Showdown on NRC nuke waste con game in Chicago: "This member of the public does not share your confidence!"
North Anna watchdog Erica Grey, and Diane D'Arrigo of NIRS, unfurl a banner at NRC's first Nuke Waste Con Game meeting, held Oct. 1st in the NRC Commissioners conference room at NRC HQ in Rockville, MD. Photo by Beyond Nuclear's Kevin Kamps.On Nov. 12th in Oak Brook, IL outside Chicago, Beyond Nuclear joined with environmental and public interest colleagues at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) public comment meeting on the agency's court-ordered draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement (GEIS) on so-called "Nuclear Waste Confidence." The multi-state coalition included representatives from, and affiliated with, the following groups: Nuclear Energy Information Service (NEIS); Stand Up, Save Lives!; Nuclear Free Illinois; Global Warming Solutions Group of Central IL; Sierra Club Illinois Nuclear Free Committee; Michigan Safe Energy Future--South Haven Chapter; Missouri Coalition for the Environment; IL Families Against Toxic Wastes; Chicago Media Watch; League of Women Voters; Rainforest Action Network; Ministry for a Sustainable Earth; West Suburban Coalition for Peace and Justice, Citizens Acting to Protect Our Water (CAPOW!); Chicago Indy Media; and Multikulti. Concerned citizens, as from the communities around Exelon Nuclear's Byron, Dresden, Braidwood, and Zion nuclear power plants, also spoke out.
By a nearly 3 to 1 margin, public interest and environmental advocates expressed a resounding "no confidence in NRC nuke waste CON-fidence" at the public comment microphone. 38 "no confidence votes" were cast, as compared to 14 supporting NRC's nuke waste con game -- mostly representing Exelon Nuclear itself, or those directly under its direct financial influence. So many spoke out against NRC's nuke waste con job that the meeting went for around an hour longer than originally planned. The shellacking took place, interestingly enough, just 9 miles or so from NRC's Region 3 headquarters office in Lisle, IL. The meeting took place just 13 miles or so from Exelon Nuclear's world HQ in Warrenville, IL (where the Nuclear-Free Great Lakes Action Camp took place in August 2001, including a non-violent civil disobedience action resulting in a dozen arrests that disrupted Exelon's ribbon-cutting ceremony).
NEIS, Sierra Club Illinois Nuclear Free Committee, Stand Up, Save Lives!, Nuclear Free Illinois, and Michigan Safe Energy Future (MSEF)--South Haven Chapter put out a press release.
Bette Pierman of MSEF stated:
“While reviewing the documents for comment, the term “adequate” repeatedly appears regarding the steps currently used to store toxic nuclear waste. Whenever I hear the term used by NRC staff to describe any of the nuclear plants across the country, but in particular Entergy’s Palisades Nuclear Plant, I cringe. I am not sure how the use of this term is supposed to be reassuring to the public since it means “good enough.” The connotation connected with “good enough” is mediocre. So, I ask you, how safe would you feel with an “adequate” pilot on a turbulent transcontinental flight? Or, how quickly would you employ an “adequate” heart surgeon if you required surgery? Yet, you throw the word “adequate” around to the public like that is supposed to reassure us about the safety of these aging, decrepit nuclear power plants around this country and what you propose as the generic treatment of waste storage for a number of years far into the future. This member of the public does not share your confidence!”
Read Bette Pierman's full comment to NRC here.
NEIS printed a series of signs, which supporters held up when they heard "waste confidence," or "safe storage," etc. Thus, this was a version of playing "Nukespeak Bingo"!
NEIS also distributed "ESSENTIAL POINTS TO MAKE IN YOUR COMMENTS ABOUT NRC'S WASTE CONFIDENCE RULE," as well as “IT ALL BOILS DOWN TO – DO WE TRUST THE NRC?”
Beyond Nuclear had an information table, displaying its banner and pamphlets, including its "Catastrophic Risks of GE BWR Mark I High-Level Radioactive Waste Storage Pools" fact sheet.
During NRC's "open house" session, Beyond Nuclear's Radioactive Waste Watchdog, Kevin Kamps, donned a mock radiation protection suit and handed out "chunks of radioactive waste" ("Atomic Fireball" candies), affixed to NEIS info. cards, to passersby. This street theater action was to counter the Nuclear Energy Insitute and Exelon Nuclear's misleading info. table handout -- mock nuclear fuel pellets, which failed to mention how deadly irradiated nuclear fuel pellets are in the absence of radiation shielding.
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Kari Lydersen at Midwest Energy News has reported on this story.
Mike Kalas's valuable documentation of the entire proceeding thus makes it possible for you to watch the 38 speakers who expressed concerns about and opposition to NRC's blank check to industry for the creation of forever deadly high-level radioactive waste, the Nuclear Waste Confidence policy.
Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear's testimony, for example, begins at 1:09:00 and concludes at 1:13:15.
Kevin testified about site-specific issues in NRC's Region 3, also known as the Great Lakes Basin.
He discussed the high-level radioactive waste storage pool risks at GE Mark Is -- identical in design to Fukushima Daiichi -- as at Dresden (Units 2 & 3) and Quad Cities (Units 1 & 2) in IL, and Fermi 2 in MI. (Additional Mark Is in Region 3 include Duane Arnold in IA, Monticello 1 in MN; Mark IIs in Region 3 include LaSalle Units 1 & 2 in IL). Beyond Nuclear's "Freeze Our Fukushimas" pamphlet and campaign addresses not only these high-level radioactive waste storage risks at GE Mark Is and IIs in the U.S., but also the reactor risks at these too small, too weak containments.
Kevin also discussed dry cask storage risks, as revealed by NRC Region 3 dry cask storage inspector, Dr. Ross Landsman (now retired), at Palisades on the Lake Michigan shore in MI, and Commonwealth Edison/Exelon whistleblower Oscar Shirani (who passed on in late 2008).
Landsman first warned about seismic risks to Palisades' dry cask storage in Feb., 1994. He served as an expert witness, providing a declaration for an environmental coalition regarding these same risks as recently as 2007, even after his retirement from NRC. The environmental coalition filed an emergency enforcement petition at NRC, as part of its attempt to block Entergy's bid for a 20-year license extension at Palisades. Blown off in the end by NRC, the environmental coalition turned to the second highest court in the land, the federal Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. But just as happened when the "Eternal General" of the State of Michigan, Frank Kelley, fought against the loading of Palisades' dry casks on the beach at Lake Michigan beginning in 1993, the courts deferred to NRC (Kelley, who served as MI AG for 37 years, is the longest serving State Attorney General in U.S. history). Meaning, the risks remain, even now, unaddressed.
Shirani (backed by Landsman, as it turned out) revealed major quality assurance violations with the Holtec dry cask dating back to the year 2000, implicating both design and fabrication. Shirani questioned the structural integrity of Holtecs sitting still at reactor sites, let alone travelling at high speeds down U.S. railways. Despite this, NRC ignored Shirani's revelations, and did not protect him as a whistleblower. Shirani was made to pay a very high price for his truth telling -- harrassed and run out of Exelon, and then blacklisted for the last 8 years of his life by the U.S. nuclear power industry.
Frighteningly, Holtec dry casks are now deployed at 33 U.S. reactor sites (not to mention at Chernobyl in Ukraine, as well as Spain), including at Dresden in IL. Holtecs account for nearly half of the 1,700 U.S. dry casks currently deployed across the country.