6th Anniversary of the Fukushima Nuclear Meltdown

March 11, 2017 marks the sixth anniversary of the Great Earthquake and the disaster at Fukushima. We are fortunate and honored to host Dr. Gordon Edwards for our Fukushima program this year on March 10, 7 pm at the Goddard Riverside Community Center in NYC, 593 Columbus Avenue. He will also be presenting on March 11, 1:30 pm at the Peekskill Presbyterian Church, 705 South Street.

Dr. Edwards is renowned for his knowledge on the nuclear fuel cycle. He will be talking with us about Rolling Stewardship – how to best store high level radioactive waste. This topic is particularly timely since the closing of Indian Point in four years moves us quickly towards decommissioning and what to do with the tons of high level waste stored there. There is more high level radioactive waste stored at Indian Point than there was in all the spent fuel pools at Fukushima. Please mark your calendar for this important event and enjoy the interview of Dr. Edwards on the “Nuclear Hotseat.”

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Fukushima +5 Peace Walk

Members of SDIPN participated in a walk from the Peekskill Metro North station to the Indian Point nuclear power facility in Buchanan on Sunday, March 13th to mark the 5th anniversary of the ongoing nuclear meltdown in Fukushima.

#shutdownipnow

Indian Point shutdown raises new safety concerns

[Comments on this article by Tim Judson, Exec. Director of NIRS: “This is the best article on the IP2 event so far. Two points are worth correcting: this is the sixth incident at Indian Point this year, not the second. There have been four other equipment failures at IP3, resulting in shutdowns. Also, Entergy has only owned IP since 2001. The prior incidents mentioned in the article occurred when ConEd owned IP1&2 and the NY Power Authority owned IP3.]”

December 10, 2015 | Filed under: News | Posted by: The Villager

The Indian Point nuclear plant is less than 40 miles from New York City.

BY PAUL DERIENZO  |  Another troubling mishap at the Indian Point nuclear power plant last Saturday prompted a shutdown, or “trip,” of one of the two reactor units and the dispatch of inspectors from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Office made the announcement that the reactor was “forced to shut down,” but New Orleans-based Entergy, which owns the plant, said there was no release of radiation or chemicals from the incident. The company said magnets holding control rods failed when power was lost, allowing the rods to sink into the reactor vessel, as designed, which shut down the nuclear reaction. Control rods are a feature of nuclear reactors that allow the nuclear reaction to be adjusted or shut down.

Did We Almost Lose New York?

by Harvey Wasserman

Smoke seen rising from the Indian Point Energy Center on Saturday, May 9.       (Photo: Ricky Flores/AP)

For the third time in a decade a major fire/explosion has ripped apart a transformer at the Indian Point reactor complex.

News reports have taken great care to emphasize that the accident happened in the “non nuclear” segment of the plant.

Ironically, the disaster spewed oil into the Hudson River, infecting it with a toxic sheen that carried downstream for miles. Entergy, the nuke’s owner, denies there were PCBs in this transformer.

It also denies numerous studies showing serious radioactive health impacts on people throughout the region.

You can choose whether you want to believe the company in either case.

But PCBs were definitely spread by the last IP transformer fire. They re-poisoned a precious liquid lifeline where activists have spent decades dealing with PCBs previously dumped in by General Electric, which designed the reactors at Fukushima.

Meanwhile, as always, the nuclear industry hit the automatic play button to assure us all that that there was “no danger” to the public and “no harmful release” of radiation.

But what do we really know about what happened and could have happened this time around?

Explosion, Fire, Oil Spill at Indian Point Nuclear Power Facility

Around 6:00 pm Saturday evening, a transformer at the Indian Point nuclear power facility in Buchanan NY – just 25 miles from the NYC border – exploded and burst into flame. No injuries were reported but independent monitors recorded a spike in radioactive emissions of 2 -3 times the normal rate. Emergency crews initially put out the fire but it burst into flames again later on. The explosion ruptured the transformer causing a leak of the oil used to cool it, which went into a holding tank that then overflowed, discharging  thousands of gallons of the oil into the Hudson River. The explosion also initiated a shut down of the #3 reactor as a precaution. There’s no word yet when it will go back on line.  More information is provided in the articles and reports linked below.

An incident like this only adds to our argument for the complete shutdown and decommissioning of Indian Point.  A number of concerns and issues need to be restated at this time:

Fukushima + 4 Event at Goddard-Riverside Center

Video courtesy of Joe Friendly