ML20235Y843
| ML20235Y843 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Shoreham File:Long Island Lighting Company icon.png |
| Issue date: | 07/17/1987 |
| From: | Christman J HUNTON & WILLIAMS, LONG ISLAND LIGHTING CO. |
| To: | Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20235Y845 | List: |
| References | |
| CON-#387-4076 OL-3, NUDOCS 8707270076 | |
| Download: ML20235Y843 (5) | |
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4016 LILCO, July 17 1987 0
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~ gc UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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Before the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board In the Matter of
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LONG ISLAND LIGHTING COMPANY
) Docket No. 50-322-OL-3
) (Emergency Planning) l (Shoreham Nuclear Power Station,
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i Unit 1)
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l LILCO'S MOTION TO PRESENT REBUTTAL TESTIMONY BY DR. MICHAEL LINDELL l
On July 1,1987, this Board denied LILCO's request to permit LILCO's witness Dr.
Michael Lindell to respond orally to Suffolk County testimony that characterized one of Dr. Lindell's publications as supporting Suffolk Ccunty's position in this hearing. In making such a ruling, however, the Board stated that the Applicant could renew the motion af ter the Intervenor's witnesses had been cross-examined on thir issue. Tr.
1 17,780. Having heard Suffolk County's testimony and having reviewed the transcripts, LILCO now renews its motion to present oral testimony by Dr. Lindell in response to Suffolk County's testimony on the interpretation of Dr. Lindell's work.
In their written testimony, filed two weeks af ter LILCO filed its written testi-mony, Suffolk County witnesses Drs. Cole, Johnson, and Saegert cited several times to an article by Lindell and Barnes entitled " Protective Response to Technological Emer-gency: Risk Perception and Behavioral Intention," Nuclear Safety (Oct. - Dec.1986)
(hereinaf ter " Nuclear Safety article").
See " Testimony of Stephen Cole, Susan C.
Saegert, James H. Johnson, Jr., David Harris, Martin Mayer, Gregory C. Minor and Steven C. Sholly," dated April 13,1987, at 23-25, 27, 33, 56 (hereinaf ter " Cole k[
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Testimony"). In doing so, Suffolk County witnesses pulled passages from Dr. Lindell's article out of context to argue that his Nuclear Safety article is " inconsistent with his present testimony" and that the testimony and the article are in " direct contradiction" with each other. Cole Testimony at 24. Specifically, Suffolk County argued that Dr.
Lindell's article contradicted his testimony that information obtained during an emer-gency would significantly outweigh prior beliefs.
I_d. at 24. Af ter quoting other pas-sages from his article out of context, Suffolk County concluded that his " conclusions from his own research cast doubt on the validity of his testimony." [d. at 25.
These statements in the County's written testimony, LILCO submits, misinter-pret Dr. Lindell's work. Even more extreme examples of Suffolk County's misinter-pretations can be found in the County witnesses' oral testimony. When LILCO ques-tioned Drs. Cole and Saegert about Dr. Lindell's conclusions comparing dioxin and radiation, Drs. Cole and Saegert argued that according to their interpretation of Dr.
Lindell's article a radiation release was viewed more negatively, though Dr. Lindell wrote that in at least one respect the differences are "not large." Tr. at 17,848-50.
One County witness opined that one of Dr. Lindell's conclusions was "an overstate-ment." Tr.17,850. Af ter providing their own interpretation of Dr. Lindell's work both in their written and oral testimony, Suffolk County's witnesses admitted that they have never discussed this or any other publication of Dr. Lindell with him. Tr. at 17,830-31, 18,047. It also appeared that County witness Dr. Cole was familiar with only portions of Dr. Lindell's work, and not f amiliar with some of Dr. Lindell's work that might help put the Nuclear Safety article in context. The County witnesses also seemed to misun-derstand Dr. Lindell's opinion about the County's opinion polls making personal safety salient and ignoring possible " barriers" to evacuation.
Even more telling is the line of questions asked by Judge Kline at the conclusion of Suffolk County's oral testimony. Judge Kline asked Drs. Johnson, Saegert, and Cole how "these clashing views" of the experts should be resolved. To the question: "How have you reconciled these two views, both of which have at the surf ace at least, plausi-bility?," Dr. Cole responded:
A Well, I think personally the problem is that these disputes are taking place in a litigation setting.
If you read some of LILCO's witnesses pub-lished work, the work that they do and have to be peer re-vicwed, there are differences, but those differences aren't nearly as drastic, in my opinion, as they appear in front of this Board and other Boards.
For example, in the hearings that took place several years back, Dr. Sorenson was a witness for LILCO, anC we had a chance to read some of his published work, and if you look at some of his published work it has some of the same kind of analyses that, for example, Drs. Johnson and Zeigler have in theirs.
Dr. Lindell's paper that we discussed before, and that was submitted by Mr. Christman as an exhibit, the paper -- Barnes -- to me, that is entirely one hundred per-cent consistent with my work.
He did a survey of behavioral intentions. He said that these were useful surveys. He didn't deny that they were useful surveys. He said they were useful surveys. He used Governmental money from a grant to conduct this re-search, and he found that people had very high, some might call it irrational fears, of radiation. That they believed that radiation can spread very quickly over long distances, and that very large proportions of people say they would evacu-ate in case of a nuclear emergency.
That is exactly what the County surveys have shown, and other surveys commissioned by LILCO, and all the surveys have shown.
If you look at the published work, there is more agreement in a lot of this than it would seem in front of this setting here.
'* Tr. at 17,949-50. For Dr. Cole to imply that LILCO witnesses and Dr. Lindell in partic-ular have shaded their professional opinions because of this litigation is itself good cause for allowing Dr. Lindell to respond. The import of Dr. Cole's testimony is that Dr. Lindell does not hold the opinions that he has sworn to in this proceeding. LILCO and Dr. Lindell deserve the opportunity to respond to these allegations, especially in light of the fact that the Interveners declined to confront Dr. Lindell directly with the alleged contradictions when he was on the stand.
In addition, Dr. Cole's comments imply that Dr. Lindell uses surveys for the same purpose that he has used them, which is to predict future behavior. Dr. Lindell in his testimony disagreed with the use of survey for that purpose and, as Dr. Lindell will explain to the Board if permitted to do, he uses surveys to measure " behavioral inten-tions"- a very different purpose from using them to predict actual behavior.
Conclusion For the foregoing reasons, LILCO respectfully requests this Board to grant LILCO's motion to present brief oral rebuttal testimony of Dr. Lindell to Suffolk Coun-ty's testimony that mischaracterizes his professional opinions in this proceeding. His testimony would be limited to responding to Suffolk County's witnesses' characterize-tions and interpretations of his work.
LILCO notes that in the emergency planning hearings of 1984 in this proceeding the parties were allowed, upon justification, to offer oral rebuttal testimony at the end of each " cluster" of issues. LILCO's request to have Dr. Lindell testify is consistent with this precedent.
At present Dr. Lindell cannot be contacted, because he is in Michigan preparing l
for his upcoming move there. Before leaving New York af ter he testified, however, Dr.
1 Lindell provided LILCO with a tentative schedule. Based on that schedule, Dr. Lindell l
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- i should be available sometime af ter July 20th and before July 30th. If the Board grants LILCO's motion, LILCO should be able to arrange for Dr. Lindell to appear to give his rebuttal testimony during that period. Because the testimony will be brief, it should be possible to fit him in without disrupting the existing schedule.
Respectfully submitted, M
[ fames N. Christman y Mary Jo Leugers Hunton & Williams 707 East Main Street P.O. Box 1535 Richmond, Virginia 23212 DATED: July 17,1987
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