Federal Register Extracts

Agency: "Nuclear Regulatory Commission."

SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued an exemption in response to a request from Holtec Decommissioning International, LLC (HDI), an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Holtec International, that would allow HDI and Holtec Palisades, LLC, to reduce the required level of primary offsite liability insurance from $450 million to $100 million and to eliminate the requirement to carry secondary financial protection for the Palisades Nuclear Plant.

DATES: The exemption was issued on December 22, 2023.

ADDRESSES: Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2023-0198 when contacting the NRC about the availability of information regarding this document. You may obtain publicly available information related to this document using any of the following methods:

* Federal Rulemaking Website: Go to https://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2023-0198. Address questions about Docket IDs in Regulations.gov to Stacy Schumann; telephone: 301-415-0624; email: [email protected]. For technical questions, contact the individual listed in the For Further Information Contact section of this document.

* NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS): You may obtain publicly available documents online in the ADAMS Public Documents collection at https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. To begin the search, select "Begin Web-based ADAMS Search." For problems with ADAMS, please contact the NRC's Public Document Room (PDR) reference staff at 1-800-397-4209, at 301-415-4737, or by email to [email protected]. The ADAMS accession number for each document referenced (if it is available in ADAMS) is provided the first time that it is mentioned in this document.

* NRC's PDR: The PDR, where you may examine and order copies of publicly available documents, is open by appointment. To make an appointment to visit the PDR, please send an email to [email protected] or call 1-800-397-4209 or 301-415-4737, between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. eastern time (ET), Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Tanya E. Hood, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001, telephone: 301-415-1387, email: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The text of the exemption is attached.

Dated: December 28, 2023.

For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Tanya E. Hood,

Project Manager, Reactor Decommissioning Branch, Division of Decommissioning, Uranium Recovery and Waste Programs, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards.

Attachment--Exemption

Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Docket No. 50-255

Holtec Decommissioning International, LLC, and Holtec Palisades, LLC; Palisades Nuclear Plant Exemption

I. Background

By letter dated October 19, 2017 (Agencywide Documents Access and Management System Accession No. ML17292A032), Entergy Nuclear Operations, Inc. (ENOI) certified to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC, or Commission) that it planned to permanently cease power operations at the Palisades Nuclear Plant (Palisades) no later than May 31, 2022. On May 20, 2022, ENOI permanently ceased power operations at Palisades, and by letter dated June 13, 2022 (ML22164A067), ENOI certified to the NRC that the fuel was permanently removed from the Palisades reactor vessel and placed in the spent fuel pool (SFP) on June 10, 2022. Accordingly, pursuant to paragraphs 50.82(a)(2) of title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10 CFR), the 10 CFR part 50 renewed facility operating license for Palisades no longer authorizes operation of the reactor or emplacement or retention of fuel in the reactor vessel. The facility is still authorized to possess, and store irradiated (i.e., spent) nuclear fuel. Palisades spent fuel is currently stored in the SFP and in dry cask storage at the independent spent fuel storage installation (ISFSI).

II. Request/Action

By letter dated October 26, 2022 (ML22299A059), Holtec Decommissioning International, LLC (HDI), one of the licensees of Palisades and an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Holtec International (Holtec), requested an exemption on behalf of Holtec Palisades, LLC, the other Palisades licensee, from 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) concerning offsite primary and secondary liability insurance. HDI and Holtec Palisades, LLC, are hereafter collectively referred to as the licensee. The exemption from 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) would permit the licensee to reduce the required level of primary offsite liability insurance from $450 million to $100 million and to eliminate the requirement to carry secondary financial protection for Palisades.

The regulation at 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) requires licensees to have and maintain primary financial protection in an amount of $450 million. In addition, licensees are required to participate in an industry retrospective rating plan (secondary financial protection) that commits licensees to pay into an insurance pool to be used for damages that may exceed primary insurance coverage. Participation in the industry retrospective rating plan will subject the licensee to deferred premium charges up to a maximum total deferred premium of $131,056,000 with respect to any nuclear incident at any operating nuclear power plant and up to a maximum annual deferred premium of $20,496,000 per incident.

Many of the accident scenarios postulated in the updated safety analysis reports for operating power reactors involve failures or malfunctions of systems, which could affect the fuel in the reactor core and, in the most severe postulated accidents, would involve the release of large quantities of fission products. With the permanent cessation of power operations at Palisades and the permanent removal of the fuel from the reactor vessel, many accidents are no longer possible. Similarly, the associated risk of offsite liability damages that would require insurance or indemnification is commensurately lower for permanently shutdown and defueled plants. Therefore, the licensee requested an exemption from 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) to permit a reduction in primary offsite liability insurance and to withdraw from participation in the industry retrospective rating plan.

III. Discussion

Pursuant to 10 CFR 140.8, "Specific exemptions," the Commission may, upon application of any interested person or upon its own initiative, grant such exemptions from the requirements of the regulations in 10 CFR part 140 when the exemptions are authorized by law and are otherwise in the public interest. The NRC staff has reviewed the licensee's request for an exemption from 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) and has concluded that the requested exemption is authorized by law and is otherwise in the public interest.

The Price Anderson Act of 1957 (PAA) requires that nuclear power reactor licensees have insurance to compensate the public for damages arising from a nuclear incident. Specifically, the PAA requires licensees of facilities with a "rated capacity of 100,000 electrical kilowatts or more" to maintain the maximum amount of primary offsite liability insurance commercially available (currently $450 million) and a specified amount of secondary insurance coverage (currently up to $131,056,000 per reactor). In the event of an accident causing offsite damages in excess of $450 million, each licensee would be assessed a prorated share of the excess damages, up to $131,056,000 per reactor, for a total of approximately $13 billion per nuclear incident. The NRC's regulations at 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) implement these PAA insurance requirements and set forth the amount of primary and secondary insurance each power reactor licensee must have.

As noted above, the PAA requirements with respect to primary and secondary insurance and the implementing regulations at 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) apply to licensees of facilities with a "rated capacity of 100,000 electrical kilowatts or more." In accordance with 10 CFR 50.82(a)(2), the license for a power reactor no longer authorizes operation of the reactor or emplacement or retention of fuel into the reactor vessel upon the docketing of the certifications for permanent cessation of operations and permanent removal of fuel from the reactor vessel. Therefore, the reactor cannot be used to generate power.

Accordingly, a reactor that is undergoing decommissioning has no "rated capacity." Therefore, the NRC may take the reactor licensee out of the category of reactor licensees that are required to maintain the maximum available insurance and to participate in the secondary retrospective insurance pool.

The financial protection limits of 10 CFR 140.11(a)(4) were established to require licensees to maintain sufficient insurance, as specified under the PAA, to satisfy liability claims by members of the public for personal injury, property damage, and the legal cost associated with lawsuits as the result of a nuclear accident at an operating reactor with a rated capacity of 100,000 kilowatts electric or greater. Therefore, the insurance levels established by this regulation, as required by the PAA, were associated with the risks and potential consequences of an accident at an operating reactor with a rated capacity of 100,000 kilowatts electric or greater.

The legal and associated technical basis for granting exemptions from 10 CFR part 140 is set forth in SECY-93-127, "Financial Protection Required of Licensees of Large Nuclear Power Plants During Decommissioning," dated May 10, 1993 (ML12257A628). The legal analysis underlying SECY-93-127 concluded that, upon a technical finding that lesser potential hazards exist after permanent cessation of power operations (and the reactor having no "rated capacity"), the Commission has the discretion under the PAA to reduce the amount of insurance required of a licensee undergoing decommissioning.

--This is a summary of a Federal Register article originally published on the page number listed below--

Notice; issuance.

Citation: "89 FR 483"

Document Number: "Docket No. 50-255; NRC-2023-0198"

Federal Register Page Number: "483"

"Notices"