[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 55 (Wednesday, March 21, 2012)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 16483-16484]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-6843]


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 Proposed Rules
                                                 Federal Register
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 This section of the FEDERAL REGISTER contains notices to the public of 
 the proposed issuance of rules and regulations. The purpose of these 
 notices is to give interested persons an opportunity to participate in 
 the rule making prior to the adoption of the final rules.
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  Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 55 / Wednesday, March 21, 2012 / 
Proposed Rules  

[[Page 16483]]



NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

10 CFR Part 50

[Docket Nos. PRM-50-101; NRC-2011-0189]


Petition for Rulemaking Submitted by the Natural Resources 
Defense Council, Inc.

AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

ACTION: Petition for rulemaking; consideration in the rulemaking 
process.

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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC or the Commission) 
will consider the issues raised in the petition for rulemaking (PRM), 
PRM-50-101, submitted by the Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. 
(NRDC or the petitioner), in the rulemaking process. The petitioner 
requests that the NRC amend its regulations to require each operating 
and new reactor licensee to establish station blackout (SBO) mitigation 
strategies and resources. The NRC determined that the issues raised in 
the PRM are appropriate for consideration and will consider them in the 
planned ``Station Blackout'' rulemaking.

DATES: The docket for the petition for rulemaking, PRM-50-101, is 
closed on March 21, 2012.

ADDRESSES: Further NRC action on the issues raised by this petition 
will be accessible on the Federal rulemaking Web site, http://www.regulations.gov, by searching on Docket ID NRC-2011-0299, which is 
the rulemaking docket for the planned SBO rulemaking.
    You can access publicly available documents related to the petition 
using the following methods:
     NRC's Public Document Room (PDR): The public may examine 
and have copied, for a fee, publicly available documents at the NRC's 
PDR, O1-F21, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, 
Maryland 20852.
     NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System 
(ADAMS):
    Publicly available documents created or received at the NRC are 
available online in the NRC Library at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. From this page, the public can gain entry into ADAMS, which 
provides text and image files of the NRC's public documents. If you do 
not have access to ADAMS or if there are problems in accessing the 
documents located in ADAMS, contact the NRC's PDR reference staff at 1-
800-397-4209, 301-415-4737, or by email to [email protected].
     Federal Rulemaking Web Site: Supporting materials related 
to this petition can be found at http://www.regulations.gov by 
searching on the Docket IDs for PRM-50-101 and the planned SBO 
rulemaking, NRC-2011-0189 and NRC-2011-0299, respectively. Address 
questions about NRC dockets to Carol Gallagher, telephone: 301-492-
3668; email: [email protected].

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Tim Reed, Office of Nuclear Reactor 
Regulation, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555; 
telephone: 301-415-1462; email: [email protected]; or Scott Sloan, 
Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission, Washington, DC 20555; telephone: 301-415-1619; email: 
[email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

The Petition

    On September 20, 2011, the NRC published a notice of receipt (76 FR 
58165) of six PRMs filed by the NRDC, including PRM-50-101. The 
petitioner solely and specifically cited the ``Recommendations for 
Enhancing Reactor Safety in the 21st Century: The Near-Term Task Force 
Review of Insights from the Fukushima Dai-ichi Accident'' (Fukushima 
Task Force Report, ADAMS Accession No. ML111861807), dated July 12, 
2011, as the rationale for the PRMs. For PRM-50-101, the petitioner 
cites Section 4.2.1, pages 32-39, of the Fukushima Task Force Report, 
regarding the enhancement of the ability of nuclear power plants to 
deal with the effect of prolonged SBO conditions at single and 
multiunit sites without damage to the nuclear fuel in the reactor or 
spent fuel pool and without the loss of reactor coolant system or 
primary containment integrity. At the time of receipt of the PRMs, the 
Commission was still in the process of reviewing the Fukushima Task 
Force Report, and the NRC did not institute a public comment period for 
the PRMs.
    In PRM-50-101, the petitioner requests the NRC to institute a 
rulemaking proceeding applicable to nuclear facilities licensed under 
Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR) parts 50, 52, and 
other applicable regulations to revise 10 CFR 50.63 to require each 
operating and new reactor licensee to (1) establish a minimum coping 
time of 8 hours for a loss of all alternating current (AC) power, (2) 
establish the equipment, procedures, and training necessary to 
implement an ``extended loss of all AC'' coping time of 72 hours for 
core and spent fuel cooling and for reactor coolant system and primary 
containment integrity as needed, and (3) preplan and prestage offsite 
resources to support uninterrupted core and spent fuel pool cooling and 
reactor cooling and reactor coolant system and containment integrity as 
needed, including the ability to deliver the equipment to the site in 
the time period allowed for extending coping, under conditions 
involving significant degradation of offsite transportation 
infrastructure associated with significant natural disasters.

Reasons for Consideration

    The Commission has established a process for addressing a number of 
the recommendations in the Fukushima Task Force Report, and the NRC 
determined that the issues raised in PRM-50-101 are appropriate for 
consideration and will consider them in the planned SBO rulemaking 
based on Section 4.2.1 of the Fukushima Task Force Report 
(Recommendation 4.1). The public will have the opportunity to provide 
comments on the issues raised by the petitioner in PRM-50-101 as part 
of the SBO rulemaking. The NRC will consider the issues raised by the 
remaining NRDC PRMs through the process the Commission establishes for 
addressing the remaining recommendations in the Fukushima Task Force 
Report. This PRM docket is closed.

    Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 12th day of March 2012.

[[Page 16484]]

    For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
R.W. Borchardt,
Executive Director for Operations.
[FR Doc. 2012-6843 Filed 3-20-12; 8:45 am]
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