ACTION ALERT: Hearing Wednesday, Sept. 13 2 Pilgrim related bills

[Diane TURCO]

Dear All,

 

The Joint Committee on Public Safety and Homeland Security will be holding an in-person and virtual hearing on Wednesday, September 13th at 12 PM. For oral testimony during the hearing , sign up to do so with this form.

The deadline to pre-register to testify in person is Monday, September 11th at 11:59 PM. 

 

Written testimony can be emailed to Destiny Ihenacho at destiny....@mahouse.gov or Ryann Mitchell at ryann.m...@masenate.gov    

(https://malegislature.gov/Events/Hearings/Detail/4664)

• S.1498 - https://malegislature.gov/Bills/193/S1498 - Amends the Civil Defense Act to designate any community within a 50-mile radius (up from the current  10-mile radius) of an active nuclear power plant or an inactive nuclear power plant storing nuclear waste as a state Nuclear Power Plan Area; allows for emergency planning in the expanded Nuclear Power Plan Areas, and for assessments to be made against inactive plants which are still storing nuclear material.

Currently,  the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has basically abdicated any responsibilty to Holtec to provide emergency planning outside the Holtec chain link fence of the property around the Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation (ISFSI). It is up to local responders. The state does have a law for Nuclear Power Plant Areas but that is only up to a 10 mile radius. Massachusetts now needs to update using current science and information regarding dry cask dangers and plan accordingly. 

 

At Pilgrim, as you know, 42 years of high level dangerous nuclear waste are in substandard Holtec thin-walled cans placed in a concrete overpack on a pad located right along Rocky Hill Road. Each of the 61 casks hold more than half the Cesium-137 released at Chernobyl among many other dangerous radionuclides. There are weapons on the open market that can breach the cans, spewing the contents into our communities. The cans are suseptible to corrosion cracking in marine envirnments. This is the radioactive garbarge that was meant for Yucca Mountain to be buried for tens of thousands of years. Yet, now, it sits along side a public road open to degradation and bad actors. 

Our communities remain at risk so the state must step up. Last session, this bill was voted favorably out of Committee and died in Senate Ways and Means. Let's get a vote on the floor this year. 

Can you send a short email in support of S.1498 by Wednesday, September 13? 

SAMPLE:
Dear Chairmen Senator Timilty and Representative Gonzalez,

I write in support of S.1498, a bill to expand the Nuclear Power Plant Area for emergency planning from 10 miles to 50 miles to include nuclear waste dump sites such as the Holtec-Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station Independent Spent Fuel Installation. This location holds 61 vulnerable thin-walled cans of the high level nuclear waste and presents a constant risk to our communities that is not being recognized.  

This bill was voted favorably out of committee last session so I ask for a prompt favorable vote to move to full floor vote this year.

Thank you for protecting our communities,

[Name, address]

 

Another bill is also in this committee.

• H.2302 - https://malegislature.gov/Bills/193/H2302 - this Rep. Cutler/Rep. Peake bill creating the new state Commission to study the planned discharge and includes a moritorium during the study. We support the bill. With Mass DEP's tentative decision to deny Holtec the dumping permit, this bill has become just a back up. Senator Su Moran filed a similar bill which already had a hearing.

 

Attached is a photo of the cans from busy Rocky Hill Road!  Enlarge and you can see the grey casks on the hill. The chainlink fence is on the hill. The evergreen trees in the foreground were planted by Holtec and meant to hide the casks. Really. 

 

I have been so busy with the DEP and whistleblower letter and am just writing up testimony. If you have any questions, please check in with me.

 

Thank you, thank you for all who are staying on top of this, keeping our legislators informed, and working to protect our communities. 

Don't stop being alarmed, Diane

 

Links for more info on dry cask dangers and what can be done to improve the situation. 

https://sanonofresafety.org/nuclear-waste/

 

http://pilgrimwatch.org/const/decommissioning_handbook_071220.pdf  page 40+