DOE extends deadline for comments on nuclear plant

 

Apr 3 - McClatchy-Tribune Business News Formerly Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News - Joe Walker The Paducah Sun, Ky.

A two-month extension will allow people to incorporate comments about a Paducah siting study for a 1,000-job spent nuclear fuel recycling plant into a nationwide environmental impact statement.

The Department of Energy announced Monday that it has extended the comment deadline for its Global Nuclear Energy Partnership program from Wednesday to June 4. Comments will be used to help DOE decide by June 2008 whether and where to build one or more recycling plants and advanced recycling reactors that would generate electricity while destroying a large amount of highly radioactive waste left over from fuel rods.

A Paducah task force, which is competing with 12 other cities for the facilities, has until May 30 to finish its siting study. Task force representative Dale Allen said the study should be finished and posted on the local Web site, www.paducahgnep.com, by May 1.

"We were really time-constrained in getting the report in, but this will give the public an opportunity to see the finished report and comment directly into the programmatic environmental impact statement," Allen said. "We'll put our report on the Paducah Web site word for word."

Allen said concerns were expressed at a recent public meeting about the time constraints for public comments.

"Continuing the environmental scoping process means we will continue to better understand the environmental conditions under which we will be operating," DOE Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Dennis Spurgeon said. "We have seen strong support for GNEP all across the country, and it's encouraging to hear that an increasing number of Americans recognize the growing need for nuclear energy, a safe, affordable and emissions-free power source."

In two previous public meetings in Paducah, GNEP has received support from business and governmental leaders but opposition from some environmental activists and neighbors of the proposed plant site. The $15 billion recycling factory is targeted for 580 acres just southwest of the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant and would open about 2020.

Two other public meetings are scheduled -- April 10 at Harrah's theater in Metropolis, Ill., and April 12 at Kentucky Dam Village State Resort Park Convention Center in Gilbertsville. Each meeting is scheduled to last from 6 to 8:30 p.m.