MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) – A judicial arm of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has rejected Massachusetts’ contention that the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant should be barred from running for 20 extra years because of the possibility of a terrorist attack. The Massachusetts attorney general’s office had asked the NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, which is considering extending Vermont Yankee’s license beyond its current expiration date in 2012, to hear its concern that an attack on the plant’s spent fuel storage pool could release large amounts of radioactivity into the environment.

Vermont Yankee sits on the west bank of the Connecticut River in Vernon, within sight of New Hampshire and a few miles north of the Vermont-Massachusetts border. Parts of Franklin County, Mass., are within Vermont Yankee’s emergency evacuation zone.

In a ruling issued Friday, the NRC panel said it would hold hearings on contentions raised by the state of Vermont and the nuclear watchdog group New England Coalition. Those contentions have to do with how well the plant’s aging components will handle continued operation, and whether releases of water by the plant will raise water temperatures and do ecological damage to the Connecticut River.

But it said it would not hear Massachusetts’ contention that, in the panel’s words, “when the likelihood of a terrorist attack is taken into account, the estimated probability of this type of accident is within the range that must be discussed.”

The board said the NRC addressed worries about spent fuel storage pools in generic rules that apply to reactors around the country, and that it did not see a need to delve into the those issues in connection with Vermont Yankee’s request for a license extension.

The ruling came less than 18 months after the National Academy of Science issued a report saying spent fuel storage pools were vulnerable to terrorist attacks that could unleash raging fires and deadly releases of radiation.

The academy, which advises the federal government on scientific issues, said the fuel pools are less protected than reactors themselves, which have hardened containments.

The academy said the pools typically contain much more radioactive material than a plant’s reactor. Vermont Yankee’s pool contains highly radioactive waste from the plant’s 34 years of operation.

The academy said neither the government nor the nuclear industry “adequately understands the vulnerabilities and consequences of” a terrorist attack targeting a spent fuel pool. Its scientists recommended undertaking a plant-by-plant examination of fuel storage security as soon as possible.

A message left Saturday for Vermont Yankee spokesman Robert Williams was not immediately returned.

AP-ES-09-23-06 1250EDT