ASLBP issues split decision on vessel risks at Palisades, Beyond Nuclear vows appeal

A diagram describing pressurized thermal shock in a nuclear reactor. Credit: Japan Atomic Energy Agency. Japan's worst embrittled RPV, at Genkai 1, has been permanently closed in the aftermath of Fukushima.A U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel (ASLBP) issued a ruling on May 8th that recognized an environmental coalition's legal standing, but rejected its proferred contention, thus denying any further hearings on the matter.

Beyond Nuclear and coalition partners Don't Waste MI, MI Safe Energy Future--Shoreline Chapter, and Nuclear Energy Information Service of Chicago, represented by Toledo attorney Terry Lodge, and expert witness Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Associates, Inc., filed an intervention on Dec. 1st against regulatory rollbacks on reactor pressure vessel (RPV) embrittlement/pressurized thermal shock (PTS) risks at Palisades, the most brittle RPV in the U.S. See the full docket of filings between the adversarial parties, here.

The coalition has issued a press release in response to the rejection of its contention. It has vowed to appeal the ruling within the next 25 days.

Lodge filed a second, related but separate intervention on behalf of the coalition on March 9. It challenges Entergy’s License Amendment Request to NRC for “equivalent margins analysis” regulatory relief from potentially disastrous “ductile tearing” (as opposed to brittle fracture) risks at Palisades, due to another form of age-related RPV metal degradation (loss of Charpy V-Notch Upper Shelf Energy below the 50 foot-pound screening criteria). The ASLBP has yet to rule on that intervention.