Skip to content
John Livingston's

The Nuclear Electrical Engineer

An educational resource for electrical engineers in the nuclear power industry

Here you can find design tips on technical skills like cable and breaker sizing, short-circuit evaluations and more, PLUS deep-dive analysis of nuclear-specific topics like design basis, Tech Specs, UFSARs, and safety-related SSCs — built from primary source documents.

Licensing Basis · Feature

The most common licensing basis documents

John Livingston
December 9, 2014 · 1 min read

The NRC requires a new plant undergoing the licensing process to create a set of documents that will govern its operation. It reviews, and eventually approves, these documents, then grants an operating license on the basis of their content (and proof that the content has been implemented in the plant). This group of documents makes up what we call the “licensing basis documents.” They are numerous:

  • Operating License (which usually consists of a combination of one or more of the following documents)
  • Tech Specs (TS)
  • Tech Specs Bases
  • Technical Requirements Manual (TRM)
  • Updated Final Safety Analysis Report (UFSAR)
  • Quality Assurance Program Manual (QAPM)
  • Fire Protection Plan (with the Fire Hazards Analysis, or FHA)
  • Emergency Plan (E-Plan)
  • Environmental Protection Plan
  • Security Plan
  • Core Operating Limits Report (COLR)
  • Offsite Dose Calculation Manual (ODCM)
  • NRC Orders (and exemptions that have been granted)

Three of the documents can only be modified by the plant after being granted special permission to do so by the NRC: the operating license, the tech specs, or a plant’s response to NRC Orders. A plant can change any of the others without the NRC’s permission as long as the changes fit within certain guidelines established by the NRC.