03-15-2005, 01:07 AM
quote:
HEALTH section, hartford courant
Coalition Disputes NRC Report
Says Millstone Data Show Illegal Operations
March 4, 2005
By THOMAS D. WILLIAMS, Courant Staff Writer
A state coalition of environmental groups told the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission that past data released by the Millstone Nuclear Power Complex shows that it emits "highly significant concentrations" of radioactive, cancer-causing particles in the New London area.
Those findings, issued by the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone on Wednesday, the final deadline to oppose the Waterford plant's
request for a 20-year license renewal, are contrary to an NRC report on the plant.
"Based on [Millstone's] reporting of radiation sampling in the environment, the coalition believes the available data reviewed by the NRC for the years 2001, 2002 and 2003 prove that routine operations of Millstone are in violation of federal health standards and are illegal," said Nancy Burton, a leader of the coalition. The group was organized in 1999 to challenge Millstone's application to the NRC to double its spent fuel storage capacity.
Last year Millstone, about 2½ miles from New London, produced 48 percent of Connecticut's electricity, said Peter Hyde, spokesman for Dominion Nuclear Connecticut Inc., the plant's operator.
In December, the NRC reported, in a preliminary draft environmental impact statement, that Millstone does not pose significant emission hazards to the air, water or soil.
"Environmental impacts are not detectable or are so minor that they will neither destabilize nor noticeably alter any important attribute of the [surrounding environment]," the NRC report said.
The coalition disputed those findings in response to the NRC's request for public comments on the December draft report. The coalition enlisted Ernest J. Sternglass, a retired professor of radiological physics at the University of Pittsburgh Medical School, to analyze Millstone's data.
Sternglass said a goat milk sample obtained by Millstone officials in September 2001, taken 51/2 miles north of Millstone on the outskirts of Waterford, revealed an "extremely large concentration" of strontium-90, a cancer-causing radioactive isotope.
That concentration is "close to twice the highest measured in Connecticut milk ... at the height of nuclear weapons testing in 1963," Sternglass said. Hazardous levels of strontium-90 decline over time, he said.
Millstone's operators test goat's or cow's milk within a certain radius of the plant once or twice a month. Milk is tested because it has high calcium content, and strontium-90 is drawn to calcium in the bones of humans and animals.
Exposure to low levels of strontium-90 and other bone-seeking radioactive chemicals routinely released by nuclear power plants increases the risk of bone cancer or leukemia, Sternglass said. It also weakens the immune defenses provided by white blood cells that originate in bone marrow, Sternglass said. But strontium-90, he said, is only one of several dangerous cancer-causing hazards flowing into water, air and soil from nuclear power plant emissions. He said data from 2002 and 2003 indicated unacceptable levels of other radioactive emissions in those years.
Because the strontium-90 level was so high in the goat's milk tested in 2001, Sternglass said, "there is an astronomically small chance that it is a statistical fluctuation [or error]." That measurement excludes the possibility it was due to past nuclear bomb testing because it was so much higher than the readings from nuclear weapons testing in the state in the 1950s and '60s, Sternglass said.
Hyde disagreed. Annual monitoring of Millstone's stack emissions and the soil and the water next to the plant show strontium-90 levels had declined for years before the September 2001 reading, and for years after it, he said.
Sternglass said his review of the data confirms abnormally high readings of radioactive hazards.
The NRC is expected to issue the final environmental impact statement at the end of July.
http://www.courant.com/news/health/hc-nu...1663.story
quote:
Boy's Cancer Blamed On Millstone
Mom's Exposure To Chemicals Alleged
March 11, 2005
By THOMAS D. WILLIAMS, Courant Staff Writer
NIANTIC -- Seven-year-old Zachery M. Hartley has a rare, disfiguring cancer of the jaw. His parents and an internationally known physician blame the Millstone nuclear power plant.
Dr. Helen Caldicott, a co-founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility, said Thursday that it is likely the rare disorder afflicted Zachery because his mother swam in the ocean near the nuclear plant during her pregnancy.
At a bayside press conference, Caldicott said Tonia Hartley came in contact with radiological compounds discharged from the plant into Niantic bay.
Michael and Tonia Hartley and a state anti-nuclear group are demanding that Millstone be shut down and that swimming in the bay be prohibited.
Although Millstone was closed at the time in 1997 when Tonia Hartley went swimming, Caldicott said, the plant was "washing out with volatiles [chemicals] and that had a synergistic effect" making the water emissions extremely hazardous. She said anyone swimming in the bay then could have been exposed to the chemicals by swallowing or breathing them, absorbing them through the skin or eating contaminated fish from the bay.
But, Peter Hyde, spokesman for Dominion Nuclear Connecticut Inc., the plant's operator, said: "We've looked at this and we empathize a great deal with this boy and his family. But we don't agree that there is any evidence that Millstone caused this boy's cancer. We live here. We swim in this water. We would never do anything consciously to cause harm to our families or neighbors."
Hyde said Caldicott did not say she could definitively link the cancer to the plant's emissions.
Invited to the press conference by the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone, Caldicott said 17 to 19 similar occurrences of rare cancers have been reported among people living in the vicinity of Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island, N.Y.
Brookhaven, begun in 1947 as a nuclear-science research center, conducts research in the physical, biomedical, and environmental sciences, as well as in energy technologies and national security for the U.S. Department of Energy.
The Hartleys did not fully link Tonia Hartley's swimming to her son's cancer until January while viewing a public television broadcast of the coalition opposing Millstone's pending re-licensing application, said Nancy Burton, a coalition leader.
Tonia Hartley, who swam regularly for seven months while she was pregnant, was in Boston Thursday readying for Zachery's next major operation, but sent a tape recording of her comments to the conference.
"Connecticut is not looking out for its children," she said. "There were no signs posted on the beach by the state, the town or the federal government that swimming in the water could be hazardous to my unborn child.
"I'm sharing our story as a mother looking out for the community so the community can make an educated decision knowing the price we paid for being unaware. This has been a nightmare for my family for seven years and it is continuing to be a nightmare for the rest of Zachery's life," she said.
As his son stood by, Michael Hartley said he and his wife decided to go public because "no one in town has said anything about this, and if they know they are not talking. I want the public to vote on it," he said.
An advocate of citizen action to remedy the nuclear and environmental crises, Caldicott, 66, has spent the past 35 years on an international campaign to educate the public about the medical hazards of the nuclear industry
http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-exp...7417.story
[ March 11, 2005, 06:56 PM: Message edited by: jimmy ]
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HEALTH section, hartford courant
Coalition Disputes NRC Report
Says Millstone Data Show Illegal Operations
March 4, 2005
By THOMAS D. WILLIAMS, Courant Staff Writer
A state coalition of environmental groups told the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission that past data released by the Millstone Nuclear Power Complex shows that it emits "highly significant concentrations" of radioactive, cancer-causing particles in the New London area.
Those findings, issued by the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone on Wednesday, the final deadline to oppose the Waterford plant's
request for a 20-year license renewal, are contrary to an NRC report on the plant.
"Based on [Millstone's] reporting of radiation sampling in the environment, the coalition believes the available data reviewed by the NRC for the years 2001, 2002 and 2003 prove that routine operations of Millstone are in violation of federal health standards and are illegal," said Nancy Burton, a leader of the coalition. The group was organized in 1999 to challenge Millstone's application to the NRC to double its spent fuel storage capacity.
Last year Millstone, about 2½ miles from New London, produced 48 percent of Connecticut's electricity, said Peter Hyde, spokesman for Dominion Nuclear Connecticut Inc., the plant's operator.
In December, the NRC reported, in a preliminary draft environmental impact statement, that Millstone does not pose significant emission hazards to the air, water or soil.
"Environmental impacts are not detectable or are so minor that they will neither destabilize nor noticeably alter any important attribute of the [surrounding environment]," the NRC report said.
The coalition disputed those findings in response to the NRC's request for public comments on the December draft report. The coalition enlisted Ernest J. Sternglass, a retired professor of radiological physics at the University of Pittsburgh Medical School, to analyze Millstone's data.
Sternglass said a goat milk sample obtained by Millstone officials in September 2001, taken 51/2 miles north of Millstone on the outskirts of Waterford, revealed an "extremely large concentration" of strontium-90, a cancer-causing radioactive isotope.
That concentration is "close to twice the highest measured in Connecticut milk ... at the height of nuclear weapons testing in 1963," Sternglass said. Hazardous levels of strontium-90 decline over time, he said.
Millstone's operators test goat's or cow's milk within a certain radius of the plant once or twice a month. Milk is tested because it has high calcium content, and strontium-90 is drawn to calcium in the bones of humans and animals.
Exposure to low levels of strontium-90 and other bone-seeking radioactive chemicals routinely released by nuclear power plants increases the risk of bone cancer or leukemia, Sternglass said. It also weakens the immune defenses provided by white blood cells that originate in bone marrow, Sternglass said. But strontium-90, he said, is only one of several dangerous cancer-causing hazards flowing into water, air and soil from nuclear power plant emissions. He said data from 2002 and 2003 indicated unacceptable levels of other radioactive emissions in those years.
Because the strontium-90 level was so high in the goat's milk tested in 2001, Sternglass said, "there is an astronomically small chance that it is a statistical fluctuation [or error]." That measurement excludes the possibility it was due to past nuclear bomb testing because it was so much higher than the readings from nuclear weapons testing in the state in the 1950s and '60s, Sternglass said.
Hyde disagreed. Annual monitoring of Millstone's stack emissions and the soil and the water next to the plant show strontium-90 levels had declined for years before the September 2001 reading, and for years after it, he said.
Sternglass said his review of the data confirms abnormally high readings of radioactive hazards.
The NRC is expected to issue the final environmental impact statement at the end of July.
http://www.courant.com/news/health/hc-nu...1663.story
quote:
Boy's Cancer Blamed On Millstone
Mom's Exposure To Chemicals Alleged
March 11, 2005
By THOMAS D. WILLIAMS, Courant Staff Writer
NIANTIC -- Seven-year-old Zachery M. Hartley has a rare, disfiguring cancer of the jaw. His parents and an internationally known physician blame the Millstone nuclear power plant.
Dr. Helen Caldicott, a co-founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility, said Thursday that it is likely the rare disorder afflicted Zachery because his mother swam in the ocean near the nuclear plant during her pregnancy.
At a bayside press conference, Caldicott said Tonia Hartley came in contact with radiological compounds discharged from the plant into Niantic bay.
Michael and Tonia Hartley and a state anti-nuclear group are demanding that Millstone be shut down and that swimming in the bay be prohibited.
Although Millstone was closed at the time in 1997 when Tonia Hartley went swimming, Caldicott said, the plant was "washing out with volatiles [chemicals] and that had a synergistic effect" making the water emissions extremely hazardous. She said anyone swimming in the bay then could have been exposed to the chemicals by swallowing or breathing them, absorbing them through the skin or eating contaminated fish from the bay.
But, Peter Hyde, spokesman for Dominion Nuclear Connecticut Inc., the plant's operator, said: "We've looked at this and we empathize a great deal with this boy and his family. But we don't agree that there is any evidence that Millstone caused this boy's cancer. We live here. We swim in this water. We would never do anything consciously to cause harm to our families or neighbors."
Hyde said Caldicott did not say she could definitively link the cancer to the plant's emissions.
Invited to the press conference by the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone, Caldicott said 17 to 19 similar occurrences of rare cancers have been reported among people living in the vicinity of Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island, N.Y.
Brookhaven, begun in 1947 as a nuclear-science research center, conducts research in the physical, biomedical, and environmental sciences, as well as in energy technologies and national security for the U.S. Department of Energy.
The Hartleys did not fully link Tonia Hartley's swimming to her son's cancer until January while viewing a public television broadcast of the coalition opposing Millstone's pending re-licensing application, said Nancy Burton, a coalition leader.
Tonia Hartley, who swam regularly for seven months while she was pregnant, was in Boston Thursday readying for Zachery's next major operation, but sent a tape recording of her comments to the conference.
"Connecticut is not looking out for its children," she said. "There were no signs posted on the beach by the state, the town or the federal government that swimming in the water could be hazardous to my unborn child.
"I'm sharing our story as a mother looking out for the community so the community can make an educated decision knowing the price we paid for being unaware. This has been a nightmare for my family for seven years and it is continuing to be a nightmare for the rest of Zachery's life," she said.
As his son stood by, Michael Hartley said he and his wife decided to go public because "no one in town has said anything about this, and if they know they are not talking. I want the public to vote on it," he said.
An advocate of citizen action to remedy the nuclear and environmental crises, Caldicott, 66, has spent the past 35 years on an international campaign to educate the public about the medical hazards of the nuclear industry
http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-exp...7417.story
[ March 11, 2005, 06:56 PM: Message edited by: jimmy ]
[signature]
