Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
6/26/2015
Nuclear Regulatory Commission members questioned this week the benefits of applying Compatibility ‘B” distinction to the proposed 10.CFR.61 rule update during a NRC hearing on the Part 61 rulemaking. With a Compatibility ‘B’ distinction, the proposed rulemaking would require that the Agreement States adopt Part 61 almost exactly as the NRC words it, limiting their flexibility in adding additional requirements. Both Commissioners William Ostendorff and Jeffrey Baran focused their questions on the wisdom of requiring a Compatibility ‘B’ distinction to a panel made up of regulators and industry stakeholders, which could indicate their willingness to revisit the issue.
State regulators from Utah and Texas both agreed that a lesser compatibility requirement would prove more beneficial than a ‘B’ distinction. “I think [a lesser compatibility category] has value in maintaining public trust,” said Rusty Lundberg, director of the Utah Division of Radiation Control. “If you have state specific type issues that are more unique to a given state, whether that be based on public perception or an informed public, regardless of that perspective, I think that the ability to have something like a category ‘C’ compatibility still allows those important aspects of the rule to be adopted by the state, but allows more flexibility in this case to be more stringent.”
Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s Director of the Radioactive Materials Division Charles Maguire echoed a similar reason for his opposition to the compatibility category. “The importance of that, I think, is some of us have to face the public as keepers of the public trust,” Maquire said. “The public expects us to do the very best we can, use the best science, best tools. I don’t know how we stand down on that to say, well, cut it off at a thousand years, even though scientifically we know there could be higher doses occurring at a later date.” He added, “We do understand the charge to staff to ensure some standards across the nation, those are important, too. We would be hopeful compatibility would just allow the states that need to be more stringent the ability to be more stringent.”
The proposed revision of the Part 61 system is the latest iteration of the NRC’s Site Specific Assessment (SSA) rulemaking, begun in 2009 to address disposal of large quantities of depleted uranium. The NRC staff’s previous draft rulemaking would require low-level radioactive waste disposal sites to perform a site-specific analysis to prove their site was protective of public health and safety for 10,000 years, down from a period of compliance of 20,000 years of previous drafts. The draft rulemaking also previously called for a two-tier analysis with the first period covering 10,000 years and the second period covering long-lived isotopes.
Anything Less than Compatibility ‘B’ Could Cause Problems, Svinicki Says
Commissioner Kristine Svinicki, though, offered a different take on the issue, suggesting a national standard would prevent a state from initiating excessive safety regulations. In the Commission’s latest Staff Requirements Memorandum on part 61, Svinicki had voted in favor of the ‘B” distinction. “When we answer a question of at the national level with our authorities we determine that something is adequately protective or adequately safe, I’m sorry, we can’t just have increasing unlimited levels of safety,” Svinicki said. “We also have authorities under law, state regulators have different defined authorities, for us, we’re supposed to have reasonable assurance of adequate protection. We don’t get to say, I know of a more perfect state of safety and I can require it. There are limits to authority and for good reasons.”
One of the reasons the Commission originally assigned the distinction, according to NRC’s Larry Camper, director of the Division of Decommissioning, Uranium Recovery, and Waste Programs, was to avoid trans-boundary issues and create a national standard. “The impression we have as staff is the Commission gravitated toward Compatibility ‘B’ because of interest in consistency across the Board for all operating sites throughout the United States, as well as ensuring that issues regarding trans-boundary were addressed,” Camper said. “Now what we’ve heard from the agreement states, what you’ve heard today, is a desire for flexibility. Our view as a staff, we certainly think that should be given considerable weight because they are out there on the operating forefront. But when I hear this dialogue, I think this is precisely what the Commission had in mind.”
NRC is currently conducting a 120-day comment period on the proposed rulemaking, which will end on July 22. Following the comment period, the final rule will go to the Commission for a vote approximately 12 months later. The rule would not go into effect, however, until a year after the final rule is published. Agreement states would have three years to adopt compatible regulations. Should each step go according to plan, licensees in agreement states would not have to meet requirements until 2021.
