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The Journal News, Letter to the Editor
December 20, 2006
To the editor:
Contrary to recent newspaper reports, the amount of groundwater radioactivity beneath the Indian point nuclear power plants is no greater now than what Entergy and all involved have understood it to be and publicly discussed repeatedly since last spring. Reports that radioactivity is seven times greater than originally reported are simply not true. An apparent error made in a small set of samples that showed lower levels than the hundreds reported over the past year was never reported or communicated as representing the groundwater situation. In fact, Entergy engineers cautioned public officials in September that no conclusion can be drawn about the lower results in its samples without additional sample data.
Nevertheless, Entergy engineers and technicians have taken very important and positive steps at Indian Point to clean and remove radioactivity from the groundwater beneath the Indian Point 1 and Indian Point 2 plants. Entergy has identified the two pools connected to those plants as the source of the radioactivity. And, after time-consuming and thorough analyses and reviews using the best technologies available, we now have a clear understanding of the hydrology of the site, particularly the way underground water flows through it.
Testing is ongoing and a clean-up plan is now undergoing reviews for the area around the IP2 pool, the source of the tritium. In another cleanup effort, more than 90 percent of the radioactivity has been removed from the IP1 pool, the source of the strontium 90.
Entergy is pleased to be able to say that there is no public or worker safety risk from the groundwater contamination, which the NRC, N.Y. State and Westchester County Health Departments have confirmed, but we are not satisfied with that. We are continuing inspections of the IP2 pool, and are working to remove all the fuel from the IP1 pool, the only pool without a liner. This will enable us to completely empty the pool and end the leak at its source which we expect to complete within the next couple years.
In addition, the more than 30 monitoring wells installed over the past year provide us the capability to continually monitor the groundwater and help ensure that no dangerous levels of radioactivity ever leave the property through the groundwater either to the river or any properties nearby.
This is our safety commitment to our neighbors, to whom we are grateful for their trust and support, and to our workers of whom we are very proud for the way they have aggressively and responsibly responded when some doubted our capability or sincerity.
Sincerely, Fred Dacimo
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