Whistle-blower Urges Residents to Sign Petition to Close Oyster Creek

Dennis Zannoni's conscience is clear.

The former longtime resident safety inspector for the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station has no regrets about sounding the alarm several years ago about the oldest nuclear plant in the United States.

"I've come to be known as the Oyster Creek whistle-blower," Zannoni told an audience of about 90 who attended an informational session at the Ocean County Library in Toms River. The event was sponsored by the Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch.

"I never thought of myself as a whistle-blower," Zannoni said. "I was just doing my job.  I've often asked myself why I was removed. The answer has become a little more clear."

For 17 years, Zannoni was the DEP's chief resident inspector for the Oyster Creek plant. When Exelon — the plant's owner — asked for another 20 years to operate the plant on Route 9 in Lacey Township, Zannoni pored over documents that dealt with the aging plant's overall safety and its vulnerability to terrorist attacks.

"I spent five years of my life reviewing these documents," Zannoni said. "Things started to pop out that were troubling. When I was close to making my official decision, all of a sudden I'm moved. They didn't even ask me what were the results of your investigation."

Zannoni, a nuclear engineer, was transferred from his position as site inspector for Oyster Creek to another section in the DEP's Bureau of Nuclear Engineering soon after he made his concerns public.

"The whole process has made me a better person," Zannoni said. "I'm glad I did what I did."

Oyster Creek is roughly the same age and same design as the devastated Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex in Japan. Zannoni said he more concerned about the spent fuel rods stored 100 feet in the air in a containment building at Oyster Creek than he is about the spent rods stored in dry casks on the plant site.

"We know there's a no-fly zone over Disney," he said. "There's no no-fly zone over Oyster Creek."

He urged the audience to sign the Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch's petition to close the Oyster Creek plant now, not eight years from now, when Exelon plans to shut the plant down. The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission relicensed the then-40-year-old plant in April 2009 to operate for another 20 years, much to the dismay of a coalition of citizen groups who opposed the relicensing.

"The most important thing you can do is sign that petition," he said. "When they (NRC and public officials) see the numbers, they will actually do something concrete."

Zannoni has been researching articles dealing with the Japan disaster and how it relates to Oyster Creek.

"Almost all of them say that Oyster Creek is ground zero," he said. "It's the oldest plant. It's on the water. It's the same design as Japan. It makes a big difference. The rest of the world is looking at what you do here."

Some audience members questioned how the plant would withstand a major hurricane or earthquake.

 "The biggest threat to any nuclear plant is the loss of electricity," Zannoni said.

Brick resident Jeff Brown said any actions that would make Oyster Creek safer in the meantime should be taken immediately.

"We know the plant is going to shut in eight years," he said. "We know there is a cutoff date. The question is can we move that date up?"

Security for the spent fuel rods now stored in casks on site should be beefed up, Brown said.

"We have on-site casks out on the tarmac," he said. "A couple of hundred feet from Route 9. It should be at least secured again at a a 9/11 level. We should make them decommission the plant as soon as they close it. These are three things we could push for now."

Michael Morton, senior advocate for Greenpeace, said the organization is launching a nationwide campaign calling on President Barack Obama to shift the $54 billion in federal funds set aside for loan guarantees to construct more nuclear plants to alternative energy technologies.

"We've decided to focus on Oyster Creek because of all the problems the plant has had or could have," he said. "The more people that get involved, the better. We need to start build a group so people will start listening to us again."

Edith Gbur, president of the Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch, said her group wants the plant decommissioned immediately.

"This is a response to what has happened in Japan and how it affects us here," she said. "The Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch is interested in working with any group to shut down Oyster Creek."

New Jersey is seeking to join New York, Vermont and Connecticut in a legal challenge of the NRC's revised "waste confidence rule" that extends the time spent nuclear fuel can be stored on-site at a nuclear power plant from 30 t0 60 years after the plant shuts down operations. State Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Robert Martin has called the revised rule "unacceptable."

The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals has directed lawyers for the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission to provide more information about the "propriety" of re-licensing the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Attorneys for both the NRC and Exelon have until April 4 to respond.

Attorneys for the coalition that opposed Oyster Creek's relicensing — the New Jersey Environmental Federation, The New Jersey chapter of the Sierra Club, the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, the New Jersey Public Interest Research Group and Grandmothers, Mothers and More for Energy Safety — have until April 18 to respond to submission, the court ruled last week.

The Nuclear Information and Resource Service last week launched a campaign for the permanent shutdown of the 23 General Electric Mark I reactors currently operating in the United States. That includes Oyster Creek.