SLO County Board of Supervisors Letter to NRC

Gregory B. Jaczko, Chairman

c/o Annette l. Vietti-Cook, Secretary of the Commission

U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Mail Stop o-16G4

Washington, DC 20555-0001

February 16, 2010

RE: Relicensing application for Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant

Dear Chairman Jaczko: 

The San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors represents the residents who live within the Emergency Planning Zone of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. As such, we respectfully request that the NRC wait to begin processing the relicensing application filed in November 2009, until the seismic studies for the plant have been completed.

Our county has significant interest in seeing that these studies, as mandated by our local State Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee, be completed so as to best ensure the safety concerns of our citizens. Recently, the California Public Utilities Commission determined those studies be completed before any further taxpayer or ratepayer monies be invested in the relicensing process.

Thus, we make this request out of common sense, without any prejudice toward the power plant, which we recognize is of both local and statewide importance.

The application for relicensing was filed exactly one year after PG&E announced that an earthquake fault had been discovered 1800 feet offshore of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. Since then, the California Energy Commission has recommended further seismic studies to include three-dimensional geophysical mapping and other advanced techniques to explore fault zones near the power plant.

We are encouraged by the support shown for these expedited studies by our state’s regulators and state legislature. We have also been encouraged by PG&E’s willingness to complete these studies.

Thus, once again, in the interests of efficiency and openness, we respectfully ask that you allow these studies to be completed before public money is used to process the relicensing application for Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant.

Sincerely,

Adam Hill

Vice-Chair

San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors

CC: Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee

State Senator Abel Maldonado

U.S. Congresswoman Lois Capps