San Onfre only built for a 7.0

[itsrobert]

Oh Shit!

[CountAllVotes]

1. having lived through the Loma Prieta (a 7.1)

I say shut this damn thing down NOW!!!!!!!!

:kick: & recommend.

[bobbolink]

2. And stop the profits???? HORRORS!

We first have to have the catastrophe --- THEN we can talk about doing something about it.

:grr:

(I'm thinking the :nuke: emoticon isn't too appropriate here...)

[xchrom]

3. +1

[upi402]

4. Start cooling the thing now. The oceanic plate is about dancing these days

Seems there's lots of movement in the oceanic plate. They fooked up badly building those things on faults and on the edge of a subduction zone. Shut them down and stop gambling with our lives.

Jobs program building solar, wind, bio-mass, and geo-thermal. Developing these DER's (Distributed Energy Resources)could save lives, reduce climate change, and put money into the economy.

Win-win... win

[raouldukelives]

10. +1

[livetohike]

5. When I lived in Oceanside, CA, I went to a community meeting

(in 2002)regarding plans if San Onofre was the target of a terrorist attack :scared:. No one mentioned anything about earthquakes and plant safety, or what we locals should do.

[Misskittycat]

6. I live in Encinitas (2 towns south of Oceanside) and I'm very worried! n/t

[itsrobert]

7. Carlsbad here

off a lagoon.

[Misskittycat]

9. I didn't realize San Onofre was only built to withstand a 7.0; that's ridiculously low.

How can we possibly accept that level of risk?

[Control-Z]

12. We need to start

a campaign to shut down San Onofre, now, while people are thinking about the reality of nuclear power. Perhaps So Cal DUers could get something going? I think there are quite a few of us. We just need to find someone here who knows how to organize. Maybe contact Barbara Boxer? I'm ready.

[Misskittycat]

13. Depending on how the Japanese catastrophe plays out,

we can plug in the So. California numbers -- e.g., how many people in x number of miles would have to be evacuated,how to relocate/house all those people, how many people would be contaminated in any event, long-term health care costs, property losses, damage to local economy.

By any reasonable risk/benefit analysis, nuclear power is just not a viable energy source.

Additionally, in recent days on the cable channels, whenever someone discusses the need for nuclear power, the only alternative mentioned is oil. There isn't a peep about solar or wind energy possibilities.

[nadinbrzezinski]

31. Damn you are gonna make me do that, aren't you?

Look all that data up again....

(When we did the quake plan for TIJUANA, we also added a nuclear response addendum, due to well SAN ONOFRE)

:-)

Hey just from looking at a density area and all that, you are talking of 300, 000 people on a 30 KM exclusion zone.

[CountAllVotes]

15. the tsunami hit not far from where I live

I had no idea there was even an "alert". I woke up in the middle of the night and found out about it online.

I went out at 3:00 a.m. and filled the car up with gasoline and looked for a grocery store that was open. Everything was closed.

I came home and prepared to evacuate (i.e. head east).

Luckily, the area I live in was mildly affected but areas north of me were not so lucky. The waves that hit Crescent City were at least 8 feet high from what I heard.

I guess there is no money for tsunami alerts where I now live. :mad:

:kick:

[nadinbrzezinski]

32. What direction is your front yard looking? South?

If that is the case, there was mostly no need. The wave came from the north and they don't hoop a left let alone a U-Turn

:-)

[underseasurveyor]

8. Not happy to know that.

:-(

[jpak]

11. but it can't happen here

so everything is OK

not

[Stuart G]

21. Yes it can...

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/world/world_deaths_sort.php

[Richard D]

14. And . . .

. . . it's one mile from a major fault line.

[Journeyman]

16. The 1994 Northridge Quake occurred on a previously unknown fault line . . .

It's a blind fault - it never breaks the surface - and is buried 3 to 12 miles beneath the surface.

So I've no confidence that any West Coast structure isn't built directly upon a fault.

[Tom Rinaldo]

17. Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power plant is built directly on a fault

It is located near San Louis Obispo in California. The fault was unknown when the building permit first came up. LAter it turned out that news of the discovery of the (I think it's called) Hosgri fault was covered up and kept out of initial hearings. Needless to say it threw a wrench in the works and retrofitting of the twin nukes was required. It was only AFTER a massive civil disobdience campaign to keep Diablo from going radioactive that a secret internal whistle blower revealed that the blue prints for installing the retrofitted braces for both reactors somehow got inverted and installed backwards in each. Once again the opening got delayed while that was corrected. Diablo Canyon is now online and sitting on an Earthquake fault.

[itsrobert]

18. San Luis Obispo

Grew up 30 Miles from there.

[Cleita]

22. We are also close to the San Andreas fault that has

been predicted to have a capacity for having a 10 magnitude event. I posted on this yesterday here. Nobody seems to care much.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x628451

Californians should be in the streets getting petitions to decommission these plants. I for one am willing to cut my electric usage until alternative sources can be made to happen like solar and wind. This is what we have to do. If you can get by with four or five hours of electric usage a day, I think we can do it.

[pinto]

26. I remember the blue print fiasco. Hosgri is 2 1/2 miles off shore from the plant.

Runs up off the coast ~ 50 miles, iirc. Considered a "spur" of San Andreas, which is ~ 50 miles East of SLO.

http://www.thulescientific.com/san-andreas-fault-map.html

One point about the San Andreas not often mentioned is that the Central portion (the fault is divided into 3 portions) that runs along side Eastern SLO and Monterey Counties is segmented along its course and has breaks from the Northern and Southern section. It slips a lot but not much, so has numerous small events on a daily basis. There's a quake research center located there for that reason. They get a lot of data.

Researchers claim that while the Southern and Northern sections could have an 8.0 event, this Central section would create an event in the 7.0 - 7.5 range. Hence the the standard set at Diablo Canyon to build to withstand a 7.5 quake, fwiw. Knock on wood.

One overlooked point about Diablo is that it sits on a bluff 90 feet above sea level, so tsunami damage risk is pretty nil. San Onofre in So CA is a very different setting, though. I think they rely on a seawall.

The biggest difference between CA faults and the Japanese faults are the movement. Here they're slip faults where one plate moves parallel to an adjacent plate. Japanese faults are subduction faults where one plate rides under the adjacent fault in an opposing motion. Subduction faults build up more pressure and create much bigger earthquakes than slip faults.

I've mixed feelings about it all, tell the truth. Have lived here for over twenty years, so it's become a part of the picture, in a way. And, yeah, we have regular siren tests, every 3 months at noon on a Saturday. And regular tests of the Emergency Broadcast System on TV and radio...

:hi:

[petronius]

27. I think the fault that was discovered later is the Shoreline Fault, which runs closer,

but not through, the DC site. From what I read, it's less of a concern than the Hosgri zone.

It seems like San Onofre was cut down into the bluff a bit, and it's been years since I've been there but I think I recall that the site stair-steps a bit - the seaward side is basically on the beach, with a sea wall. Not sure what geologic layer the plant itself is sitting directly on - Monterey Formation, perhaps?

[pinto]

28. It's been years since I drove by the plant, as well. What I remember from drive-by is a low

footing. And a long low shoreline. That stretch of coastline doesn't have the hills and bluffs we have on the Central Coast. Not sure what the geologic formation is.

Yeah, the Shoreline fault is a new find. Appropriately named. Yet, as you say, considered less of a concern than Hosgri. :hi:

[Raine]

19. No wonder the "experts" always downgrade the

numbers of the serverity of earthquakes in CA. I've noticed more and more how those CO or a foreign sources will call the earthquakes in CA with a higher level than the "experts" at Cal Tech do. Those here always poo poo those other sources claiming lower numbers. Only being able to withstand 7.0 explains a whole lot.

[Cleita]

23. The private electric companies like PG & E spread their

propaganda effectively. We really need public utilities like the Dept. of Water and Power in LA. They also do a better job. I have had both and Dept of Water and Power has far superior service for less cost than PG & E.

[Cleita]

24. ...

[Raine]

29. yup, EXACTLY! nt

[Stuart G]

20. Very Very Bad News...........look here at the number of quakes above 7.0

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/world/world_deaths_sort.php

These quakes come around every so often and kill thousands...(more often than people think)
So the jerks...
did know that this could happen here..

Why didn't they make it able to withstand 9.0????
maybe costs too much.to build it that way....eh? :sarcasm:

[Cleita]

25. Read my post #22. n/t

[nadinbrzezinski]

30. south from it

and that one goes, it is KISS YOUR ASS goodbye time...

[Name removed]

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