Activists raise nuclear energy concerns

By Linda Morale, Miami Herald

As South Miami residents along the path of a proposed high-power line prepare for battle against utility giant Florida Power & Light, activists are seeking allies with a strategy from the '60s: an old-fashioned teach-in.

Citizens Allied for Safe Energy, or CASE, held an educational forum last week at a town hall meeting held in South Miami's commission chamber.

The discussion focused on the health, environmental and economic impact of FPL's plans to build two new reactors at Turkey Point and install a 230-kv overhead transmission line along nearly 18 miles of U.S. 1 to connect Turkey Point to a substation in downtown Miami.
FPL -- which puts the project's price tag at $13 billion to $18 billion -- disagrees with much of what was said at the CASE meeting.

``Nuclear generation is part of an overall program to make our generation system smarter, greener and more efficient,'' said Mayco Villafaña, an FPL spokesman. ``Nuclear energy is essential to meeting our energy needs in the future with a resource that is always available.''

Florida International University biologist Philip Stoddard opened the meeting with an overview of studies that he said have found a possible link between proximity to high-voltage lines and diseases such as childhood leukemia and Alzheimer's disease.

``Risk of leukemia living near power lines: one in 800,'' he told the near-capacity crowd, citing World Health Organization, or WHO, and Centers for Disease Control data. That's double the risk of people who are not in proximity to the transmission lines.

A 2008 study in the Journal of Carcinogenesis found that exposure to strong magnetic fields boosted cancer rates in lab rats by 45 percent.

Stoddard also presented a timeline of problems at Turkey Point drawn from decades of news articles and filings with the courts and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The list cites a string of fines -- as high as $25 million -- FPL has incurred for issues including faulty maintenance of backup water pumps, boric acid buildup on a reactor head and problems with the core cooling system.

However, a report to the NRC doesn't necessarily mean that safety is being compromised, said Mitch Singer, spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group. ``Anything is reported even if it doesn't have any impact on the safe operation of a plant,''

Singer said Saturday, adding that, for example, a water pump failure would be reported even if a second or third backup pump took over.

Laura Reynolds of the Tropical Audubon Society and Dawn Shirreffs of Clean Water Action spoke about the project's potential effects on Everglades restoration efforts and the area's fresh water supply.

Reynolds said an expanded Turkey Point, which would need millions of gallons of water daily to help cool reactors, would compete with efforts to rehydrate the Everglades.

``There's a potential loss of reuse water of 90 million gallons a day,'' Reynolds said.

Villafaña has disputed that claim. ``The new units would be designed to recycle waste water that would otherwise not be reused,'' he said earlier this fall.

Shirreffs also expressed concern about FPL's plan to dig up tons of earth and rock west of Turkey Point to elevate the new reactors about 25 feet.

``It will contribute to saltwater intrusion that's already happening,'' she said. ``Water quality would decline.''

Villafaña has said there is evidence that saltwater intrusion was occurring before the utility built its plant in the 1970s. ``The closest county drinking water well is approximately six miles from our site and there is no evidence whatsoever that water from the cooling canals has reached either of these sources,'' he said.

Some of the plant's fuel waste is stored in a series of pools. A flood in the area could push that waste inland, said National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration fishery scientist Eric Prince.

Shrimp, lobsters and stone crabs living in the bay are an important part of the local economy. But, Prince said, if new reactors will use mostly bay water for cooling, pumps could kill many of those animals' larvae. ``It makes me very uneasy as a citizen,'' he added.

FPL says Prince's concern is unfounded because the wells drawing in seawater will do so slowly and from 40 feet under the surface.

``This very low velocity is not expected to impact even small planktonic marine organisms,'' Villafaña said.

In 2006, state lawmakers passed a law that allows utilities to increase customers' bills to pay for future projects. ``It shifts the liability to you,'' Southern Alliance for Clean Energy attorney George Cavros told the audience.

He and FIU sociocultural studies professor Jerry Brown called nuclear energy ``the most expensive form of energy known.'' Both decried the idea of rate payers shouldering the cost of a project that hasn't been built.

Cavros said that, with a state push to get 20 percent of its energy from renewable sources and a recent drop in Florida's population, the plant wouldn't be needed.

Despite some recent customer losses, FPL believes growth will resume when the economy recovers, Villafaña said. He cited the utility's upcoming solar and hybrid plants in DeSoto and Martin counties as examples of FPL's ventures into renewable power.

The Public Service Commission, Villafaña added, reviews the project's cost annually to make sure the process is working for consumers.

For more information, CASE's website is www.case-fl.org; FPL's is www.fpl.com.

BY LAURA MORALES - Miami Herald
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