Thursday Meeting on Sale of VY to NorthStar

Sign from Wikipedia

The Plan for the Sale

On Thursday, March 22, the Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel (NDCAP)  will meet to discuss the sale of Vermont Yankee from Entergy to NorthStar. On March 2, all the parties to the sale (and all but one of the intervenors) signed off on a Memorandum of Understanding.
This Vermont Digger article by Mike Faher covers the memorandum and  is a little easier to read than the legal document.  State, NorthStar strike deal for sale of Vermont Yankee.

Why is the proposed sale a big deal?  I will attempt to answer that question by answering three subsidiary questions and providing some links.

1) What is this deal about?

Choices After Entergy closed Vermont Yankee, the next step was decommissioning.  Entergy looked at the available funding for decomm, and it proposed that the plant be put in SAFSTOR while the funding grew and the radioactivity of the plant diminished. (SAFSTOR can last for up to 60 years.)  Nobody really liked this idea, but it was financially practical and legal.  Entergy didn't like the plan because Entergy has expertise in running plants, but not in decommissioning them.  The state didn't like it because the plant would be just sitting there, for decades.

Decomm Companies Many other nuclear plant owners have faced this issue, and most have hired a decomm company to do the actual decomm.  This is a little complicated, due to nuclear regulations.  For example, when Exelon planned to decommission the Zion units, it hired the specialist firm EnergySolutions to do the actual work.  However, "hired" is not quite the way it happens.  Exelon transferred the Zion license to EnergySolutions, and EnergySolutions will transfer the license back to Exelon when the decomm is complete. The accumulated decomm funds were transferred with the license.  In effect, EnergySolutions owns Zion temporarily, and is directly responsible to the regulatory agencies during decomm.

The proposed Entergy/ NorthStar deal took this type of deal a step further:  Entergy will sell Vermont Yankee to NorthStar, permanently.

A Sale The sale plan led to a lot of excitement among the local nuclear opponents. A first-of-a-kind transfer (direct sale, not temporary ownership), and happening in Vermont? Oh my! The list of intervenors grew and grew. I felt sorry for both of the companies (Entergy and NorthStar) that had stepped into the morass of Vermont anti-nuclear organizations. These organizations saw this transfer as their last chance to show the world how deeply anti-nuclear they are.  I think they also saw it as their last chance to wring concessions of various types from the companies involved.

Signatures The big deal is that on March 2, all but one of the intervenors signed a Memorandum of Understanding on the terms for the transfer. Basically, Entergy and NorthStar added more bonds and more insurance and more money to the pot, and everyone signed off.  It was not just a win for the intervenors though: the decomm is allowed to use rubbilization, which means using clean debris from building demolition to fill basements.  This had been a huge issue. My blog post from last year contains facts and links, Rubble at Vermont Yankee: Framing the Discussion

Well, everyone signed off on the MOU except Conservation Law Foundation, who felt there wasn't enough money or enough guarantees. CLF predicts that the decomm will run out of money and leave Vermonters on the hook, etc.  My own prediction is that CLF will do everything in their power, including lawsuits, to try to make their prediction come true.  

2) What are  the next steps?

There are quite a few. Vermont State agencies, NorthStar and intervenors have agreed on the MOU, but the state Public Utilities Commission and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must still rule on it.  Once again, Faher at Vermont Digger has a good article on this: Vermont Yankee sale case will extend into summer.  Within that article, note that Guy Page urges plant supporters to come to the Vermont Public Utilities Commission hearing on April 12.  (Guy Page  of Vermont Energy Partnership is a frequent guest blogger at this blog.)

Guy Page's suggestion about the April meeting leads to an easy segueway into the next question:

3) Should I go to the Thursday NDCAP meeting?

Probably.  NDCAP is an advisory committee, and its meetings are often very informative.  This one will include presentations from Entergy, NorthStar and state officials. The meeting is going to be held at a bigger venue (Brattleboro High School) than usual,  because they expect quite a crowd.  In Brattleboro, "quite a crowd" can be unpleasant, as legions of nuclear opponents come in (sometimes by buses) from Massachusetts and all over Vermont and New Hampshire.  On the other hand, the NDCAP meetings are usually fairly orderly.

As I said in my book, meetings are more civilized when the groups are more even. So I do suggest that you go.

On the other hand, I am not sure I will go. I may have a family visit that interferes.  I may be there, or I may not be there.  That makes it harder for me to write: "Absolutely, go!"

If I possibly can, I will be there.

Meeting on Entergy Sale of Vermont Yankee, December 1

Vermont Yankee and NorthStar and Decommissioning

Events are moving fast in the world of decommissioning decisions about Vermont Yankee.

Entergy announced that it hoped to sell Vermont Yankee to NorthStar, which is partnered with Waste Control Specialists for the decommissioning job. Waste Control Specialists already handle all the low-level radioactive waste for Vermont and Vermont Yankee. Waste Control Specialists have also applied to be an interim storage facility for high-level waste.

Dry cask

The sale of Vermont Yankee to NorthStar is intended to speed up the decomm process by decades.  I discussed the possible sale in a previous blog post.

But wait, there's more!

And then it gets complicated:

• Almost as soon as the proposed Vermont Yankee-NorthStar deal was announced, EnergySolutions announced that it hopes to buy Waste Control Specialists.  EnergySolutions is the decomm company that is decommissioning the Zion plants, among other things.
• Almost as soon as the EnergySolutions-Waste Control merger plan was announced, the Department of Justice sued to block the merger, saying such a merger would combine the only low-level waste disposal facilities for 36 states, and therefore eliminate competition and raise prices. 
• Almost as soon....oh well, getting on with it....EnergySolutions issued a press release saying that it would fight the Department of Justice suit.

But wait, there's less!

Richard Saudek is a Vermont attorney who previously served as Chairman of the Vermont Public Service Board, and as Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Public Service.  In other words, he is very knowledgeable  about utility issues in Vermont.  In a recent article that appeared in several local papers, Susan Smallheer reported:  Richard Saudek....said he didn’t think the anti-trust suit would have an effect on the proposed sale.

In other words, unless you own stock in EnergySolutions or Waste Control Specialists, the merger and the Department of Justice lawsuit and so forth.... may well be much ado about nothing.

Meanwhile, there's a meeting

The Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen's Advisory Panel (NDCAP) will meet on the evening of  December 1 in Brattleboro. The main item on the agenda is the possible sale of Vermont Yankee to NorthStar.  Senior executives of Entergy and NorthStar will make presentations.  If you cannot attend the meeting in person, you can sign up in advance to attend it as a webinar.

For more information about NorthStar itself, I recommend this well-referenced blog post by Guy Page of VTEP, which describes many of NorthStar's previous decommissioning projects.

It turns out I won't be going to the NDCAP meeting, due to a commitment to be at a ISO-NE Consumer Liaison Group meeting the same day.  I think the NDCAP meeting will be very interesting, and I trust my friends to give me a full report.

Facts and Opinion on Entergy Sale of Vermont Yankee: Update

Dry casks at Maine Yankee

Who What Where When Why etc

In a press release  Tuesday, Entergy announced its intent to sell Vermont Yankee to NorthStar.  NorthStar would then be responsible for decommissioning Vermont Yankee.  The NorthStar website shows that their main businesses include demolition, hazardous material abatement, and clean-up services of various types.  NorthStar will partner with three companies for the Vermont Yankee work: Areva, Burn&McDonell, and Waste Control Specialists.

Significantly, Waste Control Specialists already operates the Texas Compact Facility that accepts Vermont Yankee low-level wastes, and has applied to  be an Interim Storage facility for high-level wastes.  This is mere speculation, but Waste Control might well accept Vermont Yankee high-level wastes, if Waste Control becomes an Interim Storage facility.  In the meantime, Waste Control does accept Vermont Yankee low-level wastes. Waste Control participation in the decommissioning process will probably make the process go more smoothly.

Fast decommissioning

The NorthStar team of decommissioning experts expect to fully decommission the site (with the possible exception of continued dry cask storage) by 2030, while Entergy's timeline stretched to 2068 and beyond.

A more rapidly-completed decommissioning is what the state of Vermont wants, and this transfer should provide that rapidity. The transfer of the plant from Entergy to NorthStar has to be approved by both the NRC and the Vermont Public Service Board.   The sale is expected to be complete by the end of 2018, according to a Mike Faher article in Vermont Digger.

Power companies and decommissioning companies

On WAMC, Pat Bradley interviewed me (and others) about this sale. I said that organizations that

Vermont Yankee
when it was operating

operate nuclear plants don't have expertise in nuclear decommissioning, and vice versa.  Entergy would not be able to do a decomm as fast and as well as a decomm company could do it. I pointed out that the Zion plants had also been transferred to a decommissioning company (in that case, Energy Solutions) for decomm.

Looking again at the Zion plant, the decomm project run by Energy Solutions is ahead of schedule and below budget.  That is the sort of outcome that one can expect from a company that specializes in decomm.  Vermont Yankee can expect a similar performance from NorthStar. I think this is a good move, from Entergy's point of view.

How to Decomm

In an earlier blog post about decommissioning, I noted that industry articles say that two steps are necessary to ensure fast, cost-efficient decommissioning:

• a quick downsizing  of existing workers
• a contract decomm workforce that changes as the tasks change 

Decomm is more like building a house (the carpenters doing the framing don't do the electrical work) than running a power plant.  Decomm needs a flexible workforce, but a power plant needs a steady workforce.

(Yes. This is pretty nasty for the economics and stability of the locality. )

How to supervise these contractors?  As I note in the earlier post, power companies have hired contractors to supervise the decomm contractors, but this usually didn't work very well.  Nowadays, (Zion, LaCrosse), the company that owns the power plant transfers the whole NRC license to the decomm company. That company works with the subcontractors.

Finally, my opinion

This transfer was inevitable.  I don't like it, because the new company has no incentive to retain workers from the old company.  That is, my friends who work for Entergy will probably not continue to have local jobs after the plant is transferred to NorthStar.

Quoting Bill Mohl of Entergy in an article in Vermont Digger: "Mohl said he expects that NorthStar would want to retain some of the plant staff’s expertise, and he said those employees who lose their jobs will have opportunities to find positions at other Entergy facilities."

On the other hand, Entergy itself has little incentive to retain workers locally, since the people who ran the power plant at Vermont Yankee are not the people who would be best suited for the tasks of a decommissioning job.

In other words, what I really don't like is the fact that Vermont Yankee is closed and will be decommissioned.   This transfer is just a logical consequence of that sad fact.
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Contracts: I think that "selling the plant" (Entergy) and "transferring the license"(Zion, etc)  are not quite the same.  License transfer seems to be temporary (until decomm is finished) while "sale" sounds final. At Zion, the license was transferred to Energy Solutions, and Energy Solutions also has control of the decomm fund.  However, the land and spent fuel remained with Exelon.

Since I have don't have first-hand knowledge of the the terms of either situation, I cannot comment on the contractual implications.  It is clear, however, that in either sale or transfer, the decomm company has full responsibility for the decomm, including the decomm fund.

UPDATE: This article by Dave Gram of AP states that the plan to sell VY is first-of-a-kind. As I noted above, other plants have transferred licenses to decomm companies, not been sold to those companies.

Upcoming meetings Updated: There are an  upcoming meeting of the Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen's Advisory Panel. The meeting is December 1 in Brattleboro.  It is a special meeting to discuss the sale of Vermont Yankee to NorthStar.  More information is at the Vermont  Department of Public Service site, including a link for submitting comments. (Note that the November 17 meeting, announced earlier,  has been cancelled. )

A Reasonable Look at Emergency Planning for Vermont Yankee: Guest post by Howard Shaffer

A Draft Plan

Shaffer speaking in favor of VY
PSB hearing, November 2012

Vermont's Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen's Advisory Panel (NDCAP) has written a draft plant for future emergency planning in the area around Vermont Yankee.  You can read the plan here, or I can summarize it. (This summary is simply my opinion.)

The mountains may crumble, Gibraltar may tumble, but Entergy providing money for emergency planning for the towns around Vermont Yankee---that money must be here to stay.

Howard Shaffer wrote a very reasonable comment on the plan, which I am happy to post as a guest post.  You can read more about NDCAP in the notes at the bottom of this post.

Shaffer Comments on the Draft Plan

Comments on the

Draft Advisory Opinion on

Continued Funding for the Radiological Response Plan

by the 

Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel

Introduction

The Emergency plan’s purpose is to provide for public safety during the decommissioning period.  This draft of a discussion to justify continued funding of a plan outside the plant fence appears to have been influenced by emotional concerns about the Emergency Plan used during the now completed operational period.  This draft has not sufficiently focused on the radical difference in the potential hazard that occurs after the energy releasing chain reaction in the fuel ceases.

While the plant is in operation and fission is on-going, fission products are continually produced.  After the plant is no longer operating, fission products are no longer produced, and the existing fission products decay.  The nature of any radioactive decay is that it continually decreases with time. The change from operating to not-operating is not reflected well in this draft plan.

The draft should take into account the continual decrease in the potential hazard, and the implications of the continual decrease of energy release.  The slowing of the energy release means that the any hazard from a  release of radioactive material from any damaged fuel pellets would take longer and longer to develop as time goes by, after the plant has ceased operation. The time also allows for intervening action by responders to interrupt and contain the release.

The draft seems to focus only on protective action outside the plant boundary, and forgets that inside the boundary there will always be a plan, and there would be protective and intervening action inside the boundary.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s approach takes into account both the continually decreasing potential hazard and the continually increasing length of time available for intervening action by responders.  The Commission’s approach recognizes that an Emergency Response Plan will always be needed, but for a smaller and smaller area.   The area of concern that might be affected by any release shrinks with time until it is all inside the plant boundary.

The draft does not seem to recognize the shrinkage when it contemplates a plan outside the boundary until there is no radioactive material on site.  The draft uses a potential public exposure limit that is so low that it unrealistic.  No number for the avoided exposure is given.

Problems in the Draft

The draft states that “Nevertheless, all drained structures, systems and components across the entire site are contaminated with layers of solid radioactive material …”  All?  That will be news to the employees who worked in the offices, warehouses, and operated and maintained the many secondary plant systems and equipment. Many systems and parts of the plant are not contaminated.  For example the systems handling river water, electric power, and diesels etc.  Understanding which things are contaminated and which are not is fundamental to a safe and economical decommissioning.

The draft is concerned with “radiation exposure” to the public as it should be, but does not seem clear on the fact that what this means is “excess radiation exposure.”  That is, exposure that can be controlled or avoided in excess of the natural amount of exposure everyone gets.  The draft refers to the State of Vermont’s limit of 25 mrem per year. This limit is exceeded in the State House, in the corners, by the radiation coming from the granite blocks.  Locally we all get 28 mrem per year at 0-1000 feet above sea level from cosmic radiation (Denver = 52 mrem per year).  We all get on average another 200 mrem per year from Radon gas in the air. Medical diagnostic procedures account for some exposure (CT Abdominal scan 800 mrem; I had two in 90 days).  The draft should be clear on what exposures might be if there is an accident releasing radioactive material any time during decommissioning.

The draft should have considered the physical sources of the potential radioactive material.  The main source is the used fuel pellets.  These pencil eraser sized ceramic pellets are in sealed metal tubes.  The tubes make up fuel bundles and the bundles will eventually all be in the sealed metal cans, inside the concrete shield chimneys, which are the outer layer of the Dry Cask assemblies. If an accident occurred that resulted in some fuel pellets being scattered on the ground, they would continue to be air cooled, and remain solid. Unlike, say, coal ash, these pellets are highly sintered ceramic. They would probably break into shards, not dissolve into dust.  All the structure of the plant and its equipment are a much smaller source of hazard.

While used fuel remains in the Fuel Pool in the reactor building there is some slight risk that loss of pool water could eventually lead to a release, due to used fuel damage from overheating and possible fire.  Water loss is not likely. The Fuel Pool has a heavy stainless steel liner designed and tested for zero leakage.  It is set in the middle of the Reactor Building, surrounded on the sides and bottom by thick reinforced concrete walls and floors. The top of the pool is open to the Refueling Floor, but there are many feet of water above the used fuel.  The refueling floor is surrounded by the heavy steel beams that support the overhead crane and roof.  This structure and the crane would break an aircraft impacting the building.  The pool has no drain line, and attached lines have siphon breakers.  There are several sources of water for normal and emergency filling.

Opponents of the plant cite it as being a GE Mark I style, as are the plants at the Fukushima- Daiichi site. Those pools survived the earthquake of 2011.  The unit 4 building had no fuel in the reactor, and much fuel in the fuel pool.   After being hit by the tsunami, the Unit 4 building settled several inches and tilted a little. The used and new fuel in that pool stayed in the pool, was never uncovered, and has now all been safely removed.  This demonstrates the robustness of the pool and building.

Conclusion

This draft  has two serious problems: lack of numerical values for expected off-site emissions, which could be compared to regulatory limits, and lack of understanding of the process of radioactive decay: radioactive materials get less radioactive as time goes by.  However, it is a start on a document that could be used in the decision making process.


Howard Shaffer  PE (nuclear) VT, NH, MA, IL
November 11, 2015

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The Citizen's Advisory Panel and the Draft Emergency Plan

When Vermont Yankee closed down, Vermont dissolved its Vermont State Nuclear Advisory Board VSNAP.  This panel's meetings (IMHO) had become room rentals for people to get together and bash Vermont Yankee.

When the plant announced it would close, Vermont started convened a new panel, the Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen's Advisory Panel, NDCAP.  The new panel includes members from New Hampshire and Massachusetts, and members from Vermont Yankee and the IBEW.  In terms of membership, NDCAP is clearly a more representative group than the old VSNAP. You can read its membership list here.

Howard Shaffer

Howard Shaffer has attended almost every meeting of this panel.  He acknowledges that he was late in submitting his comment on the draft plan: he missed a deadline for commenting.  That means his comments may not get into the Department of Public Service public record.

His comments are now in the public record, right here at this blog.

Shaffer has contributed many guest posts to this blog. One of my favorite posts is Where's the Magic Switch, about power and pricing on the grid. Howard Shaffer and I both received Presidential Citations from the American Nuclear Society in 2012. Photo below courtesy of American Nuclear Society.

Howard Shaffer, Meredith Angwin,
ANS president Eric Loewen

Decommissioning Meeting Wednesday Night in Brattleboro

The Meeting and the NRC

There's a meeting of the Nuclear Decommissioning Citizen Advisory Panel (NDCAP) on Wednesday night in Brattleboro. The meeting will start at 6 p.m. at the Quality Inn and Conference Center, on Vernon Road in Brattleboro. Here's a link to the agenda.
http://publicservice.vermont.gov/sites/psd/files/VY%20NDCAP%20Agenda%201-28-15%20Final.pdf

As you may note, this is an unusual meeting because a representative from NRC will be there. NDCAP itself will continue to have meetings forever, though the Rockies may crumble and Gibraltar may tumble...no, not that long.  Wrong song.

The meeting tomorrow night may well be an important meeting, because it is during the period when the NRC is taking comments on the Vermont Yankee Decommissioning Plan, the Post Shutdown Decommissioning Activities Report, aka the PSDAR. And a representative from the NRC will be there, which is always quite a draw for the opponents.  (See my post on one of the NRC-sponsored meetings: The Politics of Intimidation.)

Update Note: I originally wrote that NDCAP would have "monthly" meetings forever.  Howard Shaffer corrected this.  He informed me that NDCAP has had monthly meetings recently, since so much is going on, but the group is only required to have four meetings a year.  So they will have meetings forever, but not monthly meetings.

Sources of Information, and What to Say

Vermont Yankee has an excellent web site on decommissioning, including links to the PSDAR. The Public Service Department also a good site, with links to presentations at NDCAP meetings.  And a big Hat's Off to Howard Shaffer, for his submission to NDCAP. There were two presentations to NDCAP by nuclear opponent groups, and Howard also has a presentation.  (See December 18 meeting notes.)

The bad news is you can spend a week reading pages and pages of information about this meeting. But, if you go to the meeting, you will only get probably two minutes to say anything at all. What might you say?

My advice would be to say that with the plant shut down, and all fuel in the pool, the emergency planning zone (EPZ) no longer needs to be in effect at the time when the NRC says it doesn't need to be in effect.  In other words, the EPZ can be shut down in early 2016.

EPZ Controversy

Well, it isn't a controversy.  All nuclear people (plant, NRC etc) agree that when the fuel has been in the fuel pool for about a year, it becomes too cool to start a fire.  At that point, the emergency planning zone no longer needs to be funded.  However, the opponents are eager to have all nuclear plants spend as much money as possible and keep the emergency planning and so forth in place forever.

Or at least, they think that the EPZ should be in place until Gibraltar tumbles and...wait.  Wrong song!  No, actually, it may be the right song.

The VY Decommissioning page includes an analysis of the public comments received by the Public Service Board about the PSDAR.  You will note that the majority of the comments:

• Request EPZ until all fuel is in dry casks
• Request EPZ until all spent fuel is offsite, maybe in Yucca Mountain
• Request EPZ expansion to fifty miles.

If you go to the meeting, explain perhaps that the fuel pool will not be a danger...just about the time when the NRC says it will not be a danger.  And that the EPZ can go away....just about the time that the NRC says it no longer needs to be funded!  These dates are calculations, not coincidence. 





Will I Be At the Meeting?

Probably not.  I have to admit that I have lost my taste for watching people walk up to the microphone and endlessly repeat that they are terrified about the fuel pool. The plant is not operating. They won, and I don't want to watch them anymore.  Also,  I have lost my taste for being intimidated, and the presence of someone from the NRC may lead the opponents to having more fun (so to speak) than a normal meeting.

However, Howard Shaffer said he may go, and I may go also.  Shaffer is a real trooper, filing testimony to partially balance the testimony of the opponents. I haven't decided about this meeting. Luckily, the blizzard didn't really blizzard here, the way it blizzarded in Massachusetts. So I could go, I guess.

A lot to think about.