ML090720679
| ML090720679 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Indian Point  |
| Issue date: | 03/11/2009 |
| From: | Public Commenter Public Commenter |
| To: | Division of License Renewal |
| NRC/NRR/DLR | |
| References | |
| 73FR80440 | |
| Download: ML090720679 (3) | |
Text
1 IPRenewalCEmails From:
ablades@ramapo.edu Sent:
Wednesday, March 11, 2009 6:36 PM To:
Andrew Stuyvenberg
Subject:
Comments on DSEIS Andrew Stuyvenberg, 3/11/09 Project Manager U.S. NRC I am currently enrolled as a student at Ramapo College, and taking part in the Environmental Assessment course with Professor Edelstein. As a class we were given the task of examining the renewal of Indian Points license to operate and its Environmental Impact Statement. Since we began examining the draft environmental impact statement, it became more and more clear to myself over time, that the impact statement was created with the purpose of ensuring that Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant remain open. Focusing on my main indicator, Psychological - Social factors, has given myself an interesting point of view on which to evaluate the documents from. My understanding of Psychological - Social factors, is that it can be interpreted through psychological indicators experienced in commonly in social groups such as trust and stress.
Plant workers and engineers, employees of Entergy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and Buchanan, NY locals who depend on the plant for the local economy show a widespread acceptance for the renewal of Indian Points operating license. Their adopted viewpoints show trust in the use of nuclear power and regard it as not only safe, but as the most practical way of producing clean energy. This was displayed as many of them voiced their opinions at the public hearing we attended on February 12th. It is my belief that I would have had a much harder time understanding the Psychological - Social factor as an indicator, if I did not attend the hearing. It also revealed to me a possible approach to studying psychological - social factors, as they may be hard to discern before a draft environmental impact statement is produced. Furthermore, information revealed in the impact statement may have an effect on psychological - social factors, or even create new psychological - social patterns.
A distrust in how nuclear power is produced in our country would be considered as producing stress in a psychological - social environment. The stress results from peoples fears that nuclear power not only offers small dangers like minimal exposure to radioisotopes over a long period of time, but could also create a feeling of impending doom with those who believe strongly that a critically enormous mishap is quite possible due to the human factor. Resulting from this would be a catastrophic disaster that would have severe long term affects on not only local residents, but our nation as a whole. The Human Factor is considered as the element of possible human error in the operation of nuclear power plants. Nuclear power plants such as Indian Point are safe insofar as the engineers and technicians who run the plant do so flawlessly while keeping in line with the highest of safety procedures. Understanding of the human factor adds an interesting element to psychological - social factors.
Usually an accident at one nuclear power plant would produce uniform psychological - social patterns nationwide due to the widespread use of nuclear power. Most susceptible to these stress patterns are people living within a certain vicinity of Indian Point nuclear power plant, who feel a problem at the plant would directly affect them.
In the new millennium, possibilities of Indian Point becoming a large terrorist target have been introduced into psychological - social framework in the wake of the attacks on September 11th 2001. By looking through studies and conducting personal interviews, the results have shown that most people believe that Indian Point is safe from this threat. Documents supporting this claim have been posted on our collaborative sustainability website, but my expert opinion is that Indian Points security from this threat is still questionable. Contradicting evidence performed in multiple studies has provided mostly inconclusive results on the true nature of how secure Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant really is. The issue of total security at Indian Point and the psychological - social environment it creates is not addressed in the Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
The issue of Indian Points evacuation procedure and its psychological - social effects is also something that has been neglected in being addressed in the impact statement. In the event that something along the lines of an absolute disaster would occur at Indian Point, current procedure calls for prompt and orderly
2 evacuation. From studying the geography of the area around Indian Point and safety measures taken to counteract a meltdown or substantial release of radioactive materials, it is my belief that severe problems would be experienced in a massive wide scale evacuation. This is something that needs to be addressed fully before Indian Points license to operate is renewed. The most feared enemy is one that cannot be seen, and an accidental dangerous release of radioactive particles even on a small scale would create such mass panic that it could harm the condition of how we view Nuclear Power in our country forever.
Throughout the impact statement we see how the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission views the environmental impact of renewing Indian Points license to operate. Although they do not directly operate the plant themselves, jobs at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission do depend on the continuing operation of not just Indian Point, but all current nuclear power plants in our country. It brings in to question who should really be responsible for drafting an environmental impact statement for a nuclear power plant. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission does utilize many outside sources for scientific research and intelligence on Indian Point, but what the impact statement claims in the end is entirely up to the discretion of the NRC. In a perfect world, a third party that utilizes the best scientific research and information available would actually be responsible for drafting an environmental impact statement. Not to discredit any of the experts at NRC, but an outside group without any political ties or private interests would most likely create a more fair and balanced environmental impact statement.
Thank You Adam Blades
Federal Register Notice:
73FR80440 Comment Number:
65 Mail Envelope Properties (20090311183558.BDR75100)
Subject:
Comments on DSEIS Sent Date:
3/11/2009 6:35:58 PM Received Date:
3/11/2009 6:36:00 PM From:
ablades@ramapo.edu Created By:
ablades@ramapo.edu Recipients:
"Andrew Stuyvenberg" <Andrew.Stuyvenberg@nrc.gov>
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