Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Underground at Indian Point: pipe leaks and cables
Last week Matt Wald of the New York Times reported about a leak discovered at Indian Point in February. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/02/nyregion/02nuke.html?_r=1&hp
Wald’s lead, however, seemed to indicate the leak was new and the actual date of the leak followed some three sentences later.
The news hook for Wald was that Congressmen Ed Markey (D-Mass) and John Hall (D-NY) had just sent a high pitched letter dated April 30, 2009, to the NRC about the February leak saying “We are shocked that a 1.5 inch diameter hole, leaking at a rate of 18 gallons per minute, could develop without detection.” Undoubtedly this was a serious leak and when Entergy located and plugged up the hole in the corroded, buried pipe, it was estimated that 100,000 gallons of water laced with low levels of tritium had escaped.
The local papers reported on the leak in February but the New York Times did not. Instead, the paper ran a metro brief about Congress calling for an independent safety assessment of Indian Point.
My story about the February leak appeared in The North County News, http://www.abbylu.com/pdfs/SPOT/ippipeleaknothreat.pdf
It’s important to note that the New York Times needed a national hook to report the two-month old leak, the "after the fact" has become a growing trend for the “paper of record” and veers away from local coverage, even if it does affect some 30 million people.
Washington usually deals with the issue of nuclear power in the greater context of energy, so the news media gives us less information about potential problems at aging nuclear power plants, such as Indian Point, and how they are being regulated.
The story about the leak is the tip of the iceberg when dealing with inaccessible sprawling networks of underground pipes and cables necessary to run a nuclear power plant. Failures in these systems can come from a variety of things, including age, water damage, earthquake shifting, rats or other burrowing vermin.
Questions to be asked: How does the NRC monitor these underground systems when they can’t see them? Is there a list of inaccessible underground cable systems and pipes showing when they were installed and the rates of failure?
In a letter from the NRC to Entergy dated October 30, 2008, the regulatory group thanks Entergy for supplying some information about how they assess their underground cables.
The NRC also requested the information from other plants including Oyster Creek in New Jersey because of a failed buried cable needed for emergency operation of a diesel generator and from the Palisades Nuclear Plant in Michigan for aging affect that were unmonitored.
The three page letter basically says the NRC has all the information it needs, but at
the time, Lochbaum said the NRC asked plant owners only one basic question: it they had buried cables for key systems that might age faster than expected – a good question but too narrow, too focused.
The question that would garner a more detailed response would have been: Are there underground cables or pipes in environments harsher than was assumed that is speeding up the aging process?
Arguments against Entergy’s license renewal application for continued operation of the two reactors has included one made by the NYS Attorney General about old pipes. The AG argues that Entergy does not provide an adequate Aging Management Plan for buried pipes, tanks and transfer canals that contain radioactive fluid. Those contentions are being considered in the re-licensing process.
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2 comments:
It is good to see your perceptive comments in print. The New York Times has consitently ignored Indian Point and the problems it presents for the entire region.
It is interesting to note that historians no longer use this so called "paper of record" for their work. The atribution of sources in the Times can range from vague to non existent: ie scientists say... activists proclaim. And that is just not acceptable practice in decent journalism.
The issue of underground pipes at Indian Point has been raised consistently over the years at many NRC hearings by Gary Shaw of Croton CIP and others as well.It a tragic and potentially catastrophicmatter. It is unbelievable that this problem is not part of the relicensing proceedure.
The NRC has consistently ignored the problem of rotting undergroud cables and pipes. The entire mess serves to point out how this so called regulatory body is in bed with the industry.
Keep on asking the hard questions!
Marilyn Elie
Hello again, Abby.
I see your old "Paul Robeson" co-authoress has come out of retirement to comment. Too bad she has no technical information to add, but only social dislike of the NY Times. ( You guys might re-visit Howard Fast's Peekskill tale, with some irony that a pricey condominium now sits on the concert site.... I drive by it every day).
I too, have disliked the Times for years, but for other reasons. I find its cloying bourgeois elitism makes me nauseous. But that's just social stuff. I hate bourgeois parasites, just like Woody, Corliss, Arlo, and Pete always have. Up the working Man ! That Applebome fellow has a real good head on his shoulders, and shows no intimidation before wiggy cult members. Good man !
Now on to buried equipment.
Almost no equipment mentioned in Indian Point's Design Basis is buried. I say "almost" because there might be an item I've overlooked, otherwise I'd just say there is none at all. Yes, several old systems left over from Indian Point #1 are buried, but are not in use in IP2 & IP3, just as offsite auxiliaries.
When underground passage was needed, the method in IP2 & IP3 was to build a tunnel... with lighting, drainage, ventilation, security, closed circuit TV, and fire detection. So there are Electrical Tunnels, and City Water Tunnels, Pipe Tunnels, etc., etc.connecting all the important stuff to all the other important stuff.
Anything buried was simply anything so benign, so harmless, and so distant as to be almost not part of the main process. Thus the backup/makeup water pipe that failed in February. There was no danger, and no possibility of danger from its failure.... just local wetness. I know what you are thinking right now! When you say 'What about "slightly tritiated" water?', my rebuttal is this: Your body fluids contain "slightly tritiated" water. So just how non-tritiated must water be, for you to adjudge it not "slightly tritiated"? You throw the phrase around as a misdirection ploy, never informing readers that the rain is "slightly tritiated", as well as the Pacific Ocean. But I forgive you, you hate IPEC, and want to diss the place, if only by omission and misdirection. I understand. Its OK. You can't help yourself.
But the movement needs issues, and anything that hits the presses is an issue, if you spin it up dreadful enough. So now we get a new creation.... another imaginary IPEC, this one with all sorts of buried pipes full of Kryptonite, and rats chewing the Kryptonite, and crawling out to bite our infant babies in their strollers. Horriffic! Makes me very upset !
But it bears no resemblance to the real IPEC, which is curiously "Bury Free". But if you guys want to help Entergy inspect its septic tanks, and lawn watering devices, I'm all for it! Make them be perfect! They can do it!
Just don't try to tell the rest of us you are heroes for doing so. You are myopic and paranoid single-issue cranks, over-amping innocent minutiae about IPEC, as a substitute for having any other way to get friends.
Oh My ! Did I sat T H A T ??
I apologize.
That was wrong, so veddy veddy wrong of me!
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