Michele Kearney's Nuclear Wire

Major Energy and Environmental News and Commentary affecting the Nuclear Industry.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Arnie Gundersen Authors Another Shoddy Report

Arnie Gundersen Authors Another Shoddy Report

Nuclear consultants Fairewinds Associates and anti-nuclear activists Friends of the Earth are at it again with a new “report” that seeks to create concern, with little to no substance, over steam generator tube leaks at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). The report, “Steam Generator Failures at San Onofre,” claims that without a thorough root cause analysis of why the plant’s recently installed steam generator tubes have become worn, that:
“…radioactive releases might be significantly larger than those that occurred after the January 2012 tube leak. Such an accident would cause implementation of the California emergency evacuation plan and closing of the San Clemente beach and Interstate I-5, potentially for an extended period of time.”
Fairewinds’ opinion misleads the general public to believe that the plant already released a large amount of radiation, which in fact, it has not. In a February 17 press release, Southern California Edison (SCE) clarified:
The radioactivity released to the atmosphere during the steam generator tube leak was barely measurable – 4E-5 millirems or 0.00004 millirems -- which is 200 times less than you would receive by having a smoke detector in your home for a year.

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