In reporting for more than three decades, I could probably count on my fingers the times I've read the editorial pages of the three newspapers where I've worked.
Make sure your waders and umbrella are handy. Maybe the rowboat, too.
A new report tracking five years of whistle-blower allegations at the nation's 104 commercial nuclear reactors found Watts Bar and Sequoyah in the top five for claims in 2012.
It was 2003 when local officials had the Civic Forum torn down at 10th and Market streets and found — lying in the basement — two long brass plaques bearing this message in all capital letters: "PRIVATE PROPERTY OWNED BY STATE OF GEORGIA TEMPORARILY USED."
Although the Sequoyah Nuclear Plant required additional federal oversight in the first three months of 2012 because of excessive unplanned shutdowns and apparent violations pertaining to possible floods, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has given the plant a passing grade for safety performance.
The weekend rains dumped nearly 5 and 6 inches of rain on Southeast Tennessee and North Georgia, and more is expected late this week.
Tennessee and Georgia were squabbling over land in the Chattanooga region long before the Peach State realized it might want to make a run at the Tennessee River.
Mystery still surrounds a TVA security officer's report of a gunfight with an intruder in the middle of the night near Watts Bar Nuclear Plant.
The sheriff of Franklin County, Tenn., says he and his investigators have learned a lot about hate groups since they began investigating a March killing thought to be the work of white supremacists.
ATLANTA — TVA officials were squirming a bit Monday and a few cheeks glowed pink at times as directors and inspectors with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission plied them with questions about protecting Watts Bar and Sequoyah nuclear plants from a future monster flood.
TVA made its case to nuclear regulators today in hopes of resolving six apparent violations from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The FBI has joined the TVA and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission investigating a trespasser who exchanged gunfire with a security officer on the property of the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant early Sunday morning.
A TVA security officer patrolling on utility property near the Tennessee River at Watts Bar Nuclear plant exchanged gunfire with an unknown person early Sunday morning, according to regulators with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
If the mother of all Tennessee Valley floods had occurred last year, results at Watts Bar or Sequoyah nuclear plants could have been catastrophic, nuclear regulators and TVA officials say.
TVA's top leaders said Thursday that the federal utility will cooperate with the Obama administration's call for a review of the federal utility and its debt that is carried in the federal deficit.
TVA’s new president and CEO Bill Johnson and the TVA board chairman Bill Sansom said today that TVA will cooperate with the Obama administration’s call for a review of the federal utility and its debt that is carried in the federal deficit.
Cline Jones, executive director of the Tennessee River Valley Association, told TVA board members this morning that his group opposes any transfer of Tennessee River water to Georgia.
At the same time that citizens are cooling on nuclear power in Fukushima's wake and both nuclear regulators and operators are pushing emergency preparedness for worst-case scenarios, the EPA has moved to update radiation exposure rules.
ATHENS, Tenn. — The leader of an environmental group Tuesday asked nuclear regulators how they could ensure that the Watts Bar Unit 2 reactor's concrete foundation — poured 40 years ago — is still sufficient to support the nation's newest reactor expected to go online in 2015.
Although work on the second reactor at Watts Bar Nuclear Plant is 80 percent complete, one of the big challenges in working on it has been meeting new requirements prompted by three meltdowns in Fukushima, Japan, two years ago, according to Mike Skaggs, TVA senior vice president for nuclear construction.
Despite many starts and stops, TVA’s work on a second reactor at Watts Bar Nuclear Plant near Spring City, Tenn., is now 80 percent complete and progressing to the point that much engineering work is in the details of transferring completed systems from construction workers to operators.
WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks of North Alabama grabbed his glasses to scan page 51 of President Barack Obama's budget request Wednesday and turned red as he absorbed a seven-sentence proposal that could put TVA in private hands, alter rates for 9 million customers and jeopardize 12,000 employees.
The bat epidemic known as white-nose syndrome has reached North Alabama and the home of the world's largest wintering colony of endangered gray bats, as well as a million endangered Indiana bats.
Environmental advocates in the region worry that the State Building Commission's approval of the University of Tennessee's request to seek natural gas drilling bids on UT property sets a bad precedent for publicly owned land.
About two dozen people listened and commented Wednesday in two meetings as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission explained the process it will use to decide whether to extend Sequoyah Nuclear Plant's operating license until 2041.
TVA officials have asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to renew the operating license of Sequoyah Nuclear Plant and extend the plant's two reactor licenses for an additional 20 years — until 2040 and 2041.
This rose of a town and county, set in a valley along a river lined by mountains, is not without a thorn or two.
We — in Hamilton County — are 340,855 strong — just over 5 percent of Tennessee’s total population.
Federal regulators have cited TVA with three more apparent violations at Watts Bar Nuclear Plant — this time over thousands of parts the utility purchased that are not documented as nuclear-grade quality.
Q: Whatever happened with TVA's still-vacant board seat?
New TVA President and CEO Bill Johnson is beginning to talk about the days that will follow his self-described "100-day plan" of listening and learning.
As the sun edged over Missionary Ridge on Thursday morning, it cast long shadows onto the Ridgedale and Highland Park neighborhoods where Chattanooga police had just cleared away the crime scene from the city's eighth homicide of
Chattanooga police have identified the victim of Wednesday night’s shooting and homicide as 22-year-old Charleston P. Beard.
TVA has failed to adequately protect Sequoyah and Watts Bar nuclear plants from the potential for failure of earthen dams upstream and flooding that would ensue in the event of what utility and nuclear regulators call a probable maximum flood — an event that would surpass any known local weather occurrence.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says TVA has failed to adequately protect two nuclear plant sites from the potential for the failure of earthen dams upstream and the flooding that would ensue.
The man charged with raping and murdering Tullahoma, Tenn., nursing student Megan Sharpton will spend the rest of his life in prison without any possibility of parole, according to the plea he made Monday in Franklin County Circuit Court.
A fracking decision for UT's Cumberland Forest is on hold for now.
Environmental groups around the state are outraged that the University of Tennessee is proposing to lease more than 8,636 acres of public land in East Tennessee to an energy company looking to do hydraulic fracturing for oil or ga
The University of Tennessee is proposing to lease more than 8,636 acres of public land in East Tennessee to an energy company looking to do hydraulic fracturing for oil or gas.
When Water for Elephants and "42" were filmed in Chattanooga, state officials rolled out the red carpet with nearly $1 million in incentives and tax credits.
East Tennessee in coming years may find itself front and center in the growing debate over fracking — the hydraulic or nitrogen gas fracturing of shale rock deep underground to free natural gas.
Seriously. Where else can you live where you can have a cold-and-ice day Friday and a sunny, near-50 afternoon of glory today?
The Tennessee Emergency Management Agency has declared a state of emergency.
The Paint Rock River is one of the last free-flowing rivers in the Southeastern United States, and its Cumberland Plateau headwaters in Franklin County, Tenn., soon may become America's newest national wildlife refuge.
Bill Tittle was there at midnight on New Year's Eve 13 years ago, sitting in Hamilton County's emergency command center as the world expected mass blackouts once computer clocks rolled into the new millennium.
Tired of rain? Don't fret: Forecasters say the wet stuff will be snow later today.
As rain continues in the Tennessee Valley for the 10th straight day, local emergency officials aren't the only ones watching South Chickamauga Creek with worried eyes.
A problem that surfaced 18 months ago at Watts Bar Nuclear Plant's still-under-construction Unit 2 reactor has resulted in the safety reviews for 500 packages of TVA-purchased parts.
TVA is to begin today replacing 100 emergency sirens within the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant's 10-mile radius in McMinn, Meigs and Rhea counties.
