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Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Great
Lakes; Don’t Waste For Immediate Release June 22, 2006 Contacts: Alice Hirt, Don’t Waste Michigan, Michael Keegan, Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Great Lakes, Anne Woiwode, Sierra Club Environmental
Coalition Opposes Due to
Risk of Terrorist Attack Covert, Michigan— Citing a recent federal court ruling that the
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) cannot ignore the threat of terrorist
attack during licensing proceedings for nuclear power facilities, a coalition
of grassroots Michigan and Great Lakes Basin environmental groups has requested
official analysis and hearings on the matter before the granting of a twenty
year license extension to Consumers Energy’s Palisades nuclear power
plant. The five-member NRC Commission is scheduled to vote Friday, June 23rd
whether the coalition’s contentions opposing the license extension,
including one concerning terrorist attack, will be granted a hearing before the Atomic Safety and
Licensing Board. The 9th Circuit Federal Court of Appeals in The environmental coalition, including the Sierra Club
Michigan Chapter, has requested the NRC to analyze the terrorist threat to In addition, a number of groups which formally intervened against the license extension last summer before the NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board are now calling upon the NRC Commissioners to re-open hearings on their contention concerning
terrorism risks at (continued) Commission will vote Friday, June 23rd on whether to
override its licensing board in favor of the environmental coalition’s
appeal. In addition, NRC’s Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards is
set to discuss NRC’s Safety Evaluation Report regarding the “Palisades represents a radioactive bull’s eye
on the shore of 20% of the planet’s surface fresh water, the Great Lakes,”
said Michael Keegan of the Coalition for a Nuclear-Free Great Lakes in “We call upon the NRC to protect the people and
environment of the Lake Michigan shoreline by addressing the risks of sabotage
and terrorism from twenty more years of operations and waste generation at “We call upon Governor Granholm, and all of our elected officials, to join us in addressing this issue so vital to our state’s safety and security,” said Alice Hirt of Don’t Waste Michigan. On October 8, 2002 Granholm, as Nearly four years later, Congress has still not acted on the urgent request, despite extensive media coverage of government and industry inaction, the 9/11 Commission Report’s revelation that nuclear power plants were an original target for the 2001 terrorist attacks, a 2005 National Academies of Science report on the vulnerability to terrorist attack of radioactive waste storage pools at reactor sites, and even a U.S. General Accounting Office report in April 2006 revealing that NRC had weakened its security regulations in contradiction to its own staff’s recommendations after consulting with the nuclear power industry on cost considerations. See http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/security/securityhome.htm for more information. “Living in the shadow of Davis-Besse nuclear
power plant, we urge that the Palisades reactor be shut down for safety's sake,”
said Terry Lodge of the Toledo Coalition for Safe Energy, who is also serving
as pro bono attorney for the coalition opposing Palisades’ re-licensing. “Davis-Besse
came close to a meltdown in 2002, and we don't want to risk that at NRC’s Office of Inspector General concluded that NRC contributed to the near-miss at Davis-Besse by placing the nuclear utility's profits ahead of public safety. --30-- |