Kan, Jaczko, Gundersen, Bradford and Ulrich address Fukushima and San Onofre in southern CA
June 7, 2013
What lessons does the triple meltdown at the GE BWR Mark Is at Fukushima Daiichi hold for the U.S.? Well, for starters, the U.S. has 31 GE BWR Mark Is and IIs.
On June 4th, former Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan (photo, left), former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Gregory Jaczko, former NRC Commissioner Peter Bradford, Fairewinds Associates, Inc.'s Chief Engineer Arnie Gundersen, and Friends of the Earth's nuclear campaigner Kendra Ulrich gathered in San Diego to discuss lessons learned from the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe, and their application at the problem-plagued San Onofre nuclear power plant. A video of the entire event is posted online.
Kan and Jaczko served during the beginning of the Fukushima catastrophe. Bradford served during the Three Mile Island partial meltdown of 1979. Gundersen serves as FOE's expert witness, in opposition to San Onofre's proposed restart. Ulrich also serves on Beyond Nuclear's board of directors.
Arnie Gundersen went into the history of GE's involvement at Fukushima Daiichi, and draws parallels to risks at GE reactors in the U.S.
Three days after the event, on June 7th, Southern California Edison announced that it would permanently shutdown San Onofre 2 & 3 (Pressurized Water Reactors), due to dangerous design flaws in Mitsubishi Heavy Industries of Japan replacement steam generators.