NRC takes on dispute over VY water discharge

By Shay Totten | Vermont Guardian

Posted January 11, 2007

ROCKVILLE, MD — The five-member board that oversees the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) will review a dispute over the impact of warmer water discharges by Vermont Yankee if its license to operate beyond 2012 is extended, according to a ruling issued today.

In a 3-2 decision, commissioners argued that the normal avenue for such a review — the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) — would be bypassed because they believe the question of thermal discharge has broader implications across the industry, and could come up in other license renewal cases.

The contention was one of several raised by the New England Coalition, and scheduled to be heard by the ASLB. Vermont Yankee appealed the decision to review the contention.

The group believes Entergy has not adequately answered questions about the long-term impact on the Connecticut River that a rise in water temperature — by one degree over what is currently allowed in its permit — will have on various aquatic species.

In its appeal, Vermont Yankee claimed there would be no adverse impact due to the change.

“The sharply differing views of the majority and dissenting member of the board on the regulatory requirements for environmental assessment of the impact of thermal discharge from a once-through cooling system raise significant issues of potentially broad impact and may well recur in the likely license renewal proceedings for other plants that use such a cooling system but whose operating licenses have not been renewed,” wrote the majority in its decision.

Agreeing with the decision were commissioners Dale E. Klein, chairman Edward McGaffigan, Jr., and Jeffrey S. Merrifield.

In their dissent, board members Peter Lyons and Gregory Jaczko, said the majority’s decision overlooks one important fact — the NRC has already reviewed nearly two dozen license renewals.

“The majority decision implies that the issue of the impact of thermal discharge from a once-through cooling system is a new issue before the commission and suggests that since industry expects all plants will seek license renewal, this issue ‘may well recur’ in the ‘likely’ license renewal proceeding,” the pair writes. “First, according to the NRC license renewal website, the NRC has completed its review on no less than 23 plant applications. Had this matter been indeed of substantial significance, it likely would have surfaced before. It hardly seems a worthwhile exercise of the commission’s supervisory authority to resolve a routine contention admissibility dispute.”

The ruling did not fall along party lines, said an NRC spokesman.

Ray Shadis, a technical advisor to NEC, said he is looking forward to litigating the issue before the commission, as it remains a critical question, however he questioned why the NRC would take it on.

He hopes the commission will provide guidance to the ASLB and give it back to them for a full judicial review rather than adjudicate it.

Vermont Yankee officials were not immediately available for comment.

In September, the ASLB agreed to hear contentions filed by the state of Vermont and a citizen watchdog group as part of its review of Vermont Yankee’s bid to operate beyond 2012. Vermont Yankee appealed their ruling to the full NRC.

The ASLB ruling allowed one of the state Department of Public Service’s three contentions, and four of the six contentions filed by the New England Coalition. It denied outright contentions from two other interested groups — the Massachusetts Attorney General and the Town of Marlboro.

The Massachusetts attorney general’s office appealed the ruling, and the full NRC will examine it, today's ruling also noted.

Of these five allowed contentions, four relate to various safety aspects of operating the plant beyond its original 40-year license, while the fifth relates to the environmental impact its water discharges have on the Connecticut River.

The ASLB, which is a quasi-judicial panel of judges within the NRC, has only allowed several outside groups to contest license extensions.

Vermont Yankee's 40-year license expires on March 21, 2012. Entergy, the plant’s owner, has formally asked to extend that term for 20 years. If approved, the extension — coupled with a 20 percent uprate that has been implemented at the plant — would increase the output of radioactive waste, and it may also add stress to the plant beyond its original design, critics contend.

The ASLB agreed to hear NEC’s concerns about Entergy’s plans to monitor key components as the plant ages and produces power at a higher rate than originally licensed.

The group contends that Entergy’s proposed plan to monitor for overall metal fatigue at the aging plant is inadequate, and specifically falls short in relation to two key components — the steam dryer and the pipes that carry the steam.

The ASLB agreed to hear one contention by Vermont officials. They are questioning Entergy’s plan to monitor and manage the aging concrete that surrounds most of the reactor containment vessel, called a “drywell.”