ML022490021

License Amendment, Revise Average Planar Linear Heat Generation Rate for GE14 Fuel Technical Specifications (TAC Mb 3187)

ML022490021
Person / Time
Site:	Monticello
Issue date:	10/02/2002
From:	Miranda S NRC/NRR/DLPM/LPD3
To:	Forbes J Nuclear Management Co
References
TAC MB3187
Download: ML022490021 (10)

Text

October 2, 2002 Mr. Jeffrey S. Forbes Site Vice President Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant Nuclear Management Company, LLC 2807 West County Road 75 Monticello, MN 55362-9637

SUBJECT:

MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT - ISSUANCE OF AMENDMENT REVISING THE TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS PERTAINING TO THE AVERAGE PLANAR LINEAR HEAT GENERATION RATE FOR GE14 FUEL (TAC NO. MB3187)

Dear Mr. Forbes:

The Commission has issued the enclosed Amendment No. 131 to Facility Operating License No. DPR-22 for the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant. The amendment consists of changes to the Technical Specifications (TSs) in response to your application dated October 17, 2001, as supplemented June 25, 2002.

The amendment revises the multiplier values for the single-loop operation average planar linear heat generation rate to account for the use of General Electric (GE)14 fuel.

A copy of our related safety evaluation is also enclosed. The Notice of Issuance will be included in the Commissions biweekly Federal Register notice.

Sincerely,

/RA/

Samuel Miranda, Project Manager, Section 1 Project Directorate III Division of Licensing Project Management Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation Docket No. 50-263

Enclosures:

1. Amendment No. 131 to DPR-22

2. Safety Evaluation cc w/encls: See next page

ML022490021 *Provided SE input by memo OFFICE PDIII-1/PM PDIII-1/LA SRXB/SC* RORP/SC OGC PDIII-1/SC NAME SMiranda RBouling RCaruso RDennig RWeisman LRaghavan DATE 09/10/02 09/10/02 08/26/02 09/11/02 09/18/02 09/03/02 Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant cc:

J. E. Silberg, Esquire Commissioner Shaw, Pittman, Potts and Trowbridge Minnesota Department of Commerce 2300 N Street, N. W. 121 Seventh Place East Washington, DC 20037 Suite 200 St. Paul, MN 55101-2145 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Resident Inspectors Office Adonis A. Neblett 2807 W. County Road 75 Assistant Attorney General Monticello, MN 55362 Office of the Attorney General 445 Minnesota Street Site Licensing Manager Suite 900 Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant St. Paul, MN 55101-2127 Nuclear Management Company, LLC 2807 West County Road 75 Mr. Roy A. Anderson Monticello, MN 55362-9637 Executive Vice President and Chief Nuclear Officer Robert Nelson, President Nuclear Management Company, LLC Minnesota Environmental Control 700 First Street Citizens Association (MECCA) Hudson, WI 54016 1051 South McKnight Road St. Paul, MN 55119 Nuclear Asset Manager Xcel Energy, Inc.

Commissioner 414 Nicollet Mall Minnesota Pollution Control Agency Minneapolis, MN 55401 520 Lafayette Road St. Paul, MN 55155-4194 Regional Administrator, Region III U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 801 Warrenville Road Lisle, IL 60532-4351 Commissioner Minnesota Department of Health 717 Delaware Street, S. E.

Minneapolis, MN 55440 Douglas M. Gruber, Auditor/Treasurer Wright County Government Center 10 NW Second Street Buffalo, MN 55313 March 2002

NUCLEAR MANAGEMENT COMPANY, LLC DOCKET NO. 50-263 MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT AMENDMENT TO FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE Amendment No. 131 License No. DPR-22

1. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (the Commission) has found that:

A. The application for amendment by Nuclear Management Company, LLC (the licensee), dated October 17, 2001, as supplemented June 25, 2002, complies with the standards and requirements of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (the Act), and the Commissions rules and regulations set forth in 10 CFR Chapter I; B. The facility will operate in conformity with the application, the provisions of the Act, and the rules and regulations of the Commission; C. There is reasonable assurance (i) that the activities authorized by this amendment can be conducted without endangering the health and safety of the public, and (ii) that such activities will be conducted in compliance with the Commissions regulations; D. The issuance of this amendment will not be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and safety of the public; and E. The issuance of this amendment is in accordance with 10 CFR Part 51 of the Commissions regulations and all applicable requirements have been satisfied.

2. Accordingly, the license is amended by changes to the Technical Specifications as indicated in the attachment to this license amendment, and paragraph 2.C.2 of Facility Operating License No. DPR-22 is hereby amended to read as follows:

Technical Specifications The Technical Specifications contained in Appendix A, as revised through Amendment No. 131, are hereby incorporated in the license. The licensee shall operate the facility in accordance with the Technical Specifications.

3. This license amendment is effective as of its date of issuance and shall be implemented within 60 days of the date of issuance.

FOR THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

/RA/

L. Raghavan, Chief, Section 1 Project Directorate III Division of Licensing Project Management Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation

Attachment:

Changes to the Technical Specifications Date of Issuance: October 2, 2002

ATTACHMENT TO LICENSE AMENDMENT NO. 131 FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE NO. DPR-22 DOCKET NO. 50-263 Replace the following page of the Appendix A Technical Specifications with the attached revised page. The revised page is identified by amendment number and contains a marginal line indicating the area of change.

REMOVE INSERT 211 211

SAFETY EVALUATION BY THE OFFICE OF NUCLEAR REACTOR REGULATION RELATED TO AMENDMENT NO. 131 TO FACILITY OPERATING LICENSE NO. DPR-22 NUCLEAR MANAGEMENT COMPANY, LLC MONTICELLO NUCLEAR GENERATING PLANT DOCKET NO. 50-263

1.0 INTRODUCTION

By application dated October 17, 2001, as supplemented by letter dated June 25, 2002, the Nuclear Management Company, LLC (the licensee), requested changes to the Technical Specifications (TSs) for the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant. The proposed changes would update the multiplier values for the single-loop operation (SLO) average planar linear heat generation rate (APLHGR) to account for the use of General Electric (GE)14 fuel.

The June 25, 2002, supplemental letter provided additional clarifying information that was within the scope of the original application and did not change the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staffs initial proposed no significant hazards consideration determination.

2.0 REGULATORY EVALUATION

Section 182a of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (the Act) requires applicants for nuclear power plant operating licenses to include TSs as part of the license. The Commissions regulatory requirements related to the content of TSs are set forth in Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR) 50.36. The regulation requires that TSs include items in the following eight specific categories: (1) safety limits, limiting safety system settings, and limiting control settings; (2) limiting conditions for operation (LCOs); (3) surveillance requirements; (4) design features; (5) administrative controls; (6) decommissioning; (7) initial notification; and (8) written reports.

The regulation at 10 CFR 50.36 specifies the following four criteria to be used in determining whether a particular structure, system or component is required to be included in an LCO:

(1) installed instrumentation that is used to detect, and indicate in the control room, a significant abnormal degradation of the reactor coolant pressure boundary; (2) a process variable, design feature, or operating restriction that is an initial condition of a design-basis accident or transient analysis that either assumes the failure of, or presents a challenge to, the integrity of a fission product barrier; (3) a structure, system, or component that is part of the primary success path and which functions or actuates to mitigate a design-basis accident or transient that either assumes the failure of, or presents a challenge to, the integrity of a fission product barrier; or (4) a structure, system, or component which operating experience or probabilistic safety

assessment has shown to be significant to public health and safety. LCOs and related requirements that fall within or satisfy any of the criteria in the regulation must be retained in the TSs, while those requirements that do not fall within or satisfy these criteria may be relocated to licensee-controlled documents.

The Monticello TSs include detailed information related to system design and operation which meet the criteria of 10 CFR Section 50.36 for inclusion in the TSs. Specifically, the Monticello TSs include a LCO that is based upon the APLHGR during SLO. This LCO protects against a challenge to the fuel cladding integrity following a loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA), which would be likely to occur should the fuel peak cladding temperature (PCT) exceed the safety limit. The APLHGR is modified by a multiplier that is determined, in part, by the fuel design. The licensee has proposed to change this multiplier value to the appropriate value for the GE14 fuel design that will be used in the Cycle 21 core reload.

3.0 EVALUATION The NRC staff has reviewed the licensees regulatory and technical analyses in support of its proposed license amendment which are described in the October 17, 2002, and in supplementary information supplied in response to an NRC staff request for additional information (RAI). The evaluation below will support the conclusion that: (1) there is reasonable assurance that the health and safety of the public will not be endangered by operation in the proposed manner, (2) such activities will be conducted in compliance with the Commission's regulations, and (3) the issuance of the amendments will not be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and safety of the public.

3.1 Statement of Proposed Changes The licensee has proposed to revise Monticello TS 3.11.A.a to update the multiplier values for the SLO APLHGR. These changes are required because the licensee will end the use of GE10 fuel at Monticello and begin the use of GE14 fuel after Cycle 20. Therefore, the licensee proposed to delete the GE10 SLO APLHGR multiplier value of 0.78, which was used for Cycle 20, and replace it with a GE14 SLO APLHGR multiplier value of 0.90, which would apply for Cycle 21.

3.2 Evaluation of Proposed Changes The licensee has proposed to delete the SLO APLHGR multiplier value in TS 3.11.A.a because this value is characteristic of the GE10 fuel design, a fuel design that will not be present in the Monticello Cycle 21 core. The NRC staff finds the deletion of this multiplier value acceptable since it would no longer be relevant to the Monticello core loading.

In Cycle 21, the licensee intends to begin using GE14 fuel. Therefore, the licensee proposes to add a new SLO APLHGR multiplier value of 0.90, which is based upon the GE14 fuel design, to TS 3.11.A.a.

The SLO multiplier value is determined such that the PCT that results from the SLO LOCA analysis is lower than the PCT that results from the two-loop LOCA analysis. These LOCA analyses are performed using NRC-approved methods and uncertainties (described in GE Topical Report NEDE-23785-PA, Revision 1, The GESTR-LOCA and SAFER Models for Evaluation of the Loss-of-Coolant Accident (Volume III), SAFER/GESTR Application Methodology October 1984).

In the June 25, 2002, supplemental letter responding to the NRC staffs RAI, the licensee indicated that the fuel vendor, GE, had applied certain proprietary improvements to the NEDE-23785-PA methods it uses to calculate upper bound PCT results. These improvements tend to reduce the magnitude of uncertainties in the PCT calculations and thereby permit a decrease in the adder that must be applied to the APLHGR multiplier values to account for uncertainties. Thus, a higher value for the APLHGR multiplier can used in the two-loop LOCA analyses, and still satisfy the PCT safety limit. Therefore, with the improved methods, the SLO APLHGR multiplier value can also be higher since this value is defined in terms of the two-loop operation APLHGR multiplier (i.e., it is set to yield a PCT that is lower than the PCT resulting from the two-loop LOCA analyses). The licensee requested that certain information identified as proprietary in the June 25, 2002, supplemental letter be withheld from public disclosure. The NRC staff granted the licensees request by letter dated September 23, 2002.

The NRC staff has reviewed the licensees description of the PCT calculation improvements provided in the June 25, 2002, supplemental letter and agrees that the improvements are based on previous NRC-approved methods, and do not introduce any new methodology that would require a separate review by the NRC staff.

The NRC staff has reviewed the proposed revision to TS 3.11.A.a, which would add the SLO APLHGR multiplier value for GE14 fuel, and found it to be acceptable since approved methods were used to calculate the multiplier value, and the upper bound PCT calculation improvements are within the original approved methodology.

3.3 Summary The NRC staff concludes that the licensees proposed changes to TS 3.11.A.a to delete the SLO APLHGR multiplier for GE10 fuel and replace it with the SLO APLHGR multiplier for GE14 fuel for Cycle 21 operation is acceptable since the multiplier value has been determined by using an NRC-approved methodology.

4.0 STATE CONSULTATION

In accordance with the Commission's regulations, the Minnesota State official was notified of the proposed issuance of the amendment. The State official had no comments.

5.0 ENVIRONMENTAL CONSIDERATION

The amendment changes a requirement with respect to the installation or use of a facility component located within the restricted area as defined in 10 CFR Part 20. The staff has determined that the amendment involves no significant increase in the amounts, and no significant change in the types, of any effluents that may be released offsite, and that there is no significant increase in individual or cumulative occupational radiation exposure. The

Commission has previously issued a proposed finding that the amendment involves no significant hazards consideration and there has been no public comment on such finding (66 FR 57122). Accordingly, the amendment meets the eligibility criteria for categorical exclusion set forth in 10 CFR 51.22(c)(9). Pursuant to 10 CFR 51.22(b), no environmental impact statement or environmental assessment need be prepared in connection with the issuance of the amendment.

6.0 CONCLUSION

The Commission has concluded, based on the considerations discussed above, that: (1) there is reasonable assurance that the health and safety of the public will not be endangered by operation in the proposed manner, (2) such activities will be conducted in compliance with the Commissions regulations, and (3) the issuance of the amendment will not be inimical to the common defense and security or to the health and safety of the public.

Principal Contributors: T. Huang S. Miranda Date: October 2, 2002