Vermont Yankee revealed Friday that strontium-90 has been detected in soil near the site where a tritium leak had previously been discovered at Vermont Yankee. More recognizable by name to most of us Baby Boomers than tritium, strontium-90 contamination truly is cause for alarm and poses a whole new set of challenges to the prospect of eventual clean-up. As nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen explains, contact with the radioactive isotope is extremely dangerous, as it concentrates in human bone, causing leukemia.
"This is the worst," Gundersen said. "This is the most harmful, the hardest-to-detect and the most soluble."
It's interesting that this information took so long to reach the public. The Free Press reports that the results of the March 17 soil sampling that revealed the strontium-90 contamination were received on Monday, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission was only notified on Thursday.
My guess is that VY spokesman Larry Smith has the spin-cycle in full revolution.
In a 24-page brief to the Vermont Public Service Board (PSB) April 30, 2010, Entergy and Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee (ENVY) claim that their information belongs to them and to the NRC. Vermont and its intervenors do not have the right to look at information requested by intervenors, the PSB and the Department of Public Service, according to ENVY & Entergy attorneys.
"Entergy VY takes the position that the investigation itself is preempted by the NRC's federal jurisdiction,"
wrote Downs Rachlin Martin Attorney John Marshall in his MOTION TO MODIFY THE PREHEARING CONFERENCE MEMORANDUM AND TO ENLARGE THE TIME FOR ENTERGY VY TO RESPOND TO PENDING DISCOVERY REQUESTS. See the entire document below the fold.
"Discovery is needed to address the issue of preemption," wrote Sandy Levine, CLF's senior counsel, who also rejected Marshall's claim that Yankee's employees were too busy with the outage to respond to the requests.
"A company as large and well-funded as Entergy should be able to walk and chew gum at the same time," she wrote. "To the extent it is not able to do both, it should not be allowed to operate a nuclear facility in the state of Vermont."
Nowhere does federal preemption exclude Entergy and ENVY's obligation to meet NRC General Design Criteria 60 that states:
Criterion 60--Control of releases of radioactive materials to the environment. The nuclear power unit design shall include means to control suitably the release of radioactive materials in gaseous and liquid effluents and to handle radioactive solid wastes produced during normal reactor operation, including anticipated operational occurrences. Sufficient holdup capacity shall be provided for retention of gaseous and liquid effluents containing radioactive materials, particularly where unfavorable site environmental conditions can be expected to impose unusual operational limitations upon the release of such effluents to the environment.
Non-existent buried underground pipes that have leaked tritium into the Connecticut River, are none of our business according to Entergy's attorneys.
Writing for CLF, Levine stated that Entergy's request "perpetuates the continuing efforts ... to hide important information ... They are refusing to provide factual information that is necessary for the board to determine the scope of its authority."
Despite all the best efforts of Entergy to keep a lid on the controversy over Vermont Yankee's leaks-and-creaks, and to push through its bid for relicencing, it appears that, internationally speaking, the cat is out of the bag.
This, just in from the global giant of environmental activism, Greenpeace:
Greenpeace Crashes Entergy Shareholder Meeting to Deliver Message from Vermonters to Close Vermont Yankee
JACKSON, MS - Greenpeace today crashed Entergy's annual shareholder meeting, demanding the company stop its
effort to overturn the Vermont Senate's vote to deny re-licensing for the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor.
As Entergy executives delivered statements about company profits, Greenpeace activists delivered a letter from Vermonters
demanding that Entergy retire the reactor as scheduled in 2012. Entergy shareholders, upper management, and board members
were presented with the open letter at their lunch tables, which is available at: http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/...
Shut out during the shut down, as once again Entergy tries to control media access to a select few.
When independent documentary filmmaker and public television videographer Robbie Lepzer registered to film a public tour of Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee (VY), he expected it to be a rather standard process. After all, Entergy regularly admits the press and TV cameras for site tours. This tour, scheduled for Thursday April 29 is for members of the Public Service Board (PSB) and the media.
-------
Update #1
Entergy Nuclear Operations, Inc. (together, "Entergy VY"),have determined to allow credentialed media, including Tuming Tide Productions, to take photographs of or film the areas to be visited during the site visit.
[See complete Downs, Rachlin, Martin response to the Public Service Board in last attached document.] Turning Tide Productions is Robbie Leppzer's film company.
-------
Leppzer's shut out during shut down by Entergy has resulted in a PSB demand for information from Entergy as to why a journalist is not being allowed to film when other TV media is filming and has been filming. [Emphasis added.]
MEMORANDUM
To: Parties in PSB Docket No. 7600
From: Susan M. Hudson, Clerk of the Board
Re: Turning Tide Productions' Request to Film Site Visit
Date: April 27, 2010
On April 27, 2010, Robbie Leppzer sent the attached e-mail to the Public Service Board ("Board") requesting that the Board take action to allow Mr. Leppzer to bring television cameras to the site visit in Docket 7600 scheduled for Thursday, April 29. The Board requests that Entergy submit a response to Mr. Leppzer's request by noon on April 28. In particular, the Board requests Entergy to address whether Entergy is permitting news organizations to have television cameras, as Mr. Leppzer indicates. If so, Entergy should explain why Mr. Leppzer is being treated differently from those news organizations. The Board also requests that Entergy explain what, if any, restrictions on cameras are
necessary to ensure that Entergy fulfills its security and safety obligations.
Other parties may also submit comments by the same deadline.
cc: Robbie Leppzer
Leppzer has more than 30-years of documentary film making [see Leppzer's resume below the fold]. In preparation for a documentary film on the relicensing of VY, he has been filming testimony presented to the Legislature and its committees since January when discussion of both the leak and Entergy's request to relicense the nuclear plant began in earnest. Given that Vermont is the only state in the country to have the legal right to decide if VY should receive its Certificate for Public Good (CPG), it makes sense to me that someone would want to create a documentary about this subject. I also expect that Entergy would try to thwart such an effort.
At the very time Entergy is claiming a new policy of openness to Vermont State officials, boards, commissions, the legislature and the media, it has denied Leppzer permission to film the tour even though he is filming for CCTV Channnel 17 out of Burlington, VT in addition to his own documentary work. Leppzer may, as Entergy's Smith informed him, may take the tour, but without any film equipment, a predicament that is challenging for a filmmaker.
Entergy's action has once again put them in the spotlight in a negative way. After being shut out of filming, Leppzer contacted State Representative Sarah Edwards from Brattleboro, who is a member of the House Committee on Natural Resources and the Vermont State Nuclear Advisory Panel. Edwards wrote to Entergy requesting that they reconsider their decision and give Leppzer equal access. Smith still denied Leppzer access, so at that time, Leppzer sent the entire packet of email correspondence, herein reproduced below the fold, to the PSB.
The PSB has given Entergy until noon today to explain why they are preventing Leppzer from filming.
More below the fold, including the entire email correspondence between Leppzer and Entergy's Smith.
Dave Gram of the AP has the scoop on that Cesium-37 found at Vermont Yankee in February, which Entergy had tried to fob off on background radiation from 1950s nuclear tests, or Chernobyl, or anything other than that oh-so-reliable plant on the banks of the CT River (enphasis mine). Well, all I can say is "Surprise, surprise, surprise!":
The Health Department statement on Tuesday said the cesium-137 found in the Vermont Yankee soil samples was three to 12 times as high as the background levels attributed to the other causes, meaning it "appears likely the Cs-137 comes from Vermont Yankee reactor related sources."
Vermont Yankee spokesman Larry Smith said he was not surprised by the finding, and that plant officials believe the cesium can be cleaned up as part of their already planned effort to remove some of the soil around plant buildings and ship it off for treatment as low-level radioactive waste.
Today, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) called on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to reconsider its plans to hold a private meeting regarding NRC oversight of Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee (ENVY), ENVY's tritium releases, and other issues questions from attendees. The closed meeting for invitees the NRC deemed to be stakeholders is scheduled for April 14 at the Keene Country Club in Keene, NH.
March 30, 2010
The Honorable Gregory B. Jaczko
Chairman
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, D.C. 20555-0001
Dear Chairman Jaczko:
We write to follow up on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's invitation to participate in a closed-door "Government-to-Government" meeting on April 14 in Keene, New Hampshire.
We are committed to open and transparent government and to honoring both the letter and spirit of Vermont's open meeting laws. Avoiding Vermont's open meeting laws by holding this meeting in New Hampshire will only add to the growing public skepticism about the handling of oversight at Vermont Yankee, and could curtail participation from Vermont officials.
While we recognize that the discussion of information relating to security considerations often requires confidential briefings, the discussion of broader issues surrounding this facility is of great interest to Vermonters and is a discussion that should be conducted in a public setting.
We urge you to reconsider, and to hold the April 14 meeting in Vermont so that Vermont's federal, state and local officials can fully participate. We look forward to hearing from you regarding this request.
Sincerely,
Patrick Leahy Bernard Sanders Peter Welch
U.S. Senator U.S. Senator U.S. Representative
I deeply appreciate this letter from our Congressional Delegation. Safe and reliable nuclear power are not issues to be discussed behind closed doors. Entergy has not met its burden of proof on ENVY's reliability to the State of Vermont or its burden of proof on safety issues to the NRC, now matter what public claims are made by NRC spokespersons.
More on this and on Secretary of State Deb Markowitz's comments will be added below the fold.
According to Terri Hallenbeck of the Burlington Free Press, House Speaker Shap Smith said Friday that the House may vote about the continued operation of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant following the town meeting break. See BFP
"We may vote on continued operation," said Smith, D-Morristown. "If there is a vote from both bodies that they believe Vermont Yankee should not continue to operate, that's a pretty clear indication there will not be continued operation."
While some Republicans and Governor Douglas have attempted to paint the legislative push against relicensing Yankee as some type of partisan bickering on the part of the Democratically controlled legislature or the proclivity of gubernatorial candidates, it is clear that such statements are simply last ditch efforts on the part of the lame-duck Douglas administration.
This lame-duck administration is clearly out of touch with the interests of the general public and most of its legislators, as well as Vermont's own statutorily mandated guidelines established in 2008 regarding the public trust water resource statute.
According to Jon Groveman legal counsel for VNRC, "In 2008, the Vermont Legislature passed, and Governor Douglas signed, a bill declaring groundwater to be a public trust resource." see public trust
House Natural Resources Chairman Tony Klein, a Democrat and Vice Chair Republican Joe Krawczyk are showing real statesmanship by working together to craft bi-partisan legislation that protects Vermont's environmental resources as well as protecting Vermont against the economic repercussions of Entergy's poor operation of Vermont Yankee.
According to an Atlanta Journal Constitution article by Dave Gram,
Vermont utility regulators will consider revoking the operating license of the state's lone nuclear plant, as well as the less drastic step of a temporary shutdown while a leak of radioactive material at the plant is found and stopped.
In other news the source of the leak may have been found according to the Rutland Herald.
By the way, this is the system Arnie wrote to DPS and Entergy about on Aug 13, and what now fired Entergy employee and legislative liaison Dave McElwee said did not exist. The same Dave McElwee seen on the iamvy promotional website now removed.
See A Chronicle of Issues Regarding Buried Tanks and Underground Piping at VT Yankee on the JFO website: http://www.leg.state.vt.us/JFO...
It's barely a month ago, but the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United could have a bearing on tomorrow's vote on letting Vermont Yankee's operating license expire on time.
Or maybe I should say that considerations of Citizens Unitedshould have a tremendous bearing on the vote, and here's why. You probably know what the Supreme Court did in Citizens United, and I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that they opened the floodgates to unlimited spending by corporations in political campaigns.
Corporations like Enexus, or Entergy, or whatever they're calling themselves to stay ahead of state scrutiny these days.
You probably get campaign solicitations from political parties every week. In fact, I just got one while I was writing this. If you're like me, whenever you get these calls you think about how important the cause is, what your budget happens to look like that week, and you decide how much you can afford to spend.
If you're Entergy, what's potentially at stake in November's election is whether they get to keep running their plant, so let's take a look at the numbers. On average, Vermont Yankee sells the electricity it generates at about a nickel a kwh, or $50 per Megawatt hour, so every hour their sales are about $31,500, and every day they're running it's about $756,000. In a year that puts their sales at about $276,000,000. Kind of a lot of money, huh?
Now, we have a state Senate (maybe) and five Democratic candidates for governor who are saying they should be required to shut down in 2012, which means shutting off the $276 million spigot. One might think it's worth a lot of money to them to stop that from happening. That's why they're buying all the full-page ads in the paper, running all the TV spots, flying their PR flack up from New Orleansto glad-hand the locals, and offering a sweetheart deal (what? Did you say bribe? I'm shocked!) if we let them keep running.
And their message? The same as Douglas's message: do nothing. They know that Douglas won't be around to carry their heavy water next year, but they can hope that Brian Dubie will follow in Douglas's footsteps, if only they can sit on the ball until November. That's why they are doing what they can to stall a legislative vote this year.
But remember Citizens United? That's the game changer in this fight. Say the Democratic candidate is Peter Shumlin, who has come out strong against relicensing. Or, for that matter, any other D, all of whom favor closing VY. And just say, just for the hell of it, that Dubie has come out in favor of relicensing. (He can't hide forever, right?)
Thanks to Citizens United, if the election in November is between a Democrat who favors shutting down VY and a Republican who favors keeping it open, how much is it worth it to Entergy to keep the plant running? Obviously not three quarters of a million a day, because that's their total sales, but definitely in the millions, right? Tens of millions? What does it cost to pay for a governor and sixteen senators?
If it's still an open question in November, we can expect to see possibly the most expensive election in Vermont history.
The vote's tomorrow, and the Senate should vote No and let VY close.
The tritium plume emanating from the allegedly nonexistent underground leaking pipes has now reached the Connecticut River according to the State of Vermont Department of Health (DOH) website. DOH http://healthvermont.gov/envir...
Lawrence Auclair, webmaster of evacuationplans.org has a number of links on his website to all the recent news regarding Vermont Yankee's aging managment issues: http://www.evacuationplans.org/
On Feb. 4, 2010, well number GZ-14, which is only 30 feet from the Connecticut River, was measured at 70,000 pCi/L of tritium. Yesterday that well registered 119,000 pCi/L tritium, which is six times the maximum level the EPA regulations allow for drinking water. Other states like California and Colorado limit the levels they allow to 400 pCi/L in California and 500 pCi/L in Colorado.
I was here in the Statehouse for testimony this morning by Fairewinds Associates, Inc regarding Vermont Yankee before the Senate Natural Resources Committee. At lunch we were asked to stay and come to the press conference held in Senate Chambers. Press Release Below in its entirety:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 16, 2010
CONTACT:
Alexandra MacLean, (802) 828-3806
Montpelier, Vt - Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin, today announced that the Senate will vote before the town meeting break on whether or not relicensing the Vermont Yankee nuclear power station to operate beyond its scheduled closing date is in the best interest of Vermonters.
"It is the responsibility of the General Assembly to vote on the continued operation of Vermont Yankee," said Senator Peter Shumlin. "We have a responsibility to provide Vermonters and Vermont businesses a direction for our energy future, provide our electric utilities with sufficient time to secure delivery of energy, and in the event that the plant ceases operating as scheduled in 2012, provide the workers at Vermont Yankee adequate time to secure employment."
Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin has asked the Senate Finance Committee to take up the legislation relating to the continued operation of the Vermont Yankee nuclear energy generating plant this week. The full Senate is expected to consider the question of continued operation before legislators return home for town meeting.
"Vermonter's deserve better than what Entergy Louisiana has to offer. The reactor is too old to operate reliably past its scheduled closure in 2012. The corporation has misled our public officials and the people of Vermont," said Senator Peter Shumlin. "Vermonter's confidence in Vermont Yankee has been further marred by Entergy's attempt to create a debt ridden spin off corporation to take ownership of the plant. The cleanup fund is already more than half a billion dollars short and Vermonters cannot afford a corporation that may shift that cost to ratepayers. There is also frustration with Entergy/Enexus' power purchase proposal, which would raise Vermonter's electricity rates by nearly 50% and provide us with only 11% of our power. Operating Vermont Yankee beyond its scheduled closing date of March 12, 2012 is not in the best interests of Vermonters and unnecessary delay is an irresponsible option for our energy future."
Okay...I'm going to play a hunch here and suggest that an effort may be afoot to convince our beleaguered legislators that it will be unnecessary to stick their necks out and participate in a vote on relicensing Vermont Yankee. The gist of this fanciful scenario is that, if our lawmakers can resist the impulse to bring the measure to a vote in the 2010 session, Vermont Yankee will make the first move to discontinue its relationship with Vermont, sparing everyone from the discomfort of having to "come out" against relicensing. Yeah, sure; and if you go for that one, I've got waterfront property in Death Valley that might interest you.
Update: A story in the The Rutland Herald identifies the engineer who gave the misleading responses to the Panel as David McElwee, Entergy's public liaison officer, and has VY officials admitting that they "should have been more thorough" in responding to the Public Oversight Panel's questions. The Herald quotes from an August 13 e-mail sent by McElwee to panel member Arnie Gundersen, state nuclear engineer, Uldis Vanags, and Sarah Hofmann, public advocacy director for the Department of Public Service:
As for your outstanding question on underground piping goes, Act 189 requested that an underground piping system carrying radionuclides be part of the inspection...we have none. Since this is not an item active in the review of ... recommendations, we consider this issue closed.
In a press release, Gundersen states that
The Panel was informed that there were no systems with underground piping that carry radioactivity at VY
It seems that Entergy just can't quit stepping all over its own feet in the effort to court approval for a VY license extension. In light of the recent revelation that there has been a tritium contamination of groundwater at Vermont Yankee, it appears that ENVY was less than forthcoming in its representation to the Vermont Yankee Public Oversight Panel in 2008 that there was no radioactivity in VY's underground pipe system.
Is anyone else tired of Entergy's rather lame PR push to gain support for relicensing Vermont Yankee?
If so, you will enjoy the entertaining and informative parody posted by VY challenger Fake-Rob Williams. You see, Fake-Rob Williams (a parody of VY official spokesman, Rob Williams) has discovered that the link provided on Entergy's "I Am Vermont Yankee" site for the public to post their presumably supportive comments about VY is, in fact, non-functional.
Leaping into the breach, Fake-Rob Williams has helpfully provided an alternative site for readers comments called "I Love Vermont Yankee." Against a bubblegum pink background, "I Love Vermont Yankee" echos the features on Entergy's "I am Vermont Yankee" website, offering smiling celebrity pics as stand-ins for the suspiciously homogenized representations of "actual" VY employees that appear on the Entergy site. Fake-Rob makes his own comments on Vermont Yankee; remarks that he repeatedly tried to submit on the "I am Vermont Yankee" site over the course of an entire day, finding that they NEVER appeared in the queue of that day's submissions. Fake-Rob's comments were a series of "helpful" reminders of the many embarrassing faux pas committed by VY and it's employees over the recent past.
Noted physician and author Dr. Helen Caldicott spoke last night at UVM, spoke Tuesday at Middlebury College, and will be speaking tonight in Montpelier and tomorrow night in Brattleboro.
Hear Dr. Caldicott tonight: April 9 5:30pm
The Chapel, Vermont College of Fine Arts, 36 College St, Montpelier, VT
I was lucky enough to have lunch with Dr. Caldicott yesterday and to be part of a panel discussion with her that was hosted by Margaret Harrington on CCTV Burlington yesterday afternoon. More about both those items in a later post.
Dr. Caldicott co-founded Physicians for Social Responsibility, an organization
of 32,400 medical professionals committed to educating their colleagues to the
dangers of nuclear power and nuclear weapons. The international umbrella
organization, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, won
the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985.
If you miss tonight's lecture, head to Brattleboro tomorrow, April 10 @ 7:00pm
Latchis 4, Latchis Theatre, 50 Main St., Brattleboro, VT (one door down from the main entrance)
Dr. Caldicott has spent 35 years as an advocate of citizen awareness regarding the world's nuclear and environmental crisis. Her international campaign strives to educate the public about the medical hazards of the nuclear age and the necessary changes in human behavior needed to prevent environmental destruction.
Trained as a physician and thoroughly versed in the science of nuclear energy, Dr. Caldicott is a knowledgeable and inspiring speaker. During the 1970's Dr. Caldicott was an instructor in pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and served
on the staff of the Children's Hospital Medical Center. One of the most influential women of the 20th century, she has received many awards for her
work. She is the author of seven books, including War in Heaven, (published in March 2007), Nuclear Power is Not the Answer (2006), If You Love This Planet: A Plan to Heal the Earth (1992), and Nuclear Madness: What You Can Do (1979). She
has also been the focus of several films, including Eight Minutes to Midnight, nominated for an Academy Award in 1981, and If You Love This Planet, which won The Academy Award for best documentary in 1982.
Dr. Caldicott's lectures are free and open to the public.
(According to Ed, Entergy CEO J. Wayne Leonard sees COAL as the energy answer. And, the further loss in ENVY Decommissioning Funds announced today as well as the end of federal funding for Yucca Mountain, may mean Vermonters are sitting on toxic nuclear waste for at least 1,000 years. - promoted by Maggie Gundersen)
J. Wayne Leonard, the exorbitantly overpaid CEO of the Entergy companies, went to the MIT Energy Conference.
And Leonard said, "The market has already picked the winning technology: coal."
So stop playing games with Vermont, agree to shut down Vermont Yankee in 2012 and clean it up and go home.
Please.
-------------------
Update by Maggie Gundersen
While Leonard was off at MIT lauding coal, ENVY's decommissioning fund dropped even lower according to figures released today. This is down from the September 2007 figure of $440,003,672 that I criticized in my white paper on decommissioning in November 2007.
March 31, 2008 $427,406,446
June 20, 2008 $414,412,426
September 30, 2008 $397,035,937
October 30, 2008 $364,426,383
November 30, 2008 $360,673,692
December 31, 2008 $372,012,078
January 31, 2009 $361,489,579
February 28, 2009 $347,291,410
ENVY tried to take me to task. Not only has my data proven correct, but my original estimate that it would take at least $1 Billion to dismantle and clean-up Vermont Yankee is holding true.
Imagine during these tough economic times being assessed $1,000 for every man, woman and child in order to clean up this mess... take a good look at which legislators did not want to protect Vermont's taxpayers last year and instead voted to protect this bloated corporate behemoth which pays its CEO more than $29 Million per year in total compensation. Wow that's almost half of Vermont's entire rainy day fund. No wonder he doesn't see our demands for decommissioning money as anything important.
Now today, Yucca Mountain is no more. [See the Discover Magazine Blog below the fold.] Vermont Yankee's spent nuclear fuel may belong to Vermonters for at least 1,000 years!
Missed this yesterday, so I am quoting today from yesterday's Prog Blog:
Entergy Resolution
Morgan Daybell February 9th, 2009
Yesterday, the State Committee of the Progressive Party voted unanimously to support the following resolution, modeled after the resolutions being warned across the state for town meeting day:
The State Committee of the Vermont Progressive Party requests the Vermont Legislature to:
1. Recognize that the 2% of our New England region's power grid supply that is provided by Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plantcan be replaced with a combination of local, renewable electricity and efficiency measures, along with the purchase of hydro generated electricity, and excess power already in the New England electricity market;
2. Given the viable alternatives and the risks posed by continued operation, ensure that Vermont Yankee will cease operation in March 2012, after having completed its 40 year design life by not granting approval for operation of the plant after that date and by not determining that further operation will promote the general welfare;
3. Hold the Entergy Corporation, which purchased Vermont Yankee in 2002, responsible to fully fund the plant's clean-up and decommissioning when the reactor closes, as the corporation pledged to do when it purchased Vermont Yankee.
Progressives in attendance pledged to support the town meeting resolutions, and the broader effort to close Entergy's Vernon plant in 2012.
It is the Governor Douglas "hidden" tax hike, which will be assessed to every Vermonter.
Like every other state in the country, Vermonters are facing tough economic times. Bush's tax cuts to the wealthy and increased tax burden upon the middle class in the midst of escalating medical insurance costs, job loss, and the financial debacle facing banks and mortgage lenders have left the economy almost in ruin.
Vermonters are seeing those financial constraints first hand in cuts to vital social services as state jobs are cut to balance the budget, while Governor Douglas retains a $400,000 taxpayer supported PR staff, according to Shay Totten of Seven Days (http://www.7dvt.com/2008blame-game). Now in the latest insult to injury, the Governor claims that he has the right to campaign on taxpayer dollars. This story first broken by Shay Totten (http://www.7dvt.com/2008governors-free-ride), has been thoroughly expanded on Green Mountain Daily by Nate Freeman http://greenmountaindaily.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=3521. After being bombarded by rallies across the state, http://greenmountaindaily.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=3532, Douglas suddenly claimed that he was repaying the state for his campaign phone calls and copying costs. Of course in typical Douglas fashion, there are no records...
But wait, it gets worse, much worse.
Those issues pale in comparison to the Guv's biggest whopper. Yes, it is the Douglas's unbridled support of Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee LLC. Read those last three initials again - LLC. Those three initials that stand for Limited Liability Corporation. Aye, there's the rub, to quote Hamlet as he contemplates suicide. Talk about financial suicide, because ENVY is an LLC with no assets to support Vermont Yankee's cleanup, Governor Douglas would rather add a tax burden of $1,000 to each and every Vermonter (yes, every man, woman, and child) than to tell ENVY it is time to fill the fund. Take a look at this graph, and then say in unison, "THANKS JIM!"
The graph shows the gap between what Entergy has saved and what it will owe to dismantle Vermont Yankee's carcass. Why does Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee (ENVY) get to make over $150,000,000 each year and then leave us holding the bag for more than half a billion dollars in clean up costs? Do the math. That is a tax of at least $1,000 for each and every Vermonter. Lets all say in unison, "Thanks Jim!"
I work as a paralegal specializing in nuclear safety litigation. What does that mean? I work with lawyers and nuclear safety experts all over the country and in Canada to hold the nuclear industry to federal and Canadian statutes and to make sure that the NRC and Canadian government are meeting their primary mission to protect public health and safety. I am also a former nuclear industry employee.
When my firm Fairewinds Associates, Inc wrote the two white papers last year that alerted the Vermont Legislature to the shortage in the decommissioning fund, my work was criticized quite heavily in the press and in public by the Douglas Administration, Commissioner O'Brien and Entergy spokespeople who vehemently denied my firm's concerns.
I worked all legislative session to help legislators understand the magnitude of the lack of money within the decommissioning fund, and while the Bill did pass the legislature, it was not veto proof. Check out the legislative record. See how your legislator voted and if they voted against the bill, ask him or her why he or she voted against protecting Vermonters from financial usury by an out of state corporation.
Did you know that Entergy makes at least $150 million in profit per year from Vermont Yankee. Quite a tidy sum to send to headquarters in Louisana, where CEO, J. Wayne Leonard earned a hefty $40,000,000 during the past five years, making him the 11th most highly paid utility executive in the country according to the May 2007 Forbes Magazine.
My concern has always been that without adequate money in the decommissioning fund, Vermonters will get stuck footing the bill.
The NRC claims,
"that if there is a shortfall in the VY decommissioning fund, Entergy is on the hook,"
according to Fair Game columnist Shay Totten in this week's Seven Days (http://www.7dvt.com/2008l-word).
"If we determine that the growth of the funds would be insufficient to properly decommission the plant when the time comes, we can require the company to address that," NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said.
May I remind you that NRC spokesperson Neil Sheehan is the same NRC spokesperson who initially told Vermonters that the cooling tower collapse, was only a slight deformity in the wood, that is until a nuclear whistleblower slipped out the infamous pictures that told Vermonters the whole story.
And ratepayers in other states like Connecticut and Massachusetts have been forced to pay the bill left behind when Connecticut Yankee and Massachusetts Yankee Rowe were decommissioned and dismantled. The NRC did not make the utilities clean up their own mess. In Connecticut, for example, the ratepayers fought a court suit to try to force payment by the utility, and they still got stuck for the $500 Million shortage.
Is anyone else tired of Entergy's rather lame PR push to gain support for relicensing Vermont Yankee?
