ML061700050
| ML061700050 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Pilgrim |
| Issue date: | 05/17/2006 |
| From: | NRC/NRR/ADRO |
| To: | NRC/NRR/ADRO/DLR |
| Williamson A, REBA/DLR/NRR, 415-1878 | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML061700040 | List: |
| References | |
| Download: ML061700050 (108) | |
Text
Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.
Washington, D.C.
(202) 234-4433 1
2 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 3
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 4
+ + + + +
5 6
7
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -x 8
IN THE MATTER OF:
9 PUBLIC SCOPING MEETING 10 11 FOR 12 13 PILGRIM NUCLEAR POWER STATION :
14
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -x 15 Evening Meeting 16 Wednesday 17 May 17, 2006 18 19 Ballroom 20 Radisson Hotel Plymouth 21 180 Water Street 22 Plymouth, Massachusetts 23 24 The above-entitled matter was convened, 25 pursuant to Notice, at 7:05 p.m.
26
Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.
Washington, D.C.
(202) 234-4433 BEFORE:
Chip Cameron 1
3 Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.
Washington, D.C.
(202) 234-4433 I N D E X 1
SPEAKER:
PAGE:
2 Chip Cameron 4
3 Rani Franovich 8
4 Robert Schaaf 16 5
Sheila Hollis 24 6
Susan Uttal 27 7
Andre Martecchini 29 8
Mary Lampert 30 9
Sarah Thatcher 31 10 Tamara Race 34 11 Mathew Briggs 35 12 Ram Subbaratnam 36 13 Peter Roveto 37 14 David Agnew 39 15 P.T. Kuo 33 16 Ron Millican 34 17 Diane Turco 50 18 Trish Milligan 51 19 Mary Ellen Burns 52 20 Jeff Berger 55 21 Becky Chin 58 22 Peter Curley 68 23 Joyce McMahon 69 24 Arthur Powers 74 25
4 Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.
Washington, D.C.
(202) 234-4433 I N D E X 1
SPEAKER:
PAGE:
2 Leonard Curcuru 77 3
William Stone 78 4
Sandra Woods 74 5
Janet Humes 75 6
Bob Smith 76 7
Jerry Benezra 80 8
Richard Emch 88 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
5 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 P R O C E E D I N G S 1
(7:05 p.m.)
2 MR. CAMERON: Good evening, everyone. My 3
name is Chip Cameron and I am the Special Counsel for 4
Public Liaison at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 5
the NRC, we'll be using that acronym tonight. And I 6
would like to welcome you to the NRC's public meeting 7
tonight. Our subject is the environmental review that 8
the NRC conducts as one part of its evaluation of a 9
license application that we received from Entergy to 10 renew the operating license at the Pilgrim Plant, and 11 it's my pleasure to serve as your facilitator tonight 12 and, in that role, I'll try to help all of you to have 13 a productive meeting.
14 I just want to cover a few items on 15 meeting process before we get started so that you'll 16 know what to expect tonight and I would like to talk 17 about, first, the format for the meeting. Secondly, 18 some very simple ground rules and, thirdly, to 19 introduce the NRC speakers who will be giving you some 20 background on license renewal.
21 In terms of the format for tonight's 22 meeting, it's going to be a two-part format. In the 23 first part of the meeting, we are going to give you 24 some background information on the NRC's license 25
6 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 renewal process, generally, and specifically on the 1
environmental review part of that license renewal 2
process so that you have some information to know what 3
is going to be going on, what we look at.
4 The second part of the meeting is our 5
opportunity to listen to all of you, to listen to some 6
formal comments that you might have on the license 7
renewal process and specifically on the environmental 8
review. The NRC staff is going to tell you that this 9
is a scoping meeting and scoping is a term that's used 10 in connection with the preparation of environmental 11 impact statements.
12 Basically, the scoping process is designed 13 to help the NRC determine what should be within the 14 scope of this environmental impact statement, what 15 issues should be looked at, what alternatives should we 16 evaluate. And we are going to be taking written 17 comment on these issues and the staff will tell you 18 more about that, but we wanted to be here tonight with 19 you in person to hear your comments, and anything that 20 we hear tonight will have the same weight as written 21 comments.
22 In terms of ground rules for the meeting, 23 we will have a short question session after the NRC 24 presentations to see if we've explained things clearly 25
7 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 and, if you have a question, signal me and I'll bring 1
you this cordless microphone, and please introduce 2
yourself to us and we'll try to answer your question.
3 I would ask everyone to try to be brief with your 4
questions and when we are in the question period, to 5
confine that to questions. If you have a comment, 6
you'll have an opportunity to make it during the 7
comment part of the meeting.
8 I would also ask that only one person 9
speak at a time so that we could give our full 10 attention to whomever has the floor at the moment and 11 so that our court reporter, Marty Farley, can get a 12 clean transcript so he'll know who is speaking at the 13 time. When we get to the formal comment period, I'm 14 going to set a guideline of five minutes for a 15 presentation, and five minutes is enough time to 16 summarize your main points.
17 If you want to elaborate on them, you can 18 submit a written comment to us, and it also does two 19 important things, one, it alerts the NRC staff to 20 issues that we should start thinking about right away, 21 tonight, and possibly getting an opportunity to talk to 22 you in more detail about those issues. The second 23 important thing it does is it alerts everybody else in 24 the audience to what the concerns are, and I just would 25
8 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 ask you to be courteous and respect other people's 1
opinions. You are going to hear opinions tonight that 2
you may not agree with and let's just extend courtesy 3
to everyone.
4 And let me introduce the NRC speakers to 5
you. First of all, we are going to go to Rani 6
Franovich, who is right here, and Rani is the chief of 7
the environmental review section in our license renewal 8
program, and she and her staff are responsible for 9
doing the environmental reviews on all of the 10 applications that we receive for license renewal. And 11 she has had a varied career at the NRC, she has been 12 with us for about 15 years. She was a resident 13 inspector at the Catawba Nuclear Power Plant in South 14 Carolina and we have resident inspectors at all of our 15 reactors to make sure that the licensee complies with 16 our regulations, and Rani will talk a little bit more 17 about that later on.
18 She has also served as the project manager 19 for various license renewal applications, on the safety 20 evaluation, and she has been the coordinator, the 21 enforcement coordinator, in our Office of Nuclear 22 Reactor Regulation to determine what compliance 23 measures should be taken against licensees who have not 24 followed the NRC regulations. She is from that famous 25
9 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 university, Virginia Tech, and she has a bachelor's 1
degree in psychology and a master's degree in, what is 2
it, industrial and systems engineering, also from 3
Virginia Tech. She is going to give you an overview of 4
license renewal and then we are going to go to the 5
environmental review, specifically, and Mr. Bob Schaaf 6
is right here, he is going to do that for you.
7 He is the project manager on the 8
environmental review for this renewal application and 9
Bob has also been with us for about 15 years, working 10 in one of the NRC regional offices. He was a project 11 manager for a number of operating reactors and also the 12 project manager on the environmental reviews for other 13 license renewal applications, and he has a bachelor's 14 degree in mechanical engineering from Georgia Tech.
15 And with that, I would just thank all of 16 you for being with us tonight, to help us with this 17 project, and we are going to go to Rani first, and then 18 to Bob, and we'll just go through their presentations 19 and we'll open it up for questions. Thank you.
20 Rani?
21 MS. FRANOVICH: I just want to take a 22 minute to thank you all for being here, this is a very 23 important part of our review process, seeking input 24 from the local community is important to us because the 25
10 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 local community has insights that we can't necessarily 1
always glean out of data and the Internet, so thank you 2
for coming, taking time out of your busy schedules and 3
spending some time with us tonight.
4 I hope the information we provide this 5
evening will help you understand the process we are 6
going to go through with license renewal help you 7
understand the role that you can play in helping us 8
make sure that the environmental impact assessment we 9
prepare for Pilgrim license renewal is accurate.
10 The next slide, please.
11 I would like to start off by briefly going 12 over the purpose of tonight's meeting. We'll explain 13 the NRC's license renewal process for nuclear power 14 plants with emphasis on the environmental review 15 process, and we'll talk about typical areas included in 16 our environmental review. We also will share with you 17 the license renewal review schedule, then really the 18 most important part of today's meeting is for us to 19 receive comments you may have on the scope of our 20 environmental review. We also will give you some 21 information about how you can submit comments to us on 22 the scope of the review outside this meeting.
23 At the conclusion of the staff's 24 presentation, we will be happy to answer any questions 25
11 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 that you may have on the process and the scope.
1 However, I must ask you to limit your participation to 2
questions only and hold your comments until the 3
appropriate time in tonight's meeting. Once all 4
questions are answered, we can begin to receive any 5
comments you have on the scope of our environmental 6
review.
7 Next slide, please.
8 Before I get into a discussion of the 9
license renewal process, I would like to take a minute 10 to talk about the NRC in terms of what we do and what 11 our mission is. The Atomic Energy Act is the 12 legislation that authorizes the NRC to issue operating 13 licenses. The Atomic Energy Act provides for a 40 year 14 license term for power reactors, this 40 year term is 15 based primarily on economic considerations and 16 antitrust factors, not on safety limitations of the 17 plant. The Atomic Energy Act also authorizes the NRC 18 to regulate the civilian use of nuclear materials in 19 the United States.
20 In exercising that authority, the NRC's 21 mission is threefold, to ensure adequate protection of 22 public health and safety, to promote the common defense 23 and security and to protect the environment. The NRC 24 accomplishes its mission through a combination of 25
12 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 regulatory programs and processes, such as conducting 1
inspections, issuing enforcement actions, assessing 2
licensee performance and evaluating operating 3
experience from nuclear plants across this country as 4
well as internationally. The regulations that the NRC 5
enforces are contained in Title 10 of the Code of 6
Federal Regulations, which is commonly referred to as 7
10 CFR. 8 Next slide, please.
9 As I've mentioned, the Atomic Energy Act 10 provides for a 40 year license term for power reactors.
11 Our regulations also include provisions for extending 12 plant operation for up to an additional 20 years. For 13 Pilgrim, the operating license will expire June 8, 14 2012. Entergy has requested license renewal for 15 Pilgrim. As part of the NRC's review of the license 16 renewal application, we will perform an environmental 17 review to look at the impacts on the environment of an 18 additional 20 years of operation.
19 The purpose of this meeting is to give you 20 information about the process and to seek your input on 21 what issues we should consider within the scope of our 22 review.
23 Next slide, please.
24 The NRC's license renewal review is 25
13 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 similar to the original licensing process in that 1
involves two parts, an environmental review and a 2
safety review. This slide really gives a big picture 3
of the license renewal process, which involves these 4
two parallel paths. I'm going to briefly describe 5
these two review processes, starting with the safety 6
review.
7 Next slide, please.
8 Two guiding principles form the basis of 9
the NRC's approach in performing its safety review.
10 The first principle is that the current regulatory 11 process is adequate to ensure that the licensing basis 12 of all currently operating plants provides and 13 maintains an acceptable level of safety with the 14 possible exception of the effects of aging on certain 15 structures, systems and components. The second 16 principle is that the current plant specific licensing 17 basis must be maintained during the renewal term in the 18 same manner and to the same extent as during the 19 original license term.
20 Next slide, please.
21 You might ask what does the safety review 22 consider? For license renewal, the safety review focus 23 on aging management of systems, structures and 24 components that are important to safety, as determined 25
14 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 by the license renewal scoping criteria contained in 10 1
CFR, Part 54. The license renewal safety review does 2
not assess current operational issues such as security, 3
emergency planning and safety performance. The NRC 4
monitors and provides regulatory oversight of these 5
issues on an ongoing basis under the current operating 6
license. Because the NRC is addressing these current 7
operating issues on a continuing basis, we do not 8
reevaluate them again in license renewal.
9 Next slide, please.
10 As I have mentioned, the license renewal 11 safety review focuses on plant aging and the programs 12 that the licensee has already implemented or will 13 implement to manage the effects of aging. Let me 14 introduce Mr. Ram Subbaratnam, the safety project 15 manager. Ram is in charge of the staff safety review.
16 The safety review involves the NRC staff's evaluation 17 of technical information that is contained in the 18 license renewal application, this is referred to as the 19 safety evaluation. The NRC staff also conducts audits 20 as part of its safety evaluation. There is a team of 21 about 30 NRC technical reviewers and contractors who 22 are conducting the safety evaluation at this time.
23 The safety review also includes plant 24 inspections, the inspections are conducted by a team of 25
15 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 inspectors from both NRC headquarters and the Region 1
One office in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania.
2 A representative from our inspection 3
program is here today, the senior resident at Pilgrim 4
is Bill Raymond.
5 Bill, could you stand, please?
6 As Chip mentioned, we have resident 7
inspectors at all of the plants across the country.
8 Bill is the senior resident at Pilgrim, he lives in the 9
community and works at the plant 40 hours4.62963e-4 days <br />0.0111 hours <br />6.613757e-5 weeks <br />1.522e-5 months <br /> a week, he 10 and another inspector. They are the eyes and the ears 11 of the agency, they are there to make sure that NRC 12 regulations are complied with at all times.
13 The staff documents the results of its 14 review in a safety evaluation report, that report is 15 then independently reviewed by the Advisory Committee 16 on Reactor Safeguards or the ACRS. The ACRS is a group 17 of nationally recognized technical experts that serve 18 as a consulting body to the Commission. They review 19 each license renewal application and safety evaluation 20 report, they form their own conclusions and 21 recommendations on the proposed or requested action and 22 they report those conclusions and recommendations 23 directly to the Commission.
24 Next slide, please.
25
16 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 This slide illustrates how these various 1
activities make up the safety review process. I would 2
like to point out that these hexagons on the slide, 3
these yellow symbols here, these represent 4
opportunities for public participation. Also, the 5
staff will present the results of its safety review to 6
the ACRS and that presentation will be open to the 7
public.
8 Next slide, please.
9 The second part of the review process 10 involves an environmental review with scoping 11 activities and the development of an environmental 12 impact statement. As I've said, we are here today to 13 receive your comments on the scope of that review, we 14 will consider any comments on the scope that we receive 15 at this meeting or in any written form. Then, in 16 December, we will expect to issue the draft 17 environmental impact statement for comment.
18 Next slide, please.
19 So, the final agency decision on whether 20 or not to issue a renewed operating license depends on 21 several inputs, inspection reports and a confirmatory 22 letter from the Region One Administrator, conclusions 23 and recommendations of the ACRS which are documented in 24 a letter to the Commission, the safety evaluation 25
17 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 report which documents the results of the staff's 1
safety review and the final environmental impact 2
statement which documents the results of the staff's 3
environmental review.
4 Again, the yellow hexagons on the slide 5
indicate opportunities for public participation, an 6
early opportunity is during the scoping meeting 7
tonight. The meeting on the draft EIS is another 8
opportunity. At this time, there is still an 9
opportunity to request a hearing, that opportunity 10 remains open through May 27th. As I mentioned, the 11 ACRS meetings also are open to the public.
12 Before I turn the presentation over to Bob 13 Schaaf, I would like to mention a change in the staff's 14 review team. Bob has been the environmental project 15 manager for Pilgrim up until this time. However, he is 16 assuming new responsibilities and is turning the 17 project over to Alicia Williamson.
18 Alicia, could you please stand?
19 Alicia is the new project manager for 20 Pilgrim, she will take this project to the finish 21 line.
22 And now Bob will discuss the environmental 23 review in more detail.
24 MR. SCHAAF: Thank you, Rani.
25
18 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Again, my name is Bob Schaaf, I'm the 1
Environmental Project Manager for the Pilgrim license 2
renewal application review. I'm going to spend the 3
next 15 minutes or so discussing the environmental 4
review process and how the public can participate in 5
that process. The National Environmental Policy Act of 6
1969, or NEPA, requires that federal agencies follow a 7
systematic approach in evaluating potential 8
environmental impacts associated with certain actions.
9 We are required to consider the impact of the proposed 10 action and to consider mitigation for impacts that we 11 consider to be significant.
12 We are also required to consider the 13 impacts of alternatives to the proposed action, in this 14 case, license renewal. Alternatives include the no 15 action alternative. In other words, not renewing the 16 license, as well as construction and operation of 17 replacement power generating facilities and other 18 alternatives for replacing the lost generation, such as 19 conservation efforts.
20 The NEPA process requires development of 21 an environmental impact statement, or EIS, for any 22 proposed action that may significantly effect the 23 quality of the human environment. NEPA and our 24 environmental impact statement are disclosure tools, 25
19 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 they are specifically structured to involve the public 1
in the process, this meeting is a part of that effort 2
to involve the public in our environmental review.
3 Specifically, we are here to gather information on the 4
scope of our review, as Chip mentioned earlier. In 5
other words, what special issues should the staff 6
consider for the proposed Pilgrim license renewal.
7 The Commission has determined that an 8
environmental impact statement will be prepared for the 9
proposed renewal of nuclear power plant licenses. The 10 NRC staff developed a generic impact statement for 11 license renewal, referred to as the GEIS, that 12 identifies a number of issues common to all nuclear 13 plant license renewals. The staff is supplementing 14 that generic impact statement with a site specific 15 impact statement, or SEIS, that will address issues 16 that are specific to the Pilgrim site.
17 Now I would like to provide a little more 18 information about the GEIS. The generic environmental 19 impact statement for license renewal, also known as 20 NUREG-1437 or the GEIS, identified 92 environmental 21 issues that are evaluated for license renewal. On the 22 left side, 69 of these issues are considered generic, 23 or category one, which means that the impacts are 24 similar for all reactors or for all reactors with 25
20 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 certain features, such as plants that have cooling 1
towers. Only certain issues addressed in the GEIS are 2
applicable to Pilgrim. For example, GEIS issues 3
related to cooling towers are not be applicable because 4
the plant does not use cooling towers.
5 For those category one issues that are 6
applicable to Pilgrim, we will assess whether there is 7
any new information related to the issue that might 8
effect our conclusion reached in the GEIS. If there is 9
no new information, then the conclusions of the GEIS 10 are adopted for Pilgrim. If new information is 11 identified and determined to be significant, then a 12 site specific analysis will be performed for that issue 13 and identification of new and significant information 14 is one area where public participation, during scoping, 15 is particularly important.
16 Of the remaining 23 issues, down the 17 center column, 21 are referred to as category two, 18 indicating that the NRC staff found that a site 19 specific analysis is needed to determine the potential 20 impacts. For example, potential impacts to threatened 21 and endangered species need to be evaluated for each 22 site because the species present will differ from one 23 site to another. The remaining two issues, 24 environmental justice and potential chronic effects of 25
21 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 transmission line electromagnetic fields, were not 1
categorized in the GEIS and a site specific analysis is 2
needed for these issues, so a site specific analysis 3
will be performed for all category two and 4
uncategorized issues that are applicable to Pilgrim.
5 Finally, down the right side, the NRC 6
staff will look for potential new issues that were not 7
identified in the GEIS. Identification of potential 8
new issues is another area where public participation, 9
during scoping, is important in helping us identify 10 issues. This slide shows the NRC's decision standard 11 for the environmental review for license renewal. To 12 paraphrase, we are trying to determine whether the 13 environmental impacts of license renewal are great 14 enough that license renewal for Pilgrim would be 15 unreasonable. In other words, is license renewal 16 acceptable from an environmental perspective?
17 This slide lists important milestone dates 18 for our environmental review, the highlighted dates 19 indicate opportunities for public involvement in the 20 review. Our Federal Register notice of intent to 21 prepare an environmental impact statement and conduct a 22 scoping process started the scoping period for our 23 review. Again, the purpose of scoping is to scope out 24 or define the bounds of the environmental review. As I 25
22 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 noted previously, we are especially interested in 1
identifying any potential new and significant 2
information and any potential new issues. This meeting 3
is a part of the scoping process, comments from the 4
public, again, are an important tool in helping us 5
define the scope of the review.
6 The meeting is being transcribed and 7
comments provided here carry the same weight as written 8
comments submitted to the NRC. Written comments can 9
also be submitted to the NRC through June 16, 2006, as 10 indicated on the schedule.
11 Following the scoping period, the staff 12 will review the comments and issue what we call a 13 scoping summary report, which is scheduled to be issued 14 in August of this year, and that will address all of 15 the comments we have received during the scoping 16 period. We anticipate publishing the draft impact 17 statement in December of this year and we will provide 18 an opportunity for public comment on that draft. We 19 also plan to have another meeting here in January of 20 next year to receive comments on the draft.
21 Once the comment period closes, we will 22 develop the final supplemental impact statement, which 23 we expect to publish in August of next year. If you 24 would like a copy of any of these reports, please be 25
23 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 sure and leave your name and mailing address at the 1
registration desk, either on a blue card or on a yellow 2
card, if you plan to provide comments this evening. At 3
this point, again, we are in the process of gathering 4
information needed to prepare the draft impact 5
statement. As indicated here, we rely on a range of 6
information sources.
7 Two weeks ago, members of the staff and a 8
team of contracted environmental experts conducted an 9
environmental audit to help us gather information. In 10 addition to meeting with the applicant, and observing 11 conditions at the site and reviewing reference 12 documents used by the applicant in preparing their 13 environmental report, members of our team also met with 14 local, state and federal agencies to gather 15 information. Comments provided at this meeting and 16 written comments submitted by June 16th will also 17 inform our review.
18 Our team looks at a wide range of 19 environmental impact areas, some of the areas 20 considered include air quality, water quality and 21 potential effects on plants, wildlife and people living 22 in the vicinity of the plant. We also consider 23 environmental justice, which focuses on whether there 24 are minority or low income populations that may be 25
24 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 disproportionately impacted by the proposed license 1
renewal. This slide provides contact information, in 2
case you have additional questions after today.
3 Alicia and I are the designated points of 4
contact at the NRC for the environmental portion of the 5
license renewal review and, as noted earlier, Ram is 6
the project manager for the aging management portion of 7
the review. His contact information is available on 8
our Website.
9 Although our phone numbers are provided 10 here, we still need to get your specific comments 11 regarding the environmental review in some form that we 12 can document, either in writing or, as Chip has 13 indicated, through oral comments given at this 14 transcribed meeting.
15 Arrangements have been made for the 16 documents associated with our environmental review to 17 be available locally. The Plymouth Public Library, the 18 Kingston Public Library and the Duxbury Free Library 19 have all been kind enough to make some shelf space 20 available for documents related to our review. Also, 21 documents are available through our document management 22 system, which can be accessed on our internet home 23 page, and the draft and final impact statements will be 24 posted on the license renewal Web page.
25
25 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 After this meeting, comments can be 1
submitted by mail, by e-mail or in person at NRC 2
headquarters. Specific written comments can be 3
addressed via mail or e-mail at the addresses shown 4
here and, although not too many people take advantage 5
of the option, comments can be delivered in person, if 6
you happen to be in the Rockville area.
7 That concludes the formal presentation. I 8
would also like to add my thanks for your coming out 9
tonight to hear our presentations and to provide us 10 with your comments. We received a number of very, very 11 good comments this afternoon, in the afternoon session, 12 that we will be considering in our review.
13 MR. CAMERON: Great, thank you, Bob.
14 Thanks, Rani.
15 We do have time for some questions on the 16 process, if anybody has a question about what you 17 heard. Yes, ma'am? And please just introduce yourself 18 to us.
19 MS. HOLLIS: Sheila Hollis.
20 My question relates to the 21 interrelationship between the scoping and the EIS 22 process, as opposed to the intervention and request for 23 hearing process on the non-environmental issues, how 24 they relate to one another and once they come together, 25
26 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 at the end, in the relicensing decisional process.
1 MR. CAMERON: Good question.
2 MR. SCHAAF: Well the scoping comments and 3
the scoping period, which is open until June 16th, will 4
inform the environmental review and provide us 5
additional information in drafting our supplemental 6
impact statement. Separately, a notice for opportunity 7
for hearing was published in the Federal Register 8
related to the application and that opportunity for 9
hearing closes around, it's May 27th and that is a 10 separate process, which was indicated in the slides 11 that Rani presented, where there is an opportunity for 12 hearing.
13 The impact, the draft, the final impact 14 statement, the safety evaluation report, will be inputs 15 to a hearing process, if a hearing is granted. It's a 16 separate process with separate deadlines. The hearing 17 is one input to the final agency decision, the 18 supplemental impact statement would be another input to 19 a final agency decision.
20 MR. CAMERON: So that, as Bob implied, if 21 there is a hearing, environmental as well as safety 22 issues can be subjects for the hearing, and does that, 23 is that clear to you, Ms. Hollis, or do you need some 24 more clarification on that?
25
27 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 MS. HOLLIS: I understand that the process 1
is there, but I was interested in how it comes together 2
and whether one must, in order to fully participate in 3
the environmental issues, ask for a hearing, versus if 4
you wanted to have a hearing on non-environmental 5
issues. Is that, do those processes ultimately meet 6
together at the NRC decision table on the decision to 7
relicense, and all the considerations at the same time?
8 And do you have to be active in both?
9 MR. SCHAAF: I think that your answer to 10 the last question is no, it is possible for someone to 11 file a petition for hearing, and not provide comments 12 on scoping and carry through in the hearing process.
13 Alternatively, an individual could provide scoping 14 comments and not wish to be party to a hearing, and 15 those would be considered.
16 MR. CAMERON: And I may ask Susan Uttal 17 from our Office of General Counsel if she wants to add 18 anything on here but, if there is no hearing, the 19 environmental review, the safety review, the 20 inspection, the ACRS review all come together and are 21 considered in making the decision on license renewal.
22 Those same things occur even if there is a hearing, but 23 a hearing puts a finer point on the whole process.
24 Do you want to explain that to us, Susan?
25
28 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 MS. UTTAL: Susan Uttal from the Office of 1
General Counsel in the NRC. The hearing process is 2
separate from the staff review. What happens there is 3
that a person or an organization will ask for 4
intervention and present the issues, the specific 5
issues that they want to be heard. Now the issues do 6
not encompass everything that's in the review, they 7
will be pinpointed to the specific areas of interest, 8
and the hearing will be held before a three-judge 9
independent panel. Now the three judges work for the 10 NRC but they are independent of the staff and their 11 decision is made independent of the staff.
12 They will review all the materials that 13 are submitted to them by the parties on the issues that 14 are admitted for adjudication. If no hearing is 15 requested, then the hearing panel does not pass on any 16 issues involved in the license renewal evaluation but, 17 if a hearing is requested, the licensing board will 18 only pass on those issues that are presented to it and 19 that are admitted for adjudication in the hearing.
20 MR. CAMERON: And as Susan noted, the 21 hearing will focus on specific issues, rather than the 22 entire staff review, but those issues could be 23 environmental issues or they could be safety issues.
24 Okay, is that helpful? Sort of?
25
29 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 MS. HOLLIS: If the environmental issues 1
end up in a hearing, is there an appellate, what's the 2
appellate process, if one does not, if a party does not 3
feel like their environmental issues are resolved? And 4
also, if their issues are not resolved, could you 5
please explain the appellate process on the safety 6
issues?
7 MR. CAMERON: Go ahead, Susan.
8 MS. UTTAL: The process is the same. Once 9
a matter goes before a panel, a three-judge panel, for 10 hearing, if a party is not satisfied with the decision 11 of the panel on the issues, they can appeal to the 12 Commission, the Commission will determine whether to 13 take review. If it does or doesn't and you, a person 14 is not, a party is not satisfied with the Commission's 15 disposition, then you can take it to the court of 16 appeals in the federal system.
17 MR. CAMERON: --the NRC appellate process 18 and just so it's clear, because I keep hearing perhaps 19 a little confusion, is that the hearing will encompass 20 both environmental and safety issues, there is not, the 21 hearing is not only for safety issues. All right, 22 great.
23 Thank you, Susan, very much.
24 Thanks, Bob.
25
30 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Let's go to Andre and please introduce 1
yourself to us.
2 MR. MARTECCHINI: Andre Martecchini, 3
Selectman from the Town of Duxbury. I have a question 4
in terms of process. If the, I surmise that there are 5
going to be some comments that might involve studies, a 6
little bit longer term studies or requests to scope 7
that. If you have a deadline that you are going to 8
have a draft or at least your milestone says a draft 9
milestone of December of `06, which is seven months 10 away or whatever, how, if you have some longer term 11 issues that maybe need a little bit more study, how do 12 you deal with that?
13 MR. SCHAAF: Well in conducting the 14 review, we don't Commission additional environmental 15 studies, we gather the data that is available, we have 16 engaged the National Marine Fishery Service, the 17 Massachusetts Department of Marine Fisheries, for 18 example, for issues related to impacts to aquatic 19 ecology, and some other sources of information on the 20 state of the resource. The facility itself actually 21 does monitoring as well of their impacts, what they are 22 drawing into the plant.
23 We look at the available data, we look at, 24 depending upon the issue, if there it some regulatory 25
31 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 structure in place or existing mitigation which is in 1
place to minimize impacts. We take all of the 2
information that is available into account and come to 3
our best conclusion on what the impact is in that area, 4
but we don't, we don't engage new studies.
5 MR. CAMERON: If there were an issue that 6
we felt need to be explored in further detail in order 7
to make a decision, would we, would we engage in extra 8
effort? I think that's perhaps what Andre is 9
interested in.
10 MR. SCHAAF: I think we would look to what 11 information was available. I mean we might have to 12 consider whether there would be some impact to the 13 schedule but, generally, what we are looking for is 14 what is the information available on the impact of the 15 facility.
16 MR. CAMERON: Okay, Mary?
17 MS. LAMPERT: Going back to the previous 18 question, just looking at the dates, that May 27th, the 19 motion to intervene, is due. We don't know whether a 20 contention will be accepted or not and there is a 21 definite track and time period. However, on June 16th, 22 the comment period closes, so I guess to cover bases, 23 your advise would be that, in essence, we have to 24 submit to both, if we have an issue that has 25
32 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 environmental impact?
1 MR. SCHAAF: It's not necessary but I 2
think it, I guess I would consider it to be prudent.
3 If you've got a concern that you want us to consider in 4
the environmental review, then I would recommend that 5
you submit it to us as a comment for scoping.
6 MR. CAMERON: And the way that, and Susan, 7
correct me on this, okay, if I'm wrong, but the amount 8
of information, the type of information, the format 9
that the information is in is going to be different for 10 the request for intervention than it is comments on the 11 environmental, on the scoping issues, correct? Okay.
12 Let's go over here.
13 MS. THATCHER: I just think it would be a 14 clarification for people who are in the environment, we 15 happen to be from Cape Cod, where people can come, who 16 have done a fair amount of study on this issue over the 17 years, can come and voice their fears and what this 18 means in an enormous, let's see 26 years. I think 19 where we are concerned on Cape Cod is the safety issue 20 of your spent fuel pool. Now where can regular people 21 come in, not hearing all these dates, where would the 22 best place for people who have spent a lot of time 23 looking and doing research and feel that they need to 24 have a forum where they can say this is a pretty scary 25
33 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 situation?
1 And with all this technical stuff that we 2
are hearing now, the impact of this and that, we are 3
not hearing what the real heartfelt fright of us who 4
have children, and children, grandchildren and great 5
grandchildren. I think we need a forum where things 6
are a little less formal and where just people who are 7
neighbors of the plant really want to hear about 8
protections, about what that spent fuel pool is going 9
to do in the next 26 years, with no place to take 10 stuff, so I think that's what I want to hear.
11 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you.
12 Rani, I've, why don't you answer and then 13 I might have a suggestion in terms of what this lady is 14 looking for, but go ahead.
15 MS. FRANOVICH: When it comes to spent 16 fuel that's located in the fuel pool, the fuel pool is 17 one of those structures that is within the scope of 18 license renewal, so is it examined in so far as the 19 effects of aging are addressed. When it comes to spent 20 fuel that's not in the pool, and I'm not aware of any 21 dry cast storage at Pilgrim, then the issues would be 22 beyond the scope of the license renewal review, if they 23 are not related to aging, and there are several options 24 available to members of the public. You could petition 25
34 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 for rulemaking, if you feel that the NRC's regulations 1
do not adequately cover safety of the spent fuel pools, 2
or you could, on the safety side, if you feel like 3
there is an aging issue that is not being addressed by 4
the staff, then you could request hearing on that 5
concern.
6 MR. CAMERON: I think she was talking 7
about using spent fuel as an example but talking about 8
basic concerns of people who live near the plant, in 9
some informal way, where they can express those 10 concerns, and certainly you can express those concerns 11 at this meeting. When we have the draft environmental 12 impact statement meeting, you could express those 13 concerns and, occasionally, the staff will just sit 14 down, informally, with people and perhaps talk to them 15 about issues, and I guess I would just ask Rani and her 16 staff to take that possibility under advisement so that 17 you would have that forum.
18 MS. FRANOVICH: And certainly the staff 19 will be available after the public meeting to meet with 20 members of the public.
21 MR. CAMERON: Okay, let's go over here and 22 please introduce yourself.
23 MS. RACE: My name is Tamara Race. And in 24 answer to your question, I have been involved in 25
35 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 several issues across the country like this and, in 1
answer to your question, one of the things that you 2
might do is write those findings and submit them as a 3
comment to the scope or to the scoping. Also, it's 4
very helpful when draft environmental statements are 5
issued, there are times when you can submit again any 6
studies you have performed, any research you have done 7
that you would like to submit and make part of the 8
record.
9 That can be done as part of your public 10 comment process, as well as some of the things that 11 Chip has so ably represented to you, there are a lot of 12 options under public participation strategies that the 13 NRC have and most federal agencies will have that allow 14 you to function as a proponent of a particular either 15 opinion or of a particular study. I have certainly 16 myself submitted opinions and studies that have been 17 supported as comments, versus just as a personal 18 opinion, so you may want to think about submitting it 19 like that as well and they will be considered, I'm 20 pretty sure.
21 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Tamara.
22 And I guess, for the record, could we get 23 your name, ma'am?
24 MS. THATCHER: Sarah Thatcher, from 25
36 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Dennis, Cape Cod.
1 MR. CAMERON: Sarah Thatcher.
2 Other questions? Yes, sir?
3 MR. BRIGGS: Hi. My name is Matthew 4
Briggs and I live in close physical proximity to the 5
plant and I was wondering if you could give me the feel 6
for the total number of NRC inspectors that are 7
involved in inspecting the facility, both right at 8
Pilgrim, as you go through this, and back at the NRC 9
offices when the field work is complete.
10 MS. FRANOVICH: I can give it a shot and, 11 if I miss the mark, Bill Raymond can correct me.
12 There are two inspectors assigned to work 13 at Pilgrim 40 hours4.62963e-4 days <br />0.0111 hours <br />6.613757e-5 weeks <br />1.522e-5 months <br /> a week, they spend five to seven 14 years, typically, at a site and then they move on to 15 another site but, at all nuclear power plants in the 16 country, we have at least two inspectors. For 17 multi-unit sites, three unit sites, we may have as many 18 as three. The regional office, Region One is in King 19 of Prussia, Pennsylvania and they have what we consider 20 experts in certain specific areas. There may be expert 21 health physicists, expert materials examiners, 22 materials inspectors who come out to the site on 23 periodic intervals and conduct special inspections that 24 are part of the baseline inspection program.
25
37 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 And basically, the inspection programs, 1
the reactor oversight program has a number of 2
inspections, some actually look at processes, like 3
corrective action programs, problem identification and 4
resolution. So the NRC is, I can't give you a number, 5
precisely, but I would say, in the course of a year, 6
you could have 15-20 NRC inspectors visit that plant, 7
above and beyond the inspectors that are assigned 8
there.
9 Does that answer your question?
10 MR. BRIGGS: I think it does, as far as 11 routine visits, but I am also interested in their 12 presence for the license renewal process, how many 13 additional inspectors are involved in the additional 14 work that's done?
15 MS. FRANOVICH: Between the NRC staff and 16 contractors, Ram, would you say seven to nine 17 inspectors?
18 MR. SUBBARATNAM: Yeah. The team of 19 inspectors--
20 MR. CAMERON: Let me get this on the 21 record for us, okay? And please introduce yourself to 22 us.
23 MR. SUBBARATNAM: They will come in and be 24 doing inspections during the process of, under a six or 25
38 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 seven month effort. So there will be more than one 1
opportunity for inspectors to come in, walk through the 2
plant, look at specific issues, address them and then 3
document them in the inspection reports. At the end of 4
all the inspection, one of the process requirements is 5
to have, your final regional administrator's approval 6
letter saying that there is satisfactory inspection has 7
been completed, specifically applicable to the license 8
renewal will be required. That is the process which is 9
the process to do it, so there will be more than two or 10 three inspections dedicated to the license renewal 11 process.
12 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Ram.
13 Does our resident, do you want to add 14 anything? All right, does that give you an idea?
15 MR. BRIGGS: Yes, it does.
16 MR. CAMERON: Other questions before we go 17 into the comment? Yes, sir?
18 MR. ROVETO: My name is Peter Roveto, I 19 live in Duxbury.
20 Just a process question. Did I understand 21 that you've got a safety process and you've got an 22 environmental impact process and you do not take the 23 operating record of the plant into account in the 24 renewal at all? And why is that so?
25
39 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 MR. CAMERON: Okay and, of course, 1
operating record could encompass environmental or 2
safety issues, so the question is how does the 3
operating experience of the plant play into license 4
renewal?
5 MS. FRANOVICH: Well I think the question 6
may be a little different from that, Chip. Is the 7
question, you know, if they have current performance 8
issues, why is that not considered for license renewal?
9 Okay, 10 CFR, Part 50 are the regulations that govern 10 current operation. They are required to meet those 11 regulations today, so the resident inspectors, the 12 inspectors from the regional office and, even at 13 headquarters, we hold the applicant or the licensee 14 accountable to those regulations now. If there are 15 safety and performance issues at Pilgrim, then they are 16 being dealt with through the reactor oversight program.
17 We have a number of options available to 18 us, we can demand addition, demand information, a 19 demand for information, we can issue orders, we can 20 just pick up the phone, and call the site vice 21 president and say we have concerns in this area, and 22 they will respond, they will address those concerns, so 23 that's going on under a separate process. For license 24 renewal, we focus specifically on aging because there 25
40 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 are a number of other programs and processes in place 1
that are addressing the safety and performance issues, 2
if there are any, right now. Does that answer your 3
question?
4 MR. CAMERON: Does that get it, Peter?
5 MR. ROVETO: That does answer the 6
question.
7 MR. CAMERON: Good. Thanks, Rani, for 8
picking up on that.
9 MS. FRANOVICH: The gentleman doesn't look 10 terribly satisfied with the answer, but we can talk 11 some more after the meeting, if you would like.
12 MR. CAMERON: Anybody else? Yes?
13 MR. AGNEW: David Agnew, Chatham, Mass.
14 I might be a little thick, but I'm 15 wondering if you could clarify what is appropriate to 16 field, in terms of comments regarding the scope of the 17 environmental study and, I mean, to me, the word 18 environment is a pretty big word, like everything is in 19 the environment. So, you know, plutonium in the 20 lobsters, is that worthy of consideration? Cancer in 21 humans, is that worthy of consideration? A half 22 billion gallons of hot water a day dumped into Cape Cod 23 Bay, is that worthy of consideration?
24 And then, if you would, I realize that 25
41 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 tonight is specifically about the environmental and not 1
about the safety aspect, but I wonder if you could, 2
since these meetings are few and far between, if you 3
might be able to very briefly tell us when the deadline 4
is to submit such comments as might be heard under the 5
safety aspect of the review?
6 MR. CAMERON: So, Bob, are you going to do 7
the what's generally within scope and out of scope?
8 MR. SCHAAF: Well I might take the second 9
one first in that there is not really an analogous 10 comment process on the safety review, there are 11 opportunities for public involvement and those are the 12 filing a petition to request a hearing, there is an 13 opportunity when the Advisory Committee for Reactor 14 Safeguards reviews the application and the safety 15 evaluation report that the staff has prepared. They do 16 take public comments at those meetings, I think they 17 can be provided to them in writing, if someone, and we 18 can give you an answer for that, if you are interested.
19 They may be able to be provided in writing because they 20 typically hold those meetings in Rockville.
21 So there is not really a similar process 22 for providing comments. To the extent that we receive 23 comments that may relate to the aging management review 24 that the safety PM is conducting for license renewal, 25
42 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 we do, we do forward those to them for their 1
consideration in their review, but they don't offer a 2
public reply to those comments, such as we do with 3
scoping comments and comments on the draft, they factor 4
it into their review. As far as issues to be provided 5
on the environmental impact, certainly all of those 6
examples you gave are valid issues.
7 Honestly, it does help somewhat for folks 8
to do a little bit of homework in looking at the GEIS, 9
it's available on our website, and getting and 10 understanding of the background and the information 11 that has been considered in the development of those 12 category one issues. But certainly, if you are aware 13 of particular studies in an area that, or impacts that 14 you have concerns with, anything that relates to 15 aquatic ecology, terrestrial ecology, water quality, 16 water use, both ground water and surface water, you 17 know, threatened and endangered species, human health 18 impacts, anything that might be considered in any way 19 an environmental impact that you have a concern with or 20 issues are within the scope of our, may be within the 21 scope of our review, I'll put it that way, but it is a 22 pretty, it is a pretty broad review.
23 MR. CAMERON: Did you mention, on the 24 safety side, that when we do meetings on safety issues 25
43 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 that, although there are a meeting with the license 1
applicant, that the public has an opportunity to offer 2
observations on those safety issues.
3 MR. SCHAAF: When the inspection teams and 4
the audit teams for the safety review perform their 5
audits or inspections at the site, they do have exit 6
meetings, and it is a different level of involvement 7
that is offered but it is, there is an opportunity for 8
members of the public to question the staff on the 9
results of the review and to, and to comment on issues 10 of concern. It's not, they are not typically 11 transcribed meetings, such as this one, but the staff 12 is available to receive those comments and questions.
13 MR. CAMERON: And David, we are going to 14 go to Dr. P.T. Kuo, who is head of the license renewal, 15 deputy director of the license renewal program, to talk 16 more about the safety side, but I would just encourage 17 you because, as you said, environment is a very broad 18 term and, even though the generic statement might have 19 closed generically some issues, even those issues can 20 be opened if new and significant information is 21 presented. That's why we encourage people, if you have 22 a concern, if you have an issue, give us that issue so 23 that we can look at it and decide whether it's 24 ultimately in scope. And I'm going to ask Dr. Kuo to 25
44 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 talk about the safety issues.
1 MR. KUO: Thank you, Chip.
2 On the safety side, we do not have a 3
similar process, like the review that we have now.
4 However, we have many meetings with the applicants on 5
safety issues and every, each and every of these 6
meetings are public. In addition to that, we also have 7
audit teams on site, most likely they will come to the 8
site for about three times, do three audits, in other 9
words, and each of these audit meetings, after we 10 complete all these three meetings, then we will have an 11 exit meeting, or you can call it a status meeting.
12 That is to tell that between the NRC staff and the 13 applicant, to tell the applicant what our findings are, 14 what the issues are and that is also public, the public 15 can attend those meetings, if you wish.
16 And I'll come back to the issue this 17 gentleman brought about the operating records. When we 18 do the safety review, as Rani indicated several times, 19 we focus on the aging, so we review the aging 20 management program and in each of these aging 21 management programs, operating experience is one of the 22 most important factors we consider. So when we have, 23 when we review the aging management program, we will 24 review the operating experience records, whether they 25
45 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 are a current program actually is equal to job that we 1
want them to do.
2 If not, then they, say they have a program 3
to try to prevent a leak, and if they have several 4
leaks in the operating period and they say they have 5
the corrective action program to correct this problem, 6
well after the corrective program, they still have 7
leaks, then we will have questions about how effective 8
is your corrective action program, so that's a part of 9
our review. So it's all factored into our review about 10 each. I hope this answers your questions.
11 MR. CAMERON: Thank you so much, P.T.,
12 that's an important clarification.
13 And just to emphasize something, I believe 14 someone had a question over here, just to emphasize one 15 final thing for David that Bob said is that even though 16 we are here to hear environmental concerns, if someone 17 has a safety concern, we want to hear that expressed 18 and that's why we have Ram here. We make sure that 19 those safety issues are referred over so that Ram can 20 be sure that those are considered in the safety review.
21 Yes, sir?
22 MR. MILLICAN: Hi. My name is Ron 23 Millican. I have a couple of questions, which I 24 apologize if they are not relevant to the process, but 25
46 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 I think it's a point of information that members of the 1
community would want to know about, and the first is 2
what is the average life of a nuclear plant of this 3
design?
4 MR. SCHAAF: Well the plants are licensed 5
for 40 years, but that's based, in the Atomic Energy 6
Act, on economic considerations. Some components may 7
have been designed with a 40 year life in mind because 8
of that, but many of those components are replaced over 9
the life of the facility and that is what the focus of 10 the aging management review is on is to look at any 11 components that had originally a 40 year design life.
12 Part of the safety review is to go to the applicant to 13 prepare what we call time limited aging analyses, to 14 reevaluate those to extend the design life of those 15 components to a, for a 20 year renewal, a 60 year 16 operating period. I don't know if that quite gets to 17 your question.
18 MR. MILLICAN: But it does, but it doesn't 19 what the average life is. I mean if --.
20 MS. FRANOVICH: There is no numerical 21 value that can be provided to answer the question. As 22 Bob mentioned and as I stated when I gave my 23 presentation, the life of the plant is limited by the 24 Atomic Energy Act, not design considerations. In other 25
47 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 words, the plant is licensed to operate for 40 years 1
because that's what the Atomic Energy Act authorizes, 2
not because that's as good as the plant can last. The 3
plant can last longer than 40 years, certain components 4
may need to be refurbished or replaced. Sometimes 5
those refurbishments and replacements take place in the 6
current operating term, in the first 40 years.
7 So it just depends on what the component 8
is, what the design life of the component is, not the 9
plant, and what the licensee or applicant proposes to 10 do to either manage the aging, refurbish the component, 11 monitor aging or replace it, get a new one. Does that 12 answer your question?
13 MR. MILLICAN: Sort of, but I guess my 14 follow up question would be, as in any type of plant, 15 there must be some period of which the plant wears out, 16 or the physical structure or the radioactivity within 17 the plant itself, or are you saying that these plants 18 could last for 200 years?
19 MS. FRANOVICH: I didn't say they could 20 last for 200 years.
21 MR. MILLICAN: I know, I said that, but 22 you said indefinitely or didn't say a time period, so 23 I'm curious.
24 MS. FRANOVICH: The answer is component 25
48 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 specific, it's operating experience specific and that's 1
what the staff looks at. On a component by component 2
basis, what's the component, what's the material of the 3
component, what's the environment that the component is 4
exposed to, what are the aging effects and what is an 5
appropriate aging management program. Bob mentioned 6
time limited aging analyses, these are analyses on 7
components that are assumed to be long lived, that have 8
an analyzed life where the applicant can say based on 9
where this component's life is at this point in time, 10 we can analyze that the life can be extended by another 11 15 or 20 years, so those are options as well.
12 But it's not that the plant all of a 13 sudden, over night, at year 40, is no longer capable of 14 running, it's component and structure specific. And so 15 when a particular component or structure has been 16 subjected to an environment that causes aging effects 17 that need to be dealt with, that's what the staff 18 verifies the applicant will do for license renewal.
19 MR. MILLICAN: Okay, just one more, sorry.
20 So that would indicate that there has never been a 21 decommissioning of a nuclear plant in the U.S.?
22 MS. FRANOVICH: I don't think that's a 23 cogent statement. There have been plants that have 24 decommissioned for economic reasons.
25
49 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 MR. MILLICAN: For economic reasons but 1
not for safety reasons?
2 MS. FRANOVICH: Right. Now the staff has 3
the opportunity to issue an order to shut down a plant 4
for safety concerns, but it will do that in the current 5
operating term, it won't wait and say we are just not 6
going to renew your license. It would take the action 7
to issue an order to shut the plant down as soon as it 8
has a concern with safety, but the plants that have 9
chosen not to continue to operate have done that for 10 economic reasons.
11 MR. MILLICAN: Okay.
12 MR. CAMERON: I think it's important that, 13 is one more question that the reason that some of those 14 plants, you are saying it's economic reasons, but it 15 may have been that in order to comply with NRC safety 16 regulations, that--
17 MS. FRANOVICH: Capital investments would 18 have precluded--
19 MR. CAMERON: --plant would have to do 20 something and they decided that the cost benefit was 21 not there, and that's what Rani means by the economic, 22 but the driver was the compliance with NRC safety 23 regulations.
24 MR. MILLICAN: Okay, thank you, and thank 25
50 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 you for your patience, one more question.
1 MS. FRANOVICH: Good clarification, 2
thanks, Chip.
3 MR. MILLICAN: If, at some point, this 4
particular plant had to be decommissioned and the 5
current owners were not financially able to do that 6
because of the amount of the cost, who would be 7
responsible for picking up the cost to decommission a 8
plant that was deemed to be unsafe?
9 MS. UTTAL: There is a decommissioning 10 fund that all utilities have been required to 11 contribute to since, I guess since the day they started 12 to operate, and I think that decommissioning fund was 13 up to maybe $16 billion, at last count.
14 MR. CAMERON: And don't confuse the Price 15 Anderson with the individual licensee.
16 MS. UTTAL: This is not Price, each 17 individual plant is required to have a decommissioning 18 fund, in a minimum amount, that is outside the 19 administrative control of the licensee, and most of the 20 licensees have chosen to have trust funds that they 21 invest in and the money is put in in various ways, 22 whether they are an electric utility or a nonelectric 23 utility. There is a mandatory minimum that is 24 recalculated every year, it's in 50, 10 CFR 50.75 and 25
51 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 five years before the licensee, the license is to 1
terminate, they have to do a site specific study to 2
pinpoint exactly how much it will cost to decommission, 3
but each licensee has many millions of dollars in these 4
decommissioning funds. I don't know what the status of 5
Pilgrim, I believe that it's fully funded and I believe 6
that's of the day it was transferred.
7 MR. CAMERON: It is fully funded.
8 MS. UTTAL: It is fully funded because 9
when it was transferred, it was required by the staff 10 to have a fully, and by the regulations to have a fully 11 funded decommissioning fund.
12 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you, Susan.
13 I think we need to get to comments and is 14 there, do we have one more question?
15 Diane? Go ahead. A question?
16 MS. TURCO: It was just so nice to come 17 down to Plymouth, what a beautiful town it is, it's so 18 quaint and it just brings to back to like the `60s, and 19 it made us think about that too because now, when you 20 talk about the environment, the environment of the Town 21 of Plymouth and surrounding areas has changed greatly, 22 the population has just boomed, and yet the emergency 23 plans are around these kind of narrow, small streets.
24 And my question is, and this is very 25
52 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 serious, is emergency planning and the safety, does the 1
NRC feel that the ten mile emergency planning zone can 2
be safely evacuated in the event of an accident at 3
Pilgrim? A fast moving accident.
4 MR. CAMERON: Can we go to Trish? Trish, 5
did you hear the question? Trish Milligan is with our 6
Nuclear Safety and Incident Response staff at NRC 7
headquarters and an emergency planning expert.
8 MS. MILLIGAN: Okay, as I understand your 9
question, it was does the NRC believe that the 10 population in the ten mile emergency planning zone can 11 be safeLy evacuated in a fast moving accident? There 12 are a variety of protective measures that would be 13 implemented in a fast moving accident, emergency 14 planning is not just evacuation, there is a lot that 15 goes into it, sheltering is one of those options. So, 16 through a combination of protective actions, yes, the 17 NRC believes that the population within the ten mile 18 emergency planning zone of the Pilgrim Station can be 19 safety protected in the event of a fast moving 20 accident.
21 MR. CAMERON: Thank you and thank you for 22 that question.
23 Let's go to comments and if we have any 24 time left or there are other questions, we'll go to 25
53 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 that. We are going to start with some local officials, 1
we are going to go to Thomas Bott and then to Mary 2
Ellen Burns and then to Andre Martecchini. Mr. Bott?
3 Okay, thank you.
4 Mary Ellen?
5 MS. BURNS: Good evening. My name is Mary 6
Ellen Burns, I am an elementary educator and a former 7
elementary school administrator. I am a town meeting 8
representative in Precinct 13, West Plymouth. My 9
husband and I have been residents of Plymouth for the 10 past 20 years, our 19 year old son was born here.
11 Very briefly tonight, it is my intent to 12 express to the NRC support for the renewal of the 13 license of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station. It is my 14 opinion, as well as the opinion of a significant number 15 of residents, to whom have spoken, both within my 16 precinct as well as within the general Plymouth 17 population, that the renewal of the license would 18 indeed be in the best interest of the community of 19 Plymouth. Thank you.
20 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Mary Ellen.
21 And we are going to go to Andre 22 Martecchini now. Do you want to use this? It's up to 23 you, it's totally up to you.
24 MR. MARTECCHINI: Thank you very much. I 25
54 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 would like to thank the NRC for holding this event, and 1
my name is Andre Martecchini, I'm from the Town of 2
Duxbury, I'm a selectman, I represent about 15,000 3
people within the emergency evacuation zone of Pilgrim 4
Nuclear Power Plant. We have, in Duxbury, been very 5
concerned about the plant over the years, so I think 6
it's very important that certainly we, the citizens of 7
Duxbury, but certainly all of the citizens of this area 8
be very concerned about what goes into the scope of 9
this draft EIR. I would like to mention just two 10 points, briefly, one of them would be health concerns.
11 We have heard various studies have been 12 performed and I would like to make sure that the scope 13 does take into account an examination of various 14 studies of cancer. I know I have anecdotally seen, in 15 Duxbury, people with breast cancer, with various types 16 of cancers, that I'm not sure, and I don't know the 17 answer, and I'm not accusing anyone of anything, but I 18 would like to make sure that if there is any evidence 19 that does link health effects from radiation to these 20 various cancers, that that be studied and, if there is 21 obviously a causal effect, that, to me, would be 22 grounds for not relicensing the plant.
23 I believe we have very, very little data 24 monitoring radiation in the area. There may be 25
55 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 occasional radiation monitors at the plant but, for 1
instance, in Duxbury, we don't have any radiation 2
detectors, so I think I hear people say that even 3
during, if we had any kind of an event, it would be 4
very important for us to know where, if there is a 5
radiation release, where is it going and is it in fact 6
in Duxbury, or is it in Carver or is it in Plymouth?
7 So I think, as one of the mitigation things that I 8
would like to very strongly request, is that radiation 9
monitors be put throughout the area, and many of them.
10 And it would be, I think, in Pilgrim's 11 interest to have that because if, as I think they 12 claim, that radiation is not being disseminated around, 13 that would certainly prove their point. If there is 14 nothing being measured, then that's great for all of us 15 to know.
16 And secondly, the area of marine and 17 environmental concerns, the Town of Duxbury and I know 18 the Town of Plymouth, we have a thriving, and 19 aquaculture and marine fisheries business going on, and 20 not to mention the recreational sailing, and fishing 21 and everything. We are very concerned. As we see 22 today, we've had to close the bay, up and down the 23 coast, because of the flooding and rain. What is the 24 effect of the heat of the discharge that's being dumped 25
56 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 into the bay? How does that effect our environment for 1
our marine industries? So I think those two things I 2
would like to make sure will get in there and I will 3
have some formal written comments to be submitted 4
later. Thank you.
5 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Selectman 6
Martecchini.
7 We are going to go to Jeff Berger, and 8
then Becky Chin and then Mary Lampert. Jeff?
9 MR. BERGER: Thank you. My name is, 10 excuse me for sitting, I'm recovering from cancer 11 surgery. My name is Jeff Berger, I'm Chairman of the 12 Nuclear Matters Committee of Plymouth, an advisory 13 group to the Plymouth Board of Selectmen.
14 In commenting about what Andre just said, 15 we do need to find out whether there is any 16 statistically significant amount of radiation in the 17 communities surrounding this plant and we need to find 18 out whether there is any relationship between that and 19 incidents of cancer that are statistically significant 20 in being higher than should normally be expected.
21 I have a certain kind of cancer and so do 22 the four people that live next to me on my street, we 23 need to find out why. I'm not casting dispersions on 24 the plant or suggesting that it's cause, that it's the 25
57 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 cause of this, but we do need to find out what the 1
cause is. There is an environmentally related 2
Achilles's Heel instituted for Plymouth and the towns 3
surrounding Plymouth and that Achilles's Heel is caused 4
by the NRC's current regulations. Here is the problem, 5
under your regulations, Entergy's Pilgrim Nuclear Power 6
Plant is told to monitor winds only from within the 7
grounds of the plant, no meteorological monitoring is 8
required anywhere else.
9 Consequently, should there be a serious 10 accident at Pilgrim, which results in the emission of a 11 dangerous, high radioactive plume, your required 12 monitoring will only tell emergency officials where the 13 wind is blowing at the plant, not where the plume is 14 actually going. Plymouth is a coastal community.
15 Particularly, in the summer, Plymouth may experience 16 sea breezes, cold fronts, warm fronts, occluded fronts 17 and other variations in wind speed and direction. A 18 member of our committee, Richard Rothstein, is a 19 certified consulting meteorologist with over three 20 decades of power and industrial consulting experience, 21 that's the gentleman sitting to my right.
22 In laymen's terms, he is a scientist 23 capable of giving expert testimony concerning wind 24 conditions. His findings, under the auspices of the 25
58 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Nuclear Matters Committee, make it abundantly clear 1
that your monitoring tells officials nothing about 2
where a dangerous radioactive plume is actually going.
3 Your monitoring only says where the plume came from and 4
we already know that. If emergency officials within 5
the EPZ assume that a radioactive plume will travel in 6
a straight line from the plant, and if they make life 7
or death decisions based on that wrong assumption, they 8
could easily send thousands of Plymouth residents, 9
Duxbury residents and residents from surrounding towns 10 directly into the path of a radioactive cloud, 11 jeopardizing their health and their lives.
12 I believe you have said that, in the case 13 of a serious accident at Pilgrim, you intend to send 14 people into the field to monitor the plume's movement, 15 that will not work. In an age of cell phones, text 16 massaging and the Internet, news of a severe problem at 17 Pilgrim will reach most Plymouth almost instantly and 18 that means gridlock. NRC representatives dispatched to 19 conduct field monitoring will be hopelessly stuck in 20 traffic, like the rest of us.
21 There is one and only one way to ensure 22 that emergency officials have accurate, real time 23 information about the direction and speed of winds 24 within the EPZ, information on which they can reliably 25
59 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 base life or death decisions concerning evacuation or 1
sheltering in place, that is by requiring that Entergy 2
create, construct and deploy a complete, effective, 3
acceptable system of real time meteorological 4
monitoring stations throughout the EPZ, coupled with 5
current state of the art air quality models for 6
reliable dose prediction. Anything less means 7
emergency officials will have to make life or death 8
decisions based on information that is, in the very 9
simplest terms, garbage.
10 If you relicense this plant without 11 requiring Entergy to do that, you are not only failing 12 to account for Plymouth's environment in monitoring the 13 flow of radioactive plumes but, infinitely worse, you 14 are possibly imperiling the lives of thousands of 15 innocent people.
16 MR. CAMERON: Thank you for those 17 comments, Mr. Berger.
18 Next, we'll go to Becky Chin and, Becky, 19 would you like to use the podium?
20 MS. CHIN: Thank you. My name is Becky 21 Chin and I am currently the Vice Chairman of the 22 Duxbury Nuclear Advisory Committee and I have, however, 23 served two terms on the Duxbury School Committee, as 24 well as two terms on the Duxbury Board of Health, and I 25
60 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 have been a permanent resident of Duxbury for 36 years.
1 My comments tonight are on the direct 2
torus vent system that Pilgrim, as a Mark 1 boiling 3
water reactor, was built with a faulty containment 4
system and, in order to protect that containment from 5
total rupture, it was determined it was necessary to 6
vent any high pressure build up.
7 So the result was the direct torus vent 8
system was installed at Pilgrim, as well as all Mark 1 9
reactors, this system is an extension of the 10 containment ventilation system installed as a plant 11 upgrade in the 1980s, but it bypasses the standby gas 12 treatment system filters normally used to process 13 releases via the containment ventilation pathway.
14 Operated from the control room, the vent is a 15 reinforced pipe installed in the torus and designed to 16 release radioactive, high pressure steam generated in a 17 severe accident by allowing the unfiltered release 18 directly to the atmosphere through a 300 foot vent 19 stack.
20 There is no radiation monitor on the pipe 21 and valves that compromise the direct torus vent line.
22 So venting can result in a significant radioactive 23 release, even a release on the order of one percent of 24 the core's radioactive iodine and cesium would be a 25
61 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 very severe event. Reactor operators now have the 1
option, by direct action, to expose the public and the 2
environment to unknown amounts of harmful radiation in 3
order to save containment. The purpose of the 4
containment is to provide a barrier between the lethal 5
radiation inside the reactor and the public.
6 As a result of the GE design deficiency, 7
the original idea for a passive containment system has 8
been dangerously compromised and given over to human 9
control with all its associated risks of error and 10 technical failure. We want indirect venting, that is 11 allowing the steamer air to escape only after it's 12 passed through filters. The wet well pool will not 13 scrub out or eliminate highly radioactive fission 14 products. Unfiltered venting has been judged unsafe by 15 all regulatory agencies outside the United States, the 16 only advantage of direct venting is saving money for 17 the industry at the expense of the population.
18 The EPA has an acceptable standard for 19 exposure but, in the real world, there is no safe level 20 of exposure to radiation. Under the severe accident 21 mitigation analysis, Pilgrim's application stated that 22 a filter would reduce by half the amount of radiation 23 that would be released in an accident. I think half is 24 a major benefit for public health and safety. The 25
62 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 consequences should be calculated and compared with the 1
cost of the filtration system and mitigation should be 2
focused on the protection of public health, safety and 3
the regional economy, not a cost benefit for a multi 4
billion dollar industry trying to save dollars.
5 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Becky.
6 And we are going to get to Mary, Mary 7
Lampert, now and, Mary, I believe you are also going to 8
put something into the record from Mass PIRG?
9 MS. LAMPERT: Yes. I have two comments 10 tonight, one from Mass PIRG that I will read and hand 11 in and then the other add on from Pilgrim Watch. This 12 actually is combined Toxics Action Center, Clean Water 13 Action and Mass PIRG. We appreciate your holding this 14 hearing for the public to be able to provide input on 15 the environmental review you will be conducting in 16 considering relicensing Pilgrim, the public deserves a 17 strong voice in the decision of whether to extend the 18 license or not. These brief comments will discuss 19 environmental issues and the review process, but we 20 would like to note the wide range of other issues that 21 are absent from the review.
22 These issues include security risks from a 23 overflowing on site waste storage pool and lax 24 oversight, 1970s era emergency planning and the often 25
63 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 economic cost to the surrounding communities and the 1
state. The Pilgrim Plant causes environmental damage 2
in three primary ways, radioactive releases, the 3
accumulation of dangerous waste and the high impact 4
water cooling system. Of these, only the water cooling 5
system is getting any attention by the Commission 6
during the review process. If the NRC decides to 7
relicense Pilgrim, we will have 20 more years of damage 8
to the health of ecosystems, species and humans.
9 We urge the NRC to consider, in depth, all 10 the significant environmental impacts which we believe 11 are grounds for denying the relicense of the plant.
12 The National Academy of Sciences BIERS 7 report, 13 biological effects of ionizing radiation, June, 2005, 14 stated that there is no safe dose of radiation.
15 Pilgrim emits radiation daily and these radiation 16 releases have been linked to increased rates of 17 leukemia and thyroid cancers in the towns around 18 Pilgrim. Over 1.2 million pounds of high level 19 radioactive nuclear waste is stored on site at the 20 Pilgrim Plant, this waste poses a risk to the health of 21 humans and ecosystems for centuries to come, but there 22 are currently no clear disposal options outside of the 23 state.
24 Even if present plans for establishing a 25
64 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 federal waste repository at Yucca Mountain move forward 1
on schedule, that facility would reach maximum capacity 2
long before a relicensed Pilgrim stops generating its 3
waste. Plant owners and the NRC need to have a clear 4
and safe plan for storage of radioactive waste before 5
the extension is granted. Finally, the Pilgrim Plant's 6
cooling system causes significant damage to the 7
environment of Cape Cod Bay. Pilgrim uses a once 8
through cooling system, taking in nearly one half 9
billion gallons of water a day and setting it into the 10 bay at 25 or more degrees hotter.
11 An additional 20 years of operations at 12 Pilgrim, using this cooling system, could kill billions 13 of aquatic plants and animals, this cooling system also 14 violates Section 316B of the Federal Clean Water Act 15 which requires the plant to use the best available 16 technology to minimize environmental impact. We 17 believe that the plant must be held to the highest 18 standards under the Clean Water Act and a closed cycle 19 cooling system should be installed as soon as possible, 20 and certainly before the license extension is granted.
21 Based on the seriousness of environmental impacts, we 22 ask the Commission to broaden the scope of its 23 environmental review to include radiation and waste 24 accumulation and to require major improvements in 25
65 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Pilgrim's cooling system.
1 And from Pilgrim Watch, which is a local 2
group that deals, works with these three groups, that 3
are statewide, on this important issue, we would add, 4
on spent fuel, that this should be considered in this 5
relicensing process because there is significant new 6
information which is the standard, the new information 7
that is significant is that excluding spent fuel from 8
the review was based on a feeling there would be off 9
site options. However, we know there are no off site 10 options in any period of time that we will be talking 11 about in the license extension.
12 Therefore, the Waste Confidence Act, which 13 exists and was the underpinning of why spent fuel is 14 not looked at, does not hold water, so the new 15 information is Yucca is not going to happen any time 16 soon, reprocessing is not going to happen any time 17 soon, nor is the Goshute Indian Tribe place going to 18 happen any time soon, so we'll be here. Therefore, we 19 must be told beforehand what the options will be for 20 safer storage. The Town of Duxbury, on two occasions, 21 has stated that we want safer interim storage, meaning 22 low density pool storage, and secured, hardened dry 23 cast storage until there is an off site option.
24 The second new piece of information is the 25
66 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 National Academy of Sciences' study on the 1
vulnerability of spent fuel storage and they stated, 2
unequivocally, that reactors designed like Pilgrim, 3
Mark One BWRs, that have the pool high up in the attic, 4
if you will, of the reactor building, are the most 5
vulnerable to loss of water, whether by accident or 6
attack, and there would be a consequence, fire, in a 7
dense pool that could not be put out and could 8
contaminate 500 miles. Therefore, for at least these 9
two pieces of new and significant information, it 10 should be considered.
11 Health is another issue that should be 12 considered on a site specific basis, again because of 13 new and significant information. There have been 14 studies of health damage in this community, there were 15 studies done by Dr. Sidney Cobb and Dr. Richard Clapp 16 in the `70s, there was a case controlled leukemia study 17 showing a fourfold increase the closer you lived or 18 worked to Pilgrim. Then there has been a statistical 19 or simply significant increase in thyroid cancer and 20 leukemia in all seven impacted communities because both 21 Pembroke and Plympton are effected by the sea breeze 22 effect and get these emissions.
23 Another piece of new information is the 24 BIERS 7 report which found exposure to low level 25
67 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 radiation at least three times more damaging than 1
heretofore thought. Also, we have, as new information, 2
the demographic changes projected from 2012 to 2032 of 3
a one out of three being over 55 and older people are 4
susceptible to radiation damage than younger. Also, 5
the BIERS 7 report pointed out the synergistic effect 6
of radiation with other toxins, each magnifying the 7
other's mischief, if you will, and no one can doubt the 8
fact that, between 2012 and 2032, there will be more, 9
not less, pollution.
10 These communities are also downwind from 11 the Canal Electric Plant and there has been significant 12 pesticide use in the agriculture. So, we have been 13 exposed and will continue to be exposed to a 14 multiplicity of toxins that will work together. Also, 15 no one denied the fact that 1982, when Pilgrim had a 16 severe accident of blowing its filters, that that 17 damaging effect is still here. Many of what never 18 should been released radionuclides, with long half 19 lives, are still in our environment. This is all new 20 information, therefore, and significant information.
21 Therefore, it should be looked at.
22 The last point that Pilgrim Watch would 23 like to add onto the marine effects are these specifics 24 issues, effects of once through cooling. DEP stated 25
68 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 that the resource agencies, in concert with the 1
permitting agencies, should consider further evaluation 2
of the intake effects to winter flounder. If effects 3
are found to be substantial, these agencies should 4
determine what steps should be taken next. They 5
particularly pointed out that winter flounder that is 6
dumped in from a Chatham laboratory, that we heard from 7
this afternoon, that these are fish that go in, but 8
they are different, genetically, and they don't breed 9
with the current stock.
10 The second comment from DEP was because 11 impringed fish from the intake screens are shunted back 12 into the intake, there is concern that these fish, 13 weakened from impringement, will simply be reimpringed.
14 Permitting the resource, permitting resource agencies 15 should consider requiring an assessment of 16 reimpringement rates to select species of concern.
17 These studies should also assess the need to relocate 18 the discharge point for impringed fish in order to 19 minimize reimpringement. Thermal discharge temperature 20 is now averaged, there should be a cap and required 21 instantaneous measurement.
22 Rainbow smelt, as you heard today, they 23 are considering putting on the endangered species list 24 because of their low numbers in the Jones River 25
69 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Watershed. There should be a policy statement 1
regarding losses on a square mile basis, this has not 2
been done by any federal agency and, if you don't have 3
a real standard, then what are you doing? Also, there 4
appear to be many methods used to determine impact, 5
each with drawbacks. What methods would provide the 6
most reliable results? This should be clearly stated 7
in the analysis provided.
8 Last, no, that would be a repeat. So, 9
that's it, and we will provide written testimony, and 10 thank you very much for the opportunity and we 11 appreciate, in particular, Chip, the way you handle the 12 meetings. Thank you.
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Mary.
14 Our next three speakers, we are going to 15 go to Mr. Peter Roveto, are you okay? All right.
16 David Agnew and then Peter Curley. David, 17 do you want to come up? I'm sorry? Okay, thank you, 18 David.
19 Mr. Curley?
20 MR. CURLEY: My name is Peter Curley and I 21 am a resident of Plymouth, I live in town, I've lived 22 here since 1970 with my family. I have a concern about 23 the warning system for the Plymouth power plant, I had 24 mentioned this to people in the past, some of them from 25
70 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Pilgrim, and nothing public has ever been made of it.
1 My concerns are the following, the warning towers, if 2
you would call them, are insufficient in terms of 3
warning people inside a building, particularly if there 4
is a sufficient storm outside, a windstorm, or a 5
snowstorm or rain, and more particularly, at 3:00 in 6
the morning when you are sound asleep, you just don't 7
hear them.
8 My recommendation would be, instead, would 9
be to have every dwelling or every building, office 10 space, be outfitted with a radio receiver that would be 11 on and one, it would have a battery back up built into 12 it so that people could be woken up, if Pilgrim goes 13 off at 2:00 in the morning, which, you know, this does 14 not, there is no provision for this, at the present 15 time, so that if there is any type of alarm, you are 16 not going to hear it, if you are asleep. That's really 17 all I had to say, thank you.
18 MR. CAMERON: Thank you for that 19 suggestion, Mr. Curley.
20 I think maybe we will go to Joyce, Joyce 21 McMahon, at this point.
22 MS. MCMAHON: Good evening. My name is 23 Joyce McMahon and I am the Communications Director for 24 the Massachusetts Affordable Reliable Electricity 25
71 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Alliance, Mass AREA, for short.
1 First, let me thank you for this 2
opportunity to address the Commission, we do appreciate 3
your time. Second, I would like to tell you a bit 4
about Mass AREA and why we felt it was important to be 5
here. Mass AREA is a diverse, statewide group 6
comprised of more than 50 labor/trade associations, 7
businesses, including Entergy, educators, scientists, 8
advocates and community leaders. We are committed to 9
finding clean, low cost and reliable electricity 10 solutions that benefit all of Massachusetts, this is an 11 urgent public policy challenge.
12 We came together in early January after 13 several warnings were issued by the Federal Energy 14 Regulatory Commission, ISO New England, the Federal 15 Reserve Bank of Boston and the Federal Deposit 16 Insurance Corporation, all of which said that energy 17 supplies will be insufficient to meet demand as early 18 as 2008, and that energy prices are currently causing 19 and, for the foreseeable future, will continue to cause 20 hardship for the region's businesses and residents, 21 particularly the most vulnerable populations, such as 22 elderly and the low income.
23 While Mass AREA's mission is broad and 24 focused to include new electric generation in the form 25
72 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 of renewable energy sources, developing new natural gas 1
supplies and encouraging energy efficiency and 2
conservation, Mass AREA and its members fully support 3
the relicensing of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant.
4 Given this pending electricity supply problem, we must 5
keep Pilgrim station in operation as, on a typical day, 6
it provides seven to nine percent of the commonwealth's 7
electricity. Without it, Massachusetts and the region, 8
as a whole, could face power supply shortages, 9
including rolling blackouts, a lot sooner than the 10 prediction of two years from now.
11 Further, since no new power plants are 12 planned and Cape Wind faces opposition, it becomes even 13 more vital that we maintain our current supply, 14 including Pilgrim. From an economic standpoint, since 15 the owners of the plant sell their power through long 16 term contracts and not on the volatile short term 17 market, the power produced at Pilgrim is much lower 18 cost than the regional average.
19 Since Massachusetts ranks third in the 20 nation in terms of highest electricity cost and since 21 we also have some of the highest housing and health 22 care costs, it becomes even more important to maintain 23 Pilgrim's very reliable, low cost electricity so that 24 we don't continue to have an exodus of residents and 25
73 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 businesses from our state who can no longer afford to 1
live or work here.
2 Speaking of work, Pilgrim is also an 3
important source of jobs, there is more than 700 4
permanent, full time employees, most of whom live in 5
Plymouth and the surrounding communities. Indeed, 6
Pilgrim supports the local economy to the tune of $135 7
million a year in local economic activity. More 8
importantly, the electricity that Pilgrim supplies is 9
created without generating any greenhouse gas emissions 10 and, therefore, it does not contribute to global 11 warming.
12 Entergy, the owners of the plant, is also 13 involved in a number of valuable environmental 14 initiatives, perhaps one of the most interesting is 15 that they did a great deal of study in the waters of 16 Cape Cod and the indigenous fish populations. That 17 resulted in their working with Llennoco, a fish 18 hatchery in Chatham, down on the Cape, which every year 19 hatches, rears and releases 25,000 winter flounder into 20 Plymouth Harbor for the benefit of the state and the 21 local fishing industry. Entergy also contributes a 22 large amount of money, in the form of grants, to 23 several local environmental groups working with aquatic 24 and other environmental initiatives.
25
74 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Also, from an environmental standpoint, 1
Pilgrim doesn't require any potentially environmentally 2
perilous actions, such as drilling wells, sending 3
tankers across oceans loaded with fossil fuel cargos, 4
nor laying pipelines over land or under sea to get fuel 5
to this plant, nor does it require the taking of tens 6
of thousands of acres of land to erect wind turbines to 7
create a similar electrical output.
8 My point here is not to disparage any and 9
all fuel sources, but rather to demonstrate that no 10 energy option is going to please all the people all the 11 time, nor is there a silver bullet that is going to 12 solve our energy supply crisis.
13 Mass AREA has weighed all the 14 environmental, economic and energy supply traits of 15 Pilgrim, particularly its high NRC safety rating, and 16 concluded that the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant is vital 17 to the region, state and local community for its 18 environmentally sound operations, its economic 19 contribution to the local community through the 20 provision of jobs and purchase of goods and services 21 and its provision of reliable, low cost electricity.
22 Mass AREA encourages the NRC to grant Entergy's Pilgrim 23 Station an extension of its license so that it can 24 continue to operate safely for an additional 20 years.
25
75 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Thank you again for this opportunity to 1
speak here today, Mass AREA looks forward to 2
contributing to the process embarked upon by the NRC 3
over the course of the next 18 to 24 months.
4 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, thank you, Joyce.
5 Do we have a Mr. or a Ms. Millican? Okay.
6 Mr. Arthur Powers? And then we are going 7
to go to, after Mr. Powers, to Mr. Curcuru. Mr.
8 Powers?
9 MR. POWERS: Good evening. My name is 10 Arthur Powers, I'm a resident of Plymouth here. My 11 wife has been a property owner in town for over 30 12 years.
13 I too suffer from cancer, but it's not 14 caused by nuclear regulation, not caused by the nuclear 15 power plant, so it doesn't bother me. What bothers me 16 is, as a taxpayer in this town, we all know what's 17 happening, our taxes are going up and we want to get 18 rid of one of the better taxpayers we have in town.
19 They are willing to work with us on taxes, it's an 20 important factor, right?
21 They are over here generating quite a bit 22 of electricity for us, doing their thing. If we lose 23 them, we are going to lose that power, we are going to 24 have to rely on tankers. I recall, last summer, over 25
76 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 in Buzzard's Bay, when they were bringing the Bouchard 1
Tanker up, it hit a rock, 90,000 barrels of oil or 2
gallons of oil in Fairhaven, where I used to live, 3
where I used to have a boat. I saw the devastation 4
caused by that little tanker problem. We're talking 5
about the LNG tankers up in Boston, for natural gas, we 6
don't want that, and all these things here that you 7
brought up tonight, but people are forgetting one 8
simple fact, we need the electricity.
9 We can't be dependent on foreign oil 10 because you saw what happened to the price of gasoline, 11 you saw your energy bills this winter. What you are 12 seeing here is and what I've been listening to here 13 tonight, and I'm no scientist, I'm just a simple 14 country boy from Texas up here in New England. I'm not 15 a scientist and I'm not a greenhouse expert, but I also 16 understand we are having a problem with that too, 17 caused by fossil fuel. It makes you kind of think, 18 okay?
19 So my point is this and I would like to 20 support the Pilgrim Power Plant for the following 21 reasons, one, we need their electricity. Two, it's 22 going to help the residents of the Town of Plymouth 23 with their taxes and the surrounding town also are 24 going to benefit from it because they are going to have 25
77 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 700 jobs over there, paying salaries, and they are 1
going to spend the money in their surrounding towns.
2 People forget this.
3 I've been listening to a lot of the 4
comments tonight that I have to kind of sit back and 5
look at. This plant has been over here for 20 years, 6
the water had been coming, the water has been going, 7
and there has got to be a heck of a lot more water in 8
that ocean out there than what they are putting out 9
every day to filter it out.
10 Yeah, they are not going to have Yucca 11 Mountain for storage until the rest of the country says 12 not in my backyard, so let's give them a chance over 13 here. What do they want to do with their spent rods?
14 Well I've heard the idea of let's put it in cement.
15 Okay, that sounds good, that's acceptable, let them do 16 it. So what if it's in your backyard? It's got to go 17 somewhere. If everybody says not in my backyard, 18 what's going to happen? We are going to have 19 blackouts, we are not going to have warm houses, we are 20 not going to have schools because there is no tax 21 dollars, we are not going to have jobs.
22 We are worried about this plant over here, 23 what about the growth over here, just off Commerce Way, 24 with all those new stores they are going to put in, 25
78 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 with all those thousands of cars that are going to go 1
there every day, burning up gasoline, burning up oil, 2
burning up gas into the atmosphere with the greenhouse?
3 So think about what you are doing here. They have a 4
viable plant here that is producing energy that we 5
need. Back in 1979 and the early `80s, the general 6
manager of General Electric says we have to look at 7
nuclear, that's the way to go. Thank you.
8 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Mr. Powers.
9 As I mentioned, we are going to go to 10 Mr. Curcuru and then we are going to go to Mr. Stone.
11 This is Mr. Curcuru.
12 MR. CURCURU: Yes, my name is Leonard 13 Curcuru and I'm also a member of Mass AREA for 14 affordable, reliable electricity. I'm also an employee 15 at Pilgrim Station and, unlike many people here, me and 16 my family have lived on Rocky Hill Road, directly 17 adjacent to the plant and, as far as the environmental 18 impact, I would just like to say that it's been, from 19 what I've seen, it's been overwhelmingly positive.
20 Otherwise, I would move to a different area, and I just 21 see the abundance of wildlife in 1,500 acres of buffer 22 zone around the plant, and I see really good fishing at 23 the discharge, it's the best fishing around, and the 24 air quality is excellent, and the water quality is 25
79 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 excellent and the ground water is excellent, and I 1
would just like to see that continue.
2 We all have to keep in mind that if we do 3
shut the plant down and we don't extend the license, we 4
are still going to have to get that 680 megawatts from 5
someplace else and, like the previous gentleman said, 6
where is that electricity going to come from and what's 7
the environmental impact going to be from the 8
generation of that additional megawatts from someplace 9
else? That's about all I have to say, thank you.
10 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much.
11 Mr. Stone?
12 MR. STONE: Thanks for the opportunity to 13 speak my mind. My name is William Stone, I'm a 14 resident of Plymouth, I've lived here for 33 years. My 15 wife's family has been here for 384 years, and she has 16 allowed me to speak tonight, as well as you have. We 17 have our children living in town also and our 18 grandchildren. As I've said, we've lived here for 33 19 years.
20 By profession, I'm a certified property 21 manager and I own an accredited management 22 organization, so that we do rely on dependable 23 electricity in the operation of different plants and 24 different areas. And I think, as a resident of the 25
80 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 town, I really am not aware of the things that are 1
being eluded to tonight, other than the fact that we do 2
all recognize that, in America, we do have a pandemic 3
of cancer of different types and I think that if it's 4
directly attributable to nuclear power, then we have an 5
awful lot of it all over the country.
6 One of the things that I am concerned 7
about is the socioeconomic events, as well as the 8
environmental events on properties that have been 9
constructed in this region since 1945. When I say 10 that, in particular, I'm looking at different 11 situations and how we are going to deal with the energy 12 cutbacks that we are going to be facing in another year 13 or two, or perhaps a little bit farther out.
14 One of the properties that we do manage is 15 in Norwell, Massachusetts and it's a residential 16 property with a sewage treatment plant on it. What 17 most of our cities and towns in Southeastern 18 Massachusetts have done in the last two decades, they 19 require developers to in fact take on all of the 20 infrastructure in the development and put that actually 21 into the cost of development.
22 This particular property processes 208,000 23 gallons of sewage, on site, per month and we, in that 24 property, have only 30 families and, within that 25
81 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 property also, in that it's a 40B project, it does 1
allow for 25 percent of the homes to be occupied by 2
people with limited resources.
3 We also have a child that has brain 4
damage, she is living with a working mom and, as we are 5
trying to deal with dependable electricity for this 6
young woman, our concerns are she has to have an air 7
conditioned, climate controlled environment. So, 8
again, when we are talking about dependable electricity 9
and dependable fuel sources, we have, I have concerns 10 on a regional basis. Our firm also managed a $150 11 million golf and residential property on Buzzard's Bay 12 during the oil spill, we dealt with the Bouchard mess.
13 We dealt with it through Clean Harbors and through the 14 United States Coast Guard, and we did witness the death 15 and dying of a number of birds.
16 And I think that when we are talking about 17 fossil fuels, we have to consider that there is a risk 18 in everything, there is a risk in everything in our 19 environment. In addition to the property in Norwell, 20 we have properties in Howell and Rockland that also 21 have sewage ejection pumps. Again, these are 22 properties that have been developed in the last two 23 decades that have to in fact pump all of their sewage 24 into the towns, and our lift stations that we have are 25
82 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 something that's critical. When we are dealing with 1
sewage, we are dealing with a public health issue and I 2
think, as far as those public health issues are 3
concerned, we have to review the fact that just about 4
everything that we count on for energy has a risk 5
involved in it.
6 I don't believe that 700 employees and 7
their families would live in this town if they thought 8
that their children and they were going to all get 9
cancer, so I think we have to look at that. We also 10 have to look at the fact that we, in America, including 11 myself, I guess, we are all energy gluttons and, as 12 energy gluttons, I did sell my SUV in 2000 because I 13 saw that 40 percent of America owned SUVs and I said, 14 gee, if I know that, then I think the folks in Saudi 15 Arabia and foreign oil countries will recognize that 16 also.
17 Obviously, everything we are dealing with 18 right now is a result of our lifestyle and the 19 lifestyle we have did not bring me to count one bicycle 20 in the parking lot this evening, as I came into the 21 meeting. I think we are responsible for our own 22 future. We have literally grown in this area of 23 Plymouth, and Duxbury and all of our south shore towns, 24 from when our people landed here 384 years ago. We 25
83 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 have gone from the point where we were heating our 1
homes with firewood, and we went to coal, we didn't 2
like that, we went to oil. We are now into the nuclear 3
age and, as far as its concerned, I would just like to 4
know and I think perhaps people from some of the, some 5
of the people who are providing studies is what are the 6
alternatives?
7 Certainly, I've heard, and I think as you 8
all read in the media, wind power, solar power, fuel, 9
gas, gas fuel, as far as bringing it into Fall River, 10 bringing it into Boston Harbor, all of these things are 11 not something that anybody wants to have, as the 12 gentleman said from Texas, thank you and welcome to 13 Plymouth, for the last 20 years. The fact is that we 14 have to have alternative energy and if nuclear is not 15 the safest, then I think we have to find out what's 16 better and, as we have proposed just about everything, 17 we have had situations that have caused us to get more 18 and more limited. I don't think we can protect 19 ourselves from just about anything that we are dealing 20 with.
21 In my past, I've had the opportunity to 22 teach economics on the college level and that of course 23 requires me, I won't say requires me, but I try to read 24 the Wall Street Journal on a daily basis. One of the 25
84 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 things that I've noticed is that the Chinese Government 1
has commissioned the manufacture and construction, as 2
we know, of the world's largest hydroelectric dam, but 3
we haven't paid attention to the fact that they are 4
also commissioning 88 nuclear power plants and, if they 5
are doing that, and we have a great regulatory agency 6
in the NRC, perhaps we should also share those 7
regulations with the Chinese.
8 And while we are at it, France is going to 9
be commissioning 20 nuclear power plants also, so the 10 thoughts that I have is certainly regulations of 11 damaging causes, if they do exist, should be something 12 that would be required, but we also are living in a 13 global economy, it's a world economy and, if we don't 14 also look outside of our own borders, then we are going 15 to have some issues.
16 As far as I'm concerned, thank you very 17 much for letting me speak tonight, and I think that we 18 have the greatest country in the world and I hope that 19 we continue to talk with each other, as we have this 20 evening. Thank you.
21 MR. CAMERON: Great, thank you, thank you 22 for those thoughts, Mr. Stone.
23 And we are going to go to Joan Bartlett, 24 Joan?
25
85 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Janet? Janet Humes?
1 Sandra? Sandra Woods?
2 MS. WOODS: Hi. Thank you. My name is 3
Sandra Woods and I've lived on the South Shore most of 4
my life. I moved down to Marshfield from Medford when 5
I was five. I'm from a very large family, I'm the 6
youngest of eight, and I have a very large extended 7
family, my mother is one of seven, and I have scores of 8
cousins, and aunts and uncles in Plymouth, Duxbury, 9
Kingston, Bridgewater.
10 And I am in favor of the relicensing of 11 Pilgrim, personally. Mine is, for the most part, for 12 economic reasons. To these high energy prices, anybody 13 can see $3 gas and certainly anybody paying their 14 electric bill this year or their gas bill can see, it's 15 making it difficult for young families, like mine, to 16 make ends meet, and certainly to have time to relax, 17 and spend time with your family and enjoy the beautiful 18 surroundings we have in the south shore, it's why we 19 are here.
20 And quite frankly, it's scary to think how 21 much higher the prices could go without Pilgrim and how 22 that would impact our quality of life even further.
23 And what else do I want to say?
24 On an aside, I wanted to mention I heard a 25
86 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 lot about thyroid cancer, that's rampant in my family 1
and I would be interested to see if, on those studies, 2
they also did genetic studies because I had mine out 3
when I was two, and I lived in Medford, and my sister 4
just had hers out, and she lives in Marlboro, and I 5
have another sister who had hers out, and she lived in 6
Andover, so I wonder how much of it is genetic and how 7
much of it is environmental too, so I would like to 8
see, on those studies, if they also followed that up 9
with genetics too. Thank you.
10 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, thank you, 11 Sandra.
12 And we are going to go to Janet Humes and 13 then we'll go to Mr. Leonardi.
14 MS. HUMES: My name is Janet Humes, I'm an 15 environmental geologist and my question dovetails with 16 hers, I'm interested in what kind of epidemiological 17 studies have been conducted on cancer rates related 18 specifically to Pilgrim, as well as other areas with 19 nuclear plants, and I'm hoping somebody can help 20 distribute that information. Thanks.
21 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Janet, and when we 22 are done with the other speakers, maybe I'll ask Rich 23 Emch to perhaps tell us a little bit about that, if he 24 has the information. Pardon me? He is a health 25
87 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 physicist, but has knowledge of epidemiology and we 1
have other staff here who know that, and we'll try to 2
give you a little information on the record, but what I 3
would like to do is have Rich and Trish Milligan talk 4
to you after the meeting and tell you everything that 5
is out there, but we'll try to get some things on the 6
record for you. Pardon me?
7 MS. HUMES: The National Academy of 8
Sciences review is on the Web.
9 MR. CAMERON: Okay, and we'll give you, we 10 are going to go to the two other speakers now and then 11 we can continue this conversation.
12 Mr. Leonardi?
13 Okay, Mr. Bob Smith, and then we are going 14 to go to Mr. Jerry Benezra.
15 Mr. Smith? Great, are you going to come 16 up and talk to us? All right.
17 MR. SMITH: I spent 20 years teaching high 18 school students environmental science and so I've spent 19 a lot of time looking at the issues and trying to get 20 them to understand the issues involved with regard to 21 nuclear reactors. I'm not a nuclear scientist, by any 22 means, but I would like you all to think back three 23 weeks ago, there was an anniversary, the anniversary of 24 Chernobyl. Now most of you, most of the people here, 25
88 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 were from Carver, Plymouth, Marshfield, Duxbury. Well 1
if we take a look at Chernobyl and what happened there 2
when that nuclear reactor melted down, 125,000 people 3
died and 3.5 million people became ill, 400,000 people 4
had to permanently leave their homes, half a million 5
people were exposed to dangerous levels of 6
radioactivity.
7 As of 2010, it is expected there will be 8
8,000 to 10,000 cases of thyroid cancer as a result of 9
this catastrophe. The total cost of the damages is 10 predicted to exceed $358 billion, the food chains in 11 Europe, the former Soviet Union and the earth are 12 permanently contaminated with radioactivity from this 13 event for the next million years. The Nuclear 14 Regulatory Commission would argue that this monumental 15 catastrophe was caused by a flawed design of the 16 reactor, it could never happen in the United States, 17 but previous to Chernobyl, we had Three Mile Island and 18 there was almost a meltdown there, with our finely 19 tuned and developed design.
20 The existence, the very existence of the 21 NRC points to the possibility of a major environmental 22 disaster as a result of all these reactors. At the 23 beginning of nuclear power, power was supposed to be 24 produced and electricity so efficiently that it would 25
89 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 be too cheap to meter. As it has turned out, this form 1
of energy is the least efficient with over 92 percent 2
of the original energy being wasted and, two, it costs 3
two to three times more to generate power with nuclear 4
energy than any other form of power generation. The 5
radioactive waste problem was another issue which the 6
nuclear energy industry would have to solve in the 7
future.
8 When the plant was originally 9
commissioned, we were promised that this was a problem 10 that would be resolved. This problem has not been 11 solved, the radioactive waste produced by Pilgrim sits 12 on the site of the plant and will continue to increase 13 in quantity for another 20 years if the plant is 14 relicensed. Maybe it could be shipped to Yucca 15 Mountain in Nevada where it would have to remain safely 16 contained for over a million years. Take a trip to Las 17 Vegas and ask the officials there if they have faith in 18 the nuclear industry.
19 And then there is the security in the era 20 of 9/11, another issue which did not exist when the 21 nuclear industry was first born. Suicidal terrorists, 22 could they be stopped? Is there security that could 23 stop a shoulder launched missile attack, considering 24 that these missiles have a range of several miles? Is 25
90 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 Plymouth going to become the proving ground for the 1
success of another terrorist scenario? Twenty more 2
years of operation would certainly increase the amount 3
of waste and the damage of such an attack.
4 The NRC should be trying to figure out how 5
to solve the problem that has been created by the 6
operation of the Pilgrim Power Plant over the previous 7
40 years, not relicensing it for the next 20 years.
8 Plymouth has been lucky, during the last 9
40 years that the Pilgrim Plant has been generating 10 electricity, 20 more years, Plymouth is pushing its 11 luck. There has been no Chernobyl in Plymouth, 12 America's hometown. Every day, for the next 20 years, 13 this threat will exist, all for the sake of over priced 14 electricity. So what is going to happen to Plymouth in 15 the next 384 years, if it's still here, if we continue 16 on pursuing this disastrous approach to producing 17 electricity?
18 Let's have a wind farm out in Nantucket 19 Sound, you are not going to have any problems there.
20 There is no NRC to oversee a wind farm because there is 21 no problem with a wind farm as serious as the problem 22 that exists with the radioactive substances that we are 23 using today in these reactors. Thank you.
24 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Mr. Smith.
25
91 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 And we are going to go to Mr. Benezra, 1
Jerry Benezra, right now.
2 MR. BENEZRA: My name is Jerry Benezra, I 3
really hadn't planned on speaking this evening and I 4
need to make very clear that I am here speaking tonight 5
as a private citizen, and I only say that because I may 6
be involved in this process in another capacity. So, 7
let me repeat, I am here as a private citizen tonight, 8
speaking as a private citizen.
9 The reason I'm speaking is because, like 10 one of the previous speakers, I know a little bit about 11 what's happening China. Like that previous speaker, I 12 happen to be pro nuclear, I happen to believe that 13 there should be a nuclear power plant here in Plymouth.
14 But one of the things that happens every time I come 15 back through immigration and they say welcome home, I'm 16 not embarrassed to say I always get this chill in my 17 spine and occasionally, depending on how long I've been 18 out, I get this little tear in my eye, but what's 19 making me speak tonight is because one of the 20 differences between us and China is the process that I 21 anticipate we are going to have here.
22 So, as much as I am pro nuclear, I am also 23 pro a process that is fair and that is a level playing 24 field. The reason I'm speaking tonight is because I 25
92 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 happen to have some knowledge about the roads in 1
Plymouth, as do most of the people here.
2 We have four major north/south roads, out 3
of which one of them is Rte. 3 and the other three are 4
inadequate. One of them is a road that is primarily 5
gravel, for a large part of it, and is impassible, 6
that's the one nearest the hospital. I know, from 7
talking to people in the town, that there are problems 8
that with that road, as it gets closer to the hospital.
9 We have Rte. 3A which, as we know, is very well 10 traveled, but is also one lane, and we have another 11 private street, which now runs into the Shops at 5.
12 There is nobody in Plymouth, there is 13 nobody in Massachusetts who goes through Plymouth who 14 would believe that we could have an evacuation and the 15 reason I'm speaking tonight is because when I hear a 16 question and the question is in terms of a fast moving 17 event, and I see our facilitator, who I have a great 18 deal of respect for because of the last time he was 19 here, turns to the person at the NRC, who I assume is 20 the most knowledgeable, and that person says there is 21 no problem, then we are not only not in the same town, 22 we are not in the same state, we are not in the same 23 country and, to lapse into the vernacular, we are not 24 on the same planet.
25
93 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 So what I'm concerned about, and I 1
understand, I understand fully that tonight we are 2
talking about environmental issues, but I want to talk 3
about a process issue and my process issue is that if 4
they are as sure about everything else that is in the 5
preliminary statement as they are about that statement, 6
then we have a problem, and all of us, whether we are 7
pro nuclear or not. And believe me, I want to see this 8
plant stay, I understand what it means for the city, I 9
understand what it means for energy, I understand all 10 those issues because, without going into a resume, I'm 11 involved in a company that's involved in energy on a 12 global level, in fairly big numbers.
13 So what I want to say is that I think we 14 really need to be concerned about this process. Now 15 let's just talk about a few other things. One other 16 speaker talked about the evacuation and, by the way, we 17 have a summer place here for 35 years, my wife has been 18 here for over 50 years, and all of us who are here, 19 remember the last time they went off? I mean who even 20 realizes what it is? We are a tourist community, what 21 do the tourists know? We are protected classes here.
22 Not only do we have a lot of children here and a 23 growing demographic that is going to continue to grow 24 for elderly, we have nursing homes, we have elderly, 25
94 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 these are people in protect classes who need to have 1
something special.
2 So I would suspect that anyone who could 3
look at the demographics we have today, versus what we 4
had 20 or 30 years ago, and the demographics that we 5
all know are happening because we are keeping track of 6
the growth here, realize that, as to those protective 7
classes, be they children, and by the way, we also have 8
a prison here, which has people locked up, so we have a 9
lot of concerns we have to have, so anybody who can 10 say, not an expert but anybody who is a public official 11 who can get up here and say, I believe, it was a fast 12 moving event, that, oh, no problem, then that raises a 13 serious, serious concern for me about this whole 14 process that I think we need to be concerned about 15 because one of the things I'm learning is about the 16 NRC's antipathy for having interventions, even in I 17 think it was the State of New Jersey.
18 So I'm saying that here I think we have a 19 lot of special circumstances, not only because we have 20 one of the oldest plants but because we have a process 21 here which is starting to raise a concern on my part.
22 I spent 35 years as a trial lawyer, and I don't want to 23 talk about resumes, but I'll tell you, every once in a 24 while, I hear something that concerns me, and that 25
95 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 concerns me as to the process, as it applies to what we 1
are seeing in all of the initial material we are 2
seeing.
3 Now let me repeat one more time I want to 4
see the plant continue, I am in favor of nuclear 5
energy, but I'm also in favor of making sure that if we 6
have the oldest plant, that we have the safest and best 7
plant. And if people are going to be so out of touch 8
with what's happening today, then I'm concerned for the 9
view that this agency is going to have in 10 prognosticating what's going to happen in the next 10 11 to 20 years. And I suspect that everybody out here, 12 whether you are pro nuclear or not, whether you are pro 13 plant or not, has that same feeling, that we have to 14 have a fair process with issues that are not 15 predetermined by some national policy but are going to 16 say that we are going to live here with the safest 17 possible plant, and that we are going to have an open 18 hearing and we are going to have an opportunity to test 19 all these hypotheses.
20 And then hopefully we'll be one of those 21 situations where there will be interventions so that we 22 can have people test the type of comments I heard here 23 tonight about the ability of us to get out of here 24 safely on one road. Keep in mind, to the east we have 25
96 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 the ocean, to the west we have 24 miles of Miles 1
Standish State Forest. Somebody might want to take a 2
look at that map. We have, to the south, we have a 3
bridge, even with our governor's new fly over, which is 4
a problem, and we know, by the way, don't we, that the 5
plume goes north. That means everybody is going north 6
with the plume so, as a practical matter, you are 7
right.
8 You may try to get around this by saying 9
that we are going to have some type of safety in place 10 or some type of shelter in place, then we have to spend 11 a lot of time talking about what that shelter place is 12 going to be. Not for us because the truth is we are 13 going to have to worry about getting our children, and 14 our elderly and our protected classes out of here 15 before we worry about the rest of us, but we have to at 16 least take care of those children and the elderly 17 because what we do for the least of our children we do 18 for me, to quote the Bible.
19 So I'm saying that why I'm getting up here 20 speaking tonight and why you hear some agitation in my 21 voice is because I am very, very concerned now about 22 this process and I think we all should be. And this 23 should not turn out to be a referendum on whether we 24 are pro nuclear or anti nuclear, whether we are pro 25
97 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 plant or not plant, I think everybody can agree on one 1
thing, we want to have the safest possible plant. And 2
if it's dollars versus that, and that's what it comes 3
down to, then that's really where the rubber is going 4
to hit the road in this, the rubber is going to hit the 5
road in hoping that this agency is going to do the best 6
that they can to make sure that we and our children are 7
protected to the maximum amount and that they are going 8
to have a process that's going to allow us all to 9
participate and allow us all to test the hypotheses 10 that they are working on. Thank you very much.
11 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Jerry, you raised 12 some serious issues, obviously, and we've heard about 13 issues of emergency planning. And I don't know if this 14 is going to make any difference in terms of what your 15 perception is of what the NRC said, and I don't want to 16 get into a debate on this, but I just want Trish to 17 perhaps just reiterate what she said, which I don't 18 think she was saying that everybody is going to be able 19 to be evacuated.
20 MR. BENEZRA: The issue was not whether 21 everybody would be evacuated, the issue was that a 22 question was asked and the answer was a short answer, 23 and then the question was asked again, in a fast moving 24 situation, can we evacuate? And the answer was yes. I 25
98 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 think the record will reflect exactly what the question 1
was, what the answer was, what the context was.
2 MR. CAMERON: And this may, this doesn't, 3
this doesn't minimize the issue, the importance of the 4
issue you raised or finding the best way to handle 5
this, but I still would like to give Trish another 6
opportunity to just reiterate what you said or at least 7
to clarify that.
8 MS. MILLIGAN: For clarification purposes, 9
there is a lot that goes into emergency planning, it's 10 not just evacuation, it's a combination of evacuation.
11 There is sheltering, you hear that referred to often as 12 sheltering in place. In a fast moving event, for 13 example, you would use a combination of evacuation 14 and/or sheltering, some combination thereof, and the 15 question was did I believe or the NRC believe that the 16 public health and safety was adequately protected 17 during a fast moving event and, yes, with the emergency 18 plans in place, the shelter and evacuation plans that 19 are in place, yes, in a fast moving event, the public 20 health and safety can be protected, and that's what I 21 said.
22 23 MS. MILLIGAN: Yes, a licensee has the 24 evacuation time estimate studies and the local 25
99 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 community or the state, I'm not sure in your area who 1
is responsible for it, has developed the traffic 2
management plans.
3 (Inaudible) 4 MS. MILLIGAN: They are updated on a 5
regular basis.
6 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you, Jerry, for 7
just emphasizing the issue again and maybe you guys 8
could talk a little bit about this afterwards, if Jerry 9
is amenable to that.
10 I just want to get one other thing on the 11 record for the sake of Janet Humes who asked the 12 question about epidemiology, and I think we are about, 13 I think we have covered everybody tonight, but at least 14 one piece of data, and I think, Trish, you are going to 15 be the one who is going to put the data on the record 16 for us. Had there been any epidemiology studies in 17 relationship to Pilgrim?
18 Rich, you are going to do it? All right.
19 This is Mr. Richard Emch, NRC staff.
20 MR. EMCH: Good evening. My name is 21 Richard Emch, I'm a health physicist, I work for the 22 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Some of the 23 information I want to share with you tonight, I was 24 part of the audit team, the environmental audit team 25
100 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 that we had, that came up to Pilgrim the week before 1
last. We examined records from the plant, effluent 2
records, environmental monitoring records, we toured 3
the plant, looked at their monitoring methods and their 4
systems. I also met with officials from the Department 5
of Public Health for the State of Massachusetts, so I'm 6
going to share some information, just to give you an 7
idea.
8 Our review is still underway on these 9
topics, but let's start with a little bit of 10 information. First, effluence from the plant, there is 11 a way of calculating or saying if somebody was exposed 12 to all pathways, what would be the, we call it the 13 maximally exposed individual. This is somebody who is 14 eating, living right near the plant, eating all their 15 food from a garden there, eating beef, cattle, 16 whatever, all the various pathways, and the maximum 17 calculation for a person like that, at the Pilgrim 18 site, is approximately 2.5 millirem per year. Now, of 19 that, most of that dose calculation is from something 20 we call direct radiation, it's from something we refer 21 to as turbine-shine or nitrogen 16 shine.
22 That's nitrogen 16 radiation that comes 23 from the turbine and it bounces off the atmosphere, and 24 it really is only an issue very, very close to the 25
101 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 plant. If we take away that component and we talk 1
about just effluence, the doses are well below one 2
millirem per year. In addition to that, there is an 3
environmental meteorological monitoring program that 4
the NRC inspects, there is also environmental samples 5
that are taken by the State of Massachusetts. They do 6
analyze them on their own in their own laboratory, in 7
addition to what the NRC, in addition to what the 8
licensee analyzes.
9 There are NRC inspectors, that Rani was 10 talking about earlier, that come out from headquarters.
11 They evaluate, they inspect the process by which the 12 licensee controls effluence, and so we are talking 13 about something less than one millirem per year. The 14 dose from living in the United States, on planet earth, 15 approximately 360 millirem per year for each of us. A 16 big part of that is from building materials, from the 17 granite, you know, from granite materials in the 18 ground, from cosmic radiation, from naturally occurring 19 radioactive materials in our bodies, and that's a major 20 component of it, and then there is also a component, 21 when you go to the dentist or something like that for 22 procedures.
23 If you fly on an airplane, you get some.
24 If you live in Denver, you get a lot more cosmic, for 25
102 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 instance, than you do at sea level, so what I'm trying 1
to explain here is we are talking about how much you 2
get from a nuclear power plant or from nuclear energy 3
altogether, less than one millirem. We talked about 4
what you get from background and other sources, 360 5
millirem. So this is part of, I'm just trying to put 6
this in some perspective for you folks.
7 Now when I went to visit and I went and 8
had meetings with the Department of Public Health for 9
the State of Massachusetts, I asked them about various 10 studies, I asked them if they had any concerns and I 11 was told that, no, they don't have any concerns about 12 it. They do not believe there is any excess cancers or 13 illnesses from radiation from Pilgrim Plant, they 14 stated that flat out.
15 MR. CAMERON: Okay, I--
16 MR. EMCH: I need to add one more thing.
17 MR. CAMERON: Go ahead.
18 MR. EMCH: We do a lot of work at the NRC 19 to evaluate new studies, new information that's made 20 available, such as the BIERS 7 report. I'm not, I 21 really don't agree with a lot of your characterization 22 of the BIERS 7 report. For instance, the BIERS 7 23 report, there is a theory called the linear non 24 threshold theory that says that there is, it is prudent 25
103 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 to assume that there is some risk, some health risk, 1
associated with any amount of radiation exposure. The 2
NRC has had that as a central part of its regulations 3
and philosophies since the beginning. The whole 4
concept of as low as is reasonably achievable is 5
because of that.
What BIERS 7 did is not new, it 6
simply reaffirmed that theory.
7 Now, to go just a little further, we are 8
here to look for new and significant information. If 9
you have studies, if you have information that you 10 believe we need to be looking at as part of our review, 11 I want to see them, we do want to see them. I am happy 12 to seem them, we will look at them, we will include 13 them in the review. Thank you.
14 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Rich.
15 I just want to emphasize to people that we 16 have heard a lot of concerns about monitoring, how good 17 the sampling is, potential inadequacies tonight. The 18 comments that are going to come in on scoping are going 19 to be publicly available, not just the NRC's analysis 20 of those, and I fully expect citizens, like Mary 21 Lampert, to be submitting written comment that may take 22 us to task in terms of information that was just 23 presented. And rather than getting into perhaps an 24 interminable discussion right now on this, I would just 25
104 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 urge people to pay attention to the comments that are 1
submitted on these particular issues.
2 And I'm going to ask Rani to close us out 3
now.
4 MS. FRANOVICH: Thank you, Chip.
5 I just want to take this opportunity to 6
thank you all again for coming out and participating in 7
this meeting, providing some very good comments that we 8
will take back, and evaluate and consider in our 9
review. Thank you for sharing with us your time, time 10 out of your busy schedules, we appreciate it. As I 11 said when I opened up the meeting, it's a very 12 important part of our process, so thank you. I also 13 wanted to remind people that we have an NRC public 14 meeting feedback form, you probably can't see it, but 15 it's a form that was provided to you outside in the 16 hallway as you came into the meeting.
17 If you have any suggestions for how we can 18 improve the conduct of our meetings, things we can do 19 better, things perhaps that we are doing well that you 20 want to mention to us, please take the time to fill out 21 one of these comment feedback forms. Postage is 22 prepaid, all you need to do is fold it, put it in the 23 mail, send it to us, or you can hand it to a member of 24 the NRC staff before you leave tonight. One other 25
105 ADVANCE SERVICES Franklin, Massachusetts (508) 520-2076 thing I wanted to reiterate is that if you have 1
comments on the scope of the environmental review that 2
you think of, even after tonight's meeting, we will be 3
accepting those comments through June 16th.
4 The two points of contact for submitting 5
your comments will be Bob Schaaf and Alicia Williamson, 6
and their e-mail addresses were provided in the 7
handouts for our presentation. So if you would like to 8
talk more with the NRC staff or our contractors about 9
any additional questions or concerns you have, we will 10 be here for a while after the meeting, please let us 11 know, approach us, tell us what you would like to talk 12 with us about, we would be delighted, and thanks again 13 for your time. Good night.
14 (Whereupon, at 9:38 p.m., the hearing 15 was adjourned.)
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