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{{#Wiki_filter:Official Transcript of Proceedings  
{{#Wiki_filter:Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION


NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION  
==Title:==
10 CFR 2.206 Petition Review Board RE: Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station Docket Number: (n/a)
Location:              teleconference Date:            Tuesday, June 11, 2013 Work Order No.:        NRC-004                          Pages 1-41 Edited by Richard V. Guzman, NRC Petition Manager NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
 
1 1                      UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2                  NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3                                + + + + +
4            10 CFR 2.206 PETITION REVIEW BOARD (PRB) 5                            CONFERENCE CALL 6                                      RE 7                  PILGRIM NUCLEAR POWER STATION 8                                + + + + +
9                                  TUESDAY 10                              JUNE 11, 2013 11                                + + + + +
12                  The conference call was held, Joe 13 Giitter, Chairperson of the Petition Review Board, 14 presiding.
15 16 PETITIONER: MICHAEL MULLIGAN 17 18 PETITION REVIEW BOARD MEMBERS 19 JOE GIITTER, Director, Division of Risk Assessment 20                  in the Office of Nuclear Reactor 21                  Regulation 22 RICHARD GUZMAN, Petition Manager for 2.206 petition 23            EMILY MONTEITH, Office of General Counsel 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 1 NRC HEADQUARTERS STAFF 2 LEE BANIC, Petition Coordinator, Division of Policy 3                  and Rulemaking, NRR 4 JOHN BILLERBECK, Component Performance and Testing 5                  Branch, NRR 6            MUHAMMAD RAZZAQUE, Reactor Systems Branch, NRR 7
8 NRC REGION I OFFICE 9            FRED BOWER 10 11 ALSO PRESENT 12            JOSEPH LYNCH, Entergy 13 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 1                    P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2                                                          (3:06 p.m.)
3                MS. RIVERA:          Good afternoon.          I would 4 like        to thank    everybody          for    attending          the 5 teleconference.
6                My name is Alison Rivera, and I am the 7 Facilitator for this teleconference.                  My role is to 8 help ensure today's teleconference is informative and 9 productive.
10                The purpose of today's teleconference is 11 to allow the Petitioner, Mr. Michael Mulligan, to 12 address the Petition Review Board, or PRB, regarding 13 a 2.206 petition dated March 7, 2013, as supplemented 14 by      emails  dated    March      20th    and    April    5,    2013, 15 regarding his concerns with safety relief valves at 16 Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station.
17                This teleconference is scheduled for one 18 hour, from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m., Eastern                  Time.      It is 19 being recorded by the NRC Operations Center, and will 20 be transcribed by a court reporter.
21                The transcript will become a supplement 22 to the petition.        Prior to placing the transcript in 23 ADAMS, the PRB will review it to ensure that it does 24 not contain any allegations or sensitive information.
25                For    those        dialing        in    to        this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433        WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701        www.nealrgross.com
 
4 1 teleconference, please remember to mute your phone to 2 minimize any background noise or distraction.                      If you 3 do not have a mute button, this can be done by 4 pressing the keys *6. To unmute, you will press *6 5 again.
6                    I'd like to emphasize that we each need 7 to speak clearly and loudly, to make sure that the 8 court          reporter    can    accurately          transcribe        the 9 teleconference.
10                    If you do have something that you would 11 like to say, please first state your name for the 12 record.
13                    Now, I would like to have the NRC meeting 14 participants to introduce themselves.                    I ask that all 15 of the participants clearly state for the record your 16 name, your position, and your organization.
17                    I will start with myself, and then turn 18 it over to the other NRC participants here in the 19 room.
20                    My name is Alison Rivera, and I am a 21 Technical          Assistant        for        the    Division          of 22 Intergovernmental          Liaison        and      Rulemaking,    in      the 23 Office          of  Federal      and      State      Materials        and 24 Environmental Management Programs.
25                    CHAIR GIITTER:          Okay. I'm Joe Giitter, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 1 I'm the Director of the Division of Risk Assessment, 2 in the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulations.
3                    MR. BILLERBECK:        This is John Billerbeck.
4 I'm      a    Mechanical      Engineer        in      the  Division        of 5 Engineering in NRR.
6                    MR. BANIC:            Lee        Banic,    Petition 7 Coordinator, NRR.
8                    MR. GUZMAN:        Rich Guzman.        I'm a Senior 9 Project Manager in the Division of Operating Reactor 10 Licensing, in the Office of NRR.
11                    MS. RIVERA:              That      completes        the 12 introductions of the NRC staff in this room.                        At this 13 time,          are    there      any      NRC      participants          from 14 Headquarters on the phone?
15                    MR. RAZZAQUE:        This is Mohammed Razzaque, 16 from Reactor Systems Branch, NRR.
17                    MS. MONTIETH:        Emily Montieth, Office of 18 General Counsel.
19                    MS. RIVERA:            Are      there    any        NRC 20 participants from the regional offices on the phone?
21                    MR. BOWER:      Yes, this is Fred Bower.                I'm 22 an Acting Branch Chief from Region 1.
23                    MS. RIVERA:          At  this      time,  will      the 24 representatives          for      Entergy        Nuclear    Operations, 25 Incorporated,          Licensee        for        program,      introduce NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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6 1 themselves?
2                    MR. LYNCH:      This is Joe Lynch, Licensing 3 Manager, Pilgrim Station.
4                    MS. RIVERA:          Mr.      Mulligan,    would      you 5 please introduce yourself for the record?
6                    MR. MULLIGAN:        I'm Mike Mulligan.            I'm a 7 whistle blower.        I was in the Navy on an experimental 8 pass      protect    submarine.          I    worked    as  a    Reactor 9 Operator for a number of years, and I've worked at a 10 nuclear power plant.
11                    Thank you.
12                    MS. RIVERA:      Thank you.
13                    Are there any other, such as members of 14 the public, on the phone?
15                    And, for our court reporter, can you also 16 please state your name?
17                    COURT REPORTER:        This is Sam Wojack.            I'm 18 the court reporter.
19                    MS. RIVERA:      Before we begin, I'd like to 20 first        share  some    general      background      on  the    2.206 21 process.
22                    Section 2.206 of Title X of the Code of 23 Federal Regulations, describes the petition process, 24  the      primary  mechanism      for    the    public  to    request 25 enforcement action by the NRC in a public process.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 1 This process permits anyone to petition NRC to take 2 enforcement-type action related to NRC licensees or 3 license activities.
4                  Depending        on      the      results    of      this 5 evaluation, NRC could modify, suspend, or revoke an 6 NRC issued license, or take any other appropriate 7 enforcement action to resolve the problem.
8                  The      NRC      staff        guidance      for        the 9 disposition        of    a    2.206      petition      request      is      in 10 Management        Directive        8.11,        which    is    publicly 11 available.
12                  Again,          the      purpose        of      today's 13 teleconference          is      to    give      the    Petitioner          an 14 opportunity to provide any additional support for the 15 petition, in light of the Petition Review Board's 16 initial recommendation.
17                  This teleconference is not a hearing, nor 18 is it an opportunity for the Petitioner to question 19 or      examine  the    PRB    on    the    merits    or  the    issues 20 presented in the petition request.
21                  No decisions regarding the merits of this 22 petition will be made at this teleconference.
23                  Following          this        teleconference,            the 24 Petition      Review    Board      will    conduct      its    internal 25 deliberations.            The    outcome        of  these    internal NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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8 1 deliberations      will      then      be      discussed    with        the 2 Petitioner.
3                The  Petition        Review        Board,  typically, 4 consists of a chairman, usually a manager at the 5 Senior Executive Service level at the NRC.                      It has a 6 petition manager and other members of the Board, as 7 determined by the NRC staff, based on the content of 8 the information in the petition request.
9                As  described        in    our      process,  the      NRC 10 staff may ask clarifying questions in order to better 11 understand      the  Petitioner's          presentation,        and      to 12 reach a reasoned decision whether to accept or reject 13 the Petitioner's request for review under the 2.206 14 process.
15                Also, as described in our process, the 16 Licensees have been invited to participate in today's 17 teleconference, to ensure that they understand the 18 concerns about their facility or activity.
19                While      the      Licensees          may    also        ask 20 questions      to  clarify      the      issues        raised    by      the 21 Petitioner, I would like to stress that the Licensees 22 are not a part of the PRB's decision-making process.
23                I will now turn the teleconference over 24 to Joe Giitter, the PRB Chairman, who will discuss 25 the specific petition under consideration.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 1                    CHAIR GIITTER:          Okay, thank you, Alison.
2                    I would like to begin by summarizing the 3 PRB's        understanding        of  the    scope      of  the  petition 4 under          consideration,        and      described      the      NRC's 5 activities to date.
6                    On March, 2013, Mr. Mulligan submitted to 7 the NRC a petition on 2.206 regarding concerns with 8 the safety relief valves, or SRVs, at the Pilgrim 9 Nuclear Power Station.
10                    In  his    petition      request,      Mr. Mulligan 11 requests that the NRC immediately shut down Pilgrim 12 Nuclear        Station    on    the    basis      of    the  Licensee        is 13 operating          the  plant    in    an  unsafe      condition      with 14 defective or inoperable safety relief valves.
15                    The    Petitioner          also      indicates        that 16 Entergy        is    incapable      of    maintaining        safety        and 17 quality        of    the  plant.          In    addition,    Petitioner 18 requests the NRC to not allow the Pilgrim Plant to 19 restart following shutdown until they understand past 20 failure mechanisms of the defective SRVs at Pilgrim.
21                    As support for this request, Mr. Mulligan 22 states, in short, that the repeated nature of the 23 failure        of  the  SRVs      at    Pilgrim        demonstrates      that 24 Entergy        does  not    understand        the      mechanism    of      the 25 failure and that defective or inoperable SRVs at a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433              WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701          www.nealrgross.com
 
10 1 nuclear power plant is unsafe.
2                Mr. Mulligan also states that the NRC is 3 allowing the plant to operate with unsafe SRVs until 4 the next refueling outage, and is covering up an 5 unsafe condition at Pilgrim.
6                Mr. Mulligan requests an investigation by 7 the Office of the Inspector General for his concern.
8                Now, I would like to talk about what NRC 9 has done to date on this.
10                On March 14, 2013, the Petition Manager 11 contacted the Petitioner to discuss the 10 CFR 2.206 12 process and to offer the Petitioner an opportunity to 13 address the PRB by phone or in person.
14                The Petitioner requested to address the 15 PRB by phone, prior to its internal meeting to make 16 the initial recommendation to either accept or reject 17 the petition for review.
18                On April 11, 2013, Mr. Mulligan addressed 19 the PRB via teleconference.              The PRB then held its 20 internal PRB meeting on May 6, 2013, and on May 22, 21 2013, Mr. Mulligan was informed of the PRB's initial 22 recommendation regarding the petition, which is to 23 reject the petition for review, because in accordance 24 with Management Directive 8.11 Petitioner did not 25 provide sufficient facts, or any element of support, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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11 1 beyond the basic assertion for the inquiry.
2                    In  addition,        the    PRB  notes  that      the 3 Petitioner did not identify a violation of an NRC 4 requirement, or did Petitioner provide significant 5 new information to warrant the request of enforcement 6 action.
7                    As      support            for      its      initial 8 recommendation, the PRB notes that the Licensee's 9 operability evaluation for SRVs that have leaked at 10 Pilgrim have been reviewed by the NRC inspectors, and 11 determined to be adequately justified.                    The Licensee 12 has also complied with the applicable tech specs, and 13 has        demonstrated      that      SRVs      are  monitored        and 14 maintained in a condition that ensures that they will 15 perform their safety function.
16                    Additionally, the NRC staff continues to 17 monitor        and  collect      operating        experience    on      SRV 18 leakage problems.          While the staff acknowledges that 19 industry has seen, and is investigating leaking SRVs 20 of this specific design, the NRC staff's evaluation 21 no industry operational data to date indicates that 22 the specific SRV model or design at Pilgrim poses a 23 real significant safety concern.
24                    As a reminder for the phone participants, 25 please identify yourself if you make any remarks, as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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12 1 this will help us in the preparation of the meeting 2 transcript that will be made publicly available.
3                    Thank you.
4                    Mr. Mulligan, I'll now turn it over to 5 you, to allow you to provide any information you 6 believe        the  PRB  should      consider        as  part    of      its 7 decision.
8                    MR. MULLIGAN:        Okay.      You talked about an 9 allegation        that    you    were      going      to    submit,        an 10 allegation note or something.                    What was that about?
11 I'm just curious.
12                    MS. RIVERA:          The PRB will review the 13 transcript to ensure that there is no allegation with 14 sensitive information.
15                    MR. MULLIGAN:        Okay, thank you.
16                    I will just say that, you know, like I've 17 always been talking about the NRC kind of says I have 18 no proof about the system as far as the access to the 19 information is zilch, and you give LERs, you give 20 inaccurate, falsified information to the public as 21 far as disclosures and stuff like that.
22                    So,  how    can      somebody        like  me      have 23 confidence in the NRC doing their job?
24                    Here's a June 11th Forbes article on San 25 Onofre,        and  southern      California          citizens    problems NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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13 1 with      their    entire    nuclear      energy      sector.        So,      a 2 nuclear        energy    sector    has    taken      a  blow  now      that 3 Southern California Edison has decided to permanently 4 close this troubled nuclear plant.                        Safety is a key 5 concern.        So is honesty and transparency.
6                    So, you know, you can take -- you guys 7 talk about risk, this doesn't have any risk and stuff 8 like that, and I'm telling you this has enormous risk 9 for the community and you guys.
10                    You know, if you keep going on in this 11 direction, where, you know, a dual plant like San 12 Onofre, you know, we get the feeling that the NRC is 13 not enforcing their regulations correctly, and their 14 perceptions        of  what    the    regulations        state    is      so 15 grossly        obscene    that,      you    know,      we  mistrust        the 16 agency.        I mean, that's a risk of a different sort, 17 that you don't even take into consideration.
18                    And, this risk business, as far as giving 19 me the information, you know, as far as what is going 20 on with those valves, seeing the, you know, internal 21 documents and stuff like that, that is the same as 22 San Onofre had at its deepest core.                          You guys can 23 hide your information away from the public, and you 24 can have these special interpretations of rules and 25 regulations, as far as, you know, not having a proper NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 1 license amendment request and stuff like that, you 2 can bend the rules, and stuff like that, you know, 3 that's atrocious to think that that -- you know, all 4 you guys deal with is the risk associated with, you 5 know, as far as these engineers' calculations nobody 6 can understand.
7                  And, you don't look at the holistic risk, 8 as far as your behavior, how we, the public, see 9 this, and what garbage you've got in your document 10 and stuff like that that's the essence of, you know, 11 I talk about the tree-wise monkey architecture of 12 Federal rules.        I would include the way you interpret 13 things, you know, the see no evil, hear no evil, 14 speak no evil, the idea that you interpret things 15 behind the scenes that nobody can make sure that you 16 are telling the truth and disclosing everything, and 17 all that sort of stuff.
18                  And,    that's      what      I'm  talking    about.
19 That's what we are seeing in front of us, you know, a 20 Pilgrim plant here, they've had a lot of protests, a 21 lot of towns, you know, have given their hope as far 22 as wanting to shut that down, and, evidently, nobody 23 feels, you know, with San Onofre and a whole bunch of 24 other events everybody feels nervous about disclosing 25 things.        And, you know, you keep your things in your NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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15 1 desk, and I mean that seems to be what's going on 2 here.          The  more    you    get    frightened      about    events 3 happening in front of us, the more you hide things, 4 and the more destructive it's going to be, as far as 5 hiding events, and not taking care of these things 6 right, and turning off the public in ways.
7                    So, you know, the new LER, I forget what 8 the most recent one, is startling, things that were 9 disclosed in that.              And, of course, I put this to 10 2.206 before the LER came in, was written up.
11                    Anyways,      I    get    a      joke  out    of      the 12 Frankenstein Pilgrim SRV valve 3B, in an inspection 13 report of 2013, 00 May 8th, the inspectors observed a 14 plant shutdown on January 20, after operators had 15 identified significant leakage on SRV 3B pilot valve.
16  First        stage  temperature        indicated      a  temperature 17 greater than 35 degrees.                This exceeded the limits in 18 their procedures, and required the operating crew to 19 declare SRV 3B inoperable.                    And, you consequently 20 shut down and stuff like that.
21                    And, you either repaired it or replaced 22 it, but, certainly, you must have tested it. And 23 then,        you  know,    so    on    January        20th,    January, 24 February, I don't know, two, three weeks later on, 25 operators responded to further shut down the plant.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 1 They      started      it    back      up,    and    on  February        3rd 2 operators responded and affirmed indications of pilot 3 leakage on SRV 3B, following its repair and forced 4 outage 1906.          Pilgrim remained at 80 percent power 5 until Blizzard Nemo took the plant down.
6                    And  so,    you    know,      this  is    atrocious 7 behavior, that's one example, you know.                            You so-8 called fixed the valve, and, I mean, you know, is it 9 risky        as  far  an    engineering          calculation      on      the 10 relative work on the component, involved with the 11 component, and stuff like that, do you guys deal with 12 risk?          Or,  is  it    risky,      the      actual  behavior          or 13 Entergy not to be able to have a leak, fix it, and 14 with days of starting up the valve starts leaking 15 again, and then they are forced to have a power 16 restriction and stuff like that.
17                    So, you guys interpret this as there's no 18 safety issues, and what you can see over the period 19 when      they  purchased      these    valves,      and  stuff      like 20 that, it's just atrocious utility and NRC behavior, 21 as far as, you know, engineering quality, and, you 22 know, you know what's going on with your plant, and 23 you have the tools in front of you that you could 24 quickly repair it.            You know, this risk business is 25 an excuse to do nothing, and that's how this turns NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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17 1 out.
2                    This risk business and calculation is an 3 excuse to do nothing, and it's not an excuse to pay 4 attention to our plant.                I mean, it's not a tool that 5 forces        you  to  pay    attention        to    your  plant,        and 6 purchase the quality of valve that is necessary and 7 stuff, and to repair it correctly, and test it.                              You 8 know, like this business here, it was started up and 9 it leaked again.            And, this isn't the first time.
10                    When they purchased them brand new valves 11 and put them in for the first time, they had leaks 12 within weeks of starting up again.                          Can you imagine 13 that,        how  that    looks,      as    far      as  people  like        me 14 outside, the way we see this.                        You know, you guys 15 want      the    most    important        valve      components    in      the 16 nuclear plant, and you can't figure out the quality 17 that is necessary for their duty, and they start 18 failing        within    two    weeks,      the      new  valves      start 19 failing within two weeks.                  And then, you people have 20 the gall to come back and say, oh, well, this doesn't 21 meet any of our              -- this is all safe, and this is 22 real good stuff, everything is okay.
23                    Even to this day, even to this day with 24 two shutdowns over these valves, you are heading for 25 a third shutdown, you have an association of power NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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18 1 restrictions        and    stuff      like      that,    almost      three 2 shutdowns        and  six  or    eight      power    restrictions        at 3 different times and all that sort of stuff.
4                    And, the last LER states that we still 5 don't know what's wrong with those valves, and we are 6 doing further investigation.                  Is that what nuclear 7 power has come to, as far as, you know, you guys 8 don't have the sense of quality and expertise and 9 honesty        to  deal    with      these      things  relatively 10 immediately, and the analysis gives you the excuse 11 that nothing ever matters, that we can run these 12 things into the ground, into the dirt.
13                    I mean, you know, most of the public 14 doesn't really understand what's going on here, but I 15 do, and you do, too. And, allowing this stuff to go 16 on      here,    and  somebody        not    raising      a  stink        is 17 astonishing, especially, within the NRC.
18                    I'm going to go back to the first LER for 19 a few comments there.            At this time, the most -- this 20 is the first LER, LER 2011 007-00, right?                        At this 21 time,        the  most  probably        root      cause  are  problems 22 during the initial manufacturing and their assembly 23 of the pilot at the Target Rock prior to installation 24 at the site.
25                    CHAIR GIITTER:        Could you restate that?
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19 1                  MR. MULLIGAN:            At the time, the most 2 probable root cause were problems during the initial 3 manufacturing or assembly of the pilot at the Target 4 Rock prior to installation on the site.
5                  Wile Labs, Target Rock and Entergy are 6 looking into these problems.
7                  The identified condition, is a leaking 8 SRV pilot, based on the only pilot -- you know, 9 you've got to say this, what this is, the report 10 date, the event date, 12/26, right, 12/26, yes, the 11 pilot leaks, and this is what I'm talking about. This 12 is gross falsification of Federal documents.                        It's 13 gross falsification of Federal documents by NRC, by 14 Entergy, and the NRC doesn't call them on it.
15                  Based on the review of the data, the only 16 pilot to exhibit leakage is RV --
17                  MS. RIVERA:      Mr. Mulligan?
18                  MR. MULLIGAN:        Yes.
19                  MS. RIVERA:        This is Alison Rivera.            We 20 have        a  question    over      here      about  your  previous 21 statement,        trying    to    figure        out if  that's        an 22 additional allegation.
23                  MR. MULLIGAN:        Yes, it is.
24                  CHAIR GIITTER:          Could you, specifically, 25 state the allegation again, Mr. Mulligan?
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20 1                  MR. MULLIGAN:          Okay, based on the plant 2 data, the only -- "The only pilot valve that exhibits 3 signs of leakage is RV 203-3B."
4                  And, let me see if I can -- the last LER 5 indicates that within weeks of starting up the plant 6 they had a leak -- they had a leak on a valve, and 7 then a month before the first LER they had another 8 leak on it.
9                  And,  when    I    get      to    that  LER,      I'll 10 identify that, the time frame.
11                  CHAIR GIITTER:            Okay.      Could you just 12 restate the allegation again?                    I'm not sure I got 13 everything.
14                  MR. MULLIGAN:          Okay.        The LER that I'm 15 talking about, 2007 007-00 it quotes right here, "The 16 only pilot valve to exhibit signs of leakage is RV 17 2003-3."      2003-3, RV 2003-3B.
18                  "The only pilot valve to exhibit signs of 19 leakage is RV 2003-3," and they had two prior leaks 20 that they didn't disclose in this LER.
21                  You got it?
22                  CHAIR GIITTER:          Yes, the LER was 2007-23 007?
24                  MR. MULLIGAN:        2011.
25                  CHAIR GIITTER:        2011, I'm sorry.
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21 1                    MR. MULLIGAN:          So, this guy is -- the 2 event date is 12/26/2011 and two prior events before 3 that -- there was two prior events before that, that 4 they had leaks that they didn't disclose, that they 5 later disclosed on the most recent LER.
6                    Okay?
7                    CHAIR GIITTER:        Thank you.
8                    MR. MULLIGAN:        And, this is another one.
9  This is another allegation.                    Because the leakage 10 established by procedure did not affect the SRV set 11 pressure, or capacity, the SRV would have been able 12 to respond if needed to meet core cooling or reactor 13 vessel        over  pressure,        over        pressure    detection 14 function.
15                    And, the most recent LER says that there 16 was a leakage effect of the SRV open set point.                            And 17 so, I mean, the idea that they are saying it did not 18 affect the SRV set pressure or capacity set pressure, 19 you have to meet set pressure.
20                    So, and then later on, because of the 21 leakage you did have an SRV that exceeded its plus or 22 minus 3 percent opening set point level.                    And, if you 23 would have known about that, I believe it was 3.8, if 24 you would have known about that they would have been 25 required to shut the plant down.
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22 1                    And so, you now, you are sitting here --
2 you know, he makes a kind of a simple statement that 3 the      procedure    did    not    affect      the SRV  set      point 4 pressure.          So, what is thinking of these guys, you 5 know?          Okay, we've got leaks here and stuff like 6 that.        If it hasn't reached its set -- it hasn't been 7 inaccurate yet, but, you know, is the engineers going 8 down      there    anticipating        the    future,  can  we      have 9 opening set points inaccuracy problems that we can't 10 see and stuff like that.                We could, essentially, have 11 a set of SRVs that would not be able to reach -- be 12 at their accuracy level, plus or minus 3 percent, and 13 stuff like that.
14                    So, you know, the idea that these guys 15 can say to themselves do an analysis and say, oh, and 16 one of the issues we could have in the future with 17 our crazy SRVs that keep malfunctioning on us, is we 18 could have an inaccurate opening of an SRV.                    We could 19 have an inaccurate opening of an SRV for an over 20 pressure condition caused by the leak.                      I mean, is 21 anybody thinking about these things, about how set 22 pressure could become inaccurate?
23                    And then you say to yourself, well, do 24 they even test for set pressure on all these leaking 25 valves that they had, and stuff like that.                        Do they NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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23 1 check themselves and say, hey, we are going to do a 2 set      --  an  opening,      with    these        defective    leaking 3 valves we are going to do -- and, you know, we are 4 going to raise up questions to the valve opening and 5 see where it begins to open, and see if the leakage 6 has caused set pressure problems and stuff like that.
7  Is anybody doing that kind of stuff?
8                    You know, so there's an issue that, you 9 know, they really assumed that the leaking wouldn't 10 cause any SRV set pressure problems in the future, 11 and, of course, we know that they did.
12                    So,    and    here's      another      one  with      the 13 leaking        --  the  leaks      that    they      didn't  disclose.
14 There is no previous first-stage leakage occurring at 15 these        safety  relief      valves      since      all  four    safety 16 relief        valves    were      newly      installed      in    May        --
17 April/May, 2011, during refueling outage 18.
18                    But, you know, they made the assertion in 19 Federal documents that there was no prior leakage, 20 and you know there's two other -- there's two other 21 leakages that, you know, I should have been, you 22 know, outsiders should have been notified.                          And, we 23 should have seen how inaccurate these safety relief 24 valves are, and how unreliable, and how incompetently 25 Entergy has dealt with the -- Entergy and Target Rock NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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24 1 has dealt with these safety relief valves.
2                    Now, just like San Onofre, if you hide 3 things        it's    going      to    be    ten      times    worse        when 4 something bad happens, instead of being open and out 5 front, and making, you know, people want to talk 6 about things, and making an effort to talk about 7 those issues, instead of just kind of -- you know, 8 hiding, you know, the politicians above us, Congress 9 and, you know, the hateful Republicans and all that 10 sort of stuff, they are going to vaporize us if we 11 open our mouths, or if we enforce regulation and 12 stuff like that.              And so, I'll be quiet, you know, 13 see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil.
14                    If you get into that San Onofre mindset, 15 that's more destructive than a meltdown, as far as 16 I'm concerned.
17                    And, here's another one.                  However, the 18 industry has experienced leakage with other Target 19 rock      model    safety      relief    valves        at  other    plants.
20 Other,        you  know,    there's      Entergy,        how  come      they 21 didn't -- you know, it sounds like there was that 22 they admit in that last LER, the newest LER, that 23 there        was  a  set    of  issues      which      are  three-stage 24 Target Rock relief valves.                    Again, you know, taking 25 the narrow thing that, you know, maybe it's not an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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25 1 other        model,  you    know,      being      this  model      isn't 2 leaking, or however they want to term it, but there 3 was leaks with three-stage Target Rock.                    However, the 4 industry has experienced leakage with other Target 5 rock model safety relief valves.
6                    You know, they are saying that the three-7 stage        relief  valve,      the    three-stage      doesn't      have 8 leakage problems in the industry, when in reality 9 there was a host of Target Rock model safety relief 10 valves        that  were      leaking,      and      it's  not      full 11 disclosure.
12                    You know, how do you -- how do you -- you 13 know, if there was widespread issues in the industry 14 with        three-stage      safety      relief      valves,    how        is 15 outsiders, like a guy like me, supposed to, you know, 16 utilize it, if you guys don't want to, you know, deal 17 with your problems, it's just up to me to try and 18 figure out what's going on and trying to help you 19 guys do the right thing.
20                    With these issues in the 2.206, I mean, 21 if you hide information on me, and stuff like that, 22 then it negates the 2.206 process.                    It makes me -- it 23 makes me -- I don't have any information.                        And, you 24 keep coming back at me that, you know, I don't have 25 any information, that type of thing, and stuff like NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 1 that.
2                    So, everybody feels comfortable that I 3 don't have any evidence.                You know, is that because 4 there's no evidence, or is that because a whole ton 5 of evidence is being hidden from me.                          Those are 6 completely different things.
7                    You know, the OE business, and all the 8 internal        documents    that    Entergy        has, the  OE,      you 9 know, safety relief temperature phenomenon at Target 10 Rock, and stuff like that, you know, it's all hidden 11 from me.        It's all hidden from guys like me, and when 12 you do that you prevent a guy like me from stopping 13 you from doing the San Onofre, you know, as far as, 14 you know, harassing you, and making you slow down, 15 and making you do the right thing, and stuff like 16 that, you hide it.              And that, in essence, causes 17 these big events where you end up losing the trust of 18 people around the plant, and you have to shut down 19 the plant, or the plant operation.
20                    You know, and then we go into the -- I've 21 already        talked  about    this,      then      we go  into      the 22 following, you know, this is the next -- this was the 23 update on that LER of 2011, Level 2, and, you know, 24 there was -- and it talks about all the different, 25 you know, testing and all that sort of stuff, like, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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27 1 you know, no big deal, everything is cool.                      We looked 2 over and we find no -- who was it, there was a whole 3 bunch of you guys involved, Southern Company, Wile 4 Labs, Entergy, and who else, there was another one, 5 and stuff, and you made a big deal over that first 6 LER, that first leak and stuff, and you had another 7 shutdown,          another      new      shutdown      with  the      NEMO 8 blizzard, with that bad valve, and then like I told 9 you, then you replaced the valve with a new, fully 10 tested valve, and within days it leaks up, it has 11 leaks again, just like when you installed that valve 12 for the first -- these valves for the first time, 13 within two weeks you have an indication of leakage.
14                    You had, before the first shutdown you 15 had      two    leakages    and    stuff      like    that. This        is 16 heightened, and in the NRC's mind this is right?
17 This is the right outcome to deny me a 2.206 because 18 I don't have enough evidence and stuff like that?
19 This is right, that you don't fix this thing?
20                    I don't know, it's still up in the air as 21 far as what's causing all these shutdowns and stuff 22 like that, not only at Pilgrim, but other plants, and 23 stuff.        It's right?
24                    We are the United States of America, the 25 best country on the planet, and stuff like that, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Title:   10 CFR 2.206 Petition Review Board    RE: Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station
28 1 this        doesn't   reflect      well      on      us    at  all      as      a 2 democracy, and the essence of being truthful, honest 3 to each other, especially, with these endeavors that 4 have a lot of energy in them and stuff like that.
5 It's wrong.
6                    So, here we go.          We have in the update, 7 no additional corrective actions are recommended on 8 the results of testing, inspection and evaluation of 9 the leaking pilot valve, by a three team of Wile 10 Labs,        Target  Rock    and    Entergy.            You  know,      these 11 things -- you know, and then we talk about 10 CFR 21, 12 that for the first time in the industry it's ever 13 happened that the bellows had a crack in it, and we 14 don't know -- we are not clear whether that came from 15 a -- it came from directly from plant operation, you 16 know, they shut down, then they tested it, and then 17 up,      or    whether    it    was,      certainly        --  it      was, 18 certainly, heading back to the plant, and then you 19 say that these valves, in an emergency, you know, can 20 operate between 250 to 500 times, you know, in a dire 21 accident,        you  know,      the    worst        accident    you      can 22 imagine, no electricity and stuff like that.
23                    And, you know, you've got this defect in 24 the bellows that, you know, nobody still -- and it's 25 just astonishing, you guys are educated, and you've NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Docket Number: (n/a)  
29 1 got a whole bunch of processes and stuff like that, 2 and you can't -- it takes you years.                    I mean, the LER 3 process        sounds    like      the      engineer,      it's        not 4 engineering to engineer these documents to tell the 5 truth, it's giving them the excuse to hide it, you 6 know, we'll do another update, and we'll just ignore 7 it, and we'll falsify documents in front of you. And, 8 the NRC will, you know, hear no evil, see no evil, 9 and speak no evil.
10                  They    have    a    ton    of    rules,  but      they 11 interpret them in a special way that nobody can see 12 if they are doing it right.                    I just -- it's mind 13 boggling, when you consider how big this thing is.
14 You      know,  and  you    have    the    update,    and    however 15 industry has experienced leakage with other Target --
16 you      know,  however,      the    industry        has  experienced 17 leakage with other Target Rock model safety relief 18 valves at other plants.              Why isn't there a thing, we 19 have -- let's be honest, you know, and up front, 20 instead of giving you a baloney sentence like that, 21 why couldn't they give a list of all the plants, you 22 know, all the plants that had problems with three-23 stage relief valves.
24                  In the LER, they've got the three-stage 25 guys in there, you know, San Onofre again, how come NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Location:   teleconference
30 1 nobody -- how come in that license amendment request, 2 put these three-stage guys in there, how come they 3 didn't talk about all the vulnerability of three-4 stage valves.        How come they didn't talk about all 5 the      leakages  with    three-stage          Target    Rock    relief 6 valves in that LER.            You know, how come, you know, 7 they quoted regulations business and all that sort of 8 stuff, you know, and happy land, these are new valves 9 replacing old valves, how come you never talk about, 10 you      know,  the   thermability          of      these  three-stage 11 valves, what problems there were in the industry, and 12 that type of thing.
13                  How come -- is that all the documents, 14 you know, all the NRC's documents and LERs in the 15 industry, the happy land, this is the happy land 16 version of documentation, and we are the professional 17 class of incomplete and inaccurate Federal documents 18 and stuff like that.            Is that what this -- is that 19 what's going on here with LERs in general and stuff 20 like that, or, you know, like for like processes and 21 stuff like that, is anybody going behind the scenes 22 and talking and interpreting these things in a way 23 for themselves, and not for what's in the interest of 24 our country.
25                  That stuff, it asks so much of us, it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Date:   Tuesday, June 11, 2013
31 1 asks so much of us to be better people, and so we'll 2 go to the new one.              This is the guy that is kind of 3 interesting, you know.                I did write my 2.206 before 4 this, right, and I did have my first transcript thing 5 there, so this is a new one.                  And, you know what it's 6 talking about, SRV 3B, safety relief valve declared 7 inoperable due to leakage and set point drift, right?
8   This guy is still going to say, at the end of it, 9 after all of this in the industry we still don't know 10 what's wrong with these safety relief valves. We are 11 still investigating it.                Is that what we've come down 12 to,      that    it  takes      two    years      and  you  are      still 13 investigating it?              Is it going to be another ten 14 years before you come to a solution with this, and 15 you've become honest with people and stuff like that?
16                    Do you know how dangerous this kind of 17 stuff is to you guys, you know, if an accident shows 18 up,        and    it    turns        off      everybody,      this        is 19 extraordinarily dangerous stuff.                      You see the problem 20 we face if all of a sudden everyone has lost faith in 21 the NRC, and we start turning off these plants nilly-22 willy,        you  know,    we    lose    a  tremendous    amount        of 23 electricity, electrical capacity, because you guys 24 are mistrustful.
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Work Order No.: NRC-004 Pages 1-41
32 1 create meticulously accurate documents, but you play 2 these document games and selective disclosures, and 3 you space these things for a date, you know, six 4 months down the line.                 Your fine LER is obscenely 5 inaccurate and falsified, and it's all staged to not 6 come up with a solution or accurately describe what's 7 going on.          It's an excuse to delay fixing these 8 things and keeping a plant in operation, when they 9 shouldn't be in operation.                  It's an excuse for, you 10 know,        Entergy,    or    any    other      plant    in  the    United 11 States,        you  know,      we've    got      a  problem    and      we 12 shouldn't play these document dancing games whenever 13 we feel like it and stuff like that, and we can delay 14 admitting what's going on here for months.
15                    Now, with Vermont Yankee with the safety 16 relief threaded seal business, you won't admit to it, 17 but you did the same thing.                And so, then we go down, 18 automatic          depressuring            provides          tanks          for 19 interpreting the thermocoupling data and determine 20 valve operating, based in part on testing performed 21 by Target Rock.          Can I see that?              Can I see that --
22 can I talk to somebody in Target Rock and say, you 23 know,        what  is  your    indications          when  you    have        a 24 leaking relief valve, what is the failure rate of set 25 point        inaccuracy      problems,        you      know,  about        not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Edited by Richard V. Guzman, NRC Petition Manager
33 1 lifting plus or minus three at the right pressure.
2                    See, and remember, this is the guy that 3 you asked me the question about.                        So, as far as the 4 installation          of  RF2,    oh,      man,      I'm  getting        all 5 excited, the installation in RF018 and prior to this 6 Pilgrim experience, minor second stage valve leakage 7 from SRV, RV203-3C.                We know, from this            one, too, 8 it's      the    first  stage      and    the      second  stage,        two 9 different components here.                  So, and, basically, you 10 know, you've got the inaccuracy problems, and then 11 you've        got  the  bellows      issues.          You  know,      these 12 things are all broken up into little pieces with you 13 guys, and you see the happy tune side of it, and 14 stuff like that.
15                    What    happens        if    you    put  everything 16 together?          Do you think the bellows thing was just a 17 coincidence?          Do you think this whole cycle was just 18 a coincidence that just happened?                          Hey, you know, 19 almost three shutdowns and all these things, can you 20 imagine the money associated with this, with these 21 three shutdowns, three-day shutdowns, a million and a 22 half, maybe $2 million a day or more, and stuff like 23 that.        Is this competency?
24                    I don't understand how the CEO gets away 25 with this stuff, that he can have an organization NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC. Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
34 1 that's so incompetent, and they can't see each other 2 that he is sabotaging the operation of this plant 3 because he's losing money on full-quality valves, you 4 know, in a host of ways.                  I can't understand, I hope 5 this isn't going on throughout the whole fleet, where 6 these        guys    are    so    incompetent          and,  you      know, 7 reckless, as far as with money, with Entergy, I don't 8 see how they get away with it.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
9                    So, we are going to get done reading that 10 Pilgrim        experience      minus      second-stage      pilot      valve 11 leakage from SRV RV203-3C on May 18, 2011.                            That's 12 two      weeks,    wasn't      anybody      astonished,      brand        new 13 valves, this is a mature design of valves.                        We've had 14 these valves in the system for many decades, and two 15 weeks after installing brand new valves they start 16 leaking.
17                    And then November 2nd, they start leaking 18 again and stuff like that, and nobody does nothing?
19 You know, no, it will go away, we'll just ignore it 20 and      it    will  go    away.        Every      time  they    have        a 21 shutdown, or whatever stuff, we don't have to tell 22 anybody, and it will go away.                        We don't have to --
23 you know, all this my interest and stuff like that, 24 you'd think before they start it up they would have, 25 you know, said, oh, we found the problem, and it's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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35 1 taken care of, fixed for sure this time.                    Would you 2 trust them, though, with falsifying documents like 3 they've done, and the NRC sitting back and playing, 4 what is that one, the wise monkey stuff.
5                So,  November        25th      and  December      26th, 6 2011, the first two leaks, that was never disclosed 7 until this last -- you know, and then they -- I never 8 got to see this LER until the plant was shut down, 9 you know.      Do you know what that stinks of?              You guys 10 were structuring closure of this valve in a safe 11 shutdown, and stuff like that.                      Is that what was 12 going on here with Entergy is saying, well, we don't 13 want to admit this when the plant was in operation.
14 We don't want to, you know -- we probably have some 15 -- we don't have to disclose these things within a 16 certain amount of time, they just have to do it when 17 they feel like it, when it's convenient, when the 18 plant is in a safe condition, a shutdown condition, 19 and they won't be threatened by a shutdown, you know.
20                As I said, do we have to get in this 21 environment where everybody is so scared, you know, 22 the San Onofre shutdown, and a host of other threats 23 going on and stuff like that, and then pretty soon, 24 you know, they are pulling in the horns, and we come 25 in a dictatorship state, essentially, with releasing NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 1 information.        The security causes us to close down, 2 to be like a -- not the great United States of 3 America, our country, we are with our legal systems 4 and all that sort of stuff, are we becoming something 5 that we shouldn't be, because we are fearful, and 6 because, you know, it has to -- you know, it becomes 7 a turmoil, and troubles like that, do we hinder to 8 our basic instincts,            or do we come bigger than we 9 are, we have to be, we come bigger and better than we 10 normally are.                        Does our character ask us 11 or tell us into being more open?                      I don't feel I 12 should be closed, I try to be bigger than that.                      I've 13 got to be bigger in front of my family, in front of 14 my Nation, and I've got to set my sites to a standard 15 that purports to our Constitution, that this is the 16 ideals of our Constitution, openness, earnestness, 17 integrity, trustworthy, and I'm a man of my honor, or 18 a woman.
19                  Or, do I fiddle around with these rules, 20 I twist them around, and, you know, we all think we 21 are following the rules, but the product is that we 22 are getting falsified and inaccurate information out 23 there.        We  sit    back    and    be    happy that    we      are 24 following the rules, and nobody can -- not outsiders 25 can really understand if you are following the rules, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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37 1 or you are misinterpreting the rules and regulations 2 and stuff like that.
3                    And, you know, it goes down to this thing 4 of character and honor and stuff.                      If you don't have 5 that, you know, I'd rather have character and honor 6 than rules, really, when you get down to it.                                  I 7 believe you can be good people, and being good, and 8 honest, and transparent, and stuff like that, can 9 bail you out of a lot of trouble type of thing.
10                    And,    you    know,      fiddling      around      with 11 rules, and disclosures, and, you know, playing it 12 safe,        you  are  asking    for    a  disaster    of  enormous 13 magnitude, and        it doesn't have to, necessarily, be a 14 core meltdown, it could be an integrity meltdown, 15 like at San Onofre.
16                    So, with the condition potentially high, 17 here we go, condition potentially placed on all four 18 states SRV valves that were installed in RF018, how 19 come that ain't raising back the hairs on everybody's 20 head.        This is common mode failure.                It's diagnosed 21 and they don't know what's causing it, or they won't 22 admit it, is that what -- I mean, like I said, is 23 that what's going on here, they know what's going on 24 her but they just holding it for money reasons, not 25 to lay the blame disclosing what's going on here and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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38 1 stuff.
2                    I know I've got three minutes left.
3                    You know, that bugs me, May 18, 2011, two 4 weeks after the start-up of brand new valves, and 5 November 22nd, then they lied about it on December 6 26th.          They lied about it in documents.                See, the 7 2.206 problem is supposed to give a guy like me the 8 ability to create transparency and change your mind, 9 change your hearts and minds and stuff like that.
10 That's what the 2.206 -- it's bigger -- I'm an idiot, 11 and I'm a peon and an ant, but it's supposed to be 12 something that is bigger than me, and bigger than 13 you, and it's supposed to be a tool of transparency, 14 where our Nation gets to see what's going on, and 15 give support to the ideals of what a great nation is, 16 and      great    character,      and    honor,      and  integrity.
17 That's what the 2.206 problem is.
18                    And, the way this thing is instituted now 19 is that, it's a tool of the devil, and then we get to 20 talk about my deviation 3.8, if they would have seen 21 that, if they would have magically had the God's-eye 22 view of seeing that 3.8, they would                    have had to shut 23 down.
24                    I know, these guys don't test it until 25 they are shut down, but there's a requirement if it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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39 1 goes past the 3.8 -- 3.0, you are supposed to shut 2 down, but you don't test it.                It's mind boggling.
3                  Additional      corrective          actions    will        be 4 implemented        based      on    the    results        of    testing, 5 inspection and evaluation of the first -- leaking 6 first stage from the 2B valve.
7                  You  know,      the    risk        of  operating        the 8 valves, the risks of operating the SRV characterized 9 by increased chance, right?                  They had problems this 10 last time, you didn't know if the valve was open or 11 shut because they couldn't hear the noise monitor, or 12 the noise detector, acoustical detector, you know.                              I 13 don't know what that was all about.
14                  But, having an inadvertent open SRV would 15 increase chance of valve failure to reclose. That's 16 important, but, you know, you guys don't talk about 17 putting an accurate set point pressure on it.                              They 18 maybe        talk  about    --    talking      about    the    set    point 19 drift, and they don't even talk about -- you know, 20 you were quiet once it got back 3.0, we are supposed 21 to -- and then, you know, industry has experienced 22 numerous instances where SRV leakage has occurred at 23 other        plants  with    other      Target        Rock  three-stage 24 relief valves.          I'd like to know what that means, 25 with other -- you know, so you could have other NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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40 1 Target Rock model three-stage relief valves, I mean, 2 there's more than one model for three-stage relief 3 valves, you know.
4                But, here they start talking about, you 5 know, three-stage relief valves at Plant Hatch, and 6 other things, and then they start talking about the 7 three stage, you know.        Oh, we've had other problems, 8 even that first LER talks to us about we have leakage 9 in that other valve, not the model we are using here 10 type of language, and now they are talking about, oh, 11 well, you know, here's a list of three-stage relief 12 valves that we've had.
13                You  know,      that      whole      thing,  honesty, 14 integrity, and I'm a man of character type of thing, 15 you know, an organization, I never would write a bad 16 report, an organization never forces me to write a 17 bad or an inaccurate report, because I'm a man of 18 integrity. I will not tolerate that kind of business 19 type of thing.
20                And,  I    guess,      you      know,  you  know        my 21 issues with the Navy rock that go shut down with the 22 weather instrumentation.
23                Yes, I'm done.
24                CHAIR GIITTER:        Thank you, Mr. Mulligan.
25                At this time, does any staff here at NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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41 1 Headquarters have any questions for Mr. Mulligan?
2                  CHAIR GIITTER:          Thank you.      What about 3 the region?
4                  MR. BOWER:      None.
5                  CHAIR GIITTER:        Thank you.
6                  Before I conclude the meeting -- well, we 7 don't have any members of the public, or we didn't, 8 so I just want to make sure there's no members of the 9 public on the bridge.          Okay.
10                  As stated in the opening, the purpose of 11 this meeting is not to provide an opportunity for the 12 Petitioner or the public to question or examine the 13 PRB regarding the merits of the petition request.
14                  Mr. Mulligan, I thank you for taking time 15 to provide the NRC staff with verifying information 16 on the petition you submitted.                The PRB plans to meet 17 internally, and discuss the matter one more time.
18                  Before we close, does the court reporter 19 need        any additional      information          for the    meeting 20 transcript?
21                  COURT REPORTER:        No, I've got everything, 22 thanks.
23                  CHAIR GIITTER:          Thank you.      With that, 24 the meeting is concluded, and we'll be terminating 25 the phone connection.
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42 1               MR. MULLIGAN:         And, thank you very much 2 for this opportunity.
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3               CHAIR   GIITTER:         Okay,   thank  you,       Mr.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2 + + + + +
4 Mulligan.
3 10 CFR 2.206 PETITION REVIEW BOARD (PRB) 4 CONFERENCE CALL 5 RE 6 PILGRIM NUCLEAR POWER STATION 7 + + + + +
5               (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter was 6 concluded at 4:03 p.m.)
8 TUESDAY 9 JUNE 11, 2013 10 + + + + +
7 8
11  The conference call was held, Joe 12 Giitter, Chairperson of the Petition Review Board, 13 presiding.
9 10 11 12 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
14  15 PETITIONER: MICHAEL MULLIGAN 16  17 PETITION REVIEW BOARD MEMBERS 18 JOE GIITTER, Director, Division of Risk Assessment 19 in the Office of Nuclear Reactor 20 Regulation 21 RICHARD GUZMAN, Petition Manager for 2.206 petition 22  EMILY MONTEITH, Office of General Counsel 23  24  25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 2 NRC HEADQUARTERS STAFF 1 LEE BANIC, Petition Coordinator, Division of Policy 2 and Rulemaking, NRR 3 JOHN BILLERBECK, Component Performance and Testing 4 Branch, NRR 5  MUHAMMAD RAZZAQUE, Reactor Systems Branch, NRR 6  7 NRC REGION I OFFICE 8  FRED BOWER 9  10 ALSO PRESENT 11  JOSEPH LYNCH, Entergy 12 13 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 3 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 1 (3:06 p.m.)
2  MS. RIVERA:  Good afternoon. I would 3 like to thank everybody for attending the 4 teleconference.
5  My name is Alison Rivera, and I am the 6 Facilitator for this teleconference. My role is to 7 help ensure today's teleconference is informative and 8 productive.
9  The purpose of today's teleconference is 10 to allow the Petitioner, Mr. Michael Mulligan, to 11 address the Petition Review Board, or PRB, regarding 12 a 2.206 petition dated March 7, 2013, as supplemented 13 by emails dated March 20th and April 5, 2013, 14 regarding his concerns with safety relief valves at 15 Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station.
16  This teleconference is scheduled for one 17 hour, from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m., Eastern  Time. It is 18 being recorded by the NRC Operations Center, and will 19 be transcribed by a court reporter.
20  The transcript will become a supplement 21 to the petition. Prior to placing the transcript in 22 ADAMS, the PRB will review it to ensure that it does 23 not contain any allegations or sensitive information.
24  For those dialing in to this 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 4 teleconference, please remember to mute your phone to 1 minimize any background noise or distraction. If you 2 do not have a mute button, this can be done by 3 pressing the keys *6. To unmute, you will press *6 4 again. 5  I'd like to emphasize that we each need 6 to speak clearly and loudly, to make sure that the 7 court reporter can accurately transcribe the 8 teleconference.
9  If you do have something that you would 10 like to say, please first state your name for the 11 record. 12  Now, I would like to have the NRC meeting 13 participants to introduce themselves. I ask that all 14 of the participants clearly state for the record your 15 name, your position, and your organization.
16  I will start with myself, and then turn 17 it over to the other NRC participants here in the 18 room. 19  My name is Alison Rivera, and I am a 20 Technical Assistant for the Division of 21 Intergovernmental Liaison and Rulemaking, in the 22 Office of Federal and State Materials and 23 Environmental Management Programs.
24  CHAIR GIITTER:  Okay. I'm Joe Giitter, 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 5 I'm the Director of the Division of Risk Assessment, 1 in the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulations.
2  MR. BILLERBECK:  This is John Billerbeck.
3 I'm a Mechanical Engineer in the Division of 4 Engineering in NRR.
5  MR. BANIC:  Lee Banic, Petition 6 Coordinator, NRR.
7  MR. GUZMAN:  Rich Guzman. I'm a Senior 8 Project Manager in the Division of Operating Reactor 9 Licensing, in the Office of NRR.
10  MS. RIVERA:  That completes the 11 introductions of the NRC staff in this room. At this 12 time, are there any NRC participants from 13 Headquarters on the phone?
14  MR. RAZZAQUE:  This is Mohammed Razzaque, 15 from Reactor Systems Branch, NRR.
16  MS. MONTIETH:  Emily Montieth, Office of 17 General Counsel.
18  MS. RIVERA:  Are there any NRC 19 participants from the regional offices on the phone?
20  MR. BOWER:  Yes, this is Fred Bower. I'm 21 an Acting Branch Chief from Region 1.
22  MS. RIVERA:  At this time, will the 23 representatives for Entergy Nuclear Operations, 24 Incorporated, Licensee for program, introduce 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 6 themselves?
1  MR. LYNCH:  This is Joe Lynch, Licensing 2 Manager, Pilgrim Station.
3  MS. RIVERA:  Mr. Mulligan, would you 4 please introduce yourself for the record?
5  MR. MULLIGAN: I'm Mike Mulligan. I'm a 6 whistle blower. I was in the Navy on an experimental 7 pass protect submarine. I worked as a Reactor 8 Operator for a number of years, and I've worked at a 9 nuclear power plant.
10  Thank you.
11  MS. RIVERA:  Thank you.
12  Are there any other, such as members of 13 the public, on the phone?
14  And, for our court reporter, can you also 15 please state your name?
16  COURT REPORTER:  This is Sam Wojack. I'm 17 the court reporter.
18  MS. RIVERA:  Before we begin, I'd like to 19 first share some general background on the 2.206 20 process. 21  Section 2.206 of Title X of the Code of 22 Federal Regulations, describes the petition process, 23  the primary mechanism for the public to request 24 enforcement action by the NRC in a public process.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 7 This process permits anyone to petition NRC to take 1 enforcement-type action related to NRC licensees or 2 license activities.
3  Depending on the results of this 4 evaluation, NRC could modify, suspend, or revoke an 5 NRC issued license, or take any other appropriate 6 enforcement action to resolve the problem.
7  The NRC staff guidance for the 8 disposition of a 2.206 petition request is in 9 Management Directive 8.11, which is publicly 10 available.
11  Again, the purpose of today's 12 teleconference is to give the Petitioner an 13 opportunity to provide any additional support for the 14 petition, in light of the Petition Review Board's 15 initial recommendation.
16  This teleconference is not a hearing, nor 17 is it an opportunity for the Petitioner to question 18 or examine the PRB on the merits or the issues 19 presented in the petition request.
20  No decisions regarding the merits of this 21 petition will be made at this teleconference.
22  Following this teleconference, the 23 Petition Review Board will conduct its internal 24 deliberations. The outcome of these internal 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 8 deliberations will then be discussed with the 1 Petitioner.
2  The Petition Review Board, typically, 3 consists of a chairman, usually a manager at the 4 Senior Executive Service level at the NRC. It has a 5 petition manager and other members of the Board, as 6 determined by the NRC staff, based on the content of 7 the information in the petition request.
8  As described in our process, the NRC 9 staff may ask clarifying questions in order to better 10 understand the Petitioner's presentation, and to 11 reach a reasoned decision whether to accept or reject 12 the Petitioner's request for review under the 2.206 13 process. 14  Also, as described in our process, the 15 Licensees have been invited to participate in today's 16 teleconference, to ensure that they understand the 17 concerns about their facility or activity.
18  While the Licensees may also ask 19 questions to clarify the issues raised by the 20 Petitioner, I would like to stress that the Licensees 21 are not a part of the PRB's decision-making process.
22  I will now turn the teleconference over 23 to Joe Giitter, the PRB Chairman, who will discuss 24 the specific petition under consideration.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 9  CHAIR GIITTER: Okay, thank you, Alison.
1  I would like to begin by summarizing the 2 PRB's understanding of the scope of the petition 3 under consideration, and described the NRC's 4 activities to date.
5  On March, 2013, Mr. Mulligan submitted to 6 the NRC a petition on 2.206 regarding concerns with 7 the safety relief valves, or SRVs, at the Pilgrim 8 Nuclear Power Station.
9   In his petition request, Mr. Mulligan 10 requests that the NRC immediately shut down Pilgrim 11 Nuclear Station on the basis of the Licensee is 12 operating the plant in an unsafe condition with 13 defective or inoperable safety relief valves.
14  The Petitioner also indicates that 15 Entergy is incapable of maintaining safety and 16 quality of the plant. In addition, Petitioner 17 requests the NRC to not allow the Pilgrim Plant to 18 restart following shutdown until they understand past 19 failure mechanisms of the defective SRVs at Pilgrim.
20  As support for this request, Mr. Mulligan 21 states, in short, that the repeated nature of the 22 failure of the SRVs at Pilgrim demonstrates that 23 Entergy does not understand the mechanism of the 24 failure and that defective or inoperable SRVs at a 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  10 nuclear power plant is unsafe.
1  Mr. Mulligan also states that the NRC is 2 allowing the plant to operate with unsafe SRVs until 3 the next refueling outage, and is covering up an 4 unsafe condition at Pilgrim.
5  Mr. Mulligan requests an investigation by 6 the Office of the Inspector General for his concern.
7  Now, I would like to talk about what NRC 8 has done to date on this.
9  On March 14, 2013, the Petition Manager 10 contacted the Petitioner to discuss the 10 CFR 2.206 11 process and to offer the Petitioner an opportunity to 12 address the PRB by phone or in person.
13  The Petitioner requested to address the 14 PRB by phone, prior to its internal meeting to make 15 the initial recommendation to either accept or reject 16 the petition for review.
17  On April 11, 2013, Mr. Mulligan addressed 18 the PRB via teleconference. The PRB then held its 19 internal PRB meeting on May 6, 2013, and on May 22, 20 2013, Mr. Mulligan was informed of the PRB's initial 21 recommendation regarding the petition, which is to 22 reject the petition for review, because in accordance 23 with Management Directive 8.11 Petitioner did not 24 provide sufficient facts, or any element of support, 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  11 beyond the basic assertion for the inquiry.
1  In addition, the PRB notes that the 2 Petitioner did not identify a violation of an NRC 3 requirement, or did Petitioner provide significant 4 new information to warrant the request of enforcement 5 action. 6  As support for its initial 7 recommendation, the PRB notes that the Licensee's 8 operability evaluation for SRVs that have leaked at 9 Pilgrim have been reviewed by the NRC inspectors, and 10 determined to be adequately justified. The Licensee 11 has also complied with the applicable tech specs, and 12 has demonstrated that SRVs are monitored and 13 maintained in a condition that ensures that they will 14 perform their safety function.
15  Additionally, the NRC staff continues to 16 monitor and collect operating experience on SRV 17 leakage problems. While the staff acknowledges that 18 industry has seen, and is investigating leaking SRVs 19 of this specific design, the NRC staff's evaluation 20 no industry operational data to date indicates that 21 the specific SRV model or design at Pilgrim poses a 22 real significant safety concern.
23  As a reminder for the phone participants, 24 please identify yourself if you make any remarks, as 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  12 this will help us in the preparation of the meeting 1 transcript that will be made publicly available.
2  Thank you.
3  Mr. Mulligan, I'll now turn it over to 4 you, to allow you to provide any information you 5 believe the PRB should consider as part of its 6 decision.
7  MR. MULLIGAN:  Okay. You talked about an 8 allegation that you were going to submit, an 9 allegation note or something. What was that about?
10 I'm just curious.
11  MS. RIVERA:  The PRB will review the 12 transcript to ensure that there is no allegation with 13 sensitive information.
14  MR. MULLIGAN:  Okay, thank you.
15  I will just say that, you know, like I've 16 always been talking about the NRC kind of says I have 17 no proof about the system as far as the access to the 18 information is zilch, and you give LERs, you give 19 inaccurate, falsified information to the public as 20 far as disclosures and stuff like that.
21  So, how can somebody like me have 22 confidence in the NRC doing their job?
23  Here's a June 11th Forbes article on San 24 Onofre, and southern California citizens problems 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  13with their entire nuclear energy sector. So, a 1 nuclear energy sector has taken a blow now that 2 Southern California Edison has decided to permanently 3 close this troubled nuclear plant. Safety is a key 4 concern. So is honesty and transparency.
5  So, you know, you can take -- you guys 6 talk about risk, this doesn't have any risk and stuff 7 like that, and I'm telling you this has enormous risk 8 for the community and you guys.
9  You know, if you keep going on in this 10 direction, where, you know, a dual plant like San 11 Onofre, you know, we get the feeling that the NRC is 12 not enforcing their regulations correctly, and their 13 perceptions of what the regulations state is so 14 grossly obscene that, you know, we mistrust the 15 agency. I mean, that's a risk of a different sort, 16 that you don't even take into consideration.
17  And, this risk business, as far as giving 18 me the information, you know, as far as what is going 19 on with those valves, seeing the, you know, internal 20 documents and stuff like that, that is the same as 21 San Onofre had at its deepest core. You guys can 22 hide your information away from the public, and you 23 can have these special interpretations of rules and 24 regulations, as far as, you know, not having a proper 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  14 license amendment request and stuff like that, you 1 can bend the rules, and stuff like that, you know, 2 that's atrocious to think that that -- you know, all 3 you guys deal with is the risk associated with, you 4 know, as far as these engineers' calculations nobody 5 can understand.
6  And, you don't look at the holistic risk, 7 as far as your behavior, how we, the public, see 8 this, and what garbage you've got in your document 9 and stuff like that that's the essence of, you know, 10 I talk about the tree-wise monkey architecture of 11 Federal rules. I would include the way you interpret 12 things, you know, the see no evil, hear no evil, 13 speak no evil, the idea that you interpret things 14 behind the scenes that nobody can make sure that you 15 are telling the truth and disclosing everything, and 16 all that sort of stuff.
17  And, that's what I'm talking about.
18 That's what we are seeing in front of us, you know, a 19 Pilgrim plant here, they've had a lot of protests, a 20 lot of towns, you know, have given their hope as far 21 as wanting to shut that down, and, evidently, nobody 22 feels, you know, with San Onofre and a whole bunch of 23 other events everybody feels nervous about disclosing 24 things. And, you know, you keep your things in your 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  15 desk, and I mean that seems to be what's going on 1 here. The more you get frightened about events 2 happening in front of us, the more you hide things, 3 and the more destructive it's going to be, as far as 4 hiding events, and not taking care of these things 5 right, and turning off the public in ways.
6  So, you know, the new LER, I forget what 7 the most recent one, is startling, things that were 8 disclosed in that. And, of course, I put this to 9 2.206 before the LER came in, was written up.
10  Anyways, I get a joke out of the 11 Frankenstein Pilgrim SRV valve 3B, in an inspection 12 report of 2013, 00 May 8th, the inspectors observed a 13 plant shutdown on January 20, after operators had 14 identified significant leakage on SRV 3B pilot valve.
15  First stage temperature indicated a temperature 16 greater than 35 degrees. This exceeded the limits in 17 their procedures, and required the operating crew to 18 declare SRV 3B inoperable. And, you consequently 19 shut down and stuff like that.
20  And, you either repaired it or replaced 21 it, but, certainly, you must have tested it. And 22 then, you know, so on January 20th, January, 23 February, I don't know, two, three weeks later on, 24 operators responded to further shut down the plant.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  16They started  it back up, and on February 3rd 1 operators responded and affirmed indications of pilot 2 leakage on SRV 3B, following its repair and forced 3 outage 1906. Pilgrim remained at 80 percent power 4 until Blizzard Nemo took the plant down.
5  And so, you know, this is atrocious 6 behavior, that's one example, you know. You so-7 called fixed the valve, and, I mean, you know, is it 8 risky as far an engineering calculation on the 9 relative work on the component, involved with the 10 component, and stuff like that, do you guys deal with 11 risk?  Or, is it risky, the actual behavior or 12 Entergy not to be able to have a leak, fix it, and 13 with days of starting up the valve starts leaking 14 again, and then they are forced to have a power 15 restriction and stuff like that.
16  So, you guys interpret this as there's no 17 safety issues, and what you can see over the period 18 when they purchased these valves, and stuff like 19 that, it's just atrocious utility and NRC behavior, 20 as far as, you know, engineering quality, and, you 21 know, you know what's going on with your plant, and 22 you have the tools in front of you that you could 23 quickly repair it. You know, this risk business is 24 an excuse to do nothing, and that's how this turns 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  17 out. 1  This risk business and calculation is an 2 excuse to do nothing, and it's not an excuse to pay 3 attention to our plant. I mean, it's not a tool that 4 forces you to pay attention to your plant, and 5 purchase the quality of valve that is necessary and 6 stuff, and to repair it correctly, and test it. You 7 know, like this business here, it was started up and 8 it leaked again. And, this isn't the first time.
9  When they purchased them brand new valves 10 and put them in for the first time, they had leaks 11 within weeks of starting up again. Can you imagine 12 that, how that looks, as far as people like me 13 outside, the way we see this. You know, you guys 14 want the most important valve components in the 15 nuclear plant, and you can't figure out the quality 16 that is necessary for their duty, and they start 17 failing within two weeks, the new valves start 18 failing within two weeks. And then, you people have 19 the gall to come back and say, oh, well, this doesn't 20 meet any of our  -- this is all safe, and this is 21 real good stuff, everything is okay.
22  Even to this day, even to this day with 23 two shutdowns over these valves, you are heading for 24 a third shutdown, you have an association of power 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  18 restrictions and stuff like that, almost three 1 shutdowns and six or eight power restrictions at 2 different times and all that sort of stuff.
3  And, the last LER states that we still 4 don't know what's wrong with those valves, and we are 5 doing further investigation. Is that what nuclear 6 power has come to, as far as, you know, you guys 7 don't have the sense of quality and expertise and 8 honesty to deal with these things relatively 9 immediately, and the analysis gives you the excuse 10 that nothing ever matters, that we can run these 11 things into the ground, into the dirt.
12  I mean, you know, most of the public 13 doesn't really understand what's going on here, but I 14 do, and you do, too. And, allowing this stuff to go 15 on here, and somebody not raising a stink is 16 astonishing, especially, within the NRC.
17  I'm going to go back to the first LER for 18 a few comments there. At this time, the most -- this 19 is the first LER, LER 2011 007-00, right?  At this 20 time, the most probably root cause are problems 21 during the initial manufacturing and their assembly 22 of the pilot at the Target Rock prior to installation 23 at the site.
24  CHAIR GIITTER:  Could you restate that?
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  19  MR. MULLIGAN:  At the time, the most 1 probable root cause were problems during the initial 2 manufacturing or assembly of the pilot at the Target 3 Rock prior to installation on the site.
4  Wile Labs, Target Rock and Entergy are 5 looking into these problems.
6  The identified condition, is a leaking 7 SRV pilot, based on the only pilot -- you know, 8 you've got to say this, what this is, the report 9 date, the event date, 12/26, right, 12/26, yes, the 10 pilot leaks, and this is what I'm talking about. This 11 is gross falsification of Federal documents. It's 12 gross falsification of Federal documents by NRC, by 13 Entergy, and the NRC doesn't call them on it.
14  Based on the review of the data, the only 15 pilot to exhibit leakage is RV --
16  MS. RIVERA:  Mr. Mulligan?
17  MR. MULLIGAN:  Yes.
18  MS. RIVERA:  This is Alison Rivera. We 19 have a question over here about your previous 20 statement, trying to figure out if that's an 21 additional allegation.
22  MR. MULLIGAN:  Yes, it is.
23  CHAIR GIITTER:  Could you, specifically, 24 state the allegation again, Mr. Mulligan?
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  20  MR. MULLIGAN:  Okay, based on the plant 1 data, the only -- "The only pilot valve that exhibits 2 signs of leakage is RV 203-3B." 3  And, let me see if I can -- the last LER 4 indicates that within weeks of starting up the plant 5 they had a leak -- they had a leak on a valve, and 6 then a month before the first LER they had another 7 leak on it.
8  And, when I get to that LER, I'll 9 identify that, the time frame.
10  CHAIR GIITTER:  Okay. Could you just 11 restate the allegation again?  I'm not sure I got 12 everything.
13  MR. MULLIGAN:  Okay. The LER that I'm 14 talking about, 2007 007-00 it quotes right here, "The 15 only pilot valve to exhibit signs of leakage is RV 16 2003-3."  2003-3, RV 2003-3B.
17  "The only pilot valve to exhibit signs of 18 leakage is RV 2003-3," and they had two prior leaks 19 that they didn't disclose in this LER.
20  You got it?
21  CHAIR GIITTER:  Yes, the LER was 2007-22 007? 23  MR. MULLIGAN:  2011.
24  CHAIR GIITTER:  2011, I'm sorry.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  21  MR. MULLIGAN:  So, this guy is -- the 1 event date is 12/26/2011 and two prior events before 2 that -- there was two prior events before that, that 3 they had leaks that they didn't disclose, that they 4 later disclosed on the most recent LER.
5  Okay? 6  CHAIR GIITTER:  Thank you.
7  MR. MULLIGAN:  And, this is another one.
8  This is another allegation. Because the leakage 9 established by procedure did not affect the SRV set 10 pressure, or capacity, the SRV would have been able 11 to respond if needed to meet core cooling or reactor 12 vessel over pressure, over pressure detection 13 function.
14  And, the most recent LER says that there 15 was a leakage effect of the SRV open set point. And 16 so, I mean, the idea that they are saying it did not 17 affect the SRV set pressure or capacity set pressure, 18 you have to meet set pressure.
19  So, and then later on, because of the 20 leakage you did have an SRV that exceeded its plus or 21 minus 3 percent opening set point level. And, if you 22 would have known about that, I believe it was 3.8, if 23 you would have known about that they would have been 24 required to shut the plant down.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  22  And so, you now, you are sitting here --
1 you know, he makes a kind of a simple statement that 2 the procedure did not affect the SRV set point 3 pressure. So, what is thinking of these guys, you 4 know?  Okay, we've got leaks here and stuff like 5 that. If it hasn't reached its set -- it hasn't been 6 inaccurate yet, but, you know, is the engineers going 7 down there anticipating the future, can we have 8 opening set points inaccuracy problems that we can't 9 see and stuff like that. We could, essentially, have 10 a set of SRVs that would not be able to reach -- be 11 at their accuracy level, plus or minus 3 percent, and 12 stuff like that.
13  So, you know, the idea that these guys 14 can say to themselves do an analysis and say, oh, and 15 one of the issues we could have in the future with 16 our crazy SRVs that keep malfunctioning on us, is we 17 could have an inaccurate opening of an SRV. We could 18 have an inaccurate opening of an SRV for an over 19 pressure condition caused by the leak. I mean, is 20 anybody thinking about these things, about how set 21 pressure could become inaccurate?
22  And then you say to yourself, well, do 23 they even test for set pressure on all these leaking 24 valves that they had, and stuff like that. Do they 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  23 check themselves and say, hey, we are going to do a 1 set -- an opening, with these defective leaking 2 valves we are going to do -- and, you know, we are 3 going to raise up questions to the valve opening and 4 see where it begins to open, and see if the leakage 5 has caused set pressure problems and stuff like that.
6  Is anybody doing that kind of stuff?
7  You know, so there's an issue that, you 8 know, they really assumed that the leaking wouldn't 9 cause any SRV set pressure problems in the future, 10 and, of course, we know that they did.
11  So, and here's another one with the 12 leaking -- the leaks that they didn't disclose.
13 There is no previous first-stage leakage occurring at 14 these safety relief valves since all four safety 15 relief valves were newly installed in May --
16 April/May, 2011, during refueling outage 18.
17  But, you know, they made the assertion in 18 Federal documents that there was no prior leakage, 19 and you know there's two other -- there's two other 20 leakages that, you know, I should have been, you 21 know, outsiders should have been notified. And, we 22 should have seen how inaccurate these safety relief 23 valves are, and how unreliable, and how incompetently 24 Entergy has dealt with the -- Entergy and Target Rock 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  24 has dealt with these safety relief valves.
1  Now, just like San Onofre, if you hide 2 things it's going to be ten times worse when 3 something bad happens, instead of being open and out 4 front, and making, you know, people want to talk 5 about things, and making an effort to talk about 6 those issues, instead of just kind of -- you know, 7 hiding, you know, the politicians above us, Congress 8 and, you know, the hateful Republicans and all that 9 sort of stuff, they are going to vaporize us if we 10 open our mouths, or if we enforce regulation and 11 stuff like that. And so, I'll be quiet, you know, 12 see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil.
13  If you get into that San Onofre mindset, 14 that's more destructive than a meltdown, as far as 15 I'm concerned.
16  And, here's another one. However, the 17 industry has experienced leakage with other Target 18 rock model safety relief valves at other plants.
19 Other, you know, there's Entergy, how come they 20 didn't -- you know, it sounds like there was that 21 they admit in that last LER, the newest LER, that 22 there was a set of issues which are three-stage 23 Target Rock relief valves. Again, you know, taking 24 the narrow thing that, you know, maybe it's not an 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  25 other model, you know, being this model isn't 1 leaking, or however they want to term it, but there 2 was leaks with three-stage Target Rock. However, the 3 industry has experienced leakage with other Target 4 rock model safety relief valves.
5  You know, they are saying that the three-6 stage relief valve, the three-stage doesn't have 7 leakage problems in the industry, when in reality 8 there was a host of Target Rock model safety relief 9 valves that were leaking, and it's not full 10 disclosure.
11  You know, how do you -- how do you -- you 12 know, if there was widespread issues in the industry 13 with three-stage safety relief valves, how is 14 outsiders, like a guy like me, supposed to, you know, 15 utilize it, if you guys don't want to, you know, deal 16 with your problems, it's just up to me to try and 17 figure out what's going on and trying to help you 18 guys do the right thing.
19  With these issues in the 2.206, I mean, 20 if you hide information on me, and stuff like that, 21 then it negates the 2.206 process. It makes me -- it 22 makes me -- I don't have any information. And, you 23 keep coming back at me that, you know, I don't have 24 any information, that type of thing, and stuff like 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  26 that. 1  So, everybody feels comfortable that I 2 don't have any evidence. You know, is that because 3 there's no evidence, or is that because a whole ton 4 of evidence is being hidden from me. Those are 5 completely different things.
6  You know, the OE business, and all the 7 internal documents that Entergy has, the OE, you 8 know, safety relief temperature phenomenon at Target 9 Rock, and stuff like that, you know, it's all hidden 10 from me. It's all hidden from guys like me, and when 11 you do that you prevent a guy like me from stopping 12 you from doing the San Onofre, you know, as far as, 13 you know, harassing you, and making you slow down, 14 and making you do the right thing, and stuff like 15 that, you hide it. And that, in essence, causes 16 these big events where you end up losing the trust of 17 people around the plant, and you have to shut down 18 the plant, or the plant operation.
19  You know, and then we go into the -- I've 20 already talked about this, then we go into the 21 following, you know, this is the next -- this was the 22 update on that LER of 2011, Level 2, and, you know, 23 there was -- and it talks about all the different, 24 you know, testing and all that sort of stuff, like, 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  27you know, no big deal, everything is cool. We looked 1 over and we find no -- who was it, there was a whole 2 bunch of you guys involved, Southern Company, Wile 3 Labs, Entergy, and who else, there was another one, 4 and stuff, and you made a big deal over that first 5 LER, that first leak and stuff, and you had another 6 shutdown, another new shutdown with the NEMO 7 blizzard, with that bad valve, and then like I told 8 you, then you replaced the valve with a new, fully 9 tested valve, and within days it leaks up, it has 10 leaks again, just like when you installed that valve 11 for the first -- these valves for the first time, 12 within two weeks you have an indication of leakage.
13  You had, before the first shutdown you 14 had two leakages and stuff like that. This is 15 heightened, and in the NRC's mind this is right?
16 This is the right outcome to deny me a 2.206 because 17 I don't have enough evidence and stuff like that?
18 This is right, that you don't fix this thing?
19  I don't know, it's still up in the air as 20 far as what's causing all these shutdowns and stuff 21 like that, not only at Pilgrim, but other plants, and 22 stuff. It's right?
23  We are the United States of America, the 24 best country on the planet, and stuff like that, and 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  28 this doesn't reflect well on us at all as a 1 democracy, and the essence of being truthful, honest 2 to each other, especially, with these endeavors that 3 have a lot of energy in them and stuff like that.
4 It's wrong.
5  So, here we go. We have in the update, 6 no additional corrective actions are recommended on 7 the results of testing, inspection and evaluation of 8 the leaking pilot valve, by a three team of Wile 9 Labs, Target Rock and Entergy. You know, these 10 things -- you know, and then we talk about 10 CFR 21, 11 that for the first time in the industry it's ever 12 happened that the bellows had a crack in it, and we 13 don't know -- we are not clear whether that came from 14 a -- it came from directly from plant operation, you 15 know, they shut down, then they tested it, and then 16 up, or whether it was, certainly -- it was, 17 certainly, heading back to the plant, and then you 18 say that these valves, in an emergency, you know, can 19 operate between 250 to 500 times, you know, in a dire 20 accident, you know, the worst accident you can 21 imagine, no electricity and stuff like that.
22  And, you know, you've got this defect in 23 the bellows that, you know, nobody still -- and it's 24 just astonishing, you guys are educated, and you've 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  29 got a whole bunch of processes and stuff like that, 1 and you can't -- it takes you years. I mean, the LER 2 process sounds like the engineer, it's not 3 engineering to engineer these documents to tell the 4 truth, it's giving them the excuse to hide it, you 5 know, we'll do another update, and we'll just ignore 6 it, and we'll falsify documents in front of you. And, 7 the NRC will, you know, hear no evil, see no evil, 8 and speak no evil.
9  They have a ton of rules, but they 10 interpret them in a special way that nobody can see 11 if they are doing it right. I just -- it's mind 12 boggling, when you consider how big this thing is.
13 You know, and you have the update, and however 14 industry has experienced leakage with other Target --
15 you know, however, the industry has experienced 16 leakage with other Target Rock model safety relief 17 valves at other plants. Why isn't there a thing, we 18 have -- let's be honest, you know, and up front, 19 instead of giving you a baloney sentence like that, 20 why couldn't they give a list of all the plants, you 21 know, all the plants that had problems with three-22 stage relief valves.
23  In the LER, they've got the three-stage 24 guys in there, you know, San Onofre again, how come 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  30 nobody -- how come in that license amendment request, 1 put these three-stage guys in there, how come they 2 didn't talk about all the vulnerability of three-3 stage valves. How come they didn't talk about all 4 the leakages with three-stage Target Rock relief 5 valves in that LER. You know, how come, you know, 6 they quoted regulations business and all that sort of 7 stuff, you know, and happy land, these are new valves 8 replacing old valves, how come you never talk about, 9 you know, the thermability of these three-stage 10 valves, what problems there were in the industry, and 11 that type of thing.
12  How come -- is that all the documents, 13 you know, all the NRC's documents and LERs in the 14 industry, the happy land, this is the happy land 15 version of documentation, and we are the professional 16 class of incomplete and inaccurate Federal documents 17 and stuff like that. Is that what this -- is that 18 what's going on here with LERs in general and stuff 19 like that, or, you know, like for like processes and 20 stuff like that, is anybody going behind the scenes 21 and talking and interpreting these things in a way 22 for themselves, and not for what's in the interest of 23 our country.
24  That stuff, it asks so much of us, it 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  31 asks so much of us to be better people, and so we'll 1 go to the new one. This is the guy that is kind of 2 interesting, you know. I did write my 2.206 before 3 this, right, and I did have my first transcript thing 4 there, so this is a new one. And, you know what it's 5 talking about, SRV 3B, safety relief valve declared 6 inoperable due to leakage and set point drift, right?
7  This guy is still going to say, at the end of it, 8 after all of this in the industry we still don't know 9 what's wrong with these safety relief valves. We are 10 still investigating it. Is that what we've come down 11 to, that it takes two years and you are still 12 investigating it?  Is it going to be another ten 13 years before you come to a solution with this, and 14 you've become honest with people and stuff like that?
15  Do you know how dangerous this kind of 16 stuff is to you guys, you know, if an accident shows 17 up, and it turns off everybody, this is 18 extraordinarily dangerous stuff. You see the problem 19 we face if all of a sudden everyone has lost faith in 20 the NRC, and we start turning off these plants nilly-21 willy, you know, we lose a tremendous amount of 22 electricity, electrical capacity, because you guys 23 are mistrustful.
24  You say you follow the rules, and you 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  32 create meticulously accurate documents, but you play 1 these document games and selective disclosures, and 2 you space these things for a date, you know, six 3 months down the line. Your fine LER is obscenely 4 inaccurate and falsified, and it's all staged to not 5 come up with a solution or accurately describe what's 6 going on. It's an excuse to delay fixing these 7 things and keeping a plant in operation, when they 8 shouldn't be in operation. It's an excuse for, you 9 know, Entergy, or any other plant in the United 10 States, you know, we've got a problem and we 11 shouldn't play these document dancing games whenever 12 we feel like it and stuff like that, and we can delay 13 admitting what's going on here for months.
14  Now, with Vermont Yankee with the safety 15 relief threaded seal business, you won't admit to it, 16 but you did the same thing. And so, then we go down, 17 automatic depressuring provides tanks for 18 interpreting the thermocoupling data and determine 19 valve operating, based in part on testing performed 20 by Target Rock. Can I see that?  Can I see that --
21 can I talk to somebody in Target Rock and say, you 22 know, what is your indications when you have a 23 leaking relief valve, what is the failure rate of set 24 point inaccuracy problems, you know, about not 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  33 lifting plus or minus three at the right pressure.
1  See, and remember, this is the guy that 2 you asked me the question about. So, as far as the 3 installation of RF2, oh, man, I'm getting all 4 excited, the installation in RF018 and prior to this 5 Pilgrim experience, minor second stage valve leakage 6 from SRV, RV203-3C. We know, from this  one, too, 7 it's the first stage and the second stage, two 8 different components here. So, and, basically, you 9 know, you've got the inaccuracy problems, and then 10 you've got the bellows issues. You know, these 11 things are all broken up into little pieces with you 12 guys, and you see the happy tune side of it, and 13 stuff like that.
14  What happens if you put everything 15 together?  Do you think the bellows thing was just a 16 coincidence?  Do you think this whole cycle was just 17 a coincidence that just happened?  Hey, you know, 18 almost three shutdowns and all these things, can you 19 imagine the money associated with this, with these 20 three shutdowns, three-day shutdowns, a million and a 21 half, maybe $2 million a day or more, and stuff like 22 that. Is this competency?
23  I don't understand how the CEO gets away 24 with this stuff, that he can have an organization 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  34 that's so incompetent, and they can't see each other 1 that he is sabotaging the operation of this plant 2 because he's losing money on full-quality valves, you 3 know, in a host of ways. I can't understand, I hope 4 this isn't going on throughout the whole fleet, where 5 these guys are so incompetent and, you know, 6 reckless, as far as with money, with Entergy, I don't 7 see how they get away with it.
8  So, we are going to get done reading that 9 Pilgrim experience minus second-stage pilot valve 10 leakage from SRV RV203-3C on May 18, 2011. That's 11 two weeks, wasn't anybody astonished, brand new 12 valves, this is a mature design of valves. We've had 13 these valves in the system for many decades, and two 14 weeks after installing brand new valves they start 15 leaking. 16  And then November 2nd, they start leaking 17 again and stuff like that, and nobody does nothing?
18 You know, no, it will go away, we'll just ignore it 19 and it will go away. Every time they have a 20 shutdown, or whatever stuff, we don't have to tell 21 anybody, and it will go away. We don't have to --
22 you know, all this my interest and stuff like that, 23 you'd think before they start it up they would have, 24 you know, said, oh, we found the problem, and it's 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  35taken care of, fixed for sure this time. Would you 1 trust them, though, with falsifying documents like 2 they've done, and the NRC sitting back and playing, 3 what is that one, the wise monkey stuff.
4  So, November 25th and December 26th, 5 2011, the first two leaks, that was never disclosed 6 until this last -- you know, and then they -- I never 7 got to see this LER until the plant was shut down, 8 you know. Do you know what that stinks of?  You guys 9 were structuring closure of this valve in a safe 10 shutdown, and stuff like that. Is that what was 11 going on here with Entergy is saying, well, we don't 12 want to admit this when the plant was in operation.
13 We don't want to, you know -- we probably have some 14 -- we don't have to disclose these things within a 15 certain amount of time, they just have to do it when 16 they feel like it, when it's convenient, when the 17 plant is in a safe condition, a shutdown condition, 18 and they won't be threatened by a shutdown, you know.
19  As I said, do we have to get in this 20 environment where everybody is so scared, you know, 21 the San Onofre shutdown, and a host of other threats 22 going on and stuff like that, and then pretty soon, 23 you know, they are pulling in the horns, and we come 24 in a dictatorship state, essentially, with releasing 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  36information. The security causes us to close down, 1 to be like a -- not the great United States of 2 America, our country, we are with our legal systems 3 and all that sort of stuff, are we becoming something 4 that we shouldn't be, because we are fearful, and 5 because, you know, it has to -- you know, it becomes 6 a turmoil, and troubles like that, do we hinder to 7 our basic instincts,  or do we come bigger than we 8 are, we have to be, we come bigger and better than we 9 normally are. Does our character ask us 10 or tell us into being more open?  I don't feel I 11 should be closed, I try to be bigger than that. I've 12 got to be bigger in front of my family, in front of 13 my Nation, and I've got to set my sites to a standard 14 that purports to our Constitution, that this is the 15 ideals of our Constitution, openness, earnestness, 16 integrity, trustworthy, and I'm a man of my honor, or 17 a woman. 18  Or, do I fiddle around with these rules, 19 I twist them around, and, you know, we all think we 20 are following the rules, but the product is that we 21 are getting falsified and inaccurate information out 22 there. We sit back and be happy that we are 23 following the rules, and nobody can -- not outsiders 24 can really understand if you are following the rules, 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  37 or you are misinterpreting the rules and regulations 1 and stuff like that.
2  And, you know, it goes down to this thing 3 of character and honor and stuff. If you don't have 4 that, you know, I'd rather have character and honor 5 than rules, really, when you get down to it. I 6 believe you can be good people, and being good, and 7 honest, and transparent, and stuff like that, can 8 bail you out of a lot of trouble type of thing.
9  And, you know, fiddling around with 10 rules, and disclosures, and, you know, playing it 11 safe, you are asking for a disaster of enormous 12 magnitude, and  it doesn't have to, necessarily, be a 13 core meltdown, it could be an integrity meltdown, 14 like at San Onofre.
15  So, with the condition potentially high, 16 here we go, condition potentially placed on all four 17 states SRV valves that were installed in RF018, how 18 come that ain't raising back the hairs on everybody's 19 head. This is common mode failure. It's diagnosed 20 and they don't know what's causing it, or they won't 21 admit it, is that what -- I mean, like I said, is 22 that what's going on here, they know what's going on 23 her but they just holding it for money reasons, not 24 to lay the blame disclosing what's going on here and 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  38 stuff. 1  I know I've got three minutes left.
2  You know, that bugs me, May 18, 2011, two 3 weeks after the start-up of brand new valves, and 4 November 22nd, then they lied about it on December 5 26th. They lied about it in documents. See, the 6 2.206 problem is supposed to give a guy like me the 7 ability to create transparency and change your mind, 8 change your hearts and minds and stuff like that.
9 That's what the 2.206 -- it's bigger -- I'm an idiot, 10 and I'm a peon and an ant, but it's supposed to be 11 something that is bigger than me, and bigger than 12 you, and it's supposed to be a tool of transparency, 13 where our Nation gets to see what's going on, and 14 give support to the ideals of what a great nation is, 15 and great character, and honor, and integrity.
16 That's what the 2.206 problem is.
17  And, the way this thing is instituted now 18 is that, it's a tool of the devil, and then we get to 19 talk about my deviation 3.8, if they would have seen 20 that, if they would have magically had the God's-eye 21 view of seeing that 3.8, they would  have had to shut 22 down. 23  I know, these guys don't test it until 24 they are shut down, but there's a requirement if it 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  39 goes past the 3.8 -- 3.0, you are supposed to shut 1 down, but you don't test it. It's mind boggling.
2  Additional corrective actions will be 3 implemented based on the results of testing, 4 inspection and evaluation of the first -- leaking 5 first stage from the 2B valve.
6  You know, the risk of operating the 7 valves, the risks of operating the SRV characterized 8 by increased chance, right?  They had problems this 9 last time, you didn't know if the valve was open or 10 shut because they couldn't hear the noise monitor, or 11 the noise detector, acoustical detector, you know. I 12 don't know what that was all about.
13  But, having an inadvertent open SRV would 14 increase chance of valve failure to reclose. That's 15 important, but, you know, you guys don't talk about 16 putting an accurate set point pressure on it. They 17 maybe talk about -- talking about the set point 18 drift, and they don't even talk about -- you know, 19 you were quiet once it got back 3.0, we are supposed 20 to -- and then, you know, industry has experienced 21 numerous instances where SRV leakage has occurred at 22 other plants with other Target Rock three-stage 23 relief valves. I'd like to know what that means, 24 with other -- you know, so you could have other 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  40 Target Rock model three-stage relief valves, I mean, 1 there's more than one model for three-stage relief 2 valves, you know.
3  But, here they start talking about, you 4 know, three-stage relief valves at Plant Hatch, and 5 other things, and then they start talking about the 6 three stage, you know. Oh, we've had other problems, 7 even that first LER talks to us about we have leakage 8 in that other valve, not the model we are using here 9 type of language, and now they are talking about, oh, 10 well, you know, here's a list of three-stage relief 11 valves that we've had.
12  You know, that whole thing, honesty, 13 integrity, and I'm a man of character type of thing, 14 you know, an organization, I never would write a bad 15 report, an organization never forces me to write a 16 bad or an inaccurate report, because I'm a man of 17 integrity. I will not tolerate that kind of business 18 type of thing.
19  And, I guess, you know, you know my 20 issues with the Navy rock that go shut down with the 21 weather instrumentation.
22  Yes, I'm done.
23  CHAIR GIITTER:  Thank you, Mr. Mulligan.
24  At this time, does any staff here at 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS  1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com  41 Headquarters have any questions for Mr. Mulligan?
1  CHAIR GIITTER:  Thank you. What about 2 the region?
3  MR. BOWER:  None.
4  CHAIR GIITTER:  Thank you.
5  Before I conclude the meeting -- well, we 6 don't have any members of the public, or we didn't, 7 so I just want to make sure there's no members of the 8 public on the bridge. Okay.
9   As stated in the opening, the purpose of 10 this meeting is not to provide an opportunity for the 11 Petitioner or the public to question or examine the 12 PRB regarding the merits of the petition request.
13  Mr. Mulligan, I thank you for taking time 14 to provide the NRC staff with verifying information 15 on the petition you submitted. The PRB plans to meet 16 internally, and discuss the matter one more time.
17  Before we close, does the court reporter 18 need any additional information for the meeting 19 transcript?
20  COURT REPORTER:  No, I've got everything, 21 thanks. 22  CHAIR GIITTER:  Thank you. With that, 23 the meeting is concluded, and we'll be terminating 24 the phone connection.
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.
C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com 42  MR. MULLIGAN:  And, thank you very much 1 for this opportunity.
2  CHAIR GIITTER:  Okay, thank you, Mr.
3 Mulligan.
4  (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter was 5 concluded at 4:03 p.m.)
6  7  8  9  10  11  12}}

Latest revision as of 11:56, 5 December 2019

G20130174 - Micheal Mulligan 2.206 Petition Transcript of 6/11/13 Teleconference Safety Relief Valves at Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station
ML13189A057
Person / Time
Site: Pilgrim
Issue date: 06/11/2013
From: Richard Guzman
Plant Licensing Branch 1
To:
Guzman R
References
2.206, G20130174, NRC-004, TAC ME0927
Download: ML13189A057 (44)
v • d • e


Text

Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Title:

10 CFR 2.206 Petition Review Board RE: Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station Docket Number: (n/a)

Location: teleconference Date: Tuesday, June 11, 2013 Work Order No.: NRC-004 Pages 1-41 Edited by Richard V. Guzman, NRC Petition Manager NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.

Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433

1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + + + + +

4 10 CFR 2.206 PETITION REVIEW BOARD (PRB) 5 CONFERENCE CALL 6 RE 7 PILGRIM NUCLEAR POWER STATION 8 + + + + +

9 TUESDAY 10 JUNE 11, 2013 11 + + + + +

12 The conference call was held, Joe 13 Giitter, Chairperson of the Petition Review Board, 14 presiding.

15 16 PETITIONER: MICHAEL MULLIGAN 17 18 PETITION REVIEW BOARD MEMBERS 19 JOE GIITTER, Director, Division of Risk Assessment 20 in the Office of Nuclear Reactor 21 Regulation 22 RICHARD GUZMAN, Petition Manager for 2.206 petition 23 EMILY MONTEITH, Office of General Counsel 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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2 1 NRC HEADQUARTERS STAFF 2 LEE BANIC, Petition Coordinator, Division of Policy 3 and Rulemaking, NRR 4 JOHN BILLERBECK, Component Performance and Testing 5 Branch, NRR 6 MUHAMMAD RAZZAQUE, Reactor Systems Branch, NRR 7

8 NRC REGION I OFFICE 9 FRED BOWER 10 11 ALSO PRESENT 12 JOSEPH LYNCH, Entergy 13 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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3 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 (3:06 p.m.)

3 MS. RIVERA: Good afternoon. I would 4 like to thank everybody for attending the 5 teleconference.

6 My name is Alison Rivera, and I am the 7 Facilitator for this teleconference. My role is to 8 help ensure today's teleconference is informative and 9 productive.

10 The purpose of today's teleconference is 11 to allow the Petitioner, Mr. Michael Mulligan, to 12 address the Petition Review Board, or PRB, regarding 13 a 2.206 petition dated March 7, 2013, as supplemented 14 by emails dated March 20th and April 5, 2013, 15 regarding his concerns with safety relief valves at 16 Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station.

17 This teleconference is scheduled for one 18 hour2.083333e-4 days <br />0.005 hours <br />2.97619e-5 weeks <br />6.849e-6 months <br />, from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m., Eastern Time. It is 19 being recorded by the NRC Operations Center, and will 20 be transcribed by a court reporter.

21 The transcript will become a supplement 22 to the petition. Prior to placing the transcript in 23 ADAMS, the PRB will review it to ensure that it does 24 not contain any allegations or sensitive information.

25 For those dialing in to this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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4 1 teleconference, please remember to mute your phone to 2 minimize any background noise or distraction. If you 3 do not have a mute button, this can be done by 4 pressing the keys *6. To unmute, you will press *6 5 again.

6 I'd like to emphasize that we each need 7 to speak clearly and loudly, to make sure that the 8 court reporter can accurately transcribe the 9 teleconference.

10 If you do have something that you would 11 like to say, please first state your name for the 12 record.

13 Now, I would like to have the NRC meeting 14 participants to introduce themselves. I ask that all 15 of the participants clearly state for the record your 16 name, your position, and your organization.

17 I will start with myself, and then turn 18 it over to the other NRC participants here in the 19 room.

20 My name is Alison Rivera, and I am a 21 Technical Assistant for the Division of 22 Intergovernmental Liaison and Rulemaking, in the 23 Office of Federal and State Materials and 24 Environmental Management Programs.

25 CHAIR GIITTER: Okay. I'm Joe Giitter, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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5 1 I'm the Director of the Division of Risk Assessment, 2 in the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulations.

3 MR. BILLERBECK: This is John Billerbeck.

4 I'm a Mechanical Engineer in the Division of 5 Engineering in NRR.

6 MR. BANIC: Lee Banic, Petition 7 Coordinator, NRR.

8 MR. GUZMAN: Rich Guzman. I'm a Senior 9 Project Manager in the Division of Operating Reactor 10 Licensing, in the Office of NRR.

11 MS. RIVERA: That completes the 12 introductions of the NRC staff in this room. At this 13 time, are there any NRC participants from 14 Headquarters on the phone?

15 MR. RAZZAQUE: This is Mohammed Razzaque, 16 from Reactor Systems Branch, NRR.

17 MS. MONTIETH: Emily Montieth, Office of 18 General Counsel.

19 MS. RIVERA: Are there any NRC 20 participants from the regional offices on the phone?

21 MR. BOWER: Yes, this is Fred Bower. I'm 22 an Acting Branch Chief from Region 1.

23 MS. RIVERA: At this time, will the 24 representatives for Entergy Nuclear Operations, 25 Incorporated, Licensee for program, introduce NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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6 1 themselves?

2 MR. LYNCH: This is Joe Lynch, Licensing 3 Manager, Pilgrim Station.

4 MS. RIVERA: Mr. Mulligan, would you 5 please introduce yourself for the record?

6 MR. MULLIGAN: I'm Mike Mulligan. I'm a 7 whistle blower. I was in the Navy on an experimental 8 pass protect submarine. I worked as a Reactor 9 Operator for a number of years, and I've worked at a 10 nuclear power plant.

11 Thank you.

12 MS. RIVERA: Thank you.

13 Are there any other, such as members of 14 the public, on the phone?

15 And, for our court reporter, can you also 16 please state your name?

17 COURT REPORTER: This is Sam Wojack. I'm 18 the court reporter.

19 MS. RIVERA: Before we begin, I'd like to 20 first share some general background on the 2.206 21 process.

22 Section 2.206 of Title X of the Code of 23 Federal Regulations, describes the petition process, 24 the primary mechanism for the public to request 25 enforcement action by the NRC in a public process.

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7 1 This process permits anyone to petition NRC to take 2 enforcement-type action related to NRC licensees or 3 license activities.

4 Depending on the results of this 5 evaluation, NRC could modify, suspend, or revoke an 6 NRC issued license, or take any other appropriate 7 enforcement action to resolve the problem.

8 The NRC staff guidance for the 9 disposition of a 2.206 petition request is in 10 Management Directive 8.11, which is publicly 11 available.

12 Again, the purpose of today's 13 teleconference is to give the Petitioner an 14 opportunity to provide any additional support for the 15 petition, in light of the Petition Review Board's 16 initial recommendation.

17 This teleconference is not a hearing, nor 18 is it an opportunity for the Petitioner to question 19 or examine the PRB on the merits or the issues 20 presented in the petition request.

21 No decisions regarding the merits of this 22 petition will be made at this teleconference.

23 Following this teleconference, the 24 Petition Review Board will conduct its internal 25 deliberations. The outcome of these internal NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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8 1 deliberations will then be discussed with the 2 Petitioner.

3 The Petition Review Board, typically, 4 consists of a chairman, usually a manager at the 5 Senior Executive Service level at the NRC. It has a 6 petition manager and other members of the Board, as 7 determined by the NRC staff, based on the content of 8 the information in the petition request.

9 As described in our process, the NRC 10 staff may ask clarifying questions in order to better 11 understand the Petitioner's presentation, and to 12 reach a reasoned decision whether to accept or reject 13 the Petitioner's request for review under the 2.206 14 process.

15 Also, as described in our process, the 16 Licensees have been invited to participate in today's 17 teleconference, to ensure that they understand the 18 concerns about their facility or activity.

19 While the Licensees may also ask 20 questions to clarify the issues raised by the 21 Petitioner, I would like to stress that the Licensees 22 are not a part of the PRB's decision-making process.

23 I will now turn the teleconference over 24 to Joe Giitter, the PRB Chairman, who will discuss 25 the specific petition under consideration.

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9 1 CHAIR GIITTER: Okay, thank you, Alison.

2 I would like to begin by summarizing the 3 PRB's understanding of the scope of the petition 4 under consideration, and described the NRC's 5 activities to date.

6 On March, 2013, Mr. Mulligan submitted to 7 the NRC a petition on 2.206 regarding concerns with 8 the safety relief valves, or SRVs, at the Pilgrim 9 Nuclear Power Station.

10 In his petition request, Mr. Mulligan 11 requests that the NRC immediately shut down Pilgrim 12 Nuclear Station on the basis of the Licensee is 13 operating the plant in an unsafe condition with 14 defective or inoperable safety relief valves.

15 The Petitioner also indicates that 16 Entergy is incapable of maintaining safety and 17 quality of the plant. In addition, Petitioner 18 requests the NRC to not allow the Pilgrim Plant to 19 restart following shutdown until they understand past 20 failure mechanisms of the defective SRVs at Pilgrim.

21 As support for this request, Mr. Mulligan 22 states, in short, that the repeated nature of the 23 failure of the SRVs at Pilgrim demonstrates that 24 Entergy does not understand the mechanism of the 25 failure and that defective or inoperable SRVs at a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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10 1 nuclear power plant is unsafe.

2 Mr. Mulligan also states that the NRC is 3 allowing the plant to operate with unsafe SRVs until 4 the next refueling outage, and is covering up an 5 unsafe condition at Pilgrim.

6 Mr. Mulligan requests an investigation by 7 the Office of the Inspector General for his concern.

8 Now, I would like to talk about what NRC 9 has done to date on this.

10 On March 14, 2013, the Petition Manager 11 contacted the Petitioner to discuss the 10 CFR 2.206 12 process and to offer the Petitioner an opportunity to 13 address the PRB by phone or in person.

14 The Petitioner requested to address the 15 PRB by phone, prior to its internal meeting to make 16 the initial recommendation to either accept or reject 17 the petition for review.

18 On April 11, 2013, Mr. Mulligan addressed 19 the PRB via teleconference. The PRB then held its 20 internal PRB meeting on May 6, 2013, and on May 22, 21 2013, Mr. Mulligan was informed of the PRB's initial 22 recommendation regarding the petition, which is to 23 reject the petition for review, because in accordance 24 with Management Directive 8.11 Petitioner did not 25 provide sufficient facts, or any element of support, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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11 1 beyond the basic assertion for the inquiry.

2 In addition, the PRB notes that the 3 Petitioner did not identify a violation of an NRC 4 requirement, or did Petitioner provide significant 5 new information to warrant the request of enforcement 6 action.

7 As support for its initial 8 recommendation, the PRB notes that the Licensee's 9 operability evaluation for SRVs that have leaked at 10 Pilgrim have been reviewed by the NRC inspectors, and 11 determined to be adequately justified. The Licensee 12 has also complied with the applicable tech specs, and 13 has demonstrated that SRVs are monitored and 14 maintained in a condition that ensures that they will 15 perform their safety function.

16 Additionally, the NRC staff continues to 17 monitor and collect operating experience on SRV 18 leakage problems. While the staff acknowledges that 19 industry has seen, and is investigating leaking SRVs 20 of this specific design, the NRC staff's evaluation 21 no industry operational data to date indicates that 22 the specific SRV model or design at Pilgrim poses a 23 real significant safety concern.

24 As a reminder for the phone participants, 25 please identify yourself if you make any remarks, as NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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12 1 this will help us in the preparation of the meeting 2 transcript that will be made publicly available.

3 Thank you.

4 Mr. Mulligan, I'll now turn it over to 5 you, to allow you to provide any information you 6 believe the PRB should consider as part of its 7 decision.

8 MR. MULLIGAN: Okay. You talked about an 9 allegation that you were going to submit, an 10 allegation note or something. What was that about?

11 I'm just curious.

12 MS. RIVERA: The PRB will review the 13 transcript to ensure that there is no allegation with 14 sensitive information.

15 MR. MULLIGAN: Okay, thank you.

16 I will just say that, you know, like I've 17 always been talking about the NRC kind of says I have 18 no proof about the system as far as the access to the 19 information is zilch, and you give LERs, you give 20 inaccurate, falsified information to the public as 21 far as disclosures and stuff like that.

22 So, how can somebody like me have 23 confidence in the NRC doing their job?

24 Here's a June 11th Forbes article on San 25 Onofre, and southern California citizens problems NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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13 1 with their entire nuclear energy sector. So, a 2 nuclear energy sector has taken a blow now that 3 Southern California Edison has decided to permanently 4 close this troubled nuclear plant. Safety is a key 5 concern. So is honesty and transparency.

6 So, you know, you can take -- you guys 7 talk about risk, this doesn't have any risk and stuff 8 like that, and I'm telling you this has enormous risk 9 for the community and you guys.

10 You know, if you keep going on in this 11 direction, where, you know, a dual plant like San 12 Onofre, you know, we get the feeling that the NRC is 13 not enforcing their regulations correctly, and their 14 perceptions of what the regulations state is so 15 grossly obscene that, you know, we mistrust the 16 agency. I mean, that's a risk of a different sort, 17 that you don't even take into consideration.

18 And, this risk business, as far as giving 19 me the information, you know, as far as what is going 20 on with those valves, seeing the, you know, internal 21 documents and stuff like that, that is the same as 22 San Onofre had at its deepest core. You guys can 23 hide your information away from the public, and you 24 can have these special interpretations of rules and 25 regulations, as far as, you know, not having a proper NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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14 1 license amendment request and stuff like that, you 2 can bend the rules, and stuff like that, you know, 3 that's atrocious to think that that -- you know, all 4 you guys deal with is the risk associated with, you 5 know, as far as these engineers' calculations nobody 6 can understand.

7 And, you don't look at the holistic risk, 8 as far as your behavior, how we, the public, see 9 this, and what garbage you've got in your document 10 and stuff like that that's the essence of, you know, 11 I talk about the tree-wise monkey architecture of 12 Federal rules. I would include the way you interpret 13 things, you know, the see no evil, hear no evil, 14 speak no evil, the idea that you interpret things 15 behind the scenes that nobody can make sure that you 16 are telling the truth and disclosing everything, and 17 all that sort of stuff.

18 And, that's what I'm talking about.

19 That's what we are seeing in front of us, you know, a 20 Pilgrim plant here, they've had a lot of protests, a 21 lot of towns, you know, have given their hope as far 22 as wanting to shut that down, and, evidently, nobody 23 feels, you know, with San Onofre and a whole bunch of 24 other events everybody feels nervous about disclosing 25 things. And, you know, you keep your things in your NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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15 1 desk, and I mean that seems to be what's going on 2 here. The more you get frightened about events 3 happening in front of us, the more you hide things, 4 and the more destructive it's going to be, as far as 5 hiding events, and not taking care of these things 6 right, and turning off the public in ways.

7 So, you know, the new LER, I forget what 8 the most recent one, is startling, things that were 9 disclosed in that. And, of course, I put this to 10 2.206 before the LER came in, was written up.

11 Anyways, I get a joke out of the 12 Frankenstein Pilgrim SRV valve 3B, in an inspection 13 report of 2013, 00 May 8th, the inspectors observed a 14 plant shutdown on January 20, after operators had 15 identified significant leakage on SRV 3B pilot valve.

16 First stage temperature indicated a temperature 17 greater than 35 degrees. This exceeded the limits in 18 their procedures, and required the operating crew to 19 declare SRV 3B inoperable. And, you consequently 20 shut down and stuff like that.

21 And, you either repaired it or replaced 22 it, but, certainly, you must have tested it. And 23 then, you know, so on January 20th, January, 24 February, I don't know, two, three weeks later on, 25 operators responded to further shut down the plant.

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16 1 They started it back up, and on February 3rd 2 operators responded and affirmed indications of pilot 3 leakage on SRV 3B, following its repair and forced 4 outage 1906. Pilgrim remained at 80 percent power 5 until Blizzard Nemo took the plant down.

6 And so, you know, this is atrocious 7 behavior, that's one example, you know. You so-8 called fixed the valve, and, I mean, you know, is it 9 risky as far an engineering calculation on the 10 relative work on the component, involved with the 11 component, and stuff like that, do you guys deal with 12 risk? Or, is it risky, the actual behavior or 13 Entergy not to be able to have a leak, fix it, and 14 with days of starting up the valve starts leaking 15 again, and then they are forced to have a power 16 restriction and stuff like that.

17 So, you guys interpret this as there's no 18 safety issues, and what you can see over the period 19 when they purchased these valves, and stuff like 20 that, it's just atrocious utility and NRC behavior, 21 as far as, you know, engineering quality, and, you 22 know, you know what's going on with your plant, and 23 you have the tools in front of you that you could 24 quickly repair it. You know, this risk business is 25 an excuse to do nothing, and that's how this turns NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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17 1 out.

2 This risk business and calculation is an 3 excuse to do nothing, and it's not an excuse to pay 4 attention to our plant. I mean, it's not a tool that 5 forces you to pay attention to your plant, and 6 purchase the quality of valve that is necessary and 7 stuff, and to repair it correctly, and test it. You 8 know, like this business here, it was started up and 9 it leaked again. And, this isn't the first time.

10 When they purchased them brand new valves 11 and put them in for the first time, they had leaks 12 within weeks of starting up again. Can you imagine 13 that, how that looks, as far as people like me 14 outside, the way we see this. You know, you guys 15 want the most important valve components in the 16 nuclear plant, and you can't figure out the quality 17 that is necessary for their duty, and they start 18 failing within two weeks, the new valves start 19 failing within two weeks. And then, you people have 20 the gall to come back and say, oh, well, this doesn't 21 meet any of our -- this is all safe, and this is 22 real good stuff, everything is okay.

23 Even to this day, even to this day with 24 two shutdowns over these valves, you are heading for 25 a third shutdown, you have an association of power NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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18 1 restrictions and stuff like that, almost three 2 shutdowns and six or eight power restrictions at 3 different times and all that sort of stuff.

4 And, the last LER states that we still 5 don't know what's wrong with those valves, and we are 6 doing further investigation. Is that what nuclear 7 power has come to, as far as, you know, you guys 8 don't have the sense of quality and expertise and 9 honesty to deal with these things relatively 10 immediately, and the analysis gives you the excuse 11 that nothing ever matters, that we can run these 12 things into the ground, into the dirt.

13 I mean, you know, most of the public 14 doesn't really understand what's going on here, but I 15 do, and you do, too. And, allowing this stuff to go 16 on here, and somebody not raising a stink is 17 astonishing, especially, within the NRC.

18 I'm going to go back to the first LER for 19 a few comments there. At this time, the most -- this 20 is the first LER, LER 2011 007-00, right? At this 21 time, the most probably root cause are problems 22 during the initial manufacturing and their assembly 23 of the pilot at the Target Rock prior to installation 24 at the site.

25 CHAIR GIITTER: Could you restate that?

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19 1 MR. MULLIGAN: At the time, the most 2 probable root cause were problems during the initial 3 manufacturing or assembly of the pilot at the Target 4 Rock prior to installation on the site.

5 Wile Labs, Target Rock and Entergy are 6 looking into these problems.

7 The identified condition, is a leaking 8 SRV pilot, based on the only pilot -- you know, 9 you've got to say this, what this is, the report 10 date, the event date, 12/26, right, 12/26, yes, the 11 pilot leaks, and this is what I'm talking about. This 12 is gross falsification of Federal documents. It's 13 gross falsification of Federal documents by NRC, by 14 Entergy, and the NRC doesn't call them on it.

15 Based on the review of the data, the only 16 pilot to exhibit leakage is RV --

17 MS. RIVERA: Mr. Mulligan?

18 MR. MULLIGAN: Yes.

19 MS. RIVERA: This is Alison Rivera. We 20 have a question over here about your previous 21 statement, trying to figure out if that's an 22 additional allegation.

23 MR. MULLIGAN: Yes, it is.

24 CHAIR GIITTER: Could you, specifically, 25 state the allegation again, Mr. Mulligan?

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20 1 MR. MULLIGAN: Okay, based on the plant 2 data, the only -- "The only pilot valve that exhibits 3 signs of leakage is RV 203-3B."

4 And, let me see if I can -- the last LER 5 indicates that within weeks of starting up the plant 6 they had a leak -- they had a leak on a valve, and 7 then a month before the first LER they had another 8 leak on it.

9 And, when I get to that LER, I'll 10 identify that, the time frame.

11 CHAIR GIITTER: Okay. Could you just 12 restate the allegation again? I'm not sure I got 13 everything.

14 MR. MULLIGAN: Okay. The LER that I'm 15 talking about, 2007 007-00 it quotes right here, "The 16 only pilot valve to exhibit signs of leakage is RV 17 2003-3." 2003-3, RV 2003-3B.

18 "The only pilot valve to exhibit signs of 19 leakage is RV 2003-3," and they had two prior leaks 20 that they didn't disclose in this LER.

21 You got it?

22 CHAIR GIITTER: Yes, the LER was 2007-23 007?

24 MR. MULLIGAN: 2011.

25 CHAIR GIITTER: 2011, I'm sorry.

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21 1 MR. MULLIGAN: So, this guy is -- the 2 event date is 12/26/2011 and two prior events before 3 that -- there was two prior events before that, that 4 they had leaks that they didn't disclose, that they 5 later disclosed on the most recent LER.

6 Okay?

7 CHAIR GIITTER: Thank you.

8 MR. MULLIGAN: And, this is another one.

9 This is another allegation. Because the leakage 10 established by procedure did not affect the SRV set 11 pressure, or capacity, the SRV would have been able 12 to respond if needed to meet core cooling or reactor 13 vessel over pressure, over pressure detection 14 function.

15 And, the most recent LER says that there 16 was a leakage effect of the SRV open set point. And 17 so, I mean, the idea that they are saying it did not 18 affect the SRV set pressure or capacity set pressure, 19 you have to meet set pressure.

20 So, and then later on, because of the 21 leakage you did have an SRV that exceeded its plus or 22 minus 3 percent opening set point level. And, if you 23 would have known about that, I believe it was 3.8, if 24 you would have known about that they would have been 25 required to shut the plant down.

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22 1 And so, you now, you are sitting here --

2 you know, he makes a kind of a simple statement that 3 the procedure did not affect the SRV set point 4 pressure. So, what is thinking of these guys, you 5 know? Okay, we've got leaks here and stuff like 6 that. If it hasn't reached its set -- it hasn't been 7 inaccurate yet, but, you know, is the engineers going 8 down there anticipating the future, can we have 9 opening set points inaccuracy problems that we can't 10 see and stuff like that. We could, essentially, have 11 a set of SRVs that would not be able to reach -- be 12 at their accuracy level, plus or minus 3 percent, and 13 stuff like that.

14 So, you know, the idea that these guys 15 can say to themselves do an analysis and say, oh, and 16 one of the issues we could have in the future with 17 our crazy SRVs that keep malfunctioning on us, is we 18 could have an inaccurate opening of an SRV. We could 19 have an inaccurate opening of an SRV for an over 20 pressure condition caused by the leak. I mean, is 21 anybody thinking about these things, about how set 22 pressure could become inaccurate?

23 And then you say to yourself, well, do 24 they even test for set pressure on all these leaking 25 valves that they had, and stuff like that. Do they NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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23 1 check themselves and say, hey, we are going to do a 2 set -- an opening, with these defective leaking 3 valves we are going to do -- and, you know, we are 4 going to raise up questions to the valve opening and 5 see where it begins to open, and see if the leakage 6 has caused set pressure problems and stuff like that.

7 Is anybody doing that kind of stuff?

8 You know, so there's an issue that, you 9 know, they really assumed that the leaking wouldn't 10 cause any SRV set pressure problems in the future, 11 and, of course, we know that they did.

12 So, and here's another one with the 13 leaking -- the leaks that they didn't disclose.

14 There is no previous first-stage leakage occurring at 15 these safety relief valves since all four safety 16 relief valves were newly installed in May --

17 April/May, 2011, during refueling outage 18.

18 But, you know, they made the assertion in 19 Federal documents that there was no prior leakage, 20 and you know there's two other -- there's two other 21 leakages that, you know, I should have been, you 22 know, outsiders should have been notified. And, we 23 should have seen how inaccurate these safety relief 24 valves are, and how unreliable, and how incompetently 25 Entergy has dealt with the -- Entergy and Target Rock NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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24 1 has dealt with these safety relief valves.

2 Now, just like San Onofre, if you hide 3 things it's going to be ten times worse when 4 something bad happens, instead of being open and out 5 front, and making, you know, people want to talk 6 about things, and making an effort to talk about 7 those issues, instead of just kind of -- you know, 8 hiding, you know, the politicians above us, Congress 9 and, you know, the hateful Republicans and all that 10 sort of stuff, they are going to vaporize us if we 11 open our mouths, or if we enforce regulation and 12 stuff like that. And so, I'll be quiet, you know, 13 see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil.

14 If you get into that San Onofre mindset, 15 that's more destructive than a meltdown, as far as 16 I'm concerned.

17 And, here's another one. However, the 18 industry has experienced leakage with other Target 19 rock model safety relief valves at other plants.

20 Other, you know, there's Entergy, how come they 21 didn't -- you know, it sounds like there was that 22 they admit in that last LER, the newest LER, that 23 there was a set of issues which are three-stage 24 Target Rock relief valves. Again, you know, taking 25 the narrow thing that, you know, maybe it's not an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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25 1 other model, you know, being this model isn't 2 leaking, or however they want to term it, but there 3 was leaks with three-stage Target Rock. However, the 4 industry has experienced leakage with other Target 5 rock model safety relief valves.

6 You know, they are saying that the three-7 stage relief valve, the three-stage doesn't have 8 leakage problems in the industry, when in reality 9 there was a host of Target Rock model safety relief 10 valves that were leaking, and it's not full 11 disclosure.

12 You know, how do you -- how do you -- you 13 know, if there was widespread issues in the industry 14 with three-stage safety relief valves, how is 15 outsiders, like a guy like me, supposed to, you know, 16 utilize it, if you guys don't want to, you know, deal 17 with your problems, it's just up to me to try and 18 figure out what's going on and trying to help you 19 guys do the right thing.

20 With these issues in the 2.206, I mean, 21 if you hide information on me, and stuff like that, 22 then it negates the 2.206 process. It makes me -- it 23 makes me -- I don't have any information. And, you 24 keep coming back at me that, you know, I don't have 25 any information, that type of thing, and stuff like NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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26 1 that.

2 So, everybody feels comfortable that I 3 don't have any evidence. You know, is that because 4 there's no evidence, or is that because a whole ton 5 of evidence is being hidden from me. Those are 6 completely different things.

7 You know, the OE business, and all the 8 internal documents that Entergy has, the OE, you 9 know, safety relief temperature phenomenon at Target 10 Rock, and stuff like that, you know, it's all hidden 11 from me. It's all hidden from guys like me, and when 12 you do that you prevent a guy like me from stopping 13 you from doing the San Onofre, you know, as far as, 14 you know, harassing you, and making you slow down, 15 and making you do the right thing, and stuff like 16 that, you hide it. And that, in essence, causes 17 these big events where you end up losing the trust of 18 people around the plant, and you have to shut down 19 the plant, or the plant operation.

20 You know, and then we go into the -- I've 21 already talked about this, then we go into the 22 following, you know, this is the next -- this was the 23 update on that LER of 2011, Level 2, and, you know, 24 there was -- and it talks about all the different, 25 you know, testing and all that sort of stuff, like, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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27 1 you know, no big deal, everything is cool. We looked 2 over and we find no -- who was it, there was a whole 3 bunch of you guys involved, Southern Company, Wile 4 Labs, Entergy, and who else, there was another one, 5 and stuff, and you made a big deal over that first 6 LER, that first leak and stuff, and you had another 7 shutdown, another new shutdown with the NEMO 8 blizzard, with that bad valve, and then like I told 9 you, then you replaced the valve with a new, fully 10 tested valve, and within days it leaks up, it has 11 leaks again, just like when you installed that valve 12 for the first -- these valves for the first time, 13 within two weeks you have an indication of leakage.

14 You had, before the first shutdown you 15 had two leakages and stuff like that. This is 16 heightened, and in the NRC's mind this is right?

17 This is the right outcome to deny me a 2.206 because 18 I don't have enough evidence and stuff like that?

19 This is right, that you don't fix this thing?

20 I don't know, it's still up in the air as 21 far as what's causing all these shutdowns and stuff 22 like that, not only at Pilgrim, but other plants, and 23 stuff. It's right?

24 We are the United States of America, the 25 best country on the planet, and stuff like that, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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28 1 this doesn't reflect well on us at all as a 2 democracy, and the essence of being truthful, honest 3 to each other, especially, with these endeavors that 4 have a lot of energy in them and stuff like that.

5 It's wrong.

6 So, here we go. We have in the update, 7 no additional corrective actions are recommended on 8 the results of testing, inspection and evaluation of 9 the leaking pilot valve, by a three team of Wile 10 Labs, Target Rock and Entergy. You know, these 11 things -- you know, and then we talk about 10 CFR 21, 12 that for the first time in the industry it's ever 13 happened that the bellows had a crack in it, and we 14 don't know -- we are not clear whether that came from 15 a -- it came from directly from plant operation, you 16 know, they shut down, then they tested it, and then 17 up, or whether it was, certainly -- it was, 18 certainly, heading back to the plant, and then you 19 say that these valves, in an emergency, you know, can 20 operate between 250 to 500 times, you know, in a dire 21 accident, you know, the worst accident you can 22 imagine, no electricity and stuff like that.

23 And, you know, you've got this defect in 24 the bellows that, you know, nobody still -- and it's 25 just astonishing, you guys are educated, and you've NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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29 1 got a whole bunch of processes and stuff like that, 2 and you can't -- it takes you years. I mean, the LER 3 process sounds like the engineer, it's not 4 engineering to engineer these documents to tell the 5 truth, it's giving them the excuse to hide it, you 6 know, we'll do another update, and we'll just ignore 7 it, and we'll falsify documents in front of you. And, 8 the NRC will, you know, hear no evil, see no evil, 9 and speak no evil.

10 They have a ton of rules, but they 11 interpret them in a special way that nobody can see 12 if they are doing it right. I just -- it's mind 13 boggling, when you consider how big this thing is.

14 You know, and you have the update, and however 15 industry has experienced leakage with other Target --

16 you know, however, the industry has experienced 17 leakage with other Target Rock model safety relief 18 valves at other plants. Why isn't there a thing, we 19 have -- let's be honest, you know, and up front, 20 instead of giving you a baloney sentence like that, 21 why couldn't they give a list of all the plants, you 22 know, all the plants that had problems with three-23 stage relief valves.

24 In the LER, they've got the three-stage 25 guys in there, you know, San Onofre again, how come NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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30 1 nobody -- how come in that license amendment request, 2 put these three-stage guys in there, how come they 3 didn't talk about all the vulnerability of three-4 stage valves. How come they didn't talk about all 5 the leakages with three-stage Target Rock relief 6 valves in that LER. You know, how come, you know, 7 they quoted regulations business and all that sort of 8 stuff, you know, and happy land, these are new valves 9 replacing old valves, how come you never talk about, 10 you know, the thermability of these three-stage 11 valves, what problems there were in the industry, and 12 that type of thing.

13 How come -- is that all the documents, 14 you know, all the NRC's documents and LERs in the 15 industry, the happy land, this is the happy land 16 version of documentation, and we are the professional 17 class of incomplete and inaccurate Federal documents 18 and stuff like that. Is that what this -- is that 19 what's going on here with LERs in general and stuff 20 like that, or, you know, like for like processes and 21 stuff like that, is anybody going behind the scenes 22 and talking and interpreting these things in a way 23 for themselves, and not for what's in the interest of 24 our country.

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31 1 asks so much of us to be better people, and so we'll 2 go to the new one. This is the guy that is kind of 3 interesting, you know. I did write my 2.206 before 4 this, right, and I did have my first transcript thing 5 there, so this is a new one. And, you know what it's 6 talking about, SRV 3B, safety relief valve declared 7 inoperable due to leakage and set point drift, right?

8 This guy is still going to say, at the end of it, 9 after all of this in the industry we still don't know 10 what's wrong with these safety relief valves. We are 11 still investigating it. Is that what we've come down 12 to, that it takes two years and you are still 13 investigating it? Is it going to be another ten 14 years before you come to a solution with this, and 15 you've become honest with people and stuff like that?

16 Do you know how dangerous this kind of 17 stuff is to you guys, you know, if an accident shows 18 up, and it turns off everybody, this is 19 extraordinarily dangerous stuff. You see the problem 20 we face if all of a sudden everyone has lost faith in 21 the NRC, and we start turning off these plants nilly-22 willy, you know, we lose a tremendous amount of 23 electricity, electrical capacity, because you guys 24 are mistrustful.

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32 1 create meticulously accurate documents, but you play 2 these document games and selective disclosures, and 3 you space these things for a date, you know, six 4 months down the line. Your fine LER is obscenely 5 inaccurate and falsified, and it's all staged to not 6 come up with a solution or accurately describe what's 7 going on. It's an excuse to delay fixing these 8 things and keeping a plant in operation, when they 9 shouldn't be in operation. It's an excuse for, you 10 know, Entergy, or any other plant in the United 11 States, you know, we've got a problem and we 12 shouldn't play these document dancing games whenever 13 we feel like it and stuff like that, and we can delay 14 admitting what's going on here for months.

15 Now, with Vermont Yankee with the safety 16 relief threaded seal business, you won't admit to it, 17 but you did the same thing. And so, then we go down, 18 automatic depressuring provides tanks for 19 interpreting the thermocoupling data and determine 20 valve operating, based in part on testing performed 21 by Target Rock. Can I see that? Can I see that --

22 can I talk to somebody in Target Rock and say, you 23 know, what is your indications when you have a 24 leaking relief valve, what is the failure rate of set 25 point inaccuracy problems, you know, about not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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33 1 lifting plus or minus three at the right pressure.

2 See, and remember, this is the guy that 3 you asked me the question about. So, as far as the 4 installation of RF2, oh, man, I'm getting all 5 excited, the installation in RF018 and prior to this 6 Pilgrim experience, minor second stage valve leakage 7 from SRV, RV203-3C. We know, from this one, too, 8 it's the first stage and the second stage, two 9 different components here. So, and, basically, you 10 know, you've got the inaccuracy problems, and then 11 you've got the bellows issues. You know, these 12 things are all broken up into little pieces with you 13 guys, and you see the happy tune side of it, and 14 stuff like that.

15 What happens if you put everything 16 together? Do you think the bellows thing was just a 17 coincidence? Do you think this whole cycle was just 18 a coincidence that just happened? Hey, you know, 19 almost three shutdowns and all these things, can you 20 imagine the money associated with this, with these 21 three shutdowns, three-day shutdowns, a million and a 22 half, maybe $2 million a day or more, and stuff like 23 that. Is this competency?

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34 1 that's so incompetent, and they can't see each other 2 that he is sabotaging the operation of this plant 3 because he's losing money on full-quality valves, you 4 know, in a host of ways. I can't understand, I hope 5 this isn't going on throughout the whole fleet, where 6 these guys are so incompetent and, you know, 7 reckless, as far as with money, with Entergy, I don't 8 see how they get away with it.

9 So, we are going to get done reading that 10 Pilgrim experience minus second-stage pilot valve 11 leakage from SRV RV203-3C on May 18, 2011. That's 12 two weeks, wasn't anybody astonished, brand new 13 valves, this is a mature design of valves. We've had 14 these valves in the system for many decades, and two 15 weeks after installing brand new valves they start 16 leaking.

17 And then November 2nd, they start leaking 18 again and stuff like that, and nobody does nothing?

19 You know, no, it will go away, we'll just ignore it 20 and it will go away. Every time they have a 21 shutdown, or whatever stuff, we don't have to tell 22 anybody, and it will go away. We don't have to --

23 you know, all this my interest and stuff like that, 24 you'd think before they start it up they would have, 25 you know, said, oh, we found the problem, and it's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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35 1 taken care of, fixed for sure this time. Would you 2 trust them, though, with falsifying documents like 3 they've done, and the NRC sitting back and playing, 4 what is that one, the wise monkey stuff.

5 So, November 25th and December 26th, 6 2011, the first two leaks, that was never disclosed 7 until this last -- you know, and then they -- I never 8 got to see this LER until the plant was shut down, 9 you know. Do you know what that stinks of? You guys 10 were structuring closure of this valve in a safe 11 shutdown, and stuff like that. Is that what was 12 going on here with Entergy is saying, well, we don't 13 want to admit this when the plant was in operation.

14 We don't want to, you know -- we probably have some 15 -- we don't have to disclose these things within a 16 certain amount of time, they just have to do it when 17 they feel like it, when it's convenient, when the 18 plant is in a safe condition, a shutdown condition, 19 and they won't be threatened by a shutdown, you know.

20 As I said, do we have to get in this 21 environment where everybody is so scared, you know, 22 the San Onofre shutdown, and a host of other threats 23 going on and stuff like that, and then pretty soon, 24 you know, they are pulling in the horns, and we come 25 in a dictatorship state, essentially, with releasing NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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36 1 information. The security causes us to close down, 2 to be like a -- not the great United States of 3 America, our country, we are with our legal systems 4 and all that sort of stuff, are we becoming something 5 that we shouldn't be, because we are fearful, and 6 because, you know, it has to -- you know, it becomes 7 a turmoil, and troubles like that, do we hinder to 8 our basic instincts, or do we come bigger than we 9 are, we have to be, we come bigger and better than we 10 normally are. Does our character ask us 11 or tell us into being more open? I don't feel I 12 should be closed, I try to be bigger than that. I've 13 got to be bigger in front of my family, in front of 14 my Nation, and I've got to set my sites to a standard 15 that purports to our Constitution, that this is the 16 ideals of our Constitution, openness, earnestness, 17 integrity, trustworthy, and I'm a man of my honor, or 18 a woman.

19 Or, do I fiddle around with these rules, 20 I twist them around, and, you know, we all think we 21 are following the rules, but the product is that we 22 are getting falsified and inaccurate information out 23 there. We sit back and be happy that we are 24 following the rules, and nobody can -- not outsiders 25 can really understand if you are following the rules, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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37 1 or you are misinterpreting the rules and regulations 2 and stuff like that.

3 And, you know, it goes down to this thing 4 of character and honor and stuff. If you don't have 5 that, you know, I'd rather have character and honor 6 than rules, really, when you get down to it. I 7 believe you can be good people, and being good, and 8 honest, and transparent, and stuff like that, can 9 bail you out of a lot of trouble type of thing.

10 And, you know, fiddling around with 11 rules, and disclosures, and, you know, playing it 12 safe, you are asking for a disaster of enormous 13 magnitude, and it doesn't have to, necessarily, be a 14 core meltdown, it could be an integrity meltdown, 15 like at San Onofre.

16 So, with the condition potentially high, 17 here we go, condition potentially placed on all four 18 states SRV valves that were installed in RF018, how 19 come that ain't raising back the hairs on everybody's 20 head. This is common mode failure. It's diagnosed 21 and they don't know what's causing it, or they won't 22 admit it, is that what -- I mean, like I said, is 23 that what's going on here, they know what's going on 24 her but they just holding it for money reasons, not 25 to lay the blame disclosing what's going on here and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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38 1 stuff.

2 I know I've got three minutes left.

3 You know, that bugs me, May 18, 2011, two 4 weeks after the start-up of brand new valves, and 5 November 22nd, then they lied about it on December 6 26th. They lied about it in documents. See, the 7 2.206 problem is supposed to give a guy like me the 8 ability to create transparency and change your mind, 9 change your hearts and minds and stuff like that.

10 That's what the 2.206 -- it's bigger -- I'm an idiot, 11 and I'm a peon and an ant, but it's supposed to be 12 something that is bigger than me, and bigger than 13 you, and it's supposed to be a tool of transparency, 14 where our Nation gets to see what's going on, and 15 give support to the ideals of what a great nation is, 16 and great character, and honor, and integrity.

17 That's what the 2.206 problem is.

18 And, the way this thing is instituted now 19 is that, it's a tool of the devil, and then we get to 20 talk about my deviation 3.8, if they would have seen 21 that, if they would have magically had the God's-eye 22 view of seeing that 3.8, they would have had to shut 23 down.

24 I know, these guys don't test it until 25 they are shut down, but there's a requirement if it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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39 1 goes past the 3.8 -- 3.0, you are supposed to shut 2 down, but you don't test it. It's mind boggling.

3 Additional corrective actions will be 4 implemented based on the results of testing, 5 inspection and evaluation of the first -- leaking 6 first stage from the 2B valve.

7 You know, the risk of operating the 8 valves, the risks of operating the SRV characterized 9 by increased chance, right? They had problems this 10 last time, you didn't know if the valve was open or 11 shut because they couldn't hear the noise monitor, or 12 the noise detector, acoustical detector, you know. I 13 don't know what that was all about.

14 But, having an inadvertent open SRV would 15 increase chance of valve failure to reclose. That's 16 important, but, you know, you guys don't talk about 17 putting an accurate set point pressure on it. They 18 maybe talk about -- talking about the set point 19 drift, and they don't even talk about -- you know, 20 you were quiet once it got back 3.0, we are supposed 21 to -- and then, you know, industry has experienced 22 numerous instances where SRV leakage has occurred at 23 other plants with other Target Rock three-stage 24 relief valves. I'd like to know what that means, 25 with other -- you know, so you could have other NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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40 1 Target Rock model three-stage relief valves, I mean, 2 there's more than one model for three-stage relief 3 valves, you know.

4 But, here they start talking about, you 5 know, three-stage relief valves at Plant Hatch, and 6 other things, and then they start talking about the 7 three stage, you know. Oh, we've had other problems, 8 even that first LER talks to us about we have leakage 9 in that other valve, not the model we are using here 10 type of language, and now they are talking about, oh, 11 well, you know, here's a list of three-stage relief 12 valves that we've had.

13 You know, that whole thing, honesty, 14 integrity, and I'm a man of character type of thing, 15 you know, an organization, I never would write a bad 16 report, an organization never forces me to write a 17 bad or an inaccurate report, because I'm a man of 18 integrity. I will not tolerate that kind of business 19 type of thing.

20 And, I guess, you know, you know my 21 issues with the Navy rock that go shut down with the 22 weather instrumentation.

23 Yes, I'm done.

24 CHAIR GIITTER: Thank you, Mr. Mulligan.

25 At this time, does any staff here at NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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41 1 Headquarters have any questions for Mr. Mulligan?

2 CHAIR GIITTER: Thank you. What about 3 the region?

4 MR. BOWER: None.

5 CHAIR GIITTER: Thank you.

6 Before I conclude the meeting -- well, we 7 don't have any members of the public, or we didn't, 8 so I just want to make sure there's no members of the 9 public on the bridge. Okay.

10 As stated in the opening, the purpose of 11 this meeting is not to provide an opportunity for the 12 Petitioner or the public to question or examine the 13 PRB regarding the merits of the petition request.

14 Mr. Mulligan, I thank you for taking time 15 to provide the NRC staff with verifying information 16 on the petition you submitted. The PRB plans to meet 17 internally, and discuss the matter one more time.

18 Before we close, does the court reporter 19 need any additional information for the meeting 20 transcript?

21 COURT REPORTER: No, I've got everything, 22 thanks.

23 CHAIR GIITTER: Thank you. With that, 24 the meeting is concluded, and we'll be terminating 25 the phone connection.

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42 1 MR. MULLIGAN: And, thank you very much 2 for this opportunity.

3 CHAIR GIITTER: Okay, thank you, Mr.

4 Mulligan.

5 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter was 6 concluded at 4:03 p.m.)

7 8

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