"Nuclear Rubberstamp Commission" by Karl Grossman

Investigative journalist, and Beyond Nuclear board of directors member, Karl Grossman (pictured, left), has published an article entitled "Nuclear Rubberstamp Commission" which has appeared at the Huffington Post and elsewhere. In it, Karl reports that U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Chairman, Dr. Gregory Jaczko, has been pressured to resign over a year early due to withering attacks by the nuclear power industry and its friends within the NRC and on Capitol Hill, due to his safety advocacy. Karl points out that NRC has never, in its nearly 40 years of existence, denied a license to construct or operate a commercial atomic reactor. It has also rubberstamped 73 license extensions for 20 additional years of operation at U.S. atomic reactors, with 13 other license extensions already applied for.

Environmental coalition, concerned residents, met with NRC Chairman Jaczko after his tour of problem-plagued Palisades

Michael Keegan, Alice Hirt and Kevin Kamps of Don't Waste MI call for Palisades' permanent closure at the August 2000 Nuclear-Free Great Lakes Action Camp. From 2005 to 2007, Don't Waste MI campaigned to block NRC's 20 year license extension at Palisades, but NRC rubber-stamped it nonetheless.On May 25th, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Chairman Gregory Jaczko toured Entergy Nuclear's Palisades atomic reactor in Covert, MI on the Lake Michigan shoreline. NRC lowered Palisades' safety status to one of the four worst-run reactors in the U.S., out of 104 operating, after five euphemistically termed "unplanned shutdowns" in 2011 alone. After Jaczko's tour of the plant, he held a press conference with area media, then met with representatives of environmental groups from Michigan and Illinois, as well as concerned local residents. The environmental coalition included Beyond Nuclear, Clean Water Action, Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Great Lakes, Don't Waste Michigan, League of Women Voters, Michigan Land Trustees, and Nuclear Energy Information Service. The environmental movement of Michigan, and beyond, has long called for Palisades' permanent shutdown, for a multitude of safety and environmental reasons. From 2005 to 2007, a broad coalition of environmental groups, representing hundreds of thousands of Michiganders, sought to block NRC's 20 year license extension of Palisades, but NRC rubberstamped it nonetheless.

The single greatest safety concern, of many afflicting Palisades, is embrittlement of its reactor pressure vessel, the worst in the U.S. Michael Keegan of Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Great Lakes (pictured, left) warned about this in 1993; a year ago, the Associated Press exposed NRC's weakening of embrittlement safety regulations in order to allow Palisades to keep running. But Palisades' replacements of age-degraded steam generators (for the second time in the plant's history) as well as its reactor lid -- in the aftermath of the Davis-Besse, Ohio "Hole-in-the-Head" near-disaster -- are more than five years overdue. Palisades is thus deep into its "break-down" phase of increased reactor accident risk, as termed by David Lochbaum of Union of Concerned Scientists on his "Bathtub Curve" graphic (so named because of the curve's shape). Citizens Nuclear Information Center-Tokyo has just reported alarming news about reactor pressure vessel embrittlement/pressurized thermal shock risks at Japanese reactors.

Beyond Nuclear issued a statement, as did Don't Waste MI's Alice Hirt (pictured, left): "We do not want a Fukushima here on the shore of Lake Michigan...We plead with you to help us close down this plant NOW." Area summertime resident Gail Snyder also issued a statement.

WMUK, the NPR radio station in Kalamazoo, MI, interviewed Beyond Nuclear's Kevin Kamps (pictured, left) about reactor risks at Palisades. Kevin warned that NRC should shut Palisades down, before it melts down (the Associated Press quoted this as well), because the reactor is the worst embrittled in the U.S., with age-degraded steam generators and reactor lid, and vitally needs fire protection upgrades. Entergy promised to make these repairs over five years ago when it took over ownership from Consumers Energy at Palisades, but has broken these promises. Michigan Radio also quoted Kevin.  The Kalamazoo Gazette also reported on this story, as did theSt. Joe Herald-Palladium.

Kalamazoo News Channel 3 interviewed Maynard Kaufman and Barbara Geisler of Michigan Land Trustees in Bangor, less than 10 miles from Palisades. They warned of risks to west Michigan's vibrant shoreline agriculture from a Fukushima- or Chernobyl-like disaster. Grand Rapids TV 8 also reported on this story. TV 57 in South Bend, IN also briefly reported on Jaczko's visit.

Toledo Blade editorializes in support of consideration of renewables as alternative to Davis-Besse license extension

The Toledo Blade, which in the past has often taken pro-nuclear editorial positions, has nonetheless come out in support of an environmental coalition's contention that renewables, such as wind and solar power, should be considered as an alternative to a 20 year license extension at the problem-plagued Davis-Besse atomic reactor, with its cracked containment. Beyond Nuclear authored a wind power contention in Dec., 2010 that won admission from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) for a hearing on the merits; the ASLB likewise admitted a solar photovoltaic (PV) contention authored by the environmental coalition's expert witness, Dr. Al Compaan, an emeritus professor and former chair of the University of Toledo physics dept., a PV inventer. However, the full five member NRC Commission recently sided with FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company's appeal of the ASLB rulings, and overrode them, rejecting any consideration of renewable alternatives. The NRC Commission did the same thing at Seabrook, NH, where Beyond Nuclear authored a contention that offshore wind power in the Gulf of Maine could replace that atomic reactor's electrical output. Terry Lodge of Toledo is the attorney representing the environmental coalitions in both proceedings.

"Lessons from Fukushima: is Ohio next?" Antioch University Midwest, Yellow Springs, Ohio, Sat., April 21st

Beyond Nuclear is honored to take part in an Earth Day forum on Sat., April 21st at Antioch University Midwest in Yellow Springs, Ohio entitled "Lessons from Fukushima: is Ohio next?" A schedule for the forum, as well as a promotional flyer, are available. Beyond Nuclear's Kevin Kamps has been invited to speak about "What really happened at Fukushima-Daiichi in Japan?" While focusing on the cause of the nuclear power catastrophe, he will also provide an update on the ongoing dangerous state of what is left of the atomic reactors at Fukushima, and the relevance of "lessons learned" for the problem-plagued Davis-Besse and Perry atomic reactors in Ohio. Beyond Nuclear has, along with environmental coalition allies Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario, Don't Waste Michigan, and the Green Party of Ohio, officially intervened against FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company's proposed 20 year license extension at Davis-Besse near Toledo; FENOC's Perry plant near Cleveland is ranked by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission as one of the five least safe reactors in the U.S.

NRC has rubber-stamped license extensions and "power uprates" at 22 of 23 GE BWR Mark I reactors operating in the U.S.

Pat Birnie of the GE Shareholders Alliance has compiled U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) data on "power uprates" which the agency has approved at 22 of the 23 General Electric boiling water reactors of the Mark I design still operating across the U.S. (Nine Mile Point Unit 1 in NY is the only exception). Her chart is accessible here. The Fukushima Daiichi Units 1 to 4 which exploded and melted down beginning in March 2011 are also GE BWR Mark Is.

The single biggest power uprate, as a percentage of heat output (measured as Megawatts-thermal, or MWt), was a 20% "extended" type power uprate, granted in 2006 to Entergy Nuclear at its 34 year old (at the time) Vermont Yankee atomic reactor. This amounted to a 319 MWt power uprate (MWt must be divided by three to determine the Megawatts-electric, MWe, generated, due to the fact that 2/3rds of the heat generated by splitting atoms is lost as waste). The vibrational stresses caused by Vermont Yankee's power uprate led to the collapse of its cooling tower (see photo at left), and even contributed to a separate fiery explosion, when the increased pressure of flowing steam picked up loose metallic slag that had lain dormant for decades and slammed it into an operational transformer.

However, even bigger power uprates have been rubberstamped by NRC. The single biggest, at an individual Mark I reactor, was the 547 MWt of power uprates, granted in two installments (one a "Measurement Uncertainty Recapture" type uprate), at the Hope Creek, New Jersey Mark I. However, both Brunswick Mark Is, Units #1 and #2 in North Carolina, have each enjoyed a total of 487 MWt of power uprates, including a "stretch" type uprate, for a whopping 974 MWt of power uprates at the Brunswick nuclear power plant.

NRC gave the newly formed Exelon Nuclear Corporation (formed by the merger of Commonwealth Edison of Chicago and Philadelphia Electric Company, the first and second largest nuclear utilities in the U.S.) an early Christmas gift in 2001: a 17.8% power uprate at both of its Quad Cities 1 & 2 Mark Is, worth 446 MWt each; and a 17% power uprate, worth 430 MWt, at each of its Dresden 2 & 3 Mark Is. All four approvals took place on a single day, December 21, 2001. The combined power uprates at the four Mark I reactors netted Exelon 1,752 MWt of additional output.

While the nuclear utilities enjoy increased profits from the additional electricity sales associated with power uprates, the public downwind and downstream bears the risks of running these Mark Is harder and hotter than they were originally licensed or designed for. To make safety risks even worse, 22 of the 23 operating Mark Is have already received NRC rubberstamps for 20 year license extensions; Fermi 2 is the only exception, and it plans to apply for one in 2014. Pat Birnie has also compiled a listing of the 23 operating Mark Is in the U.S., including the reactor units' names, locations, expiration dates for their original 40 year licenses, and expiration dates for their NRC-authorized 20 year license extensions.

Pat Birnie has succeeded in getting an anti-nuclear shareholder resolution, written in the aftermath of the Fukushima Nuclear Catastrophe, onto the agenda of the General Electric annual shareholders meeting, to be held in downtown Detroit on April 25th.

Update on April 2, 2012 by admin

The GE Stockholders Alliance issued a press release about the upcoming April 25th annual meeting today.