U.S. senators this week spotlighted California’s nuclear plants and their ability to withstand earthquakes. Lawmakers also took federal regulators to task for shrugging off responsibility about temblor concerns in California. Nuclear Regulatory Commission chair Greg Jaczko told the Senate Environment & Public Works Committee April 12 that of the nation’s 104 operating nuclear plants, two are in “high seismic areas,” but that regulators are not increasing their scrutiny of the plants. Those two plants are Pacific Gas & Electric’s Diablo Canyon facility, and the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, primarily owned by Southern California Edison. “You’re not treating them any differently?” queried Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA). Jazcko maintained the plants are built to “withstand higher seismic activity.” He added that federal regulators are not singling them out. Boxer, upset by the lack of what she called regulator “humility” in the face of an ever-worsening disaster at Japanese nuclear plants, warned Jazcko, “We’ve got to respond in a much different way. We’re not humble enough in the face of Mother Nature.” Despite PG&E’s announcement the day before the hearing that it is requesting federal regulators to take seismic data into consideration before granting a 20-year license extension to the Diablo plant (see story at page 1), Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA) told senators she’s “renewing her request to the NRC to halt the relicensing process.” She explained, “We do not have the answers we need before going forward.” The California Energy Commission is in charge of making seismic recommendations on the state’s nuclear facilities. Yet CEC chair Jim Boyd told senators that the NRC “says seismic studies are not in the scope of their review” and has “given no support to recommendations [the CEC] has made.” Defending California’s nuclear plants, Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-CA) said that the facilities are “over-engineered, and that over-engineering is prudent.”
