[Federal Register Volume 71, Number 13 (Friday, January 20, 2006)]
[Notices]
[Pages 3344-3345]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E6-625]


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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION


Nuclear Information and Resource Service All Nuclear Power Plants 
That Use Hemyc/MT Fire Barriers Notice of Issuance of Director's 
Decision Under 10 CFR 2.206

    Notice is hereby given that the Director, Office of Nuclear Reactor 
Regulation, has issued a Director's Decision with regard to a petition 
dated May 12, 2005, filed by Paul Gunter on behalf of the Nuclear 
Information and Resource Service, Citizens Awareness Network, Indian 
Point Safe Coalition, North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction 
Network, Alliance for Affordable Energy, and Blue Ridge Environmental 
Defense League, hereinafter referred to as the ``petitioners.'' The 
petition was supplemented on June 1, 2005. The petition concerns the 
operation of all nuclear power plants that use Hemyc/MT fire barriers.
    The petition requested that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 
(NRC) engage in enforcement actions to modify and/or suspend operating 
licenses for Shearon Harris Nuclear Power Station Unit 1, H. B. 
Robinson Unit 2, McGuire Units 1 and 2, Catawba Units 1 and 2, Ginna, 
James A. Fitzpatrick, Indian Point Units 2 and 3, Vermont Yankee, 
Waterford Unit 3, and Arkansas Nuclear One Units 1 and 2.
    As the basis for the requests, the petitioners cited a meeting on 
April 29, 2005, held by NRC with all stakeholders to discuss the 
performance of 1-hour (Hemyc) and 3-hour (MT) fire barriers for 
Electrical Raceways during full scale fire testing. In that meeting the 
NRC staff informed all stakeholders that the Hemyc/MT electrical 
raceway fire barrier system (ERFBS) failed to protect electrical cables 
for 1 hour/3 hours in fire tests that were performed to the American 
Society of Testing and Materials (ASTM) Standard E119. The petitioners' 
request was also based on the following conclusions made by the 
petitioners: (1) The same Hemyc/MT fire barrier wrap systems as 
installed in the above nuclear plants fail to assure the protection of 
the control room operations for achieving safe shutdown

[[Page 3345]]

of the reactor in the event of a significant fire, (2) NRC has not 
quantified the full extent of the amount of Hemyc/MT fire barrier 
material in terms of linear and/or square footage deployed per fire 
protection regulation, and NRC has not determined the safety 
significance of this deployment for safe shutdown systems that are not 
currently protected by these fire barriers, and (3) the petitioners 
believe that the above listed nuclear power stations are operating in 
violation of NRC fire protection requirements and in an unanalyzed 
condition resulting in a degradation of defense-in-depth fire 
protection and safe shut down in the event of a significant fire.
    The petitioners requested that the NRC take the following actions:
    (1) Collect information through generic communications with nuclear 
industry and specifically with the named reactor sites to determine the 
extent of condition of the inoperable fire barriers; including the 
requirement that the licensees conduct a full inventory of the type 
Hemyc/MT to include the amount in linear and square footage, its 
specific applications, and the identification of safe shutdown systems, 
which are currently unprotected by the noncompliance and an assessment 
of the safety significance of each application;
    (2) The communication should require, at minimum that the above-
named sites provide justification for operation in noncompliance with 
all applicable fire protection regulations; and
    (3) With the determination that any and/or all of the above-
mentioned sites are operating in unanalyzed condition and/or that 
assurance of public health and safety is degraded, promptly order a 
suspension of the license or a power reduction of the affected reactors 
until such time as it can be demonstrated that the licensees are 
operating in conformance with all other applicable fire protection 
regulations.
    In a letter dated June 27, 2005, the NRC informed the petitioners 
that the issues in the petition were accepted for review under Section 
2.206 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR) and had been referred 
to the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation for appropriate action. A 
copy of the acknowledgment letter is publicly available in the NRC's 
Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS) under 
Accession No. ML051740562. A copy of the petition is publicly available 
in ADAMS under Accession No. ML051440209.
    The petitioners' representatives held a teleconference with the 
Petition Review Board to discuss the petition on June 1, 2005. The 
teleconference transcript was treated as a supplement to the petition 
and is publicly available in ADAMS under Accession No. ML051640452.
    The NRC sent a copy of the proposed Director's Decision to the 
petitioners for comment on October 20, 2005 (Accession No. 
ML052630411). The NRC staff did not receive any comments on the 
proposed Director's Decision.
    The Director of the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation has 
determined that, with regard to Request Nos. 1 and 2, the NRC staff has 
granted the petitioners' request through the generic communication 
process. Specifically, the NRC staff is planning to issue a Generic 
Letter (GL) to all licensees asking them to provide detailed 
information about the use of Hemyc/MT in their nuclear power plants. In 
response to Request No. 3, the NRC staff is planning to review all 
affected plants in detail and will take appropriate actions to resolve 
the issues with the use of Hemyc/MT material commensurate with the 
safety significance of the protected systems. The GL will be issued 
after the NRC's internal review process to consider comments received 
on the proposed GL is completed.
    The reasons for these decisions are explained in the Director's 
Decision pursuant to 10 CFR 2.206 (DD-06-01), the complete text of 
which is available in ADAMS, and is available for inspection at the 
Commission's Public Document Room (PDR), located at One White Flint 
North, Public File Area O1 F21, 11555 Rockville Pike (first floor), 
Rockville, Maryland, and from the ADAMS Public Library component on the 
NRC Web site, 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 at 1-800-397-4209 or 301-
415-4737, or by e-mail to [email protected].
    A copy of the Director's Decision will be filed with the Secretary 
of the Commission for the Commission's review in accordance with 10 CFR 
2.206 of the Commission's regulations. As provided for by this 
regulation, the Director's Decision will constitute the final action of 
the Commission 25 days after the date of the decision, unless the 
Commission, on its own motion, institutes a review of the Director's 
Decision in that time.

    Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 9th day of January 2006.

    For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
J.E. Dyer,
Director, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
[FR Doc. E6-625 Filed 1-19-06; 8:45 am]
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