Revised Analyses of Decommissioning for the Reference Boiling Water Reactor Power Station – Effects of Current Regulatory and Other Considerations on the Financial Assurance Requirements of the Decommissioning Rule and on Estimates of Occupational Radiation Exposure(NUREG/CR-6174)

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Publication Information

Manuscript Completed: December 1995
Date Published: July 1996

Prepared by:
R. L. Smith, M. C. Bierschbach, G. J. Konzek, P. N. McDuffie

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Richland, WA 99352

G. J. Mencinsky, NRC Project Manager

Prepared for:
Division of Regulatory Applications
Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, DC 20555-0001

NRC Job Code B2902

Availability Notice

Abstract

On June 27, 1988, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) published in the Federal Register (53 FR 24018) regulations for the General Requirements for Decommissioning Nuclear Facilities. With the issuance of the rule, owners and operators of licensed nuclear power plants are required to prepare, and submit to the NRC for review, decommissioning cost estimates for shutdown facilities. The NRC staff is in need of updated bases documentation that will assist them in assessing the adequacy of the licensee submittals, from the viewpoint of both the planned actions, including occupational radiation exposure, and the probable costs. The purpose of this reevaluation study is to update the needed bases documentation.

This report presents the results of a review and reevaluation of the PNL 1980 decommissioning study of the Washington Public Power Supply System's Washington Nuclear Plant Two (WNP-2), which is a boiling water reactor (BWR), located at Richland, Washington, including all identifiable factors and cost assumptions which contribute significantly to the total cost of decommissioning the plant for the DECON, SAFSTOR, and ENTOMB decommissioning alternatives. These alternatives now include an initial 5-7 year period during which time the spent fuel is stored in the spent fuel pool prior to beginning major disassembly or extended safe storage of the plant. Included for information (but not part of the license termination cost) is an estimate of the cost to demolish the decontaminated and clean structures on the site and to restore the site to a "green field" condition.

This report also includes consideration of the NRC requirement that decontamination and decommissioning activities leading to termination of the nuclear license be completed within 60 years of final reactor shutdown, consideration of packaging and disposal requirements for materials whose radionuclide concentrations exceed the limits for Class C lowlevel waste (i.e., Greater-Than-Class C), and reflects 1993 costs for labor, materials, transport, and disposal activities. Sensitivity of the total license termination cost to the disposal costs at different low-level radioactive waste disposal sites, to different depths of contaminated concrete surface removal within the facilities, and to different transport distances is also examined.