ML23297A265
| ML23297A265 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Hermes File:Kairos Power icon.png |
| Issue date: | 10/24/2023 |
| From: | Thi Herrera NRC/SECY |
| To: | |
| SECY RAS | |
| References | |
| Construction Permit Mndtry Hrg, RAS 56831, Kairos Power, Hermes-M 50-7513-CP | |
| Download: ML23297A265 (167) | |
Text
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION In the Matter of KAIROS POWER LLC (Hermes Test Reactor)
Docket No. --CP ORDER (Setting Deadline for Proposed Transcript Corrections)
The Commission held an evidentiary hearing on October,, at its Rockville, Maryland headquarters to receive testimony and exhibits in the uncontested portion of the captioned proceeding. The hearing transcript is appended to this Order. Pursuant to my authority under C.F.R. §.(a) and (j), the parties may file any proposed transcript corrections no later than October,. The parties may coordinate their responses and file a joint set of corrections.
IT IS SO ORDERED For the Commission Tomas E. Herrera Acting Secretary of the Commission Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this th day of October.
Tomas E.
Herrera Digitally signed by Tomas E. Herrera Date: 2023.10.24 17:13:05 -04'00'
1 UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
+ + + + +
HEARING ON CONSTRUCTION PERMIT FOR KAIROS POWER TESTING FACILITY (HERMES): SECTION 189A OF THE ATOMIC ENERGY ACT PROCEEDING (Public Meeting)
+ + + + +
- THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2023
+ + + + +
The Commission met in the Commissioners' Hearing Room, at 9:00 a.m. EDT, Christopher T. Hanson, Chair, presiding.
COMMISSION MEMBERS:
CHRISTOPHER T. HANSON, Chair DAVID A. WRIGHT, Commissioner ANNIE CAPUTO, Commissioner (by Video Teleconference)
BRADLEY R. CROWELL, Commissioner ALSO PRESENT:
TOMAS HERRERA, Acting Secretary to the Commission BROOKE CLARK, General Counsel
2 NRC STAFF:
JEREMY BOWEN, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR)
ALEXANDER CHERESKIN, NRR PEYTON DOUB, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards (NMSS)
TAMSEN DOZIER, NMSS KENNETH ERWIN, NMSS MICHELLE HART, NRR ED HELVENSTON, NRR WILLIAM JESSUP, NRR DONALD PALMROSE, NMSS CHRISTOPHER REGAN, NMSS MOHAMED SHAMS, NRR ALEXANDRA SIWY, NRR ROBERT TAYLOR, NRR CHRIS VAN WERT, NRR MEGAN WRIGHT, Office of the General Counsel ALSO PRESENT:
ED BLANDFORD, Kairos Power LLC PETER HASTINGS, Kairos Power LLC MIKE LAUFER, Kairos Power LLC RYAN LIGHTY, Morgan Lewis & Bockius PER PETERSON, Kairos Power LLC
3 PROCEEDINGS 1
8:57 a.m.
2 CHAIR HANSON: I call this hearing to order. I want to 3
welcome the applicant, Kairos Power, LLC, the NRC staff, members of the 4
public in the room with us, and those who are observing remotely.
5 I'd like to welcome Commissioner Caputo, as well. She's 6
going to be joining us remotely and participating throughout the day.
7 And I'm glad to see that one of the legacies of the pandemic 8
is the agility and nimbleness in the use of technology in this regard. And I'm 9
glad that she's able to join us in this way.
10 The Commission convenes today to conduct an evidentiary 11 hearing on Kairos' application for a construction permit for the Hermes Test 12 Reactor.
13 The construction permit if approved, would authorize the 14 construction of the Hermes Test Reactor, a fluoride, salt-cooled high 15 temperature reactor using tri-structural isotopic, or TRISO fuel in pebble form, 16 at the East Tennessee Technology Park, in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.
17 The construction permit does not authorize operation of the 18 reactor. That will require a subsequent operating license application.
19 This hearing is required under Section 189(a) of the Atomic 20 Energy Act of 1954, as amended. The Commission also will be reviewing the 21 adequacy of the NRC staff's environmental impact analysis, under the 22 National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, otherwise known as NEPA.
23 For those tuning in today, mandatory hearings represent a 24
4 long history of commitment to transparency at the NRC.
1 They were made a statutory requirement by Congress, and 2
implemented by the NRC to assure that the public is aware of and engaged in 3
agency decision making on major projects under our jurisdiction.
4 Today, the Commission will question witnesses involved in 5
the design, and review of this test reactor, and deliberate openly on key topics 6
concerning the construction permit application.
7 The general order of the hearing is as follows. First, I will 8
address procedural matters associated with the swearing in of witnesses, and 9
the admission into the record of the parties' exhibits.
10 Kairos and the NRC staff will then provide testimony in 11 witness panels, that provide an overview of the application, as well as address 12 safety and environmental topics associated with its review, with Commission 13 questions following each panel.
14 The Commission expects to issue a decision after the 15 hearing promptly, with due regard to the complexity of the issues.
16 In order to issue a construction permit, the Commission 17 must make certain specific safety and environmental findings.
18 With regard to safety, the Commission will determine in 19 accordance with 10 CFR 50.35(a), first whether the applicant has described 20 the proposed design of the facility, including the principal architectural and 21 engineering criteria for the design, and whether the applicant has identified 22 the major features, or components, incorporated therein, for the protection of 23 health and safety of the public.
24
5 Second, whether such further technical or design 1
information as may be required to complete the safety analysis, and which can 2
be reasonably left for later consideration, will be supplied in the final safety 3
analysis report.
4 Third, whether safety features or components, if any, that 5
require research and development, have been described by the applicant, and 6
the applicant has identified, and there will be conducted a research and 7
development program, reasonably designed to resolve any safety questions 8
associated with such features or components.
9 And fourth, whether on the basis of the foregoing, there is 10 reasonable assurance that such safety questions will be satisfactorily resolved 11 at or before the latest date stated in the application for completion of the 12 construction of the proposed facility.
13 And, taking into consideration the site criteria contained in 14 10 CFR Part 100, the proposed facility can be constructed and operated at 15 the proposed location, without undue risk to the health and safety of the public.
16 In making these findings, the Commission will also be 17 guided by the considerations in 10 CFR Section 50.40, which include the 18 Commission's opinion as to whether the issuance of the construction permit 19 will not be inimical to the common defense and security, or to the health and 20 safety of the public.
21 With regard to environmental considerations, in 10 CFR 22 51.105(a), the Commission will first determine whether the requirements of 23 the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, Sections 102(2)(A), (C), and 24
6 (E), and the applicable regulations in 10 CFR Part 51, have been met.
1 Second, independently consider the final balance among 2
conflicting factors contained in the record of the proceeding, with a view to 3
determining the appropriate action to be taken.
4
- Third, determine after weighing the environmental 5
economic, technical, and other benefits against environmental and other 6
costs, and considering reasonable alternatives, whether the construction 7
permit should, on the basis of the environmental review be issued, denied, or 8
appropriately conditioned.
9 And fourth, determine whether the NEPA review conducted 10 by the NRC staff has been adequate.
11 This meeting is open to the public, and we do not anticipate 12 the need to close the meeting to discuss non-public information.
13 If a party believes that the response to a question may 14 require reference to non-public information, then that party should answer the 15 question to the extent practicable, with information in the publicly available 16 record, and file any non-public response promptly after the hearing on the non-17 public docket.
18 I would now ask whether my fellow commissioners have any 19 opening remarks they'd like to make.
20 Commissioner Wright?
21 Commissioner Caputo?
22 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: No.
23 Commissioner Crowell?
24
7 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: No.
1 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
2 We will now proceed to the swearing in of witnesses, 3
beginning with Kairos. Would the Kairos and NRC counsel please come to 4
the table?
5 (Pause.)
6 Kairos counsel, please introduce yourself.
7 MR.
LIGHTY:
Good
- morning, Chair Hanson and 8
Commissioners. My name is Ryan Lighty, with the law firm of Morgan Lewis 9
and Bockius, appearing as counsel of record for Kairos Power.
10 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
11 Mr. Lighty, would you please read the names of Kairos' 12 witnesses? Each witness should stand as his or her name is read and remain 13 standing.
14 MR. LIGHTY: Yes, we present the following witnesses in 15 alphabetical order.
16 Steve Ahr.
17 Edward Blandford.
18 Martin Bryan.
19 Anthonie Cilliers.
20 Matthew Denman.
21 Oded Doron.
22 Antonio Fernandez.
23 Darrell Gardner.
24
8 Lori Gross.
1 Micah Hackett.
2 Jordan Hagaman.
3 Peter Hastings.
4 Brandon Haugh.
5 Alan Kruizenga.
6 Mike Laufer.
7 Drew Peebles.
8 Per Peterson.
9 Nader Satvat.
10 Brian Song.
11 Kevin Taylor.
12 And, Nicholas Zweibaum.
13 Thank you.
14 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
15 Would you please all raise your right hand while I read the 16 oath?
17 Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you will provide in 18 this proceeding, is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
19 Thank you. Are there any witnesses who did not take the 20 oath?
21 All right, thank you. You all may be seated.
22 NRC counsel, are there any objections to including the 23 witness list as part of the record?
24
9 MS. WRIGHT: No objections.
1 CHAIR HANSON: Excellent. In the absence of objections, 2
the witness list is admitted into the record.
3 Next, we'll turn to Kairos' exhibits. Kairos counsel, are there 4
any changes to the previously supplied exhibit list?
5 MR. LIGHTY: No changes to the exhibit list.
6 CHAIR HANSON: Excellent.
7 Please read the range of numbers of the exhibits to be 8
admitted.
9 MR. LIGHTY: As shown on Kairos' October 12, 2023, 10 Exhibit List, Kairos submitted Exhibits KRS-001 through KRS-006.
11 CHAIR HANSON: Excellent, thank you.
12 Is there a motion to admit the exhibits into the record?
13 MR. LIGHTY: Yes, Kairos moves to admit Exhibits KRS-001 14 through KRS-006 into the hearing record.
15 CHAIR HANSON: Excellent.
16 NRC counsel, are there any objections to the admission of 17 the exhibits, and the exhibit list as part of the record?
18 MS. WRIGHT: No objections from staff.
19 CHAIR HANSON: In the absence of the objections, the 20 exhibits and the exhibit list are admitted into the record.
21 (Whereupon, the above-referred to documents were 22 received into the record as Kairos Exhibit Nos. KRS-001 through KRS-006.)
23 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
24
10 We'll now turn to the presentation and the NRC staff's 1
witnesses. NRC counsel, please introduce yourself.
2 MS. WRIGHT: Good morning, I'm Megan Wright, counsel 3
for NRC staff.
4 CHAIR HANSON: Please read the names of the staff's 5
witnesses. Each witness should stand as his or her name is read and remain 6
standing.
7 MS. WRIGHT: Susan Ani, Suzanne Ani.
10 Andrew Bielen.
11 Jeremy Bowen.
13 Calvin Cheung.
14 Samuel Cuadrado de Jesus.
15 Amitava Ghosh.
16 Michelle Hart.
17 Shawn Harwell.
19 Matthew Hiser.
20 William Jessup.
21 Tuan Le.
22 Kenneth Mott.
23 Jay Robinson.
24
11 Pravin Sawant.
2 Kenneth See.
7 Chris Van Wert.
8 Jason White.
9 Peyton Doub.
10 Tami Dozier.
11 Kenneth Irwin.
12 Joseph Giacinto.
13 Donald Palmrose.
14 And, Christopher Regan.
15 CHAIR HANSON: Please raise your right hand while I, while 16 I read the oath.
17 Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you will provide in 18 this proceeding, is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
19 Okay. Are there any witnesses who did not take the oath?
20 Okay, thank you, you may be seated.
21 Kairos counsel, are there any objections to including the 22 witness list as part of the record?
23 MR. LIGHTY: No objections.
24
12 CHAIR HANSON: In the absence of the objections, the 1
witness list is admitted into the record.
2 Now we'll turn to the staff's exhibits. Counsel, are there any 3
changes to your exhibit list?
4 MS. WRIGHT: No changes.
5 CHAIR HANSON: Please read the range of numbers of the 6
exhibits to be admitted.
7 MS. WRIGHT: NRC-001 through NRC-011.
8 CHAIR HANSON: Is there a motion to admit the exhibits into 9
the record?
10 MS. WRIGHT: So moved.
11 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
12 Kairos counsel, are there any objections to the admission of 13 the exhibits, and the exhibit list into the record?
14 MR. LIGHTY: No objections.
15 CHAIR HANSON: In the absence of the objections, the 16 exhibits and the exhibit list are admitted into the record.
17 (Whereupon, the above-referred to documents were 18 received into the record as NRC Staff Exhibit Nos. NRC-001 through NRC-19 011.)
20 CHAIR HANSON: For our first, and I think that brings us to 21 the end of the formalities. It's all a formality, I suppose, but.
22 MS. WRIGHT: Thank you.
23 CHAIR HANSON: Or, it's formal, in any event. So, thank 24
13 you both, counsel.
1 For our first presentation, Kairos will provide an overview of 2
its application. Next, the staff will provide an overview of their review and key 3
regulatory findings.
4 After each overview panel, we will have a round of questions 5
from the Commissioners. For the two subsequent presentations, the safety 6
panel and the environmental panel, first Kairos and then the staff will testify, 7
followed by an opportunity for the Commission to pose questions to both 8
parties.
9 The Commissioners will have an opportunity to bank their 10 time as they see fit, to focus on particular questions and we will rotate the 11 order of questioning throughout the day.
12 I will remind witnesses of this panel, and other panels who 13 will appear before us throughout the day, that they remain under oath, and 14 that the Commission is familiar with the pre-hearing filings.
15 As a general comment to all panels, if an individual comes 16 to the podium to respond to a question or otherwise speak, approach the 17 podium and wait to be recognized.
18 And to be sworn in, if not previously sworn.
19 Thank you.
20 I'll now ask the panelists from Kairos, to please introduce 21 themselves. Please proceed.
22 MR. LAUFER: All right, good morning. Do we have the 23 slides, or just do introductions?
24
14 Sure, my name is Mike Laufer. I'm the CEO and co-founder 1
of Kairos Power.
2 MR. BLANDFORD: Good morning, my name is Ed 3
Blandford. I'm the co-founder and Chief Technology Officer.
4 MR. PETERSON: Good morning, I am Per Peterson. I am 5
the Chief Nuclear Officer. And a co-founder.
6 MR. HASTINGS: And, I am Peter Hastings, Vice-President, 7
Regulatory Affairs and Quality.
8 CHAIR HANSON: You can proceed with your overview 9
presentation.
10 MR. LAUFER: Very good.
11 Good morning, thank you Chair Hanson, and thank you 12 Commissioners for the opportunity to present the overview of Kairos Power.
13 And, it's an exciting day to be here for this hearing.
14 We just introduced ourselves, so I'll be presenting an 15 overview of Kairos Power, our vision, and in particular, how the Hermes 16 Reactor fits into our broader goal of commercializing our technology.
17 Are the slides available? Here we go.
18 All right, next slide, please.
19 At Kairos, we have a habit of beginning every presentation 20 with our mission statement. That mission is to enable the world to transition 21 to clean energy, with the ultimate goal of dramatically improving people's 22 quality of life, while protecting the environment.
23 It's what everyone in the company is focused on every day.
24
15 And, at a high level, it keeps us focused on making sure that we're working on 1
the technology, which is both affordable and safe, as we believe that those 2
are the attributes that are necessary for technology to be scalable, and to 3
enable that clean energy transition.
4 Next slide, please.
5 This is a brief overview of some of the important high-level 6
characteristics of Kairos Power.
7 So, we are a growing company in terms of both scope, and 8
size. But we are focused on engineering, design, manufacturing, and testing 9
of one technology, and that is the fluoride, salt-cooled high temperature 10 reactor.
11 As mentioned, it's a novel combination of TRISO coated 12 particle fuel, as well as molten salt coolant, specifically FLiBe.
13 We were founded in late 2016. We're coming up on seven 14 years of operation, so we're relatively a newcomer to the space, but we have 15 been growing quickly.
16 We're over 360 employees, and the vast majority are 17 focused on engineering and technology development within the company.
18 In terms of our approach, we believe that a novel approach 19 to developing nuclear technology for both speed and reducing cost, is 20 necessary.
21 And so, we've looked at other examples and as part of that 22 process, we've incorporated two aspects, which we think are fundamental to 23 our development effort, and they permeate through everything that we do.
24
16 And those are really a focus on iterative hardware 1
demonstrations that works at all scales from the specific component level 2
development, all the way through the large-scale systems such as the Hermes 3
Reactor.
4 And combining that with a strong development of in-house 5
manufacturing, and vertical integration.
6 And those two strategies are very much complimentary, and 7
we believe provide a huge number of advantages both in terms of the ability 8
to accelerate development, as well as reduce the cost of the system, which 9
we believe are necessary to achieve our mission.
10 In terms of our commercial objectives, we are focused on 11 the U.S. electricity market in the long term. And, our goal is to be competitive 12 with natural gas in that market.
13 All right, next slide, please.
14 Kairos Power, in order to enable that development 15 approach, requires a novel set of infrastructure and facilities.
16 And so we've been investing heavily over the past seven 17 years, to build that infrastructure. And, this is the current geographic footprint 18 of Kairos Power.
19 So, working from west to east, our headquarters are in 20 Alameda, California. We have a large engineering staff there, as well as two 21 of our laboratory facilities.
22 The R Lab, or Rapid Lab, which is focused on rapid, iterative 23 development with simulant fluids.
24
17 We also have the S Lab, which is the first modern facility 1
working with FLiBe. And that facility is focused on chemistry tests, as well as 2
material testing at smaller scale.
3 We also have manufacturing capabilities there supporting 4
both the local testing activities, as well as producing larger scale components 5
for our testing facilities in other locations and will be producing components 6
for the Hermes Reactor itself.
7 Continuing east, our facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, 8
KP Southwest location. We have large scale testing and manufacturing 9
facilities in that location, including the engineering test unit, which is currently 10 in hot operations and is the largest FLiBe system ever built and operated, that 11 we have at that facility there.
12 We also have a growing capability in the manufacturing side 13 at the location, and that campus will be producing a significant portion of the 14 components and modular assemblies, that will be used for the construction of 15 the Hermes Reactor.
16 Moving east, we have Oak Ridge, Tennessee, which is of 17 course, the site of the Hermes Reactor at East Tennessee Technology Park.
18 We also have a small office in Charlotte, which is focused 19 on licensing activities.
20 With Materion, we have a partnership with them. They're 21 our supplier of beryllium fluoride for our salt.
22 We have a facility there which is producing FLiBe for our 23 testing facilities, which is operational today. Then we also have a small lab 24
18 focused on instrumentation development in Rexford, New York.
1 Next slide, please.
2 So, in a grand sense what Kairos is working on in terms of 3
our specific work streams and how they connect to our commercial strategy, 4
the main product that Kairos is producing right now is not a commercial 5
reactor, as the Hermes Reactor is a test reactor.
6 But the Hermes Reactor serves a very important role in our 7
commercial strategy, and that's primarily to establish cost certainty around the 8
technology basis.
9 And so, we're very focused on systematically reducing the 10 set of risks that we feel provide a significant amount of cost uncertainty in the 11 space.
12 And, the Hermes Reactor is just a very important role to 13 resolving that.
14 So, it is our core belief that there are four components that 15 play a very important role in introducing cost certainty into a project.
16 They include technology certainty, licensing certainty, 17 supply chain and manufacturing uncertainty, and as well as build uncertainty.
18 And it's our core belief that any one of these has the 19 capability to sink a project, and have a project fail in terms of the ability to 20 control costs.
21 And so, we're focused on managing costs and risks across 22 all of these activities.
23 In terms of Kairos' work streams on the left side, we're 24
19 focused on five major areas. We have our FHR design process and 1
engineering programs, and our testing program.
2 This is a design-build-test process which I'll describe in a 3
moment, focused on iterative development.
4 We have our licensing activity, so obviously that's a focus 5
here of the hearing today. And we have parallel development for fuel 6
production and salt development, as well.
7 Next slide, please.
8 So, this is a slide which is fundamental to essentially 9
everything that Kairos is doing, and permeates the company not just on the 10 technical side, but also through all of our programs.
11 So, we do believe fundamentally, that we need to take a 12 novel approach to how we develop and implement nuclear technology.
13 This is, the top of the slide shows what we view as kind of 14 the conventional nuclear development cycle.
15 It's this very long, very expensive plan-design-build cycle.
16 And, the unfortunate reality is that in this long capital intensive cycle, the ability 17 to get the test experience back and use that to improve the technology, is very 18 slow, and only happens a few times over the course of generations.
19 So, Kairos is very much focused on reducing both the time 20 scales, and the cost associated with getting that test experience back, and 21 having it feed back in.
22 And, the Hermes Reactor is the culmination of a lot of 23 smaller iterative development loops around the component development, 24
20 system development, as well as significant non-nuclear tests to achieve that.
1 So, this is working at many different scales, but it really 2
permeates virtually everything that Kairos is doing.
3 And, we have a number of strategies to help enable it. It's 4
also complimented by the in-house manufacturing that we're establishing as 5
well.
6 That's a key accelerant for this process, and one that we've 7
found to be invaluable.
8 Next slide, please.
9 So as I mentioned, the iterative development process 10 operates at many different scales from individual components, all the way up 11 to the large scale hardware systems.
12 This is Kairos' roadmap, and a description of all the facilities 13 that we plan to develop on our pathway to our first commercial plant.
14 On the upper right, we call that the KP-X. But starting down 15 from the bottom left, we have a series of non-nuclear engineering test units, 16 ETU 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0.
17 This was foundational for our strategy that in order to move 18 quickly with hardware development, we needed to do this with non-nuclear 19 systems.
20 And scaling those up to larger scale systems to prove their, 21 both their functionality and reliability.
22 So ETU 1.0 as I mentioned, it's currently in hot operations 23 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, at our testing facility.
24
21 And as I said, it is the largest FLiBe system ever built and 1
operated. Larger, more salt than any facility used by Oak Ridge historically 2
back in the 60s.
3 ETU 2.0 is currently in the build phase where we're making 4
components for that system, as well as starting to assemble modules.
5 It will be installed in the same facility as ETU 1.0 after we 6
decommission that facility next year.
7 ETU 3.0 is in the planning phases. Right now the high level 8
objectives for that facility are really to provide a platform for the integration of 9
the reactor systems, as well as the civil structural components, in order to build 10 that confidence in the ability to construct the facility.
11 And it's currently in the planning phases.
12 After the ETU sequence, we'll proceed to the Hermes 13 Reactor series. Hermes is the focus of this hearing today, but we also plan to 14 build on that experience with the Hermes 2 Reactor.
15 We submitted a construction permit for that facility this 16 summer. It's been accepted and docketed, and it's starting the review 17 process, which we hope will be very efficient and build on the experience of 18 the Hermes 1.
19 Also just set important precedent for confidence both for 20 Kairos, and for our future customers.
21 Following the Hermes Reactor series, we'll repeat that 22 series going back to the scale up of the technology at the non-nuclear level 23 for our U facility, which will serve a lot of the same functions of the ETU series, 24
22 but for the larger scale commercial reactors.
1 And eventually our goal to deploy commercial reactors as 2
close to 2030 as possible, so we can be ready to scale for commercial 3
deployment in the 2030s.
4 All right, next slide, please.
5 I'll now hand the mic over to Per Peterson, our Chief Nuclear 6
Officer, who will describe a bit more about the, the Hermes Reactor 7
technology.
8 MR. PETERSON: Thank you, Mike, and thank you 9
Commissioners for the opportunity to present an overview of Hermes.
10 My name is Per Peterson, and I am the Chief Nuclear Officer 11 at Kairos Power. I will start off with a discussion of the purpose of the Hermes 12 Reactor.
13 Kairos is deploying Hermes to demonstrate the capability to 14 deliver low-cost nuclear heat using a low-power demonstration reactor.
15 The graphic on the right shows the approximate scale 16 comparison of the ETU series that Mike has discussed, and the Hermes 17 versus the size of a full-scale commercial reactor.
18 You can see that Hermes is a much smaller system and it 19 is, it is intentionally the smallest you can make in FHR.
20 The rapid development approach that Mike just expanded 21 on, will help us use this reactor facility to demonstrate cost certainty, which we 22 establish a little more with each of our learning cycles.
23 Hermes will also allow us to exercise and initiate our supply 24
23 chain, for the first nuclear iteration of our development path.
1 Along the way, the design and testing iterations are retiring 2
significant amounts of technology risk for the commercial reactor.
3 This also applies to licensing and also very importantly, to 4
operations. The successful licensing of Hermes will provide a KP-FHR 5
precedent and facilitate licensing certainty for the commercial scale reactor.
6 The Hermes facility will also demonstrate the operation of a 7
KP-FHR facility, including nuclear function such as reactor physics, fuel and 8
structural materials irradiation, and radiological controls.
9 Next slide, please.
10 This slide provides a high-level overview of the Hermes 11 facility. The reactor is a KP-FHR that uses a fluoride salt as a reactor coolant, 12 which when combined with its robust fuel design, can be operated at high 13 temperatures and low pressures.
14 Specifically, the coolant operates at an approximate range 15 of temperature of 550 degrees C to 650 degrees C. This is a much higher 16 temperature than the 320 degrees C of typical water-cooled reactors.
17 Moreover, water-cooled reactors operate at high pressure, 18 and this coolant is intrinsically low pressure, which means that the vessel can 19 be of thin-wall construction, which provides significant improvement in safety.
20 The fuel design consists of tri-structural isotropic fuel 21 particles, also known as TRISO fuel, that are located in an annular region of 22 a graphite pebble.
23 TRISO fuel performance has been demonstrated in the 24
24 DOE Advanced Gas Reactor Program, and is capable of retaining fission 1
products up to temperatures of 1,600 degrees C.
2 That's well above the melting temperature of typical metallic 3
structural materials, including steel.
4 The combination of this fuel and salt design provides a 5
significant margin-to-fuel failure, that allows a KP-FHR facility to take 6
advantage of different approaches to the design of structures, systems, and 7
components, which we'll be discussing on the safety panel later.
8 We plan to operate Hermes at 35 megawatts-thermal, with 9
a coolant operating temperature of around 600 degrees C. The reactor vessel 10 is 316 stainless steel.
11 Hermes relies on passive safety systems to ensure the 12 fundamental safety functions are met, which includes the shutdown elements, 13 which insert by gravity, and a decay heat removal system, which does not rely 14 on active components but instead, relies on natural phenomena, such as 15 natural circulation, to remove decay heat.
16 Next slide, please.
17 The Hermes site is located in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, within 18 the East Tennessee Technology Park. The Hermes facility will be located on 19 the former Department of Energy Gaseous Diffusion Plant, or K-33 building 20 site. This makes it a brown field.
21 Kairos chose this site because it had been previously been 22 disturbed, still has existing infrastructure, and is well characterized by the 23 DOE.
24
25 And I should also mention, there's a fantastic work force 1
available in the area, and it's directly adjacent to one of our nation's very best 2
national labs.
3 Peter will discuss this further in the environmental panel.
4 The site boundary encompasses approximately 185 acres, 5
only 30 of which would be permanently disturbed for the operation of Hermes.
6 Next slide, please.
7 This slide provides a quick overview of the Hermes 8
construction permit application. Kairos developed the application using the 9
NRC guidance for non-power reactor applications in NUREG-1537.
10 The application was submitted in two parts, which is 11 permitted by 10 CFR 2.101(a)(5).
12 The first part of the application was the preliminary safety 13 analysis report, or PSAR, which we submitted in September of 2021. That 14 doesn't seem that long ago.
15 The second part was the Hermes environmental report, or 16 ER, which we submitted a month later in October of 2021.
17 During the staff's review of the construction permit 18 application, Kairos made several changes to the application content that 19 ultimately resulted in Revision 1 of the ER, which was submitted in March of 20 this year.
21 And a Revision 3 of the PSAR, which was submitted in May 22 of this year.
23 The NRC staff issued an FSER on the PSAR in June of 24
26 2023, and an FEIS on the ER in August of 2023.
1 This concludes our prepared remarks for the overview 2
panel, and we will be happy to take any questions from the Commission.
3 Thank you.
4 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you very much Mike and Per, and 5
everyone.
6 We're going to begin the order of questions this morning for 7
this panel. We'll begin with me, Commissioner Wright. We'll go to 8
Commissioner Caputo, and then Commissioner Crowell for this.
9 I'd like to start out asking some questions kind of about the, 10 along the lines of the technology development and iteration process, Mr.
11 Laufer, that you mentioned.
12 The duration of the Hermes license, operating license, 13 would only be four years. And, this is one of two testing facilities you've 14 identified as part of the Hermes demo series in your presentation.
15 How will you be utilizing the information from the actual 16 construction of the first Hermes, this, the one under consideration now, if the 17 facility is part of the kind of iterative approach that you outlined?
18 MR. LAUFER: Thank you, Chair Hanson.
19 So, over the period of Kairos' operations, we've gained a lot 20 of insights into how to effectively do the iterative process.
21 One of the most important components is to define the 22 scope very clearly in the objectives, for each major iteration.
23 And then to be disciplined to not let it creep and become 24
27 much more, which is something that happens pretty commonly in the nuclear 1
space.
2 So, some of those major decisions are like, or such as the 3
power level, what duration, the scope of testing for the facility.
4 So, for the Hermes Reactor, for the first Hermes Reactor 5
we've made a number of deliberate decisions to simplify the scope of that 6
system, including what is the minimum lifetime that we need to achieve our 7
primary commercial and technical objectives for that facility.
8 We've determined that four years is an adequate time period 9
to achieve those operational goals.
10 And then, simplifying the architecture of the system, to 11 simply the technology development of different structures, systems, and 12 components that are necessary to deliver.
13 So, we've simplified the scope of Hermes 1. The operational 14 mission for Hermes 1 really comes from both the full life cycle of the facility.
15 So, there's the design, the licensing, and the build 16 experience. We do anticipate that there will be significant overlap in the 17 construction experience from Hermes 1 to Hermes 2.
18 They share a site. Part of the motivation to pursue the 19 construction permit application quickly for Hermes 2, was so that we can 20 mobilize appropriately between the projects, even though Hermes 2 is in a 21 much earlier state in terms of its development life cycle.
22 So, we do anticipate significant learning from the 23 construction between the two facilities. And in fact, it's kind of the other side.
24
28 ETU-3 which is in the planning stages, we expect to actually 1
it's fully merged with the Hermes work stream right now.
2 And so, we'll be working in parallel on ETU-3 build and 3
Hermes build, so that we have that parallel experience from that project to the 4
next one.
5 So, it's kind of working from the left side of the development 6
cycle, rather than from the right side of the development cycle.
7 CHAIR HANSON: Okay.
8 Well, your comment about scope creep I thought actually 9
leads into my next question I think fairly well, which from kind of both a 10 technology development standpoint and a regulatory standpoint, I guess.
11 I was interested in how, what advantages you saw or how 12 your thinking developed around anticipating building a new Hermes 2 right, 13 that would be a, to test electrical power production, rather than kind of build 14 Hermes 1 and then add that, those systems on to that facility.
15 MR. LAUFER: Sure, so as I mentioned previously, part of 16 the process requires discipline to say no to things and limit the scope.
17 And part of that was, and also to change the plan when, 18 when something doesn't make sense, to eliminate it.
19 So, as probably people are aware, the initial application for 20 the Hermes preliminary safety analysis report, did include an intermediate 21 loop.
22 And we subsequently submitted an amendment to remove 23 that. Part of that was simplifying the architecture of the system.
24
29 Not that it's a challenge that we don't think that we can, we 1
can accomplish in terms of establishing the systems that will work, but 2
reducing the scope allows our team to say focus on the most pressing 3
development needs.
4 And that's really focused on the reactor system. So, keeping 5
the developments on you know, as close to the reactor system as possible 6
has been our focus.
7 And as we work out from that, it's essentially that the 8
technology of it becomes more conventional.
9 So we're really focused on what are, what is unique about 10 the system.
11 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
12 And then finally, with the Hermes 1 and potentially Hermes 13 2 then, how are you thinking about, or anticipating the need to address multi-14 unit risk as you move through this process?
15 MR. LAUFER: So, the approach to multi-unit risk between 16 Hermes 1 and Hermes 2, so there's multiple reactors at a site, but then there's 17 also multiple reactors that are connected to the same plant.
18 CHAIR HANSON: Uh huh.
19 MR. LAUFER: And so, in terms of the multiple reactors at 20 the site, the impact and the risk profile of each reactor individually, is quite 21 small.
22 And so, I think that in the context of a historical 23 understanding of cumulative risk at the site, that's appropriate.
24
30 So, there's not much difference between having a small risk 1
profile for one reactor. It's a fairly logical extension to understand the risk 2
profile for multiple reactors.
3 In terms of the shared systems for multiple reactors, that's a 4
process that's under development.
5 For the Hermes 2 project, we've decided again to simplify 6
and keep any systems that would add complexity in terms of merging or 7
having shared system between the sites. Or particularly around safety 8
functions. We've kept them separate and independent.
9 So, the Hermes 2 is essentially two copies of the Hermes 1 10 reactor and all of the associated safety systems.
11 And then there are a few systems which are logical to share, 12 and relatively simple to do so, and the arguments around the safety 13 implications of those are minor.
14 So we've integrated those systems. But one thing that's 15 important about the architecture of the system, the profile of the architecture 16 which is safety significant, or important to safety, is relatively small.
17 And so, moving out to the power conversion system, we 18 have very low safety significance for those systems.
19 And so, the ability to use the same fundamental safety case 20 from the Hermes 1 application to the Hermes 2 application, was a relatively 21 simple process because it wasn't changing really anything about the 22 fundamental safety case of the reactor system.
23 CHAIR HANSON: Got it. Thank you very much.
24
31 Mr. Peterson?
1 MR. PETERSON: If I might, the additional advantages of the 2
multi-unit configuration derive from the manufacturing side.
3 Because doing a series of three ETUs, and then three 4
Hermes reactors drives one towards a manufacturing set of processes, which 5
are focused on serial production.
6 Therefore, if your goal is to enable the world's transition to 7
clean energy, that involves manufacturing large numbers of reactors.
8 The ability to stand up manufacturing that is capable of that 9
type of serial production, rather than one-off customized hardware, which 10 would be normally what you're doing for a test reactor, is another major benefit 11 of this approach.
12 CHAIR HANSON: All right, thank you very, very much.
13 Commissioner Wright?
14 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you, good morning to 15 you.
16 So, the Chair just asked the question and I just to drill just a 17 little bit more on the iterative process stuff.
18 The whole purpose of this is to improve your, the 19 construction process for you in the end, right, I'm assuming?
20 And, is this helping also on your in-house manufacturing 21 techniques, too?
22 MR. LAUFER: Yes.
23 So, the iterative process applies not just to the hardware 24
32 demonstrations, but also to the manufacturing capabilities to deliver that.
1 So, through the ETU sequence, we are taking on an 2
increasing fraction of in-house manufactured components and modules.
3 So, this is something we track internally. Our targets for 4
ETU-2 are 80 percent of the procurement should be raw materials or off the 5
shelf.
6 And so, that requires a significant increase in the 7
manufacturing capabilities. And the decision about what Kairos is bringing in-8 house, is really determined by three factors.
9 There's essentially the technology development required for 10 those, those components, the safety significance of those components, as 11 well as the kind of the importance of safety.
12 So, the quality requirements overlaid on those are three of 13 the criteria that we use to determine what we'll take in-house.
14 And then, that's compared against the data that we have 15 from the ETUs in terms of what are significant drivers for costs, and schedules.
16 So, those are the factors that we use to determine. But our 17 manufacturing capabilities, as well as the quality programs, are kind of 18 increasing in capability all throughout that entire sequence.
19 And at this point, we'll be confident that the full capabilities, 20 as well as the quality programs, will be where they need to be for supporting 21 Hermes construction.
22 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Mr. Laufer, you also had a 23 slide I think earlier, that you kind of said that Hermes will ultimately 24
33 demonstrate whether the U.S. and by that, the NRC, has the aptitude to 1
license an advanced reactor, right? And in a timely manner.
2 So, given what you've seen so far in the construction 3
permitting process, do you, how do you feel about the operating license part 4
of it?
5 MR. LAUFER: So, I'm highly encouraged by the success 6
that I think both Kairos, and the NRC has had in this review process.
7 It's been a highly constructive technical dialogue between 8
the two, and I think we value the feedback and the questions from the staff.
9 And, in the review process for the construction permit, both 10 sides have been important to note important issues that we know will need to 11 be addressed when we get to the operating license phase.
12 So, at this point, I believe that we have a good 13 understanding about where we need to progress to the point of being ready to 14 submit the operating license and are prepared to do so.
15 And we're working through the process to get there.
16 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Very good, thank you.
17 Per, you mentioned NUREG-1537 earlier. And apparently 18 we've used it for many types of reactors.
19 In your opinion, I guess, and Mike too, I guess, is it suitable, 20 has it been suitable for Hermes, or has there been any hiccups, or problems?
21 MR. PETERSON: Could I actually ask Peter to cover that 22 question?
23 MR. HASTINGS: Yes, so we believe it's been very 24
34 successful. And in fact, prior to our pivot to a test reactor as part of our 1
deployment cycle, we worked with the staff on what format and content for a 2
non-light water reactor would look like.
3 And, because it was in no one's interest to try to repurpose 4
NUREG-0800 to spend a lot of time within the review justifying why you're not 5
addressing light water things that simply don't apply, we ended up with a 6
notional format and content structure for the commercial reactor, that actually 7
ended up looking a lot like NUREG-1537 does.
8 So when we pivoted to the test reactor, that transition was, 9
was virtually seamless. And, we believe it's been very efficient and has gone 10 very well.
11 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Very good, thank you for that.
12 So ahead of the hearing today, we got a letter from the City 13 of Oak Ridge, and it was complimenting both the NRC and Kairos for their 14 engagement on everything from permitting issues, to site characterizations.
15 And also, outreach during the environmental process.
16 So, based on what they feel and that letter what it said, I 17 mean, are there any best practices that you're going to be looking to continue 18 moving forward working with the city, and others?
19 MR. LAUFER: Sure.
20 So I'll also compliment our neighbors in Oak Ridge, as well 21 as the city and all of the officials there. They've been both very welcoming, 22 and also giving us lots of good questions.
23 So, we've been, well, I think that we've been following what 24
35 makes sense to us in terms of community engagement. Not just in Oak Ridge, 1
but at all of Kairos' locations where were operate.
2 We think that operating transparently and with the trust of 3
the local community is essential.
4 In Oak Ridge in particular, we've been engaging for I think 5
about two years basically just prior to the submittal of the application.
6 We've had a series of both, well, through the pandemic 7
mostly virtual, but also in-person meetings primarily focused on the nearest 8
neighbors.
9 People who are in closest proximity to the site, as well as 10 the broader community.
11 And, the engagement has great. I think to date, we've 12 answered all questions. And in that community, you get a lot of very specific 13 technical questions given the connections to the lab, and we enjoy those.
14 But also the general questions broadly about what's, what 15 are we building, and what are we doing.
16 And I think that in general, the sense of the local community 17 is a lot of excitement about what Kairos is bringing, as well as how quickly 18 we're moving to, to get to that process.
19 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you very much. Mr.
20 Chair, I'm done.
21 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Wright.
22 Commissioner Caputo?
23 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Good morning, thank you all 24
36 for being here, and thank you for the overview.
1 As I'm sure many of you are aware, the statutory 2
requirements to conduct an uncontested or mandatory hearing, predates the 3
creation of the NRC.
4 The value of these uncontested mandatory hearings has 5
been debated since they were first proposed.
6 For example, during a 1961 Joint Committee on Atomic 7
Energy hearing on radiation safety and regulation, Senator Anderson noted 8
that public mandatory hearings quote, furnish an inducement to the applicant 9
and the staff, to formulate their positions in terms as susceptible to the lay 10 understanding as possible, end quote.
11 And that doing so requires quote, the applicant and the staff 12 to sharpen up their thinking, end quote.
13 In response, the witness stated that quote, in large part, the 14 same purposes would be accomplished by the publication of the Atomic 15 Energy Commission staff analysis, end quote.
16 He went on to say quote, preparation of the AEC staff 17 analysis will force careful and complete thinking about the hazards, end quote.
18 A recent news article discussing NRC's mandatory hearing 19 process cited several sources that conclude that the mandatory hearings add 20 little value.
21 That said, it remains a legal requirement regardless of the 22 history of the mandatory hearings, or whether they have been overtaken by 23 subsequent events, such as increased transparency and agency activities 24
37 including robust public communication and meetings, and the differential, the 1
differing professional opinion and non-concurrence processes for agency 2
staff.
3 Given the thoroughness of the staff's review, I find myself 4
without many questions to ask today, which as the staff will note, is unusual 5
for me.
6 I know that it takes a lot of work for both the applicant and 7
the staff not only to conduct a review, but in addition, to prepare for these 8
mandatory hearings. And, I would like to thank you for your preparation and 9
for being here today.
10 I would also like to take a moment to acknowledge the 11 written statement from the interim city manager of the City of Oak Ridge, 12 Tennessee, that Commissioner Wright mentioned, and thank him for his time 13 in submitting that statement to share the city's positive views.
14 Mr. Hastings, Kairos Power submitted a second application 15 for the two additional test reactors, Hermes 2, as has already been mentioned 16 today, which would be similar to the Hermes test reactor that's the subject of 17 this hearing.
18 Those reactors would also be located on the same site. Can 19 you talk about what if any, lessons learned from this application review, were 20 incorporated into that second application?
21 For example, if the staff requested additional information on 22 a topic in the review of this application, was that information proactively 23 included in the submission for Hermes 2?
24
38 MR. HASTINGS: Thank you, great question.
1 The short answer is yes. We did include many of the 2
lessons learned from the Hermes review, into the Hermes 2 application.
3 In fact, we worked with the staff on the specific format of the 4
Hermes 2 application, to make it as clear as possible what the differences are 5
between Hermes and Hermes 2, so as to facilitate an even more efficient 6
review for Hermes 2, than we have enjoyed for Hermes 1.
7 And, we look forward to working with the staff to make sure 8
that that process remains as efficient as possible by for example, the use of 9
the audit environment and a much quicker turnaround on responses to NRC 10 staff questions, than the more sort of bureaucratic RAI process.
11 That's one of the things that we helped the staff to pilot on 12 the Hermes application, with remarkable success.
13 So, we think that the efficiencies from Hermes will carry 14 forward into Hermes 2, to great effect.
15 And, we've seen that already with the staff's projection of a 16 fairly ambitious review schedule for the Hermes 2 application.
17 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thank you.
18 Mr. Chairman, I have no further questions for this panel. I'd 19 like to reserve my time for subsequent panels.
20 CHAIR HANSON: Of course. Thank you, Commissioner 21 Caputo.
22 Commissioner Crowell?
23 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
24
39 Thank you to everyone for being here today.
1 I'm going to kind of build off of Commissioner Caputo's 2
opening before she asked her questions about mandatory hearings.
3 And I, for the most part, I agree with her and think we need 4
to consider how we communicate, and the value of certain functions that have 5
historically been conducted at the NRC and are required by the Atomic Energy 6
Act.
7 That said, I think the portion that gives me the most concern 8
is providing a layperson's understanding of these proceedings. And that, I 9
think, is a threshold we all still need to collectively work to achieve.
10 You have an advantage in doing your project in Oak Ridge, 11 with a fairly informed community. You know, at least compared to others that 12 don't have the history that Oak Ridge has.
13 So, Mr. Laufer, I'm going to ask you what sounds like a 14 softball question but is important that is answered well.
15 If you're speaking to an average citizen not in Oak Ridge, 16 and maybe one that's not living in a community that's had nuclear power, or 17 are familiar with these issues.
18 What would you say to assure them that your project is not 19 going to impact the public health or their environment?
20 MR. LAUFER: Thank you, Commissioner.
21 It is a very important question, and one that as I said, is 22 important to be transparent and open in our communications with all the 23 communities we're engaged.
24
40 So, I think that for Kairos, the specific selection of this 1
reactor, which is different from conventional light water reactor technologies, 2
really comes down to the selection of the fuel and the coolant.
3 And they create a, what we believe is a uniquely robust, 4
intrinsic safety case for the reactor.
5 Essentially, that combination dramatically reduces the 6
possibility of the scope of bad things that can happen in the system.
7 And so, our safety objective is to maintain the integrity of 8
that combination. And if we do so, we have extremely high confidence that 9
essentially, there will be no consequences for the site.
10 And therefore, our obligation is actually not just as the 11 reactor developer, but as the owner-operator for the reliable operation of the 12 plant. And most importantly, for the protection of the plant operators.
13 And so, our perspective is the things that we need to do to 14 protect the investment, and to protect the operators, fully envelopes 15 everything that we need to do to ensure that the health and safety of the public 16 is protected.
17 And that's a core, that sense of responsibility is a core tenant 18 of Kairos itself. And I think is reflected in kind of our unique position not just 19 as the developer of the technology, but also as the owner and operator for the 20 Hermes facility.
21 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Understood, and I think 22 that's a decent explanation. I'm not sure my mom would understand it, so we 23 could probably sharpen it up a little bit.
24
41 But one thing I would add if you feel it's true, is that you 1
know, the government agency, the NRC charged with you know, ensuring that 2
these, that it's the public health and safety is protected, has kicked the tires 3
on it every which way and is in agreement upon it.
4 And I think that kind of belt and suspenders, that the entity 5
doing it, you guys and the regulator, have really done their due diligence is 6
important to emphasize, to the average person.
7 For whoever on the panel, one more question and whoever 8
is most appropriate. If you had to identify one major or most likely challenge 9
to completing construction, what do you think that would be today?
10 Is there something out there that gives you the most 11 heartburn?
12 MR. LAUFER: Sure.
13 So, I think for where we are today, I showed the geographic 14 footprint of where, where Kairos is operating. That only scratches the surface 15 of the full scope of activities that we're doing.
16 And, I think maybe looking back seven years ago in terms 17 of where we were then, and where we are now, I think we have full confidence 18 in our process, in our approach, in the technology.
19 And, we're confident that we can get to an answer to any 20 technical solution. I think the major challenge is the volume of work that needs 21 to be done.
22 So, I had mentioned the major work streams of what Kairos 23 is doing. We're committed to delivering reliable technology with significant 24
42 cost reductions.
1 And, we've taken on the responsibility to take on ourselves, 2
what is necessary to do that. And we've determined that it's necessary to take 3
on a lot.
4 And so, it's not that there's any single aspect of the path 5
which is challenging or daunting in itself, but the combination of everything, 6
which is probably our biggest challenge.
7 And of course everything, all of that has to come together 8
for Hermes, and in our perspective, doing it for a test reactor is a much simpler, 9
much more achievable process than trying to go up to a large scale 10 commercial facility for our first critical facility.
11 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Agreed, I think your 12 business models makes a lot of sense and is probably going to be a big 13 contributor to your success, for the things that are within your control.
14 Thank you, Mr. Chair.
15 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Crowell.
16 Thank you all very much from the Kairos panel on this overview.
17 I will now invite the staff to come to the table, and for their 18 overview of the application of the summary of their regulatory findings.
19 (Pause.)
20 CHAIR HANSON: Okay, I'd ask the panelists to please 21 introduce themselves.
22 MR. TAYLOR: Good morning, Chair and Commissioners.
23 I'm Rob Taylor, the Deputy Director for the Office of Nuclear Reactor 24
43 Regulation for New Reactors.
1 MR. SHAMS: Good morning, Chair and Commissioners.
2 Mohamed Shams, the Division Director for the Advanced Reactor and Non-3 Power Production and Utilization Facilities in NRR.
4 MR. REGAN: Good morning, Chair and Commissioners, my 5
name is Christopher Regan. I'm the Director of the Division of Rulemaking 6
Environmental and Financial Support, in the Office of Nuclear Material Safety 7
and Safeguards.
8 MR. BOWEN: Morning Chair, Commissioners. My name's 9
Jeremy Bowen, I'm the Deputy Director for the Division of Advanced Reactors 10 and Non-Power Production and Utilization Facilities in NRR.
11 CHAIR HANSON: That's a mouthful.
12 MR. BOWEN: A mouthful.
13 CHAIR HANSON: All right, please proceed with your 14 presentation.
15 MR. TAYLOR: Thank you. Next slide, please.
16 (Pause.)
17 MR. TAYLOR: Next slide.
18 Maybe we'll get going and the slides will catch up to us.
19 So, good morning Chair Hanson and Commissioners. I'm 20 grateful for the opportunity to be here today before you on the staff's review of 21 the Kairos Hermes construction permit application.
22 Next slide, please, slide 3.
23 With me at the table this morning are Mo Shams, Jeremy 24
44 Bowen, and Christopher Regan. This panel will discuss the NRC staff's 1
approach and findings for the safety and environmental review of the 2
application and introduce the unique aspects of the review that will be 3
discussed further in the panels to follow.
4 Next slide, please.
5 In September 2021, Kairos Power submitted a construction 6
permit, or CP application under 10 CFR Part 50, for a non-power testing facility 7
known as Hermes.
8 Hermes is a molten salt-cooled pebble bed reactor designed 9
to demonstrate the Kairos Power fluoride high temperature reactor, or FHR, 10 technology.
11 Hermes would not produce electricity but is designed to 12 operate for four years at a power level of 35 megawatts-thermal, to provide 13 insights into the design, construction, and operation of this novel technology.
14 Kairos intends to build this test reactor on the former site of 15 the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Tennessee.
16 Kairos is pursuing an iterative approach to designing and 17 demonstrating its FHR technology, through a series of planned non-nuclear 18 and nuclear test units.
19 This approach is designed to build experience and reduce 20 commercial risk as Kairos progresses towards an eventual commercial 21 design.
22 The Hermes reactor is Kairos' first nuclear test unit. In July 23 Kairos submitted a construction permit application for Hermes 2, which would 24
45 further advance demonstration of the FHR technology, and integrate electricity 1
production into the design.
2 From a safety perspective, the staff recognizes this is a 3
prudent approach to incrementally increase experience with, and knowledge 4
of, the technology while moving along the path to a full-scale power reactor.
5 Next slide, please.
6 The Hermes construction permit review represents a 7
significant achievement for the staff in the context of advanced reactor 8
technology development, commercialization, and licensing.
9 If the Commission grants the permit, Hermes would be the 10 first non-light water reactor to receive a permit or license, since 1973.
11 And from the staff's perspective, this review represents a 12 culmination of significant efforts to ready the agency for new and advanced 13 reactor applications.
14 The staff developed new modeling and simulation 15 capabilities to independently confirm the safety of these new designs, created 16 new project management and communication tools to enhance the efficiency 17 and openness of the reviews.
18 Established risks informed review guidance and 19 approaches to enable safety focused reviews, assembled dedicated review 20 teams to enable timely and holistic reviews, and implemented agile 21 management oversight at all levels to sharpen focus on early resolution of 22 issues.
23 These efforts were vital to the efficient and effective review 24
46 of the Hermes application, and the insights and lessons learned are being 1
incorporated in the current licensing reviews, and pre-application engagement 2
with potential future applicants.
3 For example, the staff is increasing management 4
engagement with the applicant to resolve outstanding questions for the 5
Abilene Christian University application, developing approaches to streamline 6
the documentation for the Hermes 2 review, and continuing to leverage risk 7
insights to progress the review of the NuScale standard design application.
8 As the interest in new and advanced reactors continues to 9
expand domestically, and internationally, the staff has committed to applying 10 experience from the Hermes review to continuous self-improvement.
11 Likewise, the industry should benefit from assessing and 12 applying insights from the Hermes experience, to optimize future advance 13 reactor applications.
14 Next slide, please.
15 The Hermes review has provided the staff with valuable 16 experience in effectively applying Part 50 to advanced test reactor review.
17 The staff implemented its advance reactor licensing 18 approach in a risk informed manner, with the right safety focus.
19 The effectiveness of the staff safety review was confirmed 20 by the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards, or ACRS, which 21 recommended issuance of the construction permit.
22 The staff's environmental review, likewise, was thorough 23 and efficient in implementing the requirements of NEPA, and other 24
47 environmental laws and regulations.
1 The Hermes application review highlights that the NRC is 2
ready to license new and advanced reactors.
3 Our preparation has enabled us to docket a high quality 4
application, and complete a timely and cost effective review ahead of an 5
aggressive schedule, without compromising safety.
6 This remarkable performance is a result of dedicated staff 7
efforts, and a team that is ready and eager to continue to refine and optimize 8
its review strategies, as it approaches other licensing actions - applications.
9 Next slide, please.
10 This concludes my opening remarks, and Mo Shams will 11 now discuss the approach the staff used to review the Hermes construction 12 permit application.
13 MR. SHAMS: Thank you, Rob. Good morning, Chair 14 Hanson and Commissioners. It is my pleasure to be here today to share with 15 you some insights into the staff's review of the Hermes construction permit 16 application. In my remarks, I will provide an overview of the staff's review 17 approach and will discuss the drivers that enabled an efficient and effective 18 review of this application. Next slide, please.
19 Consistent with Kairos' request for a construction permit 20 under 10 CFR Part 50 regulations, the staff conducted the Hermes application 21 review in accordance with this regulatory framework. This process includes 22 an acceptance review, safety and environmental evaluations, an independent 23 assessment by the ACRS, and hearings. All are performed in support of the 24
48 Commission decision on a requested permit.
1 Upon the receipt of the application, and guided by the NRC's 2
principles of good regulation, the staff conducted a thorough acceptance 3
review. Which is, an objective initial assessment of the application to ensure 4
it contains sufficient information to perform an efficient and predictable 5
licensing review. The acceptance review are a key step in the process of new 6
and advanced reactor reviews, in that they underpin our best estimate for a 7
review schedule and needed resources. They also ensure the NRC staff has 8
focused its resources on high quality applications.
9 Based on the Hermes acceptance review, the staff docketed 10 the application and established a 21-month schedule to issue the safety 11 evaluation and environmental impact statement. Both documents were 12 officially completed and issued ahead of the fast-track schedule, with the 13 safety evaluation published in June, followed by the environmental impact 14 statement in August of this year. Next slide, please.
15 In conducting an efficient and safety-focused review, the 16 staff leveraged established agency processes, augmented with new 17 technologies, and ensured the review effectively reflected the specific 18 attributes of the Hermes application and associated regulatory requirements.
19 In that regard, the staff focused its review on ensuring the application provided 20 the level of information required for a test reactor at the construction permit 21 stage, and identified information needed in an operating license application to 22 support approving the design features and specifications.
23 In addition, the safety-focused review also guided the staff 24
49 to give specific special attention to design and operating characteristics, 1
unusual or novel design features, and principal safety considerations unique 2
to the application. Those included first-of-a-kind features, like the use of 3
functional containment, the application of the American Society of Mechanical 4
Engineers' code provisions for high temperature materials, and the use of 5
buoyant fuel pebbles in the molten salt coolant.
6 Throughout review, when faced with novel issues, the staff 7
consistently embraced an entrepreneurial mind set and a solution-oriented 8
posture, raising questions early, seeking acceptable alternatives, identifying 9
flexibilities, and adapting past experiences to address the challenges.
10 For stakeholder engagement, the staff held several public 11 briefings with the ACRS to facilitate the Committee's independent review, 12 responding to questions, and highlighting key aspects of the review. In 13 addition, the staff ensured the public was kept informed of the progress of the 14 review by holding public meetings to support the engagements on both, the 15 safety and environmental reviews, updated the project dashboard to reflect 16 the status of the review, and assembled project documents to add a 17 convenient access on the Agency's public website.
18 The staff also leveraged its safety evaluation and 19 environmental impact statement to modernize its documentation of the review 20 and the regulatory findings, ensuring optimal balance between clarity and 21 conciseness. Next slide, please.
22 The Hermes application did not only encompass a review of 23 a novel reactor design, but it also afforded the staff the opportunity to 24
50 implement a number of best practices that enabled the staff to complete the 1
review ahead of schedule, and below the budget estimate. Central to the 2
review efficiency is the use of a core team approach. This approach 3
empowers a group of experts to focus their review on the greatest safety 4
aspects of the design to enable timely, efficient, and effective reviews. Indeed, 5
the core team is supported by subject matter experts from around the Agency, 6
as needed to ensure a comprehensive review of the application.
7 Another key factor in conducting an agile review is robust 8
pre-application engagement with the applicant. Kairos engaged the staff in 9
extensive pre-application efforts, enabling the staff to review and approve 11 10 topical reports addressing critical topics, such as fuel performance and high 11 temperature material qualification. The staff also sought to optimize and 12 maximize the value of our communications with the applicant. In that regard, 13 the staff leveraged the audit process to engage directly with Kairos' technical 14 experts, supporting timely and effective exchange of information.
15 Equally important is the applicant responsiveness, and 16 Kairos was exemplary in that regard providing not only timely but complete 17 responses to staff questions. Well-coordinated and appropriately focused 18 engagements with the Office of General Counsel and the ACRS are also 19 critical to optimal review schedules. Both groups demonstrated remarkable 20 flexibility reviewing material -- reviewing draft material, shifting schedules to 21 support a dynamic review, and enabling parallel activities to facilitate 22 progress.
23 These strategies and others pay dividends in completing the 24
51 Hermes construction permit under an optimal schedule and cost control, and 1
they are forming the staff's approach for conducting agile reviews for other 2
advanced reactor technologies. The Hermes review also reinforces the critical 3
role of both, a high-quality applicant and application in the success of a review.
4 Above all, the success of this review would not have been realized without the 5
remarkable effort of the exemplary group staff throughout the Agency, that 6
completed this review with commitment and dedication. And I'm immensely 7
humbled to be part of this team. Next slide, please.
8 This concludes my remarks. I will now turn the presentation 9
over to Jeremy Bowen, to provide additional insights into the staff's safety 10 review approach.
11 MR. BOWEN: Thanks, Mo. Good morning, again, Chair 12 Hanson and Commissioners. Next slide, please.
13 As you heard from Rob and Mo, the staff sought to optimize 14 the safety review of Kairos' application. One fundamental approach was to 15 consider the key design features of the Hermes test reactor in the future power 16 reactor design. Many of the features are significantly different from the 17 currently operating fleet of light-water reactors, and they provide additional 18 margin to safety. Hermes is a pebble-bed reactor that uses a lithium, fluoride, 19 beryllium molten salt mixture as the primary coolant and heat transfer fluid.
20 This salt is commonly referred to as FliBe.
21 FliBe is chemically stable and has a high capacity for both, 22 transferring heat and retaining fission products. The fuel itself is compromised 23 of tri-structural isotropic, or TRISO, particles, which are designed and 24
52 manufactured to prevent the release of fission products. Individual TRISO 1
particles are embedded into a fuel layer within graphite fuel pebbles. These 2
fuel pebbles circulate through the core, and as they complete this transit they 3
are removed and inspected. This periodic pebble inspection not only allows 4
for analysis and confirmation of fuel burnup, it also provides an additional 5
mechanism to monitor for any safety concerns or pebble damage.
6 The picture on the right side of the screen shows a cross-7 section of a fuel pebble, and the picture on the left displays a cross-section of 8
the Hermes reactor and the flow path of the coolant. Regarding heat transfer, 9
although the reactor's normal operating temperature range is approximately 10 600 degrees Celsius, FliBe has a very high boiling point that is well above 11 1000 degrees Celsius. This enables the use of a low-pressure primary system 12 which significantly changes the characteristics and impacts of a loss-of-13 coolant accident, essentially eliminating some of the concerns associated with 14 the energetic aspects of these accidents that are considered for light-water 15 reactor designs.
16 Furthermore, the heat transfer system and ultimate heat 17 sink for Hermes is simplified, and not required to be safety-related. After the 18 FLiBe passes through the core, it is circulated to an air-cooled radiator that 19 rejects heat to the atmosphere. In the event of an accident, Hermes has a 20 safety-related, passive water-cooled heat decay removal system located in 21 the reactor cavity just outside the vessel. Each of these unique features will 22 be discussed in greater detail in safety panel later. Next slide, please.
23 In addition to considering the unique aspects of the Hermes 24
53 reactor, the staff approached the safety review from both, a risk-informed and 1
a holistic perspective. The scope and depth of the staff's evaluation of specific 2
structures, systems, and components was commensurate with their applicable 3
function in the Hermes design, and the associated regulatory requirements.
4 But the staff also approached, and maintained, a big-picture safety 5
perspective. Considering the collective interplay of the systems, recognition 6
of the size of Hermes, and the relevant standards for a non-power reactor 7
construction permit.
8 To provide structure to the review, the staff started with the 9
guidance contained in NUREG-1537. As discussed earlier, NUREG-1537 is 10 the standard review plan for the diverse set of non-power reactors and 11 considers the differences between these types of facilities and large light-12 water reactors. Although the NUREG is intended to be technology-neutral, 13 the staff also considered the unique aspects of the Hermes design in applying 14 the guidance and acceptance criteria that's included in the document.
15 One example was the staff's evaluation of the Hermes 16 functional containment approach, which is not explicitly addressed in NUREG-17 1537. Furthermore, NUREG-1537 does not differentiate between a 18 construction permit and an operating license. So, the staff also exercised 19 further judgement, focusing its review on preliminary design information and 20 analyses that would support a regulatory finding to issue a construction permit.
21 The staff evaluated the descriptions of the Hermes 22 structures, systems, and components, focusing on the design and operating 23 characteristics, unusual or novel design features, and safety considerations.
24
54 The preliminary design information was evaluated to ensure conformance with 1
the regulation and the principal design criteria. Staff also assessed whether 2
there was reasonable assurance that the anticipated final Hermes design will 3
conform to these design bases. Confirmation of these findings, and a review 4
of the final design, will be completed during the staff's review of the operating 5
license application. Next slide, please.
6 Along with this review approach, the staff engaged with 7
Kairos through a series of real-time audits, assessing the safety basis of the 8
facility and closing documentation gaps necessary to support issuance of the 9
construction permit. These interactions were highly productive, and Kairos 10 was very responsive, providing requested information or revising its 11 application when necessary or appropriate.
12 I'd also like to emphasize the point that Mo made about the 13 value of extensive pre-application engagement by Kairos. This enabled the 14 staff to perform an accelerated review, because of the knowledge gained 15 through these earlier interactions or by leveraging prior regulatory decisions 16 that were captured in topical reports or other documentation.
17 In the end, the staff completed its independent review and 18 was able to make the findings outlined in the regulations. First, that the facility 19 has been sufficiently described and the major features, for the protection of 20 public health and safety, have been identified. This includes the principal 21 architectural and engineering criteria.
22 Second, that further technical or design information may be 23 reasonably left for the final safety analysis report. Areas where additional 24
55 information is needed are identified in the staff's safety evaluation report.
1 Kairos has indicated they will provide the information necessary with the 2
operating license application, and the staff will verify these items during that 3
review.
4 Third, Kairos has appropriately identified the safety features 5
or components that require additional research and development. Examples 6
include validation of computer codes, confirmation of fuel pebble behavior, 7
and qualification and surveillance of high temperature materials.
8 Finally, any safety concerns and questions will be resolved 9
prior to the completion of construction, and the Hermes facility can be 10 constructed without undue risk to the health and safety of the public.
11 Although the focus of today's hearing is on the Hermes test 12 reactor, we would like to note that the staff recently accepted the Hermes 2 13 construction permit application for review. As mentioned earlier, the Hermes 14 2 facility is an evolution of the Hermes design, and many of the structures, 15 systems, and components are similar, if not identical. Therefore, the staff 16 does intend to leverage the knowledge and experience from the Hermes 17 review to enhance the efficiency and timeliness of the Hermes 2 review.
18 Lessons learned from that exercise will be applied to future regulatory 19 engagements with both, Kairos and with the advanced reactor community as 20 a whole.
21 I'll now turn it over to Chris Regan to discuss the staff's 22 environmental review. Thank you.
23 MR. REGAN: Thank you, Jeremy. Good morning, Chair 24
56 Hanson and Commissioners. Next slide, please.
1 The environmental review of the Kairos Hermes 2
construction permit application was performed in accordance with the National 3
Environmental Policy Act of 1969, commonly referred to as NEPA. NEPA 4
requires that agency decision-making include the consideration of the 5
environmental impacts of federal actions. NEPA also requires federal 6
agencies to follow a systematic approach in evaluating potential impacts, and 7
to assess alternatives to those actions. The NEPA process involves public 8
participation during prescribed periods, and public disclosure.
9 The staff also ensures compliance with many other laws, 10 regulations, and processes as part of its NEPA process. Some examples of 11 these are the National Historic Preservation Act and the Endangered Species 12 Act, and the Commission's 2004 environmental justice policy statement. The 13 NRC regulations implementing NEPA are set forth in 10 CFR Part 51, these 14 regulations describe when the staff should prepare an environmental impact 15 statement or an environmental assessment. NRC regulations specify the 16 preparation of an environmental impact statement for the issuance of a Part 17 50 construction permit for a testing facility.
18 As previously mentioned, the environmental review 19 evaluates the environmental impacts of constructing the proposed facility, and 20 the impacts of the connected actions of operating and decommissioning the 21 facility. The environmental impact statement also presents the evaluation of 22 alternatives to the proposed action. In combination with the safety review, the 23 environmental review informs the staff recommendation to the Commission on 24
57 whether to issue the construction permit.
1 For this review, the staff conducted a high level of public 2
engagement. For example, the staff issued letters to state, local, and tribal 3
stakeholders during comment periods and when issuing the final EIS. The 4
staff also completed two public outreach meetings, one of which was a hybrid 5
meeting that offered both, virtual and in-person attendance. There were also 6
very high levels of outreach for those activities at the project management 7
level, including such items as newspaper ads, public web pages and 8
dashboards, and public meeting summaries. Next slide, please.
9 Kairos proposes to build the Hermes facility on land formerly 10 owned by the US Department of Energy. The site was formerly occupied by 11 the Department of Energy buildings K-31 and K-33 which were both part of 12 the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant, which ceased operations in 1986.
13 Both buildings were demolished and the land environmentally remediated and 14 released for industrial reuse, with restrictions.
15 Surface soils were subject to decades of heavy grading to 16 prepare the site to build and operate buildings K-31 and K-33, to raze the 17 buildings and remediate the land for subsequent industrial redevelopment.
18 Many concrete remnants of pads and building footings remain dispersed today 19 on the site and in the surface soils of the site, some of which can be seen in 20 the image shown. Next slide, please.
21 The environmental review process for preparing an 22 environmental impact statement was conducted in accordance with 10 CFR 23 Part 51. As depicted on the slide, in the bottom row in the blue boxed area, 24
58 there was a scoping period to gather input from the public, other government 1
agencies, and tribes regarding the scope of the environmental impact 2
statement. The staff conducted an audit on the Applicant's environmental 3
report and met with the Kairos technical specialists who had developed the 4
environmental report.
5 As a result of audit interactions and follow-up requests for 6
confirmatory information, Kairos provided additional information to 7
supplement its application. The staff also used independent information 8
sources in its analyses. For example, information from the Department of 9
Energy, reports from the Tennessee Department of Environmental 10 Conservation, and information from the recently completed Clinch River early 11 site permit environmental review.
12 Based on this information and the staff's independent 13 review, the staff published the draft environmental impact statement for public 14 comment in September of 2022. In August 2023, the staff published the final 15 environmental impact statement and responded to all the comments it 16 received. The staff concluded in that document that the potential impacts to 17 all environmental resources would be small.
18 During the comment period for the draft environmental 19 impact statement, government-to-government consultation was initiated by a 20 federally recognized tribe, under Section 106 of the National Historic 21 Preservation Act. The tribe requested that a cultural resources survey be 22 conducted for the proposed project, and that their office be included in the 23 development of the archaeological resource monitoring and unanticipated 24
59 discovery plan.
1 Following this, the federally recognized tribe and the 2
Applicant agreed to a path forward to support NRC Section 106 consultations.
3 In this, Kairos agreed to work with a geoarchaeologist to develop a 4
methodology for a reconnaissance field investigation and make appropriate 5
updates to the monitoring plan. Kairos completed the requested field 6
investigation in early August and used the information to update its monitoring 7
plan.
8 In recent weeks, Kairos incorporated staff and tribal input 9
into the report and the monitoring plan. And the staff is preparing a letter 10 summarizing the consultation and plans to incorporate tribal input into the 11 close-out letter. Once the tribe has concurred with the staff summary of 12 consultations within its letter, the staff will provide an update to the Tennessee 13 Historical Commission and will inform the NRC Commission of consultation 14 closure. Next slide, please.
15 The staff prepared a draft summary of record of decision, 16 which is referenced in SECY-23-0074. This document states, the decision 17 being made identifies all alternatives considered in reaching the decision and 18 discusses preferences among those alternatives. The staff -- the draft 19 summary record of decision also states that the Commission has taken all 20 practical measures, within its jurisdiction, to avoid or minimize environmental 21 harm from the alternative selected.
22 Upon completion of the National Historic Preservation Act 23 consultations with the federally recognized tribe, the staff will update the 24
60 summary of record to document consultation closure. Next slide, please.
1 10 CFR 51.105(a) lists the four environmental findings that 2
the Commission must make to support the issuance of the construction permit 3
for the Kairos project. For the first finding, in accordance with NEPA Section 4
102(2)(A), the staff's environmental review used a systematic, interdisciplinary 5
approach to integrate information from many fields. Including, the natural and 6
social sciences, as well as the environmental sciences.
7 In accordance with NEPA Section 102(2)(C), the 8
environmental impact statement for the Kairos Hermes construction permit 9
addresses the environmental impact from the proposed action, any 10 unavoidable adverse environmental impacts, alternatives to the proposed 11 action, the relationship between local short-term uses of the environment and 12 the maintenance and enhancement of long-term productivity, and any 13 irreversible and irretrievable commitments of federal resources that would be 14 involved in the proposed action, should it be implemented.
15 Also, as supported by the documentation included in the 16 final environmental impact statement, regarding the status of the consultations 17 and the plan for consultation closure, the staff concludes that it has fulfilled 18 the requirement of NEPA Section 102(2)(C) by engaging in consultation with, 19 and obtaining comments from other federal, state, and local agencies with 20 jurisdiction by law or special expertise.
21 The NRC staff also concludes that the final environmental 22 impact statement demonstrates that the NRC staff adequately considered 23 alternatives to the proposed action, and did not identify any unresolved 24
61 conflicts concerning alternatives, uses of available resources, consistent with 1
the requirements of NEPA Section 102(2)(E). The range of reasonable 2
alternatives considered in detail in the final environmental impact statement 3
includes the no-action alternative and building the Hermes test reactor at an 4
alternative site.
5 For all these reasons, the staff's review complies with NRC's 6
requirements in subsection -- Subpart A of 10 CFR Part 51. The staff 7
concludes that the findings in the final environmental impact statement 8
constitute the hard look required by NEPA and are supported by logic and 9
fact.
10 For the second finding required by 10 CFR 51.105(a), the 11 staff considered the final balance among conflicting factors for determining the 12 action to be taken, that being the issuance of the construction permit.
13 For the third finding, the NRC staff considered the cost, 14 benefit balancing, as well as reasonable alternatives. Based on that analysis, 15 the NRC staff recommends that the construction permit be issued once the 16 National Historic Preservation Act Section 106 process is complete.
17 The NRC staff based its recommendation on the Kairos 18 Hermes test reactor environmental report submitted as part of its construction 19 permit application, information gathered during the environmental audit and 20 responses to request for confirmatory information, consultation with federal, 21 state, and local agencies and federally recognized tribes, the staff's 22 independent review, the staff's consideration of public comments related to 23 the environmental review, and the assessment summarized in the 24
62 environmental impact statement, including potential mitigation measures 1
identified.
2 For the fourth finding under 10 CFR 51.105(a), the staff 3
concludes that the Commission will be able to find, after this hearing, that the 4
NEPA review performed by the staff is adequate. As will be discussed in more 5
detail during the environmental panel later today, the staff performed a 6
thorough and complete environmental review sufficient to meet the 7
requirements of NEPA, and that is adequate to inform the Commission's 8
action on approval of the construction permit. Next slide, please.
9 Robert Taylor will now introduce the Safety Environmental 10 Review Panels and conclude the staff's overview presentation.
11 MR. TAYLOR: Thank you, Chris. In the panels that follow, 12 Kairos and the staff will discuss their respective analyses, and reviews of the 13 safety and environmental aspects of the Hermes construction permit 14 application. The Safety Panel will cover Kairos' preliminary safety analysis 15 report, and the staff's safety evaluation and conclusions, including the 16 licensing process and approach, as well as the proposed construction permit 17 conditions.
18 The panel will focus primarily on the unique technical 19 considerations associated with the review of the proposed Hermes facility, 20 including TRISO fuel, molten salt coolant, high temperature materials, 21 functional containment, and passive accident response. The information 22 presented in this panel is described in greater detail in the staff's safety 23 evaluation.
24
63 The Environmental Panel will provide a summary of the 1
staff's environmental review, including public outreach, impact evaluations, 2
alternatives considered, and the status of NHPA consultations.
3 This concludes the staff's Overview Panel. We are 4
prepared to respond to any questions that you may have at this time. Thank 5
you.
6 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Rob, to you and the other 7
panelists.
8 We're going to begin questions on this panel with 9
Commissioner Wright.
10 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you, Chair.
11 Good morning and thank you for your presentations. And I 12 know it took a lot of work and you all have done a lot as has the applicant.
13 And it has not gone unnoticed. And so, thank you for all the lead to prep for 14 this.
15 I guess maybe, Rob and Mo, maybe this question is going 16 to go to you all.
17 So, as we look forward, you mentioned safety features and 18 components requiring research, right, that some had been identified.
19 Can you go a little bit more into detail about what those 20 areas are?
21 And then, I addition, as like an add on, what do you see as 22 the most challenging aspect of this research going forward? And how are we 23 planning for it?
24
64 MR. SHAMS: Thanks, Commissioner Wright. Good 1
morning.
2 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Good morning.
3 MR. SHAMS: So, as was mentioned on the prior panel, the 4
SER, Kairos, in their application, provided a listing of the different research 5
activities that they're planning on conducting.
6 A number of areas focused primarily on the performance of 7
some their features that they're considering, source term assumptions that are 8
made into that, instrumentation that will be able to be used to monitor the 9
systems and how they work, qualifications of material.
10 We mentioned earlier that the use of high temperature 11 materials is unique and its novel for this system.
12 They're using new systems like seismic isolations as well.
13 That needs to also looked at, tested.
14 So, the totality of the research being done is non-trivial, but 15 nonetheless, it's also well established, well laid out.
16 We've been visiting with Kairos, seeing their activities.
17 We're also looking at the literature on many of the 18 technologies that they're using, have been used elsewhere in different ways 19 or others.
20 So, the integrated testing, the way to, you know, accomplish 21 all this, this becomes the challenge for them, as how to be able to do it timely, 22 get it done prior to the completion of construction as required by the 23 regulations.
24
65 But we don't particularly feel that there's any unique items 1
in there that they may not be able to attain.
2 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Do you have any comment?
3 MR. TAYLOR: I think the most important thing, it's to Kairos 4
to figure out how to finish the testing and the analysis.
5 When we come to review this at the operating license stage, 6
our focus should be on the fission product retention capabilities.
7 Because those, ultimately, drive the safety case of the 8
facility.
9 So, there's a need for good testing and data analysis related 10 to those.
11 And then, based on the risk significance of other areas, the 12 scale and depth of the testing and analysis can be adjusted to reflect the risk 13 and safety perspectives and profile of the facility.
14 So, we're going to take that graded approach to each of 15 those aspects. And we've had a lot of conversation with Kairos already on 16 their plans related to that and it seems like they have good plan.
17 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: All right.
18 I guess I'll stay with you two. I'm guessing that you all can 19 certainly pitch in if you feel like you need to.
20 So, this is - in prepping, I discovered this is like a Class 104 21 license and the Atomic Energy Act directs the NRC use the minimum amount 22 of regulation needed to meet the safety and common defense obligations, 23 right, while permitting, at the same time, widespread and diverse research and 24
66 development.
1 So, can -- what practical implication does that direction have 2
or has it had on your review?
3 And can you maybe give me -- help identify some areas 4
where we've actually tailored our review?
5 MR. TAYLOR: Maybe I'll start and then, Mo can jump in.
6 So, fundamentally, first and foremost, NUREG-1537 is built 7
with the concept of Section 104 in mind because it was built originally for 8
research and test reactors.
9 So, in adapting and applying that guidance, we start from a 10 fundamental foundation of what is the minimum necessary to make our 11 regulatory finding, and we've built it that way.
12 Then, we took, as was discussed earlier, that guidance and 13 said, what's really needed for Kairos? And had a lot of discussion with them 14 on the scope and depth of their application before they came in.
15 I think Kairos' pre-application was incredibly valuable in 16 defining what that was so that Kairos didn't over prepare their application and 17 the staff didn't have to review things that weren't really necessary for the 18 findings that we have to make.
19 So, from a big picture perspective, we started with the right 20 guidance and the right structure in place that allowed us to make those 21 informed decisions.
22 And maybe Mo can give you a couple practical examples, 23 too.
24
67 MR. SHAMS: Yes, as Rob indicated, I tried to start this 1
conversation with saying, what's in the regulations is sufficient to make sure 2
that the facility is safe.
3 We're not favoring to a place where we're just, you know, 4
we're not particularly looking. We are looking exactly where we need to look.
5 Fuel needs to be safe. The safety case needs to be made.
6 But there are practical areas where the look is different. And 7
there are specific regulations that are applicable only to power reactors, 8
maintenance rule being one, and particular aspects of emergency 9
preparedness, particular aspects of licensed operator qualifications.
10 And those are areas and security requirements, those are 11 different. And these are the areas where we actually taper our look based on 12 what the -- where the regulations guide us.
13 And I don't want to give an impression that they're less.
14 They're appropriate to the level of risk that the facility poses. You know?
15 So, that's where we taper our activities and our focus in this 16 review.
17 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Yes, I like the way you worded 18 that. That's good.
19 Thank you.
20 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Wright.
21 Commissioner Caputo?
22 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thanks to the staff for that 23 overview presentation and for sitting at the table and helping us understand 24
68 the scope of your preparations for today's hearing.
1 Mr. Taylor, on slide 18, the flow chart shows the safety 2
evaluation report is an input to mandatory hearing.
3 It also shows that the environmental review is an input to the 4
Commission decision, but not the mandatory hearing.
5 As the Chair noted in his opening, and as Commissioner 6
Crowell and I mentioned on the previous panel, the Commission will determine 7
as part of its decision on the application whether the requirements of NEPA 8
have been met.
9 But it does not appear that the environmental review is a 10 necessary input to the mandatory hearing itself.
11 And I know that we've recently had to delay progress on 12 several environmental reviews and other licensing applications due to the 13 workload that the agency currently has in environmental reviews.
14 So, given the staff's sensible position that the environmental 15 review is not a necessary input to the mandatory hearing, wouldn't it be more 16 appropriate to focus future mandatory hearings on the safety review?
17 In other words, wouldn't it be appropriate to eliminate the 18 environmental discussion as part of these hearings?
19 This is not necessarily a question we need to answer for 20 today's hearing, as noted by the staff, it's not relevant to the technical content 21 of the application before us.
22 But I'd like to ask the staff to consider whether this is an area 23 where we can make efficiency gains in the same way that the Section 106 --
24
69 completion of Section 106 review was not necessary for today. I believe the 1
same logic applies to the environmental review itself which would make this 2
hearing -- the conduct of this hearing much more efficient both for the 3
Commission's time and the staff and the applicant's time to prepare.
4 MR. TAYLOR: Thank you, Commissioner.
5 As you indicated, I think that's an interesting idea of 6
something that we could pursue as a potential efficiency opportunity.
7 I think we would want to take it back and work with our Office 8
of General Counsel, the Office of the Secretary to make sure we continue to 9
meet the Commission's expectations and needs for these mandatory hearings 10 to make sure you have the fulsome information necessary to make your 11 decision.
12 But there are many ways to ensure that we can give you that 13 information.
14 So, we're certainly happy to take that back and look at it for 15 preparation for future hearings.
16 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thank you.
17 Mr. Shams, on slide 10, you mentioned that there was 18 substantial pre-application engagement.
19 And I know this is always a staple of agency discussions on 20 reviewing reactor applications, ensuring and encouraging very substantial pre-21 application engagement with applicants.
22 I'd like to get a better understanding of how much this 23 actually improved the efficiency of the overall process.
24
70 So, you discussed a couple minutes ago how the pre-1 application review tailored the scope of the application and review in response 2
to Commissioner Wright.
3 Could you, for me, discuss the extent to which the staff is 4
able to rely on conclusions it reached in topical reports and the overall effect 5
on review time given the engagement in developing and improving those 6
topical reports?
7 Can you give me specific examples of efficiencies that were 8
gained or other benefits that the application -- that the applicant gained 9
through that process?
10 MR. SHAMS: Thanks for the question, Commissioner.
11 Yes, I can point to a couple of examples.
12 So, pre-application comes in different forms for us. Some 13 are informal discussions and feedback, others are formal.
14 What Kairos has done with us is primarily formal pre-15 applications in terms of topical reports. So, those are a strong vehicle for 16 establishing staff positions, reviews, going through General Counsel's Office, 17 going through ACRS.
18 So, those are already reviewed and closed areas. And we 19 can leverage them directly in the application.
20 The examples I'll provide is the work that was done for a 21 mechanical -- mechanistic source term. This is an incredibly relevant area, 22 what kind of radionuclides are expected at what temperature levels.
23 We used that directly into assessing the bounding accidents 24
71 for the design, the ability to have that foundation already established allowed 1
us to go through this discussion specifically just for the events selected as 2
opposed to their consequences and sort of focusing more on just the events 3
themselves and the selection of the event.
4 So, that -- as far as in terms of measurable outcome, I'd say 5
our ability to finish the review in 18 months and publish the SE is a measurable 6
outcome for that.
7 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Could you --
8 MR. BOWEN: Commissioner, if I could -- sorry.
9 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Sure, go ahead.
10 MR. BOWEN: I was going to add just some data, if it helps.
11 Kairos has 11 approved topicals that were achieved through 12 pre-application engagement. They referenced eight of those in the 13 applications.
14 So, I'd have to go back and look at the application and the 15 stats to see specifically for like numbers, how much it saved.
16 But there's certainly notated areas that essentially 17 minimized the staff's review necessary in those eight areas.
18 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: So, is the staff bound by 19 conclusions that were reached in those topical reviews?
20 MR. SHAMS: They're -- yes, the answer to that is yes.
21 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Okay.
22 So, that's it for my questions on this panel.
23 Mr. Chairman, I'd like to reserve the remainder of my time 24
72 for subsequent panels.
1 CHAIR HANSON: Of course, thank you, Commissioner 2
Caputo.
3 Commissioner Crowell?
4 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
5 I'm going to build off some comments that Commissioner 6
Caputo made as well with regard to the role of the environmental NEPA review 7
and the mandatory hearing process. I think it's worth looking at.
8 I can, off the cuff, I can think of pros and cons. But with 9
some information, Rob, as you said you'd get, maybe we can look at it 10 holistically and determine what is prudent or not in that regard.
11 But it may well be an area where efficiencies can be gained.
12 Looking at the balance of the hearing process, and the 13 context of a mandatory, uncontested hearing, I think it's also important to note 14 that, you know, ACRS, our Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards, has 15 also, you know, signed off on this and recommended approval.
16 And that's a -- it's not a minor thing. It's a big note and a 17 reassurance to the public that this thing has been reviewed by experts 18 independent as well as the agency and that's what's informing our view on the 19 recommendation.
20 So, something to think about in the backdrop of the 21 mandatory uncontested hearings.
22 With that said, Rob, I'll give this one to you. I'm going to ask 23 you the same question I asked Mr. Laufer.
24
73 What's your 30-second elevator pitch on why we are 1
adequately protecting public health and safety in this license application 2
review?
3 MR. TAYLOR: Thank you for the question, Commissioner.
4 How I look at it is, the Kairos design incorporates a number 5
of advanced safety features and capabilities over the current generation of 6
reactors that just enhanced the amount of margin to risks to public health and 7
safety that make this essentially like a commercial facility elsewhere in the 8
country.
9 So, putting this near populated centers doesn't pose a risk 10 to the public health and safety. And that's the conclusion we're making at the 11 construction permit stage.
12 We'll have to finish the review at the operating license stage 13 and confirm all of that, but we have a high degree of confidence this is a very 14 safe reactor design that we can put near local populations without undue risk 15 and provide clean and reliable and safe energy to those populations.
16 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: And I think it's an important 17 caveat is that this will be looked at again in the operating context. And so, 18 there's additional assurances.
19 I'm interested in this topic of efficiencies that could be gained 20 between review from Hermes I and Hermes II.
21 I like the idea, but efficiencies apply when you have 22 similarities.
23 And if I'm a layperson looking at this, the major dissimilarity 24
74 I see is that Hermes II will produce power and be connected to the grid.
1 Why or why not is that a material difference in terms of 2
efficiencies of review and similarities between the two, Hermes I and II?
3 MR. TAYLOR: That's an absolutely great question, and one 4
we've already started looking really hard at.
5 What are the deltas between Hermes II and the Hermes that 6
we're talking about today?
7 So, as we go to prepare our safety review for this -- for the 8
Hermes II, we have made safety findings on a number of aspects related to 9
Hermes already.
10 We're going to look at the conclusions weve already made 11 and ask ourselves the question, do any of the proposed design changes alter 12 or cause us to need to re-look at those?
13 If they don't, we're going to accept the conclusions we 14 already made related to that.
15 But we're not going to gloss over it. It's going to be a 16 confirmatory look, but we're going to make sure that there's no adverse effect 17 from the new aspects of the Hermes II design.
18 But we believe there's a lot that we can accept that we've 19 already done and not have to go in depth into those aspects of the review 20 again.
21 And so, essentially, we're going to incorporate by reference 22 parts of the conclusions we've already made into the Hermes II, which is going 23 to allow us to streamline the documentation and streamline the amount of 24
75 resources we have to apply.
1 But we have already identified a number of the design 2
changes that we're going to look at.
3 And one of them is the electricity production and does it 4
have an effect on the reactor's performance and capabilities?
5 And we will scope the review to what are the specific 6
aspects and effect to that. And only go there and accept the prior conclusions 7
we already made as appropriate.
8 We think that's the key in almost every technology that's 9
going to come before us as we go through the first of a kind. We're going to 10 have to an in depth, detailed review to confirm safety.
11 But if standardization is truly achieved, then there are 12 aspects of the review we won't have to do in the second through the nth of a 13 kind. Only if changes in the design are made should we take a detailed look 14 in those specific areas.
15 So, we're building that concept already. We met just last 16 week to talk about how we're going to do second through nth of a kind and 17 shorten schedules and focus on what is really changing and what's really 18 important.
19 And you're going to find that in a lot of those cases, it's going 20 to be environmental, external hazards, and siting aspects that are unique from 21 second through nth of a kind that we're going to have to focus on and we're 22 going to be able to accept the prior safety conclusions we reached on the 23 reactor's performance and safety features.
24
76 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thanks, that was worth me 1
burning an extra minute on because it's an important point.
2 The last comment I'll make is that, Chris, your flowchart on 3
the review process is the best I've seen yet. It's the most clear, so thank you 4
for that.
5 MR. REGAN: Thank you, sir.
6 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: And then, Mr. Chair, that's 7
all I have.
8 Thanks.
9 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Crowell.
10 I'd just like to start by congratulating the staff, again, on an 11 efficient and effective review on this.
12 As you noted multiple times, Rob and Mo, that it takes two 13 to tango, as the old song goes.
14 And that having a high-quality application and a very 15 responsive applicant was also key here.
16 So, I'd like to recognize all the parties involved and express 17 my appreciation to the staff, to the amount of focus and dedication that went 18 into this effort over the last, well, the review took 18 months, but even since 19 then.
20 So, I want to just ask a couple of questions here.
21 So, this is really is kind of a first of a kind. We haven't done 22 much in this agency on non-light water reactors, certainly in a very, very long 23 time, dating back to the kind of the early days of the Atomic Energy 24
77 Commission.
1 And I'm curious how much we were able to glean from some 2
of those legacy records and if this leaves us with a knowledge management 3
lesson for the future?
4 MR. TAYLOR: Maybe I'll start and then, Mo can jump in.
5 We haven't done a non-light water reactor licensing in a very 6
long time in the United States. But that doesn't mean there isn't a ton of 7
research analysis and data out there.
8 From the legacy of the work that the national labs have done 9
and the facilities that have operated on national lab, basically, is that the 10 Department of Energy license that we didn't particularly license as well as 11 some that we did license early in the days of the AEC and NRC.
12 So, that data is still good data. That is very valuable. We 13 want to use that data.
14 The key for the applicants is to say, and tell us, why that 15 data is applicable to their design. How are they going to use it and why is the 16 verification and validation of that data in their design sufficient to support the 17 safety case?
18 So, some folks have a misimpression that there's not much 19 information out there. There is a wealth of information out there in a lot of 20 these areas.
21 There's places where they're going to have to do testing and 22 analysis specific to their design, but we want to leverage all that information 23 that already exists and give credit for it as appropriate.
24
78 Mo, you want to add anything?
1 MR. SHAMS: I wouldn't add much more than what Rob said 2
other than perhaps just a little specific.
3 We were able to go to some of the experiments that were 4
done by DOE at molten salt reactor experiments, the work that was done on 5
AGR, Advanced Gas Reactor.
6 This where we got information on just the molten salts, their 7
behaviors, got information on TRISO, how that behaves.
8 And that's what we built the case on.
9 I want to also point to that in the administrative aspects of 10 developing the license, writing the construction permit, we're able to look at 11 also these activities in the past and what was done, what was traditionally 12 included in the license versus on the permit, for that matter, versus not.
13 So, yes, we definitely were able to build on that and 14 acknowledge it in there.
15 CHAIR HANSON: Great, thank you.
16 I have kind of a similar question.
17 You know, a lot of the experience in the agency over the last 18 10 or 12 or 14 years has really been in Part 52. You know?
19 I think people recognize that we issued combined operating 20 licenses for Vogtle and Summer, but there were probably another seven or 21 eight that we also issued during that time in addition to all of the early site 22 permits, et cetera.
23 So, I guess I'm -- my question, really, for you all is, you 24
79 know, what have learned from our term - from all of that time working almost 1
exclusively with Part 52?
2 And how is that experience, then, helped us make Part --
3 you know, now, we're back in Part 50 space which we haven't done in a long 4
time, how is that kind of made Part 50 reviews more efficient?
5 MR. TAYLOR: It's a great question.
6 We haven't exercised the Part 50 regulatory muscle as 7
much recently. We did it with SHINE. We did it with Watts Bar 2. And we 8
issued the operating license there.
9 So, yes, we have a lot of experience in Part 52 which is 10 focused on a more complete design, right, when they come to us at the design 11 certification or the combined license state.
12 When we recognize that the industry was looking at using 13 the Part 50 process more because of the ability to start construction earlier in 14 the process, we actually stepped back and said, we haven't done this very 15 much.
16 We -- a lot of the staff who are here today haven't gotten a 17 chance to use this process. They're familiar with the Part 52 process.
18 So, we put a lot of emphasis into what are the findings we 19 have to make in the two-step process? Each step?
20 And started talking to the staff about the scope of the 21 reviews and the depth of information we needed at a construction permit 22 stage, recognizing that it's just one step in the process.
23 So, we put up -- we front loaded a lot of our effort with the 24
80 staff and the teams we were building to talk about the scope and depth of 1
these reviews that we actually had to accomplish so that we didn't start with 2
the Part 52 mindset of a complete design. Right?
3 There are things that we're not going to have at the 4
construction permit stage and that's okay. We'll address it and we'll resolve 5
those at the operating license stage.
6 That doesn't mean it's a deficient or an incomplete 7
application, that just means they have to have a plan to address it. And do 8
they have a reasonable plan that we have confidence in?
9 So, I think Kairos gave us a great opportunity as a first one 10 of the gate here to really do that. And I think we're going to take those lessons 11 learned, apply them to Hermes II, apply them to TerraPower, apply them to X-12 Energy that as they go through the Part 50 process.
13 Now, we have a model for how to do it.
14 CHAIR HANSON: Okay, thank you.
15 So, Rob, I think both you and Kairos, in the course of this 16 review, have set the bar pretty high for not only what comes after with this 17 particular applicant, but a lot of other applicants as well.
18 And you know, not only presuming that the Commission, 19 you know, approves the issuance of the construction permit in this case, 20 you've got another construction permit now in house.
21 The construction will proceed on Hermes I that will also be 22 overseen by the NRC, to say nothing of the dozens of topical reports from 23 other applicants in pre-application engagements and, ultimately, applications 24
81 from those folks.
1 So, how is the staff -- that seems, to me, to be a significant 2
management and resource allocation schedule for, as I said, you've set the 3
bar high in this in terms of expectations both internally and externally.
4 So, talk to me about how you're going to continue to manage 5
resources and continue to kind of meet or exceed schedules given all of the 6
work going on?
7 MR. TAYLOR: That's an absolutely great question.
8 The next six months are going to see potentially a number 9
of applications come in to us. And that is a significant workload challenge for 10 us.
11 We have already started building and staffing out our 12 concept of what the teams are going to look like for each of those reviews to 13 make sure that we have the resources dedicated and capable and that we're 14 leveraging the experience on certain technologies and future reviews as well.
15 So, we're going to have to manage all those issues and 16 we're going to have to drive resolution of complex issues very early in the 17 process very quickly.
18 We can't let them sit because they will continue to consume 19 and chew up resources and time that we won't get back at the end of the day.
20 So, we're going to have to engage when complex issues 21 come up and we're going to need the applicants to work constructively with us 22 to put those issues to bed quickly, make regulatory decisions, make safety 23 decisions, and move on so that we can focus on the next one.
24
82 Not that we're going to short circuit the decision that we 1
make or make a lesser decision, just make it in a timely manner.
2 So, it's going to be a significant effort. But what Kairos has 3
shown is we have the right project management tools. I think we have the 4
right mind set in the staff right now to do this.
5 We've invested a lot in changing our perception in the staff 6
of how to do these reviews, how to accomplish safety in a timely and cost-7 effective manner that all those pieces matter at the end of the day.
8 So, I think we have ourselves set up. Do I think it's a 9
monumental challenge for the people sitting at this table as well as many 10 others in the agency? Yes, but we have to rise to it. We're going to have to 11 prove ourselves. Right?
12 And we've proved ourselves in Kairos. We're going to have 13 to continue to prove ourselves through execution on these future projects.
14 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, well said.
15 I don't have anything to add to that.
16 With that, we are now at a ten-minute break. We will 17 reconvene at 10:58.
18 Thank you all.
19 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record 20 at 10:47 a.m. and resumed at 11:02 a.m.)
21 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. I call the hearing back to order.
22 This is the Safety Panel. The parties will address relevant sections of the 23 application and the Final Safety Evaluation with particular focus on the unique 24
83 features of the Hermes facility and novel issues raised by the application, 1
including the tri-structural isotropic (TRISO) fuel, molten salt coolant, 2
functional containment, high temperature materials, and passive accident 3
response.
4 I will ask the panelists representing Kairos to please 5
introduce themselves again.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. BLANDFORD: Thank you, Chair Hanson, and thank 8
you, Commissioners, for this opportunity to present at today's hearing.
9 My name is Ed Blandford and I am the Chief Technology 10 Officer of Kairos Power. I will be providing an overview of the Hermes safety 11 case.
12 Next slide, please. As Mike mentioned in the overview 13 presentation, we would like to begin every presentation at Kairos by reiterating 14 our mission statement, which is to enable the world's transition to clean energy 15 with the ultimate goal of dramatically improving people's quality of life while 16 protecting the environment. We can only improve people's quality of life if the 17 technology we deploy is safe.
18 Next slide, please. I am going to cover a little bit of the 19 inherent safety features of the Hermes reactor.
20 The Hermes facility leverages inherent safety features that 21 are fundamental to FHR technology. Many of those features can be traced 22 back to the original choice of fuel and the coolant.
23 The fuel as mentioned, is a tri-structural isotropic particle 24
84 design with three coating layers that retain radionuclides within the fuel. As 1
Per mentioned in the overview panel, these particle layers have been 2
demonstrated to perform successfully in temperatures well above those 3
postulated up to 1600 degrees Celsius.
4 This provides significant margin for any temperature 5
transients the fuel could experience. These particles are in a graphite pebble, 6
shown on the left, which is buoyant to the molten salt, allowing for continuous 7
online de-fueling and re-fueling.
8 This provides a unique opportunity to inspect the fuel during 9
operations. As Mike stated, the reactor coolant is a lithium fluoride-beryllium 10 fluoride molten salt that we call Flibe.
11 It's operating characteristics, such as the high melting and 12 boiling points and its large heat capacity, make it ideal for Hermes to operate 13 safely in low pressure, high temperature conditions.
14 Next slide, please. The safety case for our KP-FHR is 15 based on the technology I described in the previous slide. The fuel and salt 16 coolant allow us to take advantage of a functional containment approach in 17 the Hermes safety case.
18 The performance and characteristic of the TRISO fuel when 19 combined with the low-pressure operation of the salt results in a design with 20 significant safety margins that do not rely on traditional confinement barriers, 21 such as reactor coolant piping or a leak-tight reactor containment building.
22 The majority of the radioactive material at risk for release is 23 held within the TRISO fuel. Instead of relying on building confinement in a 24
85 postulated event, the TRISO fuel design keeps the radioactive material in the 1
fuel.
2 The Flibe acts as a secondary barrier to the three layers 3
coating the TRISO fuel particles. The functional containment approach for 4
Hermes is consistent with the functional containment approach approved by 5
the NRC in SRM-SECY-18-0096.
6 Next slide, please. Structures, systems, and components of 7
Hermes that are relied upon in the safety analysis to mitigate the 8
consequences of postulated events serve one or more of the three 9
fundamental safety functions listed on this slide, preventing the uncontrolled 10 release of radionuclides, removing decay heat, and controlling reactivity in the 11 reactor core.
12 To prevent the uncontrolled release of radionuclides the 13 Hermes design relies on functional containment that I described in the 14 previous slide. In order to maintain that functional containment, the active fuel 15 must remain covered by coolant.
16 The safety-related reactor vessel and internals ensures that 17 the Flibe level remains above the active fuel and maintains a natural 18 circulation flow path to support the decay heat removal function.
19 Although the integrity of coolant piping is not credited in the 20 safety case, those non-safety-related fluid systems are designed to ASME 21 Section VIII, B31.1/B31.3, or applicable API standards.
22 The Hermes decay heat removal system along with natural 23 circulation in the core is relied upon to perform the decay heat removal 24
86 functions. The decay heat removal system has no active components and 1
passively rejects heat to the atmosphere.
2 Finally, the reactivity in the core is controlled by the reactivity 3
control and shutdown system. The control portion of the system is non-safety-4 related and controls reactivity during normal operation.
5 The shutdown portion of the system is safety-related and 6
can maintain safe shutdown of the core without the non-safety control 7
elements.
8 Next slide, please. The Hermes safety case uses a 9
Maximum Hypothetical Accident, or MHA, to determine the preliminary design 10 meets the siting dose criteria.
11 Consistent with the guidance in NUREG-1537, the MHA is 12 a non-physical event with hypothetical conservatisms that overestimates 13 potential off-site dose consequence.
14 Because the Hermes design relies on functional 15 containment, the MHA is designed to challenge that functional containment 16 with conservative assumptions about the performance of the fuel and salt 17 coolant.
18 The MHA utilizes the source term methodology approved by 19 the NRC in Topical Report KPTR-012-PA, KP-FHR Mechanistic Source Term 20 Methodology.
21 A comprehensive set of events were postulated for the 22 Hermes design to ensure that the MHA will remain bounding. Those 23 postulated events are organized by event group consistent with the guidance 24
87 in NUREG-1537 and are described in Chapter 13 of the PSAR.
1 The resulting dose consequences estimated from the 2
conservative non-physical MHA are still less than one rem at the site 3
boundary. This meets the siting dose limits in 10 CFR Part 100 with significant 4
margin.
5 That concludes our prepared remarks for the safety panel.
6 We will be happy to answer any Commissioner questions.
7 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Mr. Blandford. I would now 8
invite the Staff panel to come to the table.
9 (Pause.)
10 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. And perhaps you could go down 11 and introduce yourselves.
12 MR. JESSUP: Sure. I'll start. Bill Jessup, Chief, Advanced 13 Reactor Licensing Branch I in the Division of Advanced Reactors and Non-14 Power Production and Utilization Facilities, or DANU, in the Office of Nuclear 15 Reactor Regulation.
16 MR. HELVENSTON: I am Ed Helvenston. I am a Project 17 Manager in the Non-Power Reactors Licensing Branch, same division as Bill.
18 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
19 MR. CHERESKIN: I am Alex Chereskin. I am a Materials 20 Engineer in Advanced Reactor Technical Branch II in the same division, 21 DANU.
22 MS. HART: Good morning. I am Michelle Hart. I am a 23 Senior Reactor Engineer in Advanced Reactor Technical Branch II, also in the 24
88 same division.
1 MS. SIWY: Good morning. I am Alex Siwy. I am a Senior 2
Nuclear Engineer in the same branch, Advanced Reactor Technical Branch 3
Number II in DANU.
4 MR. van WERT: Good morning. My name is Chris van 5
Wert. I am the Senior Technical Advisor for Reactor Fuel and I snuck in from 6
the Division of Safety Systems.
7 (Laughter.)
8 CHAIR HANSON: Well, welcome anyway.
9 MR. van WERT: Thank you.
10 CHAIR HANSON: All right. Please proceed with your 11 presentation.
12 MR. JESSUP: Okay. Great. Good morning again, Chair 13 Hanson and Commissioners. As I said, my name is Bill Jessup. Can we go 14 to Slide 3, please, since we have already gone through introductions. Okay, 15 great.
16 Our panel this morning will discuss the Staff's safety review 17 of the proposed Kairos Hermes facility construction permit application.
18 I will be providing an introduction to the safety review and 19 licensing process and approach. Ed Helvenston will discuss the proposed 20 permit conditions and summarize the Staff's interactions with the ACRS.
21 Chris van Wert, Alex Chereskin, Michelle Hart, and Alex 22 Siwy will discuss the Staff's review of novel technical aspects of Hermes.
23 Next slide, please. Great. The regulations in 10 CFR Part 24
89 50 define a testing facility in general as a nuclear reactor that is useful in the 1
conduct of research and development and would be licensed under Section 2
104 of the Atomic Energy Act for operation at a thermal power in excess of 10 3
megawatts.
4 Kairos seeks to construct a non-power reactor known as 5
Hermes that would be licensed as a testing facility under 10 CFR Part 50.
6 The Hermes facility would be used to demonstrate the 7
Kairos power fluoride salt cooled high temperature reactor technology or KP-8 FHR advanced reactor technology.
9 The construction permit licensing requirements relevant to 10 the safety review for the proposed Hermes facility are similar to those for other 11 non-power facilities licensed under Section 104 of the Atomic Energy Act and 12 10 CFR Part 50, such as research reactors.
13 However, there are some differences in the safety review 14 requirements for a testing facility versus a research reactor. For example, the 15 Hermes testing facility construction permit application is subject to an 16 independent review by the ACRS and a mandatory hearing.
17 Further, as we'll describe later in this panel, the Staff 18 encountered several novel technical issues during its reviews of the Hermes 19 construction permit application.
20 Next slide, please. To conduct its review and determine 21 appropriate acceptance criteria, the Staff used the guidance in NUREG-1537, 22 Guidelines for Preparing and Reviewing Applications for the Licensing of Non-23 Power Reactors.
24
90 In applying this guidance, the Staff determined the extent to 1
which this guidance was relevant to the Hermes construction permit 2
application. Although the guidance is technology neutral, it was originally 3
developed primarily with light-water non-power reactors in mind.
4 The Staff expects that this experience and applying existing 5
guidance to review novel designs can inform future reviews of advanced 6
reactor applications, including the advanced power reactor reviews using 7
guidance such as the NRC's Standard Review Plan in NUREG-0800.
8 While it is the responsibility of Kairos and other applicants 9
to demonstrate the safety of their designs, the Staff is also responsible for 10 performing an efficient and effective independent safety review of the 11 application.
12 To that end, the Staff performed the Hermes safety review 13 in a risk-informed manner, focusing on matters that they determined to most 14 safety significant to ensure the best use of Staff and applicant resources.
15 To further support an efficient and effective review the Staff 16 assembled a core review team which included several project managers and 17 technical reviewers in DANU.
18 The core team members devoted a significant portion of 19 their time to the Hermes application review activities for the duration of the 20 review.
21 In the core team approach, DANU technical reviewers with 22 advanced reactor technology expertise take responsibility for broad portions 23 of the application and gain a holistic understanding of the design in lieu of 24
91 dividing specific review areas among a broader group of technical reviewers.
1 Technical topics reviewed by the DANU core team include 2
thermal hydraulics, fuel and core design, and accident analyses.
3 Next slide, please. Next slide, please. We'll continue on.
4 Ed Helvenston will now discuss the proposed permit conditions and the Staff's 5
interactions with the ACRS.
6 MR. HELVENSTON: Thank you, Bill. Provided that the 7
requirements for the issuance of the construction permit are satisfied, the 8
regulations in 10 CFR Part 50 generally allow the design to mature from a 9
preliminary design in a construction permit application to a final design.
10 Pursuant to 10 CFR 50.35, a construction permit does not 11 constitute the NRC approval of the safety of any design feature unless the 12 applicant specifically makes this request.
13 Kairos did not request any such approvals. Instead, the 14 approval of the safety of design features would be made during the Staff 15 review of a final design submitted in an operating license application.
16 The Staff determined that construction permit conditions 17 regarding site characteristics and quality assurance were necessary to 18 confirm adequate design bases and assure quality.
19 Based on the Staff's review of Kairos' description and safety 20 assessment of the proposed Hermes site, the site determined that Kairos 21 provided information on the geologic features at the site in sufficient detail and 22 in a form to be integrated acceptably into design bases for the reactor 23 consistent with the requirements of 10 CFR 50.34(a).
24
92 However, to ensure the foundation rock under the site has 1
no evidence of karstic dissolution, such as voids or sinkholes, that could 2
indicate the potential for future surface deformation, Kairos stated that it will 3
inspect the exposed bedrock prior to foundation preparation for the Hermes 4
facility.
5 The Staff recommends that the Hermes construction permit 6
be conditioned to require that Kairos perform these inspections and to notify 7
the Staff once excavations for safety-related structures are opened for 8
examination by Staff.
9 The results of the inspections would confirm the adequacy 10 of the Hermes facility design basis as appropriate - and as appropriate - would 11 inform the Staff Construction Inspection Program.
12 In addition, to provide reasonable assurance that the 13 regulatory requirements and Kairos' commitments for quality assurance are 14 adequately implemented during construction, the Staff recommends that the 15 Hermes construction permit include a quality assurance condition similar to 16 the requirements of 10 CFR 50.55(f) which apply to nuclear power plant and 17 fuel reprocessing plant construction permit holders.
18 The proposed condition would require Kairos to implement 19 its quality assurance program as described in its PSAR and includes 20 requirements for changes to the program to be submitted to the NRC.
21 I guess we're on Slide 8 if those are up. I'll just keep going.
22 The Staff presented the results of its safety review at seven ACRS 23 subcommittee meetings last March and April and to the Full Committee on 24
93 May 3, 2023.
1 The ACRS' approach to the Hermes review included early 2
review of chapters of the Staff safety evaluation as they were completed and 3
focused on the safety significant aspects of the design significantly 4
complementing the Staff's efforts to optimize the review schedule and helping 5
ensure the review was efficient was thorough.
6 The ACRS recommended the issuance of a construction 7
permit in its letter dated May 16, 2023, which is contained in Appendix C of 8
the Staff safety evaluation on the Hermes review.
9 The ACRS noted three topics that it recommended being 10 addressed during the Staff's evaluation of a Hermes operating license 11 application, first, combustible gas generation associated with graphite air 12 oxidation for air ingress events, second, levels of tritium released from the 13 facility, and third, the management of airborne beryllium and tritium in the 14 facility to less than regulatory limits and to protect the safety of workers.
15 The Staff will consider these areas as appropriate in its 16 review of a future operating license application for Hermes.
17 Next slide, please. The Staff encountered several novel 18 technical issues during its review of the Hermes construction permit 19 application. These related to the use of TRISO fuel and molten salt coolant 20 as part of the Hermes design, the use of high temperature materials in 21 accordance with the American Society of Mechanical Engineers Code, 22 Section 3, Division 5, the application of the functional containment concept, 23 and the passive accident response.
24
94 Next slide, please. Chris van Wert will now discuss the 1
Staff's technical review as it pertains to the use of TRISO fuel in Hermes.
2 MR. van WERT: Thank you, Ed. Good morning, Chair and 3
Commissioners. Next slide, please. Over the next few slides, I will discuss 4
the Hermes TRISO fuel design, the Staff's review approach, and actions the 5
Applicant and the NRC Staff took to overcome a technical challenge related 6
to fuel performance.
7 The Kairos Hermes fuel design uses TRISO particles 8
imbedded in a carbon matrix pebble. For scale, a fuel pebble is roughly the 9
size of a golf ball, while the TRISO particles are roughly the size of poppy 10 seeds.
11 Each fuel pebble contains approximately 16,000 TRISO 12 particles. These TRISO particles follow the specifications of the Department 13 of Energy Advanced Gas Reactor, or AGR, Program.
14 The TRISO particle design forms four of the five fission 15 product barriers credited for functional containment in the Hermes design.
16 What differentiates the Kairos fuel pebbles from more traditional pebble bed 17 reactor fuel designs is that the Kairos TRISO particles are arranged in an 18 annulus near the surface of the pebble surrounding a low-density graphite 19 center.
20 This allows for low-density pebbles that are buoyant and 21 travel upwards through the core in the molten salt coolant.
22 Next slide, please. The fuel system design analysis in the 23 Hermes CP application relies heavily upon the previously-approved Kairos 24
95 fuel qualification topical report.
1 The approach presented in that topical report, as well as the 2
Staff's review, centered on two main evaluations. The Staff first evaluated the 3
Kairos TRISO particle design to confirm that it met the physical specifications 4
previously reviewed in an approved EPRI, or Electric Power Research 5
Institute, TRISO fuel performance topical report based on the DOE AGR 6
program.
7 The Staff also confirmed that the Hermes operating 8
conditions were within the parameters covered in the EPRI topical report.
9 By ensuring that the physical specifications and the 10 operating conditions meet the range of applicability of the EPRI TRISO fuel 11 performance report, the Staff found the data and conclusions in the EPRI 12 topical report to be applicable to the Kairos Hermes design.
13 After reviewing the Kairos TRISO particle, the Staff 14 evaluated the fuel pebble design and testing plan. This review included the 15 planned fuel pebble laboratory and a radiation test to ensure that the fuel 16 pebble behavior was understood for the expected conditions.
17 The Staff's review ensured that the breadth of testing, both 18 non-irradiated and irradiated, covered aspects of the fuel design that did not 19 already have sufficient data to support regulatory findings.
20 It is worth noting that the Kairos fuel qualification topical 21 report is the methodology to be used for fuel qualification and not the 22 qualification of the fuel itself. The topical report includes criteria for the various 23 tests that must be met to complete the fuel qualification process.
24
96 Next slide, please. While the EPRI TRISO fuel performance 1
topical report provided significant particle irradiation test data used in support 2
of the Kairos Hermes application, the AGR program was centered around 3
steady state and some anticipated operational occurrence conditions.
4 Therefore, the AGR data did not include testing that 5
included a large insertion of excess reactivity. As such, the Staff's evaluation 6
of the Kairos fuel qualification topical report included a limitation that future 7
license applications for non-power KP-FHRs, such as the Hermes CP 8
application, would need to provide justification for expected fuel integrity 9
during an overpower transient.
10 In compliance with the topical report limitation, the Hermes 11 CP application addressed the overpower transient condition. The Hermes 12 design precludes a control rod ejection event by maintaining a low differential 13 pressure, therefore, a control element withdrawal event at its maximum rate 14 provides the limiting rate of reactivity insertion.
15 Based on the analysis of this event provided in the 16 application, the energy deposition and particle heat-up caused by the transient 17 would not result in kernel melt which prevents volumetric expansion pressures 18 capable of leading to TRISO particle failures.
19 Next slide, please. Thank you and I will now turn it over to 20 Alex Chereskin who will be presenting the Staff's technical review of the 21 Hermes reactor coolant and high temperature materials.
22 MR. CHERESKIN: Thank you, Chris. Next slide, please.
23 Hermes will use a molten salt reactor coolant which is a mixture of lithium 24
97 fluoride and beryllium fluoride, as known as Flibe.
1 Flibe has desirable heat transfer characteristics that make it 2
a suitable coolant for the Hermes design. In addition, Flibe is stable at the 3
expected temperature and radiation conditions of the Hermes reactor.
4 Flibe contains beryllium which requires controls to mitigate 5
potential worker exposure. The NRC Staff recognizes the potential beryllium 6
hazard and will consider its ability to impact operations or accident response 7
accordingly during an OL application review.
8 Another consideration for use of this coolant is that 9
transmutation of lithium in the salt will generate tritium. This could be mitigated 10 via tritium control strategies.
11 The Hermes design contains a tritium management system 12 and the PSAR contains analyses to address tritium generation and control.
13 The NRC Staff will review the final methods and systems to control tritium 14 during an OL application review.
15 Next slide, please. Another feature of using Flibe as a 16 reactor coolant is its ability to retain radionuclides that either escape from the 17 TRISO fuel or are borne in the reactor coolant.
18 This is a stated safety function of Flibe in the Hermes PSAR.
19 This ability is supported by National Lab operating experience and was 20 independently considered in the context of Kairos' technology through the 21 NRC Staff's review of Kairos' topical report on mechanistic source term.
22 This approved topical report provides the methodology to 23 determine the quantity of radionuclides that remain in the salt during a 24
98 postulated event.
1 The NRC Staff evaluation of Flibe's capacity to retain 2
radionuclides supports its role as a layer in the functional containment.
3 Further information on Hermes functional containment approach will be 4
provided later in this presentation.
5 Another safety feature of Flibe is its low vapor pressure, 6
which allows the reactor to operate at near-atmospheric pressures and 7
mitigate the potential for energetic releases or bulk boiling of the coolant under 8
postulated accident scenarios.
9 Flibe composition influences its properties, so it is important 10 to maintain the composition within specified limits. The compositional 11 specification for the reactor coolant is found in an approved Kairos topical 12 report.
13 The Hermes test reactor will also contain a chemistry control 14 system that will be able to support maintaining required coolant chemistry.
15 In conclusion, the NRC Staff determined that it would be 16 acceptable to credit Flibe as a fission product barrier and that composition 17 controls would ensure the Flibe maintains its expected characteristics.
18 I will now present on aspects of the high temperature 19 materials review. Next slide, please.
20 Many Hermes components will operate at a significantly 21 higher temperature than LWRs. The figure on this slide shows safety-related 22 components and their locations in the reactor. The design uses 316H 23 stainless steel and ER-16-8-2 weld filler material for safety-related metallic 24
99 components and ET-10 for graphite reflector components.
1 The CP application included the use of ASME Code Section 2
III, Division 5, which the NRC Staff endorsed in Regulatory Guide 1.87, 3
Revision 2. The NRC Staff review of the Hermes test reactor included 4
applicability of portions of the Code for both metallic materials.
5 The Staff used Section III, Division 5, in the review of the 6
safety-related metallic components as it provides material properties, such as 7
allowable stresses based on creep damage, for the metallic materials at the 8
times and temperatures the Hermes reactor components will experience.
9 It also provides rules for other aspects important to 10 component integrity, such as pre-Service inspection, design, and fabrication 11 rules. The use of Section III, Division 5, supports the use of 316H stainless 12 steel for safety-related components in the Hermes reactor and will help ensure 13 structural and mechanical integrity of safety-related metallic components.
14 For graphite components, the Hermes PSAR cited an 15 approved topical report for qualification of the ET-10 graphite. The NRC 16 Staff's review focused on evaluating the qualification program and the CP 17 against applicable requirements from Section III, Division 5, including 18 obtaining properties of graphite when unirradiated, irradiated, oxidized and 19 exposed to molten salt.
20 Additionally, the NRC Staff can verify implementation of 21 Code design rules and evaluate the impact of graphite oxidation on 22 combustible gas generation during an OL application review.
23 Qualification and design of graphite material to Section III, 24
100 Division 5 requirements supports the safety-related graphite components in 1
the Hermes reactor because it follows an applicable NRC-endorsed 2
methodology. This helps to ensure that safety-related graphite components 3
can support safety functions.
4 Next slide, please. One unique aspect of this design that 5
the ASME Code does not address is the interactions between the environment 6
and the metallic structural materials.
7 In addition to the rules in ASME Code Section III, Division 5, 8
Kairos will qualify the 316H stainless steel and its associated weld filler metal 9
for use in the Hermes environment.
10 The Hermes qualification program for metallic materials is 11 found in a previously-approved topical report. The qualification program 12 considers the environmental effects of temperature, irradiation, stresses and 13 strains, the coolant, potential impurities in the coolant, and combinations of 14 these effects, which is shown in the figure on this slide.
15 The program provides a method to evaluate the effects of 16 the environment in combinations of different factors on multiple degradation 17 mechanisms that are applicable to 316H stainless steel in the Hermes reactor 18 design.
19 It will also be used to address materials reliability and 20 environmental compatibility in the Hermes reactor via design as well as 21 inspection and surveillance as appropriate.
22 The qualification of 316H stainless steel in the Flibe coolant 23 supports the Hermes test reactor because it provides information on 24
101 applicable degradation mechanisms to inform design of components and any 1
mitigating measures to ensure these components can perform their functions 2
during their lifetimes.
3 In conclusion, based on the use of portions of ASME Code, 4
Section III, Division 5, and the proposed materials qualification programs, the 5
NRC Staff determined the PSAR provided adequate information to support the 6
ability of safety-related components to maintain structural and mechanical 7
integrity needed to perform their design functions.
8 Next slide, please. Michelle Hart will now discuss the Staff's 9
technical review as it pertains to functional containment in the Hermes design.
10 MS. HART: Thank you, Alex. Next slide, please. Kairos 11 Power uses a functional containment approach instead of a traditional 12 containment structure for the Hermes test reactor.
13 The Commission has approved evaluating a non-light-water 14 reactor design's capability for providing retention of radionuclides through 15 various SSCs in place of a leak-tight containment.
16 The approved Staff Paper describing this concept, SECY-17 18-0096, defines functional containment as a barrier or a set of barriers taken 18 together that effectively limits the physical transport of radioactive materials to 19 the environment.
20 As alluded to by Chris and Alex, the barriers that are 21 credited as functional containment in Hermes consist of the TRISO fuel 22 particle layers and the Flibe molten salt coolant.
23 Other factors that contribute to the Hermes functional 24
102 containment approach include operating conditions, fuel form, and coolant 1
design. The primary system operates at near-atmospheric pressure limiting 2
the driving force for escape of radionuclides.
3 The TRISO fuel is very robust with a design temperature of 4
1600 degrees Celsius and provides radionuclide retention capabilities even 5
for conditions in excess of that temperature.
6 In addition, the reactor will be operated to ensure a large 7
margin to the TRISO fuel design temperature. Flibe also has favorable 8
radionuclide retention properties.
9 The ultimate acceptability of this functional containment 10 approach is demonstrated by meeting accident analysis requirements, 11 including the 10 CFR 100.11 offsite dose acceptance criteria as described in 12 PSAR Chapter 13, Accident Analyses.
13 Next slide, please. The postulated accident radiological 14 consequence analysis also assesses the fission product and radionuclide 15 retention capabilities of a nuclear reactor design, including the functional 16 containment approach.
17 For a testing facility, the siting requirements in 10 CFR 18 100.11 describe a consequence analysis to be used as an aid in evaluating a 19 proposed site.
20 The analysis should assume the expected demonstrable 21 containment leak rate and should be based upon a postulated or hypothetical 22 major accident that would result in potential hazards not exceeded by those 23 from any accident considered credible.
24
103 The Hermes PSAR identifies events consistent with a 1
maximum hypothetical accident, or MHA, approach as described in the Non-2 Power Reactor Standard Review Plan Guidance in NUREG-1537.
3 The Hermes MHA describes radiological releases based on 4
a postulated temperature-over-time profile to result in consequences that are 5
bounding for all postulated events. It is not a specific accident scenario.
6 The radiologic consequence analysis evaluates the 7
radionuclide retention within, and transport across, each of the barriers that 8
together provide the functional containment function to estimate the total 9
release to the environment and subsequent offsite doses for the Hermes MHA.
10 Kairos' commitments for testing of the fuel prior to its use, 11 fuel surveillance during operation, and continuing assessment of fission 12 product concentrations in the coolant and cover gas during reactor operation 13 support the analysis assumptions on radiological release as being the 14 expected demonstrable leak rate from the functional containment.
15 Based on this information, the Staff found that the PSAR 16 analysis of the MHA provided an acceptable analysis of the overall capability 17 of the Hermes design, including the SSCs that provide the radionuclide 18 containment function.
19 Next slide, please. The Hermes PSAR describes the 20 components and operating conditions that define the functional containment.
21 It also identifies key performance criteria for specific SSCs to ensure the MHA 22 remains bounding for postulated accidents, such as specified acceptable 23 system radionuclide release design limits for the fuel and circulating activity 24
104 limits for the Flibe coolant.
1 These performance criteria are included in the PSAR 2
description of technical specifications for which specific values are to be 3
provided in the OL application.
4 In total, the acceptability of the functional containment is 5
demonstrated through design and analysis of the individual features of the 6
functional containment as well as their combined capability.
7 Next slide, please. Alex Siwy will now discuss the Staff's 8
technical review as it pertains to passive accident response in the Hermes 9
design.
10 MS. SIWY: Thank you, Michelle. Next slide, please. I'll just 11 continue and they'll catch up.
12 The Hermes facility is designed to mitigate postulated 13 events in a passive manner eliminating the need for active components, 14 electrical power, and operator actions for those events within the design basis.
15 The shutdown function is fulfilled by a reactor trip and 16 subsequent insertion of three safety-related shutdown elements into the core.
17 The reactor trip signal removes power from an electromagnetic clutch and the 18 elements fall by gravity into the core.
19 The shutdown elements can shut down the reactor and 20 maintain it in a shutdown condition assuming the highest worth shutdown 21 element is stuck out of the core.
22 Although not credited in the accident analyses, the design 23 also includes four control elements that insert into the reflector providing 24
105 defense in depth.
1 The decay heat removal system, or DHRS, provides the 2
safety related means of heat removal for the Hermes design. The DHRS 3
operates continuously during normal and off-normal conditions above the 4
threshold reactor power level.
5 The always-on nature of the DHRS ensures that no 6
component needs to change state to activate the DHRS when it is needed to 7
mitigate a postulated event.
8 The DHRS has sufficient capacity to passively operate for 9
up to seven days to mitigate a postulated event when normal cooling is 10 unavailable.
11 Next slide, please. Given its importance for maintaining 12 adequate temperatures during a postulated event and its fundamental 13 differences relative to currently-operating reactors, the DHRS was a major 14 focus of Staff review.
15 This slide provides a diagram of the DHRS. The NRC Staff 16 ensured that the DHRS has the capacity and redundancy needed to provide 17 adequate cooling in the event of a single failure, the most extreme of which is 18 failure of an entire DHRS train.
19 In addition, the NRC Staff identified several phenomena 20 with the potential to affect DHRS performance. Examples include the two-21 phase flow dynamics associated with the initial startup of the DHRS, overfilling 22 of the steam separator, and fouling of the DHRS. Kairos plans to address 23 these and other phenomena through qualification testing for the DHRS.
24
106 The NRC Staff also identified a potential for the DHRS to 1
overcool the reactor under certain conditions and cause Flibe to freeze.
2 Therefore, the Staff will ensure that the final DHRS design submitted as part 3
of an OL application provides adequate heat removal for both high-and low-4 residual decay heat loads.
5 Next slide, please. The NRC Staff reviewed the design and 6
performance of each of the systems involved in the passive response to 7
accidents as well as their integral response as demonstrated in example 8
calculations Kairos provided in a technical report.
9 In addition, the NRC Staff performed independent scoping 10 analyses to gain insights on the responses to transients and compared our 11 results against those of the Applicant.
12 These scoping analyses helped the Staff to inform our 13 questions to Kairos during the review and provided additional confidence in 14 the acceptability of the preliminary design.
15 To support an OL application, Kairos would need to 16 demonstrate that certain SSCs will perform as assumed in the accident 17 analyses. Kairos plans to perform a variety of tests as part of this 18 demonstration.
19 Examples include shutdown element insertion into the 20 pebble bed, development and testing of the fluidic diode device that ensures 21 natural circulation when forced coolant flow is lost, and various aspects of 22 DHRS performance.
23 This concludes the safety panel presentation. We are 24
107 prepared to respond to any questions that you may have at this time.
1 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. Thank you to both panels. We 2
will begin questions now with Commissioner Caputo.
3 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thank for the presentations.
4 It's very technical but clearly reflects the significant amount of work for many 5
offices across the agency and it documents the Staff's detailed and thorough 6
review of Kairos' construction permit application.
7 So thank you very much for the work that has led us to this 8
point and for participating in today's hearing.
9 Mr. Jessup, I would like to ask you a question related to the 10 Staff's response to Commission Pre-Hearing Question Number 14.
11 The Staff response to Question 14 relies on a divination of 12 the intent of the Commission's regulations being to a limited definition of 13 "safety-related structures, systems, and components" in 10 CFR 50.2 limiting 14 that definition to power reactors.
15 However, the introductory phrase in 10 CFR 50.2 contains 16 no such limitation and indicates that the meanings provided in the subsequent 17 definitions apply as used in this Part, referring to Part 50.
18 This would seem to indicate that the definition of the safety-19 related structures, systems, and components provided in 50.2 applies to every 20 use of the phrase "in the regulations of Part 50."
21 So it strikes me that while Kairos would like to use a different 22 definition of the phrase in its preliminary safety analysis report, an exemption 23 to the definition would only be necessary if there were any regulations in Part 24
108 50 that are applicable to the construction permit application and used that 1
phrase.
2 Bill, can you confirm whether the phrase "safety-related 3
structures, systems, and components" is used in any of the regulations in Part 4
50 that are applicable to this construction permit for Hermes, a non-power --
5 MR. JESSUP: Good morning, Commissioner Caputo. I 6
think I caught the end of your question there. And so I'll answer it the best I 7
can.
8 A couple of thoughts I would have, the first relative to the 9
response that was prepared to Question 14 for the pre-hearing question set, I 10 would say what the staff tried to do there is offer a bit of a history of how that 11 term has been treated for non-power production utilization facilities. So I think, 12 you know, that is part of what you saw in response to that question.
13 I would offer a couple of other thoughts too. I agree with 14 your underlying assumption there that if the term in question is not used in the 15 regulatory requirement, the underlying regulatory requirement, then it wouldn't 16 apply.
17 And so again, embedded in there is the thought that we 18 wouldn't necessarily accept or expect exemptions from the definition 19 themselves but rather the underlying requirements. So I think I agree with the 20 assumption there.
21 It is possible that there are, if you look at the suite of 22 requirements in Part 50 and perhaps elsewhere, that are applicable to the 23 Kairos Hermes construction permit application, that none of those 24
109 requirements would include that term and that is possible.
1 And I think you heard Mo Shams in the Overview Panel, in 2
response to a question from Commissioner Wright, discussing that part of the 3
staff's review. So that was a key part of the staff's review, is evaluating the 4
regulatory applicability of requirements to Hermes.
5 That being said, relative to the matter as a whole, I think it 6
would be, it's a great question, I think it might would be worth taking back and 7
exploring, doing a more comprehensive assessment to determine where that 8
term specifically shows up and build on the work that we've already done with 9
the regulatory applicability to Hermes. So I do think there would be value in 10 that for future applications for similar designs.
11 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thank you. I agree, 12 particularly given the expectation that Kairos will ultimately submit an 13 application to build a power reactor. I agree this is worth exploring further, 14 because it doesn't make sense to attempt to issue an exemption for a 15 definition in order to give -- to construction restrictions, so thank you for that.
16 Bill, I do have another question for you. The staff anticipated 17 preparation for this hearing would entail approximately 1,500 staff hours 18 which, given our current hourly rate, equals nearly a half a million dollars that 19 we will bill to the applicant.
20 I would expect an additional impact given there is likely 21 some overlap between the staff that contributed to preparing for and 22 participating in today's hearing, rather than spending their time on other 23 reviews like the Hermes 2 application.
24
110 In your view, has the statutory mandatory hearing 1
requirement impacted the staff's ability to execute the review schedule that 2
was set for Hermes 2, the construction permit application?
3 MR. JESSUP: Thank you again for the questioning, 4
Commissioner Caputo.
5 I would agree that there is overlap between the technical 6
reviewers and project management staff that are working on Hermes 2 that 7
worked on Hermes 1. That's actually a asset to the project, is to maintain that 8
continuity.
9 That being said, I do not think, particularly because we're 10 early in the review of the Hermes construction permit - the Hermes 2 11 construction permit application - we haven't seen a detrimental effect on the 12 schedule.
13 We have an ambitious schedule that we're confident we're 14 going to meet. But there absolutely is overlap between the staff working on 15 the hearing efforts and those working on Hermes 2.
16 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: So in other words, to the 17 extent that resources are directed to prepare for the hearing, staff is spending 18 their time on the mandatory hearing rather than other applications that may be 19 pending before the agency, whether it's Hermes 2, or any other applications.
20 We're diverting their time away from those reviews in order to conduct a 21 mandatory hearing. Do I have that --
22 MR. JESSUP: Commissioner Caputo --
23 (Simultaneous speaking.)
24
111 MR. JESSUP: -- I guess I agree in the sense that if they're 1
working on Hermes 1 mandatory hearing preparation activities, they're not 2
billing to the Hermes 2 construction permit application review.
3 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thank you.
4 Mr. Chairman, I have no further questions for this panel.
5 CHAIR HANSON: Okay, thank you, Commissioner Caputo.
6 Commissioner Crowell?
7 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I've 8
really learned to enjoy going after Commissioner Caputo in the questions, 9
because I usually learn something from her questions as well. It informs mine.
10 You know, as we continue to ruminate on this value 11 proposition for mandatory hearings, you know, there's multiple ways to look at 12 it.
13 I would just add to that discussion rhetorically here, it's not 14 a question for anyone, but when we're looking at, even in a mandatory 15 uncontested setting, when it's a first of a kind technology that the agency 16 hasn't previously looked at and signed off on, I do think there's still value in it.
17 I know it's a very heavy lift, but I think there's value in it.
18 And it's not just value for this room, it's value for the public 19 in knowing that they can trust the review process and that any efficiencies we 20 gain going forward can be trusted as well. So it is a heavy lift on the front end, 21 but I do think there's value.
22 Alexandra, how do you pronounce your last name?
23 MS. SIWY: Siwy.
24
112 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Siwy, okay. Ms. Siwy, this 1
may be a little bit of an uninformed question, but when you were talking about 2
the testing that will have to be done of the passive safety systems to 3
demonstrate the effectiveness, is that -- are those tests physically done? And 4
I guess I could ask the Kairos folks too, or is it done on models and analytics?
5 MS. SIWY: I was referring specifically to tests that are 6
physically performed. But I'm sure they do modeling to inform their design, 7
and they have results that they think they're going to get, and they would 8
compare the two.
9 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Okay. And the essence of 10 my question is I think there's a measure of comfort that comes from knowing 11 that tests were done or demonstrated physically as well, as just analytically.
12 So, thank you.
13 And my last question may be similar or picking up on 14 Commissioner Caputo's first question. But she's way smarter than I am, so I'm 15 going to ask it in a different way.
16 I'm thinking about these issues that the ACRS raised and 17 this is probably to Bill or Ed. And I guess my first question is are they all 18 design-related issues, or are they more operating-related issues?
19 MR. JESSUP: Yes, I would say that they are operating-20 related issues, generally, that we, you know, we took a look at -- we certainly 21 considered carefully what was in the ACRS's letter and whether this was 22 something that we needed to go back to the applicant and get more 23 information at the CP stage. But I felt we were comfortable that, you know, 24
113 these were primarily operating issues that we felt that we could take a look at 1
these again as appropriate during the operating license.
2 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: And within that, this set of 3
ACRS concerns, are they safety-related, or are they environmental-related 4
issues?
5 MR. JESSUP: I'd say they are primarily safety-related 6
issues. You know, they could have impacts on the environmental review as 7
well. I know, for example, the issue with a tritium release, you know, that's 8
something that even if it's -- it could have some impacts on safety. But it 9
certainly could impact the environmental review as well, you know, the 10 radionuclide release rates from the facility.
11 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: And then, Bill, I think I heard 12 you say that these issues will be considered as appropriate. How is that 13 appropriateness consideration made?
14 MR. JESSUP: You're referring to the ACRS issues. Well, 15 the ACRS has outlined issues that they felt like were of concern and should 16 be addressed in the operating license application.
17 As appropriate, I think, means that we will evaluate them 18 once an operating license application comes in. We will make sure that, you 19 know, we revisit what the ACRS has said.
20 We also have a list of items that Kairos has committed to do 21 in the operating license application as well that we're tracking in Section(a)(2) 22 of the safety evaluation.
23 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Okay. It's not that you'll 24
114 make some determination on your own about whether they're considered or 1
not, it's just it'll be at the stage of the operating license?
2 MR. JESSUP: That's correct.
3 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, that's all I have.
4 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Crowell. I 5
would like to get back to this issue of safety-related, but I'm going to ask it of 6
Kairos, and recognizing the staff's response to pre-hearing Question 14 and 7
everything.
8 But we know that the classification of systems, structures, 9
and components is kind of one of the major building blocks of any licensing 10 application in front of the NRC. And, you know, you've explained why there's 11 a change in the definition of safety-related for your application, mainly because 12 of reactor coolant and pressure boundary, because the reactor coolant 13 pressure boundary, except for the reactor vessel, is not credited for fission 14 product retention like the reactor coolant pressure boundary is in a light water 15 reactor.
16 So the application, and the staff safety evaluation, and the 17 ACRS summarize and explained the deviation kind of based on the design.
18 But I'm curious to hear about your process you used to identify a need for this 19 change and then kind of successfully pursue it within the NRC's framework?
20 MR. HASTINGS: Thank you for the question. So we 21 approached it from the fundamentals of what the safety functions were for the 22 design. And obviously the recognition that we have a low-pressure system, 23 we don't have reactor coolant pressure boundary to begin with, and the 24
115 concept of functional containment, led us to sort of a performance-based 1
definition of safety related, if you will.
2 And so the distinction between the definition in 50.2 and our 3
definition really is just as simple as removing the pressure boundary 4
component from the definition.
5 CHAIR HANSON: Mr. Blandford, I don't know if you want to 6
jump in. You were nodding --
7 MR. BLANDFORD: No, I was just agreeing with Peter.
8 CHAIR HANSON: Okay.
9 (Laughter.)
10 CHAIR HANSON: All right. No, it's very helpful, kind of 11 how you thought about, again, starting with functional containment as a 12 concept and then moving down from there for that performance-base.
13 I do want to talk about function containment, but I've got a question 14 for the staff on that which I think is one of the novel aspects of this.
15 And certainly, as I think numerous people have noted, in 16 SECY-18-0096 and the SRM that followed, as kind of an overall policy 17 statement, it's one thing to kind of put that in policy back in 2018, but it's 18 another thing entirely to actually -- for you all to go through that process.
19 So how did, you know, overall, and Bill or Alex, I'm not sure, 20 or Michelle, who this question really goes to, but how did the staff kind of 21 approach this novel review of the functional containment of the design? And 22 what's left to consider in the context of an operating license application?
23 MS. HART: So in general, in the functional containment, 24
116 you would look at each of the barriers. And it's very related to source term 1
development. And so there's, like, some double-counting you can do there.
2 You're already evaluating that.
3 And so the major difference in how you look at functional 4
containment versus what we've looked at for power reactors in the past, is that 5
you have that final barrier, that containment structure that you're paying a lot 6
of attention to. Instead, we focus that or we disburse that focus across the 7
different SSCs that they're crediting for that functional containment.
8 And so at the operating license stage, I mean, we have the 9
preliminary analysis, and we have this MHA concept that they've used for a 10 non-power reactor.
11 CHAIR HANSON: Maximum hypothetical accident.
12 MS. HART: Yes.
13 CHAIR HANSON: Yes.
14 MS. HART: Yes, thank you. And so when we get to the 15 operating license stage, we'll verify that maximum hypothetical accident is still 16 bounding of all the events and that they still continue to show that the 17 functional containment is operating as they assume it would in the context of 18 the analysis.
19 CHAIR HANSON: I see. So it sounds like some of the 20 groundwork that's been laid in the functional containment concept that you 21 guys have already have done will then kind of serve both the staff and Kairos 22 well at the operating license stage then 23 MS. HART: I think it's fair to say that.
24
117 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. Yes, very good. Thank you.
1 That's it for me. Commissioner Wright?
2 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you, Chair. It's still 3
good morning. Thank you for your presentations.
4 And I didn't really know where to put this question today, so 5
I'm going to ask it now. I've got a lot of you all on a panel right now. And I'm 6
going to address it to Mike first at Kairos. But then I think it's going to, Ed, 7
maybe it might come back to you too for maybe some add-on, or response, or 8
anything.
9 So during this whole review process, Kairos has, and rightly 10 so, been cited as a positive example, right, for both how they're going about 11 stuff and how the staff is going about stuff. And it's a good-news story.
12 But there are some out there who've countered by saying, 13 yeah, but it's just a test reactor, right. How would respond to that?
14 MR. LAUFER: Thank you, Commissioner Wright, for the 15 question. Let me first start maybe by providing a little bit of a historical context 16 on how we got to the decision to do Hermes in the first place. Because it was 17 actually a pivot for the company and not part of our original plan.
18 As I said, part of the iterative development process that 19 we're relying on is kind of constantly questioning how far you need to go on 20 being disciplined to scale back on going to the minimum to get what you need 21 in terms of results.
22 So maybe not intuitively, we showed the scale of the 23 Engineering Test Unit at Hermes compared to our commercial reactor. But 24
118 the decision to pursue the Engineering Test Unit actually preceded the 1
decision to do the Hermes reactor in the first place.
2 And the scale of Hermes was actually informed by our 3
understanding and detailed engineering progress at the scale of the 4
Engineering Test Unit. And it gave us the confidence that we could pursue 5
that technology more quickly and demonstrate the fundamental aspects of the 6
technology in an architecture that basically is essentially identical to the 7
commercial reactor and probably, most significantly, relies on the same 8
fundamental safety case as a commercial reactor.
9 So building on the process for Hermes and Hermes 2, we 10 would expect essentially the same safety case to be made with a slightly larger 11 system for the commercial reactor. But establishing that confidence in the 12 licensing process is extremely valuable for our future commercial case. And 13 so being able to do it faster and with a smaller system provides significant 14 advantage.
15 The other thing I'll say, and Peter had mentioned, we had 16 previously been using 1537 as the model for our planned application at the 17 commercial scale. I think there's a lot of value in the non-power reactor 18 approach which allows for a lot of flexibility and fundamentally is about smaller 19 reactors that have more intrinsic safety and lower risk profiles. I would say 20 that generally applies to many advanced reactor concepts.
21 But conceptually, in the non-power reactor space and the 22 104 license space, you start with the minimum requirements, and then you 23 add requirements based on the risk profile of the facility.
24
119 That's, I think, a much more attractive process in licensing 1
rather than starting with the full set of power reactor regulations and having to 2
justify what doesn't apply across the board. So everything that is in there has 3
been validated that provides value for the safety case.
4 MR. HASTINGS: Yes, if I might, I want to add to that as 5
well. First of all, I obviously agree with everything that Mike said. But I get 6
this question a lot as well. We've had a lot of success in pre-application space 7
and a lot of success during the review. And a lot of people will say, you know, 8
it's only a power reactor.
9 But to amplify a point that Rob Taylor made earlier about the 10 Section 104, which implies a lower regulatory burden, that does not mean this 11 was a de minimis review. This was a comprehensive, thorough review that 12 was focused on what it needed to focus on.
13 And to the point that Mo Shams made, the main delta is the 14 set of power reactor requirements that simply don't apply to us. We 15 understand how to do all of that. It's not trivial, it's real work, but it's just work.
16 There's nothing about the power reactor requirements that 17 if we were licensing a power reactor we somehow don't know how to do it, that 18 it's a mystery to us. And I think our pursuit of a test reactor is a real testament 19 to the value of the iteration cycles.
20 It's not only in hardware but also in, licensing space. It really 21 gives all of us an opportunity to flex those muscles so that, when we do get to 22 the power reactor stage, a lot of that work has already been done.
23 And to the point that Mike just made, while its not a subject 24
120 of this proceeding, we do expect the safety case to be largely the same for the 1
commercial reactor as it is for the power reactor.
2 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you. Do you have any 3
4 MR. HELVENSTON: Yes. I can give some staff perspective 5
on that. I mean, I don't think the fact that this is a test reactor really, you know, 6
takes away from the accomplishment of being able to successfully license 7
something like this at all.
8 You know, I think even though the set of regulations might 9
be different, I think there are still a lot of lessons learned, I think, in good 10 practices from the processes we use in this review that would apply to any 11 review of a power reactor or anything else.
12 You know, the staff using flexibility in how we apply 13 guidance and, you know, being willing to be creative and think outside the box 14 in how we're doing these reviews. I think some of the process things, like the 15 use of audits that I think was mentioned before, was very successful in this 16 review.
17 So, you know, I certainly think that everything we did or most 18 of what we did in this certainly can apply in future reviews as well.
19 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you very much. That's 20 very helpful. I wanted to have that discussion. I thought it was an appropriate 21 question for today. Earlier on the previous panel and then I think as well here, 22 we talked about core team approach which, obviously, I think is smart.
23 Ballpark-wise, how many people were part of the review - of the core team, 24
121 you know, and how is maybe this approach different in this regard from other 1
application reviews that we've been doing? Anybody? Bill?
2 MR. JESSUP: I'll offer more than a ballpark. The number 3
was 12.
4 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Wow.
5 MR. JESSUP: Six were what we would call nearly full-time, 6
six -- the other six were part-time core team members so. And to answer the 7
second part of your question, the way I think about this is -- I've thought about 8
this a lot -- you could look at a pie chart and perhaps traditionally, you would 9
see 100 percent in that pie chart divided up into 25 percent increments. Here 10
-- and I'm over generalizing a bit, maybe it's five 20 percent increments relative 11 to the individuals providing most of the input to the project, and that has a lot 12 of benefits so.
13 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Good. Thank you. Ive got 14 one other question I'm going to end up with and Ed, you brought it up earlier 15 in your -- or you referred to part of this. So as part of the prehearing questions 16 the Commission asked staff about the proposed license condition related to 17 the quality assurance program, okay? Staff noted that because Hermes is 18 neither a nuclear power plant nor a fuel, you know, reprocessing plant, that 19 these requirements don't apply, right? So, therefore, you recommended 20 including a permit condition related to Kairos's QA program.
21 I guess my question is, is this concern -- because now we're 22 going into the construction process a little more flexible, right? Is this concern 23 something that is specific to this type of reactor specifically, or is it a more 24
122 generic issue? And I guess how does it compare, for example, to a vendor 1
supplying components for a COL who might not have a similar requirement?
2 MR. HELVENSTON: So I can speak a little bit to what our 3
thinking was with this condition. You know, we did acknowledge that, you 4
know, the requirements in 50.55(f) about implementation of a QA program do 5
not apply to a testing facility. They call out power reactors and fuel 6
reprocessing facilities, like you said. You know, our intention with this 7
condition was, you know, because there wasn't anything either sort of in the 8
regulations that called out explicitly, we wanted to add regulatory clarity by 9
putting something in the permit, that you know, explicitly made clear, you 10 know, what the requirements were, you know, to support our construction 11 inspection program. You know, having clarity on what you need to do is good.
12 Another aspect of it was adding -- having that change 13 control process in there. You know, if we didn't have a permit like this sort of 14 permitting this change control process similar to what the 50.55(f) allows, you 15 know, you could potentially have a need for construction permit amendments 16 that might just be something that's minor or administrative so, you know, we're 17 hopefully saving that administrative burden by working that part of that -- that 18 aspect into the permit.
19 With regard to -- I can't really speak to how that would work 20 with COL or manufacturing licenses specifically, but it seems that there's -- I 21 think it's a similar theme to, you know, it's good to have sort of regulatory clarity 22 and flexibility, and if there's a way that we can work that into a permit or 23 license, I think that's beneficial.
24
123 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Okay. Thank you so much.
1 That's all I have.
2 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Wright. That 3
brings us to the end of the Safety Panel. I want to thank both Kairos and the 4
staff for their presentations. We are way ahead of schedule by about 40 5
minutes actually and so look, in the spirit of cost-saving and efficiency and 6
innovation, we will begin lunch now and we had scheduled the lunch period 7
for about 75 minutes. We will then -- so we will reconvene at 1:20 instead of 8
2:00. I'll ask SECY to kind of post that on the website so that folks tuning in 9
from outside can see that -- should they tune into the NRC's website, that they 10 can see that we're going to start about 40 minutes early and with the 11 environmental panel and look forward to seeing you all back here. With that, 12 we are in recess.
13 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record 14 at 12:04 p.m. and resumed at 1:20 p.m.)
15 CHAIR HANSON: All right. Call this hearing to order once 16 again. This is the Environmental Panel. The parties will address the 17 environmental review performed in connection with the construction permit 18 application, including relevant sections of the Final Environmental Impact 19 Statement. I remind the witnesses that they remain under oath and that the 20 commission is familiar with their prehearing filings. I'd ask the - Kairos, once 21 again, is going to present first. I would ask the panelists representing Kairos 22 to please introduce themselves. Please proceed.
23 MR. HASTINGS: Thank you, Chair Hanson, and 24
124 Commissioners for the opportunity to present at today's hearing. I'm Peter 1
Hastings. I'm the Vice President, Regulatory Affairs and Quality for Kairos. I'll 2
be providing an overview of the Hermes environmental review.
3 Before I do that, though, I want to correct the transcript. In 4
the Safety Panel Q and A, I believe I inadvertently referred to Hermes as a 5
power reactor [Note: This discussion is on Page 119, Paragraph 2]. I believe 6
everybody knows, but just to confirm the record, it is a test reactor.
7 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. We'll make sure -- we'll figure out 8
a way to make that clarification in the record. Thank you.
9 MR. HASTINGS: Thank you. Are the slides up? Yes. Next 10 slide, please. So as you've heard a couple of times, we begin ever 11 presentation at Kairos by reiterating our mission to enable the world's 12 transition to clean energy. You will hear in this presentation how we're 13 protecting the environment by doing a thorough evaluation of the impacts to 14 the environment from the Hermes project. Next slide, please.
15 The regulatory bases for the environmental report were 16 taken from the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, NRC 17 implementing regulations for NEPA and others in the form of 10 CFR Parts 51 18 and 50, and the interim staff guidance augmenting NUREG-1537 Parts 1 and 19 2 for format and content and Standard Review Plan and acceptance criteria, 20 respectively. Next slide.
21 This slide illustrates our site selection process, which 22 focused on our site selection business objectives that included the facilitation 23 of rapid deployment of a non-power reactor to support Kairos Power's iterative 24
125 development approach; providing for a site that has sufficient high-quality site 1
data for licensing and design; and for proximity to DOE national labs to support 2
near term and future testing.
3 We identified out of the region of interest five sub-regions to 4
be considered in our site selection process, and you see them listed here. We 5
used sub-regional screening criteria, one of which was the availability of the 6
site for access, characterization, and use within the schedule for Hermes 7
deployment. Based on this selection process, we down-selected to two 8
candidate sites, one in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and one in Eagle Rock, Idaho.
9 Oak Ridge ended up as the preferred site; Eagle Rock ended up as the 10 alternative site.
11 Once Oak Ridge was chosen for the Hermes site, we've 12 actively sought to engage and support local communities in the Oak Ridge 13 area, as you heard described earlier. We also take this same approach, as I 14 think Mike indicated, for all of our facilities in all the communities where we're 15 a presence, nuclear or otherwise.
16 We've worked very hard to build trusting relationships with 17 our neighbors through meaningful outreach activities, through answering their 18 questions, and ensuring concerns are addressed. These activities have 19 included virtual and in-person community meetings, an online virtual meeting 20 space for community education.
This can be found at 21 kairospower.consultation.ai. It's a publicly available site and, Commissioner 22 Crowell, it speaks directly to your concerns about public engagement, 23 particularly at the layperson level for arcane and complex topics, such as what 24
126 we're dealing with.
1 We've conducted informational discussions, informational 2
mailings to nearby neighbors. We hosted an eat and greet at the Hermes site 3
for nearby neighbors, as well as state and local representatives at the nearby 4
K-25 history center, and we work closely with community and non-5 governmental organizations, both locally and nationally. Next slide.
6 As discussed on a previous slide, Oak Ridge, Tennessee 7
was chosen as the candidate site. Specifically within Oak Ridge, the site of 8
the former K-33 and K-31 Gaseous Diffusion Plants was chosen. As we'll 9
show on the next slide, this area was previously very heavily disturbed and 10 well-characterized, which met some of the selection criteria for our site. The 11 overall property is approximately 185 acres, and the temporarily-disturbed 12 area is approximately 138 acres. And you heard earlier the permanently 13 disturbed site for Hermes is approximately 30 acres. You can see the 14 proposed location of the Hermes facility in the southeast corner of the former 15 K-33 facility. This site has the advantage of significant existing infrastructure 16 including roads and utility connections. Next slide.
17 This slide gives a good visual indication of how the site was 18 previously disturbed. The pictures on the left show ground preparation for K-19 31 and K-33 building construction. The picture on the top right shows K-31 20 and K-33 when they were in operation. K-33 is the larger of the two facilities, 21 and to give you a feel for the scale, this building was approximately 85 feet tall 22 and covered over 30 acres. You can't see it well in this picture, but there are 23 power poles that aren't as high as the building. You can still see most of those 24
127 power poles on site today. It gives you a good feel for the size of the facility 1
that was there. And then the photo in the bottom right shows K-33 during 2
demolition. So you can see the site has been previously very heavily 3
disturbed. Next slide.
4 This is an overview of the Hermes environmental report 5
contents. The key takeaway from this slide is that the impacts of construction, 6
operations, and decommissioning were all determined to be small.
7 This concludes our proposed remarks for the Environmental 8
Panel and at the appropriate time, we'll be happy to take the Commissioner's 9
questions. Thank you.
10 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you very much, Mr. Hastings.
11 Now I'll invite the staff panel to join us at the table here. Okay. Panelists for 12 the staff, please introduce yourselves.
13 MR. ERWIN: Good afternoon, Chair Hanson. My name is 14 Ken Erwin. I'm the Branch Chief of the Environmental Review New Reactors 15 Branch in the Division of Rulemaking, Environmental, and Financial Support 16 in the Office of NMSS.
17 MS. DOZIER: Yes. I am Tamsen Dozier. I am the Project 18 Manager in the New Reactors Branch, Environmental Review Division of 19 Rulemaking, Environmental, and Financial Support in NMSS.
20 MR. DOUB: Peyton Doub. I'm an environmental scientist 21 in the department with Tam and Ken.
22 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. Thank you very much. Please 23 proceed with your presentation.
24
128 MR. ERWIN: Can we go to slide 3? On behalf of the 1
environmental team, the three of us will present to you this afternoon a 2
summary of the process staff used for developing the Environmental Impact 3
Statement, or EIS, including the identification and analysis of alternatives, a 4
summary of the environmental impacts at the Hermes site, any additional 5
notable information regarding the review, and the conclusions and 6
recommendations presented in the Final Environmental Impact Statement, or 7
FEIS. Next slide, please.
8 My team completed the environmental review of the Kairos 9
construction permit in parallel with the safety review that you heard about this 10 morning. You also heard that the staff's NEPA process and how it fits in with 11 the safety review earlier during the Overview Panel. In doing the safety 12 review, the staff followed its normal environmental review process for 13 preparing an environmental impact described in 10 CFR Part 51 and the 14 guidance in interim staff guidance augmenting NUREG-1537.
15 Additionally, the staff implemented the outcomes of its 16 recent environmental transformation effort during its review. For example, the 17 staff significantly revised the NEPA documentation in order to reduce 18 redundancy, make the document clearer, and better focus the staff's review 19 effort on impacts to the environment that were the most notable. The staff 20 also incorporated information by reference from the recently-completed Clinch 21 River Early Site Permit, or ESP, because the Clinch River and Hermes sites 22 are geographically close to each other and share a number of similarities.
23 Another result of this effort is that the page count for the 24
129 document is only 116 pages of analytical text. This is consistent with the 1
Counsel on Environmental Quality recommendation that an EIS for a simple 2
project be up to 150 pages and meets the Fiscal Responsibility Act changes 3
to NEPA which directs that in general, an EIS shall not exceed 150 pages, not 4
including any citations or appendices. In comparison, the Clinch River ESP 5
EIS published in April 2019 was 607 pages of analytical text. This is an 6
approximately 80 percent decrease.
7 Staff achieved its outcome while still completing an 8
exhaustive NEPA review implementing a very high level of public and 9
stakeholder engagement and ensuring, most importantly, that the NRC's 10 NEPA obligations and related laws, regulations, and processes were met.
11 Next slide, please.
12 Tamsen Dozier will now provide an overview of the 13 environmental review process.
14 MS. DOZIER: Thank you, Ken. Next slide, please. The 15 proposed federal action for the Kairos Hermes application is the issuance of 16 a construction permit authorizing the construction of the Hermes reactor. A 17 construction permit does not authorize the operation of a nuclear facility.
18 However, as mentioned in the Overview Panel this morning, the EIS presents 19 the staff's evaluation of the impacts from construction, operation, and 20 decommissioning of the facility at the proposed site.
21 The purpose and need for the agency's action is informed 22 by the applicant's purpose and need for the project. Kairos proposes to build 23 and operate their Hermes facility to demonstrate key elements of the Kairos 24
130 Power fluoride salt-cooled high temperature technology for future commercial 1
deployment. As previously mentioned, the operation of the Hermes reactor 2
would not generate any power for sale or distribution. Next slide, please.
3 The environmental review team followed a systematic 4
approach to evaluate the impacts expected to occur from the proposed federal 5
action. During it's 60-day scoping period, the staff contacted federal, state, 6
and local agencies, along with federally-recognized tribes to solicit comments.
7 In conducting its environmental review, the review team 8
carried out independent analyses and evaluation based on information 9
provided by the applicant, which included supplemental or clarifying 10 information submitted during the review in response to interactions during one 11 full-scope environmental audit and requests for confirmatory information.
12 During the 60-day comment period on the draft EIS, the 13 NRC received numerous comments through a public meeting and from letters 14 and emails containing written comments. All comments received were 15 considered in preparing the final EIS, which was issued in August of 2023.
16 Next slide, please.
17 The NRC's environmental review offered several 18 opportunities for members of the public to learn about and participate in the 19 review. While the March 2022 public outreach and scoping meeting was held 20 virtually due to COVID restrictions, the staff took out multiple-day news ads in 21 both local and regional news services and worked with our contacts in the 22 area to get the word out regarding the meeting. These ads also provided 23 information regarding how to submit written comments to the NRC on the 24
131 scope of the environmental review. Thirty-seven members of the public joined 1
the meeting.
2 The November 2022 meeting held during the draft EIS 3
comment period in Oak Ridge was similarly publicized. The meeting also 4
included the option for participants to join virtually via a computer or by phone 5
line, and over 75 members of the public participated in the draft EIS meeting.
6 In November 2022, the staff also met in person with local 7
government officials including city and county officials and local 8
representatives from state agencies. This meeting was to hear any feedback 9
or concerns about the project from those entities in a government-to-10 government forum.
11 Other public outreach efforts included improved access to 12 key safety and environmental review documents and regularly updated review 13 status via the construction permit review page on the NRC's website. The 14 staff shared the project review webpage link via the meeting newspaper ads, 15 press releases, and other interactions with the public. Next slide, please.
16 I will now turn the presentation over to Peyton Doub, who 17 will discuss the results of the staff's review.
18 MR. DOUB: Thank you, Tammy. Next slide, please. The 19 staff considered a range of reasonable alternatives. Traditionally, the staff has 20 considered a no-action alternative, alternative sites, alternative energy 21 generation sources, and alternative system designs. But because the 22 purpose of Hermes is to test and demonstrate a specific new technology, 23 alternatives involving other fuels or designs would not meet the purpose and 24
132 need. Kairos did, however, follow a systematic process for identifying possible 1
alternative sites. The staff considered only alternatives that were technically 2
and economically feasible. Next slide, please.
3 In Section 4.2 of the EIS, the staff reviews the iterative 4
process used by Kairos to identify alternative sites. The screening criteria 5
reflect the combination of site characteristics needed to develop and operate 6
Hermes. The screening process identified two reasonable sites for detailed 7
evaluation: the proposed site in Oak Ridge and a tract of vacant agricultural 8
land near Idaho Falls, Idaho termed the Eagle Rock site. Next slide, please.
9 Chapter 3 of the EIS evaluates potential direct, indirect, and 10 cumulative impacts to 12 distinct environmental resources as shown on this 11 slide. Chapter 4 of the EIS evaluates impacts to the same categories of 12 environmental resource by the alternatives, including the no-action alternative 13 and the Eagle Rock site alternative. Next slide, please.
14 The staff concludes that the potential direct, indirect, and 15 cumulative impacts would be small. The staff defines "small impacts" as not 16 detectable or so minor that they will neither destabilize nor noticeably alter any 17 important attribute of the resource. Even though the proposed construction 18 permit would authorize only construction of Hermes, the staff also considered 19 the potential environmental impacts from the full reactor life-cycle, including 20 operation and decommissioning. The small conclusions presented in the EIS 21 reflect the full life-cycle. The staff would supplement the EIS and update the 22 analysis for later life cycle stages should the applicant apply for future licenses 23 for Hermes.
24
133 The staff finished writing the EIS before Kairos submitted an 1
application for licensing two additional test reactors termed Hermes 2 for 2
development on the same site as Hermes. The staff prepared a new and 3
significant evaluation concluding that the contribution of Hermes 2 to the 4
cumulative impacts from Hermes would not be significant. Next slide, please.
5 Section 4.4 of the EIS compares the environmental impacts 6
from each alternative. The no-action alternative does not meet the purpose 7
and need. The environmentally preferable action that does meet the purpose 8
and need is the proposed action at Oak Ridge, which would have small 9
environmental impacts. Although the Eagle Rock alternative would also meet 10 the purpose and need, it could result in noticeable impacts to land use and 11 visual resources, ecological resources, and historic and cultural resources.
12 Building the reactor at Oak Ridge would disturb only previously-disturbed 13 lands in an existing industrial setting. In contrast, building the reactor at Eagle 14 Rock would alter the rural aesthetics of the surrounding landscape, disturb 15 agricultural land and natural vegetation, and disturb natural surface soils 16 potentially containing archeological resources. Next slide, please.
17 In addition to writing an EIS to comply with NEPA, the staff 18 also performed consultations required under Section 7 of the Endangered 19 Species Act and Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. The 20 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service concurred in writing with the staff that the 21 Hermes reactor may affect, but is not likely to adversely affect, threaten, or 22 endanger a species. For Section 106, the staff communicated with 18 23 American Indian tribes, the Tennessee Council on Historic Preservation, the 24
134 National Parks Service, and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation.
1 The Tennessee Council on Historic Preservation serves as 2
the state historic preservation officer for Tennessee and had no concerns. Of 3
the American Indian tribes consulted, only one requested to formally act as a 4
consulting party under Section 106. They requested additional information 5
about archeological resources potentially present at the site and asked to 6
participate in development of an archeological monitoring and discovery plan.
7 The staff is presently completing the consultation process with that tribe. I will 8
now turn the presentation back to Ken to wrap things up.
9 MR. ERWIN: Sorry. Thanks. Yes, slide 16, please? Thank 10 you. In accordance with 10 CFR 51.105(a), the staff weighed the 11 environmental, economic, technical, and other benefits against the 12 environmental and other costs and considered reasonable alternatives to the 13 proposed action. Based on small environmental impacts associated with the 14 proposed Kairos facility and the societal and economic benefits associated, 15 the staff determined that the benefits outweigh the small environmental cost.
16 Therefore, the staff recommends the issuance of a construction permit to 17 Kairos once NHPA consultations have concluded. Next slide, please.
18 The issuance of an operating license is a separate action 19 from the issuance of a construction permit. If Kairos were to submit an 20 application for an operating license for a 10 CFR Part 50 production and 21 utilization facility, the staff would implement its NEPA process in accordance 22 with 10 CFR Part 51. The actions undertaken as part of this process would 23 update the environmental review by discussing relevant issues or topics not 24
135 included in the FEIS and any different and new significant information 1
regarding matters discussed in the FEIS. As part of the operating license 2
application, Kairos would be required to submit a supplemental environmental 3
report, and staff would independently evaluate the information provided in the 4
supplemental environmental report and would conduct its own independent 5
review to determine if any different and significant new information has 6
become available since publication of the FEIS. The staff would follow the 7
environmental review process described in 10 CFR Part 51 in preparing any 8
new NEPA documentation required and updating that documentation based 9
on public comments as received, as appropriate.
10 This concludes the Environmental Panel presentation. We 11 are prepared to respond to any questions that you may have at this time.
12 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you. Thank you to both panels for 13 your presentations. We'll begin the questions on this round with 14 Commissioner Crowell.
15 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you, Mr. Chair, and 16 thank you to the presenters. I think my first question is going to be to the 17 Kairos folks, either to Mr. Hastings or potentially Mr. Laufer as I want to talk 18 about public outreach and how questions and comments were addressed.
19 And, you know, for people who may be listening in today who aren't from the 20 area or didn't participate in those forum, can you give some examples of some 21 of the questions and concerns raised by the community and how they were 22 addressed and satisfied? And we'll start there.
23 MR. LAUFER: Sure. Thank you for the question, 24
136 Commissioner. So as Peter mentioned, starting about two years ago, we 1
started engagements specifically with the Oak Ridge community, although 2
due to pandemic restrictions, most of those initial meetings were virtual, and 3
so they were actually open to a broader network of stakeholders given that 4
opportunity for virtual engagement.
5 In each of those meetings, there was an opportunity for 6
questions to be submitted, and I believe that all questions asked in the forum 7
were addressed, and they covered a pretty wide range of topics ranging from 8
specifics of the technology, to the safety case, to kind of the future 9
development needs of Kairos. So I think there was -- basically, any question 10 was fair game for those meetings, and I was there, well, virtually to address 11 them directly.
12 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Was the nature of the 13 questions initial concern or skepticism that had to be adequately addressed, 14 or was the level of, you know, in that community where folks are a little bit 15 more familiar with this stuff better? I'm just -- and what I'm trying to get at here 16 is, you know, is this an uncontested license and maybe this outreach 17 contributed to it. I'm trying to sort that out.
18 MR. LAUFER: So I would say that I can't recall any specific 19 critical or kind of loaded questions that came from those forums. I do recall 20 questions along the lines of how can you go faster and indicating, you know, 21 significant community and local support. We did engage in a number of 22 outreach efforts specifically with mailers to all residents within a certain 23 distance of the facility, as well as outreach to specifically communities that 24
137 may not be within the network or may not be aware of nuclear activities in the 1
area. So we did have specific outreach activities to broader communities, not 2
just those who were going to be more interested in technical issues associated 3
with the lab. In Oak Ridge, there are a lot of people who are very closely 4
connected to the lab. But we did have broader outreach.
5 And then I think really the key was the mailer campaign that 6
we had for every resident within a certain distance of the facility. We've had 7
multiple mailers. Then we have virtual mailing lists that people can join to see 8
our progress and track us. But there were outreach efforts not just to the 9
community that was interested, but also to try and cover a broader set of local 10 stakeholders.
11 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you. My next 12 question, I'm not sure if it's for the applicant or for staff or maybe both, but I 13 want to delve into this outstanding 106 consultation that is happening. And I 14 think it's worth hearing a little bit more about why that process isn't complete 15 yet, whether that's a timing issue or an issue that needs attention or concern 16 and mostly, I'd like to hear why it's not premature to be having this discussion 17 and potentially a decision on this license application before that consultation 18 is complete.
19 MR. ERWIN: Thank you, Commissioner, for that question.
20 I'll take that. I think it is a question for the staff because we are the lead for 21 consultation. It's a federal responsibility, Section 106. So I'll just say the very 22 end of your question, I don't believe you're allowed to make a decision until 23 consultations are closed. We are working to try to make sure consultations 24
138 are closed. We do have an update on that. In terms of why it was appropriate 1
to support having the hearing while consultations were ongoing, so all the 2
consulting parties were working together. I think there was a lot of agreement 3
ongoing in terms of what was happening and what Kairos was proposing is a 4
very heavily industrialized site. We believe the risks of any kind of discovery 5
are very low and on top of that, the applicant has this archeological resource 6
monitoring and discovery plan. And so if you take the combination of those, 7
all the consulting parties, including the Tennessee SHPO and the tribe and 8
the applicant themselves, all were in really a good strong path towards 9
alignment where we thought it was appropriate to move forward with 10 supporting the timing of this hearing. And so I'll also ask Tammy or Peyton if 11 you have anything you want to add related to that?
12 MS. DOZIER: So, yes, I can add something. So the timing, 13 you mentioned specifically about the timing. So the scoping period, there were 14 some questions and information was provided to the consulting tribe. And --
15 but as it turned out, they did want more information, so on the DEIS comment 16 period was when we first received their request for additional information and 17 to participate in the monitoring plan, so things proceeded along. And Section 18 106 is a process and interactions back and forth take time, so -- and, you 19 know, we have a pretty aggressive schedule here, so as Ken said, it was 20 appropriate for, we believe, because of the agreement that the parties had 21 reached to conclude consultations was on a good path, and we felt that it 22 would be appropriate to proceed.
23 MR. ERWIN: Yes. I just wanted to emphasize that part, the 24
139 agreement in principle really is what helped us make that decision to move 1
forward.
2 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: And let me try and offer 3
maybe some additional clarification on that. By referring to the agreement, is 4
that to say that if the tribe that's requested consultation were here today, they 5
would agree with what has been said and that they're okay with this process 6
and status?
7 MR. ERWIN: I'm a little bit nervous speaking for a tribe, but 8
I believe, based on my interaction, and Tammy has had a lot of interaction as 9
well, that they would agree with everything I've said, yes, sir.
10 MS. DOZIER: They do understand the process. Yes, we've 11 made very sure. In fact, even got a written -- something written back from 12 them that they confirm the process. We worked with the SECY office to make 13 sure that things were explained to them appropriately.
14 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Okay. And they fully 15 understand that the Commission won't make a final decision until the 16 consultation is complete?
17 MS. DOZIER: Correct.
18 MR. ERWIN: Yes, sir.
19 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you. Switching gears 20 and again, not sure if the applicant or staff wants to field this first, but I want 21 to talk a little bit about tritium releases and how those assumptions were 22 included in the application review and how they were bounded specifically.
23 This is an issue that ACRS raised and is of interest to me. I'm still struggling 24
140 to determine whether it is more an environmental or a safety issue, and I'm 1
happy to hear any views on that. But can whoever appropriate tell me a little 2
bit more about how tritium releases were considered and bounded?
3 MR. ERWIN: So we did look at those releases as part of 4
our radioactive health section of the EIS and in order to provide a little bit more 5
information, I'd like to call on the senior staff nuclear engineer who did that 6
review. Don, if you would?
7 MR. PALMROSE: Good afternoon, Commissioner.
8 CHAIR HANSON: Can you introduce yourself?
9 MR. PALMROSE: My name is Donald Palmrose. I'm a 10 Senior Reactor Engineer, Environmental Center of Expertise, and I have been 11 sworn in as a witness.
12 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you.
13 MR. PALMROSE: Yes. I was the lead for this review on the 14 environmental side. And so we did a review in coordination --
15 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: You may need to speak in 16 the microphone so people online can hear.
17 MR. PALMROSE: All right. We did the review in 18 coordination with the safety review to ensure that what -- the information we 19 received from Kairos was bounding and conservative. In particular for the 20 tritium case, they did provide values for us, and those were used in the code 21 that is -- that the staff applies for this. It's under the package name of NRC 22 Dose and a sub program in that is called GASPAR. And so the thing to keep 23 in mind the case of this tritium is that it is being released as a gaseous form 24
141 rather than the typical form as a -- in a water molecule that we're more used 1
to from light water reactors. So if there's any particular information you want 2
as far as how the code would handle those, a gaseous form of that, I'd have 3
to take that in writing and get back to you for additional details, if that's the 4
direction of your question.
5 MR. PALMROSE: No. But say here because you may have 6
my follow-up in your wheelhouse. So did the assumptions assume that the 7
tritium management system was operating or was failed or not operating?
8 How was that?
9 MR. PALMROSE: Could you clarify that as far as the during 10 the operation of the reactor? So --
11 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: I'm told that the EIS 12 discusses that the tritium management system used to capture tritium, Section 13 39 -- 3.9.2.3 something, and do the bounding assumptions take the TMS into 14 consideration, or do they assume failure of the TMS?
15 MR. PALMROSE: The failure of the TMS system would be 16 covered under possibly the accident section, and so as I recall, that would be 17 covered under the maximum hypothetical accident. I don't think that that 18 release was the bounding case for the maximum hypothetical accident, but I'd 19 have to refer to the safety staff for that aspect of it.
20 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Okay. And I'd be happy to 21 hear from anyone on this, because my concern is that there's a lot of -- in my 22 short time on the Commission, I've noticed in different instances a lot of 23 confusion on the behalf of the public about the relative harm of tritium being 24
142 an effluent and a gas, and it can quickly, you know, get blown out of proportion, 1
but sometimes it's very much a relevant and concerning issue. So I just want 2
to make sure we're clear on this and Mr. Hastings, please, go ahead.
3 MR. HASTINGS: Yes. I think I may be able to clarify cause 4
it's a two-part answer. What Mr. Palmrose has indicated in terms of tritium as 5
an effluent is absolutely correct and that effluent stream is governed by the 6
limits on gaseous effluent in 10 CFR 20. The tritium inventory collected b the 7
tritium management system, which is not a safety-related system, is monitored 8
under tech specs to make sure that the available inventory for potential 9
release in an accident scenario is below that assumed in the MHA. So it's not 10
-- it doesn't end up as a bounding isotope in the accident release because of 11 those tech specs.
12 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you. That's helpful.
13 Appreciate it.
14 MR. ERWIN: Yes. And I just want to add, just building on 15 that point, we do -- you know, we do normal release of radiation and accident, 16 and we do very complicated dose rate analyses using very complicated 17 computer codes. And they come to the conclusion that the releases are below 18 the limits in Part 20. So I think that's very important to make sure that we have 19 on the record that we do do those analyses and that the results are below 20 where they need to be.
21 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Okay. Thank you. Mr.
22 Chair, that's all I have.
23 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Crowell, very 24
143 much. I guess the -- my first question I think is for Kairos and it's getting back 1
to the Section 106 process question. And I guess it's just do you have 2
anything you'd like to share about your experiences with NRC Section 106 3
consultation process?
4 MR. HASTINGS: Sure. So a little bit of background may be 5
useful as well. As a result of deed restrictions put in place by the Department 6
of Energy associated with the turnover of this property to private industrial 7
development, we were always obligated to have a monitoring program in the 8
unlikely event of discovery of artifacts. So the good news is when the tribe 9
raised the question, that plan was already under development. The tribe 10 asked some questions about the details about how we developed the input to 11 that plan, and we found that the survey that was requested by the tribe largely 12 substantiated our plan, did add some details, added some details that were 13 helpful.
14 And to the question that Commissioner Crowell asked, from 15 our perspective, it was almost exclusively a matter of timing, not some 16 contention. We found ourselves in good agreement, but it took time to develop 17 the details because it was a government-to-government consultation. The 18 tribe requested anonymity and we fully respect that request and have honored 19 it. And so it's a little bit clunky to communicate back and forth just because of 20 the time frames involved. But overall, we're pleased with the outcome. We're 21 happy that we think we have been able to accommodate the tribe's request 22 and address their questions, and we look forward to closure of the 23 consultation.
24
144 CHAIR HANSON: Great. Thank you very much, really 1
appreciate it. This question is for the staff, I think. So for the environmental 2
justice analysis, Kairos used a five-mile radius for identifying environmental 3
just communities and concluded there were no minority populations to be 4
considered as environmental justice communities within that radius. The staff 5
did not agree with that five-mile radius, instead going back to the Clinch River 6
EIS, which included a 50-mile radius. But then -- and apparently, that's what 7
was used in LIC-203, which I assume is the early site permit for Clinch River.
8 But ultimately, the staff then concluded that there were no 9
environmental justice communities or no environmental justice impacts in part 10 because the closest potential environmental justice community was eight 11 miles away, which is only, by my calculations, only slightly farther than the five 12 miles maybe than Kairos considered. So can you talk a little bit about that 13 process and that decision and if, for example, what if there were not kind of a 14 recently prepared EIS in this case, right? With the Clinch River sitting out 15 there, you could refer to it, etcetera, that analysis had been done. If that hadn't 16 been done with the 50-mile radius, would five have been sufficient, or would 17 the staff have advocated for some other kind of radius in that case?
18 MR. ERWIN: So thank you for the question. That's a very 19 good question. I'll start off. So I was actually part of the Clinch River ESP 20 environmental justice analysis. It was extremely comprehensive. You know, 21 we started off at the census level. We drilled down into these various levels, 22 regional and then local levels, and you do your analysis. And then we 23 supplemented that by actually going out to the site for a week, and I actually 24
145 went out with the reviewer, and we drove around to all kinds of various 1
locations that we had -- that the reviewer had looked up ahead of time, you 2
know, religious leaders, local leaders, chamber of commerce, and we really 3
did that boots on the ground review. And we put all that in the Clinch River 4
ESP, and that was fairly recent. That was 2019.
5 So when we got this review, you know, we wanted to use 6
our best practices and incorporating by reference as much as we could, and 7
that was really one of the best things we had available and had just fairly 8
recently been done. So the reviewer updated his review based on the 9
conclusions he had made, and we ended up incorporating that into the Kairos 10 review. And I guess, I don't know, Peyton, if you want to add anything to that?
11 MR. DOUB: Yes. I'll just that another factor in the small 12 conclusion for socioeconomics and environmental justice was the small size 13 of the project. So that combined with the fact that there was an eight-mile 14 distance between the nearest EJ-recognized community jointly provided a 15 way to evidence support for our small conclusion and that socioeconomics 16 and environmental justice were not driving factors in our overall 17 recommendation among the alternatives.
18 CHAIR HANSON: I think that makes sense, Peyton. I'm 19 glad you brought up the small size of the project; right? I mean the --
20 MR. ERWIN: Right.
21 CHAIR HANSON: -- Clinch River project was a large, at 22 least one or more large light water reactor units you're talking about, the 50-23 mile thing being in a jet stream pathway zone, etcetera; right? There are 24
146 connections there. But in a way, though, it was a small project. It was 1
reasonably low-risk in terms of offsite release or impacts to environmental 2
justice communities. Kairos proposed a five-mile radius. You said, no, we've 3
got this thing that looks at 50, but kind of in the end, five miles, it sounds to 4
me like was about right in terms of the size and scale of the project and the 5
impacts. Is that fair? Am I stretching there?
6 MR. ERWIN: I think that's fair. You know, incorporating by 7
reference a big 50-mile analysis is one thing, but you do need to look at the 8
individual project --
9 CHAIR HANSON: Yes.
10 MR. ERWIN: -- itself. So I think that's important, yes.
11 CHAIR HANSON: It is a big balance.
12 MR. ERWIN: Yes. It's a big balance, yes.
13 CHAIR HANSON: Okay. All right. Great. Just with the 14 remaining time I have, I'm really interested in this idea of -- you know, we 15 talked a little bit about the Clinch River EIS obviously being a really key source 16 of input and how that may have helped streamline the overall EIS that you all 17 did. But the other part of this is that it's a brownfield and, of course, you know, 18 there's a lot of interest in turning brownfields, whether they're former coal 19 plants or other industrial sites, into nuclear sites. And I guess I'm interested 20 to hear from both Kairos and the staff to what extent was the fact that this was 21 a brownfield, did it make the environmental analysis easier or harder or a little 22 bit of both or what have you?
23 MR. ERWIN: I guess I'll start and then, you know, Tammy 24
147 and Peyton and then Kairos can add. I think the fact that it was a brownfield, 1
we -- I mean we still followed the NEPA process, and we still completed that 2
process, and we still made our findings, and we still ensured that the NRC's 3
NEPA obligations were met. I do think we -- the reason I'm hesitating a little 4
bit is because we had a big transformation effort in the middle of that, and so 5
we realized a lot of efficiencies there as well. But I do think the fact that it was 6
a brownfield process -- a brownfield site made the process easier and more 7
efficient, yes.
8 CHAIR HANSON: Okay.
9 MS. DOZIER: Yes. I would add that maybe in the Section 10 106, it wasn't so much about the brownfield site. It was just the lack of the --
11 back in the 1940's, for instance, there was not a lot of records about how deep 12 some of the previous disturbance was. And so that might have been -- and 13 Kairos can probably add to this. That might have -- you know, there was a 14 little bit more work to just -- which the report definitely has.
15 MR. ERWIN: Yes. That's a good point.
16 MS. DOZIER: Yes.
17 MR. DOUB: I would additionally add that the fact that it was 18 a brownfield definitely contributed greatly to our ability to conclude small 19 impacts. However, the analysis itself still requires a certain amount of 20 procedure. So the fact that we achieved streamlining in the EIS was not just 21 because of the brownfield site, but because of efforts that we consciously took 22 to develop a new outline that reduced redundance, summarization, and used 23 more incorporation by reference for descriptive material and established page 24
148 targets for the authors before starting. So it's more those efforts that allowed 1
us to achieve the page count than just the fact that the project's on a 2
brownfield.
3 CHAIR HANSON: Fair enough. Mr. Hastings?
4 MR. HASTINGS: So I would agree with Peyton's 5
conclusions certainly. It also depends, depending on the brownfield site. If 6
it's a legacy site with a lot of contamination, that makes baselining potentially 7
harder. It can make mitigating actions more difficult. But on balance, I think 8
you're going to find that brownfield sites are easier for data collection, certainly 9
if they have existing data, particularly on our site where we have lots of existing 10 data that we were able to take advantage of. And maybe more importantly, 11 looking forward to other brownfield sites such as coal conversion, for example, 12 the existence of infrastructure that can be repurposed is really important and 13 also not only makes it easier to develop the site, but also makes that 14 component of the potential adverse impact much, much easier.
15 CHAIR HANSON: Great. Thank you very much.
16 Commissioner Wright.
17 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you, Chair. I'm going 18 to kind of drill a little bit further, too, on this cause I had almost an identical 19 question so.
20 CHAIR HANSON: Great minds.
21 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: I know. The -- so this is for 22 staff. To follow-up a little but in a different -- maybe a different kind of direction.
23 When you were looking -- completing the review, were there specific resource 24
149 areas that you can identify maybe that because it was a previously used site, 1
it had fewer impacts than you would have expected otherwise?
2 MR. DOUB: Definitely land-based resources such as land 3
use, ecology, and to a certain extent cultural resources, although as we found 4
with cultural resources, we had to move from a two-dimensional mind set to a 5
three-dimensional mind set to examine the potential for significant resources 6
deep in the soil column, which we did. And if you want more details on that, I 7
will refer you to Tammy.
8 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Sure.
9 MR. ERWIN: Yes. And just to add, you know, they're not 10 clearing large swaths of land. They're not clearing wetlands. There's already 11 a T-line, right. They not running a big T-line and cutting down a bunch of forest 12 that's going to impact, you know, Endangered Species Act analysis.
13 MS. DOZIER: Right. I would add that, yes, just this previous 14 disturbed site is, actually the project itself had few environmental interfaces.
15 And so that was a significant help to speed things along.
16 MR. DOUB: Plus, it had existing infrastructure for an 17 established industrial park, so there wasn't a question of building a lot of 18 access roads and new transmission lines and things like that.
19 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: So I guess in a way, each one 20 of these brownfield sites stands kind of on its own, right, could -- they're not 21 all going to be the same, that's for sure.
22 MR. ERWIN: Every site's specific, yes. Every site is site-23 specific and there could be other things you need to take into account at 24
150 different sites, right, so we're aware of other sites where there may be, you 1
know, coal ash or local, you know, barracks nearby, for example, right, so.
2 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: So from a lessons learned 3
standpoint, if we -- if you -- things that you've identified and we're looking 4
forward in this whole environmental review process, how do you -- I guess 5
how do you strike the balance right now between engagement in this process 6
with the urgency that we're hearing to get some of these things done?
7 MR. ERWIN: Well, I look to the NRC's mission, right, and 8
so we protect the public health and safety, the common defense and security 9
and the environment, and it's right there in the environment. You know, it's 10 right there in the mission.
11 And we also have NEPA, which is a federal responsibility on 12 this agency and on the staff, and so we will follow that process as much as we 13 need to, to make our conclusions and document our findings and ensure the 14 NRC's NEPA obligations are covered. And we'll use all the best practices we 15 have. We'll use all the previous experience. We'll use project management, 16 professional best practices, and we'll do all that.
17 But at the end of the day, we are not going to recommend 18 moving forward unless we are sure that we've completed the NEPA process 19 in the manner that it needs to be completed.
20 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: It's nice to get that on the 21 record. Yes. So thank you. And I have one last question. So recently, you 22 know, we have some new requirements have come out of the Fiscal 23 Responsibility Act and specifically Section 102 of NEPA. One of those 24
151 changes has been an updated requirement to look at irreversible and 1
irretrievable commitments of federal resources which would be involved if 2
agency action is required. Can you talk more a little bit about that, and did 3
staff consider the expenditure of federal resources?
4 MR. ERWIN: So I'll start real quick and then Peyton can 5
add on to this one. So yes, we did. You know, Fiscal Responsibility Act came, 6
I think it was in June, and it didn't have any kind of implementation period, so 7
it was immediately required for the staff to take that into account in its FEIS. I 8
think we did that successfully, and I believe we met all of the requirements of 9
the Fiscal Responsibility Act and, you know, we relate it to the irretrievable 10 commitment of federal resources. I think, Peyton, you can.
11 MR. DOUB: Yes. It's not so much that the Fiscal 12 Responsibility Act added additional requirements. It's that it said from this 13 point on, you can focus your analysis of irreversible and irretrievable resources 14 on federal resources. Now we looked at the totality of resources, including 15 but not limited to federal resources. So our coverage was more than 16 adequate.
17 MR. ERWIN: Yes. And I guess the one thing I'll add is, you 18 know, I think even CEQ is still looking at the impacts of that law. We are very 19 engaged across the federal government with CEQ and all the FAST-41.
20 Everything the environmental federal team is doing, we are very heavily 21 involved and we are looking at them and working with our partners in OGC to 22 make sure we understand fully all the requirements of FRA going forward.
23 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Okay. Thank you so much.
24
152 Thank you.
1 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Wright.
2 Commissioner Caputo?
3 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Thank you for these 4
presentations. One advantage and one of the challenges of going last is most 5
of the questions have been asked by my colleagues, so the fact that I'm 6
running out of questions really speaks to the work the staff did in documenting 7
its thorough and complete review of the application, so thank you for that.
8 I also want to commend the staff on its approaches for 9
streamlining the Environmental Impact Statement. The result of this approach 10 is a much more concise and focused Environmental Impact Statement. I 11 would also like to note that one of the many less-often recognized or 12 articulated benefits of this effort is that executing the review efficiently and 13 timely allows those staff resources to be redeployed elsewhere, which is 14 incredibly important, given the current workload facing our environmental staff.
15 So Ken, I'm going to follow on the Chairman's question 16 about environmental justice communities. I applaud your initiative for literally 17 going out and cruising around, and I think that's really creative and I commend 18 you for that. As an additional resource, though, I'm curious. I believe there 19 are efforts within DOE to map environmental justice communities, and I 20 believe there's even an effort going on or one that has been done at the 21 National Reactor Innovation Center out at Idaho National Lab. Did the staff 22 consult any of those resources?
23 MR. ERWIN: So we are -- we have a lot of resources for all 24
153 areas of our reviews, actually. I am aware that there are various global 1
information systems from different agencies. There's the census. There's 2
DOE. I know NREC has done a lot of work to try and put things together, and 3
we do use all those resources, you know, appropriately during our review.
4 Specifically, if you want to know if we specifically used a particular system 5
from DOE, I would take that one to get back to you in writing on that one.
6 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: No. I don't need a specific 7
answer.
8 MR. ERWIN: Okay.
9 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: I just -- I know that these 10 efforts are, you know, recent in the last --
11 MR. ERWIN: Yes.
12 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: -- couple years. In an effort to 13 be efficient and not reinvent the wheel, I'm hoping that some of those 14 resources are useful to our staff --
15 MR. ERWIN: Right.
16 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: -- and, you know, make their 17 job a little easier perhaps in identifying environmental justice communities.
18 MR. ERWIN: Absolutely. They are very useful and we stay 19 abreast of that through, you know, venues like CEQ. There's quarterly federal 20 NEPA awareness meetings, and there's also FIPSE and all the stuff around 21 FAST-41 that brings everyone together to share information and best 22 practices and tools that are available to use for some of these NEPA resource 23 reviews. Thank you.
24
154 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: All right. So you talked about 1
a streamlined approach in the EIS and some of the best practices that the staff 2
realized using this approach. Could you just describe a little bit more detail on 3
how you think what you've accomplished here could be carried forward in the 4
future reviews?
5 MR. ERWIN: Yes, absolutely. So one of the biggest things, 6
I think, is using the core team. I think that's a huge gain and, you know, my 7
counterpart, Mr. Jessup, talked about that this morning. I think we're already 8
doing that. We're using a very similar group of folks for the Kairos 2 application 9
and then, you know, we have a lot of -- like we basically revised the whole 10 template. I mean I brought the -- the document's like a half an inch thick; right?
11 These used to be, you know, half -- you know, it used to be a foot tall. And so 12 I think that was a big deal, getting the -- get the table of contents revised, 13 getting the focused -- get the writing focused on impacts that matter. I think -
14
- you know, they talked about it this morning. The audit process has really 15 helped us a lot bring the technical reviewer with a technical counterpart from 16 the applicant. I think those are the big three from my perspective. I don't 17 know, Tammy has a lot of great experience and.
18 MS. DOZIER: Right. So you basically mentioned it, that the 19 processes we used to make the audit more efficient is definite -- we're 20 definitely getting more practice on that. We've been doing it a while, but we're 21 getting better at it. And so together with the NRR safety people as well, we're 22
-- I think that is definitely helping us.
23 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Well, more practice is likely on 24
155 the way.
1 MR. ERWIN: We're well aware of -- yes, trust me.
2 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: In that vein, Mr. Hastings, I'd 3
like to highlight a comment you made on the draft EIS stating your commitment 4
to working with the industry and the staff to help identify efficiencies in the 5
review process both on the applicant side and on the regulator side, so I thank 6
you for that. If there are any efficiencies you'd like to describe today, I'd like 7
to give you an opportunity to do so.
8 MR. HASTINGS: Thanks for the opportunity. I think we've 9
discussed most of what I would offer in terms of lessons learned from this 10 process. The one sort of -- without any diminishment of the importance of the 11 106 process, it is unfortunate that it took the time that it took. It's nobody's 12 fault but it does mask the performance on the environmental review more 13 broadly, which was very efficient and very timely, and we appreciate that.
14 I think just to re-highlight the audit process both on the 15 safety side and the environmental side has been spectacularly successful, so 16 I would encourage the continued use of that. And we look forward to 17 identifying other opportunities for future applications as well.
18 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Okay, thank you.
19 I'd like to close my comments today by stating my 20 agreement with Commissioner Crowell that today's type of hearing may be 21 useful in situations where the Commission and the agency is conducting a first 22 of a kind review or a novel technology. That is why I believe the decision 23 whether to conduct such a hearing should really rest with the Commission 24
156 rather than continue as a legally mandated requirement.
1 While that would require a legislative change, I believe 2
Commission discretion on the issue would be beneficial. In 2007, an NRC 3
task force recommended and the Commission agreed, that the Commission 4
request legislative authority from Congress to eliminate the statutory 5
requirement for uncontested hearings. Reasons for that recommendation 6
included that the goals of the mandatory hearing requirement are being met 7
in a variety of other ways, such as Government in the Sunshine Act, the 8
Freedom of Information Act, and the Federal Advisory Committee Act.
9 Additionally, when the NRC was established in 1974, it was 10 not given the promotional responsibilities that had previously been held by the 11 Atomic Energy Commission. External stakeholders are estimating the 12 development of significant numbers of reactors over the next couple decades.
13 Given Congresss bipartisan focus on the agency's ability to officially manage 14 forthcoming reviews, this would be an opportune time for the Commission to, 15 again request that Congress either eliminate the requirement or provide the 16 Commission with discretion in an effort to streamline our reviews.
17 With that, I conclude my questions. Thank you, Mr.
18 Chairman.
19 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Caputo, for 20 your questions and your remarks. We have on the schedule now a ten minute 21 break. We'll reconvene here at about 2:27 for the closing remarks and the 22 wrap up of this hearing. Thank you all.
23 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record 24
157 at 2:18 p.m. and resumed at 2:29 p.m.)
1 CHAIR HANSON: All right, it is now time for closing 2
statements. I'd like to offer each party the opportunity to make a closing 3
statement, beginning with Kairos.
4 MR. LAUFER: Very good. Thank you, Chair Hanson, and 5
thank you, Commissioners, for the opportunity to provide closing remarks on 6
behalf of Kairos Power and for the very thoughtful discussion and questions 7
today.
8 I would like to start by thanking the NRC staff for their 9
diligent review. Frequent open communication between the NRC and Kairos 10 has ensured that the review remained on schedule and focused on application 11 content most closely tied with the safety and environmental effects of Hermes.
12 I do hope that we can take these lessons and I'm confident 13 from the discussions today that we will be able to inform future reviews and 14 carry them forward to improve the process based on this experience today.
15 We believe that the staff's review of the construction permit 16 application for Hermes was thorough and sufficient to make findings required 17 in their safety -- Final Safety Evaluation Report and their Final Environmental 18 Impact Statement. We agree with the staff's conclusion that the FSER and 19 the FEIS that the Commission should issue the construction permit for 20 Hermes.
21 If the Commission identifies any post-hearing questions, we 22 will respond promptly as we have to any inbound requests from the NRC. We 23 request that the Commission take the matter to vote shortly after any 24
158 remaining responses are provided and the National Historic Preservation Act 1
Section 106 consultations are closed. We do think there's an opportunity for 2
closing of a highly efficient review process here and are in the home stretch.
3 We do also want to recognize the many local stakeholders 4
and thank them for their support. We want to extend our deepest thanks to 5
the local community of Oak Ridge for welcoming Kairos Power to their 6
community. We do value deeply our relationships with our neighbors and seek 7
to be a good community partner that brings value to the region.
8 It is an honor for us to follow the historical legacy of nuclear 9
development in Oak Ridge as we leverage proven technologies with historical 10 roots in that location, as well as other locations in the country. But to a large 11 degree, we do feel there's a natural historic continuation from the original days 12 of the Secret City to the effort that Kairos is continuing in Oak Ridge today.
13 Again, I would like to thank the Commission for the 14 opportunity to present on behalf of Kairos today. And I look forward to your 15 decision on the construction permit for the Hermes reactor. Thank you.
16 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you very much, Mr. Laufer. I'll 17 invite Rob Taylor from the staff to give his closing statement.
18 MR. TAYLOR: Thank you, Chair and Commissioners.
19 Today's discussion is rightfully focused on safety and 20 efficiency as we execute our responsibility to license the safe use of nuclear 21 technologies. In that theme, I'll try to keep my remarks brief.
22 The staff review of the Hermes construction permit 23 application supports the NRC's efforts to enable safe use of advanced non-24
159 light water reactors. The Hermes review presented a number of unique 1
technical and licensing considerations for the staff. The timely completion of 2
this review required the expertise, cooperation, and dedication of staff 3
throughout the agency and a constructive and active engagement from the 4
applicant.
5 Based on its evaluation of the Hermes preliminary design, 6
the staff found that there is reasonable assurance that the final design will 7
conform to the design bases with adequate margin of safety to prevent or 8
mitigate potential accidents and protect the health and safety of the public and 9
workers. The objective of the staff evaluation was to assess the sufficiency of 10 information contained in the Hermes application for the issuance of a 11 construction permit. As such, the staff evaluation of the preliminary design 12 and analysis of the proposed Hermes test reactor facility does not constitute 13 approval of the safety of any design feature or specification. Such approval 14 would be made following the evaluation of the final design of the facility as 15 described in the final safety analysis report as part of the Hermes operating 16 license application.
17 The staff also considered the potential environmental 18 impacts of the proposed facility in accordance with the National Environmental 19 Policy Act. Based on the findings of the staff review, as documented in the 20 Safety Evaluation Report and Final Environmental Impact Statement, and in 21 accordance with the 10 CFR Parts 50 and 51, the staff concludes that there is 22 sufficient information for the Commission to issue the subject Part 50 23 construction permit, with certain conditions to Kairos Power for the Hermes 24
160 test reactor once the Section 106 consultation process is completed. On 1
behalf of the staff, this concludes our prepared remarks for today.
2 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you very much, Rob, I appreciate 3
that very much. Before we proceed to the Commissioner's closing remarks, I 4
would ask my fellow Commissioners whether they have any further questions 5
associated with the parties' closing statements or otherwise?
6 Commissioner Wright?
7 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: No.
8 CHAIR HANSON: Commissioner Caputo? I'm sorry, you 9
broke up just a second there.
10 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: No, thank you.
11 CHAIR HANSON: Okay, thank you.
12 Commissioner Crowell?
13 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: No.
14 CHAIR HANSON: Okay, very good. We will now proceed 15 with closing statements, starting with Commissioner Wright.
16 COMMISSIONER WRIGHT: Thank you, Chair. So, first, I'd 17 like to thank everybody, NRC staff, Kairos, and everyone who had anything to 18 do with putting this hearing together. It was a heavy lift, but it was very, very, 19 very well done, very well put together, very well presented.
20 With this application, we had the opportunity to be 21 innovative, to be risk informed, and demonstrate excellence, and I think we 22 achieved that. This was all built on a sturdy foundation of openness and 23 collaboration as well.
24
161 It can't be overstated how significant the pre-application 1
engagements are, especially demonstrating it here for everyone coming in 2
after. They've helped produce a submittal that was clear. It's concise. And 3
it's complete. You know? And while there were some very focused questions 4
that were asked, Kairos responded very quickly and in a very timely way as 5
well. So, we thank you for that.
6 You know, this was an outstanding demonstration of our 7
ability, our staff's ability to move faster than they've ever moved before, more, 8
you know, it appears without sacrificing anything. Didn't sacrifice quality or 9
depth of our safety and environmental reviews. Reasonable assurance of 10 adequate protection is our standard. It's our mandate. And to work in a 11 baseball reference, it's our strike zone over home plate. And I think we met 12 the mark here.
13 We're anticipating this to be the first of many new 14 applications for advanced reactors. So, it was crucial that our review process 15 be agile and reliable. And I think that's been proven out by everyone who has 16 been presenting today.
17 So, again, thank you for your hard. I thank the NRC staff for 18 their hard work. And thank Kairos for their diligent work as well and to getting 19 us to the point that we are today.
20 It's an exciting time to be at the NRC and doing the kind of 21 work that we're doing. So, you all thoroughly prepared today and it shows and 22 it's appreciated. So, thank you very much.
23 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Wright.
24
162 Commissioner Caputo?
1 COMMISSIONER CAPUTO: Well, let me just associate 2
myself with Commissioner Wright's remarks. He pretty much said everything 3
that I was going to say.
4 Because our focus on this hearing is on a construction 5
permit application and the staff conducted such a detailed and thorough 6
review and documented it so well, and in addition to the preparation today and 7
the statements today, I really had few questions. And most of the ones that I 8
did have were focused on potential process improvements and lessons 9
learned rather than the application itself because of their thorough and diligent 10 effort.
11 And I think that really speaks to the nature of the quality of 12 the work done here and the high level of performance. And I do think that this 13 stands as an example going forward of the work that the staff can achieve in 14 handling a first of a kind technology. So, I commend the staff for their hard 15 work and for Kairos being diligent and responsive as an applicant. Thank you 16 for all you've achieved.
17 Mr. Chairman?
18 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Caputo.
19 Commissioner Crowell?
20 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
21 I've been on the Commission just over a year now and this 22 is my first hearing for a construction application. And it's been enlightening on 23 a number of fronts.
24
163 I want to express my appreciation to the staff. This is a 1
notable occasion for you all in addressing critics on all sides, be it that we 2
move too slow or that we don't adequately protect safety. You have addressed 3
all those things admirably today. And if anyone who was watching today didn't 4
take that from the hearing itself, I would say, well, I'll point you back to the 5
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards and their view of this proposal 6
and recommendation to approve. So, I think it's an important turning point 7
today.
8 Mr. Laufer, I was thinking about the historical arc or narrative 9
of the proposed location for your test reactor at Oak Ridge. And, you know, it 10 is, you know, Oak Ridge being the -- one of the main birth places of the 11 Manhattan Project and the advent of nuclear weapons and that you are going 12 to be first mover on using nuclear technologies to make the world a better 13 place in terms of clean energy and addressing climate change is very notable 14 in terms of these -- of the technology in Oak Ridge.
15 So, I just want to say, thanks for indulging my questions 16 today. This is the right way to do things. And I hope it is the first of many. So, 17 thank you, Mr. Chair.
18 CHAIR HANSON: Thank you, Commissioner Crowell.
19 Don't worry, this is my first mandatory hearing, too.
20 (Laughter.)
21 COMMISSIONER CROWELL: You guys made it sound like 22 these things happen all the time and they're annoying.
23 CHAIR HANSON: No, that's in part what's remarkable 24
164 about this is that they don't happen all the time. And look, it's a great pleasure 1
for me to echo and associate myself with the sentiments and, certainly, the 2
statements of my colleagues.
3 I want to express my thanks, again, for Kairos joining us 4
today, providing an overview of their technology, answering our questions, 5
giving us insight on their journey towards commercial application, and 6
providing feedback that we can continue to learn from.
7 You know, one of the things I'm most proud of being here at 8
the NRC is thinking about the tremendous amount of learning and 9
improvement that's happened on the part of the staff, not just in the last couple 10 of years, certainly, on this Kairos project. But if you go back and even think 11 about the last 10 or 15 years and all the things we've done, we talked about 12 all the COLs and ESPs that we issued, you know, NuScale, all of these other 13 things, and you know, I think a point of pride for me is, at every point, we've 14 taken a step back and said, what can we learn from this? How can we do this 15 better?
16 I think we're seeing some of the fruits of that on the Kairos 17 review today. I think we're going to continue to see that. And let me just say, 18 you know, I look forward to engaging with my colleagues to think about how 19 the Commission can, you know, execute our responsibilities with mandatory 20 hearings in a way that balances the public's interest and need for information, 21 but also in a way that is more efficient and it doesn't unnecessarily burden the 22 staff or applicants. And so, I look forward to joining them.
23 On this specific review, you know, although I think someone 24
165
-- one of my colleagues said earlier, although only for a construction permit, 1
right, at this juncture, the review really encompassed multiple complex and 2
novel considerations. Our staff has, once again, demonstrated that they are 3
not only incredibly knowledgeable, adaptable, and committed to our health 4
and safety mission, but up to the challenge of reviewing an application which 5
includes several innovative features. Again, I'm incredibly proud to be a part 6
of this agency and I'm grateful to the staff for their dedication.
7 In closing, and for the information of the parties, we're 8
getting back to the administrative stuff here, the deadline for responses to any 9
post-hearing questions will be November 2, 2023. Unless the Commission 10 directs otherwise, the Secretary plans to issue an order with post-hearing 11 questions, if any, by October 26th. The deadline for transcript corrections will 12 be October 31, 2023, noting that we already have a correction due to the 13 record, thank you, Mr. Hastings. The Secretary plans to issue an order 14 requesting proposed transcript corrections by October 24th.
15 As I mentioned this morning, the Commission expects to 16 issue a final decision promptly with due regard to the complexity of the issues.
17 This hearing is adjourned.
18 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record 19 at 2:42 p.m.)
20
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION In the Matter of
)
)
KAIROS POWER, LLC
)
Docket No. 50-7513-CP
)
(Hermes Test Reactor)
)
)
(Mandatory Hearing)
)
CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that copies of the foregoing ORDER (Setting Deadline for Proposed Transcript Corrections) have been served upon the following persons by Electronic Information Exchange.
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Office of Commission Appellate Adjudication Mail Stop: O-16B33 Washington, DC 20555-0001 E-mail: ocaamail.resource@nrc.gov U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Office of the Secretary of the Commission Mail Stop: O-16B33 Washington, DC 20555-0001 E-mail: hearingdocket@nrc.gov U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Office of the General Counsel Mail Stop - O-14A44 Washington, DC 20555-0001 Anita Ghosh-Naber David Roth Susan Vrahoretis Jeremy Wachutka Georgiann Hampton Brian Newell E-mail: anita.ghoshnaber@nrc.gov david.roth@nrc.gov susan.vrahoretis@nrc.gov jeremy.wachutka@nrc.gov georgiann.hampton@nrc.gov brian.newell@nrc.gov Counsel for Kairos Power, LLC Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, LLC 1111 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington, DC 20004 Ryan Lighty Alex Polonsky E-mail: ryan.lighty@morganlewis.com alex.polonsky@morganlewis.com Office of the Secretary of the Commission Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 24th day of October 2023 Clara I.
Sola Digitally signed by Clara I. Sola Date: 2023.10.24 17:17:21 -04'00'