A Win for Vermont Yankee

Vermont Yankee wins:

Vermont’s only nuclear plant can remain open beyond its originally scheduled shutdown date this year, despite the state’s efforts to close the 40-year-old reactor, a federal judge ruled Thursday.

In February 2010, Entergy, Vermont Yankee’s owner, discover a tritium leak at the plant. Tritium is a mildly radioactive form of hydrogen that is incorporated into water molecules. It is found in nature and as a byproduct of fission processes. Health effects are minimal and present only if ingested in large amounts.

In any event, none leaked outside the plant nor was there any measureable amount in drinking water at the plant. Regardless, in March, the state legislature voted to close the plant due to the leak.

Now, that was controversial. In all instances, only the NRC can close a plant due to a safety concern. But Vermont and Entergy had signed an agreement that said the plant could operate only if the state issued a certain document – the March vote essentially withheld that document.

In March 2011, the NRC approved a 20-year license extension for Vermont Yankee – if Vermont failed to close it.

In April 2011, Entergy, through two subsidiaries, filed suit in U.S. District Court to prevent the closure contending that the action is preempted by federal law and violates both the supremacy clause and the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution.

And that is the suit that has now prevailed. The Washington Post story quoted above is light on details, but it does mention a few interesting tidbits:

Entergy argued that the state was moving to close Vermont Yankee out of concerns over plant safety, an issue that the state agreed is solely the NRC’s jurisdiction. The state maintained it had other reasons, including that Vermont Yankee didn’t fit in to its energy plan and was likely to be increasingly unreliable as it aged.

I had assumed that Vermont believed it could close the facility for any reason, but apparently, that isn’t true. And the story doesn’t really suggest if the judge decided that federal law trumped state law.

We’ll pass along more details as we have them. In the meantime, a win is a win.

The losing side in federal court was expected to appeal [U.S. District Judge J. Garvan] Murtha’s decision to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York, though it was not immediately known whether the state would follow through with that.

And we’ll probably has a better sense of how Vermont will proceed in the days to come, too.

Vermont Yankee

71st Carnival of Nuclear Energy: Critical Reviews, History and Future Stuff

Today, we have the privilege of hosting the carnival for the seventh time in its young history. We have contributions from ten folks discussing a whole slew of things on nuclear.

History

In the latest APR Atomic Journal, Will Davis completes the story of the Elk River nuclear plant built back in the late ‘50 and ‘60s. Using original and never-before-seen material, he takes you back in time to describe one of the first reactors constructed in the world.

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Brian Wang at Next Big Future noted that research on radiation from back in 1946 was uncovered that suppressed evidence related to benign low doses of radiation.

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Speaking of history, Dan Yurman at Idaho Samizdat reported on Siemens’ exit from the nuclear energy industry. In doing so, the firm is leaving the potential for substantial revenue. Siemens will scrap its deal with Russia’s Rosatom to develop the state-owned firm's VVER pressurized water reactor (PWR) to compete with exports from Areva. Siemens said the firm felt that after Fukushima, demand for reactor exports would diminish, casting doubt on the financial viability of the deal.

Future stuff

Brian Wang also highlighted the progress of the Sanmen AP1000 construction in China with the installation of the pressure vessel.

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Margaret Harding at 4 Factor Consulting was on vacation on a cruise out in the Pacific Ocean, but was inspired to write about nuclear power cruise ships in the hope that someday they might be a reality she might get to be on.

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Charles Barton at Nuclear Green discussed a plan on how Generation IV nuclear power systems are economically viable, even when countries are faced with a sovereign debt crisis. From Barton:

by adopting more advanced nuclear technology, and adopting the thorium fuel cycle, all the objections brought against nuclear power by renewable advocates can be demonstrated to be fallacious. If we want to avoid a climate disaster, we have no choice other than to commit to a massive deployment of nuclear power. Even in the face of a sovereign debt crisis, a massive deployment of LFTRs [liquid fluoride thorium reactors] is possible.

Critical Reviews

Steve Skutnik at Neutron Economy reviewed journalist Tom Zoellner's popular book: Uranium (basically a history of uranium with a slightly bent position). Skutnik, of course, gave it a critical review and even earned a comment from the author himself. Here’s Steve:

remarkably absent from Zoellner's narrative is much discussion of the flip side of the coin: the promise of clean, abundant energy in addition to a cornucopia of advances in medicine, agriculture, and engineering.

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Inspired by a Wall Street Journal article, Rod Adams at Atomic Insights took a look at the companies and individuals that benefit from higher fossil fuel prices and larger sales volumes resulting from irrationally shutting down undamaged nuclear plants in response to the Fukushima disaster. Rod believes that plans are being executed to take advantage of the Japan situation to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) by nuclear energy competitors who want nuclear's market share for themselves.

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Steve Aplin at Canadian Energy Issues took issue with the Canadian Auto Workers union for their alliance with a renewable energy association in order to promote and create jobs. Instead, Aplin has a better recommendation for creating jobs and generating low cost electricity: nuclear.

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Gail Marcus at Nuke Power Talk attended the Energy Information Administration’s press event rolling out the International Energy Outlook 2011. Despite the fact that the IEO reports haven’t been the most favorable to nuclear in past years, she found the event interesting from a nuclear perspective:

In particular, the report has been a year in the making, and some of the information in it is already dated. The report shows the penetration of nuclear power increasing from 5% to 7% of total energy demand globally by 2035. However, Dr. Gruenspecht pointed out that the nuclear portion of the report was developed prior to the Fukushima event, and was not adjusted to reflect the decisions several countries have made following that event.

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And last but not least, Meredith Angwin at Yes Vermont Yankee analyzed VT’s energy plan (or lack thereof) published by the Department of Public Service last week. In her post, Meredith reviewed the 700 page draft energy plan which is the plan for Vermont without VY. Vermonters have only 4 weeks to review it. Luckily for Meredith, the documents had no actual content (no plan, no numbers) so reviewing it was quick work for her.

Hope you enjoyed, stay tuned for next week’s carnival at Yes Vermont Yankee!

Replacing the Foot You Shot Yourself In

Vermont is bound and determined to close the Vermont Yankee nuclear energy facility over a leakage of tritium last year that harmed no one - at all. While the leak should not have occurred, the cause of it was located and sealed and no one inside or outside the plant was harmed by it. More about tritium here

But the Vermont legislature saw it as an opportunity to close the plant, an action that Vermont  Yankee's owner, Entergy, has filed suit over. The NRC has issued a license allowing the facility to operate an additional 20 years and Entergy would like to do that. We'll see if Entergy's suit prevails - I'm not a lawyer and have no special intelligence on it. You can read more about the suit here.

So let's leave that all on the side of the road and focus on the possibility of Vermont Yankee closing. Care to guess how much of Vermont's electricity is generated by nuclear energy?

72 percent. Let that sink in - clearly, the Vermont legislature hasn't - and it's largely from Vermont Yankee, the only nuclear facility in the state. There are no coal plants and only a little natural gas (0.1%) - a little renewable energy (5 percent). Hydro (also renewable, of course) is number 2 at 22 percent.

Unwilling to gamble on Vermont Yankee, Green Mountain Power Corp. is looking instead to a nuclear plant in neighboring New Hampshire for power.The company has reached a 23-year power purchase deal to get electricity from Seabrook nuclear plant in Seabrook, N.H., officials said Tuesday.

That's called irony. Now, in fairness, Green Mountain is looking elsewhere, too, so this isn't a one-to-one swap:

The agreement, combined with a recently approved power pact with Hydro Quebec and plans to build a wind project in Lowell, helps Green Mountain Power make good on its promise of providing reliable, low-cost and low-carbon power, she said.

You'll notice that Quebec and Massachusetts benefit, but not Vermont. If the facility closes, Vermont loses about 300 jobs there - and more around the facility - and the state taxes from the facility - with no replacement. That's bad, however you look at it.

But we were intrigued by comments gathered by reporter John Curran:

Representatives of two of the company's biggest customers -- IBM in Essex Junction and Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, in Waterbury -- welcome the power deal, saying the cost and low-carbon footprint of nuclear power were appealing.

"Appealing" - we'll take it. But not everyone is happy.

"We'd prefer to see our state's utilities moving away from all forms of dirty and unreliable power, including nuclear energy," said James Moore, clean energy program director for Vermont Public Interest Research Group.

Well, you've always got the other foot.

On Vermont Yankee and States’ Rights

Over at the ANS Nuclear Cafe, Meredith Angwin who blogs at Yes Vermont Yankee, makes the case for why the NRC has jurisdiction over nuclear plants:

Watching the POP [Vermont Public Oversight Panel] at work, it was clear to me why the NRC has jurisdiction, and why nuclear regulation cannot be a state privilege. Nuclear energy cannot be regulated by a group of people who may be eager to please their legislative employers. There needs to be objective criteria, assessed by full-time experts, in order to keep a plant working well.

Having the internal workings of the plant doubly-assessed, by a group of people chosen politically, could get in the way of plant operations. It could even possibly degrade safety. Part-time inspectors with political agendas? This is not the same as having the Occupational Safety and Health Administration come to the plant. Trained OSHA inspectors go to many industrial facilities.

The NRC catches a lot of guff in the nuclear industry: The NRC is slow to act. The NRC is an expensive, overgrown bureaucracy. The NRC is headed by political appointees.

But still, down in the trenches at the inspection level, the NRC knows what it is doing. The inspectors are trained and professional. They don’t have political agendas. They won’t accept a cup of coffee from the people they are inspecting.

After watching the POP activities, it is clear to me that nuclear regulation is the business of the federal government. The Atomic Energy Act was the precursor of the NRC, and kept the nuclear safety regulation at the federal level of the government. That is how it must remain.

Thank you, NRC, for your day-to-day professionalism.

Hope ANS didn’t mind us copying many of the good parts, though there is still plenty left for others to check out.

U.S. District Court to Decide Vermont Yankee’s Future

Entergy filed a complaint today with the U.S. District Court to seek “a judgment to prevent the state of Vermont from forcing the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant to cease operation on March 21, 2012.” Looks like they have a solid case, though I’m not a lawyer so don’t quote me. Here’s one of the more notables lines from Entergy’s statement:

“We have made every reasonable effort to accommodate the state of Vermont and its officials while allowing the continued operation of Vermont Yankee – an outcome that benefits all stakeholders, including Vermont consumers and the approximately 650 men and women who work at the plant,” said Richard Smith, president of Entergy Wholesale Commodities. “Despite the fact that Vermont Yankee is important to the reliability of the New England electric transmission grid, emits virtually no greenhouse gases, and provides more than $100 million in annual economic benefits to the state of Vermont, it has been made clear that state officials are singularly focused on shutting down the plant. That has left us with no other choice but to seek relief in the court system.”

Stay tuned.

Update, 12:05: Yes Vermont Yankee has more on the suit.