Vermont Yankee New York Times
September 14, 2005
By Matthew L. Wald

WASHINGTON, Sept. 13 - A proposed agreement among nine Northeast states to cap greenhouse gas emissions from power plants casts a new light on arguments in New Jersey and Vermont about whether the licenses of two aging nuclear plants should be extended.

Community groups in both states are opposing the extensions of the licenses beyond their 40-year terms, but environmentalists are generally supportive of the proposed agreement among the governors to reduce these greenhouse gases, which contribute to global climate change. Shutting down the two reactors would mean immediate, substantial increases in the emissions, because it would increase reliance on fossil fuel plants, probably tripling emissions in Vermont and doubling them in New Jersey.

"I think the environmental community is confused right now in terms of where they want to go," said Richard A. Valentinetti, director of Vermont's air quality program, who has been deeply involved in drafting the nine-state agreement. "Obviously there's some real polarization."

Some environmentalists say the goals can be met even without the two nuclear plants, Vermont Yankee and Oyster Creek, and without other nuclear plants whose licenses will expire in the next few years.

"We just have to bust the myth that we need to be using more energy," said Rob Sargent, senior energy policy analyst for the State Public Interest Research Groups, a nonprofit consumer organization. The New Jersey affiliate of his group is a leading voice against Oyster Creek, the nation's oldest commercial nuclear plant. Mr. Sargent said that rising electricity prices would make many new energy-saving technologies practical, but he acknowledged that simply saving money would not be enough to reduce power consumption by the required amount.

Engineers and environmental experts have long predicted that planners would eventually have to choose between greater greenhouse gas emissions and heavier reliance on nuclear power. The debate has been mostly hypothetical, since nobody in the United States has ordered a new nuclear plant since the 1970's, long before global climate change was widely perceived as an issue. It was also hypothetical because there were no limits on carbon dioxide emissions in the United States.

Suddenly, both parts of the question are changing. The governors are proposing a cap on emissions, and renewal of power plant licenses has become imminent.

Oyster Creek opened near Egg Harbor, N.J., in 1969 and its license expires in 2009. A little over half the electricity produced in New Jersey comes from nuclear power, and Oyster Creek alone produces about 9 percent; in 2004 it generated 27.1 million megawatt hours.

In December 2004, the New Jersey Public Interest Research Group came out against a license extension. It said that the plant was designed to last 40 years, and that the decision by Exelon, Oyster Creek's owner, to seek a license extension was "ignoring public safety."

The plant is in a rapidly growing part of the state, the group noted, and it argued that in an emergency evacuation would be impractical.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced on Monday that it had evaluated the application by Exelon for a license extension, and had decided that it merited review.

Vermont Yankee, in Vernon, near the border with Massachusetts and New Hampshire, began commercial operation in November 1972, and its license expires in March 2012. Its capacity is 535 megawatts. In 2004 the reactor produced 3.9 million megawatt hours, which was about 71 percent of the electricity produced in the state. (That production was only about one-third of the electricity consumed in the state, because Vermont is a chronic importer of power.)

Just how much carbon dioxide the two reactors are saving depends on what the replacement power source would be. A megawatt-hour from a coal plant produces about one ton of carbon dioxide. In the long run, power companies could build natural gas plants, which produce only about half a ton per megawatt hour.

The governors' draft agreement gives Vermont a limit of 1.35 million tons of carbon dioxide, approximately equal to its current emissions. But if the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant's output were replaced with coal, Vermont's emissions would increase by nearly four million tons. If natural gas were used, the increase would still be nearly two million tons.

The agreement gives New Jersey a cap of 23 million tons, but if Oyster Creek's output was replaced with coal, the state's output of carbon dioxide would more than double.

Some environmentalists say that greenhouse emissions should be cut by switching to "renewable" fuels, including wind, solar and hydroelectric. Wind-produced power, in fact, is growing rapidly, but over all, electricity from renewable sources in 2004 was about 1 percent lower than in 2003, mostly because of less hydroelectric production. Environmentalists propose reducing carbon dioxide output by building wind turbines. But utility experts say that the amount of wind that a utility grid can tolerate is limited, because wind is intermittent and often unpredictable. In fact, the "capacity factor" of a wind turbine, defined as the amount of power actually produced in a year, compared with the amount that would result from around-the-clock generation, is about 33 percent.

In addition to Vermont and New Jersey, the seven other states in the accord are New York, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island.

Over the past 32 years Vermont Yankee has safely operated while avoiding the emission of over 100 million tons of carbon pollution into the atmosphere. Its continued operation also eliminates the need for building polluting fossil fired plants that would increase greenhouse gas emissions.

The ongoing operation of Vermont Yankee will continue to benefit our region and help achieve air quality goals.

Under the terms of a 10-year power contract signed by Entergy and VT utilities at the time of the purchase of VY by Entergy in 2002, the VT Department of Public Service estimates that VT customers will save about $250 million below regional market prices by 2012.