ML031640068
| ML031640068 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Quad Cities  |
| Issue date: | 04/08/2003 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation |
| To: | |
| Wheeler L, NRR/DRIP/RLEP, 415-1444 | |
| Shared Package | |
| ml031631260 | List: |
| References | |
| NRC-862 | |
| Download: ML031640068 (61) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Renewal of Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station Public Scoping Meeting - Afternoon Session Docket Numbers: 50-254, 50-265 Location: Moline, Illinois Date: Tuesday, April 8, 2003 Work Order No.: NRC-862 Pages 1-61
1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + + + + +
4 PUBLIC SCOPING MEETING 5 RENEWAL OF QUAD CITIES LICENSES 6 + + + + +
7 TUESDAY 8 APRIL 8, 2003 9 + + + + +
10 MOLINE, ILLINOIS 11 + + + + +
12 The Open House Public Scoping Meetings 13 were held at The Mark of the Quad Cities, 1201 River 14 Drive, Moline, Illinois at 1:00 p.m., F. Chip Cameron, 15 presiding.
16 PRESENT:
17 F. Chip Cameron 18 John Tappert 19 T.J. Kim 20 Duke Wheeler 21 22 23 24 25 26
2 1 I N D E X 2 - AGENDA ITEM PAGE 3 Welcome and Purpose of Meeting - 3 4 (F. Cameron) 5 Overview of License Renewal Process - 7/9 6 (J. Tappert/T.J. Kim) 7 Overview of Environmental Review Process - 16 8 (D. Wheeler) 9 Public Comment - 24 10 (F. Cameron) 11 Jim Bohnsack 25 12 Chief Leo Geerts 28 13 Tim Tulon 31 14 Fred Polaski 37 15 Rob Lamb 43 16 Stuart Whitt 44 17 Chris Filbert 49 18 Larry Toppert 51 19 Don Swensson 54 20 Patrick OConnor 56 21 John Malvik 59 22 Closing/Availability of Transcripts, etc.- 60 23 (F. Cameron) 24 25 26
3 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 (1:30 P.M.)
3 MR. CAMERON: Good afternoon everyone. My 4 name is Chip Cameron. Im the special counsel for 5 Public Liaison at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission 6 and I wanted to welcome all of you to the Nuclear 7 Regulatory Commissions public meeting today.
8 Were going to try to keep the acronyms 9 down or at least explain what they are but one that we 10 will be using is NRC for Nuclear Regulatory 11 Commission.
12 And its my pleasure to serve as your 13 facilitator for todays meeting and my responsibility 14 will be to try to assist you all in having a 15 productive meeting this afternoon.
16 As most or all of you may know, Exelon has 17 submitted a request to the NRC to renew the operating 18 licenses for the Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station 19 Units 1 & 2. And the focus of todays meeting is the 20 NRCs evaluation of the environmental impacts 21 associated with any NRC decision to renew the licenses 22 at Quad Cities.
23 Before we get into the substance of 24 todays meeting, I just want to go over a couple of 25 items concerned with meeting process. And one is the 26 format for the meeting. Its a relatively simple
4 1 format. Were going to break the meeting up into two 2 segments. And the first segment is going to consist 3 of some brief NRC presentations to give you some 4 background on what the NRC process is for evaluating 5 an application for license renewal. And well go out 6 to you for questions that you may have concerned with 7 those presentations.
8 The second segment of the meeting is going 9 to give us an opportunity to listen to all of you and 10 to give you an opportunity to make some more formal 11 comments for the record.
12 And the ground rules associated with all 13 this are very simple. If you - when we get to 14 question and answer - if you have a question just give 15 me a signal and Ill bring you this cordless mic or if 16 its easier for you to go to the standup mic in the 17 aisle here thats fine too. But if you could just 18 give us your name and affiliation if appropriate and 19 ask your question.
20 I would ask that only one person speak at 21 a time because we are keeping a transcript. Mr.
22 LeGrand is over here as our stenographer and all of 23 your remarks will be captured on the record and will 24 be considered as formal comments in the NRCs 25 evaluation.
5 1 And I guess the last ground rule is just 2 try to be to the point in your comments. I know that 3 this can be a controversial and complex issue and its 4 tough sometimes to be concise, but I want to make sure 5 that everybody has an opportunity to talk today so 6 that if you do try to be to the point that will allow 7 us to achieve that goal.
8 And in terms of time for the formal 9 comments, Im going to limit that to approximately 10 five to seven minutes. So if you could try to do your 11 formal comment in that time period that would also 12 help us out today.
13 In terms of the agenda were going to 14 start off as I mentioned with the NRC presentations 15 and were going to go first to Mr. John Tappert from 16 the NRC, whos right here, and Ive asked John to 17 formally welcome you because he is the Chief of the 18 Environmental Section of the License Renewal and 19 Environmental Impacts Program at the NRC.
20 And John and his staff are responsible for 21 not only doing the environmental review on this 22 application for Quad Cities, but on all the other 23 plants that we get license renewal applications from 24 as well as other types of NRC facilities.
25 By way of background, John has been with 26 the agency for approximately 12 years and has served
6 1 in a number of different capacities. He has been a 2 resident inspector. Those are the NRC inspectors that 3 are at each nuclear reactor that we regulate. His 4 undergraduate degree is from Virginia Tech in 5 aeronautic and oceanographic engineering, and he has 6 a masters degree in environmental engineering from 7 Johns Hopkins University.
8 After John is done were going to go right 9 to our first substantive presentation and Mr. T.J.
10 Kim, right here from the NRC is going to do that. And 11 T.J. is the Project Manager for the safety evaluation 12 on this application for license renewal for Quad 13 Cities.
14 And hes been with the NRC for about 19 15 years. Hes also been a resident inspector. He has 16 a chemical engineering degree from Drexel and a 17 technical management masters degree from Johns 18 Hopkins.
19 T.J. is on the safety side as we call it 20 of the License Renewal and Environmental Impacts 21 Program. So he does not work for John Tappert. One 22 of the things that youll hear today is there are two 23 basic components and theres other components but two 24 basic components to an NRC decision on whether to 25 grant a license to renew. And one is the safety 26 evaluation and T.J. will be telling you about that.
7 1 And the other part is the review of 2 environmental impacts and both of those come together 3 in our decision.
4 And to tell you about the environmental 5 impact review process, we have Mr. Duke Wheeler from 6 the NRC who is here. He is on John Tapperts staff.
7 Hes the Project Manager for the environmental review.
8 Hes been with the agency for 20 years, worked with 9 Westinghouse before that on the navy nuclear power 10 program. He was a nuclear weapons officer in the 11 United States Army and he has a nuclear engineering 12 bachelors degree from West Point.
13 And after T.J.s done well go for 14 question and answer. Hes going to talk about the 15 overview of the license renewal process and then well 16 also go out to you for questions after Duke talks 17 about the environmental review.
18 And with that Im going to ask John 19 Tappert to talk to us for a minute.
20 MR. TAPPERT: Thank you, Chip. And good 21 afternoon and welcome.
22 My name is John Tappert and Im the Chief 23 of the Environmental Section in the Office of Nuclear 24 Reaction Regulation.
25 On behalf of the Nuclear Regulatory 26 Commission, Id like to thank you for coming out today
8 1 and participating in our process. Next slide, oh, you 2 got it.
3 Some of the things wed like to cover 4 today and Id like to briefly go over the purposes of 5 todays meeting. First of all wed like to give you 6 a brief overview of the entire license renewal 7 program. And that includes both the safety review as 8 well as an environmental review which is the principal 9 focus of todays meeting.
10 Well discuss some of the areas that we 11 will review as we assess the environmental impacts 12 associated with extending the operating life of the 13 Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station for an additional 20 14 years. Well also give you some information on our 15 schedule and the opportunities that you will have to 16 participate in our process.
17 At the conclusion of the staffs 18 presentation, well be happy to receive any questions 19 or comments that you may have today which is, of 20 course, the principal purpose of todays meeting. But 21 first, let me provide some general background of the 22 license renewal program.
23 The Atomic Energy Act gives the NRC the 24 authority to issue operating licenses to commercial 25 nuclear power plants for a period of 40 years. For
9 1 Quad Cities Units 1 & 2, those operating licenses will 2 expire in 2012.
3 Our regulations also make provisions for 4 extending those operating licenses for an additional 5 20 years as part of the license renewal program, and 6 Exelon has requested license renewal for both units.
7 As part of the NRCs review of that 8 application, well be preparing an environmental 9 impact statement. Right now, we are in what we call 10 scoping where we seek to identify those issues which 11 will require the greatest focus during our review.
12 And again the principal purpose of todays meeting is 13 to receive your input into that scoping process.
14 With that brief introduction Id like to 15 ask T.J. to describe the safety portion of our review.
16 MR. KIM: Thanks, John. As Chip mentioned 17 my name is T.J. Kim and Im the NRCs project manager 18 responsible for the safety review of the Exelons 19 license renewal application for both Quad Cities and 20 Dresden plants.
21 Before I get into the discussion of the 22 license renewal process, Id like to take a minute to 23 talk about the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the NRC, 24 in terms of what we do and what our mission is.
25 As John just mentioned, the Atomic Energy 26 Act of 1954 is enabling legislation that authorizes
10 1 the NRC to regulate the civilian use of nuclear 2 materials. In carrying out this statutory authority 3 the NRCs mission is really three-fold.
4 One, to ensure adequate protection of 5 public health and safety. Two, to protect the 6 environment and three, to provide for common defense 7 and security.
8 The NRC accomplishes its mission through 9 a combination of various regulatory programs and 10 processes such as inspections, enforcement actions, 11 assessment of licensee performance, the evaluation of 12 operating experience at nuclear plants across the 13 country and in fact it includes reactor experience 14 overseas as well. And the NRC program also includes 15 rule making, promulgation of regulations and rules, 16 and, of course, licensing activities.
17 Again, these are some of the major ongoing 18 NRC programs and processes that ensures we meet the 19 NRC statutory mission.
20 The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 allows a 40-21 year license term for power reactors, but it also 22 allows for license renewal. The 40-year term, by the 23 way, is primarily based on economic and antitrust 24 considerations rather than safety limitations or 25 technical limitations. So to address the requirements 26 and the NRC processes for license renewal the
11 1 Commission has promulgated license renewal rule 2 entitled 10 Code of Federal Regulations, Part 54.
3 If I can go back to the previous slide 4 please.
5 Okay. The NRCs license renewal process 6 as defined in 10-CFR Part 54 is quite similar to the 7 original licensing process for power reactors in that 8 it involves a safety review, an environmental impact 9 review, confirmatory plant inspections, and it also 10 involves independent review by the Advisory Committee 11 on Reactor Safeguards, the ACRS.
12 There is an important distinction here, 13 however, in that when in promulgating the license 14 renewal rule, the Commission has determined that many 15 aspects of the current licensing basis, including 16 emergency planning and the plant physical security, 17 can be and will be adequately addressed by the 18 existing regulatory processes such that they can carry 19 forward into the license renewal term. Now thats a 20 very important concept to remember when we discuss 21 license renewal process.
22 Before I move on to the next slide, I want 23 to mention briefly about the role of the ACRS. The 24 ACRS basically is a group of nationally-recognized 25 technical experts in the nuclear safety area that 26 serve as a consulting body to the Commission itself.
12 1 And the ACRS independently reviews each license 2 renewal application as well as the staff safety review 3 and reports their conclusions and recommendations 4 directly to the Commission.
5 Next slide please.
6 Okay. This slide really gives a big 7 picture overview of the license renewal process. And, 8 as you can see from this slide, the process involves 9 two parallel paths. Safety review being one and 10 environmental review being the other.
11 The safety review involves the NRC staffs 12 review and assessment of the technical information 13 thats contained in the licensees license renewal 14 application.
15 I have a team of about 30 NRC technical 16 reviewers back at the NRC headquarters in Washington 17 who are conducting the safety review right now. And 18 I should also mention that my team is supported, my 19 team is supported by technical experts at three 20 different national laboratories, Argonne National Lab 21 outside of Chicago being one, Brookhaven National Lab 22 in Long Island, New York and Pacific Northwest Lab out 23 in the state of Washington being the third. So I have 24 quite an expertise put together in my team to conduct 25 this safety review.
13 1 The staffs safety review focuses on the 2 effectiveness of the proposed aging management 3 programs that are contained in the license renewal 4 application. And we, the staff review the 5 effectiveness of the proposed aging management program 6 to ensure that the plants safety can be maintained 7 throughout the license renewal term, i.e., going from 8 40 to 60 years. And that is the one important aspect 9 of the safety review.
10 The safety review also involves staffs 11 assessment of whats called time-limited aging 12 analyses that are contained in the licensees 13 application.
14 The license renewal rule requires the 15 applicant to reevaluate those design analyses that 16 assumed 40-year plant life. So the reevaluation 17 obviously requires extending that to 60 years.
18 An example of an aging, time-limited aging 19 analysis would be an environmental qualification 20 analysis for certain electrical components and cables 21 that are expected to survive and function after its 22 qualified life. So, as part of the license renewal 23 application, each applicant must demonstrate through 24 the time-limited aging analyses that these components 25 will remain functional after 60 years of extended 26 life.
14 1 So those are the two major components of 2 the staff safety review. Again, assessing the 3 effectiveness of the eight proposed aging management 4 programs in the application and also to assess 5 effectiveness of time-limited aging analyses.
6 Okay. And the results of the staff safety 7 review will be documented in a safety evaluation 8 report, and a copy of that will be provided to the 9 ACRS, as I mentioned earlier, for the second look, 10 basically.
11 This safety review process also involves 12 on site confirmitory inspections. And for the Dresden 13 and Quad Cities license renewal application were 14 planning three such inspections. One at the Exelons 15 engineering office, one at the Dresden site and the 16 third inspection will be conducted at the Quad Cities 17 site.
18 And each of these inspections will be 19 conducted by a team of seven inspectors pulled 20 together from both NRC headquarters as well as NRCs 21 Region 3 office. And the results of their inspections 22 will be documented in separate inspection report.
23 Okay, now as I mentioned earlier the 24 second process involves an environmental review and 25 that involves scoping activities, which this meeting 26 is a part of, and it also involves developing a draft
15 1 supplement to GEIS which stands for Generic 2 Environmental Impact Statement and then we will be 3 publishing that for public comment on that draft. And 4 eventually we will be issuing a final supplement to 5 the GEIS, again, the Generic Environmental Impact 6 Statement.
7 So as you can see from this slide, the 8 final agency decision on whether to approve or deny 9 the application will factor in a number of things.
10 Safety evaluation report which documents the results 11 of the safety review. The final supplement to GEIS 12 which documents the results of the environmental 13 review. Inspection reports will be factored in as 14 well and also the independent report from the ACRS 15 will all be factor into the final agency decision.
16 And I should mention that the Commission 17 schedule for this whole process is about 22 months.
18 Now one last thing I want to mention on 19 this chart is hearings, in this splash mark here, if 20 there is intervention, if theres a petition filed to 21 intervene in this process by an individual or group of 22 individuals and if they have adequate standing, in 23 other words if their request for a hearing is granted 24 by either the ASLB which stands for Atomic Safety 25 Licensing Board or the NRC Commission itself, then an
16 1 adjudicatory hearings may also be involved in this 2 process.
3 And an adjudicatory hearing is a trial 4 type hearing thats presided over by a panel of 5 administrative law judges. It involves contentions, 6 discovery, cross examinations just like a court trial.
7 And if we do get into a hearing process then the 8 Commissions schedule for the whole process is about 9 30 months.
10 That actually concludes my prepared 11 remarks. If there are any questions I'll be happy to 12 answer.
13 MR. CAMERON: Good job, T.J. Do we have 14 some questions on the overall process to enable you to 15 understand this a little bit more clearly? Any 16 questions at all?
17 Okay. And we can come back to questions 18 on this presentation after Duke Wheeler is done with 19 his presentation on the environmental program.
20 Thank you, T.J. Duke.
21 MR. WHEELER: Thank you, Chip. I am Duke 22 Wheeler and I'm the environmental project manager on 23 the NRC staff. And I'm responsible for coordinating 24 all the activities of the NRC staff and various 25 environmental experts at National Labs to develop an
17 1 environmental impact statement associated with the 2 license renewal for Quad Cities nuclear power plant.
3 May I have the next slide please.
4 The National Environmental Policy Act of 5 1969 requires that Federal agencies follow a 6 systematic approach in evaluating potential 7 environmental impacts associated with certain actions.
8 Were required to consider the impact of 9 the proposed action and also any mitigation for those 10 impacts that we consider to be significant. Were 11 also required to consider alternatives to the proposed 12 action, in this case license renewal, and that 13 includes the no-action alternative. In other words, 14 if we just decide to not approve the requested license 15 renewal what are the environmental impacts.
16 The National Environmental Policy Act and 17 our environmental impact statement are disclosure 18 tools. And they are specifically structured to 19 involve public participation, and this meeting is a 20 big part of that aspect of our review.
21 Our Commission has determined that we will 22 prepare an environmental impact statement for license 23 renewal. And we are now gathering information for an 24 environmental impact statement here and we will 25 collect your comments on the scope of what our
18 1 environmental review should be for the proposed 2 renewal of the Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station.
3 May I have the next slide please.
4 We have a certain decision standard and it 5 looks like a few lawyers might have had a hand in the 6 wording of that slide. Basically what it says, are 7 the environmental impacts of the proposed license 8 renewal so great that maintaining the license renewal 9 option for Quad Cities is unreasonable? Thats the 10 final decision that my environmental impact statement 11 will be structured to either support or not.
12 May I have the next slide please.
13 On the slide that T.J. had up on the board 14 a few minutes ago the process for license renewal 15 that, this slide is just an expansion of the lower 16 part of that slide and it gives in greater detail the 17 environmental review process.
18 We did conduct by the way, an 19 environmental site audit to help gather information.
20 It was out here about four weeks ago at Quad Cities.
21 And then on, that was on March the 12th and then a 22 couple days later on March the 14th, we issued a 23 Federal Register notice and also put out other 24 information to the public regarding our full notice of 25 intent to develop an environmental impact statement
19 1 and conduct scoping. And this started a 60-day clock 2 defined as the scoping period.
3 And were more or less in the middle of 4 that clock right now. This meeting is a part of the 5 scoping process so that we can get comments from the 6 public to help us scope out the bounds of our 7 environmental review.
8 If, in the conduct of our review, we 9 require additional information beyond what was already 10 provided to us in the initial license, then we will 11 issue a request for additional information. And I 12 plan to issue that request for additional information, 13 if there are any such requests, on May the 23rd of 14 this year.
15 And approximately eight weeks later, I 16 expect to get an answer back from the licensee and 17 then, based on all the information we have in hand, we 18 will publish a draft of the environmental impact 19 statement for public comment.
20 Now I envision publishing that draft in 21 November of this year and when I publish that draft, 22 as I said, it will be for public comment and there 23 will be a 75-day public comment period and this will 24 be heavily publicized.
20 1 I plan to have another meeting out here in 2 the Quad Cities vicinity to receive your comments on 3 the draft of the environmental impact statement.
4 Once we get comments on our draft 5 environmental impact statement, then I will publish 6 the final environmental impact statement and I have 7 July of 2004 on my schedule to publish that final 8 environmental impact statement.
9 May I have the next slide.
10 This slide just shows a couple of the 11 sources where we gather our information. We do 12 communicate with Federal, State and local officials as 13 well as local service agencies. And we also consider 14 all of the comments that we receive from the public.
15 May I have the next slide please.
16 And this slide identifies just about all 17 of the environmental disciplines that we focus on as 18 we develop our environmental impact statement. One 19 term that may not be too familiar to you is socio 20 economic impacts and environmental justice.
21 Environmental justice is a consideration 22 of the question of whether or not any environmental 23 impacts associated with the Quad Cities license 24 renewal disproportionately impact low income or 25 minority segments of the local population.
21 1 And that others as you see, the 2 terrestrial ecology and land use, hydrology and so 3 forth on the slide, all of these will be evaluated in 4 our environmental impact statement.
5 May I have the next slide.
6 This slide just recaps a couple of the key 7 dates. Our scoping and comment period, which is 8 underway right now, began on March the 14th, will end 9 on May the 12th, and, as I mentioned in November, Ill 10 issue my draft and its SEIS.
11 T.J. told you about the GEIS, the Generic 12 Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal.
13 Thats an environmental impact statement that takes 14 into account issues that pretty much affect all 15 nuclear power plants that may come to us for license 16 renewal.
17 But I will be publishing a Quad Cities-18 specific supplement and thats the SEIS that you see 19 there. And that Quad Cities-specific supplement is 20 what Ill be putting out for public comment in 21 November and, after considering your comments, 22 publishing in final in July of 2004.
23 And when I publish the draft environmental 24 impact statement, I will be making that also available 25 at the Cordova District Library, The River Valley
22 1 Public Library, and the Davenport Public Library.
2 Itll also be on our web page.
3 In addition, as many of you came in, you 4 were asked to fill out little registration cards at 5 our reception table, blue cards or yellow cards. If 6 youve indicated on that card that you would like to 7 receive a copy of the draft and the final 8 environmental impact statement, Ill make a note of 9 that and will add you to our mailing list for those 10 documents. And you may also receive copies of 11 significant correspondence that goes in and out of the 12 NRC or out of the NRC related to the development of 13 this environmental review.
14 May I have the next slide.
15 This slide just specifically identifies me 16 as your primary point of contact with the NRC for the 17 preparation of the environmental impact statement.
18 And it also identifies where documents related to our 19 review may be found in the local area.
20 I visited these libraries, spoke with the 21 staff there and theyve agreed to make space available 22 on their shelf to make Exelons application available 23 for public review in addition to our correspondence 24 and, as I mentioned before, thatll include the 25 environmental impact statements when they get 26 published.
23 1 Documents can also be reviewed at our web 2 site, and if people are having some difficulty getting 3 through if they just dont have a certain amount of 4 keyboard moxey with the computer or something just 5 isnt working right, give me a call at the telephone 6 number that you see on the slide and you and I will 7 sit there and well go through it keystroke-by-8 keystroke until we get it right and your interests are 9 adequately addressed.
10 May I have the next slide.
11 Now in addition to this meeting, there are 12 other ways that you get your comments into our 13 environmental review process. You can provide written 14 comments to me at the address on the slide to the 15 Chief of our Rules and Directives Branch and that will 16 guarantee that your comments get into our public 17 record.
18 Now you can also make comments in person.
19 I understand that here is, you know, its a 20 substantial difference between this location and my 21 office but if you have a representative in the D.C.
22 area and you want them to represent some interest they 23 can certainly call me and somebody from my office will 24 schedule a time to meet them at our office in 25 Rockville. And this was actually a practical means of 26 communicating for some of the plants that were closer
24 1 into the D.C. area. Calvert Cliffs, North Anna and 2 that sort of thing.
3 But it is something thats open to you and 4 I wanted to make sure that you were aware of it. And 5 Ive also established a specific email address at the 6 NRC for the one and only purpose of receiving your 7 comments on the development of our draft environmental 8 impact statement and what you think the scope of our 9 review should be. And that email address is the last 10 line on the slide.
11 And once again, if youre just having 12 trouble getting through to that email address give me 13 a call and well go through it.
14 May I have the next slide.
15 This concludes my remarks. Are there any, 16 go ahead Chip.
17 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Duke. And I think 18 thats the first time I heard the phrase keyboard 19 moxey so it was good.
20 Any questions on the environmental review 21 for Duke or on the safety review for T.J.? Any 22 questions at all out here?
23 Okay. Lets go and hear from you. We 24 have a number of people who wanted to make some 25 comments. And what Im going to do is start with some 26 local officials and then Im going to ask the company
25 1 to give us their vision on license renewal and then 2 well go out to the others from the community who have 3 signed up. And Id like to ask Mr. Jim Bohnsack who 4 is the, Hi, Jim, the Chair of the Rock Island County 5 Board.
6 Do you want to go ahead up there?
7 MR. BOHNSACK: Thank you for letting me 8 speak. One of the reasons that he had me charged to 9 come up and speak was that about four months ago 10 Exelon did come to our county board meeting and asked 11 for this renewal of license, assured us that they are 12 good neighbors and that they also do pay their taxes 13 and they would like to have another 20 years which we 14 did.
15 A month later we ended up, they came and 16 protested their taxes that they dont want to pay any.
17 And so we then end up going to the full board and 18 asking them to rescind their license which we did.
19 Our concern is that they pay their fair 20 taxes and I know this is talking about environmental 21 but also had calls from different public and private 22 sectors in the last week saying Exelon or Mid America 23 has called them asking them as a public relations and 24 I think thats, thats not the fair gimmick or the 25 thing that you want to hear today.
26 1 But I assure you that I want to tell you 2 that the county is, is very upset with a very good 3 company as far as generating electricity that doesnt 4 want to pay their taxes.
5 Ive got a book here thats this thick 6 that in one line if I just may read that talks about 7 their taxes. It pretty much says that on the basis of 8 these measures we estimate the market value of the 9 real estate at the Quad Cities nuclear power station 10 at January 1 st, 2001 to be zero. No taxes.
11 In their tax appeal they pretty much show 12 that they want nothing, its over 700 million dollars 13 and theyre saying they dont want to pay any, any 14 property taxes. We think thats terrible. We are 15 trying to negotiate with them now to have some kind of 16 equitable property tax.
17 But saying that, if they dont get the 18 taxes as far as environmental we do have an ESNA, a 19 safety net that we require that every two years we do 20 a complete mock situation if there was something as a, 21 as a nuclear that would happen, and myself as Rock 22 Island County Chairman, is responsible for running 23 that meeting and the state police have had full 24 authority and Im telling you that takes a lot of 25 money and a lot of property tax monies.
27 1 So Im just coming to, to you and telling 2 you that I wish you would not extend their license 3 until they get this, while I think its important that 4 they face up, pay taxes like everybody else. We all 5 have to and we all want to and if they pay that we 6 have no problem with them. They are a good company.
7 They employ good people. And so I want to make sure 8 you understand that theyre worthy of, of running a 9 good facility but they also need to be paying their 10 fair share.
11 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you very much 12 Chairman Bohnsack and I guess it might be useful to 13 just clarify for everybody and John maybe you can 14 answer this as the, is taxes one of the types of 15 socioeconomic issues that is usually evaluated in the 16 environmental impact statement?
17 MR. TAPPERT: Yeah. The, when we talk 18 about environmental were talking about the entire 19 human environment and that also includes socio 20 economic impacts in addition to like aquatic and 21 terrestrial creatures. So we do look at taxes. From 22 the environmental impact statement we do an assessment 23 of the impact in the community.
24 However, its important to note that the 25 NRC as a regulatory body, you know, we regulate them 26 from the safety standpoint and we really have no
28 1 jurisdiction over their tax base or anything like 2 that.
3 So its, its appropriate for scoping and 4 of course we have it on the transcript so we 5 appreciate your comment.
6 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much John.
7 Chief, is it Geerts?
8 CHIEF GEERTS: Yes.
9 MR. CAMERON: Can you come up and talk to 10 us? Chief Geerts is the Chief of the Albany Fire 11 Protection District. And you can, I should have 12 clarified this to Chairman Bohnsack, you can come up 13 to the podium and face out if you want.
14 CHIEF GEERTS: Well, thats fine.
15 MR. CAMERON: Oh, good.
16 CHIEF GEERTS: Id like tho thank you for 17 this opportunity to speak. As stated Im Chief Geerts 18 from the Albany Fire Protection District. Our 19 district borders, is in the 10-mile EP zone affecting 20 Quad Cities Station and, due to mutual aid effects 21 that are in place in the state of Illinois in the 22 event of an accident or for whatever unforeseen reason 23 that offsite emergency response agencies are called, 24 we are automatically dispatched with Cordova to 25 respond to the site or anything that affects the site.
29 1 So with that in mind on behalf of the 2 Albany Fire Protection District we support the license 3 renewal process for several reasons.
4 One, in working with station personnel-5 both senior management, mid-management and plant 6 workers themselves - weve adopted many of their human 7 performance standards that they have in place to 8 improve the safety of running the plant. So in our 9 business, in the fire business, weve adopted like the 10 STAR process, stop, think, act and review in our 11 processes that we do when were out performing tasks 12 in an emergency situation.
13 Also one of the greatest things that weve 14 probably adopted is their five key questions. What 15 are the defenses in place, likely situations, critical 16 steps in the safety concerns weve even adopted those 17 strictly from Exelon providing those, those human 18 performance things that they say has improved the 19 safety and a teamwork culture at the plant.
20 So in turn weve used that in the fire 21 service as well. Along with the emergency planning or 22 emergency preparedness their evacuation plans are very 23 concise and provide explicit detail in how you should 24 go about doing it in the event of a nuclear accident 25 or disaster. And we in turn have used those events
30 1 for our own plan in the event of a terror attack, 2 severe weather or a hazmat type incident.
3 So were very grateful to Exelon for 4 providing that information to help us improve our own 5 plan. And theyve allowed us the use of their burn 6 tower where we can go in a controlled atmosphere and 7 provide quality training for our new firefighters as 8 well as seasoned veteran firefighters.
9 And of course we could not go without 10 saying that it does provide an economic stability in 11 this area. There are many people that work at the 12 plant that are involved in associations like this.
13 Were a part paid type service that provides fire and 14 EMS type service along with hazmat and rescue and a 15 lot of the employees that work at Exelon are involved 16 in organizations such as ours. In fact we have 17 several that are on our department that work at Exelon 18 that provide a good base knowledge of training and are 19 committed to the community. So it is an economic 20 source that we dont want to lose.
21 So we are very supportive of the 22 relicensing process. Wed like to see it go through 23 and we want to see the plant be there for another 20 24 years. Thank you.
25 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you very much, 26 Chief Geerts.
31 1 Were going to go now to officials from 2 Exelon to tell us a little bit about their rationale 3 behind the license renewal application. And first Mr.
4 Tim Tulon who is the site vice president for the Quad 5 Cities Nuclear Power Station. Tim 6 MR. TULON: Very good, Chip, thank you very 7 much and good afternoon.
8 As Chip said my name is Tim Tulon. I am 9 the Site Vice President of the Quad Cities Station and 10 I am accountable for its operation.
11 The first thing I would like to do is to 12 thank the NRC, you know, for a consideration of our 13 license application. And I also want to thank them 14 for the opportunity to hold this public meeting 15 because I think its very important that the public 16 has the opportunity to comment.
17 In the late 1990s, I had the very same job 18 at the Braidwood Station as the Site Vice President 19 which is south of Joliet. And so I used to have to 20 come to Quad Cities to do control and observations and 21 to do, you know, different type of meetings. And 22 every time I would leave the plant, I would ask myself 23 is this going to be the last time that Im going to 24 come back to Quad Cities. Because Ill tell you what 25 is I didnt think the plant was going to make it in 26 that day and age, you know.
32 1 So here we are today, you know, the 2 performance of the plant has improved significantly 3 over that, over that period of time and we are 4 submitting an application to extend the license.
5 I am truly pleased and truly excited, you 6 know, number one for the employees at Quad Cities 7 Station to have this opportunity for a continued 8 employment and number two for the community to have 9 this continuation for, for cheap and reliable power to 10 come in.
11 So let me explain to you a little bit 12 about, about what this means. Both of the units are 13 rated at 912 megawatts of electric, you know, to put 14 that in more easy to understand terms that means that 15 both units have the power to power 1.7 million homes.
16 You know, think about that. 1.7 million homes. It is 17 a powerful and significant source of electricity.
18 One, one advantage I think that is 19 frequently overlooked within nuclear power is the 20 issue of stable fuel prices. I want you to think 21 about this is that both units at Quad Cities Station 22 can run at a 100-percent power for two years without 23 refueling. And so what that means is that the plant 24 is not subject to short term supply disruptions. It 25 is not subject to the wild price links that weve seen 26 on the mercantile exchange here recently in the price
33 1 of crude oil and also natural gas. I think thats a 2 very, very important advantage in going forward.
3 We also have 700 families that are 4 dependent on the plant to make a living. 307 of them 5 are members of the International Brotherhood of 6 Electrical Workers, Local 15 and I got to tell you 7 these are good jobs. These are high paying jobs 8 within the local community and the company has 9 excellent benefits. So our payroll is 57 million 10 dollars, 57 million dollars worth of payroll which 11 directly helps the local community.
12 When I first came to the plant a couple 13 years ago I had one of the local pastors from one of 14 the small towns seek me out and he told me, Tim, he 15 says, you have got to do a good job in running this 16 plant because this plant needs to stay open. He says, 17 I have many of my church members that work at this, 18 that work at this plant.
19 And so having Quad Cities Station 20 operating for an extended period of time is important 21 for that reason as well as, as well as many others.
22 You know, the plant has always had a very 23 firm commitment in using qualified skilled trade 24 labor, union labor to maintain the plant during, 25 during refuelings. In the year 2002, we had two 26 refueling outages. Each one of those outages employed
34 1 approximately 1200 union craftsmen. We worked 2 directly through the Tri-Cities Buildings and 3 Constructions Trade Council right here. Right here in 4 the Quad Cities to obtain that labor and so last year 5 that resulted in 30 million dollars, a 30 million 6 dollar payroll to these local craftsmen.
7 And we intend to continue that commitment 8 to use local trade labor. Additionally, we have about 9 120 full-time contractors on site and we do about two 10 million dollars worth of business each year with local 11 companies.
12 So I would offer to you that, Number one, 13 is we are a very significant source of employment for 14 the local area and Number two, we are a positive 15 economic force.
16 Im going to have to talk about property 17 taxes. You know, over the past five years we have 18 paid about 17 and half million dollars in property 19 taxes for about three and half million dollars per 20 year. The thing that complicates this substantially 21 is that the laws in the state of Illinois changed in 22 1997 with regards to how a nuclear plant is to be 23 assessed. And so we are currently in disagreement 24 with the county on the matter.
25 And Ill tell you what, its a very 26 difficult issue for both sides of the table. It
35 1 really is. And irregardless of any extreme positions 2 that were taken in the appeal process at PECO and 3 Chairman Bohnsack I want to just tell you flat out is 4 that we intend to pay property taxes. We intend to be 5 a good neighbor. We will continue to work with 6 yourself and the board to bring this thing to, to a 7 reconcilable conclusion.
8 Also I want to mention that our employees 9 are generous and involved in many local activities.
10 Last year they donated approximately $150,000 to the 11 United Way campaign in the Quad Cities. They raised 12 235 units of blood in various blood drives. You will 13 find our employees involved in youth sports, you will 14 find them involved in scouting. You will find them 15 involved in junior achievement and much, much more.
16 Regarding the environment which is really 17 what were talking about here at this meeting. I 18 think many people probably do not realize that we are 19 the only private sector facility to operate a fish 20 hatchery on the Mississippi River.
21 And ever since 1984 we have put four 22 million fish right here locally in Mississippi pools 23 13 and 14. And so our annual goal for fish production 24 is 5,000 yearling hybrid striped bass, for those of 25 you that are sports people, you know what Im talking 26 about. And 175,000 walleye fingerlings. And Ill
36 1 tell you, this is a significant recreational benefit 2 for the local community.
3 During the preparation of the license 4 extension paperwork a comparison was done to say okay, 5 if you take the generation of Quad Cities and you 6 dont use the nuclear option and you use a coal 7 burning type of option what would that result in.
8 The result would be 6,000 tons of sulphur 9 dioxide emission to the environment. 1700 tons of 10 both nitric oxides and also carbon monoxides. So its 11 a very significant benefit I think that nuclear has is 12 the avoidance of this greenhouse issue. And I, I dare 13 say that this issue will rise in importance to this 14 nation as we go forward in the future.
15 A word about post 11, 9/11 security. You 16 know, we have spent over a million dollars on 17 strengthening security at the Quad Cities Station and 18 we periodically monitor and adjust that program.
19 I will tell you that domestic nuclear 20 facilities are the best protected facilities, civilian 21 facilities period. Just, just period. This issue is 22 important to you as it is to us. And we will continue 23 with very strong support for the security program.
24 Again, Chip, I want to thank the NRC for 25 consideration of the, of our license extension and 26 this chance to comment. Id just like to close my
37 1 remarks by just saying is that this management team 2 that runs the Quad Cities Station is committed, is 3 absolutely committed to the safe and reliable 4 operation.
5 I appreciate the opportunity to comment.
6 Thank you, sir.
7 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Tim. And were 8 going to next go to Mr. Fred Polaski, who is the 9 manager of license renewal for Exelon whos going to 10 give us some, a few more words on the environmental 11 aspect.
12 MR. POLASKI: Good afternoon. As Chip 13 said, my name is Fred Polaski. Im Exelons Corporate 14 Manager for License Renewal. Im responsible for the 15 license renewal application that we prepared and 16 submitted for Dresden and Quad Cities, and also for 17 the work wed done previously on our Peach Bottom 18 Plant in Pennsylvania.
19 Im been working in this industry for 30 20 years. About 20 of it at Peach Bottom. I hold a 21 senior reactor operators license for 13 years and for 22 about the last seven years Im been working in the 23 area of license renewal both in the industry and with 24 Exelons license renewal applications.
25 Tim talked about the reasons why and the 26 good aspects of renewing a license for Quad Cities.
38 1 Id like to talk some about Exelons process for 2 preparing the license renewal application and a large 3 amount of effort and work that went into preparing 4 this application.
5 In 2000 ComEd, and this is before ComEd 6 and PECO Energy from Pennsylvania merged to form 7 Exelon, decided to pursue license renewal for both the 8 Dresden and the Quad Cities stations. Were here 9 today to talk about Quad Cities but we prepared a 10 joint application on the safety side for Dresden and 11 Quad Cities and separate environmental reports for 12 Dresden and Quad Cities.
13 The preparation of those reports began in 14 August of 2000 and were submitted in January of this 15 year. The applications were sitting out on the table 16 where you came in and the technical application is a 17 book about that thick, close to a 1000 pages, the 18 environmental report reach about that thick. That 19 represents a summary of the work that we did.
20 Ive taken a look at the volume of 21 information that supports that and its probably at 22 least a 100 times line-wise the size of what you 23 actually see in that application. It was a very 24 complete, thorough review of the information that 25 needed to be looked at.
39 1 Exelon invested over 40 man years of 2 engineering work into preparing those documents. Id 3 like to tell you the cost but unfortunately I cant 4 because its a confidential contractual obligation, 5 but we spent a lot of money on it and we got a very 6 good quality product.
7 On the safety review side and I know 8 thats not the primary topic of todays meeting but I 9 wanted to talk to you a little bit about what we did 10 and the reason for that.
11 We performed a review of all of the safety 12 equipment in the plant that needs to be reviewed for 13 the purposes of the NRC for renewing a license. And 14 the purpose of that review was to determine if the 15 necessary maintenance is being performed on the 16 equipment to make sure the equipment will operate when 17 its needed in an emergency situations.
18 Originally when Quad Cities was built all 19 of the equipment was new, it was thoroughly tested to 20 make sure it would perform. Everybody knows that as 21 you operate equipment over time whether its a nuclear 22 power plant, a chemical plant, whether its the fire 23 equipment that the local fire company uses, whether 24 its your automobile, whatever, that equipment is 25 going to age with time as its used. Doesnt mean it 26 wont work when its needed, but it will age.
40 1 Our job was to make sure that the 2 operators, the maintenance technicians at the plant 3 were doing the maintenance that they need to do on 4 that equipment to make sure its kept in good 5 condition. We did that review and like I said we 6 spent over 40 man years doing that, and our conclusion 7 was that the equipment is being maintained properly 8 and aging is being managed properly so the equipment 9 will operate properly when its needed to.
10 An analogy on an automobile. You buy a 11 new car, its brand new, it works fine. If you dont 12 do any maintenance on it its not going to last real 13 long. So you did normal routine things on it. You 14 change the oil periodically, you get it tuned up, you 15 make sure you keep it washed during the winter when 16 theres a lot of salt on the road you keep the salt 17 worn off. Why not, itll rust out from underneath, 18 you dont change the oil the engine will lock up 19 eventually on you and youll have to put a lot of 20 money into it. If you dont take care of the brakes 21 when you need them sometimes they wont work.
22 We took a look from the same kind of 23 thing. The equipment thats in the plant that needs 24 to operate routinely needs to be operating safety 25 functions is it being maintained properly and the 26 conclusion we reached was yes, it is.
41 1 When the environmental review we took a 2 look at all the aspects of the impact of the plant on 3 the environment. It was mentioned earlier and John 4 Tappert mentioned it, its not just the impact on the 5 terrestrial and the river and those kind of things 6 its the impact on all the people that live in the 7 area. And we concluded that all of the, the items 8 that have identified by the NRC when we reviewed those 9 for impact on the environment that the impact on the 10 environment is small.
11 If you read the report, the word small is 12 used a lot. Ill tell you thats sort of a regulatory 13 term and when I first got into this and starting 14 dealing with the environmental people understand what 15 that meant and what it really means for me when you 16 look at it is that if this plant continues to operate 17 beyond 40 years, the impact on the environment and 18 everything we do in this world whether its running a 19 nuclear power plant, whether its driving an 20 automobile, whether its building a new facility is 21 going to have some impact on the environment.
22 But the impact on the environment for 23 conditional, or 20 years of additional operation wont 24 be any more significant than whats going on today.
25 And so that plant is operating today, things will not 26 change when we get to 40 years.
42 1 It was mentioned earlier 40 years is, is 2 sort of an artificial lifetime of a plant and nothing 3 changes miraculously when you get to 40. Things will 4 continue as they are today.
5 Part of the review was what if we dont 6 operate that nuclear power plant. What are the 7 alternatives? And we looked at other ways of 8 generating nuclear power and determined that any 9 alternative means of generating electricity that 1800 10 megawatts would have more of an impact on the 11 environment than if we continued to operate Quad 12 Cities for an additional 20 years.
13 And so we concluded that the best thing to 14 do from an environmental view point is to continue to 15 operate Quad Cities. The conclusion we reached and 16 this is the overall Exelon team, and my own conclusion 17 personally, is that I believe the Quad Cities is a 18 safely operated plant; it can operate safely for an 19 additional 20 years and it will provide 1800 megawatts 20 of clean, reliable environmentally friendly economic 21 electricity that benefits not only this community but 22 the state of Illinois and our country. Thank you.
23 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you very much, 24 Fred. Our next speaker is Mr. Rob Lamb and then were 25 going to go to Mr. Stuart Whitt.
43 1 MR. LAMB: Good afternoon. Im Rob Lamb, 2 Vice President of the Quad Cities Development Group.
3 Were the organization that serves as the economic 4 umbrella for the greater Quad Cities area covering 5 Rock Island, Henry counties in Illinois and Scott 6 County in Iowa.
7 We support the license renewal application 8 for the Quad Cities Nuclear Generating Station. The 9 station is a vital part of the economy of the Quad 10 Cities and has a broad impact on the economy in three 11 areas.
12 The first benefit is electricity. For 13 three decades the plant has supplied the competitively 14 priced, reliable and environmentally friendly source 15 of power for our area. This has been a tremendous 16 marketing advantage for the Quad Cities area. To 17 continue marketing the Quad Cities to manufacturers 18 and other businesses we need the plant to remain an 19 integral part of what our community has to offer.
20 The second is in terms of jobs. The 21 station employs about 700 local citizens and provides 22 good income to many area families. The annual payroll 23 from the station puts about 50 million dollars into 24 the greater Quad Cities community. Those payroll 25 dollars buy goods and services from our businesses
44 1 which further strengthens our economy in the overall 2 area.
3 Finally, the station pays about three and 4 a half million dollars in taxes annually. These taxes 5 support our schools and our community infrastructure 6 making the greater Quad Cities more attractive to 7 companies looking to expand in this area and making 8 the Quad Cities a better place for our residents and 9 corporate citizens as well.
10 Relicensing of this plant is important to 11 our families, our corporate citizens, our schools and 12 our governments. As long as this facility continues 13 to be a strong economic asset in the area providing 14 cost competitive reliable energy, significant payroll 15 dollars, and critically needed property taxes the Quad 16 Cities Development Group recommends you approve the 17 relicensing request. Thank you.
18 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much, Mr.
19 Lamb. Mr. Whitt.
20 MR. WHITT: My name is Stuart Whitt and Im 21 a principal of Whitt Law which is a firm of attorneys 22 in Aurora, Illinois. I represent the County Board of 23 Rock Island County, the Board of Trustees of Blackhawk 24 College Illinois Community College District No. 503, 25 and the Board of Education of Erie Community Unit 26 School District No. 1 in litigation currently pending
45 1 before the State of Illinois Property Tax Appeal Board 2 with regard to the ad velorum real property taxes to 3 be paid by the station, by the owners of the Quad 4 Cities Nuclear Power Station.
5 Construction permits for both the Quad 6 Cities Units 1 & 2 were issued by the NRC in February 7 of 1967. Unit 1 went into operation, commercial 8 operation on February 13 th, 1973 and Unit 2 on March 9 10th, 1973. Since that time the Quad Cities Nuclear 10 Power Station has had a significant positive impact 11 upon the areas economic vitality. The county, the 12 college and the school district all recognize and 13 appreciate the positive benefits the station has 14 brought to the area.
15 Since its initial construction the Quad 16 Cities Nuclear Power Station has also been a dominant 17 tax payer in the community. In tax year 2001 the 18 station accounted for four percent of the tax revenue 19 of the county. 2.6 percent of the property tax 20 revenue of the college. 54.2 percent of the tax 21 revenue of the school district. That same year the 22 station accounted for 74.4 percent of the tax revenue 23 to the local fire protection district. 75.6 percent 24 of the tax revenue to the library district and 77.2 25 percent of the tax revenue to the township among other 26 taxing bodies.
46 1 While the Quad Cities Nuclear Power 2 Station has been the dominant taxpayer in this 3 community, the amount of taxes paid here is just a 4 fraction of those paid by Exelon for its other nuclear 5 assets throughout Illinois.
6 At the Byron Nuclear Power Station taxes 7 are in excess of 25 million dollars representing 8 $11,515 of megawatt capacity. At Clinton, which is a 9 one unit station, the taxes exceed 9.5 million dollars 10 representing $10,062 of megawatt capacity. At 11 Braidwood Units 1 & 2 the tax bill exceeds 20 million 12 dollars representing $9,263 per megawatt. LaSalle, 13 $7,181 per megawatt, Dresden 2 & 3 a tax bill of 14 nearly nine million dollars or $5,627 per megawatt of 15 capacity.
16 At the same year Quad Cities Nuclear Power 17 Station paid taxes of $3,451,554 or $2,187 per 18 megawatt of capacity. The lowest in the state. Now 19 with the recent uprating that Mr. Tulon referenced 20 when he was up here, that per megawatt tax bill has 21 now been reduced to $1,892 for each megawatt of 22 capacity prior to uprating the property taxes at Quad 23 Cities represented only 19 percent of those at Bryon.
24 For each megawatt of capacity, remarkably for each 25 megawatt of capacity the Quad Cities represented only
47 1 39 percent of the megawatt tax at Dresden which is in 2 essence a twin to the Quad Cities.
3 Prior to filing their application for a 4 20-year license extension, the owners filed an 5 assessment appeal to the State of Illinois Property 6 Tax Appeal Board. In that appeal they claimed that 7 the Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station has no value 8 whatsoever for ad velorum property taxes. Theyre 9 asking to be relieved of any obligation to pay 10 property taxes in this community effectively rendering 11 the property exempt from taxation.
12 This notwithstanding the fact that the 13 station has an established record of performance well 14 in excess of 85 percent of capacity and Mr. Tulon 15 indicated a fact that the station can run now that it 16 has been refueled in 2002 that each unit can run two 17 years without stopping.
18 And I appreciate the fact that Mr. Tulon 19 indicated that the position before the property tax 20 appeal board is unreasonable. The county, the college 21 and the school district all recognized the importance 22 of the Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station to the local 23 community and the benefits associated with the 20 year 24 extension of its operating base.
25 However, reduction of the stations 26 taxable value as requested by the owners will have a
48 1 devastating impact upon the local taxing districts 2 responsible for those social services which are vital 3 to the community.
4 The county will lose over $400,000 and the 5 college will lose over a quarter of a million 6 resulting in substantial layoffs and the corresponding 7 reduction of social services. The school district 8 will lose more that two million dollars or nearly 29 9 percent of its entire budgeted revenues.
10 This loss will not be made up by the state 11 and it cannot be made up by the local community. With 12 this loss it will be impossible for the district to 13 maintain a quality educational program for its 14 students. This impact will be felt by the other 15 taxing bodies as well.
16 The environmental report filed by Exelon 17 generation company includes Section 2.8 at page F.2-18 18 regarding property taxes. The county, the college and 19 the school district all request that the Nuclear 20 Regulatory Commission solicit and accept statements 21 from the local taxing bodies for inclusion in the 22 supplemental environmental impact statement and 23 further ask that Edison drop its appeal. Thank you.
24 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much, Mr.
25 Whitt. Were going to go next to Chris Silbert and 26 then to Larry Topper. Its Chris Sibert? Cerbert?
49 1 Anyone close to the name Chris Silbert? Okay. Im 2 sorry, but I know its, its you.
3 MS. FILBERT: Its me. Thank you. Really 4 good news, my comments are one page long and theyre 5 in 14 pica so this isnt going to take too long.
6 My name is Chris Filbert. And Im here 7 today to speak in dual capacity. My first capacity is 8 of a neighbor to the Quad Cities Nuclear Generating 9 Station. My husband and I bought a house in 1973 on 10 River Road North. And people would say I cant 11 believe youre moving in next to a nuclear plant. I 12 can honestly say that I had never at one time been 13 threatened because of it.
14 We take, I feel that the nuclear 15 generating plant is a concerned neighbor. They take 16 pride in their facility and the grounds which surround 17 them. They work very hard on keeping the appearance 18 up. They have provided quality jobs to many residents 19 of Cordova Township and funds to the area school 20 district.
21 My children went to Erie School District 22 and for the 12 years of their formal education they 23 were called the powerhouse kids lending to the fact 24 that their influence of the power facility is a great 25 influence to the area. They are a quiet neighbor and 26 a caring neighbor.
50 1 September 11th did change the sleepy 2 little town as well as the rest of the nation but 3 Exelon stepped to the plate and secured a plant in the 4 outgoing areas.
5 As a neighbor, I appreciated the 6 neighborhood meetings that they held which kept the 7 area informed, knowing and non fearful. For those 8 things I thank the Quad Cities Generating Station for 9 their concerns and caring.
10 Secondly, I speak as the Road Commissioner 11 for Cordova Township. The biggest boost to the road 12 and bridge district is the tax share supported by 13 Exelon. Without that tax base our district would be 14 in serious and desperate trouble. Approximately 70 15 percent of the monies collected in taxes are Exelons 16 share. This tax base helps keep our roads in tip top 17 condition. It helps purchase equipment and pays for 18 salary of four employees. It also helps support the 19 Cordova Township Civic Center Park.
20 Recently I asked Exelon for some help in 21 clearing some trees that were blocking the sight line 22 of an intersection and what did they do, they did it 23 no problem. Then I asked if theyd help with another 24 intersection that had a safety issue. What did they 25 do, they got it done no problem. When they were asked 26 to donate land for the great river bike path that goes
51 1 through Cordova Township no problem, it was donated 2 and the bike path was completed through our township.
3 Its this kind of mutual caring for both, 4 by both the township and the industries that make 5 everyones job less of a worry. I do appreciate 6 Exelons professionalism and competence and whenever 7 I approach them for a problem solving issue.
8 Is Exelon a good neighbor? You bet. Is 9 Exelon good for Cordova Township? With no doubt. I 10 would like to thank the NRC for allowing me the time 11 to speak todays forum and extend my support for the 12 licensing of the Quad Cities Nuclear Station. Thank 13 you.
14 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much for your 15 comments. Excuse me for mangling your last name. All 16 right. Mr. Toppert.
17 MR. TOPPERT: Good afternoon. My name is 18 Larry Toppert and Id like to thank the NRC for the 19 opportunity to be part of the licensing process. Im 20 a life long resident of the upper county, graduated 21 from Riverdale schools, went to Western Illinois 22 University. Im a certified hazardous materials 23 technician as well as an instructor in the program.
24 Ive been published in a hazardous waste magazine and 25 have a patten on a separate of issues for waste 26 reduction.
52 1 From 1986 through 1998 I lived in a family 2 farm two miles from the Exelon plant. It was there 3 that my wife and I, Deb, raised two daughters, a 4 couple of dogs, a million cats, a couple of raccoons, 5 possums and even an occasional skunk.
6 Well, back in 1983 Deb and I started 7 Toppert Jetting Service an environmental management 8 company. And its through this environmental 9 management company that Ive had contact with Exelon.
10 Weve worked not only for Exelon but for Federal, 11 State and county and municipal governments. Weve 12 also worked for fortune 100 companies, fortune 500 13 companies and even those companies that are a little 14 bit less fortunate in the Quad Cities.
15 I bring a unique perspective to the 16 licensing process, in that Ive been a neighbor close 17 at hand to the plant, and Ive been a contractor in 18 the plant. And for the last 14 years Ive worked in 19 areas in the plant that include chemistry, rad 20 protection, engineering, security, wastewater 21 treatment as well as with other contractors in the 22 plant.
23 Ive worked on some 14 different projects 24 that, and Ive been involved in everything from sewer 25 cleaning to underground storage tank removal to 26 special waste handling in the plant. And the elements
53 1 of these projects were always the same. They revolved 2 around safety, security and environmental sensitivity.
3 Coordinating these elements with a contractor and the 4 various departments in the plant is no easy task. And 5 Im here to say to you that Exelon excels at managing 6 the safety, security and the environment of the plant.
7 It is an extraordinary, it is the 8 extraordinary professionalism and the training of 9 those people within the departments that has enabled 10 the projects that Ive been involved in to be 11 successfully completed.
12 And even over this 14-year period of time, 13 Ive had the opportunity because of advancements and 14 retirements within the plant to work with other 15 individuals on similar projects and the, even though 16 the management changed, the professional and the 17 training was always a continuation of what we had 18 originally started.
19 In all my years as a contractor Ive not 20 seen any decrease in the pursuit of the best in 21 safety, security and the environment.
22 And from this position of being a close 23 neighbor and a contractor I say that its Exelons 24 continued dedication to the safety that has earned 25 them the right to remain a significant part of our 26 community for years to come. And I would urge the NRC
54 1 to renew the license for the Quad Cities Nuclear 2 Generating Station. Thank you.
3 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Mr.
4 Toppert. Next were going to go to Mr. Don Swensson 5 and then Patrick OConnor and then Katharine Sutt.
6 MR. SWENSSON: Thank you very much. Im 7 here this afternoon to talk to you about the fishery 8 that has been maintained and created by the power 9 plant.
10 The power plant raises walleyes every 11 year. Ive helped collect walleyes for the, bringing 12 of those fish and helped at various times both the 13 State of Illinois and with the power plant people.
14 The State of Illinois has a real plus 15 factor when youre talking about Pool 14 and Pool 13 16 on the river. Last week there was a 14 pound, two 17 ounce walleye taken out of Pool 14. That might be one 18 of the ones released by the nuke plant, I dont know.
19 People say well, it wasnt, it wasnt one of those 20 fish. You cant really tell the way theyre branded.
21 Its impossible to tell by the looks of the fish 22 whether or not it was one of those fish or not.
23 After the fish, if you would skin the 24 fish, yes, you could probably tell by looking at the 25 inside, from the inside the skin you could see the 26 brand marks that are put on those fish.
55 1 But it is with a great deal of 2 appreciation from the fishermen in this area to what 3 is happening in the river. That section of the river, 4 Pool 14 is probably the most outstanding walleye 5 fishery and people talk about going north to fish for 6 walleyes, Pool 14 is probably one of the better 7 walleye fisheries in, on the Mississippi River.
8 And the hybrid striped bass dont seem to 9 want to stay in Pool 13 or 14, they end up heading 10 south. Ive caught a few of them. Ive never caught 11 a lot of them but they do head south and I go all the 12 way to Arkansas to try to catch them. Not those fish 13 but fish from similar to what we have in the 14 Mississippi River.
15 But the actions of the nuclear plant in 16 maintaining a walleye fishery and a hybrid striped 17 bass fishery is an outstanding achievement, for the 18 sportsmen in this particular area. And my hats off 19 to Larry Lajune and his people on the work that they 20 do to maintain that fishery and to improve that 21 fishery. As far as Im concerned Pool 14 and Pool 13 22 are the finest two pools for walleyes in the country.
23 Thank you.
24 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Mr. Swensson. Mr.
25 OConnor.
56 1 MR. OCONNOR: Good afternoon. My name is 2 Patrick OConnor. Im a resident of the State of 3 Illinois.
4 Im here today to represent the joint 5 venture of Newberg-Perinni/Stone and Webster. Our 6 firm performs maintenance and modification work at all 7 ten of Exelons nuclear facilities here in Illinois, 8 Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
9 We advocate the license extension of Quad 10 Cities station and we encourage others to do the same.
11 Here are some facts.
12 Last year our firm worked more than 13 750,000 person-hours at the Quad Cities Station.
14 Thats the equivalent of 375 full-time employees 15 working at the site throughout the year. Our 16 employees earned more than $30 million dollars much of 17 which was returned to the local economy.
18 Apart from the hundreds of our employees 19 who work in this area many of our, we also brought in 20 many travelers. Those travelers stayed in the local 21 hotels, they bought meals from your restaurants, they 22 patronized your gas stations and they prayed in your 23 churches.
24 During the refueling outages, skilled 25 union workers from throughout the United States joined 26 hands with the local workforce to provide maintenance
57 1 on important nuclear equipment and components.
2 Pipefitters upgrade mechanical systems, electricians 3 install new circuitry to improve the stations ability 4 to monitor its equipment, carpenters erect hundreds of 5 scaffolds. All the employees, whether or Exelon or 6 contractor, work together to ensure that all the 7 needed work is performed safely and with the highest 8 quality.
9 To give you an idea of the geographical 10 reach that this plant has across the United States, in 11 the last outage in the fall, we attracted workers from 12 42 different states. The majority of the workforce is 13 from this area, but because of the talent pool that we 14 need and the criteria that we have to have to attract 15 the best workforce, we reach across the nation.
16 Our workforce is comprised of skilled 17 union building trades people. Those that Tim referred 18 to earlier. Pipefitters, boilermakes, carpenters, 19 electricians, laborers, insulators, teamsters, 20 operating engineers all working together with Exelons 21 workforce. These local unions help maintain the 22 station so that it can continue to deliver electricity 23 to our homes and businesses safely and economically.
24 I can tell you from working there that 25 Quad Cities Station is safe, orderly and operated by 26 a team of trained nuclear professionals. The safety
58 1 of the community, employees, and plant systems is at 2 the forefront of every activity performed at that 3 site. The men and women of Quad Cities Station live 4 in your community and work hard as a team to maintain 5 the highest standards of radiological safety, 6 equipment reliability, and operational excellence.
7 Their efforts have ensured that the lights will stay 8 on no matter what.
9 In the last three years, Exelon has 10 invested heavily in equipment improvements at Quad 11 Cities Station to ensure that it will perform even 12 better in the years to come. That investment has 13 resulted in additional jobs for our employees in the 14 short term and will mean plenty of work in the future 15 for refueling outages and to maintain that equipment 16 to a high state of readiness and availability.
17 The joint venture of Newberg-Perinni/Stone 18 and Webster encourages your support for the license 19 extension. We pledge to continue our best efforts to 20 work with your community to make Quad Cities Station 21 the best nuclear station in the world. Thank you very 22 much.
23 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Mr.
24 OConnor. Is there anybody else who wants to say 25 anything? Yes, sir.
59 1 MR. MALVIK: My name is John Malvik (M-a-l-2 v-i-k). I didnt register as a speaker here because 3 we had, Im on the Rock Island County Board. Im an 4 attorney in Rock Island County and a citizen who lives 5 in Moline. I, I didnt register because Mr. Bohnsack, 6 who I have the privilege of serving with on the county 7 board had, was scheduled to make remarks as was Stuart 8 Whitt the attorney representing us. But I started, I 9 found myself jotting down notes as I heard the 10 different speakers say things. And so I guess my 11 remarks are just my personal reaction to some of the 12 things that I, that I heard.
13 And my remarks have to do with the 14 socioeconomic impact thats been discussed by some of 15 the other people. And Ive heard lots of big numbers 16 that have been bandied about by the Exelon spokesmen 17 and this was, these numbers were all the money that 18 Exelon has paid and put into the community.
19 What they didnt say was what they got in 20 return. After all these were not charitable 21 contributions made by Exelon. They were monies paid 22 for goods and services. Exelon received the labor and 23 hard work of the workers that were paid. They 24 received the goods and the services that they paid 25 for.
60 1 And most importantly by paying out this 2 money, this investment in the community they received 3 the right to conduct a business by which they reaped 4 millions upon millions of dollars in profits.
5 And thats not good enough for Exelon.
6 Exelon doesnt want to pay its fair share of taxes.
7 Thats the bottom line. They dont want to pay as 8 much in taxes as they are paying. Well, who does? Im 9 a county official and I dont want to pay as much in 10 taxes as I pay.
11 This giant and profitable corporation 12 wants to shift its civic duty to pay taxes to the 13 little guy, the working men and women of our 14 community, our senior citizens, those who have to 15 struggle to make ends meet. I find Exelons conduct 16 both amoral and shameful in this regard. Thank you.
17 MR. CAMERON: Thank you for those remarks.
18 Anybody else that we didnt capture? Any questions 19 that anybody has after youve listened to the 20 presentations? Comments?
21 Okay. Im going to ask John Tappert to 22 close the meeting, the afternoon session. We will be 23 here tonight at 7:00 oclock and an open house 6:00 24 oclock. Of course youre all welcome to come back.
25 And John do you want to close it out for us?
61 1 MR. TAPPERT: Thanks, Chip. And thank all 2 of you for coming out today and providing input to our 3 scoping process for our report.
4 If you have any additional comments, Duke 5 Wheeler told you lots of ways you can communicate with 6 us and anyone with a name tag is going to be around 7 after the meeting if youd like to have a discussion 8 with us one-on-one.
9 So again, thanks for coming and we 10 appreciate your participation and have a good day.
11 (Whereupon, the above matter concluded at 12 3:00 p.m.)
13 14