Yesterday afternoon, Ratchford's supervisor posted a comment on the Herald blog refuting the story. Tim Fitzpatrick, Vice President of Corporate Communications, wrote: "It is sadly ironic that a story which accuses FPL and its people of running a shadowy campaign and using “hardball tactics” resorts to serving up a collection of rumors and innuendo based on unnamed sources." FPL knows perfectly well that its employees, fearful for their jobs, will talk to journalists, but only off-record. Its employees-- at least some of them-- are brave enough to know that the public deserves to hear the facts about the corporate rush to increase rates by $1.3 billion in order to build two new nuclear reactors at Turkey Point that aren't needed and don't contribute to solving the problems of energy efficiency and demand reduction.
The effort to permit high voltage power lines along US 1 will have a major effect on both property values and public health. But municipal officials seem to be unaware of the growing public opposition; reflected on the blogs. FPL is massaging the process of shoe-horning two new nuclear reactors as efficiently as they can, but they can't quite overcome the diverse ways that the story is getting out. So they lash out at "disingenuous" and "innuendo".
Here is the text of what was published, here, on Saturday, along with a response by Dr. Philip Stoddard, a citizen activist and member of Citizens Alliance for Safe Energy, who created the charts below. I wrote on Saturday: "There was a lot of information communicated to a concerned public about Florida Power and Light's Turkey Point facility and the threats of new nuclear reactors (at the public meeting hosted by CASE at City Hall in South Miami last week). Those threats include public health and cancer risk, environmental failure, and massive burdens on rate payers; ie. you and me. The costs for Turkey Point, its existing problems and future costs, are to be entirely shouldered by rate payers: more than $20 billion for the new reactors if the Public Service Commission approves a $1.3 billion rate increase in January 2010. The attached charts were compiled by Dr. Philip Stoddard, one of the organizers of Citizens Allied for Safe Energy. There is more information at StopFPLNOW.org Become informed. This is YOUR problem.
10 comments:
Where's Dave?
Right here.
Among all two pages of negatives spanning 37 years, look at the last comment under 1989.
While many of the line items are unemotional and factual, many others contain editorial comments which twist and bias the facts to assist readers to reach the writer's pre-determined conclusion; FPL is all bad. Just not true.
A fairer (and by extension, more credible in my opinion) compilation would have included separate line items (during the 15 year period when things were "quiet") of the fact that Turkey Point achieved SALP 1 and INPO 1 ratings for three consecutive inspection cycles (over almost a five year period). This feat was never equaled prior to Turkey Point's achievement, and has not been equaled since as far as I know.
During this time period, Turkey Point was considered one of if not the best operated nuclear plants in the country.
Again, I don't think FPL is perfect, far from it, just like most of us. I do think that while I was employed (1989-2007, which pretty much encompasses the "quiet" period) Turkey Point achieved that status of industry leader in operations and safety.
Where does all of that fit on your "fair and balanced" timeline?
Dave... Gimleteye's alterego
Oh, and I almost forgot. Under 2009 item seven. "While" and "but" are synonymous in the context that "while" is used; and you know everything that comes after a but(t) is bullsh_t.
While it didn't pose any danger, it's very dangerous. Give me a break.
Dave...Gimleteye's alterego
Hey Dave, See today's Herald article re: FPL plays hardball? Are you on Ratchford and Silagy's "opposition research, media countermeasures and social media" team? Using one of those "computers untraceable to FPL"? You're an embarrassment to all honest, hardworking FPL employees!
Don't pick on Dave. People can be loyal to a company where they have invested much of their life...even if he doesn't know the meaning of alter ego.
I'm not the one posting anonymously.
I said we could agree to disagree on nuclear power and still be friends. Aside from the nuclear issue, I agree with almost everything my buddy Gimleteye says.
I'm not character assassinating, not working for FPL in any capacity, and using a privately owned computer. How would I have access to an FPL machine when I have no relationship to the corporation.
I continue to speak only truth and do my best to be fair and balanced.
I don't have to win the argument... I just appreciate a forum where I can freely express my point of view. God bless America.
al⋅ter e⋅go [awl-ter ee-goh, eg-oh, al-] Show IPA
–noun
1. a second self; a perfect substitute or deputy: His adviser acts as his alter ego during his absence.
2. an inseparable friend.
3. another aspect of one's self.
Dave
David also didn't see that first part that showed that this was someone else's work posted by eyeonmiami.
Gimlet isn't on some lonely crusade against FPL. There are others who take issue with the company's tactics and this bullshit that they've run the plant "safely" since 1972.
Just because they didn't have an all-out meltdown doesn't mean that everything's peachy. And that they aren't honest about problems and they don't communicate with the public is all the more infuriating.
Those of us who've lived in the shadow of those reactors all these years know better than to swallow their garbage, but FPL knows that most everyone here has been a resident for less than a decade so they can say "we've always been at war with Eastasia" and get away with it.
Hi Dave, Phil Stoddard here. Yes, my real name.
Thanks for the suggestions. This history is a work in progress. I worked hard to confine it to 2 pages so it would fit on one sheet. As it was I had to set it in 9 point type. But I will improve it as time allows, and I'll consider your suggestions (I've copied them down).
In addition to the "green" level inspections, I left off year-by-year details of the various operators who were fired by FPL after they complained about safety issues during this golden period. I found the court records and the judge's opinions quite disturbing, but too long to summarize succinctly and keep to my self-imposed page limit.
Since you know the history of TPN quite well, you'll notice in particular that I left out details of how the plant operator who wrote the ECP survey report was framed, and I left off his name out of respect for his privacy. I figured the guy and his family had suffered enough. You have no complaints there.
You have already voiced your problems about my interpretation of the control rod malfunction. That interpretation was provided by another nuclear plant engineer. I hope we can agree, that nuclear plants, like helicopters, should be maintained to a degree that the parts never malfunction (especially the safety parts).
Finally, I have a great respect for the dedicated and highly-trained operators and engineers who work long dull hours to keep this plant operating as safely as they can. I have nothing but praise for the linemen who venture up the poles and put in heroic hours after storms to restore our power. But the executives who bribe politicians to let FPL rob the rate-payers while mistreating their employees and putting the public at unnecessary risk - they try so HARD to lose all public sympathy they shouldn't need to hire the likes of Bob Butterworth to tell them why.
Hah. And they do SUCH A GOOD JOB doing it!
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