ML081750428

NRC Response to J. Tauro - Grandmothers, Mothers, and More for Energy Safety (Grammes) Regarding Oyster Creek

ML081750428
Person / Time
Site:	Oyster Creek
Issue date:	06/23/2008
From:	Collins S Region 1 Administrator
To:	Rumpf B, Casey Smith, Tauro J Grandmothers, Mothers & More for Energy Safety, State of NJ, US HR (House of Representatives)
Barkley R
References
FOIA/PA-2008-0306, RA-08-114
Download: ML081750428 (11)

Text

June 23, 2008 Janet Tauro Grandmothers, Mothers, and More for Energy Safety (Grammes) 747 Bay Avenue Brick, NJ 08724

Dear Ms. Tauro:

I am writing in response to your letter to me dated June 6, 2008, regarding the annual assessment meeting recently conducted by my staff at Oyster Creek, as well as several topics related to Oyster Creek License Renewal.

In your letter, you again requested that such meetings be transcribed. While the NRC does transcribe certain meetings where public input is solicited on specific subjects, such as the Oyster Creek license renewal environmental scoping meeting, we have consistently not transcribed other NRC public meetings, in part due to the high cost. The NRC conducts on the order of 800 public meetings per year; transcribing all such meetings would be cost prohibitive.

We also believe we fully and accurately answered the publics questions raised during the question and answer session. Furthermore, the substance of the meeting with the licensee was published on the docket in our annual assessment letter to AmerGen, the licensee for Oyster Creek.

Regarding your specific concerns with the margin of safety of the drywell in areas previously subject to corrosion, we note that your organization is a party in an Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) proceeding on this subject, and an appeal on a recent ASLB decision is now before the Commission. Based on this ongoing legal action, it would be inappropriate for any members of the NRC staff to discuss or comment on this matter at this time. I would note that the NRC recently issued correspondence on Oyster Creek-related issues to members of the New Jersey State and Congressional delegations; copies of those letters are enclosed for your information.

Regarding your concerns with the safety culture within NRC Region I, I understand that Marc Dapas of my staff discussed and clarified the remarks made by another Region I manager regarding the NRC safety review of the Oyster Creek drywell shell adequacy, and the actions that would be taken by the staff if any problems were noted during a future refueling outage. I trust this clarification addressed your concerns in this matter. We believe we have a strong safety culture in the NRC, particularly in Region I. A published assessment of the NRCs overall safety culture can be found on the NRC website under 2005 reports of the Office of the Inspector General; that assessment survey was very positive regarding the overall NRC safety culture in general, and NRC Region I in particular.

As a party in the ASLB process, you are aware that the Commission issued an order on May 28, 2008, requesting additional information from the NRC staff, AmerGen and citizens groups such as yours on the analysis of the factor of safety of the drywell shell at Oyster Creek through the

J. Tauro 2 proposed license renewal period. I urge you to review the NRC staffs position in this matter, which was submitted on June 11, 2008 and June 18, 2008, copies of which were served to your organizations attorney.

If you have any further questions in this matter, please contact Richard S. Barkley, PE, of my staff at (610) 337-5065.

Sincerely,

/RA/

Samuel J. Collins Regional Administrator

Enclosures:

1) Letter to the Honorable Chris Smith, dated May 16, 2008

2) Letter to the Honorable Brian Rumpf, dated May 20, 2008

ML081750428 DOCUMENT NAME: Letter to Janet Tauro - Oyster Creek Drywell.doc After declaring this document AAn Official Agency Record@ it will be released to the Public.

To receive a copy of this document, indicate in the box: "C" = Copy without attachment/enclosure "E" = Copy with attachment/enclosure "N" = No copy OFFICE RI/ORA RI/DRS RI/RC OGC RI/RA NAME *RBarkley *RConte *KFarrar **KLF for SCollins DATE 06/17/08 06/17/08 06/19/08 06/19/08 06/20/08 May 16, 2008 The Honorable Chris Smith United States House of Representatives Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Congressman Smith:

On behalf of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), I am responding to your letter, dated April 17, 2008, to Chairman Dale E. Klein. In your letter you expressed concern about not only the agencys methodologies for calculating risk assessments for metal fatigue of recirculation nozzles at Oyster Creek Generating Station (Oyster Creek), but also the agencys timeliness of providing information to your office. I would like to clarify the agencys position, discuss our evaluation, and reiterate our openness policy.

In your letter, you summarize the NRCs position as follows: [Oyster Creek] did not employ conservative enough methodologies in calculating risk assessments for metal fatigue of recirculation nozzles. However, staff has not yet determined whether Oyster Creek employed sufficiently conservative methodologies. For assessing fatigue for one type of nozzle, the licensee employed a simplified analysis strategy that used one stress component to represent six stress components. We have asked the licensee to reanalyze that nozzle using the six stress components. The licensee submitted these results in a letter dated May 1, 2008, and the staff is determining whether the simplified methodology is adequately conservative. The analysis does not calculate risk but does calculate fatigue usage consistent with American Society of Mechanical Engineer (ASME)Section III analysis rules. The ASME Code contains acceptance criteria but does not stipulate which analysis methods should be used. Standard practice is to simplify complex analyses when appropriately justified. We asked Oyster Creek to perform a detailed analysis only to evaluate whether they appropriately simplified the analysis when it used one stress component.

The staff will document its review of the reanalysis, and will issue a publicly available supplement to the safety evaluation report, including a thorough evaluation of the fatigue analysis. In this supplement, the staff will include any nonproprietary details of the analysis.

The staff is prohibited from disclosing information to the public that legitimately constitutes proprietary information and is submitted by the licensees as proprietary pursuant to 10 CFR 2.390(b)(3).

Through our openness policy, we view nuclear regulation as the public's business. The NRC places a high priority on keeping Congress fully and currently informed. We will notify you as soon as possible of all further developments on the Oyster Creek license renewal process.

C. Smith The schedule for a final decision on relicensing has not yet been determined. The April 29, 2008, date you mention in your letter was the Commissions adjudicatory affirmation session (which had been postponed and is now tentatively scheduled for May 28, 2008). It was not the date of a final agency decision on relicensing Oyster Creek. When the agency is prepared to make a relicensing decision, you will be notified promptly.

I trust that this information is responsive to your letter.

Sincerely,

/RA/

R. W. Borchardt Executive Director for Operations cc: See next page

Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station cc:

Site Vice President - Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station Senior Resident Inspector AmerGen Energy Company, LLC U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission P.O. Box 388 P.O. Box 445 Forked River, NJ 08731 Forked River, NJ 08731 Senior Vice President- Operations Director - Licensing and Regulatory Affairs Support AmerGen Energy Company, LLC AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Correspondence Control 4300 Winfield Road P.O. Box 160 Warrenville, IL 60555 Kennett Square, PA 19348 Kathryn M. Sutton, Esquire Manager Licensing - Oyster Creek Morgan, Lewis, & Bockius LLP Exelon Generation Company, LLC 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Correspondence Control Washington, DC 20004 P.O. Box 160 Kennett Square, PA 19348 Patrick Mulligan, Chief Bureau of Nuclear Engineering Ron Bellamy, Region I New Jersey Department of U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Environmental Protection 475 Allendale Road 25 Arctic Parkway King of Prussia, PA 19406-1415 Ewing, NJ 08638 Correspondence Control Desk Vice President - Licensing and AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Regulatory Affairs 200 Exelon Way, KSA 1-N-1 AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Kennett Square, PA 19348 4300 Winfield Road Warrenville, IL 60555 Plant Manager Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station Regional Administrator, Region I AmerGen Energy Company, LLC U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission P.O. Box 388 475 Allendale Road Forked River, NJ 08731 King of Prussia, PA 19406-1415 Associate General Counsel Mayor of Lacey Township Exelon Generation Company, LLC 818 West Lacey Road 4300 Winfield Road Forked River, NJ 08731 Warrenville, IL 60555 Manager Regulatory Assurance Chief Operating Officer (COO)

Oyster Creek Generating Station AmerGen Energy Company, LLC AmerGen Energy Company, LLC 4300 Winfield Road P.O. Box 388 Warrenville, IL 60555 Forked River, NJ 08731

Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station cc:

Senior Vice President - Mid-Atlantic Operations AmerGen Energy Company, LLC 200 Exelon Way, KSA 3-N Kennett Square, PA 19348 May 20, 2008 The Honorable Brian E. Rumpf New Jersey Assemblyman 9th District Legislative Offices 620 West Lacey Road Forked River, NJ 08731

Dear Mr. Rumpf:

On behalf of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), I am responding to your April 16, 2008, letter conveying the concerns of the Legislative Delegation for the 9th District of New Jersey. You requested that the NRC release the analysis and results of AmerGens 3-D structural analysis of the Oyster Creek Generating Station (Oyster Creek) drywall shell.

The NRC cannot release proprietary information to the public without consent of the owner of the information. Our standard practice is to obtain a nonproprietary summary report so that the public is aware of the findings for these analyses. The calculations contain proprietary design information owned by General Electric and other entities outside of AmerGen. As discussed in our regulations, the staff is required to protect from public disclosure information that has been submitted as proprietary information in accordance with 10 CFR 2.390 and that the NRC has found to be proprietary. A summary report balances the need to protect proprietary data with the necessity to make the findings of the analysis public.

As part of the licensee renewal process, the applicant must meet commitments and conditions prior to entering the period of extended operation. For example, the 3-D analysis is one of many commitments that AmerGen must meet prior to the period of extended operation. The staff will inspect these commitments and license conditions using an onsite NRC inspection team, whose results will be documented in a publicly available inspection report. The NRC is not currently in possession and control of the AmerGen calculations for its 3-D finite-element analysis of the drywell shell at Oyster Creek. However, AmerGen has committed to providing the full analysis onsite for review by not only the NRC staff but also the State of New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection staff. The State of New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection has participated in other onsite audits or inspections at Oyster Creek, as well.

B. Rumpf If you have any additional questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Sincerely,

/RA RPZimmerman for/

R. W. Borchardt Executive Director for Operations cc: See next page

Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station cc Site Vice President - Oyster Creek Senior Resident Inspector Nuclear Generating Station U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission AmerGen Energy Company, LLC P.O. Box 445 P.O. Box 388 Forked River, NJ 08731 Forked River, NJ 08731 Director - Licensing and Regulatory Affairs Senior Vice President- Operations AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Support Correspondence Control AmerGen Energy Company, LLC P.O. Box 160 4300 Winfield Road Kennett Square, PA 19348 Warrenville, IL 60555 Manager Licensing - Oyster Creek Kathryn M. Sutton, Esquire Exelon Generation Company, LLC Morgan, Lewis, & Bockius LLP Correspondence Control 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW P.O. Box 160 Washington, DC 20004 Kennett Square, PA 19348 Patrick Mulligan, Chief Ron Bellamy, Region I Bureau of Nuclear Engineering U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission New Jersey Department of 475 Allendale Road Environmental Protection King of Prussia, PA 19406-1415 25 Arctic Parkway Ewing, NJ 08638 Correspondence Control Desk AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Vice President - Licensing and 200 Exelon Way, KSA 1-N-1 Regulatory Affairs Kennett Square, PA 19348 AmerGen Energy Company, LLC 4300 Winfield Road Plant Manager Warrenville, IL 60555 Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Regional Administrator, Region I P.O. Box 388 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Forked River, NJ 08731 475 Allendale Road King of Prussia, PA 19406-1415 Associate General Counsel Exelon Generation Company, LLC Mayor of Lacey Township 4300 Winfield Road 818 West Lacey Road Warrenville, IL 60555 Forked River, NJ 08731 Chief Operating Officer (COO)

Manager Regulatory Assurance AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Oyster Creek Generating Station 4300 Winfield Road AmerGen Energy Company, LLC Warrenville, IL 60555 P.O. Box 388 Forked River, NJ 08731

Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station cc Senior Vice President - Mid-Atlantic Operations AmerGen Energy Company, LLC 200 Exelon Way, KSA 3-N Kennett Square, PA 19348 Honorable Lisa P. Jackson Commissioner NJ Department of Environmental Protection 401 E. State St.

7th Floor, East Wing P.O. Box 402 Trenton, NJ 08625-0402