80 FR 53585 - Reassessment of NRC's Dollar Per Person-Rem Conversion Factor Policy

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Federal Register Volume 80, Issue 172 (September 4, 2015)

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for public comment draft NUREG-1530, ``Reassessment of NRC's Dollar Per Person-Rem Conversion Factor Policy, Revision 1.'' This proposed revision to NUREG-1530 would revise the dollar per person-rem conversion factor. The NRC uses the dollar per person-rem conversion factor in cost-benefit analyses to determine the monetary valuation of the consequences associated with radiological exposure and establishes this factor by multiplying a value of a statistical life (VSL) coefficient by a nominal risk coefficient.

[Federal Register Volume 80, Number 172 (Friday, September 4, 2015)]
[Notices]
[Pages 53585-53586]
From the Federal Register Online  [www.thefederalregister.org]
[FR Doc No: 2015-22050]



[[Page 53585]]

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

[NRC-2015-0063]


Reassessment of NRC's Dollar Per Person-Rem Conversion Factor 
Policy

AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

ACTION: Draft NUREG; request for comment.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for 
public comment draft NUREG-1530, ``Reassessment of NRC's Dollar Per 
Person-Rem Conversion Factor Policy, Revision 1.'' This proposed 
revision to NUREG-1530 would revise the dollar per person-rem 
conversion factor. The NRC uses the dollar per person-rem conversion 
factor in cost-benefit analyses to determine the monetary valuation of 
the consequences associated with radiological exposure and establishes 
this factor by multiplying a value of a statistical life (VSL) 
coefficient by a nominal risk coefficient.

DATES: Submit comments by November 3, 2015. Comments received after 
this date will be considered if it is practical to do so, but the 
Commission is able to ensure consideration only for comments received 
on or before this date.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments by any of the following methods:
     Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2015-0063. Address 
questions about NRC dockets to Carol Gallagher; telephone: 301-415-
3463; email: [email protected]. For technical questions, contact 
the individual listed in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section of 
this document.
     Mail comments to: Cindy K. Bladey, Office of 
Administration, Mail Stop: OWFN-12-H08, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001.
    For additional direction on obtaining information and submitting 
comments, see ``Obtaining Information and Submitting Comments'' in the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Alysia Bone, Office of Nuclear Reactor 
Regulation, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-
0001; telephone: 301-415-1034, email: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

I. Obtaining Information and Submitting Comments

A. Obtaining Information

    Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2015-0063 when contacting the NRC 
about the availability of information for this action. You may obtain 
publicly-available information related to this action by any of the 
following methods:
     Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2015-0063.
     NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System 
(ADAMS): You may obtain publicly-available documents online in the 
ADAMS Public Documents collection at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. To begin the search, select ``ADAMS Public Documents'' and 
then select ``Begin Web-based ADAMS Search.'' For problems with ADAMS, 
please contact the NRC's Public Document Room (PDR) reference staff at 
1-800-397-4209, 301-415-4737, or by email to [email protected]. The 
draft NUREG-1530, Revision 1, ``Reassessment of NRC's Dollar per 
Person-Rem Conversion Factor Policy'' is available in ADAMS under 
Accession No. ML15237A211.
     NRC's PDR: You may examine and purchase copies of public 
documents at the NRC's PDR, Room O1-F21, One White Flint North, 11555 
Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852.

B. Submitting Comments

    Please include Docket ID NRC-2015-0063 in the subject line of your 
comment submission, in order to ensure that the NRC is able to make 
your comment submission available to the public in this docket.
    The NRC cautions you not to include identifying or contact 
information that you do not want to be publicly disclosed in your 
comment submission. The NRC posts all comment submissions at http://www.regulations.gov as well as entering the comment submissions into 
ADAMS. The NRC does not routinely edit comment submissions to remove 
identifying or contact information.
    If you are requesting or aggregating comments from other persons 
for submission to the NRC, then you should inform those persons not to 
include identifying or contact information that they do not want to be 
publicly disclosed in their comment submission. Your request should 
state that the NRC does not routinely edit comment submissions to 
remove such information before making the comment submissions available 
to the public or entering the comment submissions into ADAMS.

II. Discussion

    This proposed revision to NUREG-1530 would revise the dollar per 
person-rem conversion factor. Revision 0 to NUREG-1530 was published in 
December 1995 (ADAMS Accession No. ML063470485). The NRC uses the 
dollar per person-rem conversion factor in cost-benefit analyses to 
determine the monetary valuation of the consequences associated with 
radiological exposure and establishes this factor by multiplying a VSL 
factor by a nominal risk coefficient. Revision 0 to NUREG-1530 set the 
dollar per person-rem value at $2,000. This number resulted from the 
multiplication of the VSL ($3 million) by the risk coefficient for 
stochastic health effects (7.0 x 10-4 per person-rem).
    This proposed revision to NUREG-1530 would make five main changes. 
First, the revision to NUREG-1530 would revise the dollar per person-
rem conversion factor to $5,100 per person-rem. The value is based on 
an updated VSL of $9.0 million and a nominal risk coefficient factor of 
5.7 x 10-4 per person-rem. The VSL estimate is derived from 
the average of both the U.S. Department of Transportation's (DOT) and 
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's VSL in 2014 dollars. The 
nominal risk coefficient value is from the International Commission on 
Radiological Protection Publication No. 103.\1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \1\ ICRP, 2007. The 2007 Recommendations of the International 
Commission on Radiological Protection. ICRP Publication 103. Ann. 
ICRP 37 (2-4).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Second, the NRC would also adopt low- and high-VSL estimates. The 
NRC would adopt a low-VSL estimate of $5.3 million and a high-VSL 
estimate of $13.2 million. These estimates are derived from the median 
of low- and high-VSL estimates from DOT, U.S. Department of Homeland 
Security, and Office of Management and Budget. These values will create 
low- and high-dollar per person-rem estimates of $3,000 and $7,500, 
respectively.
    Third, this revision would indicate that the staff will round to 
two significant figures instead of simply rounding to the nearest 
thousand dollar value. Historically, the NRC has rounded this number to 
the nearest thousand dollars for the purposes of dollar per person-rem 
estimates. Given the large uncertainties inherent in this approach, 
updates would have little to no impact on this value between periodic 
baseline reviews.

[[Page 53586]]

    Fourth, this revision would also establish a methodology for 
keeping the dollar per person-rem conversion factor up-to-date. 
Appendix A of the NUREG has a worksheet template that provides a format 
for calculating updated dollar per person-rem values. The NUREG also 
would provide procedures for re-baselining the dollar per person-rem 
conversion factor.
    Finally, this revision would provide guidance to the NRC staff on 
when to use a higher dollar per person-rem factor in accident 
sequences. On a case-by-case basis, the NRC staff should use a Dose and 
Dose Rate Effectiveness Factor for calculating dollar per person-rem 
values to a portion of the affected population.
    The NRC staff held a Category 3 public meeting on April 2, 2015, to 
discuss the update to NUREG-1530. The NRC presentation can be found in 
ADAMS under Accession No. ML15086A112, and the meeting summary can be 
found in ADAMS under Accession No. ML15098A649. In response to this 
meeting, the Nuclear Energy Institute submitted a letter to the NRC, 
which provided feedback on the proposed update. This letter and the 
associated attachement can be found at ADAMS Accession Nos. ML15126A489 
and ML15126A498, respectively.

    Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 27th day of August, 2015.

    For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Lawrence E. Kokajko,
Director, Division of Policy and Rulemaking Office of Nuclear Reactor 
Regulation.
[FR Doc. 2015-22050 Filed 9-3-15; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 7590-01-P