MONTICELLO, Minn. – The leak of radioactive waste water from the Monticello nuclear plant in November occurred when a pipe between two buildings burst. This detail has been confirmed, four months after the leak, by Xcel Energy, the plant’s owner. In the intervening four months, Xcel said, it has recovered 100,000 gallons of spilled tritium-containing water. The company still has 300,000 gallons to go. The company said it may install a permanent solution this spring. Also, above-ground storage tanks may be built for the contaminated water as it is it recovered. Other options are to treat, reuse or fully disposal of the collected water, the company said, but wasn’t specific. The leak wasn’t the first at the 50-year-old Monticello plant. Trace amounts were lost in 2009.
Tritium profile
Tritium is a radioactive isotope of hydrogen that occurs naturally in the environment and is a common byproduct of nuclear plant operations. It emits a weak form of beta radiation that does not travel very far and cannot penetrate human skin. The only known human danger is for people consuming fairly high amounts of tritium.
Tritium spills
Researchers have collected these data on tritium effluent releases in accidents, by the number milligrams per gram in water and vapor.
> United States (2009): Monticcllo, Minnesota, trace amounts, in Mississippi River watershed
> Canada (2015): Pickering, Ontario, 1,232 units in Lake Ontario.
> Taiwan (2015): Maanshan, 123 units in Luzon Strait.
> France (2018): La Hague, 32,100 units in English Channel.
> Canada (2018): Bruce, Ontario, 4,901 units in Lake Huron.
> Canada (2018): Darlington, 1,204 units in Lake Ontario.
> Romania (2018): Cernavoda, 872 units in Black Sea.
> England (2018): Sellafield, 1,342 units in Irish Sea.
> England (1019): Heysham, 1,115 units in Irish Sea.
> United States (2019): Diablo Canyon, California, 235 units in Pacific Ocean.
> South Korea (2020): Wolseong, 1,022 units in Sea of Japan.
> China (2020): Fuqing, 146 units to Taiwan Strait.
> China (2020): Sanmen, 56 units in East China Sea.
> United States (2022): Monticcllo, Minnesota, units yet to be determined, in Mississippi River watershed.
Xcel profile
Xcel was created in1998 in a merger of power companies, most notably Northern State Power of Minneapolis. There are 3.7 million customers in eight states. Annual revenue: $1.5 billion. In 2018 Xcel announced a goal of delivering 100% carbon-free electricity by 2050, the first major U.S. utility to do so. The company is publicly traded on the Nasdaq exchange in New York City. The company has 11,300 employees. The president of Xcel is Bob Frenze, a financial guy who joined the company in 2016 from the investment banking firm Goldman Sachs. These are company executives with the most responsibility for compliance with regulatory agencies, for operations, and for media relations and public relations.
> Brett Carter, chief customer relations officer.
> Tim O’Connor, chief operations officer.
> Tim Peterson, chief technical officer.
> Amanda Rome, compliance officer.
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