The state of New York is letting out a collective “Eek!” after Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Saturday statement that the groundwater around the perimeter of the Indian Point nuclear power plant is reportedly radioactive. While that may not come as much of a surprise, or raise too much alarm to those who assume a nuclear power plant cannot run without some trace after-glow leaking out into the general surrounding area, if only so little that regulations find it acceptable, one might grow a bit more alarmed to learn that the levels found in that groundwater have increased by a whopping 65,000 percent.
https://youtu.be/ZHKMyQnLLrU
Cuomo’s office issued a statement informing the public that “radioactive tritium-contaminated water leaked into the groundwater” under the power plant. To make matters worse, the facility rests snugly on the hip of the Hudson River, in Buchanan. NYC is a mere 25 miles downriver.
Cuomo’s statement states, “The facility reports that the contamination has not migrated off site and as such does not pose an immediate threat to public health,” however in this day and age of vast corporate corruption, one is forced to insert their own “allegedly” in such statements if they are wise. Underlining that necessity is the fact that Indian Point is owned by Entergy, which is based out of New Orleans, Louisiana.
Cuomo called the leak “unacceptable” and stated an investigation into the matter will be overseen by the Department of Environmental Conservation, as well as the Department of Health in order “to determine the extent of the release, its likely duration, cause and potential impacts to the environment and public health.” Dig that that statement comes after the previous statement above made by the company that the contamination has not made its way off site and poses no public health risk. Time will tell whether the investigation will confirm or repudiate that claim.
The Guardian points out, “There have been many tritium leaks at the plant in recent years, though Saturday’s leak appears to be the most serious so far.”
Lovely. Meanwhile, as they say, a solar spill is simply called a “nice day.”
Featured image by Tony Fischer via Flickr, available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial license.
