collapse

Author Topic: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?  (Read 22046 times)

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #30 on: January 25, 2013, 01:15:27 pm »
Nightmare of Nuclear Waste | San Onofre Safety




This video was published May 30th 2012 by rumorecurioso.

"This is a good educational video for everyone,
cause it makes you read it, so it sticks in your head,
way better than just listening to it.

For me it does anyway."



Peace Love Light
tfw
     

Liberty & Equality or Revolution
« Last Edit: August 15, 2018, 11:44:24 am by thorfourwinds »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #31 on: May 02, 2013, 10:08:40 am »




San Onofre Insider Says NRC Should Not Allow Nuclear Restart (Video)


For the first time, a source from inside the San Onofre nuclear power plant has come forward to warn that restarting the power plant is too dangerous.


“There is something grossly wrong,” said the inside source, a safety engineer who worked at San Onofre and has 25 years in the nuclear field. [...]

Quote
He wants to remain anonymous because he told Team 10 he fears for his safety.

“When they made these changes, they did not look at the academic research nor use critical question and an investigative attitude,”

said the source.

The anonymous insider and (Dr. Joe Hopenfeld, a former employee of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission] said if there is a main steam line break, there is potential for the reactor core to overheat – which could mean a full or partial meltdown. [...]





Surfers catch waves in the shadows of the San Onofre nuclear plant.
(Photo: digitizedchaos/ Flickr)


Published on Friday, April 26, 2013 by Common Dreams


San Onofre Whistleblower Cites "Potentially Catastrophic" Design Flaw

Inside source tells local news channel that cracked generator pipes at nuclear power plant could cause a full or partial meltdown

- Lauren McCauley, staff writer

Quote
A former safety engineer with the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station is blowing the whistle on a "potentially catastrophic problem" at the currently offline Southern California Edison plan.

According to a report by San Diego's Channel 10 News, the unnamed source—who has 25 years working in the field of nuclear safety—said that a faulty redesign of the plant's steam generators has put the system at risk of a "full or partial meltdown."

"There is something grossly wrong," he told the news station.

Quote
Since Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) undertook a redesign of the generators in 2010 and 2011, the tubes that carry scalding water and steam from the generator have been crashing into one another creating cracks and "unprecedented tube failure."


Of 19,400 tubes, a Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) report found more than 17 percent were damaged...


"Many tubes, and I don't know how many, have exhausted their fatigue life—they have no fatigue life left,"

Hopenfeld added.

"As far as I'm concerned, it's a very serious risk."

« Last Edit: August 15, 2018, 11:52:32 am by thorfourwinds »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #32 on: May 02, 2013, 11:12:17 am »
As The Worm Turns...






San Diego 6 - San Onofre Nuclear Plant Owners May Retire Reactors



SAN DIEGO (CNS) - The majority owner and operator of the idled San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station will consider permanently closing one or both reactors if proposals to restart one of its units are denied by regulators, it was reported Tuesday.

Quote
Southern California Edison made the announcement in regulatory filings and on a conference call with analysts, U-T San Diego reported. The newspaper said SCE executives blamed uncertainties about rising costs linked to a 15-month outage of the plant.

SCE pegged the price of repairs and inspections at $109 million, with replacement power costs of $444 million, according to the newspaper. A decision on retiring the reactors would come by the end of this year.

The utility has asked the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to restart Unit 2 at 70 percent power.

The reactor was undergoing scheduled maintenance in January 2012 when a small, non-injury leak was discovered from a steam pressure tube in Unit 3, which was subsequently shut down.

Errrr, not actually:

Quote
Issues with the replacement steam generators -- installed in 2010 and 2011 -- led to a shutdown of the plant that has now stretched on for more than a year. The utilities commission launched an investigation in October into the costs of the outage, which could eventually lead to money being refunded to customers.


Quote
Neither reactor has operated since.

A decision from the NRC could come within the next month or so. The commission has promised to hold a public meeting in Southern California first, and said it would only grant approval for a restart if it would be safe.

Anti-nuclear activists and Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-San Diego, have blasted the utility's restart plans.

While SCE owns the vast majority of the plant, San Diego Gas & Electric owns 20 percent and receives one-fifth of its power. SDG&E did not immediately comment on the report.
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline Amaterasu

  • The Roundtable
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6713
  • Gold 276
  • Information Will Free Us
    • T.A.P. - You're It
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #33 on: May 03, 2013, 09:11:44 pm »
Do We dare approach the possibility that this nuclear nightmare was planned and is being deliberately unsafe?

"Let's run it at only 70% and see what happens." -- The guys who want to restart San Onofre.

Geez.
"If the universe is made of mostly Dark Energy...can We use it to run Our cars?"

"If You want peace, take the profit out of war."

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #34 on: June 21, 2013, 05:37:58 pm »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #35 on: June 21, 2013, 06:29:12 pm »




FOR THE RECORD


13 June 2013
The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) is an inoperative nuclear power plant located on the Pacific coast of California, in the northwestern corner of San Diego County, south of San Clemente, now planned to be decommissioned. The landmark spherical containment buildings around the reactors are designed to prevent unexpected releases of radiation.

The now-closed facility is owned by Southern California Edison. Edison International, parent of SCE, holds 78.2% ownership in the plant; San Diego Gas & Electric Company, 20%; and the City of Riverside Utilities Department, 1.8%. When fully functional, the plant employed over 2,200 people.[4] The plant is located in Nuclear Regulatory Commission Region IV.

The plant's first unit, Unit 1, operated from 1968 to 1992.[5] Unit 2 was started in 1983 and Unit 3 started in 1984. Upgrades designed to last 20 years were made to the reactor units in 2009 and 2010; however, both reactors had to be shut down in January 2012 due to premature wear found on over 3,000 tubes in the recently replaced steam generators. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is currently investigating the events that led to the closure. In May 2013 Senator Barbara Boxer, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said the modifications had proved to be "unsafe and posed a danger to the eight million people living within 50 miles of the plant,” and she called for a criminal investigation.[6]

Southern California Edison announced on June 7, 2013 that it would "permanently retire" Unit 2 and Unit 3, citing "continuing uncertainty about when or if SONGS might return to service" and noting that ongoing regulatory and "administrative processes and appeals" would likely cause any tentative restart plans to be delayed for "more than a year." The company stated that "Full retirement of the units prior to decommissioning will take some years in accordance with customary practices. Actual decommissioning will take many years until completion."[7]

Unit 1, a first generation Westinghouse pressurized water reactor that operated for 25 years, closed permanently in 1992, and has been dismantled and is used as a storage site for spent fuel.[8] It had a spherical containment of concrete and steel with the smallest wall being 6 feet (1.8 m) thick. It generated 456 MWe gross, and 436 MWe net, when operating at 100% capacity.[9]

Units 2 and 3, Combustion Engineering two-loop pressurized water reactors, generated 1,127 MWe gross, and 1,070 MWe and 1,080 MWe net respectively, when operating at 100% capacity.[9]

In a ten-year project completed in 2011 and costing $671 million, Edison replaced the steam generators in both reactors with improved Mitsubishi steam generators. Because of the reactors' two-loop design, uncommon for large reactors of that era, the steam generators are amongst the largest in the industry.

A common shortcoming of these large steam generators was tube wear, leading to replacement being required earlier than their 40-year design life.[10] The steam generators are the largest components in the reactor, and installing them required cutting a temporary hole in the concrete containment shell. The Unit 2 replacement was completed in 2009 and Unit 3 in 2011. The company estimated that the modernization would save customers $1 billion during the plant's current license period, which ran until 2022.[11][12]

During its operation, SONGS provided about 20% of the power to large portions of Southern California.[13]


Safety issues
The San Onofre station has had technical problems over the years.

In the July 12, 1982 edition of Time states, "The firm Bechtel was ... embarrassed in 1977, when it installed a 420-ton nuclear-reactor vessel backwards" at San Onofre.[14]  :P

In 2008, the San Onofre plant received multiple citations over issues such as failed emergency generators, improperly wired batteries and falsified fire safety data.[15][16] Early in 2011, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) issued its annual review of the plant, identifying improvements but noting that in the area of human performance, "corrective actions to date have not resulted in sustained and measurable improvement”.[15]

According to the NRC, workers at San Onofre are "afraid they will be retaliated against if they bring up safety problems, something that's against the rules".[17] As of 2011, according to the NRC, there has been progress on the issue. So far, the problems have not threatened the safety of plant workers or the public.[17] In November 2011, there was an ammonia leak, where as a precaution company employees were evacuated from the area where the leak was found; units continued normal operation.[18]

In a mid-cycle inspection report, conducted from July 2011 to June 2012, it revealed a few surprises including three incidents relating to human performance; an additional issue found a failure to develop procedures for a "cyber security analysis of electronic devices" that was later corrected.[19]


Environmental risk and mitigation.
Southern California Edison states the station was "built to withstand a 7.0 magnitude earthquake directly under the plant".[20] Additionally, there is a 25-foot tsunami wall to protect the plant from a rogue wave that could be potentially generated by the active fault 5 miles offshore.[21] The closest tectonic fault line is the Christianitos fault, which is considered inactive or "dead".[22]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's estimate of the risk each year of an earthquake intense enough to cause core damage to the reactor at San Onofre was 1 in 58,824, according to an NRC study published in August 2010.[23][24]

S. David Freeman, the former head of the California Power Authority and "a longtime anti-nuclear voice",[25] has described San Onofre (and Diablo Canyon) as "disasters waiting to happen: aging, unreliable reactors sitting near earthquake fault zones on the fragile Pacific Coast, with millions or hundreds of thousands of Californians living nearby".[26]

Unlike many pressurized water reactors, but like some other seaside facilities in Southern California, the San Onofre plant used seawater for cooling, and thus lacks the large cooling towers typically associated with nuclear generating stations. However, changes to water-use regulations may have required construction of such cooling towers in the future to avoid further direct use of seawater.

Limited available land next to SONGS would likely have required towers to be built on the opposite side of Interstate 5.[27]

Additionally, more than 4,000 tons
of radioactive waste are stored at San Onofre.
[28]


Surrounding population
The NRC defines two emergency planning zones around nuclear power plants: 1) a plume exposure pathway zone with a radius of 10 miles (16 km), concerned primarily with exposure to, and inhalation of, airborne radioactive contamination, and 2) an ingestion pathway zone of about 50 miles (80 km), concerned primarily with ingestion of food and liquid contaminated by radioactivity.[29]

The average prevailing westward wind direction at San Onofre blows inland 9 months of the year.[30]

The 2010 U.S. population within 10 miles (16 km) of San Onofre was 92,687, an increase of 50.0 percent in a decade, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data for msnbc.com. The 2010 U.S. population within 50 miles (80 km) was 8,460,508, an increase of 14.9 percent since 2000.[31]

Three of the cities within 20 miles of the facility are San Clemente and Laguna Beach in Orange County and Oceanside in San Diego County.[32][33] San Diego is 45 miles south of the facility, and Los Angeles is 60 miles north of the facility.[34]


Anti-nuclear protests
See also: Anti-nuclear movement in California

On August 6, 1977, about a thousand anti-nuclear protesters marched outside the nuclear generation station, while units 2 & 3 were under construction.[35] On June 22, 1980, about 15,000 people attended a protest near San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.[36]

On March 11, 2012, more than 200 activists protested at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station to mark the one-year anniversary of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. Speakers included two Japanese residents who lived through the Fukushima meltdowns and Raymond Lutz. The generators had been offline since January 2012, and speakers said they should remain off.[37] Environmental and anti-nuclear activists gathered at Southern California Edison's Irvine headquarters in May 2012 calling for the San Onofre plant to be decommissioned.[38]


2012 shutdown and subsequent closure
Initial shutdown
Unit 2 was shut down in early January 2012 for routine refueling and replacement of the reactor vessel head.[39] On January 31, 2012, Unit 3 suffered a small radioactive leak largely inside the containment shell, with a very small release to the environment below allowable limits, and the reactor was shut down per standard procedure.[40][41]

On investigation, both units were found to show premature wear on over 3,000 tubes, in 15,000 places, in the replacement steam generators installed in 2010 and 2011.[42] Plant officials pledged not to restart the units until the causes of the tube leak and tube degradation were understood.[39]

Neither unit was ever restarted. There were no blackouts due to the lack of SONGS electricity; however, more pollution was caused due to the use of natural gas plants used to make up for the power generation, and the additional cost has led to higher utility bills.[43]

In March 2012, former nuclear power executive Arnold Gundersen of Fairewinds Associates prepared a report that argued that "design modifications in the newly installed steam generators, such as different alloy for the tubes, led to problems at the plant". According to Gundersen's report, the shutdown in 2012 was due to poor design of the replacement steam generators that included many design changes that were not reviewed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.[44]


NRC response
On March 27, 2012, the NRC issued a Confirmatory Action Letter (CAL) forbidding the plant to be reopened until the causes of its equipment problems are thoroughly understood and fixed.[45][46] At the same time, Irvine Councilman Larry Agran called for the plant to be decommissioned, saying it should be decommissioned safely and as soon as possible.[28]

Concerns include “nuclear waste stored at the plant, health hazards from radioactive material, and inadequate evacuation plans”. Agran also said that the plant threatened all of Southern California. Resolutions passed in neighboring cities Laguna Beach and San Clemente called for safer and more secure waste storage. San Clemente voted to request public information about radiation levels near the plant. Bob Steins, spokesman for Edison International, said “the company will work to prepare detailed responses to council and community member questions and concerns”.[28]

In April 2012, in a sign of mounting concern over the shutdown, NRC Chairman, Gregory Jaczko, toured the facility with Senator Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, and U.S. Representative Darrell Issa, a Republican.[47]

In May 2012, two retired natural gas electrical generators were brought back online to help replace the lost power generation capacity: the Huntington Beach Power Station, which produces 440MW of power,[48][49] and the Encina Power Station which provides 965MW; coupled with new conservation measures, this has helped keep power available to San Diego and Riverside counties.[50]

Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher declared in May 2012 that San Onofre was safe but outdated and should be replaced with a modern high-tech reactor, "not because of how unsafe it is right now, but because we can be safer and more efficient.”[51]  :P

Responding to the idea of replacing SONGS with solar power, retired physics and astronomy professor Dennis Silverman, of the University of California, Irvine,[52] has calculated it would require a facility that would be 20 square miles large, ten times larger than Orange County Great Park, and would cost $44 billion dollars.[53]

In June 2012 the environmental group Friends of the Earth filed a legal petition with the NRC, asking that any decision to restart SONGS be considered a de-facto license amendment requiring an adjudicatory public hearing, rather than a decision by the NRC commissioners. SCE and NRC Staff filed statements opposing the petition.[54][46]

In July 2012 the NRC issued its final report, identifying ten issues that need followup and stating “the plant will not be permitted to restart until the licensee has developed a plan to prevent further steam generator tube degradation and the NRC independently verifies that it can be operated safely."[55]

As of July 2012, the cost related to the shutdown had reached $165 million, with $117 million of that being the purchasing of power from other sources to replace the output of the plant.[56] As a result, the Chairman of Edison International Ted Craver stated that there is a possibility that reactor 3 might be scrapped as "It is not clear at this time whether Unit 3 will be able to restart without extensive additional repairs".[56]

In August 2012, Southern California Edison announced plans to lay off one-third, or 730, of the plants employees; the company said that the downsizing of the plant staff was planned more than two years ago. Rochelle Becker of the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility said that the layoffs showed that the company was not being honest about their plans for the power plant.[4][57] Due to the shutdown, the NRC ended requirements to monitor non-operating systems.[19]

In September 2012, Allison Macfarlane, the NRC Chairwoman, said that plant would be down for a prolonged period, and that the fuel from Unit 3 would be removed in September 2012, due to significant damage to the unit.[58]

On October 3, 2012, SCE submitted a "Unit 2 Return to Service Report" to the NRC. SCE stated it had taken corrective actions, such as plugging worn tubes and preventively plugged additional tubes. SCE proposed a restart while administratively limiting Unit 2 to 70% power, intended to prevent excessive tube vibration, until a mid-cycle inspection within 150 days of operation.[46][59]

SCE reported that most of the excessive wear was in limited areas, due to higher speed and drier steam than computer modeling had predicted, and inadequate tube support at the U-bend. Analysis had concluded operating at 70% power would eliminate the conditions that caused excessive wear.[60]

On November 8, 2012, the NRC decided to refer the Friends of the Earth hearing request to the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board.[46] By November 2012, the cost of the outage was over $300 million,[61] and discussion of restarting Unit 2 has been postponed;[62] in December 2012, the last of the four old steam generators were transported to Clive, Utah for disposal.[63]

In February 2013, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission asked the steam generator manufacturer, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, to provide a redacted version of a report on the plant's steam generators for publication. The report described the changes made in the replacement steam generator, which included the removal of a support cylinder and changes to the tube support plates and anti-vibration bars, and the addition of about 400 tubes.[64][65]


Atomic Safety and Licensing Board ruling
On May 13, 2013, the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board issued its decision on the Friends of the Earth hearing request filed in June 2012.[66][67] It determined the current NRC process on this issue constituted a de-facto license amendment requiring an adjudicatory public hearing, for three independent reasons:[46]

   1.   the SCE proposal to limit unit 2 to 70% power is inconsistent with the license, so constitutes an amendment;

   2.   unit 2 cannot safely operate within the full license scope, so the license needs to be amended;

   3.   restarting the plant with the steam generator tubes in the current degraded state is outside historical experience, and the proposal to operate them at 70% power for a limited duration before re-inspection constituted the regulatory definition of "tests or experiments", requiring a license amendment.

The Los Angeles Times reported that "Edison has signaled it may shut the plant down for good" should the company not be allowed to restart one of the reactors at 70% of capacity.[68]

On May 28, 2013, Senator Barbara Boxer asked that the United States Justice Department investigate possible malfeasance by Edison officials, and released a 2004 letter by an Edison executive that expressed worries that the new steam generators, though similar, would not be "like for like" replacements and could lead to the same kind of potential "disastrous" issues that in fact led to the plant's shutdown in 2012.

In making the request for a possible criminal investigation, Boxer's statement said

"This correspondence leads me to believe that Edison intentionally misled the public and regulators in order to avoid a full safety review and public hearing in connection with its redesign of the plant."

Edison denied any wrongdoing.[68][69]


Plant closure
On June 7, 2013, Southern California Edison announced it would "permanently retire" Unit 2 and Unit 3, ending their attempt to restart the plant at a reduced capacity. The utility said it would cut the SONGS workforce from about 1,500 to some 400 employees, with most reductions "expected to occur in 2013."

The company also said it would "pursue recovery of damages from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the supplier of the replacement steam generators",[7][70] although the contract limited liability to $138 million and excluded consequential damages.[60] The chief executive of Edison International explained that the current licenses expire in 2022, and with post-Fukushima requirements, which include re-evaluating earthquake vulnerability, it was uncertain renewal would be economic, so it made little sense making costly and politically difficult repairs now that would not make a return on investment before 2022.[71]

California Senator Dianne Feinstein signaled approval of the decision to permanently close the plant, stating "I firmly believe this is the right thing to do for the more than 7 million Californians who live within 50 miles of San Onofre."

However, Representative Darrell Issa, whose voting district includes the nuclear station, was more downbeat, saying "Our communities now face the loss of employment for more than a thousand highly skilled workers and an essential local source of low-cost, clean energy."

Issa also pledged to work to improve the prospects for nuclear power nationwide.

In contrast, Sierra Club Director Kathryn Phillips applauded the move, saying in a statement that

"We hope, especially, that the utilities will take this opportunity to help get more locally generated renewable energy, such as rooftop solar, into their portfolios."[72]


« Last Edit: August 15, 2018, 12:23:32 pm by thorfourwinds »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #36 on: June 23, 2013, 12:44:53 pm »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #37 on: June 23, 2013, 06:04:46 pm »


San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant Finally Permanently Shut Down !


Published on Jun 7, 2013
Southern California Edison announced Friday it would shut down the troubled San Onofre nuclear power plant.

The move comes 17 months after the San Onofre plant was closed because of problems in steam generator systems. The plant powered about 1.4 million households in Southern California before the outage.

?Until now, Edison had vowed to restart the plant. But the company released a statement Friday saying it would stop the process to fire up the plant.

Q&A: Why is it closing and what will it cost?

"We have concluded that the continuing uncertainty about when or if [the plant] might return to service was not good for our customers, our investors, or the need to plan for our region's long-term electricity needs,"

said Ted Craver, chairman and chief executive of Edison International, parent company of SCE.

SCE President Ron Litzinger said in a statement:

"Looking ahead, we think that our decision to retire the units will eliminate uncertainty and facilitate orderly planning for California's energy future."
« Last Edit: August 15, 2018, 12:27:33 pm by thorfourwinds »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

Offline thorfourwinds

  • Administrator
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 4227
  • Gold 364
    • EARTH AID CONCERT
Re: San Onofre - America's Fukushima?
« Reply #38 on: June 24, 2013, 08:43:58 am »



San Onofre is Dead, the Nuclear Waste Isn’t | DiaNuke.org


8 June 2013

Ace Hoffman | CounterPunch

I think Edison deserves credit for making a wise decision to permanently close the San Onofre nuclear plant. I support the decision. It’s good for business, good for California, good for the environment. It’s the correct engineering decision to make. San Onofre was irreparably damaged by vibration.

Unfortunately we are now left with one of the largest, most concentrated nuclear waste piles on the planet. This will be an eternal problem, but thankfully it is no longer a growing problem and is becoming safer by the day. It will take millions of years — not just days — to be safe, but at least we are headed in the right direction.

The employees of San Onofre have been honorable opponents and I hope they all find jobs in the solar and wind technology energy sectors. However, the investigations should proceed, at the state level, at the federal level, and at the personal level, we should all continue to ask why nuclear power is used anywhere?

Diablo Canyon is next on my personal radar.


Note: The letter shown below, from Pete Dietrich this morning to SanO employees, suggests that the real reason SCE is closing San Onofre Nuclear Waste Generating Station is because of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board’s involvement in the case.

The ASLB would not be looking into the problems at San Onofre Nuclear Waste Generating Station if Friends of the Earth (FOE) hadn’t pushed the issue with carefully-planned legal actions.

FOE deserves enormous credit for their role in this event. Southern California narrowly avoided its own Fukushima on January 12th, 2012. Eight tubes in Unit three were worn enough to fail pressure tests, and one tube in Unit two was 90% worn. Unexpected vibration had done them in.

But with bullheaded determination, SCE tried to restart anyway. The 70% plan has been lingering around since nearly the beginning of the outage. Some restart plan, any restart plan.

But first, FOE hired Arnie Gundersen to look into the matter, who is a world-renowned expert in steam generator technology, and then they hired a slew of other experts to confirm his findings. Independent experts, independent, that is, of SCE, NRC, and FOE also confirmed that SanO’s u-tubes were beyond repair. But Arnie did the hard discovery work first. Then he explained it again and again, to activists, reporters, and regulators.

Arnie Gundersen is a hero to science and reason.


?===============================================


Quote
FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY

To: SONGS Employees and Supplemental Workers

It is with a heavy heart that I share with you SCE’s decision to permanently retire both Units 2 and 3. I recognize this difficult announcement is something none of us wanted to hear, but our decision is absolutely the right thing to do. The tough reality is that the recent Atomic Safety and Licensing Board decision creates significant additional uncertainty regarding our ability to get to an NRC decision to restart Unit 2 this year. This is not good for our customers, our investors and the region.

I could not be prouder of you, the men and women who have put their hearts and souls into addressing the steam generator and the dual unit outages, all the while working safely every day. Indeed, SONGS has served this region well for more than 40 years and each of you has played a role in it.

I recognize how difficult this news is for everyone at SONGS. Today, we will be conducting a series of All Hands meetings so I can talk face-to-face with you about what this means for us as a station, and for you.
Meeting times are listed below, and I would ask that you please attend the session for your division.

I will do my best to answer your questions, but will tell you up front, I do not yet have all the answers.

More information will be solidified over the next week, but I believe it is important for us to get together and discuss this news. We will work diligently, as we have before, to get answers to your questions. We will treat everyone with dignity and respect, using a process that is fair, legal and ethical.

This morning, Edison International CEO Ted Craver, and other executives, including Ron Litzinger and myself, are holding an investor briefing to inform the financial community and the media of our decision.

Below is the company’s press statement. Indeed, we can all anticipate a robust media cycle to follow.

I want to emphasize some aspects of what today’s decision does not affect. We hold a NRC license that includes many requirements and obligations ­ including our responsibility to protect the health and safety of the public and our employees. As we move forward, we must continue to meet these license requirements as well as all the requirements of our Emergency Plan and Security Plan. I need — and ask for — your continuing support as Nuclear Professionals to ensure we remain as diligent about our responsibilities and obligations as you have demonstrated in the past.

We will have more time to talk in the days ahead, and I look forward to those interactions. But I want to say again how proud I am to be a part of this team, this station. You are the finest employees I have had the privilege to work with and lead. We have important things to accomplish here at SONGS as we prepare for decommissioning, and I know that we will do it together as true Nuclear Professionals. Keep your head up, stay focused on working safely, and never forget our commitment to excellence.

Be proud, but never satisfied!

Pete


Ace Hoffman lives in Carlsbad, California. He is an educational software developer and bladder cancer survivor, as well as a collector of military and nuclear historical documents and books. He is the author and programmer of the award-winning Animated Periodic Table of the Elements. He can be reached at: rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
« Last Edit: August 15, 2018, 12:31:54 pm by thorfourwinds »
EARTH AID is dedicated to the creation of an interactive multimedia worldwide event to raise awareness about the challenges and solutions of nuclear energy.

 


Wal-Mart.com USA, LLC
affiliate_link
Free Click Tracking
Wal-Mart.com USA, LLC

* Recent Posts

Re: kits to feed your family for a year by Shasta56
[March 17, 2024, 12:40:48 pm]


Re: kits to feed your family for a year by space otter
[March 16, 2024, 08:45:27 pm]


Re: kits to feed your family for a year by Shasta56
[March 16, 2024, 07:24:38 pm]


Re: kits to feed your family for a year by space otter
[March 16, 2024, 10:41:21 am]


Re: Full Interview - Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997) by RUSSO
[March 12, 2024, 07:22:56 pm]


Re: Full Interview - Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997) by RUSSO
[March 09, 2024, 03:25:56 am]


Re: Full Interview - Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997) by RUSSO
[March 09, 2024, 02:33:38 am]


Re: Music You Love by RUSSO
[March 09, 2024, 01:10:22 am]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by RUSSO
[March 09, 2024, 12:14:14 am]


Re: Full Interview - Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997) by RUSSO
[March 09, 2024, 12:08:46 am]


Re: A peculiar stone in DeForest by Canine
[March 03, 2024, 11:54:22 am]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by kevin
[March 03, 2024, 11:30:06 am]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by kevin
[March 03, 2024, 11:21:15 am]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by kevin
[March 03, 2024, 11:16:05 am]


Re: Music You Love by RUSSO
[March 02, 2024, 07:58:09 pm]


Re: Full Interview - Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997) by RUSSO
[March 02, 2024, 07:50:59 pm]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by RUSSO
[March 02, 2024, 07:43:03 pm]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by RUSSO
[March 02, 2024, 07:41:30 pm]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by kevin
[March 01, 2024, 11:54:23 am]


Re: The Man Who Built UFOs For The CIA (Not Bob Lazar!) by kevin
[March 01, 2024, 11:34:15 am]