NRC failing its due diligence role at San Onofre

Media Alert

The DAB Safety Team: February 26, 2013

Media Contact: Don Leichtling (619) 296-9928 or Ace Hoffman (760) 720-7261

NRC failing its due diligence role at San Onofre

The DAB Safety Team through its anonymous Expert Panel concludes that the NRC is not thoroughly reviewing the SCE, Westinghouse, AREVA and MHI Unit 2 Return to Service analyses, because understanding these analyses is a very complex and time-consuming task. Furthermore, these analyses contain many contradictions, over conservatism, ambiguity and invalidated assumptions. Based on a review of NRC Public and NRC Commissioner's Meetings, the DAB Safety Team Expert Panel further concludes that SCE, NRC and MHI are all now in the mode of justifying restarting Unit 2 at low power and operating it for a long time. Likewise, NRC-NRR management is not asking sharp safety-related questions at these web-cast meetings. Without sharp questioning, these "false-strategies" will not lead to the Correct Root Cause of the San Onofre's highly complex Replacement Steam Generator (RSG) degradation issue. Any tests MHI conducts in Japan or at San Onofre under NRC Supervision appear to be little more than an attempt to support MHI's present Anti Vibration Bar (AVB) design with some minor modifications. Yet we doubt any such design will ever be used again anywhere in the industry, and San Onofre's already damaged RSGs are simply not capable of meeting the Federal Regulations for Design Bases Accidents and anticipated operational transients. Southern Californians should not allow SCE to restart Unit 2 without complete steam generator replacement, a NRC 50.90 License Amendment along with Trial-Like Public Hearings. San Onofre with only one unit operating at 70% power along with planned/accidental outages, cannot fulfill SCE's claim of providing uninterrupted, reliable power and voltage support to the electrical grid 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The CPUC should not allow SONGS to continue as a base-load generation plant nor should Southern California ratepayers have to pay for it. Additionally, current law in California forbids "new" reactors until the spent fuel waste problem is solved, and every third "refueling" a completely new reactor has in fact been placed inside the otherwise-normal power plant, thus violating the spirit and letter of California state law. San Onofre should be decommissioned.

This press release will be posted on the web at the DAB Safety Team Documents page. Short URL: http://goo.gl/zEDfT

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The DAB Safety Team: Don, Ace and a BATTERY of safety-conscious San Onofre insiders plus industry experts from around the world who wish to remain anonymous. These volunteers assist the DAB Safety Team by sharing knowledge, opinions and insight but are not responsible for the contents of the DAB Safety Team's reports. We continue to work together as a Safety Team to prepare additional: DAB Safety Team Documents, which explain in detail why a SONGS restart is unsafe at any power level without a Full/Thorough/Transparent NRC 50.90 License Amendment and Evidentiary Public Hearings. For more information from The DAB Safety Team, please visit the link above.

Our Mission: To prevent a Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster like Fukushima, from happening in the USA.

Copyright February 26, 2013 by The DAB Safety Team. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast or redistributed without crediting the DAB Safety Team. The contents cannot be altered without the Written Permission of the DAB Safety Team Leader and/or the DAB Safety Team's Attorney.

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Ace Hoffman
Author, The Code Killers:
An Expose of the Nuclear Industry
Free download: acehoffman.org
Blog: acehoffman.blogspot.com
YouTube: youtube.com/user/AceHoffman
Carlsbad, CA
Email: ace [at] acehoffman.org

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