January 2009 Archived Updates
January 2009 Updates:
Watchdogs: Yankee audit is inadequate; 1.30.09
Experts Say VT Yankee’s Nuke Waste Is Here To Stay; 1.30.09
Vt. Yankee Permitted to Reduce Safety Tests; 1.11.09
Nuke Plant Cuts Power 60 Percent After Second Leak; 1.9.09
Entergy: Vermont Yankee Leaked Radioactive Water; 1.8.09
Friends and foes of Yankee Agree 2008 Was Memorable Year; 1.1.09
Watchdogs: Yankee Audit Is Inadequate
By BOB AUDETTE, Reformer Staff
Friday, January 30
http://www.reformer.com/ci_11588852
BRATTLEBORO — Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee ranks in the worst group of reactors in half of the benchmark measures compared in a recent audit of the plant’s operations, said Ed Anthes, of Nuclear Free Vermont by 2012.
“The equipment reliability index performance does not meet industry standards,” he said, quoting from the comprehensive vertical audit (CVA) of the nuclear power plant in Vernon.
The CVA was conducted last year after the Legislature wrote a law requiring the inspection. The audit is meant to inform both the Legislature and the state’s Public Service Board when deciding whether to allow Yankee to operate past its original license end date of 2012.
In 2006, Entergy, which owns and operates the 36-year-old boiling water reactor, applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a 20-year license extension, which would allow the plant to continue to produce power through 2032.
But even if Entergy receives approval from the NRC, the Vermont Legislature must vote yes and the Public Service Board must issue a certificate of public good stating the continued operation of the plant is in the best interests of the state.
The CVA was released in December and a five-person public oversight panel created to review the audit is expected to submit its report sometime in February.
“This was not the comprehensive vertical audit called for by the Legislature,” said Anthes.
The inspection was done in less than one-third the time needed to do the full inspection called for by the law, he said, attributing the reduced time spent on the audit to directions from Gov. James Douglas’ administration.
“Even so, although the inspection was not as thorough and detailed as called for by the law, it shows that the inspectors found that Vermont Yankee is not a good bet going forward,” said Anthes.
Nuclear Safety Associates, which was hired to conduct the audit, concluded Vermont Yankee “can be a reliable station beyond its current operating license.”
But it did add that it can only be reliable if areas of concern emphasized in the report are “effectively addressed.”
The Benchmark Report in the CVA compares Vermont Yankee to all other reactors in the United States.
“Yankee ranks in the worst group of reactors in half of the benchmark measures compared,” said Anthes.
The areas where Yankee ranked low in the benchmark analysis included plant overall performance, production costs, recordable injuries, the number of systems supervised by each system manager and its equipment performance as compared to other reactors.
Of 12 similar reactors around the country, Yankee rated 10th in equipment reliability performance. It ranked 11th out of 12 in Entergy’s fleet of nuclear reactors in the fleet equipment reliability performance benchmark.
“Yankee is in the worst performance category as compared to the overall industry,” said Anthes.
“The overall conclusions of the report show Vermont Yankee is reliable and can be operated reliably in the future,” said Rob Williams, spokesman for Yankee. “As we recently stated, the report identified a number of different areas where VY can strengthen programs and improvement efforts to help ensure the plant operates reliably during the next 20 years. We also stated that we are in the process of developing a detailed response to the insights and recommendations in the report.”
A spokesman from another anti-nuclear group said the reliability-focused CVA is neither an adequate or appropriate tool to address the prime concerns of people who live in the region.
“Taking comfort in the CVA is like sucking on a pebble to relieve hunger,” said Ray Shadis, a board member of the New England Coalition on Nuclear Pollution, which opposes the relicensing of Yankee.
The CVA was loaded with vague language that placed ultimate discretion for audit details in the hands of the Department of Public Service, he said, and DPS in turn negotiated what would be examined and how with Entergy.
“People are primarily concerned with declining safety margins, not reliability,” Shadis said. “What is called for — in the face of increasing equipment and structural failures, leaks, fires, fitness-for-duty issues, security failures, fuel handing incidents, radiation protection failures, and all the rest of the alarming findings and events that have marked Entergy’s tenure — is a full NRC-conducted safety-focused diagnostic team inspection, a second Independent Safety Assessment.”
NEC is an intervenor, and the sole intervenor focused on the condition and maintenance of Entergy Vermont Yankee systems, structures, and components, he said.
On Feb. 6, NEC will be submitting testimony to the Public Service Board, said Shadis.
A portion of NEC’s testimony will be devoted to a critique of the CVA.
“It’s irresponsible for Gov. Douglas and (DPS Commissioner) David O’Brian to ignore safety concerns,” said Clay Turnbull, a local member of NEC. “Thousands of Vermonter’s have petitioned Gov. Douglas to request that the NRC come to Vermont and perform their own Independent Safety Assessment of VY.”
The NSA report points to the urgent need for Douglas toreverse his position that Vermonters should look the other way when it comes to safety at Yankee, said Turnbull.
A spokesman for the NRC said it had no comment on the CVA. “This is the state’s review so it wouldn’t appropriate for us to comment on it,” said Neil Sheehan. “What’s more, the state is looking at reliability while our license renewal review is focused on plant safety and potential environmental impacts.”
Last year, NRC staffers determined it would be safe for Vermont Yankee to operate for an additional 20 years.
“Equipment reliability is an area Entergy has to improve on,” said Sarah Hofmann, Director for Public Advocacy for Vermont’s Department of Public Service.
In a large part, she said, this was due to problems with the plant’s cooling towers.
“However, people should look at this index in the context of the entire report,” said Hofmann. “It was only one measurement out of many recorded in the reliability assessment. Looking at the whole report gives the reader a picture of the station in its entirety from which to form a judgment.”
Experts say Vt. Yankee’s nuke waste is here to stay
By Daniel Barlow Vermont Press Bureau
Article published Jan 30, 2009
Rutland Herald
/timesargus.com/article/20090130/NEWS02/901300357/1003/NEWS02
MONTPELIER – Don’t count on Yucca Mountain or any other national solution for the long-term storage of spent nuclear fuel, a consulting group told lawmakers Thursday.
As the Vermont Legislature considers Vermont Yankee’s proposal to continue operating past its 2012 expiration date, lawmakers should assume that all the radioactive spent fuel left will be stored on-site in Vernon, nuclear consultants said.
Bruce Lacy, the founder of Iowa’s Lacy Consulting Group, told members of several House and Senate committees that dry cask storage of this waste material at nuclear power plants has become the default United States policy.
“We are storing it here in Vermont right now, but it is not going out of state unless there is a national movement,” Lacy said. “We need a positive will of Congress.”
Yucca Mountain, a ridgeline adjacent to nuclear weapons test sites in Nevada, was selected by the U.S. Department of Energy in 1987 as the storage facility for spent nuclear waste and other radioactive materials from nuclear power plants across the country.
But that site has sat unused since then, tied up with political disputes and doubts by the U.S. Congress. The Department of Energy filed a formal application to use the site late last year with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, but even that process seems fraught with problems, including funding.
Here in Vermont, lawmakers are considering a request by the owners of Vermont Yankee to extend the Vernon plant’s operating license for another 20 years beyond its 2012 end date. Storage of the nuclear waste – the byproduct of creating nuclear power – is one of the chief concerns lawmakers are struggling with.
Vermont Yankee now stores its nuclear waste in its spent fuel pool within the reactor and in underground, dry cask storage units – essentially steel and concrete storage units intended to keep the waste stored safely as it degrades naturally. Entergy Vermont Nuclear, the company that owns the plant, won legislative approval for those storage units in 2005.
Lacy said Vermont Yankee has 1,911 bundles of the waste stored in its spent fuel pool and another 340 bundles stored in dry cask units at the facility, which is located south of Brattleboro along the Connecticut River in the small town of Vernon.
The facility has enough storage room – thanks to the additional space allowed by the dry cask units – to continue storing its waste until 2032, which is when it would cease operating if its application to continue past 2012 is approved.
Rep. Sarah Edwards, P-Brattleboro, is a longtime critic of Vermont Yankee and a member of the House Natural Resources and Energy Committee. She said she worried about the long-term storage of the waste at the Vernon facility, especially if there is a natural disaster there, such as flooding.
She was surprised Thursday to learn that federal regulators did not consider the possible implications of global warming in their flooding predictions for the facility.
“Their belief is that the water levels are relatively stable,” Lacy told lawmakers.
Whenever Vermont Yankee is decommissioned – whether that is in 2012 or 2031 – the state should assume that the nuclear waste continue to be stored at the facility because there is no other viable national option, Lacy told lawmakers.
“This could be stored on site for a long time,” he said.
Another type of waste produced at Vermont Yankee also needs to find a long-term home. So-called low-level radioactive waste – anything from contaminated clothes and equipment to materials directly exposed to neutrons in the plant’s reactor – can only be stored in sites approved by the NRC, Lacy explained.
Radioactive waste dumps in South Carolina and Washington have often taken most of these classes of waste for the nuclear industry, but those sites will soon stop taking shipments from states not in their compact.
However, a new site is being constructed in Texas, which Vermont does have a contract with to store these materials, Lacy said. But the availability and cost of disposal is a wildcard in the debate over the future of Vermont Yankee.
“You cannot decommission a power plant without a contract for a disposal site,” he said.
Lacy said Vermont Yankee has three decommissioning options: Immediate decommissioning, which would take six to eight years; mothballing the facility and decommissioning over a 60-year period; and filling the structure with concrete and waiting until the radioactive material decays completely.
There have been 11 nuclear facilities that have undergone immediate decommissioning, Lacy said, with two more now in progress. Eleven sites in the country have been mothballed and two more – which he described as early, prototype reactors – have been filled with concrete and shut down.
Each option has its own costs and benefits, although the true costs of shutting down a power plant for good fluctuate and are hard to pin down. Decommissioning the facility immediately would cost between $655 million and $893 million; mothballing it for a few decades would cost between $717 million and $991 million.
Vermont Yankee’s owners have a trust fund set up to pay for decommissioning, but that account has dropped in recent months as troubles began on Wall Street. In September 2007, the fund was $440 million. In December 2008, it was $372 million.
“Like all trust funds in the United States, this has been in decline,” Lacy said.
Because of the uncertainties of the final decommissioning costs, Lacy recommended that lawmakers insist that the owners of Vermont Yankee put more money in that account.
“You can’t sharpen your pencils enough,” he said. “You don’t want to be in a position 60 years from now where there is not enough money left in that fund.”
Lacy Consulting, which bills itself as a non-partisan source of information on nuclear issues, was hired by the Vermont Legislature as consultants during the Vermont Yankee debate.
Vt. Yankee Permitted to Reduce Safety Tests
By SUSAN SMALLHEER Staff Writer
Article published Jan 11, 2009
http://timesargus.com/article/20090111/NEWS02/901110382/1003/NEWS02
BRATTLEBORO – The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has given Entergy Nuclear permission to reduce the number of times it conducts tests on control rods, a key safety system at Vermont Yankee plant.
In a decision released earlier this week, the NRC granted a license amendment to Entergy that will allow it to test the control rods on a monthly basis. The control rods are now tested weekly. Entergy filed the request in February 2008.
The control rods are inserted in the reactor core in the event of an emergency or a power reduction to reduce the amount of nuclear reaction in the plant.
Entergy Nuclear spokesman Laurence Smith said Friday that the plant had requested the reduction in order to put less stress on a “sensitive” component at the plant by needlessly testing it.
Smith said Vermont Yankee was one of the last nuclear reactors in the country to get permission from the NRC to change the standards for control rod testing, but according to the NRC only a handful of the 100 commercial reactors in the country have received such permission.
“We’re taking advantage of industry experience,” Smith said. “It’s good for us. It’s a better way to do things.”
“The change streamlines the actions and surveillances for the control rod system in areas such as scram time surveillance testing, where for instance, a small sampling of the control rods are tested at a slightly more frequent interval,” Smith said. “This is allowed by the very good VY and industry performance of this equipment. A further benefit is less reactivity manipulations are necessary, which minimizes the opportunity for errors to occur and less wear on the equipment.”
Smith said that Vermont Yankee would not implement the changes to its technical specifications until procedures and programs are revised and any training necessary is conducted.
According to Sarah Hofmann, the director of public advocacy for the Department of Public Service, the state remained neutral on Entergy’s control rod request. She stressed that the control rod testing issue was not a license renewal issue.
“The state didn’t take a stand on the recently approved change to testing of the control rods. It reduces the frequency of control rod testing to present industry practices. Some of the benefits are less impact to control room operators and a reduction in the likelihood of errors while not sacrificing quality. The DPS was aware of the change but did not object to this change,” Hofmann said.
Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said the following plants have either requested or obtained approval of the same change: Susquehanna, Grand Gulf, Browns Ferry, River Bend, Brunswick, Nine Mile Point, Fermi and Duane Arnold.
Of those plants, only Grand Gulf in Mississippi and River Bend in Louisiana are owned by Entergy Nuclear or its associated companies.
Sheehan said the technical specifications for Vermont Yankee currently require that the plant’s control rods be tested weekly. He said that Entergy control room operators move the rods one notch, with the purpose to confirm control rod insertion capability.
He said that the basis for Entergy seeking a revision of the surveillance testing requirements “is it will prevent unnecessary control rod manipulations. More specifically, it will reduce wear and tear on the system. It will also reduce the number of potential reactivity control errors, including mispositioning events, that could occur because it reduces the number of operator actions.”
“The change has been determined by the NRC staff to be acceptable because of the demonstrated historic reliability of the control rod drive mechanisms. Also, the monthly tests will continue to provide a large number of tests to provide confidence that any problems with the system would be identified,” he said.
Nuke Plant Cuts Power 60 Percent After Second Leak
Published: January 9, 2009
timesargus.com/article/20090109/NEWS02/901090369/1003/NEWS02
VERNON (AP) — The Vermont Yankee nuclear plant reduced power production by 60 percent Thursday after finding a leak of “mildly radioactive” water in a pipe that supplies water for steam generation in the reactor.
It was the second leak discovered in the nuclear power plant’s water system in the last few weeks. On Wednesday, the plant announced it could repair a water leak in a different section of the plant without reducing power.
Plant spokesman Rob Williams said the leak discovered by a technician Thursday was more pressing than the earlier leak.
None of the water that leaked was released into the environment.
“The water is processed and is eventually reused in the reactor,” Williams said. “We don’t release radioactive water from the plant.”
The latest leak was of about 60 drops a minute from a 24-inch pipe. It was discovered during a routine inspection, Williams said.
Plant operators began reducing power about 12:10 p.m.
“We’re talking about 60 drops a minute, we’re not talking about a lot at this point,” said Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman Neil Sheehan.
He said the source of the leak wouldn’t be discovered until the repairs are under way.
The other leak, from a valve gasket from a 4-inch water pipe, was discovered over the holidays.
Entergy: Vermont Yankee Leaked Radioactive Water
By Susan Smallheer Rutland Herald
Article published Jan 8, 2009
http://timesargus.com/article/20090108/NEWS01/901080363/1002/NEWS01
BRATTLEBORO — A valve leaking radioactive water inside Vermont Yankee’s reactor building was undergoing emergency repairs Wednesday, Entergy Nuclear said.
The leak did not require the company to shut down or even reduce power, according to Entergy Nuclear spokesman Laurence Smith.
Smith said the leak, which was losing about 2-1/2 gallons of “slightly radioactive” water a minute, had been discovered about two weeks ago during routine company inspection by plant operators.
Smith said the radioactive water, which comes from the reactor water’s cleanout system, was cleaned and filtered before being returned to the reactor building. The water is not discharged to the Connecticut River, he said.
He said the leaking radioactive water went into a sump drain, was filtered and was eventually returned to the reactor water system.
Smith said the metal gasket in the valve was located on what was essentially a “pool filter” on the cooling water in the reactor.
According to an e-mail from Entergy Nuclear spokesman Robert Williams, the company brought in a specialist who can repair the gasket in the valve without shutting down the valve, and the plant, as a result.
Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said the repair would only be temporary, and a permanent repair would have to be done at the plant’s next refueling outage, which is expected in 2010.
Sheehan said the NRC’s resident inspectors are closely monitoring the valve gasket repair.
News of the leak prompted a longtime Vermont Yankee critic to say the leak was just the latest in a long line of leaks at the 37-year-old reactor and another indication that Entergy and the NRC was not managing the aging problems at the plant.
“Sounds like another Bondo and duct-tape job,” said Raymond Shadis, senior technical adviser to the New England Coalition, who noted that nuclear power plants had thousands of valves.
“They’ve had many problems at Vermont Yankee with leaky valves,” said Shadis, noting the portion of the system that sprung a leak in the reactor building wasn’t in the crucial safety systems at the plant.
But Shadis said that any leak at a nuclear plant was cause for concern.
“It’s an indication of a declining, deteriorating situation,” he said.
“This is another failure of NRC oversight,” he said. “Yes, Vermont Yankee should find these problems on their own, but they should find them before they become a serious leak. This all comes under the heading ‘aging management.’”
Vermont Yankee has been faulted repeatedly for its lack of maintenance and oversight because of a series of leaks at the plant’s cooling towers, which are not considered part of the nuclear part of the plant and those not directly associated with safety.
Uldis Vanags, the Department of Public Service’s nuclear engineer, said in a series of e-mails Wednesday that the leak was “not serious but needs to be repaired.” He said the leak occurred on the plant’s 4-inch reactor water cleanout line. He said he didn’t know the cause of the failure or why the problem wasn’t caught earlier.
Sheehan said the plant could only operate a short time without the cleanout line, which filters and demineralizes the water used in the reactor.
He said the radiation is removed from the water with a series of filters and resins.
Contact Susan Smallheer at susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com.
Friends and foes of Yankee Agree 2008 Was Memorable Year
By BOB AUDETTE, Reformer Staff
Note from Denis Rydjeski of the Sierra Club: Rob Audette follows Vermont Yankee (VY) developments closely and writes for the Brattleboro Reformer. He’s by no means anti-nuke activist — which makes his year-end review all the more interested reading.
Thursday, January 1
BRATTLEBORO — There is an easily distinguishable line between those who support and those who oppose the relicensing of Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon.
But both those groups would probably agree that 2008 was a memorable year for the facility.
On the one hand, the power plant had its longest continuous run — more than 400 days — since it was started up in the early 1970s. On the other hand, a series of mishaps caused many in the public who were unaware of the plant’s relicensing application to lean toward the camp of those opposing license extension.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission released its final safety evaluation report recommending the plant receive a 20-year operating extension but the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board ruled the plant can’t receive a new license until adequate measures to control metal fatigue are in place.
Plant personnel loaded and successfully moved five casks of nuclear waste from the reactor building to a concrete pad outside of the plant but not before a gantry crane had a malfunction causing one of the 90-ton casks to slowly drop to the floor.
In mid-December, a consultancy firm hired by the state concluded Vermont Yankee could operate reliably for another 20 years but those consultants also suggested a number of conditions that should be agreed to prior to the state’s Public Service Board issuing a certificate of public good.
The state of Massachusetts is suing to stop the relicensing of both Yankee and Pilgrim nuclear station in Plymouth, Mass., on the grounds that the NRC hasn’t adequately addressed the long-term storage of spent nuclear fuel at the two plants.
In a series of reports commissioned by the Department of Public Service, experts suggested Entergy should fully fund the Yankee decommissioning fund prior to 2012, that closing Yankee would result in increased electric costs for Vermonters and that the plant’s economic impact on the state is immense.
The decommissioning trust fund dropped from $440 million to less than $350 million in the space of a year due to the Wall Street meltdown. Clean up of the site is expected to cost between $600 million and $1 billion.
More cracks were found in the plant’s steam dryer but engineers and the NRC agreed the cracks were miniscule and don’t endanger the safety or reliability of Yankee.
Following a cooling tower collapse in 2007, Yankee management promised to update its maintenance and inspection program and accelerate its efforts to replace wooden columns in the cooling towers.
A number of columns were replaced in 2008 but problems with the cooling towers still cropped up, including new leaks and the discovery of more degraded columns.
Fence line radiation levels were found to be above the state maximum but after the Department of Health changed the way it measures radiation, the levels were determined to be within acceptable limits.
Members of the Legislature accused the Department of Health of making the measurement change without following the appropriate state procedures.
At a fall meeting in Brattleboro sponsored by the NRC, former Gov. Thomas Salmon was shouted down by anti-nuclear protesters.
A dispute between a member of the Vertical Audit Public Oversight Panel and the commissioner of DPS resulted in a local legislator accusing DPS of endorsing “swift boat” attacks to undermine the panel’s authority.
Two maintenance errors led to temporary evacuations of parts of the plant due to increased radiation levels.
An Entergy plan to raise $.5 billion by spinning off Yankee and five other nuclear reactors into a new holding company was put on hold due to the uncertainty in the stock market.
Brattleboro turned down an offer for five new emergency sirens, which were quickly snatched up by Dummerston and Guilford.
Emergency managers announced the success of an emergency drill in June but members of the community wondered if the effectiveness of an emergency drill can be determined without the actual movement of people out of the emergency preparedness zone.
In its annual assessment, the NRC gave Yankee a passing grade. Near the end of the year, a new site vice president was hired.
Entergy asked the NRC if it could spend some decommissioning funds on spent fuel storage and was turned down.
The plant’s condenser, miles of tubing used to cool reactor water, sprung a small leak that engineers were unable to find.
The Advisory Commission on Reactor Safeguards also gave the plant a relicensing go-ahead.
Several state and federal legislators suggested legislation that would allow governors or public service boards with a nuclear power plant or emergency preparedness zone in their states to demand an independent safety inspection.
DPS REPORTS: CLOSING VY IS DOABLE
The following op-ed was sent to Vermont’s major newspapers:
by Michael J. Daley
It might not seem so from recent news items, but the recent reports from the
Vermont Department of Public Service (DPS) about Vermont Yankee should be very
encouraging to citizens who want the plant closed in 2012. It’s hard to see
that because the Department emphasizes the benefits of keeping Vermont Yankee
open while highlighting only the costs of closing it. But a close look at the
details leads to this conclusion: if VY is not re-licensed the lights will stay
on, electric costs will not change dramatically, and the jobs lost at VY will
be replaced many times over by jobs in the renewable energy sector.
Here are the building blocks of that conclusion:
1) The reports find that VY is insignificant to the NE power grid and will not
be missed if closed. That means the lights will stay on in Vermont and
everywhere else.
2) The added cost to electric rates of closing VY could be as little as $21
million over 20 years. That works out to just about $1.75 per person per year
($21 million/20 years/600,000 VT population).
3) Earlier DPS polls showed 62% of Vermonters want the plant to close,
and a lot of them were willing to pay more for that result. Obviously,
$1.75 per year is not too high a premium to pay to end the risk of
nuclear accident and the generation of 20 more years of nuclear waste.
4) Most figures are given in twenty-year totals to create an impression
of the plant’s importance, but the reports reveal it is actually a very tiny
part of the Vermont economy: a mere 3 tenths of one percent (0.3 %) of the
Gross State Product and only 4 tenths of one percent (0.4%) of the workforce.
5) Contrast this with tourism—the industry most likely to collapse following
a significant radiological accident at VY—at about 25% of Gross State
Product.
6) The reports state that renewable energy sources could replace VY at an
estimated cost of 7.3 cents/kwhr. This is CHEAPER than current market rates
and not as subject to inflation and market volatility.
7) Using renewables to replace VY will preserve our very low carbon
footprint AND eliminate any increase in our radioactive one, as well as
ending the risk of a reactor accident.
Renewable energy—particularly wind and wood-fired power plants—typically
creates jobs at a rate of 4 or 5 to one over nuclear. Replacing VY’s 262 MW
with in-state renewable development could create as many as 1000 new jobs!
9) The reports show that about 68% of the direct and indirect economic
benefit to the state economy comes from the wages of the 257 Vermont
employees at the plant. The rest comes from the generation and property
taxes.
10) Since a nuclear reactor operator spending his or her salary is no different
from a wood plant worker spending theirs, the direct and indirect economic
benefits from these new jobs could be five times greater. New generating
facilities will pay property taxes. These combined new revenues will easily
outstrip the lost generation tax from VY.
Beyond all this, there is a huge factor the experts overlooked. A DPS
report identified nearly 200 MW of cost-effective energy efficiency savings.
Why did the Department fail to make efficiency part of the strategy for
replacing VY? Perhaps because efficiency costs only 2.5 cents/kwhr, HALF the
price VY is charging us today! Talk about cheap! Such a comparison would
obviously make the costs of VY’s continued operation seem huge indeed. And the
other problem might be that Efficiency Vermont is three times more effective at
creating jobs by SAVING electricity than VY is by generating it.
Once efficiency is factored in with the already encouraging opportunities of
renewable energy development, closing VY becomes a win for the ratepayers, a
win for the state coffers, a win for the environment, and maybe even a win for
VY employees as jobs in the electric energy sector increase dramatically
throughout Vermont.
###
Michael J. Daley lives in Westminster, VT. He is an author of books of
science and science fiction and a lifelong renewable energy advocate.
Vermont Yankee & That Sinking Feeling
POSTED BY SHAY TOTTEN ON DECEMBER 10, 2008 AT 05:47 PM IN SERIOUS NEWS | PERMALINK
The state of Vermont’s Department of Public Service is now receiving monthly updates from Entergy on the performance of Vermont Yankee’s Decommissioning Fund — you know, the amount of money that needs to be set aside to clean up the plant once its closed.
Anyone with a 401(k) knows the stock market has been in a bit of a rut. OK, a ditch. OK, maybe a canyon. Anyway, as I pointed out in “Fair Game” in October the fund’s value has actually been dropping precipitously since the end of 2007.
So, here’s a rundown with the latest, Nov. 30, 2008 figures tacked on.
March 31, 2006: $391,882,501
Sept 30, 2006: $402,410,980
March 31, 2007: $422,182,237
Sept 30, 2007: $440,003, 672
March 31, 2008: $427,406,446
Sept 30, 2008: $397,035,937
Oct 31, 2008: $364,426,383
Nov 30, 2008: $360,673,692
It’s good to remember that when Entergy bought the plant in 2002, the fund’s value was roughly $304 million. All of that money came from ratepayers. In other words, you and I, not investments or corporate profits.
Given that taxayers in Connecticut and Massachusetts were asked to pony up the shortfall when their nuke plants were shut down, it should give anyone pause that the cost of decommissioning Vermont Yankee could run as high as $1.2 billion.
VY officials contend the plant could be mothballed for up to 60 years until enough investment money accrues in the fund to break down the reactor site.
The tanking of the fund only adds to Vermont Yankee’s woes as it tries to convince lawmakers to give it a thumbs up to operate for another 20 years. At least one key lawmaker has said he doesn’t expect there to be a vote taken this session, but rather in 2010.
A group of anti-nuke activists hopes to fill that void by putting Vermont Yankee’s relicensure request up for a public vote on Town Meeting Day 2009. So far, people in about 40 towns have expressed an interest, according to Dan DeWalt, one of the resolution’s backers.
The resolution asks the Legislature to:
Agree that the power produced by Vermont Yankee’s equals 2% of what is used in the region, and that such a small amount of power can be replaced with renewables and conservation;
Operating VY beyond 2012, a time in which it will be 40 years old, does not benefit the general welfare of the state; and,
Entergy should be held liable to pay for the full cost of decommissioning Vermont Yankee.
Meanwhile, Entergy has dumped its long-term lobbying team of Gerry Morris and Allison Crowley DeMag. In Mid-October, Entergy hired on MacLean, Meehan, and Rice as their lobbying firm of choice. Christopher Rice will serve as the nuke company’s chief face under the Golden Dome.
STATE PANEL BARRED FROM NUKE INSPECTION
By Dave Gram, Associated Press Writer
July 18, 2008
MONTPELIER, Vt. — The state Department of Public Service has declined to let members of a panel created by the Legislature to do a special audit of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant join an inspection of the plant set for Monday, officials confirmed Friday.
The decision was the latest sign of strain between the administration of Gov. Jim Douglas and the members of the newly created Public Oversight Commission appointed by House Speaker Gaye Symington and Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin.
“They’re trying to stonewall our appointees,” Shumlin said Friday. He said the legislative appointees, retired nuclear engineer Arnold Gundersen and former federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission member Peter Bradford, needed to be full participants in the Vermont Yankee review for lawmakers to have confidence in the plant’s continued
operation.
Vermont Yankee, owned by Louisiana-based Entergy Nuclear, is seeking a 20-year extension of its license, currently set to expire in 2012. Under Vermont law, the Legislature gets to vote up or down on whether that should happen, a vote that’s expected in next year’s session. Shumlin said the administration’s stance could hurt Vermont Yankee’s chances of getting legislative approval for renewing its license. “If this administration is going to stand in the way of that (inspection) process, they threaten to unravel the information we need to make a tremendously important decision for Vermonters.”
Stephen Wark, spokesman for the DPS, said Friday he could not comment of the matter because of an agreement that the deliberations of the Public Oversight Commission be kept secret. But Diane Screnci, spokeswoman for the NRC’s Northeast regional office, confirmed that no member of the Public Oversight Commission would be attending Monday’s inspection. “The Department of Public Service has not requested that any member of the panel observe the (inspection),” Screnci said. “And they would have to tell us, they would have to request this specific person and they haven’t at this point.”
Gundersen, who maintains he is not the anti-nuclear activist the department makes him out to be but who has been critical of Vermont Yankee, said Friday he also could not comment on the panel’s deliberations. But he confirmed he had been barred from Monday’s inspection tour, which is to include NRC and state officials. “Basically we’re in lockout,” he said. “It’s just more of the swift-boating of us, as far as I’m concerned.”
When Gundersen and Bradford’s appointments were announced July 1, the DPS pounced immediately, with Wark saying both men “clearly have a bias against nuclear power.” Gundersen said there was ample precedent for civilians being allowed to join nuclear inspection tours. He provided a copy of an e-mail from David Lochbaum of the Union of Concerned Scientists, a national group with a long history of criticizing nuclear power, in which Lochbaum said he had been invited on such tours in the past.
Meanwhile Friday, two groups critical of Vermont Yankee held a news conference to
denounce the state and federal response to the latest mishap at the Vernon power plant. The Vermont Public Research Group and the Citizens’ Action Network took aim at the July 11 leak in part of the plant’s cooling towers. VPIRG’s Paul Burns blasted what he called the “dangerous level of corporate incompetence shown by Entergy Nuclear and the pass-the-buck attitude of state and federal regulators.”
© Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company