Indian Point from the start

Environment New York, the state environmental advocacy agency, issues a report calling Indian Point the most dangerous nuclear power facility in the country because it threatens to contaminate drinking water for twice as many people as any other nuclear power plant.

The report says 11.3 million people in New York and New Jersey live within a 50-mile range of the plant, which is the criterion the NRC uses to gauge risk to food and water.

An Entergy spokesman counters by saying Indian Point was designed to withstand double the worst flood and 100 times the most powerful earthquake the region has ever experienced, making a repeat of the Fukushima disaster nearly impossible. The NRC also says the plant, whose IP2 and IP3 reactors come up for relicensing in 2013 and 2015 respectively, could operate safely for the next 20 years.

Gov. Cuomo today remains a staunch supporter of those who want to close Indian Point, bolstered by February’s news that two Assembly committees said the plant could be closed without overburdening taxpayers. A more recent report issued by the Union of Concerned Scientists said that IP3 is vulnerable to damage because of its location on the Ramapo fault line. That raises the probability of a disastrous radiation leakage to 1 in 10,000, far higher than the average 1-in-74,176 odds of the nation’s other 103 nuclear plants.