ML20112H924

Suppl to Comment 4 Opposing Proposed Rule 10CFR50, Reporting Reliability & Availability Info for Risk- Significant Sys & Equipment

ML20112H924
Person / Time
Site:	Beaver Valley
Issue date:	06/10/1996
From:	Jain S DUQUESNE LIGHT CO.
To:	NRC OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY (SECY)
References
FRN-61FR5318, RULE-PR-50 61FR5318-00004, 61FR5318-4, NUDOCS 9606180663
Download: ML20112H924 (8)

Text

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.,9,. .S;,1 U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission ~ p .' y Attention: Docketing and Service Branch Washington, DC 20555-0001 DOCKET NUMBER nD PROPOSED (WR 6%u) RULE rn 5o y %L =*gk

Subject:

10 CFR Part 50 Proposed Rule," Reporting Reliability and Availability Information for Risk-Significant Systems and Equipment" and the Associated Regulatory Analysis Duquesne Light Company (DLC)is responsible for the operation of Beaver Valley Power Station Units I and 2. DLC has reviewed the 10 CFR Pan 50 proposed rule,

" Reporting Reliability and Availability Information for Risk-Significant Systems and Equipment," which was published in the Federal Reaister on February 12,1996 (61 FR 5318) and the associated Regulatory Analysis. DLC hereby submits the attached comments.

DLC concurs with the comments being provided by the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI). In particular, the proposed data reporting and recordkeeping is not needed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for assessing compliance with current regulatory requirements. Also, DLC and NEl previously submitted comments on the supporting statement for the proposed rule to trie Office of Management and Budget (OMB). DLC would like to reiterate that the estimate of licensee burden provided by the NRC in the

' OMB statement was inaccurate. The proposed rule would impose a substantial burden on the nuclear industry.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on this issue. If you have any questions on this submittal, please contact Mr. Roy K. Brosi, Manager, Nuclear Safety Department, (412) 393-5210.

Sincerely, Sushil C. Jain DEllVERING l 00ALITY 9606100663 960610 ENERGV 61 5318 PDR 3so

Beaver Valley Power Station, Unit No. I and No. 2 10 CFR Part 50 Proposed Rule and the Associated Regulatory Analysis

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Page 2 c: Information and Records Management Branch (T-6-F33)

U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, DC 20555-001  ;

l Desk Officer, )

Office ofInformation and Regulatory Affairs NEOB-10202 (3150-0011)

Office of Management and Budget Washington, DC 20503 i

d

1 a

ATTACllMENT 1 Comments on 10 CFR Part 50 Proposed Rule," Reporting Reliability and Availability Information for Risk-Significant Systems and Eaulement" and the Associated Regulatory Analysis I

e Based on the discussion under " Prior Efforts" on page 5319 of the Federal Register notice, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) appears to be proceeding with rulemaking because of a perception ofindustry inaction in this area. It should be l 4

noted that the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations (INPO) Safety System Performance Indicators (SSPI) Program was expanded from 3 to 4 systems, with l

< expanded data collection. It is Duquesne Light Company's (DLC) position that a i new reporting system could be avoided by modifying the INPO SSPI Program to include an agreed upon minimal list of systems and data to be collected.

• DLC notes that there are other industry initiatives that would seem to preclude the l

need for the proposed rule. For example, the Westinghouse Owners Group (WOG) is actively pursuing development of a risk-based Inservice Testing (IST) Program d

for pumps and valves. As part of this effort, risk significance data is being j

collected from various WOG members to determine where testing should be ,

l strengthened or relaxed.

WOG is also in the process of " benchmarking" member plant Probabilistic Risk i Assessment (PRA) models in an effort to make data sharing more meaningful.

. One of the NRC justifications for the proposed rule is that it would provide a 4 source of " current industry-wide reliability and availability information for some of the systems and equipment within the scope of the Maintenance Rule." This information could then be used to enhance the goal-setting process described in the

' - Maintenance Rule. DLC agrees that if the proposed rule is implemented, it would make sense to use this information in the goal setting process. However, as stated by the NRC, this is an enhancement, and it should not be used to justify new regulations.

. Note 3, at the bottom of page 5322 of the Federal Reuister, appears to indicate a

- .less restrictive application of the Maintenance Rule than is required by NUMARC 9101 guidance. This may account for the NRC's perception that approximately 30 of 110 plants are collecting a minimum amount, if any, of performance data.

~

i , Attachment 1 (Continued)

Comments on 10 CFR Part 50 Proposed Rule i

and the Associated Regulatory Analysis

! Page 2 s

l

• On page 5324 of the Federal Register, "The Commission requests public comments

! on whether the proposed rule should contain such a . sunset provision, and if so, the 2

period of time after which the rule should automatically expire." If the sunset l

provision would require further rulemaking to expand the scope of data collection, i DLC would favor such a provision. DLC has no comment on the expiration time.

e - On page 5324 of the Federal Register,"The Commission requests public comments j on'whether the proposed rule should exempt plants that have announced (or will announce) plans to discontinue operation within a short time (e.g. two years)."

DLC considers such a "grandfathering" clause to be appropriate since it is clearly unwarranted to require compliance from plants who plan to discontinue operations j within two years. Furthermore, it seems this data may be oflittle value to the rest of the industry.

3

• Page 5325 of the Federal Register contains the following series of questions for which the NRC is seeking public comment.

Question:

Is the proposed collection ofinfonnation necessary for the proper perfonnance of ,

the functions of the NRC, and does the information have practical utility? l 4

l j Response:

For reasons already cited, DLC does not consider the proposed rule to be necessary for the NRC to achieve regulatory improvements through risk-based regulation.

l i While DLC does agree that the additional data may have marginal practical utility, the cost of achieving this marginal benefit is unreasonable. The Maintenance Rule  !

)

should be given time to be implemented and evaluated to determine its expected contributions before new rulemaking is proposed.

Ouestion Is the estimate of burden accurate?

)

Response

DLC's comments on the OMB Supporting Statement were submitted to the Office of Management and Budget in a letter dated March 14, 1996, and are included as

. Attachment 2.

i m

., Attachment I (Continued)

Comments on 10 CFR Part 50 Proposed Rule, and the Associated Regulatory Analysis j Page 3 I

. Question:

Is there a way to enhance the quality, utility and clarity of the information to be collected?

Response

DLC suggests that the information be collected less on an industry-wide basis and more in line with the peer groups that NEl has established for Maintenance Rule implementation. It is believed that the utility of the information would be improved and a standardized group of systems and data to be collected could be established.

This is also supportive of the benchmarking effort underway by the Westinghouse Owners Group.

Ouestion:

How can the burden of the collection of infonnation be minimized including by using automated collection techniques?

- Response:

4 DLC has no response at this time.

• The scheduled January 1,1997, implementation date for the proposed rule is not practical. Page 5-1 of the Regulatory Analysis Draft provides milestones that would require publishing the fm' al rule and Regulatory Guide in October 1996. It l appears from the milestones that the NRC may have difficulty meeting this

schedule. In addition, the proposed rule would be implemented at a time when l

Maintenance Rule implementation and refinement will be competing for utility resources.

. The proposed rule and draft Regulatory Analysis express concern for scheduling outages of trains at power that may put the plant in an unacceptably high-risk situation. The NRC proposes reporting instances of two or more trains of equipment, from the same or different systems, being concurrently unavailable.

This is precisely what the Maintenance Rule seeks to control under paragraph a.3 of the rule. DLC believes the NRC concern for managing risk is adequately addressed under the Maintenance Rule; therefore, the NRC should reconsider the need for this rule based on thisjustification.

1

, Attachment I (Continued)

Comments on 10 CFR Part 50 Proposed Rule, i

and the Associated Regulatory Analysis Page 4 l

.- ' Another NRC concern stated in the background for the proposed rule is that individual plant PRAs be improved and updated.with plant specific. data. The Maintenance Rule Program, as implemented at Beaver Valley Power Station, will provide for collection and feedback to the PRA for each unit. DLC believes the NRC concern for improving the quality of PRAs will be adequately addressed by the Maintenance Rule.

e Finally, in an NEI (Joe F. Calvin) letter to the NRC (James M. Taylor) dated June 7,1995, NEI expressed the opinion that the Regulatory Analysis was insufficient to support the proposed rule. NEI also questioned the NRC staff's determination that the Backfit Rule does not apply. DLC agrees with this comment and believes it is still valid.

The NEI letter stated, "The industry's revised Safety System Performance Indicators (SSPI) provide for the compilation of selected industry perfonnance data." Furthermore,"Providing SSPI data to the NRC on a plant-by-plant basis, but without attribution to each particular plant, would support generic licensing actions as well as monitoring industry-wide trends and performance."

DLC supports this position. The data the NRC seeks is not available in many cases.

It is not a matter of collecting pre-existing data and creating a report. Most utilities, including Beaver Valley Power Station, will have to begin collecting the majority of this data. If data collection changes must be made, the SSPI Program should be modified to include the minimum set of data for the minimum number of systems.

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. ATTACIIMENT 2 DLC Comments on OMB Supportine Statement l

1. The burden estimates made in the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)

Supporting Statement are dependent on the following assumption made on page 3-2 of the Draft Regulatory Analysis:

"For the purpose of this regulatory analysis, it was assumed that 80 plants would already be collecting similar data and 30 would not."

i

] Duquesne Light Company (DLC) believes that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

(NRC) may be overestimating the availability and reliability data that utilities are collecting in support of the Maintenance Rule. While 80, or more, of 110 plants are collecting various forms of availability and reliability data, it is believed that the data is primarily failure oriented, not success oriented as is the information

requested by the proposed rule. DLC believes that few plants are planning to collect data similar to that requested by the proposed rule.

If the quoted assumption is inaccurate, then the burden estimates for implementation in the "Recordkeeping Burden Table" would be underestimated.

2. The implementation burden estimate of 175 hours0.00203 days <br />0.0486 hours <br />2.893519e-4 weeks <br />6.65875e-5 months <br /> to " Develop data collection program" also does not seem to be realistic considering that program development will also include: review of the proposed rule, review of a new Regulatory Guide, possible review of a new Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) guideline and development or revision of administrative procedures to implement the new regulation.

3. Page 3-10 of the Draft Regulatory Analysis indicates the NRC expense for conducting "about two workshops" on proposed rule implementation. The burden estimates apparently do not include the utility expenses that would be incurred in supporting these workshops.

4. The Recordkeeping Burden Table indicates a significant " Annual (recurring)"

burden estimate difference between the 80 plants and the 30 plants. DLC questions why a burden difference should exist on a recurring basis once all plants have developed their programs.

5. Paragraph 12 on page 4 of the OMB Supporting Statement describes the implementation burden as being " annualized over three years." Given the current schedule ofimplementing the proposed nde on January 1,1997, it would seem that the entire implementation burden would be incurred in 1996 in order to begin data collection by the scheduled date.

.. Attachment 2 (Continued)

DLC Comments on OMB Supporting Statement Page 2

6. Having done a preliminary review of all the information provided, DLC suggests that the best way to minimize the regulatory burden for the NRC and utilities is to postpone issuance of the proposed rule and concentrate on enhancing the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations (INPO) Safety System Performance Indicators (SSPI)

Program to meet the NRC needs. The current SSPI systems could be supplemented from the " Basic Systems List" contained on page 5324 of the Federal Register,  ;

dated February 12,1996. Modifications to the INPO SSPI Program should also be minimized. If this approach is taken, the NRC and utility burden for collecting improved industry-wide data on the performance of risk-significant systems will be minimized.

.