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For Immediate Release                                            Contact: Jim Warren, NC WARN 919-416-5077

April 20, 2005                                                                      Linda Gunter, NIRS  202-328-0002   

                       

Study Confirms Public Concern Over

Nuclear Fuel Pools

 

Coalition Demands NRC Move Waste from Vulnerable Reactor Pools

 

WASHINGTON, DC – A coalition of watchdog groups says a new study by the National Academy of Sciences supports a public petition demanding emergency action by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) at 32 reactors particularly vulnerable to acts of malice.  The Nuclear Security Coalition, comprised of independent grassroots and public interest groups across the nation, said today that NAS confirmed the urgent need to reduce risks of terrorist attacks on reactor fuel pools, overcrowded with highly radioactive fuel rods, which could lead to catastrophic nuclear fires.

 

The Coalition filed an emergency petition with NRC in August 2004 calling for priority action at 32 General Electric Boiling Water Reactors (BWR), where “spent” fuel pools are located high inside unfortified buildings. Today, the groups filed supplemental information based on the Academy’s findings that power plants – BWRs in particular – are desirable targets for terrorists, susceptible to a variety of plausible attacks, and that an attack could send plumes of radiation hundreds of miles downwind. 

 

“Leaving the fuel in these vulnerable pools is like painting a bull’s-eye on the reactor roof,” said Paul Gunter, director of the Reactor Watchdog Project at Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a coalition member. “It’s time for the NRC to stop shielding the financial interests of this industry and start protecting public health and safety.”

 

NAS – the nation’s preeminent scientific body – urged prompt, interim action to reduce risks at the nation’s reactor waste pools, and for timely, independent study to determine additional “relatively simple steps that could be taken to reduce the likelihood of releases of radioactive material from dry casks in the event of a terrorist attack.”

 

The Nuclear Security Coalition and independent scientists have insisted that pools should be returned to their original low density configuration, with all waste over five years old moved into hardened dry storage, separated by berms or bunkers.  “The NAS report confirms our concerns about nuclear waste pools,” said Deb Katz of NSC. “We call on NRC to act on our petition and work with us to lower the risks to reactor communities.”

 

The August 2004 petition calls for a timetable of action at BWRs, including stakeholder meetings with affected parties. The alliance has asked to meet with the five NRC commissioners governing the agency.

 

Jim Warren of NC WARN and the Coalition stated today: “We want this deadly material out of those high-density pools, especially those surrounded by thin metal roofs and walls.” He said that not only did NAS punctuate the call for immediate measures to reduce vulnerabilities, it made clear that prompt action by NRC and the independent scientific community is necessary to protect against a foreign or domestic terrorist attack.  Warren noted that the nation’s largest pools (at Shearon Harris) and two of the unprotected BWR pools (Brunswick) are located in North Carolina.

 

NRC itself already acknowledged problems with BWRs when it conducted an analysis on waste pools, published in early 2001. That study specified that BWR pools “generally do not appear to have any significant structure that might reduce the likelihood of aircraft penetration.”

 

Editorial boards around the country have been strongly critical of NRC for hiding the NAS study conclusions that affect public, health safety and security. The Coalition has argued that NRC blocked the public release of a redacted version of the NAS study given to Congress on its completion last July, largely to keep the pool issue hidden as the industry advances an aggressive and myth-laden campaign promoting taxpayer funding for new nuclear plants.

 

At most plants, waste pools contain 10 to 30 times more radioactive material than the reactor itself. The NAS did not dispute independent experts’ calculations that a fire could lead to radioactive releases that far exceed the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and referred to “the enormous potential consequences” at stake if prompt attention was not paid to the fuel pool problem.

 

The NAS study notes, “Less spent fuel is at risk in an accident or attack on a dry-storage cask than a spent fuel pool … an accident or attack on a spent fuel pool puts the entire inventory of the pool, potentially hundreds of metric tons of spent fuel, at risk.”

 

##

 

See the NSC supplement to the petition:  http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/security/nscnas2206sup08102004.pdf

 

The Nuclear Security Coalition is a national group of 47 public interest organizations advocating for improved security at nuclear power plants.

 

 

Contact NC WARN:

North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction Network
P.O. Box 61051, Durham, NC  27715-1051
Ph: (919) 416-5077     Fax: (919) 286-3985


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