(Thank you Michael Abadi for hosting me on your public access show, “VT Blogosphere TV”  You are a great host.  I appreciated the opportunity to talk about issues important to me and all Vermonters, especially Vermont Yankee, and my role as a Justice of the Peace and my support of Marriage Equality.   – promoted by Maggie Gundersen)

Here Maggie Gundersen provides some much-needed historical context to Vermont’s ongoing problems with its dated and neglected nuclear power plant. You know the masters of spin are hard at work when the same Oversight panel report is met with headlines as different as “Oversight Panel Gives Yankee Go-Ahead” (WCAX) and “Pennywise and Pound Foolish” (Brattleboro Reformer).

The big news on Friday was the Vt House passing a decommissioning fund bill similar to the one Douglas vetoed last year. Is it possible that one man could stop both requiring Entergy to increase the decommissioning fund AND Freedom to Marry in one legislative session? That would be retrograde governing of truly historic proportions.  Below is a link dump of recent news about the decommissioning bill, the latest valve leak, and the oversight panel report.  

House approves Yankee decommissioning bill

Times Argus

The bill, which will now go to the Senate, would require three $114 million payments over the next decade and then a final payment to bring the fund to its final level to accomplish decommisioning. The fund has lost nearly $100 million of its value over the last 16 months as financial markets have tumbled.

…

The final vote on the decommissioning bill, which may well be vetoed by Gov. James Douglas if it gets to him, was 93-47.

Vt House advances Yankee Decommissioning Bill

WCAX

Under the bill, Entergy Nuclear, which owns the plant, will have to put more than $350 million into the fund.

….

Both Entergy and Governor Douglas’ administration strongly oppose the bill, and Douglas vetoed a similar measure last year.

Temporary fix stops leaky valve at Vermont Yankee

Brattleboro Reformer

A leak in a valve in a steam line at Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant was finally sealed Wednesday afternoon.

The fix, which involved injecting a sealant inside a clamp around the valve, is only temporary. The valve will be fixed when the plant undergoes its next refueling outage in 2010.

Vermont Yankee: High risk, Low Maintenance

Valley Advocate

Arnie Gundersen of Burlington, a former nuclear industry executive and one of five authors of the report, told the Associated Press that prior to the cooling tower, plant employees had asked for extra time and funds to do more detailed inspections of the cooling towers and and been refused by the plant’s owner, Entergy of Mississippi.

Gundersen told the Advocate that the panel uncovered still more evidence of neglect at the plant.

“There were 19 years of inspections they should have done on the transformer [that caught fire in 2004] and didn’t,” he said. “They didn’t have enough people to put data into the computer for their flow-acceleration corrosion program [which monitors the condition of pipes in the plant]. They didn’t put data into the computer for five years.”

‘Pennywise and pound foolish’

Brattleboro Reformer

The report can’t be much of a reassurance to Entergy, said Rep. Sarah Edwards, P-Brattleboro, adding it would be much easier dealing with the mechanics of the plant rather than having to change the managerial culture.

“Many of these concerns are long term and not easily remedied,” she said. “They will not be able to solve these problems overnight.”