Instilling a sense of confidence

Well, I have to say, it’s a good thing that “the environment” is not in any danger.  Otherwise, I’d be a little concerned that VY is waiting until April to start repairing its leaks.  The reasoning?  

Because it is near impossible, during plant operation, to get into the pipe tunnel where a leaking pipe is located, the repairs will have to wait until it is offline for refueling…

But it’s all good, because they have a “conceptual plan” to take care of that.

Now, just a bit of history: this leak was discovered in January.  Specifically, January 6th.  And April is… let’s see… too damned many months to be leaking radiation without shutting down the plant for repairs.

Oh, and we’re not talking early April.   We’re talking April 24. That’s 108 days later.  But hey, at least they’ve got cool toy robots investigating:

A small robot that was exploring the underground pipe tunnel believed to be the source of the radioactive tritium leak at the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor has fallen victim to one of the contributing factors of the leak – radioactive “mud” from deteriorating concrete and radioactive water.

I feel better now.

4 thoughts on “Instilling a sense of confidence

  1. Dig into the diverting, yet heart wrenching story of Rover the “fallen” robot and we find the scary story at the end of the article.

    In all, seven groundwater monitoring wells have tested positive for tritium, which while it occurs naturally, is also a byproduct of the nuclear fission process.“This is more evidence that tritiated groundwater has been moving away from the source … and down toward the Connecticut River,” the [Vermont]Department of Health stated.

    The leak is still leaking and will continue.This is the result of Entergy’s decision (they have regulatory flexibility on this ?) to keep the plant running (making money) these additional days(just as freaking long as they dare) until the shut-down is convenient for them.

    No Not Larry Smith

    Also I have gotten several unprompted reviews of spokesflack Larry Smith’s on the job performance and the general consensus is negative. He’s no Rob Williams and definitely he’s no Not Rob Williams.

    If we are going live with the leak and be spun for so much longer least they can put Williams, their “A” team spokesflack on duty and lie a little harder. Maybe they save Williams for the clean-up spin during shut-down. I hope he isn’t stuck in the toxic mud.

    http://rutlandherald.com/artic

  2. According to the nuclear power lovers, this is no big deal. In fact we should expect this sort of thing every day, if we are to power our nation on nuclear energy as they propose.

    Poisoning our entire environment and every body of water in the USA is a small price to pay for electricity that’s ‘too cheap to meter’.

    Of course we anti-nuclear activists aren’t scientists, so we shouldn’t be allowed to discuss these things.

    There’s a Simpsons episode where a comet is heading directly toward Springfield.  At the end of the episode the angry townfolk destroy the astronomy observatory to prevent another comet from heading toward earth ever again.  This is the mindset of pro-nuclear people: we shouldn’t be allowed to know about our nuclear plant’s 108 days of pumping Tritium into the ground water, because radioactive poison makes the poor corporation look bad.

  3. OK, I have to apologize in advance: I usually try to be serious, thoughtful and constructive when I post a comment to GMD.  But,… in this case … I cannot help going against form.

    Remembering an early scene from the movie “The Hurt Locker”, when the bomb disposal robot was slowly wheeling toward some unexploded ordinance, I could not help but imagine how we might set to film this epic about the VY robot becoming bogged down while searching for the tritium leak.  Might we call it:

    1.  The Dirt Locker — heroic little robot gets fatally mired in radioactive mud searching for sinister, underground nuclear monster; or

    2.  The Squirt Locker — duct tape, bubble gum and plumber’s putty are the last line of defense as nuclear mega-corporation discovers that modern technology cannot stem squirting radioactive leaks.  

  4. Maybe if a few people were to show up in Montpelier with vehicles that “leaked” oil and radiator fluid on the statehouse steps it could demonstrate the absurdity of allowing a broken nuclear power plant’s continued operation. We would require a vehicle that was discovered to be leaking fluids during an inspection to be fixed before it was legally allowed to travel the roads again and yet the state and feds have a different standard for power generation plants that leak radioactive materials. No wonder people are dissatisfied with government.

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