Ace Hoffman’s Email to CEP Chairman Dr. David Victor
David Victor, Chair of Edison’s Community Engagement Panel
Re: Official Actions By the San Onofre Decommissioning Community Engagement Panel
December 31, 2015
Dear Readers,
Here’s my opinion of Mr. Victor’s management of Southern California Edison’s Citizen’s Engagement Panel, prompted by his dressing-down of a local reporter over an upcoming news item (expected to be aired this evening).
Best regards,
Ace Hoffman
Carlsbad, CA
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Mr. Victor,
Outside your ivory tower, today was a work day for most working-class people. And the news never sleeps.
It’s a lot like rust in that respect — something that should concern you greatly, since you are helping “authorize” (although you claim to have no “authority” and no power) the storage of extremely large quantities of extremely poisonous, extremely delicate, extremely “hot” (radioactively and thermally) nuclear waste in our midst (in rust-prone “stainless” steel containers).
The waste is dangerous for hundreds of thousands of years and could remain at San Onofre for centuries (or longer). You say you want it moved out of here, of course, but that’s not the reality. And you’ve done nothing to prevent a catastrophic release at Diablo Canyon, having learned nothing about how much LESS dangerous nuclear waste is even just a few years after the reactor is shut down. Can you imagine being responsible for something that is a thousand times more dangerous than spent fuel, and a thousand times more likely to suffer an accident? That’s the sorry situation at Diablo Canyon, but you’ve said nothing to them about what a mess you have on your hands here — a mess that grows every day in San Luis Obispo, but fortunately, is no longer growing here.
My humble opinion, having attended (and filmed) many of the CEP meetings, and watched all but one of the rest of them, is that you were picked for the job because someone at Southern California Edison was sure you would do their bidding. And they have no intention of getting rid of you, I’m sure of that.
From early on, you’ve been cutting off discussions you don’t like. From early on, you’ve helped SCE ignore the fact that by delaying demolition of the reactor site for up to 60 years, SAFSTOR reduces exposure to radiation, for both workers and the public. The cumulative dose (especially to workers) is much higher if we demolish the plant sooner rather than later. But SCE doesn’t want to wait, so…neither do you.
SCE wants to move forward, but probably for financial reasons. What’s your reason? SCE also has willing workers (who presumably are unaware of the full extent of the dangers). Who knows who they’ll be able to find to do that dirty work in the future?
One thing there is unlikely to be in the future is a cheap place to store the waste. Few options are available for long-term storage of the radioactive debris from decommissioning, and those options are becoming more and more rare, and more and more expensive. So Edison certainly feels it’s in their best interest to dismantle SanO quickly, but is it in ours (including the workers who eagerly wish to be irradiated)? And what’s best for America? To “solve” one nuclear waste problem by creating another one somewhere else?
Google “Cactus Crater Marshall Islands” to learn what a mess nuclear “experts” have made of long-term storage of irradiated debris in the past. The cement dome is cracking, water is leaching in, radionuclides are leaching out, and the radioactive metals dumped in the middle of the lagoon are being brought to the surface for scrap by poor natives, and then sold to unscrupulous buyers who recycle the metal into everyday things.
So even the broken-up radioactive cement — and the dust — will have to be guarded for centuries! And you’re in charge. Can’t work holidays? Somebody’s got to do it.
But the debris from decommissioning, and the worker exposures during the process, are minor worries compared to thinking about the spent fuel. 365 days a year — for what is essentially an eternity (thousands of years), it will have to be guarded. Someone will have to not be with their families, not just holidays, but day and night, 24/7, as long as it’s here and probably a lot longer than that. In thin casks, in a corrosive environment (our beach).
You say that the spent fuel is “just one of many issues” and evidently don’t seem to grasp that it’s almost the ONLY issue.
Every day that waste sits here, it’s vulnerable to earthquakes, tsunamis, airplane strikes (accidental or otherwise), terrorist attacks, and decaying, cracking, embrittling metallurgical issues. For a couple of hours every three months, you control a room full of people, most of whom haven’t got any idea of the biological consequences of their decisions. Nor are they aware that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is practically clueless about what condition the cement will be in, or the metals. Nor does the NRC know of any way of inspecting the casks on the inside — or much of the outside. They know of no way of burrowing below the cement base to check on the condition of the Holtec Honeycomb-Style Waste Storage Pits without risking structural damage, water intrusion damage, etc.. Cement experts weren’t invited to your CEP meetings, but they were invited to speak at some NRC hearings this past summer (which is how I know the NRC is practically clueless). I don’t think you were in attendance then, nor, as far as I can tell, are you at most of the NRC hearings on San Onofre issues (I attend (and record) as many of them as possible). You certainly don’t speak up if you do attend.
Holtec has decided not to use reinforced concrete overpacks in the spent fuel “islands” (ISFSIs) they want SCE to buy (with ratepayer money, of course). No demolition experts were invited to the CEP to knock holes in that decision!
You never allow enough time for public comment, and it’s far too rigidly controlled. If a lot of people show up, you act like you’re running some sort of government hearing and cut down the minutes each person gets to speak. You actually have used the lamest excuse of all — that the room was only rented for so long, and no longer! (The seats are dreadfully uncomfortable in Oceanside, so I guess when the meetings are held there, it’s just as well they’re short.) SCE can afford better. The CEP chairman should demand it.
Any lost time during the “main” portion of the meeting invariably comes out of the public comment period at the end. Panelists will not respond to questions they don’t like — just like a government hearing.
You act like you think you’re king of something — and you are: You’re king of the most deadly substance in California. Your efforts are a major factor in determining how that deadly waste will be guarded — or not — for the next 300 years — or longer.
You’re forcing it down our throats. And don’t say it’s not your fault that the waste is (still) here. I’ve attended more than 20 years of hearings on San Onofre. Never saw you at one before the plant closed. So you had decades to help shut the plant down sooner, knowing — as we all knew, who bothered to look — that there was no place to put the waste once the plant closed. So yes, of course it’s your fault as much as anybody’s.
In short, you’ve done little since the beginning except push SCE’s agenda — and you ignore criticism. Regarding the upcoming NBC news item, it’s very specifically concerned about statistical shenanigans Southern California Edison has apparently been playing for years — that directly relate to their ability to properly and safely dismantle a nuclear power plant! Specifically, the allegation is that they co-mingle measured samples from highly contaminated areas with measurements from lightly contaminated areas in order to achieve a passing level in the NRC’s far-too-lenient allowable releases. Such behavior leaves a lot of room for bias, if not outright cover-up of accidental large releases. It’s a serious allegation which evidence clearly suggests was happening.
So I find it strange that as head of the Citizen’s Engagement Panel, you would have no comment yourself!
Except, of course, that all this was to be expected. The very purpose of the CEP has been, and IS, to block activists from “controlling” the conversation. With your efforts the CEP has done far better than SCE, NRC or NEI could ever have imagined — SanO’s public participation system for decommissioning a reactor is being held up nationwide by the nuclear industry and even the NRC as a great example of how to do it right! You’ve even traveled across the country to talk about it, haven’t you? (The only time you’ve spoken at an NRC event, as far as I can recall. Correct me if it’s what bothers you about this letter, of course. Was it NEI you spoke to? Or both?)
In the two years during which you’ve almost completely controlled the post-near-apocalyptic-steam-generator-failure discussion about San Onofre’s terrifying legacy of nuclear waste (pun intended), you’ve accomplished nothing that has helped get the waste removed, and blocked activist’s attempts to get better, thicker dry casks and stronger cement overpacks (steel reinforced, for starters, with drainage systems for jet fuel to be removed in well under 20 minutes).
Citizens attempting to work with SCE through the CEP have found it a fruitless endeavor in large part due to your attitude towards opinions you don’t share. You’ve listened to nuclear industry representatives for many hours — not experts (except Dr. Singh, of course) but merely salesmen — tell bald-faced lies to the CEP panelists and said nothing. But you control the conversation immediately when any activist — or even other panelists — try to speak out on any subject you don’t agree with.
Ace Hoffman
Carlsbad, CA