118th Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste (ACNW) Meeting, March 29, 2000
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON NUCLEAR WASTE *** 118TH ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON NUCLEAR WASTE (ACNW) U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 11545 Rockville Pike Conference Room 2B3 White Flint Building 2 Rockville, Maryland Wednesday, March 29, 2000 The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 8:32 a.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: B. JOHN GARRICK, Chairman, ACNW GEORGE M. HORNBERGER, Vice Chairman, ACNW RAYMOND G. WYMER, ACNW Member . PARTICIPANTS: HOWARD J. LARSON, Acting Associate Director, ACNW/ACRS RICHARD K. MAJOR, ACNW Staff JOHN GREVES, Division of Waste Management BILL RAMER, Division of Waste Management LYNN DEERING, ACNW Staff MS. HANLON . P R O C E E D I N G S [8:32 a.m.] MR. GARRICK: Good morning. Our meeting will come to order. This is the third day of the 118th meeting of the Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste. The entire meeting will be open to the public. Today the committee will meet with John Greves, director of the Division of Waste Management, to discuss items of mutual interest, assisted I assume by Bill Ramer. MR. RAMER: Yes, in my typical assistant role. [Laughter.] MR. GARRICK: And we will also continue our effort of preparing ACNW reports. Richard Major is the designated federal official for the initial portion of today's meeting. This meeting is being conducted in accordance the provisions of the Federal Advisory Committee Act. We have received no written statements, or requests to make oral statements, from members of the public regarding today's session. Should anyone wish to do so, please make your wishes known to one of the committee staff. It is requested that each speaker use one of the microphones, identify himself or herself and speak with sufficient clarity and volume so that he or she can be readily heard. John, we're anxious to hear from you. MR. GREVES: Good. Is this working? Hear this? Good. Good morning. This has been a little bit of a difficult week. I think you know that the regulatory information conference was this week, so I had two sessions that I was requested to make presentations at the conference. Also our ISCORS meetings that I know you sit in on on occasion or your staff does, that was this week and the ACNW sessions we've had, so -- I think next year as the reg information conference comes around, we'll probably encourage you to try and avoid this week. I don't know whether any of you had a chance to go around there. This is the second year I've participated, and it's a good conference. They had 900 people down there at this conference. They do break-out sessions and there were two break-out sessions, one titled Waste, one titled Decommissioning, and I made presentations at both those sessions. And I think we actually need to play a stronger role, we being NMSS, in the reg information conference, so we're going to try and work it a little harder, and I just commend that if you don't have a meeting that week, some of you may want to participate. The two sessions I participated in were basically full rooms of people, several hundred people. There's a lot of interest, mostly a utility type stakeholder crowd, but they're quite interested in the spent fuel issues, they're quite interested in Yucca Mountain, they're quite interested in the low-level waste dilemma. So again, I'm going to enjoy looking forward to next year's meeting and so I just thought I would mention that to you. Frequently the committee asks NMSS, what are your priorities, and I think we met most recently with Bill Keene, and he played out his priorities while you all were meeting and going over your agenda. And individually I just want to let you know from my vantage point, my priorities, sort of in order one, two, three and four, are, the first one is Yucca Mountain; the second one is Yucca Mountain; the third one is Yucca Mountain, and the fourth is the rest. I went to this reg information conference yesterday, and Chairman Meserve spoke as all the commissioners did. And a significant number of the questions he got were on Yucca Mountain. Commissioner Dikus spoke yesterday, I was able to sit in on that session, and in one-third of her presentation, addressed Yucca Mountain. So it is an issue, it is the issue in terms of priority, and I just thought I'd give you my personal feedback on that. This effort to make decisions regarding Yucca Mountain deserves attention, and I think this group, your group, is one that is well-equipped to provide information on that. So I just thought I'd give you my personal set of priorities. MR. GARRICK: Was there any other agency representation at the meeting? MR. GREVES: At the reg information conference? MR. GARRICK: Yeah. MR. GREVES: EPA was at the meeting; DOE was at the meeting; I was only able to be there part of the day, I don't know what other agency level of participation on, you know, the actual presentations were. They were clearly at the meeting, got up and then made comments. Whether they were part of presentations I really just wasn't able to be there and participate. But they clearly have a need to know what's going on in that type of arena. It's mostly utility, NEI, utilities, contractors that serve the -- and of course the group that I was speaking to was decommissioning and waste issues, so I recognized a number of the people in the audience. But 900 people at this meeting, and the two sessions that I was in was pretty much packed large rooms. It was hard to count, but my guess was each, the waste session and the decommissioning session probably had 200-plus people in the rooms. So it's a meeting that, you know, we need to participate in, and each of those sessions, lots of questions about Yucca Mountain, lots of questions about waste and decommissioning. I had more questions than I could answer in the venue. They had these little cards that they passed out. They kept passing the cards up, and there just wasn't time to address all the questions. So I just put it on your radar screen, and maybe you can try and avoid that week for your meetings so that some of you might be able to get down there and participate. MR. GARRICK: I think that's a very good suggestion. MR. HORNBERGER: Is the date for next year's meeting set yet? MR. GREVES: I would expect it probably is, so we'll take a note. Pat, can you just check on that, and I want to engage them into a little bit more planning in terms of the content of the meeting, and if you have an interest why don't you join me and maybe we can come up with a session where you can be part of the process. I mean I just offer that that's an idea you may want to -- MR. LARSON: Did you keep the questions that you were asked? It would be interesting to -- MR. GREVES: I kept the questions. I have them. MR. LARSON: It would be interesting for the committee to see what they are. MR. GREVES: Yes, okay. I kept them, because they were useful to me. I want to know what's on people's minds, because these are the questions we have to have the answers to. So I can share those with your staff. They're handwritten, and we can do that. Okay, moving into the topics that I want to address, and not surprising high level waste is the first topic. There's a number of things going on, and I know we've had some briefings this week of you and your staff, and the first on my list is part 63 and kind of a subset of that is defense in depth. The committee is very aware that we owe the commission a paper in April, and I might comment, it's been somewhat difficult to address the defense in depth issue. We've talked to you about it a number of times, and the thinking of defense in depth for a reactor just doesn't transport one to one for a waste disposal facility. You had a good joint session with ACRS, and I think we all learned a lot in that process. So I think we've tried to make transparent to you what our views are on part 63, defense in depth, and particular, I know you're writing a letter on that, and it's probably apparent to you that there are a number of ways to go. Is there the best way or the right way? I'm not sure, but obviously the paper we put together, we've made -- we've identified some options, made some recommendations and the commission needs to hear from the committee. I'm sure you will be providing your letter, and if yours is not exactly the same as ours, that's fine. I think this is a deliberative process, and the commission deserves the views of the staff and the views of the committee, and we go from there. So that's all I wanted to mention on that, unless you want to engage a little bit on that. I know Bill and his staff have been involved in those meetings. I'm sorry I couldn't have sat in on more of them. I'll just sort of keep moving. I know that staff briefed you I believe yesterday on the Yucca Mountain review plan. This seems to be coming together. We've briefed you, we've met with some other stakeholders. It is sort of the backbone of our review as that license application comes in the door. It's a work in progress. We're further along on the post-closure issues than we are on preclosure. We need to catch up on that, and I expect that staff gave you a good briefing on that yesterday. Bill was able to sit in on that, so if you have any questions upon reflection, Bill can answer them. I'll just keep moving. The next topic that I have is sufficiency comments. You also were briefed on that by staff, and this is one that the commission owes comments next May. And we gave you a briefing yesterday, and I think the expectation is the staff will be pulling its comments together, and we will sit down with you like we have in the past and share where we're going. There's a schedule set, and I'm sure we've found a way to go over that with you, and if there's some problems with that schedule please get back with us. But the point is, we are going to develop staff sufficiency comments, get them to the commission, and the commission is not going to have a lot of time to do a lot of deliberation, and I would encourage you to get your comments in. I think Bill was targeting April, end of April next year, give the commission, you know, a number of weeks to do the process. So if there's anything we can do to make sure that we're working hand in glove here, and making to you transparent what our own views are so that you can do what you need to do, I know how difficult it is to write letters by committee. So if there's anything we can do to facilitate you being in a position to write your own letter on this topic, let us know what that is. But this is a legislative mandate. The commission has to provide these comments, and DOE is expecting them in May, May time frame. Did we go over the schedule with them? MR. RAMER: We had a schedule and a briefing. MR. LARKINS: John, has there been any feedback from the commission on what their expectations are in this area, or any guidance to the staff as to what they are looking for? MR. RAMER: I would say that the briefing that we gave to you yesterday they're aware of, and to the extent that I guess the absence of course correction type comments from them would lead me to say they're generally aware, they're aware of our approach. MR. LARKINS: But they're aware of your strategy, your plan. MR. RAMER: Yeah, our approach. MR. GREVES: We briefed the assistants basically with the package before coming to you, and again, this was the assistants, level, they seemed pleased with the package, gave us a couple of pointers, a couple of pieces of feedback, and it's not my place to say but I think I was reading an expectation that they would hear from ACNW in the end of April time frame. But you probably need to hear that from them, not me. There are two other items that I asked Bill to address. One is 963, and then the closure plan. I know we've got some meetings that we need to brief you on, on the closure plan. Bill, would you jump in on this too? MR. RAMER: Yeah, okay, so let me give you just half a dozen or so points on the 963. Of course that's DOE proposed amendments to their citing guidelines that they would use in connection with arriving at a decision on a recommendation for the Yucca Mountain site. DOE is currently evaluating the public comments that they received on their proposed amendments. That's part 963. Their next step would be to prepare a draft final rule, and a response to comments. Our planning, our staff planning, is that we could receive such a package from DOE in the -- as early as mid-April, and if in fact that comes to pass, you know, we would -- our plan would be to begin review of those DOE papers, that being the draft final rule in response to comment. Remember, the context here is that we expect DOE will be asking the commission to concur in the proposed amendments to 963. But we the staff would be reviewing the DOE package, and preparing a recommendation to the commission on concurrence. My guess is that we would be aiming -- we don't have a firm schedule because we're not exactly sure when we're going to get the package, but my guess is that we're looking at submitting our recommendations to the commission probably in the late spring/early summer time frame. MR. GARRICK: Are there ongoing exchanges on this? MR. RAMER: Not on this topic, no. I think at this point DOE is pretty much involved in just getting on top of the comments, and how they want to respond to the comments, and what if any changes that they see as being appropriate to their proposed rule. So they're kind of doing their homework and getting their package together. MR. HORNBERGER: Do you see a need for ACNW to weigh in on this? MR. RAMER: I'd put it in the category clearly that you want to monitor, and that at this point it may well be that you don't need to. Hopefully we've given you a copy of the comments on the proposed rule, or letter to DOE on the proposed rule. We did not have a lot of comments from the staff level. So that in any event, that might be some barometer, some reading as to, that you might be interested in. I think it's clearly something you'll need to monitor, but at this point it's not clear to me that you would need to weigh in on. So we'll keep you in the loop, clearly, when we get more information and schedule, if we get more, we'll make sure you've got that as well. Any other questions on 963? Okay, the KTI closure, I was realizing last night we really have given you bits and pieces of this strategy, this initiative, but we haven't yet briefed you. We anticipated we would brief you in this meeting, but then our session with DOE was postponed until next month. But let me just run through very briefly what we're trying to do under the heading, KTI Closure, Key Technical Issues. As you know, we have nine key technical issues that we have used to focus our program the last four or five years. Our goal is to resolve all those key technical issues before DOE would submit any license application. To implement that strategy, to achieve that goal, we're using techniques that are borrowed from our general regulatory practice to basically bin issues in one of three bins, issues that are either open or they're closed, or they're closed subject to confirmation. If you've read the IRSRs, they don't really follow this strategy. We want to bring a little more focus to those areas where we think we've reached agreement or at least have an understanding with the DOE, such that we could close an issue. That means, based on the information that we've seen, we don't have any further questions. We think the information is sufficient at this point. An issue could be closed subject to confirmation. That means we understand the DOE plans to develop additional information or analyses, and we agree with that as a strategy to -- a path forward to close an issue, but we want to confirm that in fact what we expect to be given is in fact what we get from DOE. So we would close that pending confirming the data or analyses, either before we get the LA or in the license application review. And the third bin would be open issues. These are issues where we have not converged with DOE, and those are the ones that in prelicensing we want to work hard on to try to achieve closure. We'll use the Yucca Mountain review plan as the basis to close issues. We want to be asking the question if an issue is open, why do we need this information. We want to use the Yucca Mountain review plan as the device to answer that. We need it because it relates to this part of the PA. That's a little different than the way we've been addressing the KTIs and the IRSRs. We haven't really used the Yucca Mountain review plan, because it hasn't been available. Issue are closed at the staff level. That means that the issue remains open from the standpoint of an issue that could become an issue in a hearing, it could be raised by another party. It's not a binding resolution in the sense that it resolves it forever. A party outside of DOE or NRC can raise the issue in the licensing process and pursue it. Also, an issue could be reopened based on new information. Staff could reopen it's position. The goal of issue resolution is that any license application will be sufficiently complete to permit docketing, to commence our safety evaluation and to begin the preparation of the safety evaluation report that would support a decision on a construction authorization. Obviously all of this is premised on the assumption that we're going to get a license application, which at this point we have to plan for, but we don't know because there's not even a site recommendation that's been made. We will be reporting on the progress on path to resolution in our sufficiency comments. We talked about that yesterday, how the sufficiency review and the KTI closure strategy work together. We'll have a technical exchange with DOE on this on April 25 and 26, and I think Ray, you were planning on attending the one on March and hopefully that will be convenient for you. And we would be briefing you probably some time in the late spring or early summer on where we stand. So that's what I had to say on that. MR. WYMER: I recognize that you have the KTIs and the connection with the sufficiency review. But I guess it's not totally clear to me as how -- do all of the KTI open issues have to be resolved for you to agree with a sufficiency? MR. RAMER: No. No, I think we don't. Ideally, ideally yes, ideally we would work everything out as to what we want, get a commitment from DOE to provide that, put everything either in a closed or a closed subject to confirmation bin; I mean that, you know, aim high, yeah, I think that's a good objective. Realistically, the site recommendation is due. We begin considering it in November. The books are closed in terms of data and analysis for that before November, and you know, we may have issues that remain open at the site recommendation stage, but we clearly can report on our progress to get to closure, or whether we see a path forward to get to closure by the license application stage. MR. GREVES: Bill, is it fair to say that we would probably include some expectations in the sufficiency comments; this is where they are now, and we expect that's a stage suitable to get them to license application? MR. RAMER: Yeah, definitely. I mean everything is going to be out on the table. Nothing is going to be surprising DOE. Nothing is going to be surprising anyone in terms of what we think we need. MR. GREVES: One aspect is the QA aspect. We've talked to you about it periodically, and the expectation or the point DOE and others have made to us is, they expect to be I think at the 80 percent level at sufficiency time frame, if my memory is correct. And that's an indication, it's not going to all be there at the sufficiency stage. Okay, any other questions on my first three priorities; high level waste; if not, we can move on. I mentioned the first three priorities, you know, in some ways it's in jest, but it really is an indication of what's going on even internationally. You're going overseas. I was over to the Cordoba conference which I'll give you some feedback on towards the end of my discussion, but most of the energy was on deep geologic, and I'll give you a little summary of what I was experiencing while I was over there at the end of the discussion. And that's again another reason why it's high priority with me personally. Second area is decommissioning. We've been down to brief you on a number of specific topics, and so the ones I'm going to mention will be no surprise to you. Main Yankee. We now have the Main Yankee application in for review; we've done an acceptance review, and we have accepted the document. That's the third of our license termination plans that we now have in-house for review. We have Trojan, that's proceeding quite nicely, and I hope we can finish that up within the next few months. We've gone out with a round of questions on that. We also have Saxton in for review. But Main Yankee draws a lot of attention. It is the site that sort of came up with the rubbleization concept. We've talked a lot about it, and now we actually have an application in our lap to review. The staff did a paper, it took us longer than I wanted to produce this paper. And the committee has that, the committee has provided letters, and the commission I believe has sent you back an SRM forecasting an expectation you are going to follow this process and keep them informed as to what your views are. There will be a meeting on May 15th after a license termination plan is submitted. Our procedure calls for a public meeting to go up and talk to the local stakeholders about the application, who we are, what we're doing and I would encourage the committee to either have one of the committee members attend or at least your staff sit in on that, because this is one of those cases that we're going to have to cut our teeth on and see what this concept of rubbleization is about, and give it a good, comprehensive review. And my expectation is that the commission is going to expect to hear from the committee as this proceeds. I'll also point out that the meeting on the 15th is in the evening, it's in one of the school locations. The following evening in Boston is the first of a series of meetings on updating the decommissioning EIS for reactor decommissioning, so whoever you are able to send to the meeting Monday night, May 15th, might want to also attend the Boston meeting on the update of the EIS. There's been a lot of interest in this particular topic. So I would just personally encourage you to participate to the extent you can. Any questions on this topic? MR. GARRICK: Do you have any suggestions on how the committee should become informed on this project in the best way possible; should that informing come entirely from the staff, should it come some from the licensee, or what is the process? MR. GREVES: Yeah, just off the top of my head, one, I'm encouraging the committee to be informed by sitting in, these are important meetings and there will be a lot of stakeholder interest in the northeast, so you'll, to the extent you can go to that meeting to be informed on that front. Think about what do we do for important sites. We have others come in and brief on Yucca Mountain; we have people come in and brief on West Valley; so this is probably a candidate. It's got a lot of visibility, and inviting Main Yankee to come in here, obviously we will be talking to you about it, but I think that's something to think about. Main Yankee does a lot of outreach work, and my guess is they would respond positively to come in and brief the committee on what their approach is. Obviously you can read the report, but frequently you have stakeholders from various arenas come in and do a briefing on this, and in fact has Main Yankee been in here and briefed? It seems like -- MR. LARKINS: I think they came in when we had the discussions. MR. GREVES: Okay, the discussion on rubbleization. MR. GARRICK: It was pretty general, because there wasn't a specific application. MR. LARKINS: Right. MR. GREVES: Right, and we were all struggling, you know, what is this and how serious to take it. MR. GARRICK: I think that given that there is some, I would assume now, some real technical meat behind this application, that it would be quite informative for the committee to hear from the applicant. Now, is the ACRS, have they scheduled anything in connection with this? MR. GREVES: Not that I know of. You know, the site is an NRR site. But the license termination plan, the details of that really run through NMSS. So my view is the issues basically are leaching, encapsulation, decon criteria, they're really issues that I think the expectation is this committee would be addressing. MR. GARRICK: Well, since this is a precedent setting kind of activity, and could impact future decommissionings in a significant way, I would think that maybe we ought to be thinking about how to get as much insight and understanding from the point of view of the applicant, of the licensee, as we can. So I think it might be a good idea for us to think about scheduling something. MR. LEVENSON: Unfortunately the dates of the meetings you mentioned are when the committee will be in Europe. MR. GREVES: Well, I guess the staff -- are there any staff you're not taking with you? Maybe we can encourage Andy Campbell to sit in on it. MR. LARKINS: We'll make arrangements to have some staff persons cover it. MR. LEVENSON: The point I just wanted to make was, the absence of committee members doesn't mean an absence of interest. MR. GREVES: You know, part of my job is to come down and give you some upcoming events. I wasn't, I didn't put the two together, because I really got your schedule for Europe this morning, but this is a substantive event and so it sounds like you all will be to send a staff person. MR. LARKINS: It will be interesting to see the staff's acceptance review, public -- MR. GREVES: Oh, that's public. There was a lot of upfront discussion with Main Yankee. Your staff sat in on a number of those meetings, and I think that was the right thing to do. You know we rejected the first two license termination plans that came in. In hindsight my sense was we didn't have that upfront discussion, you know, there were some false expectations. And it's a little bit of a shake-out process, and this is the first plant coming in with an honest to goodness rubbleization approach. Others are talking about it. So I think it's a good idea to explore with Main Yankee, would they be willing to come in and give you a little presentation on what their approach is. MR. GARRICK: Well, I think this is something we're very interested in, and we should be, because I don't think there's been an issue come along in a while, at least on the reactor side, that has created as much discussion as this concept has. MR. GREVES: And my sense is the commission has sent you an SRM, expecting you're going to follow this topic anyhow, so it would make a lot of sense to have the licensee come in and give you some presentation, so I'd encourage you to explore that. Enough? West Valley, another one of our topics that we talk about. You're aware that we'd put out a draft policy statement. There was a uniform request for an extension of time. We extended that to the first of April, and so I expect all of them to be rolling in just about on that day. And I understand we have a briefing set up for you in the June time frame to go over this. I expect some significant comments, so as soon as that comes in we'll make an effort to get the committee copies of those comments, and I would enjoy some dialogue with you obviously in the meeting or as we get together from time to time, one on one, because this, as I've said in previous meetings with you, this is kind of a landmark site in this country. It's got one of everything. High level waste, spent fuel in the ground, an adjacent low level waste disposal facility. It's a challenge, so we'll be talking about it in June, and if you see something in these comments that you want to take up with us, I'd enjoy meeting with you, the chairman or any of the committee to discuss as we have in the past. So just stay tuned on that. Moving on to -- unless you have a comment on West Valley; I think that's something we just need to look forward to. We owe the commission what we call the decommissioning rebaselining paper. We briefed the commission last year on our SDMP program, and I think I'd characterize it that they were a little bit disappointed that it wasn't a larger presentation. We made no mention of the reactor decommissioning program, so the SRM we got back said next time you brief us on decommissioning we want to hear about all of decommissioning, including reactor. So Larry Kamper and the staff have put a lot of effort into developing the rebaselining paper, and it really paints the full picture; the SDMP sites which I think you're quite familiar with; the reactor sites that are in decommissioning space; and the other problem sites that we have. So it tries to paint the full picture and identify in fact what we've done with sites in the past, so unfortunately I think the paper ends up with about 18 different attachments, but if you want to put it all together it takes that level of a report. And I think that the staff is trying to keep you informed as to where this is, the papers, going through the struggles of concurrence, obviously you'll have the whole thing when the final concurrence is achieved. But I think we're pointing towards a briefing in June and July, so that's kind of a meaty topic that we should look forward to. You mentioned that Main Yankee rubbleization was one of the hottest things that's come along, and I agree with you, because frankly every time I am asked to give a presentation that's one of the things that's on everybody's list, will you please talk about that. Another one that's emerging is partial site release. It's got a lot of attention. There's a lot of interest in utilities in finding a way to address this topic. You look at the regulations and there's not a neat box for this issue in certain aspects, so I just have it on my list. And we may look forward to spending some time with you on that topic, although principally this is a nuclear reactor regulation issue. They're the ones that developed the paper with our input. MR. LARKINS: Is this after the facility has been defueled or is this during operation, like at Oyster Creek? MR. GREVES: Oyster Creek, it's operational. It's kind of an issue as to how do we, a utility, carve off a piece of land, and there's a bunch of question marks about this. I believe you probably have seen various papers on this, and I'm not sure whether the commission is going to give us some guidance on it. But it's a piece that probably deserves a rule-making effort. And so we are on your schedule to come down and brief on this -- Pat? STAFF MEMBER: Right now it's a June/July time frame that we were putting it on, ACRS, or it would fall under ACNW. And that was one thing I think about a week ago we talked about having to sit down and resolve, because maybe both committees would be interested in it, and that's where there's a little confusion on my part, where do we put it and is there a way to brief both committees at once. We'll be working in the next two weeks to figure out the time frame, but it would probably be again June or July on that item. MR. GREVES: The papers have NRR origin, so obviously it has to be coordinated with them. Many of the questions that come up feel like decommissioning questions, you know, what's the criteria, how do you release things; in any event, I think it's something we need to work through crossing the appropriate lines. I'm going to move on to low level waste unless there's a question that I rushed through on decommissioning. MR. GARRICK: No. MR. GREVES: Low level waste, one, our budget is very low in this arena. MR. LARKINS: Before you leave decommissioning I do have a question. MR. GREVES: Sure. MR. LARKINS: There was a request from the commission for the staff to provide a paper or to go back and look at the, I think it was entombment as a part of the decommissioning process. Is there something -- MR. GREVES: There will be a paper on that. That is, research is working that issue, and we have sat down with them and went over a strategy on how to write the paper and where to go with it. I don't see those people in the room, so it's coming and the committee, you know, obviously will see that, and to the extent it make sense it's -- it is an agenda item. But I'm just not quite sure where it fits. Maybe you want to take a look at the paper and decide after you see the paper. I'm going to move on to low level waste, and this is an arena that a decade ago I had 20-some FTE and lots of dollars attached to when the Amendments Act was moving and had some expectation of success. Well, we're in a different place now, and frankly my staff resources on this front are about three FTE and a little bit of dollars. But we have been working on one significant project that the committee is quite familiar with, the branch technical position on performance assessment. And I believe we are scheduled to come back and talk to you about that in June, so we're looking forward to that. One of the issues that we've struggled with is how to characterize the criteria for a probablistic approach and we have recommended going with what is called the peak of the mean approach in terms of meeting criteria for compliance. There has been debate over how to do that, and I would just invite the committee to look at what we've done on that point, and I'd encourage you to support the approach that we've developed. We think it's consistent with what is done in the high level waste program, but I will tell you, there has been quite a bit of discussion about this, and we'll sit down and talk to you about it. I don't know whether you have observed this already. I know Howard and others sit in on a lot of our meetings, but we owe the commission a final position, and we want to take the time to sit down and go over it with you. So that's sort of on the agenda for June. Do I have that right, Pat? It's a June agenda for this -- okay, good. In the low level waste program area, one of the questions that I got at the reg information conference was what does the NRC do if anything on the low level waste policy act. The point is, you know, we're two decades into this and we don't really have a new compact facility. Is there a role for NRC to do something, and I know the committee has asked me that question, and I'm still struggling with the answer. Waste is now disposed of at Barnwell or Envirocare, places like that. So the system seems to be working. But with Barnwell pointing towards the Atlantic Compact with New Jersey and Connecticut, there's going to come a day if all that happens where many states do not have access to disposal capacity. And you've asked me the question, I've asked myself the question; I just don't know what role NRC has in entering this fray. I mean we're a regulatory agency. The question is, is what we're doing today safe? The answer is yes, what we're doing today is safe. Is a prospect of many states not having disposal capacity a big enough problem that the agency should enter the dialogue on this, but I don't have the answer. I just share that dilemma with you. I know you've asked the question yourselves, but the prospect of, if Barnwell seals off, you know, basically the rest of the country which has access now, at some point in time in the future, that's not quite what we had in the past. For example, the State of Michigan went five years without disposal capacity. Did we have any safety problems? No. And then the doors opened up, and I imagine Michigan was able to offload a lot of the waste that they stored for five years. But if you have a large number of states that do not have disposal capacity, you get into the kinds of problems that we're experiencing with the sites you'll hear about when Kamper briefs you on the rebaselining case. I think the majority of the sites that are on our SDMP sites, are sites that were storing material and somehow it got through the floorboards. That's the problem. And of course if you store for five years, you store for ten years, your chances of getting something down into the ground or into the ground water increase. And the commission has said in the past, their preferred approach is disposal. Get on with disposal. So I just raise the issue. I don't have a good answer. I know the committee has asked themselves and have asked me the question, and maybe it's something we can talk about over time, but I just -- I'm constantly getting this question in meetings, and my first answer is no, we're a regulator; things are operating safely now; this is a issue to be considered by congress. GAO did the report, but I haven't seen any results of that process. So my expectation is that the commission might be asking us this question at some point in time. I don't have a clean answer. MR. HORNBERGER: GAO didn't have a clean answer. MR. GARRICK: Some of the key questions at the information meeting, we guess one of the questions is what can we take to the local dump. MR. GREVES: That was one of the questions. And all these things sort of weave together. An answer to what can you take to the local landfill would be settled if there was a clearance rule in this country. Partially settled. And you're very familiar with that aspect, and it's going to take a long time before this country comes to a settlement on that topic. But that's the low activity material. I'm a bit more concerned about storage of class B and C waste than I am in terms of real health and safety issues. MR. GARRICK: It seems pretty clear, isn't it, on B and C what you can do given the restrictions at Hanford in terms of the location, and the restrictions at Envirocare which pretty much leaves Barnwell. MR. GREVES: That's today's picture, yes. If Barnwell were to shut the doors even if they did it gradually, it would be a problem for a large number of states. I will have to point out to you that there is some activities in Utah about taking class B and C waste. Whether that will ever happen, who knows. There is also some discussion in New Mexico, I think it's Waste Control Specialists that's talking about developing a facility. So there are some things on the horizon out there, but you look at the track record and pretty much they all by the wayside. Look how hard California worked on their efforts out there. I mean they got a license, but they were never able to build that facility. So we're asking ourselves collectively a rhetorical question, what is our role in this process, and so far I don't have a good answer. MR. GARRICK: Do we have good information on what kind of savings or what kind of impacts would come about if we did have a clearance rule? MR. GREVES: I don't have that. Frank Cardell I think has been down to brief you. I think there are probably significant -- it sort of depends on the level and what the clearance rule ultimately would look like. The stakeholders who have this kind of material obviously have information indicating it's quite significant, if there was some clearance level. You're going to bump into it internationally when you go over to France and UK. You'll bump into a different attitude in both those countries, by the way, but it was a significant topic in the recent Cordoba meeting. And it's being practiced internationally, and the question is, what is this country going to do about it. I don't have good information on, quote, savings associated with clearance. MR. LEVENSON: Has there been any discussion I guess really on an international level, I realize it isn't NRC's role, but it seems to me one of the things we need ideally for background is just that, for somebody to determine what is the background now in the metals and materials of commerce, because we always say everything is radioactive, and it sort of is. But even if we had a clearance rule, it would be very difficult to interpret, because presumably it's above background. Has there been any discussion that you're aware of, like the IAEA or somebody to determine what is background? MR. GREVES: Well, first we all know there is background out there, in terms of -- one thing you can look at is the academy report on NARM. They did a good job of identifying what is occurring naturally in terms of uranium, thorium, radium. They also did a good job of defining -- it's natural material, but it gets enhanced depending on what -- I don't know whether you'd call that background. The terminology gets a little fuzzy. So that's a very good report in terms of giving good information about what is out there in terms of uranium, thorium and radium. So it partially answers your question. I have not participated extensively, but IAEA and the international community has worked this issue a lot, and they may very well have the kind of information you're asking about. In fact, I would encourage you to talk to Frank Cardell and Bob Meck, because they are the guys that are working this arena, and they could probably give you much better hard information than I could. So you may want to visit with them one on one. Your question or your comment was sort of going in a direction. What I see the international community doing is coming up with concentrations. The border patrol, they aren't going to be separating background from some number. If it's going to work at all, it's a concentration. How much concentration of cobalt is acceptable; I mean there's cobalt in the steel this country produces right now. It's there. And so the international community from my perspective, and again Cardell and Meck are much closer to this than I am, they're pointing towards concentration values per nuclides, and IAEA has put together tech documents on this that are quite available. Anyhow, I started out talking about the dilemma on low level waste, and -- MR. GARRICK: And you ended up talking about the dilemma on low level waste. So maybe I should move on. MR. LARSON: For your information, John, you know, Envirocare Utah did request that their license be expanded for B and C. The state has made a preliminary finding that they agree that it's okay. Their rules state though, that for B and C it has to be a public hearing. Public hearings are underway. The counties have said okay, you've got something here anyway, so we have no objection to the situation, so the process is underway. One of the questions before the State of Utah is that before B and C can be licensed in the state, they have to review the site, go through the whole process again and that Envirocare can no longer own the site if they're going to store B and C, because it goes back to the thing that the committee looked at many years ago as to whether for perpetual care it could be in the hands of private industry. So it either has to be state or federal government. But that's where Utah stands. And I think I've sent to you the preliminary decision from Bill Sinclair, from Utah. MR. GARRICK: Well, that could be a very significant event, if they indeed get a B and C permit. MR. GREVES: Could be, but I would be a little skeptical until the various stages proceed. As Howard said, Utah has some, I don't know whether they call them hearings, but I think they're occurring within the next week or two. So there steps where this thing could get off the track. There's a lot that has to happen before there is any license to do anything with B and C waste out there. Well, I'm going to move on for fear we'll get further into this dilemma, unless you've got some answers to those questions. The last item that I wanted to address was some international meetings, feedback, the most recent of which was in Cordoba, Spain. I was able to participate and Commissioner Dikus gave a keynote speech. I think Pat has copies for you. I would commend that you take a look at that. It gives a good background from the commissioner's perspective. And also Ambassador Rich, he is the ambassador to the mission in Vienna, gave a speech on energy policy. It was a broad discussion. I would just commend you read that also. I found it quite interesting. Commissioner Dikus' focus was on the legal and socio-political dimensions of radioactive waste management. The whole meeting was really structured around the convention on spent fuel management, and the management of radioactive waste. So it covered pretty much all of the issues in that convention. It's been ratified by a number of countries, not enough to make it a convention yet. And it's my understanding that it should be forwarded to the senate. It hasn't gone yet to my knowledge. And we're hopeful that it would get ratified. We've talked to all the stakeholders that we're aware of in this country, and it seems to have general support. So it will be kind of a key mechanism for us to keep an eye on, what's going on internationally in the waste business. If this country ratifies the convention, then we would be going to a meeting once every three years to provide a report on where we are in satisfying the principles of the convention and explaining what's going on in this country in terms of radioactive waste disposal. It includes both defense and civilian waste. The Department of Energy would take the lead in developing a report, but obviously NRC and EPA would also be participating. So the Cordoba, Spain, was kind of a good jumping-off meeting to lead up to the ratification of this particular convention. As far as topics discussed at Cordoba, there was a lot of discussion of spent fuel storage, and there was, I'd say it's fair to characterize, there was a consensus that spent fuel storage is not a substitute for deep geologic disposal. You can't stop there. You need to proceed with deep geologic disposal. My sense was that was an answer in the NES meeting that we attended, when was that, in November last year; I look forward to the results of that report, but I'm just giving you a flavor of the meeting. There also was a lot of discussion on deep geologic; there is some progress in Finland and Sweden; and the WIP project was pointed out as a sign of success for deep geologic. There was a lot of reference to WIP opening up. There was a number of sessions on low level waste, intermediate level waste disposal; difficulties in siting. There was a session that focused on retrievability. The international community has rallied around a retrievable concept for high level waste, spent fuel and of course we know that this was in our regulations back in 1980. But this seems to be a central theme in the international community, that there is a need to provide for retrieval for spent fuel, high level waste. Part of this is public confidence. There were sessions on public participation. There was also a session on clearance, and there was a visit to the El Cabriel low level waste disposal facility. I see on your agenda that you're going to go to the French facility at Loeb. I'm butchering these pronunciations I'm sure. But I've been to both, now the El Cabriel facility and the French facility, and they're world class facilities. They do a good job. I think you'll enjoy seeing them. You know, there's a question, does it take this much energy, does it take this much cost to dispose of low level waste; I frankly commend both of those facilities. They have a national program, they have a facility, they dispose of the waste. There's a lot of confidence in it. I think some of them are sensing some complaints about how expensive it is, but I think if you ask for example the French when you're over there what the costs are, I think they're significantly less than charges down at Barnwell. Because the Barnwell charges are more than the concrete, the steel, the operation of that facility; they include a surcharge that pays for educational expenses. I tried to understand from the French what the cost was, and I think it is a lot less than $300 a cubic foot. And my sense in trying to get that information was, they were probably in the range of the Hanford costs, something under $100 a cubic foot. And of course there's a lot of conversions you have to do in terms of meters, cubic meters and activity, but you may check that while you're over there. Just to finish up, I have looked at your schedule, and I'm please to see that you're visiting UK and France. They're both destinations that we need to understand what's going on in terms of waste management. They're key players. I would ask you who you are meeting with in those two countries. If Lawrence Williams is not on your agenda for UK, if you can get him on your agenda to at least meet with him, he seems to be my counterpart plus he has more responsibilities than I do. So he's got all the waste issues in terms of regulation in UK. And I spent a considerable amount of time with him at the Cordoba meeting, and he's facing all the same issues that we are. And in France, Dr. LaCoste is the key point of contact that we have as a regulator. And in his organization, Olivier Burgeau is the key person who reports to him that has responsibilities for regulating the types of activities that I'm involved with. So I just offer, if they're on your agenda, fine. If not you might want to see if you could spend a little bit of time or get some discretionary time in with these individuals. They're the regulators in those countries that I have contact with on a fairly frequent basis, e-mail, telephone and when I can squeeze it in, a trip. I try and spend time with these gentlemen. That's kind of the end of the points that I wanted to raise. I'd be happy to address other questions, and hope you enjoy your trip to UK and France. I'm sure you will. MR. GARRICK: Thank you. Any questions from committee members? We appreciate your sharing with us these international hints, because I think a little bit to our surprise we learned a great deal on the last such excursion that we took, and I think we'll probably do the same here. Thank you very much, appreciate it a great deal. MR. GREVES: Thank you. MR. LEVENSON: I suppose we should ask whether in the next year or so you anticipate any reordering of your first three priorities? MR. GREVES: I don't expect it. The message is, you go to -- the meetings I go to, like the reg information conference, basically that's a utility/NRR run meeting. Clearly one-third of the questions that come up are a site, and it's called Yucca Mountain, that sends me a message. And when the commissioners speak, and yeah, they talk about renewal, they talk about the new oversight process, and then they talk about Yucca Mountain for another ten-15 minutes, it's sort of a, kind of read the tea leaves. What are the priorities. MR. LARKINS: I think it's actually encouraging to see that industry is interested once again in the waste disposal area. MR. GREVES: They have to be. MR. WYMER: Did the issue of transportation come up at all? MR. GREVES: Again, you're talking about the reg information conference, or -- MR. WYMER: Yeah. MR. GREVES: I was only able to be down there for my two sessions and sitting in on Dikus' presentation. She talked about transportation some, and I just don't have enough window on the topic. There could have been a session on transportation. And I know there was one on public participation, and every meeting that Bill and company go to, transportation comes up in terms of what I'll call public participation meetings. So I just don't have a good read on what happened downtown. It came up in the Cordoba meeting. It wasn't on the agenda, but people raised the issue. MR. GARRICK: The formal remarks that were made by the commissioners, are they available? MR. GREVES: Yes, they are available. Meserve's speech was on the table down there, and there was an announcement that Commissioner Dikus' speech would be available shortly, so my understanding -- MR. LARKINS: Usually OPA puts those on the NRC website. Plus the proceedings from the RAC is available after a couple of months. MR. GARRICK: Thank you very much. MR. GREVES: Thank you. MR. GARRICK: I think it might be appropriate now for us to hear from Carol Hanlon, and get a little bit of an update on what's happening out west. MS. HANLON: As you all are very aware, there are a number of interesting activities that we're engaged in this year, and I thought it might be valuable to you just to give you a little update. Bill Ramer had discussed the 963 rule-making. I think you're familiar with that. That initially began in December of 1996 when we were evaluating supplementing the existing 960 with a part 963. At that point we did develop a proposed rule. We had a comment, a session on that, and we conducted hearings on that. Based on those we revised the proposed rule-making, and we issued a supplemental notice on November 30th, 1999. So subsequently we held a number of public hearings in Las Vegas on two separate occasions, we had two hearings. So those were conducted on February 2nd and 3rd of this year, 2000. The public comment period has been extended for a total of 111 days. It's closed now, it was closed on March 20th. So we are currently as Bill said, in the process of evaluating those comments, and revising the final rule, revising the rule for the final, and we do expect to submit that draft rule as early as April, 2000. NRC will concur before the rule is finalized, and we expect that we might have that rule available in a time frame of November 2000, as early as that point. So that's the 963 status. In addition, we're looking at the site recommendation consideration report. That's a very high priority, of course. Currently that's a two volume site recommendation consideration report, and it's purpose is to inform the public of the secretary's consideration on a possible site recommendation, also to provide the basis for public comments. We have two volumes currently. Volume one addresses the requirements from section 114 of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. That is information on the Yucca Mountain site characterization and design aspects. Volume two is a preliminary suitability evaluation against 10 CRF 963, the revised siting guidelines. Currently the site recommendation consideration report is scheduled for release in November of 2000. That will be prior to public hearings and a comment period which are required by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. And I think I mentioned the associated comment period. We are on target for that deliverable. Responses to the comment which we receive on the consideration report will be included in the site recommendation report itself, if the secretary should decide to recommend that site to the president. There are a number of technical program documents I think that you are familiar with, which do support site recommendation and the consideration report, and later the site recommendation. They include analysis and modeling reports. There are currently about 126 of those, nine process model reports and a number of site description design documents, a total system performance assessment and preliminary preclosure safety assessment, so those are proceeding. We have I think currently either four or five process model reports that we have received, a number of analysis and modeling reports, so those are proceeding. They are available to the committee, they are available. As soon as they are ready they're being put on the web, and they're being provided to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. So the process model reports are directly, provide the direct basis for the content of the site consideration document itself -- excuse me -- site recommendation consideration report. MR. GARRICK: Is there an interim PSPA before TSPA LA, or are they working on -- MS. HANLON: Yes, the TSPA SR is the interim report. Between VA and LA. The draft of that will be available in August of this year. And I think that you're aware that DOE proposed in its November 24th letter to the NRC to provide copies of all acceptable deliverables, accepted deliverables, to the NRC to support the sufficiency review, similar to the process that was used for the viability assessment. And those documents are coming through. The next major document that you're very familiar with is the environmental impact statement. The comment period has closed on that. The last comment, hearing comment -- comment hearing was held in California. They are in the process of evaluating the path forward, looking toward a final EIS to be released in fiscal year 2001. A final comment response document will be part of that final EIS. The process on finalizing the EIS is unfortunately a bit vague right now as they develop the time schedule for it and how they'll proceed, so I'd be happy to give you more information on that later as they develop their final strategy. And may I answer any questions on anything for you? MR. HORNBERGER: So you said, let's see if I got this right. 126 analyses and modeling reports in hand? MS. HANLON: In the end. MR. HORNBERGER: In the end, so you don't have them all. MS. HANLON: No, that's the total amount that will support the nine process model reports. MR. LARSON: Do you have the list of those that are completed, or is that on the web that we can -- if we look on the web can we find -- MS. HANLON: I'm not sure if it's on the web or not, but I could get you a list of the ones that are completed. MR. LARSON: Because the committee has indicated an interest in having the consultants look at some of these things as we go along. MS. HANLON: Certainly. I'll get you a list that are completed, and the schedule for the rest. MS. DEERING: Carol, how many PMRs are done; do you know? MS. HANLON: I think there are either four or five, Lynn. MS. DEERING: Already done, okay, out of the nine? MS. HANLON: We expect the rest of them to be done about the end of April or the first part of May. MR. HORNBERGER: You say there are about 30 of those? MS. HANLON: No, nine. MR. HORNBERGER: Nine total. MS. HANLON: Nine process model reports and 126 AMRs. MR. WYMER: Do you know what the technical basis was for changing the design of the repository, dropping the backfill and strip shield? MS. HANLON: I'm probably not the best one to speak to you about that, but you know, Paul has been in a couple of times to discuss it, and I understand that you'd like him to come in later this summer, if he's still on in June, and he'll be excellent to talk to you about the basis for the design change. MR. LARSON: The three presentations scheduled for June are still on? MS. HANLON: I have two, and I wasn't sure. MR. LARSON: We got performance confirmation, DOE presentation on stats and plans for site recommendation, Paul Harrington, and development of a Yucca Mountain guideline, part 63 -- MS. HANLON: Right, and Paul was not going to talk about status or site characterization rather, but design, yes. We can clarify that later. MR. LARSON: Because I had heard that there was some possibility that some of those things might slip, that's -- MS. HANLON: It's entirely up to you. We are available to provide you with speakers on those topics in June or July. In July it gets a bit more difficult because our people are more involved in the site consideration recommendation report, but in June they're available if that fits your schedule. They're available later in the summer if they're not, and some of these things can certainly be discussed with you when you come out in September. Would you like copies of these AMRs and PMRs as they come out? MS. DEERING: A hundred and twenty-six AMRs? MS. HANLON: They're fascinating, Lynn. MS. DEERING: Does each of you want a copy? MR. HORNBERGER: No. MR. GARRICK: No. MR. HORNBERGER: I think we want a library here. MS. DEERING: We've gotten a few of the PMRs, one trickled in yesterday. To Rich, it was sent to Rich, and he thought it was the first one. But I know it wasn't. MS. HANLON: Which one was that? MS. DEERING: It was maybe a -- MS. HANLON: The ISM, integrated site model, was the first. That was the first one, and we recently received either three or four more. MS. DEERING: And I can get them from the Yucca Mountain team meeting. They get circulated and you can sign up, but that's a -- I mean we could also get it directly from DOE, but -- MS. HANLON: We can get them to you directly. MR. LARKINS: Are these available in an electronic format? MS. HANLON: Yes, they are. As soon as they are accepted they go on the e-net. The website. MR. LARKINS: So we're not storing everything electronically? MS. HANLON: Yes. Just don't ever unplug the computer. MR. GARRICK: When ATOMS is in place are they going to stop sending us documents? MR. LARKINS: Yes. MR. GARRICK: When is that? MR. LARKINS: We're going to start transitioning supposedly the first of the month, but we have a phased transition plan, so we're not going to cut off everything. MR. HORNBERGER: Saturday is the date. MR. LARKINS: April Fools day. MS. DEERING: So you're just notified that these reports exist; is that how it will work, rather than get it in the mail, you'll get a notice that it's available on the internet? MR. HORNBERGER: And then you can print it out on your own printer. It will cost about three times as much as distributing it. MR. LARSON: Your own toner and your own paper. MR. GARRICK: Now we know what you're up to. Okay, thank you very much. MS. HANLON: You're certainly welcome. MR. GARRICK: Okay, we've got a lot of remaining items to get through in the next couple of hours, so we'll not transition into an ACNW report phase, but will -- MR. LARKINS: John, I'd -- you've heard about all of the activities going on in the area, decommissioning. Dick put together a report on that. MR. GARRICK: Well, I want to hear that but I was going to have that right after the break. I don't think we need a reporter for that, do we? MR. LARKINS: No. MR. GARRICK: All right, let's take a ten-minute break and then come back in here about decommissioning from Dick Salva. [Whereupon, at 9:50 a.m., the meeting was concluded.]
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