This is exactly what I was talking about.
Recently, I penned an uncharacteristically esoteric piece for the Huffington Post, discussing the need for a politics that promotes “fault tolerance” in our society. My basic thesis was this: people (individually and culturally) learn by adapting to crises, either those externally imposed, or those we bring about ourselves. The problem comes now that we have harnessed so many powerful technologies on such a grand scale that we can no longer afford to wait to learn from our mistakes, because of the scale of the consequences that arise from those mistakes. Climate change is the marquee example – we can’t simply learn our lesson after we do irreparable damage to our planet.
But for an example that hits more close to home, Vermont Yankee is a beaut. In case you haven’t heard, it’s leaking again. This time its radioactive steam into the air to go along with the tritium that’s hit the water table.
Does anybody seriously think this is going to get better? That an aging plant leaking and collapsing and belching toxins is going to stop aging? If common sense doesn’t answer that question, the second law of thermodynamics should.
There is no fault tolerance with this plant, and with our associated energy policy right here in Vermont. If we follow our pattern as a species, we won’t collectively get that lesson through our heads until we do serious damage – and the damage that will be done by our mistakes in not dealing with the danger of this plant is simply too high to absorb and casually walk away from.
We in Vermont need to approach our ballots this November with an eye towards breaking this cycle. We need to ask ourselves which candidates will look to preventing environmental disasters rather than waiting to deal with them after the fact. We need candidates who can build fault tolerance into our public institutions, because the cost of some faults is simply intolerable.
(Take the pledge at votegreengov.org)
…we call it “failing gracefully”. VY is failing, sans grace.
and manning the print news message boards with the ridiculous explanations which exceed their customary & previous ridiculous explanations.
To hell with the ‘straight face test’-their faces are straight.
How they maintain it is far beyond anything I can remotely consider reality.
It rivals even the NRC existence in the vacuum of their alternate reality & stepford-like trance.
going to apply a patch to these leaking valves and pipes that hook up to the patients heart, at some time in the future. we see this as normal maintenance for the operation of the patient’s body. stuff leaks, including blood, around the central reactor and primary pump reservoir. there is no immediate threat to the patient’s health.
our crews noticed the leaking while doing scheduled maintenance and applied a stent and patch. really, this is all normal and the patient should continue to run, bike, climb mountains, and put out huge cardio efforts. in fact, we are advising the patient to uprate their total cardio output to 110% of studied and designed values, even as they continue to have incontinence problems with their waste by-products and struggle with these internal leaks coming from key systems. we also recommend that the aging patient take their grandkids out for long high speed automobile drives in high stress traffic. don’t worry about the kids – we have airbags and safety systems that will kick in should unforeseen complications arise.
we recommend the patient wear some adult diapers and take two of these little pills and call us in the morning, at which time a representative who oversees the regulations on these types of incidents will make a blanket statement about the health of the body and how this is all ‘routine’.
government – keep your hands off my aging nuclear plant! don’t tell me how to fix my leaky valves and pipes! we don’t need death panels for good ole granny nuclear – its unamerican!
has graciously offered jobs to all w/in their fleet, so they say.
Over 2/3 do not live in VT. Many are at or near retirement.
Nuclear industry has many job openings.
Though I do not wish hardship on anyone VTer or not, going from one six figure job to another is not what I call hardship esp since this has always been a given. Most of all, I do not wish the hardship of Entergy & NRC on VTers or EPZ.
They have become occupiers & protectorate of NRC who claim PSB does not have authority in many areas & cannot shut them down.
NRC relicensing the nations nuclear waste leaking fleet is not VTs problem. They are also rewriting rules to allow 60 & 80 year licenses.
Also claiming nuclear waste can be safely stored for 60 years & looking into much longer timeframes like perpetuity when the containers they have are supposedly only safe for 20-30 & there was a story that they are flawed & in actuality not safe at all.
If VY shuttered the waste stops & relicensing for longer periods of time not possible.
The second biggest reason to close it & not allow nuclear power in VT is the slippery NRC & their propensity for revisionism. They are rogue-like in their maneuverings, regulatory enforcement & rule making.
We are facing difficult throny issues did not exist when VY built. Nuclear industry has changed & taken a nosedive.
The biggest reason to close them is that they can still circumvent state reg boards & restructure to remove their assets leaving nothing in the case of catastrophic occurance, failure, decom or waste monitoring.