FEMA Left In The Dark - Power Companies Cover-Up Y2K Troubles

By David M. Bresnahan ) 1999 WorldNetDaily.com All Rights Reserved 8-4-99

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Power companies have purposely kept federal officials in the dark about their Y2K computer bug troubles, and one government official has expressed serious concern upon learning of the deception.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency is concerned that federal agencies and private industry are not anxious to admit their Y2K problems. When agency heads and private sector executives report to FEMA at Y2K planning sessions, they most often state that "all is well," according to one FEMA official.

"We've been trying to put together exercises here, and it's been somewhat difficult because you can't get too many federal agencies to admit anything's going to go wrong -- especially (the Department of) Energy," said Jerry Connolly, assistant to the director for FEMA's office of Response and Recovery.

He expressed concern to learn that power companies have purposefully covered up information about their Y2K preparations. FEMA has no oversight of privately owned power companies, which would enable it to shut them down if they are not ready for the Y2K rollover.

WorldNetDaily uncovered plans by the North American Electric Reliability Council to hide the truth about power companies and their true Y2K readiness. A spokesman for that organization confirmed the problems and the plans to hide the truth from the Department of Energy.

"That surprises me. It really does. The utilities were pretty open at this meeting and they were saying they've done everything," said Connolly who recently attended a FEMA planning meeting that included power company representatives.

"John Koskinen is really the overseer from the federal standpoint. I can guarantee they work awfully close with the NRC, the Department of Energy and what have you. No one's brought it to our attention. If it were told to us that there were certain hot spots where there were problems, I think we would start to plan accordingly. From a contingency planning standpoint of saying this is an area where there may be major power outages and therefore translates into major shelter requirements and what have you. That hasn't been brought to our attention," said Connolly.

Koskinen is the chairman of the President's Council on the Year 2000 Conversion.

A recent memorandum from NERC to the nation's power suppliers was provided to WorldNetDaily by a concerned NERC employee. That memorandum tells power companies to cover up information about their Y2K problems and to keep the facts from the Department of Energy.

"All identified (Y2K) exceptions will be held in strict confidence and will not be reported to DOE or the public. The exceptions will be reviewed by NERC Y2K project staff for reasonableness and reliability impact on operations into the Year 2000," the memo said in part.

"It's perfectly true what it says," NERC spokesman Gene Gorzelnik confirmed to WorldNetDaily in an exclusive recorded phone interview. He defended that plan by saying the information being kept from the public and the government would only complicate rather than help the process.

"When we were working on the January report (required each quarter detailing Y2K progress), one of the things that we realized was that there were a number of utilities that weren't going to be making the June 30 target date we had established (to be Y2K ready)," Gorzelnik explained.

NERC decided to let power companies list themselves as Y2K ready in time for the June 30 deadline, even though they were not. They justified this action by permitting the utilities involved to list certain Y2K "exceptions" on a separate report which was not made public or given to the Department of Energy.

WorldNetDaily recently published a list of 35 nuclear power reactors that did not make the June 30 deadline. It is not known which companies claimed to be Y2K ready but in reality did so only by twisting the definition. Potentially there are hundreds of power plants all over the country which are not Y2K ready even though they claim to be.

Gorzelnik also admitted that power companies will be permitted to claim Y2K readiness if their mission critical systems are ready even though other systems are not ready. Such exceptions are not considered necessary to report to the Department of Energy or to the public he said.

"We felt that to put out raw data, it could very easily be misunderstood," he explained of the need to keep the details from view. NERC does not believe the Department of Energy can understand the information it is hiding about Y2K exceptions.

"One of the concerns was that if it went in to DOE it would become public knowledge and the whole process that we have been working with is one where we want the utilities to be frank with us to tell us exactly what is going on so we can work back and forth and get the problem solved," said Gorzelnik.

"If information was made public then we and the utilities were concerned that the utility itself would be spending so much time answering questions from reporters and their customers that it would divert from the actual job of getting the facility ready for Y2K. That's all that was behind that. They are taking a statement out of context and blowing it up without looking at all of the factors that went into that statement being there in the first place," he complained.

A copy of the memorandum and the admission by Gorzelnik was requested by the Senate Committee on the Year 2000 and by FEMA. Those officials said they would forward a copy to the President's Council on the Year 2000 Conversion. All involved say they plan to look into the admitted deception further to determine a course of action. _________

David M. Bresnahan, a contributing editor for WorldNetDaily.com, is the author of a new report on Y2K, the book "Cover Up: The Art and Science of Political Deception," and offers a monthly newsletter "Talk USA Investigative Reports." He may be reached through email and also maintains an archive of his work.

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), August 05, 1999

Answers

Hummmm...

Let's see the Polly's sit on this and spin...

-- Carl (clilly@goentre.com), August 05, 1999.