Politics & Government

Locals Frustrated by Power Plant Licensing Exclusion

A panel has rejected a request to include Fukushima-related issues in the Seabrook Station relicensing process.

A three-judge panel has denied motions from several local environmental organizations to suspend relicensing activities at Seabrook Station while the government investigates the recent nuclear meltdown in Japan.

Neil Sheehan, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's public affairs officer, said in an e-mail earlier this week that the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board panel has rejected the request because the contention is "premature and insufficiently focused" on Seabrook nuclear power plant's renewal application.

"The contention now before us rests on speculation built on speculation. We do not know which, if any, of the Near-Term Task Force recommendations the [NRC] might ultimately adopt," wrote Sheehan, quoting the panel's findings. "The [NRC] has stated only that, after further study, it ‘may’ determine that regulatory or procedural changes are warranted. Furthermore, we do not know the implications for the Seabrook [license renewal application] of whatever recommendations might be adopted. And interveners provide no guidance.”

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The license renewal has been a lately, as NextEra Energy, operators of Seabrook Station — — are seeking to renew the plant's license 20 years through 2050.

Doug Bogen, executive director of the Seacoast Anti-Pollution League, one of several groups who submitted the petition earlier this year, told Patch in an e-mail earlier this week that the panel's decision is frustrating because he said it doesn't make sense to renew a license that doesn't end for almost 18 years. 

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"The key question from this ruling should be 'who's doing the speculating here?'" wrote Bogen. "ASLB claims our petition is premature, yet it is they on behalf of the NRC who chose to take up the NextEra proposal twenty years ahead of the current license expiration. They claim that the potential safety issues from Fukushima 'have not yet ripened,' yet somehow Seabrook is 'ripe' for re-licensing now?"

Despite the fact that the ASLB ruling states Bogen and other interveners' contention are "not admissible," Sheehan said it "does not mean that the issues raised by the Near-Term Task Force Report are unimportant."

Bogen said his group still hopes the relicensing proceedings will be suspended — which he called a "commonsense response" — until the NRC "acts on the Fukushima recommendations," even though the approach has already been rejected.

"At the risk of speculating further, we expect that the safety issues raised by Fukushima will be determined by the NRC to be relevant sometime AFTER they have issued a renewed license for Seabrook, which by then will be a moot issue," wrote Bogen. "So it goes in the surreal - and reality-challenged - world of nuclear regulation."


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