VERNON, Vt. — The state of Vermont wants to “trust but verify” when it comes to testing groundwater at the site of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.
But plant owner Entergy Nuclear told members of the Vermont Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel recently that the testing protocol being sought by the Department of Health wasn’t necessary.
William Irwin, a panel member and the radiological and toxicology sciences chief for the Department of Health, said that there should be independent environmental surveillance of Yankee until the federal licenses for Yankee and its waste storage facility are terminated, which is not expected to happen for several decades.
Irwin told the 19member panel on Feb. 25 that the Department of Health had identified tritium in the Connecticut River “long before Vermont Yankee did,” and also identified strontium90 in groundwater, while Vermont Yankee did not.
Irwin said that the labs hired by the Vermont Department of Health “always strive to measure lower, more healthprotective concentrations of radionuclides in environmental media.”
And Irwin said the testing was needed now, as well as when the actual decommissioning of Vermont Yankee begins.
The decommissioning of Vermont Yankee “will be the largest industrial activity in Vermont’s history,” Irwin said.
Irwin’s request, which was first made in November, comes after Entergy disclosed earlier this month it was collecting radioactive contaminated water in the Vermont Yankee turbine building, after surface water seeped into the building. But photographs of the thousands of gallons of slightly radioactive water being stored in plastic kiddie pools has been met with concern. Earlier this week, House Speaker Shap Smith raised concerns about Entergy’s use of “kiddie pools” to store waste, and said the company may be cutting corners and misusing the plant’s decommissioning trust fund.
Entergy said that it was starting to ship the radioactive water, plus other “process” water, this week, to a facility in Tennessee. Irwin said that Vermonters have relied on the Department of Health’s established practice of “split samples” for tests for the last 40 years.
“We do trust the work of Entergy,” Irwin said, while noting the state needed the extra reassurance of verifying the test results.
Joseph Lynch, Entergy Nuclear spokesman, instead advocated a $60,000 testing protocol. He said Entergy spent $600,000 on groundwater testing in 2010, during the massive tritium leak, and about $250,000 in 2014, the last year that Vermont Yankee operated. Irwin said he believed the state’s plan would cost less than $250,000, probably closer to $115,000 annually. He said a “prudent use” of the decommissioning trust fund called for a $60,000 testing plan. Entergy currently tests samples from 30 monitoring wells at the Yankee site.
The two sides are hoping the citizen advisory panel will adopt an advisory opinion on the issue of groundwater testing.
Earlier in the evening, after months of discussion, the panel adopted an advisory opinion on the proposed expansion of Entergy’s radioactive fuel storage pad. The opinion calls for Entergy to pay for any costs during decommissioning if the fuel stored on the pad has to be moved. Entergy opposed the language in the opinion, which will be forwarded to the Vermont Public Service Board. The board is considering Entergy’s request to build an extension to the existing pad.