Diablo Canyon (PG&E, Central California) nuclear plant 'near miss' in report

[CreekDog]

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

For 18 months, operators at the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant near San Luis Obispo didn't realize that a system to pump water into one of their reactors during an emergency wasn't working.

It had been accidentally disabled by the plant's own engineers, according to a report issued Thursday on the safety of nuclear reactors in the United States.

The report, from the Union of Concerned Scientists watchdog group, lists 14 recent "near misses" - instances in which serious problems at a plant required federal regulators to respond.

...

Engineers at Diablo Canyon inadvertently created the problem while trying to solve another issue, according to the report.

A pair of remotely operated valves in the emergency cooling system was taking too long to move from completely closed to completely open. So engineers shortened the distance between those two positions, according to the report.
...

No one noticed until the valves refused to open during a test in October 2009, 18 months after the engineers made the changes.

"It was disabled, and they didn't know it," said Jane Swanson, spokeswoman for the Mothers for Peace anti-nuclear group, which frequently spars with federal regulators over Diablo Canyon. "That's unforgivable, and it's not that unusual."

In an emergency, Diablo Canyon operators still could have opened the valves manually.

...

(The chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission) said Thursday there was no immediate need to inspect any U.S. nuclear plants.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/17/BUA01IDTUO.DTL&tsp=1

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That PG&E operates Diablo Canyon is one of my primary concerns. I'm convinced that PG&E is, as an organization, incompetent. I live near the gas line that exploded in San Bruno, and it exploded because during maintenance, PG&E workers fouled up the power regulating the gas line pressure on the SF Peninsula and then when the line here exploded, because PG&E saved money by not putting remote shutoff valves on a 50+ year old pipeline (running very close to the San Andreas Fault) it took them 100+ minutes to get the gas shut off after the explosion occurred.

Do I trust them with Nuclear Power? Not for one damned minute.

:rant:

(oh, but PG&E did spend 45 million advertising for a ballot initiative which would have required cities that wanted to form their own municipal power utilities to pass it with a 2/3 rds majority vote.)

So, we know they are capable of spending money, it's just that it becomes very difficult for them when it involves safety.

:grr:

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. Can't happen here, eh?

[bertman]

2. Keep in mind that these incidents are THE ONES WE HEAR ABOUT. How many

do you think go unreported when found?


Recommend.

[defendandprotect]

20. In the Fukushima crisis, at plant #2, as they tried to release pressure found a VALVE was

closed which should have been open -- how long?

But again it's human error -- and it occurs at the worst possible times!!

[ThoughtCriminal]

3. Could have opened the valves manually

unless the operators weren't incapacitated or unable to reach the valves due to whatever created the emergency.

[piniella]

4. DIABLO HAS BEEN A PROBLEM FROM THE START

'MINOR' CHANGES FORSEEN AS RESULT OF MIXUP AT COAST NUCLEAR PLANT
BYLINE: By ROBERT D. HERSHEY Jr., Special to the New York Times
October 10, 1981, Saturday, Late City Final Edition

Officials of the Pacific Gas and Electric Company said today the company's Diablo Canyon nuclear plant in California required only ''minor'' modifications to remedy a construction error discovered last week and that those were expected to be completed by the end of this month.

The $2 billion plant, which has been under attack by antinuclear groups because it is near an undersea earthquake fault, has been plagued by repeated delays since construction started in 1968. Fuel was being loaded for low-power testing last week when workers found that some piping supports were incorrectly placed so that they might not be able to meet the requirements for withstanding an earthquake.

Company officials disclosed that 691 of the 2,745 pipe supports in the containment area of the No. 1 reactor required study to determine whether they were under strength. As of yesterday 27 needed to be buttressed and company officials estimated that this number would rise to 72 when the review was completed. A spokesman said the repairs would probably be made by welding additional iron bars to the piping support system.

The blunder , which the company said was its fault rather than that of outside consultants, came about when the diagram for the two mirror-image reactors was reversed.

The plans for the No. 1 reactor were used in the No. 2 reactor and vice versa.The mixup was not the result of failing to ''flip'' a single transparent blueprint, as an employee of the utility mistakenly told reporters earlier. Rather, there were separate blueprints for each reactor but the wrong ones were used. Company officials said that the mixup was not noticed because the reactors were built about two years apart.

[sce56]

6. Glad to see you come out of Lurk mode there!

:hi:

[JDPriestly]

11. Welcome to DU, piniella

[Cleita]

5. PG & E is incompetent. I live near El Diablo and

PG & E is our electric company. We regularly have power outages and nothing permanent is done to fix the reason why electricity goes out every time we have a storm or other climate or geological event. P. G. & E is evidently only a holding company so they don't really have any boots on the ground to supervise operations.

[The Green Manalishi]

7. If you can't trust PG&E, who can you trust?

:puke:

Incompetent fucking idiots.

[truedelphi]

14. Enron, maybe? n/t

[barbtries]

8. this is the one near morro bay i presume

where my brother and his family live.

[PoliticAverse]

9. Nuclear plans are completely safe...

in theory. In reality they are operated by humans.

[JDPriestly]

10. Diablo Canyon nuclear facility appears to be right on the ocean.

Here is a link to a picture on Wikipedia's page for it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Diablo_Canyon_NPP_above.jpg

[LadyHawkAZ]

12. It is

Right smack up on a cliff above the water, and accessed by a long, twisty mountain road. PG&E used to run bus tours out there when I was a kid.

My entire family, except for one sister and her kids, still live in the immediate area. I'm sending them this article, for all the good it will do. They're not going to listen.

[AsahinaKimi]

13. I am very sure that

If PG&E had a nuclear accident, they would make the customers pay for the problem. Just like what happened when that San Bruno neighborhood exploded a few months ago, from the Gas Leak.

[Rabblevox]

15. Fuck, fuck, and multiple mother-fucks!

We tried to god-damn tell them. I was beaten and jailed trying to stop Diablo Canyon. The mother-fucking shitbags didn't listen then and they are still not listening.

The stupid shits never listened, never used common sense, and now they are fucking "SURPRISED"?!

Please excuse my impotent and worthless rage, but FUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCKK!!!!!!!!!!

Dammit, I really REALLY, MOTHERFUCKING REALLY! want to hit something right now.

Please excuse me, while I chew the carpet, rather than hunt down the nearest PG&E exec.

[HEyHEY]

16. "OOOh, Diablo Canyon one, why can't you be more like diablo canyon two"

[kaffy4x4]

17. Diablo Canyon = Devils Canyon

Having lived in San Luis Obispo all my life up to 10 yrs ago, I remember the protest before, during and after the plant was built. The community didn't want it, doesn't want it and it should be shut down for good. San Luis Obispo was recently awarded the Happiest City in America...well only if you don't think about Devils Canyon.

[Rabblevox]

18. I was on the front lines. We tried. We bled. We did prison. And we lost.

I was jailed 5 times for Diablo. One of those bought me a six month sentence. My arm and two ribs were broken. Half of my face was intentionally scraped off on the pavement, I still have the scars.

Please understand, I'm not asking for sympathy or saying I'm anyone special. I did what I did willingly, and thousands around the world have given far more than I. But we failed. The nuke-oil-war machine is stronger than ever.

Excuse my while I cry for a few minutes. Right now I am more in pain than rage.

I can't hit or choke anyone. I can't elect anyone to make it better, all I can do is rant at the moment.

I know ranting isn't effective, peeps. I really do know that.

But right now it's all I've got. I feel like the Harlan Ellison story, "I have no mouth, but I must scream".

[AntiFascist]

19. Cal Poly San Luis Obispo....

is right in the path of the wind from Diablo Canyon should an accident occur. I believe they now have dry casks that are used for storing spent fuel rods. They also have open pools that were used prior to 2003. Are these used to store the spent fuel rods while they are cooling down prior to dry storage? These look like large swimming pools that are open to the air!