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{{#Wiki_filter:Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Title:            South Texas Project Units 1 and 2 License Renewal Public Meeting - Evening Session Docket Number:    (n/a)
Location:        Bay City, Texas Date:            Wednesday, March 2, 2011 Work Order No.:  NRC-740                          Pages 1-46 ORIGINAL NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
 
1                      UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2                  NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3                                . . . . .
4                  ENVIRONMENTAL SCOPING MEETING 5                    FOR THE SOUTH TEXAS PROJECT 6                  UNITS 1 AND 2 LICENSE RENEWAL 7                                  PROCESS 8
9                    Wednesday,    March 2,        2011 10 11                                Auditorium 12                              201 7th Street 13                            Bay City,      Texas 14                                  7:00 p.m.
15 16              NRC STAFF:
17              ALISON RIVERA 18              SUSAN SALTER 19              MICHELLE MOSER 20              TAM TRAN 21              BO PHAM 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433          WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701    www.nealrgross.com
 
2 1                        P RO C E E D I NG S 2                    MS. RIVERA:      Good evening, and welcome to 3 this      evening's    session of        the    South  Texas    Project 4 Units 1 and 2 License Renewal scoping meeting.                            As I 5 said, the purpose is              to discuss the scoping comments 6 for the environmental report.                    There are handouts in 7 the back,      as well as copies of the presentation that 8 the NRC staff will be giving.
9                    If you haven't already turned in a yellow 10 card and you do wish to provide comments during the 11 comment period, please fill                one out at the back on the 12 table        and bring      it    up  to    either    myself  or      Susan 13 Salter.          My  name    is    Alison    Rivera,    and    I'm      the 14 facilitator for this evening.
15                  As I mentioned, we'll have a presentation 16 by the NRC staff, followed by questions on the process 17 during which I'll            come out with a microphone to the 18 aisle and you can ask your questions on the process, 19 and then we'll turn to the comment period where you'll 20 come up to the podium.
21                    Please,      when you're making comments,                  be 22 courteous and respectful and be mindful of your time.
23 I'd ask that you be concise.                    A transcript is        being 24 taken by Leslie Berridge,                and we'd ask that you keep 25 your comments to about three to five minutes.                          And I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433            WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701        www.nealrgross.com
 
3 1 will call you three at a time.
2                    Please refrain from sidebars when other 3 people        are  up here      commenting,        and turn    all      cell 4 phones to vibrate so that they're not interrupted.                              If 5 you have to take a call,                  please just go out to the 6 lobby.
7                    Housekeeping:            Bathrooms    are  to either 8 side through the exit,              left or right.
9                    And    with    that,      I    think  I've    covered 10 everything and we can turn the presentation over to 11 the NRC.
12                    MS. MOSER:      Good evening,      everyone.          My 13 name is        Michelle Moser,        and I'm an aquatic biologist 14 with        the    NRC,    and    I'm    part      of  the    technical 15 environmental team working on the South Texas Project 16 for the license renewal application.
17                    The two project managers working on this 18 are Tam Tran,            who is    with us right here,          and John 19 Daily, and I'd like to thank all of you for coming out 20 here today.
21                    Tonight      we're going        to be providing an 22 overview of the license renewal process which includes 23 both a safety review and an environmental review.                            But 24 the most important part of tonight is                    really to hear 25 the comments that you have to provide to us,                      and it's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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4 1 your opportunity to be a part of the environmental 2  review.
3                    Before I discuss more about the license 4  renewal process, I'd like to briefly talk about NRC in 5  terms of        what we do        and our mission based                on two 6  important governing statutes.
7                      The NRC is a federal agency that regulates 8 the civilian use of nuclear materials.                          The Atomic 9  Energy        Act  authorizes      the    NRC      to  grant      40-year 10  operating licenses for nuclear power reactors and also 11  license renewals for an additional 20 years.
12                      The National Environmental Policy Act, or 13  NEPA,      establishes a national policy for considering 14  the impact of federal              decision-making            on the human 15  environment.            The    NRC  Commission          determined        that 16  nuclear reactor licensing renewal constitutes a major 17  federal        action  for    which    an    environmental          impact 18  statement,        or EIS,    is  warranted.
19                      NRC's mission is          threefold:          to ensure 20  adequate protection of public health and safety,                                to 21  promote        the  common    defense      and      security,      and      to 22  protect the environment.
23                      Now to turn a little          bit more specifically 24  to    the    South Texas      Project.          Units    1 and    2 were 25  licensed to operate in              1988 and 1989,          respectively.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 1 The      current    operating      licenses        expire    in  2027      and 2  2028.          STP    Nuclear      Operating          Company    filed          an 3  application        for license renewal of                the South Texas 4  Project with a letter dated October 25,                        2010.
5                      A license renewal application is required 6  to contain a certain set of information.                      For example, 7  there      must be    general      information        about  the plant 8  owner or operator, there's technical information which 9  pertains to aging management which is the focus of the 10  staff's        safety review,        and another component is                  the 11  environmental          report        which      is    the    applicant's 12  assessment of the environmental impacts of continued 13  operations.          We use this as the starting point for the 14  NRC staff's        independent environmental review.
15                      As  I mentioned        before,        license    renewal 16  involves two parallel reviews:                    the safety review and 17  the environmental review.
18                      The  safety review focuses                on the aging 19  effects        of  passive      and    long-lived        components        and 20  structures        that  the    NRC    deems      important    to      plant 21  safety.        The staff's main objective in this review is 22  to determine          whether      the effects          of aging will            be 23  adequately managed by the applicant.                        The review also 24  considers          generic        and      site-specific          operating 25  experience        related      to  the    effects      of  aging.          The NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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6 1 results of the safety review are documented                            in    the 2 safety evaluation report,                and sometimes we may refer 3 t that as the SER.
4                    For the environmental              review,    the staff 5 considers,        evaluates and discloses the environmental 6 impacts of continued plant operation for an additional 7 20 years.        The staff also evaluates the environmental 8 impacts        of  alternatives        to    license      renewal.          The 9 objective        of  the    review      is  to      determine      if      the 10 environmental impacts of license renewal are so great 11 that license renewal would not be a reasonable option, 12 or more plainly, is license renewal acceptable from an 13 environmental          standpoint.            The    staff    prepares          an 14 environmental impact statement to document its review, 15 and you may hear us refer to that as the EIS.
16                    Before    I  go into more          depth  about        the 17 safety and environmental reviews,                    I want to mention a 18 few areas that are very important and part of the NRC 19 oversight          process,      and    this      includes      emergency 20 planning,        security and current safety performance.
21                    NRC addresses these areas of performance 22 every day as part of the ongoing regulatory oversight 23 provided for all currently operating power reactors.
24 Therefore,        we do not reevaluate them in                  the license 25 renewal.          This  is    not    to    say    that    these    aren't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 1 important;        we  just    don't      duplicate      the    regulatory 2 process in these areas.
3                    This    diagram        illustrates        the    parallel 4 safety and environmental                review processes which you 5 can      see    both    lead      to    the    NRC    decision        on      the 6 application.          Now, in addition to these reviews, there 7 are also two other important considerations that the 8 Commission uses to help inform their decision.                            One of 9 these        considerations          is    the    independent          review 10 performed        by  the    Advisory        Committee        for    Reactor 11 Safety, which at NRC we love acronyms so we refer to 12 this      a lot as ACRS.            The ACRS reviews the license 13 renewal        application        and    the    NRC    staff's        safety 14 evaluation report.            The ACRS reports their finding and 15 recommendations directly to the Commission.
16                    Hearings          may      also      be        conducted.
17 Interested          stakeholders          may    submit        concerns          or 18 contentions and request a hearing.                        An adjudicatory 19 panel from the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board will 20 be        established          to      review        contentions              for 21 admissibility.              If      a    hearing      is    approved,          the 22 Commission would consider the outcome of the hearing 23 process in        its decision of whether or not to issue a 24 renewed operating license.
25                    Now I'm going to go into a little                  bit more NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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8 1 detail about the safety review.
2                    The regulations governing license renewal 3  for the safety review has two guiding principles.                        The 4  first      principle is that the current regulatory process 5  is adequate to ensure that the licensing basis of all 6  operating plants and provides an acceptable level of 7  safety.
8                    The second principle is            that the current 9  plant-specific        licensing      basis      must  be  maintained 10  during the license renewal in the same manner and to 11  the same extent as during the original license term.
12  In other words,        the same rules that apply under the 13  current license will continue to apply in the renewal 14  term, or the additional 20 years of operations.
15                    In  addition,        a    renewed    license        will 16  include conditions that must be met to ensure aging of 17  structures      and    components      important      to  safety are 18  adequately        managed      so    that      the    plant's    current 19  licensing basis is            maintained during the period of 20  extended operations.
21                    For the safety review, the staff performs 22  multiple-level reviews.            First, the staff reviews the 23  renewal        application      and    supporting      documentation.
24  Then the safety staff performs site audits to verify 25  the technical basis of the license renewal application NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 1 and to confirm that the applicant's aging management 2  programs        and    activities        conform        to    how    they      are 3  described in the application.                The staff documents the 4  basis and conclusion of                its reports          in  the    safety 5  evaluation report which is                publicly available.
6                    In    addition,        a    team      of    specialized 7  inspectors from NRC Region IV travel to the reactor 8  site      to verify that        aging    management        programs        are 9  being implemented, modified or planned consistent with 10  the license renewal application.
11                    Finally,      as I previously mentioned,                    the 12  ACRS performs          an independent review of the license 13  renewal application and the staff's                      safety evaluation 14  report.
15                    For the environmental                review,    the staff 16  performs their environmental review in accordance with 17  National Environmental              Policy Act of 1969,              or NEPA.
18  NEPA      requires    that    all    federal      agencies      follow        a 19  systematic        approach        in    evaluating        the    potential 20  impacts        associated      with major        federal      actions        and 21  alternatives          to  those      actions.        By  law,    the      NEPA 22  process        includes      public      participation          and    public 23  disclosure.
24                    The      NRC's      environmental            regulations 25  contained in 10 CFR Part 51 are largely based on other NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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10 1 implementing regulations for NEPA.
2                    In the staff's EIS we evaluate impacts to 3 a wide range of resources such as wildlife and fish, 4 water        and air,      historical        and cultural            resources, 5 socioeconomics,            and human health.              Starting with the 6 scoping        process,      we    consult      with various            federal, 7 state        and  local    officials,        as    well      as  leaders        of 8 Native American Nations, that have expertise in these 9 areas.
10                    As illustrated on the slide,                    some of the 11 agencies        that    we    work with        include        U.S. Fish      and 12 Wildlife          Service,        EPA,    NOAA,        state      historical 13 preservation offices, as well as many local and state 14 agencies.
15                    The environmental review begins with the 16 scoping process which is                  where we are            today.          The 17 purpose        of    the    scoping      process        is    to    identify 18 significant        issues that should be considered in                            the 19 environmental            review.            We      are      now    gathering 20 information that we will use to prepare an EIS for the 21 South Texas license renewal.                  As part of that process, 22 we are here to collect your comments on the scope of 23 the environmental review -- that is,                      the environmental 24 impacts        that    are    local    to    this    area      and that          are 25 important for the staff to consider.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433              WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701            www.nealrgross.com
 
11 1                    The    staff      has      developed        a    generic 2 environmental impact statement that addresses a number 3 of issues common to all nuclear power plants.                                  The 4 staff is        supplementing that generic EIS with a site-5 specific EIS for the South Texas Project.                            The staff 6 will also re-examine the conclusions reached in                                the 7 generic        EIS  to  determine        if  there's        any  new      and 8 significant          information          that      would      change        the 9 conclusions reached in the generic EIS.
10                    The scoping period started on January 31 11 and we will be continuing to take comments until April 12 1.
13                    In general, we are looking for information 14 about        the    environmental          impacts      from      continued 15 operation        of    the    South      Texas    Project      during        the 16 extended period of operation.                      You can assist us in 17 that process by telling us,                for example, what aspects 18 of your local community we should focus on, what local 19 environmental,          social    and    economic      issues      the NRC 20 should examine,          and what reasonable alternatives are 21 most appropriate for this region.
22                    This    next    slide      illustrates        the    NRC's 23 various        considerations        for    deciding      if    a  renewed 24 operating        license will be issued.                It's      a rigorous 25 review involving the EIS,                  safety evaluation report, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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12 1  regional inspections,            and so on.        But what's important 2  to point out here is            that the public comments are an 3  important part of the license renewal process.                                  We 4  consider        all  comments      that    we    receive    today        and 5  throughout the scoping period, and it                    helps inform and 6  shape the supplemental environmental impact statement.
7                    In  addition        to  providing      comments          at 8  today's meeting,          there are other ways that you can 9  submit comments on the environmental review.                          You can 10  provide written comments by mail to the NRC Chief of 11  Rules and Directives Branch at the address provided on 12  this slide,        and there are copies of this slide back 13  there.        Or you can send your comments electronic by 14  going to regulations.gov.
15                    You can also make your comments in person 16  if  you happen to be in            Rockville,        Maryland.      We ask 17  that you get in touch with Tam Tran beforehand so that 18  he can set up the appropriate arrangements.
19                    And    again,        the    comments      should          be 20  submitted by April 1.
21                    This    slide    shows      some      other    important 22  milestones for the environmental review process.                              The 23  opportunity to submit contentions for a hearing closes 24  on      March    14,    and    we    plan      to    issue    the      draft 25  environmental impact statement around March 2012.                            And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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13 1 once that's issued,              there will be a comment period 2  where        again  there      will    be an opportunity            for      the 3  public to read through the draft                        EIS,  and it's        an 4  opportunity for the public to comment on the draft EIS 5  and see if        there's any additional impacts that you'd 6  like to see in          it.
7                      The primary contacts within the NRC for 8  the license renewal of the South Texas Project are Tam 9  Tran and John Daily.
10                      The Bay City Public Library has agreed to 11  make the        license renewal          application        available        for 12  public review,          and when it's          published for comment, 13  the draft supplemental EIS will also be available at 14  the library.
15  In    addition,      these      documents      will      be on the NRC's 16  website at the website that's listed on this slide, 17  and the safety review schedule is                      also posted on the 18  same website.
19                      As you came in,        you were asked to fill              out 20  a registration card at our reception desk.                        If  you've 21  included your address on that card,                      we will mail you 22  a    copy      of  the      draft      and    final      EIS    for      your 23  information.        And if you didn't have an opportunity to 24  fill      out that card, please feel free before you leave 25  to fill        out a blue card and add your address to it.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 1                    This concludes my presentation and I will 2  now turn it        over to our meeting facilitator.
3                      MS. RIVERA:      Thank you, Michelle.
4                      At    this point        we'll      open the    floor        to 5 questions on the process,                  and I'll      come out with a 6 microphone if          there are any.          Just raise your hands.
7                      Do you have a question?              Please state your 8  name and affiliation,              if  any, before your question.
9                      MR. CORDER:      Good afternoon.          My name is 10  John Corder,          313 County Road 912 in Brazoria County.
11  I'm proud to say that I worked on STP 1 and 2 for five 12  years.
13                      My concern is        something that affected me 14  personally that I identified some concerns that I had 15  as time went on, and through the process of the United 16  States        Labor    Commission        I  was    able  to  settle        my 17  complaints inasmuch as I was not told ever whatever 18  happened to the results of my complaints.
19                      I'm here tonight to offer to the STP, not 20  only 1 and 2 but 3 and 4,              to please make public --              and 21  I've worked with the administration of both 1 and 2 22  and 3 and 4 --          to make public inasmuch as they could 23  put it        into the Bay City Library.
24                      Here's the facts,          if  you're any of these 25  people here --          excuse me a minute to get it            correct        --
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15 1  if    you're      an    employee,        a  contractor,        a  vendor, 2 personnel      or a visitor reporting                  safety-related          or 3 quality concerns,              what I'm saying is              that whatever 4 those concerns are should be made public,                            put in        a 5 public place.
6                    The    pressure      on    individuals        to    report 7 something is great when they fear if                        they're working 8 that they'll be terminated, or maybe they go ahead and 9 get terminated or choose another job, what happens to 10 the concern that they have identified.
11                    We have in this policy of STP that they'll 12 take      care  of  it    and NRC will,          and    I'm sure      their 13 intent is very good.                What we the people need to know 14 is      that    whatever          that    concern        was  should          be 15 identified.          That is        only part of it.            What is        the 16 resolution        to    that      concern,      and      thirdly,    whatever 17 happened      to  the    culmination        that      that  concern was 18 adequately identified.                Even if      the person wanted to 19 be anonymous,        it's    still    important publicly regarding 20 what emphasis it            has to the NRC or to the project, 21 it's      important to the public.
22                    We're here tonight to understand that the 23 NRC and the STP are interested in                          continuing their 24 license.        I agree with that.                I agree also that in 25 that process their policy should be changed in words NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 1 that would say that we,              STP,    will identify to the,              for 2 example,        Bay City Library,            will put in      the concerns 3 that      are presented        to them so that          the public will 4 have        access    to    know      what    they      were,    what        the 5 resolution was,          and if    it  in  fact was completed.
6                    Thank you very much.
7                    MS. SALTER:      Thank you,        Mr. Corder.        And 8 I believe we have some information on,                    it  sounds like, 9 maybe possibly an allegation.                      We'll    follow up with 10 that and get back with you on that.
11                    Does    anyone      have    any    questions    on      the 12 process before we move into the comment period for the 13 review,        for the license renewal review, environmental 14 evaluation?
15                    (No response.)
16                    MS. RIVERA:      Okay.      So with that,      we are 17 going to enter into the comment period.                      Again,    if    you 18 would like to make a comment and you have not filled 19 out a yellow card,            it's  not too late.        You can get one 20 in    the back and bring it              to me and we'll add you to 21 the list.
22                    I'm going to turn it              back to Alison.
23                    MS. RIVERA:      Thank you.
24                    First up,        we're    going to have Matagorda 25 County Judge        Nate McDonald,            and on deck we'll            have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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17 1 Mitch Thames,          Tim Powell and Ken Head.
2                      JUDGE McDONALD:        Good evening.        My name is 3  Nate McDonald.            I'm the county judge from Matagorda 4  County,        and I want to thank the NRC for hosting this 5  event        tonight    to  give    all    of    you  a  voice    in    the 6  process.          That's the way America was promulgated in 7 the beginning,            and that's the way it              should be and 8  always        shall be,    we hope,      and we thank you all for 9 making that available to us tonight.
10                      Ladies      and    gentlemen,          by    its      very 11  definition, an electric generating station is designed 12  to churn out power seven days a week,                      24 hours a day, 13  and hopefully 365 days a year, unless, of course,                              you 14  have those unforeseen events that come along from time 15  to time.
16                      Just    last    month      we    had  one    of    those 17  unforeseen events            right here        in    this county and in 18  many, many parts of the State of Texas.                        Many, many of 19  the electric generating stations in                        the state did a 20  fine job; many, many of them fell offline.                        I can tell 21  you,      though,    from firsthand knowledge                that  one      of 22  those stations that didn't go offline and that did do 23  a very,          very good job was right                here in    Matagorda 24  County.          We had two units of nuclear that operated 25  completely right through every outage that was in this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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18 1  cold snap that we had,                and not only that,          but did it 2  in    a    safe      and reliable        manner      with no reportable 3  injuries,          the whole thing.          You know,    that in itself 4  is plenty to keep this station running for another 20 5 years.
6                        If we start down the path of all the other 7 ancillary          things that this plant has for Matagorda 8 County,        it's      going to take a heck of al to more than 9 the three            to five minutes that              I have,  so I'm not 10  going to start down that path.                        But what I will tell 11  you and what I do know from firsthand observation is 12  that this plant              is    committed to the safety and the 13  well-being of the citizens of Matagorda                          County,        to 14  their employees,              and that's what they practice first 15  and foremost is safety, and they do that oftentimes at 16  the expense of profits.
17                        And I can tell          you that's a very,            very 18  refreshing take on a business model because you don't 19  see that much in corporate America these days,                          ladies 20  and gentlemen.            But we see that and we have that right 21  here      in  Matagorda County,            and all the while having 22  promulgated and carried out that culture of excellence 23  that they practice.                  They've developed a very good 24  business model              that does allow them to produce and 25  does      allow      them to      lead    the nation,        and even the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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19 1 world,        in safe and reliable electric generation.
2                    So that,      in a nutshell,          for me is    what's 3 the very most important thing about consideration for 4 this renewal that we're talking about tonight.
5                    I hope that the NRC will smile favorably 6 upon this plant's request and I'd hope that you would 7 grant it.        And if    there's ever anything that I or my 8 office or any of the commissioners that serve on the 9 court with me can answer for you,                      I'd hope that you 10 would call us and ask those questions of us and give 11 us the chance to answer those for you.
12                    We do appreciate you all being here this 13 evening, we do appreciate STP's confidence in us, and 14 we especially appreciate STP's willingness to grow out 15 their legacy for the county by another 20 years                                in 16 filing this application.
17                    So thank you all very, very much again, 18 NRC,      for allowing us to comment tonight.                  Thank you.
19                    MS. RIVERA:      Thank you, Judge McDonald.
20                    Next we have Mitch Thames, followed by Tim 21 Powell,        Ken Head and Mike Bolin.
22                    MR. THAMES:      And again, thank you.              I also 23 want to echo the Judge's comments.                      NRC,  thank you so 24 much for coming down to Matagorda County,                        and as an 25 official welcome,          we certainly do appreciate you.
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20 1                    I want      to touch      on two aspects            of the 2 review.        One is going to be the environmental aspect.
3  It's      very  important      when you talk about                Matagorda 4 County --        and    I'll      do    just      a    little    bit      of      a 5 commercial        --  we have a very, very sensitive area in 6 that we have the freshwater from our Colorado River, 7 two bays,      estuaries,        as well as the Gulf of Mexico.
8 We are the North American Christmas bird count winner 9 about eleven out of the last twelve years.                                It    was 10 foggy one morning and we missed some of those birds.
11                    But as you see that as we've got such a 12 great ecological area here the whole time Units 1 and 13 2 have been operating.                So we're very, very proud of 14 the      fact    that    the    South    Texas      Nuclear      Operating 15 Company,      with Units 1 and 2,            continues to operate in 16 a strong fashion while our environment is                          protected.
17                    The second is        from more of a behind-the-18 scenes type of safety aspect.                  The Judge has seen fit 19 to have me as one of the PIOs,                        public      information 20 officers,        for    the    county during          a    lot of    our STP 21 drills, many of which you grade us on every aspect of 22 it.        We're very proud of the fact                      that we set the 23 standard,      I think,      in the nation, and that's some of 24 the feedback we've gotten from the NRC.
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21 1 opened up, as the county's PIO.                        There's never been a 2 piece of information                  that's been withheld as we go 3 through drills, as situations were faced.                              We're also 4 educated          from a county standpoint,                  knowing      exactly 5 what's going on at the plant in case something should 6 ever happen.              It    is  important      for us to be able to 7 stand up and speak to the media, but more importantly, 8 as    you      know,      we're      speaking      to    the  citizens          of 9 Matagorda County and keeping them safe.
10 So on both aspects it's                    a five-star rating.
11                        We certainly do appreciate you being here, 12 and we thank you so much.
13                        MS. RIVERA:        Thank you, Mr.        Thames.
14                        Next we'll have Tim Powell,                  followed by 15 Ken Head          and Mike          Bolin.      And as      you    start your 16 comments,          if  you could introduce                yourself and give 17 your affiliation,                if  any,    please.
18                        MR. POWELL:      Thank you very much.            I'm Tim 19 Powell.          I'm the vice president of Technical Support 20 and Oversight              for the South Texas Project,                    and the 21 license renewal comes under my area.
22                        Do    appreciate        the    Nuclear      Regulatory 23 Commission            coming      down    and supporting          this    public 24 forum.        It  is extremely important,              the public input in 25 this process,              because      it  helps      us become a better NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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22 1  station with the            more input that we get.
2                      I really would like to thank the residents 3 of the local communities                  and the leaders        that have 4  come out to provide input.                We couldn't do it        without 5 you and we appreciate your support and your comments.
6                      1 would also just like to state that over 7  the last        seven years      we have had the top two-unit 8 producing power plant in the United States,                        and over 9  the last five years the top two-unit producer in                            the 10  world.          We accomplished that by focusing on safety 11  first.        Nuclear safety is our number one priority and 12  something that we hold very dear, and we continuously 13  focus on it.
14                      Our employees are active in the community.
15  I think we are an excellent corporate citizen, and we 16  look forward to doing that all the way to 2047 and 17  2048.          We look forward to serving Matagorda                    County 18  through the production of safe,                      clean,  carbon-free 19  electricity over those extra 20 years.                        Thank you.
20                      MS. RIVERA:      Thank you, Mr.        Powell.
21                      Next we have Ken Head,              followed by Mike 22  Bolin.
23                      MR. KEN HEAD:        Thank you.      My name is      Ken 24  Head.          I'm a small business owner here in Matagorda 25  County.
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23 1                  And first      of all,      I'd like to thank the 2  NRC for coming down today.              We really appreciate your 3  concern over our environment,            as well as our community 4  leaders here in Matagorda County.
5                  I'd like to express it's            necessary for the 6  continued growth of our county for you to issue the 7  20-year continuation of STP.                STP employees are some 8  of my top customers and they're the ones that keep our 9  community afloat, as well as our small businesses, our 10  hotels, our food eateries,            everywhere else.          I would 11  imagine you're staying at some of those fine utilities 12  this evening.
13                  As a long-time resident of Bay City, I've 14  seen      the good, the bad and the ugly of STP,              and good 15  thing I've never seen any bad or ugly, everything I've 16  seen has      been pretty good.            And I    appreciate        the 17  leadership out there that I see sitting around this 18  room that has made that happen.
19                  What should you focus on?            Obviously, our 20  environmental concerns are a huge part of this.                          I'm 21  the Convention and Visitors Bureau and one of our main 22  focuses is bringing tourists down to Matagorda County 23  to see what we have to offer.                Good thing one of our 24  sights to see is        STP,    as well as all around STP we 25  have tons of fishing, birding,                we have farmlands and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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24 1  everything else, and from what I've seen, there have 2  been no concerns            with those        at all,        as  I grew up 3  fishing right below STP on the Colorado River.                            And I 4 would        like to thank STP for providing                    that to me, 5 providing the safe waters and the safe grounds for me 6  to do that on.
7                    As well,      it    is  my opinion        that    if      the 8  renewal should be given to STP,                    I think the highly 9 qualified organization out there will continue working 10  on 1 and 2 as they continue to build 3 and 4,                              and I 11  think you ought to take that into accountability that 12  with the 3 and 4 coming on that they can continue to 13  operate 1 and 2 successfully.
14                    Thank you so much.
15                    MS. RIVERA:      Thank you, Mr.          Head.
16                    Next we'll have Mr.            Bolin, and if        anyone 17  else would like to register to speak,                      just fill      out a 18  yellow card.
19                    MR. BOLIN:      Thank you.          My name is        Mike 20  Bolin,        and I'm a partner with John White in a small 21  general contracting firm local to Bay City.
22                    There's not much else                to say after Ken 23  Head        covered    the    waterfront,        and    I    agree      with 24  everything that he said.                  And I'd also like to,                for 25  the      record,    say    that    I    am    absolutely        for      the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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25 1  continuation          of    such    a  good      neighbor        and  a    good 2  employer,          just a good citizen.            Our hopes are that it 3  will continue and that we're for it,                          and we just wish 4 we had more employers like you in                          this county.
5                      Thank you.
6                      MS. RIVERA:      I have a yellow card now for 7 Mr. Corder.      Did you have additional comments that you 8 wanted to come up and make?
9                      As he's approaching,            I'll      say that on deck 10  is    Casey      Kile,    Robert    Singleton,          Karen Hadden,            and 11  Bobby Head.
12                        MR. CORDER:      My name is          John Corder,          313 13  County Road 912,            Brazoria County.              It's    a pleasure to 14  be here tonight.
15                        As I said earlier,            I had the pleasure of 16  working on 1 and 2                for about      five years.            I've also 17  had the experience of overseeing quality control for 18  the    company        I've worked        for  for      about    30  years        in 19  quality        control,        and  I've    been      personally        on    five 20  nuclear plants.              This has been one of them.
21                        To more elaborate on what I just said, my 22  concern          is    having      worked      with        the      STP  present 23  administration and the Units 3 and 4,                            I'm really not 24  satisfied          that they had the openness that I expected 25  when it        come to personnel            for the individual workers NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 1  or those        that are here        in    these      categories    that      I 2 mentioned.
3                    I would admonish all of us to always keep 4  tabs on the installation itself,                    feel free that you 5  can ask questions and if                there's any questions that 6  ever come from a worker.                It  is very difficult for a 7  lot    of    people    to    identify      a  problem.        They      feel 8 threatened by it,          and frankly, that is a real concern, 9 been there.
10                      So I'm hoping that in              the renewal      --    and 11  I wish that the plants get renewed,                      I'm not going to 12  say about        nuclear not being safe,              et cetera --        I am 13  only saying that I am hoping that we have more of an 14  openness with the community or for those that have any 15  questions about the safety or any concern, whether it 16  be for personnel protection, plant safety or for the 17  administration of how they do their policies.
18                      I was working with 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 on 19  those        policies      they    have      which      said  about        the 20  openness,        and that's what I said is              that I hope that 21  we can have,        like the person said before,                it  will be 22  in    the library, but really I want the concerns to be 23  there        so  that  we    can  look      at    them    and    get    them 24  resolved.
25                      And I wish STP good luck.
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27 1                        MS. RIVERA:        Thank you,      Mr. Corder.
2                        Next we'll        have Casey Kile,          followed by 3 Robert Singleton,              Karen Hadden and Bobby Head.
4                        MR. KILE:      My name is      Casey Kile.        I'm the 5 president of Bay City Babe Ruth here in                            Bay City.
6                      And I'd      just like to say that,            on behalf 7 of Babe Ruth,            we're very grateful              for everything STP 8 does      for    us    as  an    organization.            They're      a    major 9 sponsor in          all    of our events.          Over the last      ten years 10  we've hosted four regional tournaments and eleven or 11  twelve state tournaments,                    and without STP's support, 12  we would never have been able to participate in                                those 13  tournaments or even host those tournaments.
14                        On the economic standpoint Mr.                Head said, 15  earlier        last    year we hosted a regional tournament.                        We 16  had      five      states      come      to  visit      Bay    City,    over      400 17  visitors        in    town,    over 100,000 new dollars just last 18  year,      and without          STP    supporting      that,    we wouldn't 19  have been able to host that tournament.                            So we'd like 20  to thank them.
21                        Not only do they help us monetarily with 22  our tournaments,              but their employees              also volunteer 23  with      us,      and    we'd    like    to    thank      them    for      their 24  employees and letting                  them volunteer.
25                        Over    the    last    ten    years,      like    I    said, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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28 1 we've hosted about 15 tournaments and probably half a 2  million new dollars in              Matagorda County over the last 3  ten years.
4                    So  if    you wouldn't          mind,    Bay City Babe 5  Ruth and all        the youth are in            great favor of renewing 6  STP for their license.                Thank you very much.
7                    MS. RIVERA:        Thank you,        Mr. Kile.
8                    Next we'll have Robert Singleton, followed 9  by    Karen Hadden,        and    finally,      Bobby Head.        And        if 10  anyone else is        interested in        speaking,      just please fil 11  out a yellow card and bring it                    up to Susan or I.
12                    MR. SINGLETON:          Hi.      My name    is  Robert 13  Singleton.          I'm    from    Austin      and    I'm  representing 14  public citizen at this event.
15                    You may ask why I'd            want to come down from 16  Austin to talk to you.                Well,    Austin is      a 16 percent 17  partner        in Unit    1 and Unit        2,  and if      you look back 18  over the history of the project,                    we've got a lot less 19  reason to celebrate this plant than maybe some people 20  who live here do.              I'm not going to talk a lot about 21  jobs but I'm going to wrap up with that tonight.
22                    But Austin's experience with 1 and 2 was 23  a nightmare.          We had it      thrust upon us by politicians 24  who were determined to continue to take public votes 25  until we bought a share of the plant.                      We tried      to get NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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29 1 out of the plant at one point,                      tried to sell our 16 2  percent share,            and can't.
3                      The problem was at its              worst in    the '90s 4  when 42 cents out of every dollar that we paid on a 5  utility        bill was going for debt service at NRG.                          For 6  our 16 percent share,                we were paying almost half of 7  our utility          bill for debt service on the project.
8                      I    want      to  talk    mainly      about      safety 9 tonight.        And I know that when you're living here, the 10  plant is just something that's always been there, but 11  my thinking about safety at nuclear power plants is 12  sort of:          Yeah,    they've got redundant safety systems 13  because there are redundant dangers.                          The analogy I 14  like        to    think    of    is  if    I'm      walking    through          a 15  construction site wearing a hard hat and a brick falls 16  six      stories        and  bounces      off  my      helmet,    my    first 17  thought is not thank God the helmet worked, my thought 18  is who dropped the brick.
19                      If  you want to know what's going on with 20  nuclear power plants and you support this plant,                                I'm 21  going to challenge you to do one thing,                          and that is 22  tomorrow morning go to the NRC website,                        www.nrg.gov, 23  and      click      on    event      reports    and      click  on    current 24  events.        If  you do this for a couple of days a week, 25  you're going to be convinced that nuclear power plants NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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30 1  routinely          have      near      misses        that    could        have 2  catastrophic results.
3                      Nuclear power is          the only form of energy 4  generation          that      has    the    potential        for    killing 5  thousands of people in one single event.                        I mean,        if 6  you're investing in              wind, what's the worst that can 7  happen?          You have a catastrophic accident,                you don't 8  generate          power      and      maybe        some    sheep        were 9  inconvenienced.            Nuclear power has            the capacity to 10  kill people,          it's    a dangerous        technology.        All you 11  have to do is        look at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.
12                      How many of you have ever heard of SLl?
13  It    was an experimental            reactor in          Idaho that in        the 14  early        '60s  had    a    fatal    accident.          There  was      one 15  gentleman that was actually pinned to the ceiling of 16  the containment building by a rod when there was a 17  steam explosion in the plant.                    It    impaled him to the 18  ceiling stuck on a control rod.
19                      Nuclear power can and has                  caused human 20  fatalities.          Read about Chernobyl.              I know that NRG is 21  going to say well, new reactors are safer, but they're 22  saying        this  in    a way    that    causes      me  to  ask      this 23  question. When they're talking to you about 3 and 4, 24  they say these plants are newer and safer,                          or safer 25  and more advanced than the old plants.                        Well,  they're NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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31 1 also arguing for extending the life of the old plants 2 which had a limit on their life in the first                      place for 3 a reason:          we didn't know how long you could run a 4 nuclear power plant; we still                  don't.
5                    Turkey      Point    in    Florida,      they    had      to 6 replace        the  steam generators            in    the plant,      and to 7 replace a steam generator you have to cut a hole in 8 the      containment        building,        you    have    to  take        the 9 generator out and put the new one in.                      Well, what they 10 found        was  that    the    cement    inside      the  containment 11 building had degraded over the last 20 years,                              there 12 were immense cracks that ran through the inside of the 13 structure.
14                    And that is      what happens when you extend 15 the      life    of  a  nuclear      plant.          These  things        were 16 designed to have a limited life for a reason.                          They're 17 not going to safe forever.
18                    Nuclear power was also always intended to 19 be a bridge technology.                  We're always going to find 20 something        better,      and what we          could    do  right        now 21 instead of re-license these is                    make an investment in 22 renewables which could have, in terms of jobs, just as 23 much of an impact as extending the life of this plant 24 or building new units.
25                    The other thing about switching forms of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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32 1 energy is        that you can create jobs locally that are 2 going to be exclusively locally.                  Nuclear power, a lot 3 of the jobs that are generated are going to be foreign 4 manufacturing jobs.              The components for these plants 5 are built off site,            they don't really generate that 6 much for your local economy.
7                    There are new and exciting technologies 8 that we could be counting on.                For example, there's an 9 Australian company called EnviroMission that's just 10  about to open a project in                Arizona.          What it      is    is 11  it's      a tower,    just a tower,        covered around the base 12  with thick plastic.              What it    does is      it  captures the 13  heat of the sun, the heated air rises up a chimney and 14  turns a turbine.          It's    basically the only moving part, 15  so the turbine and then the generators from it.
16                    The  cool      thing    about      it  is    that        it 17  continues        to  generate      electricity          even  at      night 18  because the head of the ground continues to make this 19  temperature differential and the air continues up the 20  chimney and the turbines continue to turn.
21                    This is      the kind of          thing that        can be 22  built and provide localized power.                    In West Texas, for 23  example,        we could build these things and not have to 24  ship the power across the state.                      We could actually 25  use it        to provide energy where it's              built.
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33 1                      There are alternatives, and I really think 2 that there's not enough proof that a plant can be run 3 longer than the time period in                        which the engineers 4 that designed it              said it      was designed to be built.
5 They're talking now about running some nuclear plants 6 for 60 years.            My question is        is  this because they're 7 so much safer than they were thought to be originally, 8 or is      this because the people that run nuclear power 9 plants        say if    we close      it    down we    don't make        any 10 money; if        we continue to run it,            sure they'll be less 11 safe      than    they    were,      but  as    long  as  they      don't 12 actually melt down,              we're going to continue to make 13 money.          I think you'll find out that's what it                    is.
14                      And    also    don't    let    NRG  give  you      this 15 talking out of both sides of their face where they say 16 the 3 and 4 are going to be better and newer,                          at the 17 same they're talking about extending the life of what 18 then could be argued are the older and the less safe 19 plants.          Can't    have    it  both    ways,    and  there      are 20 definitely alternatives.
21                      Thanks.
22                      MS. RIVERA:      Thank you,      Mr. Singleton.
23                      Next we'll have Karen Hadden,              followed by 24 our final registered speaker,                    Bobby Head.
25                      If    anybody        else      is  interested            in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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34 1  registering, just fill            out a yellow card and bring it 2  to the front.          Thank you.
3                    MS. HADDEN:        Good evening.          My name is 4  Karen Hadden,        and I'm here as executive director of 5  the SEED Coalition,              Sustainable Energy and Economic 6  Development Coalition.
7                    And    first      I'd    like      to  say  thank      you 8  because we've been down here a number of times and 9  we've        expressed      concerns        about      the  new  reactors 10  proposed,      but we've always been treated well in                        Bay 11  City,      and I have a huge respect                for the people who 12  work here and live here,                and I do think you have a 13  beautiful        community        and    I    do    hope    that  tourism 14  continues and grows.
15                    I    also      have      concerns        about    the      re-16  licensing of reactors              1 and 2.          I think there's a 17  number of issues that need to be looked at carefully 18  during this process and bearing worker safety in mind.
19  One of them is        tritium, and basically there has been 20  tritium showing up in wells on the site.                        This needs 21  to be looked into thoroughly,                  as well as tritium in 22  the      Colorado      River,        and      documented,        measured, 23  carefully analyzed to see if                    it's    safe to continue 24  down this path at this point in                    time.
25                    Another issue is control rods.                  There were NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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35 1 problems when the new reactor heads were put on,                              the 2  control rods got stuck.              This is actually happening at 3 many different reactors right now.                        And there's been 4 some flaws in          construction of some of the equipment 5 involved.          So I think during this process that there 6 should be a thorough analysis of the control rods, 7 their drive mechanism, and so on and so forth, and see 8 if there's any problems technologically with the parts 9 that are here and being used.
10                      I share the concerns mentioned by Robert II  Singleton        about    embrittlement          as    the  plants      age.
12  These reactors were not designed to run forever; they 13  were designed to be closing down about this time, and 14  the first        five years      and the last            five years of a 15  nuclear reactor's life cycle are the ones where they 16  have the most risk, and I think we should bear that in 17  mind during          this    process      and do analysis          on that 18  front.
19                      Furthermore,        in  1982    there    was a study 20  done for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission called the 21  Crack Two Study.              It  found    that      if  there  were an 22  accident      --  and they were looking at Units 1 and 2 --
23  that there would be 18,000 early deaths.                        They would 24  also be followed by thousands of cancers.                        That study 25  has not been updated.              The population in some of this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 1  region has grown,            and it    needs to be looked at again 2  to    find out what          is  the    reality of        the    situation 3  today, and that needs to be compared to other ways of 4  generating electricity.
5                    There is      a problem with the leaking main 6 cooling reservoir which was described and documented 7  in the license application for Units 3 and 4.                            There 8  needs to be tracking of where the water is                          going,      is 9  it    reaching the Gulf,          where is      it    going,  what is        it 10  doing.        That should be part of the re-licensing study 11  and analysis.
12                    Water use        is  an increasing        issue.          Up 13  until      this  point,      the    highest      use    that  I  know of 14  through researchers looking at this is                        49 percent of 15  the Colorado River has been used for cooling purposes, 16  and I know a couple of summers ago there was a lot of 17  pumping going on to refill                the reservoir when it              got 18  kind of low.
19                    It's    a problem for those of us in Austin.
20  The      Colorado      River    water    has    to    serve    a  lot      of 21  purposes.        Rice farmers need it;              we're going to need 22  it    for many, many purposes, recreation,                  fishing on our 23  end.      And Lake Travis levels were at an all-time low 24  several years ago.              Every single dam on the whole lake 25  was closed; you couldn't put a boat in.
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37 1                      And we would like to see something shift 2 to    where      this  much      water was        no    longer    required.
3 Certainly you're still                  going to have to still                cool 4 spent fuel rods and so on and so forth, but it                                is    a 5 question when you look at continuing                          the reactors' 6 life.
7                      A big issue is need for power.                  Right now 8 in the legal case involving Units 3 and 4,                          the Atomic 9 Safety        and  Licensing        Board    has      agreed      to  hear        a 10 contention          that  is    one    of  omission.          There was          a 11 failure        to analyze what          alternatives          were there in 12 terms of looking at energy efficiency.                        Building codes 13 in    particular are going to be saving --                      they've been 14 adopted --        going to be saving some 2,200 megawatts of 15 power in Texas.            We need to look at whether the power 16 is    needed,      and then we need to look at how else it 17 could be generated.
18                      And certainly jobs are crucially important 19 in every community.              We realize that that's important 20 here.          I think it's        time to      look at what are                the 21 options in        terms of transition,              what other kinds of 22 ways      to generate      electricity        could      occur here --            I 23 think        there    are    many --      and    to    start    looking        at 24 training and what other options exist.
25                      The reactor head that's stored onsite,                          I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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38 1 think as part of this process it                      should be looked into 2  about how carefully shielded that is,                          is  it  adequate.
3 Maybe it        is,    maybe it        isn't.      But I think that should 4  be looked at.
5                        Security issues continue.                  Just last week 6 we heard about                a Texas        Tech student who among his 7 plans was a plan to attack nuclear plants, and I think 8  that needs to be looked at once again as well.
9                        So      these      and    many      issues      should        be 10  addressed.            It's    an important decision.
11                        I think at this point in                  time it's        also 12  important          to    note      that      in the    world    of    emergency 13  planning        that      the    ability to        get potassium          iodide 14  tablets        out      to      the    public      seems    to    have      been 15  overlooked.              I don't see a lot of information about 16  it.        I  think it        is    one approach you could take if 17  there        was    a    serious        accident,        and that      should        be 18  looked at.            In other places in the country potassium 19  iodide        tablets        were      actually      distributed        to      the 20  community at one point in time so that if                          there was an 21  accident,        you could take it              and protect the thyroid 22  from absorption of radioactive iodine.
23                        I don't see that happening here,                    nor do I 24  see information publicized about that option.                              You can 25  buy them online, but I don't see anybody even telling NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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39 1 people about that.
2                    So I think that we will also be submitting 3 written        comments.        There's      other      concerns  that        we 4 have.          We'll  be looking more            in-depth.      A lot of 5  issues need to be fully explored,                  and we look forward 6  to    communicating        with you        further      on that    front.
7 Thank you.
8                    MS. RIVERA:      Thank you, Ms.        Hadden.
9                    Next we'll have Bobby Head.
10                    MR. BOBBY HEAD:        I'm last but I'm going to 11  try to be a little            bit quick.      I think you know I can 12  be a little        bit long-winded, most of you guys.
13                    First off, I'd like to say I'm Bobby Head, 14  a third-generation Matagorda County resident.                      Love it 15  here.      There's no place like Matagorda County.
16                    To back up a few years and tell            you things 17  that I've witnessed,            back 30 years ago when we were 18  talking about the plant,              there was a group of people 19  that decided they were going to protest it.                      They were 20  from Austin, Boston, Houston, San Francisco, and they 21  rented buses and they came down here,                    and they put it 22  in    the newspaper that they had a thousand balloons 23  that they were going to release into the atmosphere, 24  and that's what would happen if                    they had a meltdown, 25  this nuclear waste would go like this.
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40 1                    Well,  it    just so happened that some people 2  from Bay City went out there.                  As I understand, there 3  was one lady who took her three children out there to 4  see the balloons.          And it      went into the newspaper that 5  they released the balloons, just happened to be one of 6  those days that the wind was blowing north and they 7  all blew out into the Gulf.
8                    Well,    do you realize that today, what we 9 know today, if          we were to release a thousand balloons 10  it  would be much more detrimental to our environment 11  than what STP has been for 30 years.                        We couldn't do 12  that.        We would make national news if                you said we're 13  going to release a thousand balloons,                      especially in a 14  place where the number one in the nation bird count is 15                      I'm in      a unique position.            I'm going to 16  change        subjects    a    little      bit.      I'm  in  a    unique 17  position, I've worked at STP,                  I've worked outages out 18  there.        I'm one of the few guys,            I guess, that's only 19  worked        four  outages --        I  haven't      worked    the      last 20  couple --        but  I  have      been from the very top of the 21  dome      to --    what's      the      room    at    the    very    bottom 22  underneath the rods --                number 1.      I've been there.
23                      And I will tell          you one thing, of all the 24  things        I've  done    in    my    life,    worked      in  the      oil 25  industry,        worked    on    drilling      rigs,    worked      at      Dow NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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41 1 Chemical Company,        I have never ever even come close to 2 the safety that I felt at STP.                  I'm telling you they 3 spend more time working on safety than anything else.
4 I've never felt        one bit    --  and not too many people go 5 to room number 1.
6                  And it's    kind of funny you go way up in 7 the top and it's        really,      really hot,        and you go way 8 down in the bottom and it's              really,      really cold, but 9 they call that the hottest place in                      the plant,      room 10 number 1.
11                  But I'm going to tell          you, safety, there's 12 nothing like safety at STP.              I've never been involved 13 in anything like that.
14                  To say that STP is            a good neighbor,            no 15 way.      They're an awesome neighbor.                They have been an 16 awesome neighbor from day one.                  When they first          came 17 here we thought,        well,    those were the STP guys,                  and 18 for years,      those guys out at STP,              those guys out at 19 STP.      Well, they're not.        They're out coaches,          they're 20 our sponsors,        they're our mothers,              our fathers,        our 21 brothers,      our sisters and our grandchildren that are 22 out there.        They are us,        they are out people.
23                  We love you guys.        We appreciate you being 24 here.        We want not only Units 3 and 4,              we would like 25 the extension of the units there.
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42 1                    Randy Weber was here last week.                    He's our 2  state representative.                He got over in          the next room 3 and he        said,    Texas    is  growing by 113,000            people a 4 month.        Wow. We're outgrowing all the states combined.
5 We're getting more people into Texas.                          He says if          we 6 keep growing the way we are,                  that by 2015 we're going 7 to have to have five new nuclear plants,                            or 16 coal 8 plants,        or 28 gas plants,          or 3,000 windmills if                the 9 windmills agree to turn 24-7-365.                    You know that's not 10 going to happen.
11                    Would      I  like    to  see      all  of    our power 12 generated        totally clean.            Yes,    I would.        It's      not 13 realistic, not with what we have as today's knowledge.
14                    What else do I want to say?                  Just to wind 15 up,    I appreciate you guys coming down.                        If  you have 16 any questions            of me,      a guy that worked              mechanical 17 maintenance out there,                let me know because we're the 18 guys that actually go out there and turn the nuts and 19 bolts and do the work, we dress in the full uniforms 20 to go to the places we have to go.                          If  you have any 21 questions,        feel free to ask,            and we appreciate you 22 guys coming down.
23                    Thank you.
24                    MS. RIVERA:        Thank you, Mr.        Head.
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43 1 going to turn it      over to Bo Pham,            the branch chief.
2                MS. SALTER:        Oh,  wait.      We have another 3  yellow card over here.
4                  MS. RIVERA:      Sorry.
5                MR. KOVAR:      Hello.      My name is Tom Kovar, 6 and I'm a citizen of Bay City,                  a business owner,            I 7 have a little      air conditioning business.
8                And I worked at the nuclear plant for five 9  years in the construction phase in the early '80s,                        and 10  to start with we were kind of skeptical when they were 11  building the STP because there were several setbacks, 12  mainly in the construction companies,                  not in the STP 13  itself.
14                  But after it        was finally built,          we were 15  pleasantly surprised for the last 20 years in how it 16  operated and how safe it          was, and a large part of that 17  is    because  of  the NRC and how it              governs    and has 18  safeguards over the nuclear industry.
19                  You have to have electricity and you have 20  to have a lot of it.            I wish I could afford Austin's 21  16 percent.      But you have to have a lot of electricity 22  nowadays because of the way the population is,                      and if 23  you look at the last 40-50 years of power generation, 24  of    gas-fired  plants      or    coal-fired        plants  and      how 25  hazardous they are to the environment and people, then NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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44 1  I think you can't help but realize how safe nuclear 2  power is.        The government has been using it                  to power 3  their vehicles in the military for a long time.
4                      And there's no way that you can have a 5  perfect system when it's                    run by people and natural 6  disasters.          Our greatest nuclear plant in                the solar 7  system,        the sun,      has been operating for billions of 8  years        and  it    has    solar      flare-ups,      and we've        been 9  fortunate        that none of them have been too great to 10  impact us too greatly.
11                      And    in    a  smaller        sense,    our    smaller 12  nuclear reactor here has the NRC as the buffer.                                  As 13  our distance from the sun is the buffer that keeps us 14  safe, well, the NRC is the buffer against any calamity 15  happening at the nuclear plant.
16                      So  I    think      that    it's    the  best      power 17  generation --          not the best power generation because I 18  know you mentioned wind and solar and the tower that 19  you      mentioned,      and sure there's a lot better ways, 20  but on the scale that we need it                      and the timing that 21  we need it,        what are you going to do?                Are you going 22  to turn off all the lights and say let's                      wait till      all 23  this other stuff gets developed?                        You can't do that.
24                      And    so    I'm pleasantly          happy    that      the 25  nuclear plant has done as well and has been as well NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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45 1 maintained and safeguarded as it                      has,    and I    think it 2  will continue to be.
3                      Thank you.
4                      MS. RIVERA:      Thank you,        Mr. Kovar.
5                      Now I'd      like to call up Bo Pham for some 6 closing remarks.
7                      MR. PHAM:      Good    evening,        everyone.            My 8  name      is    Bo Pham,    and I'm a branch chief                at the NRC 9  headquarters          for    the    team      that's      performing          the 10  license        renewal    review    for the        application        for STP 11  here.
12                      On behalf      of the      staff,      I  just want to 13  thank everyone          for coming out and providing comments 14  tonight.          There were some good comments.                  Even though 15  this is        an environmental scoping meeting,                  I just want 16  to make sure that everyone understands that the safety 17  issues that were            brought      up,    I  will make      sure that 18  those get to the appropriate                    safety reviewers            to be 19  considered as well.
20                      To just summarize,            where we go from here 21  is    that our team is          going to gather the comments that 22  we heard today as well as the comments that we receive 23  up until          April  1.      We  will    look    at    the  comments, 24  evaluate them and consider them and how to incorporate 25  them into our first            draft of the environmental impact NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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46 1 statement.        There were several differing views on what 2 the impacts are, and I can be sure to tell                  you that we 3 may not agree on everything but we will definitely 4 consider every position that was put forth.
5                  From there,      we issue our first          draft of 6 the environmental impact statement,                  and we'll be back 7 here in the community to listen to again regarding any 8 comments you may have on that first                    draft.
9                  So with that, I appreciate your time again 10  tonight,      and I'd like to close out the meeting.
11                    The staff will also be here for a limited 12  amount of time afterwards if                you want to talk to us 13  about some of the questions.
14                    Thank you.
15                    (Whereupon, at 8:07 p.m.,            the meeting was 16  concluded.)
17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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CERTIFICATE This is    to certify that the attached proceedings before the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in    the matter of:                  South Texas Project Name of Proceeding:          Public Meeting:
Evening Session os Docket Number:                (n/a)
Location:                    Bay City,        Texas were      held as    herein    appears,      and that      this    is    the original transcript thereof for the file                      of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission taken by me and, thereafter        reduced to typewriting by me or under the direction of the court reporting company, and that the transcript        is  a  true    and    accurate      record    of      the foregoing proceedings.
PenA-i(R B Offi,ial      Reportqr Neal R. Gross & Co.,            Inc.
4 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433            WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701          www.nealrgross.com}}

Latest revision as of 02:43, 13 November 2019

Transcript of South Texas Project, Units 1 and 2, License Renewal Public Meeting - Evening Session - 03/02/2011. Pages 1-46
ML110840433
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Issue date: 03/02/2011
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NRC-740
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Text

Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Title: South Texas Project Units 1 and 2 License Renewal Public Meeting - Evening Session Docket Number: (n/a)

Location: Bay City, Texas Date: Wednesday, March 2, 2011 Work Order No.: NRC-740 Pages 1-46 ORIGINAL NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.

Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433

1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 . . . . .

4 ENVIRONMENTAL SCOPING MEETING 5 FOR THE SOUTH TEXAS PROJECT 6 UNITS 1 AND 2 LICENSE RENEWAL 7 PROCESS 8

9 Wednesday, March 2, 2011 10 11 Auditorium 12 201 7th Street 13 Bay City, Texas 14 7:00 p.m.

15 16 NRC STAFF:

17 ALISON RIVERA 18 SUSAN SALTER 19 MICHELLE MOSER 20 TAM TRAN 21 BO PHAM 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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2 1 P RO C E E D I NG S 2 MS. RIVERA: Good evening, and welcome to 3 this evening's session of the South Texas Project 4 Units 1 and 2 License Renewal scoping meeting. As I 5 said, the purpose is to discuss the scoping comments 6 for the environmental report. There are handouts in 7 the back, as well as copies of the presentation that 8 the NRC staff will be giving.

9 If you haven't already turned in a yellow 10 card and you do wish to provide comments during the 11 comment period, please fill one out at the back on the 12 table and bring it up to either myself or Susan 13 Salter. My name is Alison Rivera, and I'm the 14 facilitator for this evening.

15 As I mentioned, we'll have a presentation 16 by the NRC staff, followed by questions on the process 17 during which I'll come out with a microphone to the 18 aisle and you can ask your questions on the process, 19 and then we'll turn to the comment period where you'll 20 come up to the podium.

21 Please, when you're making comments, be 22 courteous and respectful and be mindful of your time.

23 I'd ask that you be concise. A transcript is being 24 taken by Leslie Berridge, and we'd ask that you keep 25 your comments to about three to five minutes. And I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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3 1 will call you three at a time.

2 Please refrain from sidebars when other 3 people are up here commenting, and turn all cell 4 phones to vibrate so that they're not interrupted. If 5 you have to take a call, please just go out to the 6 lobby.

7 Housekeeping: Bathrooms are to either 8 side through the exit, left or right.

9 And with that, I think I've covered 10 everything and we can turn the presentation over to 11 the NRC.

12 MS. MOSER: Good evening, everyone. My 13 name is Michelle Moser, and I'm an aquatic biologist 14 with the NRC, and I'm part of the technical 15 environmental team working on the South Texas Project 16 for the license renewal application.

17 The two project managers working on this 18 are Tam Tran, who is with us right here, and John 19 Daily, and I'd like to thank all of you for coming out 20 here today.

21 Tonight we're going to be providing an 22 overview of the license renewal process which includes 23 both a safety review and an environmental review. But 24 the most important part of tonight is really to hear 25 the comments that you have to provide to us, and it's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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4 1 your opportunity to be a part of the environmental 2 review.

3 Before I discuss more about the license 4 renewal process, I'd like to briefly talk about NRC in 5 terms of what we do and our mission based on two 6 important governing statutes.

7 The NRC is a federal agency that regulates 8 the civilian use of nuclear materials. The Atomic 9 Energy Act authorizes the NRC to grant 40-year 10 operating licenses for nuclear power reactors and also 11 license renewals for an additional 20 years.

12 The National Environmental Policy Act, or 13 NEPA, establishes a national policy for considering 14 the impact of federal decision-making on the human 15 environment. The NRC Commission determined that 16 nuclear reactor licensing renewal constitutes a major 17 federal action for which an environmental impact 18 statement, or EIS, is warranted.

19 NRC's mission is threefold: to ensure 20 adequate protection of public health and safety, to 21 promote the common defense and security, and to 22 protect the environment.

23 Now to turn a little bit more specifically 24 to the South Texas Project. Units 1 and 2 were 25 licensed to operate in 1988 and 1989, respectively.

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5 1 The current operating licenses expire in 2027 and 2 2028. STP Nuclear Operating Company filed an 3 application for license renewal of the South Texas 4 Project with a letter dated October 25, 2010.

5 A license renewal application is required 6 to contain a certain set of information. For example, 7 there must be general information about the plant 8 owner or operator, there's technical information which 9 pertains to aging management which is the focus of the 10 staff's safety review, and another component is the 11 environmental report which is the applicant's 12 assessment of the environmental impacts of continued 13 operations. We use this as the starting point for the 14 NRC staff's independent environmental review.

15 As I mentioned before, license renewal 16 involves two parallel reviews: the safety review and 17 the environmental review.

18 The safety review focuses on the aging 19 effects of passive and long-lived components and 20 structures that the NRC deems important to plant 21 safety. The staff's main objective in this review is 22 to determine whether the effects of aging will be 23 adequately managed by the applicant. The review also 24 considers generic and site-specific operating 25 experience related to the effects of aging. The NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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6 1 results of the safety review are documented in the 2 safety evaluation report, and sometimes we may refer 3 t that as the SER.

4 For the environmental review, the staff 5 considers, evaluates and discloses the environmental 6 impacts of continued plant operation for an additional 7 20 years. The staff also evaluates the environmental 8 impacts of alternatives to license renewal. The 9 objective of the review is to determine if the 10 environmental impacts of license renewal are so great 11 that license renewal would not be a reasonable option, 12 or more plainly, is license renewal acceptable from an 13 environmental standpoint. The staff prepares an 14 environmental impact statement to document its review, 15 and you may hear us refer to that as the EIS.

16 Before I go into more depth about the 17 safety and environmental reviews, I want to mention a 18 few areas that are very important and part of the NRC 19 oversight process, and this includes emergency 20 planning, security and current safety performance.

21 NRC addresses these areas of performance 22 every day as part of the ongoing regulatory oversight 23 provided for all currently operating power reactors.

24 Therefore, we do not reevaluate them in the license 25 renewal. This is not to say that these aren't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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7 1 important; we just don't duplicate the regulatory 2 process in these areas.

3 This diagram illustrates the parallel 4 safety and environmental review processes which you 5 can see both lead to the NRC decision on the 6 application. Now, in addition to these reviews, there 7 are also two other important considerations that the 8 Commission uses to help inform their decision. One of 9 these considerations is the independent review 10 performed by the Advisory Committee for Reactor 11 Safety, which at NRC we love acronyms so we refer to 12 this a lot as ACRS. The ACRS reviews the license 13 renewal application and the NRC staff's safety 14 evaluation report. The ACRS reports their finding and 15 recommendations directly to the Commission.

16 Hearings may also be conducted.

17 Interested stakeholders may submit concerns or 18 contentions and request a hearing. An adjudicatory 19 panel from the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board will 20 be established to review contentions for 21 admissibility. If a hearing is approved, the 22 Commission would consider the outcome of the hearing 23 process in its decision of whether or not to issue a 24 renewed operating license.

25 Now I'm going to go into a little bit more NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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8 1 detail about the safety review.

2 The regulations governing license renewal 3 for the safety review has two guiding principles. The 4 first principle is that the current regulatory process 5 is adequate to ensure that the licensing basis of all 6 operating plants and provides an acceptable level of 7 safety.

8 The second principle is that the current 9 plant-specific licensing basis must be maintained 10 during the license renewal in the same manner and to 11 the same extent as during the original license term.

12 In other words, the same rules that apply under the 13 current license will continue to apply in the renewal 14 term, or the additional 20 years of operations.

15 In addition, a renewed license will 16 include conditions that must be met to ensure aging of 17 structures and components important to safety are 18 adequately managed so that the plant's current 19 licensing basis is maintained during the period of 20 extended operations.

21 For the safety review, the staff performs 22 multiple-level reviews. First, the staff reviews the 23 renewal application and supporting documentation.

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9 1 and to confirm that the applicant's aging management 2 programs and activities conform to how they are 3 described in the application. The staff documents the 4 basis and conclusion of its reports in the safety 5 evaluation report which is publicly available.

6 In addition, a team of specialized 7 inspectors from NRC Region IV travel to the reactor 8 site to verify that aging management programs are 9 being implemented, modified or planned consistent with 10 the license renewal application.

11 Finally, as I previously mentioned, the 12 ACRS performs an independent review of the license 13 renewal application and the staff's safety evaluation 14 report.

15 For the environmental review, the staff 16 performs their environmental review in accordance with 17 National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, or NEPA.

18 NEPA requires that all federal agencies follow a 19 systematic approach in evaluating the potential 20 impacts associated with major federal actions and 21 alternatives to those actions. By law, the NEPA 22 process includes public participation and public 23 disclosure.

24 The NRC's environmental regulations 25 contained in 10 CFR Part 51 are largely based on other NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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10 1 implementing regulations for NEPA.

2 In the staff's EIS we evaluate impacts to 3 a wide range of resources such as wildlife and fish, 4 water and air, historical and cultural resources, 5 socioeconomics, and human health. Starting with the 6 scoping process, we consult with various federal, 7 state and local officials, as well as leaders of 8 Native American Nations, that have expertise in these 9 areas.

10 As illustrated on the slide, some of the 11 agencies that we work with include U.S. Fish and 12 Wildlife Service, EPA, NOAA, state historical 13 preservation offices, as well as many local and state 14 agencies.

15 The environmental review begins with the 16 scoping process which is where we are today. The 17 purpose of the scoping process is to identify 18 significant issues that should be considered in the 19 environmental review. We are now gathering 20 information that we will use to prepare an EIS for the 21 South Texas license renewal. As part of that process, 22 we are here to collect your comments on the scope of 23 the environmental review -- that is, the environmental 24 impacts that are local to this area and that are 25 important for the staff to consider.

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11 1 The staff has developed a generic 2 environmental impact statement that addresses a number 3 of issues common to all nuclear power plants. The 4 staff is supplementing that generic EIS with a site-5 specific EIS for the South Texas Project. The staff 6 will also re-examine the conclusions reached in the 7 generic EIS to determine if there's any new and 8 significant information that would change the 9 conclusions reached in the generic EIS.

10 The scoping period started on January 31 11 and we will be continuing to take comments until April 12 1.

13 In general, we are looking for information 14 about the environmental impacts from continued 15 operation of the South Texas Project during the 16 extended period of operation. You can assist us in 17 that process by telling us, for example, what aspects 18 of your local community we should focus on, what local 19 environmental, social and economic issues the NRC 20 should examine, and what reasonable alternatives are 21 most appropriate for this region.

22 This next slide illustrates the NRC's 23 various considerations for deciding if a renewed 24 operating license will be issued. It's a rigorous 25 review involving the EIS, safety evaluation report, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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12 1 regional inspections, and so on. But what's important 2 to point out here is that the public comments are an 3 important part of the license renewal process. We 4 consider all comments that we receive today and 5 throughout the scoping period, and it helps inform and 6 shape the supplemental environmental impact statement.

7 In addition to providing comments at 8 today's meeting, there are other ways that you can 9 submit comments on the environmental review. You can 10 provide written comments by mail to the NRC Chief of 11 Rules and Directives Branch at the address provided on 12 this slide, and there are copies of this slide back 13 there. Or you can send your comments electronic by 14 going to regulations.gov.

15 You can also make your comments in person 16 if you happen to be in Rockville, Maryland. We ask 17 that you get in touch with Tam Tran beforehand so that 18 he can set up the appropriate arrangements.

19 And again, the comments should be 20 submitted by April 1.

21 This slide shows some other important 22 milestones for the environmental review process. The 23 opportunity to submit contentions for a hearing closes 24 on March 14, and we plan to issue the draft 25 environmental impact statement around March 2012. And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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13 1 once that's issued, there will be a comment period 2 where again there will be an opportunity for the 3 public to read through the draft EIS, and it's an 4 opportunity for the public to comment on the draft EIS 5 and see if there's any additional impacts that you'd 6 like to see in it.

7 The primary contacts within the NRC for 8 the license renewal of the South Texas Project are Tam 9 Tran and John Daily.

10 The Bay City Public Library has agreed to 11 make the license renewal application available for 12 public review, and when it's published for comment, 13 the draft supplemental EIS will also be available at 14 the library.

15 In addition, these documents will be on the NRC's 16 website at the website that's listed on this slide, 17 and the safety review schedule is also posted on the 18 same website.

19 As you came in, you were asked to fill out 20 a registration card at our reception desk. If you've 21 included your address on that card, we will mail you 22 a copy of the draft and final EIS for your 23 information. And if you didn't have an opportunity to 24 fill out that card, please feel free before you leave 25 to fill out a blue card and add your address to it.

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14 1 This concludes my presentation and I will 2 now turn it over to our meeting facilitator.

3 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Michelle.

4 At this point we'll open the floor to 5 questions on the process, and I'll come out with a 6 microphone if there are any. Just raise your hands.

7 Do you have a question? Please state your 8 name and affiliation, if any, before your question.

9 MR. CORDER: Good afternoon. My name is 10 John Corder, 313 County Road 912 in Brazoria County.

11 I'm proud to say that I worked on STP 1 and 2 for five 12 years.

13 My concern is something that affected me 14 personally that I identified some concerns that I had 15 as time went on, and through the process of the United 16 States Labor Commission I was able to settle my 17 complaints inasmuch as I was not told ever whatever 18 happened to the results of my complaints.

19 I'm here tonight to offer to the STP, not 20 only 1 and 2 but 3 and 4, to please make public -- and 21 I've worked with the administration of both 1 and 2 22 and 3 and 4 -- to make public inasmuch as they could 23 put it into the Bay City Library.

24 Here's the facts, if you're any of these 25 people here -- excuse me a minute to get it correct --

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15 1 if you're an employee, a contractor, a vendor, 2 personnel or a visitor reporting safety-related or 3 quality concerns, what I'm saying is that whatever 4 those concerns are should be made public, put in a 5 public place.

6 The pressure on individuals to report 7 something is great when they fear if they're working 8 that they'll be terminated, or maybe they go ahead and 9 get terminated or choose another job, what happens to 10 the concern that they have identified.

11 We have in this policy of STP that they'll 12 take care of it and NRC will, and I'm sure their 13 intent is very good. What we the people need to know 14 is that whatever that concern was should be 15 identified. That is only part of it. What is the 16 resolution to that concern, and thirdly, whatever 17 happened to the culmination that that concern was 18 adequately identified. Even if the person wanted to 19 be anonymous, it's still important publicly regarding 20 what emphasis it has to the NRC or to the project, 21 it's important to the public.

22 We're here tonight to understand that the 23 NRC and the STP are interested in continuing their 24 license. I agree with that. I agree also that in 25 that process their policy should be changed in words NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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16 1 that would say that we, STP, will identify to the, for 2 example, Bay City Library, will put in the concerns 3 that are presented to them so that the public will 4 have access to know what they were, what the 5 resolution was, and if it in fact was completed.

6 Thank you very much.

7 MS. SALTER: Thank you, Mr. Corder. And 8 I believe we have some information on, it sounds like, 9 maybe possibly an allegation. We'll follow up with 10 that and get back with you on that.

11 Does anyone have any questions on the 12 process before we move into the comment period for the 13 review, for the license renewal review, environmental 14 evaluation?

15 (No response.)

16 MS. RIVERA: Okay. So with that, we are 17 going to enter into the comment period. Again, if you 18 would like to make a comment and you have not filled 19 out a yellow card, it's not too late. You can get one 20 in the back and bring it to me and we'll add you to 21 the list.

22 I'm going to turn it back to Alison.

23 MS. RIVERA: Thank you.

24 First up, we're going to have Matagorda 25 County Judge Nate McDonald, and on deck we'll have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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17 1 Mitch Thames, Tim Powell and Ken Head.

2 JUDGE McDONALD: Good evening. My name is 3 Nate McDonald. I'm the county judge from Matagorda 4 County, and I want to thank the NRC for hosting this 5 event tonight to give all of you a voice in the 6 process. That's the way America was promulgated in 7 the beginning, and that's the way it should be and 8 always shall be, we hope, and we thank you all for 9 making that available to us tonight.

10 Ladies and gentlemen, by its very 11 definition, an electric generating station is designed 12 to churn out power seven days a week, 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> a day, 13 and hopefully 365 days a year, unless, of course, you 14 have those unforeseen events that come along from time 15 to time.

16 Just last month we had one of those 17 unforeseen events right here in this county and in 18 many, many parts of the State of Texas. Many, many of 19 the electric generating stations in the state did a 20 fine job; many, many of them fell offline. I can tell 21 you, though, from firsthand knowledge that one of 22 those stations that didn't go offline and that did do 23 a very, very good job was right here in Matagorda 24 County. We had two units of nuclear that operated 25 completely right through every outage that was in this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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18 1 cold snap that we had, and not only that, but did it 2 in a safe and reliable manner with no reportable 3 injuries, the whole thing. You know, that in itself 4 is plenty to keep this station running for another 20 5 years.

6 If we start down the path of all the other 7 ancillary things that this plant has for Matagorda 8 County, it's going to take a heck of al to more than 9 the three to five minutes that I have, so I'm not 10 going to start down that path. But what I will tell 11 you and what I do know from firsthand observation is 12 that this plant is committed to the safety and the 13 well-being of the citizens of Matagorda County, to 14 their employees, and that's what they practice first 15 and foremost is safety, and they do that oftentimes at 16 the expense of profits.

17 And I can tell you that's a very, very 18 refreshing take on a business model because you don't 19 see that much in corporate America these days, ladies 20 and gentlemen. But we see that and we have that right 21 here in Matagorda County, and all the while having 22 promulgated and carried out that culture of excellence 23 that they practice. They've developed a very good 24 business model that does allow them to produce and 25 does allow them to lead the nation, and even the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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19 1 world, in safe and reliable electric generation.

2 So that, in a nutshell, for me is what's 3 the very most important thing about consideration for 4 this renewal that we're talking about tonight.

5 I hope that the NRC will smile favorably 6 upon this plant's request and I'd hope that you would 7 grant it. And if there's ever anything that I or my 8 office or any of the commissioners that serve on the 9 court with me can answer for you, I'd hope that you 10 would call us and ask those questions of us and give 11 us the chance to answer those for you.

12 We do appreciate you all being here this 13 evening, we do appreciate STP's confidence in us, and 14 we especially appreciate STP's willingness to grow out 15 their legacy for the county by another 20 years in 16 filing this application.

17 So thank you all very, very much again, 18 NRC, for allowing us to comment tonight. Thank you.

19 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Judge McDonald.

20 Next we have Mitch Thames, followed by Tim 21 Powell, Ken Head and Mike Bolin.

22 MR. THAMES: And again, thank you. I also 23 want to echo the Judge's comments. NRC, thank you so 24 much for coming down to Matagorda County, and as an 25 official welcome, we certainly do appreciate you.

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20 1 I want to touch on two aspects of the 2 review. One is going to be the environmental aspect.

3 It's very important when you talk about Matagorda 4 County -- and I'll do just a little bit of a 5 commercial -- we have a very, very sensitive area in 6 that we have the freshwater from our Colorado River, 7 two bays, estuaries, as well as the Gulf of Mexico.

8 We are the North American Christmas bird count winner 9 about eleven out of the last twelve years. It was 10 foggy one morning and we missed some of those birds.

11 But as you see that as we've got such a 12 great ecological area here the whole time Units 1 and 13 2 have been operating. So we're very, very proud of 14 the fact that the South Texas Nuclear Operating 15 Company, with Units 1 and 2, continues to operate in 16 a strong fashion while our environment is protected.

17 The second is from more of a behind-the-18 scenes type of safety aspect. The Judge has seen fit 19 to have me as one of the PIOs, public information 20 officers, for the county during a lot of our STP 21 drills, many of which you grade us on every aspect of 22 it. We're very proud of the fact that we set the 23 standard, I think, in the nation, and that's some of 24 the feedback we've gotten from the NRC.

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21 1 opened up, as the county's PIO. There's never been a 2 piece of information that's been withheld as we go 3 through drills, as situations were faced. We're also 4 educated from a county standpoint, knowing exactly 5 what's going on at the plant in case something should 6 ever happen. It is important for us to be able to 7 stand up and speak to the media, but more importantly, 8 as you know, we're speaking to the citizens of 9 Matagorda County and keeping them safe.

10 So on both aspects it's a five-star rating.

11 We certainly do appreciate you being here, 12 and we thank you so much.

13 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Thames.

14 Next we'll have Tim Powell, followed by 15 Ken Head and Mike Bolin. And as you start your 16 comments, if you could introduce yourself and give 17 your affiliation, if any, please.

18 MR. POWELL: Thank you very much. I'm Tim 19 Powell. I'm the vice president of Technical Support 20 and Oversight for the South Texas Project, and the 21 license renewal comes under my area.

22 Do appreciate the Nuclear Regulatory 23 Commission coming down and supporting this public 24 forum. It is extremely important, the public input in 25 this process, because it helps us become a better NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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22 1 station with the more input that we get.

2 I really would like to thank the residents 3 of the local communities and the leaders that have 4 come out to provide input. We couldn't do it without 5 you and we appreciate your support and your comments.

6 1 would also just like to state that over 7 the last seven years we have had the top two-unit 8 producing power plant in the United States, and over 9 the last five years the top two-unit producer in the 10 world. We accomplished that by focusing on safety 11 first. Nuclear safety is our number one priority and 12 something that we hold very dear, and we continuously 13 focus on it.

14 Our employees are active in the community.

15 I think we are an excellent corporate citizen, and we 16 look forward to doing that all the way to 2047 and 17 2048. We look forward to serving Matagorda County 18 through the production of safe, clean, carbon-free 19 electricity over those extra 20 years. Thank you.

20 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Powell.

21 Next we have Ken Head, followed by Mike 22 Bolin.

23 MR. KEN HEAD: Thank you. My name is Ken 24 Head. I'm a small business owner here in Matagorda 25 County.

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23 1 And first of all, I'd like to thank the 2 NRC for coming down today. We really appreciate your 3 concern over our environment, as well as our community 4 leaders here in Matagorda County.

5 I'd like to express it's necessary for the 6 continued growth of our county for you to issue the 7 20-year continuation of STP. STP employees are some 8 of my top customers and they're the ones that keep our 9 community afloat, as well as our small businesses, our 10 hotels, our food eateries, everywhere else. I would 11 imagine you're staying at some of those fine utilities 12 this evening.

13 As a long-time resident of Bay City, I've 14 seen the good, the bad and the ugly of STP, and good 15 thing I've never seen any bad or ugly, everything I've 16 seen has been pretty good. And I appreciate the 17 leadership out there that I see sitting around this 18 room that has made that happen.

19 What should you focus on? Obviously, our 20 environmental concerns are a huge part of this. I'm 21 the Convention and Visitors Bureau and one of our main 22 focuses is bringing tourists down to Matagorda County 23 to see what we have to offer. Good thing one of our 24 sights to see is STP, as well as all around STP we 25 have tons of fishing, birding, we have farmlands and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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24 1 everything else, and from what I've seen, there have 2 been no concerns with those at all, as I grew up 3 fishing right below STP on the Colorado River. And I 4 would like to thank STP for providing that to me, 5 providing the safe waters and the safe grounds for me 6 to do that on.

7 As well, it is my opinion that if the 8 renewal should be given to STP, I think the highly 9 qualified organization out there will continue working 10 on 1 and 2 as they continue to build 3 and 4, and I 11 think you ought to take that into accountability that 12 with the 3 and 4 coming on that they can continue to 13 operate 1 and 2 successfully.

14 Thank you so much.

15 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Head.

16 Next we'll have Mr. Bolin, and if anyone 17 else would like to register to speak, just fill out a 18 yellow card.

19 MR. BOLIN: Thank you. My name is Mike 20 Bolin, and I'm a partner with John White in a small 21 general contracting firm local to Bay City.

22 There's not much else to say after Ken 23 Head covered the waterfront, and I agree with 24 everything that he said. And I'd also like to, for 25 the record, say that I am absolutely for the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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25 1 continuation of such a good neighbor and a good 2 employer, just a good citizen. Our hopes are that it 3 will continue and that we're for it, and we just wish 4 we had more employers like you in this county.

5 Thank you.

6 MS. RIVERA: I have a yellow card now for 7 Mr. Corder. Did you have additional comments that you 8 wanted to come up and make?

9 As he's approaching, I'll say that on deck 10 is Casey Kile, Robert Singleton, Karen Hadden, and 11 Bobby Head.

12 MR. CORDER: My name is John Corder, 313 13 County Road 912, Brazoria County. It's a pleasure to 14 be here tonight.

15 As I said earlier, I had the pleasure of 16 working on 1 and 2 for about five years. I've also 17 had the experience of overseeing quality control for 18 the company I've worked for for about 30 years in 19 quality control, and I've been personally on five 20 nuclear plants. This has been one of them.

21 To more elaborate on what I just said, my 22 concern is having worked with the STP present 23 administration and the Units 3 and 4, I'm really not 24 satisfied that they had the openness that I expected 25 when it come to personnel for the individual workers NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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26 1 or those that are here in these categories that I 2 mentioned.

3 I would admonish all of us to always keep 4 tabs on the installation itself, feel free that you 5 can ask questions and if there's any questions that 6 ever come from a worker. It is very difficult for a 7 lot of people to identify a problem. They feel 8 threatened by it, and frankly, that is a real concern, 9 been there.

10 So I'm hoping that in the renewal -- and 11 I wish that the plants get renewed, I'm not going to 12 say about nuclear not being safe, et cetera -- I am 13 only saying that I am hoping that we have more of an 14 openness with the community or for those that have any 15 questions about the safety or any concern, whether it 16 be for personnel protection, plant safety or for the 17 administration of how they do their policies.

18 I was working with 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 on 19 those policies they have which said about the 20 openness, and that's what I said is that I hope that 21 we can have, like the person said before, it will be 22 in the library, but really I want the concerns to be 23 there so that we can look at them and get them 24 resolved.

25 And I wish STP good luck.

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27 1 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Corder.

2 Next we'll have Casey Kile, followed by 3 Robert Singleton, Karen Hadden and Bobby Head.

4 MR. KILE: My name is Casey Kile. I'm the 5 president of Bay City Babe Ruth here in Bay City.

6 And I'd just like to say that, on behalf 7 of Babe Ruth, we're very grateful for everything STP 8 does for us as an organization. They're a major 9 sponsor in all of our events. Over the last ten years 10 we've hosted four regional tournaments and eleven or 11 twelve state tournaments, and without STP's support, 12 we would never have been able to participate in those 13 tournaments or even host those tournaments.

14 On the economic standpoint Mr. Head said, 15 earlier last year we hosted a regional tournament. We 16 had five states come to visit Bay City, over 400 17 visitors in town, over 100,000 new dollars just last 18 year, and without STP supporting that, we wouldn't 19 have been able to host that tournament. So we'd like 20 to thank them.

21 Not only do they help us monetarily with 22 our tournaments, but their employees also volunteer 23 with us, and we'd like to thank them for their 24 employees and letting them volunteer.

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28 1 we've hosted about 15 tournaments and probably half a 2 million new dollars in Matagorda County over the last 3 ten years.

4 So if you wouldn't mind, Bay City Babe 5 Ruth and all the youth are in great favor of renewing 6 STP for their license. Thank you very much.

7 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Kile.

8 Next we'll have Robert Singleton, followed 9 by Karen Hadden, and finally, Bobby Head. And if 10 anyone else is interested in speaking, just please fil 11 out a yellow card and bring it up to Susan or I.

12 MR. SINGLETON: Hi. My name is Robert 13 Singleton. I'm from Austin and I'm representing 14 public citizen at this event.

15 You may ask why I'd want to come down from 16 Austin to talk to you. Well, Austin is a 16 percent 17 partner in Unit 1 and Unit 2, and if you look back 18 over the history of the project, we've got a lot less 19 reason to celebrate this plant than maybe some people 20 who live here do. I'm not going to talk a lot about 21 jobs but I'm going to wrap up with that tonight.

22 But Austin's experience with 1 and 2 was 23 a nightmare. We had it thrust upon us by politicians 24 who were determined to continue to take public votes 25 until we bought a share of the plant. We tried to get NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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29 1 out of the plant at one point, tried to sell our 16 2 percent share, and can't.

3 The problem was at its worst in the '90s 4 when 42 cents out of every dollar that we paid on a 5 utility bill was going for debt service at NRG. For 6 our 16 percent share, we were paying almost half of 7 our utility bill for debt service on the project.

8 I want to talk mainly about safety 9 tonight. And I know that when you're living here, the 10 plant is just something that's always been there, but 11 my thinking about safety at nuclear power plants is 12 sort of: Yeah, they've got redundant safety systems 13 because there are redundant dangers. The analogy I 14 like to think of is if I'm walking through a 15 construction site wearing a hard hat and a brick falls 16 six stories and bounces off my helmet, my first 17 thought is not thank God the helmet worked, my thought 18 is who dropped the brick.

19 If you want to know what's going on with 20 nuclear power plants and you support this plant, I'm 21 going to challenge you to do one thing, and that is 22 tomorrow morning go to the NRC website, www.nrg.gov, 23 and click on event reports and click on current 24 events. If you do this for a couple of days a week, 25 you're going to be convinced that nuclear power plants NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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30 1 routinely have near misses that could have 2 catastrophic results.

3 Nuclear power is the only form of energy 4 generation that has the potential for killing 5 thousands of people in one single event. I mean, if 6 you're investing in wind, what's the worst that can 7 happen? You have a catastrophic accident, you don't 8 generate power and maybe some sheep were 9 inconvenienced. Nuclear power has the capacity to 10 kill people, it's a dangerous technology. All you 11 have to do is look at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.

12 How many of you have ever heard of SLl?

13 It was an experimental reactor in Idaho that in the 14 early '60s had a fatal accident. There was one 15 gentleman that was actually pinned to the ceiling of 16 the containment building by a rod when there was a 17 steam explosion in the plant. It impaled him to the 18 ceiling stuck on a control rod.

19 Nuclear power can and has caused human 20 fatalities. Read about Chernobyl. I know that NRG is 21 going to say well, new reactors are safer, but they're 22 saying this in a way that causes me to ask this 23 question. When they're talking to you about 3 and 4, 24 they say these plants are newer and safer, or safer 25 and more advanced than the old plants. Well, they're NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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31 1 also arguing for extending the life of the old plants 2 which had a limit on their life in the first place for 3 a reason: we didn't know how long you could run a 4 nuclear power plant; we still don't.

5 Turkey Point in Florida, they had to 6 replace the steam generators in the plant, and to 7 replace a steam generator you have to cut a hole in 8 the containment building, you have to take the 9 generator out and put the new one in. Well, what they 10 found was that the cement inside the containment 11 building had degraded over the last 20 years, there 12 were immense cracks that ran through the inside of the 13 structure.

14 And that is what happens when you extend 15 the life of a nuclear plant. These things were 16 designed to have a limited life for a reason. They're 17 not going to safe forever.

18 Nuclear power was also always intended to 19 be a bridge technology. We're always going to find 20 something better, and what we could do right now 21 instead of re-license these is make an investment in 22 renewables which could have, in terms of jobs, just as 23 much of an impact as extending the life of this plant 24 or building new units.

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32 1 energy is that you can create jobs locally that are 2 going to be exclusively locally. Nuclear power, a lot 3 of the jobs that are generated are going to be foreign 4 manufacturing jobs. The components for these plants 5 are built off site, they don't really generate that 6 much for your local economy.

7 There are new and exciting technologies 8 that we could be counting on. For example, there's an 9 Australian company called EnviroMission that's just 10 about to open a project in Arizona. What it is is 11 it's a tower, just a tower, covered around the base 12 with thick plastic. What it does is it captures the 13 heat of the sun, the heated air rises up a chimney and 14 turns a turbine. It's basically the only moving part, 15 so the turbine and then the generators from it.

16 The cool thing about it is that it 17 continues to generate electricity even at night 18 because the head of the ground continues to make this 19 temperature differential and the air continues up the 20 chimney and the turbines continue to turn.

21 This is the kind of thing that can be 22 built and provide localized power. In West Texas, for 23 example, we could build these things and not have to 24 ship the power across the state. We could actually 25 use it to provide energy where it's built.

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33 1 There are alternatives, and I really think 2 that there's not enough proof that a plant can be run 3 longer than the time period in which the engineers 4 that designed it said it was designed to be built.

5 They're talking now about running some nuclear plants 6 for 60 years. My question is is this because they're 7 so much safer than they were thought to be originally, 8 or is this because the people that run nuclear power 9 plants say if we close it down we don't make any 10 money; if we continue to run it, sure they'll be less 11 safe than they were, but as long as they don't 12 actually melt down, we're going to continue to make 13 money. I think you'll find out that's what it is.

14 And also don't let NRG give you this 15 talking out of both sides of their face where they say 16 the 3 and 4 are going to be better and newer, at the 17 same they're talking about extending the life of what 18 then could be argued are the older and the less safe 19 plants. Can't have it both ways, and there are 20 definitely alternatives.

21 Thanks.

22 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Singleton.

23 Next we'll have Karen Hadden, followed by 24 our final registered speaker, Bobby Head.

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34 1 registering, just fill out a yellow card and bring it 2 to the front. Thank you.

3 MS. HADDEN: Good evening. My name is 4 Karen Hadden, and I'm here as executive director of 5 the SEED Coalition, Sustainable Energy and Economic 6 Development Coalition.

7 And first I'd like to say thank you 8 because we've been down here a number of times and 9 we've expressed concerns about the new reactors 10 proposed, but we've always been treated well in Bay 11 City, and I have a huge respect for the people who 12 work here and live here, and I do think you have a 13 beautiful community and I do hope that tourism 14 continues and grows.

15 I also have concerns about the re-16 licensing of reactors 1 and 2. I think there's a 17 number of issues that need to be looked at carefully 18 during this process and bearing worker safety in mind.

19 One of them is tritium, and basically there has been 20 tritium showing up in wells on the site. This needs 21 to be looked into thoroughly, as well as tritium in 22 the Colorado River, and documented, measured, 23 carefully analyzed to see if it's safe to continue 24 down this path at this point in time.

25 Another issue is control rods. There were NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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35 1 problems when the new reactor heads were put on, the 2 control rods got stuck. This is actually happening at 3 many different reactors right now. And there's been 4 some flaws in construction of some of the equipment 5 involved. So I think during this process that there 6 should be a thorough analysis of the control rods, 7 their drive mechanism, and so on and so forth, and see 8 if there's any problems technologically with the parts 9 that are here and being used.

10 I share the concerns mentioned by Robert II Singleton about embrittlement as the plants age.

12 These reactors were not designed to run forever; they 13 were designed to be closing down about this time, and 14 the first five years and the last five years of a 15 nuclear reactor's life cycle are the ones where they 16 have the most risk, and I think we should bear that in 17 mind during this process and do analysis on that 18 front.

19 Furthermore, in 1982 there was a study 20 done for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission called the 21 Crack Two Study. It found that if there were an 22 accident -- and they were looking at Units 1 and 2 --

23 that there would be 18,000 early deaths. They would 24 also be followed by thousands of cancers. That study 25 has not been updated. The population in some of this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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36 1 region has grown, and it needs to be looked at again 2 to find out what is the reality of the situation 3 today, and that needs to be compared to other ways of 4 generating electricity.

5 There is a problem with the leaking main 6 cooling reservoir which was described and documented 7 in the license application for Units 3 and 4. There 8 needs to be tracking of where the water is going, is 9 it reaching the Gulf, where is it going, what is it 10 doing. That should be part of the re-licensing study 11 and analysis.

12 Water use is an increasing issue. Up 13 until this point, the highest use that I know of 14 through researchers looking at this is 49 percent of 15 the Colorado River has been used for cooling purposes, 16 and I know a couple of summers ago there was a lot of 17 pumping going on to refill the reservoir when it got 18 kind of low.

19 It's a problem for those of us in Austin.

20 The Colorado River water has to serve a lot of 21 purposes. Rice farmers need it; we're going to need 22 it for many, many purposes, recreation, fishing on our 23 end. And Lake Travis levels were at an all-time low 24 several years ago. Every single dam on the whole lake 25 was closed; you couldn't put a boat in.

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37 1 And we would like to see something shift 2 to where this much water was no longer required.

3 Certainly you're still going to have to still cool 4 spent fuel rods and so on and so forth, but it is a 5 question when you look at continuing the reactors' 6 life.

7 A big issue is need for power. Right now 8 in the legal case involving Units 3 and 4, the Atomic 9 Safety and Licensing Board has agreed to hear a 10 contention that is one of omission. There was a 11 failure to analyze what alternatives were there in 12 terms of looking at energy efficiency. Building codes 13 in particular are going to be saving -- they've been 14 adopted -- going to be saving some 2,200 megawatts of 15 power in Texas. We need to look at whether the power 16 is needed, and then we need to look at how else it 17 could be generated.

18 And certainly jobs are crucially important 19 in every community. We realize that that's important 20 here. I think it's time to look at what are the 21 options in terms of transition, what other kinds of 22 ways to generate electricity could occur here -- I 23 think there are many -- and to start looking at 24 training and what other options exist.

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38 1 think as part of this process it should be looked into 2 about how carefully shielded that is, is it adequate.

3 Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. But I think that should 4 be looked at.

5 Security issues continue. Just last week 6 we heard about a Texas Tech student who among his 7 plans was a plan to attack nuclear plants, and I think 8 that needs to be looked at once again as well.

9 So these and many issues should be 10 addressed. It's an important decision.

11 I think at this point in time it's also 12 important to note that in the world of emergency 13 planning that the ability to get potassium iodide 14 tablets out to the public seems to have been 15 overlooked. I don't see a lot of information about 16 it. I think it is one approach you could take if 17 there was a serious accident, and that should be 18 looked at. In other places in the country potassium 19 iodide tablets were actually distributed to the 20 community at one point in time so that if there was an 21 accident, you could take it and protect the thyroid 22 from absorption of radioactive iodine.

23 I don't see that happening here, nor do I 24 see information publicized about that option. You can 25 buy them online, but I don't see anybody even telling NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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39 1 people about that.

2 So I think that we will also be submitting 3 written comments. There's other concerns that we 4 have. We'll be looking more in-depth. A lot of 5 issues need to be fully explored, and we look forward 6 to communicating with you further on that front.

7 Thank you.

8 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Ms. Hadden.

9 Next we'll have Bobby Head.

10 MR. BOBBY HEAD: I'm last but I'm going to 11 try to be a little bit quick. I think you know I can 12 be a little bit long-winded, most of you guys.

13 First off, I'd like to say I'm Bobby Head, 14 a third-generation Matagorda County resident. Love it 15 here. There's no place like Matagorda County.

16 To back up a few years and tell you things 17 that I've witnessed, back 30 years ago when we were 18 talking about the plant, there was a group of people 19 that decided they were going to protest it. They were 20 from Austin, Boston, Houston, San Francisco, and they 21 rented buses and they came down here, and they put it 22 in the newspaper that they had a thousand balloons 23 that they were going to release into the atmosphere, 24 and that's what would happen if they had a meltdown, 25 this nuclear waste would go like this.

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40 1 Well, it just so happened that some people 2 from Bay City went out there. As I understand, there 3 was one lady who took her three children out there to 4 see the balloons. And it went into the newspaper that 5 they released the balloons, just happened to be one of 6 those days that the wind was blowing north and they 7 all blew out into the Gulf.

8 Well, do you realize that today, what we 9 know today, if we were to release a thousand balloons 10 it would be much more detrimental to our environment 11 than what STP has been for 30 years. We couldn't do 12 that. We would make national news if you said we're 13 going to release a thousand balloons, especially in a 14 place where the number one in the nation bird count is 15 I'm in a unique position. I'm going to 16 change subjects a little bit. I'm in a unique 17 position, I've worked at STP, I've worked outages out 18 there. I'm one of the few guys, I guess, that's only 19 worked four outages -- I haven't worked the last 20 couple -- but I have been from the very top of the 21 dome to -- what's the room at the very bottom 22 underneath the rods -- number 1. I've been there.

23 And I will tell you one thing, of all the 24 things I've done in my life, worked in the oil 25 industry, worked on drilling rigs, worked at Dow NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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41 1 Chemical Company, I have never ever even come close to 2 the safety that I felt at STP. I'm telling you they 3 spend more time working on safety than anything else.

4 I've never felt one bit -- and not too many people go 5 to room number 1.

6 And it's kind of funny you go way up in 7 the top and it's really, really hot, and you go way 8 down in the bottom and it's really, really cold, but 9 they call that the hottest place in the plant, room 10 number 1.

11 But I'm going to tell you, safety, there's 12 nothing like safety at STP. I've never been involved 13 in anything like that.

14 To say that STP is a good neighbor, no 15 way. They're an awesome neighbor. They have been an 16 awesome neighbor from day one. When they first came 17 here we thought, well, those were the STP guys, and 18 for years, those guys out at STP, those guys out at 19 STP. Well, they're not. They're out coaches, they're 20 our sponsors, they're our mothers, our fathers, our 21 brothers, our sisters and our grandchildren that are 22 out there. They are us, they are out people.

23 We love you guys. We appreciate you being 24 here. We want not only Units 3 and 4, we would like 25 the extension of the units there.

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42 1 Randy Weber was here last week. He's our 2 state representative. He got over in the next room 3 and he said, Texas is growing by 113,000 people a 4 month. Wow. We're outgrowing all the states combined.

5 We're getting more people into Texas. He says if we 6 keep growing the way we are, that by 2015 we're going 7 to have to have five new nuclear plants, or 16 coal 8 plants, or 28 gas plants, or 3,000 windmills if the 9 windmills agree to turn 24-7-365. You know that's not 10 going to happen.

11 Would I like to see all of our power 12 generated totally clean. Yes, I would. It's not 13 realistic, not with what we have as today's knowledge.

14 What else do I want to say? Just to wind 15 up, I appreciate you guys coming down. If you have 16 any questions of me, a guy that worked mechanical 17 maintenance out there, let me know because we're the 18 guys that actually go out there and turn the nuts and 19 bolts and do the work, we dress in the full uniforms 20 to go to the places we have to go. If you have any 21 questions, feel free to ask, and we appreciate you 22 guys coming down.

23 Thank you.

24 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Head.

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43 1 going to turn it over to Bo Pham, the branch chief.

2 MS. SALTER: Oh, wait. We have another 3 yellow card over here.

4 MS. RIVERA: Sorry.

5 MR. KOVAR: Hello. My name is Tom Kovar, 6 and I'm a citizen of Bay City, a business owner, I 7 have a little air conditioning business.

8 And I worked at the nuclear plant for five 9 years in the construction phase in the early '80s, and 10 to start with we were kind of skeptical when they were 11 building the STP because there were several setbacks, 12 mainly in the construction companies, not in the STP 13 itself.

14 But after it was finally built, we were 15 pleasantly surprised for the last 20 years in how it 16 operated and how safe it was, and a large part of that 17 is because of the NRC and how it governs and has 18 safeguards over the nuclear industry.

19 You have to have electricity and you have 20 to have a lot of it. I wish I could afford Austin's 21 16 percent. But you have to have a lot of electricity 22 nowadays because of the way the population is, and if 23 you look at the last 40-50 years of power generation, 24 of gas-fired plants or coal-fired plants and how 25 hazardous they are to the environment and people, then NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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44 1 I think you can't help but realize how safe nuclear 2 power is. The government has been using it to power 3 their vehicles in the military for a long time.

4 And there's no way that you can have a 5 perfect system when it's run by people and natural 6 disasters. Our greatest nuclear plant in the solar 7 system, the sun, has been operating for billions of 8 years and it has solar flare-ups, and we've been 9 fortunate that none of them have been too great to 10 impact us too greatly.

11 And in a smaller sense, our smaller 12 nuclear reactor here has the NRC as the buffer. As 13 our distance from the sun is the buffer that keeps us 14 safe, well, the NRC is the buffer against any calamity 15 happening at the nuclear plant.

16 So I think that it's the best power 17 generation -- not the best power generation because I 18 know you mentioned wind and solar and the tower that 19 you mentioned, and sure there's a lot better ways, 20 but on the scale that we need it and the timing that 21 we need it, what are you going to do? Are you going 22 to turn off all the lights and say let's wait till all 23 this other stuff gets developed? You can't do that.

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45 1 maintained and safeguarded as it has, and I think it 2 will continue to be.

3 Thank you.

4 MS. RIVERA: Thank you, Mr. Kovar.

5 Now I'd like to call up Bo Pham for some 6 closing remarks.

7 MR. PHAM: Good evening, everyone. My 8 name is Bo Pham, and I'm a branch chief at the NRC 9 headquarters for the team that's performing the 10 license renewal review for the application for STP 11 here.

12 On behalf of the staff, I just want to 13 thank everyone for coming out and providing comments 14 tonight. There were some good comments. Even though 15 this is an environmental scoping meeting, I just want 16 to make sure that everyone understands that the safety 17 issues that were brought up, I will make sure that 18 those get to the appropriate safety reviewers to be 19 considered as well.

20 To just summarize, where we go from here 21 is that our team is going to gather the comments that 22 we heard today as well as the comments that we receive 23 up until April 1. We will look at the comments, 24 evaluate them and consider them and how to incorporate 25 them into our first draft of the environmental impact NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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46 1 statement. There were several differing views on what 2 the impacts are, and I can be sure to tell you that we 3 may not agree on everything but we will definitely 4 consider every position that was put forth.

5 From there, we issue our first draft of 6 the environmental impact statement, and we'll be back 7 here in the community to listen to again regarding any 8 comments you may have on that first draft.

9 So with that, I appreciate your time again 10 tonight, and I'd like to close out the meeting.

11 The staff will also be here for a limited 12 amount of time afterwards if you want to talk to us 13 about some of the questions.

14 Thank you.

15 (Whereupon, at 8:07 p.m., the meeting was 16 concluded.)

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CERTIFICATE This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the matter of: South Texas Project Name of Proceeding: Public Meeting:

Evening Session os Docket Number: (n/a)

Location: Bay City, Texas were held as herein appears, and that this is the original transcript thereof for the file of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission taken by me and, thereafter reduced to typewriting by me or under the direction of the court reporting company, and that the transcript is a true and accurate record of the foregoing proceedings.

PenA-i(R B Offi,ial Reportqr Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.

4 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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