Wednesday, the NRC staff held a public meeting related to emergency planning for SMRs and other new reactor technologies. Slides from the meeting can be found here.
A few observations from the meeting—
- Although early in the process, if executed correctly, the NRC’s Emergency Planning rulemaking could significantly reduce costs for new small modular reactors, advanced reactors, and even medical isotope reactors.
- There was significant discussion during the meeting on a number of areas, but in particular—
- Whether the rule would be “risk-informed.”
- How site-specific features would be factored into the rulemaking.
- How proposed industrial facilities near a nuclear power plant would affect emergency planning.
The NRC staff made clear during the meeting that the rulemaking would be risk-informed and consequence-oriented, and would work to incorporate the safety advances provided by new reactor designs.
- The NRC staff emphasized that it welcomes written comments as it moves forward with this rulemaking, and will lean on them in developing a proposed rule. Comments on the regulatory basis document are due by June 27, 2017.
For additional discussion on the meeting, please contact the authors.