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"As the world's attention remains focused on the nuclear calamity unfolding in Japan, American nuclear regulators and industry lobbyists have been offering assurances that plants in the United States are designed to withstand major earthquakes. But the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, which sits less than a mile from an offshore fault line, was not required to include earthquakes in its emergency response plan as a condition of being granted its license more than a quarter of a century ago. Though experts warned from the beginning that the plant would be vulnerable to an earthquake, asserting 25 years ago that it required an emergency plan as a condition of its license, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission fought against making such a provision mandatory as it allowed the facility to be built. Officials at Pacific Gas and Electric Company, the utility that operates Diablo Canyon, did not respond to calls seeking comment before the story was published. After publication, a spokesman for the company said the plant does have an earthquake procedure that had been implemented during a 2003 earthquake near the facility, and that staff are trained to respond. The company did not provide further details upon request. As Americans absorb the spectacle of a potential nuclear meltdown in Japan -- one of the world's most proficient engineering powers -- the regulatory review that ultimately enabled Diablo Canyon to be built without an earthquake response plan amplifies a gnawing question: Could the tragedy in Japan happen at home?"

Responding to the fears expressed by residents and lawmakers of the risk posed by nuclear power plants built on earthquake zones, government officials reemphasized the safety of the facilities with a press release this week. The safety of the two reactors near Taipei Basin is guaranteed and the earthquake-resistant design is solid, said the Cabinet-level Atomic Energy Council (AEC) in the release. In response to local media reports and legislators' concerns that the first and second nuclear power plants in north Taiwan threaten the region, the council reaffirmed that the earthquake-resistant designs can withstand nearly eight times the strength of the 7.3-magnitude earthquake that struck Taiwan a decade ago on Sept. 21, claiming more than 2,400 lives.

Responding to the fears expressed by residents and lawmakers of the risk posed by nuclear power plants built on earthquake zones, government officials reemphasized the safety of the facilities with a press release this week. The safety of the two reactors near Taipei Basin is guaranteed and the earthquake-resistant design is solid, said the Cabinet-level Atomic Energy Council (AEC) in the release. In response to local media reports and legislators' concerns that the first and second nuclear power plants in north Taiwan threaten the region, the council reaffirmed that the earthquake-resistant designs can withstand nearly eight times the strength of the 7.3-magnitude earthquake that struck Taiwan a decade ago on Sept. 21, claiming more than 2,400 lives.

PG&E should not be allowed to apply for a 20-year license renewal until state-of-the art seismic studies for the newly discovered earthquake fault offshore from the Diablo Canyon plant and its high-level waste site are completed. This is the position of the California Energy Commission, the California Public Utilities Commission, and the California legislature. This leaves the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility and many others wondering why the state Superintendent of Schools, Jack O¹Connell, appeared in support of PG&E's premature application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). We know there are two major active earthquake faults within two miles of Diablo Canyon; that a previously unknown fault knocked 8000 megawatts of nuclear energy offline in Japan in 2007 and commercial generation has yet to be restored, and the NRC has not required new information on the seismic adequacy of aging reactors to be reviewed when it evaluated the 54 license renewals already granted. In fact, the NRC has denied all contentions on earthquakes in relicensing proceedings.

PG&E should not be allowed to apply for a 20-year license renewal until state-of-the art seismic studies for the newly discovered earthquake fault offshore from the Diablo Canyon plant and its high-level waste site are completed. This is the position of the California Energy Commission, the California Public Utilities Commission, and the California legislature. This leaves the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility and many others wondering why the state Superintendent of Schools, Jack O¹Connell, appeared in support of PG&E's premature application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). We know there are two major active earthquake faults within two miles of Diablo Canyon; that a previously unknown fault knocked 8000 megawatts of nuclear energy offline in Japan in 2007 and commercial generation has yet to be restored, and the NRC has not required new information on the seismic adequacy of aging reactors to be reviewed when it evaluated the 54 license renewals already granted. In fact, the NRC has denied all contentions on earthquakes in relicensing proceedings.

"There is one thing for certain about Chile: the ground shakes and will continue to shake. Not only is the country located precariously on thePacific Ring of Fire with numerous volcanoes causing quakes and eruptions, but it is, as we know, also shaken by violent earthquakes and hit by tidal waves. And this is an inescapable reality that we must be ready to confront. No country with nuclear plants has undergone an earthquake of the magnitude experienced by Chile's central south, which reached 8.8 on the Richter scale. On July 16th 2007, Japan suffered an earthquake of 6.8 degrees. As a result of the quake the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, the largest in the world, with seven nuclear reactors supplying 12 per cent of Tokyo´s electricity, suffered total breakdown. And the collapse of the plant left numerous other problems in its wake, the worst being the spilling 1,200 liters of radioactive fluids into the sea, resulting in of contaminated water. There were also gas leaks of radioactive cobalt-60, and to make matters worse, hundreds of barrels with radioactive material fell from their storage places, some losing their seals and spilling part of their content. Furthermore, various evacuation pipes became disconnected, allowing toxic elements to escape. All this has been confirmed by Japan's own authorities."

There are 14 potentially active fault lines in areas near the crisis-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant and other nuclear-related facilities, the Japanese government has announced. The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency announced the results of research undertaken by power utilities following the Great East Japan Earthquake. The 14 faults discovered to be potentially active were previously considered unlikely to cause earthquakes. According to the research, a magnitude-7.6 earthquake could occur on the potentially active Hatakawa fault line in Fukushima Prefecture, the largest magnitude earthquake estimated. The agency said the intensity of any quakes from the fault lines would not exceed the level the facilities were designed to withstand. It also said there were no problems with the facilities' quake resistance. Five of the 14 fault lines are near Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima No. 1 and No. 2 nuclear power plants. The other nine are near Japan Atomic Power Co.'s Tokai No. 2 power plant and the Japan Atomic Energy Agency's Tokai reprocessing plant in Ibaraki Prefecture.

Contents KK-7 Stopped Due to Radioactive Leak, KK-6 Begins Start-up Tests Local groups demand that start-up tests be suspended until investigations into KK-7's leaking fuel rod problem have been concluded and that both KK-6 and KK-7 be immediately shut down. Hamaoka Nuclear Power Station Struck By Earthquake The fact that an earthquake that arose so far away could cause so large a ground motion begs the question of whether the plant could withstand an earthquake immediately beneath the plant. Nuclear Energy Policy Under a New Government It might be hoped that a change of government would herald a change of nuclear energy policy, but we should not be too sanguine about the chances of a significant improvement. Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant: 14 Month Delay The estimated date of completion of construction and testing of its Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant has been extended by fourteen months to October 2010. It is the seventeenth time that the schedule had been extended. Public Finance and Export Insurance for Nuclear-Related Exports NGOs demand rigorous safety assessment, information disclosure and stakeholder involvement. An accident not to be forgotten: 10 Years have passed since the JCO Criticality Accident It might not have been so when the plant was first constructed, but at the time of the accident the plant was surrounded by houses. Nuclear fuel should not be handled in such places. Workers' Radiation Exposure Data for FY2008 The total collective dose in FY 2008 for people working at nuclear power plants was 84.04 person sieverts, an increase of 5.86 person sieverts compared to the previous year. Who's Who: Hiromitsu Ino There are many superb specialists in all sorts of academic fields, but there is one important difference between Ino and a large percentage of these "experts". That is that Ino succeeded in bridging the gap between specialist research and social activism.

Contents KK-7 Stopped Due to Radioactive Leak, KK-6 Begins Start-up Tests Local groups demand that start-up tests be suspended until investigations into KK-7's leaking fuel rod problem have been concluded and that both KK-6 and KK-7 be immediately shut down. Hamaoka Nuclear Power Station Struck By Earthquake The fact that an earthquake that arose so far away could cause so large a ground motion begs the question of whether the plant could withstand an earthquake immediately beneath the plant. Nuclear Energy Policy Under a New Government It might be hoped that a change of government would herald a change of nuclear energy policy, but we should not be too sanguine about the chances of a significant improvement. Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant: 14 Month Delay The estimated date of completion of construction and testing of its Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant has been extended by fourteen months to October 2010. It is the seventeenth time that the schedule had been extended. Public Finance and Export Insurance for Nuclear-Related Exports NGOs demand rigorous safety assessment, information disclosure and stakeholder involvement. An accident not to be forgotten: 10 Years have passed since the JCO Criticality Accident It might not have been so when the plant was first constructed, but at the time of the accident the plant was surrounded by houses. Nuclear fuel should not be handled in such places. Workers' Radiation Exposure Data for FY2008 The total collective dose in FY 2008 for people working at nuclear power plants was 84.04 person sieverts, an increase of 5.86 person sieverts compared to the previous year. Who's Who: Hiromitsu Ino There are many superb specialists in all sorts of academic fields, but there is one important difference between Ino and a large percentage of these "experts". That is that Ino succeeded in bridging the gap between specialist research and social activism.

Pacific Gas & Electric Co. says the presence of the fault was discovered using new computer programming that maps epicenters Pacific Gas & Electric Co. officials announced today that they have discovered a new earthquake fault offshore of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. The presence of the fault was discovered using new computer programming that allows geologists to better map the epicenters of the many small magnitude earthquakes in the area, said Lloyd Cluff, head of PG&E's earthquake risk management program, in a summary sent to the California Energy Commission earlier this week.

Events that have occurred since the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake have reminded us of the reality Japan faces -- another powerful earthquake could occur anytime and anywhere, and we have no way to predict it. Fifty-four nuclear reactors are situated in coastal areas of Japan. Many experts have repeatedly pointed out how difficult it is to ensure the safety of nuclear power plants in this earthquake-prone country. Some scientists had predicted that radiation could leak from a nuclear power plant if it was damaged by a powerful quake and ensuing tsunami. One of them, Kobe University professor emeritus Katsuhiko Ishibashi, called such a potential accident an "earthquake-triggered nuclear power plant disaster." However, electric power suppliers as well as the government had dismissed such warnings as a "minority opinion." The consequences of this attitude are the serious crisis at the crippled Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant operated by Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO).

Hokuriku Electric Power Co. will continue operating a nuclear reactor in central Japan after winning an appeal against a suit brought by a group of citizens concerned about safety in the event of an earthquake. The Nagoya High Court today reversed a ruling ordering the utility to shut the No. 2 reactor at the Shika plant in Ishikawa prefecture, it said in a statement. The Kanazawa district court ordered the 1,206-megawatt unit halted in March 2006. Today's ruling comes as Japan's nuclear power industry tries to win back public support after an earthquake in July 2007 triggered a fire and radiation leaks at the world's biggest atomic plant and a series of cases involving falsification of safety data came to light. The government and two other regional utilities are now contesting similar court cases in one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries.

The Peace River Environmental Society arranged for a series of talks on earthquake risks surrounding the construction of a nuclear power plant near Peace River, one in Fairview at the Legion May 6. The speaker was J.R. (Jack) Century, a petroleum geologist, who suggested that building a nuclear power plant in the Peace country is both unsafe and unnecessary. Century has made a study of seismicity, vibration in the earth's crust, especially as caused by injecting or flooding liquid into and withdrawing liquid from the earth as is done for tarsands and heavy oil recovery where steam is injected to heat heavy oil to make it flow. Century says that underground fractures that help to trap oil and gas underground as well as making it possible to recover them more easily, can be both a blessing and a curse, the latter especially in a limestone structure such as underlies much of the Peace. He believes that injecting into the ground, whether it is steam to recover bitumen or carbon dioxide for storage purposes can alter the "pressure regimen" down below which can lead to increased seismic activity, which in turn could lead to collapses of underground limestone structures and/or possibly catastrophic earthquakes. He pointed to a CBC news story about Japan's Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant being damaged by a large earthquake. The damage included fires, water and oil leaks and pipes knocked out of place by the tremors. He implied that the same thing could happen in the Peace. He showed a map of the Peace detailing fault lines and both the original proposed location for the Bruce Power plant at Lac Cardinal and the more recent site are quite close to a fault lines.

An earthquake fault previously believed to be limited to an area south of Whidbey Island actually stretches 250 to 300 miles, from Victoria to Yakima, crossing the Cascade Mountains and is capable of producing a major earthquake, new research shows. Many of the other faults in Western Washington could be connected to the South Whidbey Island Fault in a network similar to the San Andreas Fault system in California, Craig Weaver, the regional earthquake coordinator for the U.S. Geological Survey based in Seattle, said in an interview this week. Suzette Kimball, the USGS acting director, told Congress on Thursday that there was "strong evidence" other faults in Western Washington were connected to the South Whidbey fault. "It appears there is a very large (fault) system in the Cascade arc," she told the House Interior appropriations subcommittee.

KPFA Weekend News Anchor Anthony Fest: California has two operating nuclear power plants, San Onofre in Orange County, and PG&E's Diablo Canyon Plant in San Luis Obispo County, on the Central Coast.   Both are on the coastline and both are built near earthquake faults.  State Senator Alex Padilla has called for a special hearing at the State capitol on April 14 to examine the risks the two aging plants might pose.  KPFA's Ann Garrison has the story. PG&E's Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant on the California Coast KPFA/Ann Garrison: For the past five years the San Luis Obispo-based Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility has been urging California legislators and oversight agencies to require peer reviewed seismic studies to measure the risk of earthquake damage to Pacific Gas and Electric's (PG&E's) nuclear power plant at Diablo Canyon and Southern California Edison's plant at San Onofre. The California Energy Commission has requested that the California Public Utilities Commission require PG&E do the latest, advanced 3-D studies on both old and new earthquake faults beneath Diablo Canyon before granting any ratepayer funding for its license renewal applications, but PG&E has opposed and fought the requirement to do the studies, and the CPUC has failed to act. Rochelle Becker, Executive Director of the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility, says that Japan's worsening nuclear catastrophe could have been California's, and that Californians should be able to insist that the studies be done now.

A new study from the Earth Institute at Columbia University says there's more seismic activity around the Big Apple than previously thought. Researchers also say they discovered a new active fault line running from Stamford, Conn., 25 miles (40.2 kilometers) west toward the Hudson River. There, this underground fault intersects with another fault line. Sitting on top of that intersection is the Indian Point nuclear power plant. Scary stuff perhaps? Maybe-but big earthquakes still remain geologically unlikely around New York City.

The nuclear power plant closest to America's largest city is more likely to be hit by an earthquake than previously thought because it sits atop a newly identified intersection of two active seismic zones, earthquake scientists warned today. The Indian Point nuclear power plant, with its two nuclear generating units, is situated 24 miles north of New York City, on the Hudson River at Buchanan, New York.

Boxun News, a Chinese-language Web site based outside China, reported that an unnamed expert has claimed that there was a nuclear explosion near the epicenter of the Sichuan earthquake, based on witness reports and the discovery of concrete rubble believed to have come from an underground military installation. The news of this nuclear explosion has raised questions about the cause of the earthquake.

Some years ago, an earthquake interrupted a meeting of the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board - precisely at the moment participants were discussing how a future earthquake could affect a nuclear repository at Yucca Mountain. After the quake passed, discussion casually resumed. It was as if that day's earthquake and Yucca Mountain's future "were in parallel universes," recalls Abby Johnson, nuclear waste adviser to Eureka County.

The unfolding disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant follows decades of falsified safety reports, fatal accidents and underestimated earthquake risk in Japan's atomic power industry. The destruction caused by last week's 9.0 earthquake and tsunami comes less than four years after a 6.8 quake shut the world's biggest atomic plant, also run by Tokyo Electric Power Co. In 2002 and 2007, revelations the utility had faked repair records forced the resignation of the company's chairman and president, and a three-week shutdown of all 17 of its reactors. With almost no oil or gas reserves of its own, nuclear power has been a national priority for Japan since the end of World War II, a conflict the country fought partly to secure oil supplies. Japan has 54 operating nuclear reactors -- more than any other country except the U.S. and France -- to power its industries, pitting economic demands against safety concerns in the world's most earthquake-prone country.

"Not only the pressure vessels, but the containment vessels of the Nos. 1 to 3 reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant were probably damaged within 24 hours of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, according to Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s analysis of the nuclear crisis. In a report on the analysis, the utility said it carried out minute calculations on internal pressure and other measurements in the nuclear reactors after the earthquake. The report was submitted to the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency on Monday night. TEPCO said it found that an isolation condenser, a type of emergency cooling device, did not work properly at the No. 1 reactor. This caused the core meltdown to progress until it damaged the bottom of the pressure vessel about 15 hours after the earthquake. Along with the meltdown, the temperature inside the steel containment vessel, which contains the pressure vessel, rose until it reached 300 C in 18 hours after the quake, much higher than 138 C the vessel was designed for. It is believed the internal temperature continued to rise after that. Containment vessels are designed for a much lower temperature and pressure than pressure vessels, which can be exposed to temperatures close to 300 C and pressure reaching 70 bars when a reactor is in operation."

As usual, last week there was an interesting article in the Nuclear Weapons & Materials Monitor. In "Pu Work Curtailed Because Of Fire Sprinkler Issues," the Monitor's Todd Jacobson reported that "Los Alamos National Laboratory [LANL] curtailed programmatic work in the lab's Plutonium Facility, putting the facility in 'standby mode' for a month from early October to Nov. 5 because of concerns about the adequacy of fire sprinkler coverage." On the bright side, the problem that 13 of 100 areas (130 sprinklers) in the facility were not adequately covered by the sprinkler system was discovered before there was a fire in one of those areas. On the not-so-bright side, two weeks ago, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) found that the facility would be vulnerable to a catastrophic fire in the case of a severe earthquake. However, it does not take an earthquake to start a fire in a glove box that could spread.

As usual, last week there was an interesting article in the Nuclear Weapons & Materials Monitor. In "Pu Work Curtailed Because Of Fire Sprinkler Issues," the Monitor's Todd Jacobson reported that "Los Alamos National Laboratory [LANL] curtailed programmatic work in the lab's Plutonium Facility, putting the facility in 'standby mode' for a month from early October to Nov. 5 because of concerns about the adequacy of fire sprinkler coverage." On the bright side, the problem that 13 of 100 areas (130 sprinklers) in the facility were not adequately covered by the sprinkler system was discovered before there was a fire in one of those areas. On the not-so-bright side, two weeks ago, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) found that the facility would be vulnerable to a catastrophic fire in the case of a severe earthquake. However, it does not take an earthquake to start a fire in a glove box that could spread.

Chronology of events surrounding crippled Fukushima nuclear plant A school building, which was submerged as a result of a tsunami on March 11, stands in an area of Yamamoto, Miyagi Prefecture. (Mainichi) TOKYO (Kyodo) -- The following is a chronology of events regarding the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station in Fukushima Prefecture, triggered by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that struck northeastern and eastern Japan. March 11 -- Magnitude 9.0 earthquake forces power plant's Nos. 1-3 reactors to suspend operations automatically (Nos. 4-6 reactors were shut down, undergoing regular checks). Prime Minister Kan declares nuclear emergency, directing local residents in 3-kilometer radius of plant to evacuate. March 12 -- Kan inspects stricken plant. Radioactive steam is vented from No. 1 reactor's containment vessel. Hydrogen explosion rips No. 1 reactor building. Government expands evacuation zone to 20 km radius of plant. March 14 -- Hydrogen explosion rocks No. 3 reactor building. No. 2 reactor's fuel rods are exposed as water recedes inside reactor vessel. March 15 -- Kan scolds Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) officials at company head office. Explosion is heard near suppression chamber of No. 2 reactor's containment vessel. Explosion is also heard at No. 4 reactor. Government directs residents in 20-30-km ring of plant to stay indoors. A tsunami crests the embankment of the Heikawa River in Miyako, Iwate Prefecture, before sweeping into the city on March 11. (Mainichi) March 16 -- Damage is feared to have been done to No. 3 reactor's containment vessel, forcing workers to retreat. March 17 -- Ground Self-Defense Force helicopters drop water on No. 3 reactor building. Fire engines spray water from ground. March 18 -- Nuclear safety agency gives crisis involving Nos. 1-3 reactors preliminary value of Level 5 on nuclear accident scale of 7. March 19 -- Tokyo firefighters spray water at No. 3 reactor. Government announces detecti