NRC ISSUES SAFETY EVALUATION REPORT FOR THE PRAIRIE ISLAND 

NUCLEAR PLANT LICENSE RENEWAL APPLICATION 

 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has issued its safety evaluation report (SER) 

with open items for the proposed renewal of the operating licenses for the Prairie Island Nuclear 

Generating Plant, Unit 1 and Unit 2, located in Welch, Minn. 

 The report documents the interim results of the NRC staff’s review of the license renewal 

application and site audits of the plant’s aging management programs to address the safety of 

plant operations during the period of extended operations. Overall, the results show that the 

applicant has identified actions that have been or will be taken to manage the effects of aging in 

the appropriate safety systems, structures and components of the plant and that their functions 

will be maintained during the period of extended operation. 

 In a letter dated June 4, Brian Holian, director of the Office of Nuclear Reactor 

Regulation’s Division of License Renewal, provided Northern States Power Company with the 

SER. Issuance of an SER with open items is a typical milestone in a license renewal review. The 

SER identifies open items that still need to be addressed by the applicant before the staff can 

complete its review. The open items in this SER involve additional reviews of the waste-gas 

decay tanks, vessel internals program, and the reactor and structures’ monitoring programs. 

 Northern States Power Company applied for a 20-year license extension for each of the 

two units at the site on April 15, 2008, to renew the licenses for both Prairie Island reactors. If 

approved, the expiration date for Prairie Island, Unit 1 would be extended to Aug. 9, 2033; and 

for Unit 2, the license would be extended to Oct. 29, 2034. 

A copy of the Prairie Island license renewal application is available at the Red Wing 

Public Library, 225 East Ave., Red Wing, Minn., and via the NRC’s web site at: 

http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/licensing/renewal/applications/prairie-island.html. After 

Northern States Power Company provides satisfactory information to address the open items, the 

NRC staff will present its conclusions on the license renewal application in an update to this 

SER. A Final SER is estimated to be issued this year in late October. 

NRC NEWS

U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 

Washington, D.C. 20555-0001 

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No. 09-104 June 4, 2009
 The SER and the license renewal application have also been provided to the NRC’s 

Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS), an independent body of experts that 

advises the NRC on reactor safety matters. An ACRS subcommittee is expected to discuss the 

SER during a July 7, public meeting at NRC Headquarters in Rockville, Md. Details of this 

meeting will be announced on the agency’s Web site at http://www.nrc.gov/publicinvolve/public-meetings/index.cfm. The full ACRS will later issue a report discussing the results 

of its review. 

A copy of the letter and the SER will be available in the NRC’s Agencywide Documents 

Access and Management Systems (ADAMS) under accession number ML091040454. 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.Resource@nrc.gov. 

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