Common use of Technical Context Clause in Contracts

Technical Context. Creating a roadmap for obtaining information from designated NPPs as they go through decommissioning is complementary to ongoing NRC research in developing technical information to support evaluating SLR as well as data collection and testing of ex-plant materials. Material degradation has traditionally been managed reactively in response to events and operating experience, rather than proactively to prevent failures. For the NPPs currently entering their first license renewal period from 40-60 years, and submitting SLR applications, it is necessary to evaluate potential degradation mechanisms out to 80 years of operation. Evaluation of material properties in SSCs from actual decommissioned NPPs will provide a basis for comparison with results of laboratory tests and calculations to resolve the four issues listed above. The proactive management of materials degradation (PMMD) information tool was originally created at PNNL for RES (POC: ▇▇▇ ▇▇▇▇) to give an expert opinion of the possible future degradation mechanisms on a subcomponent/material specific basis (PNNL-17779)i. Combined with the LER database, the PMMD information tool allows one to not only react to past events, but to anticipate future issues. The original PMMD information tool was based on NUREG/CR-6923, “Proactive Materials Degradation Assessment (PMDA),” for the first license renewal period, so it is now appropriate to integrate information from the excel databases from the recently-published five volumes of NUREG/CR-7153, “Expanded Materials Degradation Assessment (EMDA)” for SLR. At this juncture, there is demonstrated industry interest in NPP long-term operation (LTO) and regulatory interest in SLR.