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Intro: "A federal judge on Thursday blocked Vermont from forcing the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor to shut down when its license expires in March, saying that the state is trying to regulate nuclear safety, which only the federal government can do."

Cooling tower collapse at Vermont Yankee nuclear plant in 2007. In October 2009, radioactive contamination was detected in underground pipes. (photo: public domain)
Cooling tower collapse at Vermont Yankee nuclear plant in 2007. In October 2009, radioactive contamination was detected in underground pipes. (photo: public domain)



Judge Rules Vermont Can't Shut Nuclear Plant

By Matthew L. Wald, The New York Times

20 January 12

 

federal judge on Thursday blocked Vermont from forcing the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor to shut down when its license expires in March, saying that the state is trying to regulate nuclear safety, which only the federal government can do.

The judge, J. Garvan Murtha of United States District Court in Brattleboro, Vt., also held that the state cannot force the plant's owner, Entergy, to sell electricity from the reactor to in-state utilities at reduced rates as a condition of continued operation, as Entergy asserts it is now doing.

The nuclear operator filed a lawsuit last year challenging the constitutionality of a state law giving the Vermont Legislature veto power over operation of the reactor when its original 40-year license expires.

In an extensive review of the legislative record, Judge Murtha pointed out in his ruling that in remarks "too numerous to recount here," state lawmakers and witnesses made clear that their effort to close the plant was "grounded in radiological safety concerns" - the province of the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The commission has already granted Vermont Yankee a 20-year license extension.

The ruling is almost certain to be appealed by the state and an array of private groups that want the plant shut down because of leaks of radioactive tritium and other issues.

Gov. Peter Shumlin said in a statement that he was "very disappointed" in the decision, adding, "I continue to believe that it is in Vermont's best interest to retire the plant." He said he would wait to hear from the state attorney general before commenting on an appeal.

While a state decision to close a commercial reactor is very rare, the ruling was likely to resonate elsewhere. Referendums to force the closing of nuclear plants have been held in several states, including Maine, but none have passed. A California plant, Rancho Seco, in Sacramento, was closed by a referendum vote of the Sacramento Municipal Utility District in 1989, but the voters were also the plant's owners.

New York State prevented the Shoreham plant on Long Island from operating in the 1980s under an accord brokered by Gov. Mario M. Cuomo with the Long Island Lighting Company and others. His son, Andrew M. Cuomo, the current governor, is seeking to close the Indian Point nuclear plant 35 miles north of New York City, which is also owned and operated by Entergy.

In 2002, when Entergy bought the Vermont plant from a group of local utilities that built it, it signed a memorandum of understanding with the state agreeing that it would need a state "certificate of public good" as well as the federal license extension to operate after March 21, 2012, when the license expires. The Legislature later reserved to itself the power to authorize the certificate, prompting the suit.

Since Entergy bought Vermont Yankee 10 years ago, public opinion has turned sharply against the plant, which is on the Connecticut River in Vernon, just north of the Massachusetts border. In 2007, a cooling tower collapsed because of wood rot. The tower's operation was not required for safe shutdown, but pictures of the collapse damaged Vermont Yankee's image.

Later, after several plants around the country suffered leaks of radioactive water into the soil, state officials asked Vermont Yankee executives in 2009 whether their plant might be susceptible to that problem.

The executives said that Vermont Yankee had no underground pipes carrying radioactive material. But it did - and the pipes leaked.

The State Senate voted 26 to 4 in 2010 not to authorize the needed certificate.

More recently, Vermont Yankee was not helped by the disaster last year at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan. Vermont Yankee's design is nearly identical to Fukushima's No. 1 reactor.

Entergy welcomed the judge's decision, calling it "good news for our 600 employees, the environment and New England residents and industries that depend on clean, affordable, reliable power."

Vermont Yankee produces more than 70 percent of the electricity generated in the state, with much of the power going to the local utilities that are its former owners and the rest exported to neighboring states.

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