NRC Renews Vermont Yankee License

On March 10, the NRC announced they would renew Vermont Yankee's license. The earthquake and tsunami in Japan led to another announcement about the license possibly being delayed.

Today, March 21, the NRC issued the license. I can't find the license letter at the NRC website yet, so I have linked to it at the Vermont Digger site.

Due to the events in Japan, all power plants in this country will be under new types of review in the future. That is exactly what should happen! I am glad to see that the NRC is not putting the cart before the horse. They are not attempting to set up "lessons learned" before "facts are known." The Vermont Yankee license extension shows that the NRC is sticking to its procedures, which include assessment before rulemaking.

As described in this AP report, many people view the VY license extension with alarm. As you could predict, Senator Bernie Sanders is particularly concerned.

Though Vermont Yankee has its license, Larry Smith of Vermont Yankee was quite right to say that "(The license is) not a cause right now for any celebration in light of world events." Nobody in the industry is in a celebratory mood. Still, I am cheered that the horse of facts will pull the cart of lessons learned at the NRC, and that Vermont Yankee has its license.

Update: In other local news, the Vermont Senate is beginning to look at the economic consequences of closing Vermont Yankee.

NRC Will Renew Vermont Yankee License

Today, the NRC issued a letter saying that it would renew the license at Vermont Yankee. This is good news. Not unexpected news, but very good news nevertheless. As I noted in a previous post, the NRC was treating equal-performing nuclear plants in un-equal ways, depending on the amount of noise being made by anti-nuclear groups. Specifically, the Duane Arnold renewal (sister plant to Vermont Yankee) took slightly more than two years. Vermont Yankee's renewal took over five years.

Yesterday, the NRC also announced that Vermont Yankee had passed its annual review with All Green (highest quality) indicators for safety.

Technical Review?

The latest kerfuffle was about contentions by the New England Coalition, a long-term anti-nuclear group based in Maine. They carefully analyze whatever the NRC is investigating as a possible generic safety question, and immediately bring a contention that Vermont Yankee must be adhere to as-yet-unannounced standards that the NRC may someday-in-the-future decide to promulgate. The latest contention was the issue of water in electric cabling.

In my earlier blog post, I pointed out that this was equivalent to telling a business owner that he couldn't open a business because they were still deciding on some type of regulation about signs. If the problem was an immediate safety issue, the NRC would have acted, not put the issue up for review. If an issue is up for review, all plants can await the NRC's ruling on what should be done. The NRC finally recognized this.

Just to note: the person filing contentions from New England Coalition is also the man who boasted of getting state regulators "by the short hairs" about decommissioning. Looks like the NRC broke free of this grip.

Political Pressure on the NRC

Various senators and congressmen have put pressure on the NRC about Vermont Yankee in recent days.

Republican Politicians: Two Republican senators, James Inhofe and David Vitter, recently objected to the lengthy delays of the NRC in relicensing some plants.

Vermont Politicians: The Vermont congressional delegations went to the NRC to try to persuade it to forbid Vermont Yankee from using the SAFSTOR decommissioning option. Like our governor, the delegation seems to have forgotten that the state signed an agreement allowing SAFSTOR as an option. The NRC can't break that agreement. Or if it can, it can also take away the state's powers to regulate the plant. THAT would be interesting!

Assuming they are reasonable, who is NRC is more likely to listen to?

• Senators telling them to do their job without lengthy delays
• Senators telling them to beat up a power plant's agreement with a state

The NRC chose to do their job, thank heavens!

Or, if you don't like reason, try politics.

Who will the NRC listen to?

• A true-blue state that has three total votes (2 senators, 1 congressman) and is sure to vote with Obama's plans, whatever the NRC does.
• Populous Republican states, whose congressional delegations can conceivably help (or not block) Obama initiatives.

This question has an underlying assumption that the NRC is influenced by politics. I hope that is not true. Still, it's nice when reason and politics actually work in the same direction.

I am elated to see Vermont Yankee get relicensed!

-----

I also want to recommend the Idaho Samizdat post on the renewal, with reactions from anti-nuclear groups and a perspective on the state situation. As usual, Dan Yurman pulls it all together!

Champagne image from Wikimediaa