Nuclear Regulatory Commission 2017 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff has determined that the inspections, tests, and analyses have been successfully completed, and that the specified acceptance criteria are met for multiple inspections, tests, analyses, and acceptance criteria (ITAAC) for the Vogtle Electric Generating Plant (VEGP), Units 3 and 4.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued a director's decision with regard to a Petition to Intervene and Request for Hearing concerning Diablo Canyon Power Plant (DCPP) dated August 26, 2014, filed by Friends of the Earth (FOE or petitioner), asserting, in part, its concerns about DCPP's operational safety and ability to safely shut down in the event of a nearby earthquake. The petitioner's requests and the director's decision are included in the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has recently submitted a request for renewal of an existing collection to OMB for review. The information collections are entitled, ``DOE/NRC Form 740M, Concise Note; DOE/NRC Form 741, Nuclear Material Transaction Report; DOE/NRC Form 742, Material Balance Report; and DOE/NRC Form 742C, Physical Inventory Listing.''

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing Revision 3 of Regulatory Guide (RG) 1.54, ``Service Level I, II, III, and In-Scope License Renewal Protective Coatings Applied to Nuclear Power Plants.'' This RG describes a method the staff of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) considers acceptable for the selection, application, qualification, inspection, and maintenance of protective coatings applied to nuclear power plants (NPPs).

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) invites public comment on the renewal of Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approval for an existing collection of information. The information collection is entitled, ``Notice of Enforcement Discretion (NOED) for Operating Power Reactors and Gaseous Diffusion Plants (NRC Enforcement Policy).''

Pursuant to the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (the Act), the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is publishing this regular biweekly notice. The Act requires the Commission to publish notice of any amendments issued, or proposed to be issued, and grants the Commission the authority to issue and make immediately effective any amendment to an operating license or combined license, as applicable, upon a determination by the Commission that such amendment involves no significant hazards consideration, notwithstanding the pendency before the Commission of a request for a hearing from any person. This biweekly notice includes all notices of amendments issued, or proposed to be issued, from March 28, 2017, to April 10, 2017. The last biweekly notice was published on April 11, 2017.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) received an application from GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy, LLC (GEH) for an amendment to Materials License No. SNM-2500, which authorizes the storage of spent nuclear fuel and associated liquid and solid waste treatment products. The amendment would revise the license to provide clarifying administrative changes related to the specific storage of liquid and solid waste treatment products allowed to be at the site.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued a director's decision with regard to a petition dated June 30, 2016, filed by Mr. David A. Lochbaum of the Union of Concerned Scientists (the petitioner), requesting that the NRC take enforcement action against Entergy Nuclear Operations, Inc., the licensee for Indian Point Nuclear Generating, Units No. 2 and 3 (Indian Point 2 and 3). The petitioner's requests and the director's decision are included in the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing an order approving indirect license transfer of control of Renewed Facility Operating License No. NPF-42 for the Wolf Creek Generating Station (WCGS). The indirect transfer of control will result from the proposed merger of Great Plains Energy Incorporated (Great Plains) and Westar Energy, Inc. (Westar) pursuant to the terms of the merger agreement, with Westar merging and becoming a subsidiary of Great Plains. Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corporation will continue to be the operator of WCGS.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is withdrawing the selected generic communications because their guidance no longer provides useful information, their guidance is superseded by updated guidance, or the information can be more effectively made available to interested stakeholders by other means.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for public comment a draft NUREG, NUREG/BR-0058, Revision 5, ``Regulatory Analysis Guidelines of the U.S. NRC.'' This proposed revision to NUREG/ BR-0058 would update and restructure the NRC's cost-benefit guidance documents by incorporating information contained in NUREG/BR-0184, ``Regulatory Analysis Technical Handbook,'' into this document and would expand the discussion of cost-benefit analyses in NRC's regulatory analyses, backfitting analyses, and National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) analyses. Additionally, the update incorporates improvements in methods for assessing factors that are difficult to quantify, incorporates relevant cost estimating best practices, and includes improvements in uncertainty analyses for use in cost-benefit analyses.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for public comment drafts of NUREG-1122, Revision 3, ``Knowledge and Abilities Catalog for Nuclear Power Plant Operators: Pressurized Water Reactors;'' and NUREG-1123, Revision 3, ``Knowledge and Abilities Catalog for Nuclear Power Plant Operators: Boiling Water Reactors.''

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing an environmental assessment (EA) and finding of no significant impact (FONSI) in support of the NRC's consideration of issuance of a new 2017 order that would supersede an order previously issued to Waste Control Specialists LLC (WCS) on December 3, 2014 (2014 Order). The 2014 Order contained conditions and criteria that allowed WCS to be exempt from the NRC's regulations concerning special nuclear material (SNM).

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is requesting comment on a draft regulatory basis to support a rulemaking that would develop new emergency preparedness (EP) requirements for small modular reactors (SMRs) and other new technologies (ONTs), such as non-light- water reactors (non-LWRs) and medical isotope production facilities. The new EP regulations would be consequence-oriented, performance- based, and technology inclusive to the extent possible, and continue to provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety. The new EP regulations would be applicable to SMR and ONT facilities only. Large light-water reactors (LWRs), fuel cycle facilities, research and test reactors and other non-power, non- commercial, facilities are not in the scope of this rulemaking. The NRC plans to hold a public meeting to promote full understanding of the rulemaking and facilitate public participation.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is confirming the effective date of April 25, 2017, for the direct final rule that was published in the Federal Register on January 25, 2017. The direct final rule amended the NRC's spent fuel storage regulations by revising the ``List of approved spent fuel storage casks'' to include Amendment No. 14 and Revision 1 to the Initial Certificate, Amendment Nos. 1 through 11, and Amendment No. 13 to Certificate of Compliance (CoC) No. 1004 for the AREVA Inc., Standardized NUHOMS[supreg] Cask System.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is requesting comment from the general public on its patient release programs. Specifically, the NRC would like input from the public on whether additional or alternate criteria are needed and whether to clarify the NRC's current patient release requirements. The information will be used to determine whether significant regulatory changes to the NRC's patient release requirements are warranted.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is correcting a notice that was published in the Federal Register (FR) on April 4, 2017, regarding the issuance of an order to Waste Control Specialists, LLC. This action is necessary to correct the ACTION statement and to add the NRC Docket ID to the notice title and the ADDRESSES section.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is granting an exemption to allow a departure from the certification information of Tier 1 of the generic design control document (DCD) and is issuing License Amendment No. 63 to Combined Licenses (COL), NPF-93 and NPF-94. The COLs were issued to South Carolina Electric & Gas Company on behalf of itself and the South Carolina Public Service Authority (both hereafter called the licensee); for construction and operation of the Virgil C. Summer Nuclear Station (VCSNS) Units 2 and 3, located in Fairfield County, South Carolina. The granting of the exemption allows the changes to Tier 1 information asked for in the amendment. Because the acceptability of the exemption was determined in part by the acceptability of the amendment, the exemption and amendment are being issued concurrently.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is re-issuing for public comment draft regulatory guide (DG), DG-1285, ``An Approach for Using Probabilistic Risk Assessment in Risk-Informed Decisions on Plant-Specific Changes to the Licensing Basis.'' The guide was initially issued for public comment in 2012 as noticed in the Federal Register under NRC Docket number NRC-2012-0110. Subsequently, the NRC decided to incorporate additional information related to evaluation of the defense-in-depth philosophy that was not included in the original publication of DG-1285. This proposed revision of the guide, Revision 3, includes significant expansion of the guidance on the meaning of, and the process for, assessing the defense-in-depth evaluation factors.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) invites the public to comment on the renewal of Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approval for an existing collection of information. The information collection is entitled, ``Safeguards on Nuclear Material Implementation of United States/International Atomic Energy Agency Agreement (US/IAEA).''

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is providing additional information for a notice published in the Federal Register on February 3, 2017, issuing draft regulatory guide (DG), DG-1330, ``Guidance for Developing Principal Design Criteria for Non-Light Water Reactors,'' for a 60-day public comment period. This action is necessary to inform the public that a paragraph was inadvertently omitted from the ``NRC Rationale for Adaptions to GDC'' section of General Design Criterion (GDC) 26, ``Reactivity Control Systems,'' in Appendices A, B, and C of DG-1330, and provides the NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS) accession numbers for the DG and the regulatory analysis for the DG. The NRC is also extending the public comment period for an additional 15 days to allow stakeholders time to review the change and provide comments.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing a confirmatory order (Order) to Homestake Mining Company of California (HMC), to memorialize the agreements reached during alternative dispute resolution mediation sessions held on December 12, 2016, and February 15, 2017. This Order will resolve the apparent violations that were identified during an NRC records review to determine if HMC was in compliance with regulatory and license requirements for HMC's activities at the Grants, New Mexico site. This Order is effective upon its issuance.