ML20245H265
| ML20245H265 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 08/10/1989 |
| From: | NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| REF-10CFR9.7 NUDOCS 8908160386 | |
| Download: ML20245H265 (60) | |
Text
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' Attached are copies of a Commission meeting transcript and related meeting
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. placement in the Public Document Room. No other distribution is requested or required.
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t Attachments 8/10/89 - ACRS Meeting 1.
ACRS report dated 5/9/89 - NRC's Human Factors Programs and Initiatives 2.
ACRS report dated 5/9/89 - Generic Letter Related to Occupational Radiation Exposure of Skin from Hot Particles 3.
ACRS report dated 6/14/89 - Reliability and Diversity 4.
ACRS report dated 6/14/89 - Proposed Resolution of Generic Issue 128, " Electrical Power Reliability" 5.
ACRS report dated 6/14/89 - Boiling Water Reactor Core Power Stability l
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______.--.___________j
- UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
rtRionic cRitrino sv Anv1SoRv coxarrrzs on REACTOR SAFEcUARDS LOCatiOD.*
ROCKVILLE. MARYLAND h&($'
AUGUST 10, 1989 Pages:
53 PAGES Li[
NEALR.GROSSANDCO.,INC.
~1 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, Northwest Washington, D.C.
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DISCLAIMER This is an unofficial transcript of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission held on August 10, 1989, in the Commission's office at One White Flint
- North, Rockville, Maryland.
The. meeting was open to public attendance and observation.
This transcript has not been reviewed, corrected or edited, and it may contain inaccuracies.
The transcript is intended solely for general informational purposes.
As provided by 10 CFR 9.103, it is not part of the formal or informal record of decision of the matters discussed.
Expressions of opinion in this transcript do not necessarily reflect final determination or beliefs.
No pleading or other paper may be filed with the Commission in any' proceeding as the result of, or o
addressed to, any statement or argument contained herein, except as the Commission may authorize.
e" NEAL R. GROSS COURT ROpoRTERS AND TRANSCRittR5 1313 RNODE 18 LAND AVINUE. M.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINetoN. D.C. 20005 (202) 232 6
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i UNITED' STATES OF AMERICA L
l NUCLEAR-REGULATORY COMMISSION PERIODIC BRIEFING BY-ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS PUBLIC MEETING Nuclear Regulatory Commission One White Flint North Rockville, Maryland
~~
Thursday, August 10, 1989 L _-
The Commission met in'open session, pursuant to notice, at 2:00 p.m.,
Kenneth M.
Carr, Chairman, presiding.
COMMISSIONERS PRESENT:
KENNETH M.
CARR, Chairman of the Commission THOMAS M. ROBERTS, Commissioner KENNETH C.
ROGERS, Commissioner JAMES R.
CURTISS, Commissioner I
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h STAFF AND PRESENTERS SEATED AT THE COMMISSION TABLE:
WILLIAM C.
PARLER, General Counsel FORREST J.
REMICK, Chairman, ACBS CARLYLE MICHELSON, Vice Chairman, ACRS CHARLES J.
WYLIE, ACRS WILLIAM KERR,.ACRS JAMES C.
CARROLL, ACRS
-DAVID A.
WARD, ACRS HAROLD LEWIS, ACRS l
IVAN CATTON, ACRS CHESTER'SEISS, ACRS PAUL SHEWMON, ACHS I
I.
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2:00 p.m.
3 CHAIRMAN CARS:
Good afternoon, ladies and 4
gentlemen.-
5 The purpose of today's meeting is for the 6
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards to brief the.
7 Commission concerning their review of five specific 8
matters:
9 NRC's Human. Factors Program and initiatives; 10 Occupational radiation exposure of skin from 11 hot particles; 12 ~
Application of diversity in systems that use 13 redundancy to achieve high levels of reliability; 4U 14 Proposed resolution of Generic Issue 128, 15 electrical power reliability; 16 And the toiling water reactor core power 17 stability.
18 Copies of recent ACRS letters related to 19 these topics are available at the entrance to the 20 meeting room.
21 Do my fellow Commissioners have any opening 22 comments?
23 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
No.
24 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Doctor Remick, I want to 25 welcome you and the other members of the Committee on i
t.
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behalf of myself and my fellow Commissioners.
The 2
work performed by the ACRS~is very important and your 3
views are highly regarded by this Commission.
4 I might also add that this may be your last 5
time to give us advice and you'll have to be on this 6
side of the table and take it.
7 DOCTOR LEWIS:
I don't think he'll stop 8
giving you advice.
9 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
But I'm not sure of 10 our record of taking their advice.
11 CHAIRMAN CARR:
We'll have to do something 12 with it then.
13 please proceed with your presentation.
14 DOCTOR REMICK:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and 15 I would like to take this opportunity on behalf of the 16 Committee to congratulate you on becoming chairman of 17 the Commission.
This is our first opportunity express 18 those words of congratulations.
The Committee looks 19 forward to working with you and the other 20 Commissioners in the years ahead.
~
21 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Thank you.
22 DOCTOR REMICK:
We do have five topics to 23 discuss with you and the order that you just read is 24 the order that we thought we would proceed, if that's 25 acceptable.
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1 CHAIRMAN CARR:
That's fine.
2 DOCTOR REMICK:
And the first one of those 3
topics is our May 9th letter on human factors programs 4
and initiatives.
I am Chairman of the Subcommittee, 5
Human factor Subcommittee, so I'll take the lead and 6
introduce that and then entertain questions.
7 I think you're aware of the fact that the 8
ACRS for a long time has been a strong supporter of 9
increased human factors considerations.
So, we're 10 very pleased to see that the Commission is back 11 supporting research in that area.
12 One of the things we noted is there aren't 13 many topics that are proposed, and so that one gets 14 some useful information, it's going to take some 15 research management concentrated attention to make 16 sure one gets the most out of those programs.
17 In January, we held a subcommittee meeting 18 with the staff on a document at that time which was 19 called Human Factors Regulatory Research Program Plan.
20 One of the observations of the subcommittee was that 21
.to the outside world the fact that we talk about 22 research and technical assistance and what was 23 proposed at that time was just to cover the human 24 factors programs that were being under the 25 administration of Research, this was misleading to NEAL R.
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people, not realizing that there's a lot of technical 2
assistance work going on in NRR and blMS$and so forth.
3 So, one of-the recommendations of the 4;
. subcommittee, you really ought to put out something 5
that gives the total initiatives within the Agency in 6
the area of human factors, because there'are things 7
that might be research that are done within the 8
offices and there might be some things that really one 9
might define.as technical assistance that are done by 10 the Office of Research.
What makes them different is 11 the length of time.
If they're to be expected to be a 12 long period of time to do it, it's done by Research.
13 If it's a short type of effort, usually within~ the 14 other offices.
15 While we're pleased to see that the staff 16 apparently followed that advice En the documents =
17 kws before us gives a much better impression of the 18 overall program within the Agency on human factors
.19-initiatives.
So, we applaud the staff effort in that 20 area.
~
21 We're also very pleased to see that NMSS is 22 starting to consider human factors consideration in 23 medical application of radioisotopes and in industrial 24 radiography and those types of things.
That's going 25 to be a big job, and so one of the things we pointed NEAL R.
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they have one human factors expert now, it's J
l out 2
conceivable that they might need more in the future.
3 We were also pleased to see what I would 4
call, I think, an unprecedented emphasis in some areas 5
of human factors research where a diverse group of 6
research providers, we called it, are doing the work.
7 It's not just being
-done within the national 8
laboratory, but expertise from around the country, 9
from universities, private organi.ations, and-10 universities in other countries and so forth are 11 involved.
We think this is good.
The point being we 12 think-the research should be done wherever the 13 expertise is and not because it might be contractually 14 more readily accessible at the National Laboratory.
15 So, we applauded that.
16 One specific recommendation that we made, 17 and this comes about in part from our going around to 18 the regions and being told in the regions, at least 19 some of
- them, that one of the most important 20 considerations is selecting resident inspectors.
This 21 is a tough job.
It's difficult sometimes to get I
22 highly qualified people who have experience and so 23 forth.
24 So, one of our recommendations was that the 1
25 staff consider a human factors research program which
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would be intended ' to. look at this question and are 2
there ways of performing aptitude testing or are there 3
ways of better defining the training these people 4
should have, are there interpersonal skills that they 5
should know about and so forth.
So, that was our one 6
specific recommendation.
7 I had the pleasure just a couple days ago to 8
follow Commissioner Roberts at a
meeting of the 9
resident inspectors in Region I.
I brought this up 10 and I must admit it was not enthusiastically --
11 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
What's that, it was
'12 not?
13 DOCTOR REMICK:
It was not enthusiastically 14 accepted.
15 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
I was a good group.
16 DOCTOR REMICK:
It was a very, very good 17 group and I must admit you were a hard act to follow.
l8 They thought very, very much of ycur talk.
Tom Murley 19 was there during my presentation and so forth, so I 20 felt very good after a couple of hours of talking to 21 that group and I was impressed with them.
But as I 22 say, they weren't enthusiastic.
They weren't against 23 it, but they weren't quite sure what ACRS was 24 proposing and wanted to know what's wrong.
I had some 25 difficulty being specific in that area.
But it is a NEAL R.
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1 recommendation.
2
-So, with.that, I would like to open up to 3
- any questions you might have of the Committee.
4 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Roberts?
5 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
I told them that they 6
might be seeing you in a different light the next time 7
they saw you.
8 No, I have no questions.
9 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Rogers?
10 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
I wonder if you'd--
11 have you thought anything or talked about this whole 12 question of the research that's going on in shift 13 scheduling?
This troubles me a little bit because I'm
?
14 just not clear on what has to be done in the way of i
15 research in that area.
It's a business that's been 16 around for a long time and a lot of work has been 17 done, a great deal published in the literature.
Staff 18 has given us some assurances that what we are doing in 19 research really has to be done that is new.
I wonder 20 if ACRS has looked at that question-at all.
1 21 DOCTOR REMICK:
Not extensively, but when 22 you say shift scheduling, are you talking about the 23 circadian rhythm --
24 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Yes.
25 DOCTOR REMICK:
-- and also the 12 hour1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br /> i
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versus eight hour?
We have discussed with the staff p
I'm thinking back some period of 2
from time to time 3
time.
It's certainly been in the last year.
We 4
detected what we thought was the staffs somewhat 5
reluctance on the 12 hour1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br /> shift work.
But in our 6
discussion at the meeting in January, or we had a 7
subsequent subcommittee meeting with them, I
think 8
they said that they were not against the concept of 12 9
hour shifts.
They did have some concerns about 10 fatigue and so forth and thought that should be looked 11 at.
12 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
- Well, this research 13 that's going on, human factors research --
.14
. DOCTOR REMICK:
Yes.
15 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
-- in support-of some 16 kind of a position and it just isn't clear to me how 17 much research has to be done and what the unknowns are 18 that have to be explored here.
19 DOCTOR REMICK:
I can't answer that.
I 20 don't know if any of my colleagues can help or not.
21 MR. CARROLL:
I think I got the feeling from 22-our discussions with the staff --
I'm also on the 23 Human Factors Subcommittee -- that they were fairly 24 well along on this.
What remained to be done was to 25 publish this in a form that the utility industry could NEAL R.
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take advantages of it.
I guess one of the staff 2
' people made the comment that we've done an awful. lot 3
of research that probably the utilities would have had 4-to individually' pay for and we think we've done a good:
5 Job for the industry in that respect.
- 6 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
- Well, I guess -- I i
b 7.
don't know, it may be a question of a problem of what 8
you define - as research.
It may be organizing 9
information - that's out - there in the literature and 10 rather than actually doing experiments.
But I' don't 11 know, but --
12-DOCTOR REMICK:
Commissioner Rogers, I think 13 that's true.
Much'of what within the Agency is called i
L 14 research, if you look at it from perhaps a university
'15 standpoint, we might not call it research.
It's 16 things that need to be done.
Also, the question of 17 whether it's' called research or technical assistance 18 seems to be the question of how long is it going to 19' take?
If it's going to be a long period of time, p_
20 we'll give it to research.
This is what basically the 21
. staff has told us, That's how they differentiate it.
22 But it might not be basic research that we might view 23 from a university perspective.
24 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
- Well, sometimes the 25 problem is if you want an answer to something it's in
,i,
- 4.
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the literature someplace, but some people have felt 2
that it costs'more to go and find it than it'does to 3
go and actually reproduce the experiments or do an 4
experiment.
5 That raisee a qu'estion of whether you have 6
thought at all or have any opinions on whether it's 7
necessary or appropriate for NRC to establish 8
databases of research references or are there 9
satisfactory external sources that are reasonably 10 tapped?
In other'words, should we take the initiative 11 and some kind.of organization of research references, 12 not research but research references, to make it 13 easier to tap into the existing body of knowledge?
14 MR. WARD:
Forrest, I'd like to comment on 15 that.
16 DOCTOR REMICK:
Please.
17 MR. WARD:
I'll comment from the standpoint, 18 at least partially, of my participation a year or two 19 ago on the National Academy of Science panel which 20 developed some research ideas.
- There, very 21 specifically, the panel suggested to the NRC research 22 people that there was a large body of information out 23 there that would be applicable, but that some effort 24 was going to be required on the part of the staff to 25 sort it out, put it in a form that was useful for NEAL R.
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regulatory people and also for the industry.
2 So, I think the panel actually categorized 3
some areas where perhaps fresh research would be
~4 required, but many other areas where it was just a 5
matter of making use of -- making available what's 6
already out there.
7 DOCTOR REMICK:
The staff did also point out 8
a study being done at George Maeon University, if I 9
- recall, which is specifically to look at the 10 information that is available on human factors in 11 other industries and see what of that could be 12 applicable to the nuclear industry.
I was 13 particularly impressed with that approach and it 14 seemed like-it was something worthwhile, though I 15 don't.know the specifics of it.
So, it seems to me in 16 some areas the staff is trying to recoup some of that 17 information that might be available without redoing it 18 just for the nuclear industry.
19 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Have you got any 1
20 thoughts on what you think is appropriate for us to do 21 in the areas of research on organization and 22 management issues?
23 MR.
WARD:
Yes.
I think that's one area l
24 where some fresh research, as well as making use of 25 what's out there, might be available.
I think it's t
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been very sensitive and it's something difficult to 2
come to grips with.
I think there's been a lot of 3
reluctance to come to grips with it.
4 But we keep telling ourselves and each other 5
that the residual risk from operating plants is very 6-importantly dependent on issues of management and 7
organization. But we somehow think that those can be 8
resolved by kind of "sent of the pants" approaches, 9
that we're not able to investigate these things 10 systematically and scientifically.
I think it is 11 possible to become systematic and advance the art.
I 12 think that's going to be required.
13 The staff does have some programs, some very 14 interesting
- programs, largely through Brookhaven 15 National Laboratory, going on in that area.
I don't 16 know that they're going to yield any regulations.
I 17 guess I
hope they don't yield directly the 18 regulations.
But I think they might turn over some 19 rocks and make some information available to licensees i
20 that will permit them to design organization and 21 management structures from the standpoint of i
22 minimizing risk rather than accepting traditional or l
23 haphazardly put together organization management 24 structures.
25 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
I guess the key word NEAL R.
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in my' question was. appropriate, what's appropriate for 2
us to do.
3 DOCTOR REMICK:
That's right.
4 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Not what can be done 5
so much as what's appropriate for us to do.
6 DOCTOR REMICK:
You'll find a spectrum, I Y
think, across the committee.
I'm one who believed 8
very much that the organization depends on the people 9
you have and therefore you tailor make the 10 organization to the capabilities of the people and 11 that you don't come up with an ideal organization 12 structure and make people fit into it.
That's my own 13 personal view.
14 So I have some concerns about -- I have no 15 problem with us doing things to better understand what 16 works best, but it worries me very much when we go to 17 implement and we start saying, "Thou shalt do it this 18 way," because I'm not sure you can force fit an ideal 19 organization on people.
So, I have some reservations.
20 We've talked with staff about this, but they 21 assure us that it's not their intent to impose these 22 on individuals or utilities, but I personally have the l
23 reservations.
I agree with Dave.
There are things 24 that perhaps we could learn that we could pass on that 25 would be useful, but I don't know how much this Agency i
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16 l-I should regulate them.
2 Bill, please, t
3 DOCTOR EERR:
I know as little about 4
management as almost'anybody I can think of.
It seems 5
to me that what we are interested in is not. management 6
per se, but the results of management.
So, I don't
.7 think we need to encourage the use of managerial 8
.research, how one develops managerial skills.
9 What I do not think we have gone very far in 10 developing is criterie for determining whether things 11
'are operating properly.
We want safe plants and we
- 12 a r'e all wrestling with how one can recognize t h'e 13 possibility for unsafe plants before an accident 14 happens.
It would seem to me that we need to continue 15 to concentrate on that effort.
16 In the construction and
- design, we've 17 learned to put a lot of emphasis on equipment and 18 construction and control of quality and the inspection 19 of equipment, the operating phase.
That's still 20 important but there are other things that contribute.
21 I don't think we have a good way of recognizing when 22 an organization is operating in a way which is least 23 likely to produce or has a
low probability of 24 producing accidents.
That, it seems to me, requires 25 some concentration of effort, whether one calls it NEAL R.
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f 17 1 1 1 J-1 research or investigation or whatever.
But that is 2-the area that I think we should continue to emphasize.
3 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Do you think there are 4
those measures that one might find from some kind of 5
research would be different for a management of a 6
nuclear power plant from management of an automobile 7
factory or something of that sort?
8 DOCTOR KERR:
I plead not the Fifth, but 9
i gn o re.n c e.
I don't know.
I wish I knew.
10 MR.
. ARD:
No, I think there's some very W
11 real differences.
I mean I think the great difficulty 12 with nuclear power is that there is not direct, usable 13 feedback from experience to tell you how well you're 14 doing, a n.
far as the safety of nuclear power plants is I
15 concerned.
We just don' t ~ have the major accidents 16 that must be avoided.
So, we're not getting daily, 17
- weekly, yearly experience that one does in an 18 automobile factory or something else.
So, to the 19 extent that we don't have
- that, there are some 20 differences that have to be taken into account.
21 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Well, we can't afford to 22 make a mistake to learn from in this business.
23 DOCTOR KERR:
- Yes, I
think that's the 24 difference.
25 MR. WARD:
Yes, that's it.
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1 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
The data that you get, r
l h
2 you' don't like it when you have it.
I menn it's --
3 Fine, thank you.
'4 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Curtiss?
6 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
I don't have any G
questions.
7 CHAIRMAN CARR:
I_ don't have any questions, 8
but I have a comment on your aptitude testing for 9
inspectors.
My experience is in the Medical Research 10 Laboratory New London and Submarines
- has, to my 11 knowledge, for 40 years been trying to sort out from 12 the input to the submarine school over the lifetime of 13 the career what makes good submariners and they're
(
14 still working on that problem.
So, I'm not sure we 15 can figure out what makes good inspectors either.
16 DOCTOR LEWIS:
Because they're all good.
17 CHAIRMAN CARR:
I think it's a function of 18 background and training and interest and that kind of 19 thing.
So, you get some surprises when you try to 20 make judgments along that line.
21 It's the same problem with management 22 decisions.
As you say, good people can make most any 23 organization work and, conversely, the wrong people 24 can screw up most any organization.
So, it's a tough 25 job.
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All right, we can proceed then.
2 DOCTOR REMICK:
All right.
The second topic 3
then is the occupational radiation exposure of skin 4
from hot particles.
This is an cr:s -- at the time of 5
the letter I think we had strong differences with the 6
staff in some respects.
But I think we have some good 7
news and I'd like to turn that over to Jay Carroll, 8
who is Subcommittee Chairman.
9-MR. CARROLL:
Thank you, Forrest.
10 By way of background, I guess for the last 11 several years there's been a general consensus in the 12 nuclear industry that existing 10 CFR 20 limits for 13 skin exposures which are designed for exposure ef s
14 large areas of the skin were overly conservative for 15 hot particles, which we started to see as we got more 16 sensitive radiation detectior, equipment into the 17 nuclear plants.
18 The staff's ultimate plan is to revise Part 19 20 to have specific regulations dealing with hot 20 particles.
But this probably a two to three year 21 process.
In the interim, the staff has proposed an 22 interim standard to be used in taking enforcement 23 action in those instances where hot particles cause 24 exposure to individuals in the plants.
So, it's this 25 interim standard that we're considering today.
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I don't~know how much of our letter we need 2
to repeat.
I guess our recommendation was that the 3
staff's proposal for an interim standard seemed to 4
have some problems and we could therefore not endorse 5
it.
We recommended that staff senior management take 6
an active role in affecting a timely resolution of the 7
remaining outstanding issues with NCRP so that their 8
report could be published and the staff could then 9
proceed to revise this interim standard to be based on 10 the NCRP report.
11 When I mention senior management in that 12
- context, it seemed to us that there were a lot of 13 differences in what ought to be done here between 14' research and NRR and at least some of the health 15 physicists out in the regions.
That seemed to be a 16 problem and I guess that all comes together at the EDO 17 level.
So that's what we had in mind when we 18 recommended that senior management get involved in the 19 issue.
20 Since our letter, I guess there have been 21 several things that have occurred that would be of 22 interest to you.
On July 20th, the staff and NUMARC 23 met and it seemed to us that there was somewhat of a 24 disconnect between the two organizations at tha time 25 they made their presentations to our subconnittee and NEAL R.
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1 our full committee.
Out of that meeting there was 2
' agreement that there's a
need for more direct 3
discussions between the two entities and this should 4
lead to an improved working relationship.
I think 5
that's very good.
6 On July 27th, EPRI sponsored e meeting in 7
Richland, Washington that brought together EPRI and 8
their consultants, NUMARC, industry representatives, 9
one of the members of the NCRP Subcommittee on Hot 10 Particles.
Very significantly, EPRI paid to have John 11-Hopewell, who is the permanent U.K.
researcher in this 12 area come over so everybody could talk to John 13 Hopewell in one place.
NRC Research and Research's 14
. consultant, John Baum of Brookhaven, were there.
I 15 thought it was a very useful meeting because it got a 16 lot of issues out on the table.
17 EPRI also presented the work of their pig 18 studies that are being done up at Hanford, which 19 tended to support the NCRP recommendations.
20 I
guess one of the most significant 21 statements that was made in my mind was Bill Roesh of 22
- NCRP, who's been involved in their activities for 23 close to 40 years and is one of the old grey beards in 24 the rad. protection field, stating that he believed 25 the recommendation that they put forth would ensure I
- 4. -
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1 that a worker who had a hot particle exposure wouldn't 2
know it happened to him unless he had a microscope.
3.
But that was really basically what they were trying to 4
protect against.
5 But if you listen to all the experts and 6
scientists and so forth, you almost need a rosetta 7
stone to interpret what they're telling you.
8 The staff met with Warren Sinclair of NCRP 9
recently and got a commitment from Warren, who is Pre'ident of NCRP, that their finns report on this 10 a
11-subject would be published by the end of September and 12 would presumably address the concerns the staff raised 13 in reviewing that draft report.
He also indicated a
14 that their recommendations would continue to be as 15
'they were a year plus ago.
16 In discussing this with staff people 17 yesterday, I'm told that they would expect to then 18 have a new draft of the interim standard avaAlable for 19 internal review within the staff by November of 1989.
20 Hopefully we can get this very troublesome issue 21 behind us.
22 DOCTOR REMICK:
I think, Mr. Chairman, this 23 is an area that I might add to what Jay said.
From 24 time to time I know I've asked the question, is there 25 a role for ACRS any longer?
Does the Commission need 1.
1 NEAL H. GROSS 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
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it, does the nation need it?
I think this is an 2
example of the type of thing that this Committee does 3
serve when basically sound technical people are at 4
loggerheads and nothing is moving.
Sometimes the 5
Committee getting involved in speaking out and 6
encouraging gets people back together and that's a
'7 good example of that.
8 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Questions, Commissioner 9
Roberts?
10 Commissioner Rogers?
11 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
No.
12 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Curtiss?
13 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
No.
?
e--
14 CHAIRMAN CARR:
- Well, I
think you're 15 absolutely right.
This issue has been around too long 16 and personally I voiced my displeasure at not having 17 it behind us.
It seems it's taken too long to get it 18 there.
I've heard the same thing you've heard, that 19 the NCRP plans to have their final statement out in 20 September and the staff is going to have their draft 21 out for review in November and I would encourage my 22 staff to speed that review up so that the Commission 23 can act on it this year and get it finalized and get 24 it behind us and take it off the books.
25 Fine.
The next item.
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24
'I DOCTOR REMICK:
The next item then relates 2
to our letter of June 14th to-you on the subject of 3-reliability and diversity of equipment.
Doctor Kerr 4
is. the Subcommittee
- Chairman, so I'd ask him to 5
summarize that.
6 DOCTOR KERR:
I don't think it's news to 7
anyone here that in order to achieve the high 8
reliability that is required in some of the systems 9
that are a part of the safety protection of nuclear 10 power plants that one uses a number of subsystems, 11 each of which is capable of performing a function that
- 12 is needed in tanden in such a way that if one fails 13 there are still one or more left to continue to 14 perform the-function.
One gets this increase in 15' reliability by the use of redundancy if the subsystems 16' are indeed independent one of the other.
l 17 In effect, that means that the likelihood of l
18 failure of more than one of the systems in a short 19 interval is much less than the failure of any one 20 system alone.
The independence to achieve this 21 increased reliability is a very important feature.
22 The designer and the operator must strive to achieve 23 that independence in a variety of ways.
It will occur 24 if there is some external influence that produces 25 simultaneous failure or nearly simultaneous failure of NEAL R.
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.two subsystems, or if there is something about the 2
subsystems or'the equipments themselves that tends to l
l
.3 produce-simultaneous failure.
4 For that
- reason, there are situations in 5
which one uses diversity.
That is the individual 6
subsystems are deliberately chosen to be different one 7
from the other, even though the function performed may 8
be the same.
Because of this consideration there are 9
situations in which one insists on diverse subsystems 10 to make up the total system.
The ultimate goal, 11 however, is always reliability.
There are situations 12 in which this diversity may not contribute to total 13 system reliability.
14 The issue under discussion at this 15 subcommittee meeting and subsequent meeting of the 16 Committee was whether one should always insist on 17 diversity almost as if it were an end in itself, or 18 whether in an effort to achieve reliability there 19 might be situations, and indeed some of us felt that 20 there almost certainly would be situations, in which 21 diversity might not be a good idea.
22 What we were seeing was that there should be 23 an open mind on this issue and that in a particular 24 situation such as the SCRAM system in reactors where 25 one is trying to achieve a very high reliability, one NEAL R. GROSS 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
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should look carefully to ascertain that indeed the 2
introduction of diversity will increase reliability 3
rather than perhaps having the opposite effect.
4 I think that's as much as I need to say 5
about that.
I would ask any of my colleagues to add 6
to it or we'll have to try to respond to questions.
7 DOCTOR LEWIS:
No, I think you've said it 8
very well, Bill.
The point is that this is really not 9
a unique problem within the regulatory system.
If one 10 finds a philosophical solution to a problem, and in 11 many cases diversity is a philosophical solution to 12 the problem of protection against unforeseen, unknown, 13 common cause
- failures, you have different things.
14 Sometimes it takes on a life of its own and people 15 forget why they're doing that.
16 Bill was more polite than I would be.
He 17 didn't mention the particular case that incensed us, 18 but it was one in which a circuit board required a two 19 diverse circuit boards which turned out to be 20 identical but had different manufacturers stamps on 21 them.
But they were otherwise functionally and, at 22 component
- level, identical.
These were defined as 23 diverse because they were different in one respect, 24 the manufacturers stamp was different on the two of 25 them.
)
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1
- Now, it's certainly true that sometimes 2
there can be a failure specific to a plant and you 3
achieve a little bit of extra protection by getting 4
-something from another manufacturer, but it's a small 5
effect.
And yet at the regulatory level'there tends 6
often to be not very much judgment exercised about 7
what you're buying for your diversity.
Once you've 8
decided that you require diversity, then it's a
9 dichotomy, a bimodal decision.
Either you've done it 10 or you haven't done it.
If you haven't done it, you 11 don't pass.
If you have done it, you do pass.
It was 12 that sort of thing that raised our hackles, or some of 13 our hackles a little bit.
14 It's hard to know what the solution is other 15 than to say, do better, do good or be more thoughtful 16 about why you're requiring thingc.
But it's an 17 endemic problem.
18 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Rogers, any 19 comments?
20 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Well, just that the 21 point of your letter, it seemed to me, was the key 22 one, that reliability -- and as Professor Kerr has 23 maid, reliability is the objective, diversity is not 24 the objective, not unless you're in the business of 25 selling things it is. Then you might want to have a r-I NEAL R.
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market for your product and argue for diversity.
But 2
otherwise, it's the - reliability that's the key that 1
3 we're after.
_This is just one way to get there and to 4
focus on that as an ultimate good in its own right i-5 certainly seems to be misplaced.
6 But certainly the notion of redundancy 7
without diversity is also a sensible view.
You could 8
have just backup systems that could be identical and 9
we do that in some instances.
10 DOCTOR LEWIS:
There are very few airplanes 11 with a prop engine on one side and a jet engine on the 12 other side.
13 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
At least they're not i
14 supposed to operate that way.
15 DOCTOR KERR:
The letter discussed what's 16 the effect of aging on the possibility of common mode 17 of failure.
The point that we were trying to make 18 here was
- that, at least for liability theory as 19 usually interpreted, there is a region of component of 20 light during which one expects the failures to be at 21 random and then there is a region, a wear-out region 22 in which one expects more clustering.
If one operates 23 and if one has enough experience so that one can 24 define with confidence the random region, then aging 25 shouldn't have any effect on common mode of failure.
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_J-1 One removes or replaces the component.
So, we felt 2
that there was a possibility of some misunderstanding 3
in this particular arena.
4 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
I guess you don't have 5
a solution for us though, other than'to just raise the.
6 issue and think about it.
7 DOCTOR LEWIS:
I have a solution, but it's 8
not n' practical one.
You didn't say it had to be 9
practical.
10 CHAIRMAN CARR:
You mean common sense?
11 DOCTOR LEWIS:
Common sense is so common.
??
No, the subject d how to interpret rules with wisdom 13 in the support of reliability and safety is not a 14 simple one.
The question of diversity and redundancy 15 and that sort of thing is really. not the only place 16 it's come up.
It's come up in the question of how 17 much in service testing there should be, is a classic 18 place.
All through that, I at least have a sense that 19 there is a well developed, if you'll forgive me, 20 theory of reliability.
Books are written about it.
21 Professors teach courses in it.
In other words, it's 22 a legitimene human endeavor.
23 I have a sense that there's not enough use 24 of that body of knowledge within the NRC.
If you were 25 to ask me to quantify
- that, I
would surrender i
4.
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.1 instantly.
But it shows up in places of which this is 2
one.
3 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Curtiss?
4 Well, I certainly agree and I'm glad, Doctor 5
Lewis, you cleared up the specific because when I read 6
the comment I must admit it looked like motherhood to 7
me and _I
- thought, "Well, there must be something 8
behind tisat that's not apparent on the face of it 9
because it's obviously good statement."
I see what 10 you mean.
11 DOCTOR LEWIS:
But you're not coming out 12 against motherhood.
13 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Not today.
Not in this
~1 14' forum.
And your point about I
think you're
'15 supporting what we're trying to get everybody toward 16 reliability centered maintenance where if you know 17 it's going to fail you fix it first or replace it i
18 first and then you don't have to consider that in your 19 dual mode of failure.
I certainly agree with that 20 too.
21 There are a few components which -- it seems 22 there are fewer everyday that we can't replace, but 23 what you can't replace, obviously, you've got to take 24 into consideration.
25 Next item.
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1 DOCTOR REMICK:
All right.
The next one is 2
the proposed resolution of Generic Issue 128, electric 3
power systems reliability and our subcommittee 4
chairman is Charles Wylie.
So, I'll turn it over to 5
Charles.
6 MR. WYLIE:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
7 Our letter of June 14 on this subject, the 8
Generic Issue
- 128, gives our comments and 9
recommendations on the subject.
As a matter of 10 background, Generic Issue 128 is an integration of 11 three separate
- issues, namely Generic Issue 48 on 12 limiting conditions for operations for Class IE vital 13 instrumentation buses.
It deals with a safety concern 2-14 that some operating nuclear plants do not have 15 administrative controls or technical specifications 16 governing operational restrictions for their vital 17 buses and associated inverters.
It may result in the 18 failure of the plant safety systems to perform their 19 function then they're required.
20 Generic Issue 49 pertains to the interlocks 21 and limiting conditions operations for Class IE tie 22 breakers.
Again, the concern is that administrative 23 controls and technical specifications governing the 24 operation or restrictions do not exist which way 25 result in the buses being interconnected through tie 4
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1 breakers which may be left closed by mistake.
If left 2
- closed, the tie breakers can compromise the 3
independence of the redundant safety-related buses and 4
in some cases may prevent the emergency diesel 5
generators from supplying emergency power when needed.
6 Generic Issue A-30 concerns the adequacy of 7
safety-related DC power supplies and it deals with a 8
concern that some plants may not have adequate 9
provisions for monitoring, maintaining, testing to 10 assure that the DC power supplies are available and 11 capable of performing their safety functions when 12 they're needed.
13 The staff's proposed resolution to Generic 14 Issue 128 is to issue two separate generic letters 15 with related information requests to inform the 16 licensees of the concerns and to obtain information 17 for the staff to assess whether necessary actions have 18 been taken to resolve these concerns.
19 The ACRS concluded that the staff's proposed 20 resolution would probably improve the reliability of 21 the electrical systems.
- However, we viewed the 22 staff's proposed resolution as a continuation of the 23 fragmented approach to resolving safety issues rather 24 than an integrated approach.
25 The concerns raised by the particular NEAL R.
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generic issues are-highly-plant
- specific, lave 2
interrelationships among themselves as well as a-3 number of other generic issues and unresolved safety 4'
issues.
It was our opinion that a more efficient and 5
effective approach to the resolution on the issues 6
could be accomplished by
-including them in an 7
integrated approach such as the ISAP or the IPE 8
programs.
9 Therefore, we recremended that the 10 resolution of Generic Issue 128 be implemented through Il the Individual Plant Examination Program, along with 12 an assessment of the associated risk reductions.
13 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Any comment, Commissioner?
14 COMMISSIONED ROBERTS:
Well, if I remember 15 what we've witnessed over a period of time, this isn't 16 the only generic issue you think ought to be done 17 through the IPE, right?
18 MR. WYLIE:
That's correct.
19 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
I happen to agree 20 with that.
That's all I have.
21 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Rogers?
22 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Well, just on that 23 issue though, what does that really mean?
The IPEm 24 are -- some of them haven't even begun yet, I think.
25 MR. WYLIE:
Yes, that concerns us.
6 e _
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34 I-1 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
And so, what do you do 2
when you turn up something like this? 'Do you stick it 3
in a' pile and wait until an IPE turns up and then you 4
say, "This should be part of your IPE.
Look at this"?
5 I mean.in practical terms, how do you deal with issues 6
once they've been flagged as an issue of some sort?-
7 It's a question of priority, of course, but if there 8
is sufficient basis ' for being n' bit concerned about 9
it, what do you do with it in integ ating?
How do you 10 do that?
Do you wait until it's part of it and force 11~
it into the IPE program or what?
I'm just trying to 12 get a feeling about how you see this.
13 MR. CARROLL:
My answer to that would be 14 that-you put out a generic letter describing this as 15 an issue that certain licensees may have --
16 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
A disconnect from the 17 "what did you do about it" question.
18 MR. CARROLL:
Yes, and that we expect you to 19-address this in your IPE and here are the concerns the 20 Commission has about this issue.
21-COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
But you wouldn't 22 object to that, though.
You don't see any problem in 23 that, getting a letter out, sort of a notice.
24 DOCTOR REMICK:
Notify people, yes.
But no 25 imposing it ahead.
You're establishing a priority NEAL R.
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)
I when. you impose upon them and, "It must be done by 2
.this and this-date."
It might not be more important 3
than the other things they have on their plate.
4 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Yes.
5 DOCTOR REMICK:
I think Doctor Kerr wishes 6
to respond.
7 DOCTOR KERR:
I was simply going to say that 8
inevit' ably the power plant is the total system and 9
there are a lot of interactions among the various 10 subsystems.
If you pick one out to concentrate on it, 11 you may miss these interactions.
This is why a number 12 of us,. I think, feel the IPE approach is important.
13 It should encourage people to look at the total 14 system.
15 MR.
CARROLL:
I think one of the other 16 things that troubled me in listening to the staff's 17 presentation was -- part of it was the fact that it 18 isn't in somebody's tech. specs, therefore we can't 19 prove to ourselves whether they have a problem or not.
20 Therefore, we're going to ask them a
bunch of 21 questions.
That's a burden on the resources of a 22 utility.
I think the other way is a much cleaner way 23 to get the answer the staff wants, namely the IPE 24 process.
25 DOCTOR REMICK:
Doctor Seiss would like to l
I 1
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provide a response.
2 DOCTOR SEISS:
Commissioner Rogers, I don't 3
remember the exact wording of the letter, but in Mr.
4 Wylie's oral remarks he offered you two alternatives 5
to integrate this.
One was the IPE, which only comes-6 along once in a lifetime, I hope.
But the other was 7
ISAP.
ISAP is a perfectly good way of integrating 8
items that come up this month, next year, two or three 9
years later.
10 DOCTOR REMICK:
Along that line, I don't 11 know if you had an opportunity to read a letter that 12 came into the staff from Northeast Utilities about 13 their response to IPE and ISAP.
We thought that was a 14 particular interesting response from one
- licensee, 15 particularly stressing the importance of the ISAP 16 progr3m to them.
You were sent copies, and so it's 17 worthwhile
- reading, I
think.
It's an interesting 18 response.
19 Anything else on --
20 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
I guess really the 21 issue when all is said and done though is setting up a 22 whole set of new priorities piecemeal, one by one.
23 It's not getting the information out or calling 24 people's attention to the issue, but then raising it 25 to a new level of priority without looking at all the NEAL R.
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1 other things that have to be dealt with.
2 DOCTOR REMICK:
That's it exactly.
3 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Yes.
4 MR. WYLIE:
In the past, in regard to USI on 5
the black and decay heat removal, we ran into the same 6
type of situation where independently these were 7
coming out without regard to the others.
8 DOCTOR REMICK:
One can understand it from 9
the staff's side.
They work on these things very 10 diligently over a period of time and finally see some 11 resolution and so forth and you want to see some 12 action and their recommendation is action.
But 13 somehow there needs to be some coherence and some b-14 perspective put to these things rather than just one 15 coming out a week on different issues and so forth.
16 DOCTOR KERR:
And some of these generic 17 issues were probably identified by the ACRS.
18 DOCTOR REMICK:
Yes, I'm sure they were.
19 MR. WYLIE:
Well, I don't think we disagreed 20 that they're real concerns.
21 CHAIRMAN CARR:
No, the problem exists.
22 MR. WYLIE:
Yes, the problem exists.
23 CHAIRMAN CARR:
I guess my personal opinion 24 is we're approaching them all rather piecemeal instead 25 of going ahead and requiring a Level 3 PRA and getting l
t l
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it over with.
Inch up on them one at.a time.
2 Any other commentu?
3 Next item.
4 DOCTOR REMICK:
Okay.
The fifth item was 6
boiling water reactor core power stability and it is 6
our letter dated June 14th also.
Doctor Kerr is 7
subcommittee chairman and also David Ward had a
8 related subcommittee.
I turn it over to those two.
9 DOCTOR KERR:
I don't think there's much to 10 be said about that because I don't think there is any 11 significant disagreement between the staff and our 12 view on what should be done.
We have no concern about 13 a serious immediate problem.
Indeed, I think it's a i
14 consensus that the problem is real only if one gets an 15-ATWS because if you get the oscillation and can make 16 the reactor go suberitical, it eliminates it.
There 17 doesn't seem to be any disagreement about that.
It's 18 only when you may have a critical reactor and continue 19 to oscillate that yoe may have problems.
20 The difficulty arises because that 21 phenomenon is not well described yet.
I don't think 22 there ;e a computer code or an analytical approach 23 that permits one to predict the behavior that can 24 occur in the variety of situations from which the 25 oscillation might start with confidence.
Even though NEAL R. GROSS 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
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it's a low probability event that you'll get that at 2
the same time you have an ATWS, it's sort of in the 3
realm of the unknown.
If one did somehow get very 4
.large oscillations, it could be serious.
S We think it ought to be investigated, but at c-6 a reasonable pace and the staff seems to agree with 7
that approach.
So, I have nothing further to say.
8 DOCTOR REMICK:
Dave?
9 MR. WYLIE:
No, I have nothing to add.
10 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Any questions?
11 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Well, yes.
There's a 12 comment in your letter, "We're disappointed, given 13
~ many years that LWRs have been operating in this 14 country, with the present limited state of knowledge 15 and inadequacy of existing analytical tools."
16 Just not being an expert in this field, I'm 17 disappointed too.
I wonder why that is the case or if 18 it is the case.
Is it that nobody has ever done this 19 or looked at situations that can lead to things of 20 this sort or that somebody did it but somehow it got 21 lost long ago in the archives?
22 I've heard some comments from people when 23 they heard about the LaSalle incident that, "Well, 24 that's nothing new.
We knew about that years ago."
25 DOCTOR REMICK:
Correct.
l
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COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
And yet it seemed to i
2 be new to other people in the business. and it 3
certainly was new to the operators in that plant.
I j
4 wonder whether-there is an additional issue almost 5
relating to what we were talking about in the human 6
factors
- business, that somebody has looked at the 7.
thing but somehow it was a long time ago and they've 8
left the business or retired or whatever and we 9
haven't gotten that into contemporary thinting or 10 actions.
11 DOCTOR KERR:
I think I can add a little bit 12 to this, Commissioner Rogers.
Engineers, at least, 13 tend to like to treat linear systems.
The early work 14 on this oscillation, which was observed I think almost 15 when the first one of these things was constructed to 16 treat it as a linear system and one can at least 17 predict the oscillation using a linear system.
One 18 does not necessarily, and indeed I think one cannot 19 get the amplitude of the oscillations very well.
20 It's a tough problem because in order to 21 treat it one has to include special distribution.
You 22 can't treat it as a point problem and it's also a very 23 non-linear problem.
Those two things make it tough to 24 describe and tough to solve the problem.
l 25 As experience has developed, it is l
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recognized - that while the -linear approach will' give:
i 2
you a fairly good: idea of when the oscillation will
'3-start --
4 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Onset conditions, i
5 DOCTOR. KERR:
-.it doesn't permit you to 6
describe the-maplitude of.the oscillations, nor does 7
it'give you a very good idea of the effect of some of 8
the initial conditions on.that amplitude.
One has to.
9 go to the non-linear distributed system in order to 10 get that.
It's a difficult problem.
11 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
But are you saying 12 that a collection of items such as'this out there that 13 one could detect the possibility tof using linear 14 analyses that nobody has bothered to pick up and 15 really do in a non-linear way.to see how serious they 16 are in terms of amplitude and so on and'so forth?
17 DOCTOR KERR:
.There have been efforts to 18 treat various parts of the problem.
I don't think 19 there exists -- as far as I know, there does not exist 20 a satisfactory or complete solution of the things that 21 i
probably one should know, 22 CRAIRMAN CARR:
Is this in a too hard slot?
23 Is that what you're saying?
24 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
- Well, no incentive 25 maybe.
People are not afraid to tackle hard problean 1.
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1 if somebody's really interested.
2 DOCTOR REMICK:
I think the need was known.
3 Perhaps it was satisfactory until a problem develops.
4 It has stirred interest.
Certainly I know of some 5
universities that are working on the problem and 6
others.
So, I don't think it's an insolvable type of 7
situation.
8 DOCTOR LEWIS:
- Well, you know, there's a 9
level at which it is insoluble because you're talking 10 about three dimensional,
- unsteady, hydrodynamics, 11 multi-phased.
You know, that's insoluble for a long 12 time to come.
The question is narrowing down the 13 universe to the point at which you're willing to do a
14 things and the normal way you do that is that you 15 discover things.
Empirically things happen, like this 16
.particular set of oscillations happened many, many 17 years ago.
Then you analyze those.
That's what 18 graduate students are for, and you develop them.
19 But unquestionably there are thousands of 20 other oscillations out
- there, some of which may 21 actually be unstable, even in the linear domain, that 22 people haven't looked at because they haven't shown 23 up.
It's a large world out there.
24 MR.
CARROLL:
I was kidding General 25 Electric's original expert on the matter of core NEAL R.
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1 stability, one Mr. Eric Beckjord, about this the other 2
day.
.When I first knew Eric, he'was back trying to 3
make Dresden 1 be unstable.
I said, "You know, Eric, 4
you should have solved this problem in 1959."
He 5
- said, "I
did.
I kept telling people you need to keep 6
flow going'through the core."
7 CHAIRMAN CARR:
- Well, from a
safety 8
standpoint it's handleable with administrative 9
procedures.
But as a
problem for the curiosity 10 solvers, I guess it could be worked on.
11 MR. WARD:
I think one of the reasons for 12
-what we call our disappointment was our observation 13 that European developers of similar BWR systems seen id-14 to
- have, over the last 20
- years, developed more 15 comprehensive tools for -- and, in fact, ran tests 16 that were pertinent to this particular thing.
17 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Were you happy with the 18 staff's comment on that when they came back and said,
.19 "Yes, but that didn't take into account the AT'.fS part 20 of the problem"?
21 MR.
WARD:
I think that's correct and I 22 appreciate the staff's comment because we came to the 23 conclusion that although it is a problem, the safety 24 significance seems to be, as Doctor Kerr said, tied up 25 with its coincidence with an ATWS.
The staff did make 1
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1 that' point ~ in responding to us, that the Europeans f
2 haven't looked at that part of it either.
I think j
i 3
that's correct.
4 We, I think, were disappointed that there 5
wasn't a after 30 years in this nature system, 6
there wasn't a tool there.
The initial attempts at 7
analyzing this were really quite primitive and 8
compared with some of the.other sophisticated analyses 9
that are made it other areas, I think it surprised me.
10 COMMISSIONER ROGERS:
Well, do you think our 11 research program is adequately addressing possible 12 problems out there that haven't been looked at?
Again 13 it's a question of adequate.
You could look at 1
f 14 everything under the sun, but --
15 MR.
WARD:
Yes.
You can't look at the 16 universe.
In our thermal-hydraulic research letter of 17 a couple months ago, we suggested some other areas 18 that should be given attention.
But it is very 19 difficult and I --
20 CHAIRMAN CARR:
They are doing follow-up 21 research on this item.
22 MR. WARD:
Oh, they are this item, right.
23 DOCTOR REMICK:
I think the Agency has to be 24 alert and when it sees things that perhaps have not 25 been explored as thoroughly to see that it's done.
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'l But to anticipate every possible' one, I don't think 2
anybody can do it.
3 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Hopefully that's what we've 4
got operators for.
If they'see something they don't 5
understand they take the right action.
6 DOCTOR SEISS:
Excuse me.
You might ask 7
Eric Beckjord to tally up for you how many dollars NRC 8
has spent on research to answer questions that haven't 9
been asked yet.
10 CHAIRMAN CARR:
All right, sir.
Unfocused 11 research, right?
12 DOCTOR LEWIS:
I have to interject that many 13 years ago, maybe ten, I remember all existing and past 14 NRC directors of research were lined up on one side of 15 the table and each of them was asked to describe a way 16 in which the NRC research program had made reactors 17 safer than they would otherwise have been.
They all 18 gave the same answer, "Oh, there must be such cases."
19 CHAIRMAN CARR:
That's probably our fault.
20 That completes your rundown?
21 DOCTOR REMICK:
Of items that you 22 specifically suggested, yee.
j 23 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Commissioner Roberts?
l 24 Commissioner Rogers?
25 Commissioner Curtiss?
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COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
I just have a quick 2
question on a subject of future attention.
On the 3
containment design criteria initiative, I wonder if 4
you could say a word or two about what the status of q
5 that is, what your view of the timing and schedule for 6
that might be.
7 DOCTOR REMICK:
I'd like to ask Dave Ward to 8
respond to that.
9 MR. WARD:
Yes.
Our intent there is to pull 10 something together by early calendar 1990.
We're 11 planning a series of information. gathering meetings.
12 The first is scheduled for September 13th, another one 13 for October
- 17th, and a
third one probably -in 14 November, at which we're going to solicit ideas from 15 expert people who have done research and given thought 16 in this area.
Then we'll try to gel that to put 17 together in some sort of a synthesis and we hope to 18 have that completed or first cut at it in 19 January / February.
20 I should say I think that there might have 21 been a little bit of confusion about what we're trying 22 to do.
Our effort is directed toward developing what 23 I
might call a
zero-based, clean slate set of 24 containment design criteria.
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that'they won't be applicable to existing reactors.
2-They won't be applicable to the evolutionary reactors, 3
which are already. designed.
Depending on what they 4
turn out to be, they might be useful as some sort of a 5
standard for evaluating these already existing 6
designs, but that's not our primary focus.
7 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
All right.
So the 8
focus would be beyond the evolutionary class?
9 MR. WARD:
Yes.
10 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
Passive and advanced 11 non-LWRs?
12 MR. WARD:
That's correct.
13 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
And then will you "iI 14 review -- I take it from what you've got here that 15 you're already reviewing the GE ABWR and may review 16 the requirements document that EPRI is putting 17 together --
18 DOCTOR REMICK:
That's correct, yes.
19 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
-- to focus on the 20-containment question.
21 DOCTOR REMICK:
What we're working on that 22 Dave's talking about is not related to those.
It's 23 for future.
24 COMMISSIONER CURTISS:
All right.
That 25 addresses my questions.
Thank you.
I t.
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L 48-1 CHAIRMAN CARR:
I've got a couple of other 2
comments.
One is I 's. a little disappointed about the 3
. request for comments
.on the integration of the 4
regulatory process.
We're struggling along with a few' 5
of those items now and my understanding is you won't 6
be able to give us some comments on that until 7
November.
I guess we'll take it when we can get it, 8
but it's a --
9 DOCTOR REMICK:
Our subcommittee met for the 10 first time on that yesterday.
I don't know if you 11.
want to ask Doctor Lewis to quickly summarize where we 12 stand.
13 CRAIRMAN CARR:
I'd be happy to -- sure.
1*
14 DOCTOR LEWIS:
Well,.it just so happens that 15 I anticipated that this might come up.
Sometimes you 16 can predict the future.
17-We really don't have a real report.
We're 18 on the hook to report to you in November and we had 19 our first subcommittee meeting yesterday to talk about 20 it.
Commissioner Rogers was nice enough to come and 21
. help us in our confusion.
We don't have any real 22 conclusions, but we tried to put the question together 3
23 in roughly the following way, and this may change by 24 November.
We're going to meet again and try to do it.
25 You've issued four policy statements in the NEAL R.
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[.
I last few years that are significant.
Of course 2
everything you issue is significant, but there are 3
four real policy statements --
4 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Only to us sometimes.
5 DOCTOR LEWIS:
Safety
- goals, severe 6
accidents, standardization and advanced reactors.
Two 7
of those, the last two, have to do with the future and 8
the first two have to do with the present.
So we 9
decided we would stick to the present and let the 10 future take care of itself in the future.
11 We had a feeling that the word " integration" 12 means different things to different people.
The staff 13 has produced a
report which is called 178 which I
cJ 14 consists of a series of charts linking these policies 15 together with lines and it was not easy for some of us 16 to understand how that constituted integration.
17 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
You're not the only 18 one.
19 CHAIRMAN CARR:
Did you not have the colored 20 charts?
21 DOCTOR LEWIS:
- Darn, we had the blanket 22 white version.
We had the monochrome version.
23 CHAIRMAN CARR:
You need the colored charts.
24 COMMISSIONER ROBERTS:
The colored chart 25 would make it clear as mud.
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DOCTOR LEWIS:
Undoubtedly that was it 2
_because one thing that was in the first chart there, 3
the
. safety.
goal policy and the safety.
goal 4
implementation were linked by.a line-and that complex 5
was not linked to anything else by any other line.
6 But now I know that it was a line in a color that'-
7 doesn't reproduce on your Xerox machines.
So, it was 8~
undoubtedly there, which relieves ne a great deal.
9 But in any case,-we decided that as a sort 10 of first. step, and as I say this may change, that the 11 safety goal policy really is the ultimate ' expression 12-of what the commission wants from the nuclear.
13 enterprise and that everything else really has to be k.
14 in some way subservient to
- that, severe accident 15 policy being.the only other one that is relevant to 16; the' current generation of reactors.
Therefore, it has 17 to be consistent.with the safety goal policy, not the 18 other way around.
Speaking of integration, in a sense.
19 it tends to put them on a par and make people look for 20-blanks where there.is really a structure, kind of
~
21 up/down structure.
22 The reason we're sensitized to this, and 23 we've written you a number of letters on the subject, 24 is that we do see things coming out of the staff that l
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Not incoherent each in itself, but NEAL R.
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I when you look at the mass of them, they're incoherent 2
and' incoherently applied in the sense that they each 3
pose. jobs on the industry and on the utilities with 4
really not much attention to how much each one 5
contributes to the grand enterprise, which is to 6
somehow meet the safety goal or to meet the standard 7
of adequate safety.
8 We thought we might be able to do the 9
following for you by November, put together some kind 10 of integrating or coherence generating structure at 11 the top, not recommend how to reorganize the Nuclear 12 Regulatory Commission.
Thought tempting, we will try 13 not to do that.
But to, at the bottom, put together a 4"
14 list of things that we've all seen in which the lack 15 of integration or coherence is relatively clear and 16 try to set the philosophy or strategy, name-the things 17 at the bottom which violated and invite you and the 18 staff to try to fix those on the theory that those 19 fixes would work their way up into the guts of the 20 organization, point out the things that need to be 21 done.
22 We cannot make this operation coherent, but 23 we can try to help focus where some effort might be 24 and I think that's just a status report.
25 CHAIRMAN CARR:
All right.
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1 Any questions?
2 The next one is you wrote us a-letter on 3
clearing up the division responsibility between you 4
and our ACNW.
5 DOCTOR REMICK:
Yes.
6 CHAIRMAN CARR:
And we'll address that.
I 7
reconsend to my fellow Commissioners that we ask for 8
the ACNW comments so that we get I
have some 9
problems sorting out the real problem, so I want to 10 make sure I understand it before we come down with a 11 nice division of work.
But we ought to be able to 12 mort that out and we'll get you an answer back on 13 that.
14 DOCTOR REMICK:
I just might add one point 15 there to know where we're coming from.
If you look at 16 it from future licensees perspective and what they 17 have to go through, the question is in coming in for a 18 reactor facility license, must they go to the ACNW for 19 such matters as handling low-level waste in the plant, 20 things like
- that, or is there one reactor safety 21 advisory committee on those items?
Is waste then 22 something that's defined off-site and involves 23 possibly Part 72 license or 60 or 61 license and not 24 Part 50 license?
I think there's potentially some 25 confusion and unclear areas of responsibility in the NEAL R.
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1 way it's defined now.
L 2-CHAIRMAN CARR:
We do not want to 3
_ proliferate the problems.
We'd like to solve a few of 4
them if we can.
5 DOCTOR REMICK:
That's basically where we're 1
6 casing'from.
7 CHAIRMhW CARR:
I understand.
So, we'll do 8
that.
9 Are there any other comments?
10
- Well, I would like to thank the ACRS for 11 this briefing and encourage your continued high 12 quality support.
We appreciate your independent 13 reviews and we need them.
We'll be bringing to you 14 our problems that we want you to help us solve.
So we 15 thank you for this briefing and we'll look forward to 16 the next one.
17 DOCTOR REMICK:
Thank you.
We thank you for 18 the opportunity.
19 CHAIRMAN CARR:
We stand adjourned.
20 (Whereupon, at 3:08 p.m.,
the above-entitled 21 matter was adjourned.)
22 23 24 25 NEAL R.
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- 1 O_,-
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.a.
CERTIFICATE OF TRANSCRIBER
-This is to certify that the attached events of-a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission entitled:
TITLE OF MEETING: PERIODIC GRIEFING BY ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS PLACE OF MEETING' ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND DATE OF MEETING:
AUGUST 10, 1989 were' transcribed by me. I further certify that said transcription
.is accurate and complete, to the best of my ability, and that the-transcript is a true and accurate record of the foregoing events.
)
n L,,,-
m g
,)
Reporter's name:
Peter Lynch I
i 4
l 1
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C.
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,.5 8/10/89
- o
' SCHEDULING NOTES
Title:
Periodic Briefing by the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS)
- Sch'eduled:
2:00 p.m... Thursday, August. 10, 1989 (OPEN).
Duration:-
Approx 1-1/2 hrs
Participants:
ACES 60 mins
- Dr. Forrest'J..Remick
~
- James C. Carroll
- Dr. William Kerr
- David A. Ward
- Charles J. Wylie Other' Attendees-
- Harold Lewis
- CarlylelMichelson
- Paul: Shewmon
- Chester,Seiss
- Ivan Catton Speaking _
- NRC's Human Factors Program and Initiatives (ACRS Topics:
Report dated May 9, 1989)
- Generic Letter Relating to Occupational Radiation Exposure of Skin from Hot Particles (ACRS Report dated May 9, 1989)
- Application of Diversity in Systems that Use Redundancy to Achieve High Levels of Reliability (ACRS Report dated June 14, 1989)
- Proposed Resolution of Generic Issue 128, Electrical Power Reliability (ACRS Report dated' June 14,1989)
- Boiling Water Reactor Core Power. Stability (ACRS Report dated June 14,1989) (if time permits)
L -_L-
._