[Federal Register Volume 82, Number 75 (Thursday, April 20, 2017)]
[Notices]
[Pages 18677-18678]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2017-08015]
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
[Docket Nos. 50-247 and 50-286; NRC-2017-0074]
Entergy Nuclear Operations, Inc., Indian Point Nuclear
Generating, Units No. 2 and 3
AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Notice, Director's decision regarding petition.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued a
director's decision with regard to a petition dated June 30, 2016,
filed by Mr. David A. Lochbaum of the Union of Concerned Scientists
(the petitioner), requesting that the NRC take enforcement action
against Entergy Nuclear Operations, Inc., the licensee for Indian Point
Nuclear Generating, Units No. 2 and 3 (Indian Point 2 and 3). The
petitioner's requests and the director's decision are included in the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.
ADDRESSES: Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2017-0074 when contacting the
NRC about the availability of information regarding this document. You
may obtain publicly-available information related to this document
using any of the following methods:
Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2017-0074. Address
questions about NRC dockets to Carol Gallagher; telephone: 301-415-
3463; email: [email protected].
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 this
document.
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.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Notice is hereby given that the Director,
Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, has issued a director's decision
DD-17-01 (ADAMS Accession No. ML17065A030) on a petition filed by the
petitioner on June 30, 2016 (ADAMS Accession No. ML16187A186). The
petition was supplemented by letter dated January 10, 2017 (ADAMS
Accession No. ML17011A012).
In response to degradation of reactor vessel baffle-former bolts
(BFBs) identified at Indian Point 2 during its spring 2016 refueling
outage, the petitioner requested the NRC to:
(1) Issue an order requiring the licensee to inspect the reactor
vessel BFBs and install the downflow to upflow modification at Indian
Point 2 during its next refueling outage (i.e., spring 2018).
(2) Issue a demand for information requiring the licensee to submit
an operability determination to the NRC regarding continued operation
of Indian Point 3 until its reactor vessel BFBs can be inspected
according to the Electric Power Research Institute Materials
Reliability Program Topical Report MRP-227-A, ``Materials Reliability
Program: Pressurized Water Reactor Internals Inspection and Evaluation
Guidelines'' (ADAMS Package Accession No. ML120170453).
(3) Issue a demand for Information requiring the licensee to submit
an evaluation of the performance, role, and operating experience of the
Indian Point metal impact monitoring system in detecting and responding
to indications of loose parts (such as broken baffle bolt heads and
locking tab bars) within the reactor coolant system.
As the basis for this request, the petitioner cited Licensee Event
Report 2016-004-00, ``Unanalyzed Condition due to Degraded Reactor
Baffle-Former Bolts,'' submitted by the licensee on May 31, 2016 (ADAMS
Accession No. ML16159A219), that describes an event where there was an
unanalyzed condition due to degraded reactor vessel BFBs at Indian
Point 2, which is reportable under Sec. 50.73(a)(2)(ii)(B) of title 10
of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR). The petitioner states that
(1) an order is the proper means for ensuring that the bolts are
inspected and that the downflow to upflow modification is installed
during the next refueling outage at Indian Point 2, (2) Indian Point 3
is potentially operating with degraded BFBs and an operability
determination is the mechanism established by the NRC to properly
evaluate such situations, and (3) the metal impact monitoring system as
described in the updated final safety analysis report has the potential
to act as an alternate monitoring system to
[[Page 18678]]
identify degraded BFBs, yet neither the NRC nor the licensee have
referred to this system in publicly available documents relating to
this issue.
On July 28, 2016, the petitioner and the licensee met with the
NRC's Petition Review Board. The meeting provided the petitioner and
the licensee an opportunity to provide additional information and to
clarify issues cited in the petition. The transcript for that meeting
is available in ADAMS under Accession No. ML16215A391.
In the supplemental letter dated January 10, 2017, the petitioner
withdrew the first two requested enforcement actions, citing the plant
shutdown agreement reached between the licensee and the State of New
York, and documents released by the NRC in response to a Freedom of
Information Act request (FOIA/PA-2016-0457).
The NRC sent a copy of the proposed director's decision to the
petitioner and the licensee for comment on January 11, 2017 (ADAMS
Accession Nos. ML16320A269 and ML16320A273, respectively). The
petitioner and the licensee were asked to provide comments within 30
days on any part of the proposed director's decision that was
considered to be erroneous or any issues in the petition that were not
addressed. Comments were received from the petitioner and the licensee
and are addressed in the final director's decision. In the licensee's
response dated February 9, 2017 (ADAMS Accession No. ML17045A470), new
information was provided to the NRC staff that was not available when
the proposed director's decision was issued for comment. The licensee's
response (1) provided detailed information on the enhanced BFB
inspection plans for the remaining refueling outages, (2) provided the
results of the BFB failure analysis performed at the Westinghouse hot
lab testing facility, and (3) informed the NRC staff that the licensee
had changed its commitment and would not perform the downflow to upflow
modification at either of the Indian Point operating units.
Notwithstanding the fact that the petitioner withdrew the first two
requested enforcement actions, the Director of the Office of Nuclear
Reactor Regulation has determined that the petitioner's request to (1)
issue an order requiring that Indian Point 2 inspect the BFBs during
the spring 2018 refueling outage would have been denied because the
licensee committed to take this action, and the staff retains the
option to take enforcement actions if necessary, (2) issue a demand for
information requiring Indian Point 3 to perform an operability
determination was effectively met inasmuch as the licensee performed
the evaluation and made it available to NRC inspectors as part of the
NRC's reactor oversight program, and (3) issue a demand for information
requiring the licensee to provide an evaluation of the operating
history of the metal impact monitoring system be denied because the
system has no operability or regulatory requirements, loose baffle-
former bolt heads would be expected to remain in place due to the tight
clearances between the baffle plate and fuel assemblies, thus making
bolt failures very difficult to monitor using this system, and the
staff finds no basis to require such information for a nonsafety
system. The reasons for this decision are explained in the director's
decision (DD-17-01) pursuant to 10 CFR 2.206 of the Commission's
regulations.
The NRC will file a copy of the director's decision with the
Secretary of the Commission for the Commission's review in accordance
with 10 CFR 2.206. As provided 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 13th day of April 2017.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
William M. Dean,
Director, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
[FR Doc. 2017-08015 Filed 4-19-17; 8:45 am]
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