ML22277A000
| ML22277A000 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 03/21/2022 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards |
| To: | |
| Doyle, Daniel | |
| References | |
| NRC-1890, NRC-2015-0070, RIN 3150-AJ59 | |
| Download: ML22277A000 (78) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Public Meeting to Discuss the Proposed Rulemaking on "Regulatory Improvements for Production and Utilization Facilities Transitioning to Decommissioning" Docket Number: (n/a)
Location: Rockville, Maryland Date: Monday, March 21, 2022 Work Order No.: NRC-1890 Pages 1-77 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1716 14th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20009 (202) 234-4433
1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + + + + +
4 PUBLIC MEETING TO DISCUSS THE PROPOSED RULEMAKING 5 ON "REGULATORY IMPROVEMENTS FOR PRODUCTION AND 6 UTILIZATION FACILITIES TRANSITIONING TO 7 DECOMMISSIONING" 8 + + + + +
9 MONDAY, 10 MARCH 21, 2022 11 + + + + +
12 The meeting convened at the Commission 13 Hearing Room, NRC One White Flint North, 11555 14 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland, and by video 15 teleconference, at 1:00 p.m. EDT, Lance Rakovan, 16 Meeting Facilitator, presiding.
17 18 NRC STAFF PRESENT:
19 DANIEL DOYLE, NMSS/REFS/RRPB 20 SOLY SOTO LUGO, NMSS/REFS/RRPB 21 LANCE RAKOVAN, NMSS/REFS/ERLRB 22 PATRICIA K. HOLAHAN, NMSS/REFS 23 VINCE WILLIAMS, NSIR/DPCP/MSB 24 HOWARD A. BENOWITZ, OGC/LRAA/RASFP 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
2 1 C-O-N-T-E-N-T-S 2 PAGE 3 Welcome and Logistics..............................3 4 Opening Remarks....................................6 5 Background Status..................................9 6 Overview of the Proposed Rule.....................15 7 Tips for Preparing Comments.......................56 8 Next Steps........................................60 9 Break.............................................61 10 Public Feedback and Questions.....................62 11 Closing Remarks...................................74 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
3 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 1:01 p.m.
3 MR. RAKOVAN: Hello, everyone. My name is 4 Lance Rakovan. I'm a senior environmental project 5 manager at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, or 6 NRC as you'll hear it called today, and I'm sure you 7 already know.
8 It's my pleasure to help facilitate 9 today's meeting, along with the staff, who are in the 10 Commissioner's hearing room at NRC Headquarters.
11 We're going to try to make this meeting worthwhile for 12 everyone. And we hope you'll give us a hand with 13 that.
14 Go ahead to the next slide. So again, our 15 purpose today is to provide information to help you 16 make more educated comments on the proposed 17 decommissioning rule and draft regulatory guidance.
18 We'll be going through the various ways you can 19 participate in this commenting process as part of our 20 presentation.
21 Slide 3. So here is our basic agenda for 22 today. After we go over some logistics we'll have 23 some opening remarks. And then we'll provide our 24 presentations, which will include details on 25 background and status, an overview of the proposed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
4 1 rule, tips for preparing comments and next steps.
2 After a short break we'll then open the floor to 3 feedback and questions.
4 Slide 4 please. Please note that today's 5 meeting is being recorded and transcribed. We ask 6 that you help us get a full, clear accounting of that 7 meeting by staying on mute if you are on the phone or 8 on Teams and are not speaking. Or keeping your 9 electronic devices silent and keeping side discussions 10 to a minimum if you're in the room.
11 Also, it would help us out greater if 12 speakers can identify themselves and any group they 13 are with when they first talk.
14 When we do move to the Q&A portion of the 15 meeting, those of you on Teams can raise your hand 16 using that feature, if you have a question. Those on 17 the phone can hit *5.
18 When you are being called to ask a 19 question, those of you on Teams can use your unmute 20 button. And those on the phone can use *6. Please 21 note that the chat feature on Teams has been disabled.
22 Oh, and the slides that are going to be 23 shown, the Microsoft Team slides can be found in the 24 NRC ADAMS library at ML22059A016.
25 Any phone attendees, please email NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
5 1 dan.doyle@nrc.gov if you'd like us to make sure that 2 we are aware that you attended the meeting.
3 I'll go into some details about our public 4 meeting feedback forum later on in the meeting. For 5 those of you who are with us in the room today, 6 emergency exists are at all four corners of the 7 Commissioner's hearing room. Restrooms are out the 8 main entrance and then to your left.
9 With that, if you'd like to go to Slide 5.
10 I'd like to introduce Trish Holahan who is a special 11 assistant in the NRC's division --
12 DR. HOLAHAN: Before you do that --
13 MR. RAKOVAN: Oops. Trish, please?
14 DR. HOLAHAN: Before you do that, there is 15 a question I think from Steven Dolley.
16 MR. RAKOVAN: Yes. I was going to IM him 17 directly but we can go ahead and take it. Steven?
18 MR. DOLLEY: Yes, hi. Can you hear me 19 okay?
20 MR. RAKOVAN: We can. Please.
21 MR. DOLLEY: Sorry to interrupt so early.
22 Thanks for the introductory remarks. We're not 23 seeing the slides that you're calling to be shown one 24 after another, just a link to a ppt file. So if you 25 can get the slides up that would be helpful, but of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
6 1 course we can get them off ADAMS. Thanks.
2 MR. RAKOVAN: I appreciate that, thank 3 you. We'll get to work on that.
4 All right, with that I'll go ahead and 5 introduce Trish. Trish Holahan is a special assistant 6 in the NRC's Division of Rulemaking Environment and 7 Financial Support.
8 Trish is going to give some opening 9 remarks and we'll see if we can fix the slide issue.
10 Trish.
11 DR. HOLAHAN: Thank you, Lance. And 12 welcome, everybody. Good afternoon. I'm Trish 13 Holahan. As Lance already mentioned, I'm the special 14 assistant in the NRC's Division of Rulemaking 15 Environmental and Financial Support Division.
16 And I want to thank you for joining us 17 today to talk about the NRC's decommissioning 18 rulemaking. The NRC's goal for this rulemaking are to 19 maintain a safe effective and efficiency 20 decommissioning process, incorporate lessons learned 21 from the decommissioning process and support the NRC's 22 principals of good regulations. Including openness, 23 clarity and reliability.
24 The proposed rule would implement specific 25 regulatory requirements for different phases in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
7 1 decommissioning process consistent with a reduced risk 2 that occurs overtime while continuing to maintain 3 safety and security. The proposed rule would 4 incorporate lessons learned from plants that have 5 recently transitioned to decommissioning and improve 6 the effectiveness and efficiency of the regulatory 7 framework while protecting public health and safety.
8 Public comments has twice played an 9 important role in the development of this proposed 10 rule. When we published an advance notice of proposed 11 rulemaking, and later with a draft regulatory basis.
12 We are seeking public input on the 13 proposed rule to influence regulations that will guide 14 future nuclear plant decommissioning. The rule 15 addresses several regulatory areas which you will hear 16 about in more detail during this meeting.
17 We hope today's meeting will help you 18 better understand the proposed rule. We look forward 19 to your feedback and your questions today.
20 But please note that the NRC will not be 21 responding in writing to verbal comments from today's 22 meeting. Comments must be submitted in writing 23 through the methods described in the federal register 24 notice to receive formal consideration in the 25 rulemaking.
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8 1 This is the first public meeting on the 2 proposed rule. We will be having another meeting 3 following the same format on March 31st.
4 We're also planning to hold additional 5 meetings in April in various locations around the 6 country. With the option of virtual participation.
7 Please check the NRC's public website for additional 8 details about upcoming public meetings and for other 9 resources to help as you receive reviews of proposed 10 rule.
11 Thank you. And I'll turn it back to 12 Lance.
13 MR. RAKOVAN: Thanks, Trish. Can we get a 14 reading, either a thumbs up or something from someone 15 to make sure that we did fix the issue with the 16 slides, if at all possible?
17 Steve, can you --
18 MR. DOYLE: I think attendees are only 19 able to actually raise their hands. I don't think --
20 MR. RAKOVAN: Oh, okay. All right.
21 MR. DOLLEY: Yes, chat is disabled. We 22 can now see the slides. Thank you.
23 MR. RAKOVAN: Okay.
24 MR. DOLLEY: But chat is disabled, so if 25 you're asking us for some direct response you need to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
9 1 enable chat. Thank you.
2 MR. RAKOVAN: All right, thank you, Steve.
3 All right, glad we got that fixed. With that, I will 4 go ahead and turn things over to Dan Doyle who has the 5 lead for the initiative.
6 Dan has a fairly lengthy presentation so 7 we're hoping that Dan can get through his 8 presentation. We'll take a quick break so folks can 9 stretch their legs and then we'll go ahead and up 10 things up for Q&A. So, Dan, please take it away.
11 MR. DOYLE: All right, thank you very 12 much, Lance. So this is, as Lance said, our first 13 meeting of several that we have planned on the 14 decommissioning rulemaking.
15 You can go to the next slide, Soly. But I 16 just wanted to point out that we're emerging from 17 COVID-19. This is kind of new for me and for several 18 of us. Hopefully it goes smoothly.
19 It seems to be okay so far except for that 20 one little glitch with the slides. But I appreciate 21 everyone's patience with adjusting to using some of 22 this new equipment being in-person. It is nice to do 23 the in-person. And also allow people to be able to 24 attend remotely if possible. So fingers crossed on 25 everything continuing to go smoothly.
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10 1 But please raise your hand. And thank 2 you, Mr. Dolley, for doing that. Please raise your 3 hand if there is something disrupting your ability to 4 follow the meeting so thank you. Please feel free to 5 raise your hand and we'll try to address that.
6 Otherwise, as Lance said, we do have time 7 reserved for after the staff's presentation for Q&A 8 session on this. So please hold other comments until 9 that time. Thank you.
10 Okay, we can go to the next slide. So, 11 this is a very brief background and status of this 12 rulemaking activity.
13 There was an increase in, oh yes, I'm 14 sorry, can you go back on please. I should, you know, 15 I should point out one other thing is that we are 16 using Microsoft Teams for this meeting today.
17 And for those who are attending, you 18 should see on the bottom of your screen to see the 19 arrows to click back and forth through the, actually, 20 you know what, because we just switched it, actually I 21 think they don't have that feature. I'm not sure. I 22 don't know actually because we had to flip, I'm 23 sharing the screen now.
24 But you might be able to advance and back 25 up the slides. I'm sorry, I'll have to circle back NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
11 1 and see how that went later. But if you can click 2 that then you would be able to advance and go back to 3 whatever slide you wanted to see. And that would be 4 affecting just your view. And then also, you can 5 click the slides.
6 I'm sorry, you would be able to click the 7 links. So if you see blue hyperlinks in the slides 8 you would be able to click that and open the documents 9 if you wanted to.
10 Okay, back to the slide. So there was an 11 increase in nuclear power plant shutdowns that kind of 12 focus the NRC's attention on making some changes to 13 the regulations that relate to decommissioning. We 14 refer to the transition to decommissioning process as 15 the plant is approaching and going into and completing 16 decommissioning.
17 So we, the NRC initiated rulemaking 18 December 2015 to make some changes related to that 19 transition. We have already completed some extensive 20 public outreach. We did solicit comments on advance 21 notice of proposed rulemaking.
22 And we also issued a regulatory basis 23 document. We had public comment periods on both of 24 those. And also public meetings. And there is 25 information, additional information about both of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
12 1 those on our public website.
2 The proposed rule, so this is the recent 3 headline, the recent highlight and the reason we're 4 having this meeting today. We just published the 5 proposed rule in the federal register on March 3rd, 6 2022. There is the citation.
7 So we are in the comment period right now.
8 We have a 75-day comment period. And that ends on 9 May 17th, 2022.
10 Next slide please. For convenience we had 11 two slides that lists all of the key documents 12 associated with this proposed rule. So this is the 13 first slide. We have, again, the proposed rule.
14 There is that citation that is important 15 sometimes. 87 FR 12254. It was published March 3rd, 16 2022. Those two links, if you, I apologize if you're 17 not able to click it in this presentation right now, 18 you can download the slides.
19 We have, it is in ADAMS. We have the 20 accession number on the first slide. And also Lance 21 had mentioned that. Or you can email me and I will 22 get it to you.
23 So both of those links will open up the 24 proposed rule. One is the web version, and the other 25 one is a printed version. So it's the same thing, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
13 1 just two different ways of viewing that, depending on 2 what you prefer. Those are both the federal register 3 versions of the proposed rule.
4 So some supporting and related documents.
5 We have a draft regulatory analysis, which discusses 6 costs and benefits associated with this action, a 7 draft environmental assessment for compliance at the 8 National Environment Policy Act, draft supporting 9 statements for information collections.
10 There are some changes to information 11 collections in this rule. And we have those discussed 12 in there for compliance with the Paperwork Reduction 13 Act.
14 And we also have an additional document, 15 so I'll refer to that as the unofficial redline rule 16 text. There is introduction, kind of a disclaimer 17 that explains what this is. And I also have a slide 18 on it later.
19 This may be helpful if you are 20 particularly interested in the changes to the rule 21 language. The document shows the current rule 22 language as plain text. And then any changes that 23 this proposed rule would make to the rule, to the code 24 of federal regulations in a mark-up format. So, this 25 would be deleted, this would be added.
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14 1 That can be helpful with maybe a more 2 understandable way then looking at the mandatory 3 instructions, which is that portion at the end of a 4 federal register notice that is really kind of 5 instructions for an editor. Add this word, delete 6 this word.
7 But you would have to do a little bit more 8 work to understand what that changes in context. So 9 feel free to take a look at that.
10 Next slide please. We also are updating 11 four guidance documents. We're issuing four guidance 12 documents for public comment in parallel with the 13 proposed rule. They are listed here on the slide.
14 The first one is related to emergency 15 planning for decommissioning nuclear power plants.
16 That would be a new regulatory guide.
17 The other three are updates to existing 18 regulatory guides that relate to decommissioning. So 19 the second one on the list would be an update to Reg 20 Guide 1.184, decommissioning nuclear power plants.
21 The next one would be an update to Reg 22 Guide 1.159. That would be Rev 3, showing the 23 availability of funds for decommissioning production 24 or utilization facilities.
25 And then the last one on the left would be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
15 1 an update to Reg Guide 1.185, standard format and 2 content for post-shutdown decommissioning activities 3 report. So these three, four documents are also out 4 for public comment now. And so public comments would 5 be submitted on, if you have comments on the rule and 6 the guidance please submit it altogether. It all goes 7 to the same place. The same action.
8 Okay, the next slide please. Okay, so for 9 this part of the meeting we will be giving an overview 10 of the proposed rule.
11 I will start with a general discussion of 12 the graded approach. You can see me looking down, I 13 have my notes for this portion of the meeting here 14 that I'm going to try to follow.
15 So we're going to start with a general 16 discussion of what we call the graded approach concept 17 and how that has been applied to several different 18 technical areas in this rule. The rest of the slides 19 are going to give an overview for each of the 20 technical areas for the topics, the technical areas or 21 topics in this slide.
22 If you look at the proposed rule in 23 Section 4, scope of the proposal, there are 16 24 headings for different topics or areas where we're 25 proposing some changes.
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16 1 So the slide here followed the same order 2 in the proposed rule. The titles of the slides match 3 the headings in the proposed rule. And like I said, 4 we will give an overview.
5 I've been coordinating with the staff. We 6 have a great team of folks here at the NRC who are 7 working and supporting this. I am the rulemaking 8 project manager so I'm kind of coordinating it and 9 serving as a spokesperson right here, but the staff 10 are supporting, and many of them are on the line here 11 today.
12 I will be speaking to most of these 13 slides, but we do have a few staff that are going to 14 be speaking to the other slides. I'll introduce them 15 when we get to that. And I see that there is a hand 16 raised.
17 MR. RAKOVAN: Yes. Dan, I wanted to point 18 out that Dave Hills has his hand raised. Dave, did 19 you have something that you wanted to interject?
20 MR. HILLS: No, sorry, that was an error.
21 MR. DOYLE: Okay, no problem. So let's 22 move on to the next slide please.
23 The graded approach. This proposed rule 24 takes what we call a graded approach to 25 decommissioning where different levels of requirements NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
17 1 would apply at different stages of the decommissioning 2 process.
3 Across the top of this table are the four 4 levels that are used or discussed in the proposed rule 5 as a facility goes through the decommissioning 6 process. The Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 and Level 4, 7 chronologically.
8 Level 1, on the left, would begin after 9 the facility dockets the two required certifications.
10 One is for permanent cessation of operations. And 11 the other is that the fuel has been removed from the 12 reactor vessel.
13 Level 2 would be after a period of 14 sufficient decay, which would generically be ten 15 months for a boiling water reactor or 16 months for a 16 pressurized water reactor if they meet the criteria in 17 the proposed rule.
18 Level 3 would be when all fuel is in dry 19 cask storage. And Level 4 would be when all fuel is 20 offsite.
21 The rows in this table show the topic 22 areas that have updated requirements, links to these 23 levels in the proposed rule. The top row, the 24 emergency preparedness, that would use all four of the 25 levels starting with the post-shutdown emergency plan NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
18 1 in Level 1 through Level 4, where there is no longer a 2 need for an onsite radiological emergency response 3 plan because all fuel is offsite.
4 Other topic areas that used the graded 5 approach include physical security, cyber security and 6 onsite/offsite insurance. So you can see that the 7 physical security has changes in level 1 and level 3.
8 And then cyber security has changes in level 2. And 9 also onsite/offsite insurance that we'll get to that 10 when we, in the next few slides here.
11 Okay, next slide please.
12 MR. RAKOVAN: Hey, Dan, this is Lance. If 13 you can identify which slide you're on instead of 14 saying next slide that will help the folks who are on 15 the phone.
16 MR. DOYLE: Will do. Thank you. So, we 17 are on Slide 13 right now. It says, emergency 18 preparedness at the top.
19 So this is the first of the topic slides.
20 Let me just take a minute to talk about, we have a 21 theme layout for each of these.
22 So for each of the topic slides you'll see 23 a summary of the proposed changes. The box in the 24 upper right identifies the section in the proposed 25 rule, with a more detailed discussion of the topic as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
19 1 well as the page numbers in the printed version of the 2 federal register notice.
3 We also have listed all of the sections of 4 the CFR, the Code of Federal Regulations, that would 5 be changed. Where we have changes associated with 6 this topic.
7 Where it says a specific request for 8 comment, each of these slides, we will mention if 9 there are any questions related to this topic in 10 Section 5 of the proposed rule where the NRC included 11 specific questions for the public to consider.
12 Sometimes we have kind of a directed specific 13 questions that we encourage stakeholders to provide 14 feedback on.
15 So we do have 18 of those in this proposed 16 rule. And some of them relate to these topics. So 17 we'll just try to point out where those specific 18 questions are and give you a sense of what the 19 question is focused on.
20 And then on the bottom of this slide we 21 have a, it's an area for additional information where 22 we may point out some additional things we think you 23 should be aware of. And then on the bottom of this 24 slide there is this kind of a progress bar that, 25 again, is showing each of the 16 topic areas.
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20 1 I only fit five on a slide, but as we go 2 through you'll see the bold one will kind of move 3 along. In case there is a topic that you are 4 especially interested in you can kind of keep an eye 5 on that and see the next few topics that are coming 6 up. Like the parade of nations from the Olympics when 7 they come in. I don't know.
8 Okay. So emergency preparedness. Because 9 current regulations, so I'm going to give some 10 background on this. Because current regulations do 11 not provide a means to distinguish between the EP 12 requirements that apply to the operating reactor and 13 the EP requirements that will apply to the reactor 14 that has permanently ceased operations, 15 decommissioning licensees have historically requested 16 exemptions from EP requirements.
17 The proposed rule would provide common EP 18 requirements for reactors in decommissioning, 19 eliminate a need for specific exemptions or license 20 amendments.
21 Because of the decreased risk of offsite 22 radiological release and fewer types of possible 23 accidents that can occur at a decommissioning reactor, 24 the proposed EP requirements align with that reduction 25 in risk while maintaining safety.
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21 1 So what we are proposing to change. The 2 NRC is proposing to add a new section, 10 CFR 50.200 3 in the list in the upper right there. So that's a new 4 section that would provide planning standards and 5 requirements for post-shutdown and permanently de-6 fueled emergency plans.
7 The proposed standards and the 8 requirements for emergency plans are consistent with 9 the level of planning the Commission has previously 10 approved for decommissioned facilities. The proposed 11 planning requirements also ensure close coordination 12 and training with offsite response organizations is 13 maintained throughout the decommissioning process.
14 The NRC is also proposing to amend 10 CFR 15 50.54(q), Paragraph q, to provide licensees with the 16 option to use a tiered requirements and standards at 17 the appropriate time in decommissioning and to add a 18 new process by which licensees can make changes to the 19 emergency plans to transition between levels.
20 So the specific requests for comments. So 21 that was kind of the background and sort of overview 22 of what we wanted to highlight for this topic.
23 The specific request for feedback. We 24 would like to know what the advantages and 25 disadvantages are of requiring dedicated radiological NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
22 1 emergency planning, including a ten mile emergency 2 planning zone, or EPZ, until all spent nuclear fuel at 3 a site is removed from the spent fuel pool and placed 4 in dry cask storage.
5 Is there additional information the NRC 6 should consider in evaluating whether all hazards 7 planning would we as effective as dedicated 8 radiological emergency? The NRC has determined that 9 ten hours would be a sufficient amount of time for an 10 emergency response to a spent fuel pool accident based 11 on an all hazards plans.
12 Is there additional information the NRC 13 should consider in evaluating this matter?
14 The second bullet there for specific 15 requests emergency response data systems. Nuclear 16 power facilities that are shutdown permanently or 17 indefinitely are currently not required to maintain an 18 emergency response data system. These systems 19 transmit near real-time electronic data between the 20 licensee's onsite computer system and the NRC 21 operations center.
22 Licensees in Level 1 would maintain the 23 capability to provide meteorological, radiological and 24 spent fuel pool data to the NRC within a reasonable 25 time frame of following an event. What are the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
23 1 advantages and disadvantages of requiring nuclear 2 power plant licensees to maintain those aspects of the 3 emergency response data system until all spent fuel is 4 removed from the pool?
5 So that's what those two questions are 6 about.
7 We wanted to point out for this topic that 8 we do have that new guidance document. The proposed 9 guidance document.
10 The staff has developed guidance 11 corresponding to the proposed rule changes for 12 emergency planning. We have proposed this new 13 regulatory guide, Draft Guide 1346.
14 The staff, NRC staff believes that these 15 changes will establish emergency planning requirements 16 commensurate with the reduction in radiological risk 17 as licensees proceed through the decommissioning 18 process while continuing to provide reasonable 19 assurance that protective actions can and will be 20 taken in maintaining emergency preparedness as a final 21 independent layer of defense-in-depth. That's the 22 overview for this topic.
23 Next slide please. This is Slide 14. It 24 says physical security. So for this slide I will turn 25 it over to Vince Williams. Vince is a security NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
24 1 specialist in the NRCs Office of Nuclear Security and 2 Incident Response. And he is the staff lead for this 3 topic. Vince, you should be able to unmute and go for 4 this one.
5 MR. WILLIAMS: Good afternoon. My name is 6 Vince Williams. I'll be speaking to the physical 7 security area of the decommissioning role.
8 This proposed rule would allow certain 9 changes to eliminate licensee requests for approvals 10 via exemptions amendments and for certain adjustments 11 to the physical security programs. Current security 12 requirements do not reflect the reduced risks for a 13 decommissioning facility after fuel is removed from 14 the reactor vessel.
15 When the fuel is transferred into the 16 spent fuel pool, the amount of plant equipment that is 17 relied upon for the safe operation of the facility is 18 significantly reduced, which allows for certain 19 security measures to be modified because their 20 implementation is no longer needed or can be adjusted 21 for the physical protection program during 22 decommissioning.
23 Because certain security measures can be 24 modified or no longer are necessary for 25 decommissioning, commonly requested exemptions and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
25 1 amendments have been submitted by licensees to address 2 this new posture.
3 For example, the control room is 4 specifically identified in current security 5 requirements as an area that must be protected as a 6 vital area. The proposed rule would potentially 7 eliminate the need to identify the control room as a 8 vital area when all vital equipment is removed from 9 the control room and when the area does not act as a 10 vital area boundary for other areas.
11 Also, current security regulations for a 12 power reactor licensee require the use of licensed 13 senior operators for the suspension of security 14 measures during emergencies. For permanently shutdown 15 and de-fueled reactors, licensed senior operators are 16 no longer required. The proposed rule would allow 17 certified fuel handlers to be used to suspend security 18 measures during emergencies at decommissioned 19 facilities.
20 Lastly, to eliminate the need for the 21 submission of license amendments and exemptions, the 22 licensee transitions to independent spent fuel storage 23 installations.
24 The NRC is proposing that once all spent 25 nuclear fuel has been placed in dry cask storage, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
26 1 licensees may elect to protect a general license ISFSI 2 in accordance with the physical security requirements 3 that are consistent with Part 72 Subpart H, and 10 CFR 4 73.51. Licensees will continue to address the 5 applicable security related orders associated with an 6 ISFSI that are conditions of the license. Dan.
7 MR. DOYLE: Okay, thank you, Vince. All 8 right, moving on to Slide 15. So this topic is cyber 9 security.
10 Consistent with the graded approach layout 11 and the technical basis for a graded approach, and 12 that I mentioned a few slides ago, cyber security was 13 one of those items. The proposed rule would continue 14 to apply cyber security requirements to 15 decommissioning plants until the risk to significantly 16 is reduced to, sorry, until the risk is significantly 17 reduced to public health and safety.
18 Specifically, the cyber security rule is 19 continuously applied until the fuel is permanently 20 removed from the reactor vessel to the spent fuel pool 21 and there has been sufficient decay of the fuel, in 22 the spent fuel pool, such that there is little chance 23 that the spent fuel in the spent fuel pool could heat 24 up to a clad ignition temperature within ten hours if 25 a spent fuel pool were drained.
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27 1 So there is more detailed discussion in 2 the proposed rule about that under technical basis.
3 Sorry, under the technical basis for the graded 4 approach.
5 Under the proposed rule, Part 50, power 6 reactor licensees and combined license holders would 7 be subject to the same requirement. For Part 50 power 8 reactor licensees the proposed rule would remove the 9 licensed condition that requires the licensee to 10 maintain its cyber security plan and make adjustments 11 to the regulations.
12 For combing license holders, the proposed 13 rule would extend the requirements to maintain a cyber 14 security plan during decommissioning. And this would 15 be a new requirement for that change.
16 For currently operating or recently 17 shutdown Part 50 reactor licensees, because the 18 licensee cyber security plan is included as a licensed 19 condition, this license condition to maintain a cyber 20 security program remains in effect until determination 21 of the license or the NRC removed the condition from 22 the license. For example, if a licensee submits a 23 license amendment request and the NRC approves it.
24 Therefore the proposed rule would not 25 constitute back fitting because the proposed rule NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
28 1 would codify the already imposed requirement of the 2 cyber security plan, sorry. Cyber security program 3 license condition during Level 1 of the 4 decommissioning, of decommissioning, or until the 5 spent fuel in the spent fuel pool has sufficiently 6 cooled.
7 This is not true for combined licensed 8 holders. The proposed revision would constitute a new 9 requirement because the operational programs, such as 10 a security program that includes the cyber security 11 program are requirements in the regulations and not 12 properly identified as licensed conditions as they are 13 for Part 50 licensees.
14 Currently combined license holders are 15 required to maintain a cyber security program only as 16 long as 10 CFR 73.54 is applicable to them. So that 17 means that combined license holders are not required 18 to maintain their cyber security programs during 19 decommissioning because the power reactor licensee is 20 not authorized to operate nuclear power reactor during 21 decommissioning.
22 So the change to 73.54 is identified in 23 the proposed rule as a change affecting issue finality 24 for 10 CFR Part 52 combined license holders as defined 25 in 52, 10 CFR 52.98. So therefore the proposed rule NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
29 1 does include a back fit analysis in Section IX.D. So 2 that is what we have highlighted as part of the 3 additional information.
4 I think I skipped over this request for 5 comments. I don't think I included it in there. Let 6 me get back to that a little bit later. I have a 7 slide that's going to talk about the comments. I can 8 highlight what the focus of that question was.
9 Okay, next slide please. Slide 16. Drug 10 and alcohol testing. There are three items that I 11 would like to highlight related to this.
12 In Part 26, which is about fitness-for-13 duty, we would amend, the proposed rule would amend 10 14 CFR 26.3, scope, to address, to correct an 15 inconsistency in the applicability of Part 26 to Part 16 50 and 52 license holders for nuclear power reactors.
17 Part 26 does not apply to a Part 50 18 license holder once the NRC dockets the licensee's 10 19 CFR 50.82(a)(1) certification that a power reactor has 20 permanently ceased operations. Which formally 21 belongs, which is formally the decommission process.
22 However, Part 26 continues to apply to the 23 holder of the combined license issued under Part 52 24 throughout decommissioning. There is no, staff 25 believes no technical basis for this inconsistency.
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30 1 10 CFR Part 26.3 would be revised to 2 specify that Part 26 also no longer applies to a Part 3 52 license holder once the NRC dockets the licensees 4 52.10, 10 CFR 52.10(a), certification that the power 5 reactor has permanently ceased operation. So that's 6 the first change, is related to fitness-for-duty scope 7 in 10 CFR 26.3.
8 The second item to highlight here is 9 related to criminal penalties. Section 26.3 includes 10 a substantive requirement for certain entities to 11 comply with the requirements of 10 CFR Part 26 by a 12 specific deadline. The violations of the regulation 13 should be subject to criminal penalties.
14 The specific deadlines in 26.3(a) were 15 added in the 2008 Part 26 final rule. But Section 16 26.825(b) was not updated to reflect this change, 17 which is an oversight. Therefore the proposed rule 18 would remove 10 CFR 26.3 from the list of provisions 19 that are not subject to criminal penalties if violated 20 in Section 26.825(b).
21 The third item I wanted to highlight for 22 this topic is related to the Part 73 insider 23 mitigation program. Section 73.55(b)(9)(ii)(B) 24 requires that a licensees insider mitigation program 25 contains elements of a fitness-for-duty program NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
31 1 described in Part 26, but does not identify which 2 fitness-for-duty program element must be included in 3 the insider mitigation program.
4 The proposed rule would establish the 5 required elements of the fitness-for-duty program and 6 an insider mitigation program for operating and 7 decommissioning reactors under Part 50 and 52.
8 Next slide please. Slide 17. This is 9 certified fuel handler definition and elimination of 10 the shift technical advisor.
11 Certified fuel handlers are non-licensed 12 operators who are commonly used at permanently de-13 fueled nuclear facilities with irradiated fuel in 14 their spent fuel pools. The certified fuel handler is 15 intended to be the on shift representative who is 16 responsible for safe fuel handling activities and 17 always present on shift to ensure safety of the spent 18 fuel and any decommissioning related activities at the 19 facility.
20 Currently, a certified fuel handler is 21 qualified through a training program that must be 22 reviewed and approved by the NRC. The proposed rule 23 would modify the definition of a certified fuel 24 handler and add a provision that removes the need for 25 NRC approval of the training program if the training NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
32 1 program for certified fuel handler is derived from a 2 systems approach to training and includes specific 3 topics, which are outlined in the proposed rule 4 language.
5 Specifically, the training program must 6 address the safe conduct of decommissioning 7 activities, safe handling and storage of spent fuel 8 and an appropriate response to plant emergencies.
9 The proposed rule would also clarify that 10 a shift technical advisor is not required for 11 decommissioning nuclear power reactors.
12 Next slide please. So we have two slides 13 on this topic. This is decommissioning funding 14 assurance.
15 So the summary that, changes we're making.
16 The proposed rule modifies the biennial 17 decommissioning trust fund reporting frequency for 18 operating reactors, it's in 10 CFR 50.75, to be 19 consistent with the three year reporting frequency for 20 independent spent fuel storage installation.
21 We're making two changes related to 22 independent spent fuel storage insulation funding 23 reports. It would allow licensees to combine the 24 reports required by the regulations listed on the 25 slide there, 50.82(a)(8)(v), (8)(vii) and 10 CFR NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
33 1 72.30. Also related to ISFSI funding report they 2 would remove the requirement for NRC approval of the 3 report filed under 10 CFR 72.30(c).
4 The proposed rule would clarify that when 5 a licensee identifies a shortfall in the report, 6 required by 50.75(f)(1) the licensee must obtain 7 additional financial assurance to cover the shortfall 8 and discuss that information in the next report.
9 And then the final item to highlight here, 10 the proposed rule would make administrative changes to 11 ensure consistency with 50.4, written communications, 12 regarding the submission of notifications and to 13 eliminate 50.75(f)(2) because 50.75(f)(1) fully 14 encompasses paragraph (f)(2).
15 All right, next slide please. So there 16 are a number of, there are five specific requests for 17 comments related to this topic. We're still on the 18 decommissioning funding assurance, Slide 19.
19 So the headings for each of those specific 20 requests are listed here. That's in section, I think 21 I said Section 5 of the proposed rule. So I'm just 22 going to highlight briefly what these specific 23 requests are about.
24 So the first one, financial assurance.
25 What are the advantages and disadvantages of updating NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
34 1 the formula to reflect recent data and to cover all 2 estimated radiological, decommissioning costs rather 3 than the bulk of the costs?
4 The second one, the site specific cost 5 analysis. What are the advantages and disadvantages 6 of requiring a full site investigation and 7 characterization at the time of shutdown and of 8 eliminating the formula and of requiring a site 9 specific cost estimate during an operation?
10 Decommissioning trust funds. Should the 11 NRC's regulations allow decommissioning trust fund 12 assets to be used for spent fuel management if there 13 is a projected surplus in the fund based on the 14 comparison to the expect cost identified in the site 15 specific cost estimate, and the assets are returned to 16 the fund within established period of time?
17 So this is a question that we're asking 18 for feedback on. What are the advantages and 19 disadvantages of allowing decommissioning trust fund 20 assets to be used for these purposes?
21 What are the advantages and disadvantages 22 of allow decommissioning trust fund assets to be used 23 for non-radiological site restoration prior to the 24 completion of radiological decommissioning?
25 So just to be clear, that is not a change NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
35 1 that's proposed but it is a question and we are asking 2 for feedback on that topic.
3 Timing of decommissioning fund assurance 4 reporting. What are the advantages and disadvantages 5 of extending the reporting frequency from two years to 6 three years? Does this change affect the risk of 7 insufficient decommissioning funding?
8 And the last specific question. Identical 9 requirements under Section 50.82 and 52.110, besides 10 proposing conforming changes to 10 CFR 52 the NRC is 11 asking whether the NRC should maintain identical 12 requirements. In 10 CFR 52.110 and 50.82 for Part 52 13 and Part 50 licensees.
14 There is also additional guidance, as I 15 mentioned earlier. The update, the proposed update to 16 Reg Guide 1.159. Assuring the availability of fund 17 for decommissioning production of the utilization 18 facilities.
19 Next slide please. Slide 20 is focusing 20 on offsite and onsite financial protection 21 requirements and indemnity agreements.
22 These changes would provide regulatory 23 certainty by minimizing the need for licensees of 24 decommissioning reactors to request regulatory 25 exemptions for relief from requirements that should NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
36 1 apply only to operating reactor licensees.
2 And the specific requests for public 3 comment. What are the advantages and disadvantages of 4 requiring an existing level of assurance to be 5 maintained until all spent fuel is in dry cask 6 storage, or Level 3?
7 And I think I don't have the information 8 right in front of me on that second question, I'll get 9 back to that one also later.
10 Okay, next slide please. So we're on 11 Slide 21. Environmental considerations. The proposed 12 rule clarifies various environmental reporting 13 requirements, including those related to the content 14 to the post-shutdown decommissioning activities 15 report, or PSDARs.
16 In part, the proposed rule change would 17 clarify that licensees, at the PSDAR stage are 18 required to evaluate the environmental impacts from 19 decommissioning and provide in the PSDAR the basis for 20 whether the proposed decommissioning activities are 21 bounded by previously issues site-specific or generic 22 environmental reviews.
23 The Commission provided additional 24 direction in its staff requirements memorandum, which 25 is the Commission's direction to the NRC staff. With NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
37 1 respect to the consideration of any identified 2 unbounded impacts.
3 The rule changes would allow licensees to 4 use appropriate federally issued environmental review 5 documents prepared in compliance with the Endangered 6 Species Act, the National Historic Preservation Act, 7 or other environmental statutes, rather than just 8 environmental impact statements. The rule would also 9 remove language referencing amendments for authorizing 10 decommissioning activities in 10 CFR Part 51.
11 In developing the original proposed rule, 12 the NRC staff considered, but dismissed, a proposal 13 that staff approve each licensee's PSDAR before 14 allowing major activities to begin. Major 15 decommissioning activities to begin.
16 This was done on the basis that requiring 17 approval of a PSDAR would have no additional benefit 18 in terms of public health and safety. However, as 19 will be discussed later, the staff is directed by the 20 Commission to solicit public comment on the question 21 of whether the NRC should require approval of PSDAR, 22 site-specific environmental review, and a hearing 23 opportunity before undertaking any decommissioning 24 activity.
25 The two regulatory guides related to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
38 1 PSDARs were revised. So they're kind of combined into 2 a single bullet there. We're updating two guidance 3 documents associated with this topic. So those two 4 were revised to include clarifying language consistent 5 with the rule changes.
6 On a related topic that we have gotten 7 some questions about is not, I'm sorry, it is showing 8 on this slide here. That last sentence under 9 additional information.
10 The decommissioning generic environmental 11 impact statement will be updated, not as part of this 12 rulemaking activity, that will be updated separately 13 in the future. And the NRC will be putting out more 14 information about that in the future. So I wanted to 15 acknowledge that.
16 Next slide please. So we're on Slide 22, 17 record retention requirements. As noted, when a plant 18 is no longer operating and is in decommissioning, most 19 plant components, such as pumps and valves are no 20 longer in service and will eventually be removed as 21 part of the dismantlement activities. Therefore there 22 is no longer a need to retain certain records 23 associated with these components. And the rulemaking 24 eliminates many record retention, many recordkeeping 25 retention requirements.
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39 1 The proposed change would not impact the 2 records that are required to be maintained in support 3 of decommissioning and license termination activities.
4 The proposed rule also includes the specific question 5 concerning the recordkeeping requirements for 6 facilities licensed under 10 CFR Part 52.
7 One of the rulemakings, few proposed 8 changes in Part 52 would be in Section 52.63 regarding 9 the recordkeeping and retention requirements for 10 departures from the design of the facility. However, 11 these changes would not apply to a combined license 12 holder that references one of the certified designs in 13 Part 52 appendices because those appendices have their 14 own recordkeeping provisions.
15 The NRC is asking if we should revise the 16 Part 52 appendices to conform those recordkeeping 17 requirements with those proposed for 52.53.
18 Next slide please. Okay, Slide 23, low 19 level waste transportation. When a plant is actively 20 being decommissioning the plant typically generates 21 large volumes of bulk low level radioactive waste.
22 To efficiently manage the transportation 23 of the waste to a licensed disposal site most 24 licensees ship waste by rail. The railroads control 25 the schedule for the transportation of the railcars to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
40 1 the destination. And the time to reach the disposal 2 destination is generally more than the 20-day 3 notification requirement that's currently in the 4 regulation.
5 Licensees, the licensees will continue to 6 track and monitor the location of the progress of 7 their low level waste shipments, but notification to 8 the NRC would no longer be required unless the 45-day 9 limit is exceeded. So changing the 20 days to 45 10 days.
11 Next slide please. Spent fuel management 12 planning. So a brief background on this topic. The 13 NRC staff identified ambiguity in the spent fuel 14 management and decommissioning regulations due to a 15 lack of cross referencing between Part 72 and Part 50.
16 The rulemaking clarifies the information 17 for consistency. Specifically, the regulation in 10 18 CFR 72.218 states that the 10 CFR 50.54(bb) spent fuel 19 management program, or the irradiated fuel management 20 plan, or IFMP, must show how the spent fuel will be 21 managed before starting to decommission systems and 22 components needed for moving unloaded, unloading and 23 shipping the spent fuel.
24 Section 72.218 also requires that an 25 application for termination of a reactor operating NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
41 1 license submitted under 50.82 or 52.110 must also 2 describe how the spent fuel stored, under the Part 72 3 general license, will be removed from the reactor 4 site. Although Section 72.218 states what information 5 must be included in these Part 50 documents.
6 The corresponding regulations in Part 50 7 do not contain this information therefore the NRC 8 proposes to clarify and align the regulations in 9 Section 50.54(bb), 50.82, 52.110 and 72.218 to ensure 10 appropriate documentation of spent fuel management 11 plans and decommissioning plans.
12 I think we might be on the wrong slide, 13 can you back up please? Sorry. Sorry. Thank you so 14 much. So, yes, sorry. We're on the spent fuel 15 management planning topic.
16 Okay. So the rule changes that we are 17 proposing in 50.54(bb). The NRC proposes moving the 18 72.218 provisions to 50.54(bb) to clarify that the 19 irradiated fuel management plan must be submitted and 20 approved before the licensee starts to decommission 21 system structures and components needed for moving, 22 unloading and shipping the spent fuel.
23 The NRC proposes to clarify the current 24 IFMP approval process and the 50.54(bb) provisions 25 regarding preliminary approval and final NRC review of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
42 1 the irradiated fuel management plan as part of any 2 proceedings for, sorry, as part of any proceedings for 3 continued licensing under Part 50 or 72 as these 4 proceedings no longer exist as they did when 50.54(bb) 5 was first promulgated.
6 The NRC proposes to require submittal of 7 the initial IFMP and any subsequent changes to the 8 IFMP as a license amendment request. So 72.218, the 9 changes in that section.
10 The NRC proposes revising Section 72.218 11 to address the requirements related to decommissioning 12 and termination of the Part 72 general license as the 13 current title of 72.218, which is termination of 14 licenses, suggests.
15 Specifically, the proposed Section 72.218 16 notes that the general licensed ISFSI must be 17 decommissioned consistent with the requirements in 18 50.82 or 52.110 as the general license ISFSI is part 19 of the Part 50 or Part 52 licensed site. Also, the 20 proposed 72.218 notes that the general license is 21 terminated upon termination of the Part 50 or 52 22 license.
23 There is a specific request for comment 24 associated with this topic. The proposed rule 25 clarifies the current IFMP approval process by NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
43 1 requiring submittal of an initial IFMP and that any 2 changes to the IFMP, I'm sorry, and any changes to the 3 IFMP for NRC review and approval by license amendment, 4 we would like to know if stakeholders see any 5 challenges with implementing this part of the proposed 6 rule.
7 We're also considering including a change 8 control provision to specify what changes the licensee 9 can make to the IFMP without NRC approval. We would 10 like to know what stakeholders input on a change 11 control process, including criteria for changes 12 licensees can make without NRC approval and any 13 associated recordkeeping or reporting requirements for 14 those changes.
15 We are making updates to guidance 16 associated with this topic. For the IFMP we added 17 guidance to draft guide 1347 in Sections (c)(3) to 18 outline the information to be included in the 19 licensee's IFMP.
20 For general licensee ISFSI decommissioning 21 we added references to general license ISFSIs in both 22 Draft Guide 1347 and 1349 to make it clear that the 23 general license ISFSI must be decommissioned 24 consistent with the requirements in 50.82 and 52.110.
25 The NRC staff believes that these changes will NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
44 1 provide regulatory clarity and an enhanced overall 2 regulatory transparency and openness regarding 3 decommissioning and spent fuel management planning.
4 Next topic please. Or next slide please.
5 All right, so at this point I will turn it over to 6 Mr. Howard Benowitz, who is here at the table with me.
7 Howard is a senior attorney in the NRC's 8 Office of the General Counsel and is our lead attorney 9 for this rulemaking activity. Howard.
10 MR. BENOWITZ: Thanks, Dan. And for the 11 reporter, my name is Howard Benowitz with the NRC's 12 Office of the General Counsel.
13 We're on Slide 25, the backfit rule. And 14 in this proposed rule we will be providing a new 15 backfitting provision that would be for nuclear power 16 reactor licensees and decommissioning.
17 The proposed rule would renumber the 18 paragraphs of current 10 CFR 50.109. So that Section 19 50.109(a) would be the current backfit rule. And 20 50.109(b) would be the new rule text for 21 decommissioning nuclear power plant licensees.
22 The NRC is also proposing edits to the 23 backfitting provision in Part 72 so that that 24 provision applies during decommissioning of an ISFSI 25 or a monitored retrievable storage facility.
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45 1 And we would also revise the requirement 2 in 50.109 that the NRC must consider the costs of 3 imposing a backfit if the basis for backfitting is the 4 compliance exception to the requirement to perform a 5 backfit analysis. This would reflect a change in the 6 Commission's backfitting policies. And that came in a 7 2019 update to Management Directive 8.4.
8 Next slide please. That would be Slide 9 26. Regarding foreign ownership control or 10 domination.
11 The Atomic Energy Act and the NRC's 12 regulations provide definitions for utilization 13 facilities and production facilities. Additionally, 14 some of the provisions of the act, and our 15 regulations, including the foreign ownership control 16 or domination prohibition, apply only to a utilization 17 or a production facility.
18 During decommissioning activities, a 19 utilization facility, or a production facility, will 20 be dismantled to the point that it no longer meets the 21 definition of production or utilization facility.
22 The proposed rule adds language to 23 establish the criteria for when exactly a utilization 24 facility, or a production facility, is no longer a 25 utilization facility or a production facility. Just NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
46 1 physically the dismantling of the facility, or 2 whatever the licensee does to the facility, prohibits 3 it from actually performing the functions that enable 4 it to be "utilization facility or a production 5 facility."
6 The proposed rule also adds language to 7 affirm that despite not being a production or 8 utilization facility. The NRC would continue to have 9 statutory authority over the existing Part 50 or 52 10 license. And that the NRC regulations applicable to a 11 utilization facility or a production facility will 12 continue to apply to the holder of that Part 50 or 13 Part 52 license. Unless the regulations explicitly 14 state otherwise.
15 An example of this is another proposed 16 change we had in this rule which would amend the 17 foreign ownership control or domination regulation 18 that's in 10 CFR 50.38. And we would change it to 19 state that it would no longer apply, that prohibition 20 would no longer apply once a Part 50 or 52 facility is 21 no longer a utilization or a production facility.
22 Therefore our regulations would not 23 prohibit the transfer of a Part 50 or 52 license for a 24 facility that is no longer a utilization facility or a 25 production facility. No longer prohibited to transfer NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
47 1 that license to a foreign owner controlled or 2 dominated entity.
3 Next slide please. Going back to the 4 backfit slide, I just realized there's a specific 5 request for comments. We do have one on the backfit 6 rule section.
7 It asks if there are -- we want your 8 feedback on the advantages or disadvantages of having 9 a backfit provision for licensees and decommissioning.
10 I'm now on Slide 27. Regarding 11 clarification of scope of license termination plan 12 requirements. This part of the proposed rule would 13 clarify regulations in 10 CFR 50.82 and 52.110.
14 Concerning the license termination 15 requirements. And state that they do not apply before 16 fuel has been loaded into the reactor. Consistent 17 with our historical practice.
18 These license termination provisions are 19 written for reactors that have commenced operation.
20 And the NRC has historically viewed operation as 21 beginning with the loading of fuel into the reactor.
22 And this is discussed in more detail in the proposed 23 rule FRN.
24 The NRC is proposing this change because 25 some confusion has arisen about whether 52, 10 CFR NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
48 1 52.110 was applicable when certain combined license 2 holders sought to terminate their licenses during 3 construction, or before construction even began. The 4 NRC informed these licensees that 10 CFR 52.110 did 5 not apply for reasons that are documented in the 6 proposed rule.
7 Next slide please. It would be Slide 28.
8 Concerning the removal of certain license conditions 9 and withdrawal of an order.
10 So the order is Order EA-06-137. Which 11 was issued in the post-9/11 time period concerning 12 mitigation strategies for large fires or explosions at 13 nuclear power plants. We subsequently issued 14 regulations that are very similar to that order.
15 And the license conditions are conditions 16 associated with that order, order EA-02-026. And the 17 cyber security license conditions that Dan discussed 18 previously.
19 These license conditions in this order are 20 all substantively redundant with existing provisions 21 in our regulations. And so there is no reason to have 22 the license conditions in the licenses and for this 23 order to still be on the books.
24 So the license condition is deemed removed 25 would be actually removed by an administrative license NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
49 1 amendment after we, after the effective date of this 2 final rule. Presumably. Presuming that this final 3 rule includes this provision.
4 This will be done by the NRC staff.
5 Licensees would not have to submit anything by putting 6 it into the rule like this. It's procedurally more 7 efficient.
8 We are interested in obtaining stakeholder 9 input to identify potential redundant requirements 10 that are not in this proposed rule that have to do, 11 ideally related to decommissioning.
12 Next slide please. That will be slide 29.
13 This one is pretty straightforward. We have 14 regulations on our books that as written, apply to 15 what, Part 50 licensees that are in decommissioning.
16 But don't mention that provision in Part 17 52, 52.110, that would make that regulation 18 applicable, or not applicable, once that Part 52 19 licensee goes into decommissioning. So we have 20 identified several, you can see them in the top right 21 corner of the slide in that box, several regulations 22 that require, in almost every instance, it's just 23 adding the words, and 52.110, or something to that 24 effect, to ensure there is consistency between how 25 these regulations apply or don't apply to a Part 50, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
50 1 holder of a Part 50 operating license and a Part 52 2 combined license.
3 And that's it for me, Dan. Back to you.
4 MR. DOYLE: Thank you so much, Howard.
5 Next slide, please. Okay. I promised I would get 6 back to you on it, so, again, we have the Section V in 7 the Federal Register Notice.
8 We have quite a list of specific requests 9 for feedback for you to consider if this is something 10 that you are interested in. This helps the Agency 11 kind of direct attention to areas where we are 12 particularly interested in your feedback.
13 So, again, there are 18 questions that are 14 in there. We highlighted the ones that were related 15 to the previous topics, the previous on the 16 16 separate technical areas that we just finished talking 17 about.
18 So here is all of them. So there were a 19 few that I wanted to follow up with you about or 20 explain, make sure I touched on. So cyber security, I 21 think I did not cover that one. It is the fifth one 22 on the left side.
23 So the proposed rule applies cyber 24 security requirements to Level 1 plants. So that's 25 when they submit, after they submit the two NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
51 1 certifications.
2 The licensee in Level 2, which is after 3 the sufficient decay of the spent fuel, would not be 4 required to maintain a cyber security plan under this 5 proposed rule because the NRC is determined that there 6 is little chance that the spent fuel in the spent fuel 7 pool could heat up to a clad ignition temperature 8 within ten hours.
9 So our question is what would be the 10 advantages and disadvantages of extending that through 11 the end of Level 2, so extending it until, extending 12 the requirement to maintain the cyber security program 13 until all spent fuel is transferred to dry cask 14 storage. So that would be Level 3. So that is what 15 that question is about.
16 So we'll just stay on this slide here.
17 Let me jump a little bit. All right. The next one I 18 wanted to mention was insurance for specific license 19 ISFSIs. That's the fourth one on the right side 20 there.
21 Insurance for specific license ISFSIs, so 22 we have a question about that. So the question 23 basically gives a background about how things work 24 today and here is what I wanted to direct your 25 attention to, the NRC recognizes that as the reactor NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
52 1 site is decommissioned eventually all that remains of 2 the Part 50 or 52 license site is the general license 3 ISFSI under Part 72, which is essentially the same as 4 a specific license ISFSI under 10 CFR Part 72.
5 So general license, specific license 6 ISFSI, essentially the same. Considering that 10 CFR 7 Part 72 specific license ISFSIs have no financial 8 protection requirements should the NRC address the 9 disparity between specific license and general license 10 ISFSIs as part of this rulemaking? Please provide an 11 explanation for your response. That is the question.
12 All right. And then there were a few 13 other ones that were, didn't really fit under the 14 topics that we covered there, so I wanted to mention 15 the PSDAR approval question, a timeframe for 16 decommissioning, those are both on the upper left 17 there, and then on kind of the right side the 18 exemptions and the question about applicability.
19 So PSDAR approval. So the question talks 20 about basically how thing work today with the post-21 shutdown decommissioning activities report. We 22 already talked about that a little bit.
23 So the question is essentially should the 24 NRC require approval of the PSDAR site-specific 25 environmental review, have a site-specific NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
53 1 environmental review, and a hearing opportunity. We 2 are asking for stakeholder input on that.
3 The next one was the timeframe for 4 decommissioning. So the NRC is not proposing changes 5 to the decommissioning timeframe requirements as part 6 of this proposed rule.
7 Not proposing changes, but we are asking a 8 question. What would the advantages and disadvantages 9 be of requiring prompt decontamination rather than 10 allowing up to 60 years to decommission a site?
11 As part of its review of the PSDAR what 12 are advantages and disadvantages of NRC evaluating and 13 making a decision about the timeframe for 14 decommissioning on a site-specific basis?
15 All right, two more that I wanted to 16 highlight for you related to exemptions. What are the 17 advantages and disadvantages of the current 10 CFR 18 50.12 approach to decommissioning related exemptions?
19 What standard should the NRC apply in 20 determining whether to grant exemptions from the new 21 or amended regulations? What are the advantages and 22 disadvantages of providing an opportunity for the 23 public to weigh in on such exemption requests?
24 Are there other process changes the NRC 25 should consider in determining whether to grant NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
54 1 exemptions from the new or amended regulations?
2 And the last one I wanted to highlight 3 that I had not already covered is, it's underlined, it 4 says applicability. So Section III of this document 5 of the proposed rule has the discussion about 6 applicability, so we do have a specific discussion 7 that is in there about applicability to NRC licensees 8 during operations and to ISFSI only or stand-alone SSC 9 decommission reactor sites.
10 So I know that there has been some 11 stakeholder interest in this and how does this rule 12 apply to reactors that are currently operating, how 13 does it apply to reactors or facilities that have 14 already decommissioned, so we do discuss that in that 15 section.
16 Permanently shutdown nuclear power plants 17 will be at a different stage of the decommissioning 18 when the new decommissioning regulations become 19 effective and we'll have previously received varying 20 regulatory exemptions.
21 So we are asking stakeholders if you 22 foresee any implementation issues with the proposed 23 rule as it is currently written for any new or amended 24 requirements in the proposed rule, how should the 25 requirement apply to sites that are currently in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
55 1 different stages of decommissioning.
2 All right. So we have briefly touched on 3 each of these questions. Next slide, please. There 4 is a regulatory analysis. This is a standard NRC 5 practice for rulemaking.
6 We have a document where we attempt to 7 identify all of the costs and benefits associated with 8 the action that we are proposing. So we have a draft 9 regulatory analysis for this rulemaking and I wanted 10 to highlight a few aspects of that.
11 So, in summary, the proposed rule is 12 determined to be cost beneficial with the estimated 13 net averted cost of approximately $17.9 million at a 7 14 percent net present value, $37 million at a 3 percent 15 net present value, for the recommended alternatives.
16 There are a few decommissioning areas that 17 we wanted to point out. The emergency preparedness, 18 that kind of had the largest influence on this 19 outcome.
20 The emergency preparedness alternative was 21 estimated to result in this net averted cost of 22 approximately $7.74 million at 7 percent.
23 So when we say net averted cost, these are 24 costs how the future would have essentially looked if 25 we are now proposing this action and savings compared NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
56 1 to that with what we are proposing, so those are 2 considered as benefits.
3 The drug and alcohol testing alternative 4 would have $7.03 million net averted cost and the 5 decommissioning funding assurance, I'm sorry, funding, 6 sorry, I think it was a missed, typo on the slide 7 there, assurance alternative, decommissioning funding 8 assurance, not insurance, is estimated to result in 9 net averted costs of approximately $1.18 million. All 10 those are 7 percent net present value.
11 You are welcome to review and provide any 12 feedback on this document as part of the proposed rule 13 and comment.
14 Next slide, please. Again, this slide, 15 I'm sorry, that document, the regulatory analysis on 16 the earlier slide where I had listed the proposed rule 17 and other related documents.
18 All right. There are a few tips that I 19 wanted to point out. I am sure many of the people who 20 are attending this have reviewed and commented on 21 proposed rules before and are well aware of the 22 resources that are out there, but in case you aren't, 23 and there are a few things that we are doing a little 24 differently here to try to help stakeholders who are 25 interested in giving this I just wanted to point out a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
57 1 few things that you are welcome to review.
2 Next slide, please. All right, so we have 3 three tips. Tip Number 1 is to consider reviewing 4 this commenter's checklist. It's on regulations.gov.
5 This is not something that the NRC wrote, but it's on 6 regulations.gov, which is this website that many other 7 agencies use, including the NRC, for providing 8 information about rulemaking activities and to collect 9 public feedback.
10 So they have developed a list of tips and 11 things to consider as you are reviewing a proposed 12 rule to try to help the process overall be more 13 efficient, to kind of provide the kind of information 14 that is helpful to federal agencies when you submit 15 your comments, so please consider taking a look at 16 that.
17 There is a link to that checklist right on 18 regulations.gov. There is a comment form. So if you 19 click on the comment form you can enter your comments 20 there. Right on the top of that it has a link to this 21 checklist and there is also a printable format.
22 So if you are able to click the link here 23 and you wanted to do that that would come up. If not, 24 then I apologize, and you could download the slides 25 or, again, you could contact me and I could, I am NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
58 1 happy to send it to you.
2 All right, next slide, please. Tip Number 3 2, I mentioned this earlier. This is a document that 4 we have created to assist the public when reviewing 5 this proposed rule.
6 This is the unofficial redline rule 7 language. So, again, this shows how the proposed rule 8 would modify the current regulations in 9 redline/strikeout format, so what would be deleted, 10 what would stay the same.
11 So we have included all of the text in any 12 section that we are modifying. So some of them, as 13 you kind of flip through and you see this is just, you 14 know, if it's just normal looking, black-and-white 15 text without any strikeout or underline that means 16 that there is no change to that.
17 So the proposed changes are just where 18 there is the underlined text for inserted and then the 19 strikeout for text that would be deleted. So it may 20 be helpful in providing context for the changes.
21 Please consider reviewing that.
22 Next slide, please. All right. The final 23 tip is that you can find additional information about 24 this rulemaking on the NRC's public website. So we 25 just created a single-page intended to be a one-stop NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
59 1 shop for people who may be interested in this 2 rulemaking.
3 It has a direct link to the proposed rule, 4 a direct link to the form where you can submit a 5 comment if you would like to do that, the related 6 documents that I mentioned, public meetings, so 7 including this public meeting and future meetings that 8 Trish mentioned in her introduction.
9 We will be adding information there to be 10 able to join it before the meeting and then after the 11 meeting posting a link to the meeting summary and the 12 other materials if folks in the future were not able 13 to attend or if anyone here wanted to go back and take 14 a look at that later, we will be adding that to the 15 website.
16 There is a QR code if you wanted to scan 17 that and see it on your phone, but it would be kind of 18 small. There is also a short link, or you could find 19 it on the NRC's public website, or, if it's easier, 20 feel free, again, to just reach out to me and I will 21 be happy to send you a link to it.
22 Next slide, please. All right. So this 23 is just about the end of the prepared staff 24 presentation. I just wanted to highlight the next 25 steps, some of the key milestones.
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60 1 So, again, we are in the public comment 2 period right now. It closes May 17th, so that's 11:59 3 p.m. I believe it's Eastern Time, but just -- I 4 wouldn't cut it close.
5 But, anyway, it's like the end of the day, 6 so that full day you would be able to submit comments 7 and it is supposed to close like right before 8 midnight.
9 Then the staff will review all of the 10 public comments and address them as part of developing 11 the final rule package. The final rule is due to the 12 Commission October of 2023 and the final rule, or 13 estimated, so these are both estimated dates, October 14 of 2023 to the Commission and the final rule 15 publication date.
16 So we do keep our schedules updated on our 17 public website and if there is a change in the future 18 we would reflect that there.
19 Next slide, please. What is -- Let's see.
20 Okay, so that concludes what we had prepared. Thank 21 you for your attention going through that.
22 We hope that the information there was 23 helpful and useful and maybe could be used as a 24 reference or, you know, highlighting things that will 25 hopefully assist you in taking a look at this proposed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
61 1 rule. We are interested in your feedback.
2 So what we have on the agenda here --
3 Well, I think I was going to turn it back over to 4 Lance for this portion. Lance is our facilitator for 5 the meeting and will assist with the rest. Thank you.
6 MR. RAKOVAN: Yes, it's all good, Dan.
7 Thank you. That was a lot of time there and a lot to 8 digest so we wanted to give folks a chance to kind of 9 take a break, stretch their legs, take a bio break, 10 get some more caffeine, whatever you need.
11 So we were looking at ten minutes, but 12 looking at the time what do you say we start back up 13 at 2:35. Like it gives people a little bit longer 14 than ten minutes and we'll go ahead and open the floor 15 to questions at that point.
16 So, again, we'll start back at 2:35 17 Eastern. Sound good, Dan?
18 MR. DOYLE: Yes. Thank you so much.
19 MR. RAKOVAN: Okay.
20 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 21 off the record at 2:24 p.m. and resumed at 2:35 p.m.)
22 MR. RAKOVAN: Folks, if you wouldn't mind 23 giving us a second, we're going to work on making sure 24 that we can unmute that line.
25 While we are waiting for that I will go NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
62 1 ahead and go over a few things. So, again, please 2 remember that our goal here today is to help you, is 3 to help to provide you with information so that you 4 can provide informed comments.
5 So we ask that your questions focus on any 6 clarification you or others may need in terms of the 7 proposed decommissioning rule or the draft regulatory 8 guidance.
9 I will take questions here on Teams and on 10 the phone and Dan is going to help me out with any 11 hands that are raised in the Commissioner's Hearing 12 Room there at NRC Headquarters.
13 If you are on Teams you can use the raise 14 your hand feature to signal that you have a question.
15 Those on the phone can use star five. I will go in 16 order that I see hands come up.
17 Those on Teams should be able to unmute 18 themselves. Those on the phone can use star six to 19 unmute themselves. Again, I will take hands in the 20 order that I see them and work with Dan if there are 21 any questions there in the room.
22 With that, I will see if we have been able 23 to unmute the line in the room. Dan, we can't hear 24 you. Okay, unfortunately, you might need to call back 25 in, I don't know. I don't know how to unmute you, I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
63 1 apologize.
2 All right, I do see we have a question, 3 but I think we would like to try to work out our 4 technical issues before we take some, so if you could 5 give us a moment and we'll get to the questions.
6 Again, I will try to get them in the order 7 that I see them. I apologize for the delay, folks.
8 (Pause.)
9 MR. RAKOVAN: All right. I am getting 10 some messages that they are working on it. Again, 11 appreciate your patience on this.
12 (Pause.)
13 MR. DOYLE: Hello. Lance, can you hear 14 us?
15 MR. RAKOVAN: Yes, we can. You are a 16 little faint. You could be a little louder, but we 17 can hear you.
18 MR. DOYLE: Wonderful. How about now, 19 does that sound better?
20 MR. RAKOVAN: Yes, that's much better. We 21 do not have any kind of video feed or slide feed, but 22 that's okay. Do you want to go ahead? I do have one 23 hand up if you would like to take -- Oh, that person 24 just put their hand down, okay.
25 MR. DOYLE: All right. Yes, I think --
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64 1 MR. RAKOVAN: I hope we didn't intimidate 2 them.
3 MR. DOYLE: I think we will try to share 4 in case there are any questions, you know, that we 5 needed to have the slides we might need to jump back 6 to, so we will pull that up.
7 But, yes, so this is the fun part of the 8 meeting. We are here and interested in -- And, again, 9 so just to emphasize the purpose of the meeting here, 10 we are trying to help stakeholders understand the 11 proposed rule and comments would need to be submitted 12 in writing, but we are interested in any questions and 13 if there is anything that we can help to clarify.
14 Is there anyone here in the room that 15 would like to ask a question? We have the two 16 microphones.
17 MR. RAKOVAN: And, again, for anyone on 18 Teams you can raise your hand and I will take the 19 hands in the order that I see them. If you are on the 20 phone you can use star five to give me a signal and 21 then star six to unmute yourself and ask a question.
22 (Pause.)
23 MR. RAKOVAN: I see no takers on Teams.
24 Dan, anyone in the room there?
25 MR. DOYLE: Yes. It looks like we do have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
65 1 a taker. Yes, sir?
2 MR. CHAPPELL: Good afternoon. Coley 3 Chappell with PSEG Nuclear. A question on the use of 4 the unofficial redline.
5 What is the best way for when we are 6 preparing comments, what's the best way to use that 7 unofficial redline in conjunction with the updated 8 Federal Register information looking at in particular 9 perhaps some of the most recent changes that are being 10 proposed? Thank you.
11 MR. DOYLE: Okay. Thank you for that 12 question. So it sounded a little faint here in the 13 room. I will just repeat it again real quick in case 14 anyone was not able to hear.
15 The question was basically what's the best 16 way to use the unofficial redline document to 17 understand any changes, or recent changes.
18 So that document is another format or 19 another way of understanding what the changes would be 20 to the regulations.
21 So I know the last part of the Federal 22 Register Notice has the amendatory instructions where 23 it says "insert new section" 50.200, you know, delete 24 this paragraph and revise it to state the following, 25 right.
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66 1 It's kind of hard to tell what exactly the 2 changes are sometimes and just a list, we have to 3 follow a format that is given to us by the Office of 4 the Federal Register, to be extremely clear about what 5 the changes are, but that's not necessarily the best 6 format for a member of the public to really know just 7 by looking at it what actually is changing.
8 Sometimes there is just, you know, a word 9 or two that is changing. So that's just kind of 10 explaining again what the document is.
11 And then I think kind of what you are 12 getting at with, you know, recent changes, that if 13 there were, you know, we're going through a whole 14 process here, we follow our, we love processes and 15 procedures, and so part of that includes, you know, 16 the staff sending up, the staff sent up a paper to the 17 Commission. That was in 2018.
18 The Commission, there is, you know, up to 19 five Commissioners that are appointed for the NRC that 20 set the policy for the Agency. We have three at the 21 moment right now.
22 (Off microphone comment.)
23 MR. DOYLE: So they review and vote and 24 provide direction back to the staff in the staff 25 Requirements Memorandum, is what we call that. Then NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
67 1 we, the staff, will update the documents to reflect 2 that.
3 So I think what you were getting at within 4 the recent changes was the areas where the Commission 5 had directed some changes. So the staff updated the 6 other portions of the rulemaking package to reflect 7 that, so we have addressed the Commission's direction.
8 So if you see changes in the rule text you 9 should also see a corresponding discussion that is 10 consistent with that in the, you know, the scope of 11 the proposal section or, you know, in the Federal 12 Register Notice where we explain here is what this 13 topic is about and what changes we are making and the 14 purpose of those changes that those should be 15 consistent with.
16 Those should be consistent with the 17 changes to the rule languages. So if you see 18 something you should be able to jump back to that 19 section and look through there and understand or there 20 is another kind of a backup section called the 21 section-by-section analysis. We use the word 22 "section" a lot.
23 So that goes through sequentially all of 24 the, every section in the Code of Federal Regulations 25 that has a change and just very briefly states what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
68 1 that change is. So those should all be consistent. I 2 hope that answers your question.
3 MR. CHAPPELL: Yes.
4 MR. DOYLE: Yes?
5 MR. BENOWITZ: This is Howard Benowitz at 6 the NRC. Please do not submit comments on the 7 unofficial redline document, that rule text. That is 8 not part of the official package, if you will.
9 That is the Federal Register Notice and 10 accompanying documents, like the regulatory analysis, 11 you know, those documents that Dan -- This unofficial 12 redline is a tool just to help the public understand 13 and see really more of the changes that we are 14 proposing to the rule language.
15 So we would ask for comments on what I 16 would call the official documents, that's the Federal 17 Register Notice, the regulatory analysis, the 18 environmental assessment, you know, those documents.
19 This is really not part of that. I think 20 this might be the first time or it's rare that we 21 provide a document like this in rulemaking space. You 22 might find it useful, you might not.
23 But if you comment on the rule text it 24 should be on what's in the Federal Register Notice, 25 that rule text. That's all. Thank you.
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69 1 MR. RAKOVAN: All right. Dan, anyone else 2 in the room have any questions, because I don't see 3 any hands in Teams? Again, if you have a question on 4 Teams -- Oh, I do, one just popped up. Jerry Bonanno, 5 if you could unmute yourself and ask your question.
6 MR. BONANNO: Sure. Thank you. I 7 appreciate it. I appreciate the presentation. I hope 8 you all can hear me okay.
9 This is Jerry Bonanno from NEI. I had a 10 question, maybe this one is for Howard, just on the 11 proposed backfitting language in the rule in the 12 proposed 51.09B.
13 So I note in the preamble to the proposed 14 rule there was a lot of discussion of the term 15 "operate" and "operation" and tied that term to the 16 spent fuel pool and the ISFSI and the associated SSCs.
17 So I just had a question on the proposed 18 rule language in (b)(1). It says, you know, 19 "Backfitting is defined as a modification or addition 20 to system, structures, or components in use after 21 permanent cessation of operations."
22 So I was curious if that language "in use" 23 was meant to kind of refer back to the spent fuel 24 pool, associated SSCs and the 2, or, you know, how "in 25 use" was intended to limit maybe the SSCs that the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
70 1 definition applied to.
2 MR. BENOWITZ: This is Howard Benowitz 3 with the NRC. Thank you for that question. I would 4 ask that -- I am not sure what kind of answer I am 5 going to give you, so, of course, you can submit it as 6 a question which would allow us more time to think 7 about the answer than what I am allotted here.
8 I am looking at that rule language now and 9 "SSCs in use after permanent cessation of operations" 10 -- I am just trying to think if I -- Maybe we need to 11 have a point where it no longer applies.
12 I mean that might be a comment. I am just 13 thinking out loud now to help all of us, because we 14 have when it, sort of when this provision would begin, 15 but we don't necessarily, I don't know if we have one 16 when it would end, and that might help answer your 17 question or it might help define what SSCs we're 18 talking about, right.
19 I mean even if we say a license 20 termination was still an ISFSI but then you have the 21 Part 72 provision, right, 72.62, backfitting provision 22 for an ISFSI.
23 So I think, you know, here, given that you 24 have that provision for an ISFSI, the spent fuel pool 25 I think is the, it would be applicable, that would one NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
71 1 of the SSCs that would be applicable for this proposed 2 revision 50.109B(1) where it refers to SSCs.
3 Then, you know, once the facility no 4 longer has spent fuel pool, you know, what SSCs are 5 left. I mean it just, you know, depends on the 6 dismantling process.
7 But I would -- I think the answer -- I 8 think now then, thinking out loud to answer your 9 question, might be yes if the question was is it 10 referring to the SSCs like a spent fuel pool. I think 11 the answer there is yes. Does that help answer your 12 question?
13 MR. BONANNO: Yes, thank you. It was just 14 really trying to read whether, you know, when I read 15 it I had read it I think consistently with where you 16 ended up, Howard, which was it just depends what SSCs 17 are still, you know, at the plant and it's going to 18 depend on the phase of decommissioning that the plant 19 is in. But, yes, thank you, that helps.
20 MR. BENOWITZ: Great. Thanks.
21 MR. RAKOVAN: All right. Anyone else at 22 this time have any questions? Don't be shy, now is 23 the time, the floor is open.
24 Again, if you are on the phone you can use 25 star five. It looks like I do have a hand. If you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
72 1 could let us know who you are and go ahead with your 2 question, please.
3 MR. MONTGOMERY: Yes, hi. This is Bruce 4 Montgomery with the Nuclear Energy Institute. I would 5 like to thank everybody for this opportunity. We have 6 already heard a couple of our industry members are 7 going to be involved in reviewing this package, Jerry 8 and Coley.
9 It seems to me this is probably the -- You 10 know, I guess the best way to characterize this is 11 it's the beginning of an end of a very long journey 12 that started maybe, what, six years ago.
13 It looks like it's going to wrap up if we 14 stay on schedule in 2024, which means, you know, this 15 is an eight to ten year journey that we have been on.
16 But I would like to say that we very much 17 appreciate, just on a first glance of what we have 18 seen of the package, that the NRC has done a very 19 thorough and competent job of putting together this 20 very significant regulatory package.
21 It's a big body of work and, you know, 22 we've got some questions. I think you just heard a 23 couple of them.
24 I am not going to say that based on what 25 we have seen so far that we are going to ultimately NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
73 1 agree with everything in the package, but if you 2 looked at, you know, if you would just say how much 3 have we seen that we agree to, I think that in the end 4 it's going to be a very high percentage of the changes 5 that the NRC is proposing that we are going to agree 6 with.
7 I think is a very significant improvement 8 in the regulatory framework around decommissioning.
9 It's going to result in significant efficiencies in 10 transitioning plants from operations and even through 11 decommissioning.
12 We still have work to do on the back end 13 of the process. We will be working on that 14 separately, but do very much welcome the work that NRC 15 has done to identify inconsistencies and efficiencies 16 of the process, so thanks to you all for that.
17 We do intend to respond by May 17th as 18 requested and we will also be responding to the 19 special questions that are included in the package.
20 So, again, Dan, I had hoped to be there in 21 person, it just didn't work out. I couldn't get my 22 Teams link to work, but, Dan and Howard and the rest 23 of your team, thanks so much for the work you have 24 done and the opportunity today, so thank you.
25 MR. RAKOVAN: Okay. Thank you, Bruce.
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74 1 All right. Dan, I am assuming that there is no other 2 hands in the room?
3 MR. DOYLE: No, there are no hands in the 4 room.
5 MR. RAKOVAN: All right. Again, if you 6 have a question you can raise your hand if you are on 7 Teams or hit star five if you are connected through 8 your phone line.
9 (No response.)
10 MR. RAKOVAN: Seeing no hands at this 11 time.
12 MR. DOYLE: Okay, sounds good. So let's 13 go to the next slide, which I think is all the way --
14 Yes, there we go.
15 So we are always interested in feedback on 16 our public meetings and how we could do them better, 17 for example don't drop the phone line during the 18 meeting. So lesson learned from that one.
19 So there are a number of questions and we 20 encourage you to fill out this feedback form just 21 about, not about the rulemaking, just about the 22 meeting itself and how it was conducted.
23 So there is the QR for that. You can also 24 have a, there is a link to that on the meeting details 25 page on the NRC website if you would like to provide NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
75 1 feedback on that.
2 And just other I guess closing thoughts is 3 we do have another public meeting scheduled for next 4 Thursday, that's March 31st. We scheduled it later in 5 the day, so it's 4:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time.
6 The idea was to try to, you know, have 7 multiple opportunities, maybe if someone is in a 8 different time zone or is working or busy or just had 9 a conflict and wasn't able to attend today, but the 10 intention was to basically go through the same kind of 11 presentation as we did here, so going through the 12 discussion and the slides that we had today.
13 So if you are interested in kind of 14 following everything about this rulemaking and wanted 15 to see that I just wanted to point out that basically 16 the first half of it is similar to today and it would 17 be almost the same.
18 Again, we will have opportunity for 19 question and answer after that. So that's the part 20 that I imagine would be different. Also, Trish had 21 mentioned in the opening remarks that we are planning 22 for several public meetings around the country.
23 So we will be adding that to our website 24 once we have the details for that firm and, again, 25 those will be hybrid. So if folks happen to live near NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
76 1 those locations and you wanted to come in person you 2 could. If you wanted to attend on Teams you can do 3 that.
4 So we'll be putting out the agenda. I 5 guess for now I am thinking -- Well, I guess we'll 6 have to reconsider if maybe a different format or a 7 different focus would be better.
8 I guess my kind of default for now would 9 be to follow kind of a similar format again, but we 10 are open to reconsidering and we'll circle back after 11 we complete these two meetings and we'll put out 12 agendas for those meetings in April.
13 But we just wanted to do everything that 14 we could to increase awareness of the proposed rule 15 and the opportunity to provide feedback on it, so 16 that's why we were planning to have those meetings.
17 I think that concludes everything that I 18 had in mind. Trish?
19 DR. HOLAHAN: I just wanted to add on to 20 what Dan said. We are considering, you know, having 21 the meetings, but we are going to have them probably 22 in Illinois, California, Georgia, and the Boston area 23 so we can have a broad spectrum of participants that 24 want to either come or they are interested in that 25 area.
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77 1 MR. DOYLE: Okay. Thank you, everyone, so 2 much for your attention. That is all we had for you 3 today. I think we are going to be wrapping this up 4 about an hour early, which is fine. Hopefully that's 5 okay with everybody.
6 Thanks again for your time and attention 7 and we look forward to any comments you may have on 8 the proposed rule. That concludes the meeting. Thank 9 you so much.
10 DR. HOLAHAN: Thank you.
11 MR. DOYLE: Have a great day.
12 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 13 off the record at 3:00 p.m.)
14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com