[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 82 (Friday, April 26, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 32462-32464]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2024-08964]
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
[Docket Nos. 50-611 and 50-612; NRC-2023-0138]
Kairos Power, LLC; Hermes 2; Draft Environmental Assessment and
Draft Finding of No Significant Impact
AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Notice of availability and request for comment.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for
public comment a draft environmental assessment (EA) and draft finding
of no significant impact (FONSI) for proposed issuance of construction
permits (CP) to Kairos Power, LLC (Kairos). The CPs would authorize the
construction of two non-power test reactors termed Hermes 2, adjacent
to the Hermes test reactor (Hermes), on a 185-acre site located in Oak
Ridge, Tennessee. Kairos was issued a CP for Hermes, Construction
Permit No. CPTR-6, on December 14, 2023. The Hermes 2 test reactors
would demonstrate additional key elements of the Kairos Power Fluoride
Salt-Cooled, High Temperature Reactor technology for possible future
commercial deployment. The technology is an advanced nuclear reactor
technology that leverages TRI-structural ISOtropic (TRISO) particle
fuel in pebble form combined with a low-pressure fluoride salt coolant.
The NRC has prepared a draft EA and draft FONSI that consider the
environmental impacts associated with issuing the CPs.
DATES: Submit comments by May 28, 2024. Comments received after this
date will be considered if it is practicable to do so, but the NRC is
able to ensure consideration only for comments received before this
date.
ADDRESSES: You may submit comments by using any of the following
methods; however, the NRC encourages electronic comment submission
through the Federal rulemaking website:
Federal Rulemaking Website: Go to https://regulations.gov
and search for Docket ID NRC-2023-0138. Address questions about Docket
IDs in Regulations.gov to Stacy Schumann; telephone: 301-415-0624;
email: [email protected]. For technical questions, contact the
individual listed in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section of
this document.
Email: Comments may be submitted to the NRC electronically
using the email address: [email protected].
Mail comments to: Office of Administration, Mail Stop:
TWFN-7-A60M, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-
0001, ATTN: Program Management, Announcements and Editing Staff.
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: Peyton Doub, telephone: 301-415-6703,
email: [email protected] and Mary Richmond, telephone: 301-415-7218,
email: [email protected]. Both are staff of the Office of Nuclear
Material Safety and Safeguards at the 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-2023-0138 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 Website: Go to https://regulations.gov
and search for Docket ID NRC-2023-0138.
NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System
(ADAMS): You may obtain publicly available documents online in the
ADAMS Public Documents collection at https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. To begin the search, 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, at 301-415-4737,
or by email to [email protected]. For the convenience of the reader,
instructions about obtaining materials referenced in this document are
provided in the ``Availability of Documents'' section.
NRC's PDR: The PDR, where you may examine and order copies
of publicly available documents, is open by appointment. To make an
appointment to visit the PDR, please send an email to
[email protected] or call 1-800-397-4209 or 301-415-4737, between 8
a.m. and 4 p.m. eastern
[[Page 32463]]
time (ET), Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays.
NRC's Public Project Website: The draft EA and draft FONSI
can be accessed online at the Hermes 2--Kairos project specific web
page at https://www.nrc.gov/reactors/non-power/new-facility-licensing/hermes2-kairos.html.
B. Submitting Comments
The NRC encourages electronic comment submission through any of the
methods outlined in ADDRESSES section of this document. Please include
Docket ID NRC-2023-0138 in your comment submission.
The NRC cautions you not to include identifying or contact
information that you do not want to be publicly disclosed in your
comment submission. The NRC will post all comment submissions at
https://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 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. Introduction
On July 14, 2023, Kairos submitted, pursuant to part 50 of title 10
of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR), ``Domestic Licensing of
Production and Utilization Facilities,'' an application for CPs for the
Hermes 2 test reactor facility (a ``testing facility'' as defined in 10
CFR 50.2), that would consist of two fluoride salt-cooled test reactor
units at the East Tennessee Technology Park in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. A
notice of receipt and availability of the application was published in
the Federal Register on August 4, 2023 (88 FR 51876). The Hermes 2
site, adjacent to the Hermes test reactor, is situated in the Heritage
Center Industrial Park of the East Tennessee Technology Park that was
established by the City of Oak Ridge on land formerly owned by the U.S.
Department of Energy (DOE) for the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant
(ORGDP). The site was occupied by DOE Buildings K-31 and K-33, both of
which were part of the ORGDP.
The NRC staff determined that Kairos submitted the application in
accordance with 10 CFR 2.101(a)(5), and a notice of the acceptability
of docketing of Kairos's CP application was published in the Federal
Register on September 15, 2023 (88 FR 63632). The docket numbers
established for this application are 50-611 and 50-612 for Units 1 and
2, respectively. A notice of opportunity to request a hearing and
petition for leave to intervene (88 FR 81439) was published in the
Federal Register on November 22, 2023.
Section 104 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended, and its
implementing regulations authorize the NRC to issue CPs for testing
facilities. To issue a CP, the NRC is required to consider the
environmental impacts of the proposed action under the National
Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA). The NRC's environmental
protection regulations that implement NEPA in 10 CFR part 51 identify
actions for which the NRC prepares an environmental impact statement
(EIS). CPs for test reactors are an action identified as requiring an
EIS.
However, based on a review of the environmental report (ER)
submitted as part of the CP application for Hermes 2 and the results of
the EIS recently issued for the Hermes test reactor, the NRC staff
concluded that it would be prudent to first prepare a draft
environmental assessment (EA) to determine whether preparation of an
EIS would be necessary or whether a finding of no significant impact
(FONSI) could be issued for the Hermes 2 CP based on factors unique to
the Hermes 2 CP application. These factors include: (1) the similar
design of Hermes 2 and Hermes, (2) the proposed siting of Hermes 2
within a few hundred feet of Hermes, (3) the industrial nature and
heavy prior disturbance of the site, (4) the recent thorough NEPA
review performed by the staff as published in its final EIS for Hermes,
and (5) the staff's final EIS for Hermes covering the same site as
Hermes 2 and documenting all impacts as SMALL.
The NRC staff has prepared a draft EA and draft FONSI documenting
its environmental review of the Hermes 2 CP application. Based on the
environmental review, the NRC staff has made a preliminary
determination that the proposed action would not significantly affect
the quality of the human environment. Therefore, the NRC staff has made
a preliminary determination that it will not prepare an EIS and that a
draft FONSI appears warranted.
The staff will consider comments received on the draft EA and draft
FONSI over a 30-day public comment period from Federal, State, local,
and Tribal officials, and members of the public. After consideration of
these public comments, the NRC staff will make a final determination as
to whether preparation of an EIS is necessary or whether a FONSI can be
issued for the Hermes 2 CP application. However, exemptions from
certain regulations in 10 CFR part 51 would be necessary to issue a
final EA and final FONSI to support issuance of the Hermes 2 CPs. In
accordance with 10 CFR 51.6, the NRC may grant exemptions from the
requirements of 10 CFR part 51 if it determines that the exemptions are
authorized by law and are otherwise in the public interest.
III. Summary of Draft Environmental Assessment
Description of the Proposed Action and Need
The proposed action is for the NRC to issue CPs to Kairos
authorizing construction of the two proposed Hermes 2 reactors. The NRC
issuance of CPs would constitute authorization for Kairos to proceed
with the construction of the Hermes 2 reactors, two fluoride salt-
cooled test reactor units, at the East Tennessee Technology Park in Oak
Ridge, Tennessee.
The issuance of a CP is a separate licensing action from the
issuance of an operating license (OL). If the NRC issues CPs for Hermes
2 and Kairos were to seek NRC approval to operate Hermes 2, then Kairos
would have to submit a separate application for OLs pursuant to the
NRC's regulations, and Kairos would have to obtain NRC approval before
it could operate the Hermes 2 test reactors. The NRC staff would review
any application for an OL for Hermes 2 for new and significant
information related to the environmental impacts of operating and
decommissioning Hermes 2 that might alter the staff's conclusions made
in the EA for the CP application.
The need for Hermes 2 is to demonstrate key elements of the Kairos
Power Fluoride Salt-Cooled, High Temperature Reactor technology for
possible future commercial deployment. The technology is an advanced
nuclear reactor technology that leverages TRI-structural ISOtropic
particle fuel in pebble form combined with a low-pressure fluoride salt
coolant. Hermes 2 would support Kairos's reactor development program,
which relies on learning and risk reduction by narrowing the design
space through progressive test cycles. Construction and operation of
Hermes 2 also would provide validation and qualification data to
support potential future commercial reactors using the Kairos
[[Page 32464]]
Power Fluoride Salt-Cooled, High Temperature Reactor technology.
Environmental Impacts of the Proposed Action
In the draft EA, the NRC staff assessed the potential direct and
indirect environmental impacts from the proposed action associated with
the following relevant resource areas: land use and visual resources;
air quality and noise; hydrogeology and water resources; ecological
resources; historic and cultural resources; socioeconomics and
environmental justice; human health; nonradiological waste management;
uranium fuel cycle and radiological waste management; transportation of
radioactive material; and postulated accidents. The NRC staff also
considered the cumulative impacts from past, present, and reasonably
foreseeable future actions when combined with the proposed action.
The NRC staff determined that the environmental impacts of the
proposed action would be SMALL for each potentially affected
environmental resource, meaning that the environmental effects are not
detectable or are so minor that they will neither destabilize nor
noticeably alter any important attribute of the resource. In addition,
the NRC staff determined that the projected effects of climate change
would not alter any of the impact determinations described in the EA.
Furthermore, the NRC staff found that there would be no significant
negative cumulative impact to any resource area from the proposed
action when added to other past, present, and reasonably foreseeable
future actions.
Environmental Impacts of the Alternatives to the Proposed Action
The NRC staff identified a range of reasonable alternatives to the
proposed action and the environmental impacts of the alternatives as
appropriate. The NRC staff determined that there are no alternatives
that meet the need for the proposed action and that are environmentally
preferrable to the proposed action.
IV. Draft Finding of No Significant Impact
The proposed action before the NRC is whether to issue CPs (one for
each unit) to Kairos to authorize construction of the two proposed
reactors (units) making up the Hermes 2 project. The NRC has conducted
an environmental review of a request for NRC issuance of CPs for the
Hermes 2 project and prepared an EA. This draft FONSI incorporates by
reference the EA summarized in Section II of this notice and referenced
in Section V of this notice. On the basis of the EA, and its
determination that the environmental impacts would be SMALL for each
potentially affected resource area, the NRC staff has preliminarily
determined that the proposed action would not have a significant effect
on the quality of the human environment. Accordingly, the NRC staff has
made a preliminary determination that preparation of an EIS is not
required for the proposed action and that a FONSI is appears warranted.
This finding and the related environmental documents referenced
throughout the EA are available for public inspection as discussed in
the EA and Section I of this notice. The NRC's staff's determination is
tentative. Before making a final determination, the NRC staff also will
consider comments received on the draft EA and draft FONSI over a 30-
day public comment period from Federal, State, local, and Tribal
officials, and members of the public. Once NRC makes a final
determination, it will publish the final EA and final FONSI or proceed
to prepare an EIS.
V. Availability of Documents
The documents identified in the following table are available to
interested persons through one or more of the following methods, as
indicated.
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ADAMS accession No./Federal
Document description Register notice (FRN)
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Environmental Assessment and Finding of No ML24103A002.
Significant Impact for the Construction
Permits for the Kairos Hermes 2 Test
Reactors, Draft Report for Comment, dated
April 2024.
Letter to NRC from Kairos, Responses to ML24065A100 (Package).
Requests for Confirmatory Information for
the Environmental Report, dated March 4,
2024.
Letters to NRC from Kairos, Responses to ML23300A141 (Package) and
General Audit Questions, dated October 27, ML23300A144.
2023.
FRN: Kairos Power LLC Hermes 2- 88 FR 81439.
Construction Permit Application;
Opportunity to Request a Hearing and
Petition for Leave to Intervene, dated
November 22, 2023.
FRN: Acceptance for docketing of the Kairos 88 FR 63632.
Power LLC Hermes 2 Test Reactor
Construction Permit, dated September 15,
2023.
FRN: Receipt and Availability. Hermes 2 88 FR 51876.
Receipt of Application, August 4, 2023.
Letter to NRC from Kairos, Submittal of the ML23195A121 (Package).
Construction Permit Application for the
Hermes 2 Kairos Power Fluoride Salt-
Cooled, High Temperature Non-Power
Reactor, dated July 14, 2023.
Kairos Power LLC--Construction Permit for ML23338A258.
Hermes Test Reactor, dated December 14,
2023.
NUREG-2263, Environmental Impact Statement ML23214A269.
for the Construction Permit for the Kairos
Hermes Test Reactor, Final Report, dated
August 2023.
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Dated: April 22, 2024.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Daniel Barnhurst,
Chief, Environmental Project Management Branch 3, Division of
Rulemaking, Environmental, and Financial Support, Office of Nuclear
Material Safety, and Safeguards.
[FR Doc. 2024-08964 Filed 4-25-24; 8:45 am]
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