Nuclear worries voiced at Plymouth hearing

Apr 7 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Patrick Cassidy Cape Cod Times, Hyannis, Mass.

Pilgrim Nuclear Station in Plymouth is proceeding with a $65 million plan to more safely store some of its nuclear fuel waste, but for some who attended a Statehouse hearing Wednesday on nuclear safety, the move is too little too late.

The state's only active nuclear power plant is facing increasing pressure to prove that the energy source is safe in response to Japan's nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, where a tsunami almost a month ago cut power to reactors and led to the release of radioactive material.

A large group of anti-nuclear power protesters outside the Statehouse on Wednesday held signs with sayings such as "Just say no to nukes," while inside legislators pushed Pilgrim officials for information on the plant's safety.

In addition to the hearing, Gov. Deval Patrick, Senate President Therese Murray, D-Plymouth, and House Speaker Robert DeLeo, D-Winthrop, sent two letters Wednesday to Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Gregory Jackzo requesting more information about what would be done at Pilgrim to ensure the plant is operating safely, including a list of two dozen specific questions about the storage of spent fuel and other safety concerns.

Pilgrim officials at the hearing inside the Gardner Auditorium at the Statehouse did their best to allay those concerns.

Some of the spent fuel rods currently stored underwater at Pilgrim will be moved to a so-called "dry cask" that holds 50 fuel assemblies, according to Bob Smith, Entergy site vice president for the Massachusetts plant. Dry cask storage is generally considered a safer alternative to the underwater pool system.

"We expect our first offload of fuel in 2014," Smith said during the hearing.

Pilgrim has nearly 3,000 spent fuel assemblies in an on-site pool. The plant was originally licensed to store 880 fuel assemblies in the pool.

Smith and other Entergy officials faced a barrage of questions from a collection of several state legislative committees. Others who testified at the hearing included Attorney General Martha Coakley, state environmental and energy officials, and a panel of citizens.

The company only plans to remove enough fuel assemblies so that it can reload its reactor, said Mary Lampert of Pilgrim Watch, a group that has called for better safety measures at the plant.

"That maintains the pool in a dangerous situation," Lampert said after the four-hour hearing.

The fuel assemblies are stored with material that protects them from overheating even if there are more of them, said Entergy Senior Vice President and Chief Executive Officer Michael Balduzzi.

The 880 fuel assemblies the pool was originally licensed to hold does not mean it can't hold more, he said. "There's no magic about 880," he said after the hearing.

Entergy officials argued during their testimony that there are safety mechanisms in place at Pilgrim that did not exist in the Japanese plant, including backup sources of power to keep water flowing to the pool where the spent fuel is stored.

The plant has three diesel generators, one of which was installed after concerns were raised about the possibility that the two others could be knocked out of service, Smith said.

"We changed after (Three Mile Island,) we changed after Chernobyl and probably after we understand the events we will make changes after Fukushima," he said.

But legislators, the attorney general and environmental groups questioned whether the company is making changes fast enough.

The crisis in Japan has increased momentum behind efforts to get the nuclear industry to deal with its waste problem, Coakley said before her formal testimony began.

"In some respects it's changed it totally because there had been no debate," she said about discussions over nuclear power.

Ratepayers have contributed $24 billion to a fund that was intended to solve the long-term problem of storage through the construction of a national repository but the plan has been shelved, she said.

"They're sitting on a pile of money and there is no plan," she said adding that Massachusetts ratepayers pay $10 million each year for on-site storage of nuclear waste at decommissioned sites.

Lawmakers raised issues with other practices at Pilgrim, including electric cables run underground in conduits that may be prone to leakage, the size of "emergency response zones" designated if an accident occurs and support for communities around the plant who will have to respond to any potential emergency.

"My point to you, and what I would like to have you take away from this hearing, is simply that times have changed," said state Rep. Marc Pacheco, D-Taunton, chairman of the Joint Committee on Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture.

Sue Reid, vice president and director of the Conservation Law Foundation in Massachusetts, said it's about time the use of nuclear power was questioned.

"It's so long overdue in terms of addressing the spent fuel storage issues at Pilgrim," she said. "They're way behind the ball."