San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace (SLOMFP) is a participant in the anti-nuclear movement in California which is depicted in the anti-nuclear documentary film Dark Circle during the early years of protest opposing the Diablo Canyon Power Plant (DCPP). [1] In Dark Circle, Mothers for Peace takes credit for delays which prevented the plant from going online prior to the discovery of the errors.
Interest in issues with which SLOMFP contend have received considerable heightened public interest subsequent to the Fukushima nuclear accidents. With discovery of the Shoreline Fault, SLOMFP has expressed heightened concern about Diablo Canyon earthquake vulnerability.
The primary current roles of SLOMFP consists of a website, outreach efforts of Jane Swanson, [2] the current spokesperson, fundraising, and litigation. Discovery of a new earthquake fault near DCPP re-energized the anti-nuclear movement in San Luis Obispo county, and Swanson travelled to Santa Barbara and took part in a forum at the Faulkner Gallery of the Central Library on June 30, 2011. The meeting was attended by Supervisor Janet Wolf and co-hosted by the Nuclear Ages Peace Foundation and the Santa Barbara chapter of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.
SLOMFP was traumatized by an alleged embezzlement of $31,000 by their former treasurer, who was prosecuted and appeared in SLO criminal court in November for pre-trial procedures. [3] Despite this, and its history of civil disobedience, SLOMFP contends that it possesses security clearances such that the NRC should grant it access to information on terrorism vulnerabilities of DCPP with respect to nuclear spent fuel storage. [4] Swanson frequently discusses various forms of vulnerability, specifically challenging the adequacy of the no-fly zone policies putatively in place over Diablo. For instance, in an interview with KCSB's radio journalist Cathy Murrillo, Swanson contends that according to the FAA it is not a no-fly zone but merely a pilot advisory not to loiter. [2] She frequently cites outside experts such as the Union of Concerned Scientists or the National Academy of Sciences.
The SLOMFP commenced litigation of five contentions [5] of which four were accepted to proceed. The litigation before the Atomic Safety Licensing Board has been placed on hold as of the Order of June 7, 2011. This delay has no bearing on the merits but has been proclaimed as a victory by anti-nuclear activists even though it had originally been requested by Pacific Gas & Electric. [6] The primary coordinator of the litigation is Elizabeth Apfelberg, who is also Treasurer, whom their website bills as a "lay attorney". Apfelberg has been with SLOMFP since 1973. [7] They also employ attorney Diane Curran. [8] Swanson was quoted by an environmentally oriented online journalist as summarizing their intent as follows: "Our goal, with the services of our attorney in Washington D.C., Diane Curran, is to ensure that safety issues pertaining to both the reactors and the radioactive wastes at Diablo Canyon are fully studied before the NRC considers PG&E's application for license renewal." [9]
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with protecting public health and safety related to nuclear energy. Established by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the NRC began operations on January 19, 1975, as one of two successor agencies to the United States Atomic Energy Commission. Its functions include overseeing reactor safety and security, administering reactor licensing and renewal, licensing radioactive materials, radionuclide safety, and managing the storage, security, recycling, and disposal of spent fuel.
Dry cask storage is a method of storing high-level radioactive waste, such as spent nuclear fuel that has already been cooled in the spent fuel pool for at least one year and often as much as ten years. Casks are typically steel cylinders that are either welded or bolted closed. The fuel rods inside are surrounded by inert gas. Ideally, the steel cylinder provides leak-tight containment of the spent fuel. Each cylinder is surrounded by additional steel, concrete, or other material to provide radiation shielding to workers and members of the public.
The Diablo Canyon Power Plant is a nuclear power plant near Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County, California. Since the permanent shutdown of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in 2013, Diablo Canyon has been the only operational nuclear plant and largest single power station in California. It was the subject of controversy and protests during its construction, with nearly two thousand civil disobedience arrests in a two-week period in 1981.
The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) is a permanently closed nuclear power plant located south of San Clemente, California, on the Pacific coast, in Nuclear Regulatory Commission Region IV. The plant was shut down in 2013 after defects were found in replacement steam generators; it is currently in the process of decommissioning. The 2.2 GW of electricity supply lost when the plant shut down was replaced with 1.8 GW of new natural-gas fired power plants and 250 MW of energy storage projects.
Avila Beach is an unincorporated community in San Luis Obispo County, California, United States, located on San Luis Obispo Bay about 160 miles (257 km) northwest of Los Angeles, and about 200 miles (320 km) south of San Francisco. The population was 1,576 at the 2010 census. For statistical purposes, the United States Census Bureau has defined Avila Beach as a census-designated place (CDP).
The Abalone Alliance (1977–1985) was a nonviolent civil disobedience group formed to shut down the Pacific Gas and Electric Company's Diablo Canyon Power Plant near San Luis Obispo on the central California coast in the United States. They modeled their affinity group-based organizational structure after the Clamshell Alliance which was then protesting the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant in coastal New Hampshire. The group of activists took the name "Abalone Alliance" referring to the tens of thousands of wild California Red Abalone that were killed in 1974 in Diablo Cove when the unit's plumbing had its first hot flush.
Nuclear history of the United States describes the history of nuclear affairs in the United States whether civilian or military.
The anti-nuclear movement in the United States consists of more than 80 anti-nuclear groups that oppose nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and/or uranium mining. These have included the Abalone Alliance, Clamshell Alliance, Committee for Nuclear Responsibility, Nevada Desert Experience, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Plowshares Movement, Women Strike for Peace, Nukewatch, and Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. Some fringe aspects of the anti-nuclear movement have delayed construction or halted commitments to build some new nuclear plants, and have pressured the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to enforce and strengthen the safety regulations for nuclear power plants. Most groups in the movement focus on nuclear weapons.
The 1970s proved to be a pivotal period for the anti-nuclear movement in California. Opposition to nuclear power in California coincided with the growth of the country's environmental movement. Opposition to nuclear power increased when President Richard Nixon called for the construction of 1000 nuclear plants by the year 2000.
Anti-nuclear protests began on a small scale in the U.S. as early as 1946 in response to Operation Crossroads. Large scale anti-nuclear protests first emerged in the mid-1950s in Japan in the wake of the March 1954 Lucky Dragon Incident. August 1955 saw the first meeting of the World Conference against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs, which had around 3,000 participants from Japan and other nations. Protests began in Britain in the late 1950s and early 1960s. In the United Kingdom, the first Aldermaston March, organised by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, took place in 1958. In 1961, at the height of the Cold War, about 50,000 women brought together by Women Strike for Peace marched in 60 cities in the United States to demonstrate against nuclear weapons. In 1964, Peace Marches in several Australian capital cities featured "Ban the Bomb" placards.
The United States Government Accountability Office reported more than 150 incidents from 2001 to 2006 of nuclear plants not performing within acceptable safety guidelines. According to a 2010 survey of energy accidents, there have been at least 56 accidents at nuclear reactors in the United States. The most serious of these was the Three Mile Island accident in 1979. Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Plant has been the source of two of the top five most dangerous nuclear incidents in the United States since 1979. Relatively few accidents have involved fatalities.
The nuclear energy policy of the United States began in 1954 and continued with the ongoing building of nuclear power plants, the enactment of numerous pieces of legislation such as the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, and the implementation of countless policies which have guided the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy in the regulation and growth of nuclear energy companies. This includes, but is not limited to, regulations of nuclear facilities, waste storage, decommissioning of weapons-grade materials, uranium mining, and funding for nuclear companies, along with an increase in power plant building. Both legislation and bureaucratic regulations of nuclear energy in the United States have been shaped by scientific research, private industries' wishes, and public opinion, which has shifted over time and as a result of different nuclear disasters.
Dark Circle is a 1982 American documentary film directed and produced by Judy Irving, Christopher Beaver and Ruth Landy that focuses on the connections between the nuclear weapons and the nuclear power industries, with a strong emphasis on the individual human and protracted U.S. environmental costs involved. A clear point made by the film is that while only two bombs were dropped on Japan, many hundreds were exploded in the United States.
The Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, is a subordinate part of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility is a non-profit, anti-nuclear, public interest organization founded in 2005, and based in San Luis Obispo, California. It is focused on public citizen activism and public participation with regard to the Diablo Canyon Power Plant, also known as the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. The focus of the group is primarily on using leverage at the level of state agencies such as the California Public Utilities Commission. Concurrent jurisdiction of their concern also includes the California Coastal Commission, which certifies compliance of all action within the coastal zone which thus includes the plant. Their posture is primarily oppositional. Other venues for activism include the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, California Energy Commission, Regional Water Quality Control Board, SLO County, the California legislature, the office of the state attorney general, and the US Congress, of which they are in the 23rd District.
Diablo Canyon (Nuclear) Power Plant, located in San Luis Obispo County California, was originally designed to withstand a 6.75 magnitude earthquake from four faults, including the nearby San Andreas and Hosgri faults, but was later upgraded to withstand a 7.5 magnitude quake. It has redundant seismic monitoring and a safety system designed to shut it down promptly in the event of significant ground motion.
The Helms Pumped Storage Plant is located 50 mi (80 km) east of Fresno, California in the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range's Sierra National Forest. It is a power station that uses Helms Creek canyon on the North Fork of the Kings River for off-river water storage and the pumped-storage hydroelectric method to generate electricity. After being planned in the early 1970s, construction on the plant began in June 1977 and commercial operations began on 30 June 1984. It has an installed capacity of 1,212 MW and is owned by Pacific Gas and Electric Company.
Jordan Cunningham is an American attorney and politician who represented the 35th district in the California State Assembly. He is a Republican who was elected in November 2016. Cunningham's district encompassed San Luis Obispo County and portions of Santa Barbara County. Prior to being elected to the state assembly, he was a school board trustee for the Templeton Unified School District and a Deputy District Attorney for San Luis Obispo County.
Anti-nuclear protests in the United States have occurred since the development of nuclear power plants in the United States. Examples include Clamshell Alliance protests at Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant, Abalone Alliance protests at Diablo Canyon Power Plant, and those following the Three Mile Island accident in 1979.
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