[Federal Register Volume 80, Number 83 (Thursday, April 30, 2015)]
[Notices]
[Page 24290]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2015-10130]
[[Page 24290]]
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
[NRC-2015-0059]
Refining and Characterizing Heat Release Rates From Electrical
Enclosures During Fire (RACHELLE-FIRE)
AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Draft NUREG; request for comment.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is issuing for
public comment a draft NUREG, NUREG-2178 (EPRI 3002005578), ``Refining
and Characterizing Heat Release Rates from Electrical Enclosures During
Fire (RACHELLE-FIRE), Volume 1: Peak Heat Release Rates and Effect of
Obstructed Plume.''
DATES: Submit comments by June 15, 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 before this
date.
ADDRESSES: You may submit comments by any of the following methods
(unless this document describes a different method for submitting
comments on a specific subject):
Federal Rulemaking Web site: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2015-0059. 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 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: David Stroup, Office of Nuclear
Regulatory Research; telephone: 301-251-7609; email:
[email protected]; U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington,
DC 20555-0001.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
I. Obtaining Information and Submitting Comments
A. Obtaining Information
Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2015-0059 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-2015-0059.
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
ADAMS accession number for each document referenced (if it is available
in ADAMS) is provided the first time that it is mentioned in the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section. Draft NUREG--2178, ``Refining and
Characterizing Heat Release Rates from Electrical Enclosures During
Fire (RACHELLE-FIRE), is available in ADAMS under Accession No.
ML15056A144.
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-2015-0059 in the subject line of your
comment submission.
The NRC cautions you not to include identifying or contact
information that you do not want to be publically disclosed in your
comment submission. The NRC will post all comment submissions at http://www.regulations.gov as well as enter 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 into ADAMS.
II. Discussion
The Refining and Characterizing Heat Release Rates From Electrical
Enclosures During Fire (RACHELLE-FIRE) program involves a working group
of experienced fire protection and fire probabilistic risk assessment
researchers and practitioners focused on enhancing the methodology used
to model electrical enclosure fires in nuclear power plants. This
report documents the results from the working group's efforts to
develop technical information in three areas: (1) Classification of
electrical enclosures in terms of function, size, contents, and
ventilation; (2) determination of peak heat release rate (HRR)
probability distributions considering specific electrical enclosure
characteristics;, and (3) development of a method to account for the
impact of the enclosure on the vertical thermal zone of influence above
the enclosure during fire. Electrical enclosures have been classified
in groups based on their electrical function, contents, and size. Peak
HRR distributions for the different classification groups have been
developed. These distributions are based on the results of different
experimental programs intended to measure the HRR associated with fires
in electrical enclosures. In order to provide a comprehensive
characterization of electrical enclosure fires, the working group
evaluated the temperature characteristics of fire plumes associated
with these events using the Fire Dynamics Simulator program. Computer
simulations of various enclosure configurations were developed for
evaluating the fire burning inside electrical enclosures and the fire
plume temperature characteristics that would be generated. Based on
this research, new fire plume temperature profiles reflecting the
obstructed nature of fire plumes generated from fires inside electrical
enclosures are provided. Finally, examples, consolidating the
information described in this report, are provided to illustrate how to
incorporate the information documented in this report into existing
approaches for modeling fires in electrical enclosures.
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 21st day of April, 2015.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Mark Henry Salley,
Chief, Fire Research Branch, Division of Risk Analysis, Office of
Nuclear Regulatory Research.
[FR Doc. 2015-10130 Filed 4-29-15; 8:45 am]
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