For two years, Harford County Emergency Operations officials had asked who was responsible for replenishing a compound that would protect emergency responders in the event of a nuclear accident at a nearby atomic power station.

For two years, no one seemed to have an answer.

But Exelon Energy — the owners of the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station in neighboring York County, Pa. — decided Friday that it was in the company’s best interest to end the confusion and buy more than 1,500 doses of potassium iodine, or KI.

KI supposedly blocks radioactive iodine, a cancer-causing byproduct of nuclear fallout, from entering the thyroid gland. It was first distributed to all emergency responders within a 10-mile radius of Peach Bottom in 2002. The shelf life of the compound was set to expire at the end of March.

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Rick Ayres, an emergency planner for Harford County, said he has tried to find out since 2005 who was responsible for replenishing the KI. He said all he got was the runaround from Exelon and no guidance from the state agency that coordinates resources and responses during times of emergency.

It wasn’t until The Examiner ran a story last week about his plight that he began getting answers, Ayres said.

Replenishment of the county’s KI rests with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and the Maryland Department of the Environment is responsible for requesting more KI, according to Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

But according to Ed McDonough, spokesman for the Maryland Emergency Management Agency, this process provides KI to residents within Peach Bottom’s 10-mile emergency preparedness zone, not first responders.

“Traditionally, we have always relied on the power company

[Exelon] to supply our first responders,” McDonough said. “We believe it’s the power company’s responsibility.”

McDonough said that Exelon did provide KI to Harford’s first responders in 2002, but for unknown reasons, “balked” at doing so this time.

Peach Bottom spokeswoman April Shilpp denied that Exelon had supplied the previous batch, saying that would have been the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s responsibility.

However, “when it was brought to our attention that this confusion existed, we decided to do what any responsible corporate entity would, and pay for the KI,” she said.

She even volunteered that Exelon would pay for the next batch in 2013 when the second batch expires.

mplum@baltimoreexaminer.com