By: Kirk Moore
Asbury Park Press
January 15, 2010

Rep. John Adler, D-NJ, and two other members of Congress have asked the General Accounting Office to investigate the condition of buried piping systems at nuclear plants, after a leak of water carrying traces of radioactive tritium were detected at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lacey and a similar problem turned up at the Indian Point reactor in New York.

The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspection guidelines are not sufficient to ensure the integrity of that underground plumbing, which can carry cooling water for use during unexpected reactor shutdowns or diesel fuel for backup generators, the lawmakers say.

"Under current regulations, miles and miles of buried pipes within nuclear reactors have never been inspected and will likely never be inspected,'' Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., said in the letter he signed with Adler and Rep. John Hall, D-NY. "As it stands, the NRC requires - at most - a single, spot inspection of the buried piping systems no more than once every 10 years. This cannot possibly be sufficient to ensure the safety of both the public and the plant.''

Leaks from two pipes at Oyster Creek became known just a week after the plant was relicensed by the NRC to operate for another 20 years, and they were discovered only because workers found standing water in a cable vault, the congressmen said. At Indian Point, the leaks in a backup cooling water system were found last February in pipes that had not been inspected since 1973, they said.

"We have believed for a long time that an independent review of Oyster Creek is needed,'' said Jeff Tittel of the Sierra Club. As the investigative arm of Congress, the GAO has done valuable work looking into environmental issues surrounding the proposed Delaware River ship channel deepening, he said.