A panel made up of local stakeholders is set to meet for the first time this week to discuss the decommissioning of Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station.
The Community Advisory Panel (CAP) — organized by TMI-2 Solutions, the EnergySolutions subsidiary responsible for dismantling Three Mile Island — will meet virtually on Wednesday. They’ll meet at minimum twice a year, according to the group’s charter.
The CAP, established after the Nuclear Regulatory Commission approved in December the Dauphin County, Pa. plant’s license transfer to EnergySolutions from Exelon, is designed to “engage the local community and to facilitate communications” about decommissioning, the charter said. TMI-2 Solutions will provide quarterly progress reports to the panel for discussion.
Eric Epstein, chair of nuclear watchdog group Three Mile Island Alert, argued that the panel lacks teeth. In a statement provided to Weapons Complex Morning Briefing via email Monday, Epstein said that the advisory group “is an extension of the company, which funds, manages and staffs the panel.” The watchdog group was invited to serve on the panel but refused the statement said.
The panel’s first meeting comes as the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and the Susquehanna River Basin Commission are reviewing allegations from Three Mile Island Alert that the plant’s sale violates a rule in the 1972 Clean Water Act that would require EnergySolutions and Exelon to get state permission to ignore water quality standards for decommissioning.
By deadline Tuesday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, neither organization has said whether there were any water-related violations connected with the decommissioning process.
EnergySolutions first announced their intention to purchase Three Mile Island in 2019. The plant’s Unit 2 reactor shut down in 1979 after a partial core meltdown.
