The history of Diablo Canyon began in 1963. Mothers for Peace formed as an anti-Vietnam war group in 1969. In 1973, Mothers for Peace committed to using the legal system to oppose Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant, and by extension all nuclear facilities.
This Mothers for Peace Timeline lists our actions taken to achieve our goals to minimize the dangers posed by Diablo Canyon and other nuclear reactors, nuclear weapons, and radioactive waste – as well as our work to promote peace, environmental and social justice, and renewable energy.
Acronyms used in the timeline:
- MFP: San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace
- PG&E: Pacific Gas and Electric Company
- NRC: Nuclear Regulatory Commission
- ASLB: Atomic Safety and LIcensing Board of the NRC
- CPUC and PUC: California Public Utilities Commission
- DCDEP: Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel
- DCISC: Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee
| Date/Year | News | |
|---|---|---|
| 1963 | PG&E announced plans to build five atomic power plants on the Nipomo dunes. The Sierra Club opposed the plan, and the majority of the group agreed that the plants should be built at Diablo Canyon instead. Some Sierra Club opponents of the Diablo Canyon plan later started the Scenic Shoreline Preservation Conference and Friends of the Earth to oppose the construction. | |
| 1968 | A construction permit was issued for Diablo Canyon Unit 1. Early intervenors opposing the construction included The Scenic Shoreline Preservation Conference, Luigi Marre Land and Cattle Company, and San Luis Bay Properties. | |
| Feb. 1969 | The Hosgri fault was discovered just offshore. | |
| Dec. 9, 1970 | A construction permit was issued for Diablo Canyon Unit 2. | |
| Oct. 1972 | PG&E claimed this was when they first became aware of the fault. | |
| Nov. 15, 1973 | Mothers for Peace, and Sandy Silver and Elizabeth Apfelberg as individuals, filed as Intervenors against the licensing of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. MFP simultaneously took a position for conservation and solar energy. | |
| Mar. 26, 1974 | In a pre-hearing conference of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB), MFP and other intervenors emphasized the seismicity problem with the Diablo site. | |
| May 1, 1974 | The Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) rejected a request by Scenic Shoreline Preservation Conference that construction at Diablo Canyon be halted pending further studies of the earthquake fault. | |
| May 2, 1974 | In an action organized by MFP and the Cal Poly Ecology Action Club, 30 people protested at the AEC hearings in SLO against the AEC’s predetermined decisions and failure to provide an adequate public forum. | |
| June 10, 1974 | MFP asked the SLO County Board of Supervisors to hold a public forum on Diablo Canyon and to set up a fact-finding body to study problems with the operation of the plant. In July the board rejected the proposal. | |
| Sept. 26, 1974 | Following an earthquake centered 7 miles offshore of Diablo Canyon, MFP and the Scenic Shoreline Preservation Conference filed a motion before the ASLB asking that construction be halted at Diablo Canyon pending further seismicity studies. The motion was denied. | |
| Jan. 1975 | The California Department of Fish and Game revealed that between 4,000 and 13,000 abalone were killed — apparently by toxic copper released by Diablo Canyon during hot water testing. | |
| Mar. 7, 1975 | TMFP filed a motion with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) requesting a baseline study of cancer and infant mortality rates in the area around Diablo Canyon before the plant opened. The study was not done. | |
| May 1975 | Fifty area physicians joined MFP and others in asking the County Board of Supervisors to hold a public forum on the dangers of nuclear energy. The forum was held Oct. 17-18 featuring keynote speeches by Dr. John Gofman and Dr. Edward Teller. | |
| June 1975 | A Mothers for Peace poster, designed by Lori McKay showed a mother and toddler in profile. The wording read: “What do you do in case of a nuclear accident? Kiss your children goodbye.” | |
| Dec. 9, 1975 | The ASLB denied a motion by MFP that fuel should not be permitted to be loaded at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Mar. 4, 1976 | The ASLB conducted a special hearing to determine whether to grant access on security procedures at Diablo Canyon to a consultant for MFP. In spite of an opposing motion filed by a local criminal justice group, arrangements were made in June for the consultant to inspect security arrangements at the plant. | |
| Oct. 1976 | MFP retained the Los Angeles-based law firm, Center for Law in the Public Interest, to replace MFP members, Elizabeth Apfelberg, Sandy Silver, and Raye Fleming, who had been serving as excellent lay attorneys. | |
| May 1977 | Abalone Alliance was formed. | |
| June 1977 | MFP voted to become a member group of Abalone Alliance. | |
| Aug. 26, 1977 | PG&E applied for an interim license. MFP’s attorney blocked the attempt and PG&E withdrew the application. | |
| Oct. 1977 | The ASLB held hearings on safety, evacuation, and emergency plans. MFP and others tried unsuccessfully to convince them that the plans were woefully inadequate. | |
| Nov. 1977 | The NRC reversed its permission for a consultant for MFP to view Diablo security plans. | |
| Sept. 12, 1978 | The NRC ruled that the MFP consultant was not qualified to view the security plans. The consultant was killed in an accident Jan. 5, 1979, and the proposal to review the plans was withdrawn. | |
| Oct. 20, 1978 | The IRS Letter of Determination granting 501(c)(3) nonprofit status to MFP (EIN = 95-3080124) was issued. | |
| Dec. 1978 | The ASLB refused to allow two MFP consultants on earthquake safety to testify in a Diablo Canyon licensing hearing that lasted 2 1⁄2 months. They were allowed to file papers. | |
| March 28, 1979 | There was a partial core meltdown in Three Mile Island Unit #2 in Pennsylvania. | |
| May 1979 | The NRC announced a three month delay in the operating license for Unit 1 while it decided what changes might be required by the Three Mile Island accident. | |
| June 30, 1979 | Some 30,000 people gathered at an anti-nuclear rally organized by Abalone Alliance that included a speech by Gov. Brown. | |
| Oct. 1, 1979 | The ASLB ruled Diablo Canyon earthquake safe with adequate security plans. The Oct. 12, 1979, San Luis Obispo Telegram-Tribune announced that 2/3 of the decision was copied almost word-for-word from legal arguments submitted by PG&E. | |
| 1979 | The Diablo Canyon Conversion Project was formed to research the possibility of converting Diablo Canyon to an alternative fuel source. | |
| Nov. 1979 | Gov. Brown was granted intervenor status in the Diablo Canyon case. | |
| Jan. 23, 1980 | A hearing was held in San Francisco by an appeals board of the NRC to hear an appeal of the ASLB’s decision not to let representatives of the plant’s opponents who had security clearance review anti-sabotage systems for the plant. | |
| Feb. 15, 1980 | A federal licensing board’s ruling that an anti-sabotage plan for Diablo Canyon was adequate was overturned by an NRC appeals board on the grounds that the license board never looked at the plan before making its declaration. | |
| Apr. 4, 1980 | In a hearing in San Luis Obispo, MFP attorney, David Fleischaker, attempted to convince an NRC appeals panel to overrule an NRC Licensing Board declaration that Diablo Canyon was earthquake safe. | |
| May 1980 | The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) refused a request by plant opponents to revoke or modify its approval of the Diablo Canyon Plant. Opponents filed a request to reopen the hearings. | |
| June 1980 | MFP withdrew from Abalone Alliance because civil disobedience might conflict with the interventor status of MFP, and the group did not want to interfere with the Abalone Alliance plans which included civil disobedience. Individual members of MFP were free to engage in civil disobedience. | |
| July 1980 | A handful of plant opponents staged a series of sit-ins at the CPUC to protest their failure to revoke the Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity permit that allowed construction to proceed at Diablo Canyon, and their failure to allow a hearing to consider new evidence about the site, as well as possibilities for converting the plant to the use of an alternate fuel source. Governor Brown was asked to intervene. The CPUC refused to reopen hearings. | |
| Sept. 1980 | SLO county supervisors ignored objections by Diablo Canyon opponents and hired Voorhees & Assoc., the firm that wrote evacuation plans for PG&E, as the county’s emergency planning consultant. | |
| Oct. 1980 | Hearings on the seismic safety of Diablo Canyon were held in SLO. | |
| May 18, 1981 | In an event planned by MFP and endorsed by 17 citizens’ groups, around 1,000 anti-nuclear protesters gathered in SLO Mission Plaza. | |
| May 19, 1981 | A Diablo Canyon low-power test license hearing before the ASLB had to be moved from Discovery Inn to the Veterans Memorial Hall because of the overflow crowd. After the hearing, the PG&E attorney asked that the next hearing be held anywhere except San Luis Obispo. He said, the hissing “does tend to make you feel intimidated.” | |
| June 16, 1981 | The NRC Appeal Board upheld the 1979 ASLB approval of the Diablo seismic design. | |
| Sept. 9, 1981 | An appeal board of the NRC approved the physical security plan for Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 21, 1981 | The NRC approved a low power test license for Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept., 1981 | More than 10,000 people rallied in a two-week non-violent blockade of Diablo Canyon organized by Abalone Alliance, and more than 1,900 were arrested. | |
| Sept., 1981 | A young engineer discovered that the containment dome construction in Unit 1 was based on a fundamental design error. The design was 180 degrees off when compared with the blueprint. | |
| Nov.18, 1981 | The NRC suspended the low-power license for Diablo Canyon. | |
| Feb. 1982 | An earthquake design error involving valves like the ones that failed in the Three Mile Island nuclear accident was discovered at Diablo Canyon. By Dec. 10, 1982, close to 200 errors in the plant had been discovered. | |
| March. 19, 1982 | The NRC let stand the ASLB approval of the Diablo seismic design. Commissioners Gilinsky and Bradford dissented. | |
| April 23, 1982 | The ASLB approved the Diablo security plans. Intervenors appealed. | |
| Sept. 1, 1982 | The ASLB authorized the issuance of a full power license for Unit 1 at Diablo Canyon contingent on certain conditions being met. | |
| Sept.27, 1982 | SLO county supervisors adopted a nuclear emergency response plan amid heckling by plant opponents. | |
| Dec. 1982 | The NRC adopted a licensing schedule which set March 31, 1983, as the date for the Commission to vote to reinstate the low power license, and to allow fuel loading – before safety studies and necessary corrective work could be completed. | |
| Dec. 1982 | MFP organized a letter writing campaign to Morris Udall, chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, resulting in a Jan. 11, 1983, letter from Mr. Udall to the NRC expressing concern about NRC permission for fuel loading at Diablo Canyon before earthquake and safety issues were resolved. | |
| March 8, 1983 | Sandy Silver from MFP and members of other groups opposed to Diablo Canyon presented invited testimony at a congressional hearing on Diablo Canyon held in Washington, D.C. | |
| March 1983 | People Generating Energy organized a march of about 3,500 anti-Diablo protesters through San Luis Obispo. | |
| July, 1983 | The NRC Appeal Board held a hearing to decide whether to hold more extensive hearings to investigate construction quality at Diablo. | |
| Aug. 1983 | MFP urged people to write to Gov. Deukmejian pressuring him to change his mind about supporting the loading of fuel and the operation of the plant before the necessary safety hearings were completed. | |
| 1983 | MFP helped to organize Citizens for an Effective Emergency Plan (CEEP) to study the existing emergency response plans in the county and to demand that officials refuse to approve the plans until more effective ones were developed. | |
| Nov. 9, 1983 | MFP filed a case in the U. S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. requesting an injunction against fuel loading. An injunction was granted November 11 and then rescinded on Nov. 15, and PG&E began loading fuel. At a hearing in Avila Beach, the NRC said, in a written opinion, that it might wait for an appeal board to rule before authorizing PG&E to start a nuclear reaction in Unit 1 at Diablo Canyon, but the commission rejected requests by MFP to stall fuel loading until the appeal board completed hearings and issued a decision on the design quality. | |
| Jan. 1984 | MFP acquired the services of the Government Accountability Project (GAP), a Washington, D.C. nonprofit public interest group which specialized in exposing violations in federally regulated industries. | |
| Jan. 13, 1984 | Abalone Alliance started an extended blockade at the Diablo front gates with 537 people arrested over a 4-month period. | |
| Jan. 24, 1984 | MFP representatives were invited to testify in Congressman Udall’s Subcommittee for Energy and the Environment hearing in Washington D.C. | |
| March 26, 1984 | Just as the NRC seemed on the verge of granting permission for low power operation, an NRC staff engineer, Isa Yin, told the commission that it was his professional opinion that Unit 1 should not be allowed to go critical because there had been a complete breakdown in quality assurance in the plant’s piping system. Isa Yin later resigned to protest the way the NRC handled safety issues. | |
| April 13, 1984 | The NRC voted 4-1 to reinstate PG&E’s low-power testing license for Unit 1 at Diablo Canyon. | |
| April 18, 1984 | The D.C. Court of Appeals refused to grant intervenors an injunction on the low-power license. | |
| April 29, 1984 | Unit 1 at Diablo Canyon started. | |
| May 26, 1984 | Presidential candidate, Walter Mondale, spoke against Diablo Canyon in Mission Plaza. | |
| June 1984 | One hundred new cases of false or misleading statements were filed by MFP, bringing the total to 1,300. | |
| June 1984 | CODES (Consumers Organized for the Defense of Energy Safety) was organized with a goal of forcing PG&E and the NRC to comply with all legal and quality assurance safety requirements. | |
| June 14, 1984 | NRC officials testified before a congressional subcommittee about Diablo licensing. | |
| July 18, 1984 | Intervenors called for more seismic hearings following an earthquake at Morgan Hill. | |
| Aug. 2, 1984 | The NRC voted 3-1 to grant PG&E a full power license for Unit 1. | |
| Aug. 7, 1984 | MFP asked the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington D.C. for an injunction because the NRC had not considered how an earthquake might affect evacuation. | |
| Aug. 17, 1984 | The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington D.C. granted a stay on the NRC’s full power decision. | |
| Aug. 30, 1984 | A congressional subcommittee hearing on Diablo Canyon was held in the Cal Poly theater. | |
| Oct. 30, 1984 | Commissioner James Asselstine accused his fellow commissioners of serious abuses in licensing Unit 1. | |
| Oct. 31, 1984 | The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington D.C. removed the federal stay on the full power license. | |
| Nov. 2, 1984 | The NRC granted a full power operating license to PG&E for Unit 1 at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Jan. 9, 1985 | PG&E requested a full power operating license for Unit 2. | |
| April 1985 | PG&E was given permission to start low-power testing of Unit 2. | |
| May 2, 1985 | The Washington D.C. Court of Appeals voted 9-1 to reopen the MFP appeal of the Diablo operating license, but they refused to force the plant to stop operating. | |
| May 7, 1985 | Unit 1 began commercial operation. | |
| July 9-10, 1985 | A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee concluded that the NRC “circumvented the licensing process” contrary to the intent of Congress when it met in closed session four times to discuss licensing Diablo Canyon Unit 1, and it failed to hold public hearings on how an earthquake might hamper evacuation. | |
| Aug. 1, 1985 | The NRC approved a full-power operating license for Unit 2. MFP said it would challenge it. | |
| Aug. 12, 1985 | MFP, Codes, and Life on Planet Earth submitted a protest to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) demanding that CPUC carefully consider safety implications of PG&E’s cost control methods, freeze or reduce rates, and protect all of the ratepayers in the service area. | |
| Aug. 20, 1985 | Unit 2 was started. | |
| Oct. 20, 1985 | Unit 2 produced electricity for the first time. | |
| Dec. 9, 1985 | For the third time in two years, security guards at Diablo were arrested for selling cocaine. | |
| April 25, 1986 | In a decision written by Robert Bork, the U.S. Court of Appeals voted 5-4 against MFP’s request to investigate the NRC’s secret meeting on July, 1984, and to stop the operation of the plant until a hearing on the seismic issue could be held. | |
| April 26, 1986 | The Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Unit #4 in the Ukraine exploded. | |
| May 1986 | Unit 2 at Diablo Canyon began full commercial operation. | |
| June 15, 1986 | The NRC held a meeting to discuss the proposed re-racking of spent fuel at Diablo Canyon. | |
| June 19, 1986 | MFP and the Sierra Club announced that they would ask the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for an injunction to prevent PG&E from re-racking the spent fuel stored at Diablo Canyon to make it possible to store almost five times more spent fuel. | |
| July 2, 1986 | The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals placed a temporary restraining order on PG&E, prohibiting it from storing more spent fuel at Diablo Canyon than originally intended. | |
| July 24, 1986 | MFP appealed the April 25 Appeals Court decision to the Supreme Court. | |
| Aug. 1986 | An NRC internal audit found “numerous problems” in the handling of whistle blowers’ complaints at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 11, 1986 | The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the NRC violated its own regulations in approving the expansion of Diablo’s radioactive waste pools, and that spent fuel could not be stored until public safety hearings were held. | |
| Sept.16, 1986 | MFP and the Sierra Club filed a restraining order in the Ninth Circuit Court to prevent PG&E from putting spent fuel back into the re-installed original racks on the grounds that welds were used instead of bolts to anchor the racks as they were anchored when they were originally installed. They later reached an out-of-court settlement. | |
| Oct. 20, 1986 | MFP and other intervenors lost. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld without comment the April 25th U.S. Court of Appeals decision, killing the last legal challenge to operation of the plants. | |
| Nov., 1986 | Honoring a request from MFP and the Sierra Club, Rep. Leon Panetta requested a congressional review of waste storage at Diablo. | |
| January 1987 | MFP withdrew from the re-racking case in order to pursue a congressional review – leaving the Sierra Club to pursue the re-racking case alone. | |
| April 10, 1987 | During a routine refueling shutdown of Diablo Canyon Unit 2, cooling water reached the boiling point, raising the possibility of a loss of cooling and a core meltdown. | |
| May 10, 1987 | Seven members of MFP participated in the Mothers Day protest at the nuclear test site in Nevada. | |
| June 15, 1987 | The ASLB opened hearings in Avila Beach to decide whether it was safe to install higher density racks that would permit more spent fuel to be stored at Diablo. Controversy erupted over whether to admit the Brookhaven Report concerning the possibility of a nuclear fire in densely-packed spent fuel rods. | |
| Aug 28, 1987 | The state Senate Task Force on California Nuclear Emergency Response held a public hearing in SLO. | |
| Sept. 15, 1987 | The ASLB gave PG&E permission to store spent fuel at Diablo Canyon in high density storage racks that would allow six times the amount of spent fuel to be stored. | |
| Oct. 30, 1987 | The Sierra Club filed a suit in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to try to stop PG&E from increasing nuclear waste storage space. A temporary court order was issued, and it expired Nov. 12. | |
| Soon before Nov. 21, 1987 | PG&E asked the NRC for a one-year extension to complete The Long Term Seismic Study (due July 31, 1988) that was a condition of the operating license for Diablo Canyon. MFP and the Sierra Club objected and requested a public hearing. May 6, 1988 PG&E announced that it would complete the required seismic study on time (July 31, 1988). | |
| Sept. 9, 1988 | MFP, Life on Planet Earth, and Rochelle Becker, as an individual, filed testimony with the CA Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) to protest the proposed performance-based rate structure for Diablo on the grounds that PG&E would forego safety to make profits, and they considered the proposed “safety” committee a sham. | |
| Nov. 30, 1988 | The Ninth Circuit Court ruled that the NRC acted arbitrarily when it refused to hear evidence that the re-racked spent fuel storage system at Diablo presented a catastrophic hazard of fire and radiation in case of an earthquake. | |
| Dec. 1988 | A performance-based rate agreement was finalized by the CPUC after a secret session in the spring involving Attorney General Van de Kamp, the CPUC and PG&E. Other parties who had been involved in the proceedings, including Rochelle Becker and MFP, were excluded. The ruling was later challenged unsuccessfully in the CA Supreme Court by William Bennett, a member of the state Board of Equalization, and TURN (Toward Utility Rate Normalization). | |
| April 26, 1989 | MFP and Rochelle Becker petitioned the CPUC to modify the performance-based rate agreement for Diablo Canyon. | |
| Spring 1990 | A U.S. Geological Survey geologist warned that the Hosgri fault is likely a thrust fault, and that an earthquake similar to the Oct. 17, 1989, Loma Prieta quake was possible. | |
| April 1990 | MFP asked Rep. Leon Panetta, Chairman of the House Budget Committee, to seek funds for the U.S. Geological Survey to conduct its own research on the Hosgri fault. | |
| May 22, 1990 | MFP members and others testified before the first meeting of the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee, which was set up as a condition of the rate settlement. | |
| Sept. 27, 1990 | In an NRC hearing, MFP representatives testified against an NRC proposal to deregulate low-level radioactive waste. | |
| Oct. 1990 | MFP sponsored the visit of Olga Baskakova, a Soviet professor, to SLO. She left wearing a Mothers for Peace sweatshirt. | |
| Dec. 1, 1990 | MFP members joined about 1,000 anti-war protesters in a march through SLO. | |
| Feb. 26, 1991 | The NRC announced that it would indefinitely defer action on its “below regulatory concern” proposal to deregulate low-level radioactive waste. | |
| Spring 1991 | MFP collected about 4,000 signatures on a petition which was presented to the CA Coastal Commission as part of MFP testimony against an Air Force proposal to test missiles containing depleted uranium payloads off the Central Coast. The Air Force won. | |
| April 3, 1991 | MFP appealed a denial by the NRC of MFP’s request under the Freedom of Information Act to view a report from the U.S. Geological Survey which might suggest that the Hosgri fault was a greater hazard than PG&E admitted. | |
| Aug. 1991 | The NRC bowed to pressure from MFP and several members of Congress (who were alerted by a letter-writing campaign) and announced that it would reschedule a hearing in SLO that had been scheduled in Maryland on the Diablo Canyon earthquake safety report. | |
| Sept. 8, 1991 | More than 250 demonstrators marched to the gate at Diablo Canyon to commemorate the 1981 protests. | |
| Sept. 16-17, 1991 | An NRC subcommittee on earthquake safety held a hearing in SLO on the Diablo Canyon Long Term Seismic Program. | |
| Fall 1991 | MFP & TURN called for a Congressional hearing on the issue of seismic safety at Diablo. | |
| June 1992 | Kathy DiPeri was fired from her job as environmental interpreter because she refused to take children to a marine lab at Diablo Canyon. | |
| July 9, 1992 | PG&E filed a request with the NRC for a 15-year recapture of the Diablo Canyon licenses to make up for the time the plants were not operating. MFP demanded a hearing. | |
| Aug. 18, 1992 | MFP petitioned the NRC to intervene in the license recapture case. An amended petition to intervene was filed Oct. 26, 1992. | |
| Sept. 17, 1992 | MFP, CODES, and Life on Planet Earth submitted a protest to the performance-based rate decision and demanded that the CPUC carefully consider the safety implications. | |
| Sept. 23, 1992 | MFP and other groups raised $1,700 in a benefit for the children in war-torn Iraq. | |
| Dec. 10, 1992 | The ASLB held a pre-hearing conference on the license recapture issue in SLO. | |
| Jan. 26, 1993 | The ASLB accepted two of MFP’s eleven contentions in their petition for hearings on Diablo’s proposed license recapture. | |
| July 19, 1993 | The ASLB ordered the release of an industry report on Diablo Canyon operations to MFP. PG& E said it would appeal. | |
| Aug. 7-8, 1993 | MFP and other groups organized a protest march and a rally at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Aug. 17-24, 1993 | With advice from the group’s attorney, Diane Curran, Jill ZamEk acted as an excellent lay attorney for MFP in the ASLB hearing on the recapture of the Diablo Canyon licenses. The hearing was limited to maintenance of the plant and the use of a faulty fire retardant (Thermo-Lag 330). She did the whole case on cross examination without any help from expert witnesses. She was commended by a judge. | |
| Feb. 4. 1994 | A judge ruled that Kathy DiPeri should be allowed to return to her job as an environmental interpreter even though she refused to take children to a marine lab at Diablo Canyon. | |
| July 1994 | At their own expense, seven members of MFP helped build homes for Cheyenne River Sioux Indians in South Dakota with volunteers from the Habitat for Humanity Jimmy Carter Work Project ’94. | |
| Aug. 8, 1994 | MFP asked the ASLB to reopen the Diablo Canyon license recapture hearings because of new evidence about a recent NRC investigation into problems with Diablo’s auxiliary saltwater cooling system. | |
| Nov. 4, 1994 | The ASLB issued a ruling that the Diablo Canyon reactors could run until 2021 and 2025, but PG&E was forced to correct several outstanding problems that had been pointed out by MFP. The judge commended MFP for raising several key issues. | |
| April 4, 1995 | SLO Physicians for Social Responsibility and MFP sent a plea to the local Superintendent of Schools that the schools stop busing students to the marine biology lab at Diablo Canyon because of the radiation risk. | |
| Sept. 22, 1995 | PG&E reported that it was starting a two-year study on how to store more spent fuel at Diablo Canyon. | |
| April 25, 1996 | MFP collected supplies for Chernobyl victims and held a film, forum and candlelight vigil. | |
| June 13, 1996 | MFP and Rochelle Becker joined the legal proceedings before the CPUC involving the deregulation of the CA electrical industry. | |
| Feb. 5, 1997 | Whistle blower, Neil Aiken, a senior control room supervisor, testified before the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee about safety problems at the plant. | |
| Late Feb. 1997 | MFP and Rochelle Becker requested that the CPUC reopen PG&E rate hearings because recent allegations about safety problems at the plant and deregulation pressures raised questions about whether PG& E would sacrifice safety for profit under the performance-based rate structure. | |
| March 1997 | MFP started a letter writing campaign to U.S, Representative Walter Capps urging him to include Neil Aiken as a witness in the congressional oversight hearings on deregulation of electrical utilities. | |
| June 27, 1997 | MFP, Rochelle Becker, and Life on Planet Earth applied to the CPUC for a rehearing on a ruling of the CPUC that provided a monetary incentive for PG&E to defer maintenance at Diablo Canyon, and they challenged CPUC’s assertion that safety issues had been handled adequately by the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee. | |
| Dec. 1997 | MFP prepared to join the Seacoast Anti-pollution League from New Hampshire in challenging the legality of “on-line maintenance” at nuclear power plants. | |
| Spring 1998 | MFP joined a national campaign to collect baby teeth in order to measure the amount of radioactive strontium-90 – a good indication of the radiation levels the mothers were exposed to during pregnancy. | |
| June 11, 1998 | Whistleblower, Neil Aiken, was put on paid administrative leave from his job as shift supervisor at Diablo Canyon. The Union of Concerned Scientists petitioned the NRC to review the safety culture at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Jan. 23, 1999 | MFP held a “Peace Party” that resulted in the formation of the Central Coast Peace and Environmental Council (a coalition of local peace groups). | |
| Feb. 28, 1999 | MFP and other local groups sponsored an educational forum on the School of the Americas. | |
| May 1, 1999 | The Central Coast Peace and Environmental Council sponsored a march through SLO to support local residents who would be protesting at the School of the Americas in Washington, D.C. May 1-4. MFP collected donations to support those who planned to protest | |
| Dec. 1999 | MFP urged the CA Regional Water Quality Control Board to force PG&E to make renovations to Diablo Canyon to lessen future environmental damage. | |
| Dec. 16, 1999 | PG&E fired whistle blower, Neil Aiken, on the grounds of “mental instability”. | |
| March 7, 2000 | In testimony before the CA Regional Water Quality Control Board, MFP urged the board to fine PG&E for violations of its permit and the CA water code and to require modifications of the Diablo Canyon plant to prevent further damage. | |
| April, 2000 | Three members of the Central Coast Peace & Environmental Council were among local citizens who went to Washington. D.C. to protest the proposed “Star Wars” plan. | |
| April 10, 2000 | The Department of Labor concluded that PG&E maneuvered to have psychiatrists find “paranoid delusions” in whistle blower, Neil Aiken, because he complained publicly about safety problems and management inaction at Diablo Canyon. | |
| June 2, 2000 | The CA Regional Water Quality Control Board reached a tentative agreement with PG&E that would force PG&E to pay a fine and to preserve land for public use, but no modifications were required in the plant to prevent future marine damage. MFP organized a letter-writing protest that urged the board to reject the proposal. | |
| March 20, 2001 | The NRC held a meeting in SLO on PG&E’s proposal to store spent nuclear fuel at Diablo in dry casks to make room for more waste. | |
| June, 2001 | The NRC held a hearing in SLO to discuss safety issues at Diablo. | |
| Aug 9, 2001 | An NRC task force on the NRC discrimination investigation process met in SLO. The group was told that retaliation by PG&E against workers who raised safety concerns had a chilling effect on the work force at the plant. | |
| Sept. 22, 2001 | About 200 people marched through SLO to promote a peaceful resolution to the “War on Terror.” | |
| Oct. 13, 2001 | A “Walk for Peace” took place in Lompoc and ended with a non-violent vigil at Vandenberg Air Force Base in an effort to stop the militarization of outer space. | |
| Dec. 2001 | MFP and Rochelle Becker asked the CPUC to reorganize the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee to make it a genuine safety watchdog group. | |
| Spring 2002 | MFP petitioned the CPUC to open a local office of the Diablo Canyon “Independent” “Safety” Committee and to add a member representing SLO County. | |
| Spring 2002 | PG&E applied to the County of San Luis Obispo and the NRC to build and store spent fuel on site in nearly 140 dry cask storage containers (Diablo Canyon Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation (ISFSI), increasing the on-site storage capacity to 9 times the originally licensed level. MFP sponsored a letter writing campaign to the Board of Supervisors opposing an increase in the amount of spent fuel allowed. | |
| Spring 2002 | MFP received a Certificate of Recognition from the Board of Directors of the International World Peace Rose Gardens stating that MFP would be honored with a plaque in the World Peace Rose Garden Memorial on the grounds of the State Capitol in Sacramento. | |
| April 29, 2002 | At a county meeting to take public input about PG&E’s dry cask (ISFSI) permit proposal, MFP, along with other concerned citizens, urged county officials to refuse to issue a license for the dry cask storage facility and to analyze all storage options. | |
| May 14, 2002 | The Letter of Determination for the Mothers for Peace Action Committee (MFPAC) was issued by the IRS, recognizing MFPAC as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization that would be allowed to lobby for legislation. | |
| May 21, 2002 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors voted 3 to 2 against requesting intervenor status from the NRC in the review of the proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon. Supervisor Peg Pinard filed her own petition for intervenor status, along with Mothers for Peace and other organizations. | |
| Summer 2002 | With the help of MFP and other peace organizations, Carol Pimental organized local “Women in Black” anti-war vigils. | |
| Sept. 10-11, 2002 | The ASLB held a pre-hearing conference in SLO with heavy security screening of participants – including metal detectors. Intervenors demanded that the dry cask (ISFSI) plans be suspended until the security of the plant and other issues were addressed. | |
| Sept. 2002 | Toni Flynn and 36 others were given 6-months prison sentences for protesting at the School of the Americas. | |
| Oct. 26, 2002 | More than 1,000 people marched through SLO to protest a possible war in Iraq. | |
| Nov. 12, 2002 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors agreed to fund a wide-ranging study of above-ground spent fuel storage at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Nov. 2002 | NRC officials rejected the MFP petition to put the Diablo Canyon dry cask (ISFSI) plans on hold until security issues could be resolved. | |
| Nov. 22-24, 2002 | MFP and other local anti-nuclear activists sponsored a Nuclear Guardianship Training Workshop with Joanna and Fran Macy as facilitators. | |
| early Dec. 2002 | The ASLB announced that only one of the eight contentions introduced by intervenors in the Sept. 10-11 pre-hearing conference could be addressed in a full hearing – the inquiry into whether a bankrupt PG&E could afford to build and operate the spent fuel storage unit. | |
| Dec. 11, 2002 | In a County Department of Planning and Building briefing on the Diablo Canyon dry cask (ISFSI) proposal, Supervisor Peg Pinard urged the county to require the casks to be stored underground with hardened protection. | |
| Jan. 18, 2003 | Some 1,300 people marched through SLO to protest a possible military strike against Iraq. | |
| Feb. 16, 2003 | More than 1,700 people marched through SLO to protest a possible war in Iraq. | |
| Feb 28, 2003 | In a letter to the NRC, CA Attorney General Lockyer criticized the ASLB decision to limit MFP and other intervenors to a hearing on only one issue and urged the NRC to order public hearings on other critical safety and environmental issues intervenors had raised concerning the dry cask storage unit (ISFSI). | |
| March 19, 2003 | Senator Feinstein sent a letter urging the NRC to address safety and security issues before allowing Diablo Canyon to expand the inventory of spent fuel. | |
| March 23-24, 2003 | The ASLB held a public comment hearing on PG&E’s ability to pay for the proposed dry cask storage (ISFSI) while in bankruptcy. All other contentions were denied. | |
| May 19, 2003 | The ASLB heard oral arguments about whether the bankrupt PG&E had enough money to build and maintain the proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI). | |
| May, 2003 | MFP and the Union of Concerned Scientists filed a Freedom of Information request with the NRC to discover who the NRC consulted with when they developed new security rules that were announced in April. | |
| late May, 2003 | MFP filed a petition with the CPUC to make changes in the Diablo Canyon “Independent” “Safety” Committee that was set up by the CPUC to address safety concerns that were raised by the performance-based rate agreement. | |
| June 30, 2003 | Public Citizen and MFP filed a petition in the U.S. District Court of Appeals in Washington D.C. to review the action of the NRC in purporting to revise the “Design Basis Threat” which describes the types of threats against which nuclear plants must maintain effective security measures. | |
| July 10, 2003 | The Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board withdrew its support for a settlement with PG&E to offset the damage the plant does to the marine environment in exchange for the renewal of it license for five years, and the matter was postponed. | |
| Aug. 5, 2003 | The ASLB ruled that PG&E was solvent enough to build and maintain the dry cask storage facility at Diablo Canyon (ISFSI). MFP said it would appeal to the full NRC. | |
| Aug. 19, 2003 | In response to a resolution introduced by MFP, The Board of Supervisors voted 3 to 2 to urge the NRC to address safety concerns before allowing Diablo Canyon to renew its license. Aug. 27, 2003 At a CPUC public meeting in SLO, MFP and others urged the CPUC to overhaul the Diablo Canyon “Independent” ”Safety” Committee. | |
| Oct. 15, 2003 | MFP and the other intervenors were notified by the NRC that their appeal for full evidentiary hearings on terrorism was denied. The intervenors announced that they would appeal the decision in federal court – requiring around $100,000 for legal and other expenses. | |
| Fall 2003 | The Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility (A4NR) was organized by Rochelle Becker as a statewide organization to help to increase safety at Diablo Canyon, to stop the relicensing of CA nuclear plants, and to effect changes at all U.S. nuclear reactors. | |
| Dec. 22, 2003 | During the 6.5 San Simeon Earthquake, 56 of the 131 Diablo Canyon early warning sirens in the county lost power, requiring the installation of backup batteries. | |
| Jan. 2004 | MFP & other activists called for more seismic studies of Diablo Canyon in light of the Dec. 22 San Simeon earthquake. | |
| Jan. 22, 2004 | The County Planning Commission released its final environmental impact report on the dry cask storage proposal (ISFSI). Among the recommended changes was a repeat of the earlier recommendation that it must be made more secure from possible terrorist attacks. | |
| Spring 2004 | MFP and other intervenors filed with the CPUC to protest PG&E’s plan to charge ratepayers for replacement of the Diablo Canyon steam generators. | |
| March 15, 2004 | MFP and other intervenors sued the NRC in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for not publicly addressing terrorism risks posed by the dry cask spent fuel storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo. Amicus briefs supporting the suit were filed by the County of San Luis Obispo and the attorneys general of California, Massachusetts, Utah, and Washington. | |
| March 20, 2004 | About 500 people marched through SLO demanding the end of the war in Iraq. | |
| March 22, 2004 | The NRC gave PG&E permission to build the dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon. | |
| April 20, 2004 | The County Board of Supervisors voted 4 to 1 to approve the plans to build the dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon. | |
| June 9, 2004 | Concerns about the safety of Diablo Canyon following the San Simeon earthquake dominated a hostile town hall NRC meeting in SLO. | |
| Aug. 4, 2004 | Citing 9/11 concerns, the NRC announced that it would no longer keep the public informed about security gaps at nuclear power plants. | |
| Sept. 17, 2004 | In answer to the June 30, 2003, petition from Public Citizen and MFP, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ordered the NRC to conduct public hearings on its Design Basis Threat (DBT) rules. | |
| Dec. 2004 | An article about MFP and Diablo Canyon appeared in The Asahi Shimbun newspaper in Japan. | |
| Jan. 14, 2005 | Rochelle Becker and MFP were featured on the PBS show, Now, with David Brancaccio. | |
| Feb. 2005 | Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee asked the state to assess the danger of the earthquake fault to Diablo Canyon. | |
| Feb. 24, 2005 | The CPUC gave PG&E preliminary approval to charge ratepayers for the replacement of steam generators at Diablo Canyon, which would allow the plants to continue to operate after 2014. | |
| March 2005 | MFP opposed PG&E’s request to the NRC to be allowed to build temporary racks to increase the amount of spent fuel stored at Diablo until the dry cask facility (ISFSI) was completed. | |
| May 2005 | The Coastal Commission staff asked CPUC to determine the environmental impact of replacement of the steam generators if the Diablo Canyon licenses were renewed. | |
| June 2005 | In response to a National Academy of Sciences (NAS) study of waste stored at nuclear power plants, a powerful Congressional committee issued a stinging criticism of the NRC’s inaction regarding safety of the waste fuel and directed the NRC to move on recommendations made by the NAS. | |
| Oct. 2005 | Construction of the dry cask spent fuel storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo was begun. | |
| Oct. 17, 2005 | Oral arguments were heard in the Ninth Circuit Court case. | |
| Nov.17, 2005 | The Federal Register contained a notice of proposed rules for revision of the NRC Design Basis Threat that accepted one of the petitions for rulemaking that had been submitted by MFP and the Union of Concerned Scientists, but it did not address the terrorism issue raised by MFP in the Ninth Circuit Court case. | |
| Nov. 18, 2005 | The CPUC gave PG&E permission to raise customer’s utility rates by 2% to pay for the replacement of the steam generators at Diablo. | |
| Late Nov. 2005 | The NRC gave PG&E permission to install temporary racks to increase the capacity of the spent fuel pools at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec. 2005 | An unidentified man contacted MFP and said that he was riding in a private plane in May that swooped down over Diablo Canyon in a high speed aggressive dive to test the air security of the plant , and he was disturbed that there was no response. PG&E and the NRC later concluded that the incident probably did not occur. | |
| Jan. 10, 2006 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to send a letter encouraging the state Energy Commission to study the implications for CA of the federal government’s failure to open a central storage facility for high-level radioactive waste. | |
| Jan. 12, 2006 | A hopelessly deadlocked county Planning Commission denied the steam generator replacement project solely for the purpose of passing it on to the Board of Supervisors. | |
| March 7, 2006 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors voted 4 to 1 to approve the replacement of eight steam generators at Diablo Canyon. | |
| March 9, 2006 | Morgan Rafferty, from MFP, made an invited presentation at the NRC Annual Regulatory Information Conference in Rockville, MD, on the topic of nuclear plant security. | |
| March 2006 | MFP, the Sierra Club, and two Coastal Commissioners appealed the Board of Supervisors’ approval of the steam generator project to the state Coastal Commission. | |
| May 4, 2006 | Many citizens told an administrative law judge at a CPUC meeting in SLO that ratepayers should not have to pay $19 million dollars to study the feasibility of extending the Diablo Canyon operating license. MFP later announced that it did not have enough money to fight the proposal. | |
| June 2, 2006 | The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of MFP and other intervenors who contended that the NRC must do an additional analysis of the environmental effects of a possible terrorist attack on the proposed dry cask spent fuel storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon and must allow more public input before it approved the facility. | |
| July 5, 2006 | A coalition led by MFP filed a motion with the NRC to halt the construction of the dry cask (ISFSI) storage facility pending the EIR required by the Ninth Circuit Court. | |
| July, 2006 | MFP treasurer, Morgan Rafferty, was named Executive Director of the Environmental Center of SLO County (ECOSLO). | |
| Before Aug. 3, 2006 | Because of a history of violations at Diablo Canyon, MFP appealed a decision by the state Department of Toxic Substances Control to renew PG&E’s license to store toxic substances, such as chemicals and corrosives, at the plant for another 10 years. | |
| Aug. 30, 2006 | PG&E announced that it would appeal the June 2, 2006, Ninth Circuit Court ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. | |
| Sept. 6, 2006 | The NRC denied MFP’s request to invalidate PG&E’s license to store spent fuel in the dry cask (ISFSI) facility pending the EIR ordered by the court. | |
| Sept. 18, 2006 | MFP filed a motion with the NRC to reverse the NRC’s Sept. 6 ruling. | |
| before Oct.6, 2006 | The CA Governor signed a bill authored by Assemblyman Blakeslee that required the CA Energy Commission to study the cost to the state of the failure of the federal government to open a storage site for nuclear spent fuel, and to investigate strategies to replace Diablo Canyon if it were lost because of a catastrophic earthquake. | |
| Dec. 14, 2006 | The CA Coastal Commission voted to approve the generator replacement project at Diablo Canyon in exchange for PG&E’s agreement to set aside 1,200 acres for public use, to make repairs, and to move gates to give the public access to the Port San Luis Lighthouse. | |
| Jan. 16, 2007 | The intervenors won! The U.S. Supreme Court announced it would not review the Ninth Circuit Court’s June 2, 2006, decision requiring an examination of how a terrorist attack on Diablo Canyon’s proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) could harm the environment. | |
| Jan. 29, 2007 | The NRC ruled that making nuclear power plants crash-proof to an airliner attack was impractical and it was the military’s responsibility to avert such an assault. | |
| Feb. 5, 2007 | MFP, the Sierra Club, and Peg Pinard responded to a Jan. 24, 2007, motion by PG&E for prompt NRC action, and urged the Commission not to rush through its court-ordered terrorism review. | |
| Feb. 26, 2007 | In response to the court order, the NRC ordered its staff to prepare a new assessment of the potential environmental effects of a terrorist attack on Diablo Canyon. | |
| March 16, 2007 | The CA Attorney General petitioned the NRC to rescind its finding that the environmental impact of high-density spent fuel storage is insignificant, and to issue a generic determination that approval of such storage may have a significant effect on the human environment, and to order that no NRC license decision that approves high-density pool storage may issue without the adoption of an environmental impact statement that complies with NEPA in all respects. | |
| March 17, 2007 | Code Pink and other peace groups organized a St. Patrick’s Day anti-war march through SLO | |
| March 21, 2007 | MFP, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Public Citizen, and Waste Awareness and Reduction Network submitted comments to the NRC on the NRC’s proposed security regulations. MFP submitted additional comments on March 26, 2007. | |
| March 26, 2007 | MFP, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and Public Citizen urged the NRC to change the security rules to require that plants return their spent fuel pools to their original low-density configuration. | |
| April 11, 2007 | a San Francisco Superior Court denied a motion by the Coastal Law Enforcement Action Network to stop the steam generator replacement project at Diablo Canyon. | |
| May 11, 2007 | Public Citizen and MFP filed a petition in the Ninth Circuit Court to challenge recent rules by the NRC establishing security standards for nuclear plants. | |
| May 29, 2007 | The NRC issued a preliminary decision scheduled to take effect in 90 days that reaffirmed the original conclusion that the dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canon would be safe from terrorists. | |
| June, 2007 | Rochelle Becker, (A4NR), took part in a California Energy Commission workshop in Sacramento to discuss the future of nuclear energy in California. | |
| June 26, 2007 | The NRC 8-page court-ordered supplemental analysis of the possibility of a terrorist attack on the proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon was heavily criticized at a local NRC meeting in SLO. | |
| June-July, 2007 | More than 150 statewide and nationwide organizations filed comments with the NRC criticizing the preliminary supplemental terrorist threat analysis. | |
| Oct. 1, 2007 | MFP submitted its criticisms of the NRC Staff’s Final Environmental Assessment and its finding of no significant impact from a possible terrorist attack on Diablo Canyon. | |
| Oct., 2007 | Rochelle Becker was one of the national Sierra Club’s 2007 environmental award winners. | |
| Oct. 11, 2007 | The NRC Staff responded to the Oct. 1 MFP criticisms of the Final Environmental Assessment and finding of no significant impact from a possible terrorist attack. | |
| Nov. 5, 2007 | Two new steam generators arrived at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Nov. 15, 2007 | The NRC issued an addendum to the supplement to the Environmental Assessment for the Diablo Canyon Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation (ISFSI). | |
| before Jan. 19, 2008 | The NRC agreed to hear two of the five concerns raised by MFP about the proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI). | |
| Feb. 5, 2008 | Form 5768 was sent to the IRS from MFP for the section 501(h) election of an expenditure test of the amount of lobbying to replace the “substantial part of activities” test. | |
| Feb. 20, 2008 | MFP attorney, Diane Curran, filed a brief with the NRC demanding a hearing, and arguing for access to secret documents the NRC relied on for its finding that a successful terrorist attack on the Diablo Canyon ISFSI would have no significant impact on the environment. | |
| March 13, 2008 | Morgan Rafferty, from MFP, gave an invited presentation at the NRC 20th Annual Regulatory Information Conference in Bethesda, MD. | |
| March 2008 | The Coastal Law Enforcement Action Network settled its 2007 lawsuit against the California Coastal Commission over its permit for the Diablo steam generator replacement project after PG&E agreed to a variety of mitigation projects. | |
| April 12, 2008 | Unit 2 at Diablo Canyon went back on line after a two-month shutdown to replace the steam generators. The generators in Unit 1 were scheduled for replacement in early 2009. | |
| April 14, 2008 | MFP attorney, Diane Curran, filed with the NRC detailed reasons why the NRC staff needed to completely re-do its evaluation of the environmental impacts of a terrorist attack on the proposed dry cask spent fuel storage facility (ISFSI). | |
| April 14, 2008 | After receiving a message from a whistle blower who claimed that he received a downgraded performance evaluation because he raised safety concerns during the Diablo refueling, MFP filed a complaint with the NRC stating that such retaliation has a chilling effect on workers. | |
| April 16, 2008 | MFP presented an Osher Continuing Education class at Cal Poly on responsible energy choices. | |
| June, 2008 | A quilt made for Elizabeth Apfelberg featuring memorabilia from her activism for MFP, family, human rights, and social justice was on display in the SLO Public Library. | |
| July 1, 2008 | In a highly unusual oral argument before the NRC Commissioners, MFP attorney, Diane Curran, assisted by expert witness, Gordon Thompson, accused the NRC Staff of failing to address the catastrophic environmental consequences that might occur in a terrorist attack on the proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Aug. 7, 2008 | A federal court of appeals ruled that PG&E should be able to recover a greater amount of its costs for storing spent fuel at Diablo Canyon because there was no federal repository. | |
| Aug. 17, 2008 | MFP charged that a transformer fire at Diablo Canyon shortly after midnight was an explosive event that would have endangered workers if it had happened in the daytime. MFP demanded that more safeguards be in place before the replacement transformer was used. | |
| Oct. 23, 2008 | The NRC denied MFP Contention 2, as argued before the Commission July 1, 2008, that the NRC Staff was obligated under NEPA to do a thorough Environmental Impact Statement on the effects of a terrorist attack on the proposed dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) at Diablo Canyon. Commissioner Jaczko wrote a strong dissenting opinion criticizing the secrecy surrounding the documents the NRC relied on for their decision and contending that the NRC did not consider land contamination resulting from a terrorist attack. | |
| Oct. 23, 2008 | The NRC ruled that PG&E could begin loading spent fuel into the dry cask storage facility (ISFSI) without doing a more comprehensive analysis of the environmental effects of a terrorist attack. | |
| Nov. 17, 2008 | An attorney for MFP and Public Citizen appeared in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to argue for a review of security regulations at nuclear power plants. The lawsuit was filed in May, 2007. | |
| Nov. 21, 2008 | PG&E announced the discovery of a new earthquake fault less than a mile offshore. | |
| Dec. 12, 2008 | MFP attorney, Diane Curran, filed a Petition for Review with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals challenging four orders of the NRC. | |
| Dec. 12, 2008 | About 50 unionized PG&E employees held an informational picket at the entrance to Diablo Canyon for an hour to protest a PG&E policy to prioritize quick turnaround profits over long-term safety. | |
| Dec 17, 2008 | The NRC approved a rule that enhanced security requirements for nuclear power reactors. In part, the rule reflected input from the Union of Concerned Scientists and MFP. | |
| Jan. 21, 2009 | A video and an article about MFP and Diablo Canyon appeared on the Associated Press web site, and the article was copied by the Washington Post and other papers. | |
| Jan. 30, 2009 | PG&E notified the NRC of its intent to begin the loading of spent fuel into ISFSI casks on June 1, 2009. | |
| Feb. 9, 2009 | In the initial brief in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals case, Diane Curran, MFP attorney, accused the NRC of illegal secrecy and of refusing to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the Atomic Energy Act (AEA). | |
| Feb. 17, 2009 | An errata sheet and the Petitioner’s Excerpts of the Record were filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit as a follow-up to MFP’s initial brief in Case No. 08-75058, which was filed February 9, 2009. | |
| March 24, 2009 | The final phase of the steam generator replacement project at Diablo was completed. | |
| March 25, 2009 | The NRC filed the Respondents’ Brief in Case No. 08-75058 with the Ninth Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals. | |
| April 8, 2009 | The NRC Answering Brief of Respondent-Intervenor in case No. 08-75058 was filed in the Ninth Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals. | |
| April 17, 2009 | A QUESTION OF POWER, a documentary about nuclear power in California, was used as a 40th anniversary event and a fund raiser for the MFP court case. | |
| April 22, 2009 | The MFP (Petitioner’s) Reply Brief in Case No. 08-75058 was filed in the Ninth Circuit of the U.S. Court of appeals. | |
| April 25, 2009 | MFP celebrated its 40th anniversary. Certificates or letters of recognition were received from the California Assembly, the California Energy Commission, Attorney General Edmund G. Brown, Jr., and the SLO County Board of Supervisors. | |
| April 26, 2009 | MFP held a potluck in honor of attorney, Diane Curran. | |
| May 11, 2009 | The State of California filed an Amicus Curiae Brief in support of the states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York in case number 08-3903 in the Second District of the U.S. Court of Appeals. The 2006 MFP case was cited. | |
| May 28, 2009 | The NRC held an informal open house in addition to a “Town Hall” style meeting to answer questions from the public. | |
| June 9, 2009 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee held a public meeting. | |
| June 15, 2009 | PG&E began loading the first dry cask containers with “used” fuel . | |
| June, 2009 | As required by AB 1632, the California Energy Commission completed a comprehensive assessment of Diablo Canyon and San Onofre and adopted the study, “An Assessment of California’s Nuclear Power Plants: AB1632 Report” as part of its 2008 Integrated Energy Policy Report (IEPR). | |
| July 20, 2009 | Meet the Mothers Over Music and a Meal (MMOMM) fund raising event was held at the Cochran home. | |
| July 24, 2009 | Public Citizen and MPF lost their case filed May 11, 2007. In a 2-1 decision the 9th Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that the NRC can rely on the nation’s defenses to protect nuclear power plants from attacks from the air, and they do not need to order operators to take additional measures. | |
| Aug. 6, 2009 | A vigil to observe the 64th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was held in Mission Plaza in San Luis Obispo, sponsored by MFP and Code Pink. A WILF petition was circulated asking Congress to designate August 6 Nuclear Disarmament Day. | |
| Oct. 11, 2009 | The annual Solar Tour Open House was held. | |
| Oct. 20, 2009 | After protests, the NRC held a meeting in Pismo Beach that was originally scheduled in Westlake Village to discuss the proposed update of the generic rules for the renewal of nuclear power plant licenses. | |
| Oct. 23, 2009 | Two switches that had been improperly set for 18 months impairing operators’ ability to respond in the event of a severe loss of cooling water were discovered at Diablo. | |
| Nov. 24, 2009 | PG&E officials announced that they had applied to the NRC for the renewal of the two operating licenses at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Nov. 30, 2009 | The NRC conducted a special inspection at Diablo Canyon to determine how two switches that were intended to allow control room operators to remotely open cooling water valves were misaligned on October 23 during a maintenance procedure. | |
| Dec. 9 & 10, 2009 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee (DCISC) met. | |
| Dec. 21, 2009 | The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied appeals by New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts that it review the NRC’s rejection of a request by Massachusetts and California that it declare spent fuel pools at nuclear power plants a serious environmental threat. | |
| Jan. 12, 2010 | MFP filed comments objecting to the NRC’s proposal to “simplify and streamline” applications for nuclear power plant license extensions. | |
| Jan. 23, 2010 | The yearly general planning meeting for MFP members was held. | |
| Jan. 26, 2010 | The NRC met in San Luis Obispo to review maintenance problems involving misaligned valves that resulted in Diablo Canyon operating in a compromised condition for 18 months. | |
| Feb. 10 & 11, 2010 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Feb., 2010 | MFP presented Jane Addams Children’s Peace Award books to the San Luis Obispo City/County Library System. | |
| Feb. 14, 2010 | A Meet the Mothers over Music and a Meal (MMOMM) fund-raising lunch was held at Jane and Clif Swanson’s home. | |
| March 3, 2010 | The NRC held a meeting to receive public comments on the license renewal application for the Diablo Canyon plants. | |
| March 9, 2010 | The San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors requested that the NRC wait to begin processing the license renewal application for Diablo Canyon until the seismic studies for the plant have been completed and then reviewed by a panel of independent experts. | |
| March 22, 2010 | Through their attorney, Diane Curran, MFP filed with the NRC for standing as intervenors to oppose license renewal for Diablo Canyon. Five contentions were presented. | |
| March 24, 2010 | MFP had a “Fun Raiser” at Corner View Restaurant. The bar donations benefited MFP. | |
| April 13, 2010 | MFP filed objections with the California State Water Resources Control Board to proposed revisions to the policy governing use of ocean water for once-through cooling (OTC) as it relates to Diablo Canyon. | |
| May 4, 2010 | The California Water Resources Control Board ordered Diablo Canyon, to phase out its once-through cooling system by 2024 and replace it with an alternate system. | |
| May 9, 2010 | In honor of Mothers Day, the Unitarian Universalist forum in San Francisco celebrated the work of Mothers for Peace. Jane Swanson and Jill ZamEk, MFP spokespersons, spoke to the group. | |
| May 26, 2010 | The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board heard oral arguments on MFP’s challenge to the application for renewal of the Diablo Canyon Reactor licenses. | |
| June 2 & 3, 2010 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| June 3, 2010 | The California Energy Commission (CEC) supported the California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC’s) approval of ratepayer funding for PG&E to perform advanced seismic studies and suggested that the CPUC require that these studies be completed and independently peer reviewed and made part of PG&E’s license renewal feasibility studies before the CPUC issues a decision on PG&E’s license renewal application for Diablo Canyon. | |
| June, 2010 | MFP awarded a $500 scholarship to Arroyo Grande High School senior, Sean Pringle, and a $1,000 scholarship to Saint Mary’s College student, Chelsea O’Sullivan. | |
| June 23, 2010 | The SLO County Office of Emergency Services announced that an ALERT emergency classification was declared at Diablo Canyon due to the inadvertent discharge of Cardox, a carbon dioxide based fire suppression system, during maintenance activities. | |
| June 29, 2010 | The NRC held an “Open House” and end of cycle meeting on Diablo Canyon. | |
| June 30, 2010 | The Santa Barbara Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom and four other groups sponsored a presentation by MFP spokespeople, Elizabeth Apfelberg and Jane Swanson, in Santa Barbara. | |
| June 30, 2010 | The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals announced that it has scheduled oral arguments November 4 for the MFP case against the NRC. | |
| July 12, 2010 | Jane Swanson, MFP spokesperson, spoke to the Seniors for Peace in Mill Valley. | |
| July 23, 2010 | The NRC announced that a “force-on-force” security inspection in March revealed problems that could result in a downgrade in the over-all safety ranking of the plant. | |
| Aug. 3, 2010 | The Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to send a letter to the NRC asking them not to renew the Diablo Canyon license until the Shoreline fault seismic studies are complete. | |
| Aug. 4, 2010 | A 3-judge panel of NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board handed down a decision to grant MFP’s request for a hearing on four of the five Contentions filed by MFP in opposition to PG&E’s application for license renewal of the Diablo Canyon reactors. | |
| Aug. 10, 2010 | The NRC Staff notified the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board that it desires to participate as a party in the adjudicatory proceeding with respect to all of the admitted contentions. | |
| Aug. 26, 2010 | MFP’s attorney, Diane Curran, filed counter arguments to PG&E’s appeal of the August 4, 2010, Atomic Safety and Licensing Board ruling. | |
| Sept. 8 & 9, 2010 | MFP members attended and spoke out at an NRC- sponsored workshop on seismic hazards and their relation to the operation of commercial nuclear power plants and the current seismic studies involving Diablo. | |
| Sept. 21, 2010 | In honor of International Peace Day, MFP donated copies of this year’s Jane Addams Children’s Peace Award books to the San Luis City/County library. | |
| Sept. 22, 2010 | MFP board members attended an NRC meeting in San Luis Obispo on the status of a documentation and design review being conducted by PG&E at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 27, 2010 | MFP spokesperson, Jane Swanson, was interviewed by Dr. Helen Caldicott on her internationally broadcast radio program, accessible at http://ifyoulovethisplanet.org/. | |
| Oct. 16, 2010 | MFP spokesperson, Jane Swanson, participated in a workshop at UC Santa Barbara sponsored by The California Student Sustainability Coalition. | |
| Nov. 4, 2010 | The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments presented by MFP attorney, Diane Curran, in the case against the NRC and PG&E contending that an Environmental Impact Statement was required to address the potentially catastrophic impact of a terrorist attack on the dry cask spent fuel storage facility at Diablo Canyon, and that the NRC must explain its decision in a closed hearing. | |
| Nov. 6, 2010 | A “Dinner with Diane” fund raising event with MFP attorney, Diane Curran, was held at Cafe Roma. | |
| Dec. 7, 2010 | MFP received a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition from Congresswoman Lois Capps. | |
| Dec. 7, 2010 | MFP was awarded a $7,000 grant by the Fund for Santa Barbara to help pay for the services of an expert witness in their legal challenge to the renewal of the Diablo Canyon licenses. | |
| Jan. 12, 2011 | “Dangers of Living Downwind of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant”, sponsored by the Fund for Santa Barbara, was presented in the Santa Maria Public Library by Elizabeth Apfelberg and Jane Swanson from MFP. | |
| Jan. 19, 2011 | The NRC held a public meeting in San Luis Obispo to discuss a PG&E report on the Shoreline earthquake fault near Diablo Canyon. | |
| Jan. 27, 2011 | The NRC held a public meeting to review the results of a recent inspection to evaluate the ability of PG&E to manage the aging of Diablo’s components during a 20 year license extension. | |
| Jan. 28, 2011 | An administrative law judge of the California Public Utilities Commission ruled that issues raised by the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility and other groups in relicensing proceedings for Diablo Canyon merit a hearing. | |
| Jan. 29, 2011 | Mothers for Peace held the annual meeting to produce a General Plan, elect officers and other board members, assign roles and responsibilities, and adopt a budget for 2011. | |
| Feb. 3, 2011 | The NRC held a public meeting with PG&E on their request to do a digital instrumentation and control upgrade to the reactor protection and safeguards systems at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Feb. 15, 2011 | The Ninth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals denied the petition by Mothers for Peace to overturn a licensing decision by the NRC regarding the dry cask radioactive waste storage facility at Diablo Canyon, and to force the NRC to grant access to sensitive information regarding their decision in a closed hearing. | |
| Feb. 25, 2011 | State Senator Sam Blakeslee and nine other Democratic and Republican State Senators and Assembly Members invited the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to convene a meeting in California because of concerns about seismic events at nuclear power plants in California. | |
| March 11, 2011 | A 9.0 earthquake struck Japan, resulting in a tsunami and damage to fuel rods in Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants that caused the release of extensive radiation into the sea and air. | |
| Mar. 16, 2011 | In light of the Nuclear disaster in Japan, U.S. Senators Boxer and Feinstein asked the NRC to perform a thorough inspection of Diablo Canyon and San Onofre to evaluate their safety and emergency preparedness plans. | |
| Mar. 16, 2011 | MFP strongly urged the NRC to follow the lead of the European Union and apply stress tests on Diablo Canyon. | |
| Mar. 24, 2011 | Representative Lois Capps asked the NRC to immediately stay the license renewal process for the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant until further studies demonstrate that the plant’s design and operations can withstand an earthquake and other potential threats. | |
| March 29, 2011 | Representative Edward J. Markey introduced The Nuclear Power Plant Safety Act of 2011 to overhaul nuclear safety and impose a moratorium on all new nuclear power reactor licenses or license extensions until new safety. requirements are in place that reflect the lessons learned from the Fukushima reactor meltdown. | |
| Mar. 29, 2011 | Three of five SLO county supervisors called on PG&E to voluntarily suspend its drive to renew operating licenses for Diablo Canyon until extensive earthquake safety studies have been completed. | |
| Mar. 31, 2011 | MFP sponsored a candlelight vigil for the suffering people in Japan. Participants wrote “Notes of Kindness” to be sent to refugee centers in Japan. | |
| April 5, 2011 | The San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors heard a report on the county’s emergency response plan and comments about emergency planning from the public. | |
| April 10, 2011 | In a deceptive letter dated April 10, 2011, PG&E requested that the NRC delay the date of the issuance of the License Renewal for Diablo Canyon until after PG&E completes 3-D seismic studies of the Shoreline Fault. | |
| April 12, 2011 | In a letter to the NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, PG&E made it clear that its request for a delay in final approval of the license renewals did not mean that they were requesting any delay in the schedule for the hearing process for the license renewals. | |
| April 14, 2011 | California lawmakers kept up the pressure to look harder at earthquake safety at Diablo Canyon and San Onofre, questioning why federal regulators will not halt relicensing work until new seismic maps are completed. | |
| April 14, 2011 | MFP attorney, Diane Curran, filed an emergency petition on behalf of Mothers for Peace and 44 other groups across the nation asking the NRC to immediately suspend all licensing proceedings now underway at 21 plants until the NRC completes a thorough post-Fukushima reactor crisis examination comparable to the process set up in the wake of the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island. They also called for the establishment of an independent commission to supplement the NRC investigation. | |
| April 14, 2011 | A rally in San Francisco called for shutting down the California nuclear power plants. | |
| April 15. 2011 | Representative Edward J. Markey sent a letter to the NRC criticizing restraints placed on inspectors, and urging the NRC to immediately reverse the current direction given to inspectors to keep all findings and observations of vulnerabilities of U.S. reactors excluded from public reports on the Commission’s Fukushima review. | |
| April 16, 2011 | MFP sponsored a “No More Nuclear Victims” demonstration against Diablo Canyon at the Avila Pier, with more than 300 attending. | |
| April, 2011 | A “Peace Happening” benefit for MFP was organized by Laurie Laughlin and Chaz Andree at the Los Berros Peace Park near Nipomo. | |
| May 3, 2011 | The Green Party of California called for the immediate closure and decommissioning of California’s nuclear power plants. | |
| May 11, 2011 | The NRC ordered all nuclear power plant operators to submit, by June 10, detailed information about plans to respond to a possible terrorist attack. | |
| May 15, 2011 | Scholarships were awarded to high school senior, Jayden Norris, and college students, Gabriela Mendosa and Victoria Carranza. | |
| May, 2011 | An NRC inspection of emergency preparedness at Diablo revealed 20 problems – none classified as “significant”. | |
| June 7, 2011 | The NRC ordered a 52-month delay in the schedule for hearings on the application for renewal of the Diablo Canyon licenses to allow PG&E time to conduct seismic studies | |
| June 15, 2011 | The NRC held a public meeting to discuss operation performance at Diablo Canyon in 2010. | |
| June 16, 2011 | After a presentation by three NRC officials, the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to send a letter to the NRC supporting the decision to delay the Diablo Canyon license renewal process, and asking for a third-party review of the seismic studies. They also called on PG&E to provide Santa Barbara County with at least one air-monitoring station to keep track of airborne radiation blown south from the plant. | |
| June 20, 2011 | Members of the California Legislative Environmental Caucus urged President Obama to take a fresh look at the United States nuclear policies and energy priorities in light of the accident at Fukushima and Germany’s decision to phase out nuclear power. | |
| June 21 & 22, 2011 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| June 23, 2011 | In response to thousands of nearly identical CitizenLetter(C) messages voicing concerns about U.S. nuclear plants, the N RC declared that the U.S. plants are safe and a Fukushima-type accident is highly unlikely. | |
| June 24, 2011 | Three U.S. Senators asked for a Congressional investigation of safety standards and federal oversight at U. S. nuclear power plants. | |
| July 12, 2011 | MFP member, Maria Kindel, and her daughter, Sierra, delivered petitions containing 8,000 signatures to President Obama urging him to change his support for nuclear power to advocacy for clean, sustainable energy. | |
| July 16, 2011 | Full Moon Dance, a “fun” raiser for MFP, was held at Marty Brown’s home. | |
| Aug. 6, 2011 | Some MFP members took part in a protest at the Livermore Lab. | |
| Aug. 7, 2011 | Musicians United for Safe Energy (MUSE) held a benefit concert in Mountain View, California, for Japanese disaster relief and anti-nuclear organizations. | |
| Aug. 8, 2011 | The first summit of California anti-nuclear groups, Nuclear Free California, met in San Mateo to work toward the shutdown of Diablo Canyon and San Onofre and to focus on energy conservation, clean, safe, renewable solutions, and a nuclear-free California. | |
| Aug. 10, 2011 | NRC chairman, Gregory Jaczko, urged his colleagues to vote on the Fukushima Near-Term Task Force’s recommendations on U.S. reactor safety within three months. Congressman Markey criticized three of the NRC commissioners who insisted on taking more time for review. | |
| Aug. 19, 2011 | The NRC directed its staff to complete several actions within 45 days in response to recommendations from the agency’s Near-Term Task Force examination of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident in Japan. | |
| Aug. 24, 2011 | Jane Swanson and Linda Seeley met with representatives from the NRC Office of the Inspector General oversight agency. | |
| Sept. 8, 2011 | Twenty-four members of congress urged the NRC to quickly move to adopt the recommendations of the NRC’s Near Term Task Force. | |
| Sept. 9, 2011 | The NRC denied the August 11, 2011, requests by MFP and 25 other public interest groups except for the request for a safety analysis of the regulatory implications of the events at Fukushima to the extent that they directed the Task Force to undertake such analysis. | |
| Sept. 9, 2011 | A divided NRC Commission voted to allow the Obama administration to continue plans to close the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump in Nevada. | |
| Sept. 12, 2011 | An NRC staff report called on the NRC to immediately require U.S. nuclear plant operators to reevaluate whether their facilities can withstand earthquakes and floods. | |
| Sept. 13, 2011 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors asked to appoint its own seismologist to the group reviewing the studies of the earthquake faults near Diablo. | |
| Sept. 23, 2011 | PG&E asked the CA Public Utilities Commission for as much as $64 million dollars from ratepayer funds for the seismic mapping. | |
| Oct. 5 & 6, 2011 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Oct. 6, 2011 | The NRC held a public meeting on their new “Waste Confidence Rule” that will determine plans for storing nuclear waste. | |
| Oct. 12, 2011 | The NRC Commissioners voted to affirm a 2010 decision by the NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) to grant MFP a hearing on a contention that studies of the Shoreline Fault must be incorporated into the final licensing decision for Diablo Canyon. The Commissioners rejected three other contentions that had previously been allowed by the ASLB. | |
| Oct. 13, 2011 | Liz Apfelberg from MFP participated in a town hall meeting hosted by KCSB-FM News on “Devil in the Canyon: Downwind from the Diablo Canyon Power Plant”. The meeting was held at the Faulkner Gallery in the Santa Barbara Central Library & recorded for broadcast. | |
| Oct. 22 to Nov. 6, 2011 | Linda Seeley and others in MFP helped to organize the “Sacred Sites Peacewalk for a Nuclear Free World” sponsored by MFP, Indigenous People Organizing for Change, and the Nipponzan Myohoji Buddhist Order. The group walked from Diablo Canyon to a sacred native-American site in Vallejo. | |
| Oct. 26, 2011 | Members of the MFP Board of Directors, by invitation, met with NRC Commissioners, William Magwood IV and William Ostendorff, and several staff members. | |
| Nov. 29-Dec. 1, 2011 | PG&E held a seismic workshop. | |
| Dec. 2011 | SLO County Supervisor, Bruce Gibson, was appointed to the panel of scientists who will review the seismic studies near Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec. 21, 2011 | An administrative law judge for the California Public Utilities Commission ruled that PG&E’s application for 80 million dollars in ratepayer funding to pay for license renewal should not be considered until seismic studies are completed. | |
| 2011 | An article about MFP by Marilyn Delaure, “Peace Profile: The San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace”, appeared in Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice, Vol. 23, Issue 3, 2011. | |
| Jan. 18, 2012 | The NRC held a public meeting to discuss planned updates to Diablo Canyon’s reactor safety systems. | |
| Jan. 19, 2012 | In honor of Create Peace Week, Jane Addams Children’s Peace Award Book were donated by MFP to the San Luis Obispo City County Library system. | |
| Jan 21, 2012 | MFP held the annual meeting to produce a General Plan, elect officers and other board members, establish committees, assign roles and responsibilities, agree on a calendar, and adopt a budget for 2012. | |
| Jan. 26, 2012 | The Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future released its final report to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy. | |
| Feb. 1, 2012 | The California Public Utilities Commission formally dismissed a motion by PG&E to assess ratepayers $85 million to pay for the seismic studies at Diablo Canyon, but PG&E will be allowed to reopen the proceedings after the seismic studies are completed. | |
| Feb. 8-9, 2012 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Feb. 15, 2012 | Thirty-seven clean energy groups, including MFP, submitted a formal petition for rulemaking to the NRC seeking to incorporate the lessons of the Fukushima disaster by expanding emergency evacuation zones and improving emergency response planning around U. S. nuclear reactors. | |
| Feb. 15, 2012 | Jane Swanson and Liz Apfelberg from MFP gave a presentation to the San Luis Obispo Rotary Club. | |
| March 2, 2012 | The survivors of the Fukushima nuclear disaster were honored at Art After Dark in the Salon on Monterey featuring the soul artist. Stacy Bialac. Supportive notes were written to deliver to Japan, and posters and art work were prepared for the March 11commemoration. | |
| March 3, 2012 | Nuclear Free California met in San Luis Obispo followed by the SLO premiere of the movie, “Fukushima, Never Again”. | |
| March 11, 2012 | A commemoration of the March 11, 2011, Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan was held in Mission Plaza followed by a Poetry Gathering in the Steynberg Gallery. | |
| March 20, 2012 | Liz Apfelberg and Linda Seeley, from MFP, gave a presentation on the MFP opposition to Diablo Canyon in an event in Santa Cruz co-sponsored by Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom and the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Santa Cruz County. | |
| March 22, 2012 | MFP co-sponsored a presentation by Dr. Helen Caldicott in Santa Barbara. | |
| April 9, 2012 | MFP, SLO Transition Towns, The Green Party of SLO, and The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom sponsored a talk by Bruce Gagnon in the SLO Library Community Room. | |
| April 16, 2012 | A talk by Caroline Cottom, Ph.D., “Love and Social Action: How We Ended Nuclear Testing”, was co-sponsored by MFP. | |
| April 22, 2012 | MFP joined in the celebration of Earth Day. | |
| April 27, 2012 | MFP filed two formal petitions with the NRC asking that the results of the Fukushima study be incorporated in the Diablo Canyon license renewal application and arguing that the renewal application should present alternatives for meeting new NRC post-Fukushima safety requirements. | |
| May 26, 2012 | MFP awarded scholarships to high school graduates, Madelyn Daigle and Eric Brunschwiler, and university student, Gemma Garcia. | |
| June 8, 2012 | The Washington D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals vacated NRC’s Waste Confidence Rule and concluded that the NRC acted improperly when it failed to consider all the risks of storing spent fuel on site at the nation’s nuclear power plants. | |
| June 18, 2012 | A petition to the NRC filed by MFP and 21 other groups and two individuals contended that the NRC must not make final licensing decisions until it has completed a rulemaking action on the environmental impacts of used reactor fuel storage and disposal required by the June 8, 2012, Washington D.C. Circuit Court decision. | |
| June 19-20, 2012 | Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| June 27, 2012 | A panel of three NRC adjudicators appointed by the ASLB denied the April 27 and June 18 motions only on issues of timeliness. | |
| July 10, 2012 | At an event at Café Roma, Chieko Shiina, a mother from Fukuishima, with the translating help of Seshen, told about the suffering of Fukushima families, and Carole Hisasue reported on recent trips to the Fukushima area. | |
| July 24, 2012 | The California State Lands Commission rejected requests by MFP and three other groups and County Supervisor Bruce Gibson to change the location of its August 14 final hearing on PG&E’s proposed seismic survey project from Sacramento to San Luis Obispo. | |
| Aug. 7, 2012 | The NRC put a hold on final decisions on all nuclear reactor licenses and license renewals until requirements of the June 8 Waste Confidence Rule decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit could be met. | |
| Aug. 7. 2012 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors endorsed the 3-D high-energy seismic survey (HESS) in the area generally outlined in PG&E’s proposal subject to certain conditions. | |
| Aug. 9, 2012 | MFP sponsored a crane folding event in Farmers Market in commemoration of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. | |
| Aug. 20 , 2012 | The State Lands Commission approved the plan to begin seismic testing in November but specified a shorter window of time for the study to be completed. | |
| Sept. 8, 2012 | There was a peace-crane folding and story-telling gathering in Arroyo Grande with Zette Harbor in preparation for observance of the International Day of Peace September 21. | |
| Sept. 15, 2012 | MFP issued a position statement supporting seismic testing to get Information about earthquake faults near Diablo Canyon, but calling for delay in the plans until techniques could be developed that would protect marine life. | |
| Sept. 19-21, 2012 | Linda Seeley, MFP board member, spoke at the Coalition Against Nukes (CAN) Rally in Washington, D.C. and she attended a Congressional briefing sponsored by Rep. Kucinich. | |
| Sept. 21, 2012 | In honor of International Day of Peace, MFP participated in Zette Harbour’s origami peace crane folding project where 1,002 cranes were folded and displayed. | |
| Sept. 23, 2012 | Mothers for Peace and the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility received donations from the proceeds from ticket sales for the Bonnie Raitt concert in Santa Barbara. | |
| Oct. 10 & 11, 2012 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Oct. 12, 2012 | An NRC study concluded that motion from an earthquake on the Shoreline fault would not exceed the plant’s limits. | |
| Oct. 30, 2012 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors voted to oppose the planned offshore seismic testing by PG&E. | |
| Nov. 6-8, 2012 | PG&E held a public workshop on the Diablo Canyon Seismic Source Characterization. | |
| Nov. 8, 2012 | MFP and 24 other organizations challenged the NRC’s rushed response to the Waste Confidence Ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeal. | |
| Nov. 11, 2012 | A fund raising event, “Energy Sources Every Mother Can Love,” was held at Chuck and Jacque Wheeler’s house. | |
| Nov. 14, 2012 | Following heated controversy in the county, the California Coastal Commission unanimously denied permission for PG&E to begin their planned seismic testing near Diablo Canyon because of potential damage to marine life. | |
| Nov. 28, 2012 | The NRC held two public meetings on Diablo Canyon to discuss topics such as seismic issues and plant performance. | |
| Dec. 12, 2012 | Following a blessing from a representative of the Northern Chumash Tribal Council, some members of MFP joined three Buddhist monks, a nun, and their supporters in their walk from the gates of Diablo Canyon to the courthouse in SLO. | |
| Jan. 9, 2013 | The California Coastal Commission denied PG&E’s application to conduct high-energy offshore seismic tests near Diablo Canyon because of potential risk to marine life. | |
| Jan. 15, 2013 | Sherry Lewis, Linda Seeley, and Jane Swanson from MFP met with the NRC chairwoman, Allison Macfarlane. | |
| Jan. 17, 2013 | Members of MFP and the Sierra Club No Nuke Action Team took part in a panel discussion on the advisability of re-licensing Diablo Canyon at a meeting of People of Faith for Justice. | |
| Feb.1, 2013 | Seven Jane Addams Children’s Peace Award books were donated by MFP to the children’s department of the SLO City County Library system. | |
| Feb. 6-7 & 9, 2013 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Mar. 11, 2013 | On the 2nd anniversary of the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima plant in Japan, MFP sponsored an evening of shared remembrance through poetry, song, story, and kindness. | |
| Apr. 21, 2013 | MFP joined in the celebration of Earth Day. | |
| May, 2013 | In the MFP Position Statement on Seismic Testing, MFP affirmed the importance of updated and thorough seismic tests, but the group opposed the technology proposed by PG&E because of the danger to marine life. | |
| June 1, 2013 | Five hundred dollar Scholarships were awarded to four high school seniors: Emma Phillips, Jessa Culver, Joanne Crandall, and Mikaela Raphael. | |
| June 5-6, 2013 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| June 7, 2013 | Southern California Edison announced it would not restart the San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant. | |
| July, 2013 | MFP’s Linda Seeley helped the national Sierra Club organize their no nukes campaign. | |
| Aug. 9, 2013 | MFP hosted two speakers at an event marking the 68th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Reverend Gyosen Sawada and Chikako Nishiyama. | |
| Sept. 10, 2013 | MFP asked the SLO County Board of Supervisors to send a letter to the NRC and PG&E urging an accelerated transfer of radioactive waste from overcrowded pools into dry casks. | |
| Sept. 22, 2013 | MFP sponsored a fund raising event featuring their attorney, Diane Curran, from Washington D.C. in addition to a meeting with Diane Curran and leaders of other local anti-nuclear groups. | |
| Oct. 9-10, 2013 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Oct., 2013 | MFP’s Sherry Lewis attended the Ground Motion Characterization Workshop #2 in Berkeley. | |
| Nov. 20, 2013 | The NRC held a Waste Confidence meeting in SLO to receive comments from the public. MFP organized the public to attend the meeting and provided talking points for comments. | |
| Nov., 2013 | The SLO County Board of Supervisors sent a letter to senate and congressional representatives asking them to expedite the transfer of spent fuel from Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec, 18, 2013 | The NRC and PG&E held a meeting in SLO to discuss NRC’s assessment of operations at Diablo Canyon from January, 2012, through June, 2013. MFP strongly disagreed with NRC’s conclusion that the plant operated in a manner that preserved public health and safety. | |
| Dec. 20, 2013 | Thirty-three environmental organizations, including MFP, jointly filed critical comments with the NRC on its Draft Waste Confidence Rule and Draft Generic Environmental Impact Study. The filing included a petition to revise and integrate all environmental regulations related to spent fuel storage. | |
| Jan. 11, 2014 | MFP held the annual meeting to produce a General Plan, elect officers and other board members, establish committees, assign roles and responsibilities, agree on a calendar, and adopt a budget for 2014. | |
| Jan. 22, 2014 | MFP made the annual donation of Jane Addams Children’s Peace Award book to the SLO City County Library system children’s department. | |
| February to July, 2014 | MFP members scanned and put on Google Search 86 boxes full of documents that hadbeen saved by the Center For Law and the Public Interest from the MFP 1973 to1984 legal intervention to try to prevent the licensing of the Diablo Canyon reactors. | |
| Feb. 12-13, 2014 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Feb. 18, 2014 | Thirty Four organizations, including Mothers for Peace, filed a petition with the NRC demanding that all reactor licensing be suspended until the NRC addresses new findings on high-density fuel storage, pool fire risks, and mitigation alternatives. | |
| Feb. 19, 2014 | CPUC informed PG&E that before submitting an application for ratepayer funding for license renewal, it would be required to address 11 issues including seismic vulnerability, once-through cooling, and spent-fuel storage. | |
| Feb. 24, 2014 | The test results of the first water sample from the central coast were sent by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, establishing a baseline measurement that will make it possible to monitor the arrival of the radionuclide plume from Fukushima. | |
| Mar. 2, 2014 | Mothers for Peace attorney filed a petition with the NRC to halt licensing procedures for Diablo Canyon and eleven other nuclear power plants until the new and significant consequences of a spent fuel pool fire have been considered. | |
| Mar. 3, 2014 | Jane Swanson spoke for MFP at the Santa Barbara meeting of the World Business Academy and the Santa Barbara and Tri-Counties chapter of the United Nations Associations. | |
| Mar. 4, 2014 | Chumash elder, Jimmy Joe, Buddhist monk, Sawada, and their supporters left Santa Barbara for a walk to Diablo Canyon for a prayer vigil and then a march to San Luis Obispo on March 11 in opposition to the operation of Diablo Canyon – and in recognition of the Fukushima accident. | |
| Mar. 11, 2014 | Jane Swanson and Linda Seeley reported to the SLO County Board of Supervisors on the Mangano study on the health status of people living near Diablo Canyon and requested that County Health do its own study or work with state agencies to produce one. | |
| Mar. 11, 2014 | Mothers for Peace held a Fukushima anniversary memorial event at the Steynberg Gallery in San Luis Obispo. | |
| Mar. 25-27, 2014 | Sherry Lewis, SLOMFP spokesperson on seismic issues, attended the Senior Seismic Hazard Analysis Committee (SSHAC) Workshop 3. | |
| Mar. 31, 2014 | David Lochbaum , Director of the Nuclear Safety Project at the Union of Concerned Scientists, spoke in at Steynberg Gallery about the book he co-authored, Fukushima: The Story of a Nuclear Disaster. | |
| Apr. 12, 2014 | MFP took part in Children’s Day in the Plaza. | |
| Apr. 27, 2014 | MFP took part in the Earth Day celebration and the commemoration of the Chernobyl accident anniversary. | |
| May 2, 2014 | Sherry Lewis displayed an art collage created from a MFP pictures and newspaper headlines at Linnea’s “Art on a Feminism Theme” (Art After Dark). | |
| May 15, 2014 | Mothers for Peace, along with 19 other organizations and individuals, urged the NRC to rescind and reconsider the direct final rule, issued on April 15, 2014, which added “32PTH2” to the list of approved dry storage casks for the transportation of waste from high-burnup fuel. | |
| May 22, 2014 | The NRC held their annual assessment meeting in San Luis Obispo with PG&E and the public. | |
| June 7, 2014 | MFP scholarships were awarded to Kaesha Freyaldenhoven, Emma Wedell, and Harland Dahl. | |
| June 11-12, 2014 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| June 18, 2014 | Thirty Four groups, including SLOMFP, urged NRC’s “fatally compromised” William Magwood to resign from the NRC Commission due to conflict of interest. | |
| June 23, 2014 | The NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Board announced an 11-month delay in processing PG&E’s application for license renewal with publication of the final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) due in March, 2016). | |
| June 26, 2014 | In an amendment to their February 18 petition, SLOMFP and 33 other organizations demanded all licensing and re-licensing be suspended until the NRC considers new and significant information about the environmental impacts of high-density fuel storage. | |
| July 21, 2014 | Nearly three dozen groups, including SLOMFP, asked President Obama to request the immediate resignation of NRC Commissioner Magwood for ethics violations and conflict of interest. | |
| Aug. 5, 2014 | Under the Freedom of Information Act, Mothers for Peace requested from the NRC 10 sets of documents related to a 2010 report by Dr. Robert Sewell regarding the risk of a tsunami at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Aug, 6, 2014 | Shared poetry reading and contemplation in Eto Park commemorated the 69th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. | |
| Aug. 8, 2014 | A special meeting of the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee (DCISC) was held to consider the draft report on the DCISC’s Evaluation of Safety Issues for the Bechtel Power Corporation’s proposal relating to the cooling systems (Once Through Cooling, OTC) at Diablo Canyon. DCISC requested further review and analysis. | |
| Aug. 11, 2015 | Simon Malbuoef, on behalf of SLOMFP, requested that the SLO County Health Commission study the current health status of county residents compared with the status before the operation of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Aug. 21, 2014 | Mothers for Peace and 33 other groups and individuals urged the NRC to postpone major votes on nuclear waste storage and reactor licensing until after the announced August 31 departure of Commissioner Magwood. | |
| Aug. 25, 2014 | After more than a year of secrecy, a July 2013, formal dissent by Michael Peck, former NRC senior resident inspector at Diablo Canyon, was released. He disagrees with the Agency’s decision to allow the plant to continue operating despite the failure of PG&E orthe NRC to conduct rigorous safety analyses and take action to address newly identified seismic risks. | |
| Aug. 26. 2014 | Friends of the Earth (FOE) filed a petition with the NRC charging that Diablo Canyon is inviolation of its license because there is new information that earthquake faults near the plant are capable of ground motion stronger than the plant is designed and licensed for. They demanded that the plant be closed immediately pending proof that it is safe. | |
| Aug. 26, 2014 | California Senator Barbara Boxer announced that the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that she chairs will hold hearings on the suppression of the Peck document and on Diablo’s seismic risks. | |
| Sept. 8, 2014 | SLO County Board of Supervisors members Bruce Gibson and Adam Hill wrote to the NRC expressing concern about the failure of the NRC to release the Peck dissenting opinion and the results of the tsunami hazard study by Dr. Robert Sewell in a timely manner. They urged the NRC to conduct a thorough, timely, and transparent review of natural hazards affecting the operation of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 10, 2014 | After a four-year assessment of earthquake faults surrounding the plant, PG&E declared the facility to be seismically safe. The study will be peer reviewed by the Independent Peer Review Panel appointed by the PUC. On this same day, the NRC released its response to safety concerns raised by Michael Peck, concluding that the concerns were not warranted. | |
| Sept. 18, 2014 | Friends of the Earth, Mothers for Peace, the Santa Lucia Chapter of the Sierra Club, and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility filed a Freedom of Information request to determine whether the NRC and PG&E improperly worked together on a public relations strategy in releasing their reports on the same day to counteract widespread news coverage of Michael Peck’s dissenting opinion. | |
| Sept. 23, 2014 | Michael Peck submitted a lengthy opinion piece to the San Luis Obispo County Tribune defending his July 2013, Differing Professional Opinion. | |
| Sept. 29, 2014 | Mothers for Peace joined with 16 other groups nationwide to demand that the NRC stop licensing and relicensing nuclear facilities because of NRC’s failure to address a major 2012 court action and longstanding prior decisions requiring the NRC to make “Waste Confidence” findings that the fuel can be disposed of safely. | |
| Oct. 3, 2014 | The Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility asked the California Public Utilities Commission to partially deny PG&E’s request to recoup $7 million dollars from ratepayers for seismic studies of the Diablo Canyon plant because PG&E sidestepped the Independent Peer Review Panel (IPRP) that was formed to review the studies. | |
| Oct. 14-15, 2014 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. Mothers for Peace participated. | |
| Oct. 28, 2014 | Friends of the Earth petitioned the US Court of Appeals for the D.C. circuit to overturn a secret decision by the NRC to illegally alter the operating license for Diablo Canyon, allowing PG&E to hide the fact that the reactors are vulnerable to earthquakes stronger than the plant was designed to withstand. | |
| Oct. 29, 2014 | NRDC and nine other environmental groups (including Mothers for Peace) filed separate lawsuits in the D.C. Court of Appeals challenging the NRC decision to proceed with an “extended waste storage rule” and a generic environmental impact statement that fail to comply with a 2012 federal court ruling that had previously reversed the NRC. | |
| Oct. 31, 2014 | MFP appealed NRC’s failure to make a complete or meaningful response to the August 5, 2014, Freedom of Information request for documents related to the Sewell report. | |
| Nov. 4, 2014 | MFP filed with the NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Board a response to Friends of the Earth’s October 10, 2014, Request for a Hearing and Petition to Intervene and FOE’s Waiver Petition. | |
| Nov. 14-17, 2014 | Linda Seeley attended the national Sierra Club’s No Nukes Campaign Conference, and she was instrumental in helping to formulate the plans for their campaign. | |
| Nov. 18, 2014 | Elizabeth Brousse and Sherry Lewis represented Mothers for Peace at the California Water Resources Control Board meeting in Sacramento on Once Through Cooling at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Nov. 18, 2014 | In response to the request by SLO County supervisors, NRC announced that the Sewell report had been made public. | |
| Nov. 30, 2014 | Several Buddhist monks and their followers held a walk from San Luis Obispo to Diablo Canyon, a fast, and a vigil to close Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec. 1, 2014 | Comments on EPA’s Proposed Clean Power Plan were filed by 32 environmental organizations, including Mothers for Peace, and one individual calling for more stringent standards and elimination of reliance on natural gas and nuclear energy. | |
| Dec. 3, 2014 | Dr. Sam Blakeslee, Daniel Hirsch, and Congresswoman Lois Capps testified before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works on seismic issues at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec. 17, 2014 | Mothers for Peace joined with Friends of the Earth, the Santa Lucia Chapter of the Sierra Club, and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility to file an appeal to the NRC to obtain unredacted copies of emails to determine whether PG&E and the NRC worked together to counteract widespread news coverage about seismic dangers at Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec. 18, 2014 | Linda Seeley from SLOMFP and Harvey Wasserman spoke in the Great Minds Series in the San Fernando Valley on how to shut down Diablo Canyon. | |
| Jan. 23, 2015 | To begin the Nuke Free California weekend gathering in SLO, Reverend Sawada led a march from Diablo Canyon to the Courthouse in SLO. | |
| Jan. 23-25, 2015 | Activists from throughout the U.S. and Japan met in SLO to discuss strategies for shutting down Diablo Canyon and for promoting sustainable energy sources. | |
| Jan. 27, 2015 | Harvey Wasserman and MFP’s Linda Seeley joined others in a strategy session for shutting down Diablo Canyon at the San Francisco Occupy Forum. | |
| Jan. 30, 2015 | The NRC staff requested that the ASLB not consider the Jan. 21, 2015, ex parte communication via 3-mail to Judge Ryerson from Michael Peck concerning several seismic documents reltaed to Diablo Canyon and the nature of the plant’s current licensing basis. | |
| Feb. 4, 2015 | Dr. Marilyn DeLaure, a University of San Francisco Professor, spoke about Mothers for Peace’s fight against Diablo Canyon at the University of Sanfrancisco’s Santa Rosa Campus. | |
| Feb. 4, 2015 | Ina a Solartopia radio conversattion, David Braun and Mothers for Peace’s Linda Seeley spoke about the dangers of fracking and nuclear power. | |
| Feb. 4-5, 2015 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Feb. 11, 2015 | The ASLB rejected Friends of the Earth’s petition to intervene and petition for waiver of certain NRC regulations. | |
| Feb. 20, 2015 | A Washington, D.C. Federal Court of Appeals rejected an attempt by PG&E and the NRC to quash a Friends of the Earth lawsuit contending that the NRC illegally allowed PG&E to alter the Diablo Canyon license to hide Diablo Canyon’s vulnerability to earthquakes stronger than it was built to withstand. | |
| Mar. 4-11, 2015 | Japanese Buddhist monk, Sawada-shonin, and Santa Barbara Chumash representative, Jimmy Joe, led a march from Santa Barbara to the Steynberg Gallery in SLO for observance of the anniversary of the Fukushima meltdown. | |
| Mar. 7, 2015 | MFP had the annual meeting to elect officers and other board members, assign roles and responsibilities, and make the general plans for the year. | |
| Mar. 11, 2015 | MFP sponsored the Fukushima is Everywhere event at the Steynberg Gallery in observance of the anniversary of the Fukushima accident. | |
| Mar. 14, 2015 | Elizabeth Apfelberg, MFP treasurer, was nominated for the SLO County Women’s Wall of Fame. | |
| Mar. 20, 2015 | According to an article in the San Luis Obispo Tribune, the Independent Peer Review Panel (IPRP) that was appointed by the CPUC to double-check the accuracy of PG&E’s evaluation of seismic data criticized PG&E for ignoring the panel’s criticisms and recommendations. | |
| Mar. 26, 2015 | About two dozen young people (half from Japan) marched from Diablo Canyon to San Luis Obispo on their month-long journey across the United States culminating at the United Nations to bring attention to the importance of the renewal of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. | |
| Apr. 6, 2015 | MFP filed two new contentions with the NRC asserting that: 1) PG&E’s Amended Environmental Report submitted in March, 2015, fails to meet the requirements of federal law because it does not evaluate many of the energy alternatives that will be available and 2) PG&E understates the environmental impacts of renewing the Diablo Canyon licenses. | |
| Apr. 15, 2015 | MFP filed Contention C with the NRC alleging that PG&E’s Severe Accident Mitigation Alternatives (SAMA) analysis fails to account for seismic hazards at Diablo Canyon. Contention D was also filed contending that there is an inadequate discussion of flooding risk to safety equipment in the SAMA analysis. | |
| Apr. 19, 2015 | MFP took part in the Earth Day observance. | |
| Apr. 28, 2015 | The NRC announced that the staff would start processing PG&E’s application for license renewal that had been on hold since shortly after the Fukushima disaster, but PG&E did not say whether the company had decided to move forward with the permitting process. | |
| May 3, 2016 | MFP’s Jane Swanson gave a presentation to the Citizens for Peaceful Resolutions group in Ventura, CA. | |
| May 9, 2015 | Harvey Wasserman, Paul Frey, and MFP’s Linda Seeley were sponsored by the Malibu Democratic Club in a presentation at the Malibu Public Library. | |
| May 10. 2015 | On Mother’s Day some MFP supporters joined women from around the world who were standing in silent unity for “a world alive with love and possibility for every child.” | |
| May 13, 2015 | The NRC announced that PG&E must submit a detailed seismic risk analysis for Diablo Canyon by June 30, 2017. | |
| May 18, 2015 | Linda Seeley spoke on “No Fracking/No Nukes” at Occupy Forum in San Francisco. | |
| May 21, 2015 | The NRC decided that the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board will rule on Friends of the Earth’s contention that PG&E was allowed to illegally alter the plant’s license in an attempt to hide the risk from powerful earthquake faults discovered since Diablo Canyon was designed and built. | |
| May 31, 2015 | MFP Scholarships were awarded to Jensen Severance (high school) and Gemma Garcia (university). Gemma was a previous high school winner. | |
| June 2, 2015 | Linda Seeley spoke on MFP and the current situation at Diablo Canyon at Occupy Forum in San Francisco. | |
| June 10, 2015 | MFP announced that it had received information that 19 of the 34 spent fuel casks that had been loaded at the Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation (ISFSI) were loaded improperly. | |
| June 16-17, 2015 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| June 24, 2015 | NRC held the annual meeting to review operations of Diablo Canyon for 2014. | |
| June 29, 2015 | MFP attorney, Diane Curran, filed a brief on behalf of eight groups, including MFP, with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to appeal the NRC Continued Spent Fuel Storage Rule. | |
| July 9, 2015 | The NRC Atomic Safety & Licensing Board held oral arguments in Rockville, MD on the four new license renewal contentions filed by MFP, and they also met concerning the May 21, 2015, referral of the Friends of the Earth petition. MFP’s Jane Swanson and Linda Seeley attended the meeting and then talked to legislators in Washington D.C. | |
| July 20, 2015 | MFP sponsored a dinner and a program featuring South Korean, Japanese, and American activists | |
| July 31, 2015 | MFP filed an amended Contention C with the NRC claiming inadequate consideration of seismic risk in the Severe Accident Mitigation Alternatives (SAMA) analysis. PG&E moved for summary disposition on the only admitted contention (Contention EC-1). | |
| Aug. 5, 2015 | The NRC staff conducted two public meetings in SLO to describe the Environmental Impact process for the Diablo Canyon license renewal and to receive public comments on the scope of the report. | |
| Aug. 6, 2015 | NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board rejected the MFP contentions that were presented in the oral arguments on July 9 in Rockville, MD. | |
| Aug. 18, 2015 | Linda Seeley spoke about the history of the struggle at Diablo Canyon at the Occupy Forum in San Francisco. | |
| Sept. 9, 2015 | Some members of MFP met with Gunter Hamburger, an antinuclear activist from Germany, and the crew from the Veterans for Peace sailing ship touring the coast. | |
| Sept. 11, 2015 | The CA legislature passed a bill that was later signed by Governor Brown that authorized extending ratepayer funding mechanism for the SLO County Office of Emergency Services and the continued operation of the Independent Peer Review Panel until 2025. | |
| Sept. 14, 2015 | MFP asked the NRC Commissioners to review the August 6, 2015, rejection of MFP’s contentions by the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board. | |
| Sept. 25, 2015 | State Senator Bill Monning hosted the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant Seismic Safety Informational Town Hall in SLO. | |
| Sept., 2015 | An archivist in the Cal Poly Kennedy Library requested MFP memorabilia in addition to the 86 boxes of documents from the Center for Law and the Public Interest for archives on the history of Mothers for Peace to store in the library. | |
| Oct. 10, 2015 | An Up in the Air Concert was held at Hidden Springs Tree Farm as a fundraiser for MFP. | |
| Oct. 18, 2015 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Oct. 18, 2015 | The Solar and Green Building Tour benefited the MFP scholarship fund. | |
| Oct. 20-21, 2015 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. | |
| Oct. 21, 2015 | The NRC Atomic Safety & Licensing Board denied the July 31 MFP motion to file an Amended Contention C and they granted PG&E’s July 31 motion for summary disposition of Contention EC-1 regarding the Shoreline Fault – leaving MFP with no contentions to license renewal allowed by the NRC. | |
| Nov. 9, 2015 | The NRC Commissioners denied Friends of the Earth’s appeal of the ASLB rejection of their petition to intervene and their request to waive certain regulations that govern the scope of the license renewal proceeding. | |
| Dec. 1, 2015 | Elizabeth Brousse and Simone Malboeuf represented MFP at a Fund for Santa Barbara event where MFP was presented with a grant from the Fund for Santa Barbara. | |
| Dec. 1-2, 2015 | Arnie Gundersen, former nuclear industry senior vice president turned whistleblower, spoke at an event at Cal Poly Dec. 1 and at an event at Café Roma Dec. 2. | |
| Dec. 18, 2015 | California Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom directed the State Lands Commission to draw up a plan for a thorough California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review of Diablo Canyon before the leases that expire in 2018 and 2019 are renewed. | |
| Jan. 30, 2016 | MFP had the annual meeting to elect officers and other board members, assign roles and responsibilities, and make general plans for the year. | |
| Feb. 3-4, 2016 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. MFP Board member, Sherry Lewis, and other Mothers were present to ask questions and to give input to the Commissioners on topics appropriate for future meetings. | |
| Feb. 10, 2016 | The California Coastal Commission met. | |
| Feb. 25, 2016 | Linda Seeley and Jane Swanson presented to UCSB students at Avila Community Center. Topic was history and problems presented by Diablo Canyon. | |
| Mar. 10, 2016 | A report by the Disaster Accountability Project claimed that Central Coast preparedness for a nuclear emergency at Diablo Canyon is “dangerously inadequate.” The report was disputed by PG&E and local officials. | |
| Mar. 11, 2016 | MFP commemorated the Fukushima disaster at an event that included a film, music, and a prayer/peace walk from Santa Barbara to Diablo Canyon led by Reverend Sawada. | |
| Mar. 23, 2016 | MFP was one of thirty organizations that announced their opposition to CA SB968 which would mandate an analysis of the impacts of shutting down Diablo Canyon. The bill passed and was signed by Gov. Brown Sept. 26, 2016. | |
| Apr. 6, 2016 | A potluck dinner honored two women from Fukushima, Japan – Hiroko Aihara, a journalist, and Dr. Sata who has been working on health issues related to radiation exposure. | |
| Apr. 9, 2016 | MFP sponsored a retreat with Wiesie Ralston who shared ‘The Enneagram: A Model for Understanding Personality and the Spiritual Journey.” | |
| Apr. 24, 2016 | MFP participated in the Earth Day Fair and Music Festival by giving away packets of seeds and heart/peace rocks. | |
| May 5, 2016 | Jane Swanson and Linda Seeley, spokespersons for MFP, spoke to the Chamber of Commerce. | |
| May 8, 2016 | Members of MFP observed Mother’s Day by standing for five minutes in silence for peace, along with women all over the world. | |
| May 9, 2016 | MFP was one of the sponsors of a film by Josh Fox, “How To Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can’t Change” | |
| May 19, 2016 | Jane Swanson and Linda Seeley gave a presentation, “The Devil is in the Details”, sponsored by People of Faith for Justice at the United Church of Christ. | |
| May 28, 2016 | A potluck lunch was held to award MFP scholarships to Courtney McGuire, Xue DiMaggio, and Katie Chapman-Pinto. | |
| June 2, 2016 | The NRC denied a petition from Mothers for Peace to reverse the October 21, 2015, Atomic Safety & Licensing Board decision that granted a summary disposition of the one admitted contention in the Diablo Canyon license renewal proceeding; they dismissed earlier proposed contentions. | |
| June 3, 2016 | A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia denied the June 29, 2015, petition filed by Diane Curran on behalf of MFP and seven other groups appealing the NRC’s Continued Spent Fuel Storage Rule on the grounds that the court is not to substitute its judgment for that of the agency. | |
| June 21-22, 2016 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. MFP Board member, Sherry Lewis, and other Mothers were present to ask questions and to give input to the Commissioners on topics appropriate for future meetings. | |
| June 21, 2016 | PG&E announced the Joint Agreement that had been reached with some environmental and labor organizations that the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant would be closed at the end of the current licenses in 2024 and 2025 and the power would be replaced with renewable energy if the California Public Utilities Commission grants approval. | |
| June 22, 2016 | The NRC held a public meeting to discuss the annual performance assessment for the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. | |
| June 28, 2016 | After a day of testimony in Sacramento and via telecast in Morro Bay, the California State Lands Commission agreed to extend a key lease required for Diablo Canyon to continue operating beyond 2018 without requiring an environmental impact report. | |
| July 6, 2016 | Spokespersons Linda Seeley and Jane Swanson submitted an opinion piece which was later published as a Viewpoint in the Tribune newspaper titled, “Diablo Canyon: Outdated and Not Needed.” | |
| July 20, 2016 | PG&E held a public meeting to present information and respond to public comments about the joint proposal to close Diablo Canyon at the end of the current licenses. Members and supporters of SLOMFP participated and asked what justifications PG&E had for running Diablo until 2025. Why delay its Request For Offers (RFOs) of renewable energy until 2020? Why not seek those immediately? | |
| July 26, 2016 | SLO County Board of Supervisors met to discuss PG&E’s Joint Proposal. SLOMFP Spokesperson, Jane Swanson, and other Mothers pointed out that PG&E has an incentive to defer maintenance in order to avoid expenses, given that the plant has to function a maximum of nine more years. A worrisome example is that PG&E has already failed to replace the stator for unit 2, even though its expected lifetime of service ended in 2015. PG&E documents describe a stator as “critical for [the] safe, reliable operation”, and yet PG&E does not plan a full replacement of it because of the cost of up to $151 million. | |
| Aug. 6, 2016 | MFP held a memorial commemorating the bombings of the Japanese cities and renewing solidarity against nuclear weapons and nuclear energy. | |
| Aug. 8, 2016 | The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied the petition by MFP and seven other groups for rehearing of the June 3, 2016 decision by a three-judge panel. | |
| Aug. 11, 2016 | PG&E filed with the California Public Utilities Commission the proposal to close Diablo Canyon at the end of the current licenses. | |
| Sept., 2016 | Fairewinds President, Maggie Gundersen, spoke with MFP vice-president and spokesperson, Linda Seeley, about MFP intervention in the CPUC case. | |
| Sept. 15, 2016 | SLOMFP, represented by Attorney Sabrina Venskus, filed its Response to PG&E’s Joint Proposal with the CPUC. Among other points, SLOMFP argued that nine additional years of Diablo operations is unwise, unsafe, too expensive, and unnecessary. Renewable sources of energy to replace the needed portion of electricity from Diablo will be available very soon. | |
| Oct. 6, 2016 | Sherry Lewis from MFP attended the California Public Utilities Commission meeting in San Francisco on the Joint Proposal to close Diablo Canyon by 2025. | |
| Oct. 19-20, 2016 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. MFP Board member, Sherry Lewis, and other Mothers were present to ask questions and to give input to the Commissioners on topics appropriate for future meetings. | |
| Oct. 20, 2016 | The California Public Utilities Commission held a public participation meeting in San Luis Obispo on PG&E’s decision not to pursue relicensing the Diablo Canyon reactors when the licenses expire in 2024 and 2025. | |
| Dec. 2-4, 2016 | MFP board members, Linda Seeley and Molly Johnson, attended the nuclear waste summit in Chicago, sponsored by Beyond Nuclear. | |
| Jan.21, 2017 | MFP took part in the Women’s March in San Luis Obispo. | |
| Jan. 27, 2017 | MFP attorney, Sabrina Venskus, and expert witness, Arnold Gundersen, submitted expert testimony to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) contending that Diablo Canyon should be closed in 2019 instead of 2025 because it is unsafe and unreliable. | |
| Jan. 28, 2017 | MFP held the annual meeting to elect officers and other board members, assign roles and responsibilities, and make plans for 2017. | |
| Feb. 8-9, 2017 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. Members of Mothers for Peace gave input and asked questions. | |
| Mar. 11, 2017 | MFP held a remembrance ceremony commemorating the disaster at the Fukushima plant in Japan with a dinner, art, music, poetry, and a walk led by Sawada. | |
| Mar. 17, 2017 | MFP attorney, Sabrina Venskus, responded before the CPUC to PG&E’s motion to strike portions of the intervenor testimony. | |
| Apr. 19, 2017 | Representatives from MFP spoke at the Diablo Canyon closure hearings held in San Francisco by CPUC. The hearings lasted several days. | |
| Apr. 22, 2017 | MFP celebrated Earth Day by distributing seed packets and collecting signatures on postcards to be sent to EPA chief, Scott Pruitt. | |
| Apr. 25, 2017 | MFP distributed information cards at the David Crosby concert. | |
| May, 2017 | The Diablo Canyon “Screw-Up Committee” posted Diablo Canyon Screw-ups on Google under “DC Screw-Ups – Google Drive” | |
| May 20, 2017 | A Mothers for Peace scholarship was awarded to Andrea Fernandez at the annual MFP potluck lunch. | |
| May 26, 2017 | MFP attorney, Sabrina Venskus, presented the opening brief and request for oral arguments before the CPUC. | |
| June 7-8, 2017 | MFP representatives attended the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee meeting and asked questions and supplied information to the committee. | |
| June, 2017 | The MFP interactive timeline prepared by Lucas Hixson was posted on the internet.http://environmentalarchives.com/diablo-canyon/timeline/ | |
| July 11, 2017 | The World Business Academy (WBA), Santa Barbara, lost its lawsuit against the California State Lands Commission which alleged that the Commission did not have the legal authority to exempt Diablo Canyon from the EIR required by CEQA. WBA will appeal. | |
| July 12, 2017 | The NRC staff held a public meeting in San Luis Obispo with PG&E representatives to discuss the 2016 performance of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Aug. 6, 2017 | MFP commemorated the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with speakers and music. | |
| Aug., 2017 | MFP donated Jane Addams Peace Books to the library. | |
| Aug. 24, 2017 | Some members of MFP attended the “Meet and Eat” event with the crew of the Golden Rule Peace Boat. | |
| Aug. 29, 2017 | Congressman Salud Carbajal hosted a town hall meeting with representatives from PG&E and the NRC to discuss the proposed Diablo Canyon closure. | |
| Sept. 4, 2017 | Jane Swanson and Molly Johnson met with Dr. Chika Shimizu, a professor in Yamanashigakuin University in Japan, and Dr. Akinori Shimizu, professor in Fukushimi University, to discuss the evaluation process of evacuation plans. | |
| Sept. 14, 2017 | The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) held a public participation hearing in San Luis Obispo to receive comments from the public regarding PG&E’s planned retirement of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Oct. 17, 2017 | Linda Seeley and Molly Johnson represented Mothers for Peace in a discussion about Diablo Canyon’s waste storage on KVEC radio. | |
| Oct. 18-19, 2017 | Members of MFP communicated with members of the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee at the public meetings. | |
| Oct. 20, 2017 | The first presentation in the MFP educational series on nuclear waste featured Molly Johnson and Donna Gilmore discussing on-site storage. | |
| Nov. 8, 2017 | A California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) judge, Peter Allen, issued a proposed decision that would approve plans for Diablo Canyon to shut down when the licenses expire in 2024 and 2025 but would reduce the amount ratepayers would be required to pay for employee retention programs and community impact mitigation. It must be approved by a majority of the commission’s five voting members. | |
| Nov., 2017 | Jane Swanson appeared on Solartopia KPFK radio to discuss the implications of Judge Allen’s ruling. | |
| Nov. 10, 2017 | “Yucca Mountain – is it viable?”, the second presentation in the MFP educational series, featured Ian Zabarte from the Western Bands Shoshone Nation, Judy Treichal from the Nuclear Waste Task Force, and Steve Frishman from the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects. | |
| Nov. 24, 2017 | Linda Seeley spoke on Solartopia, radio station KPFK, about the reasons why Judge Allen’s proposed CPUC decision could force an early shutdown of the Diablo reactors. | |
| Dec. 1-3, 2017 | Molly Johnson represented MFP at “Dismantling the Beast”, an event sponsored by the Albuquerque Nuclear Study Group. | |
| Jan. 11, 2018 | The California Public Utilities Commission ruled that the Diablo Canyon reactors will be closed in 2024 and 2025 or sooner if necessary. | |
| Jan. 17, 2018 | A founding member of MFP, Patricia (Pat) Miller, died. | |
| Feb. 3, 2018 | Molly Johnson and her husband collected ocean water from the Pismo Beach area for testing by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The water was found to have 6.8 of Cesium 137 Bq/m3 of water (with error +/- 0.2Bq/m3), the highest found this far south. Woods Hole said it was because of the Fukushima accident. | |
| Feb. 3, 2018 | Linda Seeley from MFP was one of the speakers at the NAACP Take a Knee for Equality rally in San Luis Obispo. | |
| Feb. 7 and 8, 2018 | Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met and members of MFP contributed questions and information. | |
| Feb. 11, 2018 | MFP held the annual meeting to elect officers and other board members, assign roles and responsibilities, and develop the general plan and calendar for 2018. | |
| Feb. 15, 2018 | Evy Justesen from MFP was interviewed for the documentary, “Lives Well Lived: Celebrating the Secrets, Wit and Wisdom of Age.” | |
| March 11, 2018 | MFP sponsored an event in Eto Park to commemorate the Fukushima disaster. It included a Mozart Motet sung at Fukushima to commemorate the disaster and shared readings. | |
| March 16-18, 2018 | Jane Swanson and Molly Johnson represented MFP at a national meeting in Chicago to explore options for short-term and long-term storage of nuclear waste. | |
| March 21, 2018 | Molly Johnson from MFP was interviewed on Nuclear Hotseat Podcast about the increased Cesium 137 levels in the ocean water off the Central Coast. | |
| March 24, 2018 | Mothers for Peace participated in the March for Our Lives in San Luis Obispo in support of the Parkland shooting survivors’ demand for sensible gun legislation. | |
| April 21, 2018 | MFP celebrated Earth Day at the Earth Day Alliance Fair at Laguna Lake. The theme of was “breaking loose from plastics”. | |
| April 23, 2018 | The April 17 NRC approval of PG&E’s request to withdraw its application for the renewal of the Diablo Canyon licenses took effect. | |
| May 20-23, 2018 | Molly Johnson represented MFP at the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability’s 30th Annual DC Days meetings and met with some members of the House and Senate. | |
| May 26, 2018 | MFP awarded scholarships to high school winners, Luis Jazo and Carmen Bouquet, and college winner, Dalia Garcia. Four students who were interviewed but did not win were given $100 awards. | |
| May 30, 2018 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met and it continued to meet on the last Wednesday of each month. Linda Seeley represented MFP on the panel. | |
| June 3, 2018 | Barbara (Bobbe) Scott, a long-time and valued member of MFP, died. | |
| June 13, 2018 | A division of the U.S. Second Court of Appeals upheld a land lease extension for Diablo Canyon, rejecting the World Business Academy contention that the State Lands Commission should have required a more thorough environmental review. | |
| June 13-14, 2018 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee had public meetings. Members of MFP provided important information and asked questions. | |
| June 21-22, 2018 | MFP participated in the Women’s March SLO to protest the separation of migrant children from their parents at the border and putting them in cages. | |
| July 23, 2018 | The World Business Academy filed an appeal with the State Supreme Court of their June 13 loss in the U.S. Second Court of Appeals, asking for a more thorough environmental review before renewing the Diablo Canyon land lease. | |
| Aug. 1,2018 | In response to an invitation, some members of MFP tabled at a Jackson Browne Concert at Vina Robles. | |
| Aug. 3-6, 2018 | MFP member Gail Comer helped promoted the Great Silent Grandmother Gathering with a journey from San Jose to the wall on the border between the U.S. and Mexico to protest U.S. immigration policies including the separation of parents and children. | |
| Aug. 6 and 9, 2018 | MFP followers were urged to create a personal memorial for peace and nuclear disarmament. Some members of MFP took part in a die-in at the Livermore Lab on the anniversary of the U.S. bombing of Nagasaki. Carole Hisasue from MFP was one of the speakers. | |
| Aug. 17-18, 2018 | PG&E held meetings to hear from the public regarding the potential future uses of Diablo Canyon lands. | |
| Aug. 18, 2018 | MFP submitted an Amicus letter in support of the World Business Academy’s appeal of their case to the California State Supreme Court. | |
| Aug. 23, 2018 | MFP Board Member Linda Seeley spoke at the rally for Measure G which would have prevented fracking and drilling of new oil wells in the county. Very large investments by oil companies defeated the measure. | |
| Aug. 24-26, 2018 | Linda Seeley, a spokesperson for MFP, was a participant in the First Annual Solartopia Congress in the L.A. Trade Tech College. | |
| Aug. 28, 2018 | The NRC held a public meeting to review the operations of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Aug. 29, 2018 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel, including Linda Seeley from MFP, met in San Luis Obispo with a focus on potential future uses of Diablo Canyon lands and facilities. | |
| Sept. 8, 2018 | Some members of MFP took part in the Rise for Climate, Jobs, and Justice march in San Francisco. | |
| Sept. 13, 2018 | Linda Seeley, a spokesperson for MFP, took part in the Solartopia presentation about core embrittlement that could shut Diablo Canyon early. | |
| Sept. 14, 2018 | MFP was one of seven environmental organizations that filed a legal challenge with the NRC opposing the plans of Holtec International/Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance to construct and operate a Consolidated Interim Storage facility for high-level radioactive waste in southeastern New Mexico. | |
| Sept. 15, 2018 | Under the direction of Jill ZamEk and Jane Swanson, MFP hosted a coastal cleanup site at Oceano Lagoon to clean up the lagoon in that area. The event was organized by ECOSLO. | |
| Sept. 19, 2018 | Gov. Brown signed Senate Bill 1090 that will provide San Luis Obispo County with $85 million in rate payer funds to mitigate the impacts of the Diablo Canyon closure. | |
| Sept. 26, 2018 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Panel met with a focus, again, on future use of Diablo Canyon lands and facilities. | |
| Oct. 13, 2018 | MFP sponsored a film, A2-B-C (grades of childhood thyroid cancers), and a speaker, Michiko Kato, an evacuee from Fukushima. She described the thyroid and other health problems facing Japanese children after the nuclear meltdown in Fukushima. | |
| Oct. 24-25, 2018 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met and received questions and comments from Mothers for Peace members and others. | |
| Nov. 9-10, 2018 | MFP sponsored two presentations by Dr. Kathleen Sullivan, a long-time activist with the Nobel Prize winning organization, International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). | |
| Nov. 14, 2018 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Panel met. Linda Seeley said the Panel had been working on the vision statement which will continue to evolve. | |
| Dec. 21, 2018 | MFP presented six Jane Addams Peace Award children’s books to the local library. | |
| Jan. 24, 2019 | MFP supported the Cal Poly student SLO Peace Coalition in their Divest Cal Poly from War Protest. | |
| Jan. 26, 2019 | MFP held the annual planning meeting to elect officers and other board members, review the 2018 year, adopt a calendar and budget for 2019, and assign roles and responsibilities. | |
| Jan. 29, 2019 | MFP joined nine other groups in opposing Holtec International’s application to the NRC for a license to build the world’s largest high-level nuclear waste dump targeted for New Mexico. | |
| Jan. 30, 2019 | Congressman Carbajal asked the NRC for more information on how PG&E’s bankruptcy could impact Diablo Canyon. | |
| Feb. 2, 2019 | MFP sent a letter to CA Governor Newsom requesting his response to problems at Diablo Canyon including embrittlement, component cracking, waste management, and PG&E bankruptcy. | |
| Feb. 22, 2019 | MFP strongly urged PG&E to drop its request that the NRC grant Diablo Canyon an exemption from inspection of a highly radioactive component of the plant. The exemption was granted by the NRC September 10, 2019. | |
| Feb. 22-23, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel hosted a two-day workshop focusing on safer dry cask storage of spent fuel at Diablo Canyon and the risks of spent fuel pools, transportation, and dry casks. Three manufacturers of dry casks made presentations. Representatives from PG&E, the California Energy Commission, and the NRC outlined regulatory guidelines. | |
| Feb. 27-28, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met and received comments and questions from Mothers for Peace and others. | |
| March 12, 2019 | Liz Apfelberg died after a long illness. Liz was an active member of MFP for forty years, serving as one of the original interveners and lay attorneys and later serving as president and then treasurer. | |
| March 13, 2019 | MFP held a remembrance of the Fukushima accident in the lobby of the San Luis Obispo County Government Center just prior to the Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel meeting to discuss the storage of high level radioactive waste. | |
| April 3, 2019 | The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute’s analysis of radioactive isotopes in the sea water near the Pismo Beach Pier showed that the trend is increasing indicating that radiation from the Fukushima plant is reaching the Pismo Beach water. | |
| april 17, 2019 | The public was invited to an open house informal meeting with members of the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee. | |
| May 6, 2019 | At Congressman Carbajal’s Town Hall Meeting, Linda Seeley, a member of Mothers for Peace and the Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel, spoke about safer storage of radioactive waste at Diablo Canyon as key to the well-being of future generations. | |
| May 7, 2019 | The NRC Atomic Safety & Licensing Board denied the request made by Mothers for Peace and other Intervenors for an evidentiary hearing challenging Holtec International’s proposed high level nuclear waste dump in southeastern New Mexico. | |
| May 19-23, 2019 | Molly Johnson from MFP attended DC Days and lobbied members of Congress for opposition to consolidated interim waste storage sites and promotion of enhanced safety for storing waste on site. | |
| June 4-5, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee held public meetings with questions and comments from members of Mothers for Peace and others.. | |
| June, 2019 | MFP awarded three scholarships to high school graduating seniors Ashley Andrade of Nipomo High School, Delaney Siegmund of Morro Bay High School, and Madrid Holland of Nipomo High School. Each student has been active in addressing issues of the environment, peace, and/or social justice. | |
| June 7-9, 2019 | Molly Johnson from MFP attended the Strategic Planning Training in New York to work on a plan for radioactive waste storage. | |
| July, 2019 | MFP donated Jane Addams Peace Award Books to the SLO library in memory of Liz Apfelberg. | |
| July 12, 2019 | MFP supported the Day Of Action event in Arroyo Grande promoting humane treatment for border refugees. | |
| July 21, 2019 | MFP hosted three members of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) who were on their nuclear-free tour of California and then Japan to promote the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. | |
| July 26, 2019 | CPUC held a public meeting to provide an opportunity for customers to comment on PG&E’s request to increase rates to cover decommissioning costs. | |
| July 28, 2019 | The San Luis Obispo Board of Supervisors held a public forum to discuss the SB 968 Diablo Canyon Economic Impact Assessment. The plant closure, decommissioning, and SB 1090 assistance will present the SLO economy with both positive and negative economic impacts. | |
| July 30, 2019 | Mothers for Peace was one of the organizations that signed a Code Pink letter calling on the women of the world to stand up and speak out against a possible war with Iran. | |
| Aug. 6, 2019 | Gail Comer and Marty Brown from Mothers for Peace joined the Catholic Workers from Los Angeles and Guadalupe in an action at Vandenberg Air Force Base to commemorate the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 74 years ago and to call for a nuclear free world. | |
| Aug. 7-8, 2019 | CPUC held a public forum to receive comments on PG&E’s request to track Diablo Canyon decommissioning costs. | |
| Aug. 22, 2019 | MFP worked to support the San Luis Obispo Clean Energy Choice program to encourage new building developments to use electrical appliances and to avoid the use of fossil fuels. | |
| Aug. 27, 2019 | The NRC held an open meeting in San Luis Obispo to take information from the community on the best practices for local decommissioning advisory boards. | |
| Sept. 2019 | Chika Shimizu visited San Luis Obispo. She is a professor at a university in Japan with a grant from the Japanese government to study and compare emergency and evacuation planning in the United States compared and Japan. She was especially interested in the interactions between nuclear plant owners, emergency planners, and residents living near nuclear plants. MFP arranged meetings with PG&E and the SLO Office of Emergency Services. The NRC responded to questions by e-mail. | |
| Sept. 12, 2019 | MFP member, Henriette Groot, died. She was especially active in efforts to protect the marine environment from damage caused by Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 18, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel held a public meeting with a focus on economic impacts of the upcoming closure of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 21, 2019 | Jill ZamEk and Jane Swanson were captains of the Mothers for Peace location for the ECOSLO Beach Clean-Up. | |
| Sept. 30-Oct. 2, 2019 | Linda Seeley from MFP attended the Nuclear Decommissioning and Used Fuel Strategy Summit in Charlotte, N. Carolina. | |
| Oct. 12, 2019 | MFP held a Golden Jubilee celebration and started a Memory Book to collect memories spanning the group’s 50 year history. Carole Hisasue created a short movie to commemorate MFP’s 50 years of activism. | |
| Oct. 17, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel held an opportunities and impacts public workshop on the transportation of non-nuclear material. | |
| Oct. 23-24, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee held public meetings and received input and questions from MFP members and others. | |
| Oct. 31, 2019 | MFP filed a response before the CPUC supporting the Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility’s petition for modification of the Joint Proposal for retirement of the Diablo Canyon plant to provide for earlier closure. | |
| Oct., 2019 | The MFP Newsletter was sent to supporters. | |
| Nov. 8-10, 2019 | Molly Johnson and Linda Seeley represented MFP at the National Grassroots Activist Summit on Radioactive Waste in Albuquerque. | |
| Nov. 13, 2019 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel held an opportunities and impacts public meeting with a focus on transportation. | |
| Dec. 7, 2019 | Linda Seeley held an event on the Day of Remembrance for Lost Species at the Laguna Lake Memorial Park. | |
| Dec. 14, 2019 | Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute reported that although the December 14 water sample collected by MFP south of Pismo Pier showed lower levels of Cs137 than the sample MFP sent a year before, the values are still drifting upward indicating that radiation from the Fukushima catastrophe is still spreading to our shores. | |
| Jan. 19, 2020 | Mothers for Peace took part in the San Luis Obispo Women’s March in support of women, racial and religious minorities, and the LBGTQIA+ community. | |
| Jan. 24, 2020 | Mothers for Peace joined over a thousand local residents and others who support in-perpetuity conservation and sustainable public access to the 12,000-acre Diablo Canyon lands within the Irish Hills which include Wild Cherry Canyon. | |
| Jan. 24, 2020 | Mothers for Peace joined other groups in notifying the NRC that it opposed the development of a generic environmental impact statement for the construction and operation of advanced nuclear reactors. | |
| Feb. 2, 2020 | Mothers for Peace held the annual meeting to elect officers and other board members, assign roles and responsibilities, and review and discuss the general plan and calendar of events for 2020. | |
| Feb. 10, 2020 | Mothers for Peace requested that the California Public Utilities Commission approve the Settlement Agreement on the closure of the Diablo Canyon plants subject to the provision that PG&E agree to make a showing addressing the impact of an early shutdown and that they remove the language that PG&E will reduce site contamination “to the extent feasible and practicable in context of decommissioning plans”. | |
| Feb. 12-13, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met. Mothers for Peace initiated discussions about the design and risks of different waste storage casks, plans to make emergency planning available to the public, and other issues. | |
| Feb. 15, 2020 | Linda Seeley, spokesperson for Mothers for Peace, spoke about long-term nuclear waste storage at Diablo Canyon as part of the “Shut Diablo Canyon 2020” installment of the Active Hope series organized by Code Pink’s Cynthia Papermaster. | |
| March 4, 2020 | Jill ZamEk and June Cochran from Mothers for Peace attended a meeting in Santa Maria on how to increase health protections for people living in close proximity to oil production. They were allowed two minutes to speak. | |
| March 11, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss the disposition of Diablo Canyon lands, PG&E’s bankruptcy proceedings and the process of selecting future casks for the storage of nuclear waste on site. | |
| March 11, 2020 | Mothers for Peace sponsored a “Stand with Us” event outside the Government Center prior to the Engagement Panel meeting to commemorate the ninth anniversary of the Fukushima disaster. People were urged to send a letter to a Japanese activist who read them at the annual March 11 protest at the Japanese Consulate in San Francisco and then forwarded them to the Abe Administration in Tokyo. A news station covered it. | |
| March 2020 | Mothers for Peace joined a number of other organizations and individuals in writing a letter to Governor Newsom urging him to use his authority to shut Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant down immediately because of embrittlement, deferred maintenance, the declining need for its power, the rise of CCAs, the deteriorating economic picture for PG&E, and the significant savings for ratepayers once it closes. | |
| April 2, 2020 | Mothers for Peace sent a letter to the California Public Utilities Commission expressing support for the Tribal Land Transfer Policy that was enacted by CPUC which allows tribes the right of first refusal to acquire any property, such as Diablo Canyon lands, that are transferred away from “investor owned facilities”. MFP asked for a requirement that such a transfer must be accompanied by a conservation easement and that a workshop be held in San Luis Obispo specifically for the Diablo Lands before the policy guidelines are adopted. | |
| April 27, 2020 | Mothers for Peace sent a letter to Congressman Salud Carbajal requesting that he contact the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and demand that a public meeting be held in San Luis Obispo County to discuss the proposed transport of radioactive waste from Diablo Canyon to Holtec’s proposed Consolidated Interim Storage Facility in southeast New Mexico because of the dangers involved in transporting the waste. MFP advocates for storage of the waste on site. | |
| May 2020 | The National Decommissioning Working Group formed a Cask/Canister Sub-Committee, including Molly Johnson from Mothers for Peace, to create a fact sheet, a background paper, and a Webinar on these containers. | |
| ~ May 13, 2020 | Mothers for Peace was one of the signers on a letter opposing the decision by the Ministry of Economy, Trade & industry (METI) in Japan to dump radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean. | |
| May 20, 2020 | Mothers for Peace wrote to the Marine Sanctuaries Office at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to express support for the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary. | |
| May 25, 2020 | Mothers for Peace joined Code Pink and others in a Peace Car-a-van with peace signs and flags urging peaceful solutions to conflict and disarmament. | |
| June 10, 2020 | Mothers for Peace expressed pleasure that Monterey Bay Community Power (Central Coast Community Energy) rescinded its decision to accept nuclear into its power mix for 2020 and expressed appreciation for their willingness to hold a special meeting to take input from community members. MFP set meeting format requests, and talking points were distributed to MFP supporters for the meeting. | |
| June 2020 | The 2020 Mothers for Peace scholarship winners were announced as Dylan Stephens, college winner; Amalia Fleming, Claire Wellenkamp, Rain Garcia, and Ysabel Wulfing, high school winners. | |
| June 12, 2020 | MFP sent a comment to the NRC opposing the proposed rule change to reduce the emergency preparedness requirements for small modular reactors, “other new technologies”, and production and utilization facilities. MFP also urged an extension of the comment period until six months after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic. | |
| June 16, 2020 | Mothers for Peace was one of the signers on a letter to the Secretary of the Interior urging him to reject recommendation by the Nuclear Fuel Working Group to expand uranium mining on public lands, and to keep in place the strongest protections for the Grand Canyon, including the mineral withdrawal for the approximately one million acres of public land surrounding the Grand Canyon National Park. | |
| June 16, 2020 | Jill ZamEk spoke for Mothers for Peace at a meeting of the SLO City Council urging the council to adopt the proposed building code amendment requiring all electric energy in new buildings. | |
| June 22, 2020 | The NRC held a virtual meeting to discuss the 2019 performance of Diablo Canyon and other Region IV nuclear power plants. | |
| June 22, 2020 | MFP expressed disappointment that the NRC ignored the scoping comments MFP submitted May 18, 2018 on the Holtec Environmental Report (ER) that opposed the transportation of irradiated nuclear fuel from Diablo Canon to southeast New Mexico. MFP demanded that the NRC postpone all hearings on the facility applications until it is safe to gather in large groups, include all cities along the likely routes, and leave the public comment period open for at least 180 days beyond all public hearing dates. | |
| June 24, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met with a focus on transportation issues. | |
| July 1-2, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met electronically and discussed the Spent Fuel Risk Study, recent human performance issues, the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, and other issues. Mothers for Peace representatives asked questions and made comments. | |
| July 8, 2020 | Mothers for Peace was one of 60 organizations in 22 states that requested that the NRC indefinitely prolong the comment period and hold public meetings in sites along the route to the proposed site for the storage of nuclear waste in Texas. | |
| July 9, 2020 | Mothers for Peace joined other environmental and social justice organizations in a letter to the California Senate Environmental Quality Committee opposing AB 3279 which would weaken CEQA environmental and environmental justice protections. | |
| July 12, 2020 | Mothers for Peace submitted comments opposing the NRC’s proposed rule change to reduce the emergency preparedness requirements for small modular reactors, “other new technologies” and production and utilization facilities. | |
| July 15, 2020 | Mothers for Peace wrote to California Assemblyman Jordan Cunningham opposing his bill, AB 2898, which would include a facility that uses nuclear energy, as specified, as a renewable electrical generation facility and would recategorize nuclear energy as an eligible renewable energy resource for purposes of a retail supplier’s electricity source disclosure requirements. | |
| July 17, 2020 | The NRC reported a manual reactor scram in Diablo Canyon Unit 2 due to increased hydrogen usage. | |
| July 20, 2020 | Jane Swanson and Linda Seeley from Mothers for Peace spoke for the opposition in the Zoom SLO Braver Angels debate on the topic: “The plan to shut Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant is a mistake and should not be repeated across America.” | |
| July 25, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel had a public meeting. | |
| July 25, 2020 | Jill ZamEk spoke for Mothers for Peace, urging the California State Water Resources Control Board to reject PG&E’s request for a renewal of the exemption from the ban on Once Through Cooling. The exemption was granted September 2. | |
| July 31, 2020 | Mothers for Peace was one of 29 organizations that requested that the NRC immediately revoke or suspend the docketing and hearing notices for review of the license application by Oklo Power to build and operate a 4-megawatt thermal micro-reactor on the site of the Idaho National Laboratory. | |
| August 4, 2020 | An application by the California Community Choice Organization, Mothers for Peace, and other organizations for leave to file amicus curiae briefs in a case involving the California Public Utilities Commission and PG&E was denied. | |
| August 6 and 9, 2020 | To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and appeal for the elimination of nuclear weapons, Mothers for Peace made a set of three haiku reading videos, “Voices for Peace”. These were a part of the Peace Wave movement which included actions from all around the world demanding the elimination of all nuclear weapons. The videos were included in the virtual nuclear war protest at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. | |
| August 10, 2020 | Following a campaign by Mothers for Peace in collaboration with other groups, Monterey Bay Community Power officially reversed its decision to accept nuclear attributes from PG&E. | |
| August 12, 2020 | Linda Seeley received an e-mail from the PG&E Director of Strategic Initiatives at PG&E telling her that, because of her involvement with Mothers for Peace, he was informing her that PG&E would inspect some of the Unit 1 Auxiliary Feedwater pump discharge lines. If a problem was found, they would request a temporary license amendment to allow them to make the repairs while the unit remained online. | |
| August 21, 2020 | Attorney Diane Curran submitted a comment to the NRC on behalf of Mothers for Peace protesting NRC Staff’s proposed determination that an exigent license amendment request by PG&E meets the NRC’s standards for a No Significant Hazards determination, thereby justifying postponing a public hearing until after issuance and implementation of the license amendment request. PG&E requested permission to disable the auxiliary feedwater system, a vital cooling mechanism, for a longer period of time than permitted by the technical specifications for Diablo Canyon, for purposes of inspecting degraded conditions. The amendment was issued August 31. | |
| August 25, 2020 | Mothers for Peace was praised for playing an instrumental role in achieving the San Luis Obispo City Council’s unanimous vote to divest from weapons manufacturers. | |
| September 2, 2020 | Mothers for Peace urged Central Coast Community Energy to make a commitment to invest in our communities to accelerate clean and renewable energy resources and to provide funding for technical support in order to develop a plan that will get us to 30% of total electricity consumption from local resources by 2030. | |
| Septem,ber 22, 2020 | Mothers for Peace sent a letter to the NRC protesting the faulty procedures for the Draft Environmental Impact Statement Webinars on the proposed Holtec Consolidated Interim Storage Facility for spent nuclear fuel in New Mexico. MFP repeated the demand that all hearings be postponed until it is safe to gather in large groups, that hearings be expanded to include all the major cities along the likely routes, and that the public comment period be left open at least 180 days beyond all public hearing dates. | |
| September 22, 2020 | Seawater was collected at the Pismo Pier to be examined (again) by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute for C-137 levels from Fukushima. | |
| October 15, 2020 | Recurring problems forced Diablo Canyon Unit 2 off line, the second malfunction in a critical component of its electric generator, which was just rebuilt in July. | |
| October 22-23, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met and discussed decommissioning planning, spent fuel pool risk evaluation, plant safety and operation, and other issues. MFP participated in the discussions. | |
| October 28, 2020 | Mothers for Peace expressed disappointment to the NRC that it had ignored MFP’s 2018 scoping comments on the Application, Environmental Report, Safety Analysis Report and Emergency Response Plan. MFP requested that a public meeting be held as soon as it was safe to do so. | |
| October 28, 2020 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel hosted a virtual public meeting on water resources at Diablo Canyon. | |
| October 29, 2020 | Mothers for Peace spokesperson, Linda Seeley, spoke on “Nuclear Decommissioning and Used Fuel Strategy” at Reuters virtual international summit. | |
| November 2, 2020 | Mothers for Peace joined other organizations in opposing Interim Storage Partners application for a license to build and operate a Consolidated Interim Storage Facility for spent nuclear fuel in Andrews County, Texas. | |
| November 16, 2020 | In a message to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Mothers for Peace requested a summary dismissal of Californians for Green Nuclear Power’s request that Diablo Canyon be allowed to continue operation beyond the planned closure dates. | |
| December 7, 2020 | PG&E agreed to pay $5.9 million to the Bay Foundation of Morro Bay to fund future projects that will benefit water quality and the environment as part of a tentative settlement between PG&E and water regulators over the use of Diablo’s Once Through Cooling System. | |
| Jan. 17, 2021 | In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, Mothers for Peace Board Members posted their holding Martin Luther King, Jr. quotations on social media platforms. | |
| Jan. 26, 2021 | The NRC hosted a webinar to discuss the Diablo Canyon Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation license that is due to expire in March, 2024. | |
| Jan. 30, 2021 | Mothers for Peace announced the Jane Addams Peace Book awards for 2021 which were donated to the local library. | |
| Jan. 30, 2021 | Mothers for Peace held its Annual Planning Meeting via Zoom with a guest presentation by Joanna Macy. Officers and other Board Members were elected, roles and responsibilities were assigned, the 2021 calendar was planned, there was a reflection on past activities, and goals were set for 2021. | |
| Feb. 16-17, 2021 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met and discussed Diablo Canyon safety and operations including the Unit 2 forced outages to address main generator issues. | |
| March 5, 2021 | The local nonprofit, Regional Economic Action Coalition (REACH), hosted a virtual discussion to announce three new partners to their 2030 initiative that has a goal of creating 15,000 jobs after the decommissioning of Diablo Canyon with a focus on the use of a 600 acre area of the power plant site known as Parcel P. | |
| March 11, 2021 | Mothers for Peace hosted a webinar on the 10th anniversary of the Fukushima disaster. It included an update and photos of Fukushima and featured biologist Mary Olson. Mary’s message is that regulators should change their current focus on the health impacts of radiation on men to a focus on the health impacts on women because radiation has a greater impact on the female body. | |
| April 1, 2021 | Mothers for Peace wrote to the California Assembly Utilities and Energy Committee in support of AB 525 that would ensure that when Diablo Canyon closes, the loss of megawatts will be replaced by truly renewable and sustainable sources of energy. | |
| April 3, 2021 | Mothers for Peace wrote to WHOI to challenge statements made in the WHOI educational presentation on March 24 entitled Ocean Encounters: Radiation. A list of documented sources that would correct the misinformation was included. | |
| April 20-24, 2021 | Mothers for Peace alerted followers to virtual events that would be taking place during the three days of climate action to celebrate Earth Day. | |
| May 3, 2021 | Mothers for Peace was one of 40 organizations that united to address the radioactive waste crisis. They sent a letter to President Biden and congressional leaders urging them to adopt and act in accordance with Guiding Principles for Humane and Equitable Nuclear Waste Policy that were listed. | |
| May 11, 2021 | Mothers for Peace sent a letter to the California Senate Appropriations Committee in support of SB423 because it would advance California’s goal of an energy grid that relies on renewable, zero-carbon resources. | |
| May 12, 2021 | Sadly, former MFP Board Member, Elizabeth Brousse, died. | |
| May 14, 2021 | Mothers for Peace asked to be included as a Stakeholder in REACH deliberations concerning future uses of Parcel P, nuclear waste storage at Diablo Canyon, and other decommissioning issues. | |
| May 17, 2021 | A Zoom meeting was held to award scholarships to Arabella Edler, Savanah Ruiz, and Sydney Barker. | |
| May 26, 2021 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss topics such as spent nuclear management, the Coastal Development Permit process, and an update on decommissioning planning. | |
| May 26, 2021 | A letter was sent by Mothers for Peace to the Consulate General of Japan in Los Angeles and the Japanese Embassy in Washington D.C. opposing the decision by the Japanese government to release 1.25 million tons of treated wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi site into the Pacific Ocean. The results of the testing of waters at Pismo Beach for radioactive isotopes from Fukushima were included to demonstrate the impact of such discharges on the Pacific Ocean. | |
| June 18, 2021 | In a meeting with Congressman Carbajal, Mothers for Peace advocated for more robust casks and expressed opposition to Consolidated Interim Storage (CIS) and the importance of keeping the nuclear waste at Diablo Canyon until there is a permanent solution. | |
| June 21, 2021 | The Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board announced that PG&E will pay $5.9 million in a settlement that recognizes the long-term impacts of thermal pollution on the ocean. | |
| June 23-24, 2021 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee had a Zoom meeting and discussed the Unit 2 Main Generator outages and repairs, plant safety and operations, efforts to retain qualified staff, and other issues. | |
| July 2021 | Mothers for Peace circulated a petition to be sent to the U.S. House of Representatives and others to keep massive subsidies for nuclear power plants out of the Infrastructure Plan. | |
| August 2021 | Mothers for Peace circulated a petition to abolish nuclear weapons. | |
| August 5, 2021 | Plans for the commemoration of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were canceled because of a Covid19 resurgence. Followers were asked to sign the petition to abolish nuclear weapons and to attend online events. Mothers for Peace sent followers a commentary on the bombings written by MFP board member, Carole Hisasue. | |
| August 2021 | The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute’s analysis of water collected at Pismo Beach found that Cesium 137 decreased to 2.9. | |
| August 25, 2021 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss reuse of Diablo Canyon lands and other decommissioning issues. | |
| August 25, 2021 | Mothers for Peace was one of more than 240 organizations that signed a letter sent to Congressional leaders telling them to reject all proposals in infrastructure bills that subsidize nuclear energy and to instead invest in a just and equitable transition to safe, clean renewable energy. | |
| Sept. 15, 2021 | Mothers for Peace Board Member, Linda Seeley, was featured in a short video in response to the 2021 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and made a plea for action. | |
| Oct. 19-20, 2021 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee (DCISC) had a Zoom meeting and discussed waste storage, the relationship between the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee and the Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel, the relationship between MFP and DCISC when it was first formed, and other issues. | |
| Nov. 3, 2021 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel had a virtual meeting to discuss the potential reuse of Diablo Canyon Power Plant and its surrounding land and other issues. | |
| Nov. 29, 2021 | Mothers for Peace submitted comments and questions on the scope and content of the Environmental Impact Report for the decommissioning of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Dec. 1, 2021 | Mothers for Peace sent a message to supporters summarizing the reasons it is important for Diablo Canyon to shut down as soon as possible. | |
| Dec. 6, 2021 | More than 100 pro-Diablo people gathered in downtown San Luis Obispo to voice their support for keeping Diablo Canyon open. | |
| Jan. 19, 2022 | Mothers for Peace joined National Radioactive Waste Coalition whose goals include stopping Yucca Mountain from becoming a nuclear waste storage facility, stopping plans for centralized interim storage, keeping the waste as close to the current sites as possible, and “hardening” the storage to make it as safe as possible. | |
| Feb. 2022 | Seventy five scientists, academics, and entrepreneurs who were organized by the nonprofit foundation, Save Clean Energy, sent a letter asking Gov. Gavin Newsom to keep the Diablo Canyon reactors operating beyond the planned closing dates to fight global warming. | |
| Feb. 2022 | Mothers for Peace was included in the Coalition of Environmental and Public Interest Organizations that submitted a response to the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Nuclear Energy Request for Information on Using a Consent-Based Siting Process to identify Federal interim storage facilities. | |
| Feb. 13, 2022 | In a comment at the Policy Board meeting of Central Coast Community Energy, Mothers for Peace expressed outrage at a proposed amendment to the Community Advisory Council (CAC) Bylaws to place control over the CAC agendas and conversations. It is the antithesis of the statement of purpose. | |
| Feb. 15, 2022 | More than 50 organizations including Mothers for Peace requested that the U.S. Department of Energy withdraw, revise, and re-publish the request for information on using a consent-based siting process to identify federal interim storage facilities for nuclear waste. | |
| Feb. 15, 2022 | Jane Swanson, speaking for Mothers for Peace, requested that the San Luis Obispo Board of Supervisors schedule a presentation in the near future by experts with views that differ from those presented by the authors of the Stanford/MIT Assessment whose authors are all from organizations with vested financial interests in promoting the use of nuclear power. | |
| Feb. 15- 16, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee held a public meeting to discuss plant safety and operations, retention of employees, recent licensee event reports, NRC notices of violations, relicensing of the Independent Fuel Storage Facility, update on recent activities of the Decommissioning Engagement Panel and other issues. Mothers for Peace attended and made comment. | |
| Feb. 17, 2022 | The San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors voted 3-1 to urge Gov. Newsom to do everything he can to continue the operation of Diablo Canyon. | |
| March 11, 2022 | Mothers for Peace sponsored a webinar on the 11th anniversary of the Fukushima disaster. | |
| March 17, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss the Diablo Canyon Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation and other issues. Mothers for Peace attended. | |
| March 28, 2022 | The Office of the Inspector General for the NRC and the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board issued a report of multiple allegations about the NRC oversight of safety related issues at Diablo Canyon including the Auxiliary Feedwater System. | |
| March 28, 2022 | Mothers for Peace’s request for partnership in the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN)was approved. | |
| after April 18, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of the signers on a global letter to respond to Russia’s war in Ukraine and to call on world leaders to end the fossil fuel era and accelerate the transition to a just, equitable and renewable energy future. | |
| April 20, 2022 | The Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss spent fuel storage at Diablo Canyon and the new Orano system. Mothers for Peace attended. | |
| April 23, 2022 | Mothers for Peace staffed a booth at the 30th San Luis Obispo County Earth Day celebration at Laguna Lake. We gave away seed packets and informational postcards. | |
| April 28, 2022 | Mothers for Peace and other groups requested an extension of time to comment on a proposed NRC rule about the regulatory improvements for production and utilization facilities transitioning to decommissioning. | |
| April 28, 2022 | Mothers for Peace distributed free tickets they received for a showing of The Children at the SLO Repertoire Theater, a play about nuclear energy. | |
| April 28, 2022 | Governor Newsom indicated a desire to keep Diablo Canyon operating beyond its licenses ending in 2024 and 2025, believing the State needs its energy. | |
| April 30, 2022 | An article by Jane Swanson in the Santa Barbara Independent described Mothers for Peace’s questioning whether Governor Newsom had the power to make decisions about how long Diablo Canyon could operate. The San Luis Obispo Tribune also reported the Mothers for Peace statement. | |
| May, 2022 | Mothers for Peace scholarships were awarded to high school students Madeline Bobbitt, Helia Bushong, Melissa Gonzalez, and Paloma Nava. | |
| May 4, 2022 | The NRC hosted a public meeting in San Luis Obispo to obtain public comments on the Proposed Rulemaking on “Regulatory Improvements for Production and Utilization Facilities Transitioning to Decommissioning”. | |
| May 12, 2022 | The Decommissioning Engagement panel met and discussed the possibility of Diablo Canyon remaining open beyond 2025 and other issues. | |
| May 17, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of 67 environmental and anti-nuclear groups that expressed opposition to keeping Diablo Canyon open beyond 2025. | |
| May 25, 2022 | The Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss spent fuel storage at Diablo Canyon and other issues. | |
| June 9, 2022 | Mothers for Peace hosted a gathering in downtown San Luis Obispo to pass out information and to gather signatures on a petition opposing the dumping of Fukushima’s radioactive wastewater into the Pacific Ocean. | |
| June 14, 2022 | Mothers for Peace sent a letter to the Central Coast Community Energy Policy Board expressing disappointment and distress at the proposal to exclude public input by eviscerating the ability of the Community Advisory Council to agendize issues for consideration. | |
| June 15, 2022 | Mothers for Peace held a media briefing inviting nationally-renowned nuclear energy experts to discuss Governor Newsom’s and Senator Feinstein’s attempts to funnel billions of dollars toward extending Diablo Canyon’s operation past its scheduled decommissioning in 2024-25. | |
| June 17, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of 179 organizations that wrote to the U.S. Department of Energy expressing extreme concern about the reports that the Department of Energy is negotiating with Governor Newsom to misuse the Civil Nuclear Credit program to dismantle the fossil-free phaseout and just transition plan for Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. | |
| June 22 and 23, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee (DCISC) met to discuss plans for the post-shutdown role of DCISC and to discuss plant safety, operations, and other issues. | |
| June 27, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel held a public meeting to discuss the Department of Energy’s revision of the Civil Nuclear Credit program. | |
| July 21, 2022 | The NRC held a public meeting in San Luis Obispo to discuss the Diablo Canyon decommissioning cost estimates and management plan for the storage of highly radioactive nuclear waste and other issues. Mothers for Peace submitted comments demanding that Diablo Canyon be shut down completely by 2025 as planned. | |
| July 21, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of the environmental groups that filed reply briefs in a federal lawsuit challenging NRC’s approval of a construction and operating license for a consolidated interim storage facility in Texas to store irradiated nuclear waste | |
| July 26, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of the signers on a letter sent to U.S. senators opposing S.J. Res. 55, a joint resolution of disapproval under the Congressional Review Act, because it would undermine core provisions under the National Environmental Policy Act regulations that were restored by President Biden in April, 2022. | |
| July 26, 2022 | Mothers for Peace notified PG&E by letter of its legal jeopardy if it reneges on the 2016 agreement it forged with environmental organizations, labor, and surrounding communities – as well as approved by the State legislature and the CPUC – to retire Diablo Canyon by 2025. | |
| July 27, 2022 | Mothers for Peace donated Jane Addams award-winning peace books to the SLO County library. | |
| August 5, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of many groups, elected officials, and scholars of the world that signed an open letter to the Government of Japan condemning the decision of the Japanese government to release more than 1.28 million metric tons of irradiated water from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean. | |
| Aug. 6, 2022 | On the 77th anniversary of the U.S. detonating atomic bombs over Hiroshima, Mothers for Peace members and supporters gathered at the Mission in downtown SLO to remember the victims of nuclear weapons as well as the threats from the nuclear industry. | |
| August 12, 2022 | Mothers for Peace’s opposition to the continued operation of Diablo Canyon was presented during public comments at a joint remote workshop sponsored by the California Energy Commission, Office of Governor Newsom, and the California Independent System Operator. | |
| August 15, 2022 | Mothers for Peace sent a message to supporters urging them to contact key senators, send comments to the California Energy Commission, and send letters to the editors of local papers opposing the operation of Diablo Canyon beyond the planned closure by 2025. | |
| August 16, 2022 | Mothers for Peace spokesperson, Jane Swanson, was interviewed on radio station KPFA 3. | |
| August 24, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss California electric reliability needs, the potential operation of Diablo Canyon beyond 2025, the role Diablo Canyon could have in supporting electric reliability, the clean energy transition, and other issues. | |
| August 30, 2022 | Mothers for Peace held an emergency statewide press conference to argue against Gov. Newsom’s plan to keep Diablo Canyon running for at least another five years beyond 2024-2025. | |
| Sept. 1, 2022 | The California legislature voted to pass Senate Bill 846 supported by Governor Newsom to extend the life of Diablo Canyon. It nullifies the Joint Agreement, provides a forgivable loan of $1.4 billion to PG&E, eliminates CEQA reviews, allows continued use of once-through cooling, expedites state agency review, and allows for runaway profits for PG&E. | |
| Sept. 15, 2022 | Mothers for Peace issued a press release criticizing Gov. Newsom and Michael Shellenberger and their positions on Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 27, 2022 | Mothers for Peace submitted a statement to the SLO Board of Supervisors expressing concern and objections to the actions being taken by the Board, Governor Newsom, and CA legislators to extend the operation of Diablo Canyon. | |
| Sept. 28-29, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met to discuss Diablo Canyon plant safety and operation, activities related to potential continued operation of Diablo Canyon, and other issues. | |
| Oct. 14, 2022 | Mothers for Peace and Friends of the Earth filed a joint reply to PG&E comments on a scoping memo and ruling. It warns PG&E and CPUC to be vigilant in assessing the economic viability and safety impacts of keeping Diablo Canyon operating past its scheduled decommissioning date by 2025. | |
| Oct. 25, 2022 | Mothers for Peace, Friends of the Earth, and Union of Concerned Scientists sent a letter to Senator Laird to alert him to a legal error in Senate Bill 846. Key provisions of the bill depend on the assumption that before renewing the Diablo Canyon operating licenses the NRC will review an updated seismic assessment by PG&E and impose any necessary upgrades. However, the scope of the NRC license renewal review does not include seismic safety. | |
| Oct. 31, 2022 | PG&E filed with the NRC for renewal of the Diablo Canyon licenses. | |
| Oct. 31, 2022 | Mothers for Peace and a number of other organizations wrote to Central Coast Community Energy with a description of the attributes they should require in a new CEO. | |
| Nov. 17, 2022 | Mothers for Peace, Friends of the Earth, Environmental Working Group, and Committee to Bridge the Gap sent a letter to the NRC objecting to PG&E’s request to the NRC to unlawfully resurrect a dead license renewal application rather than file a new application to keep Diablo Canyon operating past 2025. | |
| Dec. 6, 2022 | Mothers for Peace, Friends of the Earth, Environmental Working Group, and Committee to Bridge the Gap sent a second letter to the NRC commissioners putting them on notice that the agency would violate federal law if it accepted PG&E’s Oct. 31 proposal to resurrect and fast-track its review of the long-abandoned 2009 license renewal application. | |
| Dec. 8, 2022 | The NRC held a public meeting to discuss particular technical topics for the preparation of information to support license renewal of Diablo Canyon Units 1 and 2. | |
| ~Dec. 12, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of the signers on a message to members of the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and Governor Newsom to direct the CPUC not to adopt the proposed net energy metering proposal but to instead support the highly successful solar incentive program by issuing an alternate proposed decision right away. | |
| Dec. 12, 2022 | Jill ZamEk commented for Mothers for Peace on item 7 at the San Luis Obispo City Council Meeting that the group supports the adoption of SLO City’s Climate Action Plan 2023-2037 Work Program because of the urgency of the climate crisis. The group appreciates the work by the city to achieve climate neutrality by 2035. | |
| Dec. 14, 2022 | The Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel met to discuss SB 846, actions already taken by PG&E, the role of Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee, the role of the Diablo Canyon Independent Peer Review Panel to address seismic issues, and implications of extended operations on the current decommissioning CEQA process. | |
| ~Dec. 18, 2022 | Mothers for Peace was one of the signers on a message sent to key senators urging them to oppose S.4064 , the International Nuclear Energy Act of 2022, which would create a whole-of-government enterprise to promote United States exports of nuclear energy infrastructure to countries around the world. It would encourage the spread of nuclear weapons and be a violation of environmental justice and the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities. It also would compromise the U.S.’s commitment to global climate action and climate finance. | |
| Jan. 10, 2023 | Mothers for Peace, Friends of the Earth, and Environmental Working Group filed a Petition to the NRC Commissioners asserting that the NRC does not have legal authority to extend the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant’s operating licenses past its scheduled shutdown dates of 2024 for Unit 1 and 2025 for Unit 2. | |
| Jan. 21, 2023 | Mothers for Peace held its Annual Planning Meeting via Zoom, voting on the Board of Directors, establishing roles and responsibilities, and setting the calendar for the year. The featured speaker was Laura Albers from SLO Climate Coalition. She spoke about utilizing the Resilient SLO platform for everyday opportunities for local climate action. | |
| Jan. 24, 2023 | The NRC staff denied a request by PG&E to resume reviewing a 2009 license renewal application that it formally withdrew in 2018. This decision affirmed recent arguments in the petition by Mothers for Peace, Friends of the Earth, and Environmental Working Group. | |
| Feb. 10, 2023 | Mothers for Peace attended a multi-agency “listening session” regarding SB 846 on the topics of land conservation and economic development plan and actions needed to extend operations of Diablo Canyon. MFP submitted comments at the meeting and in writing. | |
| Feb. 13, 2023 | Petitioners SLOMFP, FoE, and EWG filed a new petition demanding that the NRC finish its legal obligation to keep Diablo Canyon on schedule to close its twin units in 2024 and 2025 and repudiate PG&E’s recent request for exemption from the “Timely Renewal Rule.” | |
| Feb. 15, 16, 2023 | The Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met in Avila Beach. Several MFP members attended in person and remotely and asked questions and made comments. | |
| March 2, 2023 | NRC Staff ignored longstanding precedents and regulations and gave PG&E the exemption to operate beyond the current licenses (2024 and 2025) without a safety review or a license renewal. | |
| March 3, 2023 | MFP co-sponsored a webinar with Samuel Lawrence Foundation featuring Stanford University Professor Mark Z. Jacobson, author of the recently-published book, No Miracles Needed: How Today’s Technology Can Save Our Climate and Clean Our Air. | |
| March 7, 2023 | On behalf of MFP, Jill ZamEk spoke at the CA Water Board meeting in opposition to extending use of the once-thorough cooling system (to allow for extended operation). | |
| March 10, 2023 | MFP sent a letter to Assemblymember Luz Rivas, chair of the Natural Resources Committee (and others) opposing AB 65 which proposes to exempt Small Modular Nuclear Reactors from CA law which disallows new nuclear reactors until there is a permanent solution for the storage of the high level radioactive waste. | |
| March 11, 2023 | MFP held a BBQ fundraiser and silent auction in Atascadero. | |
| March 13, 2023 | MFP filed a hearing request with the NRC regarding the storage of high level radioactive waste in the years of extended operation. | |
| March 17, 2023 | MFP, FOE, and EWG filed a hearing request with the California State Water Resources Control Board, objecting to the proposal to extend the use of its once-through cooling system an additional 5 years – in violation of the Clean Water Act. | |
| March 19, 2023 | Spokespersons Linda Seeley and Jane Swanson were interviewed by Francesca Roth and Matthew Crotty of PBS “Earth Focus, We Are Where We Live” about the history and current legal efforts of MFP. They will return to SLO in late April to film MFP members and activities for a future broadcast on Diablo Canyon. | |
| March 22, 2023 | Via Zoom, Linda Seeley and Jane Swanson made a presentation to a Mills College class on “Media and Social Change”. Professor Keli Dailey invited comments and questions from her students. | |
| March 23, 2023 | Spokesperson Linda Seeley was interviewed by Alex Cohen on Inside the Issues on Spectrum 1TV, Southern California. The program reaches approximately 2 million households in SoCal. | |
| March 25, 2023 | MFP and Ecologistics held a film fundraiser: The Atom – A Love Affair. MFP founding members Liz Apfelberg and Jane Swanson were interviewed for this film. | |
| March 28, 2023 | On the 44th anniversary of the Three Mile Island nuclear accident, MFP, FOE, and EWG submitted a letter to the NRC demanding that the Commissioners reverse their staff’s decision to exempt PG&E from the NRC’s timely renewal regulation. | |
| April 7, 2023 | Mothers for Peace co-sponsored a webinar with Samuel Lawrence Foundation: Nuclear Winter – The Environmental Consequences of a Nuclear Exchange. Professor Brian Toon was the expert speaker. | |
| April 10, 2023 | Mothers for Peace submitted comments on AB 65 intended to overturn CA’s longstanding ban on building new nuclear facilities until there is a permanent solution to the storage of high level radioactive waste and allow for small modular nuclear reactors in the state. The bill failed. | |
| April 13, 2023 | MFP filed its Notice of Intent in the CPUC proceedings regarding the proposed license extension for Diablo Canyon. | |
| April 22, 2023 | Mothers for Peace had a booth at the annual SLO Earth Day Fair at Laguna Lake. | |
| April 28, 2023 | MFP, FOE, and EWG filed a petition with the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals challenging the NRC’s unprecedented decision to grant PG&E an exemption from submitting a license renewal application for the Diablo Canyon Unit 1 and Unit 2 nuclear reactors. | |
| May 3, 2023 | MFP attended and spoke at the NRC meeting on the license renewal process. We objected to the proposal to extend operations beyond 2024 and 2025. | |
| June 1, 2023 | MFP held a peaceful protest at the gates of Diablo Canyon as NRC Chair Christopher Hanson spoke with media. | |
| June 13, 2023 | Diane Curran represented MFP at the NRC oral argument proceeding regarding the ISFSI storage of high level radioactive waste in the years of extended operation. | |
| June 15, 2023 | Jane spoke at a meeting of the Atascadero Democratic Club. | |
| June 28-29, 2023 | Mothers for Peace attended and spoke at the Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee meetings. There was much content on the issue of potential license renewal. | |
| June 30, 2023 | MFP, FOE, and EWG filed a brief with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, challenging the NRC’s decision to exempt PG&E from the Timely Renewal Rule. | |
| June 30, 2023 | Mothers for Peace filed testimony with the CPUC in the case regarding the extended operation of Diablo Canyon. Expert testimony was submitted by Dr. Peter Bird, Mark Cooper, Peter Bradford, Rao Konidena, and Samuel Miranda. | |
| July 7, 2023 | Mothers for Peace co-sponsored the webinar “Fighting Climate Change with a Fork” – hosted by Samuel Lawrence Foundation. | |
| July 8, 2023 | Mothers for Peace held a fabulously fun “Moonlight Dance” fundraiser in Atascadero. | |
| July 29, 2023 | Melinda held a MFP fundraiser at her home – making goat cheese and chocolate treats! | |
| August 9, 2023 | On the anniversary of the Nagasaki bombing, Mothers for Peace held a nuclear-free Stand With Us event at the SLO Mission with signs and handouts regarding the connection between nuclear energy and weapons. This event was followed by a meeting of the Diablo Canyon Decommissioning Engagement Panel. Topic: draft Environmental Impact Report | |
| August 15, 2023 | Mothers for Peace attended (virtually) and spoke at the Water Resources Control Board meeting – opposing the proposal to allow the continued use of OTC at Diablo until 2030. | |
| August 26, 2023 | Melinda held a fundraiser for MFP at her home – Indigo Dye Pot workshop! | |
| Sept. 13-14, 2023 | Diablo Canyon Independent Safety Committee met in Avila Beach. MFP members attended and participated in the meetings. | |
| Sept. 14, 2023 | MFP and FOE jointly filed a petition calling on NRC commissioners to order the immediate shutdown of Diablo Canyon Unit 1 for tests and inspections of its pressure vessel that have been delayed for twenty years. | |
| Sept. 17, 2023 | MFP held a Stand With Us event in SLO in support of the March in NYC to end the use of nuclear and fossil fuels. | |