Beyond Nuclear quoted on Palisades' radioactive risks
Anti-nuke watchdogs have long called for Palisades' shutdown. Here, Don't Waste Michigan board members Michael Keegan, Alice Hirt, and Kevin Kamps speak out at the Aug. 2000 Nuclear-Free Great Lakes Action Camp. Palisades' steam, and Lake Michigan, are visible in the background.In the past five days, Rosemary Parker at the Kalamazoo Gazette has quoted Beyond Nuclear's Kevin Kamps in two articles focused on the radioactive risks of the Palisades atomic reactor on the Lake Michigan shoreline. On. Feb. 19th, in an article entitled "Is Southwest Michigan ready for nuclear emergency?", she reported:
'...But nuclear watchdog groups point to the hundreds of hours of additional oversight required by the NRC, the plant's aging equipment, the many glitches at the plant in recent months. The group Beyond Nuclear immediately responded to the change of Palisade's regulatory status with calls to "close it down before it melts down."
...Kevin Kamps, whose title is "radioactive waste watchdog" for the antinuclear group Beyond Nuclear, envisions a more unnerving worst-case scenario, akin to the disastrous 1986 explosion at Chernobyl in Ukraine, where radioactive contamination was released into the atmosphere and traveled for miles.
In his view, disaster at Palisades could put the city of Chicago's drinking water supply at risk, wipe out Southwest Michigan's fruit belt orchards, destroy the area's tourism industry for years and make ghost towns out of thriving lakeshore communities.'
Parker also quoted Kevin's response to recent high-risk accidents at Palisades in a Feb. 16th article.
NRC recently downgraded Palisades' safety status after a series of accidents in 2011. The agency plans stepped up inspections till the end of this year. However, NRC's rubberstamp of Palisades' 20 year license extension -- despite intense environmental resistance -- is the only reason the 41 year old reactor is still operating at all.
Kevin was born and raised in Kalamazoo. His anti-nuclear power activism began at Palisades in 1992.
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Tina Lam at the Detroit Free Press also reported on NRC's safety downgrade at Palisades, mentioning: "Beyond Nuclear, an anti-nuclear group, said Palisades is risky to those who get drinking water from Lake Michigan, and it should be shut down."