Skip to main content

How Safe is Vermont Yankee? Ask the NRC, Not CNN.

Another colleague of mine here at NEI forwarded me a copy of the 4Q2011 Performance Summary at Vermont Yankee conducted by the independent Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Open it up and what will you find? Nothing but the color green.

For more details, click here. Bottom line, this plant is operating safely and efficiently.

Comments

Rod Adams said…
The problem is that CNN did ask the NRC, but the NRC's official response was "no comment". When pressed about its claim to be supportive of open government, the unnamed spokesman essentially said that all of the information it needed to share about the topic was available on the NRC web site. That might be true, but that is a very large and complex web site with decades worth of information on it.

Surely, if the NRC spokesman was interested in sharing information about Vermont Yankee's safety and reliable performance, he could have invited Ms. Lyon into the building, given her a cup of coffee and showed her exactly where to look on the web site for the information that she needed.

The more I watched that segment - and I repeated it several times - the more angry I became and the more I suspected that there was a plan being executed.

Here is a link my post on the topic.

http://atomicinsights.com/2012/02/cnns-carefully-timed-attack-on-nuclear-energy-and-nrc-credibility.html

Rod Adams
Publisher, Atomic Insights
Anonymous said…
The problem with giving any comment is that through careful editing slanted journalism can make you say anything. If the news wants to sensationalize a story, they're going to do it, and your best bet is to just say nothing.
Will Davis said…
Rod, you are right on the money.

I would like to commend Rod Adams, Meredith Angwin, and every single person responsible for the NEI Nuclear Notes blog here for their complete evisceration of the CNN report. A fantastic, and accurate, response to the malarkey they're trying to push nowadays.
Kit P said…
Rod and some others do not seem to understand that it is not not the NRC's job to comment on crockumetaries.

When it comes to regulating things nuclear, the NRC does a very good job. NEI also does a good job of commenting on biased media reports.
Anonymous said…
Kit P, agree it's not their job. However, that doesn't mean it is not something they ought do anyway.

Popular posts from this blog

Fluor Invests in NuScale

You know, it’s kind of sad that no one is willing to invest in nuclear energy anymore. Wait, what? NuScale Power celebrated the news of its company-saving $30 million investment from Fluor Corp. Thursday morning with a press conference in Washington, D.C. Fluor is a design, engineering and construction company involved with some 20 plants in the 70s and 80s, but it has not held interest in a nuclear energy company until now. Fluor, which has deep roots in the nuclear industry, is betting big on small-scale nuclear energy with its NuScale investment. "It's become a serious contender in the last decade or so," John Hopkins, [Fluor’s group president in charge of new ventures], said. And that brings us to NuScale, which had run into some dark days – maybe not as dark as, say, Solyndra, but dire enough : Earlier this year, the Securities Exchange Commission filed an action against NuScale's lead investor, The Michael Kenwood Group. The firm "misap

An Ohio School Board Is Working to Save Nuclear Plants

Ohio faces a decision soon about its two nuclear reactors, Davis-Besse and Perry, and on Wednesday, neighbors of one of those plants issued a cry for help. The reactors’ problem is that the price of electricity they sell on the high-voltage grid is depressed, mostly because of a surplus of natural gas. And the reactors do not get any revenue for the other benefits they provide. Some of those benefits are regional – emissions-free electricity, reliability with months of fuel on-site, and diversity in case of problems or price spikes with gas or coal, state and federal payroll taxes, and national economic stimulus as the plants buy fuel, supplies and services. Some of the benefits are highly localized, including employment and property taxes. One locality is already feeling the pinch: Oak Harbor on Lake Erie, home to Davis-Besse. The town has a middle school in a building that is 106 years old, and an elementary school from the 1950s, and on May 2 was scheduled to have a referendu

Wednesday Update

From NEI’s Japan micro-site: NRC, Industry Concur on Many Post-Fukushima Actions Industry/Regulatory/Political Issues • There is a “great deal of alignment” between the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the industry on initial steps to take at America’s nuclear energy facilities in response to the nuclear accident in Japan, Charles Pardee, the chief operating officer of Exelon Generation Co., said at an agency briefing today. The briefing gave stakeholders an opportunity to discuss staff recommendations for near-term actions the agency may take at U.S. facilities. PowerPoint slides from the meeting are on the NRC website. • The International Atomic Energy Agency board has approved a plan that calls for inspectors to evaluate reactor safety at nuclear energy facilities every three years. Governments may opt out of having their country’s facilities inspected. Also approved were plans to maintain a rapid response team of experts ready to assist facility operators recoverin