IR 05000269/2006009

Oconee Nuclear Station - NRC Inspection Report 05000269/2006009, 05000270/2006009, & 05000287/20060009

ML060520422
Person / Time
Site:	Oconee
Issue date:	02/21/2006
From:	Casto C A Division Reactor Projects II
To:	Brandi Hamilton Duke Energy Corp
References
EA-05-228, IR-06-009
Download: ML060520422 (5)

Text

February 21, 2006

EA-05-228Duke Energy CorporationATTN:Mr. B. HamiltonVice President Oconee Nuclear Station7800 Rochester Highway Seneca, SC 29672

SUBJECT: OCONEE NUCLEAR STATION - NRC INSPECTION REPORT 05000269/2006009, 05000270/2006009, AND 05000287/20060009

Dear Mr. Hamilton:

The purpose of this letter is to provide you with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC's)final significance determination for a finding at Duke Energy Corporation's (DEC's) Oconee Nuclear Station involving the failure to promptly take adequate corrective actions to resolve tornado-related concerns with the Unit 3 control room wall. As documented in our Choice Letter dated December 19, 2005, this finding was qualitatively assessed under the significancedetermination process as a preliminary greater than Green issue (i.e., an issue of at least low to moderate safety significance), as well as identified as an apparent violation (AV 05000287/

2005012-01) of 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix B, Criterion XVI, Corrective Action. The Choice Letter offered you the opportunity (via regulatory conference or in writing) to give us your assessment of the risk significance and the associated apparent violation so that we wouldhave a complete understanding of this issue prior to determining the final significance. At your request, an open regulatory conference was conducted with members of your staff onFebruary 6, 2006, to discuss DEC's position on this issue. The enclosures to this letter include the list of attendees at the regulatory conference, and copies of the material presented by yourstaff and the NRC at the regulatory conference. During the conference, DEC provided theresults of its risk analysis, concluding that the finding was of very low safety significance. As presented, DEC's risk analysis consisted of a quantitative assessment of tornado missiledamage to the Unit 3 north control room wall, which probabilistically accounted for apeak/bounding missile inventory and tornado-related standby shutdown facility human error(i.e., consideration of operator action reliability to align the standby shutdown facility auxiliaryservice water system following a tornado strike on the plant). In addition, DEC agreed withNRC's characterization of the finding as a violation of regulatory requirements, and advised ofits plans to modify the Unit 3 north control room wall by December 31, 2007, rather than relying on a probabilistic solution. After considering the information developed during the inspection and the information DECprovided at the conference, the NRC has concluded that the inspection finding is appropriatelycharacterized in the mitigating systems cornerstone as having very low safety significance DEC2(Green). Additionally, the finding was also determined to be a violation of NRC requirements,as delineated in the Choice Letter and presented during the regulatory conference (see Enclosure 3). However, because of its very low safety significance and because the issue was entered into your corrective action program, the NRC is treating the finding as a non-citedviolation (NCV) consistent with Section VI.A.1 of the NRC Enforcement Policy.In accordance with 10 CFR 2.390 of the NRC's "Rules of Practice," a copy of this letterand its enclosures will be available electronically for public inspection in the NRC PublicDocument Room or from the Publicly Available Records (PARS) component of NRC'sdocument system (ADAMS). ADAMS is accessible from the NRC Web site at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html (the Public Electronic Reading Room).For administrative purposes, this letter is issued as NRC Inspection Report No. 05000269,270,287/2006009, and the above violation is identified as NCV 05000287/2006009-01: Failure toPromptly Identify and Correct a Long-Standing Discrepancy Between the Unit 3 Control Room and its Tornado Licensing Basis Specified in the Updated Final Safety Analysis Report.

Accordingly, the associated apparent violation AV 05000269,270,287/2005012-01 is closed.Should you have any questions regarding this letter, please contact Michael E. Ernstes, Chief,Reactor Projects Branch 1, at (404)-562-4540.

Sincerely,/RA/Charles Casto, DirectorDivision of Reactor Projects Docket Nos.:50-269, 50-270, 50-287, 72-04License Nos.:DPR-38, DPR-47, DPR-55

Enclosures:

1. List of Attendees 2. Material presented by DEC 3. Material presented by NRCcc w/encls: (see page 3)

DEC3cc w/encl:B. G. Davenport Compliance Manager (ONS)

Duke Energy Corporation Electronic Mail DistributionLisa VaughnAssociate General Counsel Duke Energy Corporation 526 South Church Street Mail Code EC 07H Charlotte, NC 28201-1244Anne CottinghamWinston & Strawn LLP Electronic Mail DistributionBeverly Hall, Acting DirectorDivision of Radiation Protection N. C. Department of Environmental Health & Natural Resources Electronic Mail DistributionHenry J. Porter, Assistant DirectorDiv. of Radioactive Waste Mgmt.

S. C. Department of Health and Environmental Control Electronic Mail DistributionR. Mike GandyDivision of Radioactive Waste Mgmt.

S. C. Department of Health and Environmental Control Electronic Mail DistributionCounty Supervisor of Oconee County 415 S. Pine Street Walhalla, SC 29691-2145Lyle Graber, LISNUS Corporation Electronic Mail DistributionR. L. Gill, Jr., M anagerNuclear Regulatory Issues and Industry Affairs Duke Energy Corporation 526 S. Church Street Charlotte, NC 28201-0006Peggy ForceAssistant Attorney General N. C. Department of Justice Electronic Mail DistributionDistribution w/encl: (See page 4)

M L060520422OFFICERII:EICSRII:DRPSIGNATURECFEMEENAMECEvansMErnstesDATE02/17/0602/16/062/ /20062/ /20062/ /20062/ /20062/ /2006 E-MAIL COPY? YESNO YESNO YESNO YESNO YESNO YESNO YESNO Enclosure 1LIST OF ATTENDEESDuke Energy CorporationD. Coyle, Oconee Operations Support ManagerG. Davenport, Oconee Regulatory Compliance Manager R. Freudenberger, Oconee Engineering Supervisor M. Glover, Oconee Engineering Manager B. Hamilton, Oconee Site Vice President D. Herrick, PRA Engineering Supervisor R. Jones, Nuclear Operations, Senior Vice President L. Kanipe, PRA Engineer J. Robertson, Oconee Senior Engineer D. Stewart, Duke Public & Community Affairs Manager R. Hester, Oconee Senior EngineerNuclear Regulatory CommissionR. Bernhard, Senior Reactor Analyst (SRA), Division of Reactor Safety (DRS), Region II (RII)R. Carroll, Senior Project Engineer, Division of Reactor Projects (DRP), Branch 1, RII C. Casto, Director, DRP, RII H. Christensen, Deputy Director, DRS, RII

• C. Doutt, Sr. Reliability & Risk Analyst, Division of Risk Assessment (DRA), Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR)M. Ernstes, Chief, DRP, Branch 1, RII

• M. Franovich, Chief, PRA Operational Support, DRA, NRR *S. Jones, Balance-of-Plant Branch, Division of Safety Systems, NRR M. King, Project Engineer, DRP, Branch 1, RII

• J. Kramer, SRA, DRA

• L. Olshan, Oconee Project Manager, NRR C. Payne, Chief, Engineering Branch 2, DRS, RII

• N. Salgado, SRA, DRA M. Shannon, Oconee Senior Resident Inspector J. Shea, Deputy Director, DRP, RII S. Sparks, Sr. Enforcement Specialist, Enforcement & Investigations Coordination Staff, RII L. Trocine, Office of Enforcement* Participated by telephone