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By Susan Smallheer Herald Staff

VERNON — Workers at the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant are taking additional precautions when working around a 97-ton cask filled with high-level radioactive waste after a crane moving the cask malfunctioned last week.

The cask still isn't in its final steel and concrete shroud or storage location, although its first shroud does protect workers from potentially deadly doses, a spokesman from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Monday.

It was the first cask that Entergy Nuclear was loading with old nuclear fuel for its new storage facility outside the reactor building.

"We're keeping very close tabs on radiation levels," said Robert Williams, spokesman for Entergy Nuclear, the owner of Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.

The cask is in a shroud that emits between 20 to 24 millirems per hour, while its final cask only emits 5 to 10 millirems of radiation per hour. An average person receives 360 millirems a year from manmade and natural sources, according to NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan.

Williams said that workers were limiting their exposure to the cask, both by not getting close to it and limiting the amount of time they spend near it.

Last Monday, the brakes on the crane lifting the loaded cask out of the spent fuel pool failed to work properly, although the brakes didn't fail entirely and the cask did not drop to the floor, Sheehan said.

Entergy Nuclear, which was beginning the process of moving old nuclear fuel into casks for transport to a new storage facility outside the plant, suspended the transfer process until the problem could be analyzed.

The brakes finally stopped the cask an inch and a half above the floor, when the operator wanted it to stop four inches above the floor, so workers could remove a plastic shield on the bottom of the cask, Sheehan said.

Sheehan said all workers on the refueling floor carry dosimeters, which measure radiation exposure, and he said the workers would take other protective measures.

Meanwhile, Williams said the crane, which is original equipment to the 36-year-old reactor, was being examined by the crane manufacturer.

"The electrical relays were out of adjustment," Williams said. He said the relay adjustments are set by technicians at the plant.

"It could be all done in just a few days," he said.

David Lochbaum, a nuclear scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington, said heavy-load-bearing cranes have long been under the attention of the NRC, but apparently with mixed results.

"By treating the issue with such nonchalance for so long, NRC enables Entergy to do a poor job," said Lochbaum.

"By telegraphing industry again and again that it's not taking crane operations seriously NRC is essentially telling Entergy that crane operations aren't on the test. Consequently, Entergy didn't give it the attention needed to prevent problems," Lochbaum added. He said about three and a half years ago, a worker was injured at the Browns Ferry nuclear plant when the crane's hook fell and struck him in the head. At that time the NRC said it wasn't their concern because a load did not fall from the crane's hook, the crane's hook itself fell, he said.

Contact Susan Smallheer at susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com