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"Vermont Yankee personnel responded to a leak of tritiated water in a timely, appropriate and effective manner, according to Nuclear Safety Associates in a supplement to the Comprehensive Reliability Assessment submitted to the state last year. Nevertheless, it wrote, the plant is potentially susceptible to similar leaks, which could prove to be a challenge to the plant's continued reliability. Nuclear Safety Associates was hired by the state to review Yankee's reliability, a report that was meant to inform the Legislature, the Public Service Board and the Department of Public Service in making the decision whether the nuclear power plant in Vernon should be allowed to continue to operate past its license expiration date of 2012. "

"An updated state report on whether the recent radioactive leaks at the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor affect the plant's long-term reliability has raised questions about the potential of additional leaks if more money isn't spent on prevention. The report, conducted by Nuclear Safety Associates of Johnson City, Tenn., and released late Friday by the Department of Public Service, said Entergy Nuclear workers responded well to the tritium leak, which was first confirmed on Jan. 6, after an initial positive test on Nov. 17. "The occurrence of the leaks underscores the need to more proactively determine plant vulnerability to similar leaks," the report concluded. "While the occurrence of the leaks is not in and of itself indicative of a lack of management oversight, more management attention needs to be applied to detect future leaks at an early stage," the report added."

"A vocal critic of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will be in Brattleboro on Saturday to discuss the failings of the government agency that is tasked with regulating the nuclear power industry. David Lochbaum, who received his bachelor of science in nuclear engineering in 1979 and is now the director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' Nuclear Safety Project, worked in the nuclear industry for 17 years as a reactor engineer, a trainer and as a consultant. He will speak at 4 p.m. in the Robert H. Gibson River Garden. The event, titled "Nuclear Cop on the Beat ... or Beaten Nuclear Cop," is free and open to the public. "I'll be talking about the leaking radioactive material from Vermont Yankee and other plants," said Lochbaum, during a telephone interview with the Reformer. Lochbaum is the guest of the New England Coalition on Nuclear Pollution, which is opposed to the continued operation of Yankee past its license expiration date of 2012. The event is the 39th Annual Membership Meeting of NEC. "

"Early last year, D CEO magazine told the story of businessman Harold Simmons' years-long campaign to open a low-level radioactive-waste facility in Andrews, Texas. While the Dallas billionaire declined to speak with us for that article, he invited us into his offices at Lincoln Center Wednesday for the Q&A interview that follows on the jump. Besides spending time defending the controversial project, Simmons-who turned 79 the following day-told us that his public companies have roared back from the recession, and that some now are setting all-time revenue records. Simmons turned much of the talking Wednesday over to William Lindquist, CEO of Waste Control Specialists LLC, the Simmons company that's trying to open and run the waste dump in far West Texas. (Both are pictured here, with Simmons at right.) As the Austin American-Statesman reported the other day, a commission run by Texas and Vermont could decide soon whether the WCS site can begin accepting radioactive waste-water filters from nuclear power plants and medical waste from laboratories and hospitals-generated in as many as 36 states."

"Texas was all set to be part of an agreement with Vermont to dump nuclear waste in a remote region of the Lone Star state, and for the most part people living near the site were OK with it. Now, though, that compact could mushroom to include waste from 36 other states, reinvigorating those who oppose the project to fight harder. Environmentalists, geologists, the Texas League of Women Voters and others say the huge dumping ground will pollute groundwater and otherwise wreak havoc with the environment. The company that runs the site contends it'll be safe and many local residents applaud any expansion as a way to bring more jobs and prosperity to the West Texas scrubland. "

"Tests on soil samples taken at Vermont Yankee Nuclear Plant in Vernon now confirm the presence of a new - and more serious - form of radioactivity in the ground outside the reactor building. Yankee spokesman Larry Smith released a statement late Friday afternoon confirming the presence of strontium 90 -- a "hard to detect" isotope found 15 feet below ground in soils excavated during the search for a broken pipe leaking tritium last March."

"The maximum radiation dose that might have been received by a child due to a leak of tritiated water at Vermont Yankee was .000072 percent of the average annual dose received from natural sources, according to a document submitted by Entergy, which owns and operates the nuclear power plant in Vernon, to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. According to the report, consumption over a one-year period of fish from the Connecticut River or vegetables, beef and milk raised with river water would have resulted in a one-year dose of .00026 millirems. The average daily dose to humans from natural sources is 360 millirems. Entergy's dose calculations have been verified to be accurate and are "a small fraction of the regulatory requirement of 3 mrem per year," according to a Ground Water Monitoring Inspection Report released by the NRC on Thursday. "

"Soil excavated from an area outside the nuclear reactor building at the Vermont Yankee plant in Vernon over the last month likely contain much of the radioactive material that has leaked from underground pipes in recent years, but the state Health Department said independent testing is expected to continue indefinitely to be sure no more remains. Officials said they have removed 180 cubic feet of dirt from the site this month, material now bagged and awaiting shipment to a nuclear waste facility."

"Texas was all set to be part of an agreement with Vermont to dump nuclear waste in a remote region of the Lone Star state, and for the most part people living near the site were OK with it. Now, though, that compact could mushroom to include waste from 36 other states, reinvigorating those who oppose the project to fight harder. -- Kentucky US Senate candidate Rand Paul's Republican colleagues have tried to contextualize his controversial comments about anti-discrimination laws and the Obama administration's handling of the Gulf Coast oil spill, but privately they bemoan the political newcomer's gaffes and wish he'd focus less on the national media spotlight and more on Kentucky and the economy. "In any campaign there's going to be a few bumps," said Brian Walsh, a spokesman. "

"In a letter dated May 20, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Petition Review Board denied a request by Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H., that it order Entergy to keep its Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant off-line until a number of actions have been completed regarding a recent leak of contaminants into the groundwater under the site. Hodes had asked the NRC to prevent Yankee from restarting after its current refueling outage until the removal of tritiated water from the ground is completed. He also asked that Entergy finish removing soil that was contaminated with radioactive cesium, manganese, cobalt, zinc and strontium before the plant is restarted. In addition, Hodes requested that the root cause analysis, the final report on why tritium leaked from the plant, and the NRC's review of documents submitted to it are both completed prior to restart. "

VERNON - Entergy Nuclear will begin storing its low-level radioactive waste on-site, after its long-time disposal site in South Carolina closes next month. Entergy Nuclear is not alone in the disposal problem, as the Chem-Nuclear LLC site in Barnwell, S.C., takes radioactive waste from 36 states.

BRATTLEBORO - After part of a cooling tower collapsed last August at Vermont's only nuclear power plant, the company that runs it blamed rotting wooden timbers that it had failed to inspect properly. The uproar that followed rekindled environmental groups' hopes of shutting down the aging plant.