NRC TO HOLD PUBLIC MEETING MARCH 8
ON PROPOSED LICENSE RENEWAL OF D. C. COOK NUCLEAR PLANT
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The meetings will be held on March 8th at the Lake Charter Township Hall, 3220 Shawnee Road, in Bridgman. There will be two similar sessions, one in the afternoon at 1:30 and one in the evening at 7:00. In addition, the NRC staff will host informal discussions one hour prior to each meeting. NRC staff members will be available to answer questions and provide additional information about the process during those informal sessions, but no comment submittals on environmental issues will be accepted at that time.

All are welcome to attend. For planning purposes, those who wish to present oral comments at the meeting may register by contacting Robert Schaaf of the NRC by telephone at 1-800- 368-5642, Extension 1312, or by email at CookEIS@nrc.gov no later than March 3th. Interested persons may also register to speak before the start of each session. Individual comment time may be limited by the time available.

The meetings will include an overview and NRC staff presentation on the environmental process related to license renewal, after which members of the public will be given the opportunity to present their comments on what environmental issues the NRC should consider during its review.

Under NRC regulations, the original operating license for a nuclear power plant is issued for up to 40 years. The license may be renewed for up to an additional 20 years if NRC requirements are met. The current operating licenses for D.C. Cook will expire on October 25, 2014 , and December 23, 2017, respectively. I&M submitted its application for license renewal on October 31, 2003.

The application is available for public review at the Bridgman Public Library, 4460 Lake Street, Bridgman, and at the Maud Preston Palenske Memorial Library, 500 Market Street, St. Joseph, Michigan. It is also available in the NRC Public Document Room at NRC Headquarters, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland, on the Internet at www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/licensing/renewal/applications/cook.html and from the Publicly Available Records component of NRC’s Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS), accessible at www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. Persons who do not have access to ADAMS or who encounter problems accessing the documents in ADAMS should contact the NRC’s Public Document Room reference staff by telephone at 1-800-397-4209, or by email at pdr.resource@nrc.gov.

An existing NRC document, “Generic Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Plants,” (NUREG-1437), assesses the scope and impact of environmental effects that would be associated with license renewal at any nuclear power plant site. The NRC staff is gathering information at these meetings for a supplement to the generic environmental impact statement that will be specific to D.C. Cook. It will contain a recommendation regarding the environmental acceptability of the license renewal action.

At the conclusion of the information-gathering process, the NRC staff will prepare a summary of significant issues and will send a copy to interested persons who participated in the scoping process. The summary will also be available for public review at the Bridgman Public Library and at the Maud Preston Palenske Memorial Library, and accessible electronically through the NRC Public Electronic Reading Room at www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html.

The NRC staff will then prepare a draft environmental impact statement supplement for public comment and will hold a public meeting to solicit comments. After consideration of comments received on the draft, the NRC will prepare a final EIS supplement.

Members of the public may also submit written comments on the scope of the D. C. Cook-specific supplement to the generic environmental impact statement. Comments should be submitted by April 6, either by mail to the Chief, Rules and Directives Branch, Division of Administrative Services, Mail Stop T-6-D-59, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C., 20555-0001, or by email to: CookEIS@nrc.gov.

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Tuesday, December 09, 2008