Platts - Friday, November 17, 2006 http://www.platts.com ------------ France's Nuclear Safety Authority holds second meeting Paris (Platts)--16Nov2006 Andre-Claude Lacoste chaired the second meeting of France's Nuclear Safety Authority November 16. Lacoste said the first task for the five-member commission of the ASN was to approve rules of procedure stipulating how the new commission is to operate and its relations with ASN staff and the French administration. He told Platts in an intervew that he expected the document to be approved next week and to be validated by the government shortly thereafter. After the validation, the ASN commission will be an independent body, legally responsible for all nuclear regulatory acts in France except major licensing actions, which will still need government approval, and emergency situations. Lacoste said he was "extremely satisfied" with how things had fallen into place to create the new authority, which began its formal existence on November 13 when the five commissioners met for the first time. UK PM Blair criticizes Conservatives for not backing nuclear London (Platts)--16Nov2006 UK Prime Minister Tony Blair Wednesday criticized Conservative party and opposition leader David Cameron for not giving more support to nuclear power. Blair said he backed nuclear power, but Cameron, member of parliament for Witney in Oxfordshire, seemed lukewarm. "The right honorable member for Witney asks me what my position is and I have said that I am in favor of it," said Blair during Wednesday's Queen's Speech debate, according to Hansard records published Thursday. "What, then, is the right honorable gentleman's position?" Blair quoted Cameron as seeming unsure about nuclear power. Cameron, said Blair, had declared that he wanted to give every opportunity for green sources of energy to come through. "If they do, well and good," Cameron had said in an interview. "If they don't, and we have to keep the lights on, then nuclear might come into the picture." Blair said that talk about "nuclear might come into the picture" would be too little, too late if power ran short. "So what is he going to do?" asked Blair. "He is the prime minister, and the cabinet secretary comes in and says, 'I am afraid the renewables haven't generated as much as we want. I am afraid we won't be able to keep the lights on.' So what is the right honorable gentleman going to say?--'Rustle me up a nuclear power station'?" Blair said that "we need to put nuclear power back on the agenda and at least replace the nuclear energy that we will lose. Without it, we will not be able to meet either our objectives on climate change or our objectives on energy security." "These are difficult and controversial decisions, but they are absolutely necessary," he said. However, Blair's government has also come under fire for being lukewarm on nuclear. British Energy said in a recent document that the government's proposed statement of support for nuclear power was too weak. The statement proposed in July's energy review says nuclear is a good idea. But it does not set out the volumes of nuclear generation capacity needed, or any timescale. NRC releases final rulemaking package on the design basis threat Washington (Platts)--15Nov2006 NRC released the final rulemaking package November 14 to revise the design basis threat, or DBT. The amendments to the DBT regulations, 10 CFR 73.1, would codify security measures imposed by the agency in April 2003 orders. The DBT defines the minimum characteristics and capabilities that reactor licensees must use to devise defensive strategies for protecting their plant. The public comment period for the proposed rule ended in mid-January but was extended for a month after a request was made by an industry organization. NRC said it received 919 comments. The revised rule will require licensees to consider cyber threats. The rulemaking package is available electronically through NRC's document system Adams under accession number ML062130289. NRC commissioner visits Bulgaria's Kozloduy nuclear plant London (Platts)--15Nov2006 NRC commissioner Jeffrey Merrifield visited Bulgaria's Kozloduy nuclear plant November 13 with US Ambassador to Bulgaria John Beyrle. The visit included a presentation by Kozloduy management and a tour of the operating nuclear units. As part of the overall modernization of Kozloduy -5 and -6, Westinghouse is replacing portions of the plant's Russian instrumentation and control systems with state-of-the-art digital control systems. The Westinghouse I&C project for the two Kozloduy units is a first-of-a-kind large scale I&C modernization project for a VVER type plant. NRC and former Davis-Besse worker close to settlement Washington (Platts)--14Nov2006 NRC staff and a former Davis-Besse worker appear close to a settlement in an enforcement proceeding against the worker. In a November 8 decision, released November 13, an Atomic Safety and Licensing Board turned down a joint proposal from both sides but indicated that the parties could address the board's concerns by clarifying certain portions of the proposed settlement. Attorneys for the NRC and for former Davis-Besse director of technical services Steven Moffitt had proposed a compromise penalty for Moffitt's alleged role in FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Co.'s reporting of false information in 2001 to the NRC on Davis-Besse's reactor vessel head condition. Key provisions of the draft settlement include a ban on Moffitt's employment at NRC-licensed facilities until January 4, 2008 and certain restrictions after that. Moffitt also would acknowledge he was "responsible for misinformation communicated to the NRC." NRC's original order, issued January 4, 2006, barred Moffitt for five years. In its order (ASLBP-06-847-03-EA), the board asked for clarifications by November 15. Progress Energy applies to renew Harris nuclear plant license Washington (Platts)--14Nov2006 Progress Energy on Tuesday said it has submitted to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission a license-renewal application requesting 20 more years of operation for the 900-MW Harris Nuclear Plant in New Hill, North Carolina. The Harris plant, 84% owned by Progress and 16% owned by N.C. Eastern Municipal Agency, is considered a baseload generation plant. The NRC granted the plant a 40-year operating license in 1986. License renewal involves a thorough assessment of the plant's operating equipment, maintenance programs, and equipment testing and replacement programs, Progress said. An environmental review also will be conducted to assess the potential impacts of continued operations. Progress said it expects the agency's review process to take 22 to 30 months. HLW shipped from France arrives at Gorleben Bonn (Platts)--13Nov2006 A convoy of 336 canisters of high-level vitrified reprocessing waste arrived at the rail head of the interim storage facility at Gorleben after being shipped from France beginning November 7, according to German police. The convoy, containing 175 metric tons of HLW from German LWR spent fuel reprocessed at Areva's reprocessing plant at La Hague, was the ninth shipment of HLW sent back to Germany from France since 1996. According to Areva, three more shipments of German reprocessing waste are expected to be shipped from La Hague to Gorleben between now and 2010. In recent years protests at Gorleben against the shipments have waned. Local opposition near Gorleben to this month's shipment flared up again after Green leaders, who until last November were part of a coalition government responsible for organizing the return of the waste from France, re-joined the protest. Separately, Sigmar Gabriel, Germany's chief regulator, and former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, on the eve of the transport announced that they favored re-opening a national debate about where the German waste should ultimately be disposed of. Schroeder suggested he favored disposing of the waste outside of Germany. Until leaving power last November, Schroeder and the Greens had insisted that German HLW would be disposed of on German territory. ------------