[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 192 (Wednesday, October 3, 2012)]
[Notices]
[Pages 60481-60482]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-24395]


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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

[NRC-2011-0296]


Design, Inspection, and Testing Criteria for Air Filtration and 
Adsorption Units of Post-Accident Engineered-Safety-Feature Atmosphere 
Cleanup Systems in Light-Water-Cooled Nuclear Power Plants

AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

ACTION: Regulatory guide; issuance.

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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC or the Commission) 
is issuing a revision to Regulatory Guide (RG) 1.52, ``Design, 
Inspection, and Testing Criteria for Air Filtration and Adsorption 
Units of Post-accident Engineered-Safety-Feature Atmosphere Cleanup 
Systems in Light-Water-Cooled Nuclear Power Plants.'' This guide 
applies to the design, inspection, and testing of air filtration and 
iodine adsorption units of engineered-safety-feature (ESF) atmosphere 
cleanup systems in light-water-cooled nuclear power plants.

ADDRESSES: Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2011-0296 when contacting the 
NRC about the availability of information regarding this document. You 
may access information related to this document, which the NRC 
possesses and are publicly available, using any of the following 
methods:
     Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2011-0296. Address 
questions about NRC dockets to Carol Gallagher; telephone: 301-492-
3668; email: [email protected].
     NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System 
(ADAMS): You may access publicly available documents online in the NRC 
Library at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. To begin the 
search, select ``ADAMS Public Documents'' and then select ``Begin Web-
based ADAMS Search.'' For problems with ADAMS, please contact the NRC's 
Public Document Room (PDR) reference staff at 1-800-397-4209, 301-415-
4737, or by email to [email protected]. The ADAMS accession number 
for each document referenced in this notice (if that document is 
available in ADAMS) is provided the first time that a document is 
referenced. Revision 4 of Regulatory Guide 1.52 is available in ADAMS 
under Accession No. ML12159A013. The regulatory analysis may be found 
in ADAMS under Accession No. ML12159A538.
     NRC's PDR: You may examine and purchase copies of public 
documents at the NRC's PDR, Room O1-F21, One White Flint North, 11555 
Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852.
    Regulatory guides are not copyrighted, and NRC approval is not 
required to reproduce them.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mekonnen Bayssie, Regulatory Guide 
Development Branch, Division of Engineering, Office of Nuclear 
Regulatory Research, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 
20555-0001; telephone: 301-251-7489; email: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. Introduction

    The NRC is issuing a revision to an existing guide in the NRC's 
``Regulatory Guide'' series. This series was developed to describe and 
make available to the public information such as methods that are 
acceptable to the NRC staff for implementing specific parts of the 
agency's regulations, techniques that the staff uses in evaluating 
specific problems or postulated accidents, and data that the staff 
needs in its review of applications for permits and licenses.
    Revision 4 of RG 1.52 was issued with a temporary identification as 
Draft Regulatory Guide, DG-1274. This guide provides a method that the 
NRC considers acceptable to implement part 50 of Title 10 of the Code 
of Federal Regulations (10 CFR), ``Domestic Licensing of Production and 
Utilization Facilities,'' Appendix A, ``General Design Criteria for 
Nuclear Power Plants,'' as it applies to the design, inspection, and 
testing of air filtration and iodine adsorption units of ESF atmosphere 
cleanup systems in light-water-cooled nuclear power plants. For the 
purposes of this guide, ESF atmosphere cleanup systems are those 
systems that are credited in the licensee's current design-basis 
accident (DBA) analysis, as described in the safety analysis report 
(SAR), or those systems that the licensee has described in the SAR as 
ESF atmosphere cleanup systems. This guide addresses ESF atmosphere 
cleanup systems, including the various components and ductwork, in the 
postulated DBA environment.
    The NRC published the previous Revision 3 of this RG in June 2001. 
Since this publication, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers 
(ASME) Committee on Nuclear Air and Gas Treatment (CONAGT) has expanded 
the scope of equipment covered by ASME AG-1, ``Code on Nuclear Air and 
Gas Treatment.'' The NRC staff had previously endorsed earlier 
revisions of ASME-AG-1 in RG 1.52. The revision to ASME-AG-1 
consolidated select requirements from ASME-N509, ``Nuclear Power Plant 
Air-Cleaning Units and Components,'' ASME-N510, ``Testing of Nuclear 
Air-Treatment Systems,'' and other documents previously endorsed by the 
NRC staff in RG 1.52. In addition, CONAGT has developed and published a 
new standard, ASME-N511-2007, ``Inservice Testing of Nuclear Air 
Treatment, Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning Systems.'' This new 
standard provides comprehensive test and inspection requirements and is 
written to complement the expanded ASME-AG-1. Revision 4 of this RG is 
necessary to address these changes to the referenced industry 
standards.

II. Further Information

    DG-1274 was published in the Federal Register on December 30, 2011 
(76 FR 82323), for a 60-day public comment period. The public comment 
period closed on February 25, 2012. Public comments on DG-1274 and the 
staff responses to the public comments are available under ADAMS 
Accession No. ML12159A049.

III. Backfitting and Issue Finality

    Issuance of this final regulatory guide does not constitute 
backfitting as defined in 10 CFR 50.109 (the Backfit Rule) and is not 
otherwise inconsistent with the issue finality provisions in 10 CFR 
Part 52. As discussed in the ``Implementation'' section of this 
regulatory guide, the NRC has no current intention to impose this 
regulatory guide on holders of current operating licenses or combined 
licenses.
    This regulatory guide may be applied to applications for operating 
licenses and combined licenses docketed by the NRC as of the date of 
issuance of the final regulatory guide, as well as future applications 
for operating licenses and combined licenses submitted after the 
issuance of the regulatory guide. Such action does not constitute 
backfitting as

[[Page 60482]]

defined in 10 CRF 50.109(a)(1) and is not otherwise inconsistent with 
the applicable issue finality provision in 10 CFR Part 52, inasmuch as 
such applicants or potential applicants are not within the scope of 
entities protected by the Backfit Rule or the relevant issue finality 
provisions in Part 52.

    Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 26th day of Sept., 2012.

    For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Thomas H. Boyce,
Chief, Regulatory Guide Development Branch, Division of Engineering, 
Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research.
[FR Doc. 2012-24395 Filed 10-2-12; 8:45 am]
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