San Onofre Nuke Plant Ready for a Quake, Officials Say

Editors Note: This is the text of a press release sent out Thursday by Scott Andreson, a San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station spokesman.

More than 10,000 Southern California Edison (SCE) employees and executives at 100 utility facilities, including the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, joined the estimated 8.6 million Californians participating in Thursday’s Great California ShakeOut emergency drill. In addition to participating in these types of exercises, the utility conducts its own emergency drills in conjunction with local emergency response agencies to ensure SCE’s readiness to protect public health and safety and restoring Southern California’s electrical infrastructure in the event of a major earthquake.

San Onofre Plant Earthquake Readiness

All critical safety structures at the San Onofre plant are designed to withstand ground motion greater than that which would be created by the maximum credible earthquake forecast for the region.

The plant has robust, redundant safety systems designed to create and maintain a safe shutdown condition in the event of a major quake.

Hundreds of San Onofre nuclear plant professionals train regularly on the safe shutdown of the plant and the timely communication to nearby communities during an emergency.

Example – Emergency preparedness professionals from the plant and 13 community and county jurisdictions will drill together for the fifth time this year on Oct. 26, practicing how they would respond to a worst-case plant scenario.

San Onofre Plant Statement

The major earthquake simulated during Thursday’s Great California ShakeOut – a 7.8 magnitude quake on the San Andreas fault – would likely have produced ground motion at the San Onofre plant site of approximately 0.13g* – less than one fifth of the level of motion the safety-related equipment is designed to withstand. The equipment used to maintain the plant in a safe condition would not be damaged by such an event.

* “g” equals the force of gravity.