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"The Vermont Public Service Board has set a hearing for the evening of July 8 at Brattleboro Union High School to take public testimony on whether it should order the shutdown of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant. The board is considering a petition by groups critical of nuclear power that Vermont Yankee be shut down until repairs can be completed to ensure any leaks of radioactive substances have stopped. Critics of the plant also are calling for it to be penalized for misleading state officials. Plant personnel said in sworn testimony before the board and elsewhere that the Vernon reactor did not have underground pipes carrying radioactive substances. Such underground pipes were found to be leaking earlier this year."

"The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) announces that, at the request of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL), the date of the one-day public hearing to consider AECL's application for the restart of the National Research Universal (NRU) Reactor is being rescheduled. The hearing was initially scheduled to take place on June 28, 2010. Date: July 5, 2010 Place: CNSC Public Hearing Room 14th floor, 280 Slater Street Ottawa, Ontario Time: as set by the agenda published prior to the hearing date The public hearing will be webcasted live on the Internet via the CNSC Web site and archived for a period of 90 days. The public was invited to submit comments on AECL's request until June 23, 2010. This time limit is not being extended. All submissions are available to the public upon request to the Secretariat."

"The U.S. Department of Labor will visit Livermore, Calif., on June 29 and Emeryville, Calif., on June 30 to present information about the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act, which provides compensation and medical benefits to employees who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. Through town hall meetings, officials will present details about two new classes of former employees at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory recently added to the EEOICPA's Special Exposure Cohort, as well as provide an overview of the program. The Labor Department's California Resource Center staff will also be available at the town hall meetings for extended periods of time to assist individuals with the filing of claims under the EEOICPA. A worker who is included in a designated SEC class of employees, and who is diagnosed with one of 22 specified cancers, may receive a presumption of causation under the EEOICPA. On April 5, 2010, the secretary of health and human services designated the following two classes of employees as additions to the SEC: all employees of the Department of Energy, its predecessor agencies, and their contractors and subcontractors, who worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., from Jan. 1, 1950, through Dec. 31, 1973, and at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., from Aug. 13, 1942, through Dec. 31, 1961, for at least 250 workdays occurring either solely under this employment or in combination with workdays within other classes of employees in the SEC. Both designations became effective on May 5, 2010. As the Department of Health and Human Services determines and introduces new SEC classes into the EEOICPA claims process, the Labor Department's role is to adjudicate these claims based on the new SEC class definition. To date, more than $118 million in compensation and medical bills have been paid to 1,0

"Some links on this page are to documents in our Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS), and others are to documents in Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF). ADAMS documents are provided in either PDF or Tagged Image File Format (TIFF). To obtain free viewers for displaying these formats, see our Plugins, Viewers, and Other Tools page. If you have questions about search techniques or problems with viewing or printing documents from ADAMS, please contact the Public Document Room staff. Date: Wednesday, June 23 and Thursday, June 24, 2010 Location: NRC Headquarters Two White Flint Auditorium"

"If you start out with one teapot and a bag of Earl Grey blend, no matter how long you let the bag steep, you still end up with tea. That analogy, offered by the chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, was touched on with reporters Monday while Gregory Jaczko was in Salt Lake City for a meeting of the Health Physics Society. Processed low-level radioactive waste or so-called "blended waste" - if it remains Class A material - "it is Class A material," Jaczko said. EnergySolutions' efforts to store the processed waste at its Clive facility have been met with criticism from some environmental advocacy groups and elicited a public policy statement of opposition to the practice by state regulators and Gov. Gary Herbert. The board, however, was careful to note that it recognized down-blended waste does not pose any unique health and safety issues, but emphasized it was opposed if the intent of blending is to alter the waste's classification."

"A Nuclear Regulatory Commission legal panel is hearing arguments in Las Vegas about whether the federal Energy Department can withdraw its application to build a national nuclear waste dump in Nevada. Local officials say a decision by the NRC's Atomic Safety and Licensing Board and Construction Authorization Board will be pivotal to the fate of the Yucca Mountain project. A public hearing was expected to take all day Thursday at an NRC hearing facility near McCarran International Airport. The panel of administrative judges are also considering which petitioners can be admitted as parties in licensing proceedings, and how millions of documents generated during more than 25 years of study could be archived, maintained and preserved."

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will solicit public comments at two meetings on Wednesday, Jan. 28, regarding its preliminary conclusion that there are no environmental impacts that would preclude a 20-year extension of the operating license for the Three Mile Island 1 nuclear power plant. A draft environmental impact statement on the proposed license renewal contains the information. The report, which was issued in December, will be discussed first at a meeting to be held at 1:30 p.m. on Jan. 28 at the Sheraton Harrisburg Hershey Hotel, 4650 Lindle Road, Harrisburg, Pa. A second session will get under way at 7 p.m. on the same day at the same location. The two meetings will begin with identical overviews, including a discussion of the contents of the report, then be opened for public comment.

An informational forum on depleted uranium sponsored by the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Jan. 30 in the 3M auditorium at the Minnesota History Center in St. Paul. In recent years, significant numbers of service members, including those in the Minnesota National Guard and Reserves, have been deployed overseas, where they might have worked with munitions and tanks reinforced with depleted uranium, a very dense metal.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will hold public meetings Tuesday, Jan. 27, in Winnsboro, S.C., and Wednesday, Jan. 28, in Blair, S.C., to discuss the environmental issues the agency should consider in reviewing a Combined License (COL) application for two new reactors proposed for the Summer site near Columbia, S.C. The NRC will meet with the public on Jan. 27 from 7 - 10 p.m. at Fairfield Central High School, 836 US Highway 321 Bypass S in Winnsboro, and on Jan. 28 from 7 - 10 p.m. at McCrorey-Liston Elementary School, 1978 State Hwy 215 South in Blair. The application's environmental report is available on the agency's Web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/col/summer.html. Copies of the report are also available at the Fairfield County Library, 300 Washington St. in Winnsboro. NRC staff will be available for informal discussions with members of the public during "open house" sessions both evenings from 6 - 7 p.m. Formal comments on the environmental review will only be accepted during the meeting from 7 - 10 p.m.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission today announced the opportunity to participate in a hearing on a Combined License (COL) application for two new nuclear reactors at the Comanche Peak site near Glen Rose, Texas. Luminant Generation submitted the COL application and associated information Sept. 19, 2008, and updated the application in November and December 2008. Luminant seeks approval to build and operate two U.S. Advanced Pressurized Water Reactors (US-APWR) at the site, about four miles north of Glen Rose. The NRC is currently reviewing the US-APWR for possible certification. The Comanche Peak application, minus proprietary or security-related details, is available on the NRC Web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/col/comanche-peak.html.

Coloradoans Against Resource Destruction (C.A.R.D.) will hold a public meeting in Fort Collins on Feb. 11 to provide an update on the status of the proposed in-situ uranium leach mining project near Nunn. Advertisement The meeting will be held at 7 p.m. in the Fort Collins Senior Center, 1200 Raintree Drive. A Canadian mining company began buying mineral leases in 2007 in Weld County and announced its intention to mine uranium six miles northeast of Fort Collins and about the same distance north of Windsor.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission plans a public meeting on Jan. 21 to review backup power problems at the Salem 1 nuclear plant in New Jersey along the Delaware River in 2005 and 2007. Under NRC rules, the agency briefly gave plant owner PSEG Nuclear it's second-worst "yellow" performance rating for reliability and availability of emergency power, a classification that was returned to normal status during the first quarter of 2008. Inspectors designated a portion of Salem's multi-part rating as "degraded" after diesel generators failed to start during three times during testing over 12 consecutive quarters.

Princeton Professor Frank von Hippel will be in town this week to talk about the Bush administration's Global Nuclear Energy Partnership and express his views and concerns about nuclear reprocessing. Von Hippel, a theoretical physicist, has a strong background in policy areas such as nuclear nonproliferation, arms control, and energy and national security. In 1993-94, he was assistant director for national security in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. He will speak at 7 p.m. Wednesday at UT's University Center Auditorium.

Beginning Monday, state regulators will hold hearings that promise to be as combustible as the topic. That's when the Public Service Commission listens to arguments on whether expanding nuclear power is the best way to meet South Carolina's energy needs. Specifically, the panel will consider a proposal from SCE&G and its partner Santee Cooper to build two new reactors costing $9.8 billion at their nuclear plant in Jenkinsville, 25 miles northwest of Columbia.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff is seeking public comments on its preliminary conclusion that there are no environmental impacts that would preclude renewal of the operating license for the Three Mile Island Nuclear Station, Unit 1 (TMI-1) in Middletown. As part of TMI-1's license renewal application, dated Jan. 8, AmerGen Energy Company, LLC, submitted an environmental report. The NRC staff reviewed the report and performed an on-site audit. The staff also considered comments made during the environmental scoping process, including comments offered at public meetings held May 1, 2007. Based on its review, the NRC staff has preliminarily determined that the environmental impacts of the license renewal for TMI-1 are not so great that they preclude license renewal. The draft supplemental environmental impact statement (EIS) is open for public comment until March 4, 2009, and will be the subject of two public meetings to be held on Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2009.

Residents near what is believed to be the nation's largest uranium deposit will have their chance to speak out next week. At a Jan. 6 hearing, residents will be asked their views on what issues should be addressed in a study of the impact of mining the ore in Virginia. A large turnout is expected for a hearing by a subcommittee of the Virginia Commission on Coal and Energy in Chatham, the historic Southside town that is Pittsylvania County's seat. Supporters of mining the deposit worth an estimated $10 billion see an opportunity to boost an economy ailing from the loss of tobacco and textile jobs.

The Virginia Commission on Coal and Energy Uranium Mining Subcommittee is responsible for overseeing all aspects, including the scope and design, of the study that will inform the General Assembly's decision whether to reaffirm or lift Virginia's moratorium on uranium mining. The subcommittee met for the first time on Friday, Dec. 12, in Richmond. The meeting included brief remarks by Dr. Michael Karmis, a professor in the Department of Mining and Minerals Engineering at Virginia Tech and director of the Virginia Center for Coal and Energy Research. The meeting also included a public hearing to receive suggestions regarding points of concern that should be included in the scope of any study on the impact of mining uranium in the Commonwealth. Twenty people spoke representing citizen and/or industry interests.

A nuclear waste reprocessing facility proposed for Grundy County will be among the options discussed at a Dec. 4 public hearing on the environmental impact of nuclear waste disposal. The facility proposed at General Electric's Morris Operation, a storage site for more than 700 metric tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste, drew regional opposition during earlier hearings. The reprocessing technology GE wants to use at the site would burn off its most radioactive components and use them to generate electricity in a specialized reactor.

The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB), an independent judicial arm of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, will provide a live video stream of the first day of its hearing concerning the NRC's Enforcement Order against former Davis-Besse employee David Geisen. The live video stream is part of an ASLB pilot program examining how information technology can enhance the public's ability to observe the Board's activities. The video stream, which will be archived for 90 days, will be available at this Web site: http://www.visualwebcaster.com/event.asp?id=53643. The video, scheduled to start Dec. 8 shortly before 9:30 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, will be available in Windows Media and QuickTime formats. The hearing will begin Dec. 8 at 9:30 a.m. and could last the entire week; the commencement of the hearing on subsequent days will be determined during the course of the hearing. The public may observe the proceeding in person, except for any closed sessions, in the ALSB Hearing Facility, Room T-3B45 of the agency's Two White Flint North building, at 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Md.

The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel's Pre-License Application Presiding Officer (PAPO) Board will hold a case management meeting Dec. 2 in Rockville, Md., to discuss how classified information will be protected and handled during adjudicatory hearings on the proposed high-level waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev. Representatives from the Department of Energy, the state of Nevada, and the NRC staff will attend the meeting at the ASLB hearing room at NRC headquarters, Two White Flint North, 11545 Rockville Pike, at 1 p.m. Eastern Time. Other potential parties who have filed a notice of appearance may participate either in person or by video hookup in the NRC's Las Vegas Hearing Facility, Pacific Enterprise Plaza, Building 1, 3250 Pepper Lane, Las Vegas, beginning at 10 a.m. Pacific Time. Members of the public are welcome to observe the meeting at either location. The meeting will also be Webcast on the Internet at http://www.visualwebcaster.com/event.asp?id=53642.