ML18023A094
| ML18023A094 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 01/18/2018 |
| From: | Denise Mcgovern NRC/SECY |
| To: | |
| References | |
| Download: ML18023A094 (105) | |
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1 UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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MEETING ON THE STRATEGIC PROGRAMMATIC OVERVIEW OF THE DECOMMISSIONING AND LOW-LEVEL WASTE AND SPENT FUEL STORAGE AND TRANSPORTATION BUSINESS LINES
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THURSDAY, JANUARY 18, 2018
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ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND
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The Commission met in the Commissioners' Hearing Room at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, at 9:00 a.m., Kristine L. Svinicki, Chairman, presiding.
COMMISSION MEMBERS:
KRISTINE L. SVINICKI, Chairman JEFF BARAN, Commissioner STEPHEN G. BURNS, Commissioner ALSO PRESENT:
ANNETTE VIETTI-COOK, Secretary of the Commission MARGARET DOANE, General Counsel
2 NRC STAFF:
MARC DAPAS, Director, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards (NMSS)
YOIRA DIAZ-SANABRIA, Chief, Containment, Structural and Thermal Branch JACK GIESSNER, Director, Division of Nuclear Materials Safety, Region III MICHAEL LAYTON, Director, Division of Spent Fuel Management, NMSS VICTOR MCCREE, Executive Director for Operations JOSEPH NICK, Deputy Director, Division of Nuclear Materials Safety, Region I JOHN TAPPERT, Director, Division of Decommissioning, Uranium Recovery, and Waste Programs, NMSS BRUCE WATSON, Chief, Reactor Decommissioning Branch, NMSS 1
3 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 (9:03 a.m.)
3 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Well, good morning, 4 everyone. It's good to see everyone on this chilly morning.
5 So the Commission convenes this morning for the 6 purpose of receiving updates and hearing from the staff about all the 7 vast diversity of topics that we carry out under the Decommissioning 8 and Low-Level Waste business line and the Spent Fuel Storage and 9 Transportation business line.
10 I always derive great value from these business line 11 meetings. I know that they can seem like a rather routine matter.
12 And this one, these topic areas in particular, there is always a broad 13 diversity of somewhat disparate kind of programmatic things going on.
14 And as hard as we try, there's always so much going on on any given 15 day that you know to maintain current status of all of these things is 16 always difficult to do. So I find great efficiency in today's meeting and 17 I know that it always is a lot of work for the NRC staff to prepare for 18 this. So I appreciate all of the efforts of our presenters and everyone 19 who supported them in being ready to present to the Commission 20 today.
21 Before we begin, I will ask my colleagues if they have 22 any opening comments.
23 Okay, hearing none, I will turn the program over to our 24 Executive Director for Operations Victor McCree. Victor, please 25 proceed.
26 MR. MCCREE: Good morning, Chairman, 27 Commissioners.
4 1 The purpose of this meeting is to provide you with an 2 update of strategic considerations associated with the 3 Decommissioning and Low-Level Waste and Spent Fuel Storage and 4 Transportation business lines, including programmatic level priorities, 5 current activities, successes, and challenges.
6 The two business lines provide oversight of 20 power 7 reactors in decommissioning, 13 complex materials decommissioning 8 sites, 13 -- excuse me -- 11 uranium recovery facilities, and 79 9 licensed independent spent fuel storage installations, in addition to 10 establishing the national framework for low-level waste disposal.
11 We accomplish our mission with our partners, the 12 Regions, the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research, the Office of 13 Nuclear Security and Incident Response, as well as our corporate 14 office partners that provide critical infrastructure support for our 15 programs.
16 You'll hear today that the business lines, with the 17 support of our partners, have accomplished much in the last year and 18 have developed effective strategies to address the challenges and 19 opportunities before us.
20 Next slide, please.
21 With respect to the Decommissioning and Low-Level 22 Waste business lines, there are several key things that are common 23 across the broad activities included in the business line and you'll hear 24 about more of them shortly.
25 Specifically, we continue to significantly engage with 26 both the domestic and international stakeholders involving complex 27 issues. We're also effectively responding to change in the industry to
5 1 include the increase in plants moving into decommissioning. The 2 decommissioning framework is successfully accommodating a new 3 decommissioning business model involving potential use of an 4 experienced decommissioning organization, other than the utility.
5 We're also proactively planning and prioritizing 6 activities to respond to uncertain external environment and we're 7 continuing to review our licensing programs and making any 8 necessary adjustments to ensure efficiency and effectiveness.
9 With me at the table today is Marc Dapas, the 10 Director of the Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards, or 11 NMSS, who will provide an overview of the business line licensing and 12 oversight successes, as well as challenges.
13 He'll be followed by John Tappert, to my right, 14 Director of the Division of Decommissioning Uranium Recovery and 15 Waste Programs, who will discuss the current uranium recovery and 16 low-level waste environment; and Bruce Watson, to John's right, the 17 Branch Chief of the Reactor Decommissioning Branch within NMSS, 18 who will discuss the current decommissioning licensing environment; 19 and Jack Giessner, to Marc's left, Director of the Region III Division of 20 Nuclear Material Safety, who will discuss the accomplishments and 21 challenges associated with the decommissioning inspection program.
22 So with that brief introduction, I'll turn the presentation 23 over to Marc Dapas.
24 Next slide, please. Marc.
25 MR. DAPAS: Thank you, Vick. Good morning, 26 Chairman Svinicki and Commissioners.
27 As Vic indicated, I'll provide a brief overview of the
6 1 breadth and scope of the Decommissioning and Low-Level Waste 2 business line and my colleagues will discuss selected topics in more 3 detail during their respective presentations.
4 Next slide, please.
5 The Decommissioning and Low-Level Waste business 6 line is responsible for ensuring the safety of a broad range of activities 7 that includes the licensing and oversight of reactor and material 8 facilities undergoing decommissioning, the oversight of the national 9 low-level waste management program, licensing and oversight of the 10 uranium recovery facilities, and monitoring of certain Department of 11 Energy sites regarding waste incidental to reprocessing activities.
12 With respect to the current business line activities, we 13 are preparing for an increased number of power plants in 14 decommissioning. We are also proactively planning for Wyoming to 15 become an Agreement State, including addressing the impact on our 16 Uranium Recovery Program and the associated licensing fees.
17 We continue to strategically assess changes in the 18 national low-level waste program and, as a result, are implementing 19 several regulatory initiatives to enhance this area.
20 We continue to actively engage the international 21 community. Our decommissioning and waste programs are robust 22 and well-respected internationally and, as such, countries are 23 interested in our program knowledge, experience, and lessons 24 learned.
25 In keeping with the NRC's strategic goals, we view 26 these interactions as opportunities to share our decommissioning 27 experience and to learn from the experience of others so we can
7 1 improve our program.
2 We continue to maintain an effective working 3 relationship with the Department of Energy regarding our support for 4 the Department's waste incidental to reprocessing activities.
5 We are implementing the Commission's direction with 6 respect to the proposed 10 CFR Part 61 rulemaking, including 7 simplifying and clarifying portions of the rule and associated guidance.
8 This will also involve the continued engagement of stakeholders to 9 ensure accurate and reliable cost and benefits are used to inform the 10 supplemental proposed rule.
11 Next slide, please.
12 We have realized success in several areas, requiring 13 significant internal and external stakeholder interaction. Specifically, 14 we have developed the recommendations on several significant policy 15 matters that will shape our approaches to longstanding and complex 16 issues.
17 For example, we provided our recommendations to 18 the Commission related to interactions with other federal partners and 19 a graded approach to licensing associated with the non-military 20 radium program and are responding to the Commission's direction to 21 implement the staff's recommendations on these policy matters.
22 We also provided recommendations related to the 23 appropriate oversight of financial assurance for radioactive sources.
24 Other examples of successful outcomes through 25 stakeholder interaction include support of significant public and 26 congressional meetings related to the shutdown of nuclear power 27 plants, consistent with our principle of openness.
8 1 Initiation of several enhancements to our licensing 2 process that will provide for greater efficiency and effectiveness in the 3 future, such as leveraging best practice licensing -- excuse me --
4 leveraging best licensing practices from other offices.
5 I mentioned during the 2016 Commission Briefing on 6 the uranium recovery product line that we had initiated a review of our 7 licensing processes. Since that briefing, we have completed an 8 independent assessment of uranium recovery licensing practices. As 9 a result, ten recommendations were identified and we are focusing on 10 efforts to implement those recommendations.
11 We have seen an improvement in our performance in 12 meeting our licensing timeliness metrics, which can be attributed to 13 the actions we have taken in response to the assessment 14 recommendations.
15 We also completed a limited evaluation of the 16 workload, fees, and organizational structure pertaining to the nuclear 17 materials and waste program areas. From this program and fee class 18 evaluation, which was conducted by a chartered working group, we 19 identified some changes to our organization processes and fee 20 structure to alleviate future budget recovery burdens on smaller fee 21 classes, such as uranium recovery.
22 Additionally, in response to Commission direction, we 23 are building on this initial program evaluation to conduct a more 24 comprehensive review of our organizational budget and fee structures 25 to include consideration of possible mergers of fee classes, business 26 lines or both, which will be completed next month.
27 In addition, the staff continues to make progress in
9 1 the licensing of new and expanded in-situ uranium recovery facilities, 2 specifically, since the last Commission meeting, we issued licenses for 3 the AUC Reno Creek and Jane Dough facilities, respectively.
4 Next slide, please.
5 We are also addressing some challenging technical, 6 organizational, and regulatory issues. For example, we are 7 developing recommendations for Commission consideration on 8 whether disposal of greater than Class C waste presents a hazard 9 such that the NRC should retain authority over its disposal. John will 10 discuss this and the status of efforts to develop a regulatory basis in 11 more detail during his presentation.
12 Another issue involves ensuring equitable and 13 transparent fees for all fee classes which, as I mentioned earlier, we 14 are addressing through the ongoing review of our organizational 15 budget and fee structure. This challenge is particularly acute for 16 uranium recovery facilities with Wyoming becoming an Agreement 17 State.
18 We are also continuing to engage industry on its 19 plans for submitting licensing action so that we can ensure that 20 resources in the uranium recovery product line are appropriate to 21 support the potential for licensing case work, given current market 22 conditions.
23 Let me now turn it over to John Tappert, which will 24 discuss the current uranium recovery and low-level waste 25 environment.
26 Next slide, please.
27 MR. TAPPERT: Thank you, Marc.
10 1 Good morning, Chairman, Commissioners. I will 2 focus my portion of the presentation on the priorities, current activities, 3 successes, challenges, and opportunities associated with the low-level 4 waste and uranium recovery aspects of the business line.
5 Next slide, please.
6 The Decommissioning and Low-Level Waste business 7 line continues to support a number of priorities involving a spectrum of 8 stakeholders and licensees. Bruce Watson will discuss the business 9 line priorities specific to the decommissioning area.
10 With respect to the other priorities, we are focused on 11 continuing to proactively refine the national low-level waste framework 12 in response to the changing external environment. This includes 13 updating the regulations in 10 CFR Part 61 and associated guidance 14 documents in response to recent Commission direction, as well as 15 addressing significant national policy issues, such as greater than 16 class C waste disposal.
17 We are also continuing efforts to monitor certain 18 Department of Energy disposal actions, in accordance with the Ronald 19 Reagan National Defense Authorization Act of 2005.
20 And we are continuing to make progress on ensuring 21 the effectiveness and efficiency of our licensing and oversight 22 activities for the uranium recovery facilities, as we plan for Wyoming 23 becoming an Agreement State.
24 Next slide, please.
25 With regards to the low-level waste program, we are 26 focusing on the implementation of the Commission's direction to revise 27 10 CFR Part 61. To that end, we held a public meeting in October
11 1 and issued a Federal Register notice to gain additional information 2 from stakeholders in the cost and benefits of the implementation of the 3 rule, in order to strengthen the regulatory analysis.
4 We are also currently modifying the proposed rule 5 language, statements of consideration, and associated guidance to 6 reflect Commission direction. We plan to publish the supplemental 7 proposed rule for a 90-day public comment period later this year.
8 Our next major task following the publication of the 9 supplement proposed rule is the development of a regulatory basis to 10 answer a question initially posed by the State of Texas regarding 11 whether an Agreement State can authorize the disposal of greater 12 than Class C in transuranic waste at a near-surface disposal facility.
13 This includes hosting a workshop to receive input 14 from the State of Texas and other interested stakeholders.
15 Consistent with Commission direction, the staff is 16 planning to complete the regulatory basis six months from the date of 17 publication of the Part 61 supplemental proposed rule. We are 18 completing a technical analysis of the main considerations associated 19 with near-surface disposal of this material and we are actively working 20 to draft the regulatory basis.
21 We have two other Part 61 follow-on activities, 22 specifically updating the forms and guidance for the Uniform Waste 23 Manifest to align it with the revised Part 61 requirements. And finally, 24 in response to Commission direction, evaluating whether a revision to 25 the waste classification tables are necessary.
26 Next slide, please.
27 In addition to our Part 61 related activities, we have
12 1 had a number of accomplishments and are planning for future 2 activities within the low-level waste program. Specifically, we issued 3 the National Report for the Joint Convention on the safety of spent fuel 4 management and radioactive waste management to support the sixth 5 review meeting of the Joint Convention this coming May.
6 Completion of the report was a significant 7 accomplishment, which required extensive coordination with the 8 Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the 9 Department of State.
10 This effort will ensure the United States maintains its 11 leadership in fulfilling the objectives of the Joint Convention to achieve 12 and maintain a high level of safety worldwide in spent fuel and 13 radioactive waste management.
14 We have also completed several milestones in 15 accordance with the monitoring responsibilities under the National 16 Defense Authorization Act. For example, we completed one on-site 17 observation visit at the Idaho National Laboratory Tank Farm Facility 18 located in Idaho and one on-site observation visit at the Savannah 19 River Site Salt Stone Disposal Facility located in South Carolina.
20 In addition, we issued a revised draft guidance 21 document regarding the 10 CFR Part 20.2002 process for public 22 comment. The 20.2002 process permits disposal of low-level waste 23 via alternate procedures not otherwise approved in the regulations.
24 Since 2000, the NRC has received approximately 20 25 requests for 20.2002 alternative disposal authorizations, of which the 26 vast majority were for offsite disposal.
27 The revisions to the guidance documents include
13 1 clarification of the meaning of disposal relative to 20.2002 2 authorizations, to include conditional recycling and reuse of materials.
3 And I just wanted to emphasize that the guidance update clarifies our 4 current approaches and is not intended to represent a change in 5 policy.
6 Regarding future activities, we plan to obtain 7 stakeholder input as part of a scoping study on the regulatory 8 oversight of very low-level waste. Currently, Part 61 does not 9 establish different regulatory controls for Class A waste, that is, very 10 low concentrations of radioactive material. This waste may currently 11 be approved for disposal at locations other than low-level waste 12 disposal facilities on a case by case basis.
13 Given the expected increase in low-level disposal 14 needs with the anticipated increase in reactor decommissioning, we 15 think it is prudent to reevaluate the appropriate regulatory process 16 level review and approval required for waste that has very low levels 17 of contamination.
18 We plan to issue a Federal Register notice in the near 19 future to obtain additional feedback on this matter.
20 And the last future activity that I will mention is that we 21 are prepared to implement the Commission direction on a rulemaking 22 plan to further evaluate potential changes to 10 CFR Part 30.35 23 regarding financial assurance for sealed sources. This rulemaking 24 plan was developed after considering the result of a scoping study that 25 examined the current financial assurance situation for the disposal of 26 Category 1 and 2 sources.
27 Next slide, please.
14 1 Now I'd like to briefly turn to the uranium recovery 2 program. We continue to provide oversight for a number of operating 3 uranium recovery sites and are making progress on our current 4 inventory of licensing actions.
5 Specifically, the staff has focused on the licensing and 6 oversight for 11 facilities, six of which are currently operating, with one 7 facility in standby, and making progress on five major licensing 8 actions, including two license renewals and three applications for 9 expansions of existing sites.
10 The other licensing actions are on hold, as requested 11 by the applicants, due to prolonged poor uranium market conditions.
12 As Marc said, one of our more significant 13 accomplishments since last year's Commission brief has been 14 issuance of a new license for the AUC Reno Creek facility and for the 15 Uranerz Jane Dough expansion.
16 And I would further note that the review of the Jane 17 Dough expansion was completed in a very timely manner, which was 18 due in part to the staff's implementation of licensing program 19 improvements.
20 One ongoing challenge for us is forecasting future 21 licensing work, given the uncertainty of market conditions. To 22 address this uncertainty, as Marc mentioned, we continue to 23 communicate with potential applicants on their schedules. We 24 budget for anticipated applications based on letters of intent and 25 historical submission rates, which has been shown to be a good 26 predictor of the number of applications to be submitted. However, 27 recent poor market conditions have caused most new projects to be
15 1 delayed.
2 Next slide, please.
3 As I mentioned earlier, we continue to make progress 4 when ensuring the effectiveness and efficiency of our licensing and 5 oversight functions, as we plan for the State of Wyoming to become 6 an Agreement State.
7 As Marc mentioned, we completed an independent 8 assessment of our licensing practices with respect to the uranium 9 recovery program, which included benchmarking with other licensing 10 organizations. We are initiating actions based on the ten 11 recommendations deriving from that assessment to enhance the 12 efficiency and effectiveness of the program. And with the 13 implementation of these recommendations, we are expecting to 14 improve licensing performance, transparency, and accountability.
15 We have continued to look for other opportunities to 16 enhance our licensing and oversight programs. Last summer, we 17 provided a paper to the Commission proposing to increase the length 18 of license term for uranium recovery facilities from 10 to 20 years.
19 The license term has changed over time, going from three years to 20 five years in 1967 and then going from five years to ten years in 1996.
21 After we evaluated our extensive experience with 22 oversight of these facilities and the associated risk, the staff 23 determined that extending the license term from 10 to 20 years would 24 not adverse impact public health and safety and, as such, 25 recommended that future licenses be issued for 20 years.
26 The Commission approved the staff's 27 recommendation and we are currently implementing that direction.
16 1 We are also continuing to proactively manage the 2 impact of the transition of Wyoming to an Agreement State under the 3 NRC's uranium recovery program.
4 At last year's Commission meeting, we mentioned 5 that we formed a Transition Team to evaluate the staffing and 6 organizational impacts of the significant reduction in the budget 7 associated with Wyoming becoming an Agreement State. Since 8 then, we have completed our evaluation of the expected impact on our 9 budgeted resources and organizational structure and are developing 10 recommendations to address them.
11 We are actively working with Wyoming to ensure a 12 smooth transition of oversight responsibility for licensees to the state.
13 We have aligned a licensing schedule, where possible, to complete 14 the licensing before the transition.
15 I would note that four of the five current major 16 licensing actions involve sites in Wyoming.
17 We have worked extensively with Wyoming to 18 implement the option directed by the Commission for dispositioning 19 and decommissioning uranium recovery sites in the state, which 20 entails the transfer of oversight responsibilities for five of the six 21 decommissioning sites to the state upon approval of its Agreement 22 State application.
23 We are also working with the state to develop options 24 for funding and the one remaining uranium recovery facility and 25 decommissioning, the American Nuclear Corporation's site, that will 26 remain under NRC oversight following the transition.
27 And based on feedback from the state and the
17 1 Department of Energy regarding decommissioning funding options, we 2 have identified what we think is a viable path forward, which we plan 3 to provide to the Commission for its consideration in a paper in the 4 near future.
5 In summary, the uranium recovery sites located in 6 Wyoming comprise a significant percentage of the sites currently 7 under our regulatory jurisdiction. With the change in our workload 8 due to the assumption of regulatory oversight for those sites by the 9 state represents a significant change that we are managing from a 10 people and programmatic standpoint.
11 Next slide, please.
12 So in closing, I would like to spend just a minute 13 discussing some of our stakeholder engagement activities. As Marc 14 mentioned, we have engaged a broad range of stakeholders.
15 For example, we recently coordinated extensively with 16 the Environmental Protection Agency on two major rules: one which 17 sets the basic regulatory framework for the groundwater protection at 18 uranium in-situ recovery sites, and another one related to the control 19 of radon emissions under the National Emissions Standards for 20 Hazardous Air Pollutants or NESHAPs.
21 We provided comments on both of these rules to the 22 Office of Management and Budget Review Process and we also 23 provided comments on the rule related to groundwater protection 24 during the public comment period which closed on October 16th of last 25 year.
26 We have also engaged extensively with other 27 stakeholders. For example, we held a well-attended technical
18 1 workshop on radiation protection, a topic of great interest, and we 2 participated in several conferences and meetings.
3 Additionally, consistent with the agency's International 4 Strategic Plan, which focuses on knowledge transfer and international 5 engagement, we hosted a foreign assignee from South Africa in our 6 Uranium Recovery Branch, during which we exchanged information 7 on our regulatory programs.
8 We also supported the development of several 9 International Atomic Energy Agency safety guides and technical 10 reports.
11 And this concludes my portion of the presentation.
12 And I will now turn it over to Bruce Watson.
13 Next slide, please.
14 MR. WATSON: Thank you, John.
15 Good morning Chairman and Commissioners and 16 thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. My presentation 17 will focus on the decommissioning program environment and 18 challenges.
19 Next slide, please.
20 With respect to the decommissioning program, we are 21 continuing our efforts to support a number of priorities involving the 22 spectrum of stakeholders and licensees. Specifically, we are 23 focusing on the following priorities: performing licensing activities and 24 maintaining effective oversight of reactor decommissioning sites; 25 conducting licensing and oversight activities for complex material 26 sites; and providing oversight at military and non-military sites with 27 radium contamination.
19 1 Next slide, please.
2 Each year the Regional Offices terminate 3 approximately 100 non-complex material sites. In our office, we 4 manage the complex sites, those that have long-lived radionuclides 5 and have significant technical challenges, such as groundwater 6 contamination.
7 During the approximately 20 years since the license 8 termination rules were implemented in 1997, a total of 71 9 NRC-licensed sites have completed decommissioning. This 10 accomplishment demonstrated the ongoing teamwork between 11 Headquarters and the Regional Offices with our licensing and 12 inspection programs.
13 During this time, we have completed license 14 terminations at seven power reactors, 16 research reactors, and 48 15 complex material sites. Of the 48 complex material sites, 22 are 16 legacy sites. Legacy sites either have financial or technical issues 17 which were preventing cleanup and closure. We have worked with 18 the site owners and, in many cases, the trustees to reduce the total 19 number of legacy sites from 27 in 1998 to the five left today.
20 On this slide, there is a red spike in 2002, designating 21 the year in which the site -- which the staff issued many draft 22 decommissioning guidance documents. We credit the guidance as 23 the major reason for the large number of terminations to date.
24 Next slide, please.
25 Since the last Commission briefing, we have 26 accomplished several major milestones within the reactor 27 decommissioning program. We approved a significant number of
20 1 license amendments, aligned an emergency plan, and physical 2 security requirements for plants in decommissioning.
3 For example, we approved license amendments for 4 Crystal River that aligned their emergency response requirements and 5 reduced the risk associated with the transfer of spent fuel to dry 6 storage.
7 Additional licensing actions and inspections were 8 completed, including those involving Kewaunee spent fuel transfer.
9 With the Regional Office, we have completed ongoing 10 confirmatory surveys at Humboldt Bay, La Crosse, and Zion. We 11 have supported the completion of the reactor decommissioning 12 rulemaking basis. This is a major rule involving significant effort from 13 several offices. This is rule is anticipated to result in efficiencies in 14 the transfer of reactors in the decommissioning and addresses several 15 complex policies issues related to decommissioning. We expect to 16 meet the goal of completing the rulemaking by the end of 2019.
17 We are effectively responding to changes and 18 challenges in the industry, including an increasing inventory of reactor 19 decommissioning sites and a new business model for 20 decommissioning.
21 Since 2013, six units have permanently ceased 22 operation, including Crystal River and Vermont Yankee, which are 23 pictured above. Not pictures are Fort Calhoun and San Onofre Units 24 2 and 3.
25 We are effectively responding to changes and 26 challenges in the industry, including anticipated increase of eight 27 power reactors permanently ceasing operations over the next few
21 1 years. From a resource standpoint, we believe the increase in 2 reactors entering decommissioning will be offset by the expected 3 license terminations at three research reactors: two at General 4 Atomics and one at the State University of New York at Buffalo; and 5 four license terminations at three power reactors: Humboldt Bay, La 6 Crosse and, of course, Zion 1 and 2. By 2020, we expect those to be 7 completed.
8 For power reactor decommissioning sites, there is a 9 new business model for decommissioning where the license is 10 temporarily transferred from the utility to a decommissioning company 11 to facilitate timely decommissioning. In this business model at the 12 completion of decommissioning, the property and the independent 13 spent fuel storage insulation are returned to the utility. We approved 14 the temporary license transfer for Zion a few years ago and recently 15 approved the license transfer for La Crosse.
16 Currently, we are reviewing a first of a kind request 17 from Vermont Yankee for a permanent license transfer to a company, 18 NorthStar, in responding to the associated hearing requests. At the 19 request of the Vermont Yankee Citizens Nuclear Decommissioning 20 Panel, we participated in a public meeting to discuss the NRC's role in 21 the license transfer process and hear public comments on the 22 proposed licensing action and sale.
23 With regard to our review of the application, we are 24 evaluating the responses provided by Entergy and NorthStar to our 25 Request for Additional Information. We plan to complete our review 26 of the application in the first half of this year.
27 Finally, the staff is evaluating General Electric's
22 1 exemption request to exceed the current 60-year time line for 2 completion of decommissioning. In assessing the license request, 3 the staff has issued additional requests for information and will be 4 providing the Commission with our recommendations whether this 5 exemption should be approved.
6 Next slide, please.
7 Internationally, we have had significant engagements 8 in the area of decommissioning which have involved both assistance 9 and cooperative technical exchanges. Examples include our support 10 of a reactor decommissioning workshop in Taiwan, supporting 11 technical exchange meeting and hosting a foreign assignee from the 12 Republic of Korea.
13 Pictured above, this past September we worked with 14 Region IV in hosting Korean and Taiwanese regulators to observe a 15 decommissioning inspection at San Onofre.
16 Last year we worked with Region III to host a French 17 delegation on a tour of the Zion Nuclear Power Plant and had bilateral 18 discussions on the decommissioning process.
19 Lastly, we continue to support IAE -- oh, excuse me, 20 International Atomic Energy Agency activities to ensure our 21 decommissioning program remains strategically aligned with the 22 international standards and requirements.
23 Next slide please.
24 We have continued to make progress in the 25 decommissioning of legacy sites. We have quickly secured 26 decommissioning funding for Westinghouse sites when Westinghouse 27 entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy, demonstrating the effectiveness of
23 1 the enhanced financial assurance requirements we implemented in 2 2012.
3 We issued an order to Fansteel, a company in 4 bankruptcy, to require actions to provide reasonable assurance of 5 adequate protection at its Oklahoma FMRI site.
6 At the American Nuclear Corporation site, we are 7 working with the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality to 8 ensure the remaining funds from the forfeited surety bond are issued 9 to stabilize the site in a safe, secure configuration.
10 The picture on this slide is Westinghouse's Hematite 11 site, which we continue to work closely with Region III to ensure the 12 site is remediated safely and to allow license termination in the near 13 future.
14 Next slide, please.
15 The staff has interacted extensively with our federal 16 partners on materials decommissioning sites. We continue to have 17 extensive interactions with the Department of Energy and participate 18 in the Navajo Nation five-year plan to address uranium contamination 19 at Uranium Mill Tailings Radiation Material Act sites. Six federal 20 agencies, in coordination with the Navajo Nation have implemented 21 the second five-year plan to address uranium contamination on the 22 Navajo Nation.
23 We participate in several of the plan's cross-cutting 24 strategies, including cleanup of the Northeast Church Rock Mine site, 25 protecting human health and the environment at former mill sites on 26 the Navajo Nation and conducting coordinated outreach and 27 education.
24 1 At West Valley, significant progress is being made 2 with the demolition of the vitrification facility and the demolition -- the 3 decontamination of the main process plan in preparation for 4 demolition. We continue to work with the Department of Energy, the 5 Environmental Protection Agency, and the State of New York to 6 resolve technical issues and coordinate oversight of the site.
7 In November, the NRC agreed to be a cooperative 8 agency on the supplemental environmental impact statement related 9 to the decommissioning of the site.
10 Pictured is the Homestake site, which has been 11 remediating the groundwater for a few decades. The site is near 12 Grants, New Mexico and Mount Taylor, an important landmark to the 13 Native Americans. We continue to work with the Environmental 14 Protection Agency and the state to ensure clear roles and 15 responsibilities and to avoid dual regulation of the site.
16 Finally, we just signed a memorandum of 17 understanding with the National Park Service with respect to 18 remediation of activities at the Great Kills Park on Staten Island, New 19 York. The National Park Service is conducting remediation activities 20 under the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation 21 and Liability Act.
22 The memorandum of understanding describes the 23 monitoring approach.
24 Next slide, please.
25 We have supported a number of significant public and 26 congressional meetings related to reactor decommissioning.
27 Specifically, we held public meetings on the Fort Calhoun
25 1 post-shutdown decommissioning activities report in the La Crosse 2 license termination plan.
3 We teamed with Region IV to support a San Onofre 4 Citizens Engagement Panel meeting to discuss the decommissioning 5 inspection program.
6 As previously noted, we participated in a Vermont 7 Yankee Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel meeting 8 on the proposed license transfer of Vermont Yankee.
9 At the request of the New York State Senate and 10 General Assembly, we provided testimony on the NRC's role in the 11 decommissioning process as it relates to the upcoming permanent 12 shutdown of Indian Point.
13 We supported a briefing of Congresswoman Lowey 14 on the announced shutdown at Indian Point and Congressman 15 Carbajal's town hall meeting on the anticipated shutdown of Diablo 16 Canyon Nuclear Power Plant.
17 Over the past few years in support of the Office of 18 Congressional Affairs, we have provided over 30 congressional 19 briefings on reactor decommissioning.
20 The picture in this slide is from the NRC's public 21 meeting in Vermont. And this illustrates the high public interest in 22 decommissioning.
23 Next slide please.
24 While Jack Giessner will be providing a regional 25 perspective on the radium program, to date the staff has made 26 substantial progress in implementing a non-military program. I would 27 like to highlight several key aspects of the program.
26 1 We are implementing a graded and risk-informed 2 approach. Specifically, we ranked the sites on the likelihood of 3 finding residual radioactive -- radium activity and we are using 4 site-specific information in lieu of generic assumptions in order to 5 determine the need for site cleanup.
6 We are gaining efficiencies and becoming more 7 effective through applying lessons learned. In most instances, we 8 have been able to gather enough information from initial site visits to 9 make a decision on the path forward without having to conduct 10 additional scoping surveys as originally envisioned. We have put 11 controls in place to ensure appropriate oversight of the cleanup 12 activities to ensure a risk-informed approach.
13 We have completed initial site visits at all of the 14 responsive owners' sites. As of November, 33 of the 39 initial site 15 visits have been completed.
16 Fourteen properties have been identified with radium 17 contamination that is above background. Of these 14 properties, four 18 were identified with contamination that exceeded our action levels for 19 recommending access controls, those with radiation equivalents of 20 100 millirem per year.
21 In those cases, we have worked with the site owners 22 to implement voluntary controls. We are also working with the site 23 owners to make progress toward site cleanup, where necessary.
24 Pictured is the Benrus Clock Company in Connecticut, 25 which recently completed cleanup activities at the site and staff 26 conducted confirmatory surveys last week.
27 Next slide, please.
27 1 We are continuing to address challenges with the 2 non-military radium program. Consistent with the Commission's 3 direction, we are working with the Environmental Protection Agency to 4 explore funding options in instances where there are funding 5 difficulties. For example, we are working with the Environmental 6 Protection Agency to obtain funding for outdoor contamination at 7 Bristol Instrument Gears in Connecticut.
8 In addition, we continue to share lessons learned with 9 involved states and communicate our status of our activities. We are 10 coordinating with the State of Connecticut to obtain cooperation from 11 site owners that are reluctant to allow access for surveys.
12 Lastly, we have been successfully communicating our 13 actions and risk of radium to the public and have received positive 14 feedback from the states, local government, and site owners on our 15 approaches.
16 Thank you and I will now turn the presentation over to 17 Jack Giessner.
18 MR. GIESSNER: Thanks, Bruce.
19 Thank you, Chairman and Commissioners for the 20 opportunity share some regional perspectives, successes, and 21 opportunities with you today.
22 Our Reactor Materials Decommissioning Program 23 play a key role in ensuring the safe and secure decommissioning of 24 power reactors and complex sites. Our oversight in this area ensures 25 the protection of public health and safety and it ensures the final 26 condition of the facility meets our requirements for unrestricted 27 release.
28 1 We risk-inform our activities throughout all phases of 2 our Decommissioning Inspection Program.
3 Next slide, please.
4 We continue to have a clear focus on safety and 5 security as we implement the inspection program for decommissioning 6 power reactors. In the pictures above, in the top left is Kewaunee, 7 which completed its spent fuel offload to the independent spent fuel 8 storage installation pad and is entering SAFSTOR. In the bottom left 9 is La Crosse Station, which is in active decommissioning.
10 Finally, on the right is a picture of both Zion 11 containments, one in the foreground and one in clear view from a 12 couple months ago. That red oval you see is highlighting what used 13 to be the wall between the Aux Building and the Turbine Building.
14 Zion is also in active decommissioning.
15 Next slide, please.
16 Our inspection manual chapter, specifically, IMC 2561 17 addresses all phases of decommissioning, including SAFSTOR, 18 transitions, and active decommissioning. The guidance assists in 19 risk-informing activities to inspect.
20 On the left is a picture of Fort Calhoun in Region IV, 21 showing the power block and containment. The licensee is 22 transitioning the site into SAFSTOR.
23 On the right is a picture also from Region IV, 24 Humboldt Bay, which is in active decommissioning. This picture shows 25 the excavation about 40 feet below grade involving the removal of the 26 concrete, which was used to support the reactor vessel.
27 Our guidance provides the needed flexibility to inspect
29 1 a wide range of activities depicted here using qualitative risk-informed 2 methods.
3 Next slide, please.
4 Given the number of facilities in various stages of 5 decommissioning, we continue to gain operating experience in all 6 phases of decommissioning. Our experience in this complex, 7 radiological, industrial environment gets shared with all the Regions, 8 as well as Headquarters.
9 In the picture at the left, an inspector observes the 10 removal of Zion's pressurizer relief tank or PRT. The PRT was cut in 11 half along its length, then coated and shipped to a waste disposal 12 facility in Clive, Utah. That's Class A waste.
13 The picture on the right shows the demolition work at 14 Humboldt Bay. This picture depicts half of the Reactor Building 15 during decommissioning, along with the piece of equipment that 16 supports further dismantlement.
17 As you can see, many activities are occurring as part 18 of the decommissioning process that have potential radiological 19 consequences. As such, it is particularly important that the licensee 20 keeps its focus on a healthy safety culture.
21 We focused on this important topic during a session 22 at last year's regulatory information conference. We also issued an 23 educational guide titled Safety Culture in Decommissioning as a 24 licensee resource. In addition, we always discuss safety culture with 25 senior managers during our site visits.
26 Next slide, please.
27 Although the risks during decommissioning is
30 1 significantly less than the risk of power operations, effective regulatory 2 oversight is still needed. Let me provide a couple of examples where 3 we have assured safe licensee performance of decommissioning 4 operations through our oversight.
5 In early May of last year, Kewaunee experienced a 6 loss of offsite power during its dry fuel storage campaign. Kewaunee 7 still had about 400 spent fuel bundles in the spent fuel pool and also 8 had a canister on the spent fuel pool floor in the process of being 9 welded. Kewaunee was able to start and load their emergency diesel 10 generator within 15 minutes.
11 We dispatched an inspector from the nearby Point 12 Beach site to assess the situation and ensure adequate fuel safety.
13 On the left is a picture of the inspector observing the 14 running diesel generator. Although offsite power was unavailable for 15 over one day, the safety of spent fuel was not jeopardized.
16 Another example to share is the need to ensure that 17 the right programs are in place during the transition to 18 decommissioning. For example, at the San Onofre Nuclear 19 Generating Station, the licensee failed to adequately implement a 20 certified fuel handling training program. Specifically, as changes to 21 the plan occurred, the licensee did not adequately implement a 22 systematic approach to its training program that reflected the 23 modifications to the facility procedures and the quality of documents.
24 Next slide, please.
25 Let me transition to complex material 26 decommissioning sites. Our inspection program also addresses all 27 phases of complex material decommissioning, specifically inspections
31 1 before dismantlement, inspections during dismantlement and 2 remediation, and inspections after remediation. This includes 3 independent surveys of soil and water.
4 The Hematite fuel facility undergoing 5 decommissioning in Missouri provides a good example of all three 6 phases of decommissioning. Working from the left, the first picture is 7 an aerial view prior to major dismantlement. The 2012 picture shows 8 the start of major remediation. The 2015 picture shows the 9 expansive nature of remediation, digging over 20 feet down to clean 10 up burial pits.
11 The final pictures shows a field remaining after the 12 cleanup activities. We are currently obtaining independent samples 13 and are reviewing the final status surveys.
14 Next slide, please.
15 At complex sites, some major activities deserve more 16 attention than others, based on the potential risk. One such example 17 is evaluating and remediating contamination in groundwater, ponds, 18 and sediments.
19 I present two examples here. On the left, inspectors 20 are collecting samples of sediment under the outfall near the Joachim 21 Creek in Hematite Site. In this case, the activities level were well 22 below the threshold needed to release the area for general use.
23 On the right is a picture of Fansteel FMRI location in 24 Oklahoma. It shows a pond that is partially remediated. Fansteel, 25 when it was in production, extracted tantalum and niobium from 26 uranium and thorium ore. That blue-gray material you see is the 27 waste product of the process that was used to remove the tantalum
32 1 and niobium from that slag material.
2 The backfield ponds is being excavated and the 3 contents of the pond are being packaged and shipped offsite as 4 funding allows.
5 Next slide, please.
6 I want to share some regional perspectives on the 7 effectiveness of the agency's action related to the non-military radium 8 program. The regions are using a temporary instruction that provides 9 guidance for case by case evaluation for as-found conditions in 10 various location. The initial surveys focus on ensuring public health 11 and safety. If required, scoping surveys are conducted later to gather 12 additional information about the site.
13 The guidance provides quantitative thresholds set to 14 reasonable values to assure actions are properly taken.
15 Lessons learned are being captured in revisions to 16 this temporary instruction, one of which is going to be issued soon.
17 The picture to the left as at a gauge company in 18 Michigan, where we found parts of radium gauges needing controls.
19 In this picture, we are observing a health physicist 20 from the Oak Ridge Associated Universities conducting surveys. The 21 picture on the right is at a salvage yard in Alaska. It shows the state 22 of disrepair we find at some locations.
23 Next slide, please.
24 I can't emphasize enough the great teamwork 25 between the Regions, Headquarters, the Environmental Protection 26 Agency, Oak Ridge Associated Universities, as well as state and local 27 officials. Several sites required very close coordination to accomplish
33 1 key tasks that involved businesses, government premises, and 2 residential apartments.
3 An excellent example of the coordination was the 4 effort associated with accessing the apartments of private citizens at 5 the Enterprise Apartments in Waterbury, Connecticut. A picture of 6 that site is on the far left of this slide. After extensive discussions with 7 the state, we conducted numerous conference calls with corporate 8 and site management. Communication tools and protocols were 9 shared and coordinated such that site management provided 10 notification to the occupants of the 13-selected apartments.
11 As a result, our team gained access to the apartments 12 without any problems, per an approved schedule. Our site team 13 included a manager, an individual from the Office of Public Affairs, and 14 a bilingual inspector.
15 A representative from Connecticut and a consultant 16 for the property owner observed the surveys which facilitated a 17 common understanding of our initial results.
18 The picture in the middle slide depicts some more 19 activities involving inspectors and health physicists serving a large 20 federal complex in Battle Creek, Michigan. We surveyed hundreds of 21 thousands of square feet of the facility during evenings and a 22 weekend to minimize the impact of that facility.
23 The other two pictures on the right show our 24 inspectors at the Bristol Instrument Gears Company in Connecticut, 25 conducting initial surveys of surface soil and below ground sediment.
26 Next slide, please.
27 Finally, I want to share some things the Regions see
34 1 as future opportunities. Where do we see the training and 2 qualification of future decommissioning health physics inspectors?
3 First, we want to leverage the work that is occurring in modeling 4 competencies. Inspectors are working with the Office of the Chief 5 Human Capital Officer and other offices to ensure the competency 6 modeling facilitates the identification of the necessary enhancements 7 to our training program.
8 Second, we want to factor in the different phases of 9 decommissioning into our work process. For example, a resident 10 inspector at a reactor site that is transitioning from power operations to 11 SAFSTOR is best suited to oversee the beginning of 12 decommissioning. However, more health physics knowledge is 13 needed later in decommissioning during the long-term storage of fuel.
14 Finally, in active decommissioning, the skills needed 15 are almost exclusively related to the standards needed to comply with 16 a decommissioning plan. In short, the principles of nuclear safety 17 and good regulation are the same between operating reactors and 18 decommissioning reactors but some skill sets are different and need 19 to be addressed.
20 We also want to think more broadly. We can 21 cross-train materials inspectors in decommissioning and independent 22 spent fuel storage installation inspectors. We want to do this when it 23 makes good business sense.
24 The Regions and Headquarters have several forums 25 where these opportunities will be discussed, including counterpart 26 meetings, biweekly phone calls, and our quarterly Decommissioning 27 Board meetings.
35 1 This concludes my presentation and I will turn it over 2 to Vic.
3 MR. MCCREE: Thank you, Jack.
4 Chairman and Commissioners, as you've heard the 5 Decommissioning and Low-Level Waste business line continues to 6 successfully fulfill its mission and execute its priorities for a number of 7 very challenging and interesting, and complex issues and areas.
8 In the spirit of Project Aim, they are actively engaging 9 stakeholders, both internally and externally. They are effectively 10 responding to change and proactively planning, and prioritizing, and 11 executing activities to prepare for the future.
12 Thank you and we are now ready to respond to your 13 questions.
14 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Thank you Victor and all the 15 presenters. In my opening comments I remarked that we were going 16 to hear about a lot of activities and you certainly fulfilled that.
17 We will begin the question and answer period with 18 Commissioner Baran.
19 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Thanks. Well, thank 20 you for presentations and for all your work.
21 I'd like to start with a few questions on the efforts to 22 assess and remediate non-military radium sites that have potential 23 radium contamination. Bruce mentioned that as of November, 33 of 24 the 39 initial site visits have been performed. Is that where things 25 stand today?
26 MR. TAPPERT: Yes, sir.
27 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. And so the total
36 1 universe of initial surveys that still need to be completed is six.
2 MR. TAPPERT: Right.
3 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. And how many 4 of these six sites involve owners who have been reluctant to allow 5 NRC access to the sites?
6 MR. TAPPERT: So there's a different story for all 7 these folks. And so we got the more proactive people we've already 8 been to and these are the kinds of the tails of the distribution.
9 So I would say of the six, one of them is in an EPA 10 CERCLA site. So we are kind of leveraging that process and that's 11 why we haven't gone out there.
12 ` The other five are folks who have been reluctant to let 13 us come on-site. One of them we have recently negotiated an 14 agreement to do a site visit. So they went from the reluctant to 15 non-reluctant at this point.
16 And the other four, we are just kind of were continuing 17 to kind of work through. And they all have different circumstances 18 and we're looking at them on a case by a case basis.
19 If you harken back to where this whole list came from, 20 it was from a contractor open literature search of where radium had 21 been known or suspected to have been used. So some of these are 22 known uses and some of are suspected uses. And that's going to 23 help inform how we're going to disposition them.
24 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. And so for the 25 six sites that haven't been surveyed yet, initially, are those all in 26 Connecticut and Michigan?
27 MR. TAPPERT: Yes.
37 1 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. And I know 2 you're working with the two states to gain access to the site. It 3 sounds like you're having some progress there on one of them.
4 MR. TAPPERT: Yes.
5 COMMISSIONER BARAN: How is that going more 6 broadly? Are you seeing progress made with the two states on 7 gaining access to the sites?
8 MR. TAPPERT: So we have had some preliminary 9 discussions with Connecticut. They're talking to their legal folks to 10 see what kind of mechanisms they might have. So I think that 11 relationship is very good and we're making progress on that.
12 There is really the only one site in Michigan, so it's a 13 much more limited engagement on that one.
14 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. And for the four 15 properties with radium contamination that exceeded the action levels, 16 it sounds like you're making pretty good progress there in getting them 17 remediated. Can you talk about that a little bit, where things stand?
18 Do you feel like we're making progress on all four of them?
19 MR. TAPPERT: Absolutely. I think it's going quite 20 well from my perspective. In fact, in Bruce's presentation, he 21 mentioned that remediation activities have actually been completed at 22 one of the sites. And we did our final status reviews on that. And 23 the work is not done until the paperwork is done, but preliminarily, it 24 looks like it was cleaned up appropriately.
25 So remediation is occurring. On one other site, a 26 contractor has been negotiated to clean up the site. The other two, 27 we're still working with the owners.
38 1 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Well, it sounds like 2 overall -- oh. Go ahead, Marc.
3 MR. DAPAS: There was just one comment I wanted 4 to make regarding access to the sites. You know there is one site 5 owner that, to date, has not indicated a desire to have us gain access 6 to the site to conduct a survey. And the individual has claimed that 7 the manufacturing process he was involved with, dealing with aircraft 8 engines, did not include instruments.
9 You know we had done a historical review looking at 10 records to determine whether there was suspected radium use at the 11 site and the site owner has indicated that there was no involvement 12 with instrumentation, whereby radium was used. And the state is 13 engaging and feels is that reasonable.
14 And so we have to determine you know what would 15 be the next step. Do we close the record because we have 16 reasonable assurance that radium contamination is not present or are 17 there additional steps we need to take? So we're still evaluating, to 18 some degree, what is the best approach, for example, in that 19 particular circumstance.
20 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Well, it sounds like 21 overall, it's going pretty well. I mean when this started out, it was 22 really just historical records that we had and this research based on 23 that. We didn't really know what we were going to find. It sounds 24 like there haven't been a ton of sites where we have found even 25 above background levels. And in the few sites where it is at action 26 level, things are moving along. There haven't been too many cases 27 where we've had problems accessing sites.
39 1 Going forward, what do you see as the main 2 challenges here? How do you see this playing out in terms of timing?
3 MR. TAPPERT: So I think you put your finger on it.
4 We have to close the loop on these last few.
5 The State of Michigan gave us some other sites that 6 we're going to look at as well, just kind of develop leads from them.
7 But by and large I think we're probably at the peak 8 right now and I would expect a declining level of effort going forward, 9 as we resolve the identified issues.
10 MR. DAPAS: The only comment I was going to 11 make, I appreciate your characterization indicating that it has gone 12 fairly well. I think it's gone as well as we could have hoped in terms 13 of the degree of engagement with local stakeholders, state, 14 cooperative property owners, identifying contamination, developing a 15 cleanup plan, remediation, and then confirmation, as indicated with 16 the Benrus Clock factory in Connecticut.
17 So you know hopefully we will be able to reach 18 closure with these remaining sites but I do think it has gone as well as 19 we could have expected up to this point in time.
20 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Great.
21 Marc, you mentioned the limited evaluation of the 22 workload fees and organizational structure of the materials and waste 23 program that was performed. I'd like to ask a couple questions or I'd 24 like to ask about a couple of the ideas for potential changes coming 25 out of that initial evaluation.
26 One idea was to evaluate the possibility of creating 27 new or revised categorical exclusions. This, presumably, would
40 1 result in a preparation of fewer environmental assessments under 2 NEPA. If the idea is to expand a list of categorical exclusions purely 3 to save the agency money, that strikes me as problematic.
4 Can someone discuss the thinking behind this 5 potential change in a little bit more detail? Or maybe the status of it 6 because I know this was just an initial look at.
7 MR. TAPPERT: Right. So thanks for the question.
8 So I guess I'd start by saying when we do these 9 reviews looking for efficiency and effectiveness improvements, as a 10 first principle, we need to ensure that the mission -- that the agency is 11 effective at fulfilling its mission. So we're going to ensure that we're 12 going to be effective at protecting people and the environment and 13 that would include faithfully fulfilling our responsibilities under the 14 National Environmental Policy Act.
15 That being said, there may be more efficient ways of 16 doing that. Categoric exclusions are a tool in the toolbox. We use 17 them today. And so the action or the recommendation was to look at 18 the work that we're doing today. And if they are certain types of 19 repetitive licensing actions that we're doing environmental 20 assessments for that have always resulted in a finding of no significant 21 impact, we would ask ourselves can we make a generic determination 22 on that type of licensing action. And if so, would that be appropriate 23 for a categoric exclusion.
24 So that's really what we want to ask ourselves. Do 25 these things exist out there? And then we would put on the green 26 eyeshades to determine how much time are we spending on that 27 versus how much time would it take to reopen the rule and do a
41 1 rulemaking and then do a cost benefit to see if it's worth pursuing.
2 So that's the thought process behind that 3 recommendation.
4 COMMISSIONER BARAN: And what do you see as 5 the next steps on that?
6 MR. TAPPERT: So we brief -- the NRC has internal 7 NEPA Steering Committee with the various organizations that have 8 equities in environmental reviews. They've been briefed on the 9 approach. They support it. We're forming a working group. We'd 10 expect to do some analysis in the next six months or so and make a 11 judgment about whether it's worth continuing to pursue or not.
12 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. Well, I 13 appreciate the way you framed it in terms of if there's some category 14 of actions where our practice has shown we really think this is an area 15 where we've done a bunch of EAs and, as an agency, we think we're 16 just not getting much out of it, we don't think these are an area where 17 we need EAs, I think that's one thing.
18 If the goal is well, there is some kind of number we're 19 trying to hit of reducing resources and so let's do more categorical 20 exclusions, I would have some concerns if that's the way we were 21 thinking about it. It sounds like we're not thinking about it that way.
22 MR. TAPPERT: We're not thinking about it that way.
23 So it's not trying to hit a budget number. It's how do we fulfill our 24 responsibility as efficiently and effectively as possible.
25 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. One other idea I 26 wanted to ask about was to reduce the frequency of the State Liaison 27 Officers Conference from once every two years to once every three
42 1 years. I've participated in the last couple of these. I think they're 2 really valuable and we don't really have too many opportunities to 3 bring all the states together like that, the state representatives 4 together at one time. It looks like the potential cost savings of 5 reducing frequency would be pretty minimal.
6 Is this something you're still looking at and is it 7 something that the staff has discussed with the State Liaison Officers?
8 MR. DAPAS: At the last State Liaison Officer 9 meeting, which was this past September -- and I'd agree with your 10 characterization. I think there is a lot of value in conducting those 11 conferences -- we did mention to the State Liaison Officers that were 12 present that we were considering various programmatic changes, 13 provided some context regarding this holistic look at organizational 14 structure, fee classes, merging business lines, the workload, which 15 then can translate to fees.
16 We did talk about potential programmatic changes 17 which would include looking at the periodicity of the State Liaison 18 Officer Conference and going from two to three year periodicity.
19 No decision has been made in that regard. And 20 you're correct, there's not a significant resource savings. The cost for 21 hosting that conference is on the order of $70,000. But as part of this 22 more holistic review we were looking at are there opportunities to 23 potentially reduce costs but no decision has been made. And we 24 would certain engage the views of state leadership and the SLOs to 25 get their perspective on the value that they receive.
26 Since we just had the conference, the next 27 conference, if we maintained a two-year periodicity would be in 2019.
43 1 If we went to three years, it would be 2020. But we have not made 2 that determination at this point in time and, as I said, would engage 3 the stakeholders to get their views and perspectives before finalizing 4 any decision.
5 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay. Well, I 6 appreciate that you're talking with them about that before you make 7 any decisions on a change there.
8 Thank you.
9 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Thank you, Commissioner 10 Baran.
11 I know recognize Commissioner Burns for his 12 questions.
13 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Thank you, Chairman.
14 And again, I express my appreciation, as well, for the overview in the 15 various aspects of this program. It is very interesting and for me is 16 that some of these names that are mentioned are sort of a trip down 17 memory lane. Some problems go away more slowly than others, let's 18 say. And I actually want to come back to that.
19 I appreciate Commissioner Baran's questions on the 20 radium program because this is one of those inserts we got but I think 21 a good program, given some of the adjustments and jurisdiction that 22 the NRC was given, I guess in the Energy Policy Act, and I appreciate 23 the effort to follow-up on it.
24 My one question on that are is when we went into this 25 and started planning to go forward, as with anything, we probably 26 estimated FTE, resources we might need. Recognizing it's still 27 ongoing, how would you assess what -- you know are we spending
44 1 more than we thought we would in terms of time and people, or less, 2 or about the same, or it's hard to tell at this point?
3 MR. TAPPERT: I don't have any hard numbers that I 4 can pull up. I think my general sense, it's probably in the ballpark of 5 what we estimated.
6 I would say probably over the last year and a half, two 7 years, there's probably more slanted to the non-military radium sites 8 because we also have similar arrangements that we have with the 9 Department of Defense to do some arbitrary oversight with them. I 10 think when we budgeted we probably budgeted higher in that area 11 than we have been executing and probably the same or maybe a little 12 bit lower in the non-military radium. But I think the envelope is 13 probably close.
14 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay, thanks.
15 MR. DAPAS: Just one perspective. From my 16 recollection from going through the various budget formulation 17 processes was that you know we are I think close to executing or 18 expending resources on the order of what we had assumed. One 19 area, though, where we did include additional funds as a planning 20 wedge was the contract we have for confirmatory surveys. And as 21 the Commission communicated to us, make sure we continue to 22 monitor that and ensure the contract expenditures are what is 23 necessary, they are not more, simply because we have budgeted and 24 have an allowance to be able to spend more.
25 So I do think we are maintaining a disciplined 26 approach in terms of the resource expenditures. And what we've 27 expended is reasonable relative to what we had anticipated.
45 1 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes, okay. Thanks, 2 Marc. And I think what I hear you and John saying is we kind of got 3 sort of the estimation, we kind of got it right and there haven't been 4 huge surprises. I mean there are always going to be in these sites 5 you know the particular aspects.
6 One of the things that interests me from the pictures 7 in the slides, I kind of understand the radium sites where you have the 8 contamination in the building. And they are probably like that old 9 apartment building, which was a factory at one time and now in the 10 modern era is a condo. So I understand that's probably some 11 residual stuff in there. There might have been a source.
12 The interesting one was like the ones going if you 13 were going into like a thrift shop or you know like an old Army Navy 14 store and you see all this type of stuff, is that a bigger problem than 15 we might think of in that because you are seeing these gauges and it's 16 like a lot of people like to collect old stuff and things like that? I don't 17 mean to raise this huge specter here but those were quite different 18 than what I would say like my clock factory that has probably 19 contaminated floors and things like that.
20 That just struck me as kind of interesting.
21 MR. TAPPERT: Yes, I think the two primary sources 22 that we're seeing are the clocks in Connecticut because of the historic 23 uses there.
24 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes.
25 MR. TAPPERT: And in turns out that Michigan had a 26 very large aircraft gauge thing. So I think we've seen a lot of -- that 27 was probably our biggest -- second biggest contributor to things.
46 1 The gauges themselves, if the gauges are intact, they 2 are really under a general license --
3 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay.
4 MR. TAPPERT: -- and we're not really putting them 5 under that program.
6 COMMISSIONER BURNS: That's a good answer.
7 MR. GIESSNER: If I could answer that?
8 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes, sure.
9 MR. GIESSNER: Sometimes when we've gone out, 10 we've heard that a certain museum may have a radium hand warmer 11 or some radium bath salts that existed in the early 1900s and a lot of it 12 was just phony. In other words, you do the survey and there's really 13 nothing there. It's sort of a scam.
14 Other times, we have found that there may have been 15 radium. Of course we would work with the owners to do that.
16 So we have an approach that takes a look at that if 17 we do receive that information.
18 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes, that's interesting.
19 And so they were phony back 100 years ago when they were sold.
20 MR. GIESSNER: Right.
21 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay. Well, that's why 22 we have regulation in other areas, I suppose.
23 Anyway, I wanted to focus and probably for the rest of 24 my time, sort of the legacy and complex sites. I think I know what it 25 means but it may just help sort of a quick the -- well, there's a 26 differentiation I guess.
27 For a legacy site, we're really talking about something
47 1 that was pre-NRC licensing. Correct? And so a complex site is, 2 again -- I think Bruce you talked about that. Tell me that again.
3 MR. WATSON: Many of the legacy sites were either 4 sites that were released from regulatory control by the Atomic Energy 5 Commission --
6 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Right.
7 MR. WATSON: -- before the NRC was an entity.
8 And then the current complex material sites are pretty much ones that 9 are under license. So those are under our current program for 10 decommissioning.
11 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay. So what makes 12 them complex?
13 MR. WATSON: In many cases, it's just a very large 14 facility with long-lived radionuclides, uranium, thorium, with extensive 15 contamination or areas that have a lot of environmental issues, which 16 then contribute to possibly groundwater contamination.
17 And so when the groundwater -- once we have 18 groundwater contamination, then it's obviously complex site that we'd 19 like the Headquarters will project manage.
20 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay. And then --
21 Marc?
22 MR. DAPAS: Just another example might be 23 extensive stakeholder engagement, working with partners, 24 Environmental Protection Agency involvement or, in the case of the 25 Great Kills Park with the National Park Service. So there are other 26 regulatory agencies that are involved that have a role. And the 27 degree of coordination, it makes it more complex that's that you have
48 1 program office, NMSS project management oversight versus just the 2 Regions conducting oversight of cleanup efforts.
3 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay. I think one of my 4 questions on this in terms of -- and again, it's easier for me to get a 5 handle on some of the legacy sites sometimes because of problems 6 that they've had there, a lot of it is prior to basically the funding 7 requirements and things like that. So those I understand. And you 8 know the difficulties of dealing with like Hematite and Fansteel, Atlas 9 Moab in the day, and a number of others.
10 What I'm trying to understand is is there something, 11 for those that we consider complex now because they have some 12 conditions as you described, is there something about the -- have we 13 reflected on to the extent to which regulatory control is satisfactory 14 with respect to either what I would say deterring a site from becoming 15 a more complex site? I mean how -- I guess my questions is: Is 16 there some reflection that we've thought of in terms of whether or not 17 the regulatory control on those sites or on the use of the materials is 18 adequate?
19 MR. WATSON: I think I can give you a little different 20 perspective. I mentioned in my presentation about securing the 21 financial things for Westinghouse. But in that rule we put that was 22 published in 2012, we called it the Decommissioning Planning Rule, 23 and it was specifically designed to prevent legacy sites. So it revised 24 the requirements for subsurface monitoring in close near the potential 25 sources of contamination, so there's early detection which then 26 prevent financial issues when you don't have the money to 27 decommission the site.
49 1 And so I think we've made some major changes that 2 have resulted in positive things with the licensees in requiring them to 3 do additional monitoring to make sure that they don't create a big 4 problem for themselves and us.
5 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay. Okay, good.
6 That's good.
7 Perhaps the last question I'll ask in this area, I think 8 Jack spoke to the issue of looking at cross-training. And one of those 9 -- I thought that was very interesting. And one of the issues is this 10 transition from -- for reactor sites from it being a quote, a reactor site 11 and it turns from the operating status to a point that you are into the 12 decommissioning.
13 Has the staff been doing any thinking about the 14 nature of that transition about when it goes to NMSS versus NRR and 15 those types of things? I'd be interested in what kind of dialogue or 16 thinking because I think your comments on that, the ability to 17 cross-train people, you hear this value. And you know when you hear 18 the arguments over SAFSTOR versus DECON, it's having people who 19 know what the plant was like, where some of the issues are, how to 20 get around it, even our folks in that way.
21 But I'd appreciate hearing more on that.
22 MR. WATSON: Internally, NRR has a procedure on 23 transitioning reactors. Along with our procedure, we have an NMSS 24 and basically it says that when the fuel is all transferred to the spent 25 fuel pool and the defuel tech specs are issued, then it gets transferred 26 to NMSS.
27 So the site has been transferred to what we consider
50 1 just a material site with fuel storage, at that point.
2 So that takes generally some time by the utility to get 3 that work accomplished. In the meantime, they'll be doing 4 preparation for making the site I'll say safer for decommissioning; 5 draining systems, making it unlikely that there would be any leaks that 6 would go to the environment.
7 On the inspection side, our inspection manual for 8 power reactors talks about the fact that we prefer to keep the resident 9 inspector there for a while. They are already familiar with the plant.
10 They are already in tune with the licensing and the safety and 11 evaluation process that the site uses. And so that adds value to the 12 transitioning process.
13 And along with that, we also will have a handoff from 14 reactor projects to DNMS for the inspection program, when we feel it's 15 appropriate. In the meantime, our decommissioning inspectors will 16 supplement the residents in any decommissioning issues that may 17 come up.
18 So this is all pretty much proceduralized in our 19 program.
20 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes, okay.
21 Yes, Marc?
22 MR. DAPAS: While it is proceduralized, we continue 23 to evaluate lessons learned as we gain more experience.
24 And regarding a resident inspector presence, my 25 recollection is we have, by practice, typically maintained the senior 26 resident on-site for up to a year after the site announced their plan to 27 permanently closed, given that corporate knowledge and to ensure
51 1 effect knowledge transfer.
2 And then we continue to engage with the Regions and 3 leverage the experience they have in looking at are there learnings in 4 terms of how we provided oversight that we then can translate to 5 modifying the procedures and guidance that we have. But it's that 6 continuous improvement aspect that I wanted to highlight --
7 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay.
8 MR. DAPAS: -- as we gain more experience with 9 oversight of these plants undergoing decommissioning.
10 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay, thanks.
11 Thanks, Chairman.
12 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Thank you, Commissioner 13 Burns.
14 This is a good meeting to be doing the final round of 15 questions because I benefit. My colleagues have covered a number 16 of the lines of inquiry that I might have asked about as well. So I 17 appreciate their questions.
18 Maybe I'll just begin with a couple of comments. I 19 think, Bruce, you had a slide about stakeholder engagement. And 20 that caused me to think about, given this diversity of issues that are on 21 the table here, I think that the staff that are working on these programs 22 do engage in a lot of stakeholder engagement and, I think, in areas 23 where there are a lot of strongly-held views.
24 So I thank all of them for that public outreach, which I 25 know likely requires us to patiently build understanding of our role of 26 what we do to maybe hear, even if they fall somewhat outside our 27 jurisdiction, a lot of people's broader concerns about the direction of
52 1 waste policy, and nuclear waste, and how it's handled in the United 2 States. So I'm grateful for all of our folks on the front lines who are 3 doing that work which is so necessary to, again, continue to build that 4 understanding.
5 And whether or not concerns are rooted in 6 fundamental misunderstandings, they are very sincerely arrived at 7 when it's your community and you're just concerned about the future 8 and what's going to happen there. So I appreciate the hard work that 9 all of our NRC experts go out and do week to week and month to 10 month on that topic. And I appreciate that Bruce included that 11 specifically in his presentation.
12 Maybe I'll pull back a little bit on some broader 13 organizational topics. Marc, you have taken over the leadership of 14 NMSS at a time when it's a few years removed from the fundamental 15 merger with FSME, which, for the life of me, has been gone for a while 16 and I don't remember the entire acronym but it was a major office here 17 at NRC in very recent history. So I should be worried that I can't 18 remember. It was Federal and State something. That's the F and 19 the S. The M-E, I'm not sure about. But maybe M was materials. I 20 don't know. We can look it up.
21 But we're still, when I listened to all the presentations 22 today, I'm thinking about how dynamic things continue to be in terms 23 of the regulated entities, the activities they are undertaking.
24 So as you've done some lessons learned, you've 25 looked at different aspects of NMSS, different licensing processes. Is 26 there anything that has been suggested in these reviews in terms of 27 within NMSS restructuring or shifting around of divisions and titles that
53 1 maybe is not needed today but is likely to be needed as more reactors 2 enter decommissioning and parts of your work are either emphasized 3 or deemphasized? Is that something that you have some preliminary 4 outcomes or you will be undertaking that going forward?
5 MR. DAPAS: Well, I look forward to providing the 6 product that you have requested in February, which represents that 7 holistic review, looking at organizational structure, business lines, fee 8 classes.
9 One of the things in conducting the review we have 10 affirmed is the current way we are organized and conducting business 11 has been effective. You know in looking at is there a compelling 12 reason to change the organizational structure, we are looking at things 13 like should we go from four divisions with a division associated with 14 each business line to perhaps three divisions.
15 We have evaluated within the division of like fuel cycle 16 safety safeguards, environmental review, given the span of control in 17 the branches, does it make sense to collapse a branch.
18 Region II has engaged with us in looking at the 19 Division of Fuel Facility and Inspection. Are there opportunities there 20 to collapse a branch?
21 You know that can result in some incremental 22 reduction in FTE in terms of organizational structure but we have not 23 identified that, to date, a significant change that would be 24 transformational in the context of 10 to 15 FTE as a result of 25 reorganizing there.
26 Like when you reorganized combined divisions, you 27 might have one less deputy division director, you know at that level of
54 1 management, but you still have the same work and you still have the 2 necessity for a given number of branches. And looking at the span of 3 control, and should that be six to ten, and do you have some branches 4 that are larger? And if we have a smaller branch, you know as I said, 5 you can move staff and consolidate.
6 But we are evaluating the pros and cons. There may 7 be some organizational restructuring that we would offer that we 8 propose but there is a very disciplined process we go through. So in 9 the deliverable that we'll provide in February, we'll talk about some of 10 the considerations with organizational structure but in terms of going 11 forward, we'd want to walk -- go through that process in engagement 12 with the union and our stakeholders, et cetera, which, by design is 13 very structured.
14 So I would offer that there are opportunities here in 15 looking at our organization but we haven't identified a significant, if you 16 will, restructuring. We do think the combining FSME and NMSS was 17 a good decision and has provided for efficiencies. I'll offer from my 18 own experience, it is particularly challenging at the office director level 19 but at lower levels in the organization it has certainly been effective.
20 So the bottom line is that we are trying to be very 21 open-minded and look at is there a true business case in terms of 22 efficiency gains that we would achieve by restructuring.
23 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Well it sounds like -- I take 24 from your answer although the admin flow of work is dynamic, the 25 trigger for broader change has to be something that is developed with 26 a strong basis. And it sounds like you keep a fairly constant eye on it, 27 you and your leadership team, and the staff, and NMSS. So I
55 1 appreciate that.
2 But there is an area that you talked about or touched 3 upon that will experience some very significant change and that will be 4 the uranium recovery area, should the Commission ultimately, in a 5 timely way, approve the Wyoming Agreement State agreement. The 6 Commission has already begun to be queried by the officials that 7 represent states that would remain in that category and there won't be 8 a whole lot of entities remaining in that category. But given our legal 9 requirement to do fee recovery for our work, which of course we must 10 comply with, it's not a secret that it's really mathematics is what it 11 comes down to. And you would have very few licensees having to 12 carry the infrastructure for an entire area. So this isn't anything that 13 we aren't mindful of it or we're not intentional about what we're doing 14 but we'll have to reconcile a number of different constraints on us.
15 I know that you haven't finished your work, that you 16 are engaged with the Chief Financial Officer. Is there anything that 17 you can say today about how we would navigate to that very 18 complicated step change from having Wyoming take so many of the 19 entities in a specific fee category?
20 MR. DAPAS: I would offer this, Chairman, that the 21 first step is to identify what is that necessary infrastructure you need to 22 maintain for oversight of three operating uranium recovery facilities, 23 going to 11 to three with Wyoming becoming an Agreement State and 24 assuming responsibility for oversight of eight of the 11, that would 25 leave three.
26 What is the infrastructure you need to ensure that you 27 are conducting the activities you have responsibility for in a
56 1 risk-informed manner?
2 Then we are looking at other things and considering, 3 quite frankly, options of should there be activities that are not on the 4 fee base? Is there the opportunity, potentially, for a surcharge? But 5 looking at a number of things under the overarching goal of 6 recognizing that three operating uranium recovery facilities cannot 7 continue -- cannot fund, if you will, the current infrastructure we have 8 in place or the current fee structure. So we've been working very 9 closely with the Office of the Chief Financial Officer and I've had 10 discussions with Maureen about that.
11 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: And I'm not asking you to 12 talk about anything that we haven't finished our analysis of. The 13 Commission has been asked, though, to maintain just communication 14 with the licensees who will remain and with the officials from those 15 states. And I think that that's a transparency measure that we can at 16 least be indicating to them that we're working on it, the status of 17 reaching any conclusions on that.
18 And I think to the extent -- if we need some sort of 19 congressional relief, I think that the earlier that we can identify that 20 and communicate it, whether or not it would be granted I don't know, 21 but the implications of what we have the discretion to do and what falls 22 outside of our discretion if others would like to at least know the 23 impact and then decide whether or not they support trying to make 24 some adjustment for us. The sooner we can do that, the better.
25 And again, I've looked a little bit at the math, at least 26 at my level, and it's very, very difficult for us to come up with solutions 27 that are equitable and fair. And again, we have the overriding
57 1 principle of invoicing to those who cause a cost for the agency. We 2 need to allocate that cost to the people who cause that cost.
3 So again, we've got a lot of principles that we've got 4 to balance here and I think we might, at the end of the day, not have 5 unlimited discretion to make adjustments. So I think we need to finish 6 our look at that and if we have preliminary problems, communication 7 those forward to the Commission --
8 MR. DAPAS: Yes, ma'am.
9 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: -- and then we can decide a 10 path forward from there.
11 So I appreciate you're looking at that.
12 I do want to note that officials from Wyoming have 13 been very complimentary of the productive engagement with NRC 14 staff. So I thank all of you for that.
15 I think that my last question might be you know a 16 number of you touched on guidance and updating guidance, and 17 guidance documents. Right now the Congress is inquiry about how 18 many guidance documents do you have. And so it reminds of how 19 significant of an instrument guidance is for a regulatory agency.
20 Again, it does not set or modify policy, as I think John Tappert said, 21 and it doesn't set requirements but it is of great utility, I think, to 22 regulated entities to have guidance.
23 Does the agency still operate under a directive that 24 guidance has to be looked at on a regular frequency for updating? At 25 one time I think we had a management directive that said every five 26 years you need to look at your guidance. Is that something maybe 27 you all can just let me know that afterwards?
58 1 But the other thing about changing guidance is that 2 we may view it as beneficial to incorporate lessons learned of the last 3 prior number of years of our regulatory oversight. It can, though, look 4 like there is a lack of stability in the regulatory program.
5 So I think we're trying, again, to balance those two 6 things we've been implementing for X number of years. We have 7 some lessons learned that should be reflected in guidance. But is 8 both resource intensive for us and then for any stakeholders who want 9 to comment on the draft updates to guidance they have to engage in 10 that. I don't know.
11 My question is: Have we looked systematically at the 12 frequency of either looking at guidance for updating or updating it and 13 have we weighed kind of the overall investment in that versus, yes, 14 there's a few potential beneficial lessons learned but it's maybe not 15 efficient to update a whole guidance document?
16 Victor, do you have just a general comment on that?
17 MR. MCCREE: So, yes. And my comment is we 18 will take that for a follow-up response because I can't quote you or cite 19 you the reference that does mandate that requirement and at what 20 frequency.
21 My recollection, however, is similar to yours. That is, 22 we do require, at some frequency, a review of our existing guidance.
23 And no, we have not initiated I guess what you 24 characterize as a systemic look at the health of doing so and how we 25 go about it. And that's something that I will take away as well.
26 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay. And I do have just 27 one quick question.
59 1 I think it was John Tappert who mentioned at some 2 point we contemplate hosting a workshop regarding Texas' request 3 with respect to GTCC waste. Your next slide, you talked about an 4 overview of the reg basis and other things that the staff views need to 5 be done in advance of that.
6 But if all of that goes as planned, what would be the 7 notional time frame, like the year of that workshop, or the quarter in 8 the year? Do you have a notional time frame or is that something 9 that you haven't developed yet?
10 MR. TAPPERT: Yes, so we're working to a timetable 11 to complete that regulatory basis within six months after we issue the 12 supplemental proposed rule. So I think that would put that workshop 13 sometime in the summer time frame is what we're notionally looking at 14 right now.
15 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay.
16 MR. TAPPERT: Summer of this year.
17 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: This year. Okay, I assume 18 if you don't specify, you mean this year.
19 MR. TAPPERT: I guess in the waste arena, we have 20 to specify the year.
21 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay. Well, again, thank 22 you all for your presentations.
23 I went over a little bit and there were a lot of topics.
24 Do either of my colleagues have a last question for this panel?
25 COMMISSIONER BURNS: No.
26 COMMISSIONER BARAN: No.
27 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay. Well, with that then,
60 1 this panel is excused.
2 And we will take a brief break. Let's try to make that 3 five -- well, we tend to run over. So let's have some truth in setting 4 times for reconvening. We'll do 10:35 and we'll really try to hold to 5 that. Thank you.
6 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the 7 record at 10:28 a.m. and resumed at 10:37 a.m.)
8 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay, well we will reconvene 9 now for our second of two panels and this panel will address the 10 Spent Fuel Storage and Transportation business line. We have some 11 of the same presenters but we've been joined by some additional NRC 12 presenters. So, welcome.
13 And I will, once again, turn this over to Victor McCree 14 to lead off the staff's presentation. Thank you.
15 MR. MCCREE: Good morning again, Chairman, 16 Commissioners.
17 We will now discuss activities involving the Spent Fuel 18 Storage and Transportation or SFST business line.
19 As we indicated the last time we briefed the 20 Commission, the workload for this business line is indeed growing, 21 given the increasing number of reactors transitioning to 22 decommissioning before the expiration of their current operating 23 licenses, resulting in additional licensing activities.
24 There is also renewed interest in licensing 25 consolidated interim storage facility or CISF and for the permanent 26 disposal of spent fuel and high-level waste.
27 We finished the initial acceptance review and
61 1 docketed an application for a CISF license from Waste Control 2 Specialists last January but the review was suspended in May at the 3 applicant's request, also, an application for CISF was submitted by 4 Holtec International last year in March, which is currently in the 5 acceptance review process. Both of these applications have 6 generated high interest from stakeholders.
7 This work is in addition to the steady baseline of work 8 in this business line, which is expected to continue into the future.
9 There also continues to be an increasing level of internal and external 10 stakeholder interest regarding business line activities. In an 11 environment of decreasing resources, we continue to focus on 12 maintaining our mission effectiveness and enhancing our agility.
13 Next slide, please.
14 With me at the table, again, is Marc Dapas, who will 15 provide an overview of the business line to include licensing and 16 oversight successes, challenges, and opportunities. He will be 17 followed by Michael Layton to my right, Director of the Division of 18 Spent Fuel Management and NMSS, who will discuss the current 19 Spent Fuel Storage and Transportation environment, as well as some 20 of the initiatives since the last time we briefed you.
21 Yoira Diaz, to Mike's right, Branch Chief of the 22 Containment, Structural, and Thermal Branch within NMSS, will then 23 discuss current technical challenges in licensing activities for spent 24 fuel management.
25 And lastly, Joe Nick, Joseph Nick, Deputy Director of 26 the Division of Nuclear Material Safety in Region I, will discuss the 27 accomplishments and challenges with respect to the independent
62 1 spent fuel storage installation or ISFSI inspection program.
2 So with that brief introduction, I'll turn the presentation 3 over to Marc.
4 Next slide, please.
5 MR. DAPAS: Thank you, Vic. Good morning, 6 again, Chairman Svinicki and Commissioners.
7 As Vic indicated, we'll now turn our attention to the 8 SFST business line. Similar to how we approached the staff's 9 presentation with respect to Decommissioning and Low-Level Waste 10 business line, I plan to provide a brief overview of the breadth and 11 scope of the SFST business line. And my colleagues will discuss 12 selected topics in more detail during their individual presentations.
13 Next slide, please.
14 The SFST business line has a multi and varied 15 workload. It includes licensing cask designs for the safe storage and 16 transportation of spent nuclear fuel, certification of radioactive material 17 transportation packages, and preparation for future potential licensing 18 actions involving alternative disposal and reprocessing strategies.
19 I would like to point out that there are more than three 20 million shipments of non-spent fuel radioactive material each year.
21 Now that material is primarily used in medical and industrial 22 applications. Approximately a third of our licensing resources are 23 dedicated to certifying the transportation packages used for these 24 shipments.
25 We continue to effectively accommodate the current 26 workload as well as prepare for future anticipated workload increases.
27
63 1 As Vic noted, we received an application from Holtec 2 International for a CISF license. Although the acceptance review for 3 that application is progressing, uncertainty remains whether we will be 4 asked to resume the review of the Waste Controls Specialist CISF 5 license application.
6 Although the work associated with alternative 7 strategies for both spent fuel disposal and reprocessing are included 8 in the SFST business line activities, that work continues to diminish 9 and, as such, resources have been reassigned to support other 10 emergent work. However, if there is renewed interest in a permanent 11 repository for high-level waste in connection with Yucca Mountain, this 12 would present a unique agility challenge for us consisting of effectively 13 supporting this emerging work and the existing case work without a 14 permanent increase in staff resources.
15 If Yucca Mountain activities unfold, there may be a 16 future need to reassign staff to support high-level waste activities and 17 develop coping strategies for managing the current workload without 18 permanently expanding the NRC staffing.
19 We are making progress in an effort to improve 20 licensing of dray cask storage by applying risk insights to the 21 regulatory review process. The staff utilized the regulatory issue 22 resolution protocol to collaborate with the industry and the Nuclear 23 Energy Institute to develop and implement a graded approach 24 methodology for a pilot licensing review.
25 The pilot review will support development of technical 26 review guidance to determine the appropriate level of detail required 27 for the certificate of compliance and technical specifications. We
64 1 expect the effort will make the storage licensing process more efficient 2 by reducing the number of required future license amendments.
3 The SFST business line also includes the 4 independent spent fuel storage installation or ISFISI inspection 5 program, which involves the oversight of ISFISI operations, including 6 loading of spent fuel, transfer of the storage systems to the storage 7 pad, and inspections of the systems while in storage.
8 Let me now turn it over to Michael Layton, who will 9 provide an overview of the current spent fuel environment.
10 Next slide, please.
11 MR. LAYTON: Thank you, Marc.
12 Good morning, Chairman Svinicki and 13 Commissioners.
14 The photos on this slide represent the activities that 15 we regulate in the SFST business line. On the left is a picture of an 16 ISFISI and associated storage cask. The photo in the middle depicts 17 a spent fuel transportation package. And on the right, is a well 18 logging source being transported.
19 Today, I'll provide you with a brief overview of the 20 spent fuel environment and discuss progress on relevant initiatives 21 since our last Commission briefing on this business line.
22 Next slide, please.
23 In this slide, the forecasted licensing actions and 24 renewals for Spent Fuel Storage and Transportation are expected to 25 increase over the next three years. The chart that is depicted here 26 shows the forecasted renewals for ISFISIs and certificates of 27 compliance or CoCs and typifies increasing workload in this business
65 1 line.
2 As you can see, there is a peak of activity in the 2020 3 time frame, which represents the anticipation of several licensees and 4 CoC holders requesting renewals, as the term of their licenses or 5 CoCs come to an end.
6 There are other amendments in transportation cask 7 reviews driven by licensee cost considerations that are also increasing 8 but the timing of this increased licensing action workload is not as 9 easily forecast as the renewal workload. To proactively address this 10 challenge, you may recall from our last Commission briefing, we have 11 initiated various actions to better position ourselves to address the 12 anticipated workload.
13 For example, we completed a new draft guidance 14 document that describes generically-applicable Aging Management 15 Programs that an applicant may use to maintain the approved design 16 basis for its storage systems during the period of extended storage.
17 This document will also assist vendors and licensees as they develop 18 their Aging Management Programs.
19 The Managing Aging Processes in Storage or MAPS 20 report was issued earlier this fiscal year for public comment and use.
21 This document is similar to the Generic Aging Lessons Learned 22 Report developed by the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation and 23 should streamline the vendors' and licensees' efforts for developing an 24 Aging Management Program. It will also aid NRC staff in identifying 25 acceptable aging management approaches in submitted documents.
26 And as Marc mentioned, although the WCS CISF 27 review was suspended, we used lessons learned from the WCS
66 1 application review to perform a pre-submittal audit of the Holtec CISF 2 application, which is allowing us to more effectively work through the 3 acceptance review process.
4 In July, Holtec notified the NRC that it would provide 5 responses to Requests for Supplemental Information or RSIs in two 6 parts. And as of December, Holtec has submitted responses to all 7 environmental and safety-related RSIs. We are proceeding with the 8 acceptance review and anticipate a decision on the docketing of the 9 application early this calendar year.
10 Additionally, I would like to discuss in more detail in 11 the next slide, we published a NUREG and are working on developing 12 a staff guidance document that will allow us to more efficiently review 13 applications related to high burnup fuel.
14 Next slide, please.
15 In addition to the anticipated workload increases, we 16 are not certain that WCS will ask us to resume our review of the CISF 17 application. Furthermore, we do not know if the Department of 18 Energy will submit a topical safety analysis report for a CISF.
19 To address this situation, we have initiated several 20 activities to increase our agility to be able to accommodate potential 21 emergent work, while continuing to be effective in our spent fuel 22 licensing and oversight mission. For example, we enhanced our 23 internal workload tracking system utilizing the web-based licensing 24 platform. This was done to more effectively focus on schedules and 25 proactively identify potential challenges to critical path items.
26 As part of the Project Aim initiative to increase 27 efficiency, we are nearing the completion of consolidating four
67 1 separate standard review plans and several interim staff guidance 2 guides into two documents, a combined transportation standard 3 review plan and a combined storage standard review plan.
4 Although this effort does not result in any new 5 guidance, the consolidation of a number of separate documents into 6 two guidance documents provides enhanced clarity and efficiency to 7 both the NRC technical reviewers, and to the vendors and licensees 8 who use those documents to prepare applications and amendment 9 requests. The intended outcome is to enhance both effectiveness 10 and efficiency in our licensing reviews.
11 At this time, the draft consolidated storage standard 12 review plan, specifically NUREG-2215 has been published for public 13 comment.
14 And lastly, with the help of the Office of Nuclear 15 Regulatory Research, we have also undertaken an effort to conduct 16 experiments and evaluate the potential impact that high burnup fuel 17 may have on cladding integrity and potential cladding degradation.
18 The result of this effort indicate that high burnup fuel does not impact 19 the cladding integrity as much as once believed. These test results 20 were published in NUREG/CR-7198 Revision 1 to help clarify 21 uncertainties and the conservatisms in regards to high burnup fuel 22 performance.
23 In addition, a staff guidance document for reviewing 24 high burnup fuel-related licensing actions is also being developed.
25 I'll now turn our presentation over to Yoira Diaz, who 26 will discuss current technical challenges in licensing activities for spent 27 fuel management.
68 1 Next slide, please.
2 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: Thanks, Mike.
3 Good morning, Chairman Svinicki and 4 Commissioners. I plan to discuss the current technical challenges for 5 spent fuel management due to the increased demands in licensing 6 actions for spent fuel storage and transportation dry casks and ISFISI 7 renewals.
8 Next slide, please.
9 Our current regulatory framework is robust, allowing 10 us to conduct effective technical reviews to support the licensing 11 process for Spent Fuel Storage and Transportation, while we continue 12 to maintain an appropriate focus on safety.
13 Comprehensive technical review processes have 14 been developed with well-established regulatory requirements and 15 acceptance criteria. These processes provide for appropriate 16 treatment of crosscutting issues, as defined in guidance documents 17 ensuring consistency in technical reviews.
18 In addition, to ensure rigorous, consistent and 19 predictable processes, we have established effective teams in which 20 corporate knowledge of technical issues is maintained by the NMSS 21 staff, with support from our partners in Research, the Regions, the 22 Office of the General Counsel, and contractors.
23 Our conclusions are well-documented in safety 24 evaluation reports, which underlie the regulatory and safety basis that 25 support our conclusions for issuing licenses and certificates of 26 compliance.
27 Our assured and well-established a spent fuel
69 1 management licensing process enable us to complete 63 licensing 2 actions last year and manage about 52 ongoing reviews.
3 Next slide, please.
4 Let me spend a couple of minutes discussing some of 5 the technical challenges we have been facing. The recent demands 6 for storage and transportation license reviews have increased. And 7 as Mike mentioned, this is mostly driven by cost considerations from 8 the licensees and vendors, which have led us to -- which have led to 9 an increased number of design changes to accommodate higher 10 thermal loads and more fuel types.
11 These two diagrams depict typical storage and 12 transportation casks. Some of the design change requests we have 13 recently received involve structural changes to the baskets to allow for 14 larger spent fuel arrangements.
15 Other license amendment requests involve changes 16 to technical specifications for storage casks. For example, licensees 17 have submitted change requests to modify the surveillance frequency 18 for block vents, allowing for different operating conditions with storage 19 casks.
20 Next slide, please.
21 The increased number of design changes have 22 brought additional challenges into the licensing review process. One 23 challenge is the need to reevaluate the technical basis for the 24 allowable peak cladding temperature limit referenced in Interim Staff 25 Guidance ISG-11, titled Cladding Considerations for Transportation 26 and Storage of Spent Fuel.
27 The issue involving increase heat load demands is
70 1 driving our focus to better understand cladding performance during 2 operations. Consequently, the treatment of analysis uncertainties 3 and the level of conservatism in thermal models is becoming 4 increasingly important as the design margin is reduced.
5 Next slide, please.
6 Although we continue to have confidence in the rigor 7 of our safety review process, we are continuing to evaluate that 8 process to enhance our agility in resolving emerging technical issues.
9 For example, we issued NUREG-2152, which provides best practice 10 guidelines pertaining to computational fluid dynamics for dry cask 11 applications. This guidance documents provides practical advice on 12 the best methods used in computational fluid dynamics to assist in 13 achieving high-quality results.
14 Although NUREG-2152 applies to computational fluid 15 dynamics, it can also be used for other computational methods.
16 Another concept we are embracing is the graded 17 approach to confirmatory analysis. This approach will make the 18 technical review process more efficient, while maintaining its 19 effectiveness on ensuring that the regulatory requirements are met.
20 In addition, it provides for consistency relative to the approach we are 21 exercising for other technical review areas.
22 Lastly, I want to briefly mention that we are also 23 participating in research efforts, specifically with the Electric Power 24 Research Institute and the Department of Energy to develop a best 25 estimate approach for addressing uncertainties in thermal models to 26 facilitate our licensing reviews.
27 As I mentioned before, understanding the treatment of
71 1 uncertainties, specifically in the thermal area, will help us to better 2 understand the thermal performance of casks. This should also lead 3 us to more robust thermal analyses with a more predictable outcome.
4 Next slide, please.
5 Other efforts we have initiated to address emergent 6 work include, as Mike already mentioned, consolidating the standard 7 review plans for storage and transportation to make our licensing 8 reviews more consistent and efficient.
9 Another area we are focusing on is effective 10 communications with licensees and applicants to expedite the 11 exchange of information and provide clarity of expectations. For 12 example, we enhanced our interactions with the stakeholders to reach 13 a resolution of an issue involving the proposed change to the Nuclear 14 Energy Institute Guidance Document, NEI-1204, titled Guidelines for 15 10 CFR 72.48 implementation.
16 These efforts should result in reaching a common 17 understanding with the industry on how the change process allowed 18 by 10 CFR 72.48 should be implemented and maintaining technical 19 consistency between transportation and storage reviews.
20 Another area of improvement involves reinforcing 21 expectations and providing for effective communications between 22 NRC staff and management. For example, we have exercised 23 greater management oversight to support streamlining the review 24 process in a risk-informed manner, while maintaining an appropriate 25 safety focus on the resolution of technical issues.
26 Lastly, we have continued to provide the necessary 27 technical support and maintain effective communications with our
72 1 regional staff through the technical assistance request process. This 2 process also provides for synergy between licensing and oversight 3 staff.
4 At this time, I would like to turn over the presentation 5 to Joe Nick, who will discuss accomplishments and challenges within 6 the inspection program for independent spent fuel storage 7 installations.
8 Next slide.
9 MR. NICK: Thank you, Yoira, and good morning, 10 Chairman and Commissioners.
11 As Yoira indicated, the topic of my presentation today 12 is the independent spent fuel storage installation inspection program 13 accomplishments and challenges.
14 Next slide, please.
15 Our independent spent fuel storage installation or 16 ISFISI inspection program plays a key role in ensuring the safe and 17 secure storage of spent fuel and high-level waste. As Jack Giessner 18 mentioned earlier in the panel, safety culture remains an important 19 focus and our inspectors continue to discuss safety culture with senior 20 managers during our visits with all our spent fuel licensees.
21 This morning, I'm going to talk to you about some 22 recent inspection activities involving spent fuel storage and the future 23 outlook of the inspection program.
24 Just to mention, this slide above shows some of the 25 different types of dry cask storage systems that are used by our 26 licensees in the country, specifically, the horizontal and vertical 27 installations.
73 1 Next slide, please.
2 Our oversight of ISFISIs includes observations of 3 construction activities at the ISFISIs. And you can see from these 4 pictures, which are images from ISFISI construction at the Crystal 5 River Plant in Florida and the Nine Mile Point site in New York.
6 As an example of our activities, I wanted to highlight 7 some of the recent activities identified by our Region III inspectors at 8 the Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station. The inspectors identified a 9 finding involving the failure of the licensee's design control measures 10 to provide for verification of design adequacy of their Auxiliary Building 11 spent fuel cask crane and the crane support structure elements.
12 They also identified, at the same time, a violation for the failure to 13 maintain sufficient records for ultrasonic testing, which were relied 14 upon to demonstrate that the spent fuel selected for loading was 15 correctly classified as intact.
16 The licensee subsequently initiated corrective actions 17 to restore compliance for these violations and they were classified as 18 minor and low safety significance violations.
19 Next slide, please.
20 Other aspects of our ISFISI oversight program involve 21 resolution of technical issues at the storage sites. For example, 22 regional inspectors performed infield verification to support the license 23 in process.
24 Another aspect of our oversight involves interactions 25 with interested members of the public. For example, the Region I 26 staff has recently supported exchanges with the public on spent fuel 27 storage, which is demonstrated through our involvement in the
74 1 recently held Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory 2 Panel meeting, the Massachusetts Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens 3 Advisory Panel meeting, and the Indian Point Local Unity Task Force 4 meeting, all held in Region I.
5 Next slide, please.
6 This slide just shows the various stages of 7 decommissioning before, during, and after cleanup. And of course, 8 spent fuel is a major part of those phases of cleanup.
9 The total number of reactors entering or planning 10 decommissioning or initiating or expanding the dry storage of spent 11 fuel are increasing and are impacting our future workload.
12 Also a recent trend has been noted where licensees 13 shutdown reactors in a prolonged, nearly continuous loading 14 campaigns to empty their spent fuel pools. And this allows them to 15 transition to a different security structure. They try to do it in an 16 intense short schedule.
17 To ensure adequate oversight of the licensee 18 activities, the extended loading campaigns result in multiple inspection 19 activities on a compressed schedule. And as an example, Crystal 20 River just finished this week loading their last cask in a loading 21 campaign. So all their fuel is now on their storage pad.
22 Next slide, please.
23 This just shows the map of the current ISFISI 24 locations across the country and it includes the ISFISIs operating 25 under general license or specific license. It also includes the three 26 proposed ISFISI sites that we have talked about previously for CISF.
27 And I would like to note that the use of the new
75 1 vendors and new designs for future loading campaigns requires 2 additional training for our staff performing preoperational and loading 3 inspections.
4 Next slide, please.
5 As licensee applications refer to new technologies 6 and consolidated interim storage facilities are approved, leading to 7 new facility construction and operation, additional inspections are 8 required for the construction and the preoperational activities, as well 9 as the oversight of licensee canister independent inspections before 10 they are transported.
11 Our oversight includes receipt inspections for the 12 storage systems, as well as assessment of the licensee actions to 13 address any identified noncompliances with the canisters or the casks.
14 The images of this slide are just associated with 15 Waste Specialists and the Holtec International CISF sites that we had 16 previously discussed.
17 Next slide, please.
18 So let me briefly mention some of the challenges we 19 are facing from a regional perspective. The first challenge involves 20 accommodating changes in the workload associated with schedule 21 changes for the ISFISI activities. For example, our experience has 22 been that loading campaigns may accelerate at different paces and, 23 as such, we need to be in a position to shift our resources to 24 accommodate these changes.
25 One of the approaches we have utilized to meet this 26 challenge involves sharing inspection resources among the regions.
27 In Region I, we also put an emphasis on ensuring that we have staff
76 1 qualified to perform these inspections. We proactively pursue 2 knowledge transfer opportunities by having newer inspectors team up 3 with experienced inspectors as a good way to most efficiently train our 4 staff.
5 Having a higher number of qualified staff helps us 6 ensure that maximum flexibility in handling these schedule changes 7 and also prepares us for any staff attrition in the future.
8 This concludes my remarks and I will turn the 9 presentation back to Vic.
10 MR. MCCREE: Thanks, Joe.
11 Chairman, Commissioners, as you've heard Spent 12 Fuel Storage and Transportation business line is operating in an 13 interesting and dynamic environment. We are experiencing growth in 14 our work due to reactor decommissioning with expedited transfer of 15 fuel to dry storage and the coming renewal applications for many dry 16 storage systems.
17 Additionally, we have engaged in the review of 18 consolidated interim storage facility applications and planning for 19 potential work on permanent spent fuel disposal.
20 In short, this provides us an opportunity to 21 demonstrate our agility and use strategic workforce planning to fulfill 22 our safety and security mission.
23 Thank you and we're now ready for any questions.
24 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Thank you, Victor, and thank 25 you to all the presenters on the panel. We will begin questions, once 26 again, with Commissioner Baran.
27 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Thanks. Thank you for
77 1 your presentations.
2 I'd like to ask a few questions on dry casks. I wanted 3 to refer to slide 47. This slide discusses accommodating higher heat 4 loads and reevaluating a technical basis for the allowable peak 5 cladding temperature limit.
6 I want to make sure I understand the basic issue 7 here. Is it that licensees and vendors are submitting applications for 8 design changes that would involve higher heat loads so that the 9 previously approved temperature limits are being approached?
10 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: Yes, that is correct.
11 COMMISSIONER BARAN: And is the staff 12 reevaluating the technical basis for the temperature limits because the 13 staff thinks they are too conservative or not conservative enough?
14 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: How I can describe that is as 15 they reach the peak cladding temperature, the allowable peak 16 cladding temperature limit, the increase on heat load is now 17 challenging that temperature limit.
18 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Right.
19 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: So they are reducing the 20 design margin of the dry cask.
21 So the staff is looking into how can we can be more 22 predictable in using the thermal models and the uncertainties that 23 those thermal models have to understanding the performance of that 24 fuel cladding performance on the safety issue.
25 So when we challenge the licensees in understanding 26 their thermal models, enters into uncertainties of the thermal model as 27 well. So the better we understand the uncertainty of the thermal
78 1 model, the more confidence we have that they can predict that peak 2 cladding temperature which equals the basis for the shielding and 3 criticality requirements that they need to meet.
4 COMMISSIONER BARAN: So I just want to make 5 sure I kind of understand the implication of that.
6 So, as you try to better understand the modeling 7 there, is it that we think what we have right now is conservative and 8 there is probably more room to play with as we get closer to the 9 temperature limits or is it a concern that boy, they're getting close?
10 And if this isn't quite as conservative as we thought it was, they are 11 going to hit the limit.
12 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: Right.
13 COMMISSIONER BARAN: I mean it is both of those 14 things that you're looking at or is it one or the other?
15 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: There is some level of 16 conservatism that the thermal models have. And definitely, the 17 increase of heat loads is merging into that conservatism. So yes, we 18 do see the margin and the conservatisms are being less.
19 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Okay.
20 MR. DAPAS: I'm just going to add my understanding 21 from talking to Yoira and Mike Layton on this issue is that as the heat 22 load increases, you are closer in approaching the peak centerline 23 temperature limit but you still have to ensure that you are accounting 24 for uncertainty and there is sufficient margin. We are not changing 25 the temperature limit but you want to ensure that that uncertainty is 26 bounded.
27 And so by refining the model, you're reducing the
79 1 uncertainty which, even though you may have a reduction in margin, if 2 the uncertainty is reduced because you have a greater understanding 3 of the modeling there then you're not impacting safety, if you will.
4 COMMISSIONER BARAN: And that's really, you're 5 kind of leading to my question. One thing I want to understand is 6 whether, when we're talking about design margin is being reduced, 7 does that mean that we're seeing safety margins reduced?
8 MR. DAPAS: I would offer this. The design margin 9 is being reduced when you assume the same uncertainty. If you 10 reduce the uncertainty, then does that offset for the fact that there is a 11 higher heat load, such that you're maintaining an appropriate design 12 margin?
13 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: Yes, that is correct.
14 So part of the discussions that we had was what is 15 the acceptance criteria that ISG-11, the cladding performance interim 16 staff guidance, has? And it specifically speaks to the margin 17 associated with that thermal model.
18 COMMISSIONER BARAN: And what is your -- I 19 mean we don't want to get too into the weeds. But what is your 20 assessment of the likelihood that those uncertainties can be reduced, 21 such that we wouldn't have a concern about this approach to the 22 temperature limit? Is that viewed as something that's likely? Is there 23 a lot of room for reducing uncertainties there? Where are we in that 24 process of reducing uncertainties?
25 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: Yes, part of my presentation I 26 mentioned that we are engaging with EPRI and DOE on the best 27 estimate approach for thermal modeling.
80 1 Right now what we are conducting is a round robin.
2 So basically, we have participants NRC, DOE working together to 3 identify what is the importance of the uncertainties and conservatisms 4 in a thermal model. So we can arrive to a collaborative approach into 5 what is the amount of significance that conservatisms have on thermal 6 models.
7 So we can have more predictable results when we 8 receive applications and we see thermal models saying my amount of 9 uncertainty is X. Now we have a better understanding and more 10 confidence that what the applicants are submitting is more consistent 11 with what we've seen in this best estimates approach experiment.
12 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Are there cases -- Mike, 13 I'm going to come back to you.
14 Are there cases where the staff has rejected 15 applications for designs or design changes because the uncertainty 16 was such that we were -- the staff was concerned it was bumping up 17 against the limit?
18 MR. LAYTON: Yes, I can address that there. We 19 have come up against challenges in certain designs that have been 20 presented to us, just for that issue.
21 And have worked with the applicants to either have 22 them withdraw the application, revise it and resubmit it so that we 23 would have a better confidence on what the safety margin would be as 24 they move forward with that.
25 The one aspect about the EPRI modeling that I 26 wanted to also bring forward, is that EPRI, with the help of Dominion
81 1 and North Anna, has a very highly instrumented cask in which they 2 have just loaded. And the purpose of that instrumentation, over a ten 3 year period, is to actually get real data on what the thermal loads are 4 shortly after loading and through the course of the next ten years 5 within that, as that cask sits there.
6 So those data are starting to come forward. EPRI is 7 sharing those data with various folks, us included.
8 And there's what we call a, kind of a blind round robin.
9 Where we're using our computational fluid dynamics model, others 10 are using other models.
11 Models are both stochastic and deterministic. And 12 seeing how modeling assumptions play into best representing those 13 uncertainties and comparing it back to data as they're being collected 14 in that cask load.
15 MR. DAPAS: Just offer one example. When we're 16 trying to ensure an appropriate focus on safety, we have modeling that 17 we can use to independently validate that the peak centerline 18 temperature will be X. And the licensee's thermal model may indicate 19 its Y.
20 And even though from our independent review we 21 say, we conclude that the temperature limit, given the heat load is not 22 going to approach the peak centerline temperature limit, we still need 23 to understand why is the licensee's model yielding a different result, 24 because in the future, the licensee could submit a license amendment 25 and reference their model is that baseline.
26 So that would be an example of where we want to
82 1 ensure there is fidelity in the model that's using, even though we've 2 already determined that what the independent modeling we use, that 3 you're not approaching the peak centerline temperature limit with an 4 undo margin.
5 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Well, thanks for that, I 6 appreciate that you are focusing on this issue. When I take a step 7 back and think more broadly, typically with new technology and 8 designs, we see a trend towards improved safety and improved 9 margins.
10 And if we're seeing the opposite trend here with 11 newer designs or design changes resulting in ever reduced margins, I 12 think that's something we should, as an agency, be focused on. It 13 sounds like you are focused on that and you're treating that seriously.
14 Can someone just briefly talk a little bit about the state 15 of the art on dry cask monitoring and surveillance, the types of 16 potential degradation that can be detected, the types of potential 17 degradation that can't be and where that stands? I know that's a lot 18 to ask in a minute, but just a brief discussion of that?
19 MS. DIAZ-SANABRIA: So, dry cask will undergo, 20 may undergo, aging service. And aging effects relevant to dry 21 storage systems include localize corrosion, pitting, chloride induced 22 stress corrosion will be one of those examples.
23 So, the system may have abrasions in the other 24 physical scarring from loading on transport operations. We perform 25 inspections on these systems that are visual examinations to identify 26 the relations that exist in the dry cask.
83 1 The visual inspection methods can detect heating 2 corrosion, for example, or physical damage. There is some 3 technology using robotic crawlers to see these different inaccessible 4 areas that can detect aging mechanisms and aging degradation.
5 There is eddy current testing on ultrasonic testing that 6 has been developed as well for characterizing the crack growth or 7 pitting and degradation pits located near to the canister welds. And 8 manufactures also have developed inspection ring system that can 9 utilize a variety of nondestructive examinations, methods, including 10 visual and eddy current ultrasonic testing.
11 Basically, there is numerous of inspection activities to 12 detect aging mechanisms that can impact the cask.
13 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Do you want to jump in, 14 Mike?
15 MR. LAYTON: Yes. In addition, I'll give you a little 16 bit of perspective of kind of where we are in the state of the art.
17 The technology is evolving and it's getting better all 18 the time. And licensees are developing these monitoring technics.
19 You heard robot crawlers that can come down inside 20 the air vents of the cask and do a complete survey around the side.
21 Other nondestructive methods.
22 Last year we had our annual Reg Con where 23 presentations came forward from Industry and EPRI, and I was 24 pleasantly surprised to see how well the technology is advancing and 25 how sensitive they're getting, particularly with the visual inspections.
26 Because the designs are very unique, each vendor
84 1 has their own special way of doing something, the techniques that are 2 applied are going to be very non-generic, but be site specific to each 3 cask. Some of them may involve crawlers, some of them, for 4 example, the horizontal casks may have a eddy current ring that they 5 setup and then withdraw the cask out and do the testing and put it 6 back in.
7 So, all of that is in the mix and licensees are taking 8 that very eagerly. Particularly as their systems progress in their 9 licensing age and move into the extended licensing for aging 10 management. So, it is an evolving one, evolving area, and we're 11 expecting to see some good things coming out of licensees' efforts in 12 that.
13 MR. DAPAS: The only thing I was going to add is 14 that when a licensee requests for renewal, they have to submit their 15 aging management programs that would describe what is their 16 ongoing program for surveillance to ensure these degradation 17 mechanisms are not resulting in degradation of the cask that is 18 beyond what was assumed in the analysis.
19 So it's important that we understand these state of the 20 art technics that are being used and reached an independent 21 conclusion that they were acceptable in terms of being able to fully 22 understand the cask condition as it continues to age.
23 COMMISSIONER BARAN: Thank you very much.
24 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Thank you. Commissioner 25 Burns.
26 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Again, thank you for the
85 1 presentations this morning on this aspect of our work. Let me focus a 2 few questions on the consolidated interim storage type facilities or 3 concept.
4 There are a couple of things. One question I had, 5 and I think it's referenced in, Mike, when you talked, I think around 6 Slide 43, about some uncertainties. We don't know at this point, for 7 example, whether or not WCS will renew efforts on its application.
8 You still have the Holtec one under review.
9 But there is a reference to a topical, a DOE topical 10 report, and I'm trying to understand, what's the significance of that and 11 what impact that has. I guess I'm not really familiar with it or what its 12 significance is.
13 MR. LAYTON: No, thank you, I do appreciate the 14 question and a chance to clarify. The topical safety analysis report is 15 something that DOE contracted and is in the last stages of completing, 16 I guess their review analysis, of the contractor's report.
17 And as we move toward moving spent fuel off of 18 decommission sites, active sites and also standalone ISFSIs, DOE will 19 be the entity responsible for moving it off of NRC licensed facilities 20 because they'll take ownership of the spent fuel. And either to a 21 permanent repository or now we have the aspect of a centralized 22 interim storage facility.
23 So there's various aspects of that storage and 24 transportation that DOE is going to address in that topical report.
25 Some of the items, for example, in our regulations under Part 72, that 26 covers storage, under Part 71, that covers transportation.
86 1 When those regulations were originally crafted, we 2 really didn't have had any concept of a centralized storage. It would 3 be, DOE would pick it up from the site and take it to a disposal facility.
4 Now with a centralized interim storage, we have 5 movement from one regulatory environment in storage, into 6 transportation and then back into storage regulatory environment.
7 So, we're working very diligently in looking at those transitions and 8 making sure that we're going to be having a consistent regulatory 9 environment as those canisters and casks move through that system.
10 And that's a lot of what the topical report will address.
11 Now, the impact of it is, when we started our 12 budgeting formulation cycle a couple of years ago, we looked at really 13 two major reviews that would be coming in two CISF applications. At 14 the time, we didn't have any visibility that we might also receive a 15 topical report from DOE, which is going to be a significant effort.
16 And as you're aware, timing is everything. So we are 17 resourced to deal with two CISF applications.
18 As timing progresses, if WSC chooses to restart for 19 us, we would have a smooth transition from where we are now into 20 reviewing the application. And I also anticipate that there may be 21 some time that WCS may want to take a pause and re-review 22 everything that they have taken.
23 So, if DOE submits a topical report for us and it 24 overlaps the work that we have with two CISF applications, we'll 25 certainly have to re-prioritize resources and see how we can manage 26 those efforts.
87 1 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Go ahead, Marc.
2 MR. DAPAS: I just was going to offer this 3 perspective, Commissioner. As you're aware, the Department of 4 Energy has included in their budget submittal for 2018, funds for 5 Yucca Mountain. Should that not come to pass with appropriations 6 decisions?
7 My understanding is the Department of Energy would 8 be looking at temporary storage in a interim storage facility. And the 9 topical safety analysis report is a means to achieve that end by 10 addressing various issues. And then that would be submitted to NRC 11 for review.
12 That's my understanding of the nexus between that.
13 And right now, the reason they haven't come forward with that is 14 because they don't know whether there will be the need for that.
15 That's the degree of uncertainty with scheduling.
16 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes.
17 MR. DAPAS: That's my understanding.
18 COMMISSIONER BURNS: What I'm trying to 19 understand is, what issues are different. I understand there are 20 things about, that I'll call more jurisdictional legal issues.
21 Like when you take it, when you pick it up from Maine 22 Yankee or -- I'm naming one that's probably wishful thinking -- you 23 pick it up from Maine Yankee it becomes then within the possession 24 DOE title. It's, right, exactly, as the Chairman said, it's a title transfer.
25 What are the technical, what technical issues are 26 there, that's what I'm trying to understand.
88 1 MR. LAYTON: Yes. And as I alluded to, that 2 difference moving from the regulatory environment of Part 72 to 71 to 3 72, in some of these casks that have been sitting out there for quite a 4 while and have gone through aging management, one of the issues, 5 technical issues may be, how well will some of those older canisters --
6 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay.
7 MR. LAYTON: -- work through transportation.
8 And as it's received at a potential CISF facility, will it 9 be adequate to still store it there for a period of time or if there is a 10 difficulty with a canister, does it go back to the facility of origin or is 11 there a repackaging that needs to be done. Those are the types of 12 technical issues that have to be looked at and brought forward.
13 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay. Well, even apart 14 of, this actually will fall into my next question, even apart from where 15 the Department of Energy becomes engaged in the take title, et 16 cetera, this goes to my question, what's the difference between a 17 regular ISFSI and the consolidated interim source?
18 I mean, I'll sort of play naive here, there are both 19 places where we're storing spent fuel, or used fuel. They all, you 20 know, my understanding, and I think my understanding is, it's not 21 essentially different.
22 So what is the different aspect of the regulatory 23 review or regulatory concern on the consolidated storage versus the 24 storage continuing at Maine Yankee or at North Anna or the like. I 25 mean, some of you it, you may have touched on it. One is, you may 26 have to track the casks better.
89 1 You know it's a Maine Yankee cask which is, let's say 2 a 20-year-old cask at this point versus a brand new top of the line 3 modern X, Y, Z cask. So, I mean, help me understand what the 4 difference focus is on these reviews, would --
5 MR. LAYTON: Actually, for us, whether it's a 6 centralized interim storage facility as an ISFSI or whether it's an ISFSI 7 at a power reactor, it's no difference to us. We use the same 8 regulatory requirements, the same safety guides for, and standard 9 review plans, that we do for any ISFSI.
10 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay.
11 MR. LAYTON: To do the licensing. So, the 12 transportation issues don't enter into our licensing aspect for the CISF.
13 But the ability for that CISF to store different types of canisters that 14 may have, may have had challenges as they were in transport, does 15 enter into it for the CISF. That's the essential technical difference.
16 And how we address that in our review is that the 17 applicant has to propose a methodology for them to be able to test 18 and receive those canisters as it comes into the facility.
19 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay.
20 MR. LAYTON: And we review that to find out if that 21 is acceptable under the regulations that we look at under Part 72.
22 COMMISSIONER BURNS: And so the difference, as 23 I understand it, is because, like when we talk transport, now, we're 24 really not talking about long distance transport, we're talking about 25 driving a couple hundred yards, maybe, at a site versus driving from, 26 as I say, Wiscasset, Maine to Waco or your path --
90 1 MR. LAYTON: Yes.
2 COMMISSIONER BURNS: -- I forget where, to the 3 New Mexico-Texas border.
4 MR. LAYTON: Right. Right. As an example, the 5 past campaigns that we've seen, and this is probably, I mean, close to 6 ten years ago or even longer, at the time the operator Progress 7 Energy was moving spent fuel from one of its facilities to another, 8 because one facility didn't have dry cask storage, so they wanted to 9 even out the pool loads.
10 So over a three year period, they went through a rail 11 campaign of moving casks. That's probably the most recent 12 experience that we've had in seeing that kind of extended campaign.
13 Others are really fuel returns from international that 14 we assist DOE with looking at those.
15 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Oh, okay.
16 MR. LAYTON: I mean, you're right, others are simply 17 within a site moving stuff around.
18 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes. I'm thinking of like, 19 well, I'm thinking of Zion. Having been out at Zion as a 20 decommissioning site it's a matter of a couple hundred yards. A 21 couple hundred yards, okay.
22 MR. DAPAS: I think that's the main difference, 23 Commissioner.
24 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes.
25 MR. DAPAS: You're transporting the fuel from the 26 spent fuel pool to the ISFSI. It's a difference when you're transporting
91 1 across states. And the length of time that you're in transportation.
2 And so the licensee that is, once operate, 3 consolidated interim storage facility, there has to be allowances for 4 verifying that the cask, when it arrives, is in the same condition that is 5 associated with the cask that was assumed in the licensing basis.
6 And while we will be certifying that transportation 7 packages are safe, et cetera, as a contingency, if there was a problem 8 that developed before that fuel can be accepted, the licensee that 9 operates the CISF has to ensure that the cask is in a certain condition.
10 Consistent with the assumption in the licensing basis. That's my 11 understanding.
12 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Yes. Okay, good. If I 13 could, one last question, hopefully fairly short answer.
14 You talk, and like, again, on the chart you see a peak 15 in applications coming in around 2020 and if you just very quickly tell 16 me, what are you all doing now to anticipate that peak and sort of 17 spread resources, inject resources or the like?
18 MR. LAYTON: Yes. And we saw that peak coming 19 for quite some time. And we have reached out to licensees and 20 certificate holders to encourage them to perhaps submit applications 21 earlier to take some of the pressure off of that peak.
22 Some certificate holders and licensees said that they 23 would do that, that's in their interest. But honestly, when you look at 24 an incentive to do that for a passive system that's sitting there, it's not 25 like a power reactor where there is an incentive to come in for early 26 license renewal, there just isn't that incentive for spent fuel.
92 1 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay.
2 MR. DAPAS: One thing I would add to that is, that 3 we are communicating to the industry high quality submittals such that 4 has an impact on the review time that's necessary, request for 5 additional information.
6 If we have a quality submittal, the licensing review 7 process is shortened, therefore you can devote those resources to 8 other licensing application or reviews.
9 COMMISSIONER BURNS: Okay, thank you.
10 Thank you, Chairman.
11 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: All right. Well, thank you all 12 for your presentations. At the risk of talking more about the topical 13 report that may or may not be submitted, I appreciate, Marc, that 14 you've described the programmatic and funding uncertainty at the 15 Department of Energy that causes there to be some uncertainty about 16 this. My question is a little different.
17 We do have an application that has been submitted to 18 us, has the applicant prepared that application reliant upon the 19 analysis in this topical report?
20 Meaning, if the topical report from DOE is not 21 submitted, would the applicant have to substantially supplement their 22 application that they submitted had they submitted with a reliance on 23 the fact that DOE would analyze the matters that you've just 24 described?
25 MR. LAYTON: Yes, that's a very good question. At 26 this point, what's in the applications are procedures for acceptance of
93 1 cask after their shipped.
2 The applicants do have in mind that this topical report 3 is hanging out there. I would have to verify with the applicants of how 4 much they have had discussions with DOE on that.
5 We have not had a great deal of detailed information 6 coming from DOE on what they see in that topical report.
7 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay.
8 MR. LAYTON: So there is a potential, yes, that as 9 the topical report is issued, that there may be some need for the 10 applicants, or depending on the timing, they may be licensees --
11 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay.
12 MR. LAYTON: -- to take those into account. And 13 those would have to be license amendments.
14 MR. DAPAS: My understanding is that we are 15 looking at the application to determine if the design of the facility is 16 acceptable and would ensure that when the fuel is there during that 17 interim period, it can be stored safety, through assumption regarding 18 the condition of the fuel in the cask when it arrives.
19 Now there are procedures that would verify that, but 20 the topical safety analysis report that DOE is generating I thought also 21 was looking at transportation between where the fuel currently resides 22 and to wherever that commercially operated CISF would be located.
23 So I don't see, and we'll verify this, that the TSAR 24 completion, you know, our review of the license application is 25 contingent upon that because it assumes that the fuel is in a safe 26 condition and confined appropriately when it arrives. Licensee or
94 1 applicant verifies that.
2 And then we're looking at the construction of the 3 facility, is it a safe design. That's my understanding.
4 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay. Well, that's helpful 5 because that certainly is a fairly typical way that applicants address 6 something. They make a set of assumptions.
7 And then of course you would have confirmatory 8 procedures that would, if the facility operated, you would need to verify 9 that that was indeed the condition of incoming materials.
10 So that is a way also that this topical report then could 11 be pursued somewhat independently of our review. I just wanted to 12 know if there was a strong link there that would impact some of the 13 indications we've given about our ability to proceed with the review on 14 a schedule that we will affix at the appropriate time.
15 This is something that really hasn't been referred to 16 but I think has come up over the time of my service on this 17 Commission, in meetings of the Commission on these topics. There 18 have at times in the United States been somewhat mini crisis of the 19 scarcity of available certified packaging for various types of nuclear 20 materials as packaging.
21 Ages, the development of new packaging is of course 22 an expensive undertaken. It has to go as certification.
23 So, there has been an inclination to extend the 24 certificate of compliance on existing packaging. I don't know the 25 current state of that, it may be that there's not a lot of nuclear 26 materials or maybe there is not a lot of activity right now, but I think
95 1 there has been a little bit of a dynamic tension about the need to, at 2 some point, develop new packaging as opposed to continuing to 3 assess and extend the lifetime of current packing.
4 Is there anyone who can give a very high-level 5 characterization of how that looks right now? And Mr. Layton is doing 6 the most thinking about this so I think he is going to weigh in.
7 MR. LAYTON: I'm not sure that this will fully address 8 your question. The terms for certificates of compliance, whether 9 they're done in the U.S. or whether they're done overseas, we work 10 very closely with the international atomic energy agency to make sure 11 that there isn't --
12 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: That it's more harmonized 13 and --
14 MR. LAYTON: Yes, that it's harmonized, there isn't 15 any inconsistency because some of the packages that we certify are 16 utilized overseas and likewise.
17 Currently, the term for the CoCs that IAEA has put out 18 in their safety standards is five years. And we recently underwent an 19 audit by the IG that ask us, so what is the basis of that term. And 20 that's a takeaway that we have on a recommendation from the IG to 21 examine that. We're just in the early stages of doing that right now.
22 MR. DAPAS: But not in the context of extending that 23 or a different period of time, simply, what is your basis for five years 24 being the length of the current certificate and where is that 25 documented, what's the safety basis?
26 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: So, we had adopted it
96 1 basically because it's an international standard and the IG suggests 2 that the record is not complete for us because we have not 3 documented our own --
4 MR. DAPAS: Yes, ma'am.
5 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: -- analysis of that as a basis?
6 MR. DAPAS: Yes, ma'am.
7 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay, I appreciate that. But 8 it sounds like right now we're not aware of some sort of scarcity in the 9 availability of packaging, we're not hearing that?
10 MR. DAPAS: We aren't. And I'll follow-up on that, 11 but I'm not aware of that.
12 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Okay, thank you. And then 13 there's been a lot of discussion about ISFSIs and I think that when we 14 reflect on areas that we're going to continue to need to have good 15 confirmatory research, good surveillance, good inspection programs, it 16 is likely to be, oh, I shouldn't say likely, it is potentially the long-term 17 dry cask storage in the United States, so it posed a question in mind, 18 hearing your answers to my colleagues and your representation about 19 North Anna embarking on a highly instrumented cask, things like this I 20 think had been talked about years ago but maybe there was 21 uncertainty about whether or not we would need it if there was timely 22 progress on disposal or perhaps even consolidated interim storage, 23 but that being said, it's looking like a very, very long-term endeavor.
24 So I appreciate also that you've commented on the 25 advancements in robotics. I think I had heard tell about something 26 that could kind of crawl around inside, but I know that there are
97 1 significant advancements in microrobotics and things like that.
2 But if the staff were to step back and think about 3 when the early ISFSIs were evaluated versus what we know today, 4 based on surveillance and monitoring, have dry cask storage 5 technologies generally performed on a materials basis, the aging 6 phenomenology, have they generally performed as predicted when 7 they were initially analyzed or are there phenomenology and 8 degradation mechanisms significantly different?
9 And I'll maybe offer you one other option for your 10 answer, which is, the question isn't highly meaningful because we 11 have the kind of very active management and surveillance all along 12 the way so we always intended to be taking a very careful eye at the 13 performance of the packaging. So whether or not our models were 14 correct, just like models for everything else we do, the thermal models 15 and other things, we're constantly taking data, updating the models 16 and therefore increasing our confidence in the models.
17 MR. LAYTON: From the perspective of some of the 18 older casks that have been out there for a while in performance, we've 19 had briefings from some operators, particularly the decommissioning 20 plant coalition, that's the folks that the Yankees and everybody else, 21 that have indicated that those packages have really performed well 22 over time, even beyond what the original intended time frame was 23 expecting that DOE pick them up and took them down to a repository.
24 What we've also been seeing on some of the casks 25 that are now moving into the beyond 20 year phase where they're 26 starting to do some very active visual inspections, those casks also
98 1 degradation mechanisms and those types of things, are not showing 2 up in those packages.
3 And again, I appreciate your perspective in 4 recognition that we're taking a very proactive view in making sure that 5 we're not waiting to see degradation but we're watching to see 6 precursors of the degradation.
7 CHAIRMAN SVINICKI: Well, and the reason I think I 8 framed this up, and I appreciate your responses, I'm asking this 9 retrospectively. But as an agency in terms of our confidence and 10 conclusions over, frankly we've analyzed hundreds of years now, so 11 we're asked, well, how can you know that because it's 100 years or 12 300 years.
13 But the truth is, if we continue to look at it 14 systematically the way we have and we have authority to compel, up 15 to and including repackaging, whatever, we have all the regulatory 16 instruments needed to require the actions of licensees to address 17 whatever we find in terms of aging phenomena, all of those things are 18 part of the substantiation of the conclusions we've reached over very 19 long periods of time that we've analyzed for these systems.
20 But I'll draw a connection, too, because I think this is 21 coming back to Commissioners Baran's questions about margin, 22 which I thought were really thoughtful that got me thinking about the 23 fact that the -- well, we're saying the Yankees, that sounds so glib --
24 but the very old ISFSIs at sites that really, but for having an ISFSI, 25 would be a greenfield site.
26 We have to think about that population of fuel, and
99 1 this gets back to these analyses about heat loads. Okay, some of 2 those reactors weren't operated for very long.
3 As a universe of fuel to be stored, the stuff being 4 irradiated today is generally a much higher burn. So then you've got 5 the uncertainty and confidence step to say, our conclusion about the 6 performance of storage systems is based on having a population of 7 fuel to be stored that was irradiated in very difference conditions.
8 And I'm generalizing of course. There is different 9 circumstances here. So we also have to challenge ourselves to say, 10 those conclusions, now we have to analyze them, we have to have 11 improved thermal models and look at the uncertainties there because 12 we have to try to draw conclusions going forward for fuel that is hotter, 13 for casks that might have more assemblies per cask.
14 And I think that there will continue to be a dynamic of 15 pressure to have storage technologies that can be more and more 16 efficiency, which colloquially means you can pack more and more stuff 17 in there that was more highly irradiated. And that's how the cost 18 efficiency for the licensee is generated, but we have to have 19 confidence going forward.
20 But then the last conclusion that I'll share is that 21 Commissioner Baran's questions also had me thinking about how 22 difficult it is for the agency to talk about this, is the classic risk 23 communication, margin has a relation to safety, but is not safety itself.
24 So, this is something that, and I sat here actually listening to the back 25 and forth going, I don't know.
26 This is so hard, sometimes we get tripped up over this
100 1 that how we would ever expect people in communities near these 2 facilities to understand it, when it tests our ability to communicate well.
3 But when you were storing a population of fuel not as 4 highly irradiated, I can absolutely see, reflecting on my career as a 5 nuclear engineer, that I would have engaged with the licensee and we 6 would have just set a thermal limit much, much lower because we had 7 no need to analyze out to much higher heat loads because the fuel to 8 be stored was not going to give that kind of a thermal loading.
9 So margin sometimes was just a kind of like, let's call 10 it good, you know, it was a convenience thing like, let's have all this 11 thermal margin because we're not storing anything that would ever get 12 close to that.
13 So some of the erosion of margin I think comes about, 14 or the request for us to accept a lesser margin as the regulator, comes 15 about because, well, now we confront a different technical challenge 16 and so we're being asked to say, could some of that be yielded back 17 for greater packing efficiency or higher thermal loading or things like 18 that.
19 And that's why at the end of the day the staffs use of 20 expert judgement is something that becomes so important. Because 21 this is the individual expertise of safety reviewers here, their 22 confidence.
23 And so as we move the agency on risk informed 24 applications, this is kind of where the rubber meets the road. Is 25 independent, you know, the individual expert judgment that needs to 26 be, I know we have models and calculations out to many, many
101 1 decimal places, but as an engineer I'm comfortable that in all 2 disciplines there is some exercising of engineering judgment that 3 needs absolutely to be done here.
4 So, I leave this discussion very impressed with all of 5 you are doing to stay on top of that, to continue to look at, yes, margin 6 is reduced, how is that effecting safety and my confidence overall 7 about the long-term performance of something that may sit on a 8 concrete pad for a very long period of time. And so I appreciate the 9 care and attention you're giving to that.
10 There is rising national interests as more sites 11 decommission in this, so, again, thank you for your work on that. And 12 I've gone over quite a bit so I'll ask my colleagues if they have any 13 final questions? Okay, if not, I'll thank you all and we are adjourned.
14 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the 15 record at 11:49 a.m.)
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