An
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering (IEEE) award and
the anniversary of a nuclear disaster in the Ukraine might seem like
unrelated events but they have ties that could have grave implications
for people in New Jersey.
On
Wednesday, April 26, the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl accident,
the New Jersey Public Interest Research Group (NJPIRG) organized an
event for the world's top engineering association to present the Carl
Barus Award for Outstanding Service in the Public Interest to Dr. Nancy
Kymn Harvin. Harvin was honored for her safety activism at the Salem
and Hope Creek nuclear power plant in New Jersey; she spoke out against
dangerous conditions at the plant that led to her firing in 2003. Since
then, she has advocated for safety improvements at the site and
throughout the nuclear industry.
"At
high professional and personal cost, your brave actions led to much
improved maintenance of our nation’s second largest nuclear power
plant," IEEE Society past president Clinton Andrews told Harvin. "This
action avoided a potential disaster and changed procedures at other
plants and at the NRC. Our country is deeply indebted to you."
It
was particularly timely for Harvin to be honored on the day that the
Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded in 1986. The explosion caused
the plant’s graphite core to burn for 10 days and created a radioactive
cloud that circled the northern hemisphere. Most of the radiation fell
on three countries, Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. But twenty years
later, farms in Sweden, Ireland and Wales, thousands of miles from the
accident site, are still affected by the fallout from Chernobyl.
“Recalling
the Chernobyl disaster should remind Governor Corzine that New Jersey’s
nuclear power plants put communities at risk,” said Suzanne Leta, an
Energy Advocate with NJPIRG.
Workers
at the Chernobyl plant knew there were problems but were afraid to
speak out and lose their jobs, according to Marianne Barisonek, a
journalist who has written a book about the accident. In 2004 Barisonek
spoke to Sergei Parashin, who was second in command at the Chernobyl
plant in 1986. “A nuclear accident can’t happen here,” Parashin said,
was the prevailing mindset at Chernobyl, not unlike Salem and Hope
Creek and other U.S. nuclear plants.
He
was aware of the problems at Three Mile Island but, as everyone knew,
that sort of thing could only happen in a capitalist country where
money was put before people, he said. Only when he saw the pieces of
fuel rods everywhere, and the exposed core and its deep purple glow did
he admit to himself the "impossible" had happened.
Just
as at Salem and Hope Creek, there had been warning signs--accidents and
radiation releases at the Chernobyl station--prior to the big one in
April of 1986. Only weeks before the disaster Chernobyl engineers had
told management the plant was too dangerous and should be shut down.
Their warnings were not heeded.
"The U.S. will hopefully escape a Chernobyl-like fate, thanks to Dr. Harvin being willing to speak up," Barisonek said.
