Earlier this week, we reported on our blog about a steam generator tube leak in unit 3 at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in California (see here and here). The key facts are that:
1) the public and plant workers were never in danger;
2) the plant responded exactly how it was supposed to—sensitive monitoring instruments alerted workers to the problem & they were able to quickly shut down the plant and isolate the component within four hours of detection. Southern California Edison, the plant’s owner, also immediately notified the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the nation’s nuclear energy regulator, of the issue; and
3) pinhole-sized leaks in steam generator tubes are not an uncommon occurrence while a new steam generator is still being broken in. (SONGS just last year finished installing new steam generators at the site.)
As soon as the event occurred, some groups immediately called for the plant to close.
For instance, in the San Clemente Times:
When a nuclear plant is shut down, either for routine purposes or during an outage like in SONGS’ case this week, fossil fuel plants in the area will start up to offset the power that is no longer being generated by the nuclear plant. The local electricity grid operator will work with the fossil fuel plant to ensure that there is enough electricity to meet the demand in the area to avoid brownouts or blackouts. Given that it is winter and southern California typically does not have cold temperatures at this time of year, electricity demand in the area is low, which allows for other plants on standby to easily fill the gap in the lost electricity supply from SONGS. If this happened during the peak of summer when electricity demand is highest, then SONGS’ shutdown could affect the grid. Throughout the year (and even more so during peak times), SONGS provides the grid with stability in a congested region with its large, continuous baseload power.
Southern California Edison’s Gil Alexander explains this week’s shutdown on the grid:
It’s important to consider that SONGS helps control power costs for Southern California, saving its customers some $250 million per year compared to the average costs of other available sources in the region. The plant generates 2,200 megawatts of electricity, which is enough to meet the needs of 1.4 million average homes. Since nuclear energy is emission-free, the SONGS plant also helped to avoid roughly 180 million metric tons of CO2 emissions.
While it may be easy for some to quickly dismiss the economic and environmental benefits that SONGS provides to the southern California area, I hope that others will take the opportunity to learn more about why SONGS is essential to the region.
1) the public and plant workers were never in danger;
2) the plant responded exactly how it was supposed to—sensitive monitoring instruments alerted workers to the problem & they were able to quickly shut down the plant and isolate the component within four hours of detection. Southern California Edison, the plant’s owner, also immediately notified the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the nation’s nuclear energy regulator, of the issue; and
3) pinhole-sized leaks in steam generator tubes are not an uncommon occurrence while a new steam generator is still being broken in. (SONGS just last year finished installing new steam generators at the site.)
As soon as the event occurred, some groups immediately called for the plant to close.
For instance, in the San Clemente Times:
But Gary Headrick of San Clemente Green said the latest incident is another reason SONGS should close.And San Onofre Safety had this to say:
"Let's move away from this outdated dangerous technology and replace it with safe and sustainable options that will lead us to a brighter future," he said in a statement.
San Onofre Unit 2 and 3 are both down today (1/31/2012) and yet we still have plenty of power without this nuclear plant running. Unit 2 is shut down for maintenance and Unit 3 is shut down after a possible leak.Although I know groups like these will take advantage of any opportunity to push their anti-nuclear energy agenda, this last quote is especially bothersome to me because it glosses over the intricacies involved with supplying electricity to the power grid and paints a picture that Californians can simply “live without” electricity from SONGS. What some may not realize is that the electricity has to come from somewhere else when a nuclear plant is shut down and it’s usually not from where they think.
Tell me again why we are risking our lives, the environment and the future of California for energy we obviously can live without?
When a nuclear plant is shut down, either for routine purposes or during an outage like in SONGS’ case this week, fossil fuel plants in the area will start up to offset the power that is no longer being generated by the nuclear plant. The local electricity grid operator will work with the fossil fuel plant to ensure that there is enough electricity to meet the demand in the area to avoid brownouts or blackouts. Given that it is winter and southern California typically does not have cold temperatures at this time of year, electricity demand in the area is low, which allows for other plants on standby to easily fill the gap in the lost electricity supply from SONGS. If this happened during the peak of summer when electricity demand is highest, then SONGS’ shutdown could affect the grid. Throughout the year (and even more so during peak times), SONGS provides the grid with stability in a congested region with its large, continuous baseload power.
Southern California Edison’s Gil Alexander explains this week’s shutdown on the grid:
The plant's only other reactor already had been deactivated for a scheduled refueling and technology upgrade, he said. But the utility has ample reserve electricity, which it buys from independent power producers, to continue meeting customer demands while the two reactors are off line, the company said.The short-term solution of purchasing power from a nearby utility comes in handy during an unexpected or planned outage, but it is not a long-term option because the costs are higher than what SONGS can produce.
"We don't expect any impact on our customers tomorrow," Alexander told Reuters.
While it may be easy for some to quickly dismiss the economic and environmental benefits that SONGS provides to the southern California area, I hope that others will take the opportunity to learn more about why SONGS is essential to the region.
Comments
There is a very serious problem going on at San Onofre Nuclear Waste Generating Station but all we hear from SCE & NRC is the same old story they always say “everything is safe, very little if any radioactivity was released,”you will be fine continue to shop”. But the fact is the only people monarchy the release of radioactivity is SCE and they will not release the information to the public. So we the citizens of San Clemente have no idea how much was released & for how long. All of these things affect the quality of life for those of us in our beautiful seaside community-health and property values.
What we the citizens of San Clemente want to know is, where is the monitoring system in real time so we know what was released and for how long. SCE knows but will not release the information, at Residents Organized for a Safe Environment (ROSE) & San Onofre Safety (SOS) & Nuclear Free California (NFC) where is the monitoring system that the citizens deserve after living next to SONGS periodically releasing highly radioactive materials on an ongoing basis all of these years? Why hasn’t the city of San Clemente, Orange County government and the state of California seen fit to monitor the ongoing release of radioactivity from this plant? Why isn’t there an epidemiology study to find out what the effect of these many releases over the years done to our community? Are the city officials & county government officials an the state of California and the NRC not aware of the recent study around France’s nuclear power plants found a alarmingly high rate of childhood leukemia within a 25 mile radius?
Finally it is time for a change, it is time for the STATES to QUESTION the AUTHORITY of the NRC and its supremacy of all things nuclear. It is not 1950 any longer the states and the citizens themselves are now much better informed about the effects of living with radiation, asked the people of Chernobyl and Fukushima Japan.
Nuclear power is not safe, not clean and not needed in CA,and carbon free. We over produce power by almost 15% in CA, SONGS produces only 6.5% of it.
ROSE http://residentsorganizedforasafeenvironment.wordpress.com/
Please see Am J Public Health 73:83-92. The abstract is quoted in its entirety below:
"Abstract: Because of the recent concern over possible health effects associated with nuclear power plants, cancer mortality patterns in Southern California have been examined for time periods before the San Onofre nuclear power plant began commercial operation in 1968 and since then. This is one of America's older plants and is surrounded by major population centers in Orange, Riverside, and San Diego Counties. Infant mortality rates and age-adjusted mortality rates for leukemia, lung cancer, all cancer, and all causes have been calculated and compared for Orange, Riverside, and San Diego Counties, for California, and for the United States during 1960-1978. In addition, childhood leukemia death rates and clusters have been examined in detail in the communities within 25 miles of San Onofre. The cancer and total mortality rates near San Onofre have remained essentially identical to the corresponding rates in California and United States from 1960 to 1978. There have been no significant radiation releases to the population surrounding the San Onofre plant and the cancer rates show no patterns which have been influenced by the presence of the plant. Although no radiogenic health effects would be expected, these results do provide a means of assessing overall mortality trends in the population."
Perhaps there should be a study to find out what the effect of pot smoking over the years has done to the cogitative skills of your community and its anti-nuclear groups.
They want studies and facts but when provided with such it still isn't good enough. I wonder where they get their information, other than skewed media. I live in a surrounding city and did my evidence based research before moving here. It's not the entire community that feels the way they do, but yet they try to speak for the entire community. Please refrain from grouping all citizens of San Clemente, Oceanside, and Camp Pendleton as "we". I'm with the evidence based "we" who have done their research and acknowledged the fact SONGS isn't killing us all with radiation leaks.
Either way, if we conserved 20% of our energy consumption, we could close both San Inoffensive and Diablo, and it would be a push. This is easily achievable. If we upgraded our transmission systems so that we didn't lose so much off the lines, we wouldn't even need to conserve to do without nukes and still be just fine.
californianuclearinitiative.com
I can only hope that if nuclear power stations are shut down, it is you who pays for expensive replacement power, the additional effects of global warming, deaths from ingesting particulate matter or the the cost of intermittent renewables. Somehow I doubt you will.
SONGS does not release highly radioactive materials into the environment. A small steam generator leak with with the secondary loop being vented does not constitute "releasing highly radioactive materials". Hence the reason you don't have a monitoring system is because it would be an absolute waste of money and is absolutely not needed.
SOARCA shows that health effects from a severe accident are small. Just ask the people of Fukushima... who uhm... are not dropping like flies. The main risk is having to evacuate an area. If extremely small increases in radiation dose are such a fuss - why not campaign against airplane flights or living in Colorado?
Nuclear power isn't the only energy source with risk. Just because the consequences are high doesn't mean the probability is high.
The only comments that are lame are your own. You ask for an epidemiology study then Brian Mays quotes one. You call his comment "completely lame and your facts are outdated". In other words, you are in denial over the evidence and are still living in a dream world.
Talking to anti-nukes like you is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon — it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flies back to its flock to claim victory.
Nuclear power is needed:
http://bravenewclimate.com/
(hey look, I can spam links too)
Also why do they disregard all the research that has already gone into studying the effects of nukes? It seems to me they do so because they cannot refute it so they call it "lame and outdated" as our fellow pigeon Gene Stone, yet again, shows us.
The NRC is already conducting an epidemiology study on nuclear power plants. Given that Gene Stones and many other anti-nukes like to cherry-pick (like citing a study from France instead of the study already done for SONGS and other plants in the US) why should yet another study even be done when people like this will just ignore the results and repeat the same crap over and over again?
Also, since I currently live in Southern California too, I think that I have at least as much right to speak about what the "Community" thinks as anyone else who lives here, including Mr. Stone. And yes, I realize that Mr. Stone voices a minority opinion (although a loud one). Thanks for the clarification.
Now, if Mr. Stone wants to lecture me on the virtues of pot smoking, then I'll defer to the expert, but based on his comments here, I'm fairly confident that I'm more familiar both with the fundamentals of nuclear technology and with the relevant epidemiological scientific literature, as I have already demonstrated.
Furthermore, unlike Mr. Stone, I'm aware that California imports more electricity than any other state in the Union. There is no "15%" over production of power, except in Mr. Stone's imagination. Coal plants in Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and New Mexico, and a big nuclear plant in Arizona are what keep the lights on in Southern California.
Here are the major suppliers:
Navajo Generating Station (coal, partially owned by the LA DWP)
Reid Gardner Generating Plant (coal, partially owned by the DWR)
Intermountain Power Plant (coal, owned primarily by the LA DWP)
Four Corners Power Plant (coal, partially owned by SCE)
San Juan Generating Station (coal, partially owned by some CA cities, towns, and agencies)
Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station (partially owned by SCE, the LA DWP, and the SC PPA)
Notes:
LA DWP is the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power
DWR is California's Department of Water Resources
SCE is Southern California Edison
SC PPA is the Southern California Public Power Authority
"If you want facts they are."
Nope. Just the same old crap that's been debunked.
"We know of no way to make high level waste safe, we will have to keep the waste somewhere safe far longer than the total of human history"
Nuclear waste can be recycled else it can be disposed of in waste repositories, which Yucca was supposed to provide. A study by EPRI shows that the peak dose to a member of the public from Yucca will be less than 0.1 millirem per year. That sounds safe to me. Of course you are probably thinking, like a typical anti-nuke, that there is no safe level of radiation.
No.
The risk from <0.1 millirem per year is tiny and if you want to quibble over such things then you might as well have Denver, Colorado evacuated.
"Nuclear is not carbon free if you look at the total life cycle."
No energy is is completely carbon free, as even building wind turbines requires the use of fossil fuel. The carbon emissions from nuclear are far lower than those of natural gas or any CCS option.
"Radioactivity is far worse than carbon,"
Both radioactivity are meaningless unless it's actually changing the climate or exposing people people to radiation.
Thankfully, radiation doses to the public, while not non-existent, are still extremely small. The same cannot be said for particulate matter or the likely effects of global warming.
"add the real cost of nuclear from start to finish (gov handouts)dare you add the cost of real problem it is the most costly way to make power."
All energy sources have such external costs. Applying this only to nuclear is a double standard and cherry picking.
@ Anonymous:
" Would it be OK if you purchased a new car and the airbags didn't work, or the brakes failed? "
No. I would be pissed. And rightfully so. However what I would not do is blow it out of proportion and then demand that we no longer use cars and instead use alternatives that are not as flexible (public transport) because the air bags might fail. That would be silly.
Also if it were a steam generator tube rupture (which is extremely serious as it can cause a large leak) I would agree with you.
@ a different anonymous:
"Either way, if we conserved 20% of our energy consumption."
Perhaps if you "conserved" 20% of your electricity California would no longer import so much, or older fossil fuel power stations, the ones that Brian mentioned, could be closed.
"If we upgraded our transmission systems so that we didn't lose so much off the lines,"
The electric grid is already very efficient. It has what? 5% losses? So you might be able to half that. So then California goes from importing 33% of its electricity to 30% of its electricity.
Give me a break.
It has taken almost a year to realize that Japan is actually being "run" by its Powerful Utility Companies and this "business" relationship extends in a "Control Continuum" that extends at one end, from actual Utility direct financial support of the highest Government Leaders in the Country, to the widely known use of organized gangs to keep citizens in line at the other!
The idea that individual Japanese people actually have a say in how they are governed, much less the way their Energy is generated, is just a well publicized fantasy that the Utilities uses to put a nuclear "smily face" on the grim reality that ever facet of Japanese life is less important than what is good for these Utilities! These Powerful Utilities ARE Japan, and the Japanese people are only "forced" customers of these Utilities since they have no other choice of providers when it come to basic needs like electricity, at lest until now! Solar panels have allowed many to get the electricity they need and this is a huge threat to these Utilities, that must be "crushed" ASAP if they are to maintain their complete control over the Japanese people!
Ever since 3/11, the rest of the World's attention has been focused on the Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster at Fukushima and Japan's response to their triple melt down. What we have learned is that the Government has allowed TEPCO to not only remain in Control of this debacle but they have actually enabled the Utility to place huge numbers of Japanese citizens at risk rather than demand that the Utility think first of human health instead of Corp. shareholder profits. The fact that radioactive pollution has now spread Globally and is affecting the rest of the Planet is hardly mentioned in MSM which points to an even greater problem for the rest of mankind; we are helpless and as yet unable to demand any "better" treatment from Japan because our own Leaders are for the most part are in full support of the those Utility backed Leaders in Japan.
Kudos to Germany and many other Countries for pointing the finger at Nuclear Power and the Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster RISK every nuclear complex now represents! People globally now are becoming informed and starting to demand answers to basic questions and once people start asking questions perhaps change will occur, even if not for the Japanese themselves... one thing is for certain, the Japanese people will be affected by their Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster for much longer than the estimated 40 to 100 years that it will take to "tidy up" after Fukushima...
Question: How many in Southern California (for example) could afford to just walk away from their homes if one of the reactors in California had a meltdown for any reason; without even considering the health implications later? The answer of course is NOT MANY! We have only to see what has happened in Japan to get a good idea; in short America cannot afford a Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster any better than Japan.
Remember most of the "rest" of America is downwind from the West Coast! Japan has been "lucky" in that regard ,since most of its radioactivity has move toward eastward North America and the rest of the planet; yet most of Northern Japan is now contaminated!+
I don't have all the answers to your questions but here are some good links:
Wind and solar power are leaving nuclear in the dust: http://is.gd/CfpiUJ
and
Solar Power Could Produce >50% of Global Electricity: http://is.gd/PU3k2y
and
Estimating US Gov't, Subsidies http://is.gd/hwnsic
and
SOLAR Power Year in Review 2011: http://is.gd/8dlYIx
Not at all. You are obviously very ignorant on the subject of reliability engineering. Anyone who knows about it will be familiar with the famous "bathtub curve", wherein "failures" (minor or not) are shown as a function of operating time. There is a break-in period wherein defects are often uncovered during initial operation, then a relatively long period of trouble-free operation, then an increase in problems as you near the end of the design life. Ever had to take a new car back for service right after getting it, maybe for a rattle or defective shock absorber? Same deal here. Engineers who understand things like this will expect some measure of effort during the break-in period of a new system. A pinhole leak in a steam generator tube is a relatively common, and minor, difficulty.
Monarchy? What's the deal with that? Anyway, here are the facts, if you want them. SONGS-1 operated for 25 years and harmed the following number of people among the general public: zero. SONGS-2 has been operating since August of 1982 and has harmed the following number of people: zero. SONGS-3 has been operating since April of 1984 and has harmed the following number of people: zero.
SONGS produces over 17,000 GW-hrs of energy per year. If you wanted to replace that with the newest HAWT models, you'd need about 4,000 windmills, which at current prices would cost you about $14 billion for capital cost of the turbines, excluding the price of land, which in many places in CA can be very pricey. Spaced properly in a line, those windmills would run from San Diego to Seattle and back. Try getting approvals for that from the environmentist wackos. Or, you could build them in a line from west to east. In that case, you'd have a single line running from San Francisco to New York City. Or you could build them in a square grid, but, properly spaced, you'd need a land area of about 45 miles on a side, or a little over 2000 sq. miles, or about four times the area of the city of Los Angeles. What an environmental nightmare! Try siting something like that. Start digging, tough guy.
By comparison, 2000 sq. miles is about 1.3 million acres. The SONGS plant occupies and area of 84 acres. So the wind farm needed to replace the generation of SONGS would occupy over 15,000 times the land area of the nuclear plant. And you call yourself an environmentalist? I'd say you're more like an environment destroyer.
There is NO LIABILITY. The reason these things are excluded from private homeowners insurance is because there is already liability coverage through the privately funded (not taxpayer, not "government") Price-Anderson liability pool, which every nuclear plant owner participates in.
However, there is homeowner liability for other, non-nuclear energy sources. Fossil fuel burning, for example. The environmental damage caused by air pollution from coal and natural gas burning and the consequent risks are borne by the public. Same with renewable (i.e., unreliable) energy, dams in particular. For example, the St Francis Dam, near Los Angeles, failed and killed 450 people. The Baldwin Hills dam collapse in Los Angeles killed five people in 1963 and washed away entire neighborhoods. In all these and similar cases involving dam collapses, the risks and liability are borne by the public.
Any insurance company selling homeowners insurance that covers a nuclear accident would be committing fraud, according to federal law.
"Nuclear is not carbon free if you look at the total life cycle."
By that standard, nothing is. Both wind and solar have non-zero lifecycle carbon footprints. Natural gas, the next-cleaner fuel after nuclear, has a huge carbon footprint by comparison, and that's what we'll be using if you go heavily into solar and/or wind, because of the need for reliable, quick-start backup power. The one study done at the University of Wisconsin a few years back showed that the lifecycle carbon footprint for nuclear was almost equal to that for wind, slightly larger than that for solar. Except when you factored in availability over the life of the facility, the nuclear carbon footprint was significantly smaller. So if you're concerned about carbon (in its various forms) buildup in the biopshere, nuclear is clearly the superior method for electricity generation.
There is NO way that home owners and or property owners are going to get reimbursed if San Onofre suffers a Fukushima type meltdown PERIOD.
Japan is now on the "hook" for a big chunk of Ten Trillion Yen; (so say it is half a Trillion Dollars US) there is no way everyone will get paid by the Industry and or their re-insurers...
BTW: I am a licensed Insurance agent in CA; so you should get informed before you spread statements that are untrue!
I suggest that EVERYONE call your Licensed Insurance Agent, your Insurance Company and or the California Dept. of Insurance at (800) 927-4357 and get informed...
Then I wish that you would please share your name and what company or companies you represent so that I know who to avoid when I go to purchase insurance, because you are woefully ignorant of the federal law that regulates liability for nuclear facilities.
Apparently a license in California doesn't guarantee much.
Fact Sheet on Nuclear Insurance and Disaster Relief Funds
http://is.gd/u2iSv6
snip
The Price-Anderson Act, which became law on September 2, 1957, was designed to ensure that adequate funds would be available to satisfy liability claims of members of the public for personal injury and property damage in the event of a nuclear accident involving a commercial nuclear power plant. The legislation helped encourage private investment in commercial nuclear power by placing a cap, or ceiling on the total amount of liability each holder of a nuclear power plant licensee faced in the event of an accident. Over the years, the "limit of liability" for a nuclear accident has increased the insurance pool to more than $12 billion.
====
In a major nuclear meltdown, the idea that everyone in SoCal would get fairly reimbursed for all their loses is IMO not going to happen, remember what happened after 911, Katrina and or BP...
I suggest that EVERYONE call your Licensed Insurance Agent, your Insurance Company and or the California Dept. of Insurance at (800) 927-4357 and get informed...
Where's that guy who's always advocating libel suits when there's finally an actual instance of potential libel on this board?
And I suggest that the MODERATOR delete/not allow mindless repeating posting. Repeating nonsensical statements ad nauseum doesn't make them true. It's wasting blog space to simply post the same lies over and over again. Until you can show me something in the Price Anderson law that says that property owners who suffer an actual loss will not be reimbursed, all I can assume is that you're making it up (i.e., lying by any other name).
Er ... who is accusing anyone of using illegal drugs?!
Perhaps you have never been to California, but here all it takes is a prescription from a doctor and smoking pot is legal, at least according to the state government. Believe it or not, there are plenty of legally operated stores throughout Southern California that sell cannabis to those with "medical" needs. They're more prevalent than Starbucks in many parts of LA.
"When people like Brian say all environmentalist [sic] smoke pot he is wrong ..."
When did I say that?
While it is clear that some very outspoken anti-nuclear campaigners clearly do smoke pot and advocate its use, I never even suggested that all self-styled environmentalists do.
If you're worried about "character assassination," Mr. Stone, then simply go on the record and state unequivocally that you do not smoke pot. That should clear things up, and I'm sure that most people will believe you. Even if you do, however, it's OK. I've already explained that you probably do it legally for "medicinal" purposes.
I suggest you read the link I posted about the Fact Sheet on Nuclear Insurance and Disaster Relief Funds
http://is.gd/u2iSv6
Then ask any lawyer if all the residents of SoCal will get fully compensated if San Onofre suffers a meltdown like Fukushima! (Short answer is NO)...
Then decide if your posts qualify as "Mindless repeating posting"...
As a Native American person I have a way of looking at the Earth that many of the people from European dissent don't seem able to understand. To us the earth is not dead, it is a living thing that gives us life, and as our duty to pass it on to the next seven generations to come in a good condition. To that end I have worked for over 35 years. Hopefully that is enough said and we can get back to talking about the issues. If this site cannot talk about anything else I will not waste my time here any longer.
Apply the argument to nuclear PROPONENTS and you see how silly it is: "Your advocacy of nuclear power as essential for energy needs is not credible, because your company does not also simultaneously build every other form of energy plant."