"Manhattan federal Judge Kenneth Karas struck down a state law last month that would prevent Holtec, the plant's owners, from discharging waste water into the river. Holtec filed a lawsuit shortly after the Save the Hudson law was passed in 2023. The judge ruled that New York overstepped its authority by preventing Holtec from releasing radioactive waste from Indian Point, which the facility has been doing lawfully for decades. The ruling stated that only the federal government has the authority to regulate nuclear discharges."
"The wastewater released by the former plant contains tritium, which the Nuclear Regulatory Commission says is a mildly radioactive type of hydrogen. Tritiated water is chemically indistinguishable from normal water and cannot be filtered. Humans are exposed to tritium through air and water. The releases from Indian Point are within federal standards, but nuclear experts have expressed uncertainty about what a safe level of exposure is and whether exposure has been studied enough."
New York Attorney General Letitia James will appeal a federal court ruling that allows Holtec to resume discharging radioactive wastewater from the shuttered Indian Point nuclear facility into the Hudson River. A Manhattan judge struck down a state law intended to block the discharges, finding that regulation of nuclear effluents lies with the federal government. The wastewater contains tritium, a mildly radioactive form of hydrogen; tritiated water is chemically indistinguishable from normal water and cannot be filtered. Releases are within federal limits, but experts express uncertainty about safe exposure and about tritium concentrating in organic matter and the food chain.
Read at Gothamist
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