News & Observer: Public Watchdog, or Progress Energy Lapdog?

In today's Raleigh News & Observer, the front page of the business section features a story by reporter John Murawski on Progress Energy's plans to announce a site next month for a new North Carolina nuclear reactor. Among the sites under consideration is the existing Shearon Harris nuclear facility 20 miles southwest of Raleigh.

But the story - a fairly substantial one at 20 column inches - includes not a single mention of the fact that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this month launched an investigation into allegations of lax security made by armed guards at the Harris plant, or that the N.C. Private Protective Services Board is looking into charges of widespread cheating by the facility's guards on state security certification exams. A Progress spokesperson acknowledged at least one of the alleged problems - malfunctioning security doors - to N&O environmental reporter Wade Rawlins.

So why the omission of an issue so important to the North Carolina public and Progress investors?

"Ask my editor," Murawski told me. "He didn't ask for it or mention it. I was trying to keep the story focused on the pending announcement, so I didn't think about putting it in. It didn't seem like it was part of that story."

I followed Murawski's suggestion and contacted his editor, Assistant Business Editor Alan Wolf. "Given the time and space constraints of this spot news story, I didn't feel the NRC investigation of allegations was relevant," Wolf said. "For one thing, we found no evidence that the allegations were related to the delay in picking the site. But it is certainly an issue we will watch closely."

That the N&O would fail to mention security concerns in the context of a story on Progress Energy's nuclear plans disturbs Jim Warren of the Durham-based N.C. Waste Awareness & Reduction Network, one of the two nuclear watchdog groups that filed the complaint sparking the NRC probe - but it doesn't surprise him. He sees the omission as part of a broader media pattern when it comes to reporting on nuclear safety and security issues.

"It's consistent with most of the news stories this year in the North Carolina media" about Progress and Duke Energy's nuclear expansion efforts, Warren says. "Almost all of them have excluded any mention of the operating records of these places, including a number of very serious problems."

Failing to mention security concerns in the context of a story about nuclear expansion poorly serves the public and lessens the chance of meaningful public debate on a critical issue, he adds.

"It would be tragic to continue in that direction," Warren concludes.

Security Lapses Alleged at Raleigh Area Nuke PlantAuthorities slow to guarantee public safety

When you visit Progress Energy's Web site, you're greeted with a message that says, "The relentless pursuit of excellence. It's what we're all about."

But that's not the image painted by security guards in charge of protecting the company's Shearon Harris nuclear power plant near Raleigh, N.C.

At least two guards have come forward to blow the whistle on serious security concerns at the facility 20 miles southwest of North Carolina's capital. The alleged problems include malfunctioning security doors to critical parts of the operation, vehicles being waved through checkpoints without required searches and widespread cheating on state security certification exams. Even more disturbing, the problems come as Progress Energy's North Carolina facilities are under apparent attack by hostile forces, with recent incidents involving someone trespassing on plant-controlled property to hang a black flag from a communication tower at Shearon Harris, a guard coming under gunfire from the woods near that facility and reported sabotage of a rail line leading from the company's Brunswick nuclear power plant near Wilmington, N.C.

The whistleblowers also report poor morale among the guards, who earn a starting wage of less than $14 an hour for what is arguably one of the most important jobs in the post-9/11 United States. The guards say they are required to put in long hours of overtime and are discouraged from reporting or seeking care for injuries sustained on the job - problems that have led some of them to begin organizing with the Security, Police and Fire Professionals of America. (The Shearon Harris guards tried to organize last year with the United Government Security Officers of America but were not successful.) Problematic working conditions for nuclear power plants guards are not limited to Shearon Harris but have been documented at facilities across the nation by the Project on Government Oversight in its 2002 report, Voices From Inside the Fences.

The guards draw a connection between the Shearon Harris plant's security problems and a corporate culture that emphasizes cutting costs. Indeed, Progress Chairman and CEO Bob McGehee recently announced a third-quarter income gain of $147 million that he attributed in part to the company's successful "cost management initiative."

One anonymous guard's allegations form the basis of a complaint filed with federal and state authorities by the North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction Network of Durham, N.C. and the Union of Concerned Scientists of Cambridge, Mass.

That guard's allegations have been confirmed by another guard who I interviewed for a recent story in The Independent. I am withholding his name to protect him from feared retaliation by his bosses. Security guards at the plant are employed by Securitas Security Services USA, a subsidiary of Sweden-based Securitas AB, the world's largest security firm. However, they answer to supervisors employed by Raleigh-based Progress.

The guards' allegations and the watchdog groups' complaint have been widely reported - not only by The Independent but also in the Raleigh News and Observer, Durham Herald-Sun and WTVD, Raleigh's local ABC television news affiliate. In addition, the N&O ran an editorial calling on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and state Attorney General Roy Cooper to investigate the allegations "as fully as possible." (The editorial charged N.C. WARN, a longtime nuclear critic, with having "an agenda" - a charge deconstructed in a subsequent letter to the editor by Jim Jensen, who pointed out that Progress Energy and the NRC have agendas as well.)

Progress spokesperson Rick Kimble told me that his company was looking into the watchdog groups' allegations. However, he acknowledged to reporter Wade Rawlins of the N&O that the facility did have malfunctioning door locks but insisted that the malfunctions don't compromise security. "If the locking mechanism doesn't work, there is a compensatory measure such as having a live guard stand there," Kimble told Rawlins.

Despite the widespread reporting of the alleged security shortcomings, the public authorities with whom the watchdog groups lodged their complaint have not yet stepped forth to assure citizens that the problems are being addressed. The NRC says it's investigating but can't divulge any details on nuke plant security. The Federal Bureau of Investigation says it has jurisdiction only over external threats such as the flag, gunshot and rail sabotage incidents, which are still under investigation. And Attorney General Roy Cooper's office punted its investigation to the state's Private Protective Services Board, which oversees the security certification tests. Progress, meanwhile, is spending its time and energy investigating the guards for releasing their concerns to the public, as I reported in last week's Independent.

Meanwhile, the whistleblowing guards live in fear - not only about the possibility of losing their jobs for speaking out, and not only about the potential of nuclear terror, but also about what will become of them if catastrophe strikes at Shearon Harris.

"It would be just like Abu Ghraib prison," one guard told me bitterly. "If something happens to that plant, it will be us guards that get into trouble."

N.C. Legislature Makes Picks for Global Warming Commission

Environmentalists are praising the legislature's appointments to the North Carolina Commission on Global Climate Change, the group charged under law with setting a greenhouse gas pollution reduction goal for the state.

"Legislators should be commended for designing a bipartisan and diverse commission that can lead North Carolina toward a prominent role in curbing global warming," says Michael Shore, an air policy analyst with the state office of Environmental Defense.

Under the law that created the commission, each chamber made nine appointments. The House appointed six of its own along with three public members. The House members are Joe Hackney (D-Orange), Becky Carney (D-Mecklenburg), Pricey Harrison (D-Guilford), Wilma Sherrill (R-Buncombe), Alice Graham Underhill (D-Craven) and W.A. Wilkins (D-Person). The public appointments are industrial safety engineer Thomas Cecich, president of TFC & Associates in Apex; Robert Glaser, president of the N.C. Automobile Dealers Association; and Susan Tompkins, chair of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Storm Water Advisory Committee.

The Senate appointed three of its members: Charlie Albertson (D-Duplin), Janet Cowell (D-Wake) and Robert Pittenger (R-Mecklenburg). It also appointed six public members: attorney John Garrou of Winston-Salem, a former managing partner of Womble Carlyle and husband of state Sen. Linda Garrou (D-Forsyth); Ivan Urlaub, policy director of the N.C. Sustainable Energy Association; Dr. Dee Eggers, professor of environmental studies at UNC-Asheville; Walter Clark, a coastal community and policy specialist with N.C. Sea Grant; Dr. Edward Erickson, an economics professor at N.C. State University; and Tim Toben, CEO of Carolina Green Energy in Chapel Hill.

Hackney and Garrou will co-chair the commission.

Under the law, the group’s other members include representatives of Duke Power, Progress Energy, N.C. Citizens for Business & Industry, the Manufacturers & Chemical Industry Council of North Carolina, N.C. Farm Bureau Federation, N.C. Forestry Association, Environmental Defense, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, N.C. Coastal Federation, Conservation Council of North Carolina, Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment, N.C. State’s College of Agriculture & Life Sciences, N.C. Agricultural & Technical State University’s School of Agriculture & Environmental Sciences and the Carolina Environmental Program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The law also named two appointees by name: Dr. Stanley Riggs, a geologist specializing in sea level change at East Carolina University and N.C. State Climatologist Dr. Sethu Raman.

The commission is scheduled to complete its work and report back to the legislature by November 2006.

The Health Risks of Nuke Plants' Routine Releases

The nuclear industry wants us to believe nuclear power plants provide "emissions-free energy," in the words of Raleigh-based Progress Energy’s Chairman and CEO Bob McGehee.

Don't believe it. It's a lie.

I detail why in my cover story in this week's Independent newspaper, reporting on health risks associated with routine releases of radioactive pollution from nuclear power plants. Unfortunately, the paper declined my offer to fully link the online version of the story, but if you're interested in getting more information on any of my sources, e-mail me at suesturgis@raleigheconews.com.