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Test suggests radioactive leak at Yankee
By Susan Smallheer Staff Writer - Published: January 8, 2010

BRATTLEBORO — Entergy Nuclear announced late Thursday one of its monitoring wells on the banks of the Connecticut River had detected radioactive tritium contamination, the first time such contamination has shown up at the plant.

Tests show tritium levels have risen sharply since it was first discovered six weeks ago.

The well, located between the reactor building and the river, first showed contamination of radioactive tritium at 700 parts per liter in mid-November, but by Wednesday, the contamination had jumped to 17,000 parts per liter. More Here

Not unlike that leak in the Champagne Region of France. Remember this is the French Nuclear system that everyone in the Nuclear Industry thinks is the model.

Radioactive Champagne in our future?
Champagne should be fizzy, not fissionable.

Raise a toast to the French nuclear industry, whose low-level radioactive waste is leaking into groundwater less than 10 kilometres (6 miles) from the famous Champagne vineyards.

Problems at a radioactive waste dumpsite in Soulaine were reported by its operator, ANDRA, to the French nuclear safety authority on May 24th, 2006. According to their report "the wall of a storage cell fissured" while concrete was being added to a recent layer of waste.

Back in the 1980's, ANDRA stated categorically that their dumpsite would not release any radioactivity into the environment. But that was when they were seeking planning permission. Today, the French nuclear authority is saying "This event revealed a flaw in the conception of the storage cells of the site."

The waste dump, Centre Stockage l’Aube (CSA) in Soulaine, contains nuclear waste both from France and abroad. More waste is trucked into the site every week. Once full, the dumpsite will be one of the world’s largest with over 1 million cubic meters of waste, including plutonium.

Greenpeace research released last week showed levels of radioactivity leaking from another dumpsite run by ANDRA in Normandy -- at up to 90 times above European safety limits. That waste has seeped into underground water used by farmers, with contamination spreading into the countryside and threatening dairy production.

The Champagne site will receive a total of 4 thousand terabequerels of tritium -- more than three times the amount of tritium waste as the dumpsite in Normandy.

A nuclear waste crisis out of control

"We have been told for decades that nuclear dumpsites will not leak and that the best standards are being applied. In reality the dumpsite in Normandy is a disaster, and radioactivity is already leaking from the dumpsite in Champagne," says Shaun Burnie, nuclear campaigner at Greenpeace International. "The authorities know they have a problem in Champagne already, with mistakes in the design. This is only the beginning of the problem, the bigger picture is that France has a nuclear waste crisis out of control that is threatening not only the environment and public health but also the economy of the Champagne region."