64996 Federal Register / Vol. 69, No. 216 / Tuesday, November 9, 2004 / Notices 

modified the TS definitions and TS 

requirements for average planar linear 

heat generation rate. Additionally, TS 

Section 6.9.1.9 is revised to correct an 

error from a previous amendment that 

inadvertently removed a reference. 

Date of issuance: October 20, 2004. 

Effective date: As of the date of 

issuance, to be implemented within 60 

days. 

Amendment No.: 154. 

Facility Operating License No. NPF–

57: This amendment revised the TSs. 

Date of initial notice in Federal 

Register: February 17, 2004 (69 FR 

7528). The June 8, 2004 letter provided 

clarifying information that did not 

change the initial proposed no 

significant hazards consideration 

determination or expand the application 

beyond the scope of the original Federal 

Register notice. 

The Commission’s related evaluation 

of the amendment is contained in a 

Safety Evaluation dated October 20, 

2004. 

No significant hazards consideration 

comments received: No.

Dated in Rockville, Maryland, this 1st day 

of November 2004.

For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

Ledyard B. Marsh, 

Director, Division of Licensing Project 

Management, Office of Nuclear Reactor 

Regulation.

[FR Doc. 04–24804 Filed 11–8–04; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 7590–01–P

NUCLEAR REGULATORY 

COMMISSION 

Notice of Availability of Interim Staff 

Guidance Documents For Fuel Cycle 

Facilities

AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission.

ACTION: Notice of availability.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Wilkins Smith, Project Manager, 

Technical Support Group, Division of 

Fuel Cycle Safety and Safeguards, Office 

of Nuclear Material Safety and 

Safeguards, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission, Washington, DC 20005–

0001. Telephone: (301) 415–5788; fax 

number: (301) 415–5370; e-mail: 

wrs@nrc.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

I. Introduction 

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission 

(NRC) plans to issue Interim Staff 

Guidance (ISG) documents for fuel cycle 

facilities. These ISG documents provide 

clarifying guidance to the NRC staff 

when reviewing either a license 

application or a license amendment 

request for a fuel cycle facility under 10 

CFR part 70. The NRC is soliciting 

public comments on the ISG documents 

which will be considered in the final 

versions or subsequent revisions. 

II. Summary 

The purpose of this notice is to 

provide the public an opportunity to 

review and comment on a draft Interim 

Staff Guidance document for fuel cycle 

facilities. Interim Staff Guidance–09 

provides guidance to NRC staff relative 

the requirements associated with the 

use of Initiating Event Frequencies 

(IEFs) for demonstrating compliance 

with the performance requirements of 

10 CFR 70.61. 

III. Interim Staff Guidance–09, 

Initiating Event Frequency, Draft 

October 20, 2004 Issue 

This guidance addresses the measures 

needed to assure the validity and 

maintenance of initiating event 

frequencies (IEFs) used to demonstrate 

compliance with the performance 

requirements for 10 CFR 70.61. 

Introduction 

The purpose of this Interim Staff 

Guidance (ISG) is to clarify the use of 

IEFs for demonstrating compliance with 

the performance requirements of 10 CFR 

70.61. NUREG–1718, ‘‘Standard Review 

Plan for the Review of an Application 

for a Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel 

Fabrication Facility,’’ and NUREG–

1520, ‘‘Standard Review Plan for the 

Review of a License Application for a 

Fuel Cycle Facility,’’ provide methods 

for reviewing integrated safety analyses 

(ISAs), employing a semi-quantitative 

risk index method. While one of these 

methods is used below to illustrate the 

use of IEFs, applicants and licensees 

may use other methods which would 

produce similar results. There is no 

particular method explicitly mandated, 

and sequences that are risk significant 

or marginally acceptable are candidates 

for more detailed evaluation by the 

applicant or licensee and reviewer. 

Discussion 

Each licensee or applicant is required 

to perform an ISA to identify all 

credible high-consequence and 

intermediate-consequence events. The 

risk of each such credible event is to be 

limited through the use of appropriate 

engineered and/or administrative 

controls to meet the performance 

requirements of 10 CFR 70.61. Such a 

control is referred to as an item relied 

on for safety (IROFS). In turn, a safety 

program must be established and 

maintained to assure that each IROFS is 

available and reliable to perform its 

intended function when needed. The 

safety program may be graded such that 

management measures applied are 

graded commensurate with the 

reduction of risk attributable to that 

item. In addition, a configuration 

management system must be established 

pursuant to § 70.72, to evaluate changes, 

to assure, in part, that the IROFS are not 

removed without at least equivalent 

replacement of the safety function. 

The risk of each credible event is 

determined by cross-referencing the 

severity of the consequence of the 

unmitigated accident sequence with the 

likelihood of occurrence in a risk matrix 

with risk index values. The likelihood 

of occurrence risk index values can be 

determined by considering the criteria 

in NUREG–1520, Tables A–9 through 

A–11. Accident sequences result from 

initiating events which are followed by 

the failure of one or more IROFS. 

Initiating events can be (1) an external 

event such as a hurricane or earthquake, 

(2) a facility event external to the 

process being analyzed (e.g., fires, 

explosions, failures of other equipment, 

flooding from facility water sources), (3) 

deviations from normal operations of 

the process (credible abnormal events), 

or (4) failures of an IROFS in the 

process. Additional guidance regarding 

initiating probabilities from natural 

phenomena hazards are addressed in 

ISG–08, Natural Phenomena Hazards. 

An initiating event does not have to 

be an IROFS failure. An item only 

becomes an IROFS if it is credited in the 

ISA for mitigation or prevention per the 

definition in § 70.4. If an item, whose 

failure initiates an event, has strictly an 

operational function, it does not have to 

be an IROFS. This applies to external 

events and can apply to internal events. 

If the item whose failure initiates an 

event, has solely a safety function that 

is credited in the ISA, then it should be 

an IROFS. If the item has both an 

operational and a safety function, the 

safety function should make it an IROFS 

(for its ISA credited safety features 

only). 

IEFs can play a significant role in 

determining whether the performance 

requirements of § 70.61 are met for a 

particular accident sequence. Whether 

an initiating event is due to an IROFS 

or a non-IROFS failure, licensees should 

take appropriate action to assure that 

any change to the basis for assigning an 

IEF value to that event is evaluated on 

a continuing basis to ensure continued 

compliance with the performance 

requirements. For example, a nonIROFS component may not be subject to 

the same QA program controls and other 

management measures that an IROFS 

Federal Register / Vol. 69, No. 216 / Tuesday, November 9, 2004 / Notices 64997

would receive (i.e., surveillance, testing, 

procurement, etc.). However, 

appropriate management controls 

should be considered, in a graded 

manner, to provide assurance that 

performance requirements are met over 

time. The ability to identify a nonIROFS component failure, similar to 

that for IROFS, may be needed to 

provide feedback on failure rates and 

IEFs to the ISA process. Changes to the 

IEF values may result from changes to 

a component’s design, procurement, 

operation, or maintenance history, as 

well as new or increased external plant 

hazards, and should be considered in a 

graded approach.

Regulatory Basis 

10 CFR 70.61, Performance 

Requirements. 

10 CFR 70.62, Safety Program and 

Integrated Safety Analysis. 

10 CFR 70.65, Additional Content of 

Applications. 

10 CFR 70.72, Facility Changes and 

Change Process. 

Applicability 

This guidance is for use in those cases 

where an applicant or licensee chooses 

to use an IROFS or non-IROFS failure 

IEF for risk determination. 

Technical Review Guidance 

1. IEF and Identification of an IROFS 

Example. A licensee uses a heater/

blower unit to heat a UF6 cylinder in a 

hot box to liquify the contents prior to 

sampling. The unmitigated accident 

sequence involves the failure of the 

controller for the heater/blower 

resulting in overheating the cylinder. 

This results in the cylinder becoming 

overpressurized and rupturing, releasing 

the UF6 to the surrounding process area. 

Such a release is analyzed to exceed the 

performance requirements of § 70.61. 

The licensee has two basic choices: (1) 

Assume the initiating event probability 

=1 and provide an appropriate level of 

mitigation or prevention solely through 

one or more IROFS, or (2) assign a value 

to the initiating event (blower/heater 

controller failure) and provide one or 

more preventive or mitigative IROFS to 

bring the accident sequence risk within 

the performance requirements. 

If the licensee chooses (2) above and 

assigns an appropriate value to the IEF, 

the indices of NUREG–1520, Table A–9, 

Failure Frequency Index Number, may 

be used. The controller for the heater/

blower unit would be assigned an 

appropriate Frequency Index Number. 

The licensee would then analyze the 

accident sequence and determine 

whether additional IROFS are necessary 

to meet the performance requirements. 

There are now two variables that feed 

into the risk determination: one or more 

IROFS failure frequencies and the IEF of 

the non-IROFS controller for the heater/

blower unit. Changes to the initiating 

event that impact the IEF of the nonIROFS controller for the heater/blower 

unit in a manner that changes the 

licensee’s previous determination of 

compliance with the performance 

requirements must be evaluated per 

§ 70.72(a). 

2. IEF Index Use 

Indices may be used to determine the 

overall likelihood of an accident 

sequence. NUREG–1520, Table A–9, 

Failure Frequency Index Numbers, 

identifies frequency index numbers 

based on specified evidence. The 

evidence used by applicants and 

licensees should be supportable and 

documented in the ISA summary as 

required by § 70.65(b)(4). The evidence 

cited in the ISA documentation should 

not be limited to anecdotal accounts and 

must demonstrate compliance with the 

descriptive definitions of unlikely, 

highly unlikely, and credible, as 

required by § 70.65(b)(9). The rigor and 

specificity of the documented evidence 

should be commensurate with the item’s 

importance to safety, and the data 

should support the frequency chosen 

(e.g., data from 30 years of plant 

operating experience based on a single 

component typically could not be 

expected to support a 10 E–2 failure 

probability). 

An item’s failure rate should be 

determined from actual data for that 

specific component or safety function in 

the current system design under the 

current environmental conditions. 

When specific failure data is limited or 

not available, the applicant or licensee 

may use more ‘‘generic’’ data with 

appropriate substantiation. However, 

when less specific failure data is 

available, appropriate conservatism 

should be exercised in assigning 

frequency indices. The footnote to Table 

A–9 that states ‘‘indices less than (more 

negative than) ¥1 should not be 

assigned to IROFS unless the 

configuration management, auditing and 

other management measures are of high 

quality, because without those 

measures, the IROFS may be changed or 

not maintained,’’ should also be applied 

to non-IROFS IEFs. In this case, 

appropriate management controls 

should be provided to assure that any 

changes to the evidence supporting IEF 

indices will be identified and promptly 

evaluated to ensure that the 

performance requirements of § 70.61 are 

met. A graded approach may be used in 

applying management controls based on 

the IEF values; however, how this will 

be done should be identified in the ISA 

Summary.

Possible changes to IEFs, failure rates, 

and the assumptions they are based on 

should be periodically evaluated by the 

licensee to assure that any change to an 

IEF has been accounted for in the ISA 

process. Over time an IEF may change 

because of component aging or 

deterioration. Maintenance and 

performance experience should be fed 

back into the IEF evaluation. IEF 

changes could involve, for example, the 

introduction of new or hazards from 

nearby processes or new materials, 

changes in design, maintenance, or 

operation activities, etc. The applicant 

or licensee should establish 

management measures, which may be 

graded, to periodically confirm that 

there have been no changes to the ISA 

assumptions. For example, an applicant 

or licensee may choose to verify that 

there have been no changes to hazards 

from maintenance activities during a 

certain period of time based on an 

appropriate documented technical 

review or audit under the QA program. 

Whatever strategy the applicant or 

licensee chooses to employ should have 

an outcome of timely identification, and 

periodic evaluation, of failure rates 

followed by a prompt evaluation of the 

failure rate change on the ISA 

assumptions. This can be accomplished 

in accordance with the corrective 

maintenance program and/or the 

Quality Assurance (QA) problem 

identification and corrective action 

system. 

Indices particularly relied upon (i.e., 

<¥1) for overall likelihood will be 

reviewed during the ISA review process. 

3. External IEFs 

Possible changes to non-natural 

phenomena external events should be 

periodically evaluated by the licensee to 

assure that any change to an IEF has 

been accounted for in the ISA process. 

Such changes could involve, for 

example, the introduction of new 

hazards from an adjoining industrial 

site, changes in adjoining transportation 

activities, etc. The applicant or licensee 

should establish management measures, 

which may be graded, to periodically 

confirm that there have been no changes 

to the ISA assumptions. For example, an 

applicant or licensee may choose to 

verify that there have been no changes 

to outside hazards based on a two- to 

three-year review under the QA 

program. 

64998 Federal Register / Vol. 69, No. 216 / Tuesday, November 9, 2004 / Notices 

1 15 U.S.C. 78s(b)(1).

2 17 CFR 240.19b-4.

3See letter from John Boese, Vice President, Chief 

Regulatory Officer, BSE, to Nancy Sanow, Assistant 

Director, Division of Market Regulation 

(‘‘Division’’), Commission, dated July 22, 2004 and 

accompanying Form 19b–4 (‘‘Amendment No. 1’’). 

Amendment No. 1 replaced and superceded the 

originally filed proposed rule change.

4See letter from John Boese, Vice President, Chief 

Regulatory Officer, BSE, to Nancy Sanow, Assistant 

Director, Division, Commission, dated August 18, 

2004 (‘‘Amendment No. 2’’). Amendment No. 2 

replaced and superceded BSE Rule Chapter XV, 

Section 17, Paragraph (a) of the previously filed 

proposed rule change.

5See letter from John Boese, Vice President, Chief 

Regulatory Officer, BSE, to Nancy Sanow, Assistant 

Director, Division, Commission, dated August 19, 

2004 (‘‘Amendment No. 3’’). Amendment No. 3 

replaced and superceded BSE Rule Chapter XV, 

Section 17, Paragraph (a) of the previously filed 

proposed rule change.

6See Securities Exchange Act Release No. 50287 

(August 27, 2004), 69 FR 53966.

7See letter from John Boese, Vice President, Chief 

Regulatory Officer, BSE, to Nancy Sanow, Assistant 

Director, Division, Commission, dated October 6, 

2004 (‘‘Amendment No. 4’’). In Amendment No. 4, 

the BSE proposed permanent approval of the SPEP 

by deleting Paragraph (f) of Chapter XV, DealerSpecialists, Section 17, Specialist Performance 

4. Assurance 

The Safety Program required by 

§ 70.62(a) should have provisions for 

implementing the appropriate 

management controls to maintain the 

validity of the IEFs. Consideration 

should also be given to commitments in 

the QA program or a specific license 

condition. 

References

U.S. Code of Federal Regulations, title 10, 

part 70, ‘‘Domestic Licensing of Special 

Nuclear Material,’’ U.S. Government 

Printing Office, January 1, 2003. 

NUREG–1520, ‘‘Standard Review Plan for the 

Review of a License Application for a Fuel 

Cycle Facility,’’ U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission, Office of Nuclear Material 

Safety and Safeguards, March 2002. 

NUREG–1718, ‘‘Standard Review Plan for the 

Review of an Application for a Mixed 

Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication Facility,’’

U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 

Office of Nuclear Material Safety and 

Safeguards, August 2000.

IV. Further Information 

Comments and questions should be 

directed to the NRC contact listed above 

by December 9, 2004. Comments 

received after this date will be 

considered if it is practical to do so, but 

assurance of consideration cannot be 

given to comments received after this 

date.

Dated in Rockville, Maryland, this 3rd day 

of November, 2004. 

For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

Melanie A. Galloway, 

Chief, Technical Support Group, Division of 

Fuel Cycle Safety and Safeguards, Office of 

Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards.

[FR Doc. 04–24890 Filed 11–8–04; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 7590–01–P

POSTAL RATE COMMISSION

Briefing on New Postal Service 

Rollforward Model

AGENCY: Postal Rate Commission.

ACTION: Notice of public briefing.

SUMMARY: The Postal Service will 

present a briefing and demonstration of 

its new PC-based rollforward model 

software on Tuesday, November 16, 

2004 at 10 a.m. in the Commission’s 

hearing room. The briefing will address 

the history of the Postal Service’s 

rollforward model, reasons why the new 

version was developed, and components 

of the new model. A question-andanswer session will follow. The meeting 

is open to the public.

DATES: Tuesday, November 16, 2004.

ADDRESSES: Postal Rate Commission 

(hearing room), 1333 H Street NW., 

Washington, DC 20268–0001, Suite 300.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Stephen L. Sharfman, General Counsel, 

202–789–6818.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Regulatory History 

69 FR 7530, February 17, 2004. 

Earlier this year, the Postal Rate 

Commission gave a public 

demonstration of the new computer 

software model it has developed to 

handle the cost model/rollforward 

function in rate cases. The Postal 

Service has likewise been involved in 

updating its rollforward software. For 

the Postal Service, this would mean 

moving from a mainframe platform to a 

PC-based platform. This presentation 

will be quite similar in content and 

format to that provided by the 

Commission. As with the Commission’s 

new software, the primary purpose of 

the Postal Service’s new model is not to 

change the substance of the rollforward 

methodology, but rather to perform the 

same computational operations and 

achieve the same results using a 

different computer platform. The 

demonstration will use the rollforward 

model from the last omnibus rate case 

to illustrate how the model works. 

The Postal Service anticipates having 

a version of the model available on the 

Commission’s Web site, http://

www.prc.gov, so that interested 

observers can load the model and follow 

along on their own computers. There are 

a limited number of computer outlets in 

the hearing room which will be 

available for use during the 

presentation. Interested persons should 

contact Steven W. Williams at 202–789–

6842.

Steven W. Williams, 

Secretary.

[FR Doc. 04–24943 Filed 11–8–04; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 7710–FW–P

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE 

COMMISSION 

[Release No. 34–50622; File No. SR–BSE–

2004–25] 

Self-Regulatory Organizations; Boston 

Stock Exchange, Inc.; Order Approving 

a Proposed Rule Change and 

Amendment Nos. 1, 2 and 3 Thereto 

and Notice of Filing and Order 

Granting Accelerated Approval to 

Amendment No. 4 Thereto Relating to 

the Specialist Performance Evaluation 

Program 

November 2, 2004. 

I. Introduction 

On June 21, 2004, the Boston Stock 

Exchange, Inc. (‘‘BSE’’ or ‘‘Exchange’’) 

filed with the Securities and Exchange 

Commission (‘‘Commission’’), pursuant 

to Section 19(b)(1) of the Securities 

Exchange Act of 1934 (‘‘Act’’) 1 and Rule 

19b–4 thereunder,2 a proposed rule 

change to amend its rules concerning its 

Specialist Performance Evaluation 

Program (‘‘SPEP’’). On July 26, 2004, the 

BSE submitted Amendment No. 1 to the 

proposed rule change.3 On August 25, 

2004, the BSE submitted Amendment 

Nos. 2 4 and 3 5 to the proposed rule 

change. The proposed rule change, as 

amended by Amendment Nos. 1, 2 and 

3, was published for comment in the 

Federal Register on September 3, 2004.6

The Commission received no comments 

on the proposed rule change.

On October 15, 2004, the BSE 

submitted Amendment No. 4 to the 

proposed rule change.7 This order