ML21062A112
| ML21062A112 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 02/04/2021 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards |
| To: | |
| Robert Beall | |
| References | |
| 10 CFR Part 53, NRC-2019-0062, RIN 3150-AK31 | |
| Download: ML21062A112 (227) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
10 CFR Part 53 "Licensing and Regulation of Advanced Nuclear Reactors" Subpart D Preliminary Proposed Rule Language Docket Number: (n/a)
Location: Teleconference Date: Thursday, February 4, 2021 Work Order No.: NRC-1376 Pages 1-226 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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10 CFR PART 53 "LICENSING AND REGULATION OF ADVANCED NUCLEAR REACTORS" SUBPART D PRELIMINARY PROPOSED RULE LANGUAGE
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THURSDAY FEBRUARY 4, 2021
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The Category 3 public meeting was held by videoconference, at 10:00 a.m.,
Robert Beall, Rulemaking Project Manager, facilitating.
NRC STAFF PRESENT ROBERT BEALL, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards AMY CUBBAGE, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation WILLIAM RECKLEY, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 JOHN SEGALA, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation MARTIN STUTZKE, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation NANETTE VALLIERE, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation ALSO PRESENT AMIR AFZALI, Southern Nuclear Company FRANK AKSTULEWICZ, Terrestrial Energy USA, Inc.
TRAVIS CHAPMAN, X-Energy CYRIL DRAFFIN, U.S. Nuclear Industry Council SARAH FIELDS, Uranium Watch DAVE GRABASKAS, Ph.D., Argonne National Laboratory DENNIS HENNEKE, GE Hitachi ERNEST JOHN LOWRY KEE, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign MIKE KELLER, Hybrid Power Technologies STEVEN KRAFT, Kraft-Contente, LLC EDWIN LYMAN, Ph.D., Union of Concerned Scientists NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 JEFF MERRIFIELD, U.S. Nuclear Industry Council TAMMY MORIN, Holtec International ROSS MOORE, Oklo Inc.
STEVEN NESBIT, LMNT Consulting MARC NICHOL, Nuclear Energy Institute REBECCA NORRIS, NuScale Power KALENE WALKER NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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4 C-O-N-T-E-N-T-S Welcome, Introductions and Logistics Robert Beall.....................................5 John Segala......................................6 Bill Reckley....................................12 Topics of Discussion Goals and Success Criteria for Part 53 Rulemaking Activity.......................................15 Key Concepts and Possible Structures.............54 Approach to Rule Language and Developing Key Guidance Documents............................115 Discussion of Previously Released Subparts......135 Subpart D: Siting Requirements..................173 Additional Public Comments, Questions, Suggestions and Closing......................................224 Adjournment......................................226 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S (10:03 a.m.)
MR. BEALL: Good morning, everyone. I want to welcome everyone and thank you for participating in today's public meeting to discuss the risk-informed technology-inclusive regulatory framework for advanced reactors, or the Part 53 rulemaking.
My name is Bob Beall and I'm from the NRC's Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards. I'm the project manager for the Part 53 rulemaking and will be serving as the facilitator for today's meeting. My role is to help ensure that today's meeting is informative and productive.
This is a Category 3 public meeting to encourage active participation and information exchange with the public to help facilitate the development of the Part 53 rulemaking. The feedback that the NRC receives today is not considered a formal public comment, so there will be no formal response to any of today's discussions.
Once again, we are using Microsoft Teams to support this public meeting on the Part 53 rulemaking. We hope that the use of Microsoft Teams will allow stakeholders to participate more freely NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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6 during the meeting.
Slide 2, please. The agenda for the day includes NRC staff and external stakeholder discussions on five topics related to the Part 53 rulemaking. Topic No. 1 will be a discussion of the goals and success criteria for the Part 53 rule.
Topic 2 will be a discussion of the key concepts and possible structures for the Part 53. Topic 3 will be about different approaches to the Part 53 proposed rule language and the development of the supporting guidance documents. Topic 4 will be a discussion of previously released subparts. And the last topic will be related to preliminary proposed rule language for Subpart D, siting requirements.
We will also have a 45-minute lunch break around 12:45 p.m. today and a couple of 15-minute breaks during today's meeting.
Slide 3, please. I would now like to introduce John Segala. John is the branch chief of the Advanced Reactor Policy Branch in the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation. John will give the opening remarks for today's meeting.
John?
MR. SEGALA: Thank you, Bob, and good morning to everyone and welcome to today's meeting.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 This is the third of many webinars the NRC will be having every four to six weeks over the next year to provide an opportunity for external stakeholders to provide feedback on NRC's development of Part 53 preliminary proposed rule language for advanced reactors.
Based on requests we received from stakeholders during the last Part 53 public meeting in January, we have restructured this meeting to be in a workshop format to allow time for a more fulsome discussion. As Bob Beall mentioned, during the first part of today's workshop we will be discussing the high-level goals, success criteria, key concepts, the structure and key guidance for Part 53. Then we'll have a discussion on the preliminary rule language for the previously released Part 53 subparts. And finally, we will be seeking input on the preliminary rule language for the newly released Subpart D siting requirements.
Since we have a lot of topics to cover in a short time today and we expect many people will want to comment on these topics, we should all try to remain patient and be respectful by allowing time for everyone to be heard. We are looking forward to having discussions today and hearing your feedback.
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8 Thanks.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thanks, John.
I would now like to introduce the NRC staff who will be leading the discussion of today's topics. Myself, as the rulemaking project manager and the meeting facilitator, and Nan Valliere and Bill Reckley from NRR. Bill and Nan are the Part 53 technical leads for this rulemaking.
In addition, we have members of the public who have requested time to discuss one or more of the topics from the Nuclear Energy Institute, the U.S.
Nuclear Industry Council, and the Union of Concerned Scientists.
If you are not using Microsoft Teams to attend this meeting and you would like to view the presentation slides, they are located in the NRC's ADAMS document database and on regulations.gov. The accession number for today's slides is ML21032A as in Alpha, 045.
Slide 4, please. The purpose of today's meeting is to exchange information, answer questions, and to discuss the Part 53 rulemaking. This is the third of a series of monthly public meetings where the NRC will discuss various topics related to the Part 53 rule. Today's meeting will focus on broader NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 objectives and the structure of the proposed Part 53 rule.
In addition, we will be discussing the Subpart D, siting requirements, preliminary proposed rule language. This is a Category 3 public meeting, which means the public participation is actively sought as we discuss the regulatory issues. Because of the number of attendees, we may need to limit the time for individual questions and discussions on a topic to make sure everyone has a chance to participate. After everyone has had a chance to ask questions, we will circle back and allow people to ask additional questions if we have time.
As I mentioned before, we are using Microsoft Teams for this public meeting. Today's meeting is using a workshop format so the number of formal presentations and the corresponding number of slides have been reduced to allot more time for open discussion on the various topics. This will also require all of us to continuously ensure that our phones are muted when we are not speaking and to do our best to not speak over each other.
To help facilitate the discussion during the meeting, we request that you use the raise hand feature in teams so we can identify who would like to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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10 speak next. The staff will call upon the individual who -- to ask their question. The raise hand button, which is shaped like a small hand, is along the top row of the Teams display area.
You can also use the chat window to alert us that you have a question. Please do not use the chat window to ask or address any technical issues about the Part 53 rule. The chat window is not part of the official meeting record and is reserved to identify when someone has a question or for handling any meeting logistics issues.
To minimize interruptions, the staff will call on participants who have used the raised hand feature or chat window to identify that they have a question or a comment. If you joined the meeting using Microsoft Teams bridge, you will not have access to these features. If you elect to ask a question or provide comment, you would need to press *6 to un-mute your phone. The staff will pause at the end of each topic to ensure all participants have an opportunity to ask questions before moving onto the next topic.
After your comment has been discussed, your phone line will be muted again. If you want to ask additional questions on a future topic, you have to press *6 to un-mute your phone. If there is a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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11 particular topic you would like to discuss, please send me an email after the meeting and we will try to include it in a future public meeting.
This meeting is being transcribed, so in order to get a clean transcription and to minimize distractions during the meeting we ask everyone to please mute their phones when they are not speaking and also to identify themselves and the group or organization they're from. A summary and transcript of today's meeting will be publicly available on or before March 5th, 2021.
Finally, this meeting is not designed nor intended to solicit or receive comments other than this rulemaking activity. Also, no regulatory decisions will be made at today's meeting.
Please note that towards the end of the presentation slides there are two slides containing acronyms and abbreviations that may be used during this meeting and a set of backup slides that contain additional information about the Part 53 rulemaking.
And with that, I would like to turn the meeting over to Bill Reckley to start the discussions on the Part 53 rulemaking.
Bill?
MR. RECKLEY: (No audible response.)
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12 MS. VALLIERE: Bill, if you're talking, you need to take yourself off of mute.
MR. RECKLEY: Thank you, Nan.
So again, my name is Bill Reckley in the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation. I wasn't going to go over this slide in detail, but just wanted to use it because for anyone that's new to this topic today, just joining this meeting for the first time, we will inevitably fall in and out of using some of the language that's reflected in this slide in terms of the organization that we've presented on Part 53, and in particular our reference to subparts.
And so just all this slide is trying to show is that in previous discussions we've laid out an initial framework or structure for Part 53 that's organized with Subpart B defining the overall safety objectives, and then Subpart C talking about the design and analysis phase of the life cycle. Then Subpart D, siting. And as Bob mentioned, we'll talk about that a little later today in the meeting.
Subpart E would be construction and manufacturing.
And again, we would like to maybe have a little discussion primarily at the next meeting in March on manufacturing and what industry would like to make sure we address within that section of the rule.
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13 Subpart F would be operations and cover things like configuration control, staffing and such, and then decommissioning or retirement. And Subpart H being the licensing processes associated with Part 53.
So if you can go to the next slide. This, we'd just like to reinforce each time this whole activity is on a relatively tight schedule. Our goal is to have the consolidated rulemaking package, meaning the whole part, done basically by the end of the year to support our interactions at the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards so they can make their recommendations to the Commission and we can get the package to the Commission in early to mid-2022. And that's the schedule that was established by the Commission in trying to meet the intent of the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act, or NEIMA.
And so all this slide is trying to show is our efforts to go through the various subparts in order to meet that schedule.
And so as you can see, the discussion periods were originally laid out in kind of a staircase. As we get into this, they're becoming more of a plateau. And the difficulty with that is that some of the topics -- and you can see in the March, April, May meetings we will be still discussing some NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 of the earlier subparts as we introduce topics such as construction and operations. And operations is going to be a particularly extensive subpart with a lot of topics, like I mentioned, things like staffing that people want to see more flexibility provided. So that in and of itself is going to be a complicated discussion and we'll be having to introduce that in the upcoming meetings as we continue discussions on the previously released subparts, so, not much other to say other than how challenging this is going to be.
And so with that, Bob, were there anybody -- do we have any other opening remarks before getting into the first session on goals and success?
MR. BEALL: Nope, we were just going right into that, Bill, once you're done, unless anybody has any questions right now.
(No audible response.)
MR. BEALL: Okay. Seeing no raised hands, so, Bill, we can just move into the first section.
MS. VALLIERE: Hey, Bob. So Cyril has his hand raised.
Cyril, is that for this section or the following section?
MR. DRAFFIN: Oh, I have just a quick comment. We appreciate -- this is Cyril Draffin from NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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15 the U.S. Nuclear Industry Council. We appreciate NRC having this workshop today. We understand the challenges that Bill just mentioned in terms of the schedule. We think it's important to focus on Subpart B because that's really a foundation and there will be discussion on that later today. We have some process concerns because of the challenges of doing all these
-- building out all these subparts all at once and we look forward to the dialogue during today's meeting and workshop.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Thanks, Cyril.
Okay. We can go to the next slide. And what we're going to talk about -- and again, as has been mentioned, we're going to try a little bit different format today with hopefully a lot more discussion.
So we only have one slide on the topic of goals and success and it's a slide we used prior when we were talking about the rulemaking plan and the White Paper we initially issued last fall with the --
some questions we had on the rulemaking. And so the bullets are just the high-level objectives for this rulemaking from the staff's point of view.
And so the first one is to make sure that when we're done that this regulation would provide NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 reasonable assurance of adequate protection to the same degree as the protection provided by current regulations for operating and other light-water reactors going through different licensing processes currently.
The second bullet is to protect public health and minimize danger to life or property to at least the same degree of protection as required by --
for current light-water reactors. And we'll get into some discussions on this bullet later. I would just
-- for those that will be talking later, from the people who have already expressed interest in talking or even from the general audience weighing -- is to keep in mind that NRC regulations currently do go beyond the adequate protection standard. And one relatively easy example of that for future reactors is the Severe Accident Policy Statement and how that Severe Accident Policy Statement was put into place for Gen 3 plants, the passive light-water plants under Part 52.
And so a question from us is, as you say, we don't need to worry about anything but adequate protection, is the proposal to escalate every other consideration that we have into that adequate protection area, and in so doing, how then does that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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17 carry through, going back to the previous slide, on the structure and life cycle? How would that decision to escalate matters up to adequate protection carry through as you go through the design stages and the operating stages?
Then the third bullet is to provide greater operational flexibilities. And this is in accordance with the Advanced Reactor Policy Statement and subsequent Commission decisions that advanced reactors are expected to have attributes that provide safety margins, and then those safety margins should be able to be used to provide operational flexibilities in areas such as some of the mitigation measures that were needed for the current generation plants.
And then the last two bullets ensure that the requirements for licensing and regulating are clear and appropriate. That's kind of along the lines of the principles of good regulation.
And then lastly, to use this whole process that we're currently under to develop the preliminary language and then ultimately the proposed rulemaking to the Commission to use this whole year that we're currently in to identify, define and hopefully resolve additional areas of concern that are brought up as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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18 part of this discussion.
So with that, I will turn it over to Marc Nichol from the Nuclear Energy Institute.
MR. NICHOL: Can you hear me?
MR. BEALL: Yes, hang on for a minute, Marc.
Steve Kraft, you have a question?
MR. KRAFT: Yes, thanks, Bob.
Bill Reckley, just to make sure I recall this correctly from my days with Marc at NEI, anything that becomes deemed by the NRC to be required for adequate protection is then, if I could use the word loosely perhaps, mandatory, in that it doesn't get subject to things like the backfit rule and like that.
I mean, I recall having those discussions during the Fukushima years. But adequate protection of course is one of these things where it's not defined. If you see it -- you know it when you see it. Some excellent papers have been written by former commissioners on the topic. But I just want to make sure that that was
-- that's -- my understanding is correct.
MR. RECKLEY: Yes, if we're using the term in the backfit process for operating reactors, then --
and that's usually -- given that's where we've been for the last couple decades, that's usually how it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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19 comes up. Then that's where you're right, that the --
we would not consider cost in determined whether we needed to take action. We could consider cost to determine what action to take, but not ultimately to achieve the goal. And so that's correct.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Let's go to slide 9.
And, Marc, I think you're un-muted.
MR. NICHOL: Yes, Bob. Can you hear me?
MR. BEALL: Yes, sir, I can.
MR. NICHOL: All right. Thanks. You can move onto the next slide. Oh, sorry, the next one.
So this is the vision and goals that NEI had sent in a letter on October 21st, and I'd first like to sort of make a comment on what Bill just presented.
Within those high-level goals I think there's a lot of alignment between our thinking and your thinking, specifically, you know, the focus on reasonable assurance of adequate protection.
I think that the second bullet that you had in terms of minimized danger will come up later in this meeting, so I won't dwell on it now, but within that it does help to -- if we align on a vision, and the vision is from our perspective -- and I'll --
rather than read it, I'll give you the sort of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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20 shorthand, which is Part 53 is so much better than Part 50 and 52 for all stakeholders that that is the go-to regulation that all new reactors want to be licensed under. So that's the sort of visceral feeling that I'd like to have at the end of this rulemaking. So that's a different way of explaining that vision that we had there.
In terms of the goals, as I said, I think there's a lot of alignment with what we had put together and what the NRC just presented. I think we have a little bit more detail in ours, and so it's helpful to know where within that detail there may be common or a shared agreement and where there may be some differences of opinion.
In terms of the technology-inclusive, just one thing to bring up from a long time ago: we'd like this to be able to apply to any new reactor and not have an artificial screening out of different types of technologies. I think in the NRC's language that you've been putting forward it would allow that, but I just want to make sure that it was conveyed that that's important to us.
Efficiency is extremely important to the industry. The NRC is making great strides in licensing new reactors to be able to achieve the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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21 target schedules you've laid out in that sense, but even the target schedules that are there and the --
even the best costs we've seen in the past are more than we think are necessary. And so really key to achieving something efficient is to set targets for what that efficiency is. And they should be aspirational, but that should really drive the thinking. So we had put together some targets on licensing and oversight that we hope will sort of guide the thinking about how we put together regulations that first and foremost assure safety and security and then find out how to do that in the most efficient way possible.
Flexibility is going to come up throughout today's meeting as well as being informed and clarity in the rule language especially, so those will be topics we'd revisit later on today.
So let's move on to the next slide. I won't dwell on it. There's two slides related to success criteria. Rather than read these, these came from our letter (audio interference) 23rd. It was the next step of detail after putting together the vision and goals. It's, how do you translate that into something specific to guide the Part 53 rulemaking?
We believe that if you -- like any large project, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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22 you're more successful if you define the project requirements up front. Basically, what are those things that define success or the desired end state?
We call then success criteria for the final rule.
You can go on to the next slide. And here's a high-level listing of them; we have many more in our letter, but it's essentially what are the functions that Part 53 rule has to accomplish to be --
to meet the success and those goals that we had set out? So there's a number of them. Rather than list through them, rather just open it up to conversation, and would really appreciate if the NRC had any feedback after considering that letter and especially if there's any agreement or disagreement on what those success criteria might be. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Marc.
Bill, do you have any -- you want to say anything or do you want to move on to Cyril?
MR. RECKLEY: No, I don't have anything.
I think we can move on and then just open it up for general discussion.
MR. BEALL: Okay, great.
All right, Cyril, would you like to talk about your slides, please?
MR. DRAFFIN: Certainly. And you can on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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23 to the next slide. It's not really that the slides are important; it's the content. So to circle back to what Bill presented, we agree in terms of the objectives: the reasonable assurance for adequate protection, the first one; the third one, operational flexibilities; the fourth one, it being clear and resolving issues. I think those are all important objectives. We support the vision that NEI presented.
I think we will circle back on the -- your second bullet. It's not intent to escalate all the other topics into adequate protection and it -- but it would be helpful to clarify what other parts are going to be referenced outside of Part 53.
So to reiterate on the goals and success criterion, again, I think that there's cohesion between what the NRC is saying and what the industry is saying, that we want it risk-informed, but also not excluding deterministic approach. There's -- maybe we want flexibility to allow some combination of risk-informed and deterministic, which will take a little bit of challenge, but I think it's important because different people have different approaches and we want 53 to be as broad as possible.
The importance of adequate protection is strong starting with what's in Subpart B, what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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24 language is used. We've indicated that requirements beyond the adequate protection only served to drive the cost of licensing with no real benefit. We do think it's important to have operational excellence, and that might be best achieved through industry oversight, the Institute for Nuclear Power Operations.
There are some other things that are important, you know, in terms of Part 20 for workers.
You mentioned Subparts C and D. And so there are other things that are important to consider in the regulations, but the idea is not to put in things which are -- have not been required in the past.
We certainly don't want to kind of increase the regulatory burden. I think there's agreement that we want to make it technology-inclusive for all reactor types and sizes. Obviously, you have to think about micro-reactors and how does that fit in.
And then finally to reiterate the clear and simple; I think we've all stated that, and the question is, so how does that happen in terms of a streamlined licensing process? That means the licensing requirements are understood, the view was straightforward and efficient. I think it would help in the review of the Part 53 to say, what other parts NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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25 would be referenced in that activity? Would it be parts of -- I know there's efforts to pull in parts of Part 100 in the language that maybe not reference that, but I think delineating that and delineating that early, like now, would be helpful to see what's going to be referenced outside of Part 53, because it's going to be referenced, and it's less important to capture in 53. And if you have to meet other requirements such as Bill just mentioned one earlier, which one are they, and delineating that would be a helpful gathering.
The final point to be made for success criteria is it's not just the regulations. It's the regulations, which we clearly want clear, but also it's the supporting guidance and delineating what's needed now and as we go. I think that guidance is important to go along with the actual regulations.
And finally, an understanding of how they're going to be reviewed: we want to make sure that the individuals at the NRC in future years kind of review it the same way so you don't have a lot of differentiation between which reviewer happens to be assigned to an review application. So, understanding the way the review will be do I think is helpful. So, these are things to kind of look forward to. It's a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 fast schedule already just on the regulation side, but we want to remember the licensing process and the guidance that would go with that as well as the implementation.
So I'll pause there and open it up for discussion to make sure that there's cohesion on the goals and success criteria and the idea that it is flexible and that people seek it out, that applicants and the NRC find this to be a real improvement over what currently exists rather than just a way of restating what's been done in the past is a very important success criteria.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thanks, Cyril.
Nan, you had your hand up?
MS. VALLIERE: Yes, thanks, Bob.
Cyril, if I could just ask you a question here to help better understand the message on slide 15, particularly with regard to the use of some of the terminology. In the first bullet there you say that Part 53 should be risk-informed but not excluding a deterministic approach. The NRC generally defines risk-informed regulation as an approach that uses risk insights as well as deterministic approaches together.
So with this in mind maybe you can clarify what you mean when you say risk-informed but not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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27 excluding a deterministic approach given that the term risk-informed in and of itself is a combination of risk assessments and deterministic approaches.
MR. DRAFFIN: I think just it's a matter of implementation. There may be some others from industry that would want to clarify, but there are certain things in terms of, let's say, how PRAs are done or whether you need a PRA. There may be different approaches that people will want to use in order to show it's risk-informed. And some of them may be deterministic and some of them may have -- rely upon other components and equipment and make other cases and other justifications, perhaps even using some international approaches.
So it's not a change that we're looking that we think needs to be made as much as just an awareness of how that would be implemented, but if others want to comment, they're welcome to.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Yes, this is Jeff Merrifield backing up Cyril on that. I think we talked to the advanced reactor community of NIC. I think there was a recognition that some reactors may be very small, may not be taking an approach to implement a PRA, but instead could be regulated in a risk-informed way based on specific deterministic NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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28 factors. So I think this is really, you know, part of what Cyril was trying to say here is we do want to remain that level of flexibility and not have the expectation that every reactor design that's going to come in is going to have a full-blown PRA.
MS. VALLIERE: Thank you. So maybe I would reword it to say risk-informed but not excluding a primarily deterministic approach, still risk-informed.
MR. MERRIFIELD: I think you can make that clarification.
MS. VALLIERE: Okay. Thank you.
MR. NICHOL: Nan, this is Marc from NEI, because we've had similar discussions with our members and it does -- as you just sort of concluded there, it does focus really around the use of the PRA. Some will like to have a very robust PRA along the lines of the non-LWR PRA standard that's in development, and so the rule should obviously allow that. Others feel that by the nature of their design, such a sophisticated PRA doesn't really benefit them and they should be able to do things more akin to like a maximum credible accident type of approach and still use some risk insights within that so it's not completely devoid of some risk evaluation.
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29 And so that's the consideration as we look at PRA requirements within the rule, but it also is manifested in the safety criteria. So it -- where there are the QHOs does that drive you to a PRA that is much more robust than somebody would like to use?
By including quantitative frequencies in the rule does that do that? So that's why in our proposals on Subpart B we haven't reached a conclusion exactly how to address those.
MS. VALLIERE: Thank you, Marc, and I'm sure we'll have further discussions as we get into the later topics today. So thank you. I appreciate that.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Amir, I think you have your hand up. Please if you'd un-mute.
MR. AFZALI: Good morning. Thanks a lot for the opportunity. I was wondering if you could add one more goal that's from owner-operators could be important and that says incentivizing safety improvement. The goal should be to incentivize that.
As new technologies become available for an existing plant, it could be good that if you gain a lot of margin to be able to reduce some requirements. So that if we have a process which another owner's controlled activity to use a -- understand the margin, ensure demonstration that additional margins are NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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30 gained through safety improvement, through some innovative safety improvement, then they can reduce requirements elsewhere. So that should be an objective of the Part 53 rule.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you.
Ed Lyman, you have your hand up?
DR. LYMAN: Yes, hi. Can you hear me?
MR. BEALL: Yes, we can.
DR. LYMAN: Yes, I'd like to make a few comments on the discussion so far. So, the first one would be on the scope of the rule, and I would offer that what NEI and NIC have proposed, that this rule should apply for any new reactor, is not consistent with the letter of the law as NEIMA specifies. And of course the NRC doesn't have to follow the letter of the law, but the law does say that this is a rulemaking for advanced reactors and it defines advanced reactor in the law. And it's not consistent with any new reactor application, so just noting for the record that that interpretation would not be consistent with NEIMA.
Now on the question of -- I think that the (audio interference) has to be at least equivalent in terms of protecting public health and safety as the existing rules. And frankly, from what I've heard of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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31 the discussions and (audio interference) far I'm not confident that that's where this is going because if the commonly understood framework is -- and terms are distorted and confused, as I've heard, then it's going to be very hard to understand whether what you're doing is actually complying with the current standards, or consistent with the current standards for adequate protection.
And on that note, UCS would be happy if the Commission wanted to redefine adequate protection to encompass every -- accidents up to and including let's say a -- the EPA (audio interference). I mean, that would be fine with us. So that's clearly not what NEI and NIC are proposing, I imagine, but getting rid of the dichotomy between design-basis and beyond-design-basis would be wonderful. You've just got to make sure that that envelope of adequate protection covers the scope of events which are now -- the public are -- or requirements for public protection are mandated.
So those are my comments at this point.
Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Thank you.
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32 between Part 53 and the current level of protection, unless there's a set of events that are consistent with the same level of public hazard as the design-basis events now in Part 50 and 52, and without controls that are equivalent to Appendix B, those events, then you're not going to have the same level of protection as far as I can see. So without that common -- that foundation, I don't see how you're going to have -- be able to explain this process going forward.
And as far as people who are seeking, you know, this confusion between what's deterministic and what's risk-informed, which is a very confusing discussion so far, I would offer that if an applicant wants a deterministic approach, they just go ahead with Part 50 or 52, that they're already there for them. If they want to apply for an exemption from the siting criteria, the design-basis accident, sure, they already have that option. And that's not what you're talking about here. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Ed.
Dennis, you have your hand up?
MR. HENNEKE: Yes, this is Dennis Henneke with GE Hitachi. I did want to explain on the -- one of the comments in the risk-informed but NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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33 deterministic. The -- when working on an international plant, the application of LMP may be difficult -- try to get that through another regulator.
We are still doing PRA for our plants, international plants, but really the three parts that you look under LMP, without going into great detail, we're using an approach where we selected design-basis events or licensing-based event based on the input from the PRA, the initiating events. And then the remaining analysis for defense lines, as the IAEA would call it, or defense-in-depth approach where the safety analysis and the SFC classification performed where you do -- using a relatively deterministic approach without going through something LMP-like. So that does meet the current guidelines.
So it is, as Ed was trying to refer, that we're doing something maybe that doesn't meet the current regulations. It would meet current regulations, but the approach is slightly different, using risk information but not requiring an LMP-like approach, so just wanted to clarify that.
MR. RECKLEY: Thank you, Dennis. And this is Bill Reckley. You know, among the activities that we might consider is to look at the international --
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34 the IAEA standard. And I mean, we've looked at it a fair amount and it is possible, but it would take a little work, I admit, to show an alignment and to show how those things could fit together. At least that's my own opinion. But it would take a little work and we would probably end up having to engage with IAEA, maybe preparing a tech doc or something like that, in order to move forward.
I mean, most of the IAEA guidance in their five levels and all of that remains largely described in the historical perspective that largely came out of the NRC and the light-water reactor community of the
'70s and '80s. They did add design extension, for example, and we'll talk about that a little later as we get into these methodologies, but it's a point well-taken that there may be work as we develop Part 53 to make sure it fits in with international efforts.
MR. HENNEKE: Bill, also if you're going to talk to the IAEA, recognize that they are currently developing three sets of guidance to more risk-inform their approach, both for existing hazards and external hazards, and those documents are currently in development. I'm supporting them on that, but the IAEA can provide you details on that.
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35 are similar activities underway at the Generation IV International Forum and other venues. So thank you.
MR. BEALL: Amy, from -- you have anything to say from a staff perspective?
MS. CUBBAGE: Yes, just from a staff perspective I just wanted to continue to seek to understand the views that are being presented by NIC and NEI. The issue of a deterministic -- a more deterministic approach and the challenges with the PRA, are those more focused on micro-reactors? I just wanted to kind of understand where the concerns were coming from. Because as was stated by Dr. Lyman and others, Part 50 and 52 do provide a current framework that does provide a more deterministic perspective and that the NEIMA rule -- I mean legislation -- does mandate the NRC to develop a risk-informed rule.
So we're just trying to balance where we head with this and I just wanted to better understand that. So if NIC and NEI have some response, I'd appreciate that.
MR. NICHOL: Amy, this is Marc Nichol from NEI. The answer is generally yes. The discussion about having a more deterministic approach has been focused around the concept of a micro-reactor. We sort of do envision that there would need to be some NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 type of criteria that would justify that, that it wouldn't sort of be something that if a large light-water reactor tried to get licensed under this, that they would be able to come in and not have any PRA at all, then that's not what we're envisioning.
And this may come up later in the meeting, so what it may call for is some type of guidance on like a graded approach to PRA and sort of when do you need more pedigree to your PRA and when do you -- when are you able to justify less pedigree to your PRA, that type of thing.
MS. CUBBAGE: Okay. So more around the --
what does risk-informed mean and what level of a PRA is needed there? Okay. Thank you.
Does someone from NIC want to --
MR. DRAFFIN: Sure. This is Cyril and then Jeff may want to respond as well.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Yes.
MR. DRAFFIN: It's -- yes, micro-reactors is clearly part of the driving force. And as we've --
as we'll mention this afternoon, this is something that probably ought to be addressed in guidance. So I think we do need guidance. As Marc was saying, you don't want to make this a large opening that large LWRs would try to go through. But on the other hand, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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37 we don't want to be so restrictive for micro-reactors that you're putting on lots of requirements and analysis which really isn't meaningful and to drive them -- drive advanced reactors away from what we think is hopefully a desirable Part 53 process. So it takes a balance and it may be better crafted in guidance than necessarily in regulation.
MS. CUBBAGE: Yes, I mean, I'm certainly not a PRA expert; there are others on the staff much more knowledgeable than I am, but I think there is one view that a very simple facility that -- to do a PRA would be a less-burdensome task than a PRA for a large complex facility. So thank you for your perspectives.
I think there are other hands raised, Bob.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Yes, this is Jeff Merrifield, just to follow on with Cyril, you know, and I would disagree with some of the sentiments that were presented earlier.
Congress in instructing the NRC to come up with a risk-informed framework didn't say that Part 53 had to be all based on PRAs. I think when you look at what Congress was considering, we have in existence a program in Part 50 and 52 that was framed around large complicated light-water reactors and all of the things that come with it and a lot of the sort of bells and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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38 numbers that are required in order to regulate those to meet adequate protection and protect the public.
You could have a micro-reactor -- and I think I concur with Marc and Cyril that the micro-reactors were the focus of our comments on a simple set of deterministic requirements, but one could have that framework and still be risk-informed because those are the appropriate risk-informed comments --
those are the appropriate risk-informed requirements set for a very small reactor with low risk, and that doesn't necessitate having to have a PRA.
So the point here being I think that the
-- we're encouraging the Commission staff to use the flexibility that was in the NEIMA requirement in creating a risk-informed framework, but not necessarily to say that for each and every design that comes forward, particularly micro-reactors, you've got to have a PRA accompanying it.
MS. CUBBAGE: Great. Thank you.
Bob, you can take other commenters.
MR. BEALL: Yes. Dr. Kee, I think you're next, please.
MR. KEE: Hi. Yes, I don't have a Ph.D.,
by the way.
MR. BEALL: Oh, okay.
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39 MR. KEE: I thought -- so on slide 8 I thought Ed -- Dr. Lyman was going to comment on this, but the -- and I thought we were going to be talking about Part D today, so what I see is -- and maybe I'm so old-fashioned, but I remember 25 REM being kind of like an emergency dose limit and you had to volunteer for that. Now people in the low population zone, they're not going to be volunteering if they see that.
And this is a boundary.
Well, here's my -- here's what I think --
and I feel like I'm maybe channeling Don Quixote or something, but the new -- at the advanced reactors we have this new, for example, TRISO fuel, that it's not going to -- it's going to take a really big deal to ever see any release of fission products or noble gases from that stuff. And it seems to me like if our expectation really is that advanced reactors are that much more reliable or better designed, let's say, then I think we should put or money where our mouth is because -- yes, 25 REM is what's in the existing regulations as far as I can tell.
And I just want to comment on -- there's been a lot of discussion about PRA and I have a little bit of experience with that, enough to be dangerous, I guess. Something PRA misses -- and there needs to be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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40 a lot of work before -- my opinion, there needs to be a lot of work done before we go off into the quantified risk area using what exists now in probabilistic risk assessment technology. And one of the major things it misses is hazard intensity.
So what does that mean when you put out a new technology or even a new plant? Like TMI. It was, what, one year old when it went to core damage.
We need to be very careful and stay as close as we can in design space as the advanced reactor people are doing to ensure protection.
I think if you go back to the individual plan examination ask -- it asks something that's in PRA, but didn't -- you didn't have to use PRA. It said you could use your existing engineering staff to study sequences that can go to failure. And I think that's where we need to be in these advanced reactors, not in risk quantification on something we don't have the advantage of having large numbers on our side.
Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Jeff Merrifield, you have anything else? You still have your hand up.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Apologize. I'm taking my hand down.
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41 next.
MS. MORIN: Thank you. This is Tammy Morin from Holtec International. I'm going back to the slide for the NIC where the question, I guess, kind of started this whole conversation in risk-informed but not excluding deterministic approach. I believe this is for safety analysis.
If a plant can show deterministically that there's no dose and that the public is adequately protected, wouldn't that be more palatable for the public rather than something that's with the probabilistic assessment saying that there's still some possibility that this could happen even though it's very remote? That's what I think we're trying to say here is that if we can deterministically show that there are no consequences to the public, then we should be able to follow that under the new Part 53 guidance.
And even though we're designing a small light-water reactor, we're looking forward to Part 53 because -- and I know Ed Lyman mentioned the other two regulations, Part 50 and Part 52, there's still a lot of large light-water reactor prescriptive requirements in there that we would have to take exemptions to.
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42 and I'm -- at least from a Holtec and in this Part 53, is that if you can deterministically show that you are
-- in your safety analysis -- that you are not putting the public's health and safety at risk and the environment, then why not pursue that over the PRA?
Thanks.
MR. RECKLEY: Yes, and this -- this is Bill Reckley again. And this goes in part -- and we raised this back in December, as to how we might show this. And the question we asked for example was whether the unmitigated event as it's defined in ANS 2.26 on seismic design and in a number of DOE standards and orders for both reactor and non-reactor facilities -- whether that kind of an approach would be -- people would be interested in it. And now, it's a fairly conservative approach, but I think the staff, given its conservatism in looking at an unmitigated event -- it would be something the staff would be amendable to.
Part of the issue, to be honest, is as we've looked at literature it's not clear to us that any reactor, even the micro-reactors, would gain much from considering that approach. But we'd certainly be open to hearing if people have looked at such an approach and think that the doses used in simple NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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43 approach would be below what they want to be. And this is another thing we'll talk about later with the integrated approach.
The 25 REM might not be a challenge, but people want to do things like look at the Emergency Planning Zone Protective Action Guide, which is a lower number. There may be other considerations that would even use a lower dose in order to get some of the considerations that we'll talk about later today, like siting.
So I think we're amenable to this, but one of the things that's been lacking, from our perspective, is an assessment by anybody that shows you would actually gain from such an approach, without bringing in frequency, right? I mean, if -- part of this argument -- and we had it back over the ages, is really I think what people want to exclude and the difference between most deterministic approaches and one that leans more in the risk-informed area is the introduction of frequency as a component.
And again, going back to the simple, what can go wrong? How likely is it? What's the consequences? That's the risk. If you can show there's no consequences, then you can show basically or have a strong argument that the frequency is not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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44 important. We'll all acknowledge that.
The trouble is as we get into discussions with most people, sooner or later, frequency ends up being an important component in the discussion.
That's our experience and why when we looked at Part 53 we leaned that way, because that's what we've seen over the last 30, 40 years.
So anyway, Bob, more people with their hands up.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Bill. Amir, you're next.
MR. AFZALI: Thanks. I'm not going to go into the, what is the concept of risk-informed regulatory framework, I think the industry is working very hard at coming up to a consensus decision on that and I support those consensus building activities.
Obviously, Southern has specific opinion on the topic and we have expressed those opinions and we continue to do so. But what I think we want to wait to work with the industry to come up with a consensus approach.
A notion that is presented here that kind of I want to discuss really is this complexity of PRA.
PRA is just a tool that reflects the complexity of your safety case. I have worked on a PRAs for very NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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45 simple systems and that been very simple. It's not a theoretical conversation for me, I actually worked on them.
And if you look at the outside of nuclear, NASA, for example, they learned that using a PRA, especially for newer design, is really important.
When we went to demilitarize our chemical weapons, to burn them, the first approach was a quantitative risk assessment, which was basically a PRA.
Every single time, I think that two things are kind of demonstrated. One is complexity of PRA is highly related to the complexity of the safety case you are making. And then, the second thing is, you'll always gain insights from using the PRA, in terms of where you have an excessive margin and where you have that potentially can make improvements.
So, this concept of PRAs are going to be highly complex for a very simple system is not consistent, as far as I know, in my experience, I'm not making judgment about anybody else's experience, with what we have seen.
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46 case.
One of the first step in a PRA is the screening assessment, typically. And the screening assessment is unmitigated event, is something you need to worry about.
So, anyways, I just want to make sure that that perspective is provided. Again, I'm not making any, advocating for any position in terms of risk-informed or what the exact rule language should be, that's an ongoing conversation with our colleagues here.
I just want to make sure the PRA and use of PRA is --
(Simultaneous speaking.)
MR. AFZALI: So, I heard another individual who wishes to speak up, so I'm going to keep quiet.
Thanks a lot.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Amir. Steve Kraft, you have your hand up?
MR. KRAFT: Yeah, I did, thank you. Just sitting here listening to the various conversations, discussion, I was wondering whether there's a little bit of talking past each other here, that many folks are sort of saying the same thing.
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47 Amir just sort of summed it up when he said linking the complexity of the PRA analysis to the simplicity of the design, that's kind of a broad heading.
But if you think about it, Amy said that risk-informed means you use risk insights to make --
Amy, I don't mean to put words in your mouth, I thought I heard you say deterministic decisions.
Well, the --
MS. CUBBAGE: I think someone else may have said that.
MR. KRAFT: All right. But it's a good point, though. So, thank you for that correction.
It's a good point, though.
The point being that, without saying I know the details of anyone's design or particularly the Holtec SMR design you guys worked on, it seems to me that deterministic approaches doesn't mean zero releases, it means a release that doesn't exceed a standard.
And I think Bill went through that, and citing the request that says, hey, someone's got to sort of convince us that this approach works. And you can do it by citing a various different set of release standards, whether it's emergency releases or protective guideline, Bill gave a whole hierarchy.
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48 Bill, I think you went from sort of higher to lower through that.
And it would seem to me that the way I would recommend a licensee go about this is to work closely with NRC staff, of course, but show, look, here's the risk as we provide through our design.
And you're going to have to do a certain amount of analysis, a certain amount, maybe not the sort of full-blown PRA that everyone's imagining, which was developed as a result of that Three Mile Island accident, all that stuff, which is very, very complicated and very expensive to do.
But to say, hey, look, here's the risk, here's, not the risk, but here's the way our numbers work out. And if we just operate the plant the way we design it, the way we say we're going to operate it, with NRC oversight, if there is an event, here's what happens, there's no release, there is a little bit of release, there's a release that doesn't go beyond the fence line, or there is a release that goes beyond the fence line, but these are the numbers.
And if NRC could be persuaded that, you know what, that's right, well then, you've got a deterministic case.
The issue comes in is what Bill said, is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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49 if you can't make the case, you end up citing frequency. And it was this need to cite frequency over time and the improvement in PRA technology, yes, applied to large LWRs, that led to the industry working with NRC over the years to say, we're learning, we're better, we know more, let's use more risk insights.
And that's how you get there. So, that doesn't mean that you got to start that way with these designs that are, the way I'm hearing it, the way I read about it, will provide better ways to get to, more innovative ways to get to the same safety case.
So, I think that's the way you do it. You do have to match them, the way Amir described it, but I don't think it's the large effort people might be imagining.
And the last thing I want to mention is that Part 53, as I learned in a previous meeting, is not about security. That's in the advanced reactor security rule, but that's worked its way through in a different process. But it will kind of say, holistically, you've got to do it.
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50 there is no, no matter what happens, no matter who intrudes, no matter what cyber event, you can cause these accidents and it's just, I don't mean to be flip here, but a no never mind, well then, you don't need security. That's a null case, I think.
But that's kind of the way I'm seeing it.
I just don't see it as complicated as, I understand the concern, but I just don't see it as complicated as perhaps people are imagining. But I just want to make that observation, because I'm just listening to all this conversation and trying to put it together, and that's kind of what I'm seeing. Thanks.
MS. MORIN: This is Tammy Morin from Holtec, can I just kind of respond? I also don't think it should be complicated, but I think we keep talking about PRA, like the capital PRA, which is the full-fledged that we're used to seeing in light water reactors, current light water reactors.
And I am all for risk informing decision-making, but we have to -- and you mentioned that we might be talking past each other, in the case that the capital letter PRA, to me, seems like a lot more.
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51 PRA, small letter PRA, you're looking at different things to risk-inform your design, but it's not the full-fledged PRA.
And that's what we should be talking about using parts of the PRA, but I'm concerned about this capital letter PRA. And maybe we're not, maybe I'm hearing a different thing from the NRC, but I feel like that's what they're looking for.
MR. KRAFT: Well, it's Steve again. Well, Tammy, I don't disagree with the general point you're making, and that is the NRC, no disrespect to my colleagues at NRC, NRC is used to licensing large light water reactors.
I mean, let's be honest about it, Bill said that, been doing this thing for decades. And in fact, Bill and I have been (audio interference) together, Bill, unfortunately.
But the point I'm getting at is, okay, so I think what that means though is that, Amir pointed to it, you do the screening analysis. But then, the way I would recommending doing it, is then you've got to work with the staff through whatever pathway you can identify, in terms of the requirements, and say, here's where you get, when you follow the NRC requirements, here's where you get.
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52 And that begins, of course, that begins here, is what those requirements are. But if Part 53 is written correctly, the way Marc Nichol laid it out, it should have enough options in it, enough requirements in it, that will allow you these various off-ramps into where you want to go.
I understand the concern, Tammy, believe me, I do. I've been in this industry a long time, I understand how that works. But that's where the challenge, of course, comes in.
And I think this becomes a -- there's a way to do it, I just think you've got to be careful and Part 53 has got to be written correctly. And so, I'll shut up, but I made the point. I think there's a pathway here.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Steve. Ed Lyman, you've been waiting patiently, so you want to say something?
DR. LYMAN: Yes, thanks. So, listening to this conversation, I'd say that the biggest danger here is circular reasoning.
And so, if Merrifield says a micro-reactor that's low risk doesn't need a PRA, that's circular reasoning. And that's because you can't make the statement that it has low risk unless you've evaluated NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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53 the risk.
So, maybe he's not talking about risk, he's talking about consequence. If you're talking about consequences, fine, then you have to look at some unmitigated event and what should that event be?
Well, as Steve Kraft pointed out, you're looking at a rule which is going to tie security requirements to potential consequences of sabotage.
So, maybe that unmitigated event needs to be the design-basis threat attack, unmitigated, without any interdiction or neutralization of the adversary, on that micro-reactor, then you look at the offsite dose and everything else and compare to your parameters.
And, frankly, that exercise, even for a very small a very small micro-reactor, is going to lead to doses that, depending on where your boundary is, are probably going to challenge the siting criteria.
So, if that's the route they want to go in, fine, but the first step would be to look at that unmitigated sabotage attack, using the design-basis threat, better tools, explosives, et cetera, and evaluate those consequences.
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54 if you're going to not say you need to do a risk analysis, because you're assuming from the get-go there's low risk.
And looking at these studies that have already been done of micro-reactor unmitigated dose consequences, those are going to challenge NRC's current dose standard. So, that's my comment, thanks.
MR. BEALL: Thank you, Ed. We're getting a little, we're going over a little bit on this discussion, so, and we have many topics to get through, so I'd like to go ahead and start the next topic and move on to the next one, which is key concepts and possible structures. So, Bill, do you want to start us off on that, please?
MR. MERRIFIELD: Before we do, Bill, this is Jeff Merrifield, if I can just make a very quick comment? And that is, a lot of this came as a springboard off of a bullet point that was in the next slides.
I think the point, we need to go back up to 50,000 feet and say, the standards you want to have for a 500 megawatt advanced reactor and the standards you have for a megawatt and a half advanced reactor, it wouldn't be the same kind of PRA and analysis.
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55 graded approach to looking at those. Obviously, you've got to be able to demonstrate that the reactor, whatever size, is going to meet the safety requirements, but not necessarily impose the same type of PRA and scope on two quite different designs.
Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Jeff. Bill, do you want to kick us off on the next topic, please?
MR. RECKLEY: Sure, Bob. So, the next discussion topic that is in the agenda is to talk about key concepts and the structure of Part 53.
So, again, we have just a slide that kind of goes over again what we've said in the previous meetings. I'm not going to talk about our structure, we'll talk about that later.
But you see it, and the whole idea there was to lay out design or safety criteria, and then, establish throughout the life cycle of a facility what actions were needed to support meeting those criteria.
So, that's the basic notion of our structure.
A couple key concepts, and I think we've talked about this in the past, but maybe not. The one item that I think is getting a fair amount of attention is the two-tier structure that we've introduced here.
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56 And I would be the first to admit that if you look back through evaluations and histories of AEC and even the NRC up to recent history, the distinction between Section 182 of the Act, reasonable assurance of adequate protection, and the 161 minimize danger standard has not always been clear.
And when we write a safety evaluation, we typically only talk about reasonable assurance of adequate protection.
But, again, if you look at the regulatory history, and I bring up the severe accident policy statement as one example, there have been over those years the introduction of requirements for future plants that were considered appropriate because they would be in a position to include design features to address something like severe accident design features.
So, we were trying to use this opportunity to more clearly distinguish between those two standards in the Atomic Energy Act, and then, to carry through all the phases of the Part 53 a distinction that adequate protection, and this is almost just plain English, it's needed for adequate protection, it needs the most stringent controls.
And so, it would be considered in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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57 safety classification of equipment. It would be considered in the need to have a licensed operator do that activity. It would be reflected in technical specifications, because it's needed for adequate protection.
And we can talk about (audio interference) we use the existing criteria from Part 50 and 52, the 25 rem number. But even in -- I don't think anyone would think that if any reactor facility simply told us over the last, since creation, that they were safe because they kept the dose to an individual less than 25 rem at a mile that we would have thought that was good enough.
And so, we do go beyond that standard.
And so, we put that into the second tier. And so, the second tier includes a lot of the things that would have been gathered traditionally in rulemakings like station blackout, severe accident design features, to some degree.
This is -- if you keep it in the deterministic realm, it's equivalent to level 4 in the IAEA standards. But to actually include a broadened tier for that, and then reflect that throughout the Part 53 and provide more flexibility in the design and maintenance of those requirements.
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58 They are still requirements, they're still important, they're still showing that that plant that we would license is okay to be put where it's put, but there would be more flexibility in how a licensee manages the risk associated with that facility.
And, yes, it goes below 25 rem. And again, we think any, since creation, there has been requirements that went well below a simple requirement of 25 rem at the exclusionary boundary.
So, that's the bullets there and the basic discussion of the third bullet.
And then, lastly, the Subpart H, which we're going to have to start to talk about here in the spring, would be used to show how we incorporate these technical requirements into the actual license applications and other processes, like reporting and some of the other things that are also to be addressed within this Part 53.
So, Bob, I'll shut up and turn it over to, I think Cyril is next.
MR. BEALL: Yes. Cyril, go ahead.
MR. DRAFFIN: Thank you. Cyril Draffin with the U.S. Nuclear Industry Council. We're going to have a variety of speakers on different topics and for each topic, we'd like to have a discussion on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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59 them. So, you can go on to the next slide.
We'll start with kind of a process concern. To date, NRC's working hard under a tight time schedule, but it seems like that, NRC has requested feedback, a number of stakeholders have made comments through three meetings, but there hasn't been any redrafted rule language.
And I know that NRC might be considering that in March, but I think that's important to not just get input, but to know kind of clarity on what's appropriate, what's not. So, that would be the first point.
The second point is that the Subpart B safety criteria is the foundation for 53. And instead of agreeing and understanding and maybe iterating on Subpart B, NRC's going on to draft other parts.
So, there's important other subparts to look at, but if they're based on the language in Subpart B and Subpart B changes, then we might be getting ahead of the game and the process might be going too fast to keep putting out new subparts without resolving the keystone, if you will, based on some of the discussions today.
And some of that could be in that language itself. Also, some of it could be in guidance, as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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60 we've talked about just recently on PRA.
The last point is, circling back to what Bill just mentioned, in terms of Tier 1 and Tier 2, that's a creative approach that NRC has taken. It is not something that the industry finds clear or satisfactory and we thought it confusing.
I think the ACRS, when they met earlier last month, the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards also had some questions on it. So, it might be evolving.
I think what Bill described as the allowing flexibility for things which are not adequate protection has merit, and it may be helpful, again, to define what other rules would be required that don't have to be in 53.
So, I think this is an area where there's not consensus yet, in terms of what should be in Subpart B. And I think it merits consideration, which we're going to have today, and there will be an afternoon session on this, so I think that's something we hopefully would be able to resolve.
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61 forward on Subpart B.
So, unless Bill wanted to comment on this, I'll go on to the next slide.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah, please do so.
MR. DRAFFIN: Okay. Then, we wanted to tee up six key concepts which we think have importance.
We've already touched upon adequate protection, which we think is important.
And what I would like to do is, well, I'll turn it over in a moment to someone to talk about each one of these things, risk-informed, performance space, adequate defense-in-depth, quantitative health objectives, and quality assurance.
So, if we go on to the next slide I'd like to have Dennis Henneke kind of lead us in that discussion on adequate protection. There's two slides on that. So, I'll turn it over to Dennis.
MR. HENNEKE: Sorry, Cyril, I was not prepared to discuss this slide. I guess I was not clear that I was going to be discussing it. Do you want to present it and I can add to --
MR. DRAFFIN: On second thought, why don't we let Frank, I think Frank had shown some interest in that. Excuse me, I jumped ahead a little bit.
MR. HENNEKE: Sure.
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62 MR. DRAFFIN: Frank --
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Yes.
MR. DRAFFIN: -- from Terrestrial?
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: So, can everybody hear me okay?
MR. BEALL: Yes, we can.
MS. VALLIERE: A little muffled.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Okay. I'll try to speak louder, if that's better.
I think we talked a little bit about this adequate protection discussion already, and specifically Bill's discussions, going back to slide 8, were particularly helpful in trying to clarify what the staff's intents were with respect to the two different criteria, or two tiers of criteria, if you will.
And I think that earlier discussion highlighted a couple of key things. And that is, in trying to define adequate protection, the emphasis, and we'll get into this more in the discussions, I'm sure, on Subpart B, but the emphasis in terms of spelling out adequate protection was focused on dose.
And so, the question clearly evolves from that, which is where is the boundaries of adequate protection? And so, in its construction, does Tier 2 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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63 constitute adequate protection? Because --
(Simultaneous speaking.)
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Could somebody mute their phone, please?
So, I think in taking this forward, we do believe that the fundamental premise is to clearly define where adequate protection begins and where it ends. And then, understand what additional protections are required.
And I know Bill mentioned some of this in his last discussion, with respect to the two tiers.
And try to understand why those requirements are appropriate.
And I think that's kind of the direction that USNIC has been providing its comments in, which is don't use this as an opportunity to just add requirements, that there has to be some nexus to safety, whatever the right word is, about why that requirement is essential.
And, again, when we get into discussions of Subpart C, which we haven't touched on yet, when you start asking, we've had expanded discussions on PRAs already, but if adequate protection governs the development of licensing basis events and the classification of SSCs, then it would draw in, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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64 adequate protection would draw in the PRA.
So, is that really the intent, in terms of the reach of an adequate protection standard? And what would have to be defended going forward? And we don't think that that's true.
And I agree with Bill on many points, he brought out a lot of points that I kind of wrote notes down and I try to capture some of these when you get into the necessity of Tier 2.
I don't think there would be a disagreement on the part of the industry, and I'm putting words in their mouth, I'm not speaking for them with consensus here, that it's important to have worker protection requirements and it's important to provide protection for effluents and it's important to make sure that security is appropriately governed and that the appropriate potential postulated events are identified and evaluated.
But I don't think that's the question. I think the question is, how do you specify when you've satisfied what's good enough? And right now, the construction of Tier 2 kind of conflates two of the issues.
One is what is done for normal effluents and what is done for beyond-design-basis events. And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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65 that's an interesting combination of regulatory requirements. And like I said, we'll talk about that more when we get into Subpart B.
The other thing, and it gets to the reach of adequate protection, if you're drawing in advanced reactor or severe accident mitigation discussions, the question that I would have here is, is this evolving the representation of the severe accident mitigation design alternatives discussions that are typically found in the documents supporting NEPA under Part 51 and are you now making them technical requirements and does the acceptance criteria change for those evaluations that are performed?
Because under Part 51, there's a dollars per person rem assessment number, that criteria 2 would seem to now include an integrated dose criterion in addition to or instead of.
So, it's those kinds of discussions where we're trying to understand what is sufficient to make the safety case? So, I'll stop there.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Frank, thank you. Bill or anybody from the NRC staff have anything to say?
MR. RECKLEY: This is Bill. I think as Frank mentioned, we'll probably get into this a little more.
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66 But just kind of throwing the question back over the fence, our thinking was something like severe accident design features that are requirement, per the policy, not the court case on NEPA that led to the severe accident design alternatives or mitigation alternatives, but the Commission Policy Statement on severe accidents.
And we thought that that requirement, since it was actually imposed as a beyond adequate protection item, that we could address that in the second tier.
And that's addressed through the probabilistic risk assessment and the actual requirements that were put in Subpart C on design and analysis, that there would be an opportunity to look at the risk and assess through the various considerations of the analysis, and I know we'll have discussions about PRA, but that the PRA is well-suited for looking at something like severe accident design features, and to assess it through that in the defense-in-depth mechanisms that we're also discussing.
In the absence of having a second tier, which is the way we kind of look, or at least the way I read your proposal, then where would a requirement NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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67 like that go? Would it be under that definition, then, required for adequate protection?
It's a regulatory requirement, it has to go somewhere, and if you only have one tier, you have one bucket and you got to put it in a bucket, it's got to go in the only bucket you've got. And the way we kind of read what NIC is proposing is, in terms of regulation, you've only got one bucket.
And so, that would be the thing to think about. If you want to build that structure, which is kind of more of a GDC kind of structure, where everything is put into a requirement on a more deterministic basis, then one of the thoughts is, you guys got to think that through, how does that then affect safety classification? How does that affect, later on, the technical specifications and other operating constraints?
So, that's really, the biggest puzzle for us is this concept of putting everything into the adequate protection space.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: So, thanks for that, Bill. And I think that that helps. And I'll just respond off the cuff here, without giving it a whole lot of thought.
And maybe the challenge that you raise is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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68 the creation of buckets. Is it really necessary to try to put everything in one bucket or two buckets?
I mean, you could clearly have a section in the rule that would spell out the mitigation of beyond-design-basis events or something that has its own criteria. It doesn't have to come out, necessarily, under the safety criteria that is spelled out as Tier 1 or Tier 2.
But, again, we'll have those discussions.
I'm not saying that you shouldn't have something like that, I'm just saying that in its present focus, it appears that there's a lot of emphasis placed on whether something is or isn't adequate protection.
And if it isn't adequate protection, then that would be a lot of testing going on, with respect to why it's necessary to put in a rule.
And one last comment, and this is more than the first time that this has been raised, and that is, the concept of going back to the policy statement and its implementation, if this is the first broad-scale application of this Commission Policy Statement in rule language, then there isn't really a credit yet for how that should be done.
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69 we're talking about a broad-scale rulemaking. And so, I think we need to be careful with generalizing the policy statement into a regulatory requirement. And I think the staff knows that already, but I'm just pointing it out again so that we're careful with the language going forward.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Frank.
Cyril, I think the next slide is Dennis's?
MR. DRAFFIN: Yes, it is. That would be risk-informed. And again, the purpose for this is to raise topics for discussion, because I think these are important. And we've already touched upon PRA, but since Dennis has worked on it internationally and domestically, I turn it over to him.
MR. HENNEKE: Thank you, Cyril. Again, Dennis Henneke with GE Hitachi. Finally, a slide a PRA guy can talk about.
We did -- these are, the next couple of slides are really to bring up the discussion a little bit more in detail that we've already talked about quite a bit.
We know that the Licensing Modernization Project, the LMP, is performing detailed PRAs in support of a fully risk-informed process for LBE selection, SSC classification, defense-in-depth NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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70 determination.
And a plant that wants to go forward in that under the Part 53 regulations probably that should be supported. But other plants, like we mentioned, are using international regulations or requirements, like the IAEA SSR 2-1, or Canadian regulations, for example, LMP would be difficult to support.
So, our personal approach at GE is, we are doing PRAs, although it may not be initially in the design, you'll see on the next slide, but we can understand that other reactors may not initially have a PRA performed and may prefer to go primarily deterministic.
So, we're hoping that Part 53 doesn't require all the phases of LMP and then, the risk information can be, for example, only on the LBE selection or with the risk information used to supplement deterministic information, that's what I was saying.
So, that approach for partial risk-informed approach is what's being discussed at the IAEA. And we've heard examples of TMI or IPEEE as well.
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71 have an advanced standard, where we do comprehensive evaluations of all possible scenarios, and the PRA can provide you some good information, if it's available.
So, those sorts of examples probably don't apply now.
But that said, it's hard to do a PRA early in design. And so, we want some flexibility in using a more deterministic approach, especially on our initial safety analysis.
If you go to the next slide, a couple of points on that. As I mentioned already, PRA matures with design and site selection characterization. One of the points is to perform a PRA, we had to meet the PRA standard.
I'm currently the vice chair of the joint ANS/ASME PRA standard, soon to be chair. There's about 200 PRA folks working on various aspects of that.
And this is the endorsed approach for performing a PRA, currently, early in design, without a site selected, without a detailed design. It would be hard to meet the PRA standard.
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72 the standard. And so, need to be flexible on it, even for a plant that may be going fully risk-informed.
And as we mentioned, we have a range of PRA usage, from LMP to a more deterministic approach, using IAEA approaches, and so, we want flexibility on that.
And so, we're just looking for flexibility, and happy to work with the staff on how we may be able to word that to allow a range of flexibility in applying PRA to Part 53.
I'll stop there and see if there are any questions.
MS. CUBBAGE: This is Amy Cubbage from the NRC, I did have a comment.
I think, when we're looking at just using the terminology of the current licensing processes, combined license and operating license or a design certification, we're making final safety conclusions on a final design, recognizing that the design isn't to the point of a construction level of detail.
But it would need to have certain design features described, such that you could do a risk analysis of them. And for any details that weren't available, you would need to make assumptions, and then, that would set design requirements and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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73 reliability requirements for the SSCs.
And you could also make assumptions about a site, if you were doing a design certification instead of a COL or an OL.
And so, I just wanted to kind of throw that out there as there's concerns about the ability to do a PRA at various design stages, but I think, ultimately, you have to make assumptions and account for uncertainties.
MR. HENNEKE: Yeah, I agree with you, Amy.
And the X-300, for example, we have a PRA, it is bounding at this point, because of assumptions.
But the -- and we can perform the PRA, but we can't meet the standard, because the PRA standard would not allow significant conservatism for the risk significant access sequences. And so, you would fail if you went to do a peer review, because you couldn't meet the requirements.
And so, you have to be aware that these conservative PRAs early in the design phase will come out, we would probably do a self-assessment versus a peer review at that point, and we'd just have to demonstrate that they're conservative at that point, do our evaluations to that, and then, update it as the design details and those assumptions, conservative NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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74 assumptions are removed with actual design details or site-specific information.
MS. CUBBAGE: Great, Dennis, thanks for that clarification. I don't know if anyone else from the staff wants to react to that from a PRA standard perspective. But if not, Jeff Merrifield has his hand raised.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Thanks, Amy. I just want to make a generalized comment about the proceedings today.
As we tried to put together the slides for NIC, it was based on our understanding of where the staff was coming from, given the presentations you've made previously and some of the conversations.
I think both as it relates to the earlier discussions, certainly both, I think, Frank and Dennis have brought out some additional thoughts that you all have commented, I think, very thoughtfully on.
And this is the very kind of dialogue we felt was helpful for this type of a format, because it gives us a better insight as to the direction, and that certainly, I think, will cause us to think about some of our approaches and respond, hopefully, also in a thoughtful way.
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75 I do want to encourage what I think has been a very helpful dialogue, and appreciate all in that regard.
MS. CUBBAGE: I agree, I think this is very productive back and forth.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Bill, do you have anything to add or do you want to go on to the next one?
MR. RECKLEY: No, I didn't have anything, so we can go on.
MR. BEALL: Oh, Nan's got her hand up.
Nan?
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah.
MS. VALLIERE: Yeah. I guess I just wanted to say, more make a comment than ask a question, that listening to all this, it's clear that this PRA question isn't just one question to me, it's several questions and several that need to be worked through.
The first question is, will a PRA in some form be a requirement for new applicants under Part 53? The second question is, if so, what role will the PRA be required to play in determining the licensing basis? And then, thirdly, maybe, what standards would such a PRA have to meet?
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76 be able to tackle them a little easier than trying to lump them all in together into one big problem statement.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Nan.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah, I'll just -- this is Bill. I'll just share, this is kind of like, to some degree, deja vu, just the discussions.
When we were working on the licensing strategy for next generation nuclear plant, we identified a number of options of how to proceed. And option two was risk-informed and performance-based.
And option three was risk-informed and performance-based, with greater emphasis on PRA.
And, basically, this is the same discussion we were having 14 years ago. And I'm not trying to say there's a right or wrong to it, I'm just saying it's kind of like this philosophical thing you can get into.
And as I think Steve Kraft mentioned, what we concluded back then was, it's a lot of discussion and the end result is much closer than what people might think, based on the arguments that are underway.
So, anyway, with that, Bob, I'll shut up and you can move on to the next one.
(Laughter.)
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77 MR. BEALL: Okay. So, Cyril, I think we're ready for your next speaker.
MR. DRAFFIN: Great, okay. Thank you, Dennis. The next one is on performance-based, and there will be two people who might be making comments.
One is Travis Chapman from X-energy and Ross Moore from Oklo.
MR. MOORE: Hey, Cyril, can you hear me?
MR. DRAFFIN: Yes.
MR. MOORE: All right. This is Ross Moore from Oklo. And so, I'm going to, we've already talked to these performance-based regulation slides at the last meeting, I believe, so I'm just going to highlight a few key points, and then, we can move forward with the discussion, if there is any.
But, essentially, performance-based is, obviously, the other of this risk-informed performance-based. We've spent a lot of time discussing risk informing the regulations, but the other aspect of that is ensuring that the regulations allow for a performance-based approach.
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78 demonstrate safety. And that's kind of one of the key aspects of performance-based.
And one of the benefits of that, obviously, allows for the use of design features and programmatic controls, as selected by the applicant, to kind of leave a little bit of flexibility in how they choose to implement that and using the performance-based piece of that, the measurable outcomes, to demonstrate compliance at the outset.
So, that's kind of the highlight there.
And then, obviously, on the second slide there, just kind of discusses some other considerations.
We've talked about the LMP process and how Part 53 should, obviously, allow for the LMP approach, but not necessarily implicitly require it. And I think that was kind of discussed at the last meeting.
And I guess, the other thing I just kind of want to make sure is clear is that, obviously, these Part 53 requirements -- Part 53 has been a long time in the making, it's obviously a once in a generational rulemaking that will probably be in place for quite some time.
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79 these things are changing and evolving on a very frequent basis.
And I think it's prudent to allow for applicants to be able to select those when they go to actually construct and build a facility and use the performance-based criteria to demonstrate compliance, rather than having to necessarily prescriptively outline those up-front or have those prescriptively outlined in the regulations as they currently might be.
So, that's kind of my key points and I'll turn it back.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Ross.
MR. DRAFFIN: We would be interested in any NRC response to the comments, and particularly what of this should be in regulations and what should be allowed choice, perhaps, with guidance included?
MR. RECKLEY: This is Bill. Yeah, I think we've been trying to do this. And so, we'd be interested, especially as we get into the discussions of Subpart C on design and analysis, and then, later, on operations, which is another area where the performance-based approach can show up.
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80 in the actual subparts.
A particular interest that we have is to see how we can do first-of-a-kind licensing and use the performance-based elements to kind of support that. Given the lack of operating experience, it's always going to be an issue for a first-of-a-kind plant.
Our thinking has been a performance-based approach can be used. Now, people have to realize that, to a certain degree, performance-based approaches might transfer some business risk to whoever's doing that, an operating company or a designer, whoever's actually undertaking that first-of-a-kind plant might undertake some business risk in performance-based approaches.
But that, to the degree that's willing to be accepted by that party, I think we're very interested to try to make sure this rule can accommodate that.
MR. DRAFFIN: Were you planning on having some first-of-a-kind language incorporated in more of the subparts coming up?
MR. RECKLEY: The initial thought was just the performance-based elements, if we did it right, we wouldn't necessarily have to call out, this is a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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81 provision for first-of-a-kind. But, again, during the discussions, if that is easier, maybe we could do that.
But the thought was just the use of the performance-based approaches should be flexible enough to accommodate first-of-a-kind or subsequent units, with the performance elements being appropriately set for each case.
So, for a first-of-a-kind, maybe the surveillance program that's talked about in the operations section would be much more frequent. And then, we could look at what we did in Part 52 Appendix J and build in a performance element that as operating experience is gained, that surveillance interval can be extended.
So, I mean, that was some of the thinking, that we wouldn't necessarily have to call out first-of-a-kind, but if we did it right, it could accommodate first-of-a-kind.
But, again, we'll get into that discussion when we get to operations, primarily, maybe somewhat Subpart C on design, but primarily in operations.
MR. SEGALA: This is John Segala. I just wanted to add that, I mean, this may be obvious, but to the extent there's always a trade-off between NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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82 first-of-a-kind approaches and predictability and timeliness, in terms of NRC being able to do a quick review and things like that.
So, as we've been building the framework, we've tried to have in the back of the mind sort of having a balance between flexibility and predictability, and it's hard to achieve both.
So, just something to think about, as the more flexibility that's added, it provides freedom and innovative thinking, but it also has a potential to not have the predictability.
So, of course, we would encourage applicants doing new approaches to come talk to us early during pre-app, so that those new approaches can be better understood by the staff. So, but that's all I'll say for that.
MR. DRAFFIN: Okay, thank you. I think we can probably go on to the next topic, which is adequate defense-in-depth. And Dennis Henneke of GE Hitachi will address this.
MR. HENNEKE: Thank you, Cyril. The defense-in-depth, again, these are two slides that we want to open up discussion and discuss a little bit, throw out some ideas. I am supporting the defense-in-depth tabletop under LMP and TICAP. And have thought NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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83 a lot about defense-in-depth.
Defense-in-depth really started, well, defense-in-depth is obviously not a new concept, but in a risk-informed, performance-based arena, really came out of Reg Guide 1.174, where you perform your PRA calculations for an application, and then, you ensure that the application does not reduce safety margins and demonstrate adequate defense-in-depth.
So, defense-in-depth is really a process step in a risk-informed process, an application. And so, we're kind of leaning towards thinking that it really needs to be more in guidance, rather than a part of regulation or part of formal SAR to say, yes, our plant has adequate defense-in-depth because of the following reasons. And so, let me add some details on that.
For the LMP application, we performed the defense-in-depth, which is a very, has its own chapter in NEI 18-04 and very comprehensive review of things like cliff edge effect events, changes in DBE/LBE classification, if you take a system out, does it change the event? Does a system prevent a safety system from being asked for in the AOO region? Those sorts of things, it's a very long series of steps that we perform under LMP.
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84 But even under LMP, it's difficult to say, now, in what we're going to provide in the SAR to demonstrate adequate defense-in-depth for the design, other than to say, we performed defense-in-depth reviews under LMP and here's the results of those reviews, and as a result of those reviews, we came up with NSRST components and we came up with these special treatments and so on.
Under LMP, I think LMP, folks that are going through this are showing that we're coming up with different defense-in-depth approaches. A smaller source term may have something that looks much different than something with a larger source term, those reactors with passive designs will look different than those with active safety systems, and so on.
So, in the end, what is the acceptance criteria for defense-in-depth really isn't clear.
What we, again, have is a defense-in-depth process by which we can go through the risk-informed approach to supplement that with additional requirements and safety measures.
If you go to the next slide, so, some of the questions we've seen on this, as far as multiple barriers, that is one of the LMP questions. Do we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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85 only look at that in DBE range or do we ask that for beyond-design-basis or lower events? Do we need to have multiple barriers in these regions? Not really sure that question's been answered.
So, in the end, we're thinking that defense-in-depth really needs to be described more in guidance and we need to kind of work on that together to see how we would translate our design into what's needed for an application and how we can demonstrate that.
But I think the question really is, back to the NRC is, what is it you're trying to get out of asking for defense-in-depth and what is it you're trying to have the applicant present in the area of defense-in-depth, besides going through a systematic review such as that in 18-04?
So, that's kind of just opening volley on bringing the questions to you guys for discussion.
Thanks.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah, this is Bill. One of the things that's a challenge in trying to do this Part 53 is the technology-inclusive nature, right?
And so, we're trying to look, and I'm trying to explain why we put it in, we're trying to look at the key philosophies that reflect the NRC's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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86 actions that were, like you said, Dennis, over many, many years.
And defense-in-depth has been one of those key philosophies, and it's reflected in various documents, including the most cited Reg Guide 1.174.
But in coming up with a -- and much of what we've done has been defined specifically for light water reactors, obviously.
So, going forward in a technology-inclusive approach, we wanted to maintain that philosophy and make sure it was reflected. And so, that's why it was there.
We do have, as you mentioned, one way that we found acceptable under NEI 18-04 Licensing Modernization Project, an assessment. And as you mentioned, it's clear there's some engineering judgment, and that's the nature of defense-in-depth, that it's going to be hard to have a numerical approach those this, where you find.
So, what we were trying to do in what we put in the defense-in-depth element was to tie it to QHOs, an overall risk assessment that defense-in-depth supports, and then, add some specific DID elements that you'll find in IAEA guidance, in LMP guidance, and so forth about ensuring that even within a risk NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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87 assessment approach, a PRA approach, that you're not overly relying on a single design feature or a single program.
So, that was the nature of just trying to reinforce the importance of this and make sure for any technology that it's reflected.
So, I'll turn it back to other discussions or, Dennis, if you had kind of additional discussion?
MR. HENNEKE: No, I appreciate the feedback and it sounds like you guys have been thinking about that a little bit, so we'll just continue discussing this as needed.
You're correct, we have one approach under LMP that does discuss these issues about the single feature and other aspects of defense-in-depth, but need to see if there's a more deterministic approach, as we've talked about before, a partial use of risk information, as I talked about for the event selection, about deterministic safety analysis. The deterministic safety analysis is somewhat of a defense-in-depth argument by itself.
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88 have adequate defense-in-depth. It has to be something different than that, I would think.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. And, again, we're thinking about these comments as we're getting them.
I do think, if you look at, for an example, the IAEA approach, which might be of interest given your previous comments about the international element, if you look at level 4 in the IAEA methodology, it's going beyond design-basis accidents.
And so, you basically are introducing the equivalent of beyond-design-basis events. They call them design extension conditions, but the concept is similar.
If you're not going to use a probabilistic risk assessment to define those kind of event sequences, the methodology is going to require you to do something, some additional failures, in order to identify the design extension conditions.
And so, again, we see, basically, a similarity, and obviously NEI 18-04 calls out the IAEA methodology, as one of the considerations in how it was constructed.
So, again, I would look and just say as a general matter, no matter what methodology you're looking at, ours as we currently proposed it, and, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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89 again, we're looking at it for possible revisions, or you look at the IAEA methodology or, at this stage, almost any methodology, you're going to go beyond design-basis accidents and need to identify design features and programs to address something worse than that.
MR. DRAFFIN: And, Bill, how much do you plan on putting in guidance versus putting in regulation? In other words, could you elaborate on what you have in mind for what would be in guidance for defense-in-depth?
MR. RECKLEY: Well, I mean, it's a -- we have a talk this afternoon on guidance. But we would hope, as we do this rule, to have at least one acceptable means to meet the rule established. And in this discussion, we have one acceptable way, through NEI 18-04.
And we're not saying that's the only way, but that's -- our goal is to have at least one way to do it when we put this proposed rule out so people can understand how it can be met.
If there are alternative approaches, like a more deterministic approach, in which you would identify beyond-design-basis accidents, let's say you're trying to fit it into the level 4 kind of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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90 discussion in the IAEA guidance, we'll need to talk with whoever would be championing that approach to see who would develop the guidance.
The NRC did not develop the Licensing Modernization, that was done through a coordinated effort, DOE, Southern, NEI, to develop that methodology, which we found acceptable.
If an entity or group of entities wants to develop alternatives to that, I think we would be amenable and we'll try, as we get into the discussions on Subpart C, to build in that flexibility. But I --
the NRC didn't develop LMP and I don't think we would develop the alternatives.
So, if, one of the areas of discussion this afternoon is the development of guidance and if people want to take up the alternative, again, I think we'd be amenable to looking at it, but the NRC is not likely to develop it.
MS. CUBBAGE: Bill, I would also just like to add, with the discussion of deterministic approaches, I think, kind of keying on what others have said, it's hard to envision a deterministic approach that wouldn't result in probably a more severe accident to be considered.
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91 enough enough and trying to have a predictable process to determine that in a technology-inclusive way is very challenging.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. But, yeah, I mean, this is, to some degree, the more established process.
So, if you want to look at what that looks like, I mean, you can go back to NUREG-1368 on PRISM, the pre-application review from the 80s, or 1338 for the MHTGR, that was the methodology back then in the 80s.
And so, if you want to see what it looks like, and we can dig that stuff up. So, that, yeah, we can do that.
MS. CUBBAGE: You're typically looking at more severe events and you're looking at needing, potentially, containment, and things of that nature.
MR. RECKLEY: The approach, the deterministic approach to addressing uncertainties usually introduces conservatisms in the design. That has in large part led to trying to go to a more risk-informed approach, including using PRA, to allow some of those design conservatisms, things like leak-tight containments, for alternatives to be considered.
Now, again, some of the discussion now with micro-reactors and smaller inventories, there may NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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92 be a discussion that we didn't have back then, but again, our search of the literature, it's not as clear that simply lowering the inventory will get you out of those other design conservatisms that Amy's mentioning.
But that's something to consider as we get into the discussion in the next couple months, I guess, we can have that more.
MR. HENNEKE: Yeah, this is Dennis again, let me clarify. You're both correct on that.
IAEA approach, it requires the use of conservatism, if you're not using risk information.
If you are using risk information, it requires the treatment of uncertainty and the understanding of uncertainty in the assessment.
So, and, yes, if you went purely deterministic, it would almost certainly require you to assign defense level 4, which would be similar to NSRST in LMP. It would require additional components be considered, whereas a risk-informed approach may send that to a defense line 5, I know we're losing a lot of people when we go into there, which could be classified as non-safety with commercial treatment kind of thing.
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93 we just need to make sure that the flexibility is there in the regulation that would allow somebody to use that approach, even though it may add additional requirements to their plant, it would not require the use of risk informing defense lines.
MS. CUBBAGE: And just to briefly add to that, Dennis, the concept of practical elimination and selecting deterministically a series of events that would need to be demonstrated to be either protected against or eliminated, that would be another factor that comes in with the IAEA approach.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Amy. We have a few more topics and sub-topics to get through. So, Cyril, can we move on to the next one, which is QHOs.
MR. DRAFFIN: Absolutely. Thank you for the dialogue. Rebecca Norris from NuScale will touch upon that. We just mentioned the QHOs a moment ago.
MS. NORRIS: Yes. Good morning, can everyone hear me okay?
MR. DRAFFIN: Yes.
MS. NORRIS: Thank you. So, we had pretty much the same slide last meeting, so I won't go in detail.
The recommendation that we came up with was completely removing Bravo 2 from 53.23, 53.23 is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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94 the second tier requirements. And though we understand that we might not be adding it in the first place.
So, I kind of wanted to open up the question again as to the reasoning behind adding the additional requirements of the QHO into Part 53 and also, the reasoning behind slightly changing the numbers from the 1986 safety goals that were originally put out. There's, I think it goes from one to five, between the 1986 safety goal and Part 53.
So, we just wanted to ask those questions again, to see if there was -- because maybe if we know the reasoning behind adding it, we might have a better recommendation than simply removing it. But as it stands now, that is our recommendation.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah, this is Bill. So, again, the rationale, we got into this a little bit with the discussion with Frank, was a purely deterministic approach, historically, and whether you want to say that was implemented through the General Design Criteria or some similar approach, led to, over the decades, things like 50.69.
It led to, under LMP, non-safety-related with special treatment. Even historically within the NRC, it led to things like augmented quality, so that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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95 we didn't need safety-related equipment.
And so, the idea was to recognize from the beginning and build the rule with multiple buckets, going back to that analogy, poor as it may be.
And so, if you're going to have a second tier, to try to get the results that were ultimately the goal of things like 50.69 for the operating reactors, then you need a criteria for that tier, a success criteria for what you're trying to accomplish through that.
So, those elements that were added over the years, in looking at both LMP and 50.69 for the operating fleet, brought in the risk elements. And so, the notion was margins to the QHOs would be a logical criteria to choose for a risk-informed approach, similar in nature to 50.69 or the LMP.
So, that, I mean, that was the initial logic. And so, the thought that we would like to propose to the stakeholders are, if there's a desire to have the same result that 50.69 was trying to do for the operating fleet and that LMP was trying to do for those using that methodology -- and by the way, the QHOs are one of the success criteria, the cumulative risk measure criteria in LMP. So, again, the LMP is available as a way to meet this proposed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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96 requirement.
But if there is an alternative that would support this, again, the treatment below safety-related, the treatment below technical specifications, those things that were trying to be accomplished through 50.69 and LMP, if there's a proposed alternative to have that in place, then we would need a criteria.
And so, I'm kind of at a loss to come up with what it might be, but we'd be open if there's a way to phrase this or frame it, if anyone else has an idea.
MR. BEALL: Frank, I think you have your hand raised?
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Yeah, thanks, Bill. One question that I think has percolated around inside of our discussions is why aren't mitigating strategies good enough?
Why the dose criteria -- I mean, you look at what was done for Fukushima, right?, and you come up with a series of mitigating strategies that rely on coping discussions and the ability to bring equipment from offsite facilities to the aid of the reactor that's in duress.
So, this seems to be one step beyond that.
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97 And so, I think that's why we keep asking the question is, if mitigating strategies were good enough for the LWR fleet, why all of a sudden are you adding dose criteria on top of that?
MR. RECKLEY: The general reason we use dose criteria is because it is the universal metric.
And, ultimately, what is the NRC's primary mission, is to limit that dose to the public.
And it is technology-inclusive. The one thing that any reactor design has in common is its generation of radionuclides as the hazard that NRC is charged to control. So, that's the reason we gravitated to dose, is because it's a universal metric.
If you go to a more deterministic approach
-- the thing about mitigating strategies and Fukushima is, it was added on top of everything that was already in place. So, it is not as simple as saying mitigating measures are okay, mitigating measures were okay for the operating fleet in addition to everything else they already had.
And so, we would have to think about, and it's the same thing that we were just talking about in defense-in-depth, in large part, if there's an approach where people want to deterministically add a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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98 level of defense beyond the design-basis accident and come up with a methodology for identifying those beyond-design-basis events and how they would be treated under the IAEA methodology, with an independent barrier to address that particular event, I think we could probably do that.
I guess, to some degree, to be honest, I guess our premise, or I'll speak first-person, my premise was the years of experience have shown most people wanted to get away from that approach. If going back to that approach is what we want to allow, I think we can accommodate it.
Again, this is -- what you're proposing is a very traditional approach and we can probably do that, as long as people realize, as Amy mentioned earlier, the deterministic approach and just adding barriers tends to be conservative and add to the design.
MS. CUBBAGE: And I'll also add, Bill, that to do it in a technology-inclusive way is very challenging.
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99 need a surrogate or replacement for those, and to do that in a technology-inclusive way is very challenging.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: So, I will -- just let me respond very quickly, and I'll let others engage here.
I think, I'm going to say that if we step back and you talk about regulatory framework that was in place for LWRs, we're constructing that regulatory framework with Part 53.
And the concept is that you're going to establish these fundamental safety functions that must be provided. And to get to beyond-design-basis events, you're going to have to lose one or two of those fundamental safety functions, to even achieve a beyond-design-basis type scenario.
So, from a mitigating standpoint, it would be simply restoring the function that you've already determined is essential for safety.
So, I think when we look at concepts that we're putting forward under Part 53, we have to look at them with a different lens, and we're building that environment by having this string of postulated events and being constructed to quality and defense-in-depth, all of that is pointing to areas where mitigation could be successful without having to establish a dose NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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100 criteria.
And I appreciate where Bill is coming from, but I think we can't just say, we're going to have to have additional barriers, nor am I saying that this is necessarily deterministic, because we are establishing those fundamental requirements for the facility, in terms of controlling heat generation or whatever vernacular you want to use.
And if to mitigate a beyond-design-basis event, you have to go and restore those capabilities, that would seem to be a forthright approach. So, I'll stop and let others contribute.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thanks, Frank. Ed Lyman, you have your hand up?
DR. LYMAN: Yeah, hi, thanks. So, I find this discussion pretty confusing.
But, first of all, just in response to the previous comment, the post-Fukushima requirements, you may recall that there were a whole lot of requirements that were recommended by the task force and staff and were evaluated through the backfit rule and they were not imposed, partly because they weren't safety significant enhancements based on a comparison with the QHOs.
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101 are not related to the current regulatory actions for the existing fleet is not accurate.
Second comment, I'm totally confused by what NIC is asking for. We've heard, as we all know, the PRAs for plants that don't have operating experience can't be developed in sufficient detail, that they have to have conservatisms, yet then there's a statement that it's not clear what the purpose of defense-in-depth is.
Well, I mean, if you're going to try to justify all the regulatory flexibilities that are contemplated as part of this rule, based on the PRA, if it's not well-developed, not validated with operating experience, then you're going to have to have a conservative PRA and it's going to have to have well-established margins through defense-in-depth.
And, otherwise, I don't know what this whole effort is about. It sounds to me like industry wants to just be able to pick and choose whatever requirements and methodologies they want to to justify their projects, and that can't be the way this rule is structured.
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102 define adequate protection, for the purposes of this rule, something it hasn't done clearly in 50 years, and to expect that to happen over the next few months, I mean, that's kind of absurd to me. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Ed. Rebecca, you have your hand up?
MS. NORRIS: Yes. So, my comments are focused pretty specifically on QHO, I know we were talking about the bigger picture with the other comments. But that response is very helpful, so thank you.
I think our recommendation would still be that 53.23 is adequate without Bravo 2. However, if it's deemed that Bravo 2 still needs to be maintained, this is my personal recommendation, it's not be vetted through NIC, but I would recommend not putting on an arbitrary margin onto the 1986 requirements and simply putting them into the rule as-is, because I find it confusing.
There's already going to have to be margin whenever any plant is licensed based on this, there's going to be plenty of margin that is going to be required, so we don't need to add additional margin just to the rule from the 1986 requirements.
So, that would be my one comment on that.
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103 So, thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Rebecca.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. And in the bigger discussion, and I think we'll have this maybe later on, it's still -- we're looking for thoughts on even including the numerical values versus using language -
- or we could even move it up a level from the quantitative to the qualitative.
So, again, we can keep the same concept and if it's the numerical values that are of concern, we can certainly discuss that as we kind of go forward.
MR. BEALL: Okay. So, Amir, you're up.
MR. AFZALI: Again, thanks a lot, again.
First of all, I want to echo Jeff Merrifield's comment that this is really good meeting. I think it's one of the best meeting I've been involved in, where people are more and more explicit about what they're asking and what they concerns are.
And I also highly appreciate the staff's responses, it shows the thoroughness of the thought process to get where they got to. So, I want to congratulate the staff and the industry for conducting such a beneficial meeting.
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104 particularly refers to if you use a deterministic approach, you probably have a conservative design. I would content that the question is unnecessary burden and siloed conservatism versus holistic conservatism.
I believe a risk-informed approach gives you a more conservative design at the end of the day, but it gives it a holistic one and avoids unnecessary burden. So, I encourage the staff to look at it from that point of view.
In the nuclear industry, especially for owner-operator who has to live with it for many years, the concept of not being conservative is foreign to us. So, we want to be conservative, but we want to be holistic.
And so, the way we say we want to make conservative decisions based on the realistic analysis. The analysis doesn't -- once we put a bunch of conservatism in analysis, that's where you fail, potentially, the conservative decision-making and imposing unnecessary burden.
So, there is a necessary burden and there is an unnecessary burden, and I want to make sure that we who support the risk-informed approach do not contemplate or do not seem to suggest that we are trying to be non-conservative, that's not the way we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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105 operate.
So, and I continuously bring up this point of owner-operator perspective because these things have to survive for a number of years, right? They're going to operate for a number of years, and usually what we have experienced when we make siloed conservatism and you may not have considered all potential events and have measures against them to some degree, or at least understand them, then the events find you, and then, you have good cumulative effect of regulation and increasing level of regulation.
So, that's what we are trying to avoid.
That's why I bring up this owner-operator perspective.
I do want to acknowledge that the work done by the developers, for example, I know Dr. Kam Ghaffarian, X-energy's founder, I know how dedicated he is to safety and environmental responsibility and how much risk is taken. I know Dr. Sang. So, I know a lot of these developers and the people who are investing significant amount of funding, and GE, I worked with GE for a long time.
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106 providing that perspective so these things become commercially viable so we have a long-term application or maintenance of many of them to be built.
So, that is the frame, that's why a risk-informed performance-based approach makes sense.
Now, what the language is, again, specific language in the rule, as was stated before, it's -- we are discussing it with our colleagues at both NIC and NEI and we are not making any final determination. We have a strong position, but that strong position doesn't mean that we are not flexible.
Given all that stuff, I want to make sure that it's very clear, we did this not because we are married to a particular method, we have investigated many, many approaches and we thought a holistic approach to show performance objectives of the regulations are met and allow flexibility between how you reach those performance objectives, whether you want to look at the heat removal function or you want to look at the containment function or whatever, that's where innovation takes place.
Some people may look at reduced source terms, some people may look at some type of fuel containment, some people may think of big EPZ zone, whatever they wish to do.
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107 But this is the platform that NEI 18-04 is built on. And we want to make sure that this conversation doesn't imply that this is, like, happen last week or four or five years ago, this is based on 30 years of experience and it's significantly more foundation, it has actually have a PRA standard, which is recently actually been approved.
So, it's one of the few aspects of non-light water reactors where we have approved at least the standard, which is endorsed by the community. So, I just want to bring those points up.
Again, I'm not advocating for any particular language as part of this conversation, I'm just giving it some perspective of why the work was done and why it makes sense.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Amir. We can take one more question. Steve Nesbit, you have your hand up?
MR. NESBIT: This is Steve Nesbit with LMNT Consulting. I have a narrow and focused question, or comment.
I want to endorse what Rebecca Norris said earlier about the form, if you're going to include quantitative health objectives, I think you ought to either include what was published and adopted by the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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108 NRC, by the Commission in association with the safety goals or explain why you're going to change them.
So, I'm curious why they're changed, but I think that if that's going to go in a rule, then it ought to just be what it is.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Steve. Ed, you have something very quick?
DR. LYMAN: Yeah, very quick. I'm not sure what we're talking about when they say the QHOs in this proposal are different. Can someone explain that? Because I think they're the same, the acute health effects and chronic are the same as they always were --
MR. NESBIT: Yeah --
DR. LYMAN: -- as far as I can see.
MR. NESBIT: -- this is Steve Nesbit. I'll explain, if you want. The QHOs are expressed in terms of fatalities and the language, draft language in Subpart B is expressed in terms of health effects.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Go ahead, Bill.
MR. DRAFFIN: You want to go on to quality assurance?
MR. BEALL: Yes, please.
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109 the quality program is necessary, but not to apply direction on which approaches to use?
And second of all, in the recommendations on this page and the last one and the first one on the next page, will you be including guidance that would allow ISO 9000, IAEA, commercial dedication programs, in other words, other approaches that are being used around the world, to be acceptable for QA?
MR. RECKLEY: This is Bill. I mean, our initial language was, we tried to use the generally accepted standards in order to provide that flexibility. Again, kind of looking at how -- and we'll maybe get into this this afternoon when we talk about the guidance documents.
Our goal would be to make sure we have at least one way defined to meet the requirements. We have that now through NQA-1.
If there's a desire, and I understand it, but if there's a desire to broaden that to include ISO standards or other standards, I think we'd have to have a discussion in regards to who would take on developing that guidance.
I'm not sure the staff is able to do that.
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110 developing guidance in the QA area, to bring in the possible use of those other standards, I think we'd be amenable to it.
But that will -- maybe we can talk about that this afternoon, when we talk about what entities might want to volunteer to develop what guidance.
MR. DRAFFIN: Okay. But we just want to make sure, or at least highly recommend, that the rule just state a quality program is necessary and not give an example, and that the guidance would, as you say, give at least one, but preferably flexibility and may give three or four examples. And that's what we can talk about later.
That's all we had for QA, unless someone else wanted to raise any issues?
MR. BEALL: Nope, go ahead, Cyril, nobody raised their hand.
MR. DRAFFIN: On the next slide, on possible structures, we would like NRC to come forward with a list of other parts that Part 53 will reference. It would be nice to have a particular list, just shown on a slide at the next meeting saying, these are the ones you plan on referencing.
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111 for not just regulatory text, but guidance and review process.
So, I think we can end our remarks here and turn it over to NEI, unless anybody has any comments on this slide.
MR. BEALL: Nope, no raised hands. So, Marc Nichols?
MR. NICHOL: Yeah, thanks, Bob, can you hear me?
MR. BEALL: Yes, sir. You're a little soft, but we can hear you.
MR. NICHOL: Okay. Sorry about that.
Yeah, my phone's right next to my mouth. Let's go on to the next slide. So, and I should be brief, because I know we're probably all itching for a break here.
The first thing I wanted to start out in my key concepts, this actually aligns very well with the NRC slide, I think it's slide 18, of your key concepts and your little chart of subparts. But it is different in a very fundamental way.
So, where we began is structuring Part 53 around the NRC's regulatory functions. And I'll go through some of these. Now, they do align with your points, in terms of defining requirements based on high level safety criteria, some different subparts on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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112 facility life cycle, and then, something about licensing and sort of process requirements.
The key difference, though, when you start with the regulatory functions, and we define a set of them we think is comprehensive, to what the NRC needs to be able to do to sort of regulate in the space, is first determining the standards for reasonable assurance of adequate protections, determine facility characteristics needed to meet those public protection criteria, this somewhat goes along with it.
And then, we get into, well, how do you provide reasonable assurance that the facility is designed to meet those safety requirements? How do you provide reasonable assurance that the facility is constructed and operated in accordance with the design?
And then, there's two process ones, which are what types of licenses for this will the NRC grant and the process for obtaining them? And then, what information is needed for the NRC to facilitate that process?
So, when you break it down to that, into those functions, the key difference, when you look at it through this lens, is that you're very focused on what requirements are necessary and sufficient to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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113 perform those regulatory functions?
And that's really important because what we see in Part 50 and 52 are a lot of requirements and regulatory burden which really aren't geared toward that. And I say that, and I know people might try to take this and spin it the wrong way, we're very much in support and want to make sure the requirements provide safety for the public, safety and security for the public.
And so, when I say there's requirements out there that don't align with the regulatory functions, it's that they're not providing a safety benefit, but they are providing a lot of regulatory burden, not just on the industry, but on the NRC itself.
And so, that's why, even though structurally these questions may be aligned with the NRC's slide, I would encourage the NRC and all stakeholders to look through this lens of what are the regulatory functions and what are the necessary and sufficient requirements needed to be able to provide those? So, let's go on to the next slide.
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114 personal views or our NEI views in this area, they may come up later as we talk about Subpart B.
But then, there's also key process topics.
And none of these have been hit on in any of the previous meetings.
So, what's the level of detail or prescription in regulations versus use of guidance?
This will come up in the next session. How do you organize the technical requirements and documentation requirements? What's the relationship between the 50 and 52 licensing processes with Part 53? What is licensing basis documentation and how do you do those changes?
So, there are other topics that are going to need to be discussed. I think what we found today in this meeting is that there's a lot of discussion that needs to occur around these detailed topics.
The other takeaway I would have is that answering actually this first process topic, what's the level of detail in regulations versus use of guidance, really is going to influence the discussion on those technical topics.
So, the more prescriptive you are in regulations, the more, I think, discussion needs to happen, because it's potentially limiting flexibility.
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115 As I'll talk about later in the rule language, an approach that uses high level regulation rule language and utilizes guidance more for the details, I think is going to be what helps us most in this Part 53 rulemaking. So, thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Marc.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah, this is Bill. Just to Marc's last point, I'll just add, one of the things that will help keep us at a high level is trying to stay technology-inclusive, in our view. So, I think, throughout this, there will be natural limits to how detailed we can get, because of our desire to have a technology-inclusive rule.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Is there anybody on the phone line who would like to ask anything? You can hit Star-6 to unmute your phone. Okay. With that, and there's no one raising any hands, we will take a lunch break.
We had a really good discussion this morning, so we will reconvene, we're a little bit over, so let's come back at 1:35, and we will start up on the next topic, which is the approach to rule language and developing key guidance documents. So, please be back on line at 1:35. Thank you very much.
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116 off the record at 12:53 p.m. and resumed at 1:35 p.m.)
MR. BEALL: Good afternoon, everyone.
Welcome to the second half of our public meeting on Part 53.
So next slide, please.
So this afternoon we are going to start off with a discussion of the approach to rule language and the development of the supporting reg guides.
So with that, I'd like to turn it over to Bill Reckley to start us off on the staff's presentation. Bill?
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Thanks, Bob.
So, again, we only have one slide and then we can provide a little background and then open it up for other presentations and discussions.
Just to kind of go over some material that
-- that we have talked about before, the development of our rulemaking plan -- and even before the rulemaking plan -- has been that we would construct Part 53 such that the approach, the methodology in NEI 18-84, and reflected in Reg Guide 1.233, would be one acceptable way of constructing the rule.
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117 associated with Part 53. One is the development of application guidance through the Technology-Inclusive Content of Applications Program, or TICAP, which is a utility-led DOE-supported activity that's a follow-on to NEI 18-04.
And then the staff's effort to develop other advanced reactor content of application guidance
-- and some of that we have talked about in specific meetings on that topic, with a goal, as we talked about earlier, to try to increase the performance-based element into the process and maybe cut down on the amount of -- level of detail that would be in application.
So if you're not following those activities, I would just put in a plug that you need to, because from our point of view these are supportive efforts.
We have also tried, as much as we can --
some of these were started before Part 53, but we're trying to stay coordinated in terms of our work and other areas such as emergency preparedness, that proposed rulemaking, some rulemaking and other discussions in the security area, our previous work in the development of SECY 20-45 in regards to siting, the generic environmental impact statement, GEIS NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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118 efforts.
There's also a number of activities outside the NRC that we're involved in, such as the work in standards development organizations -- ANS, ASME, for example -- with one I guess particular topic of relevance today is the development of the non-light water reactor PRA standard.
I mentioned earlier when we were looking at the schedule, we're initiating work in other areas like human factors, staffing, operator licensing, that whole area, that is going to be a major discussion.
And so just kind of preparing people that as we get into these subparts in the next couple months, some of the topics are major areas, and we're going to have to talk about how we can get through them in the most efficient and timely manner to support the overall rulemaking schedule, which, again, from the staff's point of view, is to basically have this pretty well done by the end of the year.
There will be other areas that we'll talk about in some of those subparts, like technical specification. There has been some discussion about developing additional guidance in the area of developing special treatment for the non-safety-related, with special treatment structures, systems, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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119 and components.
And one of the things that I hope at least today is the beginning of the discussion on is we know there will be other guidance documents -- and some of them major, like the human factors ones -- that we're going to have to talk about and initiate whether we're able to have them done by the time -- even the first draft done by the time of the proposed rule would be the goal.
But even if we're not able to do that, to have them in progress by the time we -- we finish the proposed rulemaking and who might pick up this kind of guidance. And so a little later today we'll kind of walk through some of those areas and point out I think some of the big ones.
But just people need to start to think.
There has been some discussion of micro-reactors, and we look at the area of manufacturing licenses as a logical connect to some, if not most, of those micro-reactor designs. And that's an area that has --
that has not been used since the 1970s.
We acknowledged it could use some updating in the rule language, which we can do in Part 53. It gives us an opportunity.
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120 might be another important area, so just looking to stakeholders as to who might support that effort.
So that's the staff's introduction. If we want to go to the next slide, and Marc can provide NEI's views.
MR. NICHOL: Yeah. Thanks, Bill.
Appreciate your perspectives. I will sort of comment on those as I go through my prepared material.
If you can go to the next slide, please.
So a lot of this discussion is focused on the regulatory guidance, but I want to preface it by talking about the approach to rule language, because that has a huge influence.
I alluded to it in an earlier comment about how a lot of these discussions on detailed topics, you know, are going to be really impacted by the choices we make in terms of rule language, and setting aside sort of the technical content discussion that the stakeholders and NRC are having, even to say the safety criteria, the proposed language that the NRC has put out.
We need to also talk about the language itself. And one of the things we have noticed is that the language choices that the NRC has chosen is that it's more prescriptive than what you might typically NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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121 find in Part 50 and 52. As we look at it to be technology-inclusive performance-based, and risk-informed, it really should be going the other way, which is higher level language that is -- that is less prescriptive. And so that's a key -- a key feature we need to sort of align on.
Recognizing that, you know, our views on rule language, you know, appear to be different than what the NRC's views are on rule language, we have decided to put together what we're calling a discussion draft for Part 53, and it will build all of the Part 53 regulations/requirements that we think are necessary, so you can see how they all interact, but you can also see how to achieve this high-level, technology-inclusive, performance-based, risk-informed rule language that we think provides more flexibility rather than the more prescriptive, which limits flexibility.
That will even help in the discussion of these detailed technical topics. As you -- as you are less prescriptive at the rule level, and allow for those details to be developed in guidance -- and you can have multiple approaches developed below the rule language -- I think the -- I think the intensity with which we discuss these technical topics will help to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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122 moderate. So I wanted to point that out.
The other thing that we noticed as we've been putting this discussion draft together is that all of these difference guidance -- potential guidance areas start to become illuminated. As you pointed out, Bill, there may be a lot of them, and, you know, looking at it, it's going to be really important to have guidance alongside the rule when the rule language is very high level, so that you can understand how it operates at a more detailed level.
So getting -- understanding which -- what guidance documents are needed, getting started on those early is going to be important for the success of this rulemaking.
So when we look at the higher level requirements, we think about, well, there is going to be a lot of details that have historically been in regulations would be in guidance. And now part of this may just be getting rid of the prescriptive nature and making it more performance-based or it might be part of, you know, making it technology-inclusive, whatever it is.
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123 level.
You'll need guidance for technology-specific considerations. When you look at Part 50, it's written around large light water reactors.
That's part of the trouble we're having with Part 50 as we look at advanced reactors. So, but there is a lot of clarity that comes along in terms of clarity in terms of NRC expectations when you have that type of detail. And so there may be a desire to have that type of detail for different technologies, so technology-specific considerations.
And then the licensing approach considerations. So we've heard a lot of discussion on PRA, 18-04 being one approach, not the only approach, and, you know, I agree with all of that. But, you know, so the licensing approaches might need to be defined more in guidance, and certainly we support the
-- 18-04 and TICAP, as well as we support other approaches that people would want to use.
So when we look at potential topics for guidance, these are just a couple of areas that stood out. They're not the only ones, but they are the ones that rose to the top of most likely needing guidance.
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124 meet what is needed for a construction permit or an early site permit or operating license, design certification, whatever it is. And there is a lot of work going on with TICAP and ARCAP, so I think we can leverage those.
When we look at Part 53, we're looking at doing a performance-based approach to security beyond what -- anything the NRC has contemplated to date.
And so, you know, is there a potential need for something related to security content? And how do you do security in a performance-based manner?
That translates into the safety and security paradigm, and, you know, when you start to do performance-based security alongside safety, and how that -- that might look, the NEI 18-04 is a great risk-informed approach or licensing approach to safety. But what about -- what about doing the same thing for security? So that would be a question there.
Technology-specific guidance, as we mentioned, we're -- in our discussion draft, we're coming up with new concepts that would apply to Part 53 we think that our -- that our more technology inclusive and performance based. So with these new concepts, and by not specifying specifically these are NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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125 the types of functions and these are the types of systems and components you need. By allowing that to be technology dependent -- performance based at the rule level, and then technology dependent, there might be a need for guidance to define sort of that -- that core set for a particular technology type.
And then there may be some specific technical topics. A graded approach to PRA was raised before, commercial grade, QA standards. There might even be some -- some I'll say licensing process lines as we -- as we look to define a new type of safety and security paradigm. You know, how does that -- how does that interplay with current licensing control processes like 50.59? Is there going to be need -- a need for revisions or a new guidance document for that? So those are all things to keep an eye on.
I think that was my only slide.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Marc.
Cyril?
MR. DRAFFIN: I just want to give NRC a chance to comment on Marc's thoughts.
MR. RECKLEY: This is Bill. I think we find ourselves in general agreement, Marc. We'll just have to have those discussions. As we go forward, we'll see what you provide us in -- in this more NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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126 detailed write up and have to, in the very short term, come to some discussions and hopefully agreement about who might work on what guidance.
So, at this point, I think Cyril could go on or there are some other hands up, Bob.
MR. BEALL: Yes, Frank.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Yeah. Hi. Thanks. Can you go back to the staff's slide here, 41? Or 40?
Thank you.
So, Bill, I just have a question with respect to the first two bullets. And it's just maybe a little bit of clarity. I fully acknowledge that, you know, Reg Guide 1.233 endorses 18-04. But one of the -- one of the comments that has been prevalent throughout this process is whether or not the rule is too closely structured to the guidance, so that the only way to meet the rule is to follow the guide.
And then the next bullet talks to, you know, the need for supplemental guidance. And the construct for TICAP and ARCAP, if it's more closely aligned to meeting the reg guide, then, again, you get to this place where the only way to satisfy the rule is to implement 18-04.
And I don't -- I don't believe that is the process here, but I think that's kind of taking the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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127 long way around to getting to the question, so I'm just going to ask it. I believe there is internal Commission requirements that when a rule goes to the Commission there has to be a discussion about how or what guidance is available to implement the rule.
And if it is the staff contemplating --
and I think, you know, getting this from maybe some of the comments before lunch, that the staff is going to just say -- tell the Commission that it doesn't need to develop any guidance with respect to implementing this rule because Reg Guide 1.233 is already available. Is that where this is headed?
MR. RECKLEY: Well, we will say that Reg Guide 1.233 -- and it may need tweaked as we go forward, but the general concept and more or less the way it is is one acceptable way to meet the rule. And as we develop the rule, we're trying to make sure that that work that was done remains one way.
And, you know, we are hearing the observations and comments that maybe our first draft comes across as -- as locking you into that methodology. And we'll -- we'll look to see where we might change language to make sure that's not the case, at the same time trying to walk this -- this tightrope that Reg Guide 1.233 and the work that we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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128 anticipate will be done under TICAP will remain one way to meet the rule.
Then the broader discussion is if alternative ways are to be developed, who will do that? And given the time constraints and the amount of effort involved -- you know, I can't speak for the agency -- I don't see us developing new guidance. We would entertain guidance if somebody wants to develop alternatives, but I don't foresee us developing guidance on alternatives.
As I mentioned earlier, we didn't develop LMP. We were well familiar with it, given its genesis out of NG&B and previous efforts, as Amir said, that have been underway for decades. But we didn't develop it. It was an industry effort, and we endorsed it as one acceptable way.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Yeah. I appreciate that, and I see that my comments probably drew lots of attention here. But just as a comment, when 18-04 was under development, Part 53 was still a twinkle in everybody's eye. And it was a risk-informed way to meet Part 52 or Part 50.
So I think what this does or what -- my understanding of what this will do is it will likely engage industry at a much higher level about the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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129 content of TICAP/ARCAP, because that is where the discussions about what is sufficient for an application are going to occur now.
So I will just put that out there and let others respond.
MS. CUBBAGE: Frank, this is Amy Cubbage.
I just also wanted to add that the record is pretty clear that when we, you know, put up SECY papers on the LMP, it was -- it was setting the stage for Part 53. This is -- it's no secret that we have been working on this for years, and this was, you know, what the -- what industry and other stakeholders agreed that this was a priority for us, and it took years to develop this.
So it's not that we just out of the blue decided to stand behind Reg Guide 1.233 as our --
going in as the supporting guidance for Part 53.
MR. SEGALA: This is John Segala. Our vision and strategy document in the mid- and long-term IAPs also included an activity to look at whether --
you know, whether we should do Part 53. It's just NEIMA made it a requirement, and then the Commission is having us do it, you know, sooner rather than later.
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130 everything we were developing under the vision and strategy and IAPs would all be guidance that could support a future rulemaking under Part 53. That has always been our plan since day one.
And I'll add that the Commission's directed schedule was premised on the fact that all of this foundational work had been laid, and it would facilitate doing this rule on this quite aggressive schedule.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Steve Nesbit, I see you have a hand up.
MR. NESBIT: Yes, thank you. Steve Nesbit, LMNT Consulting. Just a question of clarification.
Bill, in talking about guidance that was coming down the pike, you mentioned a couple of times human factors and kind of what I heard maybe -- maybe wasn't exactly what you said, but it kind of told me that this was going to be a significant impact and issue and all that kind of stuff.
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131 require some pretty timely operator actions, et cetera, to mitigate design basis accidents.
So is there anything more you can expand on that?
MR. RECKLEY: Well, and this is, you know, the value of the discussions that we'll be having, somewhat today but also continuing these discussions.
If the desire was to have somewhat reduced staffing from current requirements, we would be prepared.
We've done it.
However, what we're hearing is that there will be proposals to -- to go further than that, to look at the role of licensed operators and whether licensed operators are necessary for all facilities, to look at the potential for even an unmanned micro-reactor.
If it is to go that far -- and, again, if
-- if what we hear from stakeholders is there is no desire to go beyond what we have done recently in terms of staffing levels, this will be much less an issue. If, however, there is a desire for us to go further, a notion of addressing the role of licensed operators, and so forth, is -- it's a novel concept, and it's -- you know, it's -- it will be a major undertaking.
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132 So what I was saying was in anticipation that we're going to be asked to be very flexible and have this rule basically have a graded approach from almost zero, if not zero, all the way up to the current staffing requirements.
MR. NESBIT: Okay. Thanks for that clarification. That makes sense.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Amir, you have your hand up?
MR. AFZALI: Thanks a lot, again. So, again, I am not here to advocate for specific rule language. That's an ongoing conversation that you are having.
I just would like you to consider the following from, again, owner-operator perspective.
What makes sense in terms of having a holistic approach in modernizing regulation? Those modernization includes things like design features.
If you are after -- I think we earlier talked about control room staffing, we are talking about control room staffing, if you are talking about EPZ zone, offsite power requirement.
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133 deploy this, and several customers at a reasonable rate while we are protecting the environment and the public.
And then, also, the other aspect of regulation is on operational site, things like if we have events that come about that you have to address if there are new innovations, you know, if you are talking about, for example, in the light water reactor world, shut down reactor, shut down -- we are talking about accident or in fuel accident, new innovations, and those come around, how easily can we -- which framework allows you to easily implement those.
You know, issues like ISI program, dealing with fire protection program, technical specification, all of those operational stuff, we need to kind of modernize all of those and what framework allows us best to get there.
And last, but not least, I know there was a conversation or there was -- there were a number of statements about guidance in the areas that you may not be undertaking, but it seems to me that you have to get guidance -- provide guidance on the reactor oversight program. How do you risk-inform that?
ROP, maintenance rule, inspection during construction, and how do you modernize all of that?
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134 And what framework gives you the best option, the most transparent option, to deal all the different designs in a fair way? If the margin cannot be clearly demonstrated within different design, then how do you make a decision?
So those are the -- again, I'm not advocating for language, because I think at some point things can be accomplished during the guidance or during the actual rule language. But there is a need for efficiently moving to deal with all of those, and time is running out.
I mean, they've got the ARDP demonstration program ongoing, and they need clear guidance. they need to be commercially viable while protecting the public and environment. We need to get there. And my question -- it isn't my question. It's more of a suggestion to please consider what framework allows you to do all of that.
Thank you.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. Thank you, Amir. And we -- we do -- again, we're trying to juggle a lot of things here. We do have an initiative underway -- we are just beginning it -- to look at the other areas, like oversight, inspection, ROP, and so forth, and what that might look like going forward.
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135 But with that, Bob, if -- there's more hands, I see.
MR. BEALL: Yeah. Frank, you have your hand up. Do you want to say something else on this topic?
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Sorry. I forgot to take it down. My bad.
MR. BEALL: Okay. No problem. Okay.
That's all for the hand-raising. So, Cyril, we can go on to the next one, or present your slides.
MR. DRAFFIN: Yes. So two parts. First, I want to discuss the language. We strongly encourage NRC to redraft Subpart B. We offer some alternative language later today. And we had previously stated we are very skeptical of the facility safety program, Subpart F, and I think ACRS also had some questions, and that we encourage you to update the language, Subpart B, before you go on and do all -- do the other subparts. So that's basically reiterating what we said earlier.
Regarding -- we also had said earlier today that we thought it would be very helpful if you had a list of what others -- parts that Part 53 would reference. So I think that would be a helpful list.
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136 now. You had mentioned there is going to be a lot of guidance required, and I think keeping that list and what exists and what needs to be done, it is probably helpful to have that in one place that can then be obviously updated as a living document.
We were concerned that -- I thought I heard you say that as long as you had one option for meeting the regulation, that was good enough, and that may not be good enough. Having one I think is desirable -- and if it's Reg Guide 1.233, that's perfectly fine -- but not to limit that.
And it may be that in things like PRA and defense-in-depth you will need guidance, and that that may be graded, and depending on the characteristics of the reactor under question. So I think that will be needed, and you'll need to have alternative paths.
And we also mentioned QA, that it's not just saying, well, we have NQA-1, that's good enough, but to -- what other ones are available and to explicitly list them. And that gets to the question not only what is the list of guidance, but how detailed should it be. So I think that would be a helpful thing to have.
And then, also, as NEI mentioned, that it's good to have Part 53 high level, and then use the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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137 guidance to provide the level of detail and clarity of what is needed. So all of that leads to the desire and need to have an understanding of what the guidance is. So it would be helpful if you could tell us whether you have that kind of list already of what guidance you're going to be doing and kind of a crosswalk between what exists, what is needed, particularly if you want to have more than one alternative because having one alternative doesn't provide much flexibility.
So I'll be interested in NRC's reaction and thoughts and suggestions.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. I mean, we have -- we have some of those thoughts, and maybe as I go through
-- before we go into Subpart D, I was going to walk through once again just the other parts, but -- the other subparts and some of the major areas that will be addressed within them.
I know it becomes a kind of revolving question, but in terms of what guidance would be available, you know, a question back to stakeholders is, is anybody developing guidance? The staff has plans to develop some guidance. We are working with particular stakeholders, such as the TICAP effort, in areas, but one of the things that would do us a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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138 service is if industry could basically say what they are willing or already considering developing.
Again, we are familiar with what standards are being prepared, but by the established SDOs, we're familiar with obviously those things we're actively engaged in, but we're -- if what we don't know about means it's not underway, then there will be guidance in some of these areas that there won't be alternatives, I don't believe, because this -- the staff will not be able to address all possible contingencies.
So I see Nan has got her hand up. Maybe she wanted to weigh in here as well.
MS. VALLIERE: Yeah, Bill. I really, Cyril, just wanted to address your comment that if --
if there is only one -- one set of guidance available for a particular rule provision that limits flexibility. And I just want to, you know, restate the obvious I guess that guidance is not a requirement.
So if the rule is written at a high level, and we only have a guidance document that provides one method for meeting that, that doesn't limit the flexibility to meet it by other methods. I just want to make that clear.
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139 MR. DRAFFIN: Right. It really depends on how the language is written, as you point out. If it's high level, then it's -- I agree.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Marty, I see you have your hand up?
MR. STUTZKE: Yeah, hi. I wanted to give you an update on staff's work to endorse the non-LWR PRA standard. We expect to issue regulatory guidance by December of this year, 2021. That guidance will look similar or analogous to Reg Guide 1.200. And, in addition to endorsing the non-LWR PRA standard, it will endorse NEI 20-09, which is peer review guidance.
And I would point out that neither the standard or NEI's guidance has yet been formally issued.
MR. DRAFFIN: Thanks.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Marty.
Marc Nichol?
MR. NICHOL: Yeah. Thanks. Just a couple of contents -- comments around the guidance -- sorry
-- topic. One, I'm sensing a lot of -- it's not the right word, but apprehension about the mountain of guidance that might need to be developed. And so I wanted to try and put it in perspective, so we're not all so overwhelmed by it.
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140 One is, I mean, it certainly is possible to have a rule without any guidance. I mean, there is no requirement for guidance. And so if you look at, well, why would you want guidance, or why would you need guidance, there is a couple of reasons. One is, especially from an industry side, we may want guidance for a particular topic because we don't know what the ultimate staff position might be.
You know the phrase "the devil is in the details," we might find out later that what the staff is thinking about for a particular high-level requirement, as you get into the details of it, actually doesn't look so good to us. And if we knew that, we would have been -- you know, we would have had a position on perhaps a different way to do that rule. So that might be one reason.
The other is that there is a lot of uncertainty for the applicants, or maybe even the NRC reviewer, on how to interpret a rule into details.
And so there is a need for that clarification for you get an application.
And so if we think about it in that context, I think a good process is, as Cyril mentioned, which is, well, let's start creating a list of what type of guidance we need. And we can start NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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141 that today. And a process I think might work well for that is to first look at all of the requirements that are going to be in Part 53, and then just start doing an assessment. Is there a need for guidance for this particular requirement, or is it, you know, pretty much self-explanatory? Or has equivalent guidance that could be -- might be under Part 50.52 that could be reasonably extrapolated for the use in Part 53, such that, you know, some major revision isn't a high priority at this time.
And then we can start triaging and working our way down to -- what's that core set of guidance that has to accompany the draft rule or there's a potential that this whole rule will not be implemented as successfully as we're hoping it would be. So I just wanted to put that perspective and how we might think through this issue.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. Thank you, Marc, and maybe that will be a homework assignment for all of us after today's meeting, to some degree maybe during it, but definitely after it, so we can in short order have a follow-on discussion.
MR. BEALL: Yep. Thanks.
Ernest, you have your hand up?
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142 wanted to talk about the performance-based part that we talked about? That was back on slide 27. And I --
just a couple points on that. One, I think that that is -- having worked in a nuclear power plant for 30 years, no plant actually stays the same over time.
You know, in tests and, in fact, NRC inspections, we find problems and we fix them, so we do root cause and fix the problems.
And I think that's my understanding of performance based. You make sure that you're meeting the design requirements during operation. And, by the way, this is sort of where the wheels start to fall off on PRA, because it doesn't really recognize that process of, you know, build, you know, find it -- you have an upset or an inspection or a test of some sort, surveillance test, you find something wrong, you fix it, and go forward.
So I think that fork of the risk-informed performance-based, I hope we don't draw off that. I mean, I agree with whoever said that we should maybe emphasize that more and allow people to build a plant and then, you know, obviously, it has to be safe when it's built. But there is going to be changes, and they are going to be inevitable. And that's performance -- I guess that's what I interpret as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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143 being performance based and don't know what the NRC idea is.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thanks, Ernest.
Steve Kraft, do you have a comment? You have your hand raised?
MR. KRAFT: I do. Thanks. Just thinking about the way the guidance would work, and the comments that Marc made about the language being at a higher level -- and the rule being at a higher level, so the guidance can handle the technology inclusion, but being mindful of a comment about how, well, if guidance is one way to meet a requirement. That's not liberating; that's limiting.
Just some experience we have had over the years with guidance, particularly, Bill, you'll remember during the Fukushima time period and all of the guidance we brought -- two things. That the industry is capable of putting guiderails in guidance that says, "If your plant can meet these -- this set of requirements within the guiderails, you just do this one thing and you're good. But if you don't, you've got to show NRC the following 12 things." And that worked. NRC was okay with that.
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144 are imagining when they say different technologies. I know some of these technologies are very different --
different fuel, whatever, different fuel, different fluids.
But just there are lots of commonalities regardless, and I can imagine guidance if -- provided the rule is written at a sufficiently -- I don't know what the right word is -- generic or high -- whatever word Marc was using -- to say if your technology, the fuel exhibits -- I'm making this up, the following 12 things, doesn't matter whether -- whatever the technology is, and it could be driven by the fluid that's used.
Then, okay, that's good, and then you do these three things over here and you're done. If you don't, well, then, you've got to do these other things.
I think it could be written in a way that gives the flexibility -- and I know that lots of reg guides say this is only one way to do it, that the staff has endorsed, however you could do other ways, but I think the guidance could be written in such a way.
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145 of interest, there's guidance, there's standards, there's everything you can think of. Didn't NEI write for Fukushima like a broader kind of guidance that said to do X, you've got to look here; to do Y, you've got to look there.
In other words, it was sort of a summary.
I don't even know what it was called, but it had -- I think it had to do with -- I forget which part of the Fukushima response to that was. I seem to remember that being done.
My point is -- is that none of this has to be particularly limiting. It really is the way that it is written. And then it gives every different technology vendor an opportunity to join together in the industry meetings to say, "Okay. This is what my technology is expected to do, so we need to be covered this way." I mean, this -- to me, this is -- this is
-- it's a challenge, but it's not beyond doing.
Thanks.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. And as we go forward
-- and like I said, maybe we can all take a homework assignment to think about this for the rest of today, and then after today in preparation for future discussions, but we look at the Part 53 guidance as itself the guidance is likely to be at a fairly high NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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146 level if it is keeping to the technology-inclusive nature of Part 53.
Then what people have to keep in mind is for specific technologies there may well be much more detailed guidance that gets down into this is a way to model a specific material, and sometimes that will be done through a vendor-specific topical report, maybe it is something that would come out of a technology working group or a particular laboratory that would say, "For a technology, we foresee them relying on this material or this barrier. Here is how you can model the amount of material -- amount of radionuclides that will make it through a material."
And some of that work, for example, has been going on now for a long time in regards to the performance of TRISO fuel for that -- that would be one example. And there's things in place through the laboratories and EPRI to do that for that specific technology.
So, you know, people just have to keep a broad mind. There will be high-level -- there will be high-level guidance on Part 53, and then very likely there is going to be technology-specific guidance to fill it in for specific designs, specific materials, and so forth.
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147 So, Bob, I think maybe you've got one --
one or two more hands.
MR. BEALL: Yeah. We have Mike Keller.
Glad to see you're back online. Please go ahead and ask your question, please.
MR. KELLER: Yeah. Can you hear me?
MR. BEALL: Yes, sir.
MR. KELLER: Okay. Thank you. I'm a little puzzled. Why the great emphasis on guidance?
It almost seems as though that's for the NRC and not the applicant. I mean, the applicant has an obligation to justify what he is doing, and ultimately that's what he has to do. So the absence of guidance isn't necessarily fatal from the applicant's standpoint.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. This is Bill. This goes to -- somewhat to Marc's point. What you're trying to do through guidance is provide predictability. The rule might be very broad. The guidance would say this is one acceptable way to do it, such that when an application is made, there is increased predictability in -- compared to -- you're right.
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148 a case-by-case basis, it's a little less predictable, a little less efficient than having guidance in place.
MR. KELLER: Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Cyril, you have your hand up.
MR. DRAFFIN: Yeah. So in terms of the list, I think it's good that Bill wants to go forward with that. You know, you might also augment it by, you know, how extensive it should be. You know, you refer to the fact that some of it might be high level, and some of it might be specific, whether any of those things exist, and what's needed. I mean, I think that's really part of thinking through the whole process.
And then, just to restate what has been said, that guidance is helpful, so it's -- Nan made the comment it -- not having guidance doesn't reduce the ability to do it, but we do want the predictability that was just talked about. And so the fact it's in the guidance saying here is one path, and here is a second or third path that could be considered, adds a little bit more credibility and understanding that something could be done.
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149 understanding of how the staff would review it in the future.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Cyril.
Seeing as there's no more hands, let's go ahead and move on to the next topic, discussion of previously released subparts. So, Bill, can you take us through that, please?
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. And we just have one very quick slide here. It's -- I think most of the people on the call would realize what we've previously released, and that is Subparts B on the safety criteria, C on design and analysis, a portion of the operations subpart, Subpart F, that related to a possible facility safety program, and then today's discussion on Subpart D, siting. And then the rest of the subparts we will be releasing in the future. They are currently being written.
So, but that's really all I had. Bob, we can get into the next slide and NIC's comments.
MR. DRAFFIN: This is Cyril. You can go on to the next slide. But just to remind people that U.S. Nuclear Industry Council sent in some suggested language, which we are going to talk about right now, and that's available in ADAMS. And I'll read the number, and Bob can correct me if I've got it wrong.
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150 ML21035A003. Again, ML21035A003. So this will be available if we want to pull it up now or later.
MR. BEALL: It should be also available on regulations.gov today also.
MR. DRAFFIN: Thanks, Bob.
So now I'd like to turn it over to Frank, who is with Terrestrial, and Frank Akstulewicz will kind of go through some of our thinking on Part B, which is capturing the language, which could be pulled up if need be, to cover some of the points that we'd like to kind of go through.
And then, again, NRC can refer to the exact language and wording, and what we provided was the NRC preliminary language. What we suggested is language, and then a discussion on what we were thinking about it.
So, Frank, I'll turn it over to you to start with safety objectives.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: All right. Thanks, Cyril.
So just a couple of high-level discussion points. I realize today we had a lot of discussion on some of these points before we would get into the specifics here, and so you have to take our proposals with the grain of salt that they were intended, which NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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151 is to represent the philosophy has put forward in some the earlier slides and how we would restructure the rule to try to fulfill that.
So I think the first safety objectives I think -- and I can't remember the details -- go to the next slide, please, Cyril.
Okay. So we will kind of at a very high level walk through this. I think the general view here was the safety objectives were similar. We had some proposed language modifications there in terms of eliminating some language that we thought may have been unnecessary.
We proposed to restructure the way the safety criteria were characterized, not as tier 1 and tier 2, but in terms of the specific nature that those criteria represented. So the first set of criteria would be your transient and accident radiological criteria, and then you would have a separate section for routine operational and safety criteria.
And instead of having that incorporated in Section 220 A, and then 260, you would just combine it into one very simplified paragraph -- and I think we proposed it in 260 -- that would just refer to the occupational limits that are in Part 20, Subparts C and D.
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152 I'm not trying to reproduce the language again to make sure that they were aligned with what was already existing in Part 20.
The next bullet we talked about -- at great length about Section 220 and adequate protection, and specifically this is the 220 Bravo discussions that we've had earlier. And I don't think we need to dwell on that again. I think we understand the staff's point of view on this particular matter, and we'll just go back and discuss among ourselves whether we want to change our position on this or not.
We repositioned the discussion of safety function up closer to the safety criteria, rather than having them be farther away. We then retained the licensing basis event, and defense-in-depth would round out the section with respect to Subpart B.
Now, one of the things that we had kicked around under defense-in-depth was this idea that the discussion of beyond design basis events might be better served, instead of it being listed as safety criteria, to be one of the objectives of defense-in-depth.
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153 the argument about defense-in-depth as Bill and others have pointed out in some of our earlier conversation.
So that's part of the really simplified overview of what the NIC proposal was in terms of trying to restructure Subpart B and change some of the language in Subpart B.
The one thing that I don't know -- Bill, are we going to get into any very specific discussions about the language in the Subpart B paragraphs? Bill?
MR. RECKLEY: We can. Did you mean to pull up your -- your proposal or --
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: No. I just -- one of the things that we wanted to point out here was -- and this is a question that I had myself -- that was, if you look at -- at the language of paragraph 220(b),
which is the first criteria as it relates to licensing basis events -- and I think what they mentioned in some of their comments earlier, if you read that language carefully, I think it says that any licensing basis event with a frequency greater than 10 to the minus 4, so that would include events that would occur more than once in the life of a plant, could meet a 25 rem criterion.
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154 that was one of the questions we had. Was it really the staff's intent to permit any transient or accident with a frequency greater than 10 to the minus 4 per year to have that 25 rem consequence limit, both at the site boundary and at the LPZ?
MR. RECKLEY: No. And I will acknowledge
-- and I think it was you, Frank, pointed out that we
-- by not including something on anticipated operational occurrences that might have led to confusion.
What we were trying to do there, and then especially if you look at that language in 220(b) and its connection with the design and analysis part, is to lay out a deterministic design basis accident and say that it was the deterministic design basis accident assessment that would be used to compare to the 25 rem criteria at the exclusionary boundary or at the low population zone boundary.
And so I do believe you guys have a good point that by being silent on the more frequent events, the AOO events, that they might have led to that impression. But, again, what we were trying to do in that language under the criteria is to support what then later showed up in Subpart C as the requirement to do a design basis accident more NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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155 traditional deterministic assessment for comparison to the 25 rem.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Thanks. And I thought that's what you meant. And this gets to one of the other comments that I know we've made over the course of these months, which is making sure that the terms of art that we're using when refer to these -- you know, these events is specific.
So, you know, it isn't -- if you mean design basis accidents, then we should use that phraseology, so that everybody understands that that's what it is, and then define those terms, whether they be AOOs or DBAs or beyond design basis events somewhere in the body of the rule or in the guidance.
I know they're defined in 1804, but, you know, this doesn't refer to those definitions. So you're kind of at a loss to look at the language very specifically and say, "Okay. Do I understand exactly the structure of this rule?"
So that's kind of -- that was one of the more important comments that we wanted to highlight with respect to the structure of the rule. I think the other thing is we wanted to -- we also have the idea that, you know, if you're going to have safety objectives or safety criteria, that you leave the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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156 design measures and program management controls out of the -- out of the structure of the rule language and take it to the engineering or analysis portions, or whatever you're going to define as Subpart C, where you get into the design and analysis requirement, because the design features and programmatic controls are in fact your design features.
So, from that overarching construct, it makes it a little clearer as to what your acceptance criteria are, and then where your assessments of the design features and programmatic controls will be.
So those are kind of the high overarching comments. I will -- I see there's hands up, so I'll stop talking and let people engage.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thanks, Frank.
Ed Lyman, you have your hand up.
DR. LYMAN: Yes. Just a quick point on the discussion. So, but clearly the -- any AOO would necessarily have a consequence -- radiological consequence below 25 rem, right? So if it -- then there is something wrong with the design of the plant, so I don't see what the point of that is.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. I think, Ed, what the
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157 intend for it to be a straight line like that for any event less than 10 to the minus 4. We would envision more stringent requirements for an anticipated operational occurrence. It's just the way we have it crafted there.
DR. LYMAN: So you are going to introduce another threshold is what I gather.
MR. RECKLEY: A lower one, yes.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Any additional questions? Go ahead, Bill.
MR. DRAFFIN: Well, a comment. This is --
oh, and then Bill wants to add something. But we did describe for plant workers -- we called it routine operation radiation protection, and so that was the terminology we're using.
And also, if you pulled up, Bob, the language for guidance on defense-in-depth, what we did in that language is we suggested that -- we gave some examples of where it kind of got into -- ought to be included for defense-in-depth.
So if you see on the -- a little further down, the right-hand side, not that you're going to be able to read this carefully right now, but it's just available for future review right there. Starting with that page, and defense-in-depth guidance should NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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158 state what is important, and it goes on for the following page, to give some additional guidance that we think ought to be included.
So that's just delineating the idea of having the regulations being high level and then the guidance describing some of the approaches that could be taken, recognizing there may be some variation. As we talked about earlier today, it could be a graded approach to what would be required for an applicant.
So I just wanted to augment that in terms of what is available for your review.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Cyril.
Mike Keller, you have your hand up. Mike?
I think we may have lost him again.
MR. KELLER: Can you hear me?
MR. BEALL: Yes, we can now.
MR. KELLER: Yeah. This is Mike Keller.
MR. BEALL: Yeah. Go ahead, Mike.
MR. KELLER: Yeah. Why isn't the 25 rem level lower for these passive designs?
MR. RECKLEY: Well, basically, we were --
we were maintain -- the NRC, in establishing the requirements we put into Part 53, maintaining current limits and reference values, the 25 rem is really a reference value, not a firm regulatory limit. But NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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159 based on a history of development and Commission decisions, the approach that we entered into this is that we would maintain the requirements in terms of the highest level thresholds, which for us are those related to the Commission-established radiological thresholds or reference values and also the safety goal policy statement. We would maintain those.
So that was -- that was the decision. I know there was some discussion earlier in regards to international designs. People will just have to be cognizant that as you go into a different country for potential licensing that even if the general construct is the same, some of the numbers in terms of the dose to the public, and in some cases even the thresholds in terms of the frequencies for event categories will change.
And so a designer just may want to take that into consideration. It's usually possible to construct a design that would -- that would meet any country that you're interested in. It just might mean that for some countries you'd be more -- you'd be using more restrictive thresholds than perhaps that country's regulations would require.
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160 advanced reactors was that they would be safer than the existing fleet. That would imply that you back the limits down.
MR. RECKLEY: Well, one way that that's being pursued -- and there is an expectation that they have margins and that the offsite -- both the frequency and magnitude of offsite releases would be less or can be less, if the advanced reactors have certain attributes.
But the thought is that that margin would be used for operational flexibilities. For example, if you can ensure that the offsite releases remain the dose below, let's say, the EPA protective action guidelines for protective actions such as evacuations, then there may be relaxations in emergency planning zones.
And so, yeah, as a general matter, there is an expectation that they will be lower and that that will then allow for operational flexibilities, such as more flexibility in siting and emergency planning.
MR. KELLER: So you're saying that as far as the requirements are concerned, the advanced reactors only have to be as safe as the existing fleet, you know, for the DBEs?
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161 MR. RECKLEY: That an advanced reactor could proceed meeting the same requirements. And if the doses were as high as what was calculated in the past for large light water reactors, then perhaps they would need to maintain a 10-mile emergency planning zone.
So that -- I mean, but overall the level of safety that has been established, considering the whole integration of all of the requirements, including emergency planning and siting on the mitigation side, that -- that has been established as an acceptable level of safety.
MR. KELLER: Hmm. I don't know. That just seems inconsistent with the philosophy of the --
making these things safer. If they really are safer, then you would expect to have the -- have lower requirements without any particular problem.
MR. SEGALA: Hey, Bill. This is John Segala. Can you talk a little bit -- because it's --
it was the Commission that directed the staff to hold, you know, the safety of advanced reactors to be the same as that that exists for operating reactors. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
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162 from a 2012 SECY paper -- 2012 --
MS. VALLIERE: I think it was 2010.
MR. RECKLEY: 2010?
MS. VALLIERE: 121.
MR. RECKLEY: There you go. Thanks, Nan.
MS. VALLIERE: Sure.
MR. RECKLEY: Yes. Let the younger folks with the memories come to my rescue.
MR. BEALL: Hey, Nan, can you repeat that SECY number again?
MS. VALLIERE: Yes. I believe it's SECY 10-0121.
MR. SEGALA: And the SRM -- and the SRM for that.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. Really, the SRM is what people want to look at. That is where the Commission reinforced -- I don't want to say that --
that was the SRM and that that was established. They just reinforced it. So --
MS. CUBBAGE: You have to go back to the advanced reactor policy statement as well.
MR. RECKLEY: Right.
MS. CUBBAGE: That's where it comes from.
MR. KELLER: I'm not too sure that would inspire a lot of confidence, but whatever.
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163 MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Bob, is there more hands?
MR. BEALL: Yes. Steve Kraft?
MR. KRAFT: Yeah. I was going to mention advanced reactor policy statement covers it, but it also says that these -- this new technology would be more innovative, and then meet a safety and -- I'm paraphrasing -- security objective -- requirement, objective, equal -- at least as equal to.
So they could meet -- they could do better. And I think that -- a couple of things here.
Bill, that the -- the graphic you call the bowtie I think expresses that -- once you get your head around that complicated graphic, kind of expresses it how the different pieces and parts fit together and they could play off against each other.
But the point of -- the point is that --
the way I understand this is that you would meet the same requirement, whatever that is, but you would be operating further away, as Bill said, further away to give more. So if something did happen, then you have more capacity, let's say, before that event leads to that kind of release.
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164 could not require all of that and you could just, you know, tighten up the numbers. But then, you know, that then locks things in a little in a way that might not be able to allow all of the technology, but also then it becomes up to the -- no one has -- no one has really gotten to the point where in their -- those that have some applications and where they could say with the kind of -- "certainty" is the wrong word, but within the realm of how NRC views these things and gets to raise safety (audio interference) that -- so this is the way this plant could operate, and this is the kind of safety -- you don't just -- and the point being that it could be a lot lower.
And then -- and that, frankly, does give
-- could give the public more confidence because you could say to the public, look, yeah, that's the requirement, but we're going to operate way over here, whereas current LWRs, while they meet the same requirement, they are operating closer.
So I think that the -- there is -- Bill is right about the history, but it gets -- to me, it allows I don't want to say easier, but the innovation in these technologies probably make it more confident than you can meet these technologies, meet these --
meet these requirements.
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165 So, I mean, that's what I would suggest.
It's really up to the licensee and NRC in each individual case to come up with how it is actually going to work.
Thanks.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. And it's -- I mean, it's more complicated than it sounds I guess. But, I mean, the advanced reactor policy statement, the most
-- the most often cited, at least the one I most often cite, desirable attribute is increased thermal capacity. And so what does increased thermal capacity by you? Time.
And so the need for prompt operator action, the need for automatic systems that can start and deliver cooling within seconds, those are kind of the operational flexibilities that advanced reactor attributes might provide. You know, they have to demonstrate that. But it's those kind of operational flexibilities that end up being recognized, as well as what other people have said about the mitigation side and emergency planning, and so forth.
So, Bob, additional hands, I see.
MR. BEALL: Yes. Dr. Lyman?
DR. LYMAN: Yes. So I would -- I would take a different tack. I'd say that the advanced NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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166 reactor policy statement, not -- by not requiring that new plants meet a higher safety standard than the existing fleet, has inhibited safety innovation. We commented back on the revised policy statement, 2009, saying there is time to change that, and the Commission (audio interference) off.
So I think Mr. Keller has a great point.
It's one of the only industries where, you know, continuous safety improvement or trying to achieve increased safety with new generations of technology is not -- it's not a regulatory requirement.
And that's a deficiency that I would think that with Part 53, given all of the rhetoric about enhanced safety, it's time to move on and not just say you're relying on an expectation or a hope, with your fingers crossed, but you are actually requiring greater safety, and you're not allowing that greater safety to be -- not by reducing the margin in other areas.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Ed.
Marc Nichol, you have your hand up.
MR. NICHOL: Yeah, thanks. Just a comment on process. I think we've fallen off of the intended process. It was to present slides and then have the discussion. This is the second time I have been NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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167 waiting to present mine -- my slides, but yet the discussion has gone on.
So I'll just present my ideas because they would have helped inform this discussion. First of all, for the Subpart B, NEI had proposed an alternative back in December, and we still have yet to hear any feedback from the NRC on the proposal we think aligns with both the safety expectations, the NRC's concepts, but helps streamline it and make it more efficient. So we would entertain feedback on that when the NRC decides that you're able to do that.
I did want to go back for a second to the earlier discussion on defense-in-depth and QHO, and it does play into Subpart B. And while I'm very pleased with all of the discussion we're having here, I was very disappointed at the tone that I was hearing from NRC that essentially you're inflexible to consider other ideas.
I thought U.S. NIC did a great job in presenting their views on QHOs and defense-in-depth, and I felt it was received by the NRC as a "Thanks, but no thanks; we've made up our mind."
It concerns me for two reasons. One, we're early in the process, and I don't think anybody can claim they have the best idea. So I think being NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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168 open to new ideas and flexible to change positions is really important at this stage.
The second is I actually don't think the NRC has a sound basis for your positions on QHOs and defense-in-depth. If we take QHOs, I think -- and, again, back in January, NEI presented on all the factors to consider. It's not a decision to be made lightly, and we would -- we encourage more discussion and have yet to hear back from the NRC on those proposed views.
But it fails to recognize that the QHOs are a safety goal policy, and they are being implemented under Part 50 without an equivalent requirement. So it can be done in Part 53.
Now, NEI hasn't taken a position on whether they should or should not be in the rules. I think there is arguments both ways. I just don't think the NRC's argument is one of them.
And so when it comes to defense-in-depth, the NRC's position or proposal is very prescriptive.
It's not performance-based at all. If you look at the requirement, at least in part it talks about no single design or operational feature, no matter how robust, should be exclusively relied upon to meet the safety criteria.
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169 You know, set aside that it's applying to normal safety criteria. I don't think that's the NRC's intent, that you have multiple backup systems for normal operations. But as it applies to design basis accidents, it fails to consider the potential consequences.
What if the failure of this single design element results in a dose that is below one rem? Do you really need a backup system for that? Does it really make sense?
So I would encourage the NRC to rethink that. And, in addition to that, I'd point out that Part 50 doesn't have an across-the-board defense-in-depth requirement. Defense-in-depth is very important. It's a great design consideration. There are requirements related to fire protection, related to risk categorization, but it's not across the board.
And so we don't think that you even need a defense-in-depth criteria.
As you look at the slide that you have up there -- actually, if you go to the next slide, you'll look at some of the analysis -- between the two slides I guess -- you'll look -- between the safety characteristics and the analysis features, we think there is a performance-based way that can -- that the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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170 rules can be written up that allows flexibility for each approach. And depending on the nature, you know, of the particular aspect of the design, defense-in-depth can be implemented in different ways.
So we would ask the NRC to continue to keep an open mind in this regard.
Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Marc.
Mike Keller, you have your hand up.
MS. VALLIERE: We don't hear you yet.
MR. BEALL: You have to unmute, Mike.
MR. KELLER: Oh.
MR. BEALL: Ah, there you are.
MR. KELLER: Okay. Sorry to keep pounding on this, but if you have lower frequencies and doses for the DBEs, the expectation would be that the licensing would be simpler. I don't see any provisions in the way 53 is structured to allow that.
Maybe I'm missing something, but it doesn't look like there is any mechanism for relief.
MR. RECKLEY: Yeah. I mean, this is --
this comes back I think -- Dr. Lyman mentioned -- to somewhat the argument that we need to try to avoid a circular argument. The real structure of Part 53 --
and, really, you're only seeing kind of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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171 foundations at this point, and as we get into the discussions on analysis -- on the other areas, primarily into the operations area, where you would start to see the flexibilities that come out of the foundation, but there needs to be requirements in place to actually prove your point that they are safer.
At what point -- and as we develop Subpart H on licensing, maybe we can reflect that a safer plant gets the -- gets some possible relief in being able to simplify applications.
But what needs to be in place -- and this is -- this is really Subparts B and C primarily -- to actually prove the point. And I think that's where we are of trying to lay out the ground rules for how an applicant actually demonstrates that the safety margins have been enhanced, and then if they are enhanced, how they would get the flexibilities in the labor sections.
And so that becomes -- that becomes the challenge, and the -- you know, so to Marc's point, I think we remain open, if you think there is a simpler way to prove that a particular design or particular facility is safer, but it has to be proved so that you can then get the possible flexibilities in other parts NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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172 of the rule. At least that's the way we've been laying it out, so --
MR. KELLER: I thought that was one of the fundamental purposes of the PRA.
MR. RECKLEY: That, and that -- that would be one possible way.
So just -- Bob, I think we have some other hands up.
MR. BEALL: Yes, we have one more.
Mr. Merrifield.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Thank you very much. And appreciate, you know, Marc's presentation on behalf of NEI. I know he had to wait a while, and so that's always tough.
I just wanted to say, again for the record, I know there were some comments made about changes that could or didn't get made in the policy statement. As far as the matter of what it is we have to shoot for, Congress in NEIMA, in requiring the NRC to put together an alternative framework for Part 53, could have required the agency to go beyond the adequate protection standard and increase the level of requirements for advanced reactors.
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173 weighed in that the set of standards, based on adequate protection and other elements that we have used for other reactors, is appropriate, at least as a base standard.
So I just want to -- just want to make that clear. The Commission is not rationing, and Congress is not rationing in this regard.
Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Jeff.
Seeing there is no more hands here, let's take a 15-minute break before we move on to the next topic. I also would like to point out, if you open up the chat window, the staff has put in links for the advanced reactor policy statement, and also for the Commission SRM to SECY 10-0121. And you can find --
you can just click those links and pull up those documents.
So with that, let's take a quick 15-minute break and be back -- actually, let's take a 10-minute break. Let's be back at 3:10. Okay?
Thank you very much.
(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 3:01 p.m. and resumed at 3:11 p.m.)
MR. BEALL: Okay. I'd like to welcome everybody back. So we are going to get started again.
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174 So we are going to start with Subpart D, Siting Requirements.
So, Bill, can you please kick off this section.
MR. BECKLEY: Yes. Thank you, Bob.
Although to be honest I thought about taking the dog for a walk and not coming back.
So I guess before I get into this I will ask people, one, to keep in mind the staff is getting input from multiple stakeholders and we have been getting that along the way at different times.
For example, we had our first meeting on Subpart B with the ACRS in mid-January, and so the timing of when we develop and release revisions, or iterations as the Commission called them in the SRM, is based on engagement with multiple stakeholders.
We hope now that we have had this discussion today as well as the feedback we have gotten from both internal and external stakeholders that we will develop and release revisions to the previously released documents hopefully in support of the March meeting, but we have to make the internal discussions possible in order to do that.
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175 specific enough to be meaningful. We can't have a rule that says reactors shall be safe and everything else is addressed in guidance.
And so it does have to have enough meat to the actual regulation to be a meaningful regulation.
It can't be so vague that the rule itself relies totally on the guidance documents. So we're trying to walk that line, you know.
I will apologize if people feel we have been unresponsive, but, you know, there is multiple conversations going on at the same time here and we'll try, like I say, to put out some revisions by March.
So as Bob said we'll get into the last topic of the day, which is Subpart D that we released, but one of the things that we had heard from previous meetings, and I debated whether we should do this at the beginning or the end and it might have helped to do it at the beginning of today's discussion, but we wanted to keep the workshop kind of format going and not dominate the conversation, but one of the requests we had gotten in the January, or it might have been the November meeting, was to go through an outline of the construct, a little more detail perhaps than what has been talked in the figure.
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176 just go through the outline that we currently envision and maybe that will help put things in context.
If we could go to the next slide. You know, this is the slide we have been using for well over a year trying to solicit thoughts and suggestions and input on our development of this Part 53.
Understand perfectly that it didn't get much attention until the Commission's SRM in the accelerated schedule, you know, and if I am going to turn the tide a little bit, that can go to the staff's frustrations of us trying to engage stakeholders and basically having very little interest in the discussion until relatively recently, but now that I vented we can go on. Everybody is familiar with this slide.
So Subpart A is the general provisions.
There needs to be a place where we talk about the scope and the definitions and interpretations and how to write to the NRC and some broad things that exist in current regulations in 50 and 52 on completeness of information and protection of plant employees from discrimination for bringing safety concerns, things like this.
So this will look a lot like the early sections of Part 50 and 52 and even other parts of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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177 other NRC regulations.
Subpart B, if we go to the next slide. We have talked about this, this is our current construct in what we released I think for the first time in the November meeting and then we have been talking for both the January and today about it.
So people are familiar with what we think needs to be addressed within the safety criteria.
Again, we'll continue the discussions, whether it remains more or less the way it is or we take comments from various stakeholders here and ACRS and others and make some tweaks, we'll have under discussion after today.
Next slide. Subpart C we released for the last discussion in January, the design and analysis section, and this is just the framework as it was released, so we are listening to people and thinking of possible changes.
In particular I think a message we have heard is the requirement to actually use the PRA as opposed to use the PRA as a tool but be supportive of other design approaches.
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178 in March.
Going on to Subpart D, this is the topic we will be discussing today so I will just skip over that since we're going to talk about it more in detail in a second.
Go to the next slide. Construction and Manufacturing. I think I mentioned earlier especially in the area of manufacturing we would be very interested in hearing what is the range of thought that potential users of a manufacturing license might want included.
One of the biggest questions that arise is the loading of fuel at the manufacturing facility, the potential to do criticality testing at the manufacturing facility, then the transportation of that loaded manufactured unit to a site for installation.
So the range of options that people would like us to consider and address within the rule would be of great interest to us based on discussions and thoughts and what we have been seeing from DOE, the Department of Energy, and some of the design efforts, not necessarily the application of it through the Department of Defense, but at least some of the drivers for the designs.
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179 We think we need to address things like fuel loading at the manufacturing facility and transportation, but if that's not the case that's an area we wouldn't need to develop requirements for.
If we could go to the next slide.
Operations. As I mentioned this becomes one of the bigger areas, especially for those companies who might be the owner operators of such facilities and we have divided this really into kind of three main areas.
The first one being structure, systems, and components, the hardware, the equipment, and thoughts are we don't have this very far along, but a rough table of contents are outlined are what are needed in terms of the programs to first address normal operations.
And, you know, we have heard and have under consideration how much we need to consider normal operations but keeping the current general construct this section currently has a space to consider normal ops and normal effluence.
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180 safety significant but not safety-related, and this gets into the areas such as special treatment, reliability assurance programs, for example, maintenance, some version or rough equivalence to the maintenance rule perhaps, then other areas like quality assurance as it applies to operations.
The potential to put in aging management right into the initial parts of Part 53, license renewal is an area that we haven't given too much thought yet to how we are going to interface with the license renewal regulations, but there is a potential to help that process by having aging management programs from the beginning, design control, and the previously discussed facility safety program.
Then if you go to the next slide we'll move to personnel, another key area for operations.
And just the very preliminary thought, and again this goes to providing the most flexibility and being technology inclusive is to require the development of a concept of operations.
And so each design would have to develop such a concept of operations identifying the role of personnel in meeting the first tier safety criteria as we have defined it and then any role of personnel in meeting the second tier.
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181 Then again along the general theme that we were trying to have of being able to distinguish between what was needed for the first tier being in equipment space, safety-related equipment, and carrying that through operations and technical specifications, perhaps over even into personnel and making a distinction between what would be a way to distinguish between what a licensed operator would be required for and what areas a non-licensed staff could support.
So these are just some very preliminary thoughts, but as I mentioned if this is to address the whole gamut from basically a potential facility with very little staffing up to the current requirements as addressed by Part 55 then this would be an important area to discuss and even have a guidance prepared for.
Next slide. Just some listing of programs, and I think Amir mentioned fire protection.
There is probably a couple that we didn't include here that we would put in the programmatic area of operations just for the need to make sure we address things like radiation protection, emergency preparedness, security.
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182 didn't address them in the design area or somewhere else.
So now we can go to the next slide, Slide 65, Decommissioning. It's not clear. We really haven't delved into this yet.
It's not clear that there would be many changes from existing requirements and so it may be possible to largely carry those over into Subpart G, but we haven't given this one a lot of thought yet.
Next one. Subpart H we're starting to develop and it's -- Going to I guess a previous question as a general rule of thumb on how we are addressing what we refer to and what we incorporate, the general rule of thumb is we won't reference 50 or 52.
So anything that is currently is in 50 or 52 will be addressed in Part 53. That might mean in some cases cutting and pasting it over or tweaking it, but there wouldn't be references back and forth between 50 and 52 and the proposed 53.
Other parts of NRC regulations we are kind of addressing case-by-case as to whether it makes more sense to pull it in or refer to it, and so Part 51 on environment, Part 73 on security, more likely than not we'll refer to those regulations and not try to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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183 subsume them into Part 53.
In other cases where it can be more limited, and today's discussion on siting is an example, we think we can bring 100 into Part 53 and thereby cut out one reference to another part of NRC regulations.
But I digress a little bit, but somebody had asked earlier about a general rule of thumb on how we were doing this. It's important for Subpart H because, again, we won't be referring to 50 or 52, we would more likely copy those elements over.
So the general layout of the licensing is we -- And this is, again, early on, but we're going to have to start making progress on this and having discussions by the next couple meetings, definitely by April start to have discussion on the licensing subpart.
But, anyway, to lay it out is to just talk about the areas as they largely currently exist and we're not re-inventing at this point any brand new approach, although the relationships might change a little bit.
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184 design approvals, design certifications, manufacturing licenses, and then as I mentioned we'd really like to have a discussion in regards to manufacturing licenses on what people would want it to address in terms of manufacturing and potential loading of fuel, transportation, and deployment.
I got a question marked by conceptual design reviews. Previous assessments have been by the staff anyway that we didn't need to have that. We have the capability to do it, as we did back in the
'80s for the pre-application reviews of MHTGR and PRISM, and SAFR.
So we have the capability, it's not addressed in a rule, but if there is a desire to maybe expand the staged licensing process a little further than it currently is and introduce conceptual design reviews into the regulations then we can talk about that, and then ultimately the licenses that go to both design and siting, being a construction permit, operating license, and combined license.
A very early concept, and we haven't tried to see if this is workable or not, but we took a concept out of NEI 02-02, which was as you might imagine developed in 2002 and it was Part 53 at the time, so 20 years ago it was NEI's proposed Part 53.
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185 One of the things that that NEI 02-02 had was a content table which went through the various applications, let's say construction permit, and in tabular form tried to say what would be required in a construction permit.
You know, ultimately when you get to the operating license or combined license everything has to be provided but it kind of in a tabular format said what the various applications would need to provide.
So it is an intriguing idea. We thought we would look into it, but, again, we haven't exercised it enough to know if it's actually practical to do.
So if we could go to the next slide.
Subpart I was maintaining the licensing basis. This would be how to do an amendment to a license once you get an operating license or you enter the operating phase of a COL, how you would update the FSAR, there has been some discussion today about updating PRAs, and then some general things that we typically have in Parts 50 and 52, backfitting, requesting information under 50.54(f), and things like that.
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186 look into, but there are a whole bunch of other areas that we can't forget about, and so we need to look through all of those lists.
This is kind of our current parking lot of all those things. And so, again, as we get into it we might find that we can move these around a little bit, but in the end there will be some need to address all of these items and there may be need to provide guidance in some of these areas as well.
So with that let's get into Subpart D. I guess, and I know it's going to be pressed for time, Bob, but maybe we can just see if there is a question or a comment on the outline before jumping into the details of Subpart D.
MR. BEALL: Yes, I think that's a good idea. Okay, Frank, go ahead, please.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: Hi, Bill. Could you go back to the I guess it's two slides, the one where you talked about manufacturing licenses. One more. Yes.
I know this is preliminary, but my recollection is that in Part 52 each one of the sections like for design certifications or combined licenses had their own special sections with respect to content of an application or the content of an FSAR.
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187 Is it conceptually the idea that you are going to just transition all of that over or is there going to be some, you know, ARCAP/TICAP modifications to each of those sections that would reflect the risk-informed thinking or is it too early to tell?
MR. RECKLEY: Well, I'll see if Nan has given any additional thought to it. I don't -- I mean I think we will be informed by TICAP in some of these other ongoing discussions.
I think we'll try to remain flexible on how it's laid out. And, actually, 50.34, if you look at it now 50.34 doesn't really in terms of structure lay out very much like an FSAR, but I think we'll try to organize it but I don't know that we are very far along in that thinking about how to organize it.
MS. VALLIERE: Yes, Bill, I would agree with that. I would say, you know, I haven't thought so much about how it is organized as what is in it and clearly the content of what is in 50 and 52 is going to have to change quite a bit to reflect, you know, the broader redesign of Part 53 of developing a licensing basis and what needs to be in the application.
So from that perspective that's, you know, the main driver for copying over 50 and 52. It's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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188 those content of application sections that will clearly be the biggest lift here.
So, again, the formatting probably too soon to tell, but we will definitely be, you know, doing our best to coordinate with the TICAP/ARCAP efforts. We definitely need to stay aligned with those efforts.
MR. AKSTULEWICZ: All right. Thanks.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Kalene, I see your hand is up.
MS. WALKER: Hi, there. I notice you kind of glossed over decommissioning and I am wondering when the spent fuel waste management is going to be factored into this discussion, because that's kind of a big quagmire currently from 60 years of the regular nuclear power so I think it deserves some significant attention.
MR. RECKLEY: Yes, okay. I mean spent fuel in terms of its maintenance on site -- I guess I'll break it into two. In terms of its maintenance on site will be addressed within the technical requirements because one thing Part 53 will do consistent with all the previous discussions is to look at all of the inventories of radionuclides and make sure there is controls for all of those NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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189 inventories, whether they be in the core, whether they be spent fuel, whether they be waste gas, wherever the radionuclides are there will controls.
The longer term fuel cycle aspects of nuclear power those will be addressed as they are now kind of out in regulations outside of the specific regulations on the specific nuclear facility.
So there is another set of efforts on the overall fuel cycle and then this one would be on the specific nuclear power facility including spent fuel while it's at that facility.
So that probably doesn't answer your question, but that's --
MS. WALKER: So are you saying that basically you're just going to pick up 72 and 71? Are you saying that you are just going to pick up, you know, send it over to Part 72 and Part 71 for regular power plants, you're not going to address the long-term storage of this what presumably will be a significantly higher burn of fuel so it will be a whole other level of storage long term?
MR. RECKLEY: And there may -- And as we look at that there may need to be changes to 72 or at least to specific cask certifications under 72.
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190 significant thing to factor into your overall picture and design. Thank you.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Marc, you have your hand up.
MR. NICHOL: Yes. Thank you. Just a few general points about this. First of all thank you for laying this out there. This actually goes a long way in helping stakeholders understand your vision of Part 53 so I wanted to express my appreciation for that.
The things you laid out are largely in line with things we have identified and we'll be putting in our discussion draft. I do note in a few areas there are what appears to be requirements that I am at least not remembering are in Part 50 or 52 so it's a potential that there are sort of new.
And so I would just caution the NRC on establishing requirements in Part 53 that Part 50 and 52 demonstrated are not necessary. I am just putting that out as something we'll be watching.
The other thing I wanted to mention is related to how it relates to other parts within the rule, and I think that's going to be a key topic going forward.
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191 today, whether it's Part 20, there is Part 21, Part 70 and 71 just came up, there is Part 73, and how they are integrated or referenced are going to be important as well as potential conforming changes to that part.
The last comment, I think I heard you say that you are not looking at making changes related to Part 73. In our view 73.55 is one of the most prescriptive requirements you have on the books and to be performance based for advanced reactors is going to take more than even the NRC's proposing under the SRM security rule.
So that's an area we'd really like to performance base. There may be other sections within Part 73 that are just fine the way they are, but I just wanted to put that out there for your awareness.
Thank you.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay, yes. Thanks, Marc.
Yes, I meant 72, so, yes, we realize 73 is a point of discussion we still have to have.
I mean did something strike you in --
(audio interference) the requirement to develop and submit a concept of operations is new, not required under Part 50, but it's not required under Part 50 because you have Part 55 that says you'll have this number of operators and senior operators and shift NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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192 technical advisors.
So when you comment if any alternative to the existing requirement that itself becomes a new requirement is seen as an obstacle, is that what you were referring to or was there another element?
MR. NICHOL: It could be. But, you know, just seeing these slides isn't enough information for me to know exactly what is being proposed, but it could be that you are proposing that this is a new way to address an existing requirement under Part 53 or explicitly within Part 53 where Part 50 may have referenced something, you know, something like a fitness for duty requirement that, you know, one approach could just be reference the current part for fitness for duty, another approach could be, well, let's re-write fitness for duty in Part 53 that makes sense for this rule.
So to the extent that it is sort of restructuring how requirements operate, because I know that Part 50 has a lot of requirements outside of Part 50 that apply to the facility, to the extent that it's that I don't think that that's the real concern.
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193 under Part 53.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay, fair enough.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Amir, do you have a question?
MR. AFZALI: Maybe a comment more than a question. So first of all I totally agree with Marc in terms of the usefulness of what you put up on the table because it basically shows to me anyways that the integrated nature of the entire regulation and that's what I earlier on was talking about siloed conservatism. A holistic conservatism makes a lot more sense.
Secondly, I want to apologize for what I am going to say right now because it's really I haven't thought through it. It's just I saw an opportunity to bring up something which is really important from the owner operator's point of view and that's ease of being able to factor in safety, as we see things out there that improve safety ease of implementing them and being able to reduce requirements elsewhere.
So when I look at Subpart Foxtrot and I read the title, "Requirements," and I then I read some of the text it implies that it's additional, it sounds like more things have to be done as opposed to less NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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194 optimized, they make sure we create a best margin.
So if we can take up Foxtrot and look at Subpart India and see how they relate and how can we put something in Subpart Foxtrot which reduces all the burdens of Subpart India that is something that would be really helpful.
For example, do we need, if we find a situation that a new technology comes in and allows us to do some, do work, work more remotely or through robotics or whatever, it's safety.
If it's going to cost us a lot of money to change our license that may de-incentivize people actually moving to that direction. Is there a way to bring it into some kind of an owner's control program with NRC oversight that allows those types of safety improvements be made and at the same time gain some benefit elsewhere.
I will finish off by giving an example of what I mean. We at Southern Company will spend a lot of money with Westinghouse that would have been shutdown, RCB shutdown sales because we want to improve safety.
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195 safety at the same time some of the burdensome, unnecessary burdens, were reduced.
So that type of a formulation would be very helpful as you are thinking about are these requirements in a way can be formulated such that allows and incentivizes modernization and innovation.
Thank you.
MR. RECKLEY: Thanks, Amir. Steve?
MR. NESBIT: This is Steve Nesbit with LMNT Consulting. Just a quick response to the earlier comment related to used fuel storage.
I just wanted to point out that actually the industry and the regulatory oversight from the NRC have a record of more than 60 years of safe storage and transportation of used fuel in this country, so it's a heck of track record.
I think that it is appropriate to re-look at those regulations in 10 CFR Part 71 and 72 for issues that might relate to the different technologies that might be employed and the different types and forms of used fuels because those regulations are obviously focused on light-water reactor fuel.
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196 regulations as performance based and therefore technology neutral as possible. Thanks.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Yes, thanks, Steve.
And there are NRC efforts underway to look at the fuel cycle, including the back end, and it's just not something I am personally involved in and not something that really we are considering.
MR. NESBIT: It's probably not a top priority right now.
MR. RECKLEY: Well, not --
(Simultaneous speaking.)
MS. CUBBAGE: Well, actually -- Yes, this is Amy Cubbage. I would like to say that it's just separate from what is being discussed today and we will continue to have updates on those activities at our periodic advanced reactor stakeholder meetings where we are looking at the regulatory infrastructure.
Currently, we are concluding that the framework is available. You know, there may be a need for guidance in certain areas, but we do have the regulatory framework taking on all different types of fuel forms on the fuel cycle side.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Bob, I think we have two more hands and then we'll get in such that the meeting doesn't fall too far behind schedule.
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197 MR. BEALL: All right. So I have Mike Keller. Please go ahead.
MR. KELLER: Yes. I just --
MR. BEALL: Go ahead, Mike, we can --
MR. KELLER: Yes. If the plant is passively fail-safe does the NRC really need to be heavily involved in O&M?
MR. RECKLEY: I guess I'll just say that if there were such a thing then it could get reflected in flexibilities in the operating stage, so that would be the challenge in instructing.
Subpart F is to make sure that it provides that flexibility, but there will always be requirements to do surveillances and so forth to make sure that it maintains whatever is providing that risk profile.
So, Jeff, if you want to go ahead and then we can get into Subpart D.
MR. MERRIFIELD: Thanks, Bill. Just as a follow along to Steve Nesbit. I want to say I agree with his comments about the tremendously positive track record of the NRC oversight of managing fuel both onsite and in transportation and the very positive track record over the last 60 years.
I would also note Congress obviously in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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198 reviewing NEIMA in requirements applicable to advanced reactors could have chosen to delve into this area, but obviously was comfortable with the regulatory regime and made no changes to the way this fuel should be managed relative to the advanced reactors. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Thank you, Jeff.
Okay, Bill, let's go ahead and start going through the Subpart D preliminary rule language, okay?
I think you're muted, Bill.
MR. RECKLEY: Oops, thanks. So since this was released, I'll go through it fairly quickly so we can get to people's observations about what we did release in support of the meeting.
So this is the general layout. I'll just make the observation that this area is probably, at least in my view, did not really significantly change.
We did bring over, and we think we've brought over Part 100, and so we don't need to refer to that. But overall, I think it remains generally consistent with what we've been doing for a long time.
So if you go to 71, it just lays out some general requirements and objectives for this subpart.
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199 plant, that's largely external hazards, and what can the plant do to the environment, including populations. And so that's the way this was laid out.
It does try to bring the two-tiered structure into this subpart as well.
So if we go on to the next slide, 72, we talk about external hazards and basically lay out that the safety related structure, systems, and components would have to be protected against a design basis external hazard level which we've tried to make consistent across the hazards.
Currently there's a bit of a range, and we picked one in 100,000 years, because that is generally the seismic requirements and seems to be the most developed of the external hazards.
The next one is we go into the safe shutdown earthquake. Again, this is generally consistent with what we have now or at least what we have now through the more recent guidance documents in the area of risk informed seismic hazard curves.
So going on to 73, just one addition, and this is new, kind of thought it would generate some discussion, so we'll see. But basically, it's an extension of the probabilistic risk assessment and the notion that, in addition to specifically addressing in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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200 a historically somewhat deterministic mechanism for external hazards and the protection of safety related equipment, that external hazards would also be addressed within the PRA, including potential hazards that would be above the design basis external hazard level.
Going on to 74, this is site characteristics. Again, this is not really much of a change. Basically, it requires an applicant to characterize the site in terms of all of those features mentioned there.
So going on to 75, this is the population related siting considerations. And this is also an area that we basically brought over existing requirements. We have, in SECY 20-0045, have before the Commission a potential alternative to the current guidance in terms of population density out to a defined distance.
But that SECY paper did not include any changes to actual regulations, and some of that is just due to the flexibility of the existing regulations. So we do maintain a requirement to define an exclusionary boundary and a low population zone boundary.
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201 depending on the assessment of potential offsite consequences, those two boundaries can be the site boundary. So the exclusionary boundary can be the same as the site boundary, and the LPZ can be the same as the site boundary, depending on the dose assessments and the calculation of consequences.
Going on to 76, also maintained the notion of population center distance, this has been in place really since the development of Part 100, that you maintain a distance out to one a third from the low population zone and to require reactor sites be away from densely populated centers.
There was some discussion that a development of SECY 20-45 on population centers, the current Part 100 definition is a population of greater than 25,000 people. I think we made a note that, at this time, we weren't proposing to change that definition.
There was a discussion during the development of SECY 20-0045 that the industry might want us to revisit the 25,000 number. This would be an opportunity for alternate proposals if there's an argument for changing that.
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202 reflected in SECY 20-0045, assuming the Commission approves that proposal. But we didn't go much beyond that alternative.
So we can go on then to the next slide,
- 77. And this again, just reflecting that the language of external hazards and site characteristics being integrated into the overall development of design features or at least showing that the design features can accommodate the particular site characteristics and external hazards.
So this is just primarily an interface requirement and then also an interface requirement with Part 51 which I mentioned earlier. Part 51 is one of the parts we would refer to but not attempt to incorporate all of those environmental regulations into Part 53.
So we can go on to 78. I'll turn it over to Marc for their observations on Subpart D.
MR. NICHOL: All right, thanks, Bill.
Next slide, please.
So I think we are philosophically aligned that Part 100 requirements, or I should say siting requirements that are, you know, in the notes are currently in Part 100, siting itself, the requirements can be in Part 53, so we don't need to reference Part NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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203 100. So I'm glad to see we're aligned there.
But I think, when I look at what you've done, it looks like you're basically bringing in the entire siting concept the way it is today and just popping it in Part 53. And I think we have a lot of opportunity to really be transformational in this regard.
And I say that because, when I look at Part 100, this is a regulation that goes back, I don't know, into the early '60s maybe, long before we had requirements for emergency preparedness and other things that have been added into Part 50.
And so, to me, it's never been updated to reflect this sort of integrated thinking on safety for nuclear plants. To me, to bring an analogy, it's kind of like putting a dinosaur in a spaceship. And so I think we need to completely rethink what siting is for Part 53.
I think we can do that by better looking at how it integrates into the safety of the plant.
And so that's one of the key things, is look at how we integrate it. You know, siting is based a lot on the external events. External events is just one additional type of event.
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204 events, query events. And you have a lot of the same concepts that you have to design against certain events. You have to consider the characteristics of the site.
You know, by putting all those together, and if you think about your bow tie diagram, if you sort of figure out how siting and external events fit in that, I think we can come up with a new paradigm for siting. We're proposing one in our discussion draft that we'll hopefully send to you soon, so you'll see where our details thinking is there.
Going along with this is what is the appropriate boundary. So the EAB and LPZ are what's used today, site boundary is used for emergency preparedness. It sure would be much more efficient if we can align all these boundaries rather than have to maintain three different boundaries. So, you know, we're proposing to do that, try to leverage the site boundary.
And when you do that, when you leverage the site boundary, when you leverage the safety criteria, especially, you know, that are in terms of dose limits to protect the public, when you put all that together in this new thinking for siting, a couple of things happen.
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205 One, the concept of a distance to a population center no longer makes sense. It's sort of that, I think, was a very prescriptive and overly deterministic way to say, well, we don't know what we don't know. So let's put this distance to the population center in there just to make sure we're safe. If you really peel back the onion, you'll see that it does nothing. And so it's really not necessary to carry forward that concept.
There's other things in terms of how you might define it in a technology inclusive and performance based manner in terms of how you'll define the characteristics of the site that have a significant impact depending on the design, depending on the site.
Some site characteristics may be important in this type of application and other characteristics may be important for another type of application, so doing that in a performance-based way.
The other thing that I think we can do here is in relationship to the details in the regulations related to seismic hazard. They're great details, don't get me wrong, but do they really need to be in the rule? It sort of sticks out like a sore thumb. Perhaps just proposing guidance, that might be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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206 a better way to address it. So that's our initial feedback on siting. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Cyril, you want to do US NIC's slides please?
MR. DRAFFIN: Sure. Before we start, I just wanted to circle back with, we have the request for NRC to list what other parts are going to be cited. We appreciate Bill citing the five but, you know, we also thought that Part 20 might be cited, C and D.
And you know, we referred to 55 and 70, 71, 72, 73. So I think maybe for the next meeting, Bill might just continue that, deciding what's going to be cited and what's not. And if it's going to be a portion of it, that too would be helpful.
So moving on to the next slide for Slide D, I'd like to Ross Moore of Oklo to cover some of the key points we had for comments, general comments, and then some questions we'd raised. But I think the points made by NEI have a lot of merit. So Ross, I'll turn it over to you.
MR. MOORE: Thank you, Cyril. Yes, this is Ross Moore, Oklo. I think a lot of the comments I'll raise here kind of echo a little bit of what Marc already presented and also has already been discussed.
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207 The first comment, and the first I really cover some just high level, I guess, thoughts coming out of the initial response to the Subpart D language.
And then the subsequent questions are really, you know, kind of just asking for clarification to some of the part requirements that are kind of being transferred over from Part 100 or being newly generated to kind of get a better understanding of the staff's intent, maybe behind some of those requirements being incorporated the way they are in Part 53.
And so that's kind of, like, so in the interest of time, I'll kind of read through all of that and then open it up or return it back to the NRC.
But the first slide, you know, we've already talked a little bit about it, but the current, retaining the language from Part 100, moving it into Part 53, unnecessarily prohibits advanced reactors from being co-located near populated areas.
You know, there are opportunities to replace coal fired power plants and improve carbon emissions for that goal. And the co-located requirement there really doesn't have a clear tie to a safety goal if one can demonstrate, you know, meeting the adequate protection regs in a site boundary.
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208 And then the second part here, I think, really goes back to the slide that you presented, Bill, on Slide 56 which I think is pertinent. You kind of walked through the intent of developing the regulations, first by establishing the safety requirements then, you know, looking at the design and analysis requirements that support that, and then looking at siting.
And I think that could be a good way to look at it in the sense that, you know, Part 100 currently asks applicants to look at a wide range of, you know, the citing characteristics regardless of the design of the facility itself.
Whereas, you know, one should potentially get a look at how the facility is designed first and then determine what remaining questions might remain with respect to potential setting characteristics that could have an impact to the facility itself.
And, you know, there might be bounding cases where regardless of the external hazard, it might not have not have an impact on the facility and result in any offsite dose. And so therefore, you know, grabbing siting characteristics unnecessarily for that is not necessary.
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209 discussed, there is some Subpart D language that could be put in a guidance viz regulations or at least expanded in guidance. And I think Marc already talked about some parts of that. But I think the external hazards piece in there probably requires a little bit of additional clarification.
And then, Bill, you've kind of already addressed this a little bit, and I just wanted to raise the point that there is that outstanding SECY 20-0045 which does kind of, you know, talk to the subject of population density with respect to Part 100. But I'm curious to see how, you know, specifically if, depending upon what the response is from the Commission, how that might inform potential changes to the Part 50 requirements as they currently stand.
Next slide, please. All right, so I won't touch on the first part, because I think we've already kind of addressed the fact that, you know, there is kind of a concern over these, Tier 1, Tier 2 categories. For 53.510, one of the first questions we had, and I think, Bill, you kind of already answered it a little bit, was clarify why one of 100,000 years was chosen.
You mentioned you referenced the seismic, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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210 you know, hazards analysis. And I'm assuming that that means that this language or that frequency comes from, you know, ANS 2.26, which as one of 100,000 years assessment for seismic design Category 5 facilities.
But that kind of assumes that, you know, all advanced reactors would be seismic design Category
- 5. And I don't know that that's a prevailing assumption. I think that there is plenty of justification that advanced reactors would fall well outside of that scope and not require, you know, frequency evaluations on quite that range.
It also is, it challenges, or not challenges, but it's different in the sense the design-based events are assessed an E to the minus four frequency and this is E to the minus five, so there's kind of a difference there that kind of doesn't add up.
Question for five, 53.510 Bravo again goes back to evaluation of the size and the region type being based on the reactor design first viz the nature of the region second.
I think the current language says, hey, you should be evaluating the size of the region first.
And I think, again, this goes back to, you know, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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211 evaluating the reactor design first, then help inform what site characteristics, you know, need to be assessed as per the region.
And then we go to the external hazard frequency. I think the language as written is a little ambiguous, what range of external frequencies, what range of external hazards?
There are plenty of site locations that certainly don't require evaluation of the full scope of potential external hazards that eventually exist across, you know, quote, unquote, the world. But that could be limited, and that could be either expanded upon in guidance or potentially clarified.
Next slide, please. I thought 53.520 generally provided, with a little bit of maybe wordsmithing, generally provides the key information that would be sufficient to address requirements for siting.
I will go into 53.530 a little bit, but I think we've already kind of covered that, for the most part. But again, there's a lot of language that's been carried over from Part 100 that particularly precludes, you know, facilities.
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212 boundaries like EAB that might be arbitrary, presumes a large release, and might not require precluding, you know, sites from being located near large population centers.
And then I guess, and then the last comment I'll make is on 53.540. Again, we're continuing to reference the facilities AP program. I know there's been a lot of comments on that. And again, I think we've kind of talked about how you'll start talking about kind of some of the revisions to the previously released language. So I'm curious to see how that starts integrating as this new language is proposed that references previously released language that might have been revised.
So I think that covers the general scope of my comments. I'll turn it back.
MR. BEALL: Okay, thanks, Ross. Okay, we have some questions. Bill, do you want to say anything first, or do you want to just go straight to the open mic?
MR. RECKLEY: I think we can go over.
Yes, just go to the questions and comments.
MR. BEALL: Okay. So, Dave, you raised your hand first.
DR. GRABASKAS: Sure, thanks. So I had a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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213 question on the third part of 53.510 on external hazards. Looking at, you know, potentially looking at frequencies or magnitudes beyond the design basis external hazard levels, is the thought there that special treatment type requirements could fall out for SSCs? And if so, is there any feeling about what frequency range you'd be looking at here?
You know, would this be all the way down to 5E to the negative 7 following OMP or, you know, is there some different motivation there? Thanks.
MR. RECKLEY: It's possible that that could happen. And the other part of requiring it or proposing to require it here is that you could also, in a risk profile, even for hazards that don't exceed the design basis hazard level, the overall risk profile might be that the protection of one safety related train, while it ensures one success path, you still may benefit from special treatment of other equipment in the overall risk profile. So it would do both as it's being proposed.
MR. BEALL: Okay. Sarah Fields, you're next. Sarah, again, unmute your mic. Yes, I can hear you now.
MS. FIELDS: You can hear me now?
MR. BEALL: Yes, ma'am.
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214 MS. FIELDS: Oh, okay. I had a problem unmuting. One of my concerns is establishing an emergency planning zone at the site boundary rather than a larger zone of ten miles and then also 50 miles, and particularly as it affects the ability of the public to establish standing if they wish to challenge the siting and operation of a specific reactor.
Generally, an intervener can establish standing if they live within the ten or 50 mile zone.
But if you no longer have those zones, it will be more difficult for an intervener to establish standing.
And I understand, of course, the industry, and historically the NRC, has not been encouraging of interventions to challenge nuclear reactor siting and operations. But I think this is a factor that the NRC should consider.
And also, I have a comment about transportation of fuel. There really isn't much of a historical record transporting spent fuel to a repository. And of course, we do not have a repository. So a permanent repository, and a so-called interim repository, I don't think is appropriate either.
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215 spent fuel onsite, and then later transportation of that fuel to some kind of permanent repository, I think is an important element in the development, and siting, and licensing of advanced reactors. Thank you.
MR. BEALL: Okay, thank you, Sarah. Ed Lyman, you have your hand up.
MR. RECKLEY: Yes, Bob ---
(Simultaneous speaking.)
MR. RECKLEY: No, this is Bill. I'm sorry. Just in regards to the previous comment, we are looking at how Part 53, and as we get into the licensing processes, we'll maybe have an opportunity to discuss this a little more. But we are looking at how that interfaces with Part 2 which is our hearing processes and so forth. So we are looking at that area. And I think maybe a future meeting will be an opportunity to discuss that a little further. With that, I'm sorry, Ed, go ahead.
DR. LYMAN: Actually, first I'd like to amplify on Ms. Fields' comment. It's not just transportation that's an issue with regard to spent fuel storage onsite, but it's also an issue with regard to all of the safety analysis that you would be doing on Part 53 to support, you know, the various NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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216 applications of the rule.
And so if spent fuel will be stored onsite, possibly several, you know, the lifetime of the plant's worth, that's going to be a source of radioactive material that could potentially be mobilized in an accident.
And even if you have the micro-reactor, or a small modular reactor, if you're accumulating many decades worth of fuel, that's not going to be a small source term. So you're going to have to include all potential radiological sources onsite in making this determination, including siting.
You know, on siting specifically, it's not true there's no clear nexus to a safety goal with the requirement that there be, that reactors be sited away from densely populated urban areas, that's a defense in depth measure, as Commissioner Baran pointed when he spoke.
And it's as true today as it was back in the 50s when the Reactor Safeguard Committee first, you know, proposed remote siting for new plants.
Because if you have a first of a kind plant, then you need defense in depth to ensure that you're protecting the public.
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217 that are now on paper that have never accumulated any operating experience can be built in densely populated areas without going through that elemental phase is a dangerous and injurious notion and especially coupled with all the other measures that would be relaxed, potentially, under this rule, including not having an emergency planning zone offsite at all, or not having any security, or not having leakage containment.
In the case of Ravenswood, if you recall that, when Ed proposed fuel containment to compensate for the location of that plant in the middle of New York City, and now we're going in the other direction where you're saying you possibly need no containment at all, yet you can still site it.
It's all in one side, and nothing's on the other. The only thing that's on the other side is the PRA saying all this is low risk. And we've just heard from GE that, as we all know, the PRAs have very limited validity for a plant that's first of a kind.
So, I mean, this whole thing is you are going in a very dangerous direction unless you go back to the fundamentals, and the science, and stop pretending that you're talking about these mythical plants that are just going to magically be safer when there's really no clinical evidence to support that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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218 for any of the non-light water reactor designs that I can think of. Thank you.
MR. RECKLEY: Thank you, Ed. And I will point out for those, as you look at Subpart D, and Ed raises a good point in that the siting policy that's been in place for a long time at the NRC, and the Atomic Energy Commission before the NRC, considered siting somewhat independent from the design and as kind of a defense in depth measure.
And so, again, just as you look at it and you and consider proposing language to us, I would suggest you go back and look at the siting study from the, God, some decade, 70s or 80s. That was after TMI, so it would have been in the 80s, I guess.
And just, you know, kind of look at that history, and there's policy and a lot of things that went into play. And to be honest that's why, when we were developing Subpart D, we didn't challenge a lot of those things.
For those who are proposing alternatives, Part 53 might be an effort to go before the Commission and say in addition to everything else in Part 53, we're kind of also suggesting a change in siting policy, that the staff didn't go there.
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219 guess?
MR. BEALL: Yes. Go ahead, Mike. You hook up your mic, please.
MR. KELLER: This is Mike Keller.
MR. BEALL: Go ahead, Mike.
MR. KELLER: This is Mike Keller with Hybrid Power Technologies. With passively fail-safe designs if the dose and frequency levels are significantly below say 25 rem and whatever its frequency are there relief mechanisms in Part 53 relative to the population zone requirements and allied requirements? If not, why not?
MR. RECKLEY: Well, the approach we took in crafting Part 53 on siting is that really, in terms of population, it comes down to the proposal in SECY 20-0045 which can be supported if the Commission approves it. If the Commission does not approve it, then we'll be determining, in the short term, the guidance would remain the same until we maybe develop yet another alternative. But that's 500 people per square mile out to 20 miles.
As Ross Moore observed, that can be restrictive. And so we looked, and when we developed that paper, you know, we looked at a variety of studies that Oak Ridge National lab had done. They NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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220 have a whole program to look at siting possible plants.
And maintaining the 25,000 population center number does provide some restrictions, obviously. But when you looked at the SAGE studies done by Oak Ridge, in terms of using smaller nuclear units to replace retiring fossil units, it did open up a bunch of sites, not every site, but it did free up a lot of potential retiring fossil sites that would be not in a population center exceeding 25,000 people.
So it kind of, in our view, got us in between. It didn't make siting totally open, but at the same time it did open up some potential sites by providing relaxation on that 20 mile radius.
So, Ross, I see you have your hand up again.
MR. KELLER: I have one follow-up.
MR. RECKLEY: Yes, go ahead.
MR. KELLER: So there is no relief for passive designs is what you're saying?
MR. RECKLEY: The relief would be built in, and it's described in that SECY paper if that is where we go. In terms of emergency planning zones, if the consequences can be shown to be below our threshold, such as 1 rem for the protective action NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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221 guidelines, then the proposed rule on emergency planning would provide some relief in terms of a smaller emergency planning zone with the potential that the zone would collapse all the way to the fence.
MR. KELLER: Are we talking about 53 or some other regulation?
MR. RECKLEY: That's a proposed rule for current regulations, but we would adopt at least that here, assuming that that final rule continues on track, that proposed rule goes on track.
MR. BEALL: Right, Mike. This is Bob Beall. That's the emergency preparedness for small modular reactors and other new technologies rule.
MR. KELLER: Which is outside 53?
MS. CUBBAGE: I'll put a link to information on that in the chat.
MR. KELLER: Well, I'm just kind of curious as to how this is supposed to be linked up.
MR. BEALL: Yes. Well, right now that rulemaking is proposing to add a new section, 50.160, to the current regulations. And that rulemaking is apparently ahead of this Part 53 rulemaking activity.
MR. KELLER: Okay, I understand. Thank you.
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222 you had a question. You had your hand up?
MR. MOORE: Hi. Yes, I just wanted to cover a few things that had been discussed. The first being, so I can appreciate the fact that Part 100 had long been considered separate based on historical analysis that had been previously done. But I think at this point, right, we're now choosing to incorporate it into Part 53 which gives us an opportunity to revisit some of those perspectives and see if they are still applicable to this new generation of reactor technology.
And I think we can do so in a both risk informed, performance-based approach. And I go back to the one on Slide 83, which I didn't really properly cover, but the locating away from densely populated centers language is particularly prescriptive.
And, you know, there is a PRA associated, could be a PRA associated to demonstrate the safety case for many of these advanced reactor designs. But there's also a performance-based component of it that I think is expected.
And for a first of a kind reactor, you know, where many of these are, have been designed on paper, and many still do have, you know, decades of operational experience, especially those bounded upon, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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223 like, sodium fast reactor technology and otherwise, but performance-based approach, you know, offers the opportunity to establish a systematic approach to demonstrate safety in a kind of a methodological way where you can kind of first establish criteria that, you know, must be met prior to operation, prior to startup and, obviously, once you've actually started up through surveillance frequencies, et cetera.
And so there is a mechanism to continually demonstrate and validate the safety case of even a first of a kind reactor. So I just wanted to add those points there.
MR. RECKLEY: Okay. Thank you, Ross.
MR. BEALL: Okay, I don't see anybody's hands up. Is there anybody on the bridge line that would like to say anything? If you do, just please hit star six.
Okay, not hearing anything, can you go to the next slide, please?
Are there final discussions or questions before we start wrapping up the meeting?
Cyril, you have your hand up.
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224 forward to March and specific, you know, if there are changes in language based on the comments you've received from a variety of stakeholders, and to work with you in terms of next steps.
MR. BEALL: Great, thank you very much.
Okay, next slide, please. This slide provides an overview of the current Part 53 rulemaking process. In addition, as you see in this slide, we are still in the first milestone where the staff is performing public outreach, meeting with the ACRS, and working on the draft proposed rule package.
The staff has approximately 15 months to complete these activities before the draft proposed rule is submitted to the Commission by April of 2022.
The staff is still projecting that the Part 53 proposed rule will be published for public comment in October of that year.
Slide 88, please. The staff will be hosting additional public meetings each month. We are proposing to hold future meetings on the first Thursday of every month with our next public meeting tentatively scheduled for March 4th, 2021.
These public meetings will cover additional topics that will include the release of additional Part 53 preliminary proposed rule language.
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225 The staff will continue to post all preliminary proposed rule language and any comment submittals received on the preliminary proposed rule language on regulations.gov under Docket ID NRC-2019-0062 prior to the public meetings.
Slide 89 please. The staff is also meeting with the ACRS Future Plants Subcommittee to receive feedback on the Part 53 rulemaking. The next meeting with the ACRS Subcommittee will be on February 18th, 2021, to discuss Part 53 Subpart C, design analysis requirements and D, siting requirements.
Additional ACRS meetings will be held every month.
Slide 90. If you have additional input or suggestions for future topics related to the Part 53 rulemaking, please send an email to Bill and I at the addresses shown on this slide. Your interest and comments will improve our rulemaking effort.
I also encourage you to monitor the Part 53 rulemaking Docket ID, NRC-2019-0062, on the regulations.gov website for updates and important documents related to this rulemaking.
Finally, we are always looking for ways to improve our public meetings, and your feedback is important to us. At the end of the meeting, please go to the NRC Public Meeting web page, click on the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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226 recently held meetings button, and look for this meeting. The meeting feedback form will be at the bottom of the meeting announcement.
I'd like to thank everyone for participating in today's meeting. And I hope everyone has a good evening. This concludes our meeting for the day. Thank you very much for your participation.
(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 4:34 p.m.)
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