ML22230A076
| ML22230A076 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 12/08/1977 |
| From: | NRC/OCM |
| To: | |
| References | |
| Tran-M771208 | |
| Download: ML22230A076 (55) | |
Text
RETURN TO SEC1 ETARIAT RECORDS NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION IN THE MATTER OF:
JOINT MEETING OF THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION AND THE ADV!SORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS Place
- Washington, D. C.
Date
- Thursday, 8 December 19 77 ACE
- FEDERAL REPORTERS, INC.
Official Reporten 444 North Capitol Street Washington, D.C. 20001 NATIONWIDE COVERAGE* DAILY Pages 1 -
51 Telephone:
(202 ) 347*3700
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DISCLAIMER This is an unoffici~l tr~nscript pf a meeting oi the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission held on. December 8, 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 10 CFR 9.103, it is not part of the formal or informal record of decision of the matters di_scussed.
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 Cammi ssion may authorize.
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10 11 12 13 14 15 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION JOINT MEETING OF THE
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- NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION AND THE ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS Room 1130 1717 H Street, N. W.
Washington, D. C.
Thursday, 8' December 1977 The joint meeting of the*Nuclear Regulatory Commission 16 and the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards convened at 1
17 2:17 p.m.., pursuant to *notice, Dr. Joseph M. Hendrie, Chairman 18 of the Commission, presiding.
19 PRESENT:
, 20 21 22 23 Commission Members:
DR. JOSEPH M. HENDRIE, Chairman of the Commission MR. PETER A. BRADFORD, Commissioner MR. VICTOR GILINSKY, Commissioner MR. RICHARDT. KENNEDY, Commissioner a
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ACRS Members:
MR. MYER BENDER, Chairman 25 DR. STEPHEN LAWROSKI, Vice Chairman
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25 MR. JOHN H. ARNOLD, Member DR. SPENCER H. BUSH, Member DR. MAX W. CARBON, Member MR. JESSE EBERSOLE, Member MR. HAROLD ETHERINGTON, Member DR. HERBERT s. ISBIN, Member PROF. WILLIAM KERR, Member DR. J. CARSON MARK, Member DR~ DADE w. MOELLER, Member DR. DAVID OKRENT, Member DR. MILTON s. PLESSET, Member DR. PAUL G. SHEWMO~, Member DR. CHESTER P. SIESS, Member 1a
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P R O C E E D I N G S CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
May we commence.
I am delighted to see the Committee here again and welcome you all, new members and old members, worn-out members --
(Laughter.)
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Traveling members.
Let's see.
You have given me a folder to work* through. : ::If luck is with us we will all have the same folder.
And they do look the same from here.
MR. BENDER:
It happens sometimes.
I CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay.
I think we have a fair number of _things to talk about.
We may at least touch upon some of them.* Okay?
MR. BENDER:
Fine.
Thank you, Chairman Hendrie and Commissioners.
We, as you said, we have a fairly long agenda to cover today.
My suspicion is -that time won't permit us to cover everything.
What I would like to do is to concentrate on the first three items specified in the meeting agenda first, and then if time permits, to deal with things that may be covered in the ACRS report which was submitted to you previously in draft form, and it has some subject matter in it that may be of interest to the Commission.that you might like to have covered.
However, if it is suitable to you, I would like to begin by some discussion of the ACRS vacancies and what is
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being done about them.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Please do.
MR. BENDER:
First I think it should be noted that Dr. Bush, after 12 years of serving on the Committee, has decided that life could be easier if he could spend his time more in the Northwest and he is retiring th?-S year.
And the Committee recognizing that he is one of our.more hardworking members, not the only one, but one of the more hardworking, will miss him terribly and we need to have a replacement, physically, for him.
I know Dr. Shewmon is providing the metallurgical skill that Dr. Bush had contributed to the Committee when he stayed on permanently.
We also expect that John Arnold will be leaving when his* term expires and I _must say for a guy that learned all of his nuclear knowledge after he came on the Committee, he has become surprisingly good and we are going to miss him.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
It's a shame to waste all that education.
MR. BENDER:
It shows. it is not __ incomprehensible.
However, since they are both going, we clearly have to replace them.
We have instituted a plan to advertise the vacancies and I think, as you will see in the tab, I think it must be in Tab 3 or 2.
I am not sure which.
We have suggested some capability that is needed in the Committee.
Primarily we are interested in getting some people *.)_,
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that have some industrial background and perhaps some skill and knowledge of the codes that the nuclear systems are designed to.
People have suggested that if these people happen to have systems engineering understanding, that would be helpful to the Committee as well.
And the advertisement or the announcement that has been prepared suggests those kinds of capabilities as:being the principal needs.
I think the Committee does not rule out the possibility it may find other capabilities might be useful if people outside of the Committee offered names, but we see our immediate needs in those directions.
At this stage, it is not clear that the method for getting people will be successful, if this is the only avenue.
As you know from previous experience, we tried very hard to get outside nominations and the nominations we got turned out to be people that were not available, didn't have the right exper-tise, and for various reasons *dia.n 't serve the purpose of the Committee.
I think that is about all we have to say about that.
If_ you want us to respond to any questions, we will be happy to do so.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I think solicitation along this line is appropriate.
I do think the Committee has a diverse enough membership and that the stature and reputation and position in the field, in itself that the Committee has a
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Nevertheless, I think public solicitation is a useful 3
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25 thing and may bring up some people that would not have occurred to you.
It seems to me quite a reasonable thing to do.
Let's see, this would be --.it I s been done several times before.
MR. BENDER:
I think this is the second time we publically solicited.
CHAIRMA.. ~ HENDRIE:
Well, the Commission is always very reluctant to do precedent-setting things.
As long as this is the second one of these, it is probably all right.
MR. BENDER:
By finding one by this method, we will set a nice precedent.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I think it* is an eminently sensible thing to do an.d we encourage you to do it.
MR. BENDER:
Fine.
The second item we wanted to discuss briefly was the fellowship program.
As you know, that is in the bill which will probably be signed.
I don't think it will be very easy to do, but who knows.
Sin~e the fellowship program is in the bill, we are implementing, or planning to set up an.. opera-tion to get some people on board.
We have identified a group of problems that the fellows would work on.
I think we have to screen the list.
We realize that the role of the fellow in our operation has to be one of information gathering and analysis as opposed to one where the fellows create new
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information.
Clearly, to get the right kind of people, there will have to be some creative element to the work and it has to be structured in that way, but we envision that it will take a while to get good people active and we probably won't have a large number of them before the end of the year, but we are pursu~ng the matter as diligently as we can with the Personnel Staff and hopefully we will get some help within a reasonable time.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Is there a public announce-ment associated with that or will there be?
MR. FRALEY:
I think we will have to go out and announce that these vacancies are available and call for people to apply who are intere.sted, so I think in that way, there will be some sort of a public announcement, yes.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I guess that.while you will end up circularizing universities and other places that seem like reasonable centers of interest in this kind of thing, I assume those announcements will be noted in the Commission News Re-lease and in the weekly collection of these things and so on, so that it will get out to the whole mailing list one way or another.
MR. BENDER:
If we can go to the third item then.
As you know, _the bill also includes the Congressional bill -
includes a requirement that the ACRS perform a review of the
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NRC safety requirements and anticipating that requirement in the bill, we have been carrying on a review process for several months.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Is.that a one-time review or is this supposed to be an annual?
MR. BENDER:
Annual review is our interpretation.
I don't know that we have lboked at it~in detail.
Let me suggest this mode for discussion.
Dr. Siess has been carrying the effort and pretty much running the review.
I suggest we let him summarize what the situation is and then because there is particular interest in the matter of the ECCS, _bypass experiment, which the Committee has not come to a final conclusion on, I thought it might be useful for you to hear the pros and cons of the experiment as the Committee understands them today.
Now, we are still trying to sort out the matter and the Committee does not have a final position on this yet.
DR. SIESS:
First, I am not chairing it.
I am cochairing it.
Dave Okrent is the regular chairman of the Reactor Safety Research Subcommittee but in his occasional absence I have taken on some of the responsibility.
MR. BENDER:
In the real sense, he is sharing it.
Not honorary cochairman this time.
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DR. SIESS:
In an anticipatory manner, we began._
working *on th:is. thing back in May by enlarging the standing 8
ACRS Subcommittee on Reactor Rese~rch to include all 15 members of the Committee, divided up into six working groups, and we divided up the research programs into what looked like logical groups and assigned those to each of the six wo~king groups.
At this particular time we have draft chapters covering all the areas of research and including one --
some comments on research management and introduction, of course.
We wi-lL be spending most of our time at this meeting, except for time devoted to D. C. Cook, going over those drafts, and I hope arriving at some level of consensus.
We expect to. make the 31 December 1977 deadline, and just hope that the law gets signed before that time.
I don~ t think the data on our report should precede the data on the*bill.-
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
There is also the terrible thought that suppose in some fashion it falls out of the bill in. the last minute, and you.ha,ve done a report that you didn ~t need to:
DR. SIESS:
If that happens, we can send the report to the Commission, and I am sure you will find it useful.
CHAIR't-1AN HENDRIE:
We will find it useful.
DR. SIESS: That is where we stand. As I say, we are
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25 shooting for the end of this year. Beginning January 1, I think we will start on next year's report.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
It seems no more than timely to do so.
DR. SIESS:
We think we know a little bit better how to do it. Before the year is out, we expect to use some number of the Fellows to assist us in that.
So I think in terms of the general situation, that is it.,.Mike.
MR. BENDER:
Do you have 3.ny general questions or comments on the,status prior to this other discussion?
9 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
No. We are just encouraged to know that you* have sort :of anticipated what was coming and have gone ahead so e ffecti ve-ly to coalesce the Committee opinion around these.
DR. SIESS:
It is about two days ahead of us.
We have. gone ahead, how effectively, I don't know yet.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Can you tell us what the categories are?
DR. SIESS: They are listed on the second page of our report to you. They essentially apply -- These are the branch designations, systems, engineering analysis, development is principally ECCS research, then there is fuel behavior branch, lf).etallurgy, material, site safety... These are basically the branches within the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research.
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25 10 That seemed to be the way they had it divided up, an we divided up essentially.the same way.
COMiv'uSSIONER GILINSKY: Research management is what, kind of an overall assessment?
DR. SIESS:
It is look~ng at a number of things.
The Committee hasn't read the draft I wrote last weekend yet, but one thing that I am sure it will cover, because I have selected this from individual chapters and put it into one chapter, is that the size of the office staff seems awfully small for the amount of work that-- the amount of research that they are administering and monitoring, and what we think they should be doing.
We think they should be spending quite a bit of their time knowing what the problems are, knowing what other people are doing to solve those problems, helping to set up res~arch statements, problem statements, and not spend all thei time managing research.
Responsive research that is going on there, is something like
$2 million a man.
That seems pretty high by almost any standards.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
You say you drafted this last weekend. Sol Levine didn't?
DR. SIESS:
No. Sol didn't have anything to do with this. The individual working groups pretty much had this perception individually. The actual ratios, dollars per man,
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25 11 varied tremendously thro_ugh the organization, but they all seem to be rather excessive, and it just doesn't look like the Staff was large enough to do all the things that they think they ought to do; and certa+/-.nly, that we think they ought to do.
MR. BENDER:
Let's recognize the Committee _. __ as a whole has not looked at Dr. Siess' draft. We may temper his views a little bit.
DR. SIESS: Those statements I made were culled from individual working group drafts.
I think there is a certain amount of agreement in the general area.
The other things.r won't mention, the Committee hasn't seen them, but they were secondary things.
MR. BENDER:
With respect to the ECCS bypass experiment, as you know*r ihere are many views concerning that experiment, its value, and the Cammi ttee spent the better part of this morning hearing the Staff's discussion of it, and hear-ing the views of the members concerning it~
We have elected to ask Dr. Plesset to outline the paten tial criticisms of it, and Dr. Isbin to express the thoughts that support the experiment.
We think it would be useful to have that done.
I will ask Dr. Plesset to start off.
DR. PLESSET:
I am supposed to accentuate the negative and let Isbin accentuate the positive.
You know, of course, that that is not enough time, one morning for the
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25 Committee to get a consensus.
It usually takes quite a bit longer.
So I am just presenting one facet of the question.
12 I t..."iink that what is involved in asking for this facility goes to the heart of a lot of the problems of two-phase flow, which appear here, but in other parts of ECCS analysis.
I also think it is worthi.,saying that the fact that we could use more infor-mation on bypass shouldn't.be taken to mean that we have any reservations about the conservatism of Appendix K, so far as
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Now, there are several things that might be asked about this program.
It is.a large _facility, and these often tend to not be adaptable to what you learri, nor flexible. and sometime*s one *is saddled with a facility which guides the progmatn rather than the rev~rse.
So that one should ask, is it a cost-effective thing to do?
I am sure we will learn something from the facility but will we learn all that we should learn?
I don't believe it th~t this.facility will establish scaling.laws which will make it possible to extrapolate to full-scale with any great degree of certainty.
Essentially., as I understand it, we are going from a
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4 13 It is true there is in the program a third scale facility, but*to my mind; this is not a true one-third scale facility.
It is reduced from what a tr.ue one-third scale facility. :should be, inasmuch as it doesn't have the steam 5
requirement that such a facility would need.
6 I think one could learn a great deal without 7
plunging into this large expenditure and large facility at
- 8 this time, by further work with the two-fifteenth scale 9
facility, at Battelle-Columbus, and perhaps I would like very 10 much to see some basic studies of two-phase flow, of a quite 11 general nature which would give us *a very.useful background 12 for understanding the physical laws and physical behavior of 13 such flows, not necessarily limited to the by.pass question, 14 which in many ways may not be one of the most important 15 16 17 18 19 questions in the whole system of reactor behavior.
I think that is as much-as I would say at this time and if you have *any. more questions later on, I would be glad to answer.. them.
MR. BENDER:
Let me suggest then that Dr. Isbin E~
20 present the other aspects of it.
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DR,-ISBIJN:
With that introduction, :,..,let me add Milt and I are cochairmen of working group 1, which deals with this systems analysis and ECCS.
And that perhaps one of the difficulties that face us now is in part due to some of your rules.
In February of this year, the ECCS Subcommittee met to discuss with the Staff this end of bypass test facility and we were told at that time that until the documents had been presented formally to the Commission as far as a recommendation on the Staff, we would not have --
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Which document?
DR. ISBIN:
Documents that would present a position 13 paper of the Staff whi-ch would explain in detail what the objecti es 14 and test matrices and plans might be for this end of bypass test 15 facility.
16 So as*a consequence, neither the ECCS Subcommittee 17 nor the working group *through this past year have re--reviewed 18 the material on this subject.
19 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:. The Staff had a group of 20 consul tan ts looking at this.
Did you ever meet with them?
21 DR. ISBIN:
All right.
We met *in February, which 22 initiated this d~scussion.
23 You had a review group in April in which* some of our consultants also participated, but.it is my understanding that the progress between February and April was not very much.
I 15 That some of the questions which our Staff, our consultants 2
had raised, were not really thoroughly answered and addressed 3
even in the April meeting, and i:t _is underst,andable from my 4
point of view to see some of the negati:ve c~mments, which arose 5
from that April meeting.
6 Since that time, there has been considerable work don 7
by the NRC, both by the regulatory group and by your safety 8
research group.. 11uch of this information has not been discussed 9
by the full Corru:nittee, and it was only today that we had a chan e 10 to be brought up-to-date as to the status.
So we are not in 11 the position to g.i ve you a formal conclusion or a cops ens us or 12 a
collegial_' conclusion of the end of bypass at this time.
13 It is my personal point of,view that the Staff work 14 that has been done subsequently is very significant, and 15 indeed does justify going _ahead with this large-scale experiment 16 that this would be the.first time in which such instrumentation 17 of local phenomena would be measured, which is important in l8 developing your advanced codes, which work.on the premise that 19 if you ~now the local conditions, then indeed you can test the 20 *-.flCMable conditions.
This is all part of scaling.
21 22 23 I don't think that we and our consultants have had a full opportunity to appreciate all of the background work that has gone into the current study.
You have available to you some of the best experts in this field, not only in terms of your own people, but also the contractors* that are involved in
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this TRAC Code and its ability to use such information and the 4
need for additional information is quite obvious.
All of the 5
Committee members have been on record as always advocating a 6 better understanding of the two-phase flow phenomena.
7 We have not been exposed in such depth to give you 8
a collegial answer as to the accomplishment of this particular 9 facility,but the principal objective, as I understand it, of this 10 facility is not so much in trying to answer a specific question 11 on safety conservatism in Appendix K, but it is more broadly 12 addressed in fundamentals.
This is something that the ACRS 13 in general has long advocated.
14 15 Perhaps I should stop at this point.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I think a good summary of the 16 points of view.
17 I suspect the Committee has more Subcommittee meeting 18 scheduled.
19 How will you gather your thoughts together from here 20 on.out?
21 MR. BENDER:
Well, I hesitate to speculate.on what 22 the Committee will do, but I offer some possible actions.
23 24 Since we have to write our report to Congress this month, we are going to meet Dr. Siess' goal.
We may have to partially beg the question concerning the final Committee view.
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17 possible we, of course, will try to come to some consensus but 2
turns out we are uncomfortable with the amount of informa-3 4
we have been able to develop in the time frame, it would undesirable to express an opinion that wasn't well based.
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we don't come to.a conclusion, I think it is a fair judgment t 6
e would encourage our Subcommittee to do some further review of 7
e proposal, prior to taking a position.
8 It is clear that Dr. Plesset's view is not unique 9
to him.
There are many people that think that more general 10 kinds of studies might be more useful than the large facility; 11 but it is also true. there is another school of thought that 12 favors the facility; and the Commi tt.ee is not unaware of the 13 possibility of a dichotomy of.positions, either of which might 14 turn out to be a useful way of going and you may be constrained 15 by time and money.
16 I think that is probably: as much as we can say about 17 that particular problem at this stage.
18 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay..
Fair enough.
19 MR. BENDER:
If there.are.no further questions, or 20 if.there are things --
Mr. Kennedy has come in, things that 21 you might want to ask about.
22 23 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I am sorry I am late.
24 I appreciate your going forward without me.
MR. BENDER:
We excuse you.
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25 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
As I understand it, you were
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18 discussing the bypass proposal and the Committee is not of one 2
mind on the question.
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It is not rare for the Committee.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Even for *the Commission.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Have_you had an opportunity t 6
discuss this further with our ow~ consultants?
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MR. BENDER:
The Staff consultants?
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY*:
Yes.
I gather they were 9
rather unenthusiastic about this in April.
10 What Mr. Isbin seems to be saying is that things have 11 happened since then?
12 DR. ISBIN:
In my judgment,* there has been consider-13 able progress since April; which our own ACRS consultants have 14 not had the advantage o~ reviewing.
I can't speak as to what 15 16 17 18 19
.20 21 22 23 conclusions they would come to,.but I would be optimistic.
MR. BENDER:
But we haven't had the benefit of that information that.Dr. Isbin has talked about put on the con-sultants as a basis for changing their judgments.
What we know about them now is based on what they have had, what, from April and prior to that.
Is that right, Herb?
think DR. ISBIN:
This* ;i.s the recorded comment, yes.
MR. BENDER:
Dr. Plesset has talked to them.
DR. PLESSET:
I can'* t speak -for al 1 of them, but I there are som~ of them who have not changed their views.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
These are the Staff '*s?
19 DR. PLESSET:
No.
Our consultants'.
I can't speak 2 for all of them.
3 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
All of them have not changed 4 their views.
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DR. PLESSET:
I know all of them have not.
MR. BENDER:
There is a group of people that think 7
the large facility can't quite do what it is claimed to do, 8
and that it is very costly.
There might be better ways of 9 getting comparable information.
10 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Could you briefly elucidate 11 why they think it-can't do what it is supposed to do r in what 12 regard can '*t it do.what it is supposed to do?
13 14 MR. BENDER:
I will leave that to one of the experts.
DR. ISBIN:
The difficulty we have in speaking for 15 our consultants at this stage is a.remark that I made to start 16 with, the consultants have not had.the benefit of the recent 17 Staff work which, in my mind, would make the difference.
18 That is probably as far as we can go.
19 MR. BENDER:
Dr. Pless*et.could *probably say something 20 about what some of the reservations are.
21 It is too short a meeting to cover them in great de-22 tail, but in a qualitative sense maybe.
23 DR. PLESSET:
I think one of the ways of expressing 24 the reservations, Mr. Commissioner, is *that the problem is, what are the scaling laws for the complex phenomena involved in Ac. Reporters, Inc.
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.20 this two-phase flow in ECC bypass, and there is some scepticism which is serious, on the part of some people in the field of thermalhydraulics, that one can get these laws by going from, say, 2/15 to 3/15 or even to the third scale which even in the third scale, which in many respects is not a true test.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
You would do what, do a serie of smaller-scale experiments?
DR. PLESSET:
Yes.
Though I would like to leave that to a few of the academic experts in this field, if they are given this problem and an enormous amount of money and some time to do the kind of-experiments that would elucidate the unknown.
At the same time I would encourage a lot of empha-13 sis on the present two-fifteenth scale test.
14 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Moving to smaller scale goes the 15 wrong direction.
The uncertainty in terms of scaling the reacto 16 systems on the upside, not the downside.
If you went down 17 from 2/15 to 1, from that to 1/30, to 1/1000, where you were 18 sure you could scale in that range, you still wouldn't have 19 dealt with what to me seems like *to be an intellectual diffi-20 culty that we are able to be very sure or as confident as we 21 would like to be in moving toward full scale.
22 So it seems to me, you have to move upward instead 23 of down and unfortunately you rise into a dollar ceiling and 24 practicality ceiling very rapidly.
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25 DR. PLESSET:
If you limit yourself to trying to seal
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21 to the reactor type situation you do run into what you are speaking of and that is a difficulty, but there are other kinds of experiments not tied to a particular geometry or trying to duplicate a reactor in some small scale, still can tell you 5
a great deal.
6 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
But is that a replacement for 7
having the best information you think you can get, about the 8
object about which the questions arise?
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 DR. PLESSET:
Hopefully it would be.
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2 22 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
If it would be, why do we have large hardware in the field at all, experimental 3
hardware?
4 You know, the same argument would s.ay.tha t 5
LOFT, which has not been a notably e.fficient exp en di ture 6
but is turning out to be a very interesting, integral 7
experiment, we could have done without that and done a 8
series of isolated, small-scale things on the laboratory 9
bench and that would have been fine.
10 COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
There*"s a difference of 11 ti me and money, though.
In other words, if you can do 12 small-scale for a comparable amount for less, with 13 14 comparable time, or less money and less time --
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
It seems to me that the 15 product is what is important.
If you are not going to 16 get a product that is going to be useful in terms of what
-17 you set out to do, then no amount invest~d in this work 18 will be worth putting in it.
I 19 On the other hand, if you can get the product and 20 you concluded the product itself is important, and I"m 21 persuaded it is, then it seems to me if you can put money 22 in it and get it, get that product, then you have a simple 23 24 25 cost benefit analysis to draw.
You can say to yourself, uI know I"m going to get the product now and it.J's a product that will be satis.factory now.
Am I willing to
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23 spend that kind of money?
I'm not willing to spend the money at all if I don*'t think I-'m going to get the product. 11 That-' s the point.
So the question is:
Where does one go in this 6
project?
Where does one get to a,confidence level that's 7
halfway reasonable in the scientific sense, that he*'s 8
going to get a product that's going to be genuinely.useful and can be extrapolated1 if nBcessary?
Where do you ha ve to 10 go in scaling to do that?
11 DR. PLESSET:
I*f I could try to answer that very 12 brie_fly.
I don*'t th.ink we can determine a scale experiment 13 now on the basis of what we know.
We certainly would 14 learn something by this expenditure, but we can't be 15 certain that we will get really acceptable answers from 16 the point of view of the reactor itself.
17 If we could get the sea ling laws, then we 18 would be certain.
But I question whether we will out of 19 th.is program.
20 In connection with LOFT 21 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
Would a larger scale 22 experiment make that more likely?
23 24 25 DR. PLESSET:
Oh, yes.
COMM! SSIONER KENNEDY:
How large?
DR. PLESSET:
I think half.scale -would be nice,
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. 21 22 23 24 25 24 but that's kind of ridiculous.
That/s just out of sight.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
That's what the experiment started out to be a year-and-a-half or two years ago, as I re ca 11.
MR. BENDER:
Since only money stands in the way -
DR. BUSH:
A quarter of a billion dollars.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
We recycled this last piece of conver~ation in order to get Mr. Kennedy up to speed, and I make a finding that he 1 s now up to speed.
MR. BENDER:
It was probably worthwhile.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
To me it was and I appreciate it.
MR. BENDER:
If we can go to the ACRS activities report which is in Tab I, I suggest that you just let me select topics to be covered in some order and that will save you a lot of fumbling around.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Appreciate it.
MR. BENDER:
The first item I would like to deal with is the sxatus of our generic items evaluation.
Dr. Bush mad.ea valiant effort to develop a new position.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I asiumed he solved them.
Surely we won't let him retire without having solved them.
MR. BENDER:
We will leave.it to Dr. Bush to
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25 see if he will accede to that request.
DR. BUSH:
This report, at least the 95 percent of it, follows the pattern which was developed 4
in the first 2 or 3 reports; namely, a reiteration of 5
the resolved and unresolved issues, and, of cour..se, an 6
indication of those issues resolved since the preceding 7
report, namely, number 5.
8 It differs in one significant aspect and it 9
got part way to the goal, only part way.
But at least 10 it was a step.
And that is, in the final pages, we have 11 attempted something that hasn"t been done before and 12 I personally felt was need_ed; that is, to attempt to 13 14 15 place priori ties on the resolution of these items that will tell us where to put your money.
And we benchmark on the staff priorities, on 16 the comparable issues.
Obviously, they have more priorities 17 because they have more.issues.
There is a difference to a 18 degree in that we were considering priorities within 19 priorities; but, finally, back off from that, so our 20 AEs are comparable to the staffers-" AEs and their number..s 21 are just an in di ca tor.
22 The. report does not go a step further and 23 establish what to do with the resolution, but that*-'s another 24 25 matt er.
MR. CASE:
I thought there was fairly good
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26 coordination between our AEs and yours.
DR. BUSH:
I didn't mean to indicate there wasn't.
There are very few issues where we would place 4
higher prioritie~.
5 MR. BENDER:
We plan during the next year to take 6
a very hard look at the implementation action associated 7
with generic items; both those which are in the resolved 8
category and those which are in the unresolved category,
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with the anticipation that we will be in a little better 10 position to evaluate the effectiveness of our advice.
II We may report to -you later on that subject.
12 That's all we have on the generic items business
- 13 If there is noth.ing more you want to comment on, 14 I would like to turn now to a matter which the committee 15 has decided it should examine:
that is, the application of 16 ALARA principles., of things other than the environmental 17 effluents.
18 I would 1 ike for* Dr. -Moeller to comment on 19 that.
20 DR. MOELLER:
As the commissioners well know, 21 the staff has looked at the ALARA criteria, has developed 22 ALARA criteria for the environmental releases from nuclear 23 power facilities, commercial nuclear power facilities 24 25 into various regulatory guides;' notably, No. 8.8.
They have developed guides and criteria form-plant control
27 of exposures, keeping them as low as reasonably 2
achievable.
3 The committee, and IJm sure the staff, has 4
looked at other areas.
But we thought at this time it 5
might be a wise move to do this in a formal way through 6
a series of subcommittee meetings, and to look at the 7
application of ALARA principles, topics such as waste 8
disposal, reprocessing plants, if that would be applicable, 9
or fuel fabrication plants, enrichment, and particularly 10 decommissioning of commercial plants that are no longer l 1 needed.
12 That is, what would be a wise system of rules
]3 14 and guides to apply in det~rmining whether you kept the doses or whether you are keeping the doses.within the 15 ALARA criteria.
16 We would like both at public and occupational 17 exposures in this regard.
We are particularly interested 18 in finding out what the staff is doing, the size of its 19 effort in this area, their priorities and their goals.
20 I think that pretty much wraps up what we have 21 in mind.
22 MR. BENDER:
If there are no comments, then I 23 would like 24 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I guess I-would just remark, 25 and r-m sure you already have it well in mind, that I
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28 would expect that your interest would be one of radiation protect! on, radiation safety a spec ts.
The committee in the pa st, in part on its own 4
inclination and in part, it seems to me, on the inclination 5
of the commission, ha.s* not moved into the area of 6
reviewing the broad aspects of the com mission-J's 7
environmental analysis of plants.
8 Those cover a very broad range under a series 9
of subjects, it seems to me, the committee would find 10 itself rea ll.y over-extended trying to cover.
11 So I understand your.. interest in ALARA matters, 12 as I have indicated.
You can tell me if IJ"m wrong
- 13 14 DR. M0EI.l.ER:
We agree.
MR. BENDER=
I think you sensed our intent.
15 As a matter of fact, it makes a very convenient 16 transition to the next topic, which is proposed legislation 17 to reform the regulatory pr9cess.
18 We have not had time to look at the proposed 19 new legislation that has_been drafted, I think, by the 20 commission staff or perhaps by some combination of 21 commission staff and other people.
22 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Actually, it's a combination 23 of other people, parens, and the commission staff, close 24 25 pa.rens.
MR. BENDER:
We are looking at it from the
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.I I 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 29 standpoint of what the demands are on the committee in terms of what it will be expected to review.
It seems to be a backing away somewhat from our original suggestion that we have the option of when to apply the committee review process, but it doesn~t back away entirely.
The sense of it is feir ly close to what was originally intended.
There is one point, though, that I think we should take not.e of.
Since you suggested that we are very limited in our safety review processes, it's not really clear to us that there is great value in changing the name of the committee to something.which has the term 11safetyu in it,
.and offers the opportunity +/-or us to expand.our role.
I think the committee still prefers that it retain its name and not have to explain that *11 safety 11 means safeguards, and vice versa, on a continuing basis.
PROF. KERR:
We are prepared to get our placards out and march around the table.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Down in front on the street is the proper place to do that.
Up here ri.obody wi 11 know, but down there you can do better.
You can get the networks and everything down there.
We will come back to that in a second *. First, I want to. say about the draft legislation, a good part of the draft legislation that concerns the NRC flows fairly
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. 21 22 23 24 25 30 directly from past legislative proposals which the commissi01 has made.
So that by the time it's sorted out and so on, why, it looks very much -- it ends up being very much Ii ke proposals thq t the commission has made in the past -- early site reviews, and so on.
In the section on the advisory committee role, I can_ remember -- my God, it must be 1969 or something like that -- I can remember going to see the. joint committee with somebody and talking about legislation to relieve the committee of the mandatory review requirement and leave it in an arrangement in which either the commission might request your revi.ew on a project or _the committee might say that it thought it ought to review, and either one of those would then be binding.
You know, establish that the review ought to be done and sort of every year since then it comes around.
Now, current language backs a little bit away from relieving all the mandatory things.
In fact, all it relieves you from, gives us the option, again, in terms of your wanting to review and saying so, or the commission wanting you to review and saying so -
that's limited to thermal power _reactor plants.
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25 31 So that all of the other facilities in the fuel cycle that you look at are mandatory reviews, advanced reactors.
The language, "thermal neutron,".... -
I think I am responsible for putting "neutron".::in. * :.The.. language started out to be "thermal power plant," and I can perceive that it might be hard to decide what exactly that applied to and I was prepared to have the Staff begin to write regulations for coal-fired sta-tions, which they clearly would do under that kind of language, but I put ~~neutron" in.
It is rather clumsy language.
HTGRs would fall into that category and then, of course, the light water machines.
That is a pretty fair frac-tion of the business, so I think even though it isn't as broad a relief as we asked for in previous years, in terms of its effectiveness, if you should ever need it and want to exercise it, then it is pretty good.
I do suspect that advanced reactors, experimental machines, other fuel cycle facilities are sort of going to be enough of a one-of-a-kind proposition so that the Committee would very likely want to look at them, whether it had relief of the mandatory provision or not.
There are people who are very -- who feel that relieving the mandatory requirements of the Committee is a loss from the overall Commission safety review process.
MR. BENDER:
As I say, we don't see what is in the proposed bill as* being a major variation from what had been
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25 32 originally proposed.
What we are mainly planning to look.at is whe:t.hery*there are implications in the law, in the proposed law, that we h,aven' t understood, that ought to be examined more carefully.
It turns out legal people often put things -- put interpretation on things after they come into existence that you didn't expect at the time the laws were prepared for passage.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Legislation is wondrous stuff.
It can do all kinds of things.
.M:R. BENDER:
I do hope you will join our march not to change our hame, however.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
On the name change, I am about to slide back ln my chair and say, "My colleagues will address this subject."
Do you want to saying anything?
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
It is sort of an historical name, but .safeguards" has taken on a different meaning than what it had originally.
It is a useful thing to have things called by what they do.
I think the most important thing is to keep the initials ~he same.
MR. BENDER:
I will ask Ray Fraley to tell this story.
Ray.
MR. FRALEY:
In order to help people understand, we have told our *secretaries to answer the phone as the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards instead of just using the
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33 initials, and so usually they finish and somebody says, "Oh, this isn't the ACRS office," :and they hang up.
MR. BENDER:
Your p'oint about the acronym is right.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
You know, some companies just drop the name.
MR. BENDER:
Connotation of "safeguard 11 will change with time.
The Committee hasn't changed with time.
It will just retain its tradition.
I think that is enough about that.
CHAirutiAN HENDRIE:
It is duly noted.
I trust the Committee will have an opportuni-ty -- if we get their bill before the Congress, I assume in due tlme~:c the Committee will have a chance to talk to the appropriate committees and I assume the Chairman will step right up there and voice the colloquial opinion.
DR. -LAWROSKI:
We have a large amount of paper with the letterhead on it.
MR. BENDER:. Which will serve no other purpose.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
We can postpone the effective date until the stationery stocks are expended.
MR. BENDER:
If Dr. Siess would mention briefly the situation about the review of the transportation of radioactive material.
DR. SIESS:
I would remind you in January, 1976, almost two years ago, Chairman Anders asked the Committee to take on a couple of tasks.
I just can't help -- I have got to
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34 say this.-:-:most of these tasks involve safeguards to a small degree, but the extent to which they involved safeguards was even greater than the extent to which they involve,reactors.
So if you are looking for an obsolete word CHAIRMA.~ HENDRIE:
You fellows j~st won't quit on a subject.
I used to have the same trouble when I was chairman of the Committee.
DR. SIESS:
One of these tasks had to do with the plutonium shipping package.
We were asked to review the result of the program and make comments to the Commission by mid-March of two years agor so that is a little behind schedule but we are still~.working;' with the Staff.
When they have something on that, we review it with them.
The other cha.rge given :to us --.
COMMISSIONER Y~NNEDY:
Do you _nave anything on --
DR. SIESS:
I understand the Staff is waiting for something from the National Research.Council, Academy of Science, Academy of Engineering Committee, and we haven't met with them, oh, I guess in al-most a year.
'I'.he Subcommittee met with them.
The full committee.
We wrote a letter on it, said we thought they had a pretty good package and they were going to qualify it and come back.
They wanted us to look at the qualifying tests and so forth.
I guess the Academy of Science's committee wants them to crash that airplane.
I think it is silly.
We told
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25 35 them that.
But then they can listen to two committees, and they will get two views.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
What is this?
DR. SIESS:
There was a proposal to get an old 707 and run it into something with.one of these packages in it.
FAA did this.
They ran it out off the end of a runway into a barricade or something, they obviously don't fly it into the ground,* and they had that one cooked up.
It was only going to cost about a quarter of a million dollars.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
If.they got the airplane free.
DR. SIESS:
I think that is right.
We didn't see much point in it. It was one point on a curve and it might not even be on the curve and not quite in the same category as the bypass test.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:. You can scope what will.. happen in an aircraft crash in lot easier ways.
It is a pretty mushy frame.
DR. SIESS:
It is a public relations gimmick as far as I am concerned to crash an a~rplane with a package in it.
r*don't think it proves anything one way or the other.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Let's make.sure if it is done, why, we get good movies.
COMM.:IS,.S.IONER KENNEDY:
If it is done, we have to approve it, Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I will be out of town.
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36 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
I will be, too.
And that means we can't possibly approve it.
DR. SIESS:
The-,other matter, it says: * "Th:-**Ccrnnission-*.
has under way a more general rulemaking proceeding concerning the packaging and transportation of plutonium and radioactive materials.
The Commission requests ACRS to keep informed concerning the progress of these proceedings and to comment on the proposed rules after issuance."
We have kept informed of*the progress by reviewing 10 with the Staff its draft environmental statement on transporta-11 tion of radioactiye materials, and that included all modes and 12 all materials.
We commented on the draft statement.
We comment 13 ed on the fin.a.I statement.
14 You told them to come back to us after they finished 15 editing the final statement.
That is NUREG 0170.
- We had our- -
16 Subcommittee meeting to review that.
The Subcommittee felt 17 we put in just about as much as we would.
The editing job had l8 been pretty good.
And it was our understanding it was going
. 19 20 21 out for public comment on a 45-and 90-day basis.
We ares :.kept inf orrned.
The other thing we were asked to do was comment on the proposed rules after issuance.
I think we stand ready to comment on proposed rules, if any.
NUREG 0170 concludes there is no need to change the rules.
If the Commission agrees with that and decides not to
I d 5 37 change the rules, at least not now, then we would consider our 2
job done.
We have kept informed; there is no rules to comment 3
on; we will go onto some other business.
If you do propose to 4
change some rules, we will be prepared to comment on them.
5 Now, that was another Commission that asked us to do 6 that.
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25 38 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
My thought here was, if the Subcommittee had been keeping current on the matter DR. SIESS:
It's been the Subcommittee.
It's not been to the full Committee.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Pretty well agrees with the substance of the Staff direction, and with the conclusion that the rule change,*:is not needed --
DR. SIESS:
I didn I t say that..
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
You don't agree that --
DR. SIESS:
We didn't address the question as to whether the+/-r conclusion was adequate.
We looked primarily at the technical validity of the record -and had some *comments of the organization of it, but the question as to whether a rule change is needed was not addressed as such and it's not easy to address in a very simple manner.
That _report l_umps together all radioactive materials.
It separates modes of transport.
I look at 10,000 person rem exposure, 1975, and find that 7000 of that, roughly, is radiopharmaceuticals.
You have to dig to separate out the radiopharma-ceuticals from the spent fuel.
If the decision is, do you transport it by truck or by plane or by rail or do you change it, I don't see how that decision can-be made without looking at the different uses,
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25 diffe~ent kinds of materials.
Sane of our consultants felt the same way.
If a hospital in mid-Manhattan, there are only certain ways you can get the radiopharmaceuticals out.
Helicopter or truck.
39 There's not any reactors in mid-Manhattan or fuel reprocessing or fuel storage facilities there.
So spent fuel doesn't have to go through mid.,;Manhatta in the same way that radiopharmaceuticals do, but this report
~oesn't separate those out.
It looks at all of those materials, all the modes of transport, generally concludes that the consequences to the public are small, even including accidents factored in-'.:.on a probability basis, and says, you know, there's some possible changes.
Shipping everything by barge looks like it might be economical.
Shipping certain things by airfreight instead of passenger doesn't look economical.
to answer.
You know.
That kind of thing.
But it's much too complicated a question for us We have to have more specific questions.
MR. MINOGUE:
May I add a comment?
The basic task attempted in this particular study
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- 1:s going on within the Staff, a number of specific problem areas have been identified that warrant further study.
So 6ertainly the conclusion of the Staff is not that no furthe:i:- work need be done, but no general* reassessment of the rules --- even that I think needs another round of public comment.
I would certainly welcome comment from the ACRS as a whole during* that public comment period.
We are not prepared to make a recommendation to the 13 Commission.
14 The next step, the report goes to the printers this 15 week and the next step is to get public comment and on the 16 basis of that, assessing that, come *to the Commission with 17 a recommendation*, which will not be until next summer.
18 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Okay.
Well, let's see, the 19 Committee's question is, what further instructions might the 20 Commission see fit to offer on this subject?
21 Have you fulfilled the request made, or what?
22 23 DR. SIESS:
What advice do you want from us?
. We are still an advisory committee, no matter what I
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25 MR. BENDER:
We are suggesting we don't do any more
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41 unless you ask us further and we are not proposing to do anything voluntarily at this stage.
COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:
That would be consistent with the name change.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I think you will want to keep 6
track of the.., ongoing 7
DR. SIESS:
We will be: glad to look at the public 8
comment on NUREG 0170.
9 10 11 12 13 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
And if particular studies.flow out of the examination, I assume the Subcommittee would stay aware of those.
With regard to the present stqge of things; it seems to me that if the Committee doesn't feel within 15 16 14 itself*any strong need *to develop the subject in the full Committee and come to a letter report, I wouldn't think that the Commission would feel any inc.lination to ask you do do that.
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. 21 22 23 If you want to do it, I'm sure the Commissionwould be glad to have whatever report you might *:want to make.
activity.
What you might do is just note -- well, let's -see DR. SIESS:
It's in the letter.
Page 2 o.f the It says that we anticipate no further activity in this area unless a decision is made to continue to consider 24 rule changes in the future.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
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25 I would regard that as sufficient.
I don't feel any need for you to do more than that.
MR. GOSSICK:
Mr. Chairman, before we leave this area, I would just like to say there was never any serious consideration on the part of the Staff to do this air crash experiment.
There was some conversation at the lower level.
In fact, I think the suggestion came from the National Assembly of Engineers.
I wanted.::you to know this was not in the.serious stage of consid~ration.
DR. SIESS:
I said the NAE committee had recommended it.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
There has been a lot of COMMISSION$R KENNEDY:
It was also one of the Staff's papers.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
We have a lot of aeronauticals in NAE and they would like to see *a little action in this area.
I can understand it.
MR. BENDER:
Next item?
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
If we can do it in five minutes.
MR. BENDER:
If we have the option of dealing with something in five minutes, I think I would like Dr. Bush to
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 43 just close up by summarizing the situation concerning the tectonics of the Pacific Northwest which was reviewe_d last month..
DR. BUSH:
I might mention there's a lot more to this letter than appears on first reading.
This is an outgrowth of comments regarding seismicity as was relevant to the Skagit plant.
We did receive a letter on Skagit but because of the -phraseology that was developed in the official repo:r:-t __
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to the USGS it has much greater implications.
As written, it has the implications to influence two operating plants, three under advanced construction, six under early construction, plus a few reprocessing plants, in a very largerarea.
Briefly, obviously, we had to lean extremely heavily on our consultant in this area.
The report ends up surprisingly enough being less conservative, taking a lower intensity *value than suggested by the USGS, namely, an MM 8 as contrasted with a 9 or 10 that was discussed based on the use of the modified Mercalli criteria.
22 With regard to the mobility, in other words, moving 23 it from.one point to another, we were much closer to the 24 iAce-r Reporters, Inc.
25 Staff position.
I think another message is that the letter or the
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25 44 report pretty*much spells out that the Columbia Plateau tends to be either a different province or subprovince or at least is of much lower intensity.
The Columbia Plateau not only includes Hanford, but also that whole area down the Columbia River to the mouth, so it's a very large area indeed, which would encompass plants such as T~ojan, Pebble Springs, et cetera.
Not necessarily picking up the WNP-35 plant or Skagit, but it does represent_,__ I think, in some respects-.,a milestone.
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-,13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 45 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Spence, in discussing that situation with the consultants, was. there_ any discussion about ways that one might go ahead and establish a basis for believin that the province there is something less than the whole northwest quadrant of the country?
DR. BUSH:
Yes. Well, it is perhaps less of a pr:o--;*_
vince, but more on the quake itself, which would get us back tCMards where we were in Sundesert or some of the others.
There is ongoing work, with which I believe the consultants are hardly -- the consultants are hardly in accord, which indicates there is at least potential for structure in an extremely wild area, very difficult to get into.
This is being explored further.
I think Schlimmer, some of his work is being pursued in this respect. That is part of it. There was a great deal of work done which I think tends to indicate inferentially, that, indeed, the Columbia Plateau represents* a distinctly different province.
It has to do with magnetic measurements, with pole structure, things of that natu<re.
I think when you put all of.that together, our consultants, I believe, were pretty much unanimous with regard 22 to the plateau. Ther? was not that degree of uniformity with 23
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25 across, so I kind of avoided that, and I tried to indicate that, but I believe that -- well, it would be highly desirable t
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25 46 see some more work, to see if you can tie it to a fault structure.
I think otherwise it points in the same direction.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Is there any sort of -- Is there A and B, would there be any utility in sort of a micro-seismic monitoring net out in that area.
DR. BUSH:
There is one to a degree, as you probably realiz$,in the Hanford area.
You mean, a large one.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
On the Hanford. :Reservation.
But is it still operating, by the way?
I can remember that it was a matter of keen inte;rest in FFTF construction permit reviews.
DR. BUSH.:
To my knowledge, it is an I believe there is also one west of the Cascades, because of the deep quakes.
Now, whether it meets your criteria of being a microseismic net, th_at is a question of how many stations, et cetera, but by and* large I would say there is reasonably good instrumentat.t6tr*~ in that respect.
There are obviously some areas where there isn't enough,particularly -as you move up towards the Canadian border.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE: Very good.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
You said you had some prob1e s about get.ting staff documents, because of our rules or something in the* area we are talking about.
Has.that been
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DR. ISBIN:
When I,, went back to your February meeting to see why we haven'.: t gotten the follow-through infor-mation, and it was indicated there the information would not be available to us until it had been presented you.
That_
.apparently: these are your rules.
COMMISSlONER GILINSKY:
And --
DR. ISBIN:
If I am misquoting the Staff, perhaps they can correct me.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Do. you have everything now?
DR. ISBIN:
We have everything now, yes.
CHAIRMAL~ HENDRr-E:
.Was this connected with whether or not it was going to be proposed in the budget.
MR. LEVINE:
I don't know 'whY-we wouldn't furnish 16 1 t.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE :
The next time that happens, my 17 recommendation is an immediate resprt to the Freedom of 18 Information Act.
19 COMMISSIONER KENNEDY:. Who made that pronouncement?
20 21 22 DR. BUSH:
It was predecisional information, I suspect is what it is.
MR. FRALEY:
I believe after some.initial discussion 23 we probably were able to get these documents, but.it may have I,
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25 been a misunderstanding as to the degree to which we could protect them, in view of the Federal Advisory Committee Act.
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25 48 I do think we have all of the appropriate documents.
COMMISSIONER GILINSKY:
Is this a problem of proprietary information or what?
MR. FRALEY:
It might have been.
I am not familiar with the problem.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Do you know,
- can you protect predecisional Staff papers?
MR. FRALEY:
Yes, we can.
DR. SIESS:
Not forever.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I would think so, but the Advisory Committee.Act is not at*odds with the Freedom of Information Act. They do fit together.
MR~ FRALEY:
That is to protect the papers, but the Federal Adivsory Committee Act requires that they be discussed in open meetings, which is a bit of a problem.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE :
We do it all the time.
COMMISSIONER* GILINSKY: Don't the papers relate to another advisory commit~ee?
DR. PLESSET:
You.=-.are thinking of a review group.
I was :interested in getting consultants' __ reports.
I got them last night.
I asked for them about a. *.month ago.
I don't know why it took so long.
MR. BENDER: That doesn't have to do-with restraint on;information. That is just a procedural problem.
i PROF. KERR:
I still insist that is a short-term
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,, CHAIID-1AL~ **HENDRIE: What is a large number, when you hunt lions?
Zero is a large* number, when you hunt lions.
DR. SIESS:
We are still havi-ng some trouble getting 5
_documents out of the Staff.
6 DR. OKRENT:
I find one of the best ways to find out 7
what Mr. Pollard has found.
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'c 25 CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
If you perceive-~ At least in principle it would be poss.ible to.sort:.: of turn the faucet.
toward the Committee and just,:*you know, give you a copy of everything.
DR. SIESS:
There was one stage where we said we wou d like to see the FY '79 budget requests from research, and the word got back to me now.-::-.:. I was going.through intermediaries who were going through intermedia~ies --:-:.!.that we :a:an' t release the FY '78 budget requ~st, because 0MB says we can't let it*out of this place, until they have accepted it.or something.
We kept fussing about this, for about three months, and then finally somebody said, :well, that was in something that was sent down to the ACRS office with a whole NRC budget request four months ago.
Obviously, that was filed away somewhere else.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Your problem may not be in getting information, but in finding it and knowing when you got it.
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9 10 l l 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 50 MR. BENDER: That's always been part of our problem.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
They're due to be getting stages particularly in the closing days of the budget review, when decisions are being made, at the different levels for Staff for presentation to the Commission.. These represent some-tines hard-fought decisions,
/which are not going to make everybod happy.
Somebody' s::project got cut out, now the question is,
.will the Commission accept or will the Executive Director accept that, or whatever.
I think there might be some time when the limi ted-_amounts of that might be considered,.
DR. SIESS:
We have to find some way to work this out for the report next year, because the Congress wants this report from us, they said, by 31 December, because they want to.use it in considering the FY '79 budget.
Now, they a~e going to get a report from us that is essentially not even based on the '79 budget.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
Sir, as Chairman of the Commission, I assure you I do not know what the '79 budget 20 will be that will be presented to Congress..
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25 a report DR. SIESS:
We are trying to deal in enough generality that it doesn't address a particular budget.
We are not trying to review the Staff's budget. We are trying to review the research program as it exists, but we haven't seen
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25 51 the five-year plan.
I have seen about a third of it.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
I think we ought to be able to get you a reasonable amount of in&ormation.
DR. SIESS:
We are going to start January 1 on next year's.
January 2.
MR. LEVINE:
On the five-year plan, if we had heard that it had all not gotten to you, we would have sent down another set.
CO.MMTSSIONER KENNEDY:
It is a pretty small organization.
It can't be that lost. If you say you sent it and they say they haven't received -it DR. SIESS:
We have part of the five-year program, but I have never seen the whole thing. It is a small organi za-tion, but it generates a lot of paper.
PROF. KERR:
There is a_ law about that.
CHAIRMAN HENDRIE:
It suggests somewhere there is a bus or truck filled *with these things. We will try to do better with the paper and perhaps next year, knowing now that it is an annual event, one can look forward to a more orderly s*or.ting out.
I commend the Committee for being able to manage it under the present circumstances.
Okay. Thank you very much for ooming.
(Whereupon at 3: 3 7 p,.,m., the meeting was adjourned.)