Primary Reactor Containment Leakage Testing for Water-Cooled Power Reactors

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is amending its regulations to provide a performance-based option for leakage-rate testing of containments of light-water-cooled nuclear power plants. This option is available for voluntary adoption by licensees in lieu of compliance with the prescriptive requirements contained in the current regulation. This action improves the focus of the regulations by eliminating prescriptive requirements that are marginal to safety. The final rule allows test intervals to be based on system and component performance and provides licensees greater flexibility for cost-effective implementation methods of regulatory safety objectives.