ML20212C582

Notifies of Application of 10CFR55.31(e) to Senior Reactor Operators Licenses During Rensselaer Polytechnic Inst Highly Enriched U/Low Enriched U Core Conversion Process,Per Telcons.Listed Tasks Underway

ML20212C582
Person / Time
Site:	Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Issue date:	02/24/1987
From:	Harris D, Rodriguezvera RENSSELAER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE, TROY, NY
To:	Dosa J Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation
References
NUDOCS 8703030821
Download: ML20212C582 (5)

Text

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Department of Nucliar Engineering a

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Troy, New York 12180-3590 February 24, 1987-Mr. John Dosa, Project Manager Standardization and Special Projects Directorate Division of PWR Licensing-B Office- of Nuclear Reactor Regulation U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, DC 20555

SUBJECT:

APPLICATION OF 10 CFR 55.31(e) TO THE SRO's LICENSES DURING RPI HEU/ LEU CORE CONVERSION.

This is to notify you about our interpretation of 10 CFR 55.31(e) in the case of our SRO licenses during the RPI HEU/ LEU Core Conversion process.

We sent you copies (attached here as well) of our memoranda to Dr. R.T.

Lahey, Jr. informing of the HEU fuel shipment from the RPI Reactor Critical Facility (RCF), and receipt and storage of the LEU fuel at the RCF (December 31, 1986). According with the first memorandum, the last time we manipulated HEU fuel was on October 27, 1986, when we removed it from the core, inventoried it and loaded it into shipping cask FBF-35. In accord with the second memorandum, the last time we handled LEU fuel was on December 31, 1986, when the LEU SPERT fuel was inventoried and stored at the RCF fuel vault.

According to Section 5.6 of our recently amended

• Technical Specifications:

"all fuel transfers shall be conducted under the direction of a licensed senior operator." So last time we actively performed the functions of senior reactor operators was on December 31, 1986, and therefore if we would

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not perform the functions of SRO's before April 30, 1987, then we would have to demonstrate to the NRC that our knowledge and understanding of facility

operation and administration are satisfactory, in compliance with 10 CFR 55.31(e). We expect to receive an NRC order for LEU fuel loading sometime in r April 1987. In the meantime we have been working in the following tasks

• Amendment No. 6 to License CX-22 effective on December 1, 1986.

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D.R. Harris /F. Rodriguez-Vera February 24, 1987 Page 2

1. Formulation of the proposed SAR and Technical Specifications for the LEU. fuel core.

2. ' Answer to NRC Questions regarding previous task.

3. Regular instruments tests and calibration according to our Internal Procedures, which should be performed even when the reactor is shut down.

4. Weekly inspections of stored LEU fuel in accordance with our Internal Procedures.

5. Biannual RPI written examinations relevant to the LEU core (completed for Harris and Rodriguez-Vera on January 16, 1987).

6. Modifications to our Requalification Program for SRO's in view of the HEU/ LEU core conversion.

We consider that performance of these tasks includes on-the-job training and is sufficient to maintain our operator licenses.

This written notification is a result of our phone conversations with Mr.

Joseph Buzzy (NRC Headquarters) and Mr. Doug Coe (NRC-Region I) over the last two weeks. We expect to send our new Requalification Program to these gentlemen, af ter review and approval by our Nuclear Safety Review Board (NSR3), as suggested by Mr. Buzzy.

Sincerely, t%L .

r. Donald R. Harris Fr sco . Rodriguez-Vera Director of the RCF Supe isor of the RCF SRO License No. SOP-10360 SRO License No. SOP-10359 Enclosures Copy of memoranda to Dr. R.T. Lahey, Jr. , from D.R. Harris and F. Rodriguez dated 10/28/86, and 12/31/86.

Copy of Amendment No. 6 to License CX-22.

cc: Joseph Buzzy (NRC. Washington, DC)

Doug Coe (NRC. Region I) i i

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Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Troy, New York 12180-3590 October 28, 1986 TO: Dr. R.T. Lahey, Jr.

FROM: Dr. D.R. Harris and F. Rodriguez l

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SUBJECT:

HEU Fuel Shipping out of the RPI Critical Facility Two shipping casks, DOT 6M Type B, arrived at the RPI reactor facility on

. October 21, 1986 and were inspected. The 177 HEU fuel plates at the reactor

• facility, license CX-22, were inventoried, inspected and packed into cask FBF-10 on October 27, 1986. R.M. Ryan brought 11 HEU fuel plates fros' the RPI LINAC, license SNM-910, to the reactor facility. on October 27; we inventoried and inspected the 11 plates, and we loaded them into cask 1BF-35. The shipping casks were closed, and seal numbers 5350 and 5356 were attached to casks FBF-10 and FBF-35, respectively. The packaging, closures, and seals were inspected by us and by R.M. Ryan, Director, RPI Radiation and Nuclear Safety Office, on October 27. These operations were conducted in accord with cur " Procedures for Packaging of Licensed Haterial for Transport".

Alland sarlier, paperwork we now relevant await to this HEU fuel shipment was completed by us the SST truck. The provision of the shipping casks cad the assignment of the SST truck to pick up our fuel are responsibilities of USDOE personnel and are not at our discretion.

4 Photographs of the two sealed shipping casks, ready for, shipment, are cttached to this meno. We would like to keep these pictures in our file for the next NSRB meeting, and for the NRC inspectors to review, so please send them back to us.

/evh Attachment C/ B. Drobnicki J. Dosa (NRC)

G. Judd R. Ryan

! D. Sangrey

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FIGURE 1. Container FBF #10, Seal #5350 Containing 177 HEU Fuel Plates from l j the Critical Facility (License CK-22) i l

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FIGURE 2. Container FBF #35, Seal #5356 Containing 11 HEU Plates from the LINAC Vault (License S?ti-910) ,

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Rensselaer Polytechnic institute Troy, New York 12180-3590 December 31, 1986 TO: Dr. R.T. Lahey, Jr.

FROM: Dr. D.R. Harris F. Rodriguez

SUBJECT:

Receipt of Low-Enrichment Fuel at RFI Critical Facility

REFERENCES:

10/28/86'and 12/5/86 Ffemos J.L. Snelgrove, R.F. Domagain, and L.R. Dates, "Reqitalification of SPERT Pins for Use in liniversity Reactors,"

ANL/RERTR/TM-8, December 1986.

The new low-enrichment fuel (592 rods of 4.81 wolght parcont If215

• curi chmont-) wan recolved nt the RPI Ronctor CrItienI rnetiIiy (Rf:F) on lincombe r '10, 1986. The Inel was in9pected, loventorted, and stored in tha reconstructed RCF' fuel vault on December 30 and 3i, 1986. The empty shipping canks used to ship the new fatel will be rettirned on .Innunry I'l, 1987 to EC&G Idaho. The new fuel wa9 nubjected to nn intonnive rpini t flention investigntion by Argonne Hattonni Imborntnry innder contract: to tlin llS H O F,. The (nel was fotind to be in excellent condit ten (Snalgrove, 1986).

The tinclear Regn1ntory Commins ton han npproved (R. Crui ter, verbal commiinicat.f on, Flovember 1986) the qual.lfIcatto't of the new finet for n9e in tita RCF.

/evh C/ !). Berg K. Brown (DOE)

G. Dahl J. Donn (NRC)

B. Drobnicki G. Judd A. Maclea R. Ryan D. Sangrey

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1. g UNITED STATES 8 a NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION E  :

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RENSSELAER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE DOCKET NO. 50-225 f

i, AMENDMENT TO FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE

' . Amendment No. 6 License No. CX-22

1. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (the Commission) has found that:

, A. The application for amendment to Facility Operating License No.

, CX-22, filed by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (the licensee),

dated October 17, 1986, complies with the standards and requirements

, of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (the Act), and the

! Commission's regulations as set forth in 10 CFR Chapter I; i

B. The faciliti will operate in conformity with the amended license, the provisions of the Act, and the rules and regulations of the Commission; 1 C. There is reasonable assurance: (i) that the activities authorized L by P s amendment can be conducted without endangering the health j ai . afety of the public, and (ii) that such activities will be l conducted in compliance with the Commission's. regulations; D. The issuance of this amendment will not be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and' safety of the,public; i

E. The issuance of this amendment is in accordance with 10 CFR Part 51 of the Commission's regulations and all applicable requirements have '

been satisfied; and l F. Publication of notice of this amendment is not required since it does not involve a significant hazards consideration nor amendment of a license of the type described in 10 CFR Section 2.106(a)(2).

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4 2., Accordingly, Facility Operating License No. CX-22 is hereby. amended by adding paragraph B.5, which reads as follows: ,

5. Pursuant to the Act and 10 CFR Part 70, " Domestic Licensing of Special Nuclear Material," to receive and possest, but not to use, 21.12 kilograms of contained uranium-235 in SPERT (F-1) fuel pins.

3. Accordingly, the license is amended by changes to the Technical Specificatfons as indicated in the attachment to this license amendment, and paragr6ph C.2 of License No. CX-22 is hereby amended to read as

, follows:

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2. Technical Specifications The Technical Specifications contained in Appendix A, as revised

. through Amendment No. 6, are hereby incorporated in the license.

The licensee shall operate the facility in accordance with the Technical Specifications.

4. This license amendment is effective as of its date of issuance. t FOR THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2

t/-

Herbert N. Berkow, Director Standardization and Special Projects Directorate

Division of PWR Licensing-B

Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation J

Attachment:

Appendix A Technical Specifications Changes Date of Issuance: December 1, 1986 t

ATTACHMENT TO LICENSE AMENDMENT NO. 6 FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE NO. CX-22 DOCKET NO. 50-225 Revised Appendix A Technical Specifications is as follows:

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Remove Pages Add Pages 5-2 5-2 5-3 5-3 1

Changes on the revised pages are identified by marginal lines.

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• 5-2 5.4.2 Reactor Core fhe stainless steel reactor core structure is comprised of u#er, center, and lower gria p'lates. The active core is situated netween tne upper and. center gria plates and is about 22 inches in height and 22 inches in equivalent diam-eter. The core normally contains 38 stationary fuel assem-blies and 4 control rod assemblies with fuel followers. Tne entire support structure is mounted on four posts set in tne floor of the reactor tank.

5.4.3 Standard Fuel Assemoiies A. stationary fuel assembly shall be composed of a maximum of t 18 fuel plates. The box-type fuel assembifes are 2.9 X 2.9 X 22 inches in dimensions'. The center-to-center spacing of .

the fuel plates is maintained by grooved polystyrene inserts 4 at 0.163 inch. A control rod fuel follower will be of similar fuel enrichment, but*1imited to a maximum of 16 plates per assembly. For reduced loadings, plates may be omitted or dummy plates used.

5.'4.4 Control Rod Assemolles The control ' rod assembly shall consist of a control rod -

aosoreer sec't' ion and a control rod follower. Tne length of the control rod poison section is 22 inenes and is nominally

.2.619 inches square. l The poison and fuel follower are in-i serted in a stainless steel square tuce, 2.75 inches square, which passes throug,h tne core and rests in a hydraulic ouffer l

on the bottom grid. plate,q,f,the support structure.

The drive mechanism is a mo,t or and gear oox coup. led by a mag-

- netic clutch to a rack and pinion attached to the top of the rod from an overhead cantilever mount.

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5.5 Water Handling System The water handling system allows remote filling and emptying of the reactor tank. It provides for a water dump by means of a fail safe butterfly-type gate valve wnen a reactor scram is initiated. The j filling system shall be controlled by the operator who must satisfy the sequential interlock system before adding water to the tank. A pump is provided to add the moderator-reflector water from the stor-age cump tank into the reactor tank. Slow and fast fill rates of about 10 gpm and 50 gpm, respectively, are provided. A nominal six inch valve is installed in the dump line and has the capability of emptying the reactor tank on demand of the operator or wnen a reac-tor scram is initiated, unless bypassed with the approval of the

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5-3 licensed senior operator on duty. A valve is installed in the bottom drain line of the reactor tank to provide for completely emptying the reactor tank.

5.6 Fuel i

The fuel used for reactor operation is~ a plate-type, stainless steel clad, UO -SS cermet enriched to 93% U-235. Stainless steel clad, SPERT (F-1) fu$1 pins, enriched to 4.8% U-235jcan be stored in the facility, but not used for reactor operation.

5.7 Fuel Storage and Transfer When not in use, the fuel shall be stored within the storage vault located in the reactor room. The vault shall be closed by a locked door and shall be provided with a criticality monitor near the vault door. The fuel shall be stored in cadmium clad steel tubes with no more than 1 kg fuel per tube mounted on a steel wall rack. A stora tube in the storage vault can not contain more than 15 SPERT (F-1) ge fuel pins at any time. The. center-to-center spacing of the storage tubes together with the cadmium clad steel tubes assures that the infinite multiplication factor is less than 0.9 when flooded with water.

All fuel transfers shall be conducted under the direction of a licensed senior operator.

Operating personnel shall be familiar with health physics procedures and monitoring techniques and shall monitor the operation with appropriate radiation instrumentation.

For a completely unknown or untested system, fuel loading shall follow the inverse multiplication approach to criticality and, thereafter, meet Specification 4.2. Should any interruption of the loading occur (more than four days), all fuel elements except the initial loading step shall be removed from the core in reverse sequence and the operation repeated.

For a known system, up to a quadrant of elements may be removed from the core or a single stationary fuel assembly be replaced with another stationary. assembly only under the following conditions:

1. The net change in reactivity has been previously determined by measurement or calculation to be negative or less than $.72.

. 2. The reactor is subcritical by at least $2.86 in reactivity.

3. There is initially only one vacant position within the active fuel lattice.

4. The nuclear instrumentation is on scale and the dump valve is not bypassed.

5. The critical rod bank position is checked after the operation is complete.

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/ UNITED STATES 8

6 j NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION WASHINGTON, D C. 20655 -

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SAFETY EVALUATION BY THE OFFICE OF NUCLEAR REACTOR REGULATION SUPPORTING AMENDMENT NO. 6 TO FACILITY LICENSE NO. CX-22 RENSSELAER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE DOCKET NO. 50-225 -

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1.0 INTRODUCTION

' Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) submitted an application, pursuant to 10 CFR 50.90, for an amendment to the operating Ifcense for

their 100W critical facility on October 17, 1986.

The amendment request asked for peritission to recalve and possess 600 SPERT (F-1) fuel pins containing 21.12 kilograms of contained U-235.

The fuel would be stored in the fuel storage vault with no n: ore than 15 fuel pins per storage tube. This fuel will be utilized in the reactor after fuel. the reactor's conversion to the use of Low Enriched Uranium (LEU) 2.0 EVALUATION The RPI fuel storage vault contains 81 cells composed of stainless steel l tubes, with a five inch inner diameter, surrounded by 0.015 inch of cadmium metal. These tubes are bolted to a unistrut frame in parallel rows. Each cell was designed to accommodate up to one kilogram of '

U-235. The infinite multip11 cation factor has been calculated to be less than 0.90 even if the fuel storage vault were to be entirely flooded with water. The fuel storage vault design was approved by the NRC ca December 2, 1983 1r. conjunction with RPI's license renewal.

The SPERT (F-1) fuel oins to be received and stored each contain 35.2 gm of U-235. Fifteen fuel pins in a cell would amount to 0.52 kg of U-235; an amount less than that already approved for each cell.

Forty storage tubes / cells will be used to store the SPERT (F-1) fuel pins. If RPI needs to store the fuel from its current core, there will be a sufficient nuinber of storage tubes (25 are needed) to safely accommodate these fuel plates. "

There will be no significant increase in individual or cumulative occupational radiat. ion exposure to the operating staff as a re.; ult of re elving and storing the unirradiated SPERT (F-1) fuel pins.

Radiation exposure to the public will be insignificant.

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3.0 ENVIRONMENTAL CONSIDERATION

This amendment involves changes in the installation or use of facility components located within the restricted area as defined in 10 CFR Part 20 and changes in inspection and surveillance requirements. The staff has determined that the amendment involves no significent hazards consideration (as discussed below), there is no significant change in the types or significant increase in the amcunts of any effluents that may be released offsite, and there is no significant increase in individual

, or cumulative occupational radiatiua exposure. Accordingly, this amenoment meets the eligibility criteria for categorical exclusion set forth in 10 CFR 51.22(c)(9). Pursuant to 10 CFR.51.22(b), no Environmental Impact Statement or Environmental Assessment need be prepared in connection with the issuance of this amendment.

4.0 CONCLUSION

The staff has concluded, based on the considerations discussed above, that: (1) because the amendment does not involve a significant increase in the probability or consequences of accidents previously evaluated, or create the possibility of a new or different kind of accident from any accident previously evaluated, and does not involve a significant reduction in a margir. of safety, the amendment does not involve a significant hazards consideration, (2) there is reasonable assurance that the health and safety of the public will not be endangered by the proposed activities, and (3) such activities will be conducted in compliance with the Commission's regulations and the issuance of this amendment will not be inimical to the common defense and security or the the health and safety of the public.

Principal Contributor: John Dosa Dated: December 1, 1986

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