UPDATED

Entergy keeps operating Vermont Yankee while leaking tritium (though it's not clear whether there are any new releases to the groundwater), trying to limp along until the scheduled April closing for refueling. Meanwhile, in Illinois, Exelon will have to pay big bucks for tritium leaks at three of their nuclear power plants.

Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan announced yesterday that Exelon General Corporation will pay over $1 million to settle lawsuits arising from tritium leaks into groundwater from the Braidwood, Byron and Dresden nuclear power plants.

I haven't looked at the performance of the Byron and Dresden plants. About the Braidwood plant, Public Citizen says (and the Illinois EPA confirms):

The site has experienced eight leaks between 1996 and 2006, including one in 1998 and another in 2000. The 1998 leak resulted in the release of three million gallons of tritium-contaminated water. It was not until November 2005 that the leaks were revealed to state officials.

I have a call in to the Attorney General's office about whether there are any similar lawsuits filed or planned in Vermont. I haven't heard of any, but I've also been out of state for a few days. 

UPDATE 4:30 pm: Deputy Attorney General Janet Murnane has told me that while there are numerous ongoing state investigations, no civil lawsuits have been filed against Entergy or Vermont Yankee regarding the tritium leaks.

This is old news, but I just learned about it. And there's new news that makes the old news newsworthy in a whole different way.

George W. Bush's Department of Energy issued a report in July 2008 that said that the US could generate 20% of its electricity from wind by 2030:

A 20% Wind Scenario in 2030, while ambitious, could be feasible if the significant challenges identified in this report are overcome.

The scenario is based on the assumption that overall US electric demand will grow 39% from 2005 to 2030. What if overall electric demand decreases during that same time period?

That's plausible. Today, I heard Paul Peterson of Synapse Energy Economics describe what he called 20th century truths about the electrical system that are now 21st century myths. One of them is that electricity consumption and peak loads increase each year. In fact, in New England, electricity consumption has decreased at 1.5% per year since 2005. Peterson thinks that initiatives like Efficiency Vermont can continue to reduce total demand. Scudder Parker, who consults for Efficiency Vermont's owner (VEIC), and Michael Colgrove of NYSERDA were on the same panel, and they didn't disagree (strangely enough).

What if efficiency and conservation are implemented so well that overall US electricity consumption decreases 1.5% per year from 2005 to 2030? In that case, total US annual demand would end up around 2.9 billion MWh, instead of DoE's projection of 5.8 billion MWh. The same 1.16 billion MWh annually of wind electricity that the DoE calls feasible by 2030 would represent 40% of our electric needs. That percentage, climate concerns, and a new DoE report raise some interesting questions.

With the help of Glenn Scherer at Blue Ridge Press, I turned the state Senate vote on Vermont Yankee into an op-ed on states' rights to regulate nuclear power plant. Blue Ridge Press sends out op-eds to newspapers around the country, and Glenn hoped the states' rights slant would appeal to newspapers in some conservative states.

We'll see how that strategy works. So far, it's been picked up by The Epoch Times in New York City.

I was pleased today when Free Speech Radio News broadcast a story on the Vermont Yankee vote that I put together with assistance from Thomas Weiss. Nice to get more national exposure for the story, especially since Peter Shumlin is offering to consult with other states on how they, too, can take control of their aging reactors. The producer there was a joy to work with, too--she helped enrichen and otherwise improve the initial script that Thomas and I submitted.

FSRN is broadcast in central Vermont at 6 pm weekdays on WGDR, Plainfield, 91.1 FM, and WGDR can be streamed at wgdr.org.

After rejecting a number of procedural maneuvers, including an amendment by Sen. Peg Flory to commit the state to building a second nuclear plant at the site of Vermont Yankee, the Vermont senate voted this afternoon 4-26 against the bill that would allow the Public Service Board to issue a certificate allowing Vermont Yankee to continue operating past March 21, 2012.

There's lots of news coverage elsewhere, so I'll leave the details to the other media.

I had a short conversation with nuclear guru Arnie Gundersen afterwards. He summed up the national message to nuclear plants: Tell the truth, and don't pare down your workforce to the point where you can't operate the plant well.

Sen. Phil Scott moved this afternoon to remand the bill on the relicensing of Vermont Yankee to the Economic Development Committee for more testimony on the economic impact of job losses from losing the plant.

Sen. Ann Cummings, chair of the Finance Committee, explained that they had put out a call for more testimony before reporting out the bill, and no one had answered the call. She also said that the legislature and governor had chosen to lay off more state employees in the last year than the total number of Yankee employees who would be phased out over time.

The vote was 6-24 against the motion. Those voting in favor: Brock, Flory, Mazza, Mulliin, Scott, and Starr. 

The senate is out for a short lunch break and plans to reconvene shortly to continue debate on the bill.

Word has it in the State House that it is touch-and-go whether there
will be enough votes in the Senate tomorrow to give the bill to close Vermont Yankee an up-or-down vote instead of remanding it to committee. Tonight is an excellent time to contact your senators to let them know how you feel!

At nooon today, I covered the noontime presser by Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility, which claims 1150 member businesses with 50,000 Vermont employees. A survey of the members last year showed they were in favor of closing Vermont Yankee in 2012 by a 3 to 1 margin, and the presser was to ask for a vote tomorrow to close Yankee.

Rob Michalak represented one VBSR member, Ben & Jerry's. He highlighted the importance to Ben & Jerry's of its association with Vermont and the Vermont "brand."

Michalak said that a tritium leak at a French nuclear reactor in 2008 jeopardized sales of the wine producers in the region. Ben & Jerry's employs over 500 Vermonters, he pointed out--a number very close to the total Vermonters and out-of-state employees at Vermont Yankee.

I was trying to leave the building when I blundered into another presser, this one with Peter Shumlin and Senate Majority Leader John Campbell. I'd missed an earlier presser by drawling Curt Hebert, executive vice president of Entergy Corporation, in which he announced that Entergy would offer 25 MW of its electricity to Vermont utilities at 4 cents per kWh, for three years--if the plant is relicensed in 2012.

Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin dismissed the offer, saying it was not relevant to one of the main issues in the vote scheduled for tomorrow on Yankee's future: his conclusion that Entergy Lousiana cannot be trusted. He also dismissed the scale of the offer, saying it amounted to 2% of Vermont's electricity use. He pointed out that the current market for electricity is depressed, making it difficult for Entergy to offer a better price than utilities can get elsewhere.

In a conference call with reporters this afternoon, officials from the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission revealed that Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant fixed a leaking underground pipe containing radioactivity in 2005. That was four years before Entergy officials told Vermont state regulators last year that the plant had no underground pipes.

The leak was said to be in a pipe contained by a tunnel, from which leaked water could be pumped and returned to the plant; the NRC reported no indications that the radioactivity got into the ground. The leaking radioactive water would have contained tritium, the officials believe.

John White, the NRC official responsible for radiation safety inspections at nuclear power plants in the northeast, said that the incident sounded very much like the one an anonymous whistleblower reported as taking place two years ago, but Entergy's records show that it happened in 2005.

Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant should be shut down until all the buried pipes are inspected and maintained, said an energy consultant testifying to the Senate Natural Resources and Environment Committee this morning. Paul Blanch, an energy consultant who claimed 45 years of experience in the nuclear industry, described himself as pro-safe nuclear. But Vermont Yankee isn't being operated safely, he said.

We have buried, corroded pipes that are way beyond their design life. And these pipes contain radioactive water, and it's reactor cooling water, at least at 2.5 million picocuries per liter. Conditions are unknown, the condition of those piping (sic) and the bottoms of the tanks and the dry well and so on. Sen. McDonald, you asked what needs to be done. The first thing that needs to be one, I believe, is we say "all stop." We need a program to provide reasonable assurance to the residents of Vermont and the residents of New England that these pipes are in adequate condition to assure continued operation.

Blanch said that the NRC came up with a document about handling buried pipes in December, but characterized it as "inadequate."

Blanch also said that Entergy knew long ago that they had buried pipes on the site, because their federal re-licensing application contained a management plan for the pipes. Entergy told Vermont regulators last year that there were no buried pipes at the plant, which they since admitted was not true.

Characterizing the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) as being in "panic mode," Blanch said that the NRC chairman issued a statement (apparently about tritium leaks) at 10 pm last night. Blanch met with the chairman's office last April, and coming up with a statement the week before a scheduled vote is "too late, NRC." 

NRC spokesperson Neil Sheehan had scheduled a press briefing on tritium for 2 pm today, but it was cancelled without explanation.

Other points Blanch brought up:

* Entergy's management mode for reactor pipes is "run to failure." It's like managing the tires on your car by only looking at them when they blow out. That may be OK for drinking water mains, but it's not OK for pipes containing radioactive material.

* Tritium is a symptom of a breach, and there is other radioactive stuff there. Those pipes have not been inspected, he believes, or at least no more than 10% of their length. And for buried pipes, it's impossible to monitor releases.

* The Entergy-owned Indian Point 2  leaked, in his opinion, millions of gallons of tritiated water, and the NRC did not think it was worthy of a press release. Blanch said that the NRC estimate was 100,000 gallons for the same leak.

Senators expressed a lack of confidence in the NRC's regulation of Vermont Yankee. "My concern, having talked with the NRC last week, is that there isn't anything we can demand them to do," said Diane Snelling.

UPDATE: I posted the audio from the presser.

In a press conference this afternoon with other members of Vermont State Senate leadership, Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin announced that the senate would hold a vote next week on whether to close Vermont Yankee as scheduled in 2012.

The other senators with Shumlin were John Campbell, majority leader; Ginny Lyons, chair of Natural Resources and Energy; and Ann Cummings, chair of Finance.

Shumlin said the vote would be on a bill to be introduced by Finance Committee, and the bill would on the question of whether to authorize the Public Service Board to grant a Certificate of Public Good to Vermont Yankee for operation beyond March 2012. For the nuclear power plant to continue operating beyond it's scheduled closing date, he said, the bill would have to pass the senate and the house and be signed by the governor, as with any other bill.

The written press release and Shumlin's comments in general referred to a vote before Town Meeting Day, March 2, but at one point Shumlin described the vote as taking place "next week."

Ann Cummings said the Finance Committee would continue taking testimony this week, but that after four years of intensive work on this issue, they think they've heard pretty much about all the issues.