Site-Specific Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants: Regarding Subsequent License Renewal for Oconee Nuclear Station Units 1, 2, and 3 - Draft Report for Comment (NUREG-1437, Supplement 2, Second Renewal)

This publication has been issued for public comment. Comments will be accepted until April 1, 2024. To submit comments, please see Docket ID Number NRC-2021-0146.

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Publication Information

Manuscript Completed: February 2024
Date Published: February 2024

Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, DC 20555-0001

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Abstract

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff prepared this site-specific environmental impact statement (EIS) as part of its environmental review of the Duke Energy Carolinas, LLC (Duke Energy) request to renew the operating licenses for Oconee Nuclear Station, Units 1, 2, and 3 (Oconee Station) for an additional 20 years. This EIS includes the site-specific evaluation of the environmental impacts of the proposed action, Oconee Station subsequent license renewal (SLR), and alternatives to SLR. As alternatives, the NRC considered: (1) new nuclear (advanced light-water reactor facility located at Duke Energy’s W.S. Lee Nuclear Station site combined with a small modular reactor located at the Oconee Station site); (2) a natural gas fired power plant (natural gas-fired combined-cycle facility located at the Oconee Station site); (3) a combination of solar photovoltaic, offshore wind, small modular reactors, and demand-side management, and (4) no action.

This EIS considers information contained in Duke Energy’s November 7, 2022, submittal (Agencywide Documents Access and Management System Accession No. ML21158A193; Duke Energy 2021-TN8897), which supplements its June 7, 2021, SLR application (Duke Energy 2021-TN8897). Previously, in August 2021, the NRC conducted a scoping period and published a scoping summary report (NRC 2022-TN8905). In February 2022, the Commission issued two memoranda and orders, Commission Legal Issuance (CLI)-22-02 and CLI-22-03 (NRC 2022-TN8182 and NRC 2022-TN8272), concerning SLR environmental reviews. In CLI-22-02, the Commission found that the License Renewal Generic Environmental Impact Statement (LR GEIS) did not cover the SLR period and that 10 CFR 51.53(c)(3) (TN250) does not apply to SLR applicants and, therefore, the NRC staff may not exclusively rely on the 2013 LR GEIS and Table B–1 for the evaluation of Category 1 issues. In CLI-22-03, notably, the Commission determined that the NRC staff must address these impacts on a site-specific basis in site-specific EISs.

The NRC staff prepared this site-specific 1 EIS in accordance with CLI-22-03 (NRC 2022-TN8272), that  references CLI-22-02 (NRC 2022-TN8182). This EIS considers the impacts of all SLR issues applicable to  Oconee Station SLR on a site-specific basis. Based on the evaluation of environmental impacts in this EIS, the NRC staff’s preliminary recommendation is that the adverse environmental impacts of SLR for Oconee Station are not so great that preserving the option of SLR for energy-planning decisionmakers would be unreasonable.

The NRC staff based its preliminary recommendation on the following: 

• Duke Energy’s environmental report, as supplemented
• consultation with Federal, State, Tribal, and local governmental agencies
• the NRC staff’s independent environmental review
• the consideration of public comments received during the scoping processes