Sent: Friday, March 18, 2011 4:46 PM
To: See, Kenneth; Nicholson, Thomas; Dion, Jeanne; Cook, Christopher
Cc: Randall, John; Ott, William; Chokshi, Nilesh; Raione, Richard
Subject: RE: Revision to PMP Narrative

A reasonable question that an observer of the tsunami in Japan might have goes something like this: I observed the tremendous amount of debris being carried along with the water. Are NPPs in the US sufficiently protected from flood-associated debris flow?

Joe

From: See, Kenneth
Sent: Friday, March 18, 2011 4:34 PM
To: Kanney, Joseph; Nicholson, Thomas; Dion, Jeanne; Cook, Christopher
Cc: Randall, John; Ott, William; Chokshi, Nilesh; Raione, Richard
Subject: RE: Revision to PMP Narrative

I agree. I think the term “most” of the existing plants were designed for the PMP/PMF is applicable, but not all.

Ken

I think perhaps we are getting carried away with our focus on PMP. PMP is only one part of the flooding analysis and probably the not weakest link. Recall that the design basis floods for many of the existing plants were determined from area-discharge envelope curves, not from an analysis that routed the PMP through the basin and down to the site. I’m more comfortable with the level of conservatism in PMP than I am with the level of conservatism in the envelope curve approach.

— Joe

Joseph Kanney, Ph.D.
Hydrogeologist
Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Mail Stop CSB-2A07M
11555 Rockville Pike
Rockville, MD 20852-2738
ioseph.kanney@ nrc.gov
Phone: 301-251-7600
Fax: 301-251-7422

Related articles

• March 11th, 2011 – Preliminary unconfirmed confidential information regarding Fukushima Daiichi (enformable.com)
• March 18th, 2011 – National Weather Service Reports used to estimate precipitation are 30-40 years old (enformable.com)
• March 11th, 2011 – If units 1, 2 and 3 have all lost emergency diesel generators, it would seem that this is more than coincidence (enformable.com)
• March 16th, 2011 – NRC internally frustrated by lack of better response to ‘biased (MSNBC) report’ (enformable.com)

• Tags: Fukushima Daiichi, March 2011, Nuclear Regulatory Commission