Southern California Edison has officially confirmed what has been assumed for weeks: its San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station will not come back online this summer.
The power giant is now looking at an August restart.
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Dating back to January, there have been well-documented reports of unusual wear on relatively new tubes for steam generators in both reactors and, most recently, shaky sensors.
Things are Tough All Over for San Onofre Nuclear Plant
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is expected to present special inspection findings concerning the steam generator tube leak to plant operator Edison on June 18.
San Onofre Nuclear Plant Reopening Pushed Back as 1,300 More Damaged Tubes Found
Edison says it will present the NRC a plan for restarting Unit 2 in July but that it will take longer to return Unit 3 to service. The latter reactor is where the tube wear was first observed.
San Onofre Nuclear Plant Adds Shaky Sensor Problem to Other Recent Woes
On that note, there will be tests at the plant over the summer. Edison is warning nearby residents not to be freaked out by visible steam rising from an offline facility.
VIDEO: That 70s Show: San Onofre No Nukes Rally
Running at full capacity, SONGS meets about 19 percent of Southern California's energy needs. Heading into the power-sucking summer forced Edison and the California Independent Systems Operator to complete transmission lines, come up with conservation plans and put the AES natural gas plant in Huntington Beach back into service.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.