Vermont Nuclear Power Plant Automatically Shuts Down - Reason Unknown

Earlier this week there was a problem with a cooling tower at Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power plant which caused the plant to reduce its power output by 50%:

http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/vpr/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1136248

Yesterday the entire plant went into automatic shut-down. It is not clear what caused the shutdown:

Shut the damn thing down until they figure out what is going on. Better yet, just shut the damn thing down forever, and replace it with a wind farm.

The anti-wind farm chorus never seems to show up in threads about the problems at Vermont Yankee. But let one of us wind farm advocates show up at a nuclear power rah rah thread and they are out in full force about how safe nuclear power is.

Wonder why that is. ;)

Vermont Yankee is just the tip of the iceberg. For despite the public flash and appeal of all the rules, regulations and safety measures, the truth of the matter is that our nuclear reactors are aging, badly. They will continue to break down, more frequently and in much more deadly ways as time goes on.

unless they have help. (i.e. Big bomb)

I've worked in the nuclear industry for a number of years. I know the dirty little secrets that all nuclear reactors have. For instance, one of the last nuclear plants built is close to me. From the day it was fired up until this very day, it has a seriously cracked and compromised foundation. If all went to hell in a handbasket there, despite all of the safety measures in place, the plant would leak some major radiation and quite possibly worse, since it has a fatally flawed foundation.

Many other reactors have this problem, or ones similar. Some are left over from their original design and building, others have occured simply due to the fact that they are aging and can't take the stress anymore. Our nuclear plant fleet is twenty five years old and older. Most plants were only designed for a life cycle of thirty five years, yet there are many plants still in full operation that are forty, even fifty years old.

This is simply a catastrophe waiting to happen, and when it does it will be big, despite all of the safety features.

could have happened. Entergy was just about getting carte blanche to do what they please, but having recently inspected structures bite the dirt seems to have put the brakes on. The SCRAM is icing on the cake. I live about 10 miles from the thing and every time I hear a siren I wonder if this is "it." (FYI, you really can't tell the difference between the town fire siren and the VY siren. I figure the only way I'll know is if the cats start to glow in the dark.)

We're having a solar energy rally on the 23rd, in Richmond. If you can make it I can give you some time at the mic to tell people what it's like to live near a nuclear power plant.

And to make it worse, you can see it from the hill that Wal-Mart is on. XD

knowledge I have is what I gather from the local paper. There are lots of activists in the Brattleboro area (just north of Vernon where the plant is located) who have studied the workings of VY and would probably be happy to take part. I'm sure you could drum some up if you post on ibrattleboro.com. As for living near the plant, it's like living anywhere else. Most of the time you don't know it's there and for years it seemed to run relatively safely and didn't cause much concern. Unfortunately, it's pretty much lived out its life but Entergy wants to keep it going. Just like the Minneapolis bridge.