The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said this week that it had accepted for review the Early Site Permit application for the Clinch River site near Oak Ridge, Tenn., which is earmarked as the site for two or more small modular reactors.
The application for the review was submitted by the Tennessee Valley Authority in May 2016. This was followed by supplemental information as requested, the NRC said.
Accepting the application is not the same as approval. Accepting the application means the NRC has given the application a docket number (52-047), which means it is ready for the formal review. This will include an adjudicatory hearing, which has yet to be scheduled. Notice that the application has been accepted also opens the door for petitions concerning the project, which must be filed within 60 days of the posting of notice announcing the hearing.
The NRC notes in its project overview that the Early Site Permit Application considered two reactors up to 800 MWe, 2420 MWt at the Clinch River Nuclear site. The application employed the Plant Parameter Envelope approach — by which an applicant provides "sufficient bounding parameters and characteristics of the reactor or reactors, and the associated facility, so that assessments of site safety and environmental suitability can be made by the NRC."