To: john.fialka@wsj.com
From: "Russell D. Hoffman" <rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com>
Subject: NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS AS WEAPONS FOR THE ENEMY: AN UNRECOGNIZED MILITARY PERIL
Dear Mr. Fialka,

I saw your article in WSJ (shown below).  Unmentioned in it is the concept that the reactors should be shut down because they are indefensible against any determined terrorist attack, or because they create more problems (nuclear waste) than they solve (they put electrons in wires, that's all).

Also unmentioned are the problems with embrittlement and aging, as exemplified by Davis-Besse (and the whole space shuttle fleet) recently.  Maybe the reactors used to be protected against some earthquakes, but most of them are so old, they probably can't withstand half what they were designed for.  Ditto for damage from grenades, missiles, tornadoes, etc..  Aging and embrittlement are all "force multipliers" for these risks.

I hope you will research the matter more carefully and do a more complete followup soon.  A suggested title might be, "Nuclear Power plants deemed unsafe despite repeated hollow industry, government denials."

Who deemed them unsafe?  Well, for example, Ramberg did, nearly 20 years ago.  Nothing's changed except the explosives have gotten bigger and so have the planes, and the plants have gotten older.  Oh, and the terrorists have proven their willingness to kill thousands.

Sincerely,

Russell Hoffman
Carlsbad, CA

http://www.animatedsoftware.com/environm/onofre/index.htm

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Book reference:

NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS AS WEAPONS FOR THE ENEMY: AN UNRECOGNIZED MILITARY PERIL, by Bennett Ramberg, University of California Press, Studies in International and Strategic Affairs, William Potter, Editor, Center for International and Strategic Affairs, University of California, Los Angeles, CA (“Introduction to the Paperback Edition” Copyright 1984 by the Regents of the University of California). D.C. Heath and Co., 1980, 1984.

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From:
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/0,,SB1025641801873421800,00.html

U.S. Nuclear Plants Are Feeling
Post-Sept. 11 Gaps in Security
As Washington, Industry Debate Scenarios,
Owners Rely on Their Own Ad Hoc Shields By JOHN J. FIALKA
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL


PEACH BOTTOM TOWNSHIP, Pa. -- At the sprawling nuclear-power facility here, 65 miles southwest of Philadelphia, new signs posted in the Susquehanna River warn boaters to stay away. A former parking lot has been converted into a winding driveway that forces cars and trucks to slow as they approach the plant. The National Guard and state-police units that Pennsylvania sent to protect the plant after Sept. 11 are still around.

Inside, at the end of his daily shift, security guard Jeff Johnson, a 35-year-old ex-Marine, sits down to play a serious board game that he says is "like chess." It's supposed to hone the ability of plant guards to assess and defend against an attack. It has red markers that represent terrorists and yellow markers that represent security guards, and a multilevel board that shows the floor plan of the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station.

The game, the signs in the river and the curving driveway are among the ad hoc measures that owners of the 103 commercial nuclear-power reactors operating in the U.S. have been forced to take to deal with the threat of terrorist attacks since Sept. 11. They have hired more guards and moved security devices and patrols out beyond their usual perimeters. They have bought tons of so-called Jersey barriers, or large cement curbs, to keep vehicles from ramming through fences and gates. They have installed portable lights and cut down trees to give guards better firing angles.

The U.S. has made broad changes in the way it monitors air travelers and polices its borders. But there is no unified plan to improve security at nuclear-power plants, which provide 20% of the country's electricity and could unleash far-reaching safety and health problems if damaged. Instead, there are disagreements about nearly every aspect of nuclear-plant security.

The Nuclear Energy Institute, which represents the industry, says it is better protected than most of the nation's commercial infrastructure. The industry is resisting efforts to federalize the security force at plants. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which regulates the industry, wants to upgrade plant security, but it needs help from Congress, where there are deep, partisan splits over legal changes that might help. The White House's Office of Homeland Defense is studying the matter, but it doesn't expect to have a plan until October.

Some basic questions about the government's role in safeguarding these sensitive sites remain unanswered. "Where are the lines?" asks Roy P. Zimmerman, director of the NRC's Office of Nuclear Security and Incident Response, set up in April. "Where is it that the utility has responsibility, and where is ... the responsibility for various levels of government?"

Tom Ridge, the head of President Bush's Homeland Security Office, said recently that he plans to give the president a "national strategy" on how to deal with the security vulnerabilities of U.S. industries this month and a more-detailed plan later.

An official in Mr. Ridge's office explained that the more-detailed plan expected by October will give plant owners a better sense of what they should do and what government help to expect at various points in a new four-stage terrorist alert system the office is developing. The plants remain on the high-alert status set by the NRC after Sept. 11. Meanwhile, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is worried that some kind of terrorist attack could happen to mar July 4 celebrations.

Assessing Vulnerability

Amid the debates, nuclear-plant owners are working with the NRC to wrestle with such questions as: What is the real vulnerability of nuclear plants? How does the industry deal with local laws that limit the use of weapons? What type of attack might terrorists mount and what size force would be needed to deal with it? Some of the answers are unsettling.

Peter Stockton, a former security analyst for the Energy Department who currently works for the Project on Government Oversight, a Washington advocacy group, recalls an NRC exercise several years ago in which a team playing enemy attackers got into a nuclear facility, planted mock explosives and then left without being detected. David N. Orrik, a former Navy SEAL who runs such tests for the NRC, recently told a House Commerce subcommittee that in 81 tests the NRC has staged since 1991, attackers in 37 got to parts of the plant where a real act of sabotage could have led "in many cases to a probable radioactive release." He said the industry's 46% failure rate hadn't improved before Sept. 11. The tests were canceled after that date because they would have interfered with the high-alert status of the guards.

"The facts speak for themselves," says Senate Majority Whip Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat. "You're talking about a 50% failure rate."

Richard A. Meserve, the NRC's chairman, says the results of the agency's tests overstate the failure rate because the attackers have far more knowledge of a plant's defenses than a real attacking force would. The tests, he said, also don't take into account many actions that plant engineers can take to nullify or minimize the results of an act of sabotage. For example, officials at Peach Bottom say they could minimize the damage from some types of attack by performing a "scram," which shuts down the reactors within five seconds.

The NRC acknowledges that different rules and laws around the country are hobbling efforts to ensure uniform protection for plants. The commission has long worried that differing laws in the 31 states that have nuclear plants weaken guards' ability to use their weapons.

At most plants, local laws prevent the use of automatic weapons and shoot-to-kill policies that the mostly private-sector guards have at nuclear-weapons facilities run by the Department of Energy. In some states, there could be criminal liability if guards shoot to protect private property. In a few states, laws limit guards' firepower to pistols and shotguns.

Some companies also interpret the same laws in different ways. Victor Gilinsky, a former NRC commissioner who began exploring nuclear security in the 1970s, recalls visiting a facility at that time where the company handed out cards reminding guards of their liability if they shoot an intruder. At another, he recalls, the thrust of the training appeared to be "shoot anything that moves." NRC regulators began asking Congress for a uniform federal shoot-to-kill law 15 years ago, with little response from Capitol Hill.

The possibility of aerial attacks raises other defensive problems. Nuclear plants are designed to provide protection against violent storms, earthquakes, equipment malfunctions, operator error and even the crashes of small aircraft. But the NRC fears that their massive containment domes may not be strong enough to withstand the impact of a large, fuel-laden airliner such as those used by the hijackers at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The NRC's Mr. Meserve says the agency has begun a major study of the issue, the details of which are secret.

Several times since Sept. 11, U.S. forces have responded to threats of an air attack -- which proved to be unfounded -- by scrambling fighter aircraft. But the Pentagon has rejected requests made by some outside groups that antiaircraft guns be installed near every reactor, Mr. Meserve says, and the proposal doesn't interest the NRC either.

"It raised very serious command-and-control problems," Mr. Meserve says. A facility would need a decision to fire within minutes, too short a time to get a consensus from the White House on shooting down an airliner. Other problems include the danger of accidental misfiring and the possibility that antiaircraft weapons might not deflect a large plane as it nears the plant.

The most fundamental disagreement is over the NRC regulation called the "design basis threat" -- the designation of the size and potency of attacks that plants should be prepared to thwart. The design basis threat drives nearly every security measure at nuclear-power plants, from Mr. Johnson's board game here to the size of weapons, gates, locks and fortifications. The exact numbers are secret, but according to industry and government officials, the pre-Sept. 11 threat was considered to be a few attackers equipped with grenades, explosives, automatic weapons and an insider's knowledge of the plant's defenses. The threat also included a truck bomb carried by a sport utility vehicle.

A new threat assessment, which the NRC has described to power-plant owners in secret orders and advisories, hasn't been fully spelled out yet, but it probably will involve a larger numbers of attackers, the possibility of multiple attacks against one plant and a larger truck bomb, Mr. Meserve says.

Sen. Reid and Rep. Edward J. Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, want to go further and require the NRC to specify a new threat that assumes at least 20 attackers with weapons and training comparable to U.S. Special Forces, with "at least one nuclear engineer" and an insider who has intimate knowledge of the defenses of the plant. The lawmakers argue that the Sept. 11 attack shows terrorists could have those capabilities.

Edward McGaffigan Jr., one of the NRC's five commissioners, says some of this is political hyperbole coming from people who want to see nuclear-power plants shut down. "The nuclear industry, for better or worse, is held to a higher standard, and I think we accept that, but it shouldn't be held to an impossible standard," he says. He argues that defending against the Reid-Markey "threat" would necessitate a force of 11,000 to ensure round-the-clock protection at each of 64 sites where there are power reactors (some sites, like Peach Bottom, have more than one reactor).

Legislative Impasse

There's also a legislative impasse over how to beef up the guard force. The industry and Republicans favor bills that simply correct the differences in how guards can use their guns. But those proposals have been overtaken by Democratic efforts led by Messrs. Reid and Markey to federalize and enlarge the guard force to cope with the larger threat these legislators fear.

Mr. Gilinsky, the former NRC commissioner, responds that guarding plants "is a complicated thing to which there is no easy answer." He worries that a sudden enlargement of the guard force could be needlessly expensive and even dangerous if it shifted the focus of the plant managers and the NRC from running nuclear-power plants safely to managing a large new security bureaucracy.

Aggravating the tension, industry officials complain that their two main congressional antagonists begin with an antinuclear bias. During the past two decades, Rep. Markey has been the nuclear industry's most frequent critic in Congress. Sen. Reid is leading a campaign to prevent the industry from moving nuclear waste to a federal repository in his home state of Nevada.

Another Democrat, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, is pushing to expand the circle of territory the federal government might have evacuated in a nuclear crisis to a radius of 50 miles from the current 10 miles. It's hard to estimate the likely death toll from a nuclear-plant accident because of the large number of variables and the small number of precedents. The most serious U.S. accident, that at Three Mile Island, Pa., in 1979, involved no fatalities. The radioactive release from the facility in Chernobyl, Ukraine, in 1986, caused the deaths of more than 30 workers and radiation injuries to more than 100 others. It required the evacuation and relocation of 116,000 people. About 1,800 cases of thyroid cancer have been found in children who were exposed at the time of the accident.

The U.S. nuclear industry has been lobbying Congress against federalizing the guard force, using a series of newspaper advertisements showing beefy guards carrying semi-automatic rifles. "Tough enough? You bet," says one of the ads.

Here at the Peach Bottom plant, the guards like that image. Posters of the ads hang on a wall of the guard room, where Mr. Johnson and the others play their board game. The guards are employees of Wackenhut Corp., hired by the operator of the plant, Exelon Corp. They are paid close to the industry's average, about $35,000 a year, plus overtime when they are on high alert.

Their line of defense begins with outside patrols, then double fences topped with razor wire. Those are backed with a variety of intrusion detectors, including television cameras monitored from two separate locations. In their training, Mr. Johnson and the other guards here learn that a skilled terrorist group using explosives could blast through the fence in seconds. Their response, reinforced by the daily "chess" games, is to quickly gauge the nature of the attack, then to rush to defensive positions.

In mock firefights four times a year, opposing teams of guards test their skills using plastic rifles that make squeaking noises and softball-sized plastic grenades accompanied by simulated explosions. During such exercises, the plant brings in an extra shift, called a "shadow force," that engages in the mock battle while the regular shift guards the plant. Guards sometimes "shoot" from behind mobile barriers designed to stop bullets, and use wire-mesh screens that can be pulled out from walls to stop grenades lobbed at them by the attackers.

"Delay is the name of the game," says Wayne A. Trump, manager of security at Peach Bottom. "We fall back, protect and call in outside help." Describing how the firefight would play out in the cavernous turbine room that connects the two nuclear reactors, he says his guards are trained to aim at what he called "fatal funnels," places where attackers are most vulnerable as they race into the plant.

While the guards here figure out how to cope, others ponder the bigger question of where their job ends and the government's should begin. "At some point, a commercial entity reaches a limit as to the size and nature of the threat it can, or should, solely contend with," Stephen D. Floyd, an official of the Nuclear Energy Institute, recently told a House Commerce subcommittee. His hope is that Congress will somehow agree on a "reasonable" definition of that point.

Write to John J. Fialka at john.fialka@wsj.com

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