Some sobering maps..... oh but we're not like Japan.

[trumad]

I encourage you to click on the link and read the comments.

The ongoing nuclear crisis in Japan is raising new questions about the safety of nuclear power plants located in earthquake prone California.

Maps from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and U.S. Geological Survey show all four of California's nuclear power plants located in or close by "High Hazard" earthquake zones:
http://politics.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474979134178

[meow mix]

1. it will never happen here, the nukers promise!!!

and thier promises are worthless

[EFerrari]

7. My favorite uncle worked on "fixing" the engineering at Diablo Canyon

in the last years before his retirement from PG&E. The thing I remember most about it was how he said every scrap of paper related to the project was very tightly controlled, i.e., PG&E was mostly concerned with secrecy.

[Cleita]

23. PG & E will still be licensed to operate up to 2025.

The Sierra Club and other organizations are trying to keep them from renewing, however, the Enron fleecing of California that got Grey Davis recalled gave them some backing to keep operating. I'm hoping that we get active to shut this plant down now. We residents may have to make some sacrifice in cutting our electric usage way down until alternative energy sources can be implemented.

[ensho]

2. and the ones in Fl. could be drowned by hurricanes/surges

and the one on the G. of Mex. has had to extend their water intake pipes further and further out as the gulf waters warm up

[robdogbucky]

3. Not to mention the New Madrid fault line

That some Russian experts and the guy that predicted the New Zealand earthquake a few weeks ago, will blow sometime later this month.

That changes the focus from Cal, where there are only two plants to the Mississippi Valley, which by my reckoning has about a dozen plants in and around it.

Yikes!

[Arugula Latte]

5. Looks like there are four plants in SoCal.

And just one is enough to contaminate the area for generations to come.

[robdogbucky]

16. Wrong, there are only two that are operating.

I can't explain the graphic that appears to you to represent 4 such plants, but I can assure you 100% that the only two operational plants in Cal are Diablo Canyon and San Onofre. I live here as do about 45 million others and we are intimately familiar with the number of operating plants with radioactive fuel in them right now, this minute.

I think you are fooled by someone's graphic. There were some other smaller experimental and commercial plants in the past, but they have all been shut down:


Nuclear Plants in California

Operating nuclear power plants in California are Diablo Canyon, near San Luis Obispo, and San Onofre, about midway between Los Angeles and San Diego. Nuclear units at both plants use ocean water for cooling.

California also has four commercial nuclear power plants and an experimental plant that are no longer in operation. These include:

The Santa Susana Sodium Reactor Experimental (SRE) (closed in 1964)
The Vallecitos Nuclear Power Plant near Pleasanton, Calif., (closed in 1967)
The 63 MW Boiling Water Reactor at the Humboldt Bay Nuclear Power Plant (closed in 1976)
The 913 MW Pressurized Water Reactor at the Rancho Seco Nuclear Power Plant (closed in 1989)
The 436 MW San Onofre Unit 1 Pressurized Water Reactor (closed in 1992)

http://www.energy.ca.gov/nuclear/california.html


Do you really fucking think I don't know how many plants are operating in California?

Unreal


rdb

[Arugula Latte]

18. Okay, okay. Sorry.

Jeez, I just saw the graphic.

[petronius]

20. It's actually two sites with two reactors each.

So, you were right, in a way... :)

[proud2BlibKansan]

21. There have been several earthquakes in MO in the last year or so

New Madrid could go at any time. :scared:

[OneGrassRoot]

4. Never knew SC has high risk re: earthquakes? Look at the reactors there.

Geesh

:scared:

[dogday]

9. I remember one night in January I was living in SC and

we had a small tremor, enough to see things swerve back and forth, barely noticed it, but there is potential...

[Old and In the Way]

6. So. Carolina looks like the place with the greatest potential hazard.

I count a dozen in the high hazard zone.

[uppityperson]

8. What is the bottom map? What "hazard" do they mean? Thank you.

For instance, part of AK has "highest hazard" while Fl has many reactors and no hazard. Thank you.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

10. I'm confused by that as well.

Look at Texas for example. Where our two nuclear projects are it's listed as being in the lowest hazard regions. :shrug:

[petronius]

12. It looks like it's risk of gravitational acceleration from ground movement

directly at that site. More useful than saying that a plant is designed to survive a quake of some magnitude, because quake magnitudes are measured at the epicenter and shaking will decrease with distance.

In CA, for example our two nuclear plants are designed for local accelerations of 0.67 g (San Onofre) and 0.75 g (Diablo Canyon) which corresponds to quakes of ~ 7-7.5 at the closest known faults...

(Edited for word-choice/syntax; spell-check is great, but can we please have an are-you-sure-this-is-the-word-you-meant checker? :))

[uppityperson]

13. Thanks, that makes sense. Went to the link and no explanation there.

I hate sloppiness like this, maps without descriptions are useless, grumble grumble.

Thank you, that works

[petronius]

17. That really is frustrating, isn't it?

The g map is pretty neat in general - I'd love to see a higher resolution version, with some explanation of how it was calculated...

[KittyWampus]

11. Cleita posted about this. She lives in CA. Those suckers are prime examples

of sitting ducks.

[KamaAina]

14. Diablo Canyon is directly on top of an earthquake fault.

What kind of :dunce: builds a nuke plant on top of a fault?!

[petronius]

19. It's actually not. The Hosgri Fault is about 5 km off shore, and the

more recently-discovered but less feared Shoreline Fault is closer - a few hundred meters beyond the end of the outflow pipe, IIRC...

[Cleita]

22. Oh, I feel so much better now and that the San

Andreas fault is 50 miles away. :sarcasm: You obviously don't know how large an area even a small earthquake can cover, let alone a large magnitude one. Incidentally, the epicenter of earthquake in Japan was 90 miles from Sendai, the hardest hit area.

[petronius]

24. You obviously don't know what "obviously" means. I live here too, and correcting a small bit

of erroneous information was not meant to make anyone "feel better". Do you prefer myth and urban legend to concrete information? It's your privilege if you do, but I prefer data...

[Cleita]

25. I have concrete information and sitting on top of

the Hosgri earthquake fault is pretty accurate geologically, IMHO, not to mention various small faults that are even closer.

[hugo_from_TN]

26. Perhaps you don't understand what 'directly on top of' means?

God it's hard to wade through the crap on DU sometimes...

[Cleita]

28. I think geologically such a description could be considered

acceptable. But then language being what it is doesn't always translate the same to all. This is after all not a scientific journal so for the purposes of communication I believe it works well to describe the condition.

[Gravel Democrat]

15. Here's a heartwarming detal about Palo Verde...

It's not on a fault!

There's no ocean to use in an emergency so they better hope the generators have gas...

Or that the relays haven't rusted shut

Palo Verde Safety concerns
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Verde_Nuclear_Generating_Station

In an Arizona Republic article dated February 22, 2007, it was announced that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had decided to place Palo Verde into Category 4, making it one of the most closely monitored nuclear power plants in the United States. The decision was made after the NRC discovered that electrical relays in a diesel generator did not function during tests in July and September 2006.

The finding came as the "final straw" for the NRC, after Palo Verde had several citations over safety concerns and violations over the preceding years, starting with the finding of a 'dry pipe' in the plant's emergency core-cooling system in 2004.<11>



During a March 24, 2009 public meeting, the NRC announced that it cleared the Confirmatory Action Letter (CAL) and has returned Palo Verde to Column 1 on the NRC Action Matrix. The commission's letter stated that "The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has determined that the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station has made sufficient performance improvement that it can reduce its level of inspection oversight." “Performance at Palo Verde has improved substantially and we are adjusting our oversight accordingly,” said Elmo E. Collins, NRC’s Region IV Administrator. “But we will closely monitor the plant. We are reducing our oversight, but not our vigilance.”<12><13>



Large-scale photovoltaic power plants ranking 1-50

(How many are in the USA?)

http://www.pvresources.com/en/top50pv.php

[Baclava]

27. I'll go by the USGS seismic map

I'm in the green

[Cleita]

29. Thank you. That's the best description. n/t

[SOS]

30. Build reactors near fault lines with high population density

But not in Iowa, for example, with low risk.
Perhaps our transmission lines are so antiquated, they can't move the electricity?

[eShirl]

31. Long Valley Caldera in eastern California - there isn't one near that, is there?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supervolcano

[robdogbucky]

32. "there isn't one near that, is there?"

No.

I repeat. There are only two, count 'em, two nuclear power plants in California.



San Onofre near San Clemente, on the coast.

Diablo Canyon near San Luis Obispo, on the coast.



It has been that way since 1989 when they turned off Rancho Seco, inland and just southeast of Sacramento, which plant had been down more than up during its "lifespan." I hear there is really good fishing next to it though.

[Uncle Joe]

33. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, trumad.

[nadinbrzezinski]

34. I heard the flack from DOE this morning tell me

just how we ar not like there.

I sent a nasty gram to the WH. STOP TREATING US LIKE CHILDREN!