(Host) Democrat Peter Shumlin says more extraction pumps need to be installed at the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant in Vernon.
He says the pumps could help prevent radioactive tritium from moving into a deep underground aquifer that supplies drinking water in the region.
Last week, authorities revealed the existence of tritium in a drinking water well on the plant grounds that’s no longer used.
Shumlin says the latest discovery underscores his longstanding demand that Yankee shut down in 2012 when its operating license expires.
(Shumlin) "I don’t think that it has sunk in to Vermonters and to Brian Dubie the seriousness of the challenge that we have down there. This is the worst manmade environmental disaster in my judgment in the history of this great state."
(Host) Republican Brian Dubie has been generally supportive of Vermont Yankee. But he says the latest news requires Yankee to do more to prove the plant is safe.
Officials say the significance of the latest tritium discovery is that it’s been found in a well tied to the aquifer deep under Vernon.