Report: Entergy’s corporate culture led to recent problems at Vermont Yankee

[madokie]

The Public Oversight Panel, a group of nuclear experts that reports to the Legislature, has determined that Entergy Corp.’s misstatements about underground pipes carrying radioactive waste at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon came out of a corporate culture that perpetuated inaccuracies.

Panel member Arnie Gundersen says at one point, incorrect statements from Entergy may have been used to mislead the public.

The panel issued a supplemental report on the reliability of the plant Tuesday, and listed three main “concerns,” including “misleading information,” Entergy officials’ unquestioning attitude about the maintenance and conditions at the plant and the Louisiana-based corporation’s lack of investment in “non-safety” systems before problems surface.

In January, Entergy officials discovered tritiated water leaking from underground pipes at the plant. Soon after, the Legislature asked the panel to re-evaluate its March 2009 report on the reliability of the 38-year-old nuclear power plant located on the banks of the Connecticut River in light of new revelations that the pipes did in fact exist – and that they were also leaking water contaminated with radioactive isotopes of cesium, cobalt and strontium.

http://vtdigger.org/2010/07/20/report-entergys-corporate-culture-led-to-recent-problems-at-vermont-yankee/

[bananas]

1. Good article

Vermont Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin, a Democratic candidate for governor, delivered a blunt analysis of the panel’s assessment of Entergy’s misstatements.

“There is a systemic history within the organization (Entergy) of not telling the truth when the truth must be told,” Shumlin said.

True to form, Entergy's response is to not tell the truth:

“Entergy is trying to spin the report, and saying there was no deliberate attempt to deceive,” Gundersen said. “That’s an inaccurate reading of the report.”

[madokie]

2. Thats pretty much what I've been saying all along

the industry can't be trusted to be honest with us. Funny thing is it's always been this way. Its as if the people in the know are afraid of telling us the truth because they know that if the average person knew just how dangerous these things are that we'd not allow any anywhere near any of us. Nothing I hate worse than a liar, period, and theirs many of us out there too. After Chernobyl and TMI many of us thought we were finished with having to fight this battle but that wasn't to be as the nuke industry has or are attempting to raise their ugly heads again. We can get there without all this worry, we don't have to have nuclear power plants and we don't have to be burning our coal as we do today either. Theres better ways to extract the energy from carbon based material and always have been but somewhere along the line the decision was made to do it the easiest way, direct burn rather than gasify.