Middlebury – Sept. 27st (7-9 pm)
Middlebury High School (73 Charles Avenue)

Brattleboro – Sept. 28th (7-9 pm)
Brattleboro Union High School (131 Fairground Road)

Rutland – Sept. 29th (7-9 pm)
Rutland High School (22 Stratton Road)

Colchester – Oct. 3rd (7-9 pm)
Colchester High School (131 Laker Lane)

Danville – Oct. 6th (7-9 pm)
Danville School (148 Peacham Road)

Copies of the Draft plan are available at: http://www.vtenergyplan.vermont.gov/.   Persons requiring special accommodations please call (802) 828-2811 prior to the event to make arrangements.  Comments also may be submitted in writing to the Department at PSD.energyplan2011comments@state.vt.us or CEP Comments, Department of Public Service, 112 State Street, Montpelier, VT  05620-2601.  Comments must be received by 5:00 pm on October 10, 2011.

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802-828-4039

kelly.launder@state.vt.us

Vermont Department of Public Service Names Asa S. Hopkins
Director of Energy Policy and Planning

MONTPELIER, VT – The Vermont Department of Public Service (DPS) has named Asa S. Hopkins, Ph.D., as the new Director of Energy Policy and Planning. Dr. Hopkins will lead the Department’s policy and planning division, which serves as Vermont’s State Energy Office. In conjunction with the Commissioner of Public Service, the Governor’s office, the Legislature, and other energy stakeholders, Dr. Hopkins will develop and implement statewide energy policy, including energy efficiency and demand resource management programs, renewable energy policy, and electric utility planning.

“Asa will bring scientific rigor and a fresh perspective to energy planning here in Vermont,” said Commissioner Elizabeth Miller. “His experience in energy efficiency and in federal energy policy at the Department of Energy will be of tremendous benefit to the people of Vermont. The Department of Public Service is delighted to welcome him as Director.”

Before joining DPS, Dr. Hopkins worked at the United States Department of Energy for Under Secretary for Science Steven Koonin, serving as Dr. Koonin’s assistant project director for the DOE’s Quadrennial Technology Review. Before that he served as an analyst at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, providing economic and technical analysis of federal energy efficiency standards for appliances. Dr. Hopkins has a B.S., summa cum laude, in Physics from Haverford College and an M.S. and Ph.D, both in Physics, from the California Institute of Technology. He will join the DPS at the beginning of October.

The Department of Public Service is an agency within the executive branch of Vermont state government. Its charge is to represent the public interest in matters regarding energy, telecommunications, water and wastewater.

Judy Bruneau

Commissioner’s Office

Vermont Department of Public Service

112 State Street

Montpelier, VT 05620-2601

802-828-4071

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Department of Public Service Commissioner Elizabeth Miller, left, met with VPIRG leaders and canvassers on Thursday. VTD/Taylor Dobbs

In an effort to influence the state’s revised Comprehensive Energy Plan, the Vermont Public Interest Research Group presented state officials with 7,500 comment cards calling for 80 percent renewable electricity and heating fuel by 2030.

The VPIRG activists collected the comment cards in a door-to-door campaign across the state. The activists delivered the cards to Elizabeth Miller, the commissioner of the Department of Public Service, in a publicized meeting at her office.

Gov. Peter Shumlin has made the expansion of access to renewable energy a major priority of his administration. To that end, Miller has been charged with creating an energy plan likely to include a combination of wind, solar, hydro or biomass projects in the state of Vermont.

The primary purpose of the plan, as per the Vermont Energy Plan website, is to examine the state’s energy challenges and current energy sources.

VPIRG’s 7,500 fill-in-the-blank postcards were delivered a day before the July 15 public comment deadline. Miller said the Department of Public Service had received many comments prior to the deadline, and that most had “focused on in-state energy solutions, long-term energy security, along with the need to have an affordable [energy] portfolio.”

The cards all bore the same statements – written by VPIRG – with different signatures from residents throughout the state. Miller commended VPIRG, saying they do a “fantastic job of outreach and grassroots communication,” and said the comments would be considered as the administration drafts its energy plan.

Miller said an 80 percent renewable electricity portfolio appears to be attainable. She said 48 percent of electricity used in Vermont comes from renewable resources; 63 percent of that total comes from Hydro-Quebec, the rest comes from the state’s small solar and wind efforts, as well as biomass.

“We’re on a really good path that we just have to keep vigilant and keep moving on,” said Miller. Meeting ambitious renewable targets for transportation and heating energy will be more of a challenge, Miller said. Vermont has a long way to go to meet VPIRG’s goal of 80 percent by 2030.

“When you look at total energy usage statewide, heating is only about 5 percent renewable right now,” Miller said.

Though Shumlin has said he wants to increase the amount of renewable power in the state, his administration will not officially set a target until a draft of his comprehensive energy plan is released to the public in mid-August. The deadline for the final plan is Oct. 1. The Douglas administration prepared a draft “Comprehensive Energy Plan” in 2009, but it was never formally adopted. Shumlin says he is “revitalizing” the Douglas plan.

James Moore, clean energy program director for VPIRG, said the state needs to improve its energy standards to meet growing demand for renewable energy.

Dylan Zwicky, a VPIRG team leader, spent the early summer talking with Vermonters about future sources for electricity and fuels for transportation and heat. “Generally, all across the state, people want to see more renewable energy,” Zwicky said.

Many people have been turning to alternatives modes of travel such as public transit, carpools and bicycling, Zwicky said. Most of the Vermonters he interviewed, however, were less concerned about vehicular transportation.

Miller stressed that transportation will be an important part of the state’s energy plan. She said transportation costs are about 30 percent of Vermonters’ energy expenditures. Public transit, carpooling, more efficient vehicles, and even electric cars can be a part of the solution, she said.

“When you look at bringing transportation costs down, you have to look at several ways to do it,” Miller said.

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Contact:
Elizabeth H. Miller
Commissioner
802-828-2321
Elizabeth.Miller@state.vt.us

MONTPELIER, VT – The Vermont Department of Public Service (DPS) has named John Beling as its new Director of Public Advocacy and Consumer Affairs. Mr. Beling, who has served as Special Counsel for DPS during the past year, will head the Department’s staff of attorneys who represent ratepayers in all public service company proceedings before the Public Service Board and in all other venues where those interests are at stake, such as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), the Federal Communication Commission (FCC), and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). Mr. Beling will advise the Commissioner and DPS regarding the public interest and will help guide the long-term interest of all Vermonters in reliable, environmentally sustainable, and economically sound provision of utility services.  He will also oversee the Department’s Consumer Affairs division which reviews and investigates consumer complaints regarding regulated utility services.

“John has done excellent work for the Department this past year,” said Commissioner Elizabeth Miller, “and has deep experience in environmental litigation. He is the right person for this position. The Department of Public Service is delighted to welcome him as Director.”

Before joining DPS, Mr. Beling worked at the Vermont Attorney General’s office on environmental matters and served as enforcement counsel with the United States Environmental Protection Agency in Boston.  Mr. Beling started his career in the Torts Branch of the United States Department of Justice as a trial attorney focusing on asbestos and environmental tort litigation.  Mr. Beling has a BA, cum laude, in English and History from Tufts University and a JD from St. John’s University School of Law.

When not at work, John serves as a lecturer for the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice. He also serves as a mock trial judge for Vermont Law School and enjoys coaching youth sports and instructing adaptive skiing.

“I look forward to helping to craft the policies that will balance the needs of progress and the needs of the consumer to enhance the superb quality of life that we enjoy here in Vermont,” commented Beling.

The Department of Public Service is an agency within the executive branch of Vermont state government. Its charge is to represent the public interest in matters regarding energy, telecommunications, water and wastewater.

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Rep. Tony Klein. VTD/Josh Larkin

Rep. Tony Klein, D-East Montpelier, chair of the House Energy and Natural Resources Committee, requested the study in April, according to a memo obtained from the department.

Read the memo. Rep. Tony Klein’s request; DPS response

The state has 20 utilities ranging in size from Central Vermont Public Service, the state’s largest power provider, to Vermont Electric Co-operative, which serves 10 percent of ratepayers, to 15 village and town power departments sprinkled across the state. The municipal electric entities were formed by the Rural Electrification Administration in the 1940s and 1950s.

In the letter sent, dated April 26, Klein asked the DPS to examine whether consolidating all 20 providers into one, two or three entities would save ratepayers money.

Vermont’s small utility world has been turned upside down since then. The Department of Public Service is moving ahead with Klein’s request in the aftermath of one of the biggest power deals in the state’s history.

Gaz Metro, the Montreal-based utility that owns Green Mountain Power, Vermont’s second largest utility has made a hostile takeover bid for Central Vermont Public Service, which serves 165,000 Vermonters. If the directors of CVPS accept the offer, Gaz Metro would consolidate Vermont’s two biggest utility companies into one entity that would provide electricity to 70 percent of Vermont ratepayers.

Green Mountain Power says the consolidation of the two companies will create efficiencies, eliminate managerial and operational redundancies and save ratepayers money. Job savings would come through natural attrition in the workforce and some reductions in force among top managers, according to Robert Dostis, a vice president for Green Mountain Power.

Klein is not an enthusiastic supporter of the merger. “This is the most radical change to our utilities over the last 60, even 100 years,” Klein said in an interview.

“The combining of these two utilities could be good or bad and a lot of questions and information need to come up to the surface,” Klein said.

If Fortis ends up winning out over Green Mountain Power, Klein expects CVPS to continue operating as it does now, but if GMP succeeds then the price of power can be expected to drop. Employees and ratepayers at other municipalities will be running to the general managers asking them to sell if power prices under GMP are much lower, Klein speculates.

“If Fortis wins this battle things will stay the same, if GMP wins this battle I think consolidation is inevitable,” Klein said.

In his April memo, Klein asked the department to look into “the cost of DPS and Public Service Board (PSB) regulations, such as staff, counsel, and expert witness or advisor retention; costs of electric utilities themselves, such as duplicative and administrative resources within the utilities, participation in regulatory proceedings and retention of outside assistance; and an estimate of savings to ratepayers, if any, that would accrue by reducing the number of utilities.”

Those savings, Klein said, would also likely come through job vacancies. There would be one general manager for a group of consolidated municipal utilities, for example, instead of 15 separate managerial salaries.

Dave Mullett from the Vermont Public Power Supply Authority sees it differently.

“I’d be frankly surprised if it (consolidating) saves money,” Mullett said. In his view, locally run municipalities have many benefits and they offer certain efficiencies in services.

The Department of Public Service’s Commissioner Liz Miller says it is too early to speculate on whether consolidating will save any money.

In a letter to Klein on Wednesday from Sarah Hofmann, deputy commissioner of DPS, Hofmann wrote that the department had begun mapping out a methodology and time line for the study.

“It will involve a great deal of work, reviewing and analyzing information both already in the hands at the Department and that which we will obtain through requests to the utilities,” Hofmann wrote.

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Gov. Peter Shumlin and Commissioner Liz Miller announce the creation of an oversight panel to watch over the management of Vermont Yankee. Photo by Josh Larkin

In the wake of new tests that show elevated levels of tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen, in two monitoring wells at Vermont Yankee, Gov. Peter Shumlin announced on Tuesday that the state will create an oversight panel to keep tabs on Entergy Corporation’s management of the plant.

The affected wells are 150 to 200 feet north of the tritium plume that was first identified a year ago.

Entergy notified the Shumlin administration about the new tritium discoveries two weeks ago. The results were from tests conducted in December. The corporation’s radioactive sensing equipment broke down in the interim. The governor noted that Entergy didn’t mention the problem when officials gave testimony before the Public Service Board recently.

“We have a responsibility to all Vermonters that we operate a nuclear power plant that is not leaking tritium or other radioactive substances into the ground,” Shumlin said.  “This is the second January in a row that we’ve been stuck with this challenge. I intend as governor to work together with the commissioner to ensure we get straight talk and transparency; have a plan to get to the bottom of it; have a more active relationship with Entergy to ensure we’re getting accurate information in a timely fashion.”

On Friday, Dr. Harry Chen, the commissioner of the Department of Health sent a letter to Entergy, insisting that the company send the state split samples of water from monitoring wells. DOH is missing “hundreds” of samples, some of which date back to September.

“Obviously, I am concerned, No. 1 that this aging plant continues to show signs of a lack of reliability by yet another leak or a plume that is moving in directions north,” Shumlin said. “No. 2 by a lack of transparency by Entergy Louisiana in communicating to Vermont the challenges we’re facing in terms of the aging plant and reliability that should be a concern to all Vermonters. They’re certainly a concern to me.”

Shumlin outlined a three-point plan for the Department of Public Service to address the tritium problem at Vermont Yankee.

1. The governor has charged Liz Miller, the commissioner of the Department of Public Service, with appointing nuclear experts to a Reliability Oversight Committee. The panel will advise the department about Vermont Yankee reliability and “other issues that come up” as the state moves toward closing the plant in 2012.
2. The state will expect daily updates on tritium levels in monitoring wells from Entergy to the Department of Public Service and the Department of Health, Shumlin said. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has called for a similar testing regimen.
3. Shumlin has demanded that Entergy give the Department an emergency plan within 24 hours that explains how “they’re going to get to the bottom of this will be formulating a plan to get to the bottom of this latest leak.”

Shumlin said these steps are necessary because “Entergy Louisiana does not do business the way Vermonters do business.”

“That’s been my experience,” Shumlin said. “I have not seen any behavior that suggests that they’ve decided to do business differently.”

Shumlin appointed Peter Bradford and Richard Saudek to the Texas Low-Level Nuclear Waste Compact Commission. Bradford, an adjunct professor at Vermont Law School, and Saudek, Vermont’s first commissioner of the Department of Public Service, will replace Uldis Vanags, the state’s nuclear engineer, and Stephen Wark, the communications director for the department.

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For immediate release: Dec. 22, 2010

CVPS, DPS agree on smaller rate increase

Central Vermont Public Service (NYSE-CV) and the Vermont Department of Public Service have agreed to a rate settlement that will reduce a November rate request.

Driven by reliability and transmission improvements and increasing power costs, in November CVPS asked the Vermont Public Service Board to authorize an 8.34 percent rate increase under the company’s alternative regulation plan. CVPS and the DPS have agreed to reduce the increase, which is expected to take effect Jan. 1, to 7.67 percent. The agreement also amends and extends the company’s alternative regulation plan.

Under the settlement, which must be approved by the PSB, the company’s allowed return on equity would remain at the current level of 9.59 percent. CVPS agreed to reduce its return on equity request and make an additional $13 million investment in the Vermont Electric Power Company by the end of the year, changes that reduced the size of the rate increase.

Even with the increase, CVPS’s rates will remain among the lowest of the major utilities in New England.

Under the proposed base rate change, a residential customer using 500 kilowatt-hours per month would experience a $5.91 increase, from $78.11 to $84.02. By comparison, the same customer would pay as much as $121.80 elsewhere in New England, according to the Edison Electric Institute.

Since 1999, CVPS rates have risen at a fraction of the rate of inflation in the energy sector, with a handful of increases and decreases, including a 1.15 percent decrease in July. Overall, rates in 2011 are expected to be 21.8 percent higher than in 1999. Based on the latest federal data available, the Consumer Price Index for Energy has increased 81 percent.

“We have worked hard to mitigate the need for a rate increase, and are pleased that the VELCO investment will help reduce the impact on customers,” President Bob Young said. “The increase is driven in large part by increases in power costs and a large increase for reliability improvements and regional transmission costs.

“I wish we could forego an increase, but we must continue to invest in our systems and pay our share of regional transmission costs,” Young said. “While it doesn’t eliminate the impact, I am proud to say we will continue to provide a value that is extremely competitive in the region, even after the increase.”

Other Vermont utilities have received rate increases ranging from 3.11 percent to as much as 30.76 percent in the past 8 months.

The new rates will serve as the base rates for 2011 under CVPS’s amended alternative regulation framework. Under the plan, CVPS’s rates are adjusted up or down every quarter to account for specified changes in power costs, and annually for specified changes in other costs and earnings.

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PowerPoint

“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled.” So wrote the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard P. Feynman. He could have been, but was not, writing about Vermont Yankee.

The Feynman quote appears just prior to a revised edition of “The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint” by Edward R. Tufte, the famous Yale University expert on visual evidence. This latest version of Tufte’s seminal essay, which among other things contains the infamous PowerPoint slide that helped destroy the space shuttle Columbia, appears in his 2006 book Beautiful Evidence.

The not-so-beautiful evidence of how Vermont Yankee failed to communicate to state officials the existence of tritium-leaking underground pipes at the Vernon facility is chronicled in the February 22, 2010 report of the law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius that the nuclear plant commissioned and filed with the Public Service Board in April. The lawyers’ key conclusion: “Although [we] did not find a basis to substantiate intentional wrongdoing,” certain Vermont Yankee personnel “failed at times to clarify understandings and assumptions.”

To offer an example of this failure to clarify, and as a fan of Tufte’s essay, I recently focused on the Morgan Lewis report’s discussion of a particular PowerPoint presentation given by Vermont Yankee employees to state investigators on September 11, 2008. (See “The Perils of PowerPoint at Vermont Yankee,” May 5, 2010.)

As noted there, one of the Vermont Yankee employees present at this meeting told the investigators that he couldn’t understand how anyone could have walked away from the meeting not understanding that two different kinds of pipes were at issue. One kind, underground pipes making direct contact with the soils beneath the plant, contained no radioactive materials. The other kind, leaking tritium, were buried in trenches and were therefore not considered “underground.” My hypothesis was (and remains) that maybe, just maybe, PowerPoint contributed to this muddle.

At least two noteworthy people found this publicly expressed theory to be unhelpful. One was David O’Brien, commissioner of the Vermont Department of Public Service (DPS). The other was Meredith Angwin, formerly of the Electric Power Research Institute and now the person behind the “Yes Vermont Yankee” blog. Particularly if you don’t like Vermont Yankee, Angwin’s blog is worth reading because her analysis is clear and notably devoid of nuclear industry PR blarney.

Angwin’s contention is that “everyone,” by which she means both Vermont Yankee employees and the state investigators who were scrutinizing the plant, knew of the existence of the now-infamous pipes. Her ‘beautiful evidence’ of this is piping diagrams that, according to the Morgan Lewis report, Vermont Yankee gave the investigators on September 9, 2009, two days prior to the PowerPoint pow-wow. Angwin further points out that at the September 11 confab, the Vermont Yankee folks didn’t just show slides, they also distributed a table that described the various piping systems at the facility. I acknowledged this as well.

The “Yes Vermont Yankee” blogger therefore discounted my analysis as mere “rhetoric” intent on “tarring [Vermont Yankee] with completely unrelated disasters” like the Columbia disaster and military setbacks in Afghanistan, both of which I did indeed mention. O’Brien likewise found my analysis to be sensationalist and oversimplified.

In reality, the three of us are in complete agreement. But why is this significant and not just a written record of obscure written exchanges among two smart people and one law professor? O’Brien gives the answer in the response to Angwin he posted on her blog.

The commissioner pointed out that regulatory agencies like DPS “have to trust a utility to provide us with accurate information. Our entire system of regulation is based upon that basic premise. If that was not true, the DPS and every other [utility regulator] in the country would have to be at least twice as large.”

In other words, this isn’t the Watergate scandal. Vermont Yankee insists that its employees did not intentionally spread falsehoods. It is unlikely that anyone else (including DPS) will be able to prove otherwise. But this episode throws into sharp relief a related and potentially even more disturbing reality about the regulation of nuclear power plants and, indeed, the rest of the electric power industry.

Basically, it comes down to this: If the regulators don’t ask it, and if they don’t ask it with excruciating specificity, and if they don’t follow up those queries with equally precise questions in person and in writing, utilities do not volunteer the information, much less offer assistance to the regulators in getting the data they need. Every utility regulator in the country knows this. I knew it when I served as general counsel to a utility commission in a nearby state.

This is not the regulators’ fault. Employees of regulatory agencies, including DPS and the Vermont Public Service Board that decides utility cases, are dedicated, idealistic and insightful people. But they are completely out-gunned by the companies they regulate – companies that know the rules and how to work them. For example, they know how to put regulators in the position of having too little time to deploy their meager resources to full effect.

“People forget that the legislation [ordering the Vermont Yankee investigation] had us on a very tight schedule where we had less than 4 months to complete a massive inspection,” O’Brien noted. “We had to get the scope of the inspection agreed upon with the [outside “Public Oversight Panel” created by the legislation] so we could get started before the clock ran out. We did not have reason to believe that VY was not providing accurate information with regard to the pipes and therefore had no reason to second guess them by spending more time and money to verify their statement upfront.”

In these circumstances, it is not sensationalist to compare the Vermont Yankee investigation to the situation confronted by NASA decisionmakers on late January of 2003 as a fatally damaged Space Shuttle Columbia orbited the earth. They saw PowerPoint slides prepared by a private company (Boeing) that failed to convince them of the gravity of the situation. They had other sources of information, of course, as did the state’s consultants who watched Vermont Yankee’s PowerPoint slides five Januaries later. But in both situations, the reliance on PowerPoint was emblematic of the way so many private companies react to public scrutiny.

Seven astronauts died as the result of Columbia’s fateful final flight. That’s seven more people than Vermont Yankee has killed over the course of 38 years in service. Everyone is testy about nuclear power, which, in turn, engenders a low tolerance for an analogy between the causes of the Columbia disaster and the failure of investigators to understand what was leaking tritium at Vermont Yankee.

Though highly critical of PowerPoint, Tufte nowhere contends that anyone should eschew its use altogether. Rather, he argues for a responsible approach to the challenge of information transfer on the part of those charged with explaining complex technical matters to others. When those others are regulators and their consultants, the situation is particularly acute not because these professionals lack expertise but because they are short and time and resources despite being charged with undertaking efforts of high public importance.

Thus, as to what occurred at Vermont Yankee three years ago, PowerPoint was not the disease. It was the symptom of the disease.

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.

VTDigger

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.”

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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