Student/faculty report recommends nuclear power plant protections.
By: Jeff Milgram
A task force made up of Princeton University faculty and students will issue a report today on ways to protect three South Jersey nuclear power plants from a terrorist attack.
The 150-page report calls for:
• Structurally strengthening the plants to withstand a Sept. 11-type terrorist attack using airplanes;
• Resuming mock terrorist attacks at nuclear plants, which had been suspended in 1998, to test security;
• Increasing the number, training and pay of the private security guards at the three facilities in Lower Alloways Creek Township in Salem County, Salem units 1 and 2 and Hope Creek;
• More stringent screening of guards and not allowing them to work until their background checks are completed;
• Advanced distribution of potassium iodide tablets, which would keep radioactive materials from concentrating in the thyroid in the event of a nuclear release, to all residents within 50 miles; and
• Shifting most of the spent fuel rods from storage pools at the reactors into 150 safer dry storage casks near the reactors.
The report will be made public during a press conference at 11 a.m. in the State House.
The report was supervised by Professor Frank von Hippel, a physicist and nuclear policy analyst, and Zia Mian, a Pakistani physicist who is a lecturer at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.
The students interviewed plant officials, but never went inside the facilities, Professor von Hippel said.
The report "looked at a large set of vulnerabilities, some specific to Salem, some general," Dr. Mian said.
The report was commissioned by the Coalition for Peace Action, and was prepared by the students as part of the university’s Community Based Learning Initiative project. The project gives students the opportunity to do research on real-life issues if they can find a group to sponsor the research.
"The coalition had been a customer last year," Professor von Hippel said. The coalition commissioned a study on child-proofing guns last year, he said.
"Since 9/11, with the danger of ‘dirty’ bombs and nuclear reactor terrorism, we thought this was an important issue," the Rev. Bob Moore, executive director of the coalition, said. "We told them, ‘We want you to propose some solutions.’ "
The report found that Nuclear Regulatory Commission security standards are outdated. "It used to be three attackers with military training or a truck bomb like the World Trade Center" attack in 1993, Dr. Mian said.
"That’s a long way from Sept. 11," said Dr. Mian, the author of several books and articles on the nuclear danger in Pakistan and South Asia. "It should be able to withstand a Sept. 11th attack."
In their research, the students found that 46 percent of American nuclear power plants failed mock terrorist attacks designed to test their ability to meet the NRC standards. Then, the mock attacks were stopped in 1998, he said.
The students also looked at the danger of airplane attacks like those of Sept. 11, and the possibility of shattering the concrete around the nuclear core and causing a meltdown.
"There’s no guarantee it would … cause a meltdown," Dr. Mian said. "But there’s no guarantee it wouldn’t."
On Wednesday, the eve of the Moscow-St. Petersburg summit between President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the coalition will hold several activities that will support reduction of the nuclear arsenals of both countries.
From 4:30 to 5:30 p.m., supporters of the coalition will hold up posters to be seen by drivers entering and leaving Princeton near the intersection of Route 206 and Nassau Street. They also will distribute fliers to motorists and pedestrians.
At 5:30 p.m., there will be a rally on the lawn in front of Princeton Borough Hall.