NRC recommends safety measures for nuke plants

A federal task force Wednesday recommended sweeping regulatory changes to better protect the public and the nation's 104 nuclear reactors, including two at the Millstone Power Station in Waterford, in light of the Fukushima Dai-ichi disaster in Japan.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Japan Task Force has proposed rewriting federal rules to prevent the loss of power, core melts, spent fuel-pool fires and radioactive releases that Japanese reactors experienced in the March 11 tsunami and earthquake.

The task force maintains that "a sequence of events like the Fukushima accident is unlikely to occur in the United States" and that plants can be operated safely. However, it said any nuclear accident involving core damage and uncontrolled release of radioactivity to the environment is "inherently unacceptable."

The task force recommendations, which the NRC will now consider, cover everything from loss of power, earthquakes, flooding and spent fuel-pool safety to emergency preparedness.

Charles Miller, an NRC veteran, said the task force looked at four areas: ensuring protection, enhancing accident mitigation, strengthening emergency preparedness and improving the efficiency of NRC programs.

Tony Pietrangelo, senior vice president and chief nuclear officer for the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry trade group, said that every company that operates a U.S. reactor has "verified its ability to safely manage a severe event, regardless of its cause" since the disaster last spring. NEI would participate in public meetings involving the task force's recommendations, he added.

Millstone owner Dominion has already addressed many of the recommendations in the report, said spokesman Rick Zuercher, and is reviewing the task force report "in great detail." Dominion also owns reactors in Wisconsin and Virginia.

"Once we have conducted a detailed review we will better be able to assess any additional implications," he said.

In Waterford, Millstone's two pressurized water reactors generate 2,097 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 500,000 homes. Unit 1, a closed reactor, still has spent fuel stored in a reactor pool whose design is similar to the reactor pools in Japan.

In March, Dominion launched a "Beyond Design Basis Response Team" to address site-specific issues. "Beyond design basis" accidents like those precipitated by prolonged power loss and natural calamities are more extreme than the type of accidents reactors are designed to withstand.

So far, some of the steps the team has taken at Millstone include verifying that portable radios, lighting and a diesel-powered water pump are available and operable; ensuring that procedures for lessening the impact of an accident are in place; and making sure operator training and qualifications are up to date, Zuercher said.

In addition, the Dominion team also is verifying that the reactors can handle extreme weather and seismic activity and is reviewing emergency equipment readiness for emergency procedures, he said.

"We've been plugged in internationally," he added, as part of the Fukushima Response Steering Committee, which includes the Nuclear Energy Institute, the Electric Power Research Institute and the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations. David Heacock, president and chief nuclear officer for Dominion Nuclear, sits on the committee, he said.

A national nuclear watchdog group, The Union of Concerned Scientists, also issued recommendations Wednesday based on longstanding safety concerns as well as worries emanating from Japan's experience at Fukushima. The group neither endorses nor opposes nuclear power.

Emergency planning zone configurations of a 10-mile radius around reactors should be re-examined in light of the NRC's own call in the spring for a 50-mile evacuation area in Japan, said Edwin Lyman, a senior scientist in the Union of Concerned Scientists' Global Security Program. The task force recommendations fall short of that, he said.

NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan countered that "the 10-mile planning zone is the starting point for emergency response, not the end point. That does not preclude expanding beyond the 10-mile radius if circumstances dictate that."

p.daddona@theday.com

• Re-evaluate and upgrade seismic and flooding protection every 10 years;

• Mitigate station blackout capability to a minimum coping time of 8 hours;

• Keep the core and spent fuel pool cool at least 72 hours;

• Address emergency plans for prolonged station blackouts and events involving multiple reactors;

• Require ways to provide additional cooling water to spent fuel pools if necessary;

• Require reliable hardened vent designs in boiling water reactors similar to those in Japan;

• Strengthen and integrate on-site emergency response capabilities;

• Identify ways to control hydrogen;

• Evaluate ways to prevent or mitigate seismically induced fires or floods;

• Pursue extra emergency preparedness related to blackouts and multiunit events;

• Pursue emergency preparedness involving radiation monitoring and public education;

• Focus more attention on defense-in-depth requirements.