The owners of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant can eliminate a real-time emergency monitoring data system, even though spent nuclear fuel is still cooling inside the plant, a federal regulatory panel ruled last week. Entergy Corp. shut down the reactor Dec. 31.
The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board denied a petition from the state of Vermont requesting that Entergy maintain an emergency response data system to monitor spent nuclear fuel. The three-member panel said under federal regulations non-operating plants are exempt from maintaining the system.
Vermont has 25 days to appeal the Jan. 28 ruling. Officials could not be reached Monday for comment.
The Louisiana-based company permanently shutdown the Vernon plant for economic reasons. In March 2014, the company filed a request with regulators to reduce their emergency planning measures after shutdown.
Vermont argues the data system is needed to ensure a timely response to emergencies. Without the data, the state will not have access to real time data concerning conditions inside the spent nuclear fuel pool.
All spent nuclear fuel was removed from the reactor last month. Vermont Yankee will store up to 2,996 spent fuel assemblies in a cooling pool until 2020. After which the assemblies will be stored on site indefinitely, or until the federal government removes it from the site along the west shore of the Connecticut River.
The data system is intended to monitor conditions within the reactor core during operation, according to Neil Sheehan, a spokesperson for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
“We think there is ample time for there to be a response and let members of the public know if there were to be some issues involving the spent fuel pool,” Sheehan said. “It’s a much more simplified set of data than a reactor.”
He said other closed nuclear power plants maintain this data system after shutdown.
Entergy says they are not required by federal law to maintain the data system. The company says there are other monitoring systems in place that are adequate to respond to an emergency involving the spent nuclear fuel pool.
The company has agreed to decommission the plant sooner than required by federal regulators. Decommissioning will likely begin after a special fund grows enough interest to cover the entire cost of the process. A spokesman for the company said the emergency response changes will reduce costs and therefore reduce the timeline for decommissioning.
One panel member dissented with the majority, arguing that Entergy should keep the data system in place for some time “to assure no reduction in the effectiveness of its emergency plan and, in turn, no adverse impact on public health and safety.”
The state has other concerns about the company’s post-shutdown plans, including Entergy’s proposal to eliminate off-site emergency response staffing and how to pay for decommissioning costs.
