San Onofre Equipment the Weight of a 747 to Be Hauled on Local Freeways via Carlsbad Patch

Southern California Edison says slightly radioactive nuclear equipment is going to Clive, Utah

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Two new gigantic steam generators were manufactured in Japan and barged to Oceanside when the project started. They were hauled up the beaches of Camp Pendleton to San Onofre.

Edison engineers cut holes in the containment domes at San Onofre, brought the old boilers and heat exchangers out, and placed the massive new generators inside.

The old generators are in four pieces, and this would be the third shipment of huge components to Utah, said Edison, which owns the San Onofre plant along with SDG&E and the city of Riverside.

Last week, state regulators began an investigation into why the massive project essentially failed. The replacement steam generators had been redesigned by Edison and the manufacturer, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, to generate additional power in a controversial move that was not approved in advance by federal regulators.

The explosive force of steam inside the exchangers’ tubes began to tear them apart, and the station was shut off Jan. 8. The nuclear station had generated about 20 percent of the electricity delivered to 14 million residents in the Southern California Edison service area for two decades.

The California Public Utilities Commission estimates that ratepayers have spent $1.1 billion so far on fixing the problem, and buying expensive replacement power.

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