What a mad, mad world … FPL, the public, and new nuclear at Turkey Point, Miami,Florida

It’s a mad, mad world where permitting new nuclear reactors at sea level on the edge of a national park amounts to a game of hiding the salami. ( ‘FPL canals criticized as health risk’, Miami Herald, April 26, 2009 ) The madness continues today at the Planning Advisory Board where new FPL requests for additional changes to underlying zoning will be heard, before going to the full county commission in short order. Two things happened in 2007 and 2008, to put the public interest on a severe defensive with respect to FPL’s plan for two new nuclear reactors at Turkey Point. The second is arguably more important than the first. A year ago, on March 18, 2008, the Florida Public Service Commission “determined” the need for two new nuclear reactors at FPL’s Turkey Point facility, where two existing and aged reactors and more than a hundred miles of cooling canals sit at the edge of Biscayne National Park. What the PSC’s press release doesn’t say is that the determination allowed FPL to begin charging its customers for the planning costs of the massive project; in other words, setting loose an army of lobbyists, consultants and engineering firms whose compensation depends, entirely, on whatever it takes to gain further approvals. ( ‘FPL customers may be charged to fund new Turkey Point reactors’, Miami Today, March 27, 2008) Six months earlier, the Miami Dade County Commission had granted a special use permit for FPL despite the objections of environmentalists who raised both of the issues that comprise today’s story in The Miami Herald: salt water intrusion and the role of rock mining. The first steps to the commission approval occurred on November 28, 2007 when the Development Impact Review Committee approved the exemption sought by FPL lobbyists. It was, naturally, a date selected close enough to Thanksgiving to ensure that few people would pay attention: “A review of the project by the Department of Environmental Resources Management (DERM) indicates that approximately 296 acres of the total 365 acre site (Area B on Exhibit A) are coastal wetlands containing mangroves and other native, halophytic vegetation located within Environmental Protection Subarea F and adjacent to Biscayne National Park. A majority of these wetlands would be destroyed during the construction of the proposed fill pads for the reactors and ancillary facilities.” On December 20– in case you missed it because of Christmas five days later– the county commission approved by an 11-1 vote the zoning change sought by FPL. It was a key step because from that point, the game of hide the salami moved to state and federal processes that would require cash-strapped environmental groups to litigate in distant courtrooms in Tallahassee and who knows where else. The application cites the County Comprehensive Master Development Plan in respect to where FPL wants to build its new reactors: “The Environmental Protection designation applies to those areas in the County most environmentally significant, most susceptible to environmental degradation and where such degradation would adversely affect the supply of potable fresh water or environmental systems of County, regional, State or national importance. These lands are characteristically high-quality marshes, swamps and wet prairies, and are not suited for urban or agricultural development. However, some high-quality uplands such as tropical hammocks and pinelands on the State Conservation And Recreation Lands (CARL) and Miami-Dade County Environmentally Endangered Lands (EEL) acquisition lists are also included. Most of the CARL projects are designated on the future Land Use Plan (LUP) Map, but some are not because of their small size. EEL projects that are acquired and are large enough to be depicted at the Plan Map scale are also designated on the Future

Land Use Plan Map. It is the policy of this Plan that all land areas identified on the State CARL, Miami-Dade County EEL, and South Florida Water Management Save Our Rivers (SOR) acquisition lists shall have equally high priority for public acquisition as those land areas designated Environmental Protection on the Future LUP Map. Uses permitted within these areas must be compatible with the area’s environment and the objectives of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan, and shall not adversely affect the long-term viability, form or function of these ecosystems. Residential development in this area shall be limited to a maximum density of one unit per five acres, and in some parts of this area lower densities are required to protect the fresh water supply and the integrity of the ecosystems. Public and private wetland mitigation banks and restoration programs may also be approved in Environmental Protection areas where beneficial to county ecological systems. Because of the importance of maintaining the natural form and function of these areas, many of these areas have been slated for purchase by State or federal agencies. Miami-Dade County will encourage the acquisition of these areas by public or private institutions that will manage these areas toward this objective. However, so long as these lands remain in private ownership, some compatible use of this land will be permitted by Miami-Dade County consistent with the goals, objectives and policies of this Plan and the objectives of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan. All proposed uses will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis for compliance with environmental regulations and consistency with this Plan and the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan.” Through its December 2007 approval, the Miami Dade County Commission essentially waived its right to obtain hard answers first, including; where exactly FPL would mine lime rock to build a 20 foot fill pad, for 300 plus acres, what would be the effect of salt water intrusion, and where would the coolant water–some 90 million gallons per day– come from. The county commissioners also did not think it important when granting variances on right-of-ways and county access roads that the entire area of the new reactors, anticipated to cost at least $24 BILLION, would be underwater if sea level rises as predicted by the end of the century and within the lifetime of the nuclear units. Recently, all four of FPL’s Florida nuclear reactors were approved to operate 20 years further than their original 40 year licenses. ( ‘Tropic Atomic; FPL says new nukes, skeptics say ‘no nukes’, Closer Magazine, March 2008 ) And so, the new nuclear reactors that would come online in 2018 to 2020 will have operational lifetimes — as opposed to yours or mine– well within the rapid sea level rise horizon. Today’s Miami Herald report doesn’t get into the ‘hide-the-salami-and-really-screw-your-grandchildren’ scenario, but it does report the presence of tritium in South Dade water tables far from the existing reactors– a measurable isotope that does not naturally occur but that FPL naturally does not want to measure because it doesn’t want the data how far inland from existing nuclear facilities its pollution is tracking. “Regulators don’t yet know the size of the salty plume, but preliminary studies suggest a leading edge has marched far enough east, just past the Homestead Miami Speedway, to pose risks to drinking-water wells for Keys and Homestead residents and Everglades restoration projects intended to revive historic freshwater flows to the bay.” (Herald, cited above.) No amount of solar charm or wind can mask what FPL is doing in South Dade.

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What a mad, mad world … FPL, the public, and new nuclear at Turkey Point, Miami,Florida

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