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Nuclear Regulatory Commission Issues Tennessee Valley Authority Initial Approval for Small Modular Reactor Powerplant Site

Pre-assembled small modular nuclear reactor for electricity generation advances in site and design regulatory approval process..

Small modular reactor (SMR) power module. NuScale Power image.

  • Proposed site is the the former Clinch River Breeder Reactor project, cancelled in 1983, near Oak Ridge, Tennessee.

  • Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) site application is based on small modular reactor (SMR) design.

  • Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) will conduct a mandatory hearing on the TVA Clinch River site permit later this year.

  • NRC is reviewing NuScale Power’s SMR design for future commercial U.S. electric power generation.

Links to more information are listed in the Sources section at end of this report.

See Appendix for NRC news release and correspondence excerpts.

The United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has completed two steps in its review of Tennessee Valley Authority’s application to build a small modular reactor (SMR) nuclear-powered electric generating station:

  1. NRC published an Environmental Impact Statement - Final Report for the Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) proposed Clinch River site April 3, 2019.

  2. NRC announced completion of NRC staff’s Final Safety Evaluation Report for TVA’s Early Site Permit application June 18, 2019. NRC will conduct a mandatory hearing to review the report later this year.

A TVA spokesman told the Chattanooga Times Free Press that the NRC Clinch River SMR site permit provides another option for future energy supplies, but that “TVA is years from a decision whether or not to build an SMR.”

TVA is the largest United States government-owned power provider, delivering electricity to local power companies and to large, energy-intensive industrial customers and federal facilities. TVA’s electricity generation portfolio is 37% nuclear, 24% coal, 20% natural gas, 9% hydro, 3% wind + solar and 7% energy efficiency, consisting of:

  • 7 fossil plants (29 active units)

  • 3 nuclear plants (7 units)

  • 29 hydro plants (109 units)

  • 1 pumped storage hydroelectric plant (4 units)

  • 9 natural gas combustion turbine gas plants (85 units)

  • 7 natural gas combined cycle gas plants (15 units)

  • 1 diesel generator site (5 units)

  • 15 solar energy sites

  • 1 wind energy site

TVA will close two coal-fired powerplants in the next few years: Paradise in western Kentucky (2020), Bull Run near Oak Ridge, Tennessee (2023).

TVA sold more than 152.3 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity for revenue of about $10.7 billion in fiscal year 2017.

Sources: TVA, NRC, Chattanooga Times Free Press

Tennessee Valley Authority service area. Linecurrents map adapted from TVA similar.

NRC Approval of NuScale Power SMR Design Expected in 2020

NRC accepted an SMR design certification application (DCA) from NuScale Power in March 2017 for further review. Responding to a Linecurrents inquiry regarding status of its Nuclear Regulatory Commission application, NuScale Power replied June 21, 2019

“NuScale’s SMR is on schedule to earn NRC approval by September 2020. The NRC’s review of the company’s design certification application (DCA) began in March 2017. The NRC completed the first and most intensive phase of review of NuScales’s DCA; a major achievement. Phase 2, 3, and 4 of Design Certification Review are now in progress.”

NRC completed Phase 1 review of NuScale’s SMR design in April 2018.

NuScale describes SMR powerplant generating capacity and economies nuscale.com:

“A NuScale power plant can house up to 12 SMRs for a total facility output of up to 720 megawatts (gross). The SMR design is scalable, allowing customers to incrementally increase facility output to match demand. It is also flexible, providing significant opportunities to reduce the financial commitments and overall production costs normally associated with giga-watt size nuclear facilities, including the amount of required staff because of the SMR’s unparalleled safety features.”

Sources: NuScale Power > About Us

NuScale describes its SMR safety features:
Below list quoted from NuScale.com.

  • . . safely shuts down and self-cools, indefinitely with no operator action, no AC or DC power.

  • High-pressure containment vessel, redundant passive decay heat removal, and containment heat removal systems.

  • . . . integrated design of the NuScale Power Module, encompassing the reactor, steam generators, and pressurizer, and its use of natural circulation eliminates the need for large primary piping and reactor coolant pumps.

  • A small nuclear fuel inventory, since each 60 MWe (gross) NuScale Power Module houses approximately 5 percent of the nuclear fuel of a conventional 1,000 MWe nuclear reactor.

  • Containment vessel submerged in an ultimate heat sink for core cooling in a below grade reactor pool structure housed in a Seismic Category 1 reactor building.

Sources: NuScale Power > Safety

NuScale SMR Design and Development History

SMR design began in 2000 with U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) funding. Idaho National Environment & Engineering Laboratory led the project with support from Oregon State University (OSU), which gained experience with development of passive safety systems that use natural circulation to provide cooling for nuclear powerplants.

The DOE research project concluded in 2003. OSU designers built a one-third scale electrically-heated version of their plant as a test facility. OSU granted NuScale Power exclusive rights to the nuclear powerplant design in 2007. (Sources: NuScale Power > History).

Sources: NuScale Power > History

NuScale’s most recent DOE funding consisted of $40 million in cost-sharing financial assistance from DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy “U.S. Industry Opportunities for Advanced Nuclear Technology Development” funding opportunity in 2018.

Sources: NuScale Power > DOE

NuScale office and design/engineering locations:

Portland, Oregon - headquarters
Corvallis, Oregon
Charlotte, North Carolina
Rockville, Maryland
Arlington, Virginia
Richland, Washington
London, United Kingdom


Sources


Appendix

NRC Completes Safety Review of Early Site Permit for Clinch River Nuclear Site

Excerpts from Nuclear Regulatory Commission
News Release

NRC News
Office of Public Affairs
Washington, DC
June 18, 2019
_ _ _ _ _ _ _

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has completed its Final Safety Evaluation Report for an Early Site Permit application from Tennessee Valley Authority for the Clinch River Nuclear Site. The report concludes there are no safety aspects that would preclude issuing the permit for the site, approximately five miles southwest of Oak Ridge, Tenn.

The approximately 600-page report describes the agency's review of the application, and incorporates comments from the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards. The NRC staff reviewed information on topics including:

• site seismology, geology, meteorology and hydrology;

• risks from potential accidents resulting from operation of a nuclear plant at the site; and

• the major features of the emergency plan TVA would implement if a reactor was built at the site.

The report also reviewed unique aspects of the application. These included requests for exemptions from some offsite emergency planning requirements, including the plume exposure pathway emergency planning zone, as well as a proposed plume exposure planning zone size methodology. A future reactor license applicant could use the sizing methodology to determine an appropriate planning zone for the application’s specific reactor type.

The ESP process allows an applicant to address site-related issues, such as environmental impacts, for possible future construction and operation of a nuclear power plant at the site. TVA submitted the application on May 12, 2016. More information on the ESP process is available on the NRC website.

The staff will provide the report on the application to the Commission for a mandatory hearing on the permit later this year. The staff issued its Environmental Impact Statement on the application in April 2019. The Commission will conduct the hearing to determine whether the staff’s review supports the findings necessary to issue the permit.

End of excerpts from Nuclear Regulatory Commission
News Release

Possible configuration of a small modular reactor powerplant site. NuScale Power image.

NRC Advisory Committee: SMR Is Safe to Operate at Clinch River Proposed Site

Excerpts from Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Advisory Committee Correspondence

United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards
Washington, DC 20555 - 0001

January 9, 2019

The Honorable Kristine L. Svinicki
Chairman
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, DC 20555-0001

SUBJECT: EARLY SITE PERMIT – CLINCH RIVER NUCLEAR SITE

Dear Chairman Svinicki:

During the 659th meeting of the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS), December 6-7, 2018, we completed our review of the early site permit application submitted by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) for two or more small modular reactors (SMRs) at its Clinch River Nuclear (CRN) Site, and the NRC staff’s safety evaluation report. Our Regulatory Policies and Practices Subcommittee received an informational briefing on this topic on November 15, 2017, and also reviewed this matter at its meetings on May 15, August 22, October 17, and November 14, 2018. During our reviews, we had the benefit of discussions with the staff and representatives of TVA. We also had the benefit of the referenced documents. Our reviews of the application and the safety evaluation report were conducted to fulfill the requirements of 10 CFR 52.23, which states that the ACRS shall report on those portions of an early site permit application that concern safety.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

  1. Small modular reactors with design characteristics within the plant parameter envelope used by TVA in developing its Clinch River Nuclear Site early site permit application can be constructed and operated without undue risk to the health and safety of the public.

  2. The staff’s safety evaluation report of the TVA early site permit application should be issued. The staff accepted TVA’s plume exposure pathway emergency planning zone sizing methodology; two major features emergency plans (one plan for a site boundary plume exposure pathway emergency planning zone and a second plan for an approximate 2-mile radius plume exposure pathway emergency planning zone); and associated exemption requests. The safety evaluation report also identified a number of items that are treated either as permit conditions or as action items that must be addressed at the operating license stage.

  3. The early site permit for the Clinch River Nuclear Site should be issued.

BACKGROUND

An early site permit is the Commission’s approval of the safety and environmental suitability for a proposed site to support future construction and operation of one or more nuclear power plants. TVA’s submittal addresses site suitability issues, environmental protection issues, and plans for coping with emergencies, independent of the review of a specific nuclear power plant design. Before a plant can be constructed, either under a combined license or a construction permit, a specific reactor technology for the site must be reviewed and approved by the NRC.

TVA filed an early site permit application for its CRN Site in May 2016 and the NRC accepted and docketed the application in December 2016. The TVA application was based on a plant parameter envelope (PPE) approach as a surrogate for a specific plant design. Using inputs from four prospective vendors (NuScale, Holtec, BWX Technologies, and Westinghouse) of light-water reactor-derivative SMR designs, TVA determined bounding values for construction and operation of two or more SMRs at the CRN Site with a total nuclear generating capacity up to 2420 MWt and 800 MWe (up to 800 MWt for a single unit or module). This approach allows TVA flexibility, while also potentially reducing licensing risk. . . .

SUMMARY

The TVA early site permit application and the staff’s review demonstrated suitability of the CRN Site considering topics including surrounding population, external hazards, site physical characteristics, potential radionuclide releases, and emergency preparedness. This application is unique in its approach to emergency planning in that it proposes a risk-informed, dose-based, consequence-oriented methodology to determine the appropriate PEP EPZ. We note that this is in parallel to proposed rulemaking on emergency preparedness for small modular reactors and other new technologies, which we agreed with in our recent October 19, 2018 letter on this subject.

The TVA early site permit application benefits from the proposed use of advanced light-water reactor-derivative SMR designs that are expected to exhibit both lower accident frequencies and consequences than the current fleet of large light-water reactors; the large body of knowledge associated with light-water reactor technology, particularly regarding source terms; and extensive light-water reactor operating and licensing experience. TVA’s approach to emergency planning in providing dose savings is consistent with that used in developing NUREG-0396 and the staff’s proposed current rulemaking on the matter. The early site permit for the Clinch River Nuclear Site should be issued.

Sincerely,
Michael L. Corradini
Chairman

End of excerpts from Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Advisory Committee Correspondence

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