Sep 29, 2024: The case against restarting Three Mile Island’s Unit-1

TMI-Alert's Eric Epstein and nuclear activist Gene Stilp discuss, with the Patriot-News editorial board, nuclear power, electrical deregulation, alternative energy and their challenges to PPL's application to construct a new nuclear reactor at Bell Bend near Berwick, Pa. 

videos.pennlive.com/patriot-news/2009/07/activists_gene_stilp_and_eric.html 

By Marlene Lang 

Think you are the only one who can't manage to set aside a nest egg? Don't feel lonely. Your neighborhood nuclear power plant may be busily creating a remedial savings plan of its own. 

Twenty-six plants nationwide showed shortfalls in the funds they are required by federal law to set aside for dismantling the reactors someday and cleaning up after themselves. The closely watched Three Mile Island plant was not on the shortfall list. 

Every year the Nuclear Regulatory Commission checks on the state of so-called "decommissioning funds." Most years there are only a handful of plants running short of having those estimated costs laid up, usually four or five one official said. Those billions set aside for close-down and clean-up don't just pile up under a mattress, of course; the money is invested in the stock market. According to an Associated Press report, some $4.4 billion in decommissioning funds was lost in the downturn, even as the actual costs for shutting down plants has risen by $4.6 billion because of (I love this part) rising energy costs – and labor costs. 

The NRC license renewal staff has evaluation the environmental impacts related to

re-licensing the Three Mile Island Nuclear Station Unit 1 reactor and has concluded that 

the effects would be "small," overall but that the cumulative effect over time would be

 "small to moderate" as related to aquatic resources. The June 29, 2009 memo is reproduced

here and attached below are related documents. 

MEMORANDUM TO: Brian E. Holian, Director 

Division of License Renewal 

Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation 

FROM: Sarah Lopas, Project Manager /RA/ 

Reactor Projects Branch 1 

Division of License Renewal 

Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation 

Dr. Cooper said: "We are literally seeing nuclear reactor history repeat itself. The 'Great Bandwagon Market' that ended so badly for consumers in the1970s and1980s was driven by advocates who confused hope and hype with reality." The study finds that new reactor costs are now more than four times greater than original "renaissance" projections.

By Ad Crable

Staff Writer, Lancaster New Era

The economic downturn has caused funds set aside for the safe closure of the Three Mile Island and Peach Bottom nuclear plants to drop dramatically in the last two years.

Since 2007, estimates of dismantling costs at the nation's 104 nuclear plants have risen by more than $4.6 billion while the investment funds that are supposed to pay for the closures — or decommissioning as it's called — have dropped $4.4 billion, according to an investigation by the Associated Press.

According to decommissioning fund statements filed by Exelon Corp., owners of the two plants, the balance in the closure fund for Three Mile Island's Unit 1 dropped $69 million from 2007 to 2009.

For Peach Bottom, decommissioning funds dropped $64 million over the last two years for Unit 2 and nearly $70 million for the Unit 3 reactor.

The fund losses are tied to investments.

Is it a cause for concern?

June 8, 2009

FROM: UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

A watchdog group thinks satellite images could pose a risk, but the nuclear plant says no security measures are compromised.

Monday, June 08, 2009

BY MONICA VON DOBENECK mdobeneck@patriot-news.com

Visitors at Three Mile Island are asked not to photograph guard towers, vehicle barriers and other security measures. Yet these items are easily seen on the Internet through such sites as Microsoft's maps.live.com, now bing.com/maps.

Scott Portzline, a consultant for the watchdog group Three Mile Island Alert, thinks this is a security problem.

He has monitored sites such as Google Earth, which bring satellite images to home computers, for several years. Recently, he said, the level of detail has increased.

Experts working to determine source of leak, says plant VP

June 8, 2009 ATED STORY

A tritium leak was found during routine monitoring of Exelon Corp.'s Dresden nuclear plant last week, but contaminated water was contained to the property and did not pose a public health threat, company officials said today.

Testing at Dresden, near the Grundy County town of Morris about 60 miles southwest of Chicago, found tritium levels of 3.2 million picocuries per liter of water in a monitoring well, storm drains and concrete vault. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's limit for drinking water is 20,000 picocuries per liter.

 WASHINGTON -- A security consultant with a citizen watchdog group claims that a list containing sensitive nuclear facilities' information that was inadvertently leaked to the Internet could provide terrorists with the tools needed to formulate a plan to attack a commercial nuclear plant.

Nuclear license renewal sparks protest

Coalition asks federal court to overturn NRC

June 02, 2009

BY MARYANN SPOTO

Star-Ledger Staff

Two months after the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lacey Township, New Jersey, won a 20-year extension of its license, a coalition of environmental and citizens groups has asked a federal court to overturn the decision.

Citing inadequate information provided to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission about the plant's safety, the coalition wants a federal court to invalidate the relicensing of the 40-year-old facility.