ML20248L819

Discusses Closure of Confirmatory Action Ltr RIII-98-01 Issued on 980116 to Document Licensee Commitments to Resolve 10CFR50,App R Safe Shutdown Issues & Restart of Quad Cities Units 1 & 2

ML20248L819
Person / Time
Site:	Quad Cities
Issue date:	05/22/1998
From:	Caldwell J NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION III)
To:	Kingsley O COMMONWEALTH EDISON CO.
References
CAL-RIII-98-01, CAL-RIII-98-1, NUDOCS 9806110383
Download: ML20248L819 (6)

Text

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/ g o NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMl!SION REGION 111 g 801 WARRENVILLE ROAD LISLE. ILLINOIS 60532 4351

• • • • • May 22,1998 CAL No. Rlli-98-001 Mr. Oliver D. Kingsley President, Nuclear Generation Group Commonwealth Edison Company ATTN: Regulatory Services Executive Towers West til 1400 Opus Place, Suite 500 Downers Grove, IL 60515

SUBJECT:

-CLOSURE OF CONFIRMATORY ACTION LETTER Rill-98-001 AND RESTART-OF QUAD CITIES UNITS 1 AND 2

References:

(1) NRC Confirmatory Action Letter Rlll-98-001, dated January 16,1998 (2) Comed letter, Joel P. Dimmette, Jr., to NRC, dated April 29,1998, entitled,

" Closure of NRC Confirmatory Action Letter of January 16,1998, No. Rill-98-001" (3) Comed letter, Joel P. Dimmette, Jr., to NRC, dated May 22,1998, entitled

" Response to Questions Raised During Confirmatory Action Letter Closure Inspection and Summary of Fire Protection Compensatory Actions" (4) Comed letter, David A. Sager to A. Bill Beach, dated April 2,1998, entitled,

" Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station Pre-Startup Actions" (5) Comed letter, Joel P. Dimmette, Jr., to NRC, dated May 12,1998, entitled

" Quad Cities Startup Readiness Status" v

Dear Mr. Kingsley:

On January 16,1998, the NRC issued Confirmatory Action Letter (CAL) No. Rill-98-001 to

. document your commitments to resolve 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix R safe shutdown issues at Quad Cities Nuclear Station, Units 1 and 2. In response to the CAL, the Quad Cities staff with Comed corporate and contractor assistance, performed a series of actions including review, revision, validation, and approval of the Safe Shutdown Analysis (SSA); review, revision, validation and approval of procedures to implement the SSA; and identification of any conditions left discrepant with 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix R and the corresponding implementation of appropriate compensatory measures._ These actions and their results were summarized in Reference (2). } O.

Following the issuance of the CAL, we conducted bi weekly public meetings with you to discuss the progress at Quad Cities Station in resolving the Appendix R safe shutdown issues. In addition, we reviewed your docketed correspondence addressing several of these issues and conducted onsite inspections to evaluate implementation of your corrective actions. From these inspections, meetings, and documentation reviews, two attemative post-fire safe shutdown 1-related technical areas involving loss of 125V DC breaker control power and multiple fire-induced spurious actuations of equipment were identified as being in non-cgmpliance with 10 CFR ~

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Part 50, Appendix R. It is our understanding that you have implemented and will maintain appropriate compensatory measures for each of these areas until you have established full l compliance with Appendix R. i Following NRC identification of these two issues and other concems noted during our inspections i of the revised SSA and procedures, you committed to conduct a re-review of a specifically j i

selected fire area Turbine Building II (TB ll), to ensure these types of issues had been appropriately considered during your earlier reviews. You have completed that review and concluded that the earlier reviews of TB 11 were satisfactory. We,in tum, have inspected the ,

results of your review and performed an independent assessment of TB 11. Based on the results l of our inspection activities, we have concluded that your revised SSA and associated )

implementing procedures provide an interim safe shutdown methodology that is acceptable for  ;

the short term while corrective actions are being developed to achieve full compliance with Appendix R.

You have also provided additional commitments to continue improvement of the Appendix R safe shutdown capability at Quad Cities including: a study of multiple spurious operations planned to be completed by August 1,1998 and a point-by-point review of the SSA against Appendix R requirements by August 15,1998. In addition, during the May 22,1998, inspection exit meeting and as documented in Reference (3), you committed, as part of an effort to strengthen the overall fire protection and safe shutdown capabilities at the Quad Cities station, to reduce the  ;

need to evacuate the control room and to improve electrical control and distribution, including l actions that will result in the availability of 125V DC breaker control power during fires in certain plant areas. It is our understanding, based on Reference (3) and discussion at the 4 aforementioned exit meeting, that you intend to complete these improvements at the earliest  !'

practical date and not later than the first refueling outage for each unit following the end of 1998, the date by which these improvements will be identified. It is important that these additional activities be completed in a timely, thorough, and high quality manner to ensure previous problems with planning for a safe shutdown in the event of a fire at Quad Cities do not recur.

Based on the NRC inspection activities identified above, the compensatory actions you have committed to put in place before startup of Unit 2, discussions between your staff and the NRC during the bi-weekly public meetings, and our review of your docketed correspondence, I have determined that your actions pursuant to CAL Rill-98-001 are adequate to close the CAL.

In addition to the Appendix R issues that formed the basis for CAL Rlll-98-001, several other problem areas were identified at Quad Cities during the period that the units have been shutdown. Many of these problem areas and your resultant actions were documented in References (4) and (5). We have also discussed these issues with you during the bi-weekly meetings rnentioned earlier. We have conducted inspections of your actions to improve performance in some of these areas, including a maintenance rule followup inspection, a design inspection utilizing an architect / engineer team, a corrective action inspection, and continuing inspections by our Quad Cities resident inspection office staff.

1 O. Kingsley . j With the completion of our inspection activities and the bi-weekly status meetings, we have conc!uded the issues at Quad Cities have been sufficiently addressed to support the startup of Unit 2. We have concluded that when you complete the remaining actions you have described for Unit 1, conditions will be acceptable to support the startup of Unit 1 wlth no further action on )

our part. While we recognize the resolve and determination of your staff to complete the CAL action items and the other corrective action issues, continued vigilance will be necessary to ensure that the positive changes initiated at the Quad Cities Station are permanently integre,ted into the plant staffs day-to-day activities, and the problems that resulted in the need for these actions do not recur.

We will continue to closely monitor the progress of Qua'd Cities through our inspection program.

eincerely, l

{k>0 .

James L. Caldwell Acting Regional Administrator Docket Nos.: 50-254;50-265 License Nos.: DPR-29; DPR-30 cc: M. Wallace, denior Vice President D. Helwig, Senior Vice President G. Stanley, PWR Vice President J. Perry, BWR Vice President D. Farrar, Regulatory Services Manager

1. Johnson, Licensing Director DCD - Licensing J. Dimmette, Jr., Site Vice President W. Pearce, Quad Cities Station Manager C. C. Peterson, Regulatory Affairs Manager Richard Hubbard Nathan Schloss, Economist Office of the Attomey General State Liaison officer Chairman, Illinois Commerce Commission I W. D. Leech, Manager of Nuclear MidAmerican Energy Company i

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O. Kingsley With the completion of our inspection activities and the bi-weekly status meetings, we have concluded the issues at Quad Cities have been sufficiently addressed to support the startup of Unit 2. We have concluded that when you complete the remaining actions you have described l

for Unit 1, conditions will be acceptable to support the startup of Unit 1 with no further action on I our part While we recognize the resolve and determination of your staff to complete the CAL l action items and the other corrective action issues, continued vigilance will be necessary to ensure that the positive changes initiated at the Quad Cities Station are permanently integrated into the plant staff's day-to-day activities, and the problems that resulted in the need for these actions do not recur.

1 We will continue to closely monitor the progress of Quad Cities through our inspection program.

Sincerely, James L. Caldwell Acting Regional Administrator Docket Nos.: 50-254;50 265 License Nos.: DPR-29; DPR-30 l cc: M. Wallace, Senior Vice President D. Helwig, Senior Vice President G. Stanley, PWR Vice President J. Perry, BWR Vice President i D. Farrar, Regulatory l Services Manager l

1. Johnson, Licensing Director j DCD - Licensing J. Dimmette, Jr., Site Vice President W. Pearce, Quad Cities Station Manager C. C. Peterson, Regulatory Affairs Manager Richard Hubbard Nathan Schloss, Economist j Office of the Attomey General i State Liaison Officer Chairman, Illinois Commerce Commission W. D. Leech, Manager of Nuclear l MidAmerican Energy Company SEE PREVIOUS CONCURRENCES DOCUMENT NAME: G:\ QUAD \QUA98001. CAL To receive a copy of this document, Indicate in the tiox:*c" = Copy without enclosure *E"= Copy with enclosure"N"= No cop" OFFICE R!ll l Rlli lG NRR A l6 Rlli NAME Lerch/dj Rin r M J E ef , Marsh lM, Clayton DATE Y"fft 4l5(' su immer numammuummmu .- unna mini OFFICE Rlli Rlli _g E Rlll , r Rlli//p, NAME Berson Grobf%dMQ Dapav//R) CafdMij .

DATE $27A4" G.7'/f/ 3/2%/'1%

OVFICIAL RECORD COPY

l s .- o O. Kingsley ,

1 Following the completion of our inspection activities and the bi-weekly status meetings, we have concluded these issues have been sufficiently addressed to support the startup of Unit 2. When you complete the remainie actions you have described in the 21 areas listed above for Unit 1,

' conditions will also be s,aptable to support the startup of Unit 1 with no further action on our part. While we recognize the resolve and determination of your staff to complete the CAL action items and the other corrective action issues, continued vigilance will be necessary to ensure that the positive changes initiated at the Quad Cities Station are permanently integrated into the plant staff's day-to-day activities, and the problems that resulted in the need for these actions do not recur.

We will continue to closely monitor the progress of Quad Cities through our inspection program.

Sincerely, James L. Caldwell Acting Regional Administrator Docket Nos.: 50-254;50-265 License Nos.: DPR-29; DPR-30 See Attached Distribution DOCUMENT NAME: G:\ QUAD \QUA98001. CAL j

To receive a copy of this documord, Indicate in the box:"c" = Copy without enclosure *E*= Copy with enclosure"N"= No cop r OFFICE Rlli l Rill l Rlli l Rill C NAME Lerch/dj ##L Ring Gardner Clayton /fL f 2c 5 p . . , _ .

n n OFFICE Rill 20, AJ Rll! __

Rlli Rill NAME Berso P Grobe Grant Caldwell DATE Sh' /M 1 OFFICIAL RECORD COPY l

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l O. Kingsley 4 1 Distribution:

H. Thompson, Jr., OEDO J. Goldberg, OGC

~J. Lieberman, OE ~

' B. Boger, NRR SAR (E-Mail) 1 Project Mgr., NRR

' C. Paperiello, Rlli J. Caldwell, Rill B, Clayton, Rlli SRI Quad Cities l DRP TSS

' DRS (2)

Rill PRR PUBLIC IE-01 Docket File -

GREENS LEO (E-Mail)

DOCDESK (E-Mail) 110032

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