1. Sign on in support of the 79 experts’ letter to Governor Newsom

79 scientists, academics and entrepreneurs from a range of disciplines, including former Secretary of Energy and Nobel Laureate, Dr. Steven Chu, Pulitzer Prize Laureate, Richard Rhodes and reknown climate scientist, Dr. James Hansen, sent a letter to Governor Newsom explaining in great detail why the decision to prematurely close Diablo Canyon would be bad for climate and bad for California. The Climate Coalition heartily welcomes this important outreach to the governor and agrees with the contents of this letter. We reproduced this letter here and have urged everyone to add your name to this appeal. We will continue to collect more signatures from the general public and send these additional signatures to the Governor office as they rise. 

Update 1:  On April 29, the L.A. Times published an article titled California promised to close its last nuclear plant. Now Newsom is reconsidering.  The Climate Coalition has drafted and then sent an Open Letter to thank Governor Newsom for working to prevent the closure of the Diablo Canyon plant by applying for federal support funds through the DOE’s new Civil Nuclear Credit program.  We will forward signatories of this draft open letter to Gov. Newson as well.

Update 2:  On August 12, the Governor’s office, the California Energy Commission and CALISO hosted a public workshop to report on the findings of the state’s energy planners showing that the state will experience far worse grid outages with the expected closure of Diablo Canyon. They provided opportunities to submit written comment about Diablo Canyon and make public comments. Please submit a comments to the CEC’s website in support of Diablo Canyon. Use a descriptive “Comment Title” to clearly indicate your support for Diablo Canyon’s continued operation. Use docket number “21-ESR-01” and be sure that any PDF that you submit is searchable. If they stopped taking comments there, you can submit a written comment by email to docket@energy.ca.gov.

Update 3:  The Governor has had legislation submitted that will provide $1.4 billion of state funds to support the extension of Diablo Canyon’s NRC license. We nowneed to urge our California Assembly Representatives and Senators to approve this legilsation.  Please use the SAVE CLEAN ENERGY site’s petition form to send messages to your representatives in the California State House. Also, there will be an important meeting on Thursday, August 25th, 2022 in Sacramento, of the Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee, at noon.  The address is 1021 O Street, Room 1200.  Please try to attend and/or sign up to attend virtually to express support for extending the operations of Diablo Canyon.

2. Legal Defense of Diablo Canyon & Opposition to CPUC’s plan to fill in with Coal Power

The independent, non-profit intervenor, Californians for Green Nuclear Power (CGNP) has been waging a legal battle to save Diablo Canyon for years. They have supported the relentless efforts of Dr. Gene Nelson, who has volunteered thousands of hours of his time, and helped to fund the filing of dozens of briefs in a multitude of actions, in the interests of the environment, ratepayers and public safety. Nevertheless, for years, all of CGNP’s filings have been met by a wall of denial, obstruction and obfuscation from state and federal agencies.  Meanwhile, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) claimed that Diablo Canyon’s clean energy would be replaced with other sources of clean energy, as required by law.  This kept state leaders in support of the decision to close Diablo Canyon. Unfortunately, the idea that Diablo’s “5 Hoover Dams” worth of clean, 24×7 power could be replaced with wind or solar was a complete fiction. In fact, the CPUC’s 2026 procurement order for the additional 11,500 megawatts of energy cannot be filled with new wind or solar and the state will have to scramble to even be able to replace that enormous amount with energy from burning coal. They have to race to complete transmission lines from Wyoming to get sufficient power from coal. And that’s apparently what their plan has been.

Dr. Gene Nelson was the first to reveal this elaborate charade to the public. As he explained in an OpEd in _____, in order to meet this energy demand, the state plans to allow “Unspecified Energy Imports” from out-of-state to meet the 2026 shortfall,” as revealed in a document filed by the California Independent System Operator in 2020. In fact, the CPUC’s references to “unspecified imports” is a California legal euphemism that mostly applies to out-of-state coal-fired generation, such as that provided by PacifiCorp.  This subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Energy (BHE) owns several coal and natural gas plants in the west and is currently constructing an Energy Gateway transmission project that will link to California. There is already a transmission line in southern Nevada that links to a Southern California Edison substation, providing access to the California grid.

But it gets even worse.  Despite a 2006 California law (SB 1368) that sets an emission standard for power provided to California, PacifiCorp obtained an exemption due to its “small footprint” in California. Furthermore, the CPUC allowed itself a legal loophole that enables them to avoid reporting on the emissions from out-of-state power generation.  Governor Brown vetoed a bill that would have required CALISO to provide disclosure of Energy Content.  It thus appears that the CPUC is acquiescing to Diablo Canyon’s closure, knowing that the energy will be replaced by dirty coal and that those emissions can be deceitfully omitted from inclusion under SB 1368.

Dr. Nelson began waging a battle to bring this emission loophole to the attention of the public—and he succeeded. CPUC commissioners, as well as those of the California Energy Commission and the California Independent System Operator (CASIO) Board of Governors are all appointed by Gov. Gavin Newsom. Now that their scheme has been revealed, they are much less willing to let such a detrimental solution be used, which is clearly contrary to what California’s laws and the public demand. The revelation of California becoming reliant on coal would have been devastating for Governor Newson. We are pleased to have supported Dr. Nelson and CGNP in ensuring that California protect its existing clean energy from Diablo Canyon. They continue to wage a PR and ongoing legal battle on behalf of California’s residents. They welcome both financial and research support. Please contact Government@CGNP.org for information on how you can help.

3. Petition to Governor Newsom, the California Legislature and the CPUC

The Climate Coalition has prepared a state-wide petition to circulate to send to Governor Newsom, the California Legislature and CPUC to SAVE CLEAN ENERGY from DIABLO CANYON.  Closing Diablo Canyon before we have eliminated the dirty energy that is causing climate makes no sense whatsoever. California needs to reverse the decision to shutter clean Diablo Canyon before all sources of dirty emissions have been shuttered.  This petition is being held for the time being, as we follow the news about Newsom’s efforts to apply for CNC funds to keep Diablo Canyon running. Nevertheless, we are welcoming early signatures and comments on the current draft, which is likely to evolve.  We could also use your help when we are ready to circulate this petition.

Save Diablo Poll

The San Luis Obispo paper ran an article with a review of the MIT and Stanford report which was released in November, 2021 showing the benefits of continued operation of Diablo Canyon. They provided a very clear overview of the issues as described in the study.  The publishers of the article decided to field an informal poll at the bottom of this article asking readers if they think Diablo should remain open or be closed. Contrary to what many people would suspect, 94% of those who answered the poll, totalling over 550 respondents, voted to keep the plant running!  5% supported closing the plant and only 1% didn’t know.  This reflects the changing attitudes about the role of nuclear energy in efforts to decarbonize the grid.

(PLEASE CONTACT US TO SHARE OTHER CAMPAIGN INFO THAT YOU KNOW ABOUT!)