Department for which an NRC licensability review has been requested.
These concepts are:
The Commissioners '
- 350 Mwt Modular High Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor (MHTGR)
- 425 Mwt liquid sodium cooled reactor called the Power Reactor Inherently Safe Module (PRISM)
- 900 Mwt liquid sodium cooled reactor called the Sodium Advanced Fast Reactor (SAFR)
As a result of this briefing the Commission requested that the staff provide them with an information paper describing the staff's plans for review of these concepts.
The background and discussion provided below addresses this request.
The NRC was approached early in 1984 by DOE regarding the initiation of interactions in the advanced reactor area to provide DOE and its contractors with guidance early in the design process (prior to any formal application) regarding the requirements for and the licensability of certain advanced reactor designs.
This action was in part stimulated by the Commission's interest in developing a, poli-cy on advanced reactors encouraging such interaction.
A series of' letters between NRC and DOE (references 1-6) were exchanged regarding the form of and support for such interactions.
Some interactions between the staff and DOE also took place during this time period to familiarize the staff with the DOE plans and concepts.
Progress on development of a Commission policy on advanced reactors continued and, in recognition of the Commission's interest in this area and of the developing advanced reactor programs in the U.S., an Advanced Reactors Group was formed in NRR in May, 1984 to be the point of.
contact for NRC activities in this area.
In March, 1985 a draft Commission Policy Statement on the Regulation of Advanced Nuclear Power Plant was issued for public comment (50FR 11882, dated March 26, 1985).
In mid-1985 DOE proposed specific plans and schedules (references 7 and 8) for the review of one MHTGR and two liquid metal reactors (LMRs).
The proposed plan called for interactions in FY1986 between the staff and DOE on key safety and licensing issues associ-ated with the three concepts and, beginning in FY1987, staff review of a Preliminary Safety Information Document (PSID) to be submitted by DOE on each design.
The PSID is to be basically a description of the conceptual design, including proposed licensing criteria and i
safety analysis to illustrate plant response to accident conditions.
A Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) on each of the three designs and a description of their supporting R&D programs were also to be submitted by DOE in support of the review.
The output of the staff review of the PSIDs would be a Safety Evaluation Report (SER) on each concept, giving guidance on the ifcensing criteria to be applied and the potential of the designs to meet these criteria.
Proposed com-plation dates for the staff review were September, 1987 for the MHTGR and February,1988 for the U4Rs.
The DOE proposed plans were agreed i
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The Commissioners to by NRC (references 9 and 10) on the condition that NRC received resources consistent with its Congressional budget requests.
More specific and detailed interactions between the staff and DOE and its contractors began in August, 1985, first with briefings by DOE to update the staff on the three concepts being developed and then later on with interactions on certain key issues associated with the three concepts.
These interactions were preliminary discussions to provide early staff review and feedback on key issues which could be factored into the PSIDs on each of the three designs.
Tha key issues identi-fied for early discussion on the MHTGR and LMRs are listed in Tables 1 and 2, respectively.
Early in 1986, the ACRS Subcommittee on Ad-vanced Reactors and the Full Committee were also briefed on the three advanced concepts and on the staff's review plans.
They indicated their support for these interactions in a letter from D. Ward to Chairman Palladino, dated April 16, 1986.
In addition, the Commis-sion testified before the House Subcommittee on Energy Research and Production, Committee on Science and Technology, regarding NRC's i
plans in the area of advanced reactors.
This testimony took place on i
October 31, 1985 and the Commission's support and intent to review the DOE advanced reactor concepts was stated.
The interactions with DOE proceeded as planned until February, 1986 when, due to resource constraints, the staff review was put on hold 4
(reference 11).
Up until that time the interactions listed in Table i
3 had taken place.
DOE has continued to proceed with preparation of the PSIDs for the three advanced concepts.
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In September, 1986 the staff interactions with DOE and its contrac-tors on the advanced concepts resumed as committed to in references 12 and 13.
Testimony before the House Subcommittee on Energy Re-search and Production was presented by NRR on September 17, 1986 l
regarding NRC plans to resume the review the MHTGR concept.
- Again, i
our intent to perform the review was stated.
Discussion of the staff's current review plan on these concepts follows.
DISCUSSION:
The current staff review plan and schedule for reviewing the MHTGR and LMR concepts is shown in Figure 1.
This plan was developed by the staff in late FY1986 and is based upon applying resources to the review effort in FY1987 and FY1988 consis-tent with that shown in Table 4.
Currently, staff responsibility for the review of the advanced reac-tor concepts and the development of plans and resource requests in this regard rests with the Safety Program Evaluation Branch (SPEB) in the Division of Safety Review and Oversight (DSRO), NRR.
The func-tion of the Advanced Reactors Group was put in SPEB in the most re-cent NRR reorganization.
Support to NRR in the review effort is to
Tho Commission'ers 5-also be provided by the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research.
In the NRC reorganization effort currently underway, the lead responsi-bility for these reviews is to be transferred from NRR to RES.
Ap-propriate personnel from SPEB will also be transferred to RES to provide experience and continuity in the review.
The current plan for staff review of the three advanced concepts consists of two parts:
(1)
Preparation of three Commission. Papers on items of a policy nature associated with the advanced designs, (2) Review of the PSIDs (including PRAs and R&D program de-scriptions) for the three advanced designs, The two parts are discussed in more detail below:
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Commission Papers i
From the staff review effort completed between August 1985 and Febru-ary,1986, it became apparent that certain issues associated with the advanced concepts are related to Commission policies and their reso-lution could potentially be considered Commission policy matters themselves.
Therefore, it was decided to address these issues early in the review and to raise them to Commission attention in the form of Commission Papers.
Currently, the issues considered to require Commission attention are:
Standardization, which includes the following:
Are the goals of the DOE advanced reactor programs i
with regard to standardization consistent with Commis-sion goals / policy (e.g., the extent of the plant to be standardized, the level of design detail to be standardized)?
What level of operating experience, supporting R&D, prototype testing or initial start-up testing are necessary on a new reactor design before NRC would consider granting a final design approval or certifi-cation of that design?
Treatment of Severe Accidents, which includes the following:
Is the range of accidents to be considered in the design acceptable?
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Are the source terms to be used acceptable?
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What preventive / mitigative measures are to be taken for severe accidents?
Are the emergency planning requirements acceptable?
Are the plans for the treatment of severe accidents consistent with the Commission's Severe Accident and Safety Goal Policy Statements?
Containment, which includes the following:
What is the basis fcr the containment design?
Are the containment plans consistent with the Commis-sion's Severe Accident and Safety Goal Policy Statements?
It is our plan to write a paper on each of the above three issues.
Each paper will include:
a description of how each advanced concept plans to address the above questions /subissues, a description of the staff evaluation of these plans, a recommended NRC position on the subject questions / issues, including the need for any rule changes, exemptions, policy considerations to imple-ment the recommended position.
It is planned to develop the recommended NRC position in the form of criteria which can be used as guidance for these designs.
Commission guidance or decisions on items addressed in these papers will be requested, as appropriate.
ACRS and CRGR review on the above Commission Papers will be sought prior to their transmittal to the Commission.
The schedule for completion of the papers is as follows:
Oraft to CRGR Final To Subject ACRS Mtg w/ACRS Review Commission
- Standardization 1/87 2/87 3/87 4/87
- Severe Accidents 3/87 4/87 5/87 6/87
- Containment 3/87 4/87 5/87 6/87
The Commissioners '
To date we have met with DOE and its contractors on the subject of standardization as it relates to all three advanced concepts.
During November and December 1986, ws have meetings scheduled with DOE and its contractors on the severe accident and containment subjects on all three designs.
PSID Review PSID's for the three advanced concepts have been prepared by DOE and its contractors.
The PSID for the MHTGR was formally submitted to
' NRC by DOE for review on September 30, 1986 (Reference 14) and ac-knowledged via Reference 15.
Formal submittal by DOE of the PSIDs for the two LMRs was made on November 17, 1986 (Reference 16) and acknowledged via Reference 17.
Along with the PSIDs, PRAs and a description of the supporting R&D programs for each concept are being submitted.
Project numbers have been assigned to the PSID reviews as follows:
MHTGR (Project #672), SAFR (Projec.t. #673) and PRISM (Project #674).
The objectives of the staff review of the PSIDs are to:
1) provide guidance on the licensing criteria which apply to the designs, 2) assess the potential of the designs to meet these criteria,
- and, 3) assess the adequacy of the existing technology base and R&D programs supporting the designs.
The review to be done by the staff will be coordinated by SPEB.
It will involve support from other parts of the Agency as well as Na-tional Laboratories as follows:
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SPEB responsible for overall coordination and management of the review.
Will also be lead for review of unique i
(i.e., not similar to LWR) features of the design.
DSR0 Will provide reviewers from branches outside SPEB to support the review.
These will include reviewers for the PRA, I&C, mechanical, structural, and materials areas.
RES Will provide review support to NRR in the areas of PRA review, R&D Program Review and Code Development / Improvement.
BNL Will provide analytical support and assistance in the review of the MHTGR and LMR Safety Analysis, PRAs and supporting R&D programs.
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The Commissioners -
ORNL Will provide analytical support and assistance in the review of the MHTGR Safety Analysis, supporting R&D program and control system.
As stated in the Federal Register notice (FR 24643, dated July 8, 1986) which contained the final Advanced Reactor Policy Statement, general guidance regarding implementation and utilization of this Policy Statement, including the implications of other Commission policies, practices and regulations, is to be documented in a NUREG report.
The staff is currently developing this NUREG which has been given the title NUREG-1226 " Development and Utilization of the NRC Policy Statement on the Regulation of Advanced Nuclear Power Plants."
NUREG-1226 will be provided to the Commission for review prior to its issuance.
Key points regarding the approach the staff intends to take to meet its objectives on the review of the three DOE advanced concepts follow:
Since the DOE advanced reactor programs are each directed toward developing a specific standard plant design, our review will be directed toward the review of those specific plants, and not toward general or generic reviews of safety issues, criteria, etc.
Criteria and guidance then developed will, for the most part, be applicable to a specific design.
It is anticipated, however, that the criteria and guidance developed would form the foundation for the developement of general guidance and crite-ria, if such general guidance and criteria were desired.
The development of licensing criteria will build upon existing LWR criteria, where practical.
Where changes are needed they will be made on a case by case basis to account for the unique characteristics of the design.
In the development of licensing criteria for the three advanced concepts conside,ation will be given to the use of less or non prescriptive criteria, where appropriate.
The designers are expected to propose the criteria they desire to use including any less or non prescriptive crite-ria.
In general, the staff will consider the use of less or non prescriptive criteria provided the following can be satis-factorily addressed:
Identification of what needs to be regulated to ensure the criteria are met.
How uncertainties will be identified and treated.
Identification of how defense-in-depth will be maintained.
More detailed guidance on the use of less or non prescriptive criteria will be provided in the forthcoming staff NUREG-1226.
- The Commissioners
- To assess the potential of the design to meet the criteria, the staff review will include independent analysis of the key safety characteristics of the plant.
The objectives of this analysis will be to evaluate in those key areas the safety characteris-tics of the design, to explore the design for margin and weak points and to determine the areas of uncertainty in the analyti-cal tools and supporting base technology.
As stated in the Advanced Reactor Policy Statement the advanced concept must, as a minimum, have the same degree of protection of the public and environment as is required fior current genera-tion LWRs.
However, enhanced margins of safety over current generation LWRs are expected.
The degree of safety will be based on a judgement of the designs involving:
the extent to which the designs incorporata those attributes listed as desirable in the Advanced Reactor Policy Statement, s
the uncertainties associated with the safety ar.alysis and supporting base technology for the designs, the extent to which margins and defense-in-depth are employed to account for these uncertainties, the capability and margin included in the design to prevent and mitigate severe accidents in compliance with the Commission's Severe Accident and Safety Goal
- Policies, the acceptability of the balance between accident prevention and mitigation used in the design, the previous operating experience, existing technology and proposed R&D supporting the design, and compliance with the licensing criteria developed for the design.
Consideration will be given to giving credit for enhanced safety characteristics incorporated into the design.
This credit may be in the form of changed design criteria or administrative requirement.
ACRS and CRGR Review ACRS participation in the review of the PSIDs is planned.
Copies of the PSIDs will be provided to the ACRS as soon as they are received by the staff (Copies of the PSID for the MHTGR have already been provided to ACRS).
Drafts of the staff's SERs on the three concepts will be provided to ACRS and CRGR for review and comment prior to issuing the SERs as follows:
'The Commissioners,
CRGR Issue SER Draft to ACRS MTG w/ACRS Review Final SER MHTGR 10/87 11/87 12/87 1/88 PRISM 1/88 2/88 3/88 4/88 SAFR 1/88 2/88 3/88 4/88 Prior to completion of the draft SER, meetings may be held with ACRS on specific issues associated with the three concepts to familiarize the ACRS with the issues and to solicit early comment and feedback on them.
Resources Staff resources to perform these reviews on the schedule shown in Figure 1, have been estimated. These are listed in Table 4.
RES resources for FY1987 have been allocated consistent with that show'n in Table 4.
NRR resources for FY1987 are currently under re-view.
Due to other priority work within NRR it may not be possible for NRR to provide full funding for this review in FY1987.
A funding level of approximately 700K from NRR in FY1387 is currently projected which would result in a schedule slip of approximately 6 months in completion of the SERs.
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Victor Stello, Jr.,
Executive Director for Operations
Enclosures:
1)
List of Reference Letters
- 2) Tables 1 Thru 4
- 3) Figure 1 DISTRIBUTION:
Cormnissioners OGC (H Street)
REFERENCE LETTERS 1).
1/3/84 J. Griffith to W. Dircks Want to start interaction on HTGR.
2).
5/15/84 W. Dircks to J. Griffith Agree to start interaction on HTGR.
3).
7/11/84 S. Brewer to H. Denton Proposed 3 phase approach for interaction on advanced i
reactors.
4).
8/6/84 H. Denton to S. Brewer Agreed to 3 phase approach for interaction.
5).
2/12/85 J. Vaughan to N. Palladino Request for continued support on advanced reactors.
6).
3/14/85 W. Dircks to J. Vaughan Committed to continued support of advanced reactor interaction.
7).
4/26/85 J. Vaughan to W. Dircks Transmitted HTGR Licensing Plan.
8).
7/1/85 J. Vaughan to W. Dircks Transmitted LMR Licensing Plan.
9).
7/11/85 W. Dircks to J. Vaughan Committed to review of conceptual HTGR design.
10). 9/13/85 W. Dircks to J. Vaughan Committed to review of conceptual LMR designs.
11). 2/19/86 H. Denton to J. Vaughan Informed DOE of impact of budget reductions on planned NRC/ DOE advanced reactor interactions.
12). 7/30/86 V. Stello to J. Vaughan Committed to resume reviews of HTGR and LMRs in FY87.
13). 9/5/86 L. Zech to J. McClure Informed him advanced reactor Policy Statement was issued and that NRC would resume interactions with DOE.
2-14). 9/30/86 F. Gavigan to T. Speis Transmitted PSID for HTGR 15). 10/17/86 T. Speis to F. Gavigan Confirmed receipt of PSID for HTGR and NRC review schedule.
16). 11/17/86 F. Gavigan to T. Speis Transmi'tted PSIDs for PRISM and SAFR 17). 11/26/86 T. Speis to F. Gavigan Confirmed receipt of PSIDs for LMRs and NRC review schedule.
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TABLE 1 i
KEY SAFETY AND LICENSING ISSUES FOR THE MODULAR HTGR 4
Use of Top Level Non-Prescriptive Criteria.
Treatment of severe accidents (including source term and emergency planning).
Lack of Conventional Containment / Confinement Building.
Multi-Module Control Scheme.
Design and reliability of shutdown systems.
i Design and reliability of decay heat removal systems.
l Use of Non-Safety grade balance of plant (including control room).
Graphite structural criteria i
Effect of air / water ingress events on graphite and plant j
performance.
l Provisions for inservice inspection (including graphite structures).
Implementation of standardization.
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TABLE 2 KEY SAFETY AND LICENSING ISSUES FOR THE LMRs Treatment of severe accidents (including source term and amergency planning)
Adequacy of containment Use of metal fuel Multi-Module control scheme Design and reliability of shutdown systems Design and reliability of decay heat removal systems Use of non-safety grade balance of plant (including control room)
Provisions for inservice inspection Implementation of standardization
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L TABLE 3 6
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<z,1 Staff Interactions to Date and Planned on DOE's Advanced Reactor Concepts
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Topic MHTGR PRISM SAFR 7-
' Concept
Description:
7/31-8/1/85 9/27/84 9/26/84 and and and T
12/18/85 11/7/85 11/6/85
- Emergency Planning Strategy 11/4/85 11/12/86 10/16/86
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Design Criteria 1/30/85 11/19/85 and J'
11/12/85
- Accident Selection Process 5/31/85 11/19/85 11/19/85 and 10/8/86 Response to Station Blackout 8/8/85 8/8/85
- Shutdown Heat Removal System 9/26/85 9/26/85
- Tornado Design Requirements 8/29/85 s
- Overhead Crane Design 10/11/85 Require ~ments
- Safeguards and Security Plan 11/21/85
- Metal Fuel 1/22/86 1/22/86
- Treatment of TMI and Generic 2/10/86 2/10/86 Safety Issues
- Plans for Inservice Inspection 2/19/86
- Plans for-Standardization 9/30/86 9/9/86 9/12/86 TreakmntofSevere 11/25/86 11/12/86 10/16/86 i.,
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Accidents
- Containment Desi.gn 12/11/86*
11/13/86 11/19/86
- Use of a Demonstration 1/15/87*
Safety Test and other R&D
- Planned m
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TABLE 4 l
CURRENT RESOURCE PROJECTION FOR STAFF REVIEW OF 00E ADVANCED CONCEPTS STAFF MANPOWER (PSY)
FY87 FY88 NRR 8.0 5.7 RES 2.0 2.0, TOTAL ID D
w TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE FY87 FY88 NRR 1500K 700K RES 400K 500K TOTAL 1900K 12d6K l
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SCHEDULE FOR NRC REVIEW OF DOE ADVANCED REACTOR CONCEPTS FY 86 FY 87 FY 88 JAS O N D J F M A M J.J :A iS O N D J F M ;A :M J J A S Commission Papers:
-Severe Accident / Source U
U U - PAPER TO COMM4/87 Term /EP 11/86 (L87
- - ~ ~ ~
-Containment / Confinement V
U U.- PAPER TO COMN_I4L87 11/86 4/87 MTGS W/ DOE MTG W/ACRS
-Standardization V
-~U U-PAPER TO COMM f/87 9/_83 2/87
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PSIDs:
1.
IITGR:
DEGIN STAFF REVIEW
-PSID Review U
U
-PRA Review U
O
-R&D Program Review U
-issue SER/LIC LTR
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'U ISSUE SER - 1/88 2.
SAFR:
IIEGIN STAFF. REVIEW
-PSID Review U
U
-PRA Review V
U
-R&D Program Review U
U 12/86
-issue SER/LIC LTR
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U lSSUE SER - 4/88 1/88 3.
PRISM:
DEGIN STAFF REVIEW
-PSID Review U ~~ ~ ~~ '
U
-PRA Review _
U U
-R&D Program Review U
-issue SER/LIC LTR
~ ~ "U
~7 1SSUE SER - 4/88 1/88
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C.
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