NRC NEWS

 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 

 Office of Public Affairs, Region I

 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa.

www.nrc.gov

 

No. I-06-016 March 22, 2006

Contact: Diane Screnci, 610/337-5330 E-mail: opa1@nrc.gov

Neil Sheehan, 610/337-5331

NRC TO DISCUSS 2005 ASSESSMENT FOR MILLSTONE NUCLEAR PLANT

 AT TWO PUBLIC MEETINGS SCHEDULED FOR MARCH 29

Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with representatives of Dominion Nuclear

Connecticut, Inc., on Wednesday, March 29, to discuss the agency’s annual assessment of safety

performance at the Millstone nuclear power plant. The period of performance to be discussed in Jan. 1

to Dec. 31, 2005.

Dominion operates the Unit 2 and 3 reactors at the Waterford, Conn., site.

The meeting, which will be open to the public for observation, is scheduled to begin at 3 p.m. at

the Leland F. Sillin, Jr., Training Center, located at the plant on Rope Ferry Road.

NRC staff will also hold a joint meeting at 6 p.m. the same day with Connecticut’s Nuclear

Energy Advisory Council (NEAC) to discuss the annual assessment. That session will take place at

Waterford Town Hall, 15 Rope Ferry Road in Waterford.

Before the meetings are adjourned, NRC staff will be available to answer questions from the

public on the safety performance of the Millstone plant, as well as the role of the NRC in ensuring safe

plant operation.

“As we do every year, we have carefully reviewed the safety performance of the Millstone

nuclear power plant during the previous calendar year,” NRC Region I Administrator Samuel J. Collins

said. “The meetings on March 29th will afford the public a chance to learn more about the results of

our assessment and to pose any questions they might have regarding plant performance or our oversight

activities.”

A letter sent from the NRC Region I Office to plant officials addresses the performance of the

plant during the period and will serve as the basis for the discussion at the meetings. It is available on

the NRC web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/mill_2005q4.pdf . 

Notices for the meetings, with agendas attached, are available in the NRC’s Agencywide Documents

Access and Management System (ADAMS) under accession numbers ML060660566 and

ML060660570. The NRC slides will be available in ADAMS at least three days before the meetings;
they will be provided in a revision to the meeting notices. ADAMS is accessible via the agency’s web

site at: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html . Help in using ADAMS is available by contacting

the NRC’s Public Document Room at 1-800-397-4209 or 301-415-4737, or by e-mail at

PDR@NRC.GOV .

Overall, the Millstone plant operated safely during the period. The NRC uses color-coded

inspection findings and performance indicators to assess nuclear power plant performance. The colors

start with “green” and then increase to “white,” “yellow” or “red,” commensurate with the safety

significance of the issues involved. Because all of the inspection findings and performance indicators

for the Millstone Units 2 and 3 during 2005 were determined to be “green,” the plant will receive a

baseline (or routine) level of inspections during the upcoming assessment period.

Routine inspections are performed by three NRC Resident Inspectors assigned to the plant and

by inspection specialists from the Region I Office in King of Prussia, Pa., and the agency’s

headquarters in Rockville, Md. Among the areas of plant operations to be inspected this year by NRC

specialists are the replacement of the pressurizer during the next Unit 2 refueling and maintenance

outage, the plant’s independent spent fuel storage facility, emergency preparedness and radioactive

material processing and transportation.

Current performance information for Millstone Unit 2 is available on the NRC web site at:

http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/MILL2/mill2_chart.html .

Current performance information for Millstone Unit 3 is available on the NRC web site at:

http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/MILL3/mill3_chart.html .

###