The blackout of August 2003 was a major wake-up call. In the aftermath of the August 14th blackout, we have learned that our national antiquated power-distribution system has long been hindered by shoddy equipment and outmoded technology, making it an accident waiting to happen. Energy experts agreed that the blackout was not triggered by a lack of electric power capacity.

The blackout also illustrates just how low Entergy is willing to stoop in their effort to dupe the public. Shamelessly, Entergy continues to make the false claim that the blackout justifies the need for Indian Point’s power. Nothing could be further from the truth! Power was restored to metropolitan area residents days before the Indian Point nuclear power plant began to generate electricity. The blackout also sheds light on Indian Point’s vulnerability to a scenario involving loss of offsite power and the implications for plant safety systems.

Here are the Facts:

• The blackout was caused by an antiquated electricity transmission system. This was not a supply problem!

• Indian Point, like all commercial nuclear reactors, depends on electricity to produce electricity.

• Indian Point is vulnerable to loss of offsite power, which compromises the plants’ critical emergency cooling systems for the nuclear fuel in the reactor core and equipment in the control room. In the event that the limited onsite back-up power fails, the nuclear fuel could dangerously overheat and control room equipment could malfunction triggering a catastrophic release of radiation.

• Following grid failure and blackout, Indian Point must draw power from offsite to have the necessary juice to power up both reactors. Onsite power is not significant enough to perform this task on its own. As a result, Indian Point will always be the last of the power plants to resume operation and produce electricity.

• Electric service was returned to all metropolitan area residents before IP-2 came back on line (IP-3 is expected to be back in operation by the end of the week).

• Energy conservation and efficiency measures play an important role in reducing the strain on the transmission grid and avoid the possibility of another blackout. At a press conference on August 16th, Gov. Pataki stated, “conservation reduced demand by 2500 MWs, the equivalent of three nuclear power plants.” This is an amazing accomplishment given the unexpected situation. It emphasizes the need for greater conservation and efficiency measures right now. With a strong conservation and efficiency plan in place, a consistent reduction in consumption can be achieved in a manner that does not impose on people’s lifestyles.

Indian Point Needs Electricity to Produce Electricity and Maintain Key Cooling Systems

To produce electricity and to ensure safe operation, the Indian Point nuclear power plant needs to draw electricity from offsite...through the grid. As a result of the blackout and grid failure, all of New York’s nuclear power reactors, including Indian Point 2 and 3, were shut down to avoid equipment damage caused by power surges.

Event reports on the NRC website confirm that all New York reactors lost offsite power and shut down on Thursday. Only three other commercial power reactors had to shut down due to the blackout (Oyster Creek in NJ, Perry in OH, and Fermi in MI).

To power up the reactors at unit 2 and 3, Indian Point will need to draw electricity from the grid. Indian Point lacks "black start" capability (the ability to start up without electricity from the grid). In contrast, hydro and fossil fuel sources can start up soon after a total collapse of the grid and produce electricity to be sent into the grid. However, in all grid failure and blackout situations, it will take Indian Point days before it will be producing electricity that will be distributed into the grid. By then, residents in the NYC metropolitan area will have had service returned to them. So, just how reliable and vital is Indian Point's electricity? With Indian Point offline, there is 13,100 MWs available to NYC, which has a peak demand for this summer and next of 11,000 MWs. The 2,000 MWs of surplus power available to NYC can be further bolstered through the deployment of conservation and efficiency measures, and the ability to impact power from other areas.

Loss of Offsite Electricity is a Leading Risk Contributor to Core Damage Frequency

Unlike conventional power sources (thermal power units, or hydroelectric dams), nuclear power plants, like Indian Point, have long term shutdown cooling requirements that consume power and have stringent voltage and frequency limitations (imposed to assure the operability of critical emergency cooling systems).

A key difference between nuclear and conventional power plants is the heat that must be removed following a full plant trip. All thermal power plants that are run at elevated temperatures require time to shut off the heat source, (be it from oil or coal combustion) and to cool down metal components without damaging boiler tubes or furnace walls. A nuclear reactor, even with the chain reaction completely shut down, will generate significant heat from fission product decay that persists on a logarithmic time scale.

A reliable means of long-term decay heat removal is required in order to prevent long term overheating of the reactor fuel elements. Typically the decay heat removal process is dependent on availability of a long-term stable source of electric power – either from the grid or from on-site power sources.
A loss of offsite power causes the sudden interruption of normal power to all in-plant loads such as pumps, and for most reactor types causes the control rods to insert independent of any control or protective system actions. All nuclear power plants are designed to cope with loss of offsite power by tripping the reactor and turbine, attempting to switch to an alternate offsite power source, and if this fails, starting emergency onsite diesel generators to provide heat removal until normal power is restored. The diesel generators must have sufficient fuel to run for seven days. The generators are tested frequently because if they were to fail, leading to a complete blackout at a nuclear plant, the nuclear fuel or control room equipment could overheat dangerously.

What if terrorists targeted transmission lines feeding into the Indian Point site, eliminating the off-site power supply to the plant, and simultaneously destroyed the onsite emergency power generators? This could ultimately trigger a catastrophic release of radiation which would lead to hundreds of thousands of deaths and injuries as well as billions of dollars in loss of property.
Sudden reliance on backup diesel generators is less than reassuring, especially considering that there have been 15 instances in the past 12 months in which emergency generators have either malfunctioned or failed to operate at all, in certain cases leading to a plant shutdown; on several occasions all backup generators failed at once. One, Fermi, located uncomfortably close to Detroit, found all four of its backup generators simultaneously inoperable on February 1 of this year. While a plant can last between two and eight hours without backup generators before melting down, Detroit may go through the weekend before seeing full power returned, rendering the concept of such a blackout leading to a nuclear meltdown not at all beyond imagination or possibility.

And then there is the unforeseeable. Sometimes blackouts are unpredictable. What if this blackout had occurred during a refueling outage at Indian Point? Such a scenario would seriously challenge the cooling of the irradiated ("spent") fuel during its transfer from the reactor to storage, and would compromise the ability to keep the fuel in the pool cool.

In conclusion, there are many lessons learned by last week’s blackout. Most salient of these lessons are: 1) that we can live in a world without Indian Point; 2) a strong energy conservation and efficiency program should be developed to help to reduce the strain on the electricity grid; and 3) nuclear safety at Indian Point is jeopardized by loss of offsite power.