Trial is scheduled for Friday, April 14, in a California watchdog organization’s lawsuit seeking to block a state permit allowing for expansion of the dry-storage pad for spent fuel at the closed San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS).
The hearing is scheduled to begin at 2 p.m. local time before San Diego County Superior Court Judge Judith Hayes. It was not immediately known how long the trial is expected to last, or when Hayes might rule on the case pitting plaintiffs Citizens Oversight and Patricia Borchmann against the California Coastal Commission and SONGS majority owner Southern California Edison.
The commission in October 2015 authorized the utility to expand SONGS’ spent fuel storage pad to accommodate 75 or so more concrete-encased steel canisters in underground storage. The facility already holds 51 canisters above ground but is near capacity.
SONGS is 45 miles south of San Diego. The plaintiffs have warned of the dangers of placing an additional 3,600 pounds of nuclear waste 100 feet from the Pacific Ocean in a heavily populated area that is prone to earthquakes and tsunamis. Citizens Oversight has instead suggested several alternative locations it believes would be safer, including the Mojave Desert and the Palo Verde nuclear power facility in Arizona.
Southern California Edison has said the steel canisters built by Holtec International surpass state earthquake safety requirements and would protect the spent fuel from dangers such as tsunamis or fire. The company has also noted that the Palo Verde plant is only licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to store spent fuel from its own operations, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported last year.
SONGS was officially closed in 2013 after its owners determined it would be too expensive to fix faulty steam generators in the plant’s last two operating reactors.
The waste will be stored on-site at SONGS until interim or permanent repositories are built to hold the nation’s stockpile of spent fuel, but that is years if not decades in the future.
