Crack Kills

Dear God,

Coming on the heels of embarrassing news earlier this year -- first about a stoned control room operator and then about a drunk employee – is news about crack at Vermont Yankee.

Only, as I pointed out to the Rutland Herald, it's not really news. We've always had a crack problem. Unfortuntately, I'm not talking about the drug-of-choice problem from the mid 1980s, the one produced by smoking a boiled combination of powdered cocaine, water, and baking soda. That kind of crack problem has to do with the risk of death inherent in a crazed attempt to get high. Crack kills, and even if it doesn't it can make you paranoid and violent.

No, the crack problem we have at Vermont Yankee is potentially far more deadly. Though it does sound milder. Listen: "We found 16 new cracks in the steam dryer." Big deal, huh? Well, it is. Just add those 16 new cracks to the 47 cracks the dryer already had, and we now have a ringing total of 63 steam dryer cracks.

Yeah, I know. Well, if 47 cracks haven't been a problem, why should anyone believe that 63 will be? In other words, how in heaven's name could this kind of crack problem be more serious than the problem ruining the lives of hundreds of thousands of addicts as well as the lives of their children and their crime victims?

Here's the "how" of it all: Our kind of crack problem threatens the lives of hundreds of thousands of people who have not thumbed their noses at conventional wisdom and flagrantly hurt themselves and others. Our kind of crack problem threatens people who've only endangered themselves and their families by listening uncritically while I blather about Vermont Yankee being safe, clean, and reliable. Hearing my assurances, they have agreed to live or work near an aging nuclear power plant whose major parts collapse in broad daylight but that, incredibly, has been allowed by the NRC to boost its power output by 20% and chug along at that rate rather too merrily.

We have not yet had any disastrous -- or even dramatic -- consequences to that power uprate. But other plants have not been so lucky. Indeed, as of October 15, 2004, a cracked steam dryer had failed in four of ten nuclear power plants receiving uprates of 13% or more.

And when she blows, she blows.

According to Ray Shadis, NEC Technical Staff advisor, “In one reactor a piece of heavy steel nine feet long and a foot and a half wide tore loose and was blown down the steam line at supersonic speed.” According to the Rutland Herald, after an uprate "at the Dresden reactor in Illinois, the vibration from additional power generation caused pieces of the steam dryer to come loose, and lodge in safety-related equipment."

Hmmm. One event sounds dreadful, the other sounds like the stuff of a lullabye. I wonder if those are two descriptions of the same accident? If so, it's a textbook example of the power of subtle phrasing. "Lodged in safety-related equipment." Well, that's something an eyelash could do, and what harm would that bring? Let's go live near that power plant!

And so today, appreciating anew the power of tact, in announcing the discovery of the 16 new cracks I did not iterate for the media the many safety problems that uprates have caused in the steam dryers of nuclear power plants across the nation. Rather, I delicately suggested that our 16 steam dryer cracks are not new harbingers of catastrophe to come. They're old, tired harbingers that can safely be ignored. Because, actually, these 16 cracks may have been with us all along. We've only noticed them now that our inspection equipment is better.

Which is to say that, as Vermont Yankee's inspection technology improves, we shouldn't rush to do anything about the information we glean. Instead we should assume that any discovery that makes our uprate or continued operation seem dangerous is only an artifact of Entergy Nuclear/Vermont Yankee's rising commitment to state-of-the-art measurement tools -- and of our incredible honesty and transparency.

Hey, Lord! Did you hear inspirational music swelling as I typed that last sentence? Heavens, I like that sentence!

I think I may even like it more than than the "higher fenceline radiation levels are really a measure of lower fenceline radiation levels" argument we put out just a few weeks ago. Over the years at Vermont Yankee, we've really learned to uprate the PR.

Thanks for hearing me out, Lord, like you always do.

Amen,

Fake-Rob