[Federal Register Volume 64, Number 171 (Friday, September 3, 1999)]
[Rules and Regulations]
[Pages 48496-48507]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 99-22764]
[[Page 48495]]
_______________________________________________________________________
Part III
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
_______________________________________________________________________
10 CFR Part 51
Changes to Requirements for Environmental Review for Renewal of Nuclear
Power Plant Operating Licenses; Final Rules
Federal Register / Vol. 64, No. 171 / Friday, September 3, 1999 /
Rules and Regulations
[[Page 48496]]
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
10 CFR Part 51
RIN 3150-AG05
Changes to Requirements for Environmental Review for Renewal of
Nuclear Power Plant Operating Licenses
AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Final Rule.
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SUMMARY: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is amending its
regulations on the environmental information required in applications
to renew the operating licenses of nuclear power plants. This amendment
expands the generic findings about the environmental impacts due to
transportation of fuel and waste to and from a single nuclear power
plant. Specifically, this amendment adds to findings concerning the
cumulative environmental impacts of convergence of spent fuel shipments
on a single destination, rather than multiple destinations, and the
environmental impact of transportation of higher enriched and higher
burnup spent fuel during the renewal term. The effect of this amendment
is to permit the NRC to make a generic finding regarding the impacts so
that an analysis of these impacts will not have to be repeated for each
individual license renewal application. This action reduces the
regulatory burden on applicants for license renewal by replacing
individual plant operating license renewal reviews with a generic
review of these topics. Also, this amendment incorporates rule language
to be consistent with the findings in NUREG-1437, ``Generic
Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants''
(May 1996), which addresses local traffic impacts attributable to
continued operation of the nuclear power plant during the license
renewal term.
In analyzing the environmental impact of transporting spent fuel
and waste in the vicinity of a single repository, the NRC evaluated the
impact in the vicinity of Yucca Mountain and specifically the impacts
in the vicinity of Las Vegas, NV. The NRC elected to evaluate the
impacts in the vicinity of Yucca Mountain because Yucca Mountain is the
only location currently being evaluated for a repository under the
Nuclear Waste Policy Act. The NRC's analysis of the impacts in the
vicinity of Yucca Mountain in this instance does not prejudge the
eventual licensing of Yucca Mountain as a repository. Rather, it
reflects NRC's existing license renewal process by reflecting current
repository activities and policies. If an application is filed by the
Department of Energy (DOE), the licensing process for a repository in
the vicinity of Yucca Mountain will constitute an entirely separate
regulatory action from the proposed final rule. Furthermore, if, based
on technical or national policy considerations, some site other than
Yucca Mountain is selected in the future for study as a repository, the
NRC will evaluate the applicability of the generic environmental impact
statement for the license renewal process to other proposed repository
sites.
EFFECTIVE DATE: October 4, 1999.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Donald P. Cleary, Office of Nuclear
Reactor Regulation, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC
20555-0001, telephone: 301-415-3903; e-mail: [email protected].
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Background
On June 5, 1996 (61 FR 28467), the Commission published in the
Federal Register a final rule amending its environmental protection
regulations in 10 CFR part 51 to improve the efficiency of the process
of environmental review for applicants seeking to renew a nuclear power
plant operating license for up to an additional 20 years. The
rulemaking was based on the analyses reported in the final report of
NUREG-1437, ``Generic Environmental Impact Statement for License
Renewal of Nuclear Plants'' (GEIS) (May 1996). The rulemaking drew on
the considerable experience of operating nuclear power plants in order
to generically assess many of the environmental impacts, so that
repetitive reviews of issues whose impacts are well understood could be
minimized. In the statement of considerations accompanying the final
rule, the Commission stated that before the final rule became
effective, the Commission was seeking comments on the treatment of low-
level waste (LLW) storage and disposal impacts, the cumulative
radiological effects from the uranium fuel cycle, and the effects from
the disposal of high-level waste (HLW) and spent fuel. In response to
the June 5, 1996, final rule, a number of commentors stated that the
requirements for the review of transportation of HLW in the rule were
unclear with respect to (1) the use and legal status of 10 CFR 51.52,
``Table S-4-- Environmental Impact of Transportation of Fuel and Waste
To and From One Light-Water-Cooled Nuclear Power Reactor,'' in plant-
specific license renewal reviews; (2) the conditions that must be met
before an applicant may adopt Table S-4; and (3) the extent to which
the generic effects of transporting spent fuel to a HLW repository
should be considered in a plant-specific license renewal review.
After considering the comments received on the rule, the Commission
republished the rule in the Federal Register on December 18, 1996 (61
FR 66537). The rule at 10 CFR 51.53(c)(3)(ii)(M) continued to require,
``The environmental effects of transportation of fuel and waste shall
be reviewed in accordance with 10 CFR 51.52.'' However, in response to
comments received, the following requirement was added:
The review of impacts shall also discuss the generic and
cumulative impacts associated with transportation operation in the
vicinity of a high-level waste repository site. The candidate site
at Yucca Mountain should be used as a representative site for the
purpose of impact analysis as long as that site is under
consideration for licensing.
Also in response to the comments, the Commission stated that:
As part of its effort to develop regulatory guidance for this
rule, the Commission will consider whether further changes to the
rule are desirable to generically address: (1) the issue of
cumulative transportation impacts and (2) the implications that the
use of higher burnup fuel have for the conclusions in Table S-4.
After consideration of these issues, the Commission will determine
whether the issue of transportation impacts should be changed to
Category 1.1
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\1\ In NUREG-1437 and in the rule, Category 1 issues are those
environmental issues for which the analysis and findings have been
determined to be applicable to all nuclear power plants or to plants
with specific types of cooling systems or other common plant or site
characteristics. Absent new information that significantly changes
the finding, these generic findings may be adopted in plant license
renewal reviews. Category 2 issues are those that analysis has shown
that one or more of the criteria of Category 1 cannot be met and,
therefore, additional plant-specific review is required.
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In SECY-97-279, titled ``Generic and Cumulative Environmental
Impacts of Transportation of High-Level Waste (HLW) in the Vicinity of
a HLW Repository,'' dated December 3, 1997, the NRC staff informed the
Commission that it was the staff's preliminary view that its
supplemental analyses of the generic and cumulative impacts of the
transportation of HLW and of the implications of higher burnup fuel for
transportation impacts support a reasonable technical and legal
determination that transportation of HLW is a Category 1 issue and may
be generically adopted in a license renewal application. In a Staff
Requirements Memorandum (SRM) dated January 13,
[[Page 48497]]
1998, the Commission directed the NRC staff to proceed with rulemaking
to amend 10 CFR 51.53(c)(3)(ii)(M) to categorize the impacts of
transportation of HLW as a Category 1 issue. In a memorandum dated July
1, 1998, the NRC staff informed the Commission of its plans for
amending 10 CFR part 51.
In that memorandum the NRC staff also proposed, as an
administrative amendment, to address local traffic impacts attributable
to continued operation of the plant during the license renewal term.
This issue was identified as a Category 2 issue in NUREG-1437, Section
4.7.3.2 and the overall issue of transportation was designated as
Category 2 in the rule (see 10 CFR Part 51, Subpart A, Appendix B,
Table B-1, ``Public Services, Transportation''). However, the specific
issue of local transportation impacts during the renewal term was
inadvertently omitted from 10 CFR 51.53(c)(3)(ii)(J) and its inclusion
in Table B-1 is not explicitly stated. The basic transportation concern
identified in NUREG-1437 is the potential adverse contribution of a
larger plant work force to traffic flow in the vicinity of the power
plant.
To address the above issues, the Commission issued proposed
amendments to 10 CFR part 51 on February 26, 1999 (64 FR 9884), and
provided a public comment period of 60 days. The supplemental analysis,
which supports this rule, is reported in NUREG-1437, Vol. 1, Addendum
1, ``Generic Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of
Nuclear Plants: Main Report Section 6.3--`Transportation,' Table 9.1
`Summary of findings on NEPA issues for license renewal of nuclear
power plants,' Final Report.'' The draft for comment was published in
February 1999 and the final report is expected to be published in
August 1999.
The public comment period closed on April 27, 1999. Extensive
public comments were received, including concerns by some commentors
about the length of the comment period. Although the NRC did not extend
the public comment period, the NRC staff did consider comments dated as
late as June 25, 1999, and received as late as early July 1999. The NRC
staff's responses to the comments are provided below. As explained in
more detail below, the comments have led to both the use of more
conservative assumptions in the analysis reported in Addendum 1 and a
fuller explanation of the analysis. The regulatory text has been edited
for clarification but there is no material change from the proposed
rule.
Discussion
Relationship of This Rulemaking to Repository Licensing
The NRC is promulgating this rule in order to meet its National
Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) responsibilities to consider the
environmental impact of its license renewal decisions. In 1996 (61 FR
28467 and 61 FR 66537), the NRC published a rule that codified
conclusions regarding the environmental impacts of license renewal (see
10 CFR part 51, Appendix B to subpart A). The amendment issued in the
present Notice constitutes a relatively small addition to those
previously published conclusions. In particular, as discussed above,
this amendment ensures among other things that the NRC has considered
the likely impacts of transporting spent fuel generated during the
license renewal period over a single transportation corridor in the
vicinity of a waste repository.
Because the Yucca Mountain site in Nevada currently represents the
most likely candidate for a repository, the NRC has used that site as a
representative site for its analysis in lieu of considering
transportation to an unspecified, hypothetical site. The decision to
use Yucca Mountain for the purposes of the current analysis, however,
in no way increases or decreases the likelihood that Yucca Mountain
will in fact be licensed as a repository for the nation's high level
waste. Instead, it simply provides the NRC with the information it
needs to gauge the potential impacts from licensing nuclear power
plants for an additional 20 year period. If an application is filed by
the Department of Energy (DOE), the licensing process for a repository
in the vicinity of Yucca Mountain will constitute an entirely separate
regulatory action from this final rule. Any NRC decision on a
repository license will be accompanied by separate safety and
environmental analyses that will include a thorough examination of the
environmental impacts stemming from the construction and operation of
the repository. If the analyses prepared for the repository licensing
decision yield results that are inconsistent with those reached in the
present notice, it is likely that the NRC will have to amend the
conclusions in Table B-1 of Part 51 to conform with the new findings.
Amendments to the Rule
The current regulations require each applicant for license renewal
to review the environmental effects of transportation of fuel and waste
in accordance with 10 CFR 51.52, and to discuss the generic and
cumulative impacts associated with transportation in the vicinity of
the candidate HLW repository site at Yucca Mountain (see 10 CFR
51.53(c)(3)(ii)(M)). The NRC staff has performed a generic assessment
of these cumulative impacts, which is reported in NUREG-1437, Vol. 1,
Addendum 1. The analysis focused on Clark County, Nevada because it
represents the area with the largest population in the vicinity of the
potential repository. The final rule codifies the conclusions of this
analysis in 10 CFR Part 51. In addition, the NRC staff has generically
considered the potential impacts of transporting higher enriched and
higher burnup fuel than is currently covered in 10 CFR 51.52 and is
codifying these findings with this final rule. That assessment
concludes that the impacts of transporting fuel and waste generated
during the license renewal period are small and are consistent with the
impacts of the values in Table S-4 of the Commission's regulations
(Sec. 51.52). Under the Commission's regulations for the environmental
review of license renewal decisions (see 10 CFR part 51, subpart A,
appendix B), the Commission may reach a conclusion of ``small'' impact
for a particular issue if the:
* * * environmental effects are not detectable or are so minor that
they will neither destabilize nor noticeably alter any important
attribute of the resource. For the purposes of assessing
radiological impacts, the Commission has concluded that those
impacts that do not exceed permissible levels in the Commission's
regulations are considered small as the term is used in this table.
The final rule amends the issue of transportation of fuel and waste
from Category 2 to Category 1. In order to reach this Category 1
conclusion on an issue and thus not require site specific analysis of
the issue pursuant to Sec. 51.53(c)(3)(i), the Commission has made the
following findings in accordance with the definitions set out in 10 CFR
Part 51, Subpart A, Appendix B:
(1) The environmental impacts associated with the issue have been
determined to apply either to all plants or, for some issues, to plants
having a specific type of cooling system or other specified plant or
site characteristic;
(2) A single significance level, in this case ``small'' has been
assigned to the impacts (except for collective off site radiological
impacts from the fuel cycle
[[Page 48498]]
and from high level waste and spent fuel disposal 2); and
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\2\ This exception only applies to the two entries in Table B-1
labeled ``Offsite radiological impacts (collective effects)'' and
``Offsite radiological impacts (spent fuel and high level waste
disposal).
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(3) Mitigation of adverse impacts associated with the issue has
been considered in the analysis, and it has been determined that
additional plant-specific mitigation measures are likely not to be
sufficiently beneficial to warrant implementation.
As a result of this Category 1 finding, neither applicants nor the
NRC staff will need to prepare a separate analysis of the issue for
individual license renewal applications as long as no new and
significant information exists. The analysis in NUREG-1437, Vol. 1,
Addendum 1 which forms the technical basis for the rulemaking, relies
on a series of conservative assumptions. As such, the results of the
analysis overestimate the environmental impacts of spent fuel shipments
converging on one location, such as Yucca Mountain. Although the NRC
staff has assessed these impacts as if Yucca Mountain would be the only
HLW repository, the NRC staff believes that the impacts calculated for
Yucca Mountain bound the impacts that would be experienced for a site
other than Yucca Mountain. It is unlikely that any other repository
site would have an exposed population greater than that assumed for Las
Vegas and it is unlikely that spent-fuel shipments from all points of
origin converge on and are transported through one metropolitan area.
If an alternative to a high level waste repository at Yucca Mountain is
considered in the future, the NRC may need to determine whether such an
alternative includes new and significant information that may change
the regulatory outcome.
In addition to considering the cumulative impacts of transportation
in the vicinity of a repository, the NRC also considered whether use of
higher burnup or higher enriched fuel that is shipped to a repository
results in impacts consistent with the NRC regulations
(Sec. 51.52,`Table S-4--Environmental Impact of Transportation of Fuel
and Waste To and From One Light-Water-Cooled Nuclear Power Reactor').
The environmental consequences of incremental increases in the burnup
of fuel and the associated use of higher enrichment fuel are discussed
in Section 6.2.3 of NUREG-1437. Section 6.2.3 addresses the sensitivity
of the data presented in Table S-3 and Table S-4 to the growing use of
higher enriched fuel and higher fuel burnup. Table S-3 summarizes
natural resource use and effluents to the environment for the uranium
fuel cycle, from mining to ultimate disposal of spent fuel. The
discussion of the implications for the environmental impact data
reported in Table S-4 was not repeated or referenced in Section 6.3,
which addresses the incremental impacts of license renewal on the
transportation of fuel and waste to and from nuclear power plants.
Addendum 1 and this final rule clarify the NRC findings on the
sensitivity of values in Table S-4 to the use of higher enrichment fuel
and higher burnup fuel presently in use. The analysis concludes that
shipment of higher enriched or higher burnup fuel results in impacts
consistent with the impacts in Table S-4, 10 CFR 51.52. It should be
noted that cask designs used to transport or store higher enriched fuel
and higher burnup fuel require specific NRC review and approval.
In the course of preparing the final rule, several non-substantive
changes to the wording and organization of the regulatory text were
made in order to maintain the rule's internal consistency. First, the
content of the proposed language in Sec. 51.53(c)(3)(ii)(J) regarding
local transportation impacts in the vicinity of the licensed plant was
also placed into Table B-1 under ``Public Services, Transportation''
under the Socioeconomics section of the Table. Similarly, the proposed
language in Sec. 51.53(c)(3)(ii)(M) has not been included in the final
rule because the matters covered by Sec. 51.53(c)(3)(ii) only apply to
Category 2 issues and, as such, the inclusion of matters related to a
Category 1 issue in that section would not have been appropriate.
Instead, the content of the language that had been proposed for
Sec. 51.53(c)(3)(ii)(M) is adequately covered by the amended entry in
Table B-1 itself under the issue of ``Transportation'' in the Uranium
Fuel Cycle and Waste Management section.
Response to Comments
Thirty-one comment letters were received on the proposed rule from
power reactor licensees, State and local Government agencies, the
nuclear power industry and its legal affiliations, a public interest
group, and an individual. Most of the comments were from the State of
Nevada, Clark and Nye Counties, Nevada, and local government entities
in Nevada. These comments focused on the NRC not involving Nevada in
scoping and designing the study in Addendum 1 and on perceived
deficiencies in the scope and thoroughness of the analysis in the
Addendum. The State of Utah also submitted extensive comments that
focused on concerns with the scope and thoroughness of the supporting
analysis in Addendum 1, including the lack of consideration of the
proposed Private Fuel Storage Facility at Skull Valley, Utah. Industry
comments focused on clarifications in the rule language.
The written comments have been summarized and grouped into issue
categories. As a result of the NRC staff's review of all written
comments, some modifications and clarifications have been incorporated
into Addendum 1--notably, the use of more conservative assumptions in
the analyses and a fuller explanation of those analyses. In addition,
the rule language has been edited for clarification. The NRC staff has
also prepared responses, given below, to the issues raised by the
commentors.
Issue 1--Public Notice
Comment: The titles of the notices published in the Federal
Register were inaccurate and misleading because they do not clearly
indicate the subject matter of the proposed rule and Addendum 1 that
addresses transportation of spent nuclear fuel.
Response: The NRC believes that the titles properly reflect the
regulatory action being taken. As required by NRC
regulations,3 a notice of the proposed rule and a Notice of
Availability of Addendum 1 were published in the Federal Register (64
FR 9884 and 64 FR 9889, February 26, 1999). While the notice's title
did not include the specific term ``transportation,'' the titles define
the subject matter of the regulation to be affected; the title of the
proposed rule is ``Changes to Requirements for Environmental Review for
Renewal of Nuclear Power Plant Operating Licenses.'' The title of the
Notice of Availability is ``Changes to Requirements for Environmental
Review for Renewal of Nuclear Power Plant Operating Licenses,
Availability of Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement.'' Addendum
1 supplements specific sections of NUREG-1437, Generic Environmental
Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants (May 1996). This
limited function is indicated by the title of Addendum 1, Generic
Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants:
Main Report Section 6.3--``Transportation,'' Table 9.1 ``Summary of
findings on NEPA issues
[[Page 48499]]
for license renewal of nuclear power plants,'' Draft Report for
Comment.
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\3\ 10 CFR 2.804, ``Notice of proposed rulemaking'' and 10 CFR
51.117, ``Draft environmental impact statement'notice of
availability.''
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The rule change and the supporting Addendum 1 affect only the
plant-specific environmental analysis required to be submitted in the
Environmental Report of an applicant for the renewal of a nuclear power
plant operating license and the plant-specific supplemental
environmental impact statement prepared by the NRC. Even though the
analysis in Addendum 1 focuses on spent-fuel shipments converging on
the proposed repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, that analysis and
the resulting rule affect only the review requirements for renewal of
an individual nuclear power plant operating license. It is not intended
that Addendum 1 or the revised rule support any other regulatory
decision by the NRC.
Issue 2--Communications
Comment: NRC failed to consult with Nevada State agencies, Nevada
local governments, and with Nevada Indian Tribes.
Response: As discussed above, a variety of organizations and
government agencies submitted substantive comments in response to the
proposed rule. The NRC has considered these comments and, in many
cases, altered its analysis as a result of this input. Prior to
issuance of the proposed rule for comment, however, the NRC did not
seek any pre-publication input from Nevada state agencies, Nevada local
Governments, and Nevada Indian Tribes for the following reasons. First,
the rule involves a narrow aspect of the environmental review of
individual nuclear power plant license renewal decisions, which is a
regulatory decision completely separate from the regulatory
requirements that will guide the NRC licensing review of a HLW
repository and from the decision process leading to a DOE site
recommendation on Yucca Mountain, Nevada, the site DOE currently has
under study. This rule amends the December 18, 1996, rule with respect
to two questions not adequately answered:
1. Are the current environmental impact values in Table S-4, based
on several destinations, still reasonable to incorporate in a license
renewal review that assumes a single destination for spent fuel at
Yucca Mountain, Nevada?
2. Are the current environmental impact values in Table S-4 (which
are based on fuel enriched to no greater than 4 percent, the average
level of irradiation of spent fuel not exceeding 33,000 MWd/MTU, and
shipment no less than 90 days after discharge from the reactor) still
reasonable to incorporate in a license renewal review of plants that
may use fuel enriched up to 5 percent and potentially ship spent fuel
with a burnup of up to 62,000 MWd/MTU?
The amendment has no direct regulatory impact on any entity within
Nevada. The selection of Yucca Mountain for the generic evaluation of
transportation impacts was made because that site is currently the only
one under consideration for a high-level-waste (HLW) repository. Before
HLW is actually transported to Yucca Mountain, Nevada, the State, local
Governments, Indian Tribes, and the public have the opportunity to
provide input on site-specific transportation impacts by commenting on
DOE's draft EIS for the proposed repository at the Yucca Mountain site,
which was made available for a 180-day comment period beginning on
August 13, 1999 (http://www.ynp.gov).
Also, the need for and scope of the current rule amendment were
identified within the context of a preceding rulemaking that specified
the plant-specific content of the environmental review of applications
for the renewal of individual nuclear power plant operating licenses.
The previous final rule was published in the Federal Register first on
June 5, 1996 (61 FR 28467), and again with minor modifications on
December 18, 1996 (61 FR 66537). The Commission stated in the December
Federal Register notice, ``as part of its efforts to develop regulatory
guidance for this rule, the Commission will consider whether further
changes to the rule are desirable to generically address: (1) The issue
of cumulative transportation impacts and (2) the implications that the
use of higher burn-up fuel have for the conclusions in Table S-4. After
consideration of these issues, the Commission will determine whether
the issue of transportation impacts should be changed to Category 1.''
Issue 3--Transportation Analysis
Comment: NRC failed to consult relevant Yucca Mountain
transportation risk and impact studies.
Response: The publications cited by commentors have been reviewed
for information that may be of direct use within the limited focus and
purpose of the current rule. Most of the information in these documents
was found to be potentially more relevant to a detailed site-specific
review of Yucca Mountain than to the generic analysis for this rule.
That information has been brought to the attention of those
organizational units within the NRC responsible for activities relating
to DOE's study on the Yucca Mountain site so they can appropriately
consider the information in any future prelicensing activities
involving Yucca Mountain. Specific to the current rule, the demographic
data used as inputs to the RADTRAN computer code, which was used to
generate the impact analysis in Addendum 1 were more current than data
used in many of the studies cited by the commentors.
Comment: NRC failed to consult the full spectrum of transportation
mode and route scenarios.
Response: The purpose of this rule and associated analysis is to
reach conclusions regarding the likely environmental impact of license
renewal. As noted above, this amendment is an addition to generic
assessments of license renewal environmental impacts already codified
in the Commission's regulations at 10 CFR part 51, subpart A, appendix
B. It is not an environmental impact statement for a repository at
Yucca Mountain for which DOE is responsible and, as such, does not
delve into the expansive range of different transportation modes and
route scenarios that would be considered in the context of a decision
on Yucca Mountain as the possible site for the facility itself.
Instead, the NRC has sought to determine a conservative estimate of the
likely impacts from transporting fuel and waste generated, during the
license renewal term, in the vicinity of a potential repository. In
doing so, the NRC considered only those transportation modes and route
scenarios that would likely result in the greatest impacts. For the
proposed rule, the NRC staff--in consultation with the DOE staff--
determined that truck shipments through densely populated areas of
Clark County, Nevada, would have the highest potential impacts among
the alternative transportation scenarios and modes that would receive
serious consideration in decisions relating to the suitability of the
site undergoing study for a repository at Yucca Mountain. The NRC
continues to believe that using these route scenarios and modes to
generate conservative estimates is reasonable for the purpose of this
rulemaking.
Comment: There was insufficient consideration of routine
transportation radiological risks due to use of an average dose rate
lower than the regulatory limit.
Response: The RADTRAN analysis reported in the final Addendum 1 has
been modified to use the most conservative assumption that the
radiation levels for all shipments are at the regulatory limit of 0.1
mSv/hour [10
[[Page 48500]]
mrem/hour] at 2 m [6.6 ft] from the shipment vehicle surface. As noted
in Section 2.2.3 of Addendum 1, this assumption is sufficiently
conservative to bound the analysis of routine transportation
radiological risk and allow a reasonable assessment of that risk.
Actual average radiation levels and associated doses would be much
lower because shipments must be designed so that the regulatory limits
are not exceeded. The use of the regulatory limits in the revised
analysis results in higher dose estimates for incident-free
transportation. However, these revised estimates are still small as
defined in 10 CFR Part 51, Subpart A, Appendix B. Consequently, the
conclusion regarding the radiological risks of routine transportation
remains valid.
Comment: There was insufficient consideration of routine
transportation radiological risks to members of the public residing,
working, or institutionally confined at locations near shipping routes.
Response: The analysis encompasses members of the public residing,
working, or institutionally confined at locations near shipping routes
by assuming that the resident population along the transportation
routes is exposed to every shipment. The text of Sect. 2.3 of Addendum
1, has been revised to state this assumption and its effects on the
revised analysis more clearly. In addition, more conservative
assumptions of truck speed have been used in the revised RADTRAN
analysis thus extending the exposure time to individuals along the
transportation route. These assumptions further ensure that members of
the public cited by the commentors would be encompassed by the dose and
risk assessments. As expected, the use of these more conservative
assumptions leads to higher estimates of radiation dose to the public.
However, these revised dose estimates remain well below regulatory
limits for members of the public and small compared to natural
background and other sources of radiation exposure.
Several commentors indicated that Addendum 1 should focus on unique
and location-specific circumstances of the transportation routes and
population centers. However, the analysis in Addendum 1 is generic and
was designed to support only the limited scope of the decision
regarding this rule change. The NRC believes that the routes chosen
represent a conservative analysis due to the higher number of people
who live along these routes. Because the purpose of this rule is to
provide a generic analysis for the limited purpose of determining the
likely impact of transportation during the license renewal term, the
large analytical effort required for the identification of specific
population locations and traffic circumstances is not warranted within
the context of the current rule. Although the comments raise valid
issues, those concerns should be resolved within the context of
studying, and making decisions concerning, the suitability of the
candidate repository site at Yucca Mountain and regulatory requirements
governing transportation of spent fuel.
Comment: There was insufficient consideration of radiological risks
resulting from traffic gridlock incidents.
Response: Traffic gridlock incidents are not specifically analyzed
in NUREG-1437 because of the limited scope and generic nature of the
analysis (see response to comment on consideration of risks to members
of the public, above). However, the revised RADTRAN analysis
conservatively includes approximately two hours of stationary time in
Clark County (during a 100 to 140 mile trip depending upon the route)
for each truck shipment; and traffic gridlock could be one of the
reasons for the truck being stationary.
To a limited extent, the incorporation of more conservative
assumptions of truck speed into the revised RADTRAN analysis
compensates for an analysis of traffic gridlock by allowing for
increased exposure time at any given point during transport. As noted
earlier, these revised assumptions lead to higher but still small dose
estimates. In addition, the routes used in the analysis in Addendum 1
were deliberately chosen to maximize estimated dose. Actual routes
would be less likely to have significant areas where traffic gridlock
occurs. The selection of the actual routes, for example, would comply
with the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Highway
Administration regulations (49 CFR Part 397, Subpart D) that require
minimizing the time in transit (i.e., avoiding periods of great traffic
congestion) for routing radioactive shipments.
Comment: There was insufficient consideration of routine
transportation radiological risks to vehicle inspectors and escorts.
Response: The RADTRAN analysis in the revised Addendum 1 uses the
regulatory dose rate limit of .02 mSv/hour (2 mrem/hour) for the
vehicle crew. In addition, a discussion of potential doses to escorts
has been included in Addendum 1, Section 2.2.3. In the analysis, both
the escorts and drivers are assumed to be exposed to the regulatory
limit, although the dose to the escorts would realistically be less
than that to the drivers. Even with these more conservative
assumptions, the estimated dose and risk to the crew are small and
below regulatory limits.
The risk to vehicle inspectors would be encompassed by the addition
of stationary time for the transport truck in Clark County (see
response to comment about traffic gridlock, above). Again, the
estimated dose and risk are increased by the use of more conservative
assumptions; but they remain small and below regulatory limits.
Comment: There was insufficient consideration of severe
transportation accident risks.
Response: The Commission has evaluated the potential radiological
hazards of severe transportation accidents involving truck and rail
spent nuclear fuel (SNF) shipments (NUREG/CR-4829, ``Shipping Container
Response to Severe Highway and Railway Accident Conditions'' February
1987, commonly referred to as the modal study). The modal study
evaluated SNF shipping casks certified to NRC standards against thermal
and mechanical forces generated in actual truck and rail accidents.
This evaluation included an assessment of cask performance for a number
of severe transportation accidents, including the Caldecott Tunnel
fire. The modal study concluded that there would be no release in 994
of 1,000 real accidents, and that a substantially lower fraction of
accidents could result in any significant release. These results when
combined with the probability of a severe accident involving a shipment
of SNF, demonstrate that the overall risk associated with severe
accidents of SNF shipping casks is very low. The results of the modal
study were factored into the analysis for this rulemaking, as an input
to the RADTRAN computer code. Additional analyses were performed to
address the possible impacts of accidents involving higher burnup fuel.
The consequences associated with an individual SNF shipment have an
upper bound, based on the amount of material in the package, the
availability of mechanisms to disperse the radioactive contents, the
locations and number of receptors, and post-event intervention than
would occur. Further, this upper bound in transit might reasonably be
expected to be less than that at the origin or destination points
(where more SNF would be stored), and some events themselves might be
expected to have greater consequences than the damage they cause to the
SNF cask. The NRC recognizes that there are some conceivable events
(not necessarily traditional `transportation accidents'), that might be
hypothesized to occur to a SNF cask while in transport. Even
[[Page 48501]]
though these events have an extremely low probability of occurring,
they might result in high consequences if they were to occur. The NRC
considers these events to be remote and speculative and thus, does not
call for detailed consideration. Because the NRC traditionally
considers risk to be the product of the probability of an event and its
resultant consequences, events with such low probability of occurring
have a negligible contribution to the overall risk. In addition, as the
probabilities of the events become very low, the value of insights to
be gained, for use in regulatory decisions, is not apparent.
Comment: The study underestimates Clark County's residential
population and growth rate. In addition, the study does not account for
the large nonresident population, resulting in underestimates of risk
and impacts.
Response: In keeping with the generic nature and limited intent of
the analysis, the original analysis used best available data and best
estimates of existing population and population growth rates. In
response to commentors' concerns and to reflect the potentially large
population growth rate of Clark County, the NRC staff has incorporated
higher population estimates into the analysis to provide conservative
(higher than best estimate) assessments of potential impacts. However,
as indicated by the comment, the task of estimating the impacts on the
area population is more complex than assuming a population growth rate.
Both the rate of growth of the population and changes in location of
the population within the county are important. As stated in Addendum
1, populations within a half mile of the transportation route are the
most affected by the transportation activities. Therefore, in order to
ensure that the size of the affected population is conservative, the
NRC staff's analysis not only increases over time the existing
population densities along the assumed transportation routes, but also
forecasts increased residential, business, and transient/tourist
populations in the areas of likely development.
Issue 4--Cumulative Impacts
Comment: NRC failed to consider cumulative impacts of all spent
fuel, HLW, and low-level-waste shipments.
Response: Table S-4 shows the environmental impacts of
transportation of fuel and waste directly attributable to one nuclear
power plant. The current rulemaking was narrowly focused on the
question of whether the impact values given in Table S-4 would be
different with spent fuel shipments converging on one destination,
Yucca Mountain--the candidate site under study by DOE for a repository,
rather than several destinations. Table S-4 does not consider non-
commercial power reactor shipments of fuel and waste. Nevertheless, a
discussion of the cumulative impacts of transporting spent fuel, HLW,
and low-level waste through southern Nevada has been added to Addendum
1 (Section 2.4). To estimate the potential cumulative effects of DOE
shipments of LLW to the Nevada Test Site as well as shipments of HLW to
a possible repository, the NRC staff used information published in
DOE's Waste Management Programmatic EIS (DOE/EIS-0200--F) May 1997. To
ensure that cumulative impacts are not underestimated, the NRC staff
selected alternatives in the EIS that led to the highest numbers of
shipments to the Nevada Test Site and Yucca Mountain. The results of
the analysis indicate that the cumulative doses and expected cancer
fatalities resulting from the civilian SNF and the DOE shipments are
small compared to the risk of cancer from other causes.
Comment: Commentors stated that cumulative impacts along the
Wasatch Front must be considered.
Response: The State of Utah maintains that a study similar to the
one conducted for Las Vegas and Clark County must be conducted for the
cumulative impacts along the Wasatch Front that would originate from
the proposed Private Fuel Storage Facility to be located at Skull
Valley, Utah. Such an analysis is beyond the scope of this generic
rulemaking because the Commission directed that cumulative impacts
attributed to transportation be analyzed only in the vicinity of Yucca
Mountain. However, the NRC is currently reviewing a site-specific
application for construction and operation of the proposed Private Fuel
Storage Facility at Skull Valley in a separate regulatory action. A
site-specific study of the cumulative impacts of transportation is part
of that review. The study will be reported in a draft Environmental
Impact Statement to be published for public comment. Its availability
will be noticed in the Federal Register.
Issue 5--Legal Requirements
Comment: NRC failed to conduct a legally sufficient risk
assessment. Use of a model such as RADTRAN is not in and of itself
sufficient to meet the requirements of the National Environmental
Policy Act. The NRC must consider consequences of low-probability,
high-consequence accidents not included in RADTRAN, including unique
local conditions, unforeseen events, sabotage, and human error in cask
design. The NRC should adopt the comprehensive risk assessment approach
for SNF and HLW transportation described in Golding and White,
Guidelines on the Scope, Content, and Use of Comprehensive Risk
Assessment in the Management of High-Level Nuclear Waste Transportation
(1990).
Response: See the response above regarding consideration of severe
accident risk (low probability, high consequence accidents) during
transportation.
The NRC's regulatory program will continue to ensure that the risk
of severe transportation accidents are minimized. Physical security for
spent fuel transportation is regulated under 10 CFR 73.37. The
regulatory philosophy is designed to reduce the threat potential to
shipments and to facilitate response to incidents and recovery of
packages that might be diverted in transit. Although the analysis
supporting the current rule does not account for the potential for
human error, activities related to the design, fabrication,
maintenance, and use of transportation packages are conducted under an
NRC-approved Quality Assurance Program. This helps to provide
consistency in performance and helps reduce the incidence of human
error. While a location-specific transportation risk assessment is
included in the DOE EIS for the decisions relating to a possible Yucca
Mountain repository, the NRC staff believes that the analysis conducted
for this rulemaking provides an adequate consideration of the impacts
from license renewal. Further, through its regulatory, licensing, and
certification functions, the NRC has tried to ensure that
transportation of SNF is performed safely with minimum risk to the
public, and that vehicle crashes while transporting SNF do not result
in severe accidents. Similarly, DOE is expected to ensure that the
routes and procedures chosen for SNF transport to the repository
provide ample protection of the public health and safety and the NRC
reviews and approves the selected routes.
The analysis in Addendum 1 shows that even with conservative
assumptions, the cumulative radiological and non-radiological accident
risks of SNF transport in Clark County are small. However, there are a
number of opportunities to further reduce human health impacts. These
include transporting SNF by rail rather than by truck. This would
reduce human health effects by reducing the number of shipments and the
likelihood
[[Page 48502]]
of accidents. In addition, shipping SNF via the proposed beltway would
reduce health impacts compared to shipping via the current interstate
highway system. The implementation of such mitigative measures must
await future decisions that fall well outside of the scope of this
rulemaking. In addition, for the purposes of individual license renewal
rule decisions, no plant specific mitigation measures were found
appropriate for addressing the impacts identified in the Addendum. The
NRC staff notes that DOE addresses transportation impacts, mitigation
measures, and alternative transportation modes in its EIS for the
proposed repository at Yucca Mountain.
Issue 6--Socioeconomics
Comment: NRC failed to consider socioeconomic impacts.
Response: Several commentors raised an issue of public perception
of risk of waste shipments and its effect on tourism and property
values. Under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the NRC is
obligated to consider the effects on the physical environment that
could result from the proposed action. Effects that are not directly
related to the physical environment must have a reasonably close causal
relationship to a change in the physical environment. The Supreme Court
ruling in Metropolitan Edison Co. v. People Against Nuclear Energy, 460
U.S. 766 (1983) has narrowly circumscribed, if not entirely eliminated,
an agency's NEPA obligation to consider impacts arising solely from the
public's perception that an agency's action has created risks of
accidents. Accordingly, it is not necessary to consider the impacts on
tourism and property values from the public's perception of risk.
The socioeconomic impacts of plant refurbishment and continued
operation during the renewal period are discussed in the plant-specific
supplement to the GEIS for each individual license renewal applicant.
The NRC recognizes that there will likely be increased costs in the
unlikely event of an accident. However, for the majority of
transportation accidents that may occur, the associated costs are
small. For the most severe accidents analyzed by the RADTRAN computer
code, the costs could be substantial. Given the low probability of such
accidents, the socioeconomic impacts of transportation of SNF do not
alter the Commission's conclusions regarding the impacts of this issue.
Issue 7--Higher Burnup Fuel
Comment: There was insufficient consideration of extended fuel
burnup issues.
Response: Section 3 of Addendum 1 addresses the issues associated
with extended fuel burnup in detail. The NRC staff's analysis of higher
burnup fuel examined the issues of radiation doses due to higher dose
rates during shipment, higher radiation doses in the event of
transportation accidents, and the potential for a criticality in the
very unlikely event that high burnup fuel geometry is altered during a
transportation accident.
The analysis done by the NRC staff concluded that higher burnup
fuel would likely cause higher dose rates during transportation and
that dose rates following transportation accidents with radiological
releases would also increase, all other things being equal. However,
despite the increased dose rates the potential impacts on the transport
crews and the affected members of the public would still be acceptably
small. The analysis of the potential for criticality following a change
in fuel geometry as the result of a transportation accident determined
that such an event was not a concern.
Issue 8--Environmental Justice
Comment: NRC failed to consider Environmental Justice.
Response: The analysis suggests that the routes through downtown
Las Vegas, Nevada may run through areas containing a higher proportion
of low-income and minority groups than the beltway routes. However, as
discussed in Sections 2.3 and 2.4 Addendum, the radiological and
nonradiological impacts of transportation of SNF are small. In
addition, these small impacts are dispersed throughout the entire
routes and do not appear to fall disproportionately in any one area.
Based on the analysis performed the NRC staff concludes the overall
impacts of transportation of SNF will not likely be disproportionately
high or adverse for any minority or low-income population.
Issue 9--Regulatory Text
Comment: Several suggestions for clarifying the regulatory text
were offered.
Response: The rule has been revised to make it clear that the
environmental impact values in Table S-4 (10 CFR 51.52) may be used to
account for the environmental effects of transportation of fuel and
waste to and from a nuclear power plant at a repository such as Yucca
Mountain, Nevada, which is under consideration as a HLW repository. If,
in the future, Yucca Mountain is removed from consideration as a HLW
repository, the Commission will evaluate whether the generic analysis
performed for the current rule is applicable to other sites that are
considered. If fuel enrichment greater than 5 percent Uranium-235 and
fuel burnup of greater than 62,000 MWd/MTU are approved by the
Commission, the Commission will consider a rulemaking to assess the
continuing generic applicability of Table S-4 to environmental reviews
for license renewal.
Comment: The addition to the rule of local transportation impacts
associated with continued operation of a plant during the license
renewal period needs further clarification in the rule language and in
the Supplementary Information.
Response: The rule was revised to clarify that the issue of
``Public services, Transportation'' in Table B-1 of Appendix B to
Subpart A of 10 CFR Part 51 involves the contribution of highway
traffic directly attributable to refurbishment and continued operation
of a plant during the license renewal period to changes in the service
levels of highways in the vicinity of the plant. The majority of
traffic directly attributable to a plant is commuting plant workers.
Comment: Paragraph (M) of 10 CFR 51.53(c)(3)(ii) should be deleted.
Response: The rule language has been amended and Paragraph (M) has
been deleted. This change from the proposed rule was necessary in order
to provide consistency with 51.53(c)(3)(ii), as this section only deals
with Category 2 issues. Since the cumulative impacts of transportation
of SNF in the vicinity of Yucca Mountain is no longer a Category 2
issue, inclusion in 51.53(c)(3)(ii) is no longer necessary.
Other Comments
This section addresses the comments that are not encompassed by the
issue summaries and responses given above. In addition, some comments
were received after the close of the comment period. These comments
were reviewed, and most were found to be similar to comments already
addressed by the issue summaries and responses. However, the comments
that raised new ideas relevant to Addendum 1 are also presented in this
section. For these late comments, revisions to Addendum 1 were
necessarily minimal.
Comment: Addendum 1 assumes that truck transport would have the
highest doses. This assumption is not necessarily valid. Also, a
different route that avoids Las Vegas should be
[[Page 48503]]
addressed. (A route through Nellis Air Force Base and down US-95 is
being considered by DOE and it has been shown to have higher risks of
accident fatalities and to increase the radiological risk.) Routes
chosen in Addendum 1 do not bound the analysis properly.
Response: The transportation and route scenarios and their
underlying assumptions were designed to reflect situations that most
likely would result in highest doses in order to bound the analysis
properly as the routes chosen for this analysis were the most populated
routes in the State of Nevada. Also, as noted in an earlier response,
the NRC staff consulted DOE in determining that truck shipments through
densely populated areas of Clark County, Nevada, would have the highest
potential impacts among the alternative transportation scenarios that
would be given serious consideration in decisions relating to the
suitability of the site undergoing study for a repository at Yucca
Mountain.
The comment that a route from Nellis Air Force Base down US-95 is
higher risk than those selected by the NRC staff provided no specific
details concerning that assertion. In the NRC staff's view, any route
that bypasses major centers of population will have significantly lower
radiological impacts. With regard to traffic accident rates, while it
may be true that certain routes will have accident rates that are
higher than average, the average rates are low enough that modest
increases from the average will not significantly change the staff's
conclusions.
Comment: SNF from California would go through Las Vegas twice (in
route to Skull Valley and subsequently to Yucca Mountain), resulting in
increased risk.
Response: If the proposed SNF storage facility is licensed and
built, some SNF may go through Clark County on the way to Skull Valley,
Utah. The NRC staff has not analyzed this possible impact because it is
not clear at this time that the proposed Skull Valley facility will be
licensed or that the SNF would go through Las Vegas if the facility
were built. In addition, SNF from California makes up only a small
fraction of the SNF that would be shipped. The NRC staff concludes that
the conservative assumptions used in the analysis more than compensate
for minor changes in transportation plans that may develop for that
fraction of the total SNF.
Comment: The NRC should provide affected parties with some
statement of the regulatory effect of the interrelationships between
the numerous other similar analyses.
Response: As a general matter, the National Environmental Policy
Act (NEPA) requires all Federal agencies to perform an environmental
review for certain actions they propose to conduct. In the context of
nuclear waste management, several agencies have regulatory and
operational responsibilities which may involve various proposed actions
that, in turn, require the preparation of environmental impact
statements (EISs). Inevitably, there may be a degree of overlap in the
types of impacts discussed in these various EISs. However, the analysis
developed by the NRC for the purposes of license renewal is not binding
on future actions and associated environmental impact analyses.
The NRC proposed action that has triggered the preparation of this
rulemaking and the associated analysis of environmental impact is the
agency's responsibility to review applications for the renewal of
nuclear power plant licenses. In light of the discrete purpose of this
rulemaking, the NRC has sought to gauge the impacts of license renewal
given the information currently available on those impacts including
the transportation of spent fuel. Even though these impacts do not
occur at the plant site during license renewal, the NRC has considered
them here pursuant to its NEPA responsibilities.
Future EISs prepared by other agencies on proposed actions in the
waste management arena (e.g., any recommendation by DOE on approval of
the Yucca Mountain site for development of a repository) will
undoubtedly address some of the same impacts covered by the analysis
described in this notice. Some of these other impact statements are
anticipated to be more detailed given their purpose and the
availability of additional information in the future. This, however,
does not diminish the adequacy of the NRC's action. This analysis is
sufficient for the purpose it serves and it provides the Commission
with the information needed to weigh the likely environmental impacts
of SNF transportation for individual license renewals applications and
reach informed decisions regarding the acceptability of these
applications. The rule does not, however, dictate any particular result
for future actions taken with regard to a waste repository or other
waste management matters. Specifically, any generic conclusions by the
Commission concerning the cumulative environmental impacts of
transportation associated with nuclear power plants would in no way
affect any DOE decision concerning the suitability of Yucca Mountain or
any consideration that DOE may give to transportation impacts in making
that decision.
Comment: Addendum 1 is not meaningful to the public. For example,
it is impossible to determine if the spent fuel isotope inventory shown
in the sample pages of the RADTRAN printout matches the fuel considered
in the Addendum.
Response: In preparing Addendum 1, the NRC staff has attempted to
write to a broad and diverse audience as much as possible. The NRC
staff acknowledges that this rulemaking involves complicated, technical
issues. However, the NRC staff has attempted to present these matters
in the most clear manner possible. Addendum 1 has been revised and
Table 2 provides the fuel isotope inventory that can be compared to the
sample pages of the RADTRAN computer code printout.
Comment: The study area is inaccurately defined and the location of
some cities is incorrectly stated.
Response: During the preparation of Addendum 1, the initial study
area selected for analysis emphasized the urban areas in and near Las
Vegas. Route selections were based in part on their proximity to those
areas, not to county borders. However, in response to public comments,
the study area was expanded to include the entire county. Consequently,
the ``entry'' point for SNF shipments shifted to cities such as
Mesquite.
Comment: Addendum 1 should discuss potential mitigation measures,
not rely on the DOE Yucca Mountain EIS for that discussion.
Response: The analysis in Addendum 1 shows that, even with
conservative assumptions, the cumulative radiological and non-
radiological accident risks of SNF transport in Clark County are small.
However, there are a number of opportunities to further reduce human
health impacts. These include transporting SNF by rail rather than by
truck. This would reduce human health effects by reducing the number of
shipments and the likelihood of accidents. In addition, shipping SNF
via the proposed beltway would reduce health impacts compared to
shipping via the current interstate highway system. The implementation
of such mitigative measures must await future decisions that fall well
outside of the scope of this rulemaking. In addition, for the purposes
of individual license renewal rule decisions, no plant specific
mitigation measures were found appropriate for addressing the impacts
identified in the Addendum. The NRC notes that DOE addresses
transportation
[[Page 48504]]
impacts, mitigation measures, and alternative transportation modes in
its EIS for the proposed action to develop a repository at Yucca
Mountain.
Comment: Addendum 1 does not mention that the proposed repository
which is the destination for shipments of spent nuclear fuel is in Nye
County.
Response: A statement noting that the proposed Yucca Mountain
repository is in Nye County has been added to Addendum 1.
Comment: No statements of baseline conditions are given in Addendum
1.
Response: Addendum 1 uses background and natural radiation levels
as the baseline conditions against which dose estimates can be
compared. Both are presented in Addendum 1 and are based in large part
on information published by the National Council on Radiation
Protection and Measurements.
Comment: The analysis in Addendum 1 is limited to human health
effects. Other potential impacts should be considered.
Response: Addendum 1 was prepared to provide information regarding
a proposed rule to determine whether the transportation of higher
enriched, higher burnup fuel to a single destination is consistent with
the values of Table S-4. Because the pertinent section of Table S-4
concerns impact values for human health effects, Addendum 1
concentrates on potential cumulative impacts to human health. However,
Section 2.3 of Addendum 1 has been revised to look at the potentially
most significant non-human health effect which is the potential
increase in traffic volume in Clark County as the result of the
transportation of SNF. The NRC staff conclusion is that the impacts are
small.
Comment: The analysis assumes the use of the large-capacity GA-4/9
truck cask, which has not been certified and must be used in
combination with specially designed trucks that have not been tested.
It also assumes that these cask and truck systems will be available in
sufficient quantity for the shipments. The commentor seeks assurance
that the assumed truck cask system is feasible and that DOE's proposed
regional service contractor approach would feasiblely result in the use
of such a system for all shipments in the potential truck shipment
campaign.
Response: The analysis done by the NRC staff assumes that an
adequate number of certified casks would be available. Addendum 1 used
extremely conservative assumptions regarding SNF shipments and casks to
ensure that the analysis would lead to maximum dose estimates. For
example, the analysis of incident-free transportation impacts assumes
the use of legal-weight trucks for shipment of the SNF, which results
in more and smaller shipments. For the accident analysis, the use of
the largest-capacity casks was assumed in order to maximize the amount
of SNF that would be involved in the accident. These parameters were
intended to bound the parts of the analysis, not to describe parts of
the actual SNF shipment protocol such as the specific casks that will
be used.
Comment: The analysis appears to assume that oldest spent nuclear
fuel would be shipped first to the repository. If so, how will
institutional measures achieve this sequencing? If they do not, how
will the maximum potential radioactive risk in shipment and storage or
disposal be addressed?
Response: The spent fuel will be shipped in casks certified by the
NRC. In fact, the current practice of NRC issuing certificates of
compliance for casks used for shipment of power reactor fuel is to
specify 5 years as the minimum cooling period in a certificate.
Comment: Addendum 1 uses national accident rate statistics. State
and/or local rates would be more appropriate.
Response: For the analysis of radiological accidents, data specific
to Nevada were used in the RADTRAN computer code runs. However, for the
analysis of non-radiological accidents, the NRC staff required data
regarding not only accident rates but also injury and fatality
statistics. Those data were not available except from the U.S.
Department of Transportation.
Comment: Water resource supplies within boundaries of the State of
Nevada belong to the public. All waters are subject to appropriation
for the beneficial use only under state law.
Response: The water resources of the state will be unaffected by
the transport of SNF through Clark County.
Comment: Report failed to provide conditions for informed consent
which requires disclosure to those affected, their understanding , and
voluntary acceptance.
Response: NRC regulations already contain values that the NRC
considers to be acceptable environmental impacts from the shipment of
SNF and other radioactive waste. In Addendum 1 the NRC staff is, in
part, ensuring that the overall impacts of the transportation of the
additional SNF that will be generated as the result of nuclear power
plant license renewal are bounded, given the best information the NRC
staff has at this time, by those values previously found acceptable.
The values specified in the regulations are supported by analysis and
were adopted into the regulations only after providing opportunity for
public comment as part of the NRC's rulemaking process. As such, the
NRC has followed all applicable legal requirements and appropriately
carried out its responsibility to consider the environmental impacts of
its license renewal decision.
Comment: The NRC staff uses ``flawed'' science as evidenced by
factors including a questionable definition of risk which fails to
account for severe accidents, use of misleading if not false average
radiation dose rates, manipulation of dose rate data to obtain
acceptable results and lack of empirical data especially that
applicable to transportation of SNF.
Response: The decision before the Commission is whether the impacts
of license renewal are so severe that they should preclude the option
of license renewal. As such, the Commission has considered a reasonable
estimate of impacts and not included remote and speculative scenarios
that do not add to our regulatory decision (see also response to
comment on severe accidents, above).
In the analyses described in Addendum 1 the NRC staff uses dose
rates that reflect the applicable regulatory limit rather than average
dose rates. Even with these very conservative assumptions for dose
rates, transportation modes, transportation routes, and a number of
other factors, radiation impacts on the transport crews and the general
public were not only found to be within all regulatory limits but small
as well and there was no need to adjust the assumptions.
Throughout Addendum 1 the NRC staff discusses the assumptions that
were made and where applicable the empirical data used to support those
assumptions is referenced. With respect to making judgements about the
shipment of spent fuel the NRC staff has the benefit of data from over
40 years of experience in shipping SNF in this country as well as
overseas.
Comment: High level waste management and transportation should not
be a generic issue and Yucca Mountain should not be used for the study
as DOE is behind schedule and it is not an approved site for SNF.
Response: Given that the potential environmental impacts of the
transportation of SNF resulting from license renewal are similar for
all nuclear power plants who seek to renew their operating licenses,
and that the NRC staff's analysis contained in Addendum 1 concludes
that the impacts are likely to be small, the Commission feels it is
appropriate to reclassify the issue as a Category 1 issue. Use of Yucca
[[Page 48505]]
Mountain, Nevada for purposes of the staff's analysis, as the
destination of the SNF is appropriate as it is the only site presently
under study. It must be emphasized that this generic environmental
impact statement is required to make use of the best information
available and at this time the assumption that Yucca Mountain is the
destination is reasonable for purposes of the staff's analysis. If in
the future, conditions change, the assumption made for this analysis
may need to be reevaluated.
Comment: Need to consider the intermodal option being considered by
Congress for Caliente, Nevada.
Response: The shipment of SNF by rail to Caliente and then
transferring it to truck for shipment to Yucca Mountain is one of many
options under consideration by DOE. Rather than speculate on which
transportation option or options will ultimately be selected, the NRC
staff has chosen a mode and routes to Yucca Mountain which in its
judgement will have the greatest potential environmental impacts in
order to do a bounding analysis for the purpose of this rulemaking.
Comment: The analysis needs to address the impacts of above ground
nuclear weapons testing being done at the Nevada Test Site.
Response: For the purposes of considering the environmental impacts
of license renewal, there does not appear to be a relevant connection
between transportation impacts from civilian SNF and defense related
weapons testing at the Nevada test site.
Comment: The analysis relies on assumptions that are 25-30 years
old and that have a number of problems including omission of important
radionuclides (Iodine-129, Chlorine-36 and Cobalt-60), unrealistic
RADTRAN assumptions including inadequate consideration of severe
accidents, outdated assumptions from NUREG-0170 and WASH-1238 including
the failure to consider the degradation of cladding during extended dry
storage, and failure to consider the rail-heavy haul truck option.
Response: With regard to the radionuclides, as indicated in Table 2
of Addendum 1, Cobalt-60 is considered. While both Iodine-129 and
Chlorine-36 are long lived, neither is a significant contributor to
overall dose. Iodine-129 has a very low specific activity and Chlorine-
36 is a beta emitter.
The issue of the severity of accidents considered in the NRC
staff's analysis was addressed in an earlier response to comment. The
assumptions that are used in the NRC staff's analysis have been
periodically reviewed and found adequate. The hypothetical accident
conditions of 10 CFR 71.73 have been evaluated against actual
conditions encountered in highway and railway accidents and were found
to be bounding as documented in NUREG/CR-4829, February 1987,
``Shipping Container Response to Severe Highway and Railway Accident
Conditions.'' As noted in Table 3 of Addendum 1, the version of RADTRAN
used is updated to March 1999.
Section 3 of Addendum 1 does consider the possible effect of
cladding degradation on criticality in the context of increased burnup.
That analysis would be equally applicable to any cladding degradation
that might occur during prolonged dry storage of the SNF.
With regard to what is asserted to be inadequate consideration of
the potential radiological impacts of the rail-heavy haul truck option,
the NRC staff has analyzed the radiological impacts of the truck mode
along various routes through and around Las Vegas and concludes that
they are the limiting scenarios. The largest doses in the incident-free
conditions are now to the public. If the rail-heavy haul transport
scenario was adopted, a substantial portion of the public exposure
would be avoided, since in this scenario, the slow moving heavy haul
truck transport would not move through a major population center.
Comment: NRC must consider potential Indian Tribe claims of
authority to regulate shipments across reservation lands.
Response: This analysis is a generic study that assumes certain
routes for the purpose of evaluating environmental impacts. Because the
purpose of this study is neither to propose nor approve routes, the NRC
does not need to consider tribal claims of authority to regulate
shipments in the context of this analysis.
Comment: The beltway is a county road, not part of the Federal
highway system; it is not clear it can be used for shipments.
Response: The DOT regulations do not require that SNF shipments
only use federal highways. Therefore, the NRC assumed that the beltway
is a possible route around Las Vegas.
Comment: The NRC should address the implications of higher
enrichment, higher burnup fuel for consequences of radiological
sabotage, as NRC has done so far for the increase in burnup from 33,000
MWd/MTU to 40,000 MWd/MTU (see 49 FR 23867, Proposed Revisions to 10
CFR 73, Modification of Protection Requirements for Spent Fuel
Shipments, 6/8/84).
Response: The NRC has not quantified the likelihood of the
occurrence of sabotage in this analysis because the likelihood of an
individual attack cannot be determined with any degree of certainty.
Nonetheless, the NRC has considered, for the purposes of this
environmental impact statement and rulemaking, the environmental
consequences of such an event. In the determination of the consequences
of such an event, higher burnup is only one factor. Based on the
staff's study of higher burnup fuel (NUREG-1437, Vol.1, Addendum 1,
Table 2), the consequences of a sabotage event involving such fuel
could be larger than those in the studies referenced by the commentor.
However, given that the consequences of the studies referenced by the
commentor were small, even modest increases due to the effects of
higher burnup fuel would not result in unacceptably large consequences.
Because burnup is not the only factor that could affect the
consequences of a sabotage event, the staff continues to study this
area. Should new and significant information result from the further
study, actions addressing such information will be considered.
Nevertheless, the extensive security measures required by NRC
regulations make sabotage events extremely unlikely. Moreover, the
casks required to be used to transport spent fuel are designed to
withstand very substantial impacts during transport without loss of
containment integrity. The cask designs should serve to further reduce
the likelihood of release of radioactive material in the extremely
unlikely event of sabotage. In view of the fact that NRC safeguards
regulations make sabotage events extremely unlikely, and the fact that
the cask designs themselves should make a release of radioactive
material unlikely even were sabotage to occur, and based on our
judgement that, in the extremely unlikely event that sabotage and
releases did occur, the consequences from higher burnup fuel would not
be unacceptably large, we have concluded that a more extensive study of
higher burnup fuel consequences is not warranted for this environmental
impact statement and rulemaking.
On June 22, 1999, the Nevada Attorney General filed a petition with
the Commission which requested the NRC to amend regulations governing
safeguards for shipments of spent nuclear fuel against sabotage and
terrorism and to initiate a comprehensive assessment. In particular,
the petition indicated that
[[Page 48506]]
NRC should factor into its regulations the changing nature of threats
posed by domestic terrorists, the increased availability of advanced
weaponry and the greater vulnerability of larger shipping casks
traveling across the country. If, as a result of reviewing this
petition, the NRC reaches conclusions that are inconsistent with the
results or assumptions in the present rulemaking, the Commission will
need to revisit the analysis presented here.
Finding of No Significant Environmental Impact: Availability
The NRC has determined that this final rule is the type of action
described as a categorical exclusion in 10 CFR 51.22(c)(3). Therefore,
neither an environmental impact statement nor an environmental
assessment has been prepared for this regulation. This action is
procedural in nature and pertains only to the type of environmental
information to be reviewed.
Paperwork Reduction Act Statement
This final rule decreases unnecessary regulatory burden on
licensees by eliminating the requirement that license renewal
applicants address the generic and cumulative environmental impacts
associated with transportation operation in the vicinity of a HLW
repository site (-400 hours, -2 responses), and adds a new requirement
to address local traffic impacts attributable to continued operation of
the plant during the license renewal term (+20 hours, +2 responses).
The public burden for these information collections is estimated to
average a reduction of 200 hours for each of 2 responses for the
elimination of the above mentioned requirement, and an increase of 10
hours for each of 2 responses for the new requirement, for a net burden
reduction of 380 hours. Because the burden for this information
collection is insignificant, Office of Management and Budget (OMB)
clearance is not required. Existing requirements were approved by the
OMB, approval number 3150-0021.
Public Protection Notification
If a means used to impose an information collection does not
display a currently valid OMB control number, the NRC may not conduct
or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to, the information
collection.
Regulatory Analysis
The regulatory analysis prepared for the final rule published on
June 5, 1996 (61 FR 28467), and amended on December 18, 1996 (61 FR
66537), to make minor clarifying and conforming changes and add
language unintentionally omitted from the June 5, 1996 final rule. The
rule is unchanged except for an increase in benefits derived from a
reduction in the applicant burden of 190 hours of effort in preparing
an application for renewal of a nuclear power plant operating license.
This change increases the substantial cost saving of the final rule
estimated in NUREG-1440, ``Regulatory Analysis for Amendments to
Regulations for the Environmental Review for Renewal of Nuclear Power
Plant Operating Licences.'' NUREG-1440 is available for inspection in
the NRC Public Document Room, 2120 L Street NW. (Lower Level),
Washington, DC. In addition, copies of NRC final documents cited here
may be purchased from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government
Printing Office, PO Box 37082, Washington, DC 20013-7082. Copies are
also available for purchase from the National Technical Information
Service, 5285 Port Royal Road, Springfield, Virginia 22161.
Regulatory Flexibility Act Certification
As required by the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980 (5 U.S.C.
605(b)), the Commission certifies that this final rule will not have a
significant impact on a substantial number of small entities. The final
rule will reduce the amount of information to be submitted by nuclear
power plant licensees to facilitate NRC's obligations under the
National Environmental Policy Act. Nuclear power plant licensees do not
fall within the definition of small businesses as defined in Section 3
of the Small Business Act (15 U.S.C. 632) or the Commission's Size
Standards, April 11, 1995 (60 FR 18344).
Backfit Analysis
The Commission has determined that these amendments do not involve
any provisions that would impose backfits as defined in 10 CFR
50.109(a)(1); therefore, a backfit analysis need not be prepared.
Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act
In accordance with the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement
Fairness Act of 1996, the NRC has determined that this action is not a
major rule and has verified this determination with the Office of
Information and Regulatory Affairs of OMB.
National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act
The National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act of 1995, Pub.
L 104-113, requires that Federal agencies use technical standards
developed by or adopted by voluntary consensus standards bodies unless
the use of such a standard is inconsistent with applicable law or
otherwise impractical. There are no consensus standards that apply to
the analysis and findings process, nor to the requirements imposed by
this rule. Thus the provisions of the Act do not apply to this rule.
List of Subjects in 10 CFR Part 51
Administrative practice and procedure, Environmental impact
statement, Nuclear materials, Nuclear power plants and reactors,
Reporting and recordkeeping requirements.
For the reasons set out in the preamble to this notice and under
the authority of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended; the Energy
Reorganization Act of 1974, as amended; the National Environmental
Policy Act of 1969, as amended; and 5 U.S.C. 552 and 553, the NRC is
adopting the following amendments to 10 CFR part 51.
PART 51--ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION REGULATIONS FOR DOMESTIC
LICENSING AND RELATED REGULATORY FUNCTIONS
1. The authority citation for part 51 continues to read as follows:
Authority: Sec. 161, 68 Stat. 948, as amended, Sec. 1701, 106
Stat. 2951, 2952, 2953 (42 U.S.C. 2201, 2297f); secs. 201, as
amended, 202, 88 Stat. 1242, as amended, 1244 (42 U.S.C. 5841,
5842).
Subpart A also issued under National Environmental Policy Act of
1969, secs. 102, 104, 105, 83 Stat. 853-854, as amended (42 U.S.C.
4332, 4334, 4335); and Pub. L. 95-604, Title II, 92 Stat. 3033-3041;
and sec.193, Pub. L. 101-575, 104 Stat. 2835, (42 U.S.C. 2243).
Sections 51.20, 51.30, 51.60, 51.61, 51.80, and 51.97 also issued
under secs. 135, 141, Pub. L. 97-425, 96 Stat. 2232, 2241, and sec.
148, Pub. L. 100-203, 101 Stat. 1330-223 (42 U.S.C. 10155, 10161,
10168). Section 51.22 also issued under sec. 274, 73 Stat. 688, as
amended by 92 Stat. 3036-3038 (42 U.S.C. 2021) and under Nuclear
Waste Policy Act of 1982, sec. 121, 96 Stat. 2228 (42 U.S.C. 10141).
Sections 51.43, 51.67, and 51.109 also issued under Nuclear Waste
Policy Act of 1982, sec. 114(f), 96 Stat. 2216, as amended (42
U.S.C. 10134(f)).
2. In Sec. 51.53, paragraph (c)(3)(ii)(M) is removed and reserved
and paragraph (c)(3)(ii)(J) is revised to read as follows:
Sec. 51.53 Post-construction environmental reports.
* * * * *
(c) * * *
(3) * * *
(ii) * * *
[[Page 48507]]
(J) All applicants shall assess the impact of highway traffic
generated by the proposed project on the level of service of local
highways during periods of license renewal refurbishment activities and
during the term of the renewed license.
* * * * *
(M) [Reserved].
* * * * *
3. The ``Public services, Transportation'' issue under the
Socioeconomics Section and the ``Transportation'' issue under the
Uranium Fuel Cycle and Waste Management Section of Table B-1, Appendix
B to Subpart A to 10 CFR Part 51 are revised to read as follows:
Appendix B to Subpart A--Environmental Effect of Renewing the
Operating License of a Nuclear Power Plant
* * * * *
Table B-1.--Summary of Findings on NEPA Issues for License Renewal of
Nuclear Power Plants \1\
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Issue Category Findings
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* * * *
* * *
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Socioeconomics
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* * * *
* * *
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Public services, Transportation.. 2 SMALL, MODERATE, OR
LARGE. Transportation
impacts (level of
service) of highway
traffic generated
during plant
refurbishment and
during the term of the
renewed license are
generally expected to
be of small
significance. However,
the increase in traffic
associated with
additional workers and
the local road and
traffic control
conditions may lead to
impacts of moderate or
large significance at
some sites. See Sec.
51.53(c)(3)(ii)(J).
* * * *
* * *
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Uranium Fuel Cycle and Waste Management
------------------------------------------------------------------------
* * * *
* * *
Transportation................... 1 SMALL. The impacts of
transporting spent fuel
enriched up to 5
percent uranium-235
with average burnup for
the peak rod to current
levels approved by NRC
up to 62,000 MWd/MTU
and the cumulative
impacts of transporting
high-level waste to a
single repository, such
as Yucca Mountain,
Nevada are found to be
consistent with the
impact values contained
in 10 CFR 51.52(c),
Summary Table S-4--
Environmental Impact of
Transportation of Fuel
and Waste to and from
One Light-Water-Cooled
Nuclear Power Reactor.
If fuel enrichment or
burnup conditions are
not met, the applicant
must submit an
assessment of the
implications for the
environmental impact
values reported in Sec.
51.52.
* * * *
* * *
------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Data supporting this table are contained in NUREG-1437, ``Generic
Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants''
(May 1996) and NUREG-1437, Vol. 1, Addendum 1, ``Generic Environmental
Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants: Main Report
Section 6.3--`Transportation,' Table 9.1 `Summary of findings on NEPA
issues for license renewal of nuclear power plants,' Final Report''
(August 1999).
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 26th day of August, 1999.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Annette Vietti-Cook,
Secretary of the Commission.
[FR Doc. 99-22764 Filed 9-2-99; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 7590-01-P