Members of a new group organized locally to oppose nuclear power expansion in the Tennessee Valley plan to take their concerns to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission hearing in Scottsboro, Ala., on April 3.
The group, the Bellefonte Efficiency & Sustainability Team, or BEST, also hopes to organize additional local and regional opposition to the proposed licensing of reactors to be built at the never-finished Bellefonte Nuclear Plant in Hollywood, Ala., near Scottsboro, Ala.
“We are gravely concerned about the legacy nuclear reactors would leave to our children and their children,” BEST co-founder Bill Reynolds, of Chattanooga, said in a statement.
The group has written a letter to the NRC asking the federal nuclear regulator to suspend Tennessee Valley Authority’s application.
The letter says TVA’s application is incomplete, omitting information the agency claims is proprietary, said Crossville, Tenn., resident Louise Gorenflo, signer of the Feb. 29 letter. The omissions make it hard for the public to provide adequate input at the upcoming hearing, she said.
TVA spokesman John Moulton said TVA operates its nuclear plants safely. He also said power demand in the region is growing at about 2 percent a year so TVA will need new generating units along with its current initiatives to reduce energy use through efficiency and conservation.
“Both the licensing process and environmental reviews for a new nuclear plant at Bellefonte are just beginning, and (the reviews) will include numerous opportunities for the public and environmental groups to voice their opinions such as those voiced by this group,” he said.
BEST, formed in February, now has about 20 members and is a chapter of the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, said Ms. Gorenflo. The Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League was founded in 1984 in opposition to a plan then to bring nuclear waste to the Eastern part of the United States, according to league spokesman Louis Zeller.
Mr. Zeller said NRC and TVA should consider safer and more economical options to generate power, and he criticized TVA’s application now before the NRC.
“There are pieces missing to the puzzle,” he said of the application. “Why would TVA have proprietary concerns when there is no competition for power generation in the region?”
Ms. Gorenflo said she also is very concerned with the “huge” cost of the proposed reactors.
“We have to use the energy we’re generating now more wisely,” she said. “It’s done in other parts of the country, but nobody’s pushing TVA.”
After BEST wrote the NRC calling for the suspension of TVA’s license application, TVA wrote its own letter to NRC on March 12, according to BEST officials. A response is expected from NRC at the April meeting, they said.
TVA applied for a license to build two new reactors at Bellefonte in October. The NRC accepted the application on Jan. 28.
Pam Sohn has been reporting or editing Chattanooga news for 25 years. A Walden’s Ridge native, she began her journalism career with a 10-year stint at the Anniston (Ala.) Star. She came to the Chattanooga Times Free Press in 1999 after working at the Chattanooga Times for 14 years. She has been a city editor, Sunday editor, wire editor, projects team leader and assistant lifestyle editor. As a reporter, she also has covered the police, ...
