By John Stang
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission this week approved its first regulatory exemption of the COVID-18 pandemic for a spent fuel storage licensee, along with lifting work-hour limits for another nuclear power plant.
As of Wednesday, GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy has been granted a two-month extension to file the license renewal application for its Morris Operation independent spent fuel storage installation (ISFSI) in Grundy County, Illinois.
That pushes the deadline from May 31 to July 31. Companies generally are required to submit ISFSI renewal applications at least two years before expiration of the license.
The Morris Operation is a wet pool ISFSI with 772 tons of used fuel from multiple nuclear power plants. The location was intended to house a spent nuclear fuel reprocessing plant that never operated. Its new license could be good for up to 40 years.
GE Hitachi asked for the extension in order to deal with state workplace restrictions and site safety protocols due to the COVID 19 public health emergency. The NRC concluded that safety, security, and environmental protections would not be affected by the delay, according to the Wednesday approval letter signed by John McKirgan, chief of the NRC’s Storage and Transportation Licensing Branch.
As of deadline Friday, no other approved exemptions for ISFSI licensees had been posted to the spent-fuel section of the NRC web page on its COVID-19 response. However, at least one request document was loaded into the agency’s online documents database – a May 13 letter from Pacific Gas and Electric regarding the ISFSI for its decommissioned Humboldt Bay nuclear power plant in Eureka, Calif.
The utility is requesting authorization to delay physicals and weapon and other training for its security personnel until the pandemic is over. Those are generally required every 12 months. Most medical providers are not currently providing physicals, PG&E said, while training would involve close physical contact in breach of federal and state guidelines for social distancing at least 6 feet apart, PG&E said.
The NRC is still considering the PG&E request for Humboldt Bay. It is also reviewing exemption filings for ISFSIs at two other retired nuclear power plants: Trojan in Oregon and Haddam Neck in Connecticut. Details on those requests were not immediately available.
There generally has been some lag time between approval of relief measures and their listing on the agency website. During a call on May 8, nuclear industry representatives said they anticipated submissions over the following two weeks for ISFSI exemptions.
The NRC has offered licensees for nuclear plants and other operations expedited consideration of a range of relief measures that might be necessary during the nation’s COVID-19 public health emergency. These have included exemptions to the work-hour limits for power reactor personnel and temporary delays for requirements such as medical exams and training for workers.
The concept is to help licensees juggle shifts and work-hours to deal with social distancing requirement and shift demands due to the novel coronavirus 2019, and to help nuclear facilities deal with scheduling and other matters affected by ripple effects from the pandemic.
Relief can come in three forms: exemptions from NRC regulations and amendments to licenses; discretion on citing licensees for violations of rules; and emergency relief.
The NRC web page for COVID-19 exemptions for decommissioning of nuclear facilities and uranium recovery lists a May 7 application from Holtec International. The document has not been made public and remained under review as of deadline Friday. Details of the request were also not immediately available.
Follow-up messages from the agency to Holtec indicate the request involves the retired Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in New Jersey. Holtec is decommissioning the single-reactor facility it acquired last year from power company Exelon.
The New Jersey energy technology company is also decommissioning the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts, which it bought in 2019 from Entergy. Holtec said Friday it had not filed an exemption request for the single-reactor Cape Cod property.
The three other listed exemption requests under the decommissioning and uranium recovery section, two of which have been approved and one that is pending, were all filed by mining companies.
The work-hour relief requests at operational nuclear power plants have received perhaps the most attention from the public since they began to be filed in April. The idea is to help nuclear sites deal with personnel shortages due to workers getting sick and having to be quarantined at their homes.
The expanded limits allow personnel to work 16 hours in a 24-hour period, up to 86 hours every seven days, and up to 12-hour shifts for 14 consecutive days. The standard federal limits are working 16 hours in a 24-hour period, 26 hours in a 48-hour period, and 72 hours in a seven-day period.
When a nuclear facility files a request, it must demonstrate it can no longer meet federal work-hour control requirements; prove it has procedures to manage fatigue; show employees will remain within the expanded limits; and provide six days off every 30 days. Procedures must be established to observe workers’ behaviors and all them to declare themselves for self-isolation.
The NRC on Thursday approved a May 11 exemption on work-hour limits for DTE Energy’s Fermi Reactor No. 2 near Monroe, Mich. This exemption will extend to July 14.
As of Friday morning, approvals were listed for seven other power plants, all from April. They are:
- Energy Harbor Nuclear Corp.’s Beaver Valley Power Station Units 1 and 2 in Shippingport, Pa. This exemption will extend to June 17.
- Arizona Public Service Co.’s Palo Verde Nuclear Generation Station’s Units 1, 2 and 3 near Tonopah, Arizona. This exemption will extend to June 15.
- NextEra Energy’s Seabrook Station No. 1 in Seabrook, N.H. This exemption will extend to June 12.
- Exelon Generation Corp.’s Braidwood Station Units 1 and 1, south of Chicago. This exemption will extend to June 12
- Exelon’s Quad Cities Nuclear Power Plant units 1 and 2 near Cordova, Ill. This exemption will extend to June 7.
- Exelon’s: R. E. Ginna Nuclear Power Plant in Ontario, N.Y. This exemption will extend to June 5.
- Exelon’s Limerick Generating Station’s Units 1 and 2 northwest of Philadelphia. This exemption will extend to June 2.
