November 15, 2016 

The Honorable Shelley Moore Capito 

Chairman, Subcommittee on Clean Air 

 and Nuclear Safety 

Committee on Environment and Public Works 

United States Senate 

Washington, DC 20510 

Dear Madam Chairwoman: 

On behalf of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), I am pleased to submit 

the “Semiannual Status Report on the Licensing Activities and Regulatory Duties of the United 

States Nuclear Regulatory Commission.” The enclosed report covers NRC activities from April 

through September 2016. It includes a list of rulemaking activities, including their priority and 

schedule, as requested in the Joint Explanatory Statement that accompanied the Consolidated 

Appropriations Act, 2016. 

During this reporting period, the NRC was actively reviewing 8 license renewal 

applications for a total of 12 power reactors. The staff also continued reviewing four new 

reactor combined license applications for seven proposed new reactors. Shortly after the close 

of this reporting period, the NRC issued combined licenses for two reactors in Levy County, FL. 

In early September 2016, the NRC issued mid-cycle assessment letters to the Nation’s 

99 operating commercial nuclear power plants regarding their performance during the first half 

of 2016. The mid-cycle assessment period ended on June 30, 2016, with 96 plants in the two 

highest performance categories. Eighty-seven of those plants fully met all safety and security 

performance objectives and will continue to receive baseline inspections. The other nine 

reactors need to resolve one or two items of low safety significance and will receive 

supplemental NRC inspection to follow up on corrective actions. At the end of the mid-cycle 

assessment period, three reactors (Arkansas Nuclear One 1 and 2 (in Arkansas) and Pilgrim (in 

Massachusetts)) were in the fourth performance category. As such, these three plants will 

receive the highest level of regulatory oversight. Arkansas Nuclear One 1 and 2 were in the 

fourth performance category because of two safety findings of substantial significance. The 

NRC placed Pilgrim in this category because of long-standing performance issues of low-tomoderate significance. NRC oversight of these reactors will include several additional 

inspections and frequent NRC management involvement to confirm the reactors are addressing 

the performance issues. 

As part of the agency’s Project Aim initiative to become more efficient and effective, the 

Commission approved the staff’s recommendation to discontinue the mid-cycle assessments 

after this assessment period. The staff has determined that the discontinuation will not 

adversely impact the NRC’s mission, principles, or values. In place of mid-cycle assessments, 

the staff will use ongoing routine assessment activities for site-specific oversight, including 

continuous assessment activities and the continued use of the annual assessments. 
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The NRC also continues to address post-Fukushima safety enhancements and lessons 

learned. The enclosed report describes the agency’s Fukushima-related actions during the 

reporting period. 

Other Noteworthy Licensing and Regulatory Activities of the Past 6 Months 

 In April 2016 Waste Control Specialists (WCS) submitted to the NRC an application for a 

consolidated interim storage facility (CISF) for spent fuel in Andrews County, Texas; the NRC 

staff is currently evaluating the WCS application to determine whether it is acceptable for staff 

review. The agency also expects to receive an application for a CISF in southeastern New 

Mexico from Holtec International in March 2017. 

In early May 2016, the NRC staff published its final environmental impact statement 

supplement on a proposed permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level 

radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. This document supplements environmental 

impact statements the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) prepared on the proposed repository. 

The supplement analyzes potential impacts on ground water and impacts associated with 

surface water discharges and determines all impacts would be “SMALL”1. In addition, in August 

2016, the NRC made nearly 3.7 million documents from the adjudicatory hearing on the 

proposed high-level radioactive waste repository publicly available in its online documents 

database. These documents were formerly part of the Licensing Support Network, the 

document access system that was shut down when the repository hearing was suspended in 

September 2011. 

Also in May 2016, the NRC and the U.S. Department of Defense finalized a 

memorandum of understanding (MOU) describing the two agencies’ respective roles in the 

cleanup of radium and other unlicensed radioactive materials at military sites. The MOU 

provides two ways the NRC will be involved in military cleanup projects. First, at sites where the 

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has oversight under Superfund, NRC staff would 

limit its involvement to staying informed about remedial actions. Second, at sites without EPA 

oversight, the NRC would monitor the cleanup of unlicensed radiological material, which could 

include document review and comment, site observations, and confirmatory radiological 

surveys. 

NRC also issued its draft “NRC Vision and Strategy: Safely Achieving Effective and 

Efficient Non-Light-Water Reactor Mission Readiness” in May 2016. Subsequently, on 

June 7-8, 2016, the NRC and DOE held the second in their joint workshop series on innovative 

advanced reactor technologies. These workshops are designed to facilitate discussion on the 

opportunities and challenges for safely developing and deploying advanced non-light-water 

reactors. These workshops focus on both DOE’s and NRC’s strategic activities to support 

advanced reactor design, regulatory review, and deployment. 

In late June 2016, the NRC made available to the public an unclassified version of its 

annual report to Congress detailing the previous year’s security inspection program. This report 

is required under the Energy Policy Act of 2005. The report indicates that in 2015, the NRC 

conducted 242 security inspections at commercial nuclear power plants and Category I fuel 

 

1 A determination of “SMALL” indicates that the environmental effects are not detectable or are so minor 

that they will neither destabilize nor noticeably alter any important attribute or the resource. 
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cycle facilities. Those included 22 force-on-force inspections involving simulated attacks on the 

facilities to test the effectiveness of a licensee’s security. 

 On July 28, 2016, the NRC conducted the mandatory hearing on the application from 

Duke Energy Florida, LLC, for combined licenses to construct and operate two new AP1000 

reactors at the Levy Nuclear Plant site in Levy County, Florida. The application was filed in 

2008. The NRC issued the final environmental impact statement in April 2012 and the final 

safety evaluation report in June 2016. The mandatory hearing is the final step in Title 10 of the 

Code of Federal Regulations Part 52 licensing process. Shortly after the close of the reporting 

period, the Commission authorized issuance of the combined licenses. 

Also during the reporting period, the NRC received an “A” from the Small Business 

Administration (SBA) for its FY 2015 efforts to meet the Federal contracting goals for small 

businesses. In FY 2015, the NRC had $239 million in eligible contracting dollars. Of that 

amount, over 31 percent went to small businesses—exceeding the agency goal of 29 percent. 

This marks the fifth consecutive year the NRC has earned this recognition from the SBA. 

Rulemaking activities during the reporting period included issuing a final rule amending 

NRC regulations to reflect the licensing, inspection, special project, and annual fees the agency 

will charge applicants and licensees during FY 2016. The amended regulations reduce annual 

fees for most licensees primarily due to a decrease in the NRC’s budget. The NRC also 

published a final rule amending its regulations to establish a separate fee structure for lightwater small modular reactors because it anticipates that it will soon receive small modular 

reactor license applications. 

 Finally, from April through September 2016, the agency conducted approximately 

471 public meetings—both in the Washington, DC, area and around the country—addressing a 

full range of NRC issues. The meetings included Commission, advisory committee, licensing 

board, and staff-sponsored events. Also during this time, the NRC received 367 new Freedom 

of Information Act (FOIA) requests and closed 449 pending FOIA requests. 

Please feel free to contact me or Eugene Dacus, Director of the Office of Congressional 

Affairs, at (301) 415-1776, if you have any questions or need additional information. 

 Sincerely, 

 /RA/ 

 Stephen G. Burns 

Enclosure: 

As stated 

cc: Senator Thomas R. Carper
Identical letter sent to: 

The Honorable Shelley Moore Capito 

Chairman, Subcommittee on Clean Air 

 and Nuclear Safety 

Committee on Environment and Public 

 Works 

United States Senate 

Washington, DC 20510 

cc: Senator Thomas R. Carper 

The Honorable James Inhofe 

Chairman, Committee on Environment 

 and Public Works 

United States Senate 

Washington, DC 20510 

cc: Senator Barbara Boxer 

The Honorable Fred Upton 

Chairman, Committee on Energy 

 and Commerce 

United States House of Representatives 

Washington, DC 20515 

cc: Representative Frank Pallone, Jr. 

The Honorable Pete Olson 

Vice Chairman, Subcommittee on Energy 

 and Power 

Committee on Energy and Commerce 

United States House of Representatives 

Washington, DC 20515 

cc: Representative Bobby L. Rush 

The Honorable John Shimkus 

Chairman, Subcommittee on Environment 

 and the Economy 

Committee on Energy and Commerce 

United States House of Representatives 

Washington, DC 20515 

cc: Representative Paul Tonko 

The Honorable Mike Simpson 

Chairman, Subcommittee on Energy 

 and Water Development 

Committee on Appropriations 

United States House of Representatives 

Washington, DC 20515 

cc: Representative Marcy Kaptur 

The Honorable Lamar Alexander 

Chairman, Subcommittee on Energy 

 and Water Development 

Committee on Appropriations 

United States Senate 

Washington, DC 20510 

cc: Senator Dianne Feinstein