PG&E, former employee to hold talks on nuclear power plant
Source: Eureka Times-Standard
Two talks and presentations will be held on Wednesday regarding the nuclear program at the Pacific Gas and Electric Companys Humboldt Bay Power Plant, though their tones will likely be much different.
PG&E is set to hold a public open house at the Wharfinger Building in Eureka on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the ongoing decommissioning of the plants nuclear power facility known as Unit 3.
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Earlier on Wednesday at the Arcata City Library, former Eureka resident and former plant nuclear control technician Bob Rowen is set to hold a lecture and Q&A session to discuss the allegations he has raised about the plants operations and government oversight.
Having already written a book on the topic, My Humboldt Diary: A True Story of Betrayal of the Public Trust, Rowen claims PG&E and government agencies like the now defunct Atomic Energy Commission made decisions or intentionally ignored incidents of radioactive exposure to both power plant employees and members of the surrounding communities.
After bringing his allegations forward, Rowen claims he and other employees were fired in 1970 as retaliation with subsequent police investigations, attempts to smear his character and even death threats occurring in the aftermath.
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Read more: http://www.times-standard.com/events/20150815/pge-former-employee-to-hold-talks-on-nuclear-power-plant
bananas
(27,509 posts)Whistleblowers book tells his Humboldt County story
By Will Houston, Eureka Times-Standard
Posted: 02/27/15
Rowen, a former U.S. Marine, says he was fired for speaking up about safety issues. Shaun Walker The Times-Standard
In the time of Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks Julian Assange, one of Humboldt Countys older whistleblowers is telling his side of the story in a book chronicling his radioactive relationship with PG&E in the 1960s and early 1970s and what he considers the nuclear power industries betrayal of public trust.
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Rowen is currently touring the North Coast with his new, self-published book, My Humboldt Diary: A True Story of Betrayal of the Public Trust, in which he claims PG&E plant management and related government agencies made decisions or intentionally ignored incidents of radioactive exposure to both power plant employees and members of the surrounding communities. Along with the ensuing aftermath of his whistleblowing activity, the meticulously detailed 487-page diary delves into Rowens arguments against the nations use of nuclear energy, what he says were attempts to smear his character and investigations, media censorship and the violation of public trust. Im wired to expose corruption, he said. People fabricate things and have a total disregard for public and employee safety. Im wired to do something about it. ... Its corporate America. Its not just PG&E that engages in this kind of behavior. Theyre going to do whatever they find necessary to protect their interests. The whole system seems to be rooted in greed and the bottom line employee safety, public safety be damned.
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After being fired from PG&E, Rowen brought his findings to the Atomic Energy Commission, which found that PG&E had not committed any major safety violations relating to radiation exposure in its investigation. Rowen dedicates an entire chapter of the book, The AEC Whitewash, to the investigation, listing each of his claims and the agencys responses.
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Rowen said his family would also receive anonymous death threats after the infamous 1970 safety meeting, terrifying his 6-year-old son Rob who received one unintentionally after picking up the phone after being told not to by his parents.
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Its not that Im trying to get back at PG&E with this book, Im trying to wake up the public, he said. ... The purpose is to show what the nuclear industry is capable of doing, how far theyre willing to go to protect what turns out to be a failed and dangerous technology and how anyone who attempts to expose this has to be dealt with. ... If people remain ignorant of what the nuclear industry is doing and is capable of doing then nothing will change.
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