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On March 28, 1979, there was a transient event at the second reactor at the Three Mile Island (TMI) nuclear plant just south of Harrisburg, the capital city of Pennsylvania. A transient event. It was the term used by a plant spokesman to describe the fact that all hell was on the verge of breaking loose. A broken pump, a stuck valve, a false reading, and operator error drained the water out of the second reactor, exposing the superheated core and threatening a meltdown and massive radiation release. The reactor core partially melted, but after three tense days, the containment system held. The nuclear industry's credibility didn't.

It was just more than 30 years ago when no one noticed that a valve had opened in Three Mile Island's Unit 2 reactor allowing reactor coolant to escape. That mechanical failure was followed by a series of bad decisions that led not only to the fuel core starting to melt but also to detectable radiation being released into the air and water. It was the worst nuclear power plant accident in the United States. There were many issues and lessons learned. We thought one of them was the need for honesty and transparency from the owners of the nuclear facility. Former Gov. Dick Thornburgh was in office for just 72 days when the call came about the accident. In 1999, he offered reflections on what happened as events unfolded. One of the things he said was: "The credibility of the utility, in particular, did not fare well. It first seemed to speak with many voices, and then with none at all. On the first day, it made its debut by seeking to minimize the incident - assuring us that 'everything is under control' when we later learned it wasn't, and that 'all safety equipment functioned properly' when we later learned it didn't." And even when company technicians found that radiation levels in the area surrounding the island had climbed above normal, the company neglected to include that information in its statement to the public.

It was just more than 30 years ago when no one noticed that a valve had opened in Three Mile Island's Unit 2 reactor allowing reactor coolant to escape. That mechanical failure was followed by a series of bad decisions that led not only to the fuel core starting to melt but also to detectable radiation being released into the air and water. It was the worst nuclear power plant accident in the United States. There were many issues and lessons learned. We thought one of them was the need for honesty and transparency from the owners of the nuclear facility. Former Gov. Dick Thornburgh was in office for just 72 days when the call came about the accident. In 1999, he offered reflections on what happened as events unfolded. One of the things he said was: "The credibility of the utility, in particular, did not fare well. It first seemed to speak with many voices, and then with none at all. On the first day, it made its debut by seeking to minimize the incident - assuring us that 'everything is under control' when we later learned it wasn't, and that 'all safety equipment functioned properly' when we later learned it didn't." And even when company technicians found that radiation levels in the area surrounding the island had climbed above normal, the company neglected to include that information in its statement to the public.

A Three Mile Island-commissioned public-opinion poll that favors the continued operation of the plant will not influence a pending federal decision to renew the site's operating license for 20 more years. "The poll means nothing to (the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission)," NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said. "We don't base our decisions on polls that are put out by companies that operate plants."

Since when is nuclear an "alternative energy source"? Nuclear power has been around for decades. It's second only to coal for electricity production in the United States, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. And yet in its recent public survey, Three Mile Island repeatedly refers to nuclear power as an "alternative energy source."

The office that AmerGen Energy will use to give out information about a nuclear emergency at Three Mile Island moves to Chester County next week. The move means local news organizations will have to send reporters to Coatesville, about 65 miles away, if they want face-to-face access to plant experts. AmerGen will close the center in Susquehanna Township off Interstate 81. The location is the same used by AmerGen's parent company, Exelon Corp., to handle emergencies at its Peach Bottom and Limerick plants.

Eric Epstein, the anti-nuclear activist who devoted much of his life to trying to shut down the Three Mile Island nuclear station, has agreed not to oppose a 20-year extension of the plant's operating license. Change of position? No, Epstein said. It's about being realistic.

The nuclear plant at Three Mile Island will get closer scrutiny from federal regulators for the next 12 months, following a lapse in security procedures that occurred last summer. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission concluded that the security issue was of moderate to serious significance. The problem was discovered and reported by AmerGen Energy, the operator of the plant,

The Three Mile Island nuclear power plant will undergo its biggest modification ever this fall when two new steam generators are brought in to replace the originals. The work, plus other maintenance work which will be done at the same time while the plant is shut down, will bring an extra 3,000 workers to the island for a couple of months, according to spokesman Ralph DeSantis. The workers will include pipe fitters, electricians, carpenters, ironworkers and boilermakers who will be contracted through their unions, DeSantis said. The steam generators are each seven stories tall and weigh more than one million pounds. They are being assembled in France and will come to Three Mile Island by barge, ship, and 150-wheel trailer. The project, which has been in the planning stages for two years, is projected to cost $280 million, DeSantis said.

The Nuclear Industry Embraces Junk Science [Henry Payne] Global warming makes strange bedfellows. Thirty years ago, the U.S. nuclear industry was a victim of junk science. Media and green fear-mongering in the wake of Three Mile Island led Americans to believe nuclear energy was unsafe, could cause a "China syndrome," and even a nuclear holocaust (a cartoon by Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Herblock of the Washington Post in 1979 showed a mushroom cloud emerging from a TMI cooling tower). As a result, nuclear energy was shunned and not a single power plant has been built in the U.S. since. But now, as the same media and green fear-mongers attempt to destroy the coal industry for causing global warming, killer hurricanes, and coastal flooding, the nuclear industry has jumped aboard the junk-science bandwagon.

A plan to carry two massive generators through Lancaster County en route to Three Mile Island is generating a lot of interest - and concern - among local residents. Anyone interested in asking questions or learning more about the plan will have three opportunities to do so. AREVA Inc., the Paris-based manufacturer of the 811-ton steam generators, will host three public meetings to discuss the matter. The following meetings are scheduled:

Editor's note: This story originally appeared in Facing South, the online magazine of the Institute for Southern Studies. For links to supporting documents, please see the original story. Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near It was April Fool's Day, 1979-30 years ago this month-when Randall Thompson first set foot inside the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near Middletown, Pa. Just four days earlier, in the early morning hours of March 28, a relatively minor problem in the plant's Unit 2 reactor sparked a series of mishaps that led to the meltdown of almost half the uranium fuel and uncontrolled releases of radiation into the air and surrounding Susquehanna River.

It will be exactly 30 years tomorrow since the nation's worst commercial nuclear accident occurred on a three-mile (five kilometer) slip of land in the Susquehanna River in the shadow of Harrisburg, Pa. Until that day, few people had ever heard of Three Mile Island-now there are few who haven't. Once a majestic symbol of nuclear power, the plant would become synonymous with its dangers after one of its two reactors-the newer one, known as Unit 2-nearly melted down on March 28, 1979, just months after it was fired up.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission moved too quickly to license too many reactors in the years before the March 1979 Three Mile Island-2 accident, former NRC commissioner Peter Bradford told a Senate panel March 24. Bradford, now an adjunct professor at the Institute for Energy and the Environment at the Vermont Law School, testified that one of the lessons from the accident was that "nuclear power is least safe when complacency and pressure to expedite are highest." Other witnesses told the Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety that the industry and regulators must remain vigilant and guard against becoming complacent. NRC Chairman Dale Klein and the other three commissioners said revisions to emergency preparedness planning, modifications to plant control room equipment, better operator training and changes to the agency's enforcement authority have improved safety conditions in the industry. Marvin Fertel, the president and CEO of the Nuclear Energy Institute, said the creation of the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations nine months after the accident helped the industry to "strive for excellence" in plant operations rather than just meet the minimum regulatory requirements.

"President Obama's move to revive nuclear power, with $8.3 billion in federal loan guarantees for two reactors in Georgia, has special resonance for those of us who experienced the Three Mile Island nuclear scare. In retrospect, the T-shirts that said "I Survived TMI" were overly dramatic. But at the time it didn't seem that way -- which may be why I'm deeply ambivalent about the second coming of nukes. In March 1979, I was in my 20s, the only woman among five reporters in the cramped Associated Press bureau at the state Capitol in Harrisburg, Pa. And I was a newcomer. I had been there just six weeks when the report came in that state troopers had shut down a reactor in Middletown, about 10 miles down the Susquehanna River."

An Exelon Nuclear monitor located about a mile away from Three Mile Island in Dauphin County picked up trace amounts of radiation during the same week workers were exposed to contamination at the plant. Between Nov. 18 and Nov. 24, one of TMI's seven remote monitors detected an increase of 0.02 millirems, said Beth Archer, an Exelon spokeswoman. A millirem is a measure of radiation exposure. A second monitor recorded a statistically insignificant change in its reading, she said. A typical person receives about 360 millirems of radiation annually from natural sources, such as soil and rocks, cosmic rays, food and consumer products.

An Exelon Nuclear monitor located about a mile away from Three Mile Island in Dauphin County picked up trace amounts of radiation during the same week workers were exposed to contamination at the plant. Between Nov. 18 and Nov. 24, one of TMI's seven remote monitors detected an increase of 0.02 millirems, said Beth Archer, an Exelon spokeswoman. A millirem is a measure of radiation exposure. A second monitor recorded a statistically insignificant change in its reading, she said. A typical person receives about 360 millirems of radiation annually from natural sources, such as soil and rocks, cosmic rays, food and consumer products.

"As radiation poured from 3 Mile Island 31 years ago this weekend, utility executives rested easy. They knew that no matter how many people their errant nuke killed, and no matter how much property it destroyed, they would not be held liable. Today this same class of executives demands untold taxpayer billions to build still more TMIs. No matter how many meltdowns they cause, and how much havoc they visit down on the public, they still believe they're above the law. Fueled with more than $600 million public relations slush money, they demand a risk-free "renaissance" financed by you and yours. "

Legend says curses come in threes. Let's pray that doesn't happen with the unholy trinity of the Corporate Climate Bill. It demands drilling for oil, digging for coal and big money for new nukes. How such a devil's brew could help save the Earth conjures a corporate cynicism beyond the scope of the human mind and soul. It all now bears a special curse. It was meant for Earth Day. Then it slipped to the April 26 Chernobyl anniversary. But co-sponsor Lindsay Graham (R-SC) pitched a fit over immigration and pulled his support. As did Earth herself. Just prior, more than two dozen hill country miners were killed in a veritable Three Mile Island of black carbon. This entirely avoidable accident was built on years of sloppy denial by King Coal and the tacit assent of pliant regulators. With mountains of offal being pitched into rivers and streams, and underground hell holes filled with gas and soot, coal has been slaughtering people and eco-systems here for more than a century. Now, as at TMI, the death has become visible. Meanwhile, the undersea gusher destroying the Gulf of Mexico may soon pour up the east coast. Like Chernobyl, it defies comprehension. "

Gov. Ed Rendell is steamed over a five-hour wait before officials at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant told state officials about a radiation leak. Rendell's letter sent to top Exelon Corp. executives said it is "totally unacceptable" that plant officials waited so long to report Saturday's accident. The accident at the central Pennsylvania plant exposed employees to small amounts of radiation.

Gov. Ed Rendell is steamed over a five-hour wait before officials at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant told state officials about a radiation leak. Rendell's letter sent to top Exelon Corp. executives said it is "totally unacceptable" that plant officials waited so long to report Saturday's accident. The accident at the central Pennsylvania plant exposed employees to small amounts of radiation.