The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is allowing Holtec International to delay conducting a mandatory force-on-force security exercise at the retired Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The federal regulator issued the exemption on June 18. The document was posted Friday to the agency’s website.
Nuclear licensees for months have received expedited NRC consideration of regulatory exemptions intended to ensure they can sustain operations during the federal public health emergency declared in January without putting their personnel at greater risk of infection by novel coronavirus 2019.
Federal regulations on physical protections for nuclear plants and materials require licensees to conduct quarterly tactical response drills and annual force-on-force exercises. In its request for a regulatory exemption, Holtec said it could conduct the quarterly events, but not the force-on-force exercise in which a security team must fight off a mock attack on a facility.
“Quarterly training is able to be conducted since it is done in small groups pulling select individuals off shift and training in accordance with our social distancing policies,” Andrea Sterdis, vice president for regulatory and environmental affairs for Holtec Decommissioning International, wrote in a June 11 supplement to the company’s June 5 application. “This allows us to complete the requirement for a tactical response drill on a quarterly basis. Annual training requires a full force-on-force exercise that cannot be conducted under current social distancing policies.”
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission determined the exemption would not violate federal law; would not breach life, property, or the common defense; and serves the public interest, Patricia Holahan, director of the agency’s Division of Decommissioning, Uranium Recovery. and Waste Programs, wrote in the June 18 letter to Sterdis. The exemption is good for 90 days past the expiration of the COVID-19 public health emergency or Dec. 31, 2020, whichever comes first.
This is just the second regulatory exemption for a nuclear facility in decommissioning. Holtec received the first in May for its Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in New Jersey, giving the company a break on both force-on-force exercises and tactical drills.
