Environmental Organizations Move to Intervene in Diablo Canyon Relicensing Process
Legal filings highlight significant environmental and public safety risks at Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant as Nuclear Regulatory Commission considers 20-year relicensing applicationWASHINGTON – Today, Mothers for Peace, Environmental Working Group, and Friends of the Earth filed a motion to intervene and a hearing request in PG&E’s applications to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), which seek to relicense Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant to operate for 20 more years. The groups have also submitted an enforcement petition to NRC Commissioners seeking immediate closure of Diablo Canyon due to unacceptable, significant earthquake risks that recently came to light.
PG&E applied to the NRC in Nov. 2023 to relicense the nuclear power plant despite delays in critical safety inspections and maintenance work. This intervention marks the organizations’ latest move in the ongoing legal battle to assure that Diablo does not continue to operate beyond its scheduled lifetime unless its safety can be certain. The organizations’ lawsuit against the NRC for granting an unlawful and unprecedented regulatory exemption — which allows PG&E to operate for an indefinite period beyond its scheduled shutdown dates of 2024 and 2025 — is pending in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Friends of the Earth and Mothers for Peace are also litigating over the NRC’s denial of a hearing request related to the decision to unlawfully delay a long-outstanding inspection of Diablo Canyon’s Unit 1 pressure vessel, which showed signs of embrittlement over two decades ago. The two organizations also have a petition pending with NRC, requesting an immediate shutdown until this inspection occurs.
“The NRC is responsible to ensure that operation of the Diablo Canyon reactors does not pose a significant risk to public health and safety or the environment,” said Diane Curran, attorney for San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace. “The public will be looking to these federal regulators to address their serious concerns about whether it is safe to continue running this aging reactor in a significant earthquake zone for years past their expiration dates.”
“The aging Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, which sits atop a web of fault lines, is not only unnecessary for California’s electricity supply, but unsafe,” said Caroline Leary, General Counsel and Chief Operating Officer for EWG. “Federal regulators with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must not ignore its risks to the public and the environment, especially considering a blunt assessment nearly a decade ago by the plant’s top NRC safety inspector that called for its closure due to earthquake hazards.”
“Friends of the Earth is proud to continue the fight to finally terminate Diablo Canyon for good,” said Hallie Templeton, Legal Director for Friends of the Earth. “PG&E agreed in 2016 to shut down this dangerous nuclear power plant by 2024 and 2025, but now it is joining public officials to push for another extension. We will keep prioritizing people and the planet by ensuring that the risks associated with Diablo Canyon’s extension are closely analyzed before any decisions are made.”
Communications contact: Brittany Miller, [email protected], (202) 222-0746