I'm sure many Vermonters have been turning the same question over in their minds that I have. What relationship does that ominously percolating reactor at the Fukushima Dailichi plant in disaster-struck Japan have to our own little hot pot at Vermont Yankee? As it turns out, the answer is,"quite a bit."
Like VY, Fukushima's troubled reactor is a BWR (Boiling Water Reactor) with a G.E. Mark 1 containment design. Also like VY, it appears to be approaching 40-years in operation.
I did a little digging and learned that there is reason for concern about the ability of the Mark 1 containment design to successfully hold up to pressure.
The NRC, who has never met a reactor they couldn't relicense, just yesterday signed-off on another twenty years of wear, tear and capricious management for VY. Gives you pause, doesn't it?
I've fixed the link. It seems to have been my error in coding. It should work now.
According to this morning's Free Press, the NRC is poised to relicense Vermont Yankee as early as next week. It's time to flood the NRC with calls and e-mails expressing alarm and opposition to continued operation of the plant.
Telephone numbers are given on their website:
Public Affairs 301-415-8200
Safety or Security Concerns 1-800-695-7403
I decided an e-mail was in order, but there is no e-mail address given. You have to go to this page. You'll find an embedded submission form which you fill-out and send.
With an emboldened plutocracy flexing its muscles all over the country, it's good to have another reminder that our DC delegation continues to look out for the poor "step-children" who have been generally cut-adrift in the current round of economic blackmail. In this case, those "step-children" are the twin causes of environmental and human safety, both of which Entergy apologists would willingly sacrifice on the altar of "cheap" energy, just to keep VY burbling away well past its sell-by date.
Our own "DC 3" have all signed onto a letter drafted by Bernie Sanders, who sits on the panel charged with oversight of the NRC, urging that regulatory body to ensure that clean-up of Vermont Yankee is undertaken immediately following closure of the plant.
The lawmakers called it "unacceptable" that Entergy, which owns the Vermont plant, could engage in "decades of delay" before cleaning up the site along the Connecticut River at Vernon, Vt. "Immediate decommissioning will assure Vermonters that the plant is being disassembled safely," the delegation wrote. An immediate cleanup and shutdown of the site also would allow the plant operator to take advantage of the skills of many long-term Yankee employees who otherwise would lose their jobs.
In the letter to Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko, the delegation requests a meeting with the full commission; and that the meeting should include Governor Shumlin,
because of the "enormous consequences" for Vermont and the state's "vital interest" in the plant's safe shutdown.
Tying swift decommissioning to job retention is a brilliant and entirely legitimate strategy, which should steal some thunder from one of VY's dwindling arguments against closure.
As we know all too well,
Entergy has indicated it favors a so-called "SAFSTOR" decommissioning method, a process that the delegation letter said "would let Entergy off the hook" for cleanup and waste disposal for years or even decades. "While Entergy may prefer leaving the plant to sit like an abandoned factory because it has not saved the necessary funds to fully decommission the plant, this is not the safest option for Vermonters," Leahy, Sanders and Welch wrote.
"We have a right to our own opinions but not our own facts." Suffice it to say, Entergy Louisiana & VT Yankee still do not get this. Judging from past & present behavior, they never will. Their display of inherent dishonesty which was found to be corporate-wide, including being caught deliberately giving false information to VT regulators, legislature & those tasked with oversight has proven this, as well as abject failure at the 'transparency', as promised. Since then, things have only worsened.
On the anniversary of the historic and infamous vote by VT senate to close Entergy Louisiana owned Vermont Yankee, on schedule, by nearly unanimous 26-4 vote, Entergy Louisiana continues its fear mongering campaign and 'sky is falling' message to VT residents with all out assault on the state. The big prize? To overshadow and thereby obscure VT's victory, all taking place on the anniversary of the vote, hopefully with favorable outcome for them.
Obvious mission to undermine the will of the people by overturning the vote taken one year ago to shutter VY on schedule. Using their corporate might, attempted muscling of VT is very bald. This includes VT business community aligned with AIV-Entergy is also a member, and very own Entergy sponsored VTEP, a 'diverse business group' in which all members share at least one thing in common, all support VY continued operation-Entergy is also a member.
With VT news media at its disposal, in this past year continuing to the present VT has been bombarded with full page ads from Entergy Louisiana promoting VY as they & apologists attempted to explain away the series of failures spanning six years which served as evidence the plant had fallen into a state of disrepair due to faulty maintenance procedures by the company.
Ads were stopped when VT AG ruled they contained false information. Media blitz from Entergy Louisiana including employees and VT businesses all appearing as virtual bots in Stepford-like trance, as well as slanted & erroneous missives from a variety of sources, primarily VTEP staffers doing double duty as 'energy lobbyists' to legislature, Brad Ferland & Guy Page. Also including academicians from NH & VT, who have no nuclear experience or credentials, as evidenced by their irrelevent and inaccuracy-laden commentary. Valley News 1/19/2011 letter titled, "The Truth About Tritium" by Thomas Curphey, is a mere straw man argument as tritium itself has never been the main issue but the spin orchestrated by Entergy Lousiana. Another, Brattleboro Reformer "Free speech, energy choices and public health" op-ed by Gerry Silverstein, frequent VY apologist to VT news media, in which he compares the health of 38 year old plant to a 38 year old human body, was very strange since this is from a UVM professor teaching medical students. Facepalm.
Step 3: Report the event to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on December 22.
Step 4: keep running those sappy "I am Vermont Yankee" ads on TV. Ignore the fact that nobody much cares how nice the employees of Vermont Yankee are, but we care very much about whether they are competent enough to run the plant and honest enough to be trusted with the public health and safety. I keep waiting for them to identify one of their employes as a fork and spoon operator from Sector 7g, but so far no luck.)
Good work for Reformer reporter Bob Audette to come up with this. The source for some of his analysis was an e-mail from Vermont Yankee. Apparently no explanation was available for why the information about the leaks, which VY had in April, or its analysis of the leaks, which they had in October, wasn't disclosed to the NRC until just before Christmas.
Oh, and if you're wondering, the collection of press releases and news updates on the Vermont Yankee web page doesn't say anything about this latest set of leaks. Not even in the section they call "We're all entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts".
Maybe, in Entergy lexicon, "facts" means "stuff we couldn't keep covered up any longer".
Happy New Year to Vermont from a Texas judge! Judge Jon Wisser issued a temporary restraining order that threw a monkey wrench into the plans for a "hurry up" vote to expand access to the nuclear dump where Vermont plans to send material from VY.
The plan up for a vote was to expand access to the low-level nuclear waste dump in West Texas to all states and commercial nuclear companies. Unbelievably, Vermont's two representatives on the committee for the dump planned to vote for the plan, even though it was likely to shut Vermont out by taking such waste on a first-come, first served basis, as reported earlier this week here by BP and quoting a December 1 report by Vermont Digger.
Texas Vox, "the Voice of Public Citizen in Texas," regards the order as a win for folks who oppose the dump entirely.
The final vote on the plan was to have taken place on Tuesday, January 4, by the members of the Texas Low-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission - just before Governor-elect Peter Shumlin will be inaugurated. That vote is now apparently on hold.
Texas Vox reports that at least 4,000 anti-expansion comments were received during the public comment period, which ended on December 27.
Stay tuned.
PS: As someone with a Vermont ISP, I found the (presumably state-tailored) advertising (by Google) on the Texas Vox site interesting: "Click to hear more about the safety of Vermont Yankee." followed by "www.iamvy.com".
Hope springs eternal in the breast of Vermont Yankee supporters who maintain that, even after countless leaks, squeaks and outright collapses; even after the legislature voted to let it go, and even after the man who led that vote is seated as Governor, there still could be some way to keep the infernal thing in operation. In today's Free Press, VY spokesman Larry Smith and Brad Ferland of Vermont Energy Partnership both expressed the hope that the Legislature could somehow be persuaded to take up the matter again; and Steve Costello of CVPS says
"If it could be shown to be safe, we want it,
But there's the rub. Every story coming out of VY over the past two years has provided more reason to believe that it is definitely unsafe to operate the plant beyond it's predicted closure date.
Apparently, supporters think that the sale of VY to a different entity could somehow put things right again; but simple commonsense predicts that any new owner of the antediluvian facility would most likely be regarding it as a strategic liability to be minimally maintained and mined for whatever tax credits or incentives might be available before an unceremonious death- dump on Vermont's front stoop. And a couple of years of marginally cheaper power are supposed to be enough to keep us on the hook? Please... we may be a rural state but we weren't born yesterday!
Some, like Orleans Senator Vince Iluzzi envision a scenario in which the sale of VY to a different entity might allow the NCR (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) to overrule Vermont's Legislature and renew VY's license unilaterally.
"Vermont may not have jurisdiction over Vermont Yankee," said Illuzzi, who voted against the plant in the Senate this year and said if there were a new vote, he's not sure how he would vote.
Now that would be really well-received by fiercely independent Vermonters.
Arne Gundersen, who advises the Legislature on all things nuclear, doubts that the NRC would intrude to such a degree, although he can well see Entergy courting any legal maneuver that might further delay the inevitable shut-down.
That's a little like sending the Lusitania in to rescue the Titanic," he said.
One thing is certain, before that glow-farm on the banks of the Connecticut River is finally shutdown, VY and her owners will have milked every opportunity available for delay.
While interest is focussed on Governor-elect Peter Shumlin and his nascent administration, outgoing Jim Douglas ("Governor Sissorhands," as he has been widely known) wanders the state in a sort of farewell tour, sloshing with jocularity and tepid humor. According to the Messenger, at a Rotary toast in St. Albans today
"Douglas...joked that his next career goal is as a greeter at the St. Albans Town Walmart."
It may look like the Douglas administration, now a "lame duck," is backing harmlessly away from the table, but don't count your giblets before they're gravy. Only today, we learn that a couple of Douglas appointees are hurriedly concluding negotiations on an obscure matter that may have greater influence over the fate of Vermont Yankee than either the determinations of the legislature or the will of the people. Now this is pretty wonky stuff which, rest-asssured, both Entergy and the Douglas Administration very much hope will not engage the majority of Vermonters. Vermont Digger has the story, and you'd best read the whole thing very carefully.
It seems that, back in 1998, when VY's "sell-by" date was still fourteen years in the future, Vermont made a compact with Texas
"to establish a permanent repository for low-level radioactive waste generated by nuclear power plants and medical and research facilities in Vermont and Texas. The compact was set up for the two states' exclusive use. (Maine was originally a part of the agreement but dropped out). In 2009, Waste Control Specialists received a license to open a radioactive waste landfill in West Texas for the compact that is now under construction."
Between 1998 and the present, I think we can fill in the blanks. Time went by; the economy of both states got dicey; and someone decided it might be a good idea to offset the cost of constructing and operating the landfill by admitting a "few more" member states into the compact. Appointed by Douglas, Vermont's only two representatives to the Texas commission, Uldis Vandis and Steven Wark, are among those supporting the move to admit more states. Several Texas commissioners apparently disagree.
"Critics say the new rules could transform the landfill into a national repository for low-level nuclear waste and that it could fill up quickly because demand for landfill space is high. Thirty-six states are not currently part of a radioactive waste disposal compact."
Sometimes we feel a little lonely around here, thinking, "Doesn't anyone else see what we're seeing?" Today, someone else sees it. The title of this morning's Burlington Free Press editorial speaks for itself: "Regulator's partisanship chips away at credibility".
I could quibble, pointing out that Dave O'Brien didn't have much credibility to begin with, but the key is that the whole world is now seeing that Dave O'Brien's loyalties are to the Douglas/Dubie administration and their wealthy friends, and not with the people of Vermont. Here's a sampling:
You should read the whole editorial. I'll just say that I'm very pleased that one of our leading daily newspapers is saying what we've been saying all along: We need someone who will be an independent defender of the health and safety of all Vermonters.
Predictably, promoters of Brian Dubie's agenda have seized on the ISO-New England statements about Vermont Yankee's withdrawal from the power auction, to do a little campaign cover-shot. It's no longer possible to link to the editorial content of the St. Albans Messenger, so you will just have to take my word for it that Emerson Lynn's Sept. 1 editorial is all over this opportunity. Get this:
...understandably, the other states in the region cant' be too happy about it. They are already beginning to talk about how the cost should not be borne by them, but by Vermont. If we cause the problem (deny the company its license) then Vermont should share more of the burden in making sure the energy source is replaced.
He goes on...and on...and finally gets to the point of lambasting Peter Shumlin for his opposition to relicensing.
Here is my e-mailed response to Mr. Lynn:
'Looks like another election year fact-check is in order when it comes to the ISO-New England and Vermont Yankee. In your September 1 editorial, you refer to the ISO as "independent." Even though it may be independent of control by any single power supplier, it is nevertheless a vehicle of the energy market as a whole, and so represents the interest of all the companies that supply power in New England. To imply that the ISO is entirely independent of Entergy is therefore somewhat disingenuous.
The ISO's clucking over the possibility that Vermont Yankee soon will not be part of the configuration of power suppliers to New England as a whole is kind of like an entity representing "big dairy" scolding Vermont for wanting to protect it's small dairy farms. As the coordinating arm of an industry dominated by big power corporations, it is unsurprising that they would take a dim view of replacing a plant operated by one of their constituents with alternative sources. If the ISO is indeed suggesting that Vermont should bear more of the burden of replacing the megawatts lost from the grid when VY goes off-line, the idea is absurd. Vermont has hosted Vermont Yankee for forty years, while consuming only a very small portion of its output. For forty years, the state has absorbed all of the risk of hosting the plant on its soil; and when it's gone, we will be the state that must cope with a long-term clean-up issue of unknown proportions.
ISO's sabre-rattling is most unbecoming, and if Brian Dubie is foolish enough to pick-up this line of argument in his campaign for governor, he can well expect that Vermonters will consider this disloyalty rather worse than what was displayed in his recent banner ads announcing that Vermont is in 47th place as one of the least friendly places in which to do business in the United States.
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.
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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.
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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.
