La Salle County’s nuclear power plant response plans evaluated

Response plans for emergencies occurring at the La Salle Generating Station, a nuclear power plant located in east central La Salle County, were evaluated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency from Nov. 15-16.

To evaluate the plans, a drill simulating a law enforcement related event that involved a release of radioactive material into the environment was developed by state, federal and Constellation Energy exercise designers. In total, more than 300 people were involved with the exercise including onsite and offsite participants, controllers and evaluators in an effort to determine the response partners’ ability to effectively execute the emergency response relating to a radioactive release at the power station.

Drills are conducted every two years in compliance with federal guidelines. To gauge the effectiveness of local plans, local responders are not included in the design of the drill. Response plans are designed to effectively respond to any type of situation that may arise.

“The purpose of the drill is to provide federal agencies with a ‘reasonable assurance’ that local responders can properly respond to and mitigate an incident at the power station,” said La Salle County Emergency Management Director Fred Moore. “Keeping the scenario a secret from local responders really puts our plans and knowledge to the test.”

Participants in the drill included the following La Salle County departments: Emergency Management, Sheriff’s Office, Highway Department, County Board Chairman and his administrative assistant, Information Technologies, 911 Director and telecommunicators, the Health Department, and Regional Office of Education; the cities of Ottawa, Streator, Marseilles and the village of Seneca; state of Illinois partners from the Illinois Emergency Management Agency, Illinois State Police, and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources Police; private partners WCMY/WRKX radio, Bruce Harris & Associates, the American Red Cross, and Constellation Energy; and mutual aid partners through the Mutual Aid Box Alarm System, the Illinois Law Enforcement Alarm System, and the Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Services; Grand Ridge Grade School and Ottawa Police Department.

“While we hope that nothing bad ever happens, we have to have plans to ensure the safety of La Salle County residents,” said County Board Chairman Don Jensen. “It’s encouraging to see how all of our partners are able to come together and effectively respond to an incident of the size and magnitude that was presented to us.”

FEMA preliminarily reported La Salle County had no negative findings or issues identified during this drill. The official federal after-action report detailing strengths, weaknesses and official findings should be available in about 90 days.