Legalectric

Here ’tis!

POLYMET ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENTS

I’ll be five years next month that I’ve been working on the Goodhue Wind Project, or as Goodhue County notes, New Era Wind Farm, LLC f/k/a AWA Goodhue Wind, LLC, f/k/a Goodhue Wind, LLC.

This photo was taken by Marie McNamara in the Goodhue Wind Project footprint, can you spell E-A-G-L-E-S?

It was the project from hell, with SO many problems, built of cards and arrogant misrepresentations, bought and dropped like a hot potato by T. Boone Pickens, and finally, operating out of a P.O. Box:

We learned Monday that the County was going to take up the project.  Goodhue Wind Truth had requested the County Resolution supporting the project from 2008 be rescinded way back in October, after the PUC had terminated the project permits, and had requested time to speak to the County board.  Turns out there was a lot more that had to be done, and that included the County Development Agreement, and multiple conditional use permits.  So that makes sense to take the time to do it right and get it ALL done.  BUT, we got no notice, no information about what agreement had been reached.  It was the last agenda item.  They agreed to make the County Attorney/Board legal memo public, and when I asked if there were copies for the public, “NO!” and Commissioner Ron Allen laughed.  Yeah, to you and yours too… anyway, then they approved it.

Five years Goodhue Wind Truth struggled with this, and were proven ahead of the curve at every juncture.

Look at what the county had agreed to, this is why another agreement was necessary to get out of it:

And the county is probably taking quite a hit:

There needs to be a “lessons learned” session after this mess… the lesson I take from it is the necessity of intervention in county permitting, costly but the only way to keep on top of it.

URGENT — MIA: All the big “environmental” groups — the Minnesota Sierra Club, Audubon Society, Fresh Energy, Izaak Walton League, Clean Water Action.  ALL were no-shows!

Greetings from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission!

Yesterday was  a long, long day, out the door just after 8 a.m. to get through the woods and over the river to the Rulemaking Advisory Committee for Minn. R. Ch. 7849 & 7850.  ZZZZZZZZZZZZ.  Then back, over the river and through the woods, with just a couple hours to study and get out the door and over the river and through the traffic jam to Minnetonka (how convenient) for an evening with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission:

Here’s Alan Muller doing his thing at the “meeting” that wasn’t a “hearing.”

Here’s the NRC page that has their info on this:

NRC Nuclear Waste Confidence Page

And here’s the actual rule that’s proposed — it took a lot of digging to find it and I needed help, but here it is:

Proposed NuclearWasteConfidenceRule

And here are the full documents for comment, the GEIS is very strange:

Nuclear Waste Confidence Rule_Proposed

Nuclear Waste GEIS

And note the Prairie Island Indian Community’s role in this case that resulted in the vacating of the Nuclear Waste Confidence Rule, with THREE reps showing up last night:

NY v NRC-Nuclear Waste Confidence Decision 11-1045-1377720

What’s strangest about this rulemaking is the way this is framed, they backwards engineered it “to support the rule.” Look at how “Issue 3” is framed below, and also “Issue 1” (click for a larger version).

No, that’s not how you do it folks.  You do the GEIS and then you find out what it says.  Maybe it supports the rule, maybe it doesn’t, it is what it is.  But nooooooooo, that’s not how they do things at the NRC.

We have until December 20, 2013 to send comments to:

• Email comments to: Rulemaking.Comments@nrc.gov. If you do not receive an automatic email reply confirming receipt, then contact us at 301–415–1677.

• Fax comments to: Secretary, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission at 301–415–1101.

• Mail comments to: Secretary, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555–0001, ATTN: Rulemakings and Adjudications Staff.

• Hand deliver comments to: 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852, between 7:30 a.m. and 4:15 p.m. (Eastern Time) Federal workdays; telephone: 301–415–1677.

I put a few choice things in the record, because the idea they can safely store nuclear waste indefinitely, and until a “repository” is built, well…. dream on, when might that happen?  And Dog help us if it does…  Confidence?  NO!

Premature Degradation of Spent Fuel Storage Cask Structures and Components from Environmental Moisture

INEL “unloads” TN-24P – stuck

Creep & Crud of Nuclear Waste Storage

And here’s Alan at the Sierra Club table, Pam Mackey-Taylor the IOWA Sierra Club.  And John LaForge/Nukewatch was there too.  It was disturbing, but not surprising that not one of the big funded “environmental” groups showed up last night, and it says a lot about Xcel’s ability to buy them off.  Iowa Sierra Club’s Wally Taylor was the one testifying… not North Star Chapter, no Clean Water Action, no Fresh Energy, no Izaak Walton League (but we know how much Bill Grant loves nuclear), no Audubon. No, no, no, no, not there.  Absent, one and all.

Note the cops in the background — the NRC found it necessary to bring in police protection, two uniformed and I think one not in uniform.  What are they afraid of?

Home a couple of minutes before midnight… rulemaking taking over a day.

This post is for all my Catholic in/out-laws and friends, and the world.  If you’re breathing, and even marginally listening, you’ve been hearing a lot about Pope Francis lately.  He’s standing up, speaking out, and sounding like a “Christian” expressing moral and ethical positions that go to the crux of what’s wrong with the world these days.  WOW!  This is SO refreshing, what with all the wingnut CINO’s trying to shove their belief system on the rest of us.  Pope Francis, I’m pleasantly stunned…

Let’s take a look at what all the fuss is about, the real thing — SIT DOWN AND READ THIS:

Evangelii Gaudium, Apostolic Exhortation of Pope Francis 2013

#202 – Inequality is the root of all social ills.

204. We can no longer trust in the unseen forces and the invisible hand of the market. Growth in justice requires more than economic growth, while presupposing such growth: it requires decisions, programmes, mechanisms and processes specifically geared to a better distribution of income, the creation of sources of employment and an integral promotion of the poor which goes beyond a simple welfare mentality. I am far from proposing an irresponsible populism, but the economy can no longer turn to remedies that are a new poison, such as attempting to increase profits by reducing the work force and thereby adding to the ranks of the excluded.

And how is the media is handling this?  In the Wall Street Journal, reporting on a Pope holding up the mirror to the capitalists:

Pope Francis Criticizes Economic Inequality in Mission Manifesto

In Slate:

Pope Francis strafes libertarian economics

In Washington Post:

Pope Frances denounces ‘trickle-down’ economic theories in sharp criticism of inequality

USA Today, with a headline that tells it like it is:

Pope Francis: ‘I prefer a church which is bruised, dirty and hurting’

And the New York Times, toning down the message:

Pope Sets Down Goals for an Inclusive Church, Reaching Out on the Streets

CNBC distances itself by putting ‘quotes’ around it:

Pope Francis attacks ‘tyranny’ of unfettered capitalism, ‘idolatory of money’

A couple of the economic based tidbits from the Evangelii Gaudium:

35. Pastoral ministry in a missionary style is not obsessed with the disjointed transmission of a multitude of doctrines to be insistently imposed

38. It is important to draw out the pastoral consequences of the Council’s teaching, which reflects an ancient conviction of the Church. First, it needs to be said that in preaching the Gospel a fitting sense of proportion has to be maintained. This would be seen in the frequency with which certain themes are brought up and in the emphasis given to them in preaching. For example, if in the course of the liturgical year a parish priest speaks about temperance ten times but only mentions charity or justice two or three times, an imbalance results, and precisely those virtues which ought to be most present in preaching and catechesis are overlooked

48. If the whole Church takes up this missionary impulse, she has to go forth to everyone without exception. But to whom should she go first? When we read the Gospel we find a clear indication: not so much our friends and wealthy neighbours, but above all the poor and the sick, those who are usually despised and overlooked, “those who cannot repay you” (Lk 14:14). There can be no room for doubt or for explanations which weaken so clear a message. Today and always, “the poor are the privileged recipients of the Gospel”, and the fact that it is freely preached to them is a sign of the kingdom that Jesus came to establish. We have to state, without mincing words, that “there is an inseparable bond between our faith and the poor”. May we never abandon them.

49. Let us go forth, then, let us go forth to offer everyone the life of Jesus Christ. Here I repeat for the entire Church what I have often said to the priests and laity of Buenos Aires: I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. I do not want a Church concerned with being at the centre and then ends by being caught up in a web of obsessions and procedures. If something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life. More than by fear of going astray, my hope is that we will be moved by the fear of remaining shut up within structures which give us a false sense of security, within rules which make us harsh judges, within habits which make us feel safe, while at our door peole are starving and Jesus does not tire of saying to us: “Give them something to eat” (Mk 6:37).

53. Just as the commandment “Thou shalt not kill” sets a clear limit in order to safeguard the value of human life, today we also have to say “thou shalt not” to an economy of exclusion and inequality. Such an economy kills. How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points? This is a case of exclusion. Can we continue to stand by when food is thrown away while people are starving? This is a case of inequality. Today everything comes under the laws of competition and the survival of the fittest, where the powerful feed upon the powerless. As a consequence, masses of people find themselves excluded and marginalized: without work, without possibilities, without any means of escape.

Human beings are themselves considered consumer goods to be used and then discarded. We have created a “disposable” culture which is now spreading. It is no longer simply about exploitation and oppression, but something new. Exclusion ultimately has to do with what it means to be a part of the society in which we live; those excluded are no longer society’s underside or its fringes or its disenfranchised – they are no longer even a part of it. The excluded are not the “exploited” but the outcast, the “leftovers”.

54. In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting. To sustain a lifestyle which excludes others, or to sustain enthusiasm for that selfish ideal, a globalization of indifference has developed. Almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people’s pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else’s responsibility and not our own. The culture of prosperity deadens us; we are thrilled if the market offers us something new to purchase; and in the meantime all those lives stunted for lack of opportunity seem a mere spectacle; they fail to move us.

55. One cause of this situation is found in our relationship with money, since we calmly accept its dominion over ourselves and our societies. The current financial crisis can make us overlook the fact that it originated in a profound human crisis: the denial of the primacy of the human person! We have created new idols. The worship of the ancient golden calf (cf. Ex 32:1-35) has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose. The worldwide crisis affecting finance and the economy lays bare their imbalances and, above all, their lack of real concern for human beings; man is reduced to one of his needs alone: consumption.

56. While the earnings of a minority are growing exponentially, so too is the gap separating the majority from the prosperity enjoyed by those happy few. This imbalance is the result of ideologies which defend the absolute autonomy of the marketplace and financial speculation. Consequently, they reject the right of states, charged with vigilance for the common good, to exercise any form of control. A new tyranny is thus born, invisible and often virtual, which unilaterally and relentlessly imposes its own laws and rules. Debt and the accumulation of interest also make it difficult for countries to realize the potential of their own economies and keep citizens from enjoying their real purchasing power. To all this we can add widespread corruption and self-serving tax evasion, which have taken on worldwide dimensions. The thirst for power and possessions knows no limits. In this system, which tends to devour everything which stands in the way of increased profits, whatever is fragile, like the environment, is defenseless before the interests of a deified market, which become the only rule.

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DATE: Wednesday, December 4, 2013

TIME: Open House: 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. (CST)
Meeting: 7:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m. (CST)

LOCATION: Minneapolis Marriott Southwest
5801 Opus Parkway
Minnetonka, Minnesota 55343
Lake of the Woods Meeting Room

SUBJECT: PUBLIC MEETING TO RECEIVE COMMENTS ON THE WASTE CONFIDENCE DRAFT GENERIC ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT AND PROPOSED RULE

That’s an old photo of Prairie Island, appropriate for an early winter day.  There is nuclear waste from the plant stored in casks just outside of the plant, and this whole nuclear compound is right next to the Mississippi River and the Prairie Island Indian Community.  Great… just great.  It’s just a couple miles upriver from us here in Red Wing, and it’s been incorporated into the City so the City could get utility personal property tax revenues, but that’s another can of worms for another day…

Nuclear Waste isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, but it’s allowed to keep piling up, and the nuclear reactors are allowed to continue to generate electricity and waste, based on the “Nuclear Waste Confidence Decision,” which was first issued in 1984, and then revisited since, and it’s essentially myopia in action:

A federal court didn’t buy the NRC’s policy:

NY v NRC-Nuclear Waste Confidence Decision 11-1045-1377720

So now they’re getting more public input into the rule.

NRC Nuclear Waste Confidence Page

What’s at issue now is the proposed Rule and the Environmental Impact Statement, and they’re soliciting comments on that EIS with the final due out about a year from now.  Here it is, and the EIS is BIG, 585 pages — yup, that’s what you’ve got to comment about (anything else will be tossed out and disregarded):

Nuclear Waste Confidence Rule_Proposed

Nuclear Waste GEIS

From the NRC’s page, the important documents/info:

• NRC Documents Related to Waste Confidence
• Waste Confidence Update Schedule
• Public Involvement in Waste Confidence
• GEIS and Waste Confidence Rule References
  • By Chapter
  • By Appendix
  • By Proposed Rule
  • By Author
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Contact Us About Waste Confidence

So now it’s up to us to sort through all of this and explain why this is utterly insane policy… New York managed to get through to the federal court, so it isn’t hopeless.  But the NRC’s persistence in its “Nuclear Waste Confidence” is inexplicable.