Update by Maggie
From the Brattleboro Reformer
100 gallons of tritium-laced water found at Vermont Yankee
According to Bob Audette at the Brattleboro Reformer, Entergy told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this afternoon that it had found about 100 gallons of free-standing water in a room in the radioactive waste building at Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon.
When it was tested, said Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the NRC, the concentration of tritium was about 2 million picocuries per liter.
According to Audette,
While Yankee was pumping the water out of the rad-waste building, about 60 more gallons washed into the room. The rad-waste building is between two wells that have tested positive for tritium.
"It is too early to determine if the rad-waste building might be the source of the groundwater contamination," said Sheehan. "The company will have to investigate that further."
Ironically most of the Vermont Press has not been given the complete story. One journalist informed me that Department of Health State Radiological Health Chief Bill Irwin and members of the DPS have known about the increased leakage and additional site contamination for several days, all the while attempting to tell the press that what leakage that is out there is meaningless and of no threat to public health and safety.
You may also see a longer story here in the New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/aponlin...
Of course the New York Times would jump on this story because New Yorkers are dealing with their own leaking Entergy nuke saga at the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant less than 40 miles outside New York City.
As part of the NRC's investigation into the contaminated wells and now the water in the rad-waste building, it is sending a health physicist to the plant next week to review the company's latest plans and actions to deal with the tritium, said Sheehan. |
