Nuclear officials return to talk about Palisades

Allegan County —

Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials are returning to South Haven Wednesday for an open house and public meeting on the performance of the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant. This is the second time in three weeks federal officials have led meetings about the plant’s operation.

The informal open house is 5:30-6:30 p.m. and the meeting is 6:30-8:30 p.m. at the Beach Haven Event Center, 10420 M-140 in South Haven.

The meeting includes a discussion between plant representatives and NRC officials about the site’s 2011 performance. A public question period follows.

“The NRC continually reviews the performance of the Palisades plant and the nation’s other commercial nuclear power facilities,” said NRC Acting Region III Administrator Cynthia Pederson. “This meeting allows us to discuss our annual assessment of safety performance with members of the local community. The goal of this open house is to explain how the NRC works to protect people and the environment and answer questions from residents about nuclear regulation.”

NRC officials also met with the public Feb. 29 to discuss safety at the plant at 27780 Blue Star Highway in Covert Township. It is owned by Entergy and provides about 18 percent of the power for Consumers Energy. It began operation in 1971. Its license expires in 2031.

Parts of Allegan County are within a 10-mile-radius Emergency Planning Zone — the prime area where people could be effected by a radiation leak from the plant and evacuations would be mostly likely in an emergency.

The plant was listed among the five lowest-performing plants of the nation’s 104 commercial reactors.

The facility’s status was downgraded last month as the result of an NRC investigation of an electrical fault at the site in September. The incident resulted in a reactor trip and the loss of half of the control room indicators. Radioactive steam was released into the environment, though the radiation levels were within acceptable levels.