[Federal Register Volume 80, Number 84 (Friday, May 1, 2015)]
[Notices]
[Pages 24981-24982]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2015-10128]


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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

[NRC-2015-0060]


Heat Release Rates of Electrical Enclosure Fires (HELEN-FIRE)

AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

ACTION: Draft NUREG; request for comment.

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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for 
public comment a draft NUREG, NUREG/CR-7197, ``Heat Release Rates of 
Electrical Enclosure Fires (HELEN-FIRE).''

DATES: Submit comments by June 15, 2015. Comments received after this 
date will be considered if it is practical to do so, but the Commission 
is able to ensure consideration only for comments received before this 
date.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments by any of the following methods 
(unless this document describes a different method for submitting 
comments on a specific subject):
     Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2015-0060. Address 
questions about NRC dockets to Carol Gallagher; telephone: 301-415-
3463; email: [email protected]. For technical questions, contact 
the individual listed in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section of 
this document.
     Mail comments to: Cindy Bladey, Office of Administration, 
Mail Stop: OWFN-12-H08, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, 
DC 20555-0001.
    For additional direction on obtaining information and submitting 
comments, see ``Obtaining Information and Submitting Comments'' in the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: David Stroup, Office of Nuclear 
Regulatory Research; telephone: 301-251-7609; email: 
[email protected]; U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, 
DC 20555-0001.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. Obtaining Information and Submitting Comments

A. Obtaining Information

    Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2015-0060 when contacting the NRC 
about the availability of information for this action. You may obtain 
publicly-available information related to this action by any of the 
following methods:
     Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2015-0060.
     NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System 
(ADAMS): You may obtain publicly-available documents online in the 
ADAMS Public Documents collection 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 (if it is available 
in ADAMS) is provided the first time that it is mentioned in the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section. Draft NUREG/CR-7197, ``Heat Release 
Rates of Electrical Enclosure Fires (HELEN-FIRE)'' is available in 
ADAMS under Accession No. ML15075A495.
     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.

B. Submitting Comments

    Please include Docket ID NRC-2015-0060 in the subject line of your 
comment submission.
    The NRC cautions you not to include identifying or contact 
information that you do not want to be publically disclosed in your 
comment submission. The NRC will post all comment submissions at http://www.regulations.gov as well as enter the comment submissions into 
ADAMS. The NRC does not routinely edit comment submissions to remove 
identifying or contact information.
    If you are requesting or aggregating comments from other persons 
for submission to the NRC, then you should inform those persons not to 
include

[[Page 24982]]

identifying or contact information that they do not want to be publicly 
disclosed in their comment submission. Your request should state that 
the NRC does not routinely edit comment submissions to remove such 
information before making the comment submissions available to the 
public or entering the comment into ADAMS.

II. Discussion

    Electrical enclosures are a potential source of fire in nuclear 
power plants because they contain both combustible materials and live 
electrical circuits. These fires have the potential to disrupt power, 
instrumentation, and control in the plant. Key parameters affecting 
fire in an electrical enclosure include its size, openings, electrical 
voltage, and combustible load. This report documents the results from 
112 full-scale experiments conducted by the National Institute of 
Standards and Technology at the Chesapeake Bay Detachment of the Naval 
Research Laboratory to better quantify the heat release rate (HRR) and 
burning behavior of electrical enclosures. Eight electrical enclosures 
were acquired from Bellefonte Nuclear Generating Station, a plant owned 
by the Tennessee Valley Authority located in Hollywood, Alabama. The 
enclosures were originally low voltage control cabinets, but in the 
experiments they were reconfigured with various amounts and types of 
electrical cable to represent other kinds of enclosures that would be 
found in a typical plant. An oxygen consumption calorimeter was built 
on site to measure the HRR of the fire as a function of time. The peak 
HRR varied from 0.3 kW to 576 kW.

    Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 21st day of April 2015.

    For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Mark Henry Salley,
Chief, Fire Research Branch, Division of Risk Analysis, Office of 
Nuclear Regulatory Research.
[FR Doc. 2015-10128 Filed 4-30-15; 8:45 am]
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