Vermont Yankee Nuclear License Renewal Challenged By State

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — A top Vermont utility regulator is heading to Washington to argue in a court hearing that the license renewal given last year by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to Entergy Corp.'s Vermont Yankee nuclear plant was issued improperly.

Elizabeth Miller, commissioner of the Department of Public Service, is to appear Wednesday before the U.S. Appeals Court for the D.C. Circuit. She says she'll tell the court that Vermont Yankee lacked the renewed water quality certificate it needed before the NRC could issue its new license.

Vermont Yankee owner Entergy argues in court papers that their previous water quality certificate was still in effect. The company and the NRC also say Vermont could have raised its issues during NRC hearings on the license renewal.

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Comments

[Lady Morrigahn]

05:19 PM on 07/07/2012

I find this abhorrent; VT shouldn't have to find a reason to not renew the nuke lease, and our Dept. of Justice is NOT supposed to be in the business of forcing contracts onto a state that doesn't want a company there. Blatant example of how deeply oligarchy has posioned the Fed gov't.

I hope VT continues this, and another tactic would be to slowly disconnect the state from the power they are producing, in the meantime.

[Genders]

01:20 PM on 05/11/2012

Only 8% of our energy in the USA comes from nukes.

We can do with them all too.

[Kenz300]

12:26 PM on 05/09/2012

Japan has shut down all 54 nuclear power plant and they seem to be getting along just fine without them.

The spent fuel rod pools now seem to be a huge disaster waiting to happen. Will the next earth quake in Japan be the one that leads to the collapse of the spent fuel rod pools of the damaged reactor spreading contamination around the world.

[Atoms4Peace1]

01:16 PM on 05/09/2012

Do you really believe for one minute they are "getting along just fine"? They are sacrificing much more than you think and are actually planning on a phased restart of the reactors.

[strangiato]

03:40 PM on 05/09/2012

Given what the people of Fukushima prefecture have been sacrificing versus that of Japanese citizens throughout the rest of the country, there is very little interest on the part of the Japanese public for either believing what its government has to say about nuclear safety or for restarting the reactors. The pain and lessons learned by nearly 90,000 Japanese who've been evacuated and lost everything have not been lost on the remainder of the Japanese population. Rest assured, there are probably very few Japanese who do not know or are not related to a displaced Fukushima refuge.

[Michael Mann]

01:29 PM on 05/09/2012

I guess a trade deficit, increased hospitalization for heat exhaustion, is getting along just fine?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/apr/19/japan-trade-deficit-record-high
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-12/heatstroke-deaths-quadruple-as-japan-shuns-ac.html

[Kenz300]

12:23 PM on 05/09/2012

It is time to transition to safe, clean alternative energy sources.

Wind, solar, wave energy, geothermal and second generation biofuels made from algae, cellulose and waste are the future.

[Atoms4Peace1]

01:16 PM on 05/09/2012

Dont forget, we all will live in tee pees too!

[Genders]

01:26 PM on 05/11/2012

completely lost it, haven't you?

http://fukushima.greenaction-japan.org/2012/05/01/an-urgent-request-on-un-intervention-to-stabilize-the-fukushima-unit-4-spent-nuclear-fuel/

Japanese are going to go solar wind and waste to energy, and your nuke nightmare will fade into a scary story we tell our kids.

[Genders]

01:25 PM on 05/11/2012

Yes! Even rooftop solar is now cheaper than nukes and much faster to install.

By the time the first new reactor can be built, solar will be 40% cheaper.

Wind and waste are half the cost of nukes.

Waste bio fuels in existing fossil generators supplies all the backup and feed stock solar and wind need.

Tell Chu to stop the loan guarantees for nukes: and put it all in solar wind and waste to energy

http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/5502/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=9662

[mamacat]

07:01 AM on 05/09/2012

Japan recently closed down the last of their nuclear reactors. It can be done. Do we have to wait until we experience a Fukushima or a Chernobyl before we end the nuclear experiment?

[Genders]

01:29 PM on 05/11/2012

It's only 8% of our energy, we can do without it while we bring up solar wind and waste to energy.

[WonderingNThinking]

02:03 AM on 05/09/2012

Go Elizabeth!!

[ItsGettingWeird]

08:50 PM on 05/08/2012

I live on a mountain her in Southern Vermont. This plant is roughly 40 miles from here.

We are starting to see homeowners install their own wind turbines. They take advantage of the wind patterns that push through the mountains.

[Atoms4Peace1]

01:16 PM on 05/09/2012

ugly eyesores. Ill never ski Killington again

[alvdh1]

02:42 PM on 05/09/2012

That, of course, would be opposed to ugly abandoned uranium mines, abandoned mountains of uranium talings, massive cooling towers visible from further away that wind turbines, giant steam clouds adding heat trapping water vapor to the atmosphere or in the case of the VY, big ugly rectangular and square box buildings full of radioactive poison oozing and dripping tritium into the ground water on the shore of a pretty lake.

It is all in the eye of the beholder, but it doesn't surprise me that you would choose ugly massive radioactive poison factories over wind turbines given your fondness of radioactive poisons.

[Genders]

01:29 PM on 05/11/2012

cooling towers are beautiful, right?

[nirek]

07:14 PM on 05/08/2012

Entergy is NOT doing anything but take profits and run the plant (40 years old) at 120% of its approved rate. The place leaks and they have mislead, misstated, and lied to the state.

[strangiato]

07:26 PM on 05/08/2012

Spot on! I don't know y I haven't fanned you already...

F&F

[Jtt]

05:36 PM on 05/08/2012

LOL ( http://www.vermontgas.com/addison/fund.html )

1. Reduce overall energy costs in Vermont

2. Increase capacity of the existing pipeline system

3. Allow more Vermont communities to receive the benefits of natural gas

4. Improve reliability of the existing distribution and transmission system

[Genders]

01:36 PM on 05/11/2012

netter than nukes. But they are also going waste to energy, wind and even solar.
http://www.revermont.org/main/vermont-solar-consumer-guide/incentive-types/
Still trying to prove everyone against nukes secretly works for the gas companies? sad.

[altohone]

05:03 PM on 05/08/2012

You would think Entergy lying about underground pipes leaking radiation would be sufficient to invalidate the renewal.

The whole process reeked of corruption and lack of accountability.

Perhaps a law like Japans mandating local approval is required here too.

[Jtt]

05:38 PM on 05/08/2012

Why not do something strange like fix them. What is the rate and species of radiation? Is it any danger to the environment or people?

[strangiato]

05:45 PM on 05/08/2012

Because if you actually had expertise in the field of nuclear engineering, you'd know that the necessary retrofitting of these Mark I plants like Vermont, Fukushima, and Pilgrim would be cost prohibitive and that is ultimately what drives the process - not a rubber stamp regulator like the NRC.

[nirek]

07:08 PM on 05/08/2012

Entergy chose not to repair but to lie about the leaks.

[strangiato]

05:42 PM on 05/08/2012

Yes, one would think that. But the NRC is essentially the nuclear industry's rubber stamp. In its history, it has never refused to relicense a nuclear power plant. Can you think of any industry in which the "regulating body" has never refused authorization or permitting for a company or enterprise? It's time for Congress and the Executive branch to clean house at the NRC. The NRC chairman recently spoke of the agency's failure to account for impact to large populations around proposed plant operations in the wake of Fukushima yet the agency is primed to relicense Vermont's sister station - the Pilgrim plant which has seen dramatic population growth in surrounding communities since the plant went on line. The NRC claims it doesn't need to consider evacuation planning in the relicensing process because "evacuation planning is done everyday". In Pilgrim's case, the most trivial of evacuation studies would reveal a chaotic and unworkable situation. Similar concerns have been raised about the Indian Point plant just north of NYC. These aging plants with massive stores of spent fuel sitting atop them are accidents waiting to happen. Given what has occurred with the same reactor design in Fukushima, it is mind boggling that these plants are even up for relicensing when rapid decommissioning should be happening.

[Jtt]

05:45 PM on 05/08/2012

Actually it is run by someone incompetent (like most anti nukes) and critical of the industry. But dont let facts trip you up. I should also point out this poster is a natural gas champion.