US agency’s Salem fish-kill study condemned
- Plant intakes kill the equivalent of 14.7 billion fish and aquatic species of all types
- Environmental groups have pressed the NRC and New Jersey for years to require water recycling systems and cooling towers
- PSEG has resisted the idea, noting that $1 billion could be required to retrofit the Salem complex
A regional conservation leader accused federal officials Wednesday of “dereliction,” after a fisheries agency omitted recent fish and turtle entrapments from a key endangered species report on the Salem/Hope Creek nuclear plant.
The National Marine Fisheries Service biological opinion on reactor site operations concluded that the site is “likely to adversely affect but not likely to jeopardize continued existence” of two endangered sturgeon species and three endangered turtle species.
Officials came to that conclusion after a nearly five-year study and a long-term assessment that included three years of data on endangered Atlantic sturgeon entrapments in the plant’s 3 billion gallon-per-day intakes. Federal officials listed the Atlantic species as endangered in 2012.
NMFS study counts for Atlantic sturgeon ended in 2013, according to the report, mid-way through a recent surge in snaggings in the plant intake. Some 23 Atlantic sturgeons were caught in the plant intakes from July 1 through mid-April of this year, triple the annual average that the agency predicted for future operations in its new report.
Captures of endangered Shortnose sturgeon since July 1 were four times the higher than rates predicted for the future. Two Kemp’s Ridley sea turtles also were taken over the same period, compared with a predicted one every three years.
“To disregard these recent impacts is a breach of duty,” said Maya van Rossum, who directs the multi-state Delaware Riverkeeper network. “If they are ignoring the recent kills of Atlantic Sturgeon, then this analysis and any of its findings are invalid and NMFS is not doing its job.”
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission posted a copy of the 246-page report and attachments on its public document site Wednesday morning. Agency spokesman Neil Sheehan said that the report is still under review.
NMFS officials were not available for questions on the findings, or van Rossum’s criticisms. But the agency’s conclusions included a new “incidental” take allowance for the otherwise protected species, provided that PSEG complies with “reasonable and prudent” efforts to minimize losses.
“The NMF recognized that our continued operation will not jeopardize the continued existence of the sturgeon. Live sturgeon that are captured are returned to the river,” said PSEG Nuclear spokesman Joe Delmar. He said some sturgeon are drawn in “already killed by the shipping channels.
“We have made changes to our process to reduce sturgeon capture and will continue to closely monitor this.”
Habitat and species impact updates are likely to loom large in the long-pending renewal of permits for PSEG Nuclear’s cooling water intake and industrial discharges for the complex on Artificial Island, N.J., southeast of Augustine Beach. The twin Salem units rank as the nation’s largest power plant user of non-recycled water tapped directly from a free-running stretch of river, and the 16th largest of any plant in the country.
One Environmental Protection Agency report in 2002 estimated that the Artificial Island intakes kill the equivalent of 14.7 billion fish and aquatic species of all types, counting larvae and fry, or the adult equivalent of 339 million fish.
Environmental groups have pressed the NRC and New Jersey for years to require water recycling systems and cooling towers to reduce draws from the river and pressure on aquatic life. PSEG has resisted the idea, defending its protection systems and compensatory environmental projects as adequate and noting that $1 billion could be required to retrofit the Salem complex.
Contact Jeff Montgomery at 463-3344 or jmontgomery@delawareonline.com