| |
Search Options | |||
| Index | Site Map | FAQ | Facility Info | Reading Rm | New | Help | Glossary | Contact Us | |
|||
RULEMAKING ISSUE
NOTATION VOTE
SECY-00-145
June 28, 2000
| FOR: | The Commissioners |
| FROM: | William D. Travers Executive Director for Operations |
| SUBJECT: | INTEGRATED RULEMAKING PLAN FOR NUCLEAR POWER PLANT DECOMMISSIONING |
To request Commission approval to proceed with developing an integrated rulemaking for nuclear power plant decommissioning in accordance with the recommendations detailed in the attached rulemaking plan. The regulatory areas addressed by this rulemaking plan are emergency planning (EP), insurance, safeguards, staffing and training, and backfit.
Since the early 1990s, the staff has been involved in an effort to improve regulations for nuclear power plants that are permanently shutdown and in the process of decommissioning. Nonetheless, decommissioning regulatory improvements in certain areas such as EP, insurance, and safeguards have proven difficult to implement because of an incomplete technical understanding of the dominant risk associated with decommissioning plants -- a beyond-design-basis zirconium fire event in the spent fuel pool (SFP). A zirconium fire is a very low probability event associated with uncovery of spent fuel within several years after the spent fuel has been moved to the SFP. Uncovery of the spent fuel is postulated to occur when a significant amount of water is lost from the SFP and can be initiated by various unlikely events such as a severe earthquake or heavy cask drop. Under certain circumstances when the spent fuel decay heat level is high, uncovery may result in cladding heatup to the point where rapid oxidation could create an exothermic zirconium reaction (commonly referred to as a zirconium fire) with the potential to propagate to a large number of fuel assemblies in the SFP. The offsite consequences of a zirconium fire would be severe. Although zirconium fires can be postulated for spent fuel storage in operating reactor SFPs, it has been concluded in the resolution of Generic Issue 82, "Beyond Design Basis Accidents in Spent Fuel Pools," and other studies that existing requirements for operating reactor SFPs (which include full-scope emergency planning, safeguards, and insurance) are sufficient to minimize any concerns. However, in an effort to maintain safety at decommissioning plants while reducing unnecessary regulatory burden, the zirconium fire scenario becomes a primary consideration. Because EP and insurance regulations are intended to provide some protection and compensation, respectively, to the public for beyond-design-basis events, the staff needed to carefully examine the technical issues associated with zirconium fires before recommending reductions in the requirements of these regulatory areas for decommissioning plants. Since sabotage is another event initiator that could result in uncovery of spent fuel in the SFP, safeguards regulations for decommissioning plants could also be impacted by zirconium fire considerations. The staff believed that consideration of zirconium fires could also have some bearing on adequate staffing levels and training requirements for decommissioning plants. There is no direct link between backfit regulations and zirconium fire considerations.
Initially, the staff focused on developing an analytical capability to determine when spent fuel in the SFP had sufficiently cooled such that a zirconium fire was no longer possible. However, there are uncertainties in the thermal-hydraulic behavior following uncovery of spent fuel in a SFP leading to a zirconium fire. In addition, there are also uncertainties in the assumptions related to the physical condition of the spent fuel and SFP following a beyond-design-basis SFP drainage accident (such as fuel spacing and building cooling air flows). Consequently, the staff has been unable to develop a standard calculational methodology that could be used to predict plant-specific SFP heatup scenarios. As a result, the staff lacked an analytical method for determining when decommissioning regulations could be relaxed on a generic basis.
During a Commission meeting on March 17, 1999, the staff suggested that decommissioning rulemaking activities in the areas of EP, insurance, and safeguards could benefit from a risk assessment of SFP accidents. Subsequently, the staff issued SECY-99-168, dated June 30, 1999, which committed to provide a detailed technical assessment of risk of SFP accidents at decommissioning nuclear power plants. The SECY paper also recommended that staffing and training and backfit regulations be included with EP, insurance, and safeguards for developing an integrated, risk-informed decommissioning rule. Regulatory decisionmaking for the integrated rulemaking plan would be based on risk-informed principles to be defined in the detailed technical study of decommissioning plant SFP risk. Preparing the rulemaking plan as an integrated package would ensure that the regulatory decisionmaking was made in a unified manner using a consistent technical basis to the maximum extent possible. A staff requirements memorandum (SRM) dated December 21, 1999, approved the SECY-99-168 recommendation to develop a single, integrated, risk-informed decommissioning rulemaking plan.
The technical study on SFP risk at decommissioning nuclear power plants has now been completed through the final draft stage and provides sufficient information to allow rulemaking activities to progress. The report concluded that approximately 1 year after permanent cessation of operations, the dominant scenario leading to zirconium fires is a beyond-design-basis earthquake with a generic frequency of less than 3E-6 per year at a decommissioning plant. This frequency is contingent on the implementation of certain SFP design, operational, and administrative features assumed by the staff or committed to by the industry that are documented in the study. Zirconium fire probabilities could be much higher for facilities that have not implemented these industry commitments or staff assumptions. However, the overall frequency of a fuel uncovery event leading to a zirconium fire compares favorably with the large early release frequency (LERF) baseline guideline of 1E-5 per year in Regulatory Guide 1.174, "An Approach for Using Probabilistic Risk Assessment in Risk-Informed Decisions on Plant-Specific Changes to the Licensing Basis." The staff recognizes that the guide was developed for different types of accidents and regulatory decisions but this general comparison is reasonable for the following reasons: (1) the LERF guideline was developed from the Commission's Safety Goals, which are intended to broadly cover accident risks; (2) while the amounts of fuel involved and mix of radionuclides available for release differ, SFP accidents and those considered in developing the guide's LERF guideline are estimated to have a generally comparable integrated dose to the public. Finally, the SFP risk study concludes that after 5 years of spent fuel decay time, a zirconium fire is no longer reasonably conceivable. This conclusion is based on conservative thermal-hydraulic calculations and the low probability of the event. The staff notes that the technical study results do not apply to high burnup or mixed-oxide fuels and the decommissioning regulations proposed by this rulemaking plan may be impacted and need future modification for SFPs containing such fuel.
The Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) reviewed the staff's technical study on SFP accident risk at decommissioning nuclear power plants and provided comments in a letter dated April 13, 2000. The staff responded to the ACRS letter on May 26, 2000, and committed to address the ACRS concerns in the final report. The staff believes that the ACRS comments will not impact the overall conclusions of the staff's risk study. The time available between a spent fuel uncovery accident and the initiation of a zirconium fire after 1 year of spent fuel decay, as well as the 5 year bounding time after which there is no further vulnerability to zirconium fires, may be slightly affected. Any revision to these times could be easily incorporated into the proposed decommissioning rule.
Based on the above information, the staff has developed a risk-informed rulemaking plan that recommends an approach for proceeding with rulemaking in the regulatory areas of EP, insurance, safeguards, backfit, and staffing and training for decommissioning nuclear power plants. The proposed plan is consistent with the technical study on SFP accident risk, takes into account past licensing practices and previous efforts in developing rulemaking in these areas, and reflects the NRC's goals of maintaining safety, reducing unnecessary regulatory burden, increasing public confidence, and improving efficiency and effectiveness.
The attached rulemaking plan would amend regulations in the areas of EP, insurance, safeguards, staffing and training, and backfit for licensees who certified, pursuant to 10 CFR 50.82(a), that they have permanently ceased facility operation(s) and have permanently removed fuel from the reactor vessel. The rulemaking plan is consistent with previous decommissioning rulemaking activities in these areas and will subsume or supersede all earlier efforts.
In addition, the rulemaking plan has considered applicable stakeholder comments received during the development of the SFP accident risk study, including those provided during a Commission meeting dated November 8, 1999. All stakeholder comments and staff responses will be included in the final report on SFP accident risk at decommissioning plants. One specific concern expressed in the Commission's SRM was that the rulemaking effort should address realistic decommissioning accident scenarios (besides the zirconium fire) that may have offsite consequences. The staff's proposed rulemaking plan recommends that in conjunction with reductions in EP or insurance for decommissioning plants, that licensees assess and evaluate if radiological hazards exist onsite that could cause offsite doses from a reasonably conceivable accident (other than a postulated zirconium fire) to exceed the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Protective Action Guidelines (PAGs) at the site boundary. This standard cannot be met for a postulated zirconium fire scenario since offsite doses could exceed the EPA PAGs under certain conditions if spent fuel in the SFP has less than 5 years of decay time. However, after approximately 1 year of spent fuel decay time, the staff believes an exception to the offsite EPA PAG standard is justified for a zirconium fire scenario considering the low likelihood of this event together with time available to take mitigative or protective actions between the initiating event and before the onset of a postulated fire.
On April 24, 2000, the staff informed the Commission via memorandum that the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) had proposed a new approach for decommissioning regulatory improvement. On May 17, 2000, NEI submitted a "white paper" providing additional details on its decommissioning regulatory improvement recommendations. The white paper provided comments on behalf of the nuclear energy industry concerning SECY-99-168 and recommended that the integrated rulemaking plan be combined with a broader based decommissioning regulatory improvement initiative. NEI also recommended a new approach to the regulatory improvement initiative not previously considered by the staff. The staff is studying the NEI recommendation as well as other recent staff considerations concerning the broader scope initiative for improving decommissioning regulations. The staff plans to meet with NEI to discuss and understand the details of the NEI proposal. The staff is currently scheduled to address the broader scope decommissioning regulatory improvement initiative in a separate SECY by September 15, 2000. However, the staff considers that the attached rulemaking plan provides a timely resolution to the subject decommissioning regulatory areas as directed by the Commission in the SRM for SECY-99-168. Because the NEI white paper included many comments related directly to the regulatory areas addressed in the attached rulemaking plan, the staff believes it is important to acknowledge the NEI positions and the corresponding staff responses as information for the Commission's consideration when evaluating the recommendations in this rulemaking plan. The specific NEI comments and staff responses are presented in Attachment 2.
The proposed rulemaking plan has involved principles of good regulation and complements the NRC's outcome based performance goals of the strategic plan. However, the potential value of this decommissioning rulemaking plan could be diminished since there are no near-term plant decommissionings expected and there is time to continue to explore other decommissioning regulatory options. In assessing this rulemaking plan relative to the NRC performance goals, the staff considered maintaining safety as the most important outcome. The regulatory proposals in this rulemaking plan maintain safety by being consistent with the results of the technical study conducted by the staff on spent fuel pool accident risk at decommissioning plants. The next performance goal captured by this plan is increasing public confidence. The staff has endeavored to increase public confidence by conducting numerous stakeholder meetings in developing the risk study for decommissioning SFPs. Although this rulemaking plan is primarily based on the best available technical information on SFP risk, the staff has tried to factor into the plan considerations and issues raised by both public and industry stakeholders while maintaining an independence from either side. The staff will continue to work with stakeholders throughout the rulemaking process. The rulemaking plan also recommends coherent, logical, practical, and predictable regulations in areas of nuclear power plant decommissioning where none currently exist. By clearly stating the agency's goals and objectives in the decommissioning regulations, public confidence is also enhanced. The third performance goal which the rulemaking plan accomplishes is reducing unnecessary regulatory burden. The staff believes that it has utilized the information in the technical study on SFP accident risk to develop regulatory strategies that reduce requirements for decommissioning licensees while maintaining safety. For example, under the proposed rulemaking plan, licensees should be able to reduce EP and safeguards regulatory requirements sooner after permanently shutting down than presently permitted. Finally, the rulemaking plan meets the fourth performance goal of improving staff efficiency, effectiveness, and realism by removing the NRC from the approval process. Specifically, the staff recommends that decommissioning licensees be permitted to implement reduced EP or safeguards requirements without NRC review or approval of the detailed plans. Thus, it is the staff's conclusion that the attached rulemaking plan supports the strategic goals of the NRC.
The staff believes that the proposed rulemaking would not have any backfit implications and therefore does not require a backfit analysis under 10 CFR 50.109. The recommended regulatory changes in this rulemaking plan could be viewed as a voluntary relaxation, since the rule will be written such that licensees could either continue to maintain their existing EP, insurance, physical security, staffing requirements, and backfit policy or adopt the proposed new regulations in each area. Since licensees would not be compelled to change their existing programs, there would be no "imposed change" constituting a backfit as defined in Section 50.109(a)(1).
Development of nuclear power plant decommissioning regulations based on the recommendations in this rulemaking plan would not result in any inconsistencies in the exemptions or amendments processed for plants already permanently shutdown.
The following paragraphs summarize the recommended regulatory changes proposed in the rulemaking plan.
This part of the integrated rulemaking recommends that new regulations be developed and included in 10 CFR 50.47 and 10 CFR 50.54 to specify appropriate levels of EP requirements for decommissioning nuclear power plants. The approach would allow a significant reduction in the level of EP when at least 1 year of spent fuel decay time has elapsed after a nuclear power plant has permanently shutdown, if the licensee implements industry and staff risk reduction measures described in the SFP risk study. After at least 1 year of spent fuel decay time, the decommissioning licensee would be able to reduce its EP program to one similar to that required for a monitored retrievable storage installation under 10 CFR 72.32(b). This could be done without NRC approval and there would no longer be a requirement for detailed offsite radiological emergency response plans. There would be additional EP reductions when (1) 5 years of spent fuel decay time has elapsed or (2) a licensee has demonstrated that the decay heat level of spent fuel in the pool is low enough that the fuel would not be susceptible to a zirconium fire if all coolant were drained from the SFP. The EP program would be similar to that required for an independent spent fuel storage installation (ISFSI) under 10 CFR 72.32(a) when fuel stored in the SFP has more than 5 years of decay time and would not change substantially when all the fuel is transferred from the SFP to an onsite ISFSI. EP under Part 50 or Part 72 would no longer be required when there is no spent fuel onsite and no other radiological hazards exist onsite that could cause offsite doses in the event of a radiological accident to exceed the EPA PAGs at the site boundary. However, a licensee would still be required under 10 CFR 30.32(i) and 10 CFR 30.72 to determine if other radioactive materials onsite require EP.
The staff has kept the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) informed of the development and recommendations of this rulemaking plan. FEMA has not at this time endorsed the plan or the recommended option the staff has proposed for EP. The staff is continuing to work with FEMA to obtain a consensus on the proposed timing and level of EP required for a nuclear power plant that has entered decommissioning. The staff will obtain FEMA's view on the proposed rule before submitting it to the Commission for approval.
The staff proposes amendments to 10 CFR 50.54(w) and 10 CFR 140.11 to allow phased reductions in the required level of onsite and offsite insurance coverage either when (1) a decommissioning licensee has demonstrated that the decay heat level of spent fuel in the pool is low enough that the fuel would not be susceptible to a zirconium fire if all coolant were drained from the SFP or (2) 5 years of spent fuel decay time has elapsed. When either of these criteria are met, licensees would be permitted to reduce onsite property damage insurance coverage from $1.06 billion to $25 million. No onsite insurance would be required after spent fuel is removed from the pool. Offsite liability insurance would drop, with primary coverage reduced from $200 million to $100 million and licensees no longer required to participate in the secondary retrospective rating pool. Offsite coverage would be further reduced to $25 million when spent fuel is removed from the pool.
The staff proposes using 10 CFR 73.55, "Requirements for physical protection of licensed activities in nuclear power reactors against radiological sabotage," as a starting point to develop a new rule that addresses the threat of sabotage at decommissioning plants. This new rule would contain the critical elements of Section 73.55 (e.g., physical barriers, armed security personnel, and vehicle control measures), but would reduce the requirements where appropriate to adequately safeguard and establish a protected area around the main security concern at a decommissioning plant -- the SFP.
The new rule would also be consistent with the safeguards requirements for ISFSIs and would not lead to a result where ISFSI regulations were more stringent than those proposed for decommissioning nuclear power plants. When all spent fuel is transferred to a dry storage ISFSI, existing safeguards regulations specified in Section 73.51 would apply. When all spent fuel is removed from the site, safeguards would no longer be required consistent with the current scope of Part 73.
This part of the integrated rulemaking would amend 10 CFR 50.54(m), 10 CFR 50.120, and the definitions section of 10 CFR Part 50 to specify appropriate levels of training and qualifications for operations and support staff at decommissioning nuclear power plants. The recommended changes would establish the regulatory requirements for the licensee's certified fuel handler program and codify appropriate staff levels at permanently shutdown and defueled reactor facilities consistent with current exemption practices. By codifying the regulations in this area, consistent, predictable requirements would be established and unnecessary regulatory burden could be eliminated. The proposed changes define the minimum staffing and training levels and should help provide assurance that permanently shutdown facilities are properly maintained, systems are safely operated, radiological activities are safely performed, and emergency response capability is preserved.
The staff proposes dividing 10 CFR 50.109, "Backfitting," into two parts. One part of the new Section 50.109 will apply to operating reactors, and one part will apply to decommissioning reactors. The operating reactor part will remain virtually the same as the current Section 50.109 with minor changes to accommodate the addition of a section that pertains to decommissioning reactors. The new decommissioning reactor section will resemble the current backfit regulations for operating reactors, except that language that does not apply to decommissioning reactors would be removed or changed.
Because the proposed rulemaking plan concerns nuclear power plant decommissioning, it would not result in compatibility or implementation issues for Agreement States.
The Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research contributed to the development and coordination of the technical basis for the rulemaking plan. The Office of General Counsel (OGC) has no legal objection to the rulemaking plan. However, OGC has not reviewed the draft regulatory language in the appendices of the rulemaking plan in detail, and expresses no legal opinion on the acceptability of the draft language. OGC will review the regulatory language at the proposed rule stage. The Office of the Chief Financial Officer has reviewed this Commission Paper for resource implications and concurs. The Office of State and Tribal Programs has no objections to the rulemaking plan and concurs. The Office of the Chief Information Officer has reviewed the rulemaking plan for information technology and information management implications and concurs. The plan suggests changes in information collection requirements that may require submission to the Office of Management and Budget when the rule is forwarded to the Office of the Federal Register for publication.
The resource estimate for the staff to complete this rulemaking is approximately 6 FTE (1.5 FTE in FY 2000, 2.5 FTE in FY 2001, and 2 FTE in FY 2002). These resources are available within the current budget since this rulemaking was explicitly included in NRR's FY 2000 budget and proposed budgets for FY 2001 and FY 2002. Contractor support is estimated in FY 2001 at $250K, of which $170K is budgeted and $80K will be reprogrammed from within the NRR FY 2001 budget.
Based on the current status of the nuclear power industry and the information the staff has developed for this rulemaking plan, the staff proposes two options:
The staff recommends Option 1. The staff has the resources and technical information available to implement Option 2 at this time but would prefer to delay moving forward on this rulemaking until the staff reassesses whether a more comprehensive, broader-scope, decommissioning regulatory improvement rulemaking plan is still justified. The staff will address any additional decommissioning regulatory improvements beyond Option 2 in a paper to be provided to the Commission by September 15, 2000.
In addition, to facilitate continued stakeholder interaction in development of the decommissioning regulatory improvements, the staff intends to make this SECY publicly available within 10 days of the date of this paper unless otherwise directed by the Commission.
| /RA by Frank J. Miraglia Acting For/
William D. Travers |
| CONTACT: | Bill Huffman, NRR/DLPM (301) 415-1141 Phillip Ray, NRR/DLPM |
[ see PDF 
file for attachments ]
| Attachments: | 1. Rulemaking Plan 2. Staff Responses to NEI White Paper Comments |
|
Privacy Policy |
Site Disclaimer |