Is San Onofre Nuke Plant Safe? Find Out at Meetings April 15, 28

The , Federal Emergency Management Agency and the city of San Clemente have all scheduled public meetings to talk about the safety of and potential risks at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.

The first is a public meeting April 15 to present initial observations on nuclear power plant exercise.

Plant spokesman Gil Alexander said Tuesday that the plant will be undergoing a series of safety drills.

(Alexander said there will be some alarms going off inside the plant as part of the drill, so don't worry that there is an emergency. The public sirens will remain silent.)

The Tuesday meeting will be the public's chance to hear how they went.

 The meeting begins at 4 p.m. at the Capistrano Unified School District Education Center at 33122 Valle Rd.

Participants in the exercise at San Onofre include the state of California; the counties of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and San Diego; the cities of Dana Point, San Clemente and San Juan Capistrano; and the Capistrano Unified School District, each of which are required to activate their emergency operations during this exercise, according to the release.

The NRC will observe and evaluate the on-site performance of SONGS staff.

The second meeting is one of several scheduled regularly every year by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to talk about any regulatory problems at the plant with plant executives in a public forum.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet in San Juan Capistrano April 28 with representatives of Southern California Edison Co. to discuss the agency's 2010 assessment of safety performance at San Onofre, according to an NRC release.

The meeting will begin at 6 p.m. at the Capistrano Unified School District Board Room, 33122 Valle Rd., San Juan Capistrano.

Following the performance assessment, the NRC staff will be available to answer questions from the public concerning San Onofre, as well as the NRC's role in ensuring safe plant operation.

According to the NRC:

San Onofre operated safely in 2010.  The licensee addressed longstanding concerns in the area of problem identification and resolution but has not been fully successful in addressing several longstanding human performance issues.  The NRC will conduct additional focused inspections in the human performance area and also in the safety-conscious work environment area to verify that corrective actions are effective and sustainable.

The following is a series of links to regulatory documents the NRC included in its release about the meeting:

A letter sent from the NRC Region IV office to plant officials addresses the performance of the plant during 2010 and will serve as the basis for the meeting discussion.  It is available on the NRC website at nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/sano_2010q4.pdf.

Current performance information for San Onofre Unit Two is available on the NRC web site at nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/SANO2/sano2_chart.html.

Current performance information for San Onofre Unit 3 is available at nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/SANO3/sano3_chart.html.

has led an effort by the City Council to examine the San Onofre plant's safety and its impact on the community. During this week's City Council meeting, Donchak went through a list of concerns and issues she wanted to learn about the plant and information she wanted available to residents.

The council voted unanimously to hold a public meeting Sept. 27 to address issues involving the plant.

Donchak said at the meeting this week that one of her main goals was to get a spot at the table when decisions about the plant were made; so many state and federal agencies have jurisdiction over the plant that it can be difficult to get anything done.

She charged the city's General Plan Advisory Committee, the group of appointees who are hashing out a new citywide set of zoning ordinances, to take a hard look at the plan's "nuclear element."

she asked for a full assessment of safety at the plant in light of lessons learned from the Fukushima disaster that is still ongoing after the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.