Vermont Yankee Future Critical for State Manufacturers

DPS Commissioner O’Brien Says Vermont Yankee is Safe, Warns of Regional Transmission Problems if Nuclear Plant Closes

Montpelier – Public Service Department Commissioner David O’Brien told an audience at the 90th Annual Meeting of Associated Industries of Vermont in Montpelier today that Vermont Yankee is safe to operate, that Vermont manufacturers need low-cost power to effectively compete with overseas competition, and closing Vermont’s only nuclear power plant would cause extensive transmission problems in the New England region.

O’Brien’s comments echoed the concerns voiced by a panel of leading manufacturing and technology companies earlier in the event who, in discussing Vermont’s key economic strengths and weaknesses, cited energy costs, along with tax burdens and other key issues, as a top concern in keeping Vermont manufacturing competitive nationally and globally. If determined to be safe and reliable by appropriate federal and state regulators, Vermont Yankee could represent one of the largest sources of affordable electricity available to the state in the years ahead. AIV has advocated allowing the Public Service Board to determine whether or not to approve relicensing Vermont Yankee in the best interest of Vermonters, rather than having the decision tied up in the politics of the Legislature.

“Vermont Yankee is safe, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission says so,” O’Brien told the crowd of 150 manufacturers and other business leaders, as well as leading state officials and candidates. “The plant scores highly in industry peer review, and its problems, although well publicized, do not pose health concerns,” said O’Brien.

O’Brien further noted that “making rate payers pay 30 cents per kilowatt for their electricity is not the solution,” a reference to the state’s feed-in tariff that requires the state’s utilities to buy electricity from solar generators at prices well above market. Vermont’s energy future is not “either/or” nuclear or renewables, it’s both, he said: “You take Vermont Yankee off line, the jobs will go away, and the carbon will go up. We have an advantage [over other northeastern states in carbon and cost], but only if we hold on to it.” He observed that a truly diverse and environmentally sound energy portfolio includes renewables supported by base load nuclear and hydro. “That has been the essence of our energy policy over the past seven years”.

Also, O’Brien recommended as a long term solution to carbon emissions that the United States needs to not just retain the viable nuclear units we have today but seriously pursue new nuclear generating units. He offered that non carbon sources such as VY and of course hydro is the true means to become independent from foreign oil. Spent nuclear fuel is a very real concern with the failure of the federal government to honor their commitments on long term storage or to advance re-processing of the waste is a scandal, “but at least you know where byproduct of generation is and you can manage it. With fossil fuels, you don’t,” noting that spent fossil fuel toxic pollutants end up in the atmosphere and have other harmful effects.

The cost and reliability of electricity is one of the most important issues for manufacturers and other energy-intensive businesses. AIV, the oldest continuous state-wide business association in Vermont, is the only state wide association dedicated primarily to manufacturers and supporting businesses and organizations. Its 90th Annual Meeting today also featured presentations from the leading gubernatorial and lieutenant gubernatorial candidates, as well as a presentation by the Blue Ribbon Tax Structure Commission.

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Vermont Yankee, photo from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

It might be an exaggeration to suggest that a PowerPoint slide, entitled “Review of Test Data Indicates Conservatism for Tile Penetration,” caused the Space Shuttle Columbia to disintegrate in the midst of a fiery reentry in January of 2003. But it is this slide, prepared by Boeing engineers for NASA decisionmakers after Columbia had been struck by debris upon launch but before it tried to land, that comes in for special criticism by Edward R. Tufte, the Yale University emeritus professor who has written four books about the visual display of data.

In his book Beautiful Evidence, Tufte calls the slide “a PowerPoint festival of bureaucratic hyper-rationalism” that contrasted sharply, and tragically, with worried communications that passed during Columbia’s last flight among lower-level NASA engineers. Moreover, as Tufte points out, the official Columbia Accident Investigation Board agreed.

“[I]t is easy to understand how a senior manager might read this PowerPoint slide and not realize that it addresses a life-threatening situation,” the Board concluded, as quoted in Beautiful Evidence. “The Board views the endemic use of PowerPoint briefing slides instead of technical papers as an illustration of the problematic methods of technical communication at NASA.”

Now imagine that, instead of being a NASA bureaucrat trying to figure out during a space shuttle flight whether launch-related damage had left the spacecraft unable to land safely, you are a nuclear consultant hired by the State of Vermont to help the Legislature decide whether the plant should stay open past 2012. You show up for a meeting on Sept. 11, 2008, with engineers and other scientists from Vermont Yankee. They’ve prepared a PowerPoint presentation entitled “Buried Underground Piping (BUP).”

This meeting looms large in the first section of a report released last month by the law firm of Morgan Lewis & Bockius on the investigation it conducted for its client Vermont Yankee. The investigation concerned whether the nuclear plant deliberately misled state officials about the existence of underground pipes at the Vernon facility – pipes that turned out to be leaking radioactive tritium.

Morgan Lewis found Vermont Yankee not guilty – concluding, in essence, that employees of the plant did indeed mislead officials about those pipes but not on purpose.

At least one of those officials – Commissioner David O’Brien of the Department of Public Service – has publicly criticized the report as a whitewash. But given the manner in which dealings between regulated utilities and their regulators typically unfold as to complex technical questions, the law firm’s conclusions have the ring of plausibility. The ring gets louder when PowerPoint is involved.

As recently as April 26, a New York Times story echoed the assessment of Tufte and the Columbia Accident Investigation Board about PowerPoint, this time in the context of the war in Afghanistan. According to the Times, General James N. Mattis, commander of the joint forces in Afghanistan, offered this assessment of the military planning process when speaking at a conference recently: “PowerPoint makes us stupid.”

The times also reported that General H. R. McMaster banned PowerPoint outright as he planned a major military effort to secure an Iraqi city in 2005. He told the newspaper that PowerPoint is “dangerous because it can create the illusion of understanding and the illusion of control. . . . Some problems in the world are not bulletizable.”

One such problem might be the distinction between “underground” and “buried” pipe at Vermont Yankee. It turns out that, at least in the minds of Vermont Yankee’s engineers, the pipes that leaked tritium were “buried” but not “underground.” By this they meant that buried pipes are laid in trenches and, thus, unlike underground pipes, do not make direct contact with the soils beneath the facility. So, the reasoning goes, when Vermont Yankee claimed there were no underground pipes containing radionuclides at the plant, their only sin was failing to clarify that there were pipes in trenches that contained such materials.

This brings to mind President Clinton’s famous grand jury testimony in 1998 that the question of whether he had been lying to aides about certain sexual transgressions turned on “what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.” However much this kind of parsing seemed unreasonable before a grand jury, it happens all the time in the utility industry when regulators meet with the regulated. At such gatherings, regulators who fail to pose exactly the right questions often do not get the information they need.

And it is in this precise light that one ought to view the contents of a PowerPoint slide, one of four whose bullet points are quoted in the Morgan Lewis report. Entitled “Program Scope” — i.e., purporting to describe the scope of Vermont Yankee’s program for inspecting buried pipe – the slide had these bullet points:
“• Piping and Tanks identified in License Renewal
• Piping that could provide a path of plant-generated radioactive material contamination to groundwater
• other as they could present an environmental concern”
Would those bullets leave the impression that the program excluded pipes in trenches? Or that Vermont Yankee had pipes with tritium in them that were outside the program? It would likely turn on what the presenters said when this slide was on the screen.

According to the Morgan Lewis report, one of the Vermont Yankee officials who helped make this PowerPoint presentation to the state’s consultants was Mark LeFrancois, whose job was “Supervisor, Code Programs.” According to Morgan Lewis, LeFrancois said he was “not sure” if the consultants asked in the course of this presentation if there was underground piping with radionuclides in it.

LeFrancois told the Morgan Lewis investigators that he explained to the state’s consultants that the now-infamous tritium pipes were “in trenches and accessible,” and therefore “not in the scope” of the pipeline inspection program. The consultants, LeFrancois told the investigators, “appeared to understand” and “did not question or challenge” Vermont Yankee’s highly specialized definition of “buried.”

Morgan Lewis reported that LeFrancois “[d]oes not see now [the consultants] could come away from the meeting thinking that there were no underground pipes that were contaminated.”

Perhaps. But in all likelihood there were engineers at Boeing who did not see how NASA decisionmakers could have come away from their infamous PowerPoint show while Columbia was aloft in 2003 without being aware that the shuttle was in mortal danger.

Admittedly, the Vermont Yankee PowerPoint presentation was just one juncture in an extended series of contacts among plant officials, the state’s consultants, and the officials to whom the consultants reported. At the September 11, 2008 meeting itself, Vermont Yankee handed out a printed table that also purported to describe the scope of its pipe inspection program. But it is hard to ignore the assertion by LeFrancois that the PowerPoint show made everything clear.

We don’t know what understandings the consultants took from the September 11 meeting. Morgan Lewis only interviewed people within the hierarchy of Vermont Yankee and its affiliates within the Entergy utility conglomerate.

So the question lingers: Was LeFrancois right? Did he and his colleagues successfully convey to the state’s consultants that pipes at Vermont Yankee were leaking tritium, but the plant didn’t consider them to be underground pipes? Or were these people just another victim of PowerPoint, described by Edward Tufte in his book as “a prankish conspiracy against evidence and thought” that “allows speakers to pretend that they are giving a real talk, and audiences to pretend that they are listening”?

Donald M. Kreis, associate director of the Institute for Energy and the Environment at Vermont Law School, is the former general counsel to the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission.

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Ridge Protectors, Inc., has fought a wind project in Sheffield. Photo by Tena Starr

It’s been a long and winding road for development of wind power in Vermont. After more than a decade of wrangling, developers have yet to build a single project in the state. But it’s possible that three out of seven proposals now in the works – one in southern Vermont and two in the Northeast Kingdom — may come to fruition, that is if public opinion and the regulatory process don’t nip them in the bud.

One of the most promising is in the Orleans County town of Lowell. Voters here turned out in large numbers on Town Meeting Day to support a commercial wind project, voting 342-114 to back Kingdom Community Wind’s plan to install 20 to 24 turbines that could produce up to three megawatts of power each. According to Green Mountain Power, it’s enough electricity to power 20,000 average Vermont households.
Green Mountain Power, along with Vermont Electric Cooperative, would own the project, and officials from the utilities immediately issued a press release saying how thrilled they were about the vote.
But given Vermont’s rocky history with wind projects, Lowell’s support may not mean much.
So far, only one project has been built — in Searsburg – and that was 13 years ago.
Of the seven wind farms that have been under development in Deerfield, Sheffield, East Haven, Ira, Grandpa’s Knob (in the Castleton area), Georgia and Lowell – only two have been given the go ahead by the Public Service Board (it has approved certificates of public good for Deerfield and Sheffield). Developers have pulled out of East Haven and Grandpa’s Knob, and voters put the kibosh on the Ira project. The certificate of public good for the Georgia project is pending.

Two factors most often waylay projects: public opposition and regulatory glitches.

The fight in Sheffield

Nearly six years ago, in December of 2005, voters in Sheffield turned out in unusually high numbers to approve a wind farm on Hard Scrabble Mountain by a vote of 120-93. At the time, the moderator of the meeting said more people had voted on the project than had voted for president that November.

Two years later, in the summer of 2007, First Wind, owner of the would-be wind farm in Sheffield, received a Certificate of Public Good from the Vermont Public Service Board to produce 40 megawatts of power – enough for 15,000 to 20,000 homes.

Officials from the company said they hoped to have the Sheffield Wind Farm completed by the end of 2008.

Ridge Protectors, Inc., has consistently challenged the project on environmental grounds and has spent several hundred thousand dollars to kill it.

It’s now 2010, and construction hasn’t even started. The proposal for 16 industrial-sized, 400-foot towers has been dogged by controversy and appeals every step of the way. It’s hung up in Vermont Environmental Court at the moment, following a December trial that focused largely on questions about the impact of the project on a wetland. John Lamontagne at First Wind said they’re hoping for a
decision soon so they can move forward.

A vocal and persistent minority, which formed a citizens group known as Ridge Protectors, Inc., has fought the Sheffield project. The group has consistently challenged the project on environmental grounds and has spent several hundred thousand dollars to kill it.

Survey says Vermonters support wind generation

In theory, Vermonters support wind power. According to a survey conducted in February by the Massachusetts-based Civil Society Institute, 92 percent of Vermonters surveyed saw nuclear as a “power source of yesterday” compared with 94 percent who are in favor of solar, 92 percent for wind and 78 percent for hydroelectric as “power sources of tomorrow” that should play a bigger role in the U.S. energy supply picture. The Civil Society Institute is a nonpartisan think tank.

A proposed project that voters in Ira nixed earlier this month, for example, would have raised $400,000 to $640,000 a year for their town.

In practice, however, building a wind farm in Vermont is no easy matter – even when the deal is sweetened with hundreds of thousands dollars a year in tax revenues for towns. A proposed project that voters in Ira nixed earlier this month, for example, would have raised $400,000 to $640,000 a year for their town, according to a report by Vermont Public Radio.

So far, the lone wind farm in Searsburg has 11 turbines and produces six megawatts of power. When it went on online in 1997, it was the biggest commercial wind farm east of the Mississippi, said Dorothy Schnure, spokeswoman for GMP. It was, in fact, a test case for how wind would perform in cold climates.

GMP operates the Searsburg farm, and Schnure said it has performed well enough that the utility has pursued other wind projects.

Residents of Searsburg don’t seem to mind the turbines, said Town Clerk Josie Kilbride. “We’ve had some opposition to noise, but not a great deal. There’s a few who don’t like the looks of them. My opinion is they’re not noisy. I live within a mile of them, and I don’t hear them.”

Kilbride said the tax revenues are a boon for the town (last year the project generated $182,715 for Searsburg’s coffers), and the farm, ironically, attracts tourists who want to look at the towers.

Town by town, however, as in the case of Sheffield, there is often fierce opposition to wind power projects.

Ira voters say no to wind

Earlier this month, the same day that Lowell voters decided to support a 40 to 60 megawatt wind farm with 20-24 commercial wind towers, voters in the town of Ira, west of Rutland, emphatically rejected a proposal that would have included three times the number of wind turbines on Lowell Mountain.

“To make a long story short, the townspeople do not support wind on our ridges,” said Christine Tyminksi, chair of the Ira Selectboard. “Why Ira? We’re just this tiny little town.”

Just under a year ago, the selectboard was presented with a petition signed by about 120 residents asking them to take any and all action possible to oppose the 90-megawatt industrial wind turbine project being undertaken by Vermont Community Wind Farm, LLC, on Mount Herrick in Ira and Poultney. The project would have consisted of 60 wind turbines 400 feet tall, 39 of which were to be installed along the ridgelines in Ira.

The project would have swallowed Ira, Tyminski said. “It’s been really tough. Everybody has their own personal opinion. But basically the community has spoken. We’re not in favor of it.”

In a letter written to the Rutland Herald following the Town Meeting Day vote, she and the chair of the planning commission, Timothy Martin, asked Vermont Community Wind Farm to respect the town’s wishes. The vote in Ira is non-binding.

“Now that the community has spoken clearly through a petition, the town plan, and the referendum vote that it does not approve of commercial wind farm development on its ridgelines, we are calling upon VCWF to respect the wishes of the community and not pursue this project or any scaled-back version that conflicts with our plan and wishes,” the letter says.

Green energy proponents, conservationists divided

Wind power has created an odd conflict between Vermont environmentalists.

On one hand, wind is supported as a renewable energy source. On the other, many who consider themselves environmentally conscious see the placement of wind turbines on the state’s rural ridges as environmental degradation. Again and again, opponents have complained that dotting Vermont’s ridgelines with 400-foot wind towers would ruin the landscape, affect wildlife and create problems with
water quality.

“We certainly know the history,” Schnure said. “Any way you generate electricity has pros and cons — we recognize that.”

She said that GMP is optimistic about the Lowell project despite the fact that two other projects that have been stalled by public opposition in Vermont.

One of the best-known opponents of commercial wind is Gov. Jim Douglas.

David O’Brien, commissioner of the Department of Public Service, said his boss’ stance on commercial windmills hasn’t changed. O’Brien said Vermont’s compact geography limits the scale of wind projects and the amount of energy they generate.

He said Douglas believes that in many instances, 400-foot wind towers don’t produce enough power to justify marring Vermont’s scenic vistas.

Long-time Vermont alternative energy developer Matthew Rubin said his East Mountain Demonstration Project was blocked by the Public Service Board and the Agency of Natural Resources because his company didn’t assess the impact turbines would have on bird migration; he argues there was no scientific basis for conducting such a study for four wind turbines.

He’s told the state agencies go slow — don’t let it happen. They make it take forever; that’s why the big development companies have pulled out of Vermont.”

Rubin said he is used to projects taking a long time, and he supports Vermont’s vaunted environmental protections, but he accuses the administration of purposely stalling projects.

“We have a governor who doesn’t want to see wind towers – that’s no secret,” Rubin said. “What is a secret is, he’s told the state agencies go slow — don’t let it happen. They make it take forever; that’s why the big development companies have pulled out of Vermont.”

The criticism of his department is unwarranted, O’Brien said. Vermonters are very cautious about all forms of development, he said, and windfarms are no different. He cited the ban on billboards and smart-growth initiatives as the bedrock of Vermont’s environmental cachet.

“There’s a place for the state to make sure these projects are in the public interest,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien says while the state doesn’t “put out the welcome mat for developers,” the governor has had no influence on his department or the Public Service Board’s decisions regarding wind, and he points out that two projects – in Sheffield and Deerfield – have recently received approval.

Some developers, though, have backed out. The original East Haven developers, including Rubin, passed the baton for their project to the Vermont Public Power Supply Authority, which represents municipal utilities. Noble Power pulled out of the Grandpa’s Knob project in Castleton, Hubbardton, Pittsford and Rutland, and sold its development leases to Manchester-based Reunion Power in December because of a lack of capital in the wake of the Lehmann Brothers collapse, according to a report in the Rutland Herald. (In a phone call, communications official Maggie Wisniewski wouldn’t say why the company left Vermont.) Green Mountain Power, which originally had planned to expand the Searsburg project, opted to involve another party, Iberdrola Renewables, in the so-called Deerfield project.

Rubin said as a result of the governor’s position on wind, developers are disinclined to come to the state, and consequently Vermont is falling behind its neighbors. Projects in New York, Maine and New Hampshire have moved forward, he said, while Vermont’s have been in limbo for one reason or another.

“Vermont starts to look sillier and sillier in terms of enlightened energy power,” Rubin said.

“Vermont is so much further ahead already in terms of renewable energy and our carbon footprint. Incrementally, we don’t have the same problem to solve.”

O’Brien disagreed: In his view, neighboring states are behind Vermont in terms of its renewable energy portfolio. “I didn’t know we were in a race,” O’Brien said, adding: “Vermont is so much further ahead already in terms of renewable energy and our carbon footprint. Incrementally, we don’t have the same problem to solve.”

In any case, he said, Vermont’s topography is a limiting factor for commercial windfarms. Proposed projects are necessarily very small by national standards, O’Brien said. The state simply doesn’t have the potential, in his view, to become a major market for wind.

Vermont utilities, however, are in the market for wind power. As it happens, GMP, for example, is looking out of state for wind generation. The utility is negotiating with Granite Reliable, a New Hampshire company, for a 20-year purchase power agreement for 25 percent of the output of a 99 megawatt project in Coos County, N.H., according to Schnure.

Language in new bill would streamline appeals

This year, the state Legislature is considering a plan to put appeals before the Public Service Board, rather than the courts, in order to make the regulatory process for wind projects more predictable.
Rep. Tony Klein, chair of the House Natural Resources and Energy Committee, said Vermont policy is intended to support renewable energy.
“Yet we find it’s been almost impossible to carry out that policy,” Klein said. “Projects seem to be all bogged down in the permit process or appeals. We’re trying to send a message to investors that not only do we want these projects to be developed, but we also have one central, professional entity. If they were to be heard, that’s where they’d be heard.”

At the moment, permits could be appealed to the PSB, to Environmental Court, or to Superior Court. A developer could potentially have three cases going on simultaneously, which is expensive.

“There’s no clear path,” Klein said. “It’s not very attractive to come to Vermont at this point.” Running appeals through the PSB wouldn’t make it easier to get permits — the standards would remain the same — but there would be a predictable process, he said.

Vermont Public Interest Research Group, a pro-wind consumer advocacy organization, supports the idea of appeals going through the Public Service Board. Any developer, whether they’re building a housing development, a shopping mall or a wind farm, needs to follow the rules and regulations that are on the books, said James Moore, Clean Energy Program Director at VPIRG. But it doesn’t make a lot of sense to have Environmental Court re-litigate what’s already been reviewed by the PSB, he added.

The PSB could simply import a lot of the sworn testimony it’s already taken, rather than asking a court to hear it anew, Moore said.

“If the project should get built, let’s build it,” he said. “We should get to a yes or no in a reasonable fashion. I don’t think this is a be-all solution. It’s a small step.” But, he added, the current process is far from smooth and efficient government.

O’Brien says he doesn’t think changes to the regulatory process are necessary. The commissioner said he has heard complaints that the regulatory process is too easy for wind developers.“Is the process we’re applying now unfairly onerous or is it taking the proper steps?” O’Brien asks, rhetorically.

Addenda: project status

East Haven
The Vermont Public Power Supply Authority has purchased the lease for the East Haven site, which could accommodate three to four windmills and generate 6 megawatts of power.

Deerfield
The Public Service Board recently issued a Certificate of Public Good to Iberdrola Renewables for a 17-turbine, 34-35.7 megawatt windfarm project on 80 acres in the Green Mountain National Forest. The project is an expansion of Searsburg. GMP is negotiating for a purchase power agreement with the company, according to Schnure.

Georgia
H.W. Venture’s application for a certificate of public good for a three- to four-turbine, 12-megawatt windfarm on Georgia Mountain in Georgia is still pending.

Grandpa’s Knob
Reunion Power, based in Manchester, bought the development rights for this project from Noble Power, a national firm. PSB has approved meteorological towers for the site.

Lowell
PSB has approved meteorological towers for the site, but an application for the wind turbines haven’t been filed yet; voters approved the project earlier this month.

Ira
Rejected by voters earlier this month; approved for met towers only.

Sheffield
Approved by voters and the Public Service Board.

(Anne Galloway contributed to this report.)

VTDigger

People should be given the benefit of the doubt when it comes to integrity.

In hindsight I regret being forthcoming about my personal holiday party, I should have answered that it was no one’s business who visits my home. Ever since this matter was first raised I feel as though my personal space has been invaded. But I do believe in sunshine, being open and honest and certainly having nothing to hide. I also believe that people should be given the benefit of the doubt when it comes to integrity. It should not be assumed that because a utility executive visits my home or we see each other in a social setting, that I or they will have some sort of bias or not ultimately act in accordance with our respective professional responsibility. I remain curious why Mr. Kearney and others do not address all the other interactions in Vermont between government and private business, at political fundraisers for all political parties, or lobbying firms hosting receptions for legislators during the legislative session while critical bills are under consideration, to name two prominent examples.

In the case of my interactions with Mr. Thayer and Entergy the inaccurate disclosure by Entergy was brought to light by the Department of Public Service and I made it very clear that there needed to be accountability on the part of Entergy personnel. I did so knowing that someone like Mr. Thayer and other employees of Entergy whom I have gotten to know over the years would be likely candidates for discipline by their employer. As many now know Mr. Thayer was one of a group of five Entergy employees who were suspended. The personal toll for these individuals is very real indeed, but the stakes here are clear and the need for public accountability vital.

Isn’t ironic that Mr. Kearney cites the tremendous financial problems for the City of Burlington as a result of the Burlington Telecom failure? I think the record is very clear that as Commissioner I called attention to the very serious nature of the problems at BT and within City government last fall. I believe if people stop and apply common sense judgment we can all recognize that business and personal lives intertwine, conflicts arise, but what matters most that in our jobs, private or public, we stay true to the mandates of our vocation. Perhaps I and other public officials and private industry leaders can be fair, objective and vigilant amidst whatever personal interactions we may have in this small, but marvelous state.

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Contact: David M. Coriell (802) 828-3333

Montpelier, Vt. – Governor Jim Douglas will travel to Quebec City this week for a series of meetings with Quebec government officials, including Premier Jean Charest, and business leaders to discuss the bilateral relationship between Vermont and Quebec. The Governor will be joined by Lt. Governor Brian Dubie and other Cabinet officials, as well as Vermont business leaders.

“Our historic relationship with Quebec has only grown closer in the past seven years,” said Governor Douglas. “It’s important that we continue to build on our strong economic, trade, energy and environmental ties as the people of our shared region confront today’s many challenges.”

The Vermont delegation will travel to Quebec City on Wednesday, March 10 and return Thursday, March 11. Agriculture Secretary Roger Allbee will lead a group of Vermont specialty food producers who will meet with counterparts across the border to discuss ways to leverage local products within our region – with a focus on “Taste of Place.” Commerce Secretary Kevin Dorn will join Governor Douglas at a breakfast meeting with the Quebec City Chamber of Commerce and the Quebec City Chapter of the American Chamber of Commerce in Canada. Public Service Commissioner David O’Brien will co-chair the meeting of the Vermont-Quebec Green Energy and Trade Task Force. Governor Douglas will meet privately with Premier Charest as well.

Two agreements between Vermont and Quebec will also be signed – one updating a previous agreement on collaborative efforts to clean-up Lake Champlain, the other committing the two jurisdictions to work together on agri-food initiatives. These agreements will update the bilateral agreement signed by Governor Douglas and Premier Charest in 2003.

“Since we both took office in 2003, it has been a great pleasure to work with Premier Charest on issues of mutual importance,” said the Governor. “On issues ranging from border security to celebrating our shared history and from trade to environmental protection, working closely with our neighbors to the north is critical. Not only do Vermonters have friends and family in Quebec , they are our largest trading partner and many Quebec-based businesses employ Vermonters.”

As chairman of the National Governors Association (NGA), Governor Douglas was honored to host the historic first meeting between the governors and the Council of the Federation – the Canadian Premiers equivalent to the NGA. Governor Douglas said of the meeting, “my experience working closely with Premier Charest and other Eastern Canadian Premiers has shown me the tremendous benefits of our cross border relationships. Bringing Canadian premiers and U.S. governors together, in one room, can lead to new opportunities to promote the interests of Americans and Canadians throughout our two nations.”

VTDigger

Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, Feb. 21, 2010

Update: Arnie Gundersen, a nuclear expert who conducted an audit of Vermont Yankee for the Legislature and who spoke with the unnamed employee in question, confirmed yesterday that the previous radioactive leak from a steam pipe occurred in 2005.

David O’Brien, commissioner of the Department of Public Service, said on Tuesday that a 2005 leak at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant is not related to the current tritium leak under investigation.

O’Brien said that a steam pipe leak identified in a statement last week by an unnamed Vermont Yankee employee is not a source of the tritium contamination now found in groundwater monitoring wells, one of which has registered a reading of the radioactive isotope as high as 2.5 million picocuries per liter.

“I’m relieved to determine this doesn’t date back to 2005,” O’Brien said in an interview.

The commissioner said he was not aware of the incident because he said the state nuclear engineer deemed it too minor to bring to his attention.

On Monday, Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials confirmed that a previous leak had occurred, and they revealed to reporters in a telephone conference call that it happened five years ago – not in 2008, as alleged by the worker.

Yesterday, in a one-page letter, John Dreyfus, director of Nuclear Safety Assurance for Entergy, said the leak from 2005 is unrelated to the tritium contamination under investigation. Dreyfus verified the following assertions made by the employee: that the leak occurred in the Advance Off-Gas drain pit, the pipe was not considered to be “buried,” i.e. in direct contact with soil; and the pipe was temporarily repaired.

Entergy responds to leak allegation in writing, Feb. 23, 2010

Last week a Yankee employee told Arnie Gundersen, a nuclear engineer who serves on the Public Oversight Panel, that the leak was unisolateable and that it came from the radioactive steam system two years ago. The employee said the only way to have repaired the leak would have been to shut down the nuclear power plant in Vernon. The worker told Gundersen that “Furmanite,” a sealant, was used to “plug the hole.” Gundersen submitted a letter to the department on Feb. 16, citing the telephone conversation as a matter of record.

Dreyfus wrote that Entergy temporarily repaired the steam pipe in February 2005 and permanently fixed it in October 2005 in a planned refueling shut down.

“The leak we have yet to find, we can’t easily get to,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien said the old leak the worker referred to was minor, amounting to a small pool of liquid from a steam pipe in a contained area near the Advanced Off-Gas system. He said the leak was contained within an internal structure that is below grade, not underground, and that it is “fully accessible.” The pipe was not, he said, in contact with soil.

The level of radiation released, he said, was not above “measurable levels.”

“It’s not something that would have allowed contamination in the general environment,” O’Brien said.

The recent leak of tritiated water is in a different location also near the Advanced Off-Gas system, O’Brien said, and investigators are excavating an area near the building in an effort to find the source of the contamination. According to reports from Vermont Yankee officials, they have dug 11 feet below grade and close enough to the AOG structure that they have had to shore up the building.

“The leak we have yet to find, we can’t easily get to,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien said the state nuclear engineer at the time, Bill Sherman, didn’t make him aware of the problem at the time it occurred because it was a “common incident” and not the only instance of a minor leak at the plant.

The source of the leak, the commissioner said, was a steam pipe in a drain pit area of the Advanced Off-Gas system. He said a bad socket weld allowed steam to escape and allowed condensation to collect as fluid on the floor.

Uldis Vanags, the current state nuclear engineer for the Department of Public Service, reviewed plant reports from 2005 and described the leak in an e-mail to O’Brien as a small stream of steam spraying from a 1-inch carbon steel pipe.

“This leak that occurred is not the leak that is presently being investigated,” Vanags wrote. “We don’t know where the leak is right now, but if it was in the AOG pit area it would be readily visible. The present leak may be in the AOG pipe tunnel which carries many pipes with different functions but includes where the pipe leak of concerns comes from, i.e. the AOG pipe tunnel.”

Vanags said there was no “direct pathway for the steam or condensate to enter the ground outside the building.” Airborne radioactive releases would have been captured by the Advanced Off-Gas ventilation system and carried to the stack for release, according to an e-mail from Sherman.

The leak, Vanags wrote, was not reportable to the department or the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under the memorandum of understanding with Entergy.

What follows is an e-mail string from the Department of Public Service.

From: Vanags, Uldis
Sent: Tuesday, February 23, 2010 11:03 AM
To: O’Brien, David
Subject: 2005 AOG pipe leak

Dave: I investigated the facts behind the allegation concerning the AOG steam leak in 2005. The materials provided to me in this investigation are the Condition Report CR-VTY-2005-00484 discovery date of 02/10/2005. Also I reviewed the Temporary Modification work package to repair the leak (M 2005-002). I also discussed this matter with VY engineers and their Health Physicist.

This was a leak on a 1 inch carbon steal pipe in what is called the drain pit area. The leaking pipe is from a steam line trap that collects condensate (liquid) from a steam pipe in the AOG pipe chase. There is no ground connection here. The leak is the result of a bad socket weld and has a small stream of steam spraying out. This leak that occurred is not the leak that is presently being investigated. We don’t know where the leak is right now, but if it was in the AOG pit area it would be readily visible. The present leak may be in the AOG pipe tunnel which carries many pipes with different functions but includes where the pipe leak of concerns comes from, (i.e. the AOG pipe tunnel).

There is no direct pathway for the steam or condensate to enter the ground outside the building. Vapor from the steam in the air goes through the HVAC system up the stack because the building is kept at negative pressure. Any water on the concrete floor would flow to a sump (if there was enough) or just evaporate and go up the stack also. During repair, a HEPA filter was placed in the room to assure any contaminates are routed to the proper engineered pathways.

This leak was not reportable to NRC and not reportable to DPS under our MOU.

A temporary sealant was used to make the repair (as is typical in the industry), prior to the permanent repair.

Uldis

Uldis Vanags
State Nuclear Engineer
Vermont Department of Public Service
112 State Street
Montpelier, VT 05620-2601
802-828-1784 (office)
email – uldis.vanags@state.vt.us

From: William Sherman
To: Hofmann, Sarah ; Vanags, Uldis
Sent: Tue Feb 23 11:24:04 2010
Subject: RE: 2005 tritium incident

Dear Sarah,

The article reference confuses two occurrences. One is a steam leak that would have resulted in airborne releases. The second is a liquid release that would result in Tritium in groundwater.

In the article, NRC confirms the 2005 event as a steam leak.

I recall that at least twice, and perhaps as many as four times, during my 18 year tenure, VY reported steam leaks with the possibility of accompanying airborne radioactive release from the Advanced Offgas System. These airborne releases would have been captured by the AOG ventilation system and carried to the stack for release. This release path is monitored (although not for Tritium). In my opinion, any small amounts of airborne tritium would have been undetectable and well below any limits. Bill Irwin could confirm. Also, these steam leaks would have resulted in small amounts of leakage through doors or other paths. This would have been too small to measure.

I do not have access to daily records, but I seem to recall one such report in the 2005 timeframe. Sorry I can’t be more definitive.

These reports were not a cause for alarm since any releases were well within limits. VY reported correctly to the NRC. We would have been aware of the report to NRC.

I would stress again that this 2005 release does not appear to be related to the current groundwater question that I think is a new phenomenon.

We have given testimony in numbers of places that these new phenomena occur, and once revealed, are handled pretty well by Entergy.

Hope this is helpful.

Bill

VTDigger

In the wake of last month’s discovery of radioative tritium contamination at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, and revelations Entergy, its owner, had evaded acknowledgement of the source of the leak, O’Brien told lawmakers Wednesday he wanted the company to bring in its own problem-solving team.

That team, he told the House Natural Resources Committee, should have a direct line of communication with the corporation’s top brass, so the company can “recognize where it’s gone wrong and (see) that those things are going to be corrected.”

Less than 24 hours later, Yankee spokesman Rob Williams announced Entergy had formed such a team.

The management team is to be comprised of eight company officials, including Curt Hebert, an executive vice president for the corporation and past chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission; Brian Cosgrove, a longtime spokesman for Yankee (and former chairman of Vermont’s Republican Party); and Larry Smith, a longtime communications manager for the plant.

Sarah Hoffman and David O'Brien

The Louisiana-based corporation has also hired an independent law firm to investigate Thayer’s alleged misstatements under oath; installed new monitoring wells at the Yankee site; and sent 20 “highly skilled” inspectors to Vernon to determine the source of the leak.

Whether Entergy’s changes will be enough to mollify administration officials and lawmakers remains to be seen.

Earlier this week, O’Brien described Entergy’s reassignment of Thayer as “tokenism,” arguing the public relations manager had failed to provide information about the existence of underground pipes at the plant to the Public Service Board last May.

“They’d have to do something miraculous to regain our trust,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien was unavailable for comment Thursday, but Gov. James Douglas, at his weekly press conference, repeatedly said “I don’t know” and “we’ll know it when we see it” in response to questions about whether Entergy’s new Yankee leadership team and other moves would satisfy the state’s demand for corrective action. The governor did not explain what specific changes he was looking for, explaining, “We don’t have the answers we need at this point.”

He said he wants to see Entergy wrap up its investigation of the misstatements and the tritium leak probe and receive a decommissioning plan from the company

“There are a lot of balls that are still in the air that may come down before we all feel comfortable,” Douglas said.

Later yesterday afternoon, Williams sent out another e-mail, this time alerting the public (to what he termed) “good news”: A new well sample had revealed a concentration of tritium 37 times the legal concentration limit for tritiated water — 774,825 picocuries per liter. Williams said the sharp increase in concentration was an indication that inspectors are closer to finding the source of the leak.

The well is located near the plant’s condensate water storage tank, and “some underground piping appears to be closer to the source,” Williams wrote. The monitoring well, he said, is located about 200 feet from the Connecticut River.

Much of the testimony O’Brien gave the House Natural Resources Committee this week centered on the tritium question. He said the department’s “highest priority is the tritium situation.” O’Brien also described his disappointment with Entergy, and his continued support for relicensing the plant.

Rep. Tony Klein, D-East Montpelier, said industry officials from around the country tend to trivialize tritium leaks. They say, “this isn’t that bad,” Klein said.

“I don’t think you’re ever going to have a sentence from me that tritium is not bad,” O’Brien said.

After repeatedly asking Entergy whether Vermont Yankee has underground pipes, O’Brien said his department only received confirmation that they existed when the tritium leak was discovered.

“We learned because of the tritium investigation, in a normal sort of call discussing what’s being done,” O’Brien said. “Our state nuclear engineer heard someone say, well we need to look at x, y, z piping
system as a possible candidate. The light went on at that very moment. And from that moment on … we were quite upset and disappointed to find out.

“I can tell you unequivocally, there’s no question in my mind that there wasn’t a communication problem,” O’Brien said.

He said the department’s main problem with Entergy has to do with lack of respect from corporate officials.

“It’s too late now, but someone at very high level should have on the very first day, and stood up here in front of the public, and said this is our responsibility, this is unacceptable, it’s not going to happen again, and here’s what we’re doing,” O’Brien said. “That hasn’t happened yet.”

O’Brien said even though he’s sure that dozens of people who work at the facility knew the pipes existed, the department, despite its inquiries, was repeatedly told Yankee was that rare nuclear plant, the only facility in the country, in fact, (according to Uldis Vanags, the state engineer) that was built without an underground piping system carrying radioactive wastes.

“It’s a bizarre circumstance, and it leads you to all sorts of headscratchers of why?” O’Brien testified. “How could that be? I can tell you one thing that occurs to me is that when we conducted this audit a
couple of years ago, one possibility is just that perhaps our role wasn’t given the respect it should have been afforded.”

“They disrespect your department that much?” Klein asked.

“That’s how I see it,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien said the industry’s primary focus is the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and that state oversight of plants is typically limited and the Vermont Department of Public Service’s level of involvement at the
facility is rare.

He described an insular corporate culture in which industry officials operate on a “different plane” and that Entergy’s attitude toward state officials is a part of that culture.

“I think you can say it’s not just this plant,” O’Brien said. “I think what’s tragic for them as the operator is that sort of, if you want to call it disrespect or lack of care has obviously created far greater problems. Two years ago, if they’d given it the consideration they should have, we would have gotten the right answer, we would have conducted the review and perhaps would have ascertained what we’re
considering now.”

O’Brien went on to say Thayer’s removal didn’t rectify the situation. Other Entergy officials, he said, had also misled his department by making incorrect statements or mishandling the inspection process. In addition, he viewed Entergy’s refusal to negotiate a power deal and to offer some resolution on decommissioning as an affront to his department.

“We find ourselves in a situation now where we’ve been poorly served by the owners of the plant,” O’Brien said. “In any sort of business relationship between a private company and the state of Vermont and its utilities, you’ve gotta have a degree of trust and confidence in your business partner; that’s the only way it works productively and effectively.”

Rep. Kurt Wright, D-Burlington, asked how Arnie Gundersen, a nuclear engineer and member of the Public Oversight Panel, knew about the pipes last summer and the Department of Public Service wasn’t aware of their existence until two or three weeks ago.

“I’ll just say this: I am absolutely confident of what the department has done in this instance and how we handled the situation and tried to follow through,” O’Brien said. “I’m aware of all the interactions Arnie had with the department and how those questions were forwarded on to Entergy. You know, if at the end of the day people won’t give you the right answer … there’s limits as to what our ability is to ascertain. I don’t have an excavator I can send down there to the site, to put it bluntly.”

“The fact that he was always sort of curious about how it is that these pipes didn’t exist, um, you know, kudos to him that he was curious about this,” O’Brien said. “It’s not as though the question wasn’t asked
multiple times.”

In response, Klein seemed incredulous. He said with Entergy’s track record of mechanical mishaps and its “exposed culture of mistruths, lying, deceit, whatever you want to call it,” and the creation of a
subsidiary spinoff, Enexus, for six plants including Yankee, “My big question to the administration or to the (department) is: What would it take? Where is the line in the sand? What would it take to happen for you guys to say enough?”

O’Brien replied: “There’s no way to answer that question. Or predict a circumstance where that would exist. From our perspective, the reliability audit was a lynchpin in looking at the reliability of the plant, and the reliability audit found that the plant can operate for an additional 20 years reliably.”

VTDigger

February 3, 2010

Here is a statement from Entergy Corporation:

Entergy Corporation Outlines Steps to Restore Trust of Vermonters

Former Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Appointed to Serve as Team Leader on Vermont Yankee

Initial Measures Will Facilitate Greater Transparency, Address Tritium Contamination and Other Concerns

In response to numerous concerns and issues that have been raised by Governor Douglas, Vermont Department of Public Service Commissioner O’Brien, state and federal legislative leaders and the public at large, Entergy Corporation has pledged to place the highest priority on restoring trust with Vermonters.

Curt L. Hébert, Jr., a past chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has been designated to lead a team of Entergy specialists addressing Vermont Yankee matters.  Hébert serves as Entergy’s executive vice president for external affairs and reports directly to J. Wayne Leonard, Entergy’s chairman and chief executive officer.

The team has already begun to meet with public, business, labor and civic leaders in Vermont. Two Entergy officials with long experience in Vermont will play expanded roles on the team. They are Brian Cosgrove, who will manage relations with state government, and Larry Smith, who will coordinate communications and media relations.

Among members of the team are Arthur Wiese, Entergy Corporation’s vice president for corporate communications; Kenneth Theobalds, vice president for government relations for Entergy’s Northeastern nuclear operations; Donald Vinci, vice president of business development for Entergy Nuclear; James Steets, vice president for Northeastern nuclear communications; and Allison Graves, director of federal energy policy.

“This situation needs to be fixed and through Curt’s leadership and direct engagement with Vermont leaders, I have every confidence it will be fixed as quickly as possible.  We must and will do better.  Entergy’s own standards, and our duty to Vermonters, demand it,” said Leonard.

“Entergy values and deeply respects our relationship with the state of Vermont and its business community and we are committed to Vermont for the long-term.  Since buying the plant in 2002 we have made more than $190 million in long-term investments at Vermont Yankee to make it a world-class nuclear facility,” said Hébert.

“We are placing the highest priority on finding the cause of the tritium and remediating any contamination.  At the same time, we must reconcile the conflicting statements made to the Department of Public Service. To this end we have engaged the services of an independent, outside law firm to fully investigate the matter, and most importantly, to make sure it does not happen again,” said Hébert.

The work of the specialized team dedicated to the company’s interaction with the Vermont officials is concurrent with Entergy’s ongoing investigation to identify the source of the elevated tritium concentrations in monitoring wells. That investigation is overseen by Entergy Nuclear senior management, including Michael Balduzzi, senior vice president and chief operating officer, and Timothy Mitchell, senior vice president for engineering and technical services.

Entergy Corporation reiterated a number of other steps it is taking to address these matters, including the following items.

·       Entergy retained an outside law firm to conduct a thorough, independent investigation pertaining to the company’s communications with the Vermont Department of Public Service.

·       Entergy is cooperating with all state and federal inquiries that the relevant agencies are conducting.

·       Entergy has installed additional testing wells at Vermont Yankee to monitor for tritium and increased the frequency of testing in order to conclusively determine the source of the tritium so that a remediation plan can be proposed to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

·       Entergy has dispatched a project team of more than 20 highly skilled professionals to Vermont Yankee to ensure a fast, comprehensive assessment of the tritium situation.

·       Entergy has unequivocally acknowledged its responsibility for the controversy. One Entergy executive involved has issued a public apology.  He has been permanently relieved of his Vermont responsibilities and placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the full investigation.

VTDigger

Vermont Yankee graffitti. Photo by Josh Larkin

Arnie Gundersen is a nuclear engineer who serves on the Vermont Yankee Public Oversight Panel. He is also the chief engineer for the paralegal services and expert witness research firm Fairewinds Associates of Burlington.

Entergy has long maintained there are no underground pipes at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon. Gundersen questioned Entergy’s assertions and insisted there had to be pipes under the facility. In early January, water containing the radioactive isotope tritium was found in a test well and in groundwater near the plant. Underground piping is suspected to be the source of the leak.

Gundersen gave a powerpoint presentation to the Senate Natural Resources Committee last week. What follows is the transcript of an interview with Anne Galloway, editor of Vtdigger.org., conducted after that presentation.

Q. Could you talk about how you came to the conclusion that there is underground piping at Vermont Yankee?

Arnie Gundersen: What (Entergy) told us (the Vermont Yankee Public Oversight Panel) was that they had no underground pipe and that the only underground pipe that they had was a drain in the chemistry lab that had been plugged years ago. It hadn’t been excavated, but they knew there was some radioactivity under the plant from this little chemistry drain. That was what we all believed even as late as June. Uldis (Vanags, the state nuclear engineer for the Vermont Department of Public Service) testified under oath that one of the reasons this plant would be easy to decommission is because there’s no contamination.

Q. Where are the master plans of the facility? Aren’t there blueprints of the plant?

AG: There are blueprints of the facility somewhere.

Q: Who has the blueprints?

AG: I’m sure now Entergy does. This week, Entergy told us when they went back, they found seven pipes in the last three weeks that they didn’t know were there, some of which have been there for 33 years.

Q: How many are there total?

AG: I don’t know exactly, but there are around 40 that are radioactive. Now that’s just what they call buried pipe. They try to split hairs here, and they try to differentiate between “buried,” which is in direct contact with either concrete or dirt, and what they call “underground,” which can be in a concrete structure where the pipe is in it, but not in direct contact with the dirt.

So there are other “underground” pipes that are not in that count of 40 “buried” pipe in direct contact with dirt or concrete.

Q: How many “underground” pipes are there?

AG: We don’t know; we’re trying to figure that out.

Q: So some of them are in concrete spaces, they’re in little rooms underneath the facility?

AG: Right, like a long, long basement, sort of, but they have a roof on them, and they are underground. There’s dirt above them and around all sides.

So anyway, until June we all thought there weren’t any. I got appointed to the role of Joint Fiscal Committee oversight. I asked for a report, and (officials at Vermont Yankee) refused to send it to me electronically, but they sent me a hard copy that was 120 pages. I started to read it, and I started hearing about these underground storm drains that have radioactivity in them. That piqued my interest, and I did a little more research, and I thought there’s got to be an off-gas system.

(Gundersen explained, noncondensable gases created in a boiling water nuclear reactor wind up in the condenser. If noncondensable gases stayed in the condenser, the plant would have to be shut down. The condenser has to be kept in a vacuum, so the off-gas system sucks the air off to maintain the vacuum. In addition to sucking the air out, the off-gas system also sucks the radioactivity out and sends it up that big stack. That’s why boiling water reactors have a big stack.)

Q: So what you’re saying is, you thought there might be an off-gas piping system underground?

AG: Originally, we had been led to believe that all those pipes were above ground. The more I studied, the more I thought, that can’t be. They have to be underground. That’s when I started asking the department (about it).

At the end of July, I wrote to the department, and I said, hey, (and I wasn’t saying we were lied to) there’s a misunderstanding here. I highlighted two things, the off-gas systems and the storm drains.

Then on Aug. 13, (David) McElwee (Vermont Yankee’s chief engineer), got back to me, and he said, no, the off-gas system does not have any water in it that could get into the ground, and the issue is closed.

Act 1 of my slide show ends in June when everybody was singing by the same sheet of music, and everybody believed, or was led to believe, there were no underground pipes. Act II (starts in) July when I discovered it, and I bugged the department through August, and I bugged the department in September, and I bugged the department in October. And they just forwarded my e-mails to Entergy, and Entergy said there is no problem, and they never became curious.

Q: Why wasn’t the Department of Public Service involved in finding out what was going on?

AG: That’s a good question. I don’t know. They have never been involved, though. If you go back to 2003, I testified that the off-site dose (radioactive emissions as a result of the “uprate,” a 20 percent increase in power production at the plant) was going to go up. Entergy said no, it’s not. The Department of Public Service blew me off. I testified the towers were weak. Entergy said they’re not, the department said they’re not; they blew me off. (One of the cooling towers collapsed in 2007.)

The decommissioning white paper Maggie Gundersen (his wife and founder of Fairewinds Associates) and I put together? We used materials that came from the department that they just didn’t analyze. (In 2008, the Gundersens estimated it would cost nearly $1 billion to decommission the plant and that Entergy’s decommissioning fund, which is supposed to cover the cost, is valued at under $400 million.)

The department under O’Brien has always sided with Entergy and has never, ever taken the technical recommendations I did. And like, here’s Maggie’s white paper. I mean, what could be more definitive than their own numbers (Entergy and DPS)? And yet unless pushed, (the department) will believe Entergy. And of course when Peter Bradford (a former NRC Commissioner) and I got appointed back in July of 2008, the governor and O’Brien went after us as lunatic anti-nukes.

It’s been the department’s reaction to always support Entergy, and they would have continued to support Entergy were it not for this leak. Had the leak not occurred, they might have gotten away with it.

I gave a courtesy copy of the report on the existence of underground piping “you’re not telling us about” to Entergy and to the department at the same time I sent it to the Joint Fiscal Office (in October). Two days later, Rob Williams (spokesman for Vermont Yankee) attacks the report, as opposed to doing some serious searching to find out whether it was right or wrong.

He sent a press release out on Oct. 22 saying he’d read the consultant’s report and he didn’t like the tone of it. We were too negative, he said, and the issues cited as serious are really just routine.

Well, I’m sorry, lying and not telling us about underground pipe is not routine, it’s serious. I talked to Peter Shumlin (president pro-tem of the Vermont Senat), and he agreed he was going to put it on the agenda for January when the Legislature came back. And of course they came back and within three days there was a leak.

Q: Where do you think the leak is?

AG: I’m pretty sure it’s in the off-gas system. We should know in the next day or two, but I’m pretty sure it’s in the system that I said was underground and radioactive and that the department blew me off on.

Q: What leads you to that conclusion?

AG: The department is saying that I wasn’t specific enough. I said off-gas, and I guess I didn’t point to the specific line. The ground-penetrating radar picked up a problem in the off-gas line, and that’s what they’re digging at in the last couple of days. There may be others, but certainly it looks like ground-penetrating radar is leading them to the off-gas system.

Q: So not only was your report ignored, but Entergy attacked the report. Why do you think the corporation continues to refuse to work with the administration and the legislative leadership on figuring out what was going on and admitting that they screwed up?

AG: I don’t think they can admit they screwed up because of the potential criminal probe going on. It’s not as if they can just throw money at this problem. They did throw money at problems in the past. In 2003, when I was a witness on the stand, they tried to impeach me with information I hadn’t seen. And I caught them. That led to the $50,000 fine against Entergy, and the funds were given to the New England Coalition (a Brattleboro-based non-profit group opposing Vermont Yankee’s relicensing).

I was working for the coalition all summer to do a document search. Well, they only gave us a little bit of documents. Then on the stand, I was testifying and they tried to impeach me. It turns out they had 200,000 documents they hadn’t given the coalition. So what happened then was, the coalition asked for another for six months so I could review it. I was a schoolteacher, and at this point it was October, and I couldn’t provide 100 percent reading of this stuff, and the department said naw, they can do it in six weeks. I had six weeks to read 200,000 pages.

The department sided with Entergy again. The $50,000 fine was nothing compared to what I might have found in the 200,000 pages.

Right after that, they tried to build a temporary building they didn’t tell anybody about. They were pretending it popped up like a mushroom. The coalition discovered it, and I did all the research on it, and they provided us the material two days before the hearing. I testified on it.

This didn’t just pop up; they were planning to do this for a year, and they never told the department.

They got fined another $82,000 for that. But again, the coalition said we have limited resources, we just discovered you guys have been lied to and it resulted in this $82,000 fine, but we need more time so our expert can look into the lies about the building. Well, the department’s position was like Entergy’s. This was O’Brien; he said they had a choice – they didn’t have to look at this building. And the Public Service Board said you alerted us to this building — but we’re not going to extend the proceedings.

The department has always gone out of its way to give Entergy everything it needs to move the ball down the field. Maggie and I, from a technical standpoint, have been the only two forcing the department to represent the people. It is the Department of Public Service. There’s a “P” in the middle of it, you know. And it hasn’t happened. I don’t blame the worker bees, this starts up at Douglas and O’Brien, and their agenda is clear — they want to get this relicensed.

Q: Even now?

AG: They think all of these issues are just speed bumps on the road to relicensing.

Q. What do you think of Douglas’ call for a time out on the Legislature’s decision on whether to relicense Vermont Yankee?

AG: I don’t think it was coincidence that I’m testifying about how the department is in cahoots with Entergy, and Douglas steals the limelight. (Douglas’ press conference occurred in the middle of Gundersen’s presentation to lawmakers last Wednesday.)

VTDigger