A watchdog group fired back at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s staff on Tuesday, saying it would be wrong for the regulator to deny a hearing over potentially relaxing post-Fukushima safety rules at the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts.
NRC’s staff last week recommended the commission deny Pilgrim Watch and seven other petitioners’ request for a public hearing concerning plant operator Entergy’s request to forgo installing a hardened containment venting system (HCVS) at the plant’s containment buildings. The new HCVS is required under NRC guidelines intended to strengthen nuclear plant safety in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan. Pilgrim features the same boiling-water reactor design as the three reactors that melted down at Fukushima.
In its formal response to NRC on Tuesday, Pilgrim Watch said that between 2013 and 2015 Entergy repeatedly told the agency that it “could and would comply” with a spring 2017 deadline to install the vent system. However, Entergy filed its relaxation request in November 2015, asking that the agency delay the deadline, according to Tuesday’s filing. The extension to Dec. 31, 2019, which is the subject of the proceedings, would allow Entergy to avoid installation entirely, as Pilgrim is slated to shut down by June 2019.
Entergy has argued that Pilgrim’s current wetwell venting system, with modifications from 2014, and with a few additional tweaks, meets post-Fukushima requirements. The NRC has granted a similar relaxation request at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in New Jersey.
NRC staff last week said Pilgrim Watch and its co-petitioners failed to establish “standing” for a hearing or to submit an “admissible contention.” The response says the organizations are not entitled to a hearing under the Atomic Energy Act or agency regulations, advising against turning the proceeding into an “amorphous public extravaganza.”
The petitioners argue that Entergy’s plan is effectively a license amendment request, not a “relaxation” request, as NRC has termed it.
“(The Atomic Energy Act’s) hearing requirement cannot be avoided by simply giving what is clearly a ‘license amendment’ a different name,” the petitioners argued Tuesday.
Safety at Pilgrim has been the subject of much criticism, as operators have experienced several unplanned shutdowns and discovered issues with safety relief valves dating back to 2013. The NRC has since downgraded the plant to Category 4 of its Action Matrix, which is the lowest safety rating a plant can have while remaining in operation. Pilgrim experienced its most recent unplanned shutdown in September, when complications with a fluctuating feedwater regulating valve led to excessive water levels in the plant’s reactor vessel.
The NRC has conducted two of three increased oversight inspection at the plant, resulting from the safety downgrade. The third and most comprehensive inspection is scheduled to begin in November.
The petitioners that joined Pilgrim Watch are: Beyond Nuclear, Pilgrim Coalition, Pilgrim Legislative Advisory Committee, Cape Downwinders, Cape Downwinders Cooperative, Massachusetts Downwinders, and Citizens Awareness Network. The NRC expects to reach a decision on the Entergy’s request before Pilgrim restarts following its compliance outage late this winter.
NRC Maintains Pilgrim is Operating Safely
Despite continuing calls to shutter the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station, the NRC maintains the plant is “operating safely.”
The NRC restated its position in an Oct. 5 letter to a cooperative of residents from Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket, who on Aug. 21 demanded the regulator close the beleaguered facility.
“Based on our inspection and oversight program to date, we continue to conclude that Pilgrim is operating safely,” the agency’s Oct. 5 letter to the Cape Downwinders reads. “While the issues that moved the plant into Column 4 were of low to moderate safety significance, the increased oversight, inspection, and assessment directed by the assessment process for a plant in Column 4 now allows us to closely monitor for indications of unacceptable performance. If at any time it is determined that performance at Pilgrim has declined to an unacceptable level, the NRC will not hesitate to take additional regulatory action, up to and including the issuance of a shutdown order.”
