The company that owns Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant wants to increase the plant's output by 20 percent.
The Louisiana-based Entergy corporation has asked Vermont and Federal regulators for permission.
The 32 year old plant is located just across the Connecticut River from Hinsdale, New Hampshire.
And anti-nuclear activists on both sides of the Connecticut want the proposed increase stopped.
Correspondent Eesha Williams files this report.
Entergy applied for the 20 percent power increase, for Vermont Yankee last year.
Also in 2003, during town meeting season, half a dozen towns near the plant announced they had other plans.
They sent a message to the legislature: close Vermont Yankee when the plant?s license expires in 2012.
Last week, some of those opponents made the trip to Montpelier to repeat that demand.
CLIP ONE: (protesters chanting anti-nuclear slogans)
WILLIAMS:
Student Tara Elliott came from Keene High School to protest in the cold and rain against Entergy?s proposal.
CLIP TWO:
I just think that nuclear power as a whole should be made history. I don?t believe in it. We don?t know what we?re going to do with the waste. We are creating a problem that we don?t know how to deal with. I thought the best way to speak my voice in terms of this problem was to get involved locally. So that?s why I came here.
WILLIAMS:
Margaret Ratheau [ra TOE] of Marlboro, Vermont works in Brattleboro, just a few miles from the nuclear plant.
She has opposed Vermont Yankee from the day it opened.
CLIP THREE:
When I took my kids 30 years ago to protest, it was about, ?What are we going to do with the waste?? ? I fear some kind of an accident. I feel this plant is not prepared to take on this kind of an uprate.
WILLIAMS:
Brendan Hoffman is a spokesman for Public Citizen in Washington, D.C.
He says Margaret Ratheau?s fears may be justified.
CLIP 7
According to a study by the United States Department of Energy (for) the House of Representatives in 1982 if there were a catastrophic accident at Vermont Yankee there would be at least 7,000 fatalities within the first year after the accident.
WILLIAMS:
Hoffan said an uprate would increase the chances of such an accident at Vermont Yankee.
Vermont Yankee went on line in 1972. Since then, the 540 megawatt plant has provided electricity to thousands of homes and businesses.
The power increase, or uprate, would add another 110 megawatts.
The plant?s opponents point out that if regulators approve the uprate, Vermont Yankee would be the oldest plant in the nation to increase power by 20 percent.
But Entergy spokesman Brian Cosgrove defends the proposal.
He told Vermont Public Radio that the state board will review the uprate for its economic merits.
After that the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission or NRC will review it for safety.
CLIP FOUR:
They look at about 20 different areas of the plant. It?s a 5,500 hour process. It takes up to a year. If they go through it and find it?s a good proposal and they approve it, then there?s a second step, a second, independent assessment of our proposal. They do a fully independent assessment of the NRC?s work. So there?s a real double and triple check and balance in that system.
WILLIAMS:
NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said his agency will perform a rigorous inspection at Vermont Yankee.
CLIP SIX:
We want to be as thorough and detailed as we can when we?re reviewing this application. We know there is a tremendous amount of public interest in this. Our goal here is to be very transparent ? everybody can know exactly what?s going on.
WILLIAMS:
Opponents of the plant upgrade want more.
They are calling for an independent safety assessment like the one performed at the Maine Yankee nuclear power plant in 1997.
The Maine Yankee inspection found so many safety problems the plant?s owner found it cheaper to close the plant than to fix them all.
The Vermont Public Service Board says it plans to issue its decision on the whether the uprate can go ahead next week.
For NHPR News this is Eesha Williams in Brattleboro.
