Relicensing
The U.S. nuclear reactor fleet is aging but owners are applying to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for license extensions to operate reactors an additional 20 years beyond their licensed lifetimes. Beyond Nuclear is challenging and opposing relicensing efforts.
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July 3, 2011 The Rutland Herald reports that the latest direct action, in an ongoing campaign of civil disobedience extending back in time several years now, took place on Thursday, July 1st in Vernon, Vermont. Among the arrested were 15 women, 6 from Vermont, 2 of whom were in their 90s.
July 1, 2011 
NRC file photo of Salem 1 and 2, on Delaware Bay watershedAs the Associated Press reports, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has now rubberstamped the 70th of 70 license extension applied for in the U.S., this time condoning 20 more years at both the Salem 1 and Salem 2 atomic reactors in New Jersey just 15 miles from Wilmington, the capital of Delaware.
In addition to the tritium leaks mentioned in the article, Salem 1's high-level radioactive waste storage pool has also leaked radioactivity into groundwater and soil, as reported in a Beyond Nuclear backgrounder on radioactivity leaks from a growing number of nuclear power plants and related facilities across the U.S. Salem 1 and 2, which share Artificial Island, NJ with a third reactor -- Hope Creek -- which happens to be an idenitical twin to the Fukushima Daiichi Units 1 to 4 (a General Electric Boiling Water Reactor with a Mark 1 containment).
According to the Calculation of Reactor Accident Consequences (CRAC-2) report commissioned by NRC, performed by Sandia National Lab, and revealed to the public (after NRC tried to bury it) by U.S. Representative Ed Markey (D-MA) in 1982, if either one of the Salem atomic reactors suffered a catastrophic radioactivity release, 100,000 people downwind and downstream could perish as "peak early fatalities," the worst such figure for any nuclear power plant in the U.S. In addition, 70,000 to 75,000 "peak early injuries" could result, as well as 40,000 "peak [latent] cancer deaths." A major accident at either Salem unit could cause $135 to 150 billion in property damage -- $297 to 330 billion when adjusted from 1982 to 2008 dollar values.
Recently, the Associated Press reported that populations have soared around atomic reactors since the 1970 U.S. Census data used to determine CRAC-2's casualty figures, calling into question the adequacy of emergency evacuation plans. In addition, Inside EPA has won investigative journalism awards for its revelation that lines of authority and sources of funding for post-accident clean up are non-existent and hotly disputed behind closed doors at EPA, FEMA, and NRC.
June 30, 2011 U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (Independent-Vermont) just released the following statement:
Sanders Expects U.S. to Stay Out of Vermont Yankee Court Fight
WASHINGTON, June 30 – Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) learned today that the U.S. Department of Justice has no plans to intervene in a legal fight over the fate of the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor at this time.
Sanders had urged Attorney General Eric Holder to stay out of a lawsuit filed in federal court in Vermont by Entergy Corp. The plant owner sued after the Vermont Senate last year voted 26-to-4 not to renew a state license for the 40-year-old, problem-plagued reactor.
“While I recognize that it is the responsibility of the Department of Justice to monitor developments in all ongoing litigation, I am pleased that they have no plans to intervene and I am confident that the Department will see no reason to intervene in the future,” Sanders said.
“I want to thank Sen. Harry Reid for his strong support for the state of Vermont,” Sanders added. “The Majority Leader is clearly in our corner on this issue and he has agreed to do everything he can to help me in this effort.”
Sanders is a member of the U.S. Senate committee that oversees the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
He criticized the NRC earlier this month after learning that commissioners secretly voted 3 to 2 to urge the Department of Justice to intervene in the Vermont case. The senator also spoke with the attorney general and other top officials at the Justice Department.
“If Vermont chooses an energy future that does not include a 40-year-old, problem-ridden nuclear power plant and that emphasizes energy efficiency and sustainable energy, it is certainly our right and the federal government has no role to play in that decision,” Sanders said.
Contact: Michael Briggs (202) 224-5141
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Three days ago, Sanders took the strong action of placing a hold on the nomination and re-confirmation of NRC Commissioner William Ostendorff, who very likely voted in favor of the U.S. Department of Justice intervening, on behalf of the NRC, on the side of Entergy Nuclear in its legal battle with the State of Vermont over the Vermont Yankee atomic reactor's 20 year license extension.
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On July 1st, E&E reported that Sanders removed his hold on the nomination of Ostendorff to serve a second -- this time full 5 year -- term on the NRC Commission. Sanders indicated that he removed the hold on Ostendorff after he confirmed with the U.S. Department of Justice that it did not intend to intervene, at NRC's urging, on the side of Entergy Nuclear in its federal legal dispute with the State of Vermont over the 20 year license extension at Vermont Yankee.
June 29, 2011 The New York Times reports that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is standing strong in his long-time resistance to a 20 year license extension at Indian Point. Although the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has sole authority to regulate nuclear power on health and safety matters, states do retain the right to not approve other needed permits -- as for water discharge into the Hudson. New York State is requiring Entergy to install cooling towers if Indian Point is to operate past 2013-2015, which would cost hundreds of millions of dollars. Entergy's Vermont Yankee has also been denied a license extension by the State of Vermont, and Pilgrim Watch has kept alive its resistance to Pilgrim's license extension in the NRC licensing proceeding for well over five years now.
June 28, 2011 
NRC's file photo of the twin reactor Prairie Island nuclear power plantMake that 68 for 68: as the Associated Press reports, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has rubberstamped another two 20 year license extensions, this time at Prairie Island Units 1 and 2 in Minnesota. NRC did so by slapping the Mdewekanton Dakota "Prairie Island Indian Community" in the face, approving the relicensing against their wishes. But then, Northern States Power built the twin-reactor complex on the island's reservation in the first place without the community's informed consent several decades ago, misleadingly telling the tribe it would be a "steam generating plant," but not mentioning the nuclear part. Since, the reactors have leaked tritium into groundwater. High-level radioactive waste dry cask storage has been built within 600 yards of the tribe's child care center. A "cask dangle" in the mid-1990s risked a high-level radioactive waste storage pool catastrophe. And now the company, renamed Xcel, will apply for a power uprate to run the reactors harder and hotter. Never mind that the site has suffered a number of serious floods in the past decade or two, and that there is only a single emergency evacuation route off the island, which itself is sometimes under water.
NSP/Xcel has also led the effort to open a parking lot dump for 40,000 metric tons of high-level radioactive waste on the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation in Utah, making it perhaps the single most environmentally racist nuclear utility in the U.S. NRC approved the license for "Private Fuel Storage LLC" in 2006, but the creation of a federal wilderness area around the Goshute reservation has thus far blocked the railway needed to deliver the deadly cargo.
