At Vermont Yankee, the main source of leaking radioactive tritium appears to have been stopped. Levels measured in a nearby monitoring well have been dropping for weeks. But plant, and government officials say the story is far from over.
A 30-foot-wide alley between two buildings is now the center of the two-month-long investigation with engineers using a high-pressure stream of water to dig around underground pipes and expose a concrete pipe tunnel. The result now is a trench, 15 to 17 feet deep and crowded with pipes.
A meeting with interested parties is expected soon to wrap up the tritium investigation to date.
But Bill Irwin, the state’s radiological health chief, says it could be two years before the tritium in the groundwater dissipates.