[Federal Register Volume 61, Number 224 (Tuesday, November 19, 1996)]
[Notices]
[Pages 58910-58911]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 96-29586]
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Draft Regulatory Guide; Issuance, Availability
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued for public comment a
draft of a guide planned for its Regulatory Guide Series. This series
has been developed to describe and make available to the public such
information as methods acceptable to the NRC staff for implementing
specific parts of the Commission's regulations, techniques used by the
staff in evaluating specific problems or postulated accidents, and data
needed by the staff in its review of applications for permits and
licenses.
The draft guide, temporarily identified by its task number, DG-1052
(which should be mentioned in all correspondence concerning this draft
guide), is titled ``Time Response Design Criteria for Safety-Related
Operator Actions.'' The guide will be in Division 1, ``Power
Reactors.'' This regulatory guide is being developed to provide methods
acceptable to the NRC staff for developing and applying timing criteria
for safety-related operator actions. This guide endorses the American
National Standards Institute/American Nuclear Society standard ANSI/
ANS-58.8-1994, ``Time Response Design Criteria for Safety-Related
Operator Actions.''
This draft guide DG-1052 supersedes DG-1040, which was issued in
June 1995 with the same title. DG-1052 has been developed as a result
of comments received on DG-1040 and review by the NRC's Advisory
Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS). Based on the information
presented in DG-1040, the ACRS, in its letter dated November 14, 1995,
to the NRC Executive Director for Operations,1 has raised the
following concerns: (1) There is no technical basis for the estimates
of minimum times for operator actions in ANSI/ANS-58.8-1994; (2)
comparison of the recommended times with results from exercises on
plant simulators does not demonstrate that these times are
appropriately conservative; (3) endorsement of the standard is not the
appropriate way to resolve Generic Safety Issue B-17; and (4) the
standard does not address operator response times for advanced nuclear
power plants.
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\1\ Copies of this letter are available for inspection or
copying for a fee from the NRC Public Document Room at 2120 L Street
NW., Washington, DC; the PDR's mailing address is Mail Stop LL-6,
Washington, DC 20555; telephone (202) 634-3273; fax (202) 634-3343.
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The draft guide has not received complete staff review and does not
represent an official NRC staff position.
Public comments are being solicited on Draft Regulatory Guide DG-
1052 and on the ACRS concerns. Comments may be accompanied by
additional relevant information or supporting data. Written comments
may be submitted to the Rules Review and Directives Branch, Division of
Freedom of Information and Publications Services, Office of
Administration, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC
20555. Copies of comments received may be examined at the NRC Public
Document Room, 2120 L Street NW., Washington, DC. Comments will be most
helpful if received by January 24, 1997.
Although a time limit is given for comments on this draft guide,
comments and suggestions in connection with items for inclusion in
guides currently being developed or improvements in all published
guides are encouraged at any time.
Comments may be submitted electronically, in either ASCII text or
Wordperfect format (version 5.1 or later), by calling the NRC
Electronic Bulletin Board on FedWorld. The bulletin board may be
accessed using a personal computer, a modem, and one of the commonly
available communications software packages, or directly via Internet.
If using a personal computer and modem, the NRC subsystem on
FedWorld can be accessed directly by dialing the toll free number: 1-
800-
[[Page 58911]]
303-9672. Communication software parameters should be set as follows:
parity to none, data bits to 8, and stop bits to 1 (N,8,1). Using ANSI
or VT-100 terminal emulation, the NRC NUREGs and RegGuides for Comment
subsystem can then be accessed by selecting the ``Rules Menu'' option
from the ``NRC Main Menu.'' For further information about options
available for NRC at FedWorld, consult the ``Help/Information Center''
from the ``NRC Main Menu.'' Users will find the ``FedWorld Online
User's Guides'' particularly helpful. Many NRC subsystems and data
bases also have a ``Help/Information Center'' option that is tailored
to the particular subsystem.
The NRC subsystem on FedWorld can also be accessed by a direct dial
phone number for the main FedWorld BBS, 703-321-3339, or by using
Telnet via Internet, fedworld.gov. If using 703-321-3339 to contact
FedWorld, the NRC subsystem will be accessed from the main FedWorld
menu by selecting the ``Regulatory, Government Administration and State
Systems,'' then selecting ``Regulatory Information Mall.'' At that
point, a menu will be displayed that has an option ``U.S. Nuclear
Regulatory Commission'' that will take you to the NRC Online main menu.
The NRC Online area also can be accessed directly by typing ``/go nrc''
at a FedWorld command line. If you access NRC from FedWorld's main
menu, you may return to FedWorld by selecting the ``Return to
FedWorld'' option from the NRC Online Main Menu. However, if you access
NRC at FedWorld by using NRC's toll-free number, you will have full
access to all NRC systems but you will not have access to the main
FedWorld system.
If you contact FedWorld using Telnet, you will see the NRC area and
menus, including the Rules menu. Although you will be able to download
documents and leave messages, you will not be able to write comments or
upload files (comments). If you contact FedWorld using FTP, all files
can be accessed and downloaded but uploads are not allowed; all you
will see is a list of files without descriptions (normal Gopher look).
An index file listing all files within a subdirectory, with
descriptions, is included. There is a 15-minute time limit for FTP
access.
Although FedWorld can be accessed through the World Wide Web, like
FTP that mode only provides access for downloading files and does not
display the NRC Rules menu.
For more information on NRC bulletin boards call Mr. Arthur Davis,
Systems Integration and Development Branch, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory
Commission, Washington, DC 20555, telephone (301) 415-5780; e-mail
AXD[email protected]. For more information on this draft regulatory guide,
contact J.J. Kramer at the NRC, telephone (301) 415-5891; e-mail
JJK[email protected].
Regulatory guides are available for inspection at the Commission's
Public Document Room, 2120 L Street NW., Washington, DC. Requests for
single copies of draft or final guides (which may be reproduced) or for
placement on an automatic distribution list for single copies of future
draft guides in specific divisions should be made in writing to the
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555, Attention:
Distribution and Mail Services Section; or by fax at (301) 415-2260.
Telephone requests cannot be accommodated. Regulatory guides are not
copyrighted, and Commission approval is not required to reproduce them.
(5 U.S.C. 552(a))
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 6th day of November 1996.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
M. Wayne Hodges,
Director, Division of Systems Technology, Office of Nuclear Regulatory
Research.
[FR Doc. 96-29586 Filed 11-18-96; 8:45 am]
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