ML22230A069
| ML22230A069 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 12/20/1977 |
| From: | NRC/OCM |
| To: | |
| References | |
| Tran-M771220 | |
| Download: ML22230A069 (43) | |
Text
RETURN TO SECRET,~RIAT RECORDS NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION IN THE MATTER OF:
Conference with Atomic Industrial Forum Place -
Washington, D. C.
Date -
Tuesday, 20 December 1977 ACE - FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
Official Reporters 444 North Capitol Street Washington, D.C. 20001 NATIONWIDE COVERAGE - DAILY Pages 1 -
40 Telephone:
(202 ) 347-3700
DISCLAIMER
\.
This is an unofficial transcript of a meeting of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission held on*. December 20, 1977
- in the Commission 1s offices at 1717 H Street, N. W., Washington, D. C.
The
- meeting was open to public attendance and observation.
This transcript has not been *reviewed, corrected, or edited, and it may contain inaccuracies.
The transcript is intended solely for general informational purposes.
As provided by l O CFR 9. l 03, it is not pa rt of the formal or informal record of decision of the matters discussed.
Expressions of opinion in this transcript do not necessarily reflect final determinations or beliefs.
No pleading or other paper may be filed with the Commission in any proceeding as the result of or addressed to any statement or argument contained herein,except as the Commission may authorize.*
CR-84 WI:.
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25 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Confer~nce with Atomic Industrial Forum 1
Tuesday, 20. December 1977 Room 1130 1717 H Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
Whereupon, the hearing convened, pursuant to notice, at 10:00 a.m.,
BEFORE:
COMMISSIONER JOSEPH M. HENDRIE, CHAIRMAN COMMISSIONER RICHARDT. KENNEDY COMMISSIONER VICTOR GILINSKY COMMISSION~R PETER BRADFORD
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25 P R O C E E D I N G S (1:35 p.m.)
CHAIRMAN ;HENDRIE:
We are almost on time.
Bill, go ahead.
MR. PARKER:
All right, sir.
2 Well, we will start by saying:
Thank you very much for this opportunity to appear before you this afternoon.
I think you.have met most of the peop 1~ here at the table.
I am Bill Parker, *chairman *of the Forum.
Joe Rengel here is vice chairman of the Forum.
John Ward is chairman of our reactor and licensing safety committee.
Mike Miller here is chairman of our lawyer's committee.
And you know Carl Wal~ke quite well, who is president of the Forum.
Some time_ ago back in the summer 1 we asked if we might have the opportunity to come before you.
We thought at that time we would be able to view five of you sitting across the table, but events haven't led to that conclusion.
So we are delighted to have this opportunity to come and appear before the four of you.
Maybe there wi 11 be a fifth one one of these days, for us to*bring him on board and bring him up to date, toe.
We certainly recognize that your responsibility is
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to regulate rather than promote the development of nuclear power.
We know, too, that such regulation has as its primary goal the advancement of public health and safety and also, assigning sui t_able respect for the environment.
I would say that industry encouraqes and supports this Iegulation and heartedly endorses it, but I would put the word "proper" in there and say that we encourage and support proper regulation.
And we would direct our words to you, that we feel that this is a responsibility that lies on your should ers to take care of the pub lie aspect of it, while at the same time imposing the proper level of regulation on the industry as such.
The Congress certainly has recognized that the general welfare of the country would be enhanced by the con..,..
tinued development of nuclear power and the peaceful uses of the atom.
So, basica~ly, that is why we are here this after--
noon; to fill you in on some of the highlights as we see the energy situation and also the problems of the nuclear in--
dustry in the context as how we see it today.
I would* like to start off by briefly touching on the overview from the electrical utility side and then Joe Rengel will follow
, giving a little br+/-ef overview of the manufacturers' viewpoint, and then John Ward will foll!ow~*dis-cussing a few of.the licensing issues, and Mike Miller on a
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few of the legal issues.
Mr. Chairman, we would propose to limit this to some 20 minutes, or thereabouts, as far as making a few pre-pared remarks.
On the other hand, I would say that if you want to break in and ask any questions as we go along, rather than waiting until the end of the presentations, we would wel-come that as well.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
All right.
We wi 11 do it.
MR. PARKER:
If *there is time at the end, Mr.
Walske has a subject that he wants to discuss with you, also.
For ~he electrical utilities, our load_ growth this year has been about seven percent.
And as we look to the fu-ture, we see that load growin~ and you get various predictions, but they all range somewhere from 5.2 to 5.5 percent out through the year 1986.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
When you say load growth, do you mean kilowatt_hours?
MR. PARKER:
Kilowatts: peak, peak growth.
On generating capacity, we see that the_growth from
.1977 to 1986 going up by some roughly 49 percent.
This is KW capacity.
During this same period of time, we see nuclear power, however, going from around the.48,000 megawatts that we have today about 163,000 in 1986.
And this is units that are under order and in the pipeline and scheduled to come on
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board during this period of time.
In other words, while the total_ generating capacity is going up some 49 percent, we see nuclear capacity in this same period of time going up 3. 5 times what it is today..
CQMrJl'.ISSIONER ~ILINSKY; Do you have a number for 1985,~ just because the government forecasts tend to be tied to that number?
MR. PARKER:
I do11 1 t have one directly in front of me.
Carl, do you have a 1985 figure?
MR. WALSKE:
Not to go with that, no..
MR. PARKER:
If I can get it for you, I.would be glad to get it after the meeting and it provide it for you.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Because these numbers are a good deal hiqher than the numbers* that are circulated in the government, among the various agencies.
And I was just wondering whether you have loqked into what the discrepancies might be due to.
MR. PARKER:
This comes from the NERC report that was prepared and distributed in August of this year.
But I
- will be glad to get you an '85 figure.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY; Because sort of the closest you come to an official number, which is somethi~g that is more or less agreed to by DOE -- wellr, at that time, ERDA.,
FEA and NRC, was more like something like 110,00.Q in 1985.
MR. PARKER:
In 1985?
Well, I have the figure on
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industry, and as I say, it is the NERC report that was pro-vided in August, and they made quite a distribution on it; 150.65.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
What do you have for --
MR. PARKER; This is 1985.
MR. RENGEL:
I have got 155.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
I think our staff would probably say something close to 100 at this point.
But let me not hold you up.
MR. PARKER:
If it so, we better go home and start reviewing MR. RENGEL:
Start shutting down plants.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
No; no.
You will have to start certain old plants, o:r:: buy some_ t_urbines, _ gas turbines.
But which ever of these several figures turns out to be the case in 1986, the nuclear capacity increment will, as you say, will be substantially, that delta will be sub-stantially larger than the overall industry.
MR. PARKER:
Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
On a fractional basis.
MR. PARKER:
And my next point --
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
I think that'-s right.
MR. PARKER: *Now the next point I want to make, and your figures_ give me a real grave concern, because again, out of the NERC study, first, we had a summer reserve -of aroun
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25 30 percent this past summer.
We will have about 32 percent reserve for this winter.
But as we look longer range, based on these fig-ures which I have given you for the_ growth,. we see that the 7
reserves in the early to mid-'80s drop to somewhere in the range~ 21, 22 percent.
And you are talking now figures sub-stantially below what I am using, and if that is so, then we are talking about dropping below 20 percent, and certainly the 21, 22 percent is predicated on present construction and being able to maintain that construction schedule and that the load forecasts are accurate,.*too, ano. not too low.
So we can see that because of these uncertainties, there can be regions of the country that could be in dire straits as far as reserve capacity by the mid-'-80s.
All this brings us to the subject of future orders and future commitments, as far as the utilities are concerned.
Now, it is now* decis-ion time for many utilities in terms of looking to the next plants.
And as they look at this, they are faced with the most difficult decision; just determining the choice of capacity, first.
There is no gas for generat-ing capacity.
Oil will probably be prohibited in most areas.
Coal, while there is a tremendous :thrust from the Administra-tion for moving to coal, the environmental impacts are going to be difficult to meet.
There are many other problems, as I view it, in
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25 terms of reaching the goals that are projected for coal; problems of manpower, capital expenditure, transportation and others.
8 This brings it down basically to the nuclear and what are its opportunities.
And we are fast losing the nuclear option because again of the long lead times and being able to get these onstream when they are actually needed._
All of this says that we need to move rapidly on nuclear.
The public says we need nuclear.
The rno$.t recent Harris Poll; I was just reading about.it coming up this morn--
ing, says that ~n the basis of 55 to 33 *, that we ought to speed up nuclear construction..
So everytime the public speaks, they*speak strongly in support of nuclear, And yet, w~ face problems.
We face oroblems within the utility.
We face problems with the Administration and their policies for moving ahead.
We face policies in the regulatory arena.
Others following me will speak to the basic -- the problems in the regulatory are~, but just let me recite in a hurried way the problems as I see them, from a utility executive point of view, that stand in front of us.
And these are the very cumbersome and overlapping federal,* state and local plant licensing processes, the ever-changing and increasing environmental restriction, the uncert-ainty of the fuel cycle, and these are certainly nothing new
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that you haven't heard all this time -- the problems with regulatory rule change and retrofit, the_ great unpredictably of cost and construction periods_, and also, the _..,._ we have faced time and time again the possibi.li ty of reactor shut....
downs from government actions.
All of. these are coupled, of course,. with the problems of half an inch*~
This make it very difficult for the utilities to move ahead.
We have a budget this year, a capital budget, of about $20 billion.
The utilities are projected to soend about $220 bil1;i.on over the next -- between now and 1985.
So we are gutsy enough to make the decision, if we can get some go-ahead from the AdJ:llinistration and from the govern-ment to support us.
Thank you~-
And Joe, would you pick up from there?
CO:MMISSIONER BRADFORD:
That $220 billion is total?
MR. PARKER:
That's total, total for the utility industry.
And that is rounded.off.
It is somewhere between
- $220 and $230 billion.
MR. RENGEL*:
There has been quite a bit of talk about the fall off in nuclear orders.
And I thought I would try to put this in perspective for you, to try to give you the change that has happened in the last two years.
So I took the period 197 2 to '7 4 and the period
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'75 to the present.
And the total amount of thermal megawatts that were ordered by the utilities, United States utilities, in those two periods, were; '72 to '74, 225,000.
And of that, 100,000 megawatts was fossil and 125,000 megawatts was nuclear 1 giving nuclear about a 55 percent ratio.
From '75 through today, another 33,000 megawatts, or only 15 percent of the first three years has been ordered.
19,500 is fossil and 13,800 is nuclear, or 42 percent.
So we haven't disappeared out of the marketplace with respect to nuclear,. but the difficulty in the whole gen...
eration.area, because of the lack of peak load growth,has shown up here as part of the utilities' concern.
And those -- this does not take into account the cancellations_ that have been made in the meantime.
So these are the ones that were ordered in those years.
But I do have for the nuclear here and here is something for each of you gentlemen.
(Distributing documents.)
MR. RENGEL:.
The backlog as reported in the papers
.of the orders of each of the principal reactor manufacturers, and their schedules are here.
And you can see the first page is Combustion Engineering, with a total of.seven plants op..,..
erating,* 26 on order for a total of 33.
None of their plants, however, are of indefinite schedule.
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25 11 Next is Babcock arid Wilcox.
They have nine plants operating.
They have 27 on order, for a total of 36, three of which are international.
However, of the 24 U. S*~ plants, six are deterrh+/-ned to be indefinite and have been postponed to an indefinite schedule.
General Electric.has a total of 3'7. plants operat....
ing and 62 on order, for a total of 99.
They have 12 of their 37 plants operating that are international, and 18 of the 62 are on order -- on order, are international..
Nine of the plants *in their scµedule are indefinite.
The.pext is Westinghouse; 37 plants operating and 82 on order.
Of those, 14 plants, international plants are operating, and 22 are on order, for a total of 36 out of 119.
There are four units that were indefinite, and of those indefinite ones, two were cancelled the first of the month, and that was Florida Power and Light, Dade County..
So that we are. now down to 1.1 7. with two indefinite.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
What would be the pattern of declining number of plants petween '72 and '-76?
MR. RENGEL:
I can't answer that question.. That is just the way things turned out.
You know~ utilities buy things in large -- big bunches.
For instance,-Duke Power Company ordered five units at once, and this would place five orders in one year, and then they are spread out over a period of time, anywhere from
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25 12 18 months to two years or so, in between the units
- MR. PARKER:
I would answer the question for you, that '74 and '75 were absolutely no-growth years.
They were flat plateau years.
COMMISSI.ONER BRADFORD:
But the pattern is di£..,..
ferent for the other three?
MR. PARKER:
You are speaking specifically of Westinghouse.
MR. RENGEL:
These are the dates the plants come on line.
This* is the customer's --, this is the utility's operating date.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
Okay.
MR. RENGLE:
Which has been published in one of several places; the Wall __ Street Journal COMMISSIONER BRADFORD: These numbers don't really reflect plants in operation?
MR. RENGEL:
The ones on the left-hand side re-present the ones in operation.
COMMISSIONER BRADFO:B.D: Then General Electric'::went
- trom 19 in operation prior to '72 to 15 in operation between
'72 and '76?
MR. RENGEL:
No.
GE went from 13 in operation prior to '72 and from 1 72* through t76, 20 units of theirs went in operation.
You are talking about COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
You are talki~g about
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25 Westinghouse?
MR. RENGEL:
No; I am talking -- excuse me.
They had.19 in operation prior to '72, 15 went into operation in those four years --
MR. PARKER:
Fifteen more.
MR. RENGEL:
Fifteen more, and three, up to the first of November, and they have one more scheduled to go into operation this year.
This just happens the way things turn out.
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
It is still a different pattern, but I)1.ad thought it was an absolute decline.
13 MR. RENGEL:
No; there is nothing that I know of that makes the pattern specific.
It does inqicate, however, that there is a -- we have had no orders of any significance, as you know, in the last three years.
We have had a total of 13,800 megawatts, representing about 12 units.
And in 1976, there was only one unit placed, and this year, there have been four.
Of the units that have been
-announced this year, two were options that had been placed prior to 1975.
Now, the thing that is of signficance, as far as we are concerned, is that there is a significant backlog that goes a long ways, and therefore, responsibility to keep teams together and keep them going for:~ this period of time..
And
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25 14 the smoother it can run, as you all know, the better off we are in the whole process.
MR. PARKE_R: If there are no questions at this point, I will call on --
better.
CHAIRMAN. HENDRIE:
No.
I understand the problem.
MR. RENGEL:
I thought this might show*it a little CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
For '* 7 9, maybe we should. go in for a plant.
(Laughter.1 CHAIRMAN HENDR!.E:
I am trying to help out.
COMMISSIONER.BRADFORD:
The problem, though, is, in terms of i*ncoming orders, in fact, if* you accumulated these graphs in a fiv~~year period from '77 on the way you have prior to '72 and then 1 72 to t76, they look quite sirn..,..
ilar f.or those, for any given five-year period.
The decline wouldn't be any wher.e near as dramatic as what you get by taking the future in one-year jumps.
MR. RENGEL:
Well, but the future in one-year
-jumps also tells the problem that each manufacturer faces, to whether or pot there is nothing.
he has got to survive those periods when And I thought -it was important for you to recog-nize that not everybody is in the same shape, that some people have more problems than others and therefore,, it is difficult.
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25 And I didn't put on here, for instance, the licensee awards.
And I didn '- t show you the time by years when the international* orders are involved for General 15 Electric and ourselves, because there are only -- GE has 18 and we have 24, and-all of those are in the periods through 1984, because the international arena, we can take an order 1 build a plant in six years and have it in operation.
In the United States it is 12 years, approximate*ly twice as long.
MR. PARKER:
When the utility CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
There is a lot of planning over here.
MR. PARKER:
Yes, sir.
What we see and what we are concerned with 6n the utility side is that if we cannot move ahead more pos,itively, if we cannot resolve some of these uncertainties so that the choice is clear, and we certainly see the choice as clear from the economic standpoint in almost every area of the United States that we push hard for nuclear; we are going to lose the expertise of the manufacturers.and the suppliers, because
- they are** rapidly working of the backlog.
And as Mr. Rengel says, they are goi~g to lose this expertise if we don't get new orders on the: books.
Now utilities did not place orders of any consequence in t75 and
'76.
And in fact, they cancelled or deferred many that were placed in '7 3_
- and '7 4 because of the no *growth actions of l 7 4
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25 16 and '75 coupled with a very difficult financial situation for a great many utilities across the nation.
Part of the post-ponements were due to financial consideration and not neces-sarily load growth factor.
This has improved somewhat, both load growth-wise and financially in the last two years.
John?
MR. WARD:
Mr. Chairman, in a former life, you were fond of saying:
It isn't necessary that we agree, but that it is necessary that we understand one another.
I hope that continues to be your motto for o"perating, because I think it is essential.that we understand the purpose CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
As a minimum.
MR. WARD:
As a minimum, I am going.to address certain of the procedurals aspects.
I do want to make one statement which Commissioner Kennedy heard me make_ in San Francisco; that reform must be addressed to reducing two principal time frames.
One is the time frame from placing of the order for the NSSS until it comes in operation, because this is the time frame which is critical for*-time cost of money.
The other area.it-must.address is the overall sche~
dule, because the overall schedule is critical to utility planning.
There are two different pieces of the problem and the one that the Comi~ission itself can directly affect
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25 most immediately is the NSSS award until operation occurs.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
John, you were quoted I don't know whether it was corr=ctly or not -- at*the San Francis co meeting; you were coJTu.-nenting on our -.-.-
MR. WARD.:
NUREG 02-92.
17 CO1'f.tMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Yes, and you say there they go taking themsel;,es off the critical path, but someone else is going to be oi it.
MR. WARD:
Yes, *sir.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Could you somewhere along the way explain_that?
MR. WARD:
Yes; yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Because all of these years people have been telli_ng us to get off the critical path, and --
MR. WARD:
I guess the problem, commissioner, is lateralling it.to somebody else isntt removing the critical path.
This is the problem I see.
All right; I hadn't _planned to g*o into that, so I didn't bring my charts.
But our present -- what I term our current schedule, and by that I mean -from the time the utility makes the decision to go until the time the plant g.ets on-line, is approximately 12-years.
I contra_sted that, just for reference's sake, with what I call the no.;.*licensing case, which is on the *order of six and a half to seven yearse
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25 18 I then looked at NUREG 02-92 -- I just happen to have a copy with me -- 02-92, and looked at the principal unique features.
And first, let me say. that I think NUREG 02..-.9.2 is an excellent study..
I think the Staff did a fine job..
I discussed this with Mr. Denton,:'.*and I said to him that if the industry had taken part, I don '*t think there would be many different things.identified as problems that have to be solved.
And I think they did an ex~ellent job.
I think the intent of their recommendation +/-s good.
Our. conc~rn,:-.and the concern I expressed in San Francisco was with implementation, and the difference between policy and implementation
- The. two uni.que features are the acceptance review and the issuance,.. the plan to issue a safety evaluation report in a very short period of time; six months, after docket.
The. acceptance review has been expanded from the current so-ca.lled mini review which is a review for complete-ness, to include.a determinatiqn of technical.adequacy.
And
- that is where my concern comes in, the definition of that term, because I have heard many, many reviewers reject appli-cations and reject positions because they are technically inadequate.
And if the acceptance review is to make a determ-ination that the application is technically adequate before it
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25 19 is docketed, then this is another area of extreme uncertainty.
In effect, the technical review is performed prior to docketing of the -application._ And while 02-92 says that the acceptance review should 'be able to be made in*a period of 60 days, two months*; there is a gr~at possibility -- in fact,
- I think a certainty -- that that review will extend to equal the technical review period as each branch looks at the appli-cation for technical adequacy prior to allowing it to be docketed.
So that in my charts, I show the acceptance review as one year, which I think is optimistic.
I also showed PSAR, or application preparation time in excess of 18 months, which is sl~ghtly longer than most applicants are taking.right now, although some of them do take periods like that.
But I tried to indicate that the preparation time would probably-be longer because of having to_get ready for this uncertain period of time, the acceptance review, and mak-ing sure that the application was as complete as possible.
- trying to cover all bases before it is submitted.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Well, it is pointed in the direction of having as much work done as possible --
MR. WARD:
Yes.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
before you get involved in the spending.of money and building things, and having as
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25 20 complete an application as possible and of design, proceeded as far as you.can..
MR. WARD:.
Yes.
COMMISSIONER. GILINSKY; 4-t seems to me a desirable thing to separate those two MR. WARD:
There is no question that it is. a good
. goal.
It is a good goal to have complete application~
It is a good goal to get rid of this proforma Q2, Q3, or what ever they are, in answer back arid forth, and to_ get t_he application in as complete a form as it can be, before it comes in.
_My concern is, there-is no discipline specified for that time period.
There is no management cons.traints that would put pressure upon the Staff to keep the acceptance review moving fast, as there is now, for instance, in the technical review.
There is a schedule and you watch those very closely.
That would not appear in ---
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:* I am sure we will have some kind of color book for that one.
MR. WARD:
I hope so.
I hope so, and I hope there is a very strict management control put on it. But I dontt see it.
And it isn't specified in the document, *and I am concerned about :the impieinentation.
And my speech in San Francisco and my concern here is to make sure.that you recognize that acceptance review can
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25 21 be very, very long.
It is an uncertain period. It makes the docketing date uncertain.
The docketing date is critical for equipment purchase,.for codes and standards.
And we are back to where we were with 50-SS(a) where we were not sure what the docketing date*was going to be, so that we are not sure that all of our equipment is purchased to the right codes and standards.
COMMISSIONER GILINKSY:
I guess I am left unsure whether you think this is pointed in*the right direction or not, or you prefer the present system.
MR. WARD:
I believe that getting-rid of the Ql, Q2 is good.. I believe that the Staff working with the appli-cant prior to submittal of the application is good.
I think technical adequacy ought to be the determination of the tech~-
nical review and not the acceptance review.
Well, that_ was my point, and the poi.flt was that thi period was being taken* out of so-called licensing time and put in pre-docket, so the critical path was moving out of your official time*frame.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
I thought that was quite clever.
(Laughter. )
MR. WARD:
I am sure Howard did, too~
(Laughter. )
MR. WARD:
But the other point that made that..,.....
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25 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I understand the difficulty.
MR. WARD:
Okay.
22 The other:point was tJ::i.e early site review, and I won't get into that, because that is something that you don 1 t have total control over.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Well, presumably to the extent that one can do early site review, it doesn 1 ~ relieve you of any of the chain of events that you have to_ go through, but --
MR. WARD:
No, but the point-~
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
If it could be separated from the from a specific NSSS contract and decision on a speci-fic unit.and done at another time, the way we have dealt with engineering scheduling problems for years, you look around and see how we can manage.to do many things as parallel as possi..,..
ble and squeeze down the overall time and make these things go along together.
MR.. WARD:. The point, Mr. Chairman is, that to standardize, we need stability.
Ahd to standardize, we need to make use of standardizatio~,. we need early site reviews.
- S_tandardization in and of itself* isn l t going to do much to the overall schedule, because the cri tial path is -*"""
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Well,--but --
MR. WARD:
The early site review has been completed on the San Joaquin plant; it took four years.
And that was on limited issues.
And I showed that period on my slide, which
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25 extended the overall time frame to 14.5 years, using the standardized application.
23 And the reason I said you don't have total control over it is because the San Joaquin siting decision won't be made solely by NRC, but it will be made by the California Energy Resources and Conservation Development Commission and others.
And th.is is the problem:
multiple agencies making the same decision, rather than the old cliche, one man, one vote; one decision, one agency.
That doesnlt exist, and that is necessary to_make the early site review useful.
It is useful now on specific issues, NRC making the technical de-cision on a specific site issue and then the applicant having confidence that that qecisioh is good, his design can go ahead he knows that he will get acceptance on that site issue when he brings it in.
That is a useful point.
But total. site certification would.stand, as you well know.
Now, the other poin~s that I wanted to make on stability -- and these are points on licensing reform that I feel fall under your cognizance, without due authority under the present regulations, and all move toward stablizing licensing requirements.* -
We would like to see that standard format content guide that was issued two years ago,f6r comment~ come out and
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25 24 let us know what they are supposed to have it in.
We would like to see the standard review plans reviewed and those ratchets that. exist in them -- and I think several le.tters have come in to you showing some 55 of those standard review plans that do not represent current practice
- but r.. epresent ratcheting requirements. -- would like the stand-ard review plans to represent your current practice, and we would like them keyed to the standard format and content guide as they are intended.to be.
We would like to see expanded and consistent use of the value impact methodology in regulation, particularly in the issuance of regulatory.guides.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:. May I ask you:
What is your perception of the "stability of the process.
11 I.. mean.
do you see it still on some sort of a steep increase in re-quirements, or.has it stablized, do you think?
MR.* WARD:
- I will give you two answers:
It has a potential to stablize.
It is not stablized.
COMMISSIONER GILINKSY:
But I mean, what,. from
- your point of view, has beerr happening in the last few years?
MR. WARD:
There has been a gr-eat move towards standardization and towards stability.
The standard review plans are a good idea, whose time maybe has passed.
But they ought to be implemented.
The Commissioner is well aware of those standard review plans, and they are a good idea.
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25 25 But they, right now, are not useful because they have not been used consistently and some of them are not usable because they _don't reflect current practices.
That is *a move toward, I think, stability. I would like to see the format guide stablized.
We have seen Revision Two putting along for a long time.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Should be_ go ahead and specify.
Revision Two and --
MR. WARD:
Well; whatever revision needs be, Mr.
Chairman.
But we don't have -- we have had that issue out for two years ~nd we are not sure where we stand.
That, I think, needs to be formalized.
We need to know the kind of information,in order to come up with a short, meaty review, we need to know the information -you~*.need to have.
That I s what that guide is intended to do, and it is in a state of flux right now.
Now to further answer your question, these tools are available to be used.
They are not used consistently, I think 02-92 pointed out facts along this line.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: My impression is that com..,..
pared with the years, the preceding years, or since 1970 or whatever, the late '60s, that things have leveled off a
_ good.deal.
MR. WARD:
Well, if you look at the bottom line~
though, Commissioner, they should be. Everything is pushing
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25 towards stability, but the schedules keep getting longer.,
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Oh, but the schedule MR. WARD:.* Back in the bad old days COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Wait, wait, wait..
The schedules are drive.n by a lot of things, including utility responses.
MR. WARD :
Sure
- 26 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
And we are-now in kind of a different period when a lot of utilities are pretty relaxed about responding to these applications...
In fact, that is one of the reasons ?ome of these plants aren't getting_built. It isn't because they aren't licensed. It is because the utili-ties don't want to build them.
So, I think we have got to be careful about sorting these things out.
MR. WARD:
I am sure that is the case in some cases..
I know.the pressure from our clients doesn't indicate what you are saying to be true.
But I know it is in other cases.
With our present schedule of 12 years, we are at the point where the utility planner is having a tough time deciding whether he can use nuclear or not, because he can ':t plan ahead that far*.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Well, I mean, I recognize that with uncertainties about demand, you obviously shift J
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25 27 towards the kinds of plants ~ou can build in a short period, because you don't want to delay making decisions, and that is, you know, an understandable situation.
Of course, to the extent one can, one wants to re-duce these periods £rom planning or conception to completion to as shor.t as possible, obviously.
MR. WARD:
Yes.
COMMISSIONER GILINKSY: But I think that the import-ant thing, it seems to me,
- is ---.and the thing that has really created difficulties for the nuclear licensing process --
is that we have_mixed up the review process and the construc-tion process, in a sense.
You know, you walk into one of these projects and ask for an application on the basis of preliminary design in a period when there is a_ good deal of thinking on the part of the government of just what the safety standards ought to be, you end up sort of with the plant half built and. the standards change.
- And these are the kinds of things you have been_complaining about.
From the point of view of the safety reviewers, this also creates a problem because you end up with the opposite situation, which is the thing is built and it is very awkward to impose new require-ments.
It cuts two ways.
I think that the direction of this report and one of which I think there is some agreement, is that this will get away from building a plant while still
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25 I
28 worrying about what it ought to look like, and whether it is going to be approved.
And that seems to be an important step forward, to try. to disentangle those kinds of activities.
And I think that is taking place~
I think it deserves support.
MR. WARD:
Oh, it certainly deserves support.
We do support it.
The backfit problem ties in with the statement I was making about an impact.statements, that I think they have to be used in making any changes, including changes to the regulatory guid~s, or issuance of regulatory-guides.
And we have seen two or three of the value impact statements that have been issued with the r~gulatory guides, and they really have not been very_ good, good pieces of work, particularly as far as the impact goes, as far as the cost goes.
This:is true for the one on fire protection; it is true on the one on cranes.
The Staff does not have the facility to assess are making.
the costs of a lot of the changes they And I.think that there needs to be an educational process, possibly interaction with industry; certainly my committee and others in industry would be happy to support that kind of an effort, to bring the costs into focus.
Well, let me make two more points.
I got side-tracked from my comments, but I am happy to answer your
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25 29 questions.
The other point comes on discipline with the Staff.
We have seen a change in the way_ the Staff operates, from a project team to a gathering of technical branches.
In fact, I have used the term, nthe tyranny of the technical branches,"
is what we are in right now.
The project manager is not the strong man, not providing perspective, not controlling the re~iew and not resolving dissention.
And particularly with the open policy now where the Commission has*-p.Sked that dissenting views be cons,tdered, there needs to be a strong decision-making process to resolve that dissention and not merely highlights it and carries it through the hearing process. It needs to be resolved.
I also suggested in my talk in San Francisco that early identification of issues, which 02-92 also supports and supports well, that the intervenor bring...--. be allowed and in fact required, to bring his technical issues to the fore while the technical review is in.process. And those technical issues should be resolved by the Staff during the technical review, not the political issues, but the technical issues, the safety issues.
I think that would be helpful~
Then the hearing board would be presented with a technical review of the intervenor and the Staff 1 s technical issues.
That would make that -- or I think that is *important.
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25 30 The final point -- and I make this every time I can -- there needs to be a goal for regulation..
There needs to be a target to shoot at.
And whether that target be a number, or whether it be a_general perception of safety, and then a studied.and careful system for making changes to that_ general perception, that has to be decided.
But I do think the Staff needs something to shoot at in their techn'ical reviews without this constant que.st for the safer and safer and safer plant.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY: That is one I will agree with you on.
MR. WARD:
That completes my presentation.
MR. PARKER:
Mike?
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Go-ahead~
MR. MILLER:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I approach my subject with a_ good deal of diffi-dence,_ since I.have chosen to bring before you the manner in which the Atomic Safety and Licensing Boards conduct public hearings.. It is a sensitive one for a practioner such as myself, who represents public utilities before licensing boards. and the NRC generally.
I have to say that these are purely observations.
This isn't sour grapes on behalf of any client and doesn't represent the views of any client.
It is, however, tempered by my own experience,
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25 31 which includes not only practicing before the Nuclear Regula-tory Commission but before state and federal courts and a variety of state and federal administrative agencies on a fairly regular basis.
Now, having made all those disclaimers, I will_ go on to say that in my estimation, the performance of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Boards is.not consistent, and it is not consistentty high, even given that there is going to be some inevitable variation among individual who are called upon to exercise judgment in a situation such as that.
That conclusion is based both on my personal ob-servations from an advocate'-s standpoint, and a review of licensing board and Appeal Board decisions
- That revie~ also suggests that perhaps some of the problems are addressable.
First, --
COMMISSIONER BRADFORD:
When you tossed in the Appeal Board.there, had you meant to include them in every-thing or just their decisions <:3-s to the quality of the --
MR. MILLER:
No.
I should add that I have a very different perception of the Appeal Board and its approach to the problems which are presented to it for adjudication.
That is, I think it does an extremely conscientious and_
thorough job.
I don't always agree with :_the results, of course, but notwithstanding that, I think it operates at a
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~)
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)
32 very different level than the licensing boards do in most cases.
The first observation that I would like to make which I think supports my_ general conclusion, is I think that the chairmen, the men who are appointed as chairmen of the licensing boards, in large measure have inadequate knowledge
-~*
of the technical issues which are presented to them.
That is, I don't know that they,....-;- I don't think that they understand the technology or the critical environmental factors that are going to be before them for decision.
This. leads them in some instances when disputes are brought before them for resolution, to rely on the tech-nical members of the board for such things as relevance, materiality and certain factual matters.
And the technical members of the board themselves lack some legal background which enables them t~ make a technical-legal judgment, if
.you will, as to the relevancy, materiality, of these matters.
What this leads to is irratic and inconsistent approaches to an evidentiary r~cord.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
May I ask you *.
MR. MILLER:
Yes.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Do you think that the idea of a board, a three-man hoard, is a reasonable idea, or...,...,
MR. MILLER:
Yes:, sir; I do.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
So it is really the wav-it
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25 33 has been implemented or carried out?
MR. MILLER:
I think so, because I think that the notion of having a trained expert in radiological health and safety matters on the one hand and an environmental expert on the other, is really a very sound idea and one which should contribute to a very-good evidentiary record.
And when boards are functioning well, they really do shape the issues that the parties are to address in a very knowledgeable and informed way.
And it leads, I think, to a_ good process; that is~ the concerns which ought to be addressed are addressed.
That is when it is working well.
But, because of these lacks that I have observed, I think that.what you find is that some matters which are clearly pertinent to the decision making process are arbi.:,.-
trarily excluded.
The opposite approach is for the licensing board chairmen to say:
Well, we will let it in for what it is worth, which leads to an over-burdened_ record.
And I have to add that it seems to me that licensing boards treat inter-,,-
venors, represented by counsel, much more gingerly than they treat licensees, public utilities and the NRC regulatory staff.
In some cases, the chairmen themselves seem to lack familiarity with the evidentiary rules and with the manner in which a hearing should be conducted; in other words, what it takes to be a judge, if you willa
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25 34 This leads to another problem; that is, the cali-ber 0£ some of the written decisions is not good.
The Appeal Board in Seabrook admonished the licensing board over*its failure to make subsidiary findings on contested pieces of evidence and even t.o discuss these conflicts, much less re....
solve them.
This leads again to burdens on all the parties, be-cause we are all *asked to prepare.draft findings of fact and conclusions of law for*the licensing board, and we kind of assume, on the basis of what the Appeal Board has told us on a number of occasions, that we really do have to get down to the nitty-gritty and almost deal with every bit of con~
tested evidence in the draft findings which we present to the licensing board.
They are then confronted with masses of pieces of papers presented by the parties and are required, then, to pick and choose, if you will, and hopefully exercise some individual initiative in making their own decisions.
I think if the overall quality of the decisions
.were better, that you wouldn't find these kinds of stringent requirements being imposed by the Appeal Board *.
And the Appeal Board discipline of licensing boards is really not a satisfa-ctory way of dealing with the situa....
tion:
First of all, it can lead to the electric utilities*
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25 35 or intervenors or any party who appears before a licensing board being penalized; that is, having the proceeding remanded for further findings., or whatever.
One of the things that I would like to suggest is that perhaps there ought to be a more extensive training* pro...
- gram.
My perception is that the program for qualification and training of panel members is somewhat limited. There may be a list of suggested readings and an occasional seminar.
I think that the lawyer members of the panel ought to be required to attend a series of lectures or seminars on the basic techn9logy of a nuclear plant, as _well.as the enviro -
mental factors that are likely to be brought to their atten-tion.
Now, this ~aises some problems in a technical sense about conflicts and talking.to people who may later appear before them as witnesses, but I believe th.ose could be resolved.
I think that at another level a knowledge of basic evidentiary rules, conduct of~ hearing, ought to be a subject
- !;or training of all members of the.panel.
The Federal Rules of Evidence were adopted within the last few years.
They are used in the federal district courts and have been followed by many state courts.
Tney are comprehensible, it seems:.to me; they are relatively simple.
And I think they could lead to an expedited.licensing process, at least insofar as the
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25 36 hearings go.
And I think that if people know about these things and if the nonlawyer members, at least, have some rudimentary familiarity with them, it may expedite the hearing process.
I think that records will become more comprehensi-ble, and this really should lead to a better quality of written decisions by the licensing boards themselves.
I should add that there is precedent for this type of approach, I.think,
- at both the federal and state levels; the Judicial Conference of the United States of the various circuits has been established by statute. _There are institutes on sentence at which judges come together and dis-cuss *the criteria that will guide them with respect to the imposition of sentences.. *.im criminal cases.
Some states have extremely formal sessions for new judges, which te~ch them how to be judges; how to call the balls and strikes,. if you will.
I don I t know th.at any-*
thing that detailed is necessary, but it is something that I think deserves your attention,.because this aspect of the
- licensing process is one which, it seems to me, the Commission itself is somewhat removed from in the conduct of its other responsibilities.
The other subject that I would like to touch very briefly on, because I see we are almost out of time( has to do with a matter of water quality technical specifications.
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25 37 This is quite a different subject.
As I am sure.this Commission knows, this is a matter which is clearly within the scope of the responsibility of the federal EPA and the states.
Mr. Case recently sent a letter to the Carolina Power and Light Company, I believe, in which he said that on an experimental basis, I believe, mak an effort to remove some of the redundant reporting require~
ments which are at present in the technical specifications.
This is a process that ought to be expedited.
In at least one instance of.which I am aware,*there are no state and feder~l requirements for monitoring of water quali~
ty parameters.
Nonetheless, the NRC tee specs require it..
The data is thus assembled.and.reported to an agency which can do nothing with it wh~n the agencies that are responsible and presumably have the authority to do sqrnething with* it, don't care to receive it.
I just urge that the process of eliminating this kind of overlap which is very expensive, I think, for the utilities and must be for the ~gency as well, be eliminated.
Thank you.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Thank you.
(Pause.)
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
That is very precisely done from a time standpoint.
I congratulate you.
MR. PARKER:
That is the end of our formal comments
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25 38 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I wish that this Commission's affairs could proceed generally in as orderly a fashion.
(Laughter.)
MR. PARKER:
Mr. Walske can take a minute and a half, if you have a* minute and a half left.
I will devote it t~ questions if you have questions.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
We.11, let' s see if there are a couple of questions.
Maybe we can do both.
(No response.)
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Shoot~
MR. *PARKER:
You have two minutes, Carl.
MR. WALSKE:
My remarks are very brief
- But I thought something should be s*aid about the question of proliferation and the work that we do at the Atomic Industrial Forum on it.
We have a number of groups that participate, and I personally am involved rather dir~-
ectly with.most of th~m.
And we don't often get together and talk and therefore, while you are all together, I tho~ght I should as=-
sure you that there is deep interest in the proliferation problem in industry, in preventing.* proliferation; not in promoting it.
And at the same time.that I say that, it is only common sense to understand that throughout the'industry, there are a lot of different view points on any_ given problem,
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25 39 and that includes proliferation.
And therefore, you can't listen to everv voice and say:
Well, that's the voice of every one.
That includes my own voice.
But at the same time, I want to assure you again that there.is a deep interest.
Now, there is a difference of
,I views generally held between what you might call the nuclear industry or nuclear establishment in this country and the Administration.
But I believe that it is an honestly held differ-ence of view that centers around the question of how much value, how much reliance you can put on the denial of the utilization of plutonium, or the denial of reprocessing as a mechanism, and _technical mechanism for slowing or halting proliferation.
And I think that difference of opinion can be summed up that in the _nuclear establishment, there is a strong feeling that technical barriers won't_ go very far in dealing with the proliferation problem;. that our main reliance has
- to be on political and institutional arrangements and that to the extent that we don't get on with the job of making the necessary political and institutional arrangements, while we look for ways more or less exclusively of pressing the technical type barriers, we will be doi~g ourselves a dis-service and we may lose the opportunity that we have now to
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25 40 make some real progress in coping with proliferation.
But again, the interest is sincere, just as sincere as the interest in the Administration, I can assure you.
But the perspective is honestly different.
Thank you.
MR. PARKER:
Mr. Chairman and Commissioners, we thank you, and put it back to your side of the table.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Well, we appreciate very much your coming.
I think the Commission understands the thrust of the remarks across the table very well.
I dqubt that each of us would have put the matters as precisely as you have put them, but that is to be expected.
We understand and wish you well.
I think it is an important enterpri~e and we wish you well~
(Laughter. }
MR. PARKER:
Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN.HENDRIE:
Thank you.
MR. PARKER:
We wish you well.
(Laughter.}
(Whereupon, at 2:34 p.m.., the hearing in the above-entitled matter was adjourned.l