PORT CLINTON — Four activist groups that contend FirstEnergy Corp.'s Davis-Besse nuclear plant is unworthy of a 20-year license extension are to appear Tuesday before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's licensing panel.

But the panel, called the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, told the groups it will refuse to hear about the plant's safety record, including the near-rupture of its original reactor head in 2002.

The all-day session is to begin at 9 a.m. in the Ottawa County Common Pleas courtroom, 315 Madison St., Port Clinton, and is to conclude by 4:30 p.m.

The public is allowed to observe, but the NRC has limited participation to itself, designated spokesmen for each of the four groups, and Davis-Besse's owner-operator, Akron-based FirstEnergy.

The four groups are Beyond Nuclear, Citizens Environmental Alliance of Southwestern Ontario (formerly the Ontario Citizens Alliance), Don't Waste Michigan, and the Green Party of Ohio.

Beyond Nuclear is a national activist group in Takoma Park, Md., which said on its Web site that actor Ed Asner is its honorary chairman. It cites Asner and fellow actors Ed Begley, Jr., James Cromwell, and Susan Sarandon on a list of 17 partners, which also includes singer Bonnie Raitt, former model Christie Brink- ley, and former tennis star John McEnroe among its partners.

The group was founded by Australian-born pediatrician Dr. Helen Caldicott, a 1985 nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize who also founded a U.S. group called Physicians for Social Responsibility.

The NRC said the panel will decide if the groups are allowed "admittance to the [licensing] proceeding."

FirstEnergy is trying to add 20 years to Davis-Besse's original 40-year license so that the plant can operate until April 22, 2037, instead of shutting down on April 22, 2017, the date Davis-Besse is now scheduled to be retired.

The NRC on Thursday announced its latest 20-year extension, its 62nd among America's 104 operating nuclear plants. None has been rejected.

Kevin Kamps, who will be representing Beyond Nuclear, said he was disappointed by the panel's decision to limit testimony to four contentions the groups identified in writing in their joint petition to intervene, filed on Dec. 27.

The groups want the panel to consider how much the development of wind power and solar power, alone or in combination with one another, could offset demand for the plant's electricity in coming decades.

The groups also plan to question the degree to which risks of nuclear power have been factored into cost-benefit analyses.

But Mr. Kamps said they won't be allowed to bring up Davis-Besse's safety record because of a technicality: They didn't spell out their intention to do so in their application. He said he didn't know he was required to disclose every talking point in advance.

Mr. Kamps has authored a 10-page paper for his group which outlines a number of close calls and design issues with the plant. The title of the paper questions if a 20-year extension would be akin to what Mr. Kamps describes as "radioactive Russian Roulette on the Great Lakes shore."

The NRC itself has described the 2002 near-rupture of Davis-Besse's original reactor head as the U.S. nuclear industry's most significant event since the half-core meltdown of the Three Mile Island Unit 2 reactor in Pennsylvania in March of 1979. The U.S. Department of Justice has done likewise in federal court.

The NRC has even put a Justice Department diorama used in the Davis-Besse federal court proceedings on display at the agency's headquarters in suburban Washington to remind regulators what happened in 2002, resulting in a two-year outage.

So much acid had leaked on top of the old reactor head that it had burned through six inches of steel and exposed a stainless-steel liner about the width of a pencil eraser. Regulators discovered it had started to buckle and crack, leading them to believe the plant's containment building would fill up with radioactive steam if it had burst.

Prior to that, a different event at Davis-Besse — a 12-minute interruption in the feedwater flow to steam generators on June 9, 1985 — was seen as the nation's closest call with a nuclear accident since Three Mile Island.

The potentially catastrophic event idled the plant for more than a year.

Harold Denton, former President Jimmy Carter's right-hand man at Three Mile Island, told a packed Washington ballroom in 2004 that he considered those two events at Davis-Besse the industry's second and third most significant behind Three Mile Island.

"We can't afford to have a Chernobyl in the Great Lakes region," Mr. Kamps said, referring to the 1986 nuclear disaster near Kiev, Russia. "It [the Great Lakes] is the source of drinking water for 40 million people."

Todd Schneider, FirstEnergy spokesman, described the previous events as "past history."

"Since 2004, Davis-Besse has operated safely and reliably," Mr. Schneider said. "We pay attention to every little detail. The culture at the plant has changed, where safety is our first and foremost concern."

Mr. Schneider said the NRC "wouldn't have allowed the plant to resume operation in the first place" if it still had reservations about FirstEnergy's ability to operate it.

Contact Tom Henry at: thenry@theblade.com or 419-724-6079

First Published February 28, 2011, 6:20 a.m.