Document: NRC Regulatory Guide
Document ID: 01fb3132-b05a-41a0-ab81-466a6fb6f4d3
Document Type: regulatory_guide
Title: Preparation of Environmental Reports for Nuclear Power Plant License Renewal Applications (Rev. 1)
Source: NRC Regulatory Guide Division 4
Source URL: https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML0916/ML091620409.pdf
Revision Date: 2023-06
Chapter: 
Section ID: RG-4.2S1
CFR Part: 
CFR Title: 

Content:
encies) and resource agencies (e.g., NMFS, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, State fish and wildlife agencies) regarding the issue of thermal impacts. Provide copies of any NPDES permits and Clean Water Act Section 316(a) determinations. If a current NPDES permit relative to thermal discharges and/or a current Section 316(a) variance from State water temperature standards do not exist, discuss the outstanding issues. • Briefly summarize any plant-specific thermal effluent studies, monitoring programs, or thermal effects or mortality studies and include locations, dates, objectives, methods, and results applicable to this license renewal application, as well as any data or data summaries available for NRC review. Estimate the number, by taxa, of fish and shellfish affected by and susceptible to the thermal effluent on a daily, monthly, and annual basis. Provide areal or volumetric estimates of thermally affected fish and shellfish habitat. Provide full documentation of analytical or modeling techniques used to assess effects. Describe these effects in terms of the commercial, recreational, and ecosystem services they would have provided. • If aquatic resources have been monitored, provide an analysis of temporal and geographic trends in the data that might indicate whether fish and shellfish populations have increased, decreased, or remained stable during the initial period of operation. Detail any relationships between patterns of thermal effects and trends in potentially affected populations. Because entrainment, impingement, and thermal impacts affect field populations simultaneously, provide, if possible, a single discussion of the effects of these stressors on trends in field data rather than discussing these three stressors individually. Water Use Conflicts on Aquatic Resources This section applies to plants with cooling ponds or cooling towers using makeup water from a river with low flow (less than 3.15 × 1012 ft3/year (9 × 1010 m3/year). Table B-1 notes