Paul Newman's Own Nuclear Reactor Safety Salsa

So, last week Paul Newman ran around Indian Point shaking hands, with Steet's nose doing the two cheek fork tongue, and left the facility ready to endorse it, and its security for another 20 years of operation. It was obvious that the doddering fool in this scenario had not done his homework on the facility, or their safety/security record...but then, he is Paul Newman of the blue eyes and faded glory.

Be interesting to know what Paul Newman thought of Entergy's Indian Point sending the REAL McCoy software up to Mass this week, instead of the sample software, so that when it was tested, the four counties surrounding Indian Point, and their emergency planning people started receiving faxes that an incident was occurring at the facility sitting on the Hudson! Neil Sheehan of the NRC, and Steets of Entergy Brown Nose fame were quick to say it was and inadvertent mistake, and the situation was rectified very soon after it happened...OH REALLY?

1. Entergy at first HAD NO CLUE, immediately contacting the State Police to find out who had HACKED INTO THEIR COMPUTER SYSTEM...ignoring the obvious (they forked up big time), they have basically admitted that a computer hacker can get into their system.

2. They sent a viable usable set of software to another reactor site...curious, was it MAILED, and if so standard first class mail? Not very prudent...what if it had been intercepted.

3. What if the Emergency Planners had taken the faxes as the real deal? Sirens sounding, people freaking out, a mass exit of four counties under way before someone called a time out. Also, look at the reverse...what if those faxes had been real, and while they were second guessing people were breathing in radioactive particulates?

So, we have Entergy playing games with safety by claiming that reactor 2 did not go into shut down, but is operating smoothly at 2 percent...all to avoid a White rating, and the NRC with a wink and a nod giving Indian Point a thumbs up on the shrewd move to avoid another unplanned shut down. We have the siren issues with the company promising us a working emergency siren system some time in August...isn't that special. There is the tritium leak into the Buchanan sewer system, and then that small problem with the explosion! We could go on, but think most of us get the picture.

To help Paul Newman get the picture, Remy Chevalier of Rock the Reactors paid a little visit to Paul Newman's organic eatery in Westport, the Dressing Room...never been there, but is the motif pink? "Another Environmentalist for Nuclear Power" bumper sticker, a flyer for Green Nuclear Butterfly and copy of Remy's latest documentary, Toaster 66, about electric car rapid chargers all along the old Route 66, so tourists can travel the old mother road without the $1000 gasoline bill for the trip were left for Paul.

Remy and Paul Newman have been adversaries for quite some time. In the late 70's, Remy fought Mr. Newman and his now retired local attorney Leo Nevas in the hope of establishing a park on Gorham Island, the once charming island in the middle of the river, downtown Westport. Remy's effort failed to prevent Mr. Nevas from building a three story office building. It would seem as if the old rivals are at it again. Remy can't understand how a seemingly intelligent man who would open an organic restaurant, could also advocate the relicensing of an old, dirty, decrepit, dangerous nuclear power plant that is leaking tritium and strontium into the Hudson River.

Maybe next time Paul is in Peekskill to sing the praises of Indian Point, he'll contact the Green Nuclear Butterfly so that we can sit down together and enlighten him to the truth he so far refuses to see...OK, maybe too harsh...sure at his age he does not see as well as he used too.

J. Patrick Moore Debunked-World's Biggest Sell Out?

Corporate Whore? Nuclear Shill? You Decide.

Dr. J. Patrick Moore, supposed co-founder of Greenpeace in 1976 said,

“It should be remembered that there are employed in the nuclear industry some very high-powered public relations organizations. One can no more trust them to tell the truth about nuclear power than about which brand of toothpaste will result in this apparently insoluble problem.” And,

“Nuclear power plants are, next to nuclear warheads themselves, the most dangerous devices that man has ever created. Their construction and proliferation is the most irresponsible, in fact the most criminal, act ever to have taken place on the planet.”

Now he has changed his mind and is considered a supposed “expert”.

His new CASEnergy coalition is exactly one of those high-powered pubic relations organizations.

Even more shocking is that as he wrongly pedals nuclear power as the solution to global warming, he espouses ideas that potentially prevent us from investing in renewable and sustainable electrical generating means.

In a Washington Post Commentary (April 2006). Dr. Moore wrote,

“And even if a jumbo jet did crash into a reactor and breach the containment, the reactor would not explode...”

5 years earlier (10 days after 9-11) Edward Lyman Ph.D of the Nuclear Control Institute wrote,

“However, a straightforward calculation shows that a large passenger jet like a Boeing 767, colliding into the reinforced concrete containment structure of a typical U.S. nuclear reactor, would in fact have a high likelihood of penetrating the containment.

While certain U.S. reactor designs are more vulnerable than others, all are potentially at risk. Gross structural failure of the containment building is also a possibility, especially for older plants which have experienced age-related degradation of containment materials ( VY is one such older reactor: ed)

The shock of such an impact would probably cause substantial damage to plant systems inside the containment, and the effect of a subsequent jet fuel fire or explosion would cause further mechanical and thermal damage to the containment, metal reactor components and the reactor vessel itself. Following such an assault, the possibility of an unmitigated loss-of-coolant accident and significant release of radiation into the environment is a very real one.”

In a Brattleboro Reformer article 1/11/07,
“ Moore believes, ‘dry cask is a perfectly safe and secure way to store spent fuel.”’

Meanwhile the issue of what to do with the waste after the “temporary” solution that may be dry cask storage, still lingers. In determining a solution to the long-term storage of radioactive waste, scientists found …

“Minerals intended to entrap nuclear waste for hundreds of thousands of years may be susceptible to structural breakdown within 1,400 years, a team from the University of Cambridge and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory reported Jan. 11, 2007 in the journal Nature.

The new study used nuclear magnetic resonance, or NMR, to show that the effects of radiation from plutonium incorporated into the mineral zircon rapidly degrades the mineral's crystal structure.

This could lead to swelling, loss of physical strength and possible cracking of the mineral as soon as 210 years, well before the radioactivity had decayed to safe levels, said lead author and Cambridge earth scientist Ian Farnan.”

Dr. Moore was wrong about the strength of the containment to withstand a modern airplane. Dr. Moore claims to know his science yet he apparently supports the current fad of temporary waste solutions. Still no one knows what to do with the waste long term. Scientists admitted to falsifying data to win pre-approval for Yucca Mountain. Because of this Yucca Mountain is likely not going to open. Now our VT legislators are hearing from an activist turned capitalist scientist and he is given the title of “expert”.

If he was an “expert” when he co-founded Greenpeace, and now as a turncoat he is considered an “expert” on the global warming issue, I just wonder what he will believe next week, month, decade and why we as laypeople or legislators should trust his supposed expertise.