Federal Officials to Evaluate Harford’s Readiness for Incident at Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station

From Harford County government:

(Bel Air, MD) – – Harford County Government, Cecil County, and the State of Maryland will participate in a mock exercise of an incident at the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station in nearby York County, Pennsylvania. The biennial graded exercise is scheduled for Tuesday, January 26, 2010.

Harford County personnel, first responders as well as state and local agencies will participate in the drill. Coordination and preparations for the exercise have been handled bythe Harford County Division of Emergency Operations, working in concert with Exelon Nuclear the operator of Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station.

Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station is located on the west bank of the Susquehanna River in York County, Pennsylvania. The three unit nuclear generating facility currently has two reactors in operation. Unit 1, which initially went on-line in 1966, has been shut down since 1974. The plant is co-owned by Exelon Generation and Public Service Electric and Gas of New Jersey.

The purpose of the annual exercise is to ensure local and state governments are adequately prepared to deal with an unusual incident at the plant and thereby provide appropriate life safety protection to the population near the facility.

“We want to ensure that Harford County Government is prepared to deal with an incident at the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station that could impact life safety to our residents,” stated Harford County Executive David R. Craig.

“Exelon, operator of the plant, has been a great neighbor to Harford County and we look forward to these exercises with great anticipation to maintain our state of readiness for an untimely incident at the plant,” remarked County Executive Craig.

Harford County is one of five counties between Maryland and Pennsylvania that participates in the drill. Evaluation elements include direction and control, communications, timely protective action decision making and implementation, activation of the Emergency Alert System (EAS), public information system, protection of school population and mass care sheltering to mention a few.

Approximately 12,000 residents and seven schools are located or live within the 10 mile Emergency Planning Zone. Exercise related activities will occur at Fallston High School and Patterson Mill Middle High School Monday evening, January 25, 2010. Field activities and activation of the Harford County Emergency Operations Center (EOC) in Hickory will take place on Tuesday, January 26, 2010.