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No. 99-137
July 6, 1999
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has developed a number of improvements for handling petitions submitted by the public requesting that the agency modify, revoke or suspend a license it has issued.
Section 2.206 of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations describes the public petition process - the primary mechanism for the public to request that the NRC take enforcement action against one of its licensees or obtain NRC's prompt review of a possible safety issue. Depending on its evaluation, NRC could modify, suspend or revoke an NRC-issued license or take any other appropriate enforcement action to resolve a problem. The NRC receives about 20 such petitions annually.
The changes are the result of a six-month effort to improve the public petition process and are based on recommendations made by petitioners and citizens' groups, all of which were surveyed in January, as well as on staff experience. The changes are designed to increase opportunities for meaningful petitioner participation, make the system more accountable to the public and improve communications between the petitioner and the NRC.
These improvements include:
Under the 2.206 process, a petitioner submits a request in writing to NRC's Executive Director for Operations, specifying the grounds for NRC to take enforcement action or the basis for requesting NRC evaluate an underlying safety issue. Unsupported assertions are not considered grounds for consideration as a 2.206 petition.
If the petition is accepted for review, NRC publishes a notice in the Federal Register, notifying the public of the matter to be reviewed. The NRC's official response to a 2.206 petition is a written director's decision that includes the technical staff's evaluation of the issues raised in the petition, results of any NRC investigation or inspection, and a decision on the petitioner's request for agency action.
All director's decisions and the NRC management directive containing the new guidelines for handling 2.206 petitions will be available through the NRC Public Document Room.
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