Meeting about Decomm and Important Posts about Closing Vermont Yankee

Marlboro College
Graduate School Building
graphic from Wikipedia

The Meeting and the Comments

Yesterday, I posted about ways to comment about Vermont Yankee's decommissioning plans. The comment period is only open until Tuesday.

Tonight, there is a meeting in Brattleboro of the Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen Advisory Panel (NDCAP).  The meeting starts at 6 p.m. at Marlboro College on Vernon Street.  Here's a link to the agenda. Regrettably, I still have a rather bad cold, and I will not be attending.

Did I say "regrettably"? Hmm....I try to be more honest than that!  These meetings can be very hard to attend because the nuclear opponents tend to dominate the conversation.  However, I have heard that this NDCAP meetings have been far more civilized than the earlier VSNAP meetings.  I encourage people to attend and support Vermont Yankee's continued operation and careful closing.

The 165 Layoffs and the Pain

As Vermont Digger posted yesterday, Entergy has announced that 165 Vermont Yankee workers will be laid off on January 19. According to an Entergy press release, 69 of these workers live in Vermont, 48 live in New Hampshire and 39 live in Massachusetts.  (I linked to the Digger article rather than the press release because you can comment on the Digger article.)

Evan Twarog at the left
Speaking at Rotary Day  at the U N

Today, I have a guest blog post at NEI Nuclear Notes about the spreading pain of Vermont Yankee closing. I attempt to cover layoffs, taxes, the grid, and my opinion that the Entergy payments for Windham County development won't help Vermont Yankee employees that much. I hope you read it and comment on it.  Pain from Vermont Yankee Closing Spreads Far and Wide.

Evan Twarog about the pain on the grid

Evan Twarog, the son of a Vermont Yankee employee, is now a blogger at Atomic Insights.  Today he has a very well-researched and thoughtful post about the price rises on the grid.  Power in New England: Why are Prices Increasing So Rapidly?  As usual, at Atomic Insights, the comment stream is also worth reading.

Those of you who follow this blog may remember that Twarog has been a frequent guest blogger, and was a summer intern at the Ethan Allen Institute Energy Education Project, two summers ago.

NEI Report on Vermont Yankee

This week, the Nuclear Energy Institute has written an excellent multi-faceted report on Vermont Yankee.  My blog post (linked above) was the final step in this report.  I encourage you to read the entire report, bookmark it, and use it!

Blog posts:

Closing Vermont Yankee, and All That It Means (overview and market problems)
Vermont Yankee and the Looming Energy Crisis (the energy market shortfalls)
Vermont Yankee and All That It Does Not Produce (effect of closing on the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative)
Pain From Vermont Yankee Closing Spreads Far and Wide  (my post, referenced above)

The report itself (Permanent at the NEI site, not blog posts):

Closing Vermont Yankee (overview and links to other pages, including great links about the energy markets, nationwide)
Nuclear Plant Shutdowns Reveal Market Problems
New England's Looming Energy Crisis
Vermont Yankee Closing Will Challenge Region's Emission Goals

Looking Forward for Nuclear, Vermont and Australia

Looking Forward, in Vermont

In recent days, some of my friends have asked me: "What are you going to do with yourself, Meredith, now that Vermont Yankee will close?"

I don't have a complete answer to that question.  There are still a lot of issues about nuclear energy in Vermont, and I will be involved in these issues and controversies.  On the other hand, resolving all these issues in the best possible way--will still not keep the plant open. Whatever I do, Vermont Yankee will still close.  Therefore, some of my motivation is definitely gone.  I am still looking for the best way forward.

For a more positive view of how we will keep working in favor of nuclear energy, please read Howard Shaffer's excellent post at ANS Nuclear Cafe.  Vermont Yankee closure announced-- There is work yet to be done. The opponents are still active, and they are still hurting nuclear energy as it goes forward. We must answer them. (Shaffer's post is also at The Energy Collective.)

Meanwhile, Andrew Stein at Vermont Digger has an article on the four, count'em, FOUR, legal issues about Vermont Yankee that are still active. As Stein writes:  Entergy may be closing Vermont Yankee, but litigation goes on.

Howard Shaffer is correct. There is still a lot to do.

Looking Forward, In Australia

For a cheerful Friday, I want to share a video from Australia about nuclear advocacy.  This video is by Ben Heard of ThinkClimate Consulting and DecarboniseSA (De-Carbonize South Australia).

This video truly shows a way to move forward.  I am happy to share it with you.

A little about the video: 

In late August, Ben Heard and I took part in one of Rod Adams excellent Atomic Show podcasts: Stomping Scare Stories. A few weeks before the podcast, Heard had made a presentation at a conference called Nuclear Power for Australia? His presentation was Gaining Community Support for the Nuclear Option.  As Heard describes in his blog-post, Andy Jaremko of Calgary made this excellent video of his presentation. 

ANO accident and Ted Rockwell death: Update and Links

On Sunday, I wrote a short blog post about the fatal accident at ANO 1, and the death of Ted Rockwell, nuclear pioneer.  Here's an update.

ANO 1

Will Davis wrote an excellent update on the ANO 1 accident.  It is at his blog, Atomic Power Review,  and I hope he will be writing more updates in the future.   The first sentence of his post reads: As of this morning, there has been exceedingly little new information released about Sunday's industrial accident at ANO Generating Station.  So true!  His post also ends with a list of unanswered questions.

I am going to add one more question to Davis list: why no pictures?  There are pictures available somewhere. I have seen people on twitter refer to pictures, but no pictures have been released to the public.  Some pictures may be gory and should not be generally released, out of sympathy to the people who suffered.  But in other accidents have the same constraints of good taste and empathy, and they release some pictures.  This accident was tragic: there is no reason to also make it mysterious.

UPDATE: A comment sent me a link to a picture of the accident. http://www.vertikal.net/en/news/story/17159/

NRC and OSHA are investigating.  Davis posts includes a time-line of events and links to many press releases, from Entergy, NRC, and OSHA. I also recommend this article from Power Engineering Magazine: Entergy Confirms Death During Refueling. It provides context, including comments on other accidents.

Ted Rockwell

Ted Rockwell, a pioneer of nuclear energy and a tireless crusader for it, passed away quietly in his sleep on Sunday, jus a few months before his 91st birthday.  I simply cannot do a better job of eulogizing him than Rod Adams did today at ANS Nuclear Cafe: Ted Rockwell, Atomic Pioneer and Tireless Campaigner for Facts.

I also recommend Rockwell's site:
Learning About Energy http://www.learningaboutenergy.com/
with the provocative sub-heading: "Much of What You Know Simply Isn't So."

The site also has links to several of his books.  I recommend his book The Rickover Effect.  I close with a short clip from Rod Adams; Ted Rockwell speaking about Small Modular Reactors in 2009.

Radiation Fears: Shaffer and Hargraves

In the past two days, Howard Shaffer and Bob Hargraves have written powerful blog posts about  fear of radiation.  Also, we have a new host for the Nuclear Blog Carnival.

The Anti-Nuclear Movement

Fluoride protester.
Not in Vermont. We don't have palm trees.

At ANS Nuclear Cafe, Shaffer posted Understanding the anti-nuclear movement: Pieces of the Puzzle.     Vermont has a highly visible anti-nuclear movement, a low rate of child vaccinations, and recent debates about water fluoridation (I kid you not).  Facts don't matter very much in this context.

Visit the anti-nuclear world-view with Shaffer. It has some virtues (I don't let anyone push me around!), but is mostly a huge drawback for society as a whole.

Radiation Superstition

Chiba Refinery in flames

At Atomic Insights, Rod Adams hosts an op-ed by Robert Hargraves: Radiation Superstition. The Chiba Refinery burned for ten days after the Japanese earthquake---ignored by the media.  Dose-response curves---ignored by the media.  LNG dangers---ignored by the media.  The superstition about harm from small amounts of radiation--constantly trumpeted by the media.

Hargraves has a Ph.D. in Physics and was vice president of Boston Scientific.  He recently spoke to the ChineseAcademy of Sciences  about thorium reactors.    In the run-up to March 11, Hargraves sent this op-ed to many prestigious journals, and was rejected by all of them.  See the list at the end of the article.

We pro-nuclear people don't try to speak only to an echo chamber of other pro-nuclear people.  That's just what happens after the main stream press rejects us. Many reporters would rather quote an anti-nuclear activist than a pro-nuclear scientist.  I guess they are more likely to get a an attention-grabbing quote from an activist.

The Carnival

Carnival 147 of Nuclear Bloggers is up now.  This is the first time it has been hosted at the blog Things Worse Than Nuclear Power.  This site describes itself as "Comparing energy sources---the take from a couple MIT engineers."  There's a new look to this Carnival. For example, it  features quick-links, separate from the summary descriptions, so you don't have to scroll very far to decide what to read.  The list is right up-front.  Great job, Things-worse!  Lots of links to important posts on Fukushima, of course.  It's that time of year....

Blog Roll Update and Welcome to New Blogger

I want to welcome new blogger, Plain English Nuclear. The subheading of this blog is "Trying to Explain What All Those Numbers and Terms Really Mean." The blogger is a nuclear professional and the blog is a very welcome addition to the pro-nuclear blog roll!

I also want to welcome Phronesaiscal blog to my blog roll. This is a multi-person blog, and I have been reading Cheryl Rofer's posts on the blog regularly. However, since many of the topics were not closely akin to Vermont Yankee topics, I didn't have the blog on the Vermont Yankee visible blogroll. Recently, however, Rofer has been doing a great job of interpreting the news from Japan. Her background includes extensive experience understanding nuclear issues in the former Soviet Union areas. Today's blog is about how radiation exposure standards are set in various nations. I hope people will enjoy her blog!

Another not-new blog is Atomic Insights. This is one of the oldest pro-nuclear blogs. Recently Rod Adams moved it off the Blogger platform to its own URL, atomicinsights.com. I have updated the address in my blog roll. Congrats on the move, Rod, and congrats on the beautiful new format!

Also, I have added a new gadget to my blog: the email signup. With this, you can be notified when I put up a new post. Think how convenient this will be! No more searching through the twitter stream, desperately trying to determine if I have posted recently. (This assumes you hang on my every word.) Kidding aside, it is good to be able to sign up for blog alerts, and I hope my readers will find this gadget useful.