ML063390626

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Meeting Report - Meeting to Discuss and Accept Public Comments on the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generation Station (Rancho Seco) License Termination Plan
ML063390626
Person / Time
Site: Rancho Seco
Issue date: 12/11/2006
From:
NRC/FSME/DWMEP/DURLD
To:
Hickman J B (301) 415-3017
References
Download: ML063390626 (39)
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December 11, 2006MEETING REPORTDATE:November 14, 2006TIME:7:00 pm LOCATION:Marriott Courtyard Hotel, 10683 White Rock Road, Rancho Cordova, CaliforniaPURPOSE:The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff conducted a meeting todiscuss and accept public comments on the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station (Rancho Seco) License Termination Plan (LTP) BACKGROUND:

In accordance with 10 CFR 50.82(a)(9), all power reactor licensees must submit an applicationfor termination of their license. The application for termination of license must be accompanied or preceded by an LTP to be submitted for NRC approval. If found acceptable by the NRC staff, the LTP is approved by license amendment, subject to such conditions and limitations as the NRC staff deems appropriate and necessary. SMUD submitted the proposed LTP for Rancho Seco with a license amendment application dated April 12, 2006. In accordance with 10 CFR 50.82(a)(9)(iii), the NRC must provide notice to individuals in the vicinity of the site that the NRC is in receipt of the Rancho Seco LTP, hold a public meeting, and accept comments from affected parties on the LTP.DISCUSSION:

A meeting transcript is attached.

ACTIONS:

No actions were identified during the meeting.

ENCLOSURES The meeting transcript and presentation materials used by the NRC and licensee at themeeting are attached.cc: Rancho Seco Service List December 11, 2006MEETING REPORTDATE:November 14, 2006TIME:7:00 pm LOCATION:Marriott Courtyard Hotel, 10683 White Rock Road, Rancho Cordova, CaliforniaPURPOSE:The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff conducted a meeting todiscuss and accept public comments on the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station (Rancho Seco) License Termination Plan (LTP) BACKGROUND:

In accordance with 10 CFR 50.82(a)(9), all power reactor licensees must submit an applicationfor termination of their license. The application for termination of license must be accompanied or preceded by an LTP to be submitted for NRC approval. If found acceptable by the NRC staff, the LTP is approved by license amendment, subject to such conditions and limitations as the NRC staff deems appropriate and necessary. SMUD submitted the proposed LTP for Rancho Seco with a license amendment application dated April 12, 2006. In accordance with 10 CFR 50.82(a)(9)(iii), the NRC must provide notice to individuals in the vicinity of the site that the NRC is in receipt of the Rancho Seco LTP, hold a public meeting, and accept comments from affected parties on the LTP.DISCUSSION:

A meeting transcript is attached.

ACTIONS:

No actions were identified during the meeting.

ENCLOSURES The meeting transcript and presentation materials used by the NRC and licensee at themeeting are attached.cc: Rancho Seco Service ListDISTRIBUTION

DURLD r/fPMNSWEBWORKRidsAcrsAcnwMailCenter LCamperKMcConnellCCraigJHickman RidsOpaMailRidsRgn4MailCenterRidsOgcMailCenterReport and Transcript: ML063390626Presentation Slides: ML063380121OFFICEDURLD/PMDURLD/LADURLD/BCNAMEJHickmanTMixon CCraigDATE12/ 5/0612/ 6/0612/ 7/06 OFFICIAL RECORD COPY Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station Service List cc:

Mr. James ShetlerAGM, Energy Supply Sacramento Municipal Utility District 6201 S Street P.O. Box 15830 Sacramento, CA 95852Mr. Jerry DelezenskiQA/Licensing Superintendent Sacramento Municipal Utility District Rancho Seco Nuclear Station 14440 Twin Cities Road Herald, CA 95638-9799Sacramento CountyBoard of Supervisors 700 H Street, Suite 2450 Sacramento, CA 95814Arlen Orchard, General CounselSacramento Municipal Utility District 6201 S Street P. O. Box 15830 Sacramento, CA 95817-1899Steve Cohn, Assistant General CounselSacramento Municipal Utility District 6201 S Street P. O. Box 15830 Sacramento, CA 95817-1899Mr. Steve HsuRadiologic Health Branch MS 7610 PO Box 997414 Sacramento, CA 95899-7414Mr. Ed Bailey, Radiation Program DirectorRadiologic Health Branch MS 7610 PO Box 997414 Sacramento, CA 95899-7414Commissioners' OfficeCalifornia Energy Commission 1516 Ninth Street (MS 34)

Sacramento, CA 95814-5512Site Document Control SupervisorSacramento Municipal Utility District Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station 14440 Twin Cities Road Herald, CA 95638-9799Regional Administrator, Region IVU.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 611 Ryan Plaza Drive, Suite 400 Arlington, TX 76011-8064Bill Potter, Coordinator (Radiological)Governor's Office of Emergency Services Radiological Preparedness Unit P.O. Box 419047 Rancho Cordova CA 95741-9047 1NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comUNITED STATES OF AMERICAU.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

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  • RANCHO SECO PUBLIC MEETING ONLICENSE TERMINATION PLAN
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  • TUESDAYNOVEMBER 14, 2006
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  • RANCHO CORDOVA, CALIFORNIAThe Public Meeting convened at the Courtyard Marriott Hotel,10683 White Rock Road, Rancho Cordova, California at 7:00 p.m.Present on Behalf of the Nuclear RegulatoryCommission:DON NOTTOLI, Board of Supervisors JOHN B. HICKMAN, Project Manager NRC NEIL HAGGERTY, Project Manager NRC CLAUDIA M. CRAIG, Section Chief, DCB NRC B. BLAIR SPITZBERG, Section Chief, NRCI N D E X 2NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comWelcome and Introductions, Mr. Nottoli...............3 Welcome and Purpose of the Meeting, Mr. Nottoli....3 Overview of License Renewal Process,John Hickman.................................5Overview of Environmental Review Process, Steve Redeker ...............................10Einar Ronningen.............................12Blair Spitzberg.............................29Closing Comments,.................................38 Adjourn...........................................38 3NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comP-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 17:00 p.m.2MR. NOTTOLI: Good evening. My name is Don Nottoli, I'm 3a member of the Board of Supervisors here in Sacramento County, and have 4the distinct pleasure of not only representing the District, which Rancho Seco 5is located but, certainly many communities surrounding that, including where 6we are this evening, the City of Rancho Cordova, here at the Marriott 7Courtyard.

8So, I want to extend a big welcome to our visitors from both 9back East but also those from the Region, and we know we have folks here for 10the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and staff as well as obviously SMUD staff, 11who again are the day to day responsible for the oversight of Rancho Seco and 12a whole lot of other facilities who provide power to this community.

13I just want to take a moment to, in addition to welcoming, you, 14to talk a little bit about the purpose of the meeting. I had the good fortune, 15about five years ago or thereabouts, when the NRC was out at that time in the 16City of Galt, had a community meeting. I had a little more attendance from the 17public but, nonetheless, we won't give up hope that some folks may arrive here 18this evening. But, at any rate, I know the purpose at that time, and again this 19evening, is to welcome public input, to get an overview of the reason why we're 20here, which is to talk about the licensing and the work as it relates to Rancho 21Seco and the oversight program, and the termination of the license. And so 22you'll hear about that from folks who are much more expert than me in that but, 23we want to encourage folks that are here from the general public, and anyone 24 4NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comelse, obviously those of you who work very closely with this particular topic and 1this community, and other communities, certainly to weigh in as well.

2So, I'm not going to belabor it, I could probably, you know, go on for 3a couple more minutes this evening but I know you want to hear from the folks 4who are expert in the field. So, I want to extend a welcome to John and to all 5the folks that are here this evening, and on behalf of certainly the SMUD staff 6and their Board, on behalf of the County of Sacramento and the Board of 7Supervisors, and certainly on behalf of the general public. And again, we thank 8you for the attention here this evening, and know that again this is part of the 9role and the work that's very important in permitting regulatory oversight for 10facilities that have served and do serve our communities in a variety of ways, 11and again we want to thank folks for taking time this evening.

12And with that, I'll turn it over to John.

13MR. HICKMAN: Thank you. I'd like to welcome you all to this NRC 14public meeting on the Rancho Seco License Termination Plan.

15To start with, I'd like to mention that we have copies of the slides at 16the back, as well as sign-up sheets if you want me to send you some 17documents, the transcript of this meeting or any other NRC documents. And 18there's another sign-up sheet if you want to make a public statement. And 19lastly, we have an NRC feedback form, if you want to provide feedback on this 20public meeting.

21I guess I'll do some quick introductions here, just so you know who we 22have. To my right we have Einar Ronningen and Steve Redeker with 23Sacramento Municipal District, Power District. And Blair Spitzberg, who is from 24the NRC Region 4 office. We have several other NRC staff people in the 25 5NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comaudience. Claudia Craig is my Section Chief at Headquarters. Neil Haggerty 1is one of the reviewers for the Rancho Seco Licensing Termination Plan, and 2Jim Webb is another reviewer.

3I guess I'll ahead and get started on presentation. To start 4with discussing the NRC focus on decommissioning, our primary focus is on 5the safe removal radiological hazards at the site. This process involves the 6removal of the facility from service, the reduction of radioactive materials on the 7site to a safe level that allows release of the site for other usage. Detailed 8radiological surveys, which will be done by both the utility and the NRC, the 9goal of which is to eventually lead to termination of the NRC license for the 10facility.11The process that we go through as part of decommissioning, 12initially, when the licensee decides they are going to terminate operation of the 13facility, they submit two certifications. The first one is that they have 14permanently ceased operation and the second one is that fuel has been 15permanently removed from the reactor vessel.

16Following these two certifications, we then issue a license 17amendment that modifies the utilities license so that they can possess the 18facility but are no longer authorized to operate it.

19Subsequently, the licensee will submit a decommissioning 20plan, this will describe their planned activities for decommissioning and, in the 21case of Rancho Seco, that has changed over time. Initially they were in safe 22store maintaining the facility and then subsequently they modified that to begin 23active decommissioning.

24 6NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comThey also submit, in the plan, also they have a schedule for 1their planned activities and they have to generate a site specific cost estimate 2for the decommissioning of the facility.

3Subsequently, as they near the end of their decommissioning 4activities, they'll submit the license termination plan, which is primarily what 5we're here to discuss this evening. That plan will provide a detailed document 6that describes the condition they intend on leaving the site in and how they will 7confirm that they decontaminated sufficiently.

8They will then conduct final status surveys, as will we, and 9assuming everything proceeds, they would then -- we would then terminate 10their license.

11During the course of decommissioning the NRC regulations 12prohibit the licensee at any time from performing activities that would prevent 13the site from being restricted or released for unrestricted use, that would result 14in any environmental impact not previously considered in their environmental 15assessment, and that would in any way result in there not being sufficient funds 16to complete the decommissioning process.

17The license termination plan, and this will just be a quick 18summary of what's in there, the licensee will be providing a more extensive 19description of what's in the LTP, provides a site characterization and this 20includes a historical site assessment of the activities that have taken place in 21the site over its operation. It identifies any remaining decommissioning and 22dismantling activities they would still have to produce before they're completed, 23their plans for any site remediation, this would be any grading or any other 24kinds of remediation activities they would have to do, their plans for their final 25 7NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comradiation surveys, description of the end use of the site and if there would be 1any restrictions imposed, whether it would be something that let's say would 2control the site for a certain number of years before the public would have 3access to anything like that. They would provide an updated site specific 4decommissioning cost at that point, updated from the decommissioning plan 5that was originally submitted. And they provide any new information that is 6necessary to supplement the environmental report.

7The NRC actions, in response to receiving the license 8termination plan, include we noticed the receipt of the plan in the Federal 9Register and make it available for public comments. The plan is available in 10our public document system called ADAMS, and in a copy of my slides there's 11a reference as to how to obtain and view the document in ADAMS if you want 12to. Opportunity for hearing is given, this is standard practice for any license 13amendment and the license termination plan is a license amendment.

14The NRC holds a public meeting on the license termination 15plan, which is what we're doing this evening.

16If the plan is determined to be acceptable by the NRC, it is 17approved by the issuance of a license amendment. In the meantime the 18licensee will continue the decommissioning of his site, and will perform their 19final status surveys.

20The NRC, usually with the use of contractors, will then visit 21the site and perform confirmatory surveys. And if the plan was followed and 22the site meets the release criteria that is specified in the license termination 23plan, the license is then terminated.

24 8NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comContact information for, if anybody needs to contact me, it's 1available in a copy of my slides, it's my name and phone number, email 2address along with Blair Spitzberg, Region IV, and the reference at the bottom 3provides the website where you can obtain any NRC documents related to 4licensing Ranch Seco.

5And now I'll turn it over to Steve Redeker to continue.

6MR. REDEKER: I'm Steve Redeker, the decommissioning 7manager of Rancho Seco and I'm pleased to have some other SMUD staff with 8us here today, Einar Ronnigen, who will give the majority of the presentation, 9and we also have some industry experts who are working with us today out at 10the plant, preparing the license termination plan and helping us with overall 11decommissioning. In the back, Bob Decker, John Newey, George Pillsbury and 12Leon Brown. So, if anyone has specific questions, they can certainly help us 13out. Thank you very much, gentlemen, for coming.

14What are we doing at Rancho Seco? Why are we, the staff 15at Rancho Seco there? Our whole objective is to decommission the facility in 16such a manner that we do not harm the environment or cause any issues 17relative to public health and safety. And we do this in a cost effective and least 18risky manner. We want to preserve the options to reuse the site by SMUD.

19That's our basic purpose of our decommissioning program at the Ranch.

20What are our goals? I tried to make this simple. What do we 21want tod, and by when? We want to be finished with our overall 22decommissioning plan by the end of 2008. We'll clean up the site to the NRC 23standards. We do expect to have a small volume of radioactive waste that we 24currently don't have an acceptable place to dispose of permanently, that will be 25 9NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comstored in a radioactive waste storage building out at the site. So, by the end of 12008, the majority of the site will be available for reuse by SMUD with no 2 restrictions.

3After 2008, for probably two or three years, we intend to do 4some non-radiological, I call it industrial decommissioning, where we will 5remove some non-radioactive portions of the plant from the site and put the site 6in a very safe and stable condition.

7We will continue to store the nuclear fuel, our fuel is in dry 8storage, there' s a brochure in the back that describes our dry storage system 9and program, and it will remain in dry storage until the U.S. Department of 10Energy comes to take it away. So, we will have a Nuclear Regulatory 11Commission license to store the radioactive waste, that small portion, and the 12nuclear fuel for many years to come.

13Safety is the primary focus of our whole decommissioning 14effort, both industrial safety and radiological safety. We, again, making it 15simple, don't hurt anyone, don't drop anything and don't spill anything. It's very 16easy for the workers to understand that concept. Don't hurt anyone, we want 17to minimize any radiation exposure dose to the workers or to the members of 18the public. We don't want any industrial accidents. We're lifting very heavy 19things, we don't want to drop anything. And don't spill anything that relates to 20hazardous materials, not just radioactive materials but asbestos, lead paint, 21PCBs, many other hazardous materials.

22So, our objective is to adequately control all of that material.

23So, safety is primary in the whole focus of decommissioning.

24Now, Einar Ronningen.

25 10NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comMR. RONNINGEN: Thanks Steve.

1I'm going to describe here, in a little bit of details, what John 2introduced and Steve led us into here, and we'll start with just what is the 3license termination plan.

4Really what it is is a very technical document that describes 5the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, how we're going to conduct 6decommissioning at Rancho Seco, and how we're going to leave the site in a 7manner that's acceptable to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, that is how 8it meets the criteria for license termination.

9John touched on the way the NRC performs the review. We 10did do some reviews onsite. The content of the LTP itself is specified by 11regulations and guidance documents that are put out by the NRC. It's prepared 12onsite with technical experts and also some technical experts from off-site, to 13supplement the knowledge that we have onsite where it's needed. For 14example, Tom Cudzillo is here, he gave us input into our hydrogeological plan 15that helps us to characterize the site.

16Once it's been prepared by those technical experts, it's 17reviewed again in a cross review by those technical experts, and then again by 18Rancho Seco management. After we've reviewed it thoroughly and are happy 19with the document, then we submit it to the NRC for their review.

20So, what are those site cleanup criteria? Well, we want to 21make the site available for unrestricted reuse. John had touched on the fact 22that we could leave the site for restricted reuse but, we want to leave it for 23unrestricted reuse. So, the laws tell us that we have to demonstrate to the 24Nuclear Regulatory Commission that we leave the facility in such a way that the 25 11NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comdose to the worker on the site is less than 25 millirem per year. And not only 1that, we have to introduce this concept here, that I'll touch on a little bit latter, 2that we call ALARA, which means As Low As Reasonably Achievable.

3We actually do a cost benefit analysis to determine how far 4below that 25 millirem per year it makes sense economically to reduce that 5dose. 6Let's talk about 25 millirem here for a moment. What is a 7millirem? A millirem is a common measurement unit that we use to describe 8the impact of radiation on the human body. And once we have this unit 9established, then we can talk about the relative numbers here. And on the 10chart, you can see we go from a low of five up to 420. Just for comparison 11purposes, we've got the 25 on the lower right there, which is the annual dose 12that a worker at Rancho Seco could receive after license termination, and that's 13a maximum. The lowest number there is five.

14Someone on a cross country flight for about six hours at 1535,000 feet might receive about five millirem. Someone getting a chest x-ray 16might receive about 35 millirem. And to go to annual doses from natural 17background radioactivity, you can see there's some variability. The annual 18average for the member citizen of the United States is 360 millirem, someone 19in San Francisco, a little bit less, about 350, someone up in Truckee a little bit 20more elevation, a little bit more rocky soils, about 420.

21Back in 1975 we did an aerial survey of the direct radiation 22field and the areas around Rancho Seco, and this is not really the total 23radiation dose someone would receive, we'll talk about that a little bit more later 24but, this demonstrates the variability in the natural background radiation that 25 12NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comone receives directly from the naturally occurring radioactive materials in those 1areas. And we can see -- I'll get the pointer out here -- we've got numbers as 2low as about 43 down here by Comanche Reservoir, and then numbers as high 3as greater than 160 east of Ione near Buena Vista. Now, these numbers aren't 4meant to alarm, and they aren't unusual as far as the variability goes. We're 5simply illustrating that natural background radioactivity varies so much that 25 6millirem per year is a small number in comparison to that. And that's all this is 7meant to illustrate.

8We had a list before that John kind of showed us, of the 9contents of the license termination plan, and to kind of go through here chapter 10by chapter and give a little bit of information on each chapter, and I'll do that 11with the highlighted chapter.

12Chapter One is General Information about the site, some 13history of the site, how the site operated, some geography, climate, those sorts 14of things, and includes the location of the facility.

15For those people that aren't aware, we can see this Lego 16shaped property that is the Rancho Seco property that's located in Southeast 17Sacramento County, about 25 miles Southeast of Sacramento.

18Here is a pretty good picture of the Lego shaped property in 19the white outline here, and all the different things that are on the facility there.

20It's almost 2500 acre facility. You can see in the upper left here, is the actual 21industrial facility that is the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station. That 22occupies about 90 acres of the 2480 acres.

23In green down here is the location of the new Consumnes 24Power Plant, which is a natural gas fired power plant that SMUD is currently 25 13NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comusing to generate electricity. And then over southeast of the plant here, we've 1got some older facilities and a newer facility here that actually generates 2electricity using the photovoltaic technique.

3Over on the eastern part of the site here, we've got areas that 4were never impacted by the operation of Rancho Seco. SMUD operates a 5recreational facility around this lake here. We've actually given some land, we 6lease it at very low cost, to something called the Performing Animal Welfare 7Society, that's based in Galt, that rescues circus animals and other animals 8from around the country and provides a good life for them.

9This red line here is the Howard Ranch trial. Immediately 10east of the site is a property called the Howard Ranch, which is a working 11ranch, and this is a nature trail that allows people to go and enjoy some of the 12natural sites at the facility.

13Recently we've turned over about 1200 of that 2500 acres to 14the Sacramento Valley Conservancy, and what they're going to do at the 15facility, basically these highlighted areas, the areas down here that are the 16Performing Animal Welfare Society as well.

17It looks like we've got someone trying to join us via wireless 18network here, join us on the meeting.

19What the Sacramento Valley Conservancy is going to do is, 20they're taking over custodianship of the land and stewardship of the land, as 21part of SMUD's commitment to the environment and protecting the 22environment, they're going to monitor the cattle grazing that occurs in the area, 23also set aside areas for preservation of endangered species.

24 14NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comIn Chapter Two, we move into Site History and Characterization, 1where radioactive materials were used and stored onsite, and unfortunately, in 2some instances spilled. And then we did a characterization of the site where 3we actually went out and numerically determined how much radioactive 4material was in each location. That helps us plan the work that we need to do, 5and let's us know where we need to actually do remediation to reduce those 6levels below that 25 millirem per year.

7Chapter Three talks about the decommissioning activities that 8are remaining at the facility. We had presented those to the NRC in our 9decommissioning plan before, but, these are those activities that are left, that 10need to be completed, to terminate the license. And I've got a couple of 11pictures here.

12This is sort of a before picture, I'll flash it up, an after picture.

13You can see a lot of things go away. The point here is we've got outside tanks, 14temporary metal buildings in different areas. We've got this temporary Quonset 15hut up here, these building out by what were spray ponds. And you can see in 16the after picture that all that structure is gone.

17Basically what you see here are all the permanent concrete 18structures at the facility, and that's basically what the facility is going to look like 19upon completion of license termination.

20Here's a picture of some demolition occurring of one of those 21temporary buildings. What I wanted to point out here is that we generate a lot 22of materials during the decommissioning process, but we do monitor all of this 23material for radioactivity. Any material that contains measurable radioactivity 24is disposed of at a waste disposal facility. Only when material can be 25 15NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comdemonstrated to have no measurable radioactivity, is it allowed to go to a 1landfill.2Chapter Four is the chapter where we talk about site 3remediation. Here's where the rubber meets the road, as far as that ALARA 4concept that we talked about before. Within Chapter Four is where we actually 5do the calculations that determine the cost, not only to SMUD for the 6performance of this extra work but, also to society. If we're going to remove 7ten truckloads of dirt to meet the 25 millirem per year, and we decide we want 8to go say 20 millirem per year, and remove two more truckloads of dirt, well, 9now we've got more trucks on the road and there's a possibility of an accident.

10That has a societal cost, even though the risks are low. But, that's where we 11perform those calculations.

12Also in Chapter Four, we describe how we're going to 13remediate the facility, and that is remove that residual radioactivity and get it 14down to a level that is below 25 millirem per year. And of course we've got a 15couple of pictures here.

16Here's one of a machine that actually shaves off the surface 17of concrete in a very uniform manner, quarter inch or half inch, after it's been 18run over the surface you can see it leaves a rather smooth surface behind.

19When there's residual radioactivity right in that upper layer, sometimes we have 20to get a little bit more aggressive and use jack hammers, or we even have 21some really big equipment that we use in the facility to really knockout concrete 22when we have to really get aggressive.

23When we're not so aggressive, you can see a rather smooth 24surface that's left behind, and a nice equipment pad here where some 25 16NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comequipment had been used before but, where we need to, we go in and really 1get aggressive on this concrete and take out three or four inches off the floor.

2You can see the exposed rebar down there. So, whatever we need to do to 3reduce the levels of residual radioactivity to meet that license termination 4criteria.5We move on to Chapter Five, after we've remediated the site, 6now we've got to take measurements to demonstrate to the NRC that we do in 7fact meet the license termination criteria, and that's what Chapter Five does.

8It's the final status survey plan.

9This is where we tell the NRC how we're going to ensure 10them that we are in fact below 25 millirem per year. It describes how we're 11going to take the measurements, where we're going to take soil samples, 12where we're going to monitor surfaces, outlines the quality program, we'll talk 13about in a moment. And also provides the content of the final report. When we 14submit this final status survey report to the NRC, that's the last time that we're 15going to monitor a particular area for the radioactivity in that area, and we want 16to make sure we provide them with the information that they need to be 17confident that they are aware of how we're leaving the site.

18How do we measure what's left? Well, we prepare very 19detailed instructions and we literally take thousands of measurements in 20building, soil, water, and we take field samples out there that are brought back 21to the laboratory for analysis. And then we take all this data and compare it to 22acceptance criteria. We'll talk about that in the next chapter a little bit. If the 23numbers come out too high, we perform additional remediation as needed.

24 17NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comAnd then we prepare that detailed report of results that get submitted to the 1 NRC.2For quality purposes, not only do we look over our own 3shoulder but, as John mentioned before, the NRC is going to look over our 4shoulder as well. Sometimes we'll go into a particular portion of a facility and 5we'll do the final status survey, and then we'll send a different technician in and 6we'll do it again to make sure the results compare and that we're doing 7everything the way that we're supposed to.

8We also have internal quality assurance people onsite that 9will look over our shoulders and make suer that we're performing everything 10according to the way that we told the NRC that we would.

11And then as John mentioned, the NRC comes in, and Blair 12is going to talk about that a little bit. We have inspectors that come in and 13monitor what we're doing, and then there are contractors, mostly the Oakridge 14Institute for Science and Education, come in and actually take samples and 15perform verification measurements.

16There is a picture of technician doing some monitoring on a 17wall, at the point here he's using a very sensitive detector, and you can see the 18cabling here that connects it to the little hand held computer. This guy is 19monitoring a floor here. The person helping him is the second technician that's 20got this hand held computer here that records all the information, as we do the 21monitoring.

22So, you can see she's got some paperwork here, hand 23records are taken, computer records are taken, we're very thorough on how we 24record this data, so we can present it in the proper way to the NRC.

25 18NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comHere's the drilling rig that we had onsite to perform drilling to 1establish some monitoring wells onsite, so we could monitor the ground water 2at Rancho Seco. The results of that ground water monitoring showed that 3there was no radioactivity of plant origin in the ground water at Rancho Seco.

4But, the only way we could know that is to drill the wells and perform that 5monitoring.

6Here we've got a bunch of different activities going on.

7We've got some buried piping here that's going to be removed, that contains 8some radioactive contamination. Then over here we've got a technician that's 9surveying the soil and making sure that the soil is acceptable in the areas 10where we're working. And again, we've got the second technician that's 11monitoring the first technician and recording data as he goes along.

12That takes us to Chapter Six, which talks about Dose 13Modeling. Here's where we demonstrate to the NRC and establish what the 14release criteria are going to be. We have these things called derived 15concentration guideline levels that are the acceptance criteria, and what I mean 16by that is that when we take an instrument out into the field, it cannot measure 1725 millirem per year, there's no instruments that do that. Number one, it's a 18very low dose rate, difficult to measure and, number two, as we'll see in a 19minute, radioactivity impacts the body in a couple different ways, not just 20directly, that's something we can measure with an instrument.

21So, we developed these DCGLs, which are the numbers that 22tell us how we're going to meet that 25 millirem per year. In this case, we're 23going to leave the facilities behind, SMUD is going to reuse the facility. We've 24 19NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comgot industrial workers that are going to be occupying the facility, so that's what 1we based our dose modeling on.

2The next picture that we're going to go to is going to describe 3some of the ways that radioactivity can interact with the human body. It's 4something that happens with naturally occurring radioactivity, and that's sort of 5a point that I want to make, is that we saw some numbers in the variability 6around Rancho Seco that varied from 43 up to 160 something.

7Previous slides before that, I said the average member of the 8public receives about 360 millirem per year. So, what's the difference there?

9Well, naturally occurring radioactive material exists in the soil around your 10home, it exists in the water that you drink, so there's different ways for that 11radioactivity to impact the body. You drink the water that contains that 12radioactive material, you're going to get some radiation dose from that. We're 13all adults here, we don't eat mud pies anymore but, there is a chance to 14actually ingest some soil that might contain naturally occurring radioactive 15material.

16So, there's a bunch of different ways and we have to take all 17of these different ways into consideration when we're talking about the residual 18radioactivity left behind at Rancho Seco.

19Argonne National Laboratory, as it states up here, is actually 20the facility that developed the computer code that we use to take that 25 21millirem per year and making it something meaningful that we can measure.

22And in the case of an industrial worker, we have all these different potential 23exposure pathways. We can have radioactive material in the soil or on the 24surfaces of the building, that would directly impact the body, sort of like an x-25 20NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comray. Like I had mentioned before, we've got naturally occurring radioactive 1material in ground water that people drink, or we could have residual 2radioactivity in the soils of Rancho Seco that could eventually leach into the 3ground water and then get into the drinking water and impact the body that 4way.5I need to make the point here that the dose calculations that 6we do are actually for a duration of 1000 years after the license termination.

7And the reason that we do that is, it would be possible perhaps for some 8material to get into the soil and then take many, many years to impact the 9ground water. And then through the drinking water, impact the people at the 10facility. Everything that we've done, and all the studies that we've done, show 11that we don't have that pathway at Rancho Seco, but the means exist in the 12computer code to make that calculation if we had to.

13So, this picture is really for illustrative purposes only. We've 14got this dust and Radon cloud here, and there really isn't brown dust of 15radioactivity surrounding Rancho Seco. It's really just a cartoon to illustrate the 16different pathways.

17We get into Chapter Seven, Financial Information. John had 18mentioned that there some restrictions on money that we can spend. We want 19to make sure that we don't put ourselves in the financial position that we can't 20complete decommissioning. So, in Chapter Seven, we give an estimate of the 21cost to complete all the work that's remaining for the license termination 22process, and then show how we're going to pay for that work and assure the 23NRC that we will have the money to pay for it.

24 21NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comChapter Eight, Environmental Impacts, we've done 1environmental reports for building Rancho Seco, operating Rancho Seco, 2decommissioning Rancho Seco. We want to take a look again and see if the 3license termination is going to change any of the environmental impact studies 4that we've done in the past. We evaluate impacts to threatening endangered 5species, water quality in the area. There could be archeological resources of 6people, remember when we put in the gas pipeline for the Consumnes Power 7Plant, we found some Wooly Mammoth bones and SMUD was very careful in 8taking care of that. And then this thing we call Environmental Justice, to make 9sure that if we are impacting the environment, if there is going to be impacting, 10that we're doing it in a fair manner.

11Steve kind of covered the schedule, I'll just give a wrap-up 12summary here. We expect to have all the radiological work done and license 13termination surveys complete by 2008. At that point we're going to reduce the 14NRC license to about a one acre facility and have some legacy waste stored 15on site for a number of years. After that waste is shipped, we'll perform the 16same monitoring on that one building that we're leaving the waste in, as we did 17for the rest of the site. And then finally completely terminate the license.

18And as Steve mentioned, we are going to do a little bit of non-19radiological work for a couple of years, after the radiological work is complete 20at the facility.

21If you want some more information, John mentioned in his 22that he's got some access to the ADAMS website, it's spelled out on the slide 23here what that stands for. And they also have a lot of information on 24decommissioning in general, and we've got that website available on our slides.

25 22NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comAnd some contact information, Steve Redeker and myself, 1Bob Jones, who is not with us tonight, is our licensing engineer, and Dace 2Udris is here form our Public Information.

3And with that, I believe I'll turn it over to Blair. I'll get your 4presentation setup here. All yours.

5MR. SPITZBERG: Okay. Good evening. My name is Blair 6Spitzberg. I'm here representing the Region IV Office, which is located in 7Arlington, Texas. I work as the Chief of the Fuel Cycle and Decommissioning 8Branch in the Regional Office, and our responsibility is to perform safety 9inspections of decommissioning activities at nuclear facilities within our reach, 10and also have responsibility for inspecting spent fuel storage facilities in our 11region.12Over the next few minutes, I hope to explain a little bit about 13our inspection program and how we conduct it at the Rancho Seco facility.

14Just to let you know where we come from, this map actually 15shows only three of the regions, because the materials program for the eastern 16half of the U.S. has been combined into Region 1. We actually have a Region 172 office in Atlanta, Georgia for the power reactor program.

18Region IV is the western half of the United States, as you can 19see it looks very much like the Louisiana Purchase. The states in blue are 20what we call agreement states, in which the states have certain regulatory 21responsibilities over radioactive materials. However, they have very little 22responsibility over nuclear power plants. The brown states are the non-23agreement states.

24 23NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comOur office is in Arlington, Texas, which is right between Dallas 1and Ft. Worth, and we're about 15 or 20 minutes from the DFW Airport.

2The Regional Office has about 160 employees, and my 3branch is within the Division of Nuclear Material Safety, which is one of three 4technical divisions within our office. My branch includes seven inspectors, 5several of whom are qualified decommissioning inspectors, and have been 6involved in the inspection of the Rancho Seco facility.

7The Regional Office only has two major responsibilities. The 8first is the implementation of the NRC's inspection program. That's our major 9reason for existence.

10Our second responsibility is that of emergency response. We 11would be the first agency responders to any event or emergency at NRC 12licensed facilities. While this response mode has seldom been used for actual 13events, we train and drill hard in the event that one were to occur.

14Both the region's major areas of responsibilities, the 15inspection and emergency response are better performed by the Regional 16Office, because we're isolated from the headquarters office, which deals more 17with policy and program management, and a lot of the other activities that are 18not associated directly with direct oversight of the licensees.

19This is just another map showing the decommissioning sites 20in Region 4, of which Rancho Seco is one of four power reactors. Actually, I 21guess you could throw the Pathfinder side in South Dakota in that group also.

22That license is also going through final decommissioning but, that was a much 23smaller reactor facility.

24 24NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comI also have the responsibility for some major fuel cycle 1facilities located, one is General Atomics in Southern California, and several in 2Oklahoma.3I want to talk, spend just a minute talking about how NRC 4ensures the safety. One of the fundamental features of the safety of nuclear 5areas is what we call the Defense In Depth, and that means essentially that the 6processes and equipment that are important to ensuring safety, that at least 7two independent controls be in place to prevent unsafe conditionings from 8occurring. So, I like to thin of the NRC's regulatory programs also in terms of 9the Defense in Depth.

10The first layer being the safety oversight that stems from the 11regulations codes and standards that have been established and must be met 12by the licensees.

13The second layer is the site specific safety reviews and 14licensing safety analysis performed by the program office in Washington D.C.

15And the license places specific safety requirements on the licensee, which are 16not codified in the regulations, and are specific to each licensee's activities.

17The third layer of the NRC regulatory oversight involves the 18area of inspection and enforcement, and that's the area that my office is 19involved in.

20In any case, the inspection and enforcement is what the 21Region IV office is primarily responsible for and it's like the old saying that 22Ronald Reagan used to use, "Trust but verify". We trust our licensees to 23perform in accordance with all of their safety requirements but, on occasion we 24 25NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comfind that there is some problem with that process, and we like to catch it early 1before something can become more problematic.

2The objectives of the NRC inspection program are fairly 3straightforward, it's to verify the safe conduct of the licensee's activities and to 4verify the adequacy of the licensees controls, and to examine trends in licensee 5safety performance.

6The NRC inspection program for the Rancho Seco facility has 7been implemented in some areas by inspectors out of our headquarters office 8but, primarily, for the most part, the inspection programs have been 9implemented by region based inspectors and those inspectors in my group.

10In general, the inspection program for decommissioning 11reactors consists of two categories of inspection. We have what we call the 12core program, that's a group of safety areas that we inspect as part of the 13routine scheduled inspections. And for reactor sites like Rancho Seco, that are 14in a state of high decommissioning activity, we inspect the core inspection 15areas at least semiannually.

16We also have a set of inspection procedures that we call on 17called discretionary inspection procedures, which are detailed reviews of 18particular functional areas. These inspection procedures are conducted based 19on the licensee's activities at the time of the inspection, or may be based upon 20licensee performance in areas found to be weak or declining.

21This slide shows some of the core decommissioning 22inspection procedures, which are routinely implemented at the Rancho Seco 23site. Since this is a meeting about decommissioning activities, I have not 24shown another area that my organization is responsible for, and that's the 25 26NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comspent fuel storage, the dry storage of the spent fuel at the site. I also have 1responsibility for that area, so I put this in here as safety of spent fuel. That's 2not strictly a decommissioning inspection area but, it's an important area that 3we also devote resources to.

4One of the things I'd like to just mention briefly is the quality 5of the inspection staff that we bring to bear on the inspection program. These 6are highly qualified, dedicated and hard working inspection staff. Most of our 7inspection staff have advanced degrees in physical sciences, and most also 8have many years of experience in the field of health physics and nuclear safety.

9In addition to their academic training and experience prior to joining the NRC, 10we also have a rigorous internal training and qualification process that they 11must complete before they're allowed to conduct inspections in any given area.

12The NRC inspection staff is very dedicated to safety at the facilities they inspect 13and are driven to find problems which could affect safety.

14Now, I'd like to also take this opportunity to introduce Mr.

15Emilio Garcia, who is one of our senior inspectors from the Regional Office, 16and he's one of the principal inspectors at the Rancho Seco site. And I'd like 17to offer you all the opportunity to introduce yourself to Mr. Garcia during the 18meeting and ask him any questions you might have.

19The findings of the inspection are typically debriefed to 20management. Actually, before the management debrief, quite often I get calls 21from the inspectors from the field, prior to their exit meeting at the end of the 22week, to let me know what their preliminary findings are. Once they get back 23to the office, we setup a management debrief, usually the week following the 24inspection, and that's where they debrief their findings to not just me but the 25 27NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comother regional managers. And we make a determination of the significance of 1the findings of the inspections.

2If there are significant findings from the inspection, violations 3rising that have certain safety significance associated with them, it may be 4important for us to take enforcement action with the licensee.

5In other cases, where there's no significant inspection 6findings, we still issue an inspection report detailing what we looked at and 7what state of safety and compliance the plant was in.

8Our inspection reports are available to the public for the most 9part, there are some exceptions to that, and these are the ones that I think you 10would probably take some comfort in, that we don't issue inspection reports 11dealing with -- that have a lot of information on physical security or safeguards 12information, or information that could place the plant in jeopardy if it fell into the 13wrong hands but, for the most part the decommissioning inspections are 14publicly available on our website at NRC.gov. And here you just go to the 15reference library and click on the ADAMS and then NRC Public Electronic 16Reading Room.

17One of the other things we do, as part of our inspection 18program, is we track and followup on safety issues. So, if we have a problem 19that's identified during one inspection, we assign a tracking number to it and we 20keep tracking that item until the licensee has taken effective corrective action.

21I'd like to just close with just summarizing what our 22inspections have revealed during the decommissioning process at Rancho 23Seco. Rancho Seco has a good inspection history with the NRC during the 24decommissioning phase. The inspection findings and violations have been of 25 28NEAL R. GROSSCOURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.(202) 234-4433WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701www.nealrgross.comlow safety significance and they've been rare, and overall we would say that 1Rancho Seco has an excellent safety record.

2So, with that, I'd like to close and I think we're going to open 3it to questions.

4MR. HICKMAN: Does anybody have any questions on 5anything they've heard this evening?

6(No response.)

7MR. HICKMAN: And I don't believe we had anybody sign up 8for any public statements, so that will conclude this evening's meeting. Thank 9you for coming.

10(Thereupon, at 7:45 p.m. the meeting was concluded.)

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