Coalition files Petition to NRC to strengthen reactor license extension rules due to significant new revelations on radioactive waste risks
February 20, 2014 
Environmental coalition attorney Diane CurranA Petition for Rulemaking was filed on Feb. 18th by Washington, D.C.-based attorney, Diane Curran (photo, left), as well as Mindy Goldstein of the Emory U. Turner Environmental Law Clinic, to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The Petition seeks to re-open the License Renewal GEIS (Generic Environmental Impact Statement), in order to consider new and significant information about irradiated nuclear fuel storage impacts that was generated by the NRC Staff during the Expedited Spent Fuel Transfer proceeding, carried out under NRC's Fukushima "Lessons Learned" activities. Curran and Goldstein filed the Petition on behalf of three dozen environmental groups, including Beyond Nuclear.
The filing urges that no reactor license extensions be approved by NRC until the Petition for Rulemaking has been integrated into NRC's safety regulations.
The coalition has issued a press release.
Incredibly enough, NRC has already rubberstamped 20-year license extensions at most, or even almost all, operating US GE BWR Mark Is and IIs (23 and 8, respectively) -- despite intense resistance by local grassroots and even national environmental groups, in many cases. However, the Limerick 1 & 2 Mark IIs in Pennsylvania, as well as the Fermi 2 Mark I in Michigan, could have their license extension application proceedings further delayed by this environmental coalition petition for rulemaking and motion for stay.
Limerick 1 & 2 applied for 20-year license extensions in 2011. NRDC has legally intervened to challenge to license extensions, contending that the SAMA (Severe Accident Mitigation Alternatives) analyses are inadequate. Remarkably, the NRC Atomic Safety (sic) and Licensing Board panel overseeing NRDC's intervention ruled against admitting the contention for a hearing on the merits. In addition to NRDC's intervention, the grassroots group ACE (Alliance for a Clean Environment), led by local Pottstown residents Dr. Buzz Cuthbert and Donna Cuthbert, has long sought Limerick 1 & 2's shutdowns.
Fermi 2 -- the largest Mark I in the world, as big in size as Fukushima Daiichi Units 1 & 2 put together -- has indicated it will seek a 20-year license extension this year. A growing coalition of groups -- Don't Waste MI, Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Great Lakes, Alliance to Halt Fermi 3, Citizens Resistance at Fermi 2, Beyond Nuclear, and others -- will oppose this, perhaps including by officially intervening in the NRC ASLB proceeding. Several groups (Beyond Nuclear, Citizens for Alternatives to Chemical Contamination, Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario, Don't Waste MI, and Sierra Club Michigan Chapter) likewise intervened against the proposed new Fermi 3 (a GE-Hitachi so-called "Economic Simplified BWR," or ESBWR) in March 2009, and have been duking it out with DTE and NRC ever since.
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On Feb. 27th, Curran and Goldstein filed a petition for stay of NRC licensing decisions, under the environmental coalition's concerns contained in the Feb. 20th Petition for Rulemaking have been addressed. This would include at old reactor license extension proceedings, such as at Davis-Besse, OH, as well as at proposed new reactor license application proceedings, such as at Fermi 3, MI, in which Beyond Nuclear is intervening.