Per Brattleboro Reformer / Bob Audette:
Sorrell and the attorneys general of New York and Connecticut are asking a federal appeals court to force the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to reconsider a decision it made regarding its waste confidence rule.
The three-member commission of the NRC ruled in December 2010 that nuclear waste could be stored in pools or dry casks at the nation’s 100-plus nuclear sites for 60 years after a reactor shuts down. Until then, the limit was 30 years.
In the lawsuit, the AGs claim the NRC violated federal laws requiring a site-by-site review of health, safety and environmental hazards.
The problem here is that the NRC hasn’t actually inspected the storage site for VY itself but ruled based on a generic sense of how such sites tend to impact the environment.
Think of it as giving a student a passing grade because most of his classmates got a passing grade, even though he never took the test.
I have to say, I’m kind of amazed to see Sorrell do, well, anything. I wouldn’t call his lack of interest in his office exactly Salmonesque but, to this point, he’s not exactly rising to head of the class, so I’ve no real confidence that this will go anywhere. In all likelihood, he’ll just give up once he gets bored or tired. But in the meantime, he’s at least making the motions of doing what an attorney general is supposed to do: uphold the laws and challenge people who would do the state harm.
But, even if this does peter out, not to worry:
Larry Smith, spokesman for Vermont Yankee, said the casks containing spent fuel in Vernon are designed and tested to prevent the release of radioactivity under the most extreme conditions — earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes and floods.
So VY says it’s nothing to be concerned about.
Don’t you feel better now?
Personally, I find Larry Smith’s reassurances so soothing and comforting that I turn to them when I have trouble falling asleep. All I have to do is read a few of them, and I’m transported into a deep, serene, huggy-snuggy slumber.
The only side effect: sometimes when I wake up in the morning, I feel the urge to give VY another chance.
Like greed, incompetence, denial and deceit — you know, what we’ve seen from VY for the past many years? Isn’t that more relevant to the safety of 60 years’ worth of having your glow-in-the-dark crap left behind in our back yard? I personally think Entergy should be compelled to store the gunk at HQ in Louisiana, preferably in the CEO’s closet. That would ensure that it would be stored very carefully indeed.
If it’s just a bunch of Vermont kids’ futures that are at risk, well I can already see the crack squad of experts at Yankee decide, “feh, stick it in a paper bag and toss it over the edge…”
…is quite a piece of work, so this VY move is surprising, while also overdue. I wonder if he would have done it without New York and Connecticut? Well, let’s give the ___ credit and see the follow-up.
Personally, on justice issues (like this) involving Vermonters, I’ve always thought of Sorrel as the kind of AG Mississippi would have in that movie Mississippi Burning. “Hey,” says Bubba Bill, “you’re in Vermont now. We don’t get all riled up about thangs.”