U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Region III Office of Public Affairs

801 Warrenville Road, Lisle, IL 60532-4351

NEWS ANNOUNCEMENT: RIII-99-32 May 25, 1999

CONTACT: Jan Strasma 630/829-9663

Angela Greenman 630/829-9662

E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov

NRC STAFF TO PRESENT REVIEW OF UTILITY’S READINESS TO LOAD

ADDITIONAL SPENT FUEL CASKS AT PALISADES NUCLEAR PLANT

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet Tuesday,

June 1, with Consumers Energy Company officials to discuss the

findings of an inspection of the utility’s preparations for

loading additional spent fuel storage casks at the Palisades

Nuclear Power Plant. The plant is located near Covert, Michigan.

The meeting will start at 2:00 p.m. in the Training Building

at the Palisades plant, 27780 Blue Star Memorial Highway, Covert.

The meeting is open to public observation. NRC officials will be

available after the meeting for questions and comments from

members of the public and the news media.

An NRC inspector is at the plant this week to observe

Consumers Energy’s practice runs of equipment and facilities to

be used during actual spent fuel loading into the dry storage

casks. NRC inspectors have also reviewed the utility’s

improvements to the spent fuel loading procedures.

Since August of last year, an NRC inspection team has been

inspecting and reviewing the ultrasonic testing of the 13

concrete and steel casks loaded with spent nuclear fuel from the

plant. Casks with this fuel are located on a concrete pad on the

plant property.

Specialists in the team both observed the utility’s

ultrasonic examinations and reviewed the test data from all 13

casks.

Last month, the NRC lifted restrictions on the loading of

spent nuclear fuel into VSC-24 dry storage casks at the Palisades

plant. These restrictions had been in place since September

1997, when the NRC issued a Confirmatory Action Letter to the

utility documenting its agreement not to load any more VSC-24

casks until problems associated with the cask closure welds were

resolved. On four occasions between 1995 and 1997 utilities using

the VSC-24 casks had cracks occur in either the weld for the

inner lid or the outer lid. In each case, the welds were
repaired and reexamined. Ultrasonic inspection was developed as

a corrective action to confirm that the entire volume of the weld

is sound.

The VSC-24, designed by Sierra Nuclear, is a vertical system

made up of two casks, one inside the other. The outer container

is 18 feet high with an 11 foot diameter and can hold 24 spent

fuel assemblies. The outer walls are made of steel-reinforced

concrete greater than two feet thick, with an inner steel lining.

The inner container, known as the multi-assembly sealed basket,

has two separately welded lids which cover the assemblies. The

inner lid is five inches of material encased in steel. The outer

lid is a thick steel disc welded in place over the inner lid.

Consumers Energy plans to load five additional VSC-24 casks,

beginning in June, to permit unloading of all fuel in the reactor

core during a refueling outage in October. The 13 casks were

loaded between 1993 and 1995.

The team will issue a written report in several weeks.

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