The letters and other opinion pieces in these pages taking the not-to-worry line on Pilgrim are framed as science-oriented, fact-based , cooler heads vs. a scared, irrational mob of kneejerk naysayers.
But it’s not really about the facts. Rather, call it a difference in emotional style: the unruffled, imperturbable unconcerned vs. the concerned, who allow themselves to be riled up by much the same set of facts. Nobody on either side thinks it is likely that Pilgrim will blow any time soon, despite its age and increasing age-related dysfunctions, well documented in this paper. The odds are against it. What happened at Fukushima to the same sort of reactor as Pilgrim probably will not happen here.
Pilgrim supporters are those inclined not to worry, to trust the for-profit company and government agency, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is supposed to have our back. They don’t allow themselves to get upset by the lack of an evacuation plan for the 220 thousand of us who live on Cape Cod.
Those of the Unconcerned who style themselves as hewing strictly to the facts always leave out some: that Pilgrim is on NRC’s list of the five most worrisome plants in the country for its age-related accidents and down times. Extolling the clean energy of nukes, they fail to mention the carbon by-product of uranium production. They prefer not to refer to the little glitsch in the whole nuclear power idea of waste disposal, the overload of spent fuel rods festering in the bosom of our nation’s birthplace.
Though styling themselves the party of science, they ignore the fact that the scientists of the Union of Concerned Scientists have put Pilgrim on their list of “near misses” for its performance in the January blizzard.
You wonder : would the Unconcerned include among the irrationally scared the country of Germany, usually known for its efficiency and science-orientation and for being the most successful country in the EU, for its decision to shut down its nuclear industry and go with alternatives?
It would be interesting to know what sort of malfunction at Pilgrim it would take to worry those with the “What, Me Worry?” bumper stickers.
In recent letters to this paper, Pilgrim workers staunchly sticking up for their employers want us to know how completely they trust that their workplace is safe. And, they insist, shouldn’t they know, they who spend all day, every day on the controversial ground itself? Would they work there, they argue reasonably, if it were not safe? Many readers would hear the flip side of that logic: trusting your life to that workplace as you do, how could you not believe it to be safe? No doubt Fukushima workers would have said the same thing.
Catchy, this emotional style of the Unconcerned. Even though all our towns are on record as wanting Pilgrim closed, there may be many who, even though they might prefer Pilgrim closed, just don’t let themselves think about it too much. No doubt Entergy banks on that complacency.
It took the concerted effort of concerned people to shut the five U.S. plants recently shut, including the nearby one in Vermont—people not afraid to worry and do something real to address that worry.
Perhaps even the Unconcerned would admit that it would have been a good thing if despite all the good reasons to to be unconcerned, someone had worried about Fukushima in advance and done something about it.
For those wanting to express their concern, there is in the works a huge March for Our Children from Pilgrim to the State House planned for June 13-16. (Info at MAdownwinders.org.)
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