[Federal Register Volume 65, Number 241 (Thursday, December 14, 2000)]
[Notices]
[Pages 78215-78217]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 00-31876]
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Request for Public Comment on the First Year of Initial
Implementation of the Reactor Oversight Process
AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Request for public comment.
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SUMMARY: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is approaching
completion of the first year of initial implementation of the Reactor
Oversight Process (ROP). In response to the Commission's Staff
Requirements Memorandum (SRM-00-0049), dated May 17, 2000, the NRC is
preparing a report summarizing the lessons learned during the first
year of initial implementation of the ROP. The NRC is requesting
comments/information from members of the public, licensees, and
interest groups related to the initial implementation of the ROP which
began at the 103 commercial nuclear power plant sites (except D.C. Cook
which is being phased into the ROP) on April 2, 2000.
The NRC is specifically requesting comments on the questions listed
at the end of this notice. The NRC is also conducting a public
workshop, tentatively scheduled for late March
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2001, to discuss lessons learned. In support of this workshop, the NRC
is seeking public feedback on key issues that should be considered
during the workshop.
DATES: (1) Submit potential topic areas for consideration during the
public ROP workshop by February 23, 2001. (2) Submit comments on the
ROP's first year of initial implementation by April 13, 2001. Comments
received after these dates will be considered if it is practical to do
so, but the Commission is able to only ensure consideration for
comments received on or before these dates.
ADDRESSES: Comments may be sent to David Meyer, Chief, Rules and
Directives Branch, Office of Administration, Mail Stop T6D59, U.S.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001or
electronically to e-mail: [email protected]
Deliver comments to: 11554 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland,
between 7:30 am and 4:15 pm on Federal workdays.
Certain documents related to this notice, including comments
received, may be examined and/or copied for a fee at the NRC Public
Document Room, One White Flint North, Room O1-F15, 11555 Rockville
Pike, Rockville, Maryland.
Documents created or received at the NRC after November 1, 1999,
are also available electronically at the NRC's Public Electronic
Reading Room on the Internet at http://www.nrc.gov/NRC/ADAMS/index.html. From this site, the public can gain entry into the NRC's
Agencywide Document Access and Management System (ADAMS), which
provides text and image files of NRC's public documents. For more
information, contact the NRC Public Document Room (PDR) Reference staff
at 1-800-397-4209, 301-415-4737 or by email to [email protected].
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: August K. Spector, Office of Nuclear
Reactor Regulation, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington DC
20555-0001, telephone (301) 415-2140, e-mail: [email protected]
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Program Overview
The mission of the NRC is to regulate the civilian uses of nuclear
materials in the United States to protect the public health and safety,
protect the environment, and promote the common defense and security by
preventing the proliferation of nuclear material. This mission is
accomplished through:
Licensing nuclear facilities and the possession, use and
disposal of nuclear materials;
Developing and implementing requirements governing
licensed activities; and
Inspection and enforcement of licensee activities to
assure compliance with these requirements and the law.
While the responsibility of the NRC is to monitor and regulate the
performance of the licensee, primary responsibility for safe operation
and handling of nuclear materials rests with the licensee.
During the past 25 years, the nuclear industry in the United States
has matured to one where licensees and the NRC have learned much about
how to safely operate nuclear facilities and handle nuclear materials.
Recently, the NRC has begun to implement more effective and efficient
inspection, assessment, and enforcement approaches which apply insights
from years of regulatory oversight and nuclear facility operation. The
NRC has also incorporated risk-informed principles and techniques into
its oversight activities. A risk-informed approach to oversight enables
the NRC to more appropriately apply its resources to oversight of
operational areas which contribute most to safe operation at nuclear
facilities.
After conducting a six-month pilot program in 1999, assessing the
results, and incorporating the lessons learned, the NRC began
implementation of the revised reactor oversight process (ROP) at all
103 nuclear facilities (except D. C. Cook) on April 2, 2000. Inherent
in the ROP are the following key NRC performance goals:
1. Maintain safety by establishing and implementing a regulatory
oversight process that assures that plants are operated safely;
2. Enhance public confidence by increasing the predictability,
consistency, and objectivity of the oversight process, providing timely
and understandable information, and providing opportunities for
meaningful involvement by the public;
3. Improve effectiveness, efficiency, and realism of the oversight
process by implementing a process of continuous improvement; and
4. Reduce unnecessary regulatory burden through the consistent
application of the process and incorporation of lessons learned.
Key elements of the ROP include revised NRC inspection procedures,
plant performance indicators, a significance determination process and
an assessment program which incorporates various risk-informed
thresholds to help determine the level of NRC oversight and
enforcement. Since process development began in 1998, the NRC has
frequently communicated with the public by various means. These have
included conducting public meetings in the vicinity of each licensed
commercial nuclear power plant, issuing Federal Register Notices
soliciting feedback on the process, publishing press releases about the
new process, conducting multiple public workshops, placing pertinent
background information in the NRC's Public Document Room, and
establishing an NRC website containing easily accessible information
about the new program and licensee performance. Information about
specific aspects of the reactor oversight process may be obtained
electronically from the following source:
www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/index.html.
NRC Reactor Oversight Public Workshop
In late March 2001, the NRC is planning a public workshop intended
to bring together all interested stakeholders to discuss key issues
that have emerged during the first year of initial implementation of
the ROP. The NRC is soliciting feedback from its public stakeholders on
what topic areas should be considered during this workshop. The NRC
will consider this feedback along with its own insights gained during
initial implementation to develop the agenda for the workshop. Some of
the areas currently under consideration include selected performance
indicators, approaches to inspecting and assessing problem
identification and resolution activities, inspection report thresholds,
and the efficacy of certain elements of the significance determination
process.
NRC Public Stakeholder Comments
The NRC continues to be interested in receiving feedback from
members of the public, various public stakeholders and industry groups
on their insights on the first year of initial implementation of the
reactor oversight process. The NRC is specifically seeking responses to
the questions listed below, which will provide the NRC with vital
information regarding the initial implementation of the reactor
oversight process, which can be used in continuing program improvement.
A summary of responses and how the responses were considered will be
included in the report submitted to the Commission on the
implementation of the ROP, currently planned for June 2001.
Questions
I. Questions related to the efficacy of the overall process (As
appropriate,
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please provide specific examples and suggestions for improvement.):
1. Does the ROP provide adequate assurance that plants are being
operated safely?
2. Does the ROP provide sufficient regulatory attention to
utilities with performance problems?
3. Does the ROP reduce unnecessary regulatory burden on licensees?
4. Does the ROP improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and realism
of the regulatory process, focusing NRC resources on those issues with
the most safety significance?
5. Has the public information associated with the ROP been
appropriate to keep the public informed, in a timely and understandable
fashion, of NRC activities related to plant safety?
(Examples: NRC plant performance web page, Plant Performance
Indicators, NRC Inspection Reports, Assessment Letters, ROP guidance
documents and implementation procedures, the NRC ROP website, press
releases)
6. Does the ROP increase the predictability, consistency, clarity
and objectivity of the NRC's oversight activities?
7. Has the public been afforded adequate opportunity to provide
input/comments and involvement in the ROP development process?
8. Has NRC been responsive to input/comments provided by the public
regarding the ROP development process?
9. Please provide any additional (brief) information or issues
related to the reactor oversight process.
II. Questions related to specific ROP program areas (As
appropriate, please provide specific examples and suggestions for
improvement.):
1. Do the performance indicators or other aspects of the ROP create
unintended consequences? (Please comment on the potential of unintended
consequences associated with the counting of manual scrams in the
Initiating Event Cornerstone Performance Indicators.)
2. Do any aspects of the ROP inappropriately increase regulatory
burden? (Please comment on any unnecessary overlap between ROP
reporting requirements with those associated with INPO, WANO, or the
Maintenance Rule.)
3. Is the Significance Determination Process (SDP) usable and does
it produce consistent and accurate results?
4. Are there areas of unnecessary overlap between the inspection
program and the performance indicators?
5. Does the ROP assessment program provide timely, consistent, and
relevant assessment information?
6. Has the NRC implemented the ROP as defined by program documents?
7. Please provide any additional (brief) information or comments on
other program areas related to the reactor oversight process. Other
areas of interest may be: the treatment of cross-cutting issues in the
ROP, the risk-based evaluation process associated with determining
event response, and the reduced subjectivity and elevated threshold for
documenting issues in inspection reports.
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 8th day of December 2000.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
William M. Dean,
Chief, Inspection Program Branch, Division of Inspection Program
Management, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
[FR Doc. 00-31876 Filed 12-13-00; 8:45 am]
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