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Second Vermont Yankee school evacuation drill scheduled
Index:
Second Vermont Yankee school evacuation drill scheduled
24 Exelon Employees To Start Work At PSEG Nuclear Plants
Small Fire Extinguished at Millstone Unit 2; No Danger to Employees
German authorities seize motors believed bound for Iran nuclear plant
=========================================
Second Vermont Yankee school evacuation drill scheduled
BRATTLEBORO, Vt. (AP) - The communities around the Vermont Yankee
nuclear power plant will make another attempt at a test evacuation of
schools following a flawed drill last month.
The second drill is scheduled for Feb. 15, Brattleboro Town Manager
Jerry Remillard said.
During the Dec. 16 drill, nearly 1,000 Vermont students could not be
evacuated from schools because of a shortage of school buses.
Emergency officials cited a breakdown in communication between
emergency management teams in Waterbury and Concord, N.H., which
delayed the deployment of buses.
Remillard said there will be better coordination between agencies in
next month's drill.
"If (this) drill goes well, then the next drill will be unannounced,"
he said.
Once the school evacuation plan can be conducted successfully and
unannounced, other components of the evacuation plan would be tested,
such as the evacuation of care facilities or traffic access and
control, Remillard said.
"I feel pretty strongly that we need to test all the components first
before we put it all together," he said.
The Dec. 16 drill tested a plan in the event of a chemical, natural
or nuclear emergency to evacuate students from 17 schools from five
towns located within the 10-mile emergency planning zone surrounding
the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.
Brattleboro Fire Chief David Emery said some of the shocking events
during the drill - such as the buses being turned around before
reaching their destination schools - wouldn't have happened during a
real emergency.
"We do not plan on leaving one child on the curb. That just will not
happen," he said. "Under (emergency) conditions, all the chips
change."
---------------
24 Exelon Employees To Start Work At PSEG Nuclear Plants
SWEDESBORO, NJ (Dow Jones)--Two dozen Exelon Corp. (EXC) employees
will begin working at Public Service Enterprise Group Inc.'s (PEG)
nuclear plants in southern New Jersey over the next two weeks as part
of an operating agreement associated with the companies' proposed
merger, an Exelon executive said late Wednesday night.
Bill Levis, an Exelon Nuclear vice president who's about to become
chief nuclear officer for the plants, said it's too early to tell how
Exelon's purchase of PSEG will affect staffing at the Hope Creek and
Salem reactors.
Levis will succeed PSEG's A. Christopher Bakken III, who will step
down Monday. That's the day Exelon will begin running day-to-day
operations at the reactors, and 18 of its employees will start
working at the New Jersey site. Six more employees will arrive two
weeks later, Levis said.
They "represent key roles across the organization," he said.
Specialized teams will also rotate through to put Exelon's plant
management model in place. These so-called transition teams could be
on site from one week to one month, Levis said.
Some Exelon managers began working at PSEG's plants toward the end of
last year.
Chicago-based Exelon, the biggest and possibly best regarded U.S.
nuclear operator, agreed to purchase PSEG in December for about $12
billion in stock and the assumption of $14 billion in debt. It co-
owns the two-unit Salem plant with PSEG and runs the Peach Bottom
facility in Pennsylvania, which the two companies also own.
Chris Bakken will work in PSEG's Newark, N.J. headquarters as senior
vice president of the transition effort. He will report to Frank
Cassidy, president of generating subsidiary PSEG Power, who oversees
the nuclear division.
Bakken, who assumed PSEG's top nuclear spot in July following his
return to the company earlier last year, has been credited, even by
PSEG critics, with slowly improving employee morale and the nuclear
company's safety culture.
PSEG's nuclear operations have come under heightened scrutiny from
regulators and investors due to lengthy and unexpected outages and
concerns that the company has emphasized production over safety.
Recently, it faced criticism for a pipe break that forced the Hope
Creek plant offline in early October, about three weeks before it was
scheduled to shut for refueling.
The company attracted even more negative publicity for its decision
to wait until spring 2006 to replace a massive, problem pump.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission held Wednesday night's public
meeting to discuss its finding that the reactor can safely return to
service, provided PSEG continuously monitors vibrations on one of the
unit's recirculating water pumps.
Bakken said PSEG plans to begin the gradual restart process at Hope
Creek on Thursday and expects the unit to begin generating
electricity again next week. PSEG has run the pump recently without
problems during tests related to the start up effort, he said.
----------------
Small Fire Extinguished at Millstone Unit 2; No Danger to Employees,
Public
WATERFORD, Conn., Jan. 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Employees at
Millstone Power Station extinguished a small fire inside the Unit 2
turbine building Friday morning. The fire posed no danger to
employees or the public, and there was no release of radiation. Unit
2 continued to operate safely at full power.
Dominion Generation, the unit of Dominion (NYSE: D) that operates the
station, declared an emergency at 10:11 a.m. Friday. The emergency
was classified as A Notice of Unusual Event, which is the lowest of
four emergency classifications used by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory
Commission. Federal, state and local authorities were notified, but
no offsite assistance was required because Millstone employees
extinguished the fire.
The fire occurred in the turbine building, which is separate and
apart from the containment structure that houses the reactor.
Dominion is investigating the cause of the 30-minute fire.
The operation of Millstone Unit 3 was not affected. Employees not
involved in the operation of the units or the investigation were
excused for the day and allowed to leave the station.
-----------------
German authorities seize motors believed bound for Iran nuclear plant
BERLIN (AP) - German authorities have halted the export of four
special low-voltage motors for a nuclear power plant in Iran, seizing
the equipment during a search this week at a company in northern
Germany, prosecutors said Friday.
Manfred Knothe, a spokesman for prosecutors in Hanover, declined to
name the firm involved, but said the director of its export
department was under investigation for violating export laws.
Material that could be used in Iran's nuclear program would require
an export permit from the German government, and "export permission
would hardly have been given," Knothe said.
The motors - each weighing 7 tons (7.7 U.S. tons) were believed to be
destined for the Bushehr nuclear reactor, and were seized during a
search by customs officials Wednesday.
The tip-off, which followed a first shipment of motors in December,
"came from the company itself," Knothe said without elaborating.
While Iran insists it only wants to generate nuclear power for
civilian uses, the United States has accused it of trying to build
nuclear weapons. Germany has been involved in European diplomatic
efforts to persuade Tehran to suspend activities that could help
produce nuclear weapons.
Preliminary investigations show that the motors were to be shipped to
Iran via various other countries in an effort to cover up the
shipment, prosecutors said.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle
Senior Vice President, Technical Operations
Global Dosimetry Solutions, Inc.
2652 McGaw Avenue
Irvine, CA 92614
Tel: (949) 296-2306 / (888) 437-1714 Extension 2306
Fax:(949) 296-1144
Global Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com/
Personal Website: http://sandy-travels.com/
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