Cape & Islands News

Panel discussion on Pilgrim Nuclear Plant at Cape Cod Community College February 22

Discussion is free and open to the public

Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant on the shores of Cape Cod Bay a few miles north of the Cape Cod Canal. Photo courtesy of Entergy from NRC.gov.

A panel discussion on the relicensing of the Pilgrim Nuclear Plant in Plymouth will be held on Wednesday, February 22 from 6:30 p.m.  to 8:30 p.m. at Cape Cod Community College in West Barnstable. The presentation, which is free and open to the public, is sponsored by CIRenew, the Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences and the Environmental Technology Program at 4Cs.

The operating license for the Pilgrim plant expires on June 8, 2012. The plant's owner Entergy Nuclear is seeking to apply for relicensing with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the next twenty-years. Pilgrim, which came online in 1972, is a 680-megawatt boiling water reactor, identical in design to Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

The panel will be made up of Carolyn O'Connor, director of external affairs for ISO New England, State Senator Dan Wolf and Mary Lampert, founder and director of Pilgrim Watch. According to CIRenew, one of the event's organizers, Entergy declined an invitation to participate in the panel.

Panelists will present introductory statements, then answer question from both the event's sponsors and the audience. The February 22nd discussion is a follow up to a similar discussion held in November 2011.

The event will be held at Cape Cod Community College on Route 132 in West Barnstable (Exit 6 off Route 6) in the Science Building, Lecture Hall C.