ML030080201
| ML030080201 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Saint Lucie  |
| Issue date: | 12/03/2002 |
| From: | NRC/OCM |
| To: | |
| MASNIK M, NRR/DRIP/RLEP, 415-1191 | |
| Shared Package | |
| ml030060091 | List: |
| References | |
| -nr, -RFPFR, NRC-668 | |
| Download: ML030080201 (158) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Preliminary Results of Environmental Review of St. Lucie Plant, Units 1 & 2 Afternoon Session Docket Number:
(50-335,50-389)
Location:
Port St. Lucie, Florida Date:
Tuesday, December 3, 2002 Work Order No.:
NRC-668 Pages 1-119 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2
+ + + + +
3 PUBLIC MEETING TO DISCUSS THE PRELIMINARY 4
RESULTS OF ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW FOR 5
LICENSE RENEWAL AT ST. LUCIE PLANT, 6
UNITS 1 AND 2 7
+ + + + +
8 TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2002 9
+ + + + +
+ + + + +
12 The Public Meeting commenced at 1:30 p.m.,
13 at Port St. Lucie City Hall, Council Chambers, 121 14 S.W. Port St. Lucie Boulevard, Port St. Lucie, 15 Florida.
16 PRESENT:
17 CHIP CAMERON, Facilitator 18 NOEL DUDLEY, Safety Project Manager 19 DR. MICHAEL MASNIK, Senior Environmental Project 20 Manager 21 JOHN TAPPERT, Section Chief, License Renewal and 22 Environmental Impacts Program 23 DUKE WHEELER, Senior Environmental Project Manager 24 RUSSELL ARRIGHI, Safety Project Manager 25
2 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 PRESENT: (CONT.)
1 S.K. MITRA, Safety Project Manager 2
JENNIFER DAVIS, General Scientist 3
ETOY HYLTON, Licensing Assistant 4
ROGER HANNAH, Region II Public Affairs Officer 5
LAURA ORR, NRC Site Secretary, St. Lucie 6
THIERRY ROSS, Senior Resident Inspector, St. Lucie 7
CASSIE BRAY, Attorney, Office of General Counsel 8
EVA HICKEY, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory 9
TARA ESCHBACH, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory 10 DUANE NEITZEL, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
3 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 A-G-E-N-D-A 1
Welcome and purpose of Meeting (Chip Cameron).. 4 2
Welcome (John Tappert) 10 3
Overview of license renewal process (Noel Dudley) 12 4
Overview of environmental review process 5
(Dr. Michael Masnik) 19 6
Q&A......................
24 7
Results of the environmental review (Eva Hickey) 31 8
Results of the environmental review 9
(Dr. Michael Masnik..............
47 10 Q&A......................
54 11 How comments can be submitted 12 (Dr. Michael Masnik) 57 13 Public comments................
59 14 Closing.................... 119 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
4 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 1
(1:30 p.m.)
2 MR. CAMERON: Good afternoon everyone.
3 My name is Chip Cameron. Im the special 4
counsel for public liaison at the Nuclear Regulatory 5
Commission and Id like to welcome all of you to the 6
NRCs public meeting this afternoon, and thank you for 7
all coming out. Its great to see such a large 8
turnout like this on these issues.
9 Our subject today is the Draft 10 Environmental Impact Statement and the preliminary 11 results in that Environmental Impact Statement on the 12 license renewal applications for the St. Lucie Units 13 1 and 2 that were submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory 14 Commission by Florida Power and Light.
15 My job is to serve as the facilitator for 16 todays meeting and in that role Im going to try to 17 help all of you to have a productive meeting this 18 afternoon. I just want to briefly go over the format 19 for the meeting and some of the ground rules, and give 20 you an overview of the agenda, and also introduce some 21 of the NRC staff and our expert consultants who will 22 be talking to you this afternoon.
23 Basically the format of the meeting, we 24 have two segments to the meeting and they match the 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 two objectives that the NRC has for the meeting today.
1 The first section is to give you some background on 2
the license renewal process, what the NRC looks at 3
when it evaluates a license renewal application. And 4
specifically we want to talk about the preliminary 5
results in the Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
6 So were going to have a series of short NRC 7
presentations for you. Well go on to you for any 8
questions that you might have about those 9
presentations.
10 And then were going to go to the second 11 part of todays meeting, which is to give those of 12 you, who want to make a more formal statement to us, 13 an opportunity to give us comments on the Draft 14 Environmental Impact Statement. And youre going to 15 be hearing from the NRC staff on this processing in a 16 few minutes, but there are going to be -- theres an 17 opportunity for written comments to be submitted on 18 these issues, but we wanted to be here in person with 19 you today to hear from you, and the comments we hear 20 today are going to be given the same weight as any 21 comments that are submitted to us in writing.
22 In terms of ground rules, theyre simple.
23 If you wish to ask questions after the NRC 24 presentations, and we wont keep you waiting till 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 theyre all done, well go out to you after each 1
presentation. Just give me a signal and Ill bring 2
this talking stick to you so that we can get you on 3
the record. Please give us your name and your 4
affiliation, if appropriate. We are taking a 5
transcript. Claudette and Glenda are here taking a 6
transcript for us and that will be available for all 7
of you to see and it will be our record of whats said 8
here today.
9 I would ask that only one person at a time 10 talk, so that we can get a clean transcript and so 11 that we can give our full attention to whomever is 12 speaking. And I would ask you to try to be as concise 13 as you can be in your comments and questions. I know 14 thats difficult on issues such as this, but try to be 15 concise, so we can give everyone who wants to talk, an 16 opportunity to talk today.
17 We did have a lot of people signed up who 18 want to make comments to us in the second part of the 19 meeting and Im asking everyone to follow a guideline 20 of five minutes in your comments up here so that we 21 can make sure that we hear from everybody today.
22 In terms of the agenda, after Im done Im 23 going to ask John Tappert, whos right down here, to 24 give us a short welcome. And John is the section 25
7 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 leader of the Environmental Section of the NRCs 1
Environmental Impacts Program thats in our Office of 2
Nuclear Reactor Regulation. And John and his staff 3
are responsible for doing the environmental reviews 4
for not only any application that comes in for license 5
renewal, but for any reactor activity or project.
6 And then were going to turn to a 7
discussion, a review of the license renewal process 8
generally. And we have Noel Dudley, who is right 9
here, whos going to do that for us. Well then go on 10 to you for any questions that you might have.
11 Well then go to Dr. Michael Masnik, who 12 is right here in the front row, and hes going to talk 13 about the environmental part of the license renewal 14 project. Go on to you for questions and then go to 15 the real part of todays meeting, which are the 16 preliminary results that are in the Draft 17 Environmental Impact Statement and Eva Hickey from 18 Pacific Northwest Lab is here to talk about that.
19 There is a
special part of the 20 environmental review. Its called severe accident 21 mitigation alternatives. And were going to have a 22 brief presentation on that. Michael Masnik is also 23 going to do that. We had one of our experts who was 24 going to do that for us today, but unfortunately there 25
8 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 were some problems back in Washington of a personal 1
nature, so Mike is going to try to fill in for us on 2
that. And well go on to you for questions after 3
that. And then well get to the formal comment part 4
of the meeting after Mike also tells us about how to 5
submit written comments.
6 Now, let me tell you a little bit about 7
the people who are going to be talking to you today.
8 As I said, John Tappert is the section leader, in the 9
Environmental Section. John has been with the NRC for 10 about eleven years. He has been a resident inspector 11 at plants that the NRC oversees. Before that, he was 12 an officer in the Nuclear Navy. And in terms of 13 education, he has a Bachelors from Virginia Tech in 14 Aerospace and Oceanographic Engineering and he has a 15 Masters Degree from Johns Hopkins University in 16 Environmental Engineering.
17 Noel Dudley is the project manager for the 18 safety evaluation on the St. Lucie license renewal 19 application and Noel also was an officer in the 20 Nuclear Navy. Hes been with the NRC for about 21 eighteen years in various positions, including being 22 a resident inspector at operating nuclear power 23 plants, and hes also served with the Advisory 24 Committee on Reactor Safety, an independent advisory 25
9 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, that youll be 1
hearing a little bit more about.
2 Noel has also done service in the Peace 3
Corps in East Africa, teaching physics and science.
4 He has a Bachelors Degree in Engineering Physics and 5
a Bachelors in Engineering, both from Lehigh.
6 In terms of Dr. Mike Masnik, Mike is the 7
environmental project manager on the St. Lucie license 8
renewal application. So youll be hearing about the 9
safety evaluation, about the environmental evaluation.
10 And Mike is uniquely qualified in a sense to be the 11 project manager on St. Lucie, because I believe he was 12 the project manager on the original licensing decision 13 on St. Lucie Unit 2.
14 He has been involved in a number of 15 activities in his career at the NRC, including 16 oversight of the cleanup of the Three Mile Island 17 reactor that was damaged, I guess twenty plus years 18 ago. Hes worked a lot in decommissioning of reactor 19 facilities.
20 Mike has a Bachelors in Zoology from 21 Cornell and he a Masters and PhD. from Virginia 22 Polytechnic Institute.
23 In terms of Eva Hickey, who is going to 24 give us the preliminary results of the Environmental 25
10 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Impact Statement, Eva has been the project team lead 1
for many of the environmental reviews on license 2
renewal applications.
3 On St. Lucie, she was the lead for the 4
radiological and decommissioning evaluation thats in 5
the Draft Environmental Impact Statement. She has had 6
over twenty years experience, not only on evaluation 7
of potential radiological consequences, but also on 8
environmental reviews generally, and emergency 9
planning. She also has a Bachelors from Virginia 10 Tech and a Masters in Health Physics from Georgia 11 Tech.
12 And Im sorry that Im taking a little bit 13 long here, but I wanted you to know the background of 14 the people who are working on the evaluation of this 15 license renewal application.
16 And with that, just thank-you, thank-you 17 for being here this afternoon and were going to get 18 on with the substance of the meeting. Ill turn it 19 over to John Tappert.
20 MR. TAPPERT: Thanks, Chip, and welcome.
21 My name is John Tappert and Im the chief 22 in the Environmental Section in the Office of Nuclear 23 Reactor Regulation. And on behalf of the Nuclear 24 Regulatory Commission, Id like to thank you for 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 coming out today and participating in our process.
1 There are several things wed like to 2
cover today and Id like to briefly go over the 3
purposes of todays meeting. Wed like to do a brief 4
overview of the entire license renewal process. This 5
includes both a safety review as well as environmental 6
review, which is the principle focus of todays 7
meeting.
8 Next wed like to give you the preliminary 9
results of our environmental review, which assesses 10 the environmental impacts associated with extending 11 the operating license of the St. Lucie Nuclear Power 12 Plant for an additional twenty years.
13 Next well give you some information about 14 the balance of our schedule and how you can 15 participate further in the process by submitting 16 written comments on the Draft Environmental Impact 17 Statement.
18 In conclusion of the staffs presentation, 19 well be happy to receive any questions or comments 20 that you may have on the draft today. But first we 21 will provide some general context for the license 22 renewal program.
23 The Atomic Energy Act gives the NRC the 24 authority to issue operating licenses to commercial 25
12 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 nuclear power plants for a period of forty years. For 1
St. Lucie Units 1 and 2, its operating licenses will 2
expire in 2016 and 2023 respectively. Our regulations 3
also make provisions for extending those operating 4
licenses for an additional twenty years, as part of 5
our license renewal program, and Florida Power and 6
Light has requested license renewal for both units.
7 As part of the NRCs review of that 8
application, we assess the environmental impacts 9
associated with extending those licenses. We held a 10 meeting here last April to explain our process and 11 also to seek your input on issues that should be 12 addressed in that Environmental Impact Statement.
13 As we indicated at that earlier 14 environmental scoping meeting, weve returned here now 15 today, to provide you with the preliminary results of 16 our review. And again, the principal reason for the 17 meeting here today is to receive your questions and 18 comments on that review.
19 And with that, Id like to ask Noel to 20 give us a brief overview of the safety portion of 21 license renewal.
22 MR. DUDLEY: Thank-you, John.
23 Good afternoon. My name is Noel Dudley 24 and Im the project manager for the safety review of 25
13 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 St. Lucie Units 1 and 2 license renewal application.
1 Before discussing the license renewal 2
process and the staff safety review, I would like to 3
talk about the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and its 4
role in licensing and regulating nuclear power plants.
5 The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 authorized 6
the NRC to regulate the civilian use of nuclear 7
material. The NRCs mission is threefold. First, to 8
ensure the adequate protection of public health and 9
safety; second, to protect the environment; and third, 10 to provide for common defense and security.
11 The NRC consists of five Commissioners and 12 the NRC staff. One of the five Commissioners is 13 designated as the chairman of the NRC. The 14 regulations enforced by the NRC are issued under Title 15 10, the Code of Federal Regulations, commonly called 16 10 C.F.R. 17 The Atomic Energy Act provided for a forty 18 year license term for power reactors, but it also 19 allowed for renewal of licenses. That forty years is 20 based primarily on economic and anti-trust 21 considerations, rather than safety limitations.
22 Major components were initially expected 23 to last up to forty years, however, operating 24 experience has demonstrated that some major 25
14 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 components, such as the steam generators, will not 1
last that long. For that reason, a number of 2
utilities has replaced major components. Since 3
components and structures can be replaced or 4
reconditioned, plant life is really determined 5
primarily by economic factors.
6 License renewal applications are submitted 7
years in advance for several reasons. If a utility 8
decides to replace a nuclear power plant, it can take 9
up to ten years to plan and construct new generated 10 capacity to replace that of the nuclear power plant.
11 In addition, decisions to replace or 12 recondition major components can involve significant 13 capital investment. As such, these decisions involve 14 financial planning many years in advance of the 15 extended period of operation.
16 Florida Power and Light has applied for 17 license renewal under 10 C.F.R., Part 54, thereby 18 requested authorization to operate St. Lucie Units 1 19 and 2 for up to an additional twenty years. The 20 current operating license for St. Lucie Unit 1 expires 21 on March 1st, 2016, and the license for Unit 2 expires 22 on April 6th, 2023.
23 Now I would like to talk about license 24 renewal, which is governed by the requirements of 10 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 C.F.R., Part 54, or which is referred to as the 1
license renewal rule. This part of the Code of 2
Federal Regulations defines the regulatory process by 3
which a nuclear utility such as Florida Power and 4
Light applies for license renewal.
5 The license renewal rule incorporates 10 6
C.F.R., Part 51, by reference. This part provides for 7
the preparation of an Environmental Impact Statement, 8
and under that part is the reason were holding this 9
public meeting today, is to hear your comments on the 10 Environmental Impact Statement.
11 The license renewal process defined in 12 Part 54 is very similar to the original licensing 13 process, in that it involves a safety review and 14 environmental impact evaluation, plant inspections and 15 review by the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards 16 or, which is also known as the ACRS.
17 The ACRS is a group of scientists and 18 nuclear industry experts, who serve as a consulting 19 body to the five Commissioners. The ACRS performs an 20 independent review of the license renewal application 21 and the staff safety evaluation, and reports its 22 findings and recommendations directly to the five 23 Commissioners.
24 This next slide illustrates two parallel 25
16 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 processes. You will see the one on the top of the 1
slide and the others towards the bottom of the slide.
2 The two parallel processes are the safety review 3
process and the environmental review process. These 4
processes are used by the NRC staff to evaluate two 5
separate aspects of the license renewal application.
6 The safety review, which is the top part 7
of the diagram, involves the staffs review of the 8
technical information in the application for renewal 9
and the staff verifies with reasonable assurance that 10 the plant can continue to operate safely during the 11 extended period of operation.
12 The staff assesses how the applicants 13 processes to monitor or manage the aging of certain 14 components that are within the scope of license 15 renewal. The staff review is documented in a safety 16 evaluation report, which is provided to the ACRS.
17 The ACRS reviews the safety evaluation report, holds 18 public meetings and prepares a report to the 19 Commission, documenting its recommendation.
20 The safety review process also involves 21 two or three inspections, which are documented in NRC 22 inspection reports. In its decision to review an 23 operating license, the NRC considers the safety 24 evaluation report, the ACRS report, the NRC Regional 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Administrators recommendations, and the inspection 1
reports.
2 At the bottom of the slide is the other 3
parallel process, the environmental review, which 4
involves scoping activities, preparation of the draft 5
supplement to the Generic Environmental Impact 6
Statement, solicitation of public comments on the 7
draft supplement and then the assurance issuance of a 8
final supplement to the generic Environmental Impact 9
Statement. This document also factors into the 10 agencys decision on the application.
11 In the safety evaluation report, the staff 12 documents its assessment of the effectiveness of the 13 applicants existing or proposed inspection in 14 maintenance activities to manage aging effects 15 applicable to passive long live structures and 16 compliments.
17 Part 54 requires the applicant to 18 reevaluate those design analyses that assume forty 19 years of plant operations. Their reevaluations extend 20 the assumed operating period to sixty years.
21 An example of that is electrical cables.
22 The aging of electrical cables could result in 23 embrittlement or breakage of the cables. These 24 initially are evaluated over a forty year period. Now 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 the license renewal applicant needs to go back and 1
evaluate the ability of those cables to withstand the 2
environment for sixty years instead of forty years.
3 These required reevaluations are called 4
time limited aging analyses. Current regulations are 5
adequate for addressing active compliments such as 6
pumps and valves, which are continually challenged to 7
reveal failures and degradations, such that corrective 8
actions can be taken.
9 Current regulations also exist to address 10 other aspects of the original license, such as 11 security and emergency planning. These current 12 regulations will also apply during the extended period 13 of operation.
14 In January of 2002, the NRC issued a 15 Federal Register notice to announce its acceptance of 16 the Florida Power and Light application for renewal of 17 the operating license for St. Lucie. This notice also 18 announced the opportunity for public participation in 19 the process.
20 This concludes my summary of the license 21 renewal process and the staffs review, and I will 22 open up for questions.
23 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thanks, Noel.
24 Even though the subject of the meeting is 25
19 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 specifically on the environmental review and the 1
Environmental Impact Statement, we thought that it 2
would be useful for you to have a larger context in 3
terms of the license renewal process overall, and 4
thats what Noel addressed.
5 Are there any questions about that overall 6
process or the safety evaluation thats done as part 7
of the license renewal process?
8 (No response.)
9 MR. CAMERON: And if things occur to you 10 on this as we go along, we can always go back. So 11 seeing no questions right now, Noel, thank-you very 12 much.
13 And lets go to Michael Masnik. Dr.
14 Masnik is going to tell us about the environmental 15 review part of the process. Mike?
16 DR. MASNIK: Thank-you, Chip.
17 I want to wish each of you a good 18 afternoon.
19 My name is Mike Masnik. Im the 20 environmental project manager for the St. Lucie 21 license renewal project. Im responsible for 22 coordinating the efforts of the NRC staff and our 23 contractors from the National Labs to conduct and 24 document the environmental review associated with 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Florida Power and Lights application for license 1
renewal at the St. Lucie site.
2 This first slide deals with NEPA. NEPA or 3
the National Environmental Policy Act was enacted in 4
1969. Its one of the most significant pieces of 5
environmental legislation that has ever been passed in 6
this country. It requires all Federal agencies to use 7
a systematic approach to consider environmental 8
impacts during certain decision-making proceedings 9
requiring major Federal actions.
10 NEPA requires that we examine the 11 environmental impacts of these proposed actions and 12 can consider mitigation measures, which are those 13 things that can be done to reduce the impact of the 14 action. NEPA requires that we consider alternatives 15 to the proposed action and that the impacts of those 16 alternatives also be evaluated.
17 And finally, NEPA requires that we 18 disclose all of this information to the public and we 19 invite public participation in the process.
20 And the NRC has determined that it will 21 prepare an Environmental Impact Statement associated 22 with renewal of the operating licenses for an 23 additional twenty years. Therefore, following the 24 process prescribed by NEPA, we have prepared a Draft 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Environmental Impact Statement that describes the 1
environmental impacts associated with operating St.
2 Lucie for an additional twenty years. That 3
Environmental Impact Statement was issued in late 4
October and todays meeting is being held to receive 5
your comments. This is the document. Its in the 6
back of the room and we have some additional copies.
7 If you dont have it, you certainly can walk away with 8
one today.
9 This next slide describes the objective of 10 our environmental review. This is from the 11 regulations and its a rather convoluted explanation 12 as to exactly what were required to do. But simply 13 put, were trying to determine whether the renewal of 14 the St. Lucie license is acceptable from an 15 environmental standpoint.
16 Now whether or not the plant actually 17 operates for an additional twenty years will be 18 determined by others, such as Florida Power and Light 19 and the State Regulatory Agencies, and it will depend 20 in a large part, on the results of the safety review, 21 which Noel has just talked about.
22 This slide shows in a little bit more 23 detail the environmental review process that Noel 24 talked about just a few minutes ago. We received the 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 application last November, 2001, and we issued a 1
Notice of Intent in the Federal Register in February 2
of this year, informing the public that we are going 3
to prepare and Environmental Impact Statement and give 4
the opportunity for the public to provide comments on 5
the scope of the review.
6 This past April, during the scoping 7
period, we held two public meetings in this very room 8
in Port St. Lucie, to receive public comment on the 9
scope of issues that should be included in the 10 Environmental Impact Statement.
11 Also in April, we went to the St. Lucie 12 site with a combined team of NRC staff members and 13 personnel from our two national laboratories, that 14 have backgrounds in specific technical and scientific 15 disciplines.
16 We familiarized ourselves with the site, 17 we met with the staff of Florida Power and Light to 18 discuss the information submitted in support of the 19 license review, and we reviewed environmental 20 documentation maintained at the plant. We also 21 examined Florida Power and Light Companys evaluation 22 process.
23 In addition, we contacted,Federal, State 24 and local agencies, as well as local service agencies 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 to obtain information on the area and on the St. Lucie 1
plants.
2 At the close of the scoping comment 3
period, we gathered up and considered all of the 4
comments that we had received from the public and from 5
the State and Federal Agencies, and many of these 6
comments contributed significantly to the document 7
were here today to discuss.
8 In May we issued requests for additional 9
information from Florida Power and Light to ensure 10 that any information that we relied on in our 11 assessment, that had not been included in the original 12 application, was submitted and docketed.
13 At the end of October, we issued the Draft 14 Environmental Impact Statement for public comment.
15 This is Supplement 11 to the Generic Environmental 16 Impact Statement. We also rely on the findings of the 17 Generic Environmental Impact Statements for part of 18 our conclusions.
19 The report is a draft, not because it is 20 incomplete, but rather because we are at an 21 intermediate in the decision-making process. Were 22 in the middle of the public comment period to allow 23 you and other members of the public to take a look at 24 the results and provide any comments you might have on 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 the report.
1 After we gather these comments and 2
evaluate them, we may decide to change portions of the 3
Environmental Impact Statement based on those 4
comments. The NRC will then issue a final 5
Environmental Impact Statement related to license 6
renewal concerning St. Lucie in or by July, 2003.
7 That concludes my presentation. Chip?
8 MR. CAMERON: Greatly done. Thank-you, 9
Mike.
10 In a minute were going to go to the 11 specific results of the Draft Environmental Impact 12 Statement, but before we do that, are there any 13 questions about the process that the NRC uses?
14 Okay. Lets go back here. Well go to 15 this gentleman first and please give us your name, 16 sir.
17 MR. BRUMFIELD: Lloyd Brumfield.
18 I have a question about NEPA. I have no 19 familiarity with the power field or nuclear field, but 20 many second-hand workshops and so on, concerning water 21 and the Army Corps of Engineers. The people that I 22 deal with are same thing as a paper tiger that no one 23 enforces. Who would enforce a NEPA and the 24 Environmental Impact Statement in this particular 25
25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 situation?
1 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Mr. Brumfield.
2 Mike?
3 DR. MASNIK: Well, NEPA is a piece of 4
legislation that essentially requires you to follow a 5
process. It doesnt guarantee an outcome. It doesnt 6
guarantee, for example, that a Federal agency would 7
pick the least -- pick the alternative that results in 8
the least impact. But as long as you follow a process 9
and youre faithful to the process, then youre 10 complying with NEPA.
11 Now there are other parts of the 12 legislation, including the full disclosure one. You 13 have to understand that before 1969, the Federal 14 agencies basically had a free hand to do pretty much 15 what they wanted to without any real public input, so 16 this was a big change.
17 Now your question on enforcement. The 18 organization within the government that has the 19 responsibility for NEPA is the Council on 20 Environmental Quality, which is an executive level 21 organization that answers to the President. They have 22
-- they work closely with and delegate a certain 23 amount of the responsibility for NEPA compliance to 24 EPA.
25
26 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 And for example, this Environmental Impact 1
Statement, we will get comments on the Impact 2
Statement from U.S. EPA. Theyre fairly consistent in 3
providing us comments. They will comment both on the 4
technical nature of the document, but also on our 5
compliance with NEPA.
6 When we issue a final Environmental Impact 7
Statement, they actually grade that Impact Statement 8
and well get a grade as an agency. And if the Impact 9
Statement is determined by EPA to be insufficient, 10 its referred back to CEQ and the executive branch of 11 the government can take some action against the 12 Federal agency that issued that, so that they would be 13 in compliance with NEPA.
14 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 15 Mike.
16 Yes, sir?
17 MR. RAATZ: My name is Bill Raatz and my 18 question is probably related more to Noels 19 presentation and he had mentioned the reasons for 20 applying for this extension of the license at this 21 time, such as the candle all ablaze and the long 22 construction time on the facilities and things of that 23 sort.
24 And as it stands now, my understanding is, 25
27 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 is that theres fourteen years that is left on the 1
older facilitys current license and that would be 2
extended to thirty-four years, with this twenty year 3
license approval. And with the newer facility, which 4
has twenty-one years left on its current license, that 5
would be extended forty-one years.
6 And my question is, is what incentive or 7
impetus is there for any kind of serious research or 8
promotion of safer renewable alternatives, such as 9
wind and solar power, fuel cells, new hydro methods.
10 If you have that kind of extension of time, you know, 11 why would you bother then, seriously looking for 12 alternatives?
13 MR. CAMERON: I think -- Im not sure 14 its actually the alternatives, looking at 15 alternatives, I dont know if thats Noel or it might 16 be something Eva is going to address later, but well, 17 go ahead.
18 DR. MASNIK: Just as a point of 19 clarification and its interesting that you bring the 20 issue up because we discussed this in the car the way 21 over here this morning, but under the Atomic Energy 22 Act, we can only issue a license for forty years. So 23 it would not, Unit 2 could not have a forty-one year 24 life extension, a license to operate for forty-one 25
28 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 years into the future.
1 The expectation is that if the Commission 2
ultimately approves the application for license 3
renewal, that it would be granted sometime next year 4
or possibly even the year after, in which case it 5
would be a forty year license.
6 With respect to your second comment and 7
that was on alternatives, I guess the way to answer it 8
is that the pursuit of alternative energy sources is 9
one, first of all, of a question of national policy 10 and second of all, economics, and neither of those 11 areas are areas that our agency would necessarily get 12 involved in. We certainly dont promote alternative 13 energy sources, because thats not our charter. Our 14 charter is to assure the safe use of nuclear power.
15 So I guess my answer is that, you know, 16 there are other agencies within the Federal government 17 that are charged with the responsibility to promote 18 and develop alternative energy sources.
19 MR. CAMERON: I think that there is some 20 information in the Draft Environmental Impact 21 Statement on looking at alternatives and I think that 22 Eva Hickey is going to address those. And perhaps 23 after that, why dont we see if we can go back to your 24 question in that context? It might give you some more 25
29 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 information.
1 All right. Yes?
2 MS. WELLS: My question -- Betty Lou 3
Wells.
4 My question is, how could more lead time 5
be built into this public hearing system so that the 6
material, which was put out in late October, would 7
reach here to be seen and studied before November the 8
26th, which is when it arrived at the depository at 9
the college?
10 DR. MASNIK: Well, it -- I am surprised 11 that if in fact the document didnt get to the library 12 by the 20th, until the 26th, because the document was 13 released for general circulation on the 1st of 14 November, basically, it was provided to people.
15 Unfortunately, Betty, we didnt have your 16 name prior to a couple -- about a month ago. So we 17 really didnt have your name and send you a document 18 until the middle -- I think it was about the middle of 19 the month.
20 We do have another almost five weeks of 21 the comment period thats still open, so if you do 22 have concerns and comments, you can get them to me.
23 And additionally, to be honest with you, the comments 24 that are submitted even after January 15th, we almost 25
30 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 always include them up until the time that we were 1
close to publication. So its obviously best for us 2
if you can get them in by a date certain, but if you 3
cant, because of whatever reason, you know, well 4
consider them as best we can.
5 So we do have an extended comment period 6
and we normally go for seventy-five days, which is 7
more than the requirements of the regulations. So I 8
think were trying to do as much as we can, but unless 9
we have your name, its oftentimes difficult for us to 10 get the information directly to you.
11 MR. CAMERON: One thing I guess we could 12 do is just check to make sure, since were going to be 13 putting other documents at the college, that just make 14 sure that they, they get them.
15 DR. MASNIK: We actually had someone 16 check this morning to make certain that everything was 17 there.
18 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Youre going to 19 follow up and --
20 MS. WELLS: I just wanted to say, I 21 wasnt asking about my own notification, but about the 22 college and I did check with Dr. Wideman, who told me 23 that he had not gotten it until the 26th.
24 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Well, well check 25
31 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 and make sure that doesnt happen in the future.
1 Anybody else before we go on to the actual 2
results of the Environmental Impact Statement?
3 (No response.)
4 MR. CAMERON: All right. Thank-you, 5
Mike.
6 And now Eva Hickey will tell us about the 7
results and Eva, remember, we still -- we have sort of 8
an outstanding question here on alternatives and you 9
may want to try to address that.
10 MS. HICKEY: Right.
11 MR. CAMERON: Okay.
12 MS. HICKEY: Good afternoon, my name is 13 Eva Hickey and Im filling in for Charlie Brandt 14 today, who is the Pacific Northwest National 15 Laboratory past leader for this
- effort, but 16 unfortunately Charles wasnt able to come to sunny 17 Florida. Hes stuck in the cold and the fog of 18 Washington.
19 I do have several of my other team members 20 here with me today and we will try to answer any 21 questions you have.
22 My assignment on this particular activity 23 was to look at the radiological aspects, the uranium 24 fuel cycle and decommissioning for the St. Lucie 25
32 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 license renewal, and I have led several of these teams 1
at other power plants.
2 Im going to take just a minute to talk to 3
you about the process that we use for doing this 4
review and then Im going to try to take a little more 5
time and talk about the actual results that we found.
6 Now first, Mike mentioned that we were 7
here in April and we -- I guess actually you talked 8
about this slide, didnt you, Mike? You just didnt 9
show it. Okay, good.
10 Anyway, this is the information that we 11 gathered as we were preparing our evaluation and here 12 again was some, the expertise that we used, looking at 13 the environmental review for St. Lucie. And now we 14 get to my slides.
15 First what I would like to talk about is 16 what we used to actually define the environmental 17 impacts that we were looking at. The NRC has defined 18 these as small, moderate and large. And these, these 19 terms have been agreed upon and are in the guidance 20 with the Council of Environmental Quality. And this 21 is what we use routinely when we do our review for 22 license renewal.
23 Ill talk a bit about each one and then 24 give you an example, so you can understand what we 25
33 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 were looking at, when we were looking at the 1
environmental impacts.
2 First, a small impact is one that is not 3
detectable or its too small to be destabilizing or to 4
noticeably alter a resource.
5 And to give you an example, one of the 6
things that we look at is the intake structures at the 7
nuclear plants. And we look at the loss of fish and 8
other -- adult and juvenile fish in the intake 9
structure.
10 Now, if the loss of the fish at the intake 11 structure is small enough that it cannot actually be 12 detected in the river and in this case, also in the 13 ocean, then the impact is considered small.
14 Our next impact level is called moderate 15 and this is an effect thats sufficient to noticeably 16 alter, but not destabilize an important resource. And 17 so looking at the example of fish in the intake 18 structure again, what we would see is the population 19 of fish may decline, but it would eventually stabilize 20 at a lower level and then we would see that same 21 population of fish, and that would be considered a 22 moderate impact.
23 And then finally, a large impact would be 24 one that would be clearly noticeable and it would be 25
34 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 sufficient to destabilize important attributes of the 1
resource. So looking at our example once again, you 2
would see a decline in the fish population and it 3
would be such that the population would not stabilize, 4
and you may continually -- and the population would 5
continually decline.
6 Youll hear me use these terms, small, 7
moderate and large throughout my discussion.
8 Now let me take just a minute to explain 9
to you exactly what we did for environmental review.
10 We use a document called the Generic Environmental 11 Impact Statement for license renewal, NUREG-1437. And 12 in that document it identifies ninety-two 13 environmental issues that are evaluated for license 14 renewal. Sixty-nine of these issues are considered 15 what we call Category 1.
16 And Category 1 means that the impacts are 17 the same for all reactors with certain features, such 18 as plants with cooling towers. And if you have the 19 same impact for all of those reactors, we call it 20 Category 1 generic.
21 And we do not necessarily -- we do not do 22 a site-specific analysis on Category 1 issues. We do 23 look to see if there is any new and significant 24 information that has been identified since NUREG-1437 25
35 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 was published.
1 Now for the other twenty-three issues, 2
those are considered Category 2 issues. Heres my 3
Category 2. And these are issues where we found that 4
the impacts may be different from plant to plant, even 5
plants with the same features. And so for these 6
issues, these twenty-three issues, we do a 7
site-specific analysis every time we do license 8
renewal.
9 However, there is another aspect here.
10 And there are some issues that are not related to St.
11 Lucie because of the way that the plant is designed, 12 and for those issues, theyre just tabled and we do 13 not do a review there.
14 During the scoping period, we looked, we 15 asked the public if they had any information, any 16 insight in new and significant information, and we 17 took that into account while we were doing our 18 environmental review.
19 So with that in mind, here is a list of 20 not all of the issues we looked at, but a number of 21 the ones that Im going to talk about today: cooling 22
- system, transmission
- lines, radiological, 23 socioeconomics, groundwater use and quality, and 24 threatened and endangered species. And you can see 25
36 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 here, we have a picture of the St. Lucie Plant.
1 Id like to talk just a minute about the 2
report itself. Hopefully, youve all had a chance to 3
look at it. Im going to be discussing most of the 4
aspects that are described in Chapter 2, which is 5
related to the plant
- itself, and then the 6
environmental impacts, the findings are primarily in 7
Chapter 4. And as Mike said, we were at St. Lucie in 8
April, gathering information for our evaluation.
9 First let me talk about the cooling 10 system. There are a number of Category 1 issues 11 related to the cooling system and if youre 12 interested, youre welcome to look in the front part 13 of the chapter for the document. Well describe 14 those.
15 The ones that I want to talk about today 16 are the Category 2 issues. They are entrainment, 17 impingement and heat shock.
18 Entrainment happens when fish eggs and 19 larvae pass through the intake screens. And what we 20 found was that there was less than two hundredths of 21 a percent mortality of fish eggs and larvae passing by 22 the intake.
23 The second Category 2
issue is 24 impingement. And impingement occurs when fish and 25
37 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 shellfish actually get trapped on the intake 1
structures. And our research found that there was 2
less than four pounds per day of fish and less than 3
two pounds per day of shellfish that were impinged.
4 The third aspect is heat shock. And heat 5
shock occurs when the cooling water is discharged and 6
it thermally alters the water near the discharge. So 7
were interested in looking at the environment around 8
the discharge.
9 And our review found that St. Lucie 10 complies with the Florida water quality standards.
11 For these three Category 2 issues we determined that 12 all the impacts were small.
13 Next Id like to talk about transmission 14 lines. The St. Lucie transmission lines, theres 15 eleven miles of corridors and they cover 766 acres.
16 Looking at the impacts from the transmission lines, we 17 determined that these were small.
18 Theres another -- theres two other 19 issues related to transmission lines. Electric shock 20 from electromagnetic fields and health effects of 21 chronic exposure to electromagnetic fields.
22 Weve looked at the evaluation in the St.
23 Lucie environmental report and determined that for 24 both of these areas, the impacts are small.
25
38 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Radiological concerns. Radiological is a 1
Category 1 issue, which as I said, means that the 2
impacts are the same from plant to plant, however, 3
because theres typically a lot of concern about 4
radiological aspects, I wanted to take just a minute 5
to discuss it.
6 What we do during our review here is, we 7
look at the effluents that are released from the 8
plants, the gaseous effluents, the liquid effluents, 9
and the solid waste management program. And we also 10 look at the off-site environmental monitoring program, 11 where they put out their monitors for determining 12 whats actually being released off-site. Then we take 13 that information and we look at what the doses to the 14 public are.
15 And what we found at St. Lucie during the 16 license renewal period is that the doses to the public 17 would not be any higher than they typically are now on 18 an annual basis. And so, because of this, weve 19 determined that the impacts are small.
20 There are four issues that are Category 2 21 under the socioeconomics area, housing and public 22 utility impacts. We determined that there would be no 23 change in housing availability, value of rental rates, 24 that the increase in water usage could be met 25
39 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 adequately and, therefore, the impacts to housing and 1
public utility is considered small.
2 One of the other Category 2 impacts that 3
we look at is also land use and transportation during 4
the license renewal period. The licensee has stated 5
that there will not be more than an additional sixty 6
employees during the license renewal term and, 7
therefore, it was determined that the impact from that 8
additional staff would be small, and that the tax 9
payments are small, relative to county revenues.
10 We look at historic and archeological 11 resources. At the St. Lucie site, there are no known 12 historic or archeological resources at the site and 13 any ground disturbances that will occur during the 14 license renewal period will be preceded by survey.
15 So this impact is considered small.
16 We look at environmental justice and we 17 determined from our review that the impact for 18 environmental justice would also be small.
19 Groundwater use and quality is a Category 20 2 issue. The potable service water used at St. Lucie 21 is about 132,000 gallons per day and this is less than 22 about ten percent of what the county supplies, 23 therefore, the impacts are considered small.
24 Threatened or endangered species. This 25
40 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 was a very interesting aspect of our review, because 1
St. Lucie has a very unique habitat and a considerable 2
number of both Federally and State listed threatened 3
and endangered species.
4 For the last twenty years, the staff has 5
been involved in protection of endangered sea turtles, 6
as well as other species and the habitats of other 7
threatened and endangered species around the site.
8 When the discussion of license renewal was 9
first started, the staff contacted the National Marine 10 Fisheries Service and was informed that there was no 11 additional consultation necessary at the time, with 12 relation to the license renewal. However, as 13 necessary, there will be continuous informal and 14 formal consultation regarding the sea turtles, until 15 either the species is de-listed or the plant 16 permanently ceases operation, likewise, for other 17 species, the plants, birds, small animals and manatees 18 that may be located near or on the site, the U.S. Fish 19 and Wildlife Service was contacted and they concurred 20 that at this time, there is no further consultation 21 needed.
So our preliminary conclusion 22 for threatened and endangered species is that the 23 impact of license renewal would be small.
24 Now, I mentioned for the Category 1 25
41 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 issues, we look at potential new and significant 1
information. And what we found, we asked for input 2
during scoping, we talked to the licensee, FP&L, and 3
they are also asked to look for new and significant 4
information on Category 1 issues, and then during our 5
review, our team looks for new and significant 6
information. And for the review at St. Lucie, we 7
found that we have no new and significant information.
8 So for all the Category 1 issues, the 9
staff accepts the conclusions in the Generic 10 Environmental Impact Statement, NUREG-1437.
11 Now we had a question earlier about 12 alternatives. One of the reviews, one of the very 13 intensive reviews that we do is looking at 14 alternatives to license renewal and I will talk just 15 a minute about that. A detailed evaluation of that 16 can be found in Chapter 8. And we look at all of the 17 same environmental impacts for all of the alternatives 18 that we look at, and thats described in Chapter 8.
19 The primary ones we look at are the no 20 action alternatives. This means that the St. Lucie 21 Units 1 and 2 would stop, would permanently cease 22 operation when their license expires and they would be 23 decommissioned, and there would be no other evaluation 24 or look at other energy sources.
25
42 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 We look at alternative energy sources such 1
as coal, natural gas and new nuclear facilities. We 2
look at purchasing electrical power from other 3
utilities and then we look at a combination of all of 4
these alternatives. There is a summary of these 5
alternatives in Table 9-1 in the report.
6 But the other question, I think, that we 7
had raised earlier was about other alternatives, other 8
sources of alternative energy sources, and in fact we 9
do look at these. And this is a list of the ones that 10 we are currently looking at, and they are identified 11 and discussed in the report.
12 Our preliminary conclusion on alternatives 13 to license renewal is that in looking at all the 14 environmental impacts, we determined that there is a 15 range of impacts from small to large and that the 16 current site prevents alternative generation at that 17 particular location.
18 Alternative sites would have higher -- may 19 have higher socioeconomic impacts, more land ecology 20 disturbances, higher atmospheric conditions and 21 potential aesthetic impacts.
22 And that is my discussion. Im open for 23 questions, if theres any questions people have.
24 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank-you, Eva.
25
43 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Were going to go over to Mr. Brumfield in 1
a moment here.
2 In terms of the question that Bill Raatz 3
asked, when you look at the alternatives, do you look 4
at that over a specific period of time in the future 5
-- I think that gets to sort of the heart of this, 6
this question, in terms of how feasible it is for 7
alternatives to be developed over a certain period of 8
time?
9 MS. HICKEY: Mike, do you want to help me 10 on this, because I -- alternatives is not my 11 particular area.
12 DR. MASNIK: Actually I think Im going 13 to rephrase that, Chip, because I think his comment --
14 and its a good comment -- that is by granting the 15 license an additional twenty year extension, arent we 16 in a way for closing the development of other forms of 17 alternative energy in the area here. And I think, in 18 some respect, its a good question, but its not one 19 that we need -- that we address.
20 You know, like I said, were not in the 21 business of promoting any source of energy generation.
22 Were promoting safe operation of nuclear power, 23 so I --
24 MR. CAMERON: Okay.
25
44 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 DR. MASNIK: And I dont know what else 1
to tell you.
2 MR. CAMERON: Thank-you for clarifying 3
that.
4 Mr. Brumfield.
5 MR. BRUMFIELD: Lloyd Brumfield.
6 On alternatives, and this seems to be true 7
in all operations, whether its electricity or 8
- whatever, conservation never seems to be an 9
alternative, an option, unless somebody like me brings 10 it up. Oh, yes, thats understood.
11 As I read, the United States has 12 approximately five percent of the worlds population, 13 yet we consume probably twenty-five percent of the 14 worlds energy. Im assuming that all plans are that 15 were going to continue to consume electricity at the 16 rate now, with the increased population. And it seems 17 to me were attacking the problem on the wrong end.
18 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 19 Mr. Brumfield, and so noted.
20 And in terms of conservation as an 21 alternative --
22 MS. HICKEY: We actually, we do look at 23 that. We look at the amount that may be conserved and 24 how that would impact the amount of energy that the 25
45 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 nuclear power plant would supply and we have looked at 1
a combination of alternatives, so we would look, say 2
at conservation as well as perhaps solar power or 3
hydro power, and so in fact, we have, we have 4
addressed conservation.
5 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you.
6 And for people who dont think that these 7
issues have been addressed the way they should, thats 8
what the comment process is all about.
9 Lets -- yes, Betty Lou? Betty Lou Wells.
10 MS. WELLS: Would you please clarify what 11 you said about dosage measurements. Dosage would not 12 be as large in the next twenty years as they are now?
13 MS. HICKEY: No. Okay, what I meant was 14 that, on an annual basis, the utility looks at -- they 15 do an estimate of the public dose every year, 16 annually. And during license renewal, it is not 17 expected that annually, that public dose would 18 increase.
19 So if youre looking at it, for the year 20 2000, and they do their calculation, their estimation 21 of what the public dose is and its a certain value, 22 over the next twenty years, each year it would be 23 somewhere within that same value.
24 MR. CAMERON: Okay.
25
46 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 MS. WELLS: In the first hearing, I never 1
could understand what I seemed to be hearing as 2
calculating that dosage in proportion to the 3
population. So are you still doing that or are you 4
saying that dosage, per individual, is smaller and the 5
population growth increases?
6 MS. HICKEY: The utility looks at the 7
emissions from the plant every year and they calculate 8
what they call an individual dose. Thats a maximum 9
individual dose, so thats a person that doesnt 10 really exist at a certain location and they have all 11 these assumptions.
12 They also do a calculation of a collective 13 dose. So that, that is looking at all the material 14 thats released from the plant and then they do a dose 15 for that population. So as the population changes, 16 yes, they will adjust their calculations, based on the 17 population change.
18 MR. CAMERON: Okay. And NRC regulations 19 govern --
20 MS. HICKEY: The government releases --
21 theres not a regulation on population dose because --
22 collective population dose -- because from plant to 23 plant, theres different populations, but the utility 24 makes that calculation and that is reported. But 25
47 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 theres not an actual regulation on what that 1
collective dose has to be.
2 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank-you, thank-3 you, Eva.
4 Lets move to short presentations and then 5
were going to get to hear from all of you in a little 6
bit more detail.
7 Thank-you, Eva.
8 And were going to hear from Mike Masnik 9
on severe accident mitigation alternatives, and hell 10 also tell us exactly what that is.
11 DR. MASNIK: Okay.
12 As Chip said, due to a personal emergency, 13 Mr.
- Rubin, who was slated to provide this 14 presentation, was unable to attend todays meeting, so 15 Ill give the presentation instead.
16 Section 5 of the draft supplement GEIS for 17 St. Lucie is entitled, "The Environmental Impacts of 18 Postulated Accidents." The GEIS evaluated two classes 19 of accidents, design basis accidents and severe 20 accidents.
21 Now, design basis accidents are those 22 accidents that both the licensee and the NRC staff 23 evaluate to ensure the plant can withstand normal and 24 abnormal transients from a broad spectrum of 25
48 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 postulated accidents without undue risk to the public.
1 The environmental impacts of design basis accidents 2
are evaluated during the initial licensing process and 3
the ability of the plant to withstand these accidents 4
has to be demonstrated before the plant is granted a 5
license.
6 Most importantly, a licensee is required 7
to maintain an acceptable design and performance 8
capability throughout the life of the facility, 9
including a extended life operation period. Since a 10 licensee has to demonstrate acceptable plant 11 performance for the design basis accidents throughout 12 the life of the plant, the Commission has determined 13 that the environmental impact of design basis 14 accidents are of small significance, because the plant 15 is designed to successfully withstand these accidents.
16 Neither the licensee nor the NRC is aware 17 of any new and significant information on the 18 capability of the plant to withstand design basis 19 accidents that is associated with a license renewal 20 application, therefore, the staff has concluded that 21 there are no impacts related to design basis 22 accidents, beyond those discussed in the GEIS.
23 Now the second category of accidents 24 evaluated in the GEIS are severe accidents. And 25
49 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 severe accidents are by definition accidents that are 1
more severe than design basis accidents, because they 2
could result in substantial damage to the reactor 3
cooler, whether or not these consequences have serious 4
offsite impacts.
5 Now, the Commission found in the GEIS the 6
consequences of a severe accident on atmospheric 7
releases fallout onto open bodies of water or releases 8
to groundwater, and subsided impacts are small for all 9
plants. Nevertheless, the Commission determined that 10 alternatives to mitigate severe accidents must be 11 considered for all plants that have not done so.
12 Now, we refer to these alternatives as 13 severe accident mitigation alternatives or we give it 14 the acronym S-A-M-A, which we refer to as SAMAs.
15 Therefore, if a plant has not had an assessment of 16 severe accident mitigation alternatives, the licensee 17 and the NRC need to perform one.
18 This is a site specific assessment and is 19 a Category 2 issue, as explained earlier in this 20 presentation by Eva. St. Lucie had not considered 21 SAMAs prior to this license renewal period.
22 Now the SAMA review for St. Lucie Units 1 23 and 2 are contained in Section 5.2 of the 24 Environmental Impact Statement. The purposes of doing 25
50 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 a SAMA evaluation is to ensure that plant changes with 1
the potential for improving severe accident safety 2
performance are identified and evaluated.
3 And the scope of the potential 4
improvements that were considered include a whole host 5
of things, including hardware modification, procedure 6
changes, changes to their training program, as well as 7
other changes.
8 The scope include SAMAs that would prevent 9
core damage and these are sometimes referred to as 10 preventative SAMAs, as well as SAMAs that improve 11 containment performance, given that a core damage 12 event might occur. These are called mitigative SAMAs.
13 The evaluation is essentially a four-step 14 process. The first step is to characterize overall 15 plant risk and the leading contributors to the risk.
16 This typically involves the extensive use of a plant 17 specific safety assessment study, also known as a PSA.
18 The PSA identifies the different contributors of 19 system failures and human errors that would be 20 required for an accident to progress to either core 21 damage or containment failure.
22 The second step of the evaluation is to 23 identify potential improvements that could further 24 reduce that risk. The information from the PSA, such 25
51 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 as the dominant accident sequences, are used to 1
identify plant improvements that would have the 2
greatest impact in reducing risk.
3 Improvements identified in other NRC and 4
industry studies, as well as SAMA analysis for other 5
plants, are also considered in the process.
6 So first, you qualify overall plant risk.
7 Second, you identify potential improvements, and the 8
next is to quantify the risk reduction potential and 9
the implementation cost for each of the improvements.
10 The risk reduction and implementation 11 costs are typically estimated using a bounding and 12 analysis. Risk reduction is generally overestimated 13 by assuming that the plant improvement is completely 14 effective in eliminating the accident sequence, and 15 the improvement is intended -- that the improvement is 16 intended to address.
17 The implementation costs are generally 18 underestimated by neglecting certain cost factors, 19 such as maintenance cost or surveillance cost of the 20 change.
21 These risk reduction potentials in 22 implementation cost estimates are used in the final 23 step to determine whether implementation of any of the 24 improvements can be justified. In determining whether 25
52 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 an improvement is justified, the NRC staff looks at 1
three factors.
2 First is whether the improvement is cost 3
beneficial. In other words, is the estimated benefit 4
greater than the estimated implementation cost of the 5
SAMA.
6 The second factor is whether the 7
improvement provides a significant reduction in total 8
risk. For example, does it eliminate a sequence or a 9
containment failure mode that contributes to a large 10 fraction of the plant risk.
11 And then the third factor is whether the 12 risk reduction is associated with aging effects during 13 the period of extended operation, in which case if it 14 was, we would be looking at implementation as part of 15 the license renewal process.
16 Well, what did the licensee and the NRC 17 find when they did this analysis. The preliminary 18 results are summarized in this slide. One hundred 19 sixty-nine candidate improvements were identified.
20 These were based on a qualitative screening of the 21 initial list of SAMAs, and it turns out that twenty-22 nine of them were not applicable to the St. Lucie 23 Plant design, and ninety had either already been 24 implemented by the plant, or the plant design met the 25
53 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 intent of the SAMA. That left fifty for further 1
evaluation.
2 The licensee then quantified the risk 3
reduction potential or benefit against the 4
implementation cost or costs, for each of the fifty 5
remaining candidates. Of the fifty SAMAs, twenty-nine 6
were eliminated from further evaluation because the 7
cost of the improvement exceeded the maximum 8
attainable benefit value for this plant. The maximum 9
attainable benefit value is a calculated dollar amount 10 associated with completely eliminating severe 11 accidents in St. Lucie.
12 Each of the remaining twenty-one SAMAs 13 were looked at and then subsequently eliminated on the 14 basis that their implementation costs exceeded twice 15 the estimated benefit for that specific SAMA. The end 16 result was that no specific SAMA candidate was found 17 to be cost beneficial.
18 This preliminary conclusion is consistent 19 with the low residual level of risk as indicated in 20 the St. Lucie PSA, and the fact that St. Lucie has 21 already implemented many of these plant improvements 22 over its twenty some years of operation, or almost 23 twenty some years of operation.
24 To summarize, the NRC staffs preliminary 25
54 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 conclusion is that additional plant improvements to 1
further mitigate severe accidents, are not required at 2
St. Lucie Units 1 and 2.
3 That concludes the presentation.
4 MR. CAMERON: Thank-you, Mike.
5 Any questions on the so called SAMAs?
6 Okay, we have a couple out here. Lets go 7
and then well come back to Betty Lou.
8 Yes?
9 MR. ONCAVAGE: Mark Oncavage.
10 The corrosion and near miss at Davis Besse 11 earlier this year, was that a SAMA or a severe 12 accident, was that a design basis, and what mitigation 13 steps do you take on something like that?
14 MR. CAMERON: Thank-you, Mike.
15 DR. MASNIK: John would be --
16 MR. CAMERON: Okay, were going to go to 17 John Tappert.
18 John?
19 MR. TAPPERT: Yeah, as to the Davis Besse 20 corrosion, actually that would have been a large break 21 or intermediate break LOCA, its possible an accident, 22 and, of course, its a design basis accident. So I 23 dont think that the SAMA reviews -- and Im in a 24 little bit of a disadvantage here because our expert 25
55 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 isnt 1
here, but I didnt see, the SAMAs do not necessarily 2
go with this type of issue. Thats because theyre a 3
design basis accident, which we evaluate generically 4
in our Generic Environmental Impact Statement.
5 MR. ONCAVAGE: And what would be the 6
mitigation --
7 MR. CAMERON: Mark, we need to get you on 8
different mike.
9 MR. ONCAVAGE: And what would be the 10 mitigation for that type of design basis accident?
11 MR. CAMERON: John, maybe just to Davis 12 Besse license renewal, how the implications are 13 generally.
14 MR. TAPPERT: Well, just listening to his 15 question, I mean there are mitigative strategies to 16 address those kinds of accidents. Basically theres 17 pumps available in the plants to replenish the water 18 in the reactor core. Theres a refueling water 19 storage tank which has a large volume of water, which 20 would be, initially we use to replace that water. If 21 that is exhausted, they have a sump in the actual 22 container building itself. They can go to recycle 23 those where you can actually continuously pump water 24 into the core to keep it cold. And so theyre 25
56 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 designed to withstand those accidents.
1 Do you want to answer that?
2 MR. DUDLEY: Yes, this is Noel Dudley.
3 As part of the license renewal process, 4
what we look at is normally the passive components, 5
the reactor being one of them, and how you manage and 6
identify aging degradation that has been seen or could 7
possibly occur. And as part of the safety review, we 8
are taking a look at, under a TLAA, time limit aging 9
analysis, for alloy 600 components, reactor vessel 10 head being one of them. So were taking a hard look 11 to see that there are programs, PMs and inspections 12 that are in place and ongoing, that would identify the 13 degradation that took place at Davis Besse before it 14 went down to that class.
15 MR. CAMERON: Great. Thanks, Noel, 16 thanks, John. I think theyll give us the information 17 out there.
18 Betty Lou?
19 MS. WELLS: Im sorry to always seem to 20 have questions.
21 Where in this formula for cost benefit 22 ratio is the human life value entered in?
23 DR. MASNIK: I believe if youre looking 24 in Section 5.2, they talk about the cost and the 25
57 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 benefit analysis. And in there is a discussion of 1
averted dose and what the value of averted dose is.
2 Now, to answer your question directly, we 3
do not estimate what the value is of a human life.
4 What we do look at, and weve assigned a value for 5
the, the amount of money that could be spent to avert 6
a specific radiological exposure.
7 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank-you.
8 Mike, do you want to just give us quickly 9
how to submit comments and then were going to ask Mr.
10 Anderson, County Administrator, to lead us on the 11 comments.
12 DR. MASNIK: Okay, Id just like to 13 summarize real quickly the conclusions of the staff 14 review.
15 The impacts of license renewal at St.
16 Lucie are small for all impact areas. In comparison, 17 the impacts of alternatives to license renewal range 18 from small to large. Therefore, the staffs 19 preliminary conclusion is that the adverse impact of 20 license renewal at St. Lucie, the impacts are not so 21 great that preserving the option of license renewal 22 for energy planning decision-makers would be 23 unreasonable.
24 Well just give you a quick recap of our 25
58 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 current status. We issued a Draft Environmental 1
Impact Statement for St. Lucie license renewal this 2
past October. We are in the middle of a public 3
comment period and, which is scheduled to close on 4
January 15th, 2003. We expect to address public 5
comments, including any necessary revisions to the 6
Draft Environmental Impact Statement for license 7
renewal, and address and issue the final Environmental 8
Impact Statement in July of next year.
9 This next slide provides information on 10 how to access the St. Lucie Environmental Impact 11 Statement. You can contact me directly at the phone 12 number provided and Ill mail you a copy. You can 13 view the document at the public library here at Indian 14 River Community College. And the document is also 15 available at our web address as given. Weve also 16 brought a few copies with us, so if you dont have 17 one, please pick one up before you leave. See Etoy, 18 who is outside, manning the desk out there.
19 This last slide gives detail on how to 20 submit comments on the draft impact statement. You 21 can submit the comments in writing or by E-mail or by 22 regular mail at the addresses given, or you can bring 23 them in person to NRC headquarters in Rockville, 24 Maryland.
25
59 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 And, Mark, I want you to know that 1
the E-mail address works. I tried it several times.
2 But just remember, if you can, please 3
submit your comments by the deadline, which is January 4
15th, 2003.
5 That concludes our presentations at 6
todays meeting.
7 MR. CAMERON: Okay, great.
8 And thank-you, Mike and thank all of you 9
for your attention during the presentations. The 10 staff from the NRC and also some of our experts will 11 be available after the meeting if theres particular 12 subjects you want to discuss in further detail.
13 And now its our opportunity to listen to 14 you. And first of all, were going to have Mr. Doug 15 Anderson, whos the County Administrator for St. Lucie 16 County.
17 We have some other government officials, 18 but next were going to go to Mr. Bob Bangert from the 19 Conservation Alliance.
20 Mr. Anderson.
21 MR. ANDERSON: Good afternoon.
22 Thank-you for letting me go first. I 23 really appreciate this.
24 St. Lucie County is one of the fastest 25
60 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 growing economies in the State of Florida, if not the 1
fastest growing economy. We have gone virtually from 2
last place in the State of Florida for percentage of 3
new jobs created, to almost number one. In fact, we 4
may be number one, with recent announcements weve 5
just made.
6 If the St. Lucie Plant were closed, the 7
loss of eight hundred full-time jobs in our community 8
would be devastating to our economy.
9 The St. Lucie Power Plant provides our 10 industry with a reliable source of electricity. In 11 St. Lucie County, were not like other areas of the 12 country where you experience brownouts or blackouts.
13 Our industry, as a diversified industry we have here 14 now, relies heavily on a steady source of electricity 15 and a reliable source.
16 Florida energy demands are growing at 17 about two percent annually. Electricity from the St.
18 Lucie Power Plant can meet the energy needs of more 19 than one-half million homes. Each St. Lucie unit 20 produces 839 million watts of energy.
21 The St. Lucie Plant is among the lowest 22 cost producers of electricity in the FPL system, and 23 this helps keep our electric bills low. And that is 24 one of the attractions to our area for industry. The 25
61 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 high energy users come here, looking at utility rates 1
is one of their objectives.
2 Our power bills are more reasonable than 3
most others in the country, in part because of this 4
plant, and we want to keep our power bills low and our 5
quality of life high.
6 We want to keep the St. Lucie Power Plant 7
as part of our future. The site is already 8
established. Theyre continuing to operate -- the 9
continuation of operating this facility means no new 10 land would be disturbed to construct a new facility to 11 replace this one.
12 It is my understanding that replacing the 13 two reactors with the equivalent electric producers 14 such as oil, or gas, or coal, could have greater 15 pollution and ecological impacts.
16 I have lived in St. Lucie County now 17 almost eight years, Ive lived and worked here, and 18 Ive grown to know the St. Lucie Plant and I have 19 worked with the different people there, and they are 20 good neighbors.
21 I have some examples here of some of the 22 things that theyve done and theyve worked very 23 closely with the County administration.
24 The St. Lucie Plant employees are leaders 25
62 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 in contributions to the local area agencies such as 1
the United Way. They support the St. Lucie County 2
Education Foundation in a scholarship program. The 3
employees are involved in youth development through 4
Scouts, Little Leagues, civic and church programs and 5
activities. The employees volunteer for Habitat for 6
Humanity in building homes for low income residents.
7 The plants information center, the Energy 8
Encounter, holds forty thousand visitors annually. In 9
addition to hands-on science programs for schools, the 10 center offers free workshops to teachers for training 11 credits and walk-in visitors are always welcome.
12 The power plant donates computers and 13 school supplies to local schools. And FP&L has made 14 substantial contributions to the countys regional 15 sports stadium, which is located in St. Lucie West.
16 And the St. Lucie County Marine Center that features 17 the Smithsonian Marine Eagle System exhibit, as well 18 as many other community projects.
19 I know a few months ago, we were putting 20 together a financial package to purchase a mobile 21 command center to be used directly between the City of 22 Fort Pierce Police Department, the Sheriffs Office, 23 the Fire District and County Administration. I went 24 to FP&L and asked if they could contribute towards 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 this mobile finance center, because while we do have 1
incidents in a lot of cases they are also on site and 2
they work with us to plan what action we have to take.
3 Within a few weeks they called me back and they said 4
yes, Doug, we will financially contribute, and they 5
presented us with a check, and thats a good neighbor.
6 The impact of the St. Lucie Plant on our 7
local economy is more than eighty million dollars 8
annually. The thing that impresses me most about the 9
St. Lucie Plant is its reputation.
10 Ive heard about the good ratings the 11 plant has received through the years from the NRC, the 12 agency here today, that watches over your plants. I 13 encourage the NRC to renew the license at St. Lucie 14 Plant, Units 1 and 2.
15 Thank-you.
16 MR. CAMERON: And thank-you very much, 17 Mr. Anderson.
18 Next were going to hear from Bob Bangert 19 from the Conservation Alliance.
20 MR. BANGERT: Good afternoon members of 21 the U.S. Regulatory Commission. My name is Bob 22 Bangert and I represent the Conservation Alliance of 23 St. Lucie County.
24 Its interesting before I start my 25
64 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 presentation, my wife and I have traveled eleven 1
thousand miles this summer, covering twenty-eight s, 2
and the question was raised about alternate energy.
3 We saw windmills all over. And when I got back, I 4
investigated a little bit and to my surprise I found 5
out that one of the subsidiaries of FP&L group is the 6
largest producer of wind power in the United States 7
and possibly the world.
8 First of all, I want to express my 9
appreciation to those who drafted this report, for 10 including a glossary of the acronyms used in the 11 report. I sure saved a hell of a lot of looking back.
12 Wouldnt it be nice if all government agencies and all 13 consultants did the same.
14 The Alliance is also very impressed by the 15 systematic and completeness of the report in 16 evaluating the environmental consequences of renewing 17 the licenses for the St. Lucie FP&L Plants 1 and 2, 18 for operation for an additional twenty years.
19 Two county parks with beach access, Blind 20 Creek Pass Park and Walton Rocks Park lie within the 21 property boundaries of FP&L, and have been included in 22 an Adopt a Beach program instigated this year through 23 the Conservation Alliance, partnership with the 24 Conservation Alliance and the City of Ft. Pierce and 25
65 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 St. Lucie County. Quite a unique partnership.
1 Volunteers have signed contracts to clean up the 2
litter from these beaches at least once every two 3
months.
4 One of our primary concerns in the past 5
has been the offshore ocean intake structures. The 6
company, by installing and maintaining three barriers 7
of these intake structures to reduce potential loss of 8
marine life, particular sea turtles, and to facilitate 9
their return to the ocean recognized our concerns.
10 The addition and construction of a new 11 smaller mesh barrier east of the larger mesh barriers, 12 plus an active program, including recovery of turtles 13 from the intake canal, has greatly reduced any harm to 14 entangled turtles.
15 FP&Ls program, which includes recovery of 16 turtles from the intake canal and barrier nets, are 17 monitored seven days a week, eight to twelve hours a 18 day, by quantum resources is exemplary. In addition 19 to the entanglement nets which are used only during 20 daylight hours under continued surveillance, plus 21 turtles removed with the dip nets and in many cases, 22 the divers go down and take them out bodily.
23 FP&L constantly is evaluating the program 24 to minimize any trauma to captured sea turtles.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Our Conservation Alliance honored one of 1
these divers, a Michael Breshett (phonetic), at our 2
Annual Awards Luncheon last May, for his work with 3
entangled turtles while on the job, as well as his 4
constant vigilance on his own time.
5 Captured healthy turtles are tagged before 6
being released back into the ocean and many have shown 7
up on distant lands, such as Costa Rica, Cuba, and 8
many other places.
9 Among many of the turtles recently 10 captured have been showing evidence of tumors on the 11 soft sections of their skin, the origin of which has 12 not yet been determined. However, there is growing 13 evidence that intrusion of treated waste water from 14 deep well injections in the area, may be linked to 15 these tumors.
16 These turtles are sent to rehabilitation 17 facilities determined by the Florida Fish and Wildlife 18 Conservation Commission.
19 I cannot stress strongly enough our 20 commendations for FP&Ls continuing efforts to improve 21 any areas that they find may be having a detrimental 22 effect on the environment, on any portion of their 23 eleven hundred plus acres on the island adjacent to 24 Plants 1 and 2, or along its transmission lines.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Now, if all of FP&Ls customers in St.
1 Lucie County and the would be as diligent in their 2
treatment and care of the environment, our future 3
generations would be assured of enjoying this special 4
piece of paradise we call St. Lucie County.
5 Thank-you.
6 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 7
Mr. Bangert.
8 Now were going to hear from a trio of 9
government officials and then were going to go to 10 Gary Cantrell and Judi Miller. But in terms of the 11 government officials, we have Ron Parrish, Deputy 12 Chief, St. Lucie Fire District, whos going to start 13 us off. And then we have Gary Wilson from the St.
14 Lucie County Sheriffs Office, and Steven Wolfberg 15 from the Martin County Department of Emergency 16 Service.
17 And this is Ron Parrish.
18 MR. PARRISH: Good afternoon.
19 And as he said, Im Ron Parrish. Im 20 Deputy Chief of Administration for the St. Lucie 21 County Fire District.
22 Im here today to represent the Fire 23 District as well as the Fire Chief, Jay Sizemore, and 24 to talk a little bit about the collective efforts that 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Florida Power and Light and the Fire District have 1
done to enhance and improve the training for the 2
safety of the public, the plant itself. This has been 3
ongoing for as long as I can remember.
4 Ive been directly involved with some very 5
intense training with Florida Power and Light. And we 6
feel as though theyve been a great corporate partner 7
in the enhancement of the training and the safety of 8
the citizens of St. Lucie County, and we support 9
relicensing of the power plant.
10 Thank-you.
11 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 12 Ron.
13 Lets next go to Gary Wilson.
14 MR. WILSON: Good afternoon.
15 As it was said, my name is Gary Wilson.
16 Im the Chief Deputy with the St. Lucie County 17 Sheriffs Office.
18 I am here today representing the Sheriffs 19 Office and the impact that FP&L has on our county.
20 And, of course, our interest is one of safety and 21 security, and one that addresses the crime issues that 22 impact us every single day. And were happy to say 23 that on all of those fronts, FP&L is not a problem for 24 us and in fact, it is a great benefit to the county 25
69 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 and our efforts, as far as the safety and security at 1
the plant, and also the impact that they have on our 2
community from a crime basis.
3 The employees at the power plant pose no 4
problem for law enforcement. And they are certainly, 5
as Mr. Anderson pointed out earlier, a great neighbor 6
for us to have here in St. Lucie County.
7 From a safety and security standpoint, the 8
St. Lucie County Sheriffs Office works closely with 9
the security department out at the plant to ensure 10 that all of those issues that of concern for a lot of 11 people who live in the area out there are taken care 12 of, and that working relationship is a very strong 13 relationship and one that were very proud of.
14 So on behalf of law enforcement in St.
15 Lucie County, we are in support of license renewal for 16 the power plant.
17 Thank-you.
18 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 19 Mr. Wilson.
20 And were going to hear from Steven 21 Wolfberg and then, I neglected to mention Don Daniels, 22 who is the emergency management coordinator for St.
23 Lucie County.
24 And this is Steven Wolfberg.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 MR. WOLFBERG: Good afternoon.
1 Steven Wolfberg, Director of Martin County 2
Emergency Services, which represents fire rescue and 3
emergency management.
4 Were here in support of the Nuclear 5
Regulatory Commissions relicensing of St. Lucies 6
Unit 1 and 2. We have had a relationship with the 7
power plant for over twenty-three years that, my 8
contemporary and
- myself, Ive been with the 9
department. During this time weve been able to build 10 a model partnership in relationships between FP&L and 11 the county, and the benefits going both way. The 12 relationship, the partnerships mature, its credible 13 and its ongoing.
14 We consider St. Lucie Power Plant a 15 partner in our planning, our response and operating, 16 and continuing education in emergency services as well 17 as just good friends, partners and corporate partners.
18 On behalf of Martin County Emergency 19 Services, again, we support the relicensing for Unit 20 1 and 2.
21 Thank-you.
22 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 23 Mr. Wolfberg.
24 Lets go to Don Daniels.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 MR. DANIELS: Good afternoon.
1 My name is Don Daniels. Ive been a 2
resident of St. Lucie County for over thirty-seven 3
years, and in the last twenty-eight years Ive been 4
involved in emergency services of one type or another.
5 Ive been with Emergency Management in the St. Lucie 6
County Public Safety Department for the last sixteen 7
years. And Im here to fill in today for our 8
Director, Mr. Jack Southern, Director of Public Safety 9
and just to give you some of the comments from our 10 agency.
11 There are many reasons the plant should 12 continue operating. Part of it is the importance to 13 our community as was stated earlier, being a good 14 neighbor, and it also has had a good environmental 15 record as been pointed out. But none of these things 16 would matter if the plant did not operate safely. And 17 this is something weve come to learn through our 18 office and through dealing with the people at the 19 plant, that they have our safety and concern at heart.
20 Many of them are our neighbors. They live in our 21 community. They are just as concerned for their 22 families as they are for anyone elses.
23 This office receives -- our office, 24 Emergency Management receives a quarterly, on a 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 quarterly basis, a report that indicates each and 1
every day that this plant meets its performance 2
standards.
3 And, for example, our office also receives 4
timely briefings and correspondence regarding in-place 5
procedures and checks by an independent quality 6
assurance organization, and that this ensures timely 7
preventative maintenance is done. These reports 8
show that St. Lucie Plant is committed to the safety 9
of residents surrounding the plant.
10 But most important is their pro-active 11 involvement in offsite and on site emergency planning.
12 Of course, on site, meaning dealing with anything 13 particular, at their particular plant facility.
14 Offsite meaning, meaning our affected population, our 15 population in our community.
16 We have exercises on a regular basis and 17 at least one a year. There are minor exercises during 18 the course of the year. We are evaluated on, at our 19 agency by Federal Emergency Management Agency, for our 20 duties and responsibilities, and how we carry them 21 out, and our actions for offsite safety for citizens.
22 And basically for Martin County and St.
23 Lucie County, our evaluations I know of over at least 24 the last sixteen years, have been flawless. And we 25
73 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 have proved that we can help protect the citizens of 1
our counties.
2 We also receive from the State of 3
Floridas Department of Health and Bureau of Radiation 4
Control, monitoring tests of radiation levels at 5
locations surrounding the nuclear plant.
6 Monitoring and testing include the 7
sampling of air, water, shoreline sediment, fish, 8
crustacea, broad leaf vegetation and milk. And these 9
levels have consistently been comparable to those 10 measured throughout the for the past twenty-five 11 years.
12 It is clearly evident that the employees 13 of the St. Lucie Plant are dedicated to making sure 14 the plant is safe, not only for themselves, but for 15 their families, friends and neighbors. This agency, 16 the St. Lucie County Department of Public Safety, 17 supports the license renewal of the St. Lucie Plant.
18 Thank-you.
19 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much, 20 Mr. Daniels.
21 Next two speakers is Gary Cantrell, who is 22 the Chief Executive Officer of the St. Lucie Medical 23 Center, and then well hear from Judi Miller.
24 MR. CANTRELL: Good afternoon.
25
74 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 My name is Gary Cantrell. Im the CEO of 1
St. Lucie Medical Center, but Im here representing 2
the Economic Development Council of St. Lucie County.
3 For me, the same reasons that you heard from everybody 4
else, we also support appeals, licensure application.
5 The Economic Development Council is very 6
supportive of it, from the standpoint that we need the 7
power and we need electricity. Our charge is to help 8
bring industry to the community. We have to have a 9
power source when they get here, thats affordable in 10 our dealings with companies coming from throughout the 11 country and looking at our community, our power rates 12 are very favorably priced, relative to where theyre 13 coming from.
14 So were very much in support of renewing 15 their license and support their application.
16 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Gary.
17 Were going to go next to Judi Miller, 18 whos with the St. Lucie County School Board, and then 19 were going to hear from Florida Power and Light.
20 MS. MILLER: Good afternoon.
21 Im Judi Miller for the record. Im a 22 member of St. Lucie County School Board and Executive 23 Director of Big Brothers, Big Sisters. Im here not 24 to speak on behalf of our school board, but to speak 25
75 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 as an individual, and I am in support of the license 1
renewal.
2 I know that you all have heard reports 3
from the safety and environmental impacts this 4
afternoon, people who are far more skilled in those 5
areas than I am.
6 Im here today to speak as somebody who 7
has lived here in this community for thirty years and 8
seen the kind of partner and good neighbor that FP&L 9
is to our community and our families here.
10 And Ive seen that firsthand, both through 11 the school system and all of the things that FP&L 12 does, from the Energy Encounter, to training kids, to 13 the supplies and materials that they donate, to the 14 manpower that they
- donate, to school system 15 committees, to the help, and support, and resources 16 they provide for community agencies such as Big 17 Brothers, Big Sisters and United Way, so I truly 18 support the license renewal.
19 Thank-you.
20 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Judi.
21 Next were going to hear from Mr. Don 22 Jernigan, who is the Site Vice-President at St. Lucie, 23 and then were going to hear from Tom Abbatiello, who 24 is the environmental lead on the St. Lucie license 25
76 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 renewal application.
1 Okay, Don.
2 MR. JERNIGAN: Good afternoon, and 3
thank-you, Mr. Cameron.
4 My name is Don Jernigan and I am the 5
Vice-president of Florida Power and Light Company, St.
6 Lucie Nuclear Power Plant.
7 I appreciate this opportunity to speak to 8
you today about FPLs application for renewal of the 9
St. Lucie operating licenses. Assisting me today is 10 Tom Abbatiello, our license renewal project 11 environmental lead, who will also address more 12 specifically, the findings contained in the draft 13 supplement Environmental Impact Statement.
14 But I would also like to thank the Nuclear 15 Regulatory Commission for arranging and holding this 16 meeting today. FPL strongly supports the openness of 17 this process.
18 During the last two years, we have been 19 involved in dialogue with the community surrounding 20 the St. Lucie Plant. In fact, we have met with more 21 than one thousand home owners, community groups and 22 government officials. In those meetings, our purpose 23 was to simply share information about what license 24 renewal is about and about our plant operations.
25
77 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 We believe that the community answers and 1
priorities should be incorporated, not only into the 2
renewal of our St. Lucie Plant operating license, but 3
also into our overall plant operations. Community 4
input is an integral part of the license renewal 5
process.
6 The application that we have prepared 7
consists of two parts, as was discussed earlier today, 8
a safety analysis and an environment report. The 9
application has been open to public review for some 10 time and the NRC has requested on several occasions, 11 comments from interested parties.
12 Just as this process has been open in 13 reviewing the environmental aspects of license 14 renewal, the safety analysis is also following a 15 parallel path. There are open public meetings and the 16 NRC is going through an intensive review of plant 17 systems to ensure the safe operation of the power 18 plant for an additional twenty years.
19 A public meeting on the scoping of the 20 NRCs environmental review over license renewal 21 application was held here in this very room last April 22 of this year. Todays meeting continues that open 23 process of seeking public input on license renewal.
24 We welcome this opportunity to gain 25
78 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 additional community input on the environmental 1
aspects of our license renewal.
2 Id like to particularly thank the members 3
of the community that are here represented today for 4
taking time out of your busy schedules to share your 5
views and ideas of this draft report with the NRC, and 6
I also appreciate the support that has been provided 7
to us by the local communities.
8 Id also like to thank the NRC staff and 9
members of the National Laboratory, their review team, 10 in their work of preparing the supplemental 11 Environmental Impact Statement for the St. Lucie 12 license renewal. I believe that this report has 13 reflected a
comprehensive assessment of the 14 environmental impact of license renewal.
15 As the vice-president of St. Lucie, my 16 first job and my primary focus is the health and 17 safety of my family, the St. Lucie employees in this 18 community, and their well being comes before anything 19 else. And when I look at the evidence as presented in 20 this supplemental Environmental Impact Statement and 21 other license renewal documents that have been 22 submitted, Im assured that the plants safety and a 23 positive impact on our environment exists with these 24 reports and whats contained in them.
25
79 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I believe the case for continued operation 1
of the St. Lucie Plant is strong. And let me address 2
while Im here, four areas:
3 One, our plant performance, the economics 4
of the St. Lucie Plant electricity, our environmental 5
stewardship and community presence.
6 First, the performance of our power plant 7
is top notch, thanks to our employees, which weve got 8
a couple here in the audience today. Their time, 9
their effort, their dedication have resulted in St.
10 Lucie consistently being recognized as one of the 11 safest and most reliable, and most efficient plants in 12 the United States. Our employees have worked 13 diligently through effective maintenance programs to 14 sustain the option for continued plant operation well 15 beyond the initial four year license.
16 Not only does the NRC monitor our 17 performance, but there are other independent agencies 18 that have also agreed that our operations are safe and 19 they have no adverse impacts on the surrounding 20 community. This includes the State of Floridas 21 Department of Health, which conducts monitoring and 22 sampling for the area around the St. Lucie Plant.
23 Another fact to consider is our ability to 24 help meet Floridas energy needs. As weve stated, 25
80 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Florida is growing two percent a year and the St.
1 Lucie Power Plant can help sustain the economic growth 2
and maintain our quality of life.
3 This power plant is strategically located 4
within the FPL generating system. And the St. Lucie 5
Plant is among the lowest cost of electricity within 6
the FPL system. So we help keep the electric bill 7
low, and thats good news for our customers.
8 And from an environmental standpoint, the 9
St. Lucie Plant remains a guardian of our s natural 10 resources. Our outstanding sea turtle programs are 11 recognized throughout the this year by the Governor.
12 And in addition, we can continue to produce clean 13 electricity without air pollution or greenhouse gases.
14 Finally, what does St. Lucie mean to our 15 community? Well, weve asked our neighbors and 16 theyve told us that were an important economic 17 factor in this community, one that they want to see 18 remain as a viable contributor. The payroll for 19 around eight hundred employees, the tax dollars, the 20 property taxes, the purchases, the contributions to 21 the local United Way agencies help in this area.
22 But more importantly is a role that the 23 people at the power plant have played in this 24 community. Our employees are active in their 25
81 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 churches, and scout organizations, and PTAs, and 1
Little Leagues, and even in local government.
2 And as a testimony to our community role, 3
many members of the local community have spoken here 4
today and have spoken here in this very room in 5
Aprils public scoping meeting on the environment 6
review of our license renewal application.
7 In summary, I believe that the reviewing 8
of the licenses of the Florida Power and Light St.
9 Lucie Nuclear Power Plant is in the best interests of 10 our community in continuing to provide safe, clean, 11 reliable, low cost electricity to our customers.
12 What Id like to do is ask our license 13 renewal project environmental lead, Tom Abbatiello, to 14 give a little bit more detail on the FPL license 15 renewal efforts and a little comment on the Draft 16 Environmental Impact Statement.
17 Tom?
18 MR. ABBATIELLO: Thanks, Don.
19 Good afternoon everyone. Its an honor to 20 be here today to share my thoughts with you about the 21 supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for the 22 St. Lucie license renewal.
23 As Don said, my name is Tom Abbatiello and 24 I am the environmental lead for the St. Lucie license 25
82 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 renewal project.
1 The supplemental Environmental Impact 2
Statement for the St. Lucie license renewal provides 3
a thorough examination of ninety-two environmental 4
issues addressed in the regulations. This very broad 5
approach has been thoughtfully designed and is 6
intended to cover the wide spectrum of issues that 7
might be raised by members of the public for 8
governmental review agencies.
9 The supplemental Environmental Impact 10 Statement concludes that the environmental impacts 11 from operating St. Lucie for an additional twenty 12 years, would be small. This conclusion is based on 13 the detailed analysis of the impact areas. I agree 14 with this conclusion. It is the same conclusion that 15 was made in FPLs environmental report prepared as a 16 part of our application.
17 But another reason I believe that St.
18 Lucie should operate for an additional twenty years, 19 is to be able to continue the award winning 20 conservation work that was initiated almost twenty 21 years ago.
22 FPL is proud of the work we do to preserve 23 and protect the environment. We believe in our 24 responsibility to operate in harmony with the 25
83 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 environment. St. Lucies unique location successfully 1
combines modern technology with a strong environmental 2
commitment.
3 As Don alluded to in his talk on October 4
8th of this year, Governor Bush and the Florida 5
Cabinet presented FPL with a 2002 Council for 6
Sustainable Florida Environmental Award.
7 This award, which is on display out in the 8
foyer, recognizes FPLs program at the St. Lucie Plant 9
for the preservation and education on endangered sea 10 turtles. The sea turtle protection and preservation 11 program will continue during the license extension 12 period.
13 The renewal of the St. Lucie licenses is 14 important in meeting the energy needs of South 15 Florida. As been stated already in this meeting, our 16 growth rate is about two percent a year and the 17 electricity being consumed per customer is also 18 increasing.
19 Because of this increasing demand, FPL 20 must plan and provide power plants to assure an ample 21 s u p p l y o f e l e c t r i c i t y.
22 And to that end, a robust network of generation 23 is best sustained by the use of diverse fuels.
24 The review of the St. Lucie operating --
25
84 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 the renewal of the St. Lucie operating licenses 1
permits FPL to continue to provide over 1700 megawatts 2
of environmentally clean and low cost generating 3
capacity, free from dependence on foreign oil.
4 The St. Lucie employees want to remain a 5
part of this community. As your neighbors, safe and 6
reliable operation of the St. Lucie Nuclear Plant is 7
our top priority. We believe license renewal makes 8
good sense. It makes good business sense for both FPL 9
and its customers. And in light of the current 10 situation in the world, we also believe that it is the 11 right thing to do for our country.
12 Thank-you.
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank-you, Tom and Don 14 Jernigan.
15 Were going to hear from Jim Vojcsik now, 16 from United Way of Martin County. And then were 17 going to hear from Arlease Hall, and then go to Frank 18 Leslie, Bill Raatz and Ralph DeCristofaro.
19 MR. VOJCSIK: Good afternoon.
20 My name is Jim Vojcsik and I am the 21 Executive Director of the United Way of Martin County.
22 My wife, Donna and I, and our two children have lived 23 in this area since 1999, and we care about the quality 24 of life, about the safety and about the environmental 25
85 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 health of our community.
1 I would like to add my voice to those 2
today, who are supporting the license renewal for 3
Florida Power and Light St. Lucie Nuclear Power Plant.
4 As has been stated, demands for energy in 5
our communities on the Treasure Coast are growing 6
annually and we need power from this plant to meet the 7
growing needs for low cost electricity. Florida Power 8
and Light has a good track record of not only 9
providing the power we need, but operating this plant 10 safely and protecting the environment.
11 As one of the largest employers in our 12 area, the St. Lucie Power Plant is important to our 13 local economy. A business of this size would be very 14 difficult to replace.
15 The St. Lucie Power Plant is a good 16 neighbor. I know personally, several of the employees 17 at the plant, who donate their time and their money to 18 making our communities better places to live. They 19 contribute hundreds of thousand of dollars and 20 volunteer hours each year to charitable organizations 21 on the Treasure Coast, including the United Way, and 22 are making a huge difference in our communities.
23 For all the reasons I mentioned, we should 24 renew the license of the St. Lucie Power Plant for 25
86 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 twenty more years.
1 Thank-you.
2 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Mr.
3 Vojcsik.
4 Arlease Hall.
5 MS. HALL: Good afternoon.
6 My name is Arlease Hall and Im back 7
again. Again, it was my decision to support the 8
license renewal of the St. Lucie Plant today and there 9
are a myriad of reasons as to why the plant should 10 continue to operate.
11 Some folks, a lot of folks have come 12 before me today, to reiterate the reasons why they 13 support Florida Power and Light. Why? Because the 14 St. Lucie Plant is important to the community. The 15 St.
Lucie Plant benefits our local economy 16 tremendously. The St. Lucie Plant has been an 17 excellent partner and neighbor, be it community or in 18 business. The St. Lucie has contentious, dedicated 19 and well trained employees.
20 And what comes to mind to me sometimes, 21 when Im going to some QIQA -- another acronym -- but 22 when youre looking at all of the power points, 23 Florida Power and Light comes up, as being one of 24 those organizations that first implemented in being on 25
87 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 line with QI in sterling criteria.
1 The St. Lucie Plant has been and has a 2
good environmental record. The St. Lucie employees 3
make our community a better place to live because of 4
their safety record, and thats whats so vitally 5
important to me, the safety record. Because all those 6
well trained individuals that meticulously -- they 7
meet the performance standards set at the highest of 8
quality levels daily.
9 I feel very strongly about the things that 10 I say to you this afternoon, because I work here and 11 the employees live in this community. They are 12 dedicated to making certain that the plant is safe, 13 not only for themselves, but for their families, 14 friends and us, because we are their neighbors.
15 St. Lucies safety inspection record has 16 been rated as one of the most reliable nuclear power 17 plants, not only of the U.S., but in the world. I 18 strongly believe that the St. Lucie Power Plant has a 19 proven safety record and one with which the employees 20 can continue to build on in the future.
21 I definitely support and again certainly 22 speak for my friends and neighbors for the license 23 renewal of the St. Lucie Plant, so lets keep it 24 operating again for the next twenty years.
25
88 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Thank-you.
1 MR. CAMERON: Okay. And thank-you, 2
Arlease, for those comments.
3 Were going to hear from Frank Leslie next 4
and were going to go to Bill Raatz, and Ralph 5
DeCristofaro.
6 Frank?
7 MR. LESLIE: Good afternoon.
8 Im interested in renewable energy in 9
particular, and so Im somewhat focused on that. I 10 did read the SEIS, Supplement 11 and found it very 11 interesting. And I especially commend that writers of 12 that report for doing such a good job in the field of 13 alternative energy.
14 There is a great difficulty within Florida 15 to find a replacement source of energy, something that 16 is cleaner or better in some sense than the exiting 17 nuclear power plant. I look at that from the 18 standpoint that if this plant were to be replaced with 19 the coal brought in by rail car, would it be oil, 20 which we certainly should save for transportation 21 aspects, or would it be natural gas, which has a 22 limitation itself.
23 There are difficulties with wind and 24 solar. Its a very diffuse energy, as opposed to 25
89 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 fuels. And as such, I tend to look at that as 1
something that will become much more of use in other 2
areas of the nation. Its not only the resource of 3
wind and solar, but also the economics of the 4
situation.
5 Florida enjoys relatively low costs for 6
kilowatt hour, whereas other s, which do have wind and 7
solar, may have very high costs. And that is an 8
offsetting factor in installing wind turbines or solar 9
module farms.
10 There are many aspects of solar and wind 11 energy within Florida. It was alleged to be the 12 sunshine back in the twenties, but in fact, the 13 amount of energy that we receive from the sun is 14 roughly about the same as in Wyoming. Unfortunately, 15 in my way of thinking, Arizona should be the sunshine 16 17 Sunshine is, of course, limited here by 18 cloud banks coming in with the sea breeze. Solar 19 energy is blocked by these clouds. And so we only get 20 about roughly 4.7 hours8.101852e-5 days <br />0.00194 hours <br />1.157407e-5 weeks <br />2.6635e-6 months <br /> per day of effective solar 21 energy. Its similar, very similar with wind energy.
22 There are frontal storms that come in from 23 the northwest. We see those periodically for five day 24 periods. But in terms of the sea breeze energy, it 25
90 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 begins roughly about nine oclock, dies out about 1
five, five p.m. And as such, it may have some future 2
as a peeking energy reduction.
3 Im not here to represent Florida 4
Institute of Technology, but Ill be teaching a 5
renewable energy course there. And we presently have 6
an extremely small DOE grant to study wind and solar 7
under sea breeze conditions. So were looking to 8
establish what that is.
9 Many years ago, the PNNL created a very 10 extensive wind energy atlas, and theyre fairly large 11 squares if you will, or rectangles in partial degrees 12 of latitude and longitude, to which numbers were 13 assigned. Those were based on existing airport 14 weather station information and as such, they did a 15 good job in covering the entire country with not only 16 a wide view S map, but individual maps for the various 17 s.
18 Within Florida we have the lowest level in 19 the interior of the, Class 1 level, and we have Class 20 2 in the coastal regions, purely because of that on 21 shore breeze and winds there coming from storms 22 offshore. That makes it very difficult. You can put 23 the two of them together in a hybrid system, but its 24 a very small amount of energy in comparison with large 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 base load plants, whether theyre coal, or oil, or 1
natural gas fire, or whether they are nuclear.
2 So that puts Florida in a difficult 3
situation. Their primary source of alternative energy 4
would be bio mass combustion. That requires large 5
land areas, harvesting, transporting, processing, and 6
when you burn it, you get a little less CO2 out than 7
you do with the fossil fuels, but its still a 8
limitation.
9 And so, in looking at the work that has 10 been done within Supplement 11, the comparison of 11 small, moderate and large impacts on the environment, 12 it appears to me that the nuclear option is the best 13 way to continue and Im supporting that.
14 Thank-you.
15 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Frank, for 16 that information on alternatives.
17 And lets now go to Bill Raatz.
18 MR. RAATZ: Hello, my name is Bill Raatz.
19 I dont represent any group. Im just a concerned 20 citizen and a resident of Port St. Lucie.
21 I live approximately, well, within a 22 radius of approximately two miles of the nuclear 23 facilities.
24 And just found out about this forum 25
92 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 yesterday and I felt compelled to come here and I 1
didnt anticipate speaking, Im not a public speaker.
2 I feel very anxious about doing this, but I feel this 3
is too important an issue to just leave to the experts 4
and to the vested interests that are obviously 5
represented here.
6 And I think, like a lot of people, I 7
presumed until fairly recently, that nuclear power was 8
going to be phased out in this country, that there are 9
too many problems with it, things that have been 10 raised by a lot of people. Just, you know, stressed 11 facilities, disposal of nuclear waste, nuclear 12 accidents. Most recently theres concern about 13 terrorist threats and how that affects nuclear 14 facilities. And so, you know, I was, like everyone 15 else, concerned about that.
16 And one thing I also want to mention, I 17 used to live in Detroit and I had a cottage in Canada 18 on Lake Erie, and from my -- I could look out across 19 Lake Erie and see the Davis Besse facility in Ohio.
20 And there were -- and I always thought like, jeez, 21 what would happen to the Great Lakes system if that 22 facility or Fermi 1 or 2 had an accident, you know, 23 would that totally destroy or obliterate the Great 24 Lakes water system. And there were, I know that there 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 were periodic discharges of radioactive water into 1
Lake Erie. And I remember, you know, there were 2
always these reassurances that thats no concern to 3
the human population.
4 But I, you know, when I would see hundreds 5
of dead fish wash up on my beach right after that, I 6
was not reassured. And then just recently, you know, 7
weve heard about, you know, problems with that 8
facility in Ohio.
9 Im sorry if Im rambling here, but as I 10 said, I just hastily scribbled a few things down here.
11 As I indicated in my question, if Florida Power and 12 Light is given this mandate to continue to operate the 13 older facility for thirty-four years, forty-one years 14 for the newer facility, what inducement, what 15 incentive, impetus is there for them to ever seriously 16 consider any other alternatives to nuclear energy, 17 safer alternatives, renewable sources of energy.
18 So I guess I would have to be some of 19 these -- maybe the sole person here who is opposed to 20 an extension of the operating license. I think its 21 premature that we should focus on looking at 22 alternatives, and I know thats not the, consistent 23 with the national energy policy, which I believe is 24 just -- our government is just manipulating public 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 fears about energy shortage in the future, so I know 1
thats not consistent with our national, current 2
national energy policy, but I think we should focus on 3
looking at those alternatives. And also, a real --
4 make a real effort at conservation education and, 5
instead of wasting energy like we do.
6 I guess thats about all I have to say.
7 Thank-you very much.
8 MR. CAMERON: And thank-you, Bill, for 9
taking the time to come to the meeting and also to 10 talk.
11 And Mr. DeCristofaro, do you want to come 12 up here?
13 All right.
14 MR. DE CRISTOFARO: Okay, my name is 15 Ralph DeCristofaro and Im just basically a concerned 16 citizen and Im a resident of the area.
17 I have a very short statement. This may 18 or may not be the right forum for it, but Id like to 19 get it on the record.
20 My concern is one of safety. Its not so 21 much of an internal accident that may occur, but 22 something that was thrust upon us on 9/11/2001, by a 23 real threat of terrorism, okay?
24 I know Im not alone on this, but my 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 concern is that of a terrorist attack on any nuclear 1
plant, whether its a -- in the same way that they did 2
with the Twin Towers in New York City. I really, I 3
guess what Im looking for is reassurance that 4
everything is being done for everyones safety, 5
relating to this.
6 Again, this may be the wrong forum, but I 7
just wanted to get my thought on record. I thank you.
8 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you very much.
9 Next were going to hear from Betty Lou 10 Wells and then Havert Fenn.
11 Betty Lou?
12 MS. WELLS: For a while there I was 13 afraid I was going to be the only Grinch in the crowd, 14 but it seems like I have one or two similarly minded 15 people.
16 My name is Betty Lou Wells. I reside at 17 1124 Jesmine Avenue, in Ft. Pierce, St. Lucie County, 18 Florida 34982.
19 Over thirty years ago, I was a member of 20 three community organizations, which attended NRC 21 public hearings on Florida Power and Lights request 22 to build a nuclear power plant now known as St. Lucie 23 1, and followed by St. Lucie 2.
24 The three organization were the League of 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Women Voters of St. Lucie County, the Conservation 1
Alliance of St. Lucie County, and CURE.
2 As a result of gathering and studying 3
handouts presented at these first hearings, members of 4
the League requested and received additional 5
information from NRC, Florida Power and Light, and 6
national organizations devoted to studying nuclear 7
power. These materials were shared with the 8
Conservation Alliance and a new group of Martin and 9
St. Lucie County residents called Citizens United 10 Against a Radioactive Environment, or CURE.
11 And let me insert here that I probably 12 agree with practically all of the positive statements 13 that were made by various people who spoke before me 14 today, that Florida Power and Light has been a good 15 neighbor, and they certainly contributed to the 16 economy of the county, but today facts relevant to an 17 extension of St. Lucie 1 and 2s operating licenses 18 from thirty to fifty years -- and by the way, Im 19 confused. Is it thirty years and if so, wouldnt that 20 cut -- wouldnt that be 2006, and Ive heard the 21 figure 2016 as the cutoff of the thirty year?
22 MR. CAMERON: Mike?
23 DR. MASNIK: Mike Masnik, NRC.
24 The -- its forty year -- they have a 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 forty year operating license, which will end on 2016.
1 And what the licensee is requesting is an additional 2
twenty years beyond 2016.
3 MS. WELLS: Okay. So I realize that some 4
of the things Im preparing to say are not accurate.
5 I had been under the impression all these years that 6
we had a thirty year operating license for these two 7
plants. So youre going to have to subtract or add 8
ten years here somewhere.
9 There are questions from those first 10 hearings that I think need to be revisited. Please 11 overlook or point out any misuse of terms in my 12 comments. Ive been out of this loop for quite a 13 while.
14 I thank the Commission for its greatly 15 expanded inclusion of questions and comments from the 16 public, and hope you will be tolerant of those of us 17 who are concerned citizens, but not as knowledgeable 18 in the subject of nuclear power as we would like to 19 be.
20 These are the questions that I have 21 already given to your staff and which I hope you will 22 be able to answer for us today.
23
- 1) Nuclear waste, particularly long lived 24 spent fuel rods was to be removed within a reasonable 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 time by the Federal Government, therefore, the subject 1
of nuclear waste was labeled generic and could not be 2
discussed in hearings for individual plants. However, 3
instead of their being removed, more spent fuel rods 4
than had been planned to be contained on site, have 5
been placed closer together in the cooling pool than 6
was originally thought to be prudent. Thirty years 7
later, there is still no time set for removal of these 8
wastes from our county.
9 Should setting a date for beginning to 10 remove wastes be a condition for approval of adding 11 twenty years of producing radioactive waste?
12
- 2) Citizens were told that an operating 13 license would be limited to thirty years, because the 14 metal end of their containers was expected to become 15 brittle by forty years use and to crack.
16 What new studies prove otherwise?
17
- 3) First hearings predicted no population 18 growth on Hutchinson Island near the plant.
19 Population on Hutchinson Island was zero at the time.
20 Now that many high rises, holding many people, exist 21 south of the plant, what different plan for population 22 evacuation in case of severe accident should be 23 established, or additional traffic lanes or people 24 transporters for evacuation indicated by current and 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 expected population?
1
- 4) What class of individuals, what age, 2
weight, sex or other attributes, working or living no 3
more than seven miles from the plant, has been 4
determined to be the most vulnerable to so-called 5
normal plant radiation emissions?
6 What is the difference between the 7
population living within a fifty mile radius of the 8
site in the year 2000, and when the plants began 9
operation, and what was the fifty mile radius 10 population predicted for the year 2000, at the time of 11 the first hearings?
12 They say you should never ask a question 13 you dont know the answer to, and I dont know the 14 answer to that when its been a while and I know its 15 a matter of record, but I am raising it at this point.
16
- 5) At the thirty year ago public 17 hearings, concern was expressed over studies which 18 showed the likelihood of a high concentration of 19 radioactive iodine in the milk of nursing mothers and 20 in milk goats living close to the plant, along Indian 21 River Drive. Goats were said to have seven times the 22 concentration of that of milk cows.
23 Have new studies been done to answer these 24 concerns or have procedures been adopted for 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 monitoring and/or notifying lactating women or goat 1
farmers?
2
- 6) Parents of St. Lucie County children, 3
who seem to have a high incidence of tumors, were 4
seeking answers a few years ago as to whether there 5
was a nuclear plant emissions connection.
6 Have these questions been resolved?
7
- 7) During the past thirty years, has new 8
equipment for improving nuclear plant safety been 9
developed, that might not have seemed cost effective 10 to install at St. Lucie 1 or 2 for forty years 11 operating period, but that should be installed for an 12 additional twenty year operation?
13 And the bottom question is, number 8), but 14 perhaps most important, does the predicted long term 15 terrorism threat that the Federal Government is 16 planning for, and with nuclear power plants labeled 17 one of the most likely targets and with St. Lucie 18 Plants vulnerable from air, land and water, should St.
19 Lucie 1 and 2 be closed as soon as possible, instead 20 of given an extended life?
21 Thank-you.
22 MR. CAMERON: And thank-you very much for 23 those specific issues, Betty Lou. And the staff has 24 informed me that they are going to look at them in the 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 evaluation of comments, but also that theyre prepared 1
to talk to you about them after the meeting, if you 2
have time.
3 All right. Thank-you.
4 Havert?
5 MR. FENN: Thank-you very much.
6 I do not represent any organization. Im 7
just a retired senior citizen whos interested in my 8
community.
9 I have on occasion served in the public in 10 St. Lucie County, first as a City Commission for Ft.
11 Pierce and then a County Commissioner for fourteen 12 years, and now Im in retirement. I still have the 13 interests of St. Lucie County.
14 Weve been, my family and I have been in 15 St. Lucie County for over forty years period that 16 Betty Lou Wells was speaking about a moment ago, we 17 were involved in all of that.
18 But we were convinced after a few years 19 that the power plant, Florida Power and Light power 20 plant was a good entity in our county. Yes, they have 21 questions about the power plant and there will always 22 be questions about the power plant. And certainly 23 when we look on TV or we pick up the newspaper and 24 see something that has happened at another power 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 plant, such as the nuclear power plant here, it does 1
give rise to what might happen here.
2 But I do have a few things that I would 3
like to say relative to why I think the power plant 4
renewal effort should be given. Im not a scientific 5
engineer, so Im not going to get into all of these 6
other things some of the people can get into.
7 Since we are all aware of why we are here, 8
and I hope not be redundant in repeating all of that, 9
but some of the good things that youve said, Im 10 saying I give my support to.
11 The -- first of all, the importance of the 12 plant to the community. Now, yes, we know that St.
13 Lucie County is one of the fastest growing counties in 14 the State of Florida and maybe the nation, now that we 15 have entities coming in that are supplying jobs and, 16 of course, the Florida Power and Light Company is 17 employing something in the neighborhood of eight 18 hundred to nine hundred people.
19 I want to stop and have you to recognize 20 that the plant does provide, as far as Im concerned, 21 a safe, clean -- safe and clean electricity. I want 22 you to know that we -- that there are other sources of 23 electricity in this area, one being the Ft. Pierce 24 Utilities Authority Electric Plant, the other being 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 over on the West Coast of Florida, and there are some 1
others, and I will not belabor those. But what Im 2
saying in the -- wherever we go, were going to need 3
electricity. Its one of the things we, we say now we 4
cannot do without. Before we had it, we didnt know 5
that.
6 I understand that the FP&L plant is among 7
the lowest cost producers of electricity and that is 8
good, because when the rate for electricity goes up 9
too high, then we will suffer. I would like for the 10 St. Lucie Plant to keep electric bills low.
11 It is my understanding that for more than 12 one reason, that the power plant is here. Someone was 13 seeking a better way to provide electricity, other 14 than the coal and the oil that we were living on at 15 one time. And as a member of this community, I 16 would like to see the power plant continue to be a 17 part of our future.
18 The location of the plant, we cannot do 19 anything about that. I think now that were in a 20 position that we could stop the increased number of 21 units at the plant, but so far as doing something 22 about the plants that are already there, I dont 23 believe we will be able to that.
24 It has been a good neighbor. I have 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 personally been involved with some of these products 1
that the nuclear plant was involved in.
2 And you think in terms that someone 3
mentioned a moment ago, about the Little League 4
baseball teams, yes. You forgot to mention one, the 5
Pop Warner Football League, too. They were involved 6
in that. And we did have Mr. Anderson to mention the 7
South County Regional Sports Complex, which they 8
participated in; the United Way and some of the others 9
that have been mentioned.
10 But I want you to know from my standpoint, 11 that they, that the power plant and its employees have 12 been a good neighbor for us, for me, and as I said, 13 Ive been here over forty years.
14 Moving right along here, I would like to 15 say that if you cannot live within the realm of this 16 facility, not knowing what is to happen, we just pray 17 to God that nothing ever happens. I have been told by 18 some authoritative sources that the power plant 19 workers are very dedicated persons and well trained.
20 Im going to live on that fact.
21 They have from time to time had electric 22 emergency drills, so that if something is to happen, 23 at least well have some direction, somewhere to go.
24 Hopefully, as I said, that God forbid or something 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 happening, but I can see now the people over in the 1
central part of the, Wachula, you know, Avon Park, 2
Okeechobee and the rest of them, yes, they could look 3
up and see a whole lot of people coming, but I pray to 4
God that that will not happen.
5 And certainly I dont think any of us want 6
to turn to fossil fuel. I dont believe we do, 7
because you know the pollution we talked about that we 8
do not want, thats what we will find.
9 So in my conclusion, I think this nuclear 10 power plant is the best thing for our community 11 environment, as some of you all have been saying. And 12 that as far as I know, it has been a good neighbor for 13 the last twenty-five years. And I will support the 14 renewal of the license for the St. Lucie Nuclear Power 15 Plant.
16 Thank-you.
17 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Mr. Fenn.
18 Next, were going to go to Mark Oncavage, 19 then Lloyd Brumfield, then Jane Rowley and Doug 20 Anderson.
21 MR. ONCAVAGE: Thank-you for the 22 opportunity to speak. My name is Mark Oncavage.
23 At the scoping meeting here in Port St.
24 Lucie on April 3rd, I raised eight public safety 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 issues that needed to be included in the Draft 1
Environmental Impact Statement and not even one of 2
those safety issues are in this draft study.
3 Apparently some individuals of the NRC have great 4
difficulty relating safety and public concerns to 5
their Environmental Impact Statement.
6 Also, I would like someone from the Office 7
of the General Counsel to explain to me exactly which 8
provisions of the National Environmental Policy Act 9
enable the NRC staff to ignore the tremendously 10 dangerous issues that I raised at the scoping meeting.
11 No matter. There are forces at work here well beyond 12 the control of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and 13 the nuclear industry.
14 2002 was a bad year. Nuclear industry 15 scandals broke out worldwide. British Nuclear Fuels 16 Limited is a privately run company thats owned by the 17 British Government. They reprocess spent fuel into 18 plutonium and uranium to fuel reactors. They have a 19 sixty billion dollar liability for the nuclear waste 20 and contamination problems that theyve created.
21 Theyre begging the British Government for money, 22 because technically, theyre bankrupt. Their 23 liabilities far exceed their assets.
24 This company sold a load of reprocessed 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 fuel to Japan. Japan found the fuel to be defective 1
and demanded that the Brits take it back. On its way 2
back, New Zealand and Caribbean Prime Ministers told 3
the ships to stay out of their waters because of the 4
dangers of terrorist attacks, contamination and 5
sinkings.
6 Meanwhile, the Irish and Norwegian 7
Governments are complaining to the European Union that 8
radioactive wastes from this companys reprocessing 9
plant are contaminating their national waters and an 10 accident could kill many of their citizens.
11 The British Government recently 12 deregulated their electricity market. They set up a 13 private company called British Energy and sold it 14 sixteen of the best reactors that they had. Since 15 started deregulation, wholesale electricity prices 16 have dropped thirty percent and now theres a 17 twenty-two percent over capacity in the system.
18 British Energy is bankrupt. Theyre 19 losing seven and a half million dollars week selling 20 nuclear generated electricity. The government floated 21 them a six hundred million dollar loan. British 22 Energy said not enough, so the government raised it to 23 one billion dollars due on November 30th, which was 24 three days ago. British Energy said no, so the due 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 date was moved to March 9th, 2003.
1 British Energy also asked for an 2
additional three hundred million dollars every year to 3
cover its waste and contamination problems. The 4
companys capitalization value has dropped ninety-two 5
percent since it was privatized in 1996. Obviously 6
its looking for some new culpable investors.
7 The German Government has promised to 8
close down all their nineteen reactors by the year 9
2020. the Germans are struggling with the problem of 10 storing high level wastes for the next few million 11 years. They said theyre going to put it deep below 12 the water table.
13 The United States, at Yucca Mountain is 14 planning to store their high level wastes above the 15 water table. The Germans said theyre not going to 16 put it in an earthquake zone or a volcano zone. Yucca 17 Mountain, our proposed repository, is in an earthquake 18 zone and a volcano zone. Do the German scientists 19 know something that we dont?
20 The Swedish Government has promised to 21 close down all their nuclear power reactors. The 22 Russian Government is down to its last reprocessing 23 plant. Its the Chelyabinsk region of the Ural 24 Mountains. This plan has suffered three catastrophic 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 nuclear accidents and this Chelyabinsk region is 1
considered to be the most contaminated place on earth, 2
which includes the Chernobyl accident area. This 3
plant lacks money as an endanger of precipitating a 4
fourth catastrophic accident, when its liquid waste 5
impoundment area bursts its banks, this would destroy 6
the Pechora River all the way down to the Arctic 7
Ocean.
8 The French Government is heavily into 9
nuclear electricity. A poll completed this past 10 September by the French Union for electricity, shows 11 that sixty-one percent of the French people polled, 12 said that they do not favor nuclear electricity, and 13 sixty-two percent of the people said they would pay 14 higher rates, up to ten percent more, to abandon 15 nuclear electricity altogether.
16 The Japanese nuclear utilities are being 17 rocked by their biggest nuclear power scandal ever.
18 It seems theyve been falsifying safety inspections 19 for the past twelve years and their reactor binding is 20 riddled with cracks. Theyve closed down twelve 21 plants and have finally sent in some honest 22 inspectors. One of the ways the Japanese Government 23 responded to this crisis, was to hand the names of the 24 whistle blowers over to the utilities.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 Because of the safety in corporate 1
government scandal, the Japanese are getting cold feet 2
about their plutonium fuel program, in which they buy 3
a reprocessed plutonium fuel from British Nuclear 4
Fuels Limited. This British reprocessor, with its 5
sixty billion dollars liability in wastes and 6
contamination, its defective fuel and its impending 7
loss of the Japanese fuel contract, still managed to 8
find one million dollars to lobby the Bush 9
administration this election cycle.
10 These international affairs show that 11 nuclear electricity is too dangerous, too expensive, 12 and too unreliable to have a meaningful future. Now, 13 lets look at the United States.
14 We all should know that there has not been 15 a new order for a nuclear reactor since Three Mile 16 Island Number 2 destroyed itself in 1979. Three Mile 17 Island Number 2 cost seven hundred million dollars to 18 build, but it was only three months old when the 19 accident occurred. It incurred 973 million dollars in 20 cleanup costs and will incur another 433 million 21 dollars in retirement costs. The utility also lost 22 425 million dollars when it canceled another plant 23 that it was building. Thats about two and a half 24 billion dollars up in smoke. The canceled plant was 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 one of ninety-seven plants that were canceled from 1
this era.
2 Another debacle was the Shoreham plant on 3
Long Island outside New York City. The plant was 4
built for five billion dollars and never produced a 5
single watt of electricity. It was deemed too 6
dangerous to operate, since the vast number of people 7
living nearby could not be evacuated in an accident.
8 The State of New York bought in from Long Island Light 9
Company just to tear it down.
10 Washington Public Power Supply System 11 wanted to build five reactors. When the cost 12 estimates reached 24 billion dollars, it defaulted on 13 2 1/4 billion dollars of municipal bonds, the largest 14 municipal bond default in history. Is there any 15 question why the investment houses on Wall Street 16 refuse to finance nuclear power plants?
17 Florida Power and Light recently purchased 18 a controlling interest in Seabrook Number 1. They 19 paid about fifteen cents on a dollar of the original 20 plant cost of six billion dollars.
21 Pilgrim Reactor in Boston sold for a 22 reported 50 million dollars. Three Mile Island Unit 23 1, the undamaged one, sold for a reported 100 million 24 dollars, but the fuel at the plant was valued at 77 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 million dollars, so the plant was only worth 23 1
million dollars, less than ten cents on a dollar.
2 This sounds like an industry in deep despair, because 3
these are speculative prices.
4 In March of 2001, cracks started being 5
seen around the control rod drive mechanisms at the 6
top of some reactor pressure vessels. The NRC knew it 7
had problems with cracks, with boric acid oozing out 8
and with corrosion. Instead of calling for immediate 9
safety inspections, it delayed the inspections order 10 until December 31st.
11 One troublesome reactor, Davis Besse, near 12 Toledo, Ohio, wanted more delays. So rather than 13 impede plant revenues, the NRC delayed the safety 14 inspections again. When the inspection was finally 15 done in March of this past year, a hole about as big 16 as a football, was discovered in the reactor lid.
17 Only a thin piece of stainless steel cladding kept the 18 reactor contents from blowing out the corrosion hole.
19 That whole affair was mismanaged by the NRC, who truly 20 endangered the public by putting utility revenues 21 before safety.
22 The nuclear industry may point to the 23 congressional designation of Yucca Mountain as the 24 repository site for high level waste as a victory.
25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 The costs for this facility will be staggering.
1 Heres a quotation from Congresswoman Shelley Berkley, 2
speaking before the House of Representatives, and I 3
quote:
4 "The projected cost of this boondoggle is 5
anywhere from 56 billion dollars to 309 billion 6
dollars. The Nuclear Waste Fund has 11 billion 7
dollars. How are we going to pay for this, raise 8
taxes, dip into the Social Security Trust Fund? And 9
once Yucca Mountain is full, then what do we do?
10 After spending hundreds of billions of dollars, we 11 will still be exactly where we are today."
12 Thank-you for your time.
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank-you for that 14 perspective, Mark.
15 Were next going to Mr. Brumfield.
16 MR. BRUMFIELD: Lloyd Brumfield. Thats 17 really a hard act to follow.
18 Id say my names Lloyd Brumfield but 19 right now its really Ebenezer Scrooge. And then Id 20 say Im really Jekyll and Hyde, especially when it 21 comes to energy and electricity, nuclear energy. And 22 I say to myself, you know, Im not really the average 23 person. Im different than the average person. I 24 think on this subject, Im more average than the 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 average.
1 Nuclear energy, even any kind of electric 2
power today, is an emotional thing with me. I mean I 3
finally will admit that. I was a teenage soldier, who 4
went into Japan as an occupation troop, rather than an 5
invasion troop, because of the A bombs. And that time 6
Im, Im really -- you know, after that, I panicked 7
for the A bomb. Nuclear fission. And then when, 8
early 50s, when the Soviet Union had got it, I got 9
shaky. Then, when it started advertising that nuclear 10 power would be too cheap to meet her, and it took one 11 up again, far as I can tell, its probably the most 12 expensive of all power.
13 But let me talk about these split 14 personalities or multiple personalities of mine.
15 Anytime I can drive by a power plant, I no longer look 16 at it as an economic, or a practical, or comfort of 17 living, even though I really get aggravated when I 18 cant turn on the light, run my computer, use my 19 drill, I want to use electricity. But when I go by a 20 power plant, nuclear power plant, I get the willies a 21 little bit, just looking at it. Maybe thats not the 22 way it ought to be, but thats the way it is.
23 But what about these coal fire plants?
24 Well, Ive got a real problem there. I came from the 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 coal mine country. Members of my family today are in 1
coal mines. I have a nephew thats in management in 2
a coal mine. And yet coal, from all indications, is 3
the cause of much of the pollution around the United 4
States in power plants and factories. Gas is a little 5
bit -- petroleum is a little bit better. Not as much 6
as it claim, and gas probably is still a little bit 7
better, but theyre all fuels that pollute badly.
8 And what am I saying? You know, I really 9
wish that nuclear power could work, but I dont 10 believe its working, for the very reasons that I get 11 the willies when I drive by the power plant over on 12 Hutchinson Island. And I hear people say, gosh, 13 thats a bad looking thing to me.
14 And then when I drive by a coal fire 15 plant, I think one of the very dozens down in Riviera 16 Beach or somewhere, we, weve got a problem. Im 17 talking to you about the industry altogether.
18 Now I have one real problem with this 19 power plant, as I do with any. As I understand it, 20 the spent fuel from day one is still there, in the 21 water or sump, and thats bothered me even before 22 September the 11th.
23 And I do know that Yucca Mountain is a 24 national political problem. But what even worries me 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 today and I said it earlier, Ive lost a lot of 1
confidence in Federal agencies monitoring and 2
policing. And the trend in Washington today is you do 3
less of it, considerably less.
4 Most of the people here today are 5
technicians, engineers, people who have been involved 6
in it. But I still think the average citizen is as 7
paranoid as I am. We want the electricity. We dont 8
like the pollution and the nuclear power plants scare 9
us. And you folks that have all of this know-how 10 probably can help us. But I still say what I said 11 earlier, I notice youve got a little bit of 12 conservation as a last item on your handout. Just a 13 little bit, some after-thought. Id really like to 14 see you move it up to the first item.
15 Thank-you.
16 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Mr.
17 Brumfield.
18 Could we have Jane Rowley, and then well 19 go to Doug Anderson.
20 MS. ROWLEY: Well, Im last, but not 21 least, cause Doug Anderson went first.
22 MR. CAMERON: Were going to do this all 23 again?
24 MS. ROWLEY: Thats it. See that? No, 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 I cant do that. I have a board meeting to go 1
tonight.
2 MR. CAMERON: Okay.
3 MS. ROWLEY: I am Jane Rowley. Whoops, 4
excuse me. I really didnt -- I dont think I need a 5
microphone.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MS. ROWLEY: My husband told me that he 8
can hear me in a room with three hundred people and 9
Im whispering, so its a real problem in my life.
10 Im Jane Rowley and Im the Director of 11 Community Relations for St. Lucie West Development 12 Corporation. Were developers in St. Lucie County and 13 throughout the State of Florida.
14 My remarks are simple. Im a lay person.
15 I pull the switch and I want my lights to go on, I 16 want my computer to go on, and I want my well water to 17 go on. Ive been a resident of the City of Port St.
18 Lucie for twenty-five years. Im a former City 19 Councilwoman for the City of Port St. Lucie. Very 20 active in the community.
21 I cant worry about whats going to happen 22 all over the world, all over the United States, but I 23 know FP&L here and our power plant, they look after 24 our safety. Theyre good community partners, very 25
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(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 active. Their employees are very active. Their 1
management is very active. Theyve been involved in 2
so many aspects of St. Lucie County and the counties 3
around us. Theyre good community partners.
4 I feel its very important that they 5
approve the operating license for the St. Lucie Power 6
Plant.
7 Thank-you very much.
8 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank-you, Jane.
9 And I think Jane is correct. She is the 10 last speaker today.
11 And Im going to turn this over to John 12 Tappert in a minute to just close this off for this 13 afternoon session, but I just want to remind people 14 that we do have a lot of NRC staff here, a lot of 15 experts who are helping us with this project. Take 16 some time to talk to them after the meeting. We do 17 have a representative of our Office of General Counsel 18 here, as well as regional staff.
19 And one person I did want to recognize, 20 because of him -- NRCs presence the community and at 21 a particular plant is Thierry Ross, whos our senior 22 resident here at St. Lucie and lives in the community, 23 and looks after NRCs responsibilities on a day to day 24 basis at the plant.
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119 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 (202) 234-4433 And, John, do you want to say some final 1
words?
2 MR. TAPPERT: I just want to thank 3
everyone for coming out and taking time out of their 4
day to come out here today.
5 Chip does these meetings for us all over 6
the country and this may be the most comments weve 7
ever gotten at one of these forums. So we appreciate 8
your participation and I would encourage you to talk 9
to one of the people with a name tag if youd like to, 10 if you have some more questions regarding the 11 relicensing.
12 And thanks for coming out again.
13 (Whereupon, at 4:30 oclock, p.m., the 14 public meeting was adjourned.)
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