Local officials in New Jersey blocked Holtec from expanding spent fuel storage space for the shuttered Oyster Creek power plant in part because the company “mischaracterized” the facility as a temporary structure, court papers filed Monday show.
“Temporary in nuclear terms means decades, not months or even years,” the Township of Lacey Planning Board wrote Monday in its opposition to a preliminary injunction Holtec sought earlier this month, when it sued the board and the township. “Nothing about these storage facilities is “temporary” in any land use sense of the word [so] the board – judging the case by land use standards and not nuclear standards – concluded that the assertion that they are temporary structures is a misrepresentation.”
For that reason and others, Lacey officials said again after a summer of headbutting with Holtec, the township voted to strike down this part of Holtec’s decommissioning plan for the old single-reactor plant. In their Monday filings, the township and board denied the vote was motivated by fear of radioactive contamination.
Holtec sued the board and Lacey Township Sept. 16 in the U.S. District Court for New Jersey in Trenton. The company and the locals have already clashed in state court this year. In the federal suit, Holtec argued that the Planning Board rejected the proposed storage expansion solely over concerns about radiological safety — which is the jurisdiction of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), not a local planning board.
The board and the township, which filed separate oppositions to Holtec’s motion on Monday, said their objections were largely for administrative reasons, including the company’s alleged failure to obtain the proper permits before building a Cask Transfer Pit at its Ocean County site.
The township did not respond to requests for comment on its Monday filing.
Holtec must respond to the township’s filing by Wednesday.
