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Research and Test Reactors Sub-Arena

Research and test reactors comprise one of four sub-arenas that the staff of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) identified in considering which areas of the reactor safety arena to target for greater use of risk information. This page summarizes the following aspects of this sub-arena:

Objective
Basis
Goals
Risk-Informed and Performance-Based Activities

Objective

Implement risk-informed activities to achieve a risk-informed and performance-based regulatory structure for oversight of research and test reactors (RTRs).

In revising the Research and Test Reactor Oversight Process (RTROP), the NRC staff intends to develop a risk-informed, performance-based baseline inspection program. Such a program will identify the minimum level of inspection required for an RTR facility, in order to give the NRC sufficient information to determine whether the facility’s performance is acceptable. Key inputs to this effort will be a regulatory framework and cornerstones of safety similar to those for power reactors, which define aspects of reactor functions or licensee activities that must be performed in accordance with a certain set of criteria to ensure that the NRC achieves its mission to protect the health and safety of the public. The risk-informed, performance-based RTROP will also include a new Significance Determination Process (SDP), which will characterize inspection findings based on their risk-significance and performance impact for RTRs.

Basis

The risk-informed and performance-based activities (listed below) for this subarena satisfy the following screening criteria:

The new risk-informed, performance-based RTROP will improve the efficiency of the NRC’s regulatory process and help to effectively communicate regulatory decisions regarding inspection findings by establishing a revised baseline inspection program and a new RTR SDP.

The NRC does not currently have analytical models of RTRs that are of sufficient quality, but such models could reasonably be developed to support a risk-informed RTROP.

The startup and implementation of this risk-informed, performance-based initiative can be realized at a reasonable cost to the NRC, with little or no financial impact on RTR licensees or the public, and will provide a net benefit by reducing the scope of routine inspection.

There are no apparent factors (e.g., legislative, judicial, adverse stakeholder reaction) that would preclude implementing a risk-informed, performance-based approach to the regulation of RTRs.

Goals and activities to meet the objective for this subarena will be performance-based, to the extent that they meet the following four criteria:
1. measurable parameters to monitor performance
2. objective criteria to assess performance
3. flexibility to allow licensees to determine how to meet the performance criteria
4. no immediate safety concern as a result of failure to meet the performance criteria

At present, there is a lack of either plant-specific or generic probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) studies and models for RTR facilities. Consequently, the first step in establishing a risk-informed, performance-based oversight process for this subarena is to develop detailed risk models for existing RTR facilities. Moreover, because of the wide variation in RTR operating power levels and facility designs (which currently include TRIGAs, pool types, tank types, AGNs, an Argonaut, a PULSTAR, and a critical assembly), the NRC staff will need to obtain several generic risk models to provide the prerequisite risk information for RTRs. The development of these generic RTR risk models could be funded through research grants, scholarships, or fellowships to universities that have programs focused on nuclear PRA studies, which could help to fill a critical skill gap related to the NRC’s mission. Then, once these studies have been completed, the NRC staff can develop and implement a risk-informed RTR baseline inspection program.

Risk will be factored into the RTR baseline inspection program in the following four ways:

Inspectable areas will be based on their risk-importance in measuring a cornerstone objective.
The inspection frequency, number of activities to inspect, and amount of time to devote to inspecting activities in each inspectable area will be based on risk information.
The selection of activities to inspect in each inspectable area will be based on risk information.
Inspectors will be trained in the use of risk information.

The new risk-informed baseline inspection program will have significant knowledge transfer benefits, in that it will shift the agency’s reliance from individual inspectors’ experience (in identifying risk- and safety-significant areas for review) to a more programmatic capture of risk and safety focus areas for inspection.

The new RTR SDP will characterize inspection findings based on their risk-significance and performance impact. Toward that end, the RTR SDP will assign a color band (green, white, yellow, or red) to each inspection finding to reflect its risk-significance (similar to the color banding used for power reactors).

Because of the current lack of RTR facility-specific PRAs, the NRC staff has not yet proposed risk-informed and performance-based rulemaking, licensing, or oversight activities for RTRs. However, the staff will revisit these functions upon completion of the PRA models (discussed above).

Goals

The NRC recognizes that models need to be developed before the staff can make significant progress in risk-informing the RTROP. This is reflected in the following goals:

Develop generic risk models for existing RTR facilities (not before 2012) based upon allocation of the requisite funding in the 2010 budget.
Develop a risk-informed, performance-based RTR baseline inspection program and a new RTR SDP (3 years after model development).

Risk-Informed and Performance-Based Activities

To request additional information, Contact Us About Risk-Informed, Performance-Based Regulation.