[Federal Register Volume 68, Number 210 (Thursday, October 30, 2003)]
[Notices]
[Pages 61838-61839]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 03-27328]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
[Docket No. 72-26]
Pacific Gas and Electric Company; Notice of Issuance of
Environmental Assessment and Finding of No Significant Impact for the
Diablo Canyon Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC or the Commission) is
considering issuance of a materials license under the requirements of
Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 72 (10 CFR Part 72),
to the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (the applicant), authorizing
the construction and operation of an independent spent fuel storage
installation (ISFSI) to be located at the Diablo Canyon Power Plant
(DCPP) in San Luis Obispo County, California. The Commission's Office
of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards has completed its review of
the environmental report submitted by the applicant on December 21,
2001, as amended by letter dated October 15, 2002, in support of its
application for a materials license. The staff's ``Environmental
Assessment Related to the Construction and Operation of the Diablo
Canyon Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation'' has been issued in
accordance with 10 CFR Part 51.
Summary of Environmental Assessment (EA)
Description of the Proposed Action: The proposed licensing action
would authorize the applicant to construct and operate a dry storage
ISFSI at the DCPP site. The purpose of the ISFSI is to provide for
additional interim storage of spent nuclear fuel generated from the
operation of the Diablo Canyon Power Plant, Units 1 and 2. The proposed
ISFSI would employ the HI-STORM 100 dry cask storage system designed by
Holtec International, Inc. The major components of the system include
the steel multipurpose canisters (MPCs), each containing 24 or 32 spent
fuel assemblies; the concrete overpacks, which provide additional
shielding for the MPCs in storage; and the transfer cask, used to move
loaded and sealed MPCs from the fuel handling building to the ISFSI. A
license issued for an ISFSI under 10 CFR Part 72 is issued for a fixed
period not to exceed 20 years. A license holder may apply to the
Commission to renew the license prior to its expiration.
Need for the Proposed Action: The Diablo Canyon ISFSI is needed to
provide additional spent fuel storage capacity so that the two DCPP
reactors can continue to generate electricity beyond 2006, when the
storage capacity of the plant's two spent fuel pools will be reached. A
delay in the availability of this additional storage capacity may cause
a reduction in power operation, or could necessitate the shutdown of
Units 1 and 2. By providing additional capacity for temporary spent
fuel storage with the proposed ISFSI, sufficient space can be
maintained in each unit's spent fuel pool to fully offload its reactor
core, if necessary, enabling the applicant to continue to operate both
units until the current operating licenses expire (September 2021 for
Unit 1 and April 2025 for Unit 2).
Environmental Impacts of the Proposed Action: The NRC staff has
concluded that the construction, operation, and decommissioning of the
Diablo Canyon ISFSI will not result in a significant impact to the
environment. Construction impacts of the ISFSI will be minor, and
limited to the small area of the ISFSI site and the excavated material
disposal sites. The site chosen for the ISFSI, on approximately 5 acres
of the 760 acre DCPP site, has been previously disturbed during plant
construction, as have the disposal sites for the excavated material.
The proposed ISFSI site and the disposal areas have been extensively
surveyed and no federal or state listed threatened or endangered
species have been found in those areas. Thus, the staff does not expect
the proposed ISFSI to impact any threatened or endangered species.
There will be minor impacts of increased noise and dust from
construction equipment and activities during the construction phase,
but this phase will be of short duration and will not impact offsite
populations. The proposed ISFSI site is near a site which is included
in the National Register of Historic Places, CA-SLO-2, but construction
of the ISFSI will not cause any adverse impacts to that site, due to
the natural features and to the administrative controls employed by the
applicant.
There will be no significant radiological or non-radiological
environmental impacts from routine operation of the ISFSI. The ISFSI is
a passive facility and no liquid or gaseous effluents will be released
from the storage casks. The dose rates from the spent fuel will be
limited by the design of the storage cask concrete overpacks. The total
occupational dose to workers at the DCPP site may increase slightly due
to work associated with loading, transferring, and storing the casks,
but all occupational doses must be maintained below the limits
specified in 10 CFR Part 20. The annual dose to the nearest resident
from ISFSI activities is estimated to be 0.40 mrem/year, which is
significantly below the annual dose limits specified in 10 CFR 72.104
and 10 CFR 20.1301(a) (25 mrem and 100 mrem, respectively). The
cumulative dose to an individual offsite from all site activities will
be 0.45 mrem/year, which is also much less than the limits specified in
10 CFR 72.104 and 10 CFR 20.1301. These doses are also a small fraction
of the doses resulting from naturally-occurring terrestrial and cosmic
radiation of about 100 mrem/yr in the vicinity of the DCPP.
Additionally, occupational doses received by facility workers will not
exceed the limits specified in 10 CFR 20.1201. For hypothetical
accidents, the calculated dose to an individual at the nearest site
boundary is well below the 5 rem limit for accidents set forth in 10
CFR 72.106(b) and in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's
protective action guidelines.
The impacts from decommissioning the ISFSI will be much less than
the minor impacts of construction and operation. Very small
occupational exposures could occur during decontamination activities,
if they are necessary, and minor noise and dust impacts could result
from dismantling the pad and structures.
Alternatives to the Proposed Action: The applicant's Environmental
Report and the staff's EA discussed several alternatives to the
proposed ISFSI. These alternatives included shipment of spent fuel off
site, and other methods to increase onsite spent fuel storage capacity,
as well as the no action alternative. In the first category, the
alternatives of shipping spent fuel from Diablo Canyon to a permanent
Federal Repository, to a reprocessing facility, or to a privately owned
spent fuel storage facility were determined to be non-viable
alternatives, as no such facilities
[[Page 61839]]
are currently available in the United States, and shipping the spent
fuel overseas is impractical in light of the political, legal, and
logistical uncertainties and the high cost. Shipping the DCPP spent
fuel to another nuclear power plant was also determined to be a non-
viable alternative, because the receiving utility would have to be
licensed to store the DCPP spent fuel, and it is unlikely that another
utility would be willing to accept it, in light of their own
limitations on spent fuel storage capacity.
Other onsite storage alternatives considered by the applicant
included increasing the capacity of the existing spent fuel pools by
re-racking or spent fuel rod consolidation, or construction of a new
spent fuel storage pool. The applicant has previously amended the DCPP
licenses to permit re-racking, and although further re-racking is
possible, it could require extensive modifications to the spent fuel
pools and supporting systems, and would not accommodate all of the
spent fuel to be generated for the duration of the plant's current
operating licenses. Spent fuel rod consolidation is also possible, but
would require replacement of the existing storage racks to support the
greater weight of the consolidated assemblies, and would require
extensive operational resources to reconfigure all the fuel assemblies
currently in storage. This alternative was also considered impractical,
due to the high cost and the significant occupational exposure to be
incurred. Similarly, although the applicant could construct an
additional spent fuel pool, the high cost associated with constructing
and maintaining such a facility and all of the necessary support
equipment, coupled with the significant occupational exposures
resulting from the extensive fuel handling operations, make this
alternative impractical.
The no action alternative could result in the extended or permanent
shutdown of both DCPP units many years before the expiration of their
current operating licenses, once the current capacity of the units'
spent fuel pools is reached. The electrical generation capacity lost
would likely be replaced by fossil-fueled plants, which could result in
greater environmental impacts and higher costs for electricity. In the
short-term, the shutdown of the DCPP would have a negative impact on
the local economy and infrastructure. For these reasons, the no action
alternative is not considered a practical alternative.
As discussed in the EA, the Commission has concluded there are no
significant environmental impacts associated with the proposed Diablo
Canyon ISFSI, and other alternatives were not pursued because of
significantly higher costs, additional occupational exposures, and the
unavailability of offsite storage options.
Agencies and Persons Contacted: Officials from the California
Energy Commission (CEC), the California Office of Historic Preservation
and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service were contacted in preparing the
staff's environmental assessment. The CEC provided comments by letter
dated August 12, 2003; these comments have been addressed in the EA.
Finding of No Significant Impact
The staff has reviewed the environmental impacts of the proposed
ISFSI relative to the requirements set forth in 10 CFR Part 51, and has
prepared an Environmental Assessment. Based on the EA, the staff
concludes that there are no significant radiological or non-
radiological impacts associated with the proposed action and that
issuance of a license for the interim storage of spent nuclear fuel at
the Diablo Canyon ISFSI will have no significant impact on the quality
of the human environment. Therefore, pursuant to 10 CFR 51.31 and
51.32, a finding of no significant impact is appropriate and an
environmental impact statement need not be prepared for the issuance of
a materials license for the Diablo Canyon ISFSI.
Further details related to this proposed action are provided in the
license application, dated December 21, 2001, as amended October 15,
2002, and the staff's EA, dated October 24, 2003. These documents and
others related to this proposed action are available for public
inspection and copying at the Commission's Public Document Room, One
White Flint North Building, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland,
or from the publicly available records component of NRC's Agencywide
Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS). ADAMS is accessible
from the NRC web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html (the
Public Electronic Reading Room). Persons who do not have access to
ADAMS, or who encounter problems in accessing the documents located in
ADAMS, should contact the NRC PDR Reference staff by telephone at 1-
800-397-4209, 301-415-4737, or by e-mail at [email protected].
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 24th day of October, 2003.
For the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
James R. Hall,
Senior Project Manager, Spent Fuel Project Office, Office of Nuclear
Material Safety and Safeguards.
[FR Doc. 03-27328 Filed 10-29-03; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 7590-01-P