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Joe Feuchard, News Servise tranch Ca Nber 16, 1 W Division of Public Information, HQ Dale J. Cook, Acting Assistaat to the Manager for Public Infora tion, SAM 800EGA "C00iFLECTING VIEWS" HL D3C
$2 -2 t S 1
Attached for your information is a piece from this afternese's News Call Bulletin'regarding the conflicting views on the quake hasard at Bed *Sa.
(Dushock is chief science writer for the I
mewspaper and has a regular TV program.) Es spent more than two hours digging inte the pubitc docummats Twsday as tell as l
soing over the recent USG3 report.
I We alae have attached a miscellaneous collection of other clips relating to the Bodega issue.
Attachments:
As stated cc: Enreld Price, REG, MQ, w/attacha.
/ Bobert _Lowens tein_.,,g,,,,,,,BQ,,, w/ attach _s.
F. K. Pittman, DRD, BQ, w/attacid.
R. W. Smith, Comp 1.
V., SAWg w/attachs.
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conflicting Views on j i
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i~GuakHazard at Bodega i g.
g By George Dushock 5
Jerry P. Eaton, the government,
more than before-the blocks will 5
'E schmologist who recently warned tumble and scatter.
E 5 against building a nuclear reactor Similarly, an auto can be raised E E on Bodega Head, be11 eves that to a high speed gradually without E
' 5 grou nd motion there during a damage to its occupants, but if a E E major earthquake may be two or' E three times stronger than is antic-standing auto is struck from the. E 5 ' ipated'by the Pacific Gas & Elec-rear by a truck traveling M high 5 E tric Co.
speed, the accelerative forces may 5 wreck both car and people.
E 5
His views are in strong con.
The standard of comparison for 5
. 5 trast with those of DonTocher, the accelerative forces is that of grav. j E l'niversity of - California selsmo).
fly, in Practice, the earth's gravita-,.
E ngixt hired as a consultant by the tional field An object d ro p p e d 5 PG&E. Tocher be1ieyes peak from a height, in a near vacuum g=
E ground motion at the reactor site will accelerate at the rate of about E
5 will be only two-thirds as strong 32 feet E as PC&E proposes to build for.
is one,a second every second. This g
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Seismologists use ; devices called TIIE AEC'S Atomic Safety and r
j E - Liecnsing Board, which will hold a accelerographs to get r e a d in gs 5 5 public hearing at Santa Rosa on ea11ed acedlerograms, measure-E ments of the horizontal or vertical 5 E PG&E's reactor construction per-acceleration during an earthquake. E E mit application, will be called upon
.No such readings have been taken 5 5 to decide whose guess is the better, on Bodega Head during a big earth E
5 The argument is technical, but quake, so Tocher. Eaton, and Saint-5, E it illustrates the uncertainties in Amand have all juggled figures 5 reismology, uncertainties which from other earthquakes-usuall g
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E - Eaton himself emphasizes in his the big El Centro earthquake of E
E reismic hazard report to the AEC.
1940-to arrive at. estimates of g "The primary difficulty is that what could happen at Bodega.
the seismologist is called upon to g
make judgments that require large T O C H E R AND George W.
5 E extrapolations beyond his personal Housner, a Cal Tech engineer, be-E professional experiences and even lieve that a quake of 190G magni-5 5 heyond those of the science he produce acceleration of no more E tude (8.2 on the Richter scale) will E E
3erves," writes Eaton, "When such than.2 of a "g" on Bodega Head. 5 E. seismological judgments are shorn The PG&E has told the AEC that E 5 of qualifications and' condensed to it will design the atom power plant E,*
E a convenient statement for en-to withstand acceleration of.3 g, a 5' 5 gineering guidance, they take on sa f e ty factor of 50 percent-if E I
E an unwarranted ring of certainty E that belles their shaky foundation."
Tocher and Housner are right.
5 I
But Saint-Amand, juggling the E 5
Presumably this caveat applies same figures, believes the ground 5, E equally to Tocher, to Eaton, and to at the reactor site may be subject E j
5 Pierre Saint-Amand, the consultant to acceleration of up to I g. And E 8
'E hired by the Northern Califofnia ~ 7 Eaton, the U. S. Geological Survey 5l E
Association to Preserve Bod ega man, says in his report:
E 5 H ead, who agrees more nearly
- It appears to me that an earth.
{ Prod uce peak accelerations be-5[
E E with Eaton than with Tocher in quake similar to that of 1906 would i
b 5 assessing earthquake hazard on the E
E Head.
E tween.3 and.7 g, and values ap-5 E
THE PROBLEM is one of ac-proaching 1 g are not impossible."
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E celerative forces, if you stack some -4 PG&E has stated that its pro-58 5 children's blocks and shove the posed atom plant would survive 5 t
E stack slowly along the floor, the forces of.6 g, but would have to E F 5 stack will survive.
shut down for repair. The shut-5 But if you shove the onck rnnv$
down could be accom e hamd +^ A -- plished with 95+ '
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predicts that some magic of technology g
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electricity from co'al, oil or water"-that 5
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If Congress and the pu blic had E
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known that this would be the meager 5
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resu1t of their bright dreams, they E
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time atomic research, Lilienthai con-
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While we debate whether to build, E
g apparent, continued subsidy can't be 5
an atomic power plant on Bodega Head,
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BUT CONTINUED subsidy is what E
justified.
5-David Lilienthal raises a larger question:
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j we are likely to have. The former AEC 5
5 be built at all?
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boss warns that atomic energy is fast g
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'I,he original chairman of the Atomic 5
E uranium bloc in Congress to roll the E
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nuclear pork barrel.
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views our efforts to find s A 4 E
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y e ople employed in some aspect of E
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E atomic energy. By 1066 we will have 5
g of Harper's Magazine.
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And the AEC is pressing for a vast 5
g and confession:.
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new research program that would cost E
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$2 billion over the next 10 years.
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make public recognition mum g
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hopes have collapsed."
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HE RECALLS the shining expecta -
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tions of the atomic dawn-that here 5
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our lives.
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"I fully shared 'these views at the j
g, time," Lilienthal admits. "Otherwise I j g
could not with such con ktion have j
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dreams to reality."
,g But, he continues, "the initjal goal 5
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... a shattered illusion...
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"The problems of securing safe and E
economically competitive power,f rom 5
the atom have far exceeded the ex-E 5
peuations of the administrators and the 5
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technical experts; nN! after all these 5
5 years and the expenditure of vast sums 5
5 of public rnoney, the problems have not 5
j yet been solved...
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Will PG6E Sito ~
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.Be Another Edsel? y
' EDITOtt: There is something i 1
about the nature of corporate I
decision that requires it to be
. seen through to. the bitter end.
One case in point was the Ford
' Motor Co. decision to enter the
, medium priced field. Company (officials realized.soon after the '
commitment was made that the Edsel was the wrong design. and 1956 the wrong year. Neverthe-less. contracts had been made
- and the project could only move forward. When the whole thing collapsed three short years later the P%rd Motor Co. was not much wiser and $350 million poorer.
PGkE's selection of Bodega Ifead as the site of an atomic I.
reactor plant is another classic
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lexample. Tm sure that mor e than one corporate officer by '
now regrets the choice of this particular site. But can he ad.
mit this to the others? Or can E they all admit to.such an error in public? And how to explain k this expensive mistake to the '
', shareholders? "Better to muddle
[ through somehow, and hope that,
wiw.n it all collapses in rubble q.no one will remember my part in it."
JACK RUDINOW Santa Rosa 8
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. investigator for. the Depart-
. f:-7*g ment of Interior, suggests A-Y[Mub O
that it should be built only if 0[SQD5GA SAl- /4Y
%, fj-J, there is no reasonab!c doubt that it wou survive any carthquake.,ld,nd therefore a
faulty l ocation?
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dega sgo Nocs not meet this test and "is not
- Pacific Gas & Electric Co.
an adequately safe location h5d aircady spent an esti-
.,,,, h::::.f for a nuclcar power pinnt."
mated $2.5 million to install
. h./D% )jI But was the so called fault
. its 325,000-kilowatt nuclear active? Dr. Glenr. Scaborg, power plant at Bodega Head.
chairman of the Atomic The hillside had been cut Energy Commission, vo!ced away into three big terraces.
ur.ccrtainty, though " work is with frcsh bcddings of ice plant covering the terrain, continuing in an anempt to determine approximately And with roads. already how long ago movement last paved to t.h o observation, occurred along the fault."
Orca, the huge hole to hottso 1"lRST MAN to be so.
"illnor Offset." C. C. Whel-
- the ~ foundation of the 061 honored twice, Dr. Linus chel, PG&E vice pcc.d::ent in million lustallation wag 10 Pauling of the California charge of enginecrh*.L re-feet below sea level by ten Institute of Technology, garded the ilnding culy as a days ago.
a Nobel Prize winner for
" minor of!sa;" since there Dut it was at that depth chemistry in 1954, won.
was no cridenca "tc date
' that workmen had discovered the 1962 Nobel Peace that any mover.1 cut has oc.
' what appeared to be an Prize for his efforts to curred alang this plane in
' carthquake fault in the bed-outlaw nuclear testing, tens of thousands of years."
l rock-a find which immedi-Then on Mond:.y. m sci-c ately brought crics of I told-
. entists retained by PG4E-i you so from the Northern Sonoma county coast. An.
Dr. Don Tocher seu.nulogist California Association to Prc.
Other argument: The San An-at the University of Califoc serve Codega IIcad and Ilar.
dreas fault was only a quar.
nia in Derkeicy, ano Sacts..
bar which had violently pro.
ter of a mile away to the monto geologist Elmer Mac.
tested tile project from the east.
llave-also expressed doubts start.
Instantly, a warnhig went that au carthquake had Composed mainly of con-to the Atomic Energy Com-caused the shifts at all.
3:ervationists, the organiza-mission: "The magnitude of Standing in the base of the I
tion had opposed the plant- ' possib!c,buhian damage that 140-foot wide hole being ex-
> which would draw water would result from the de-cavated for the plant, and j
? from Bodega Day and expel struction of the plant by r.a addressing a group of photog.
it into the Pacific ocean-earthquake," reported Dr.
raphers and newsmen who on grounds it would mar the J. P. Eaton, scismic hazards had been lowered into the I-o'
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forence, the scientists dis
- Dut the final decision on agreed with Dr. Eaton's con-whether the company could
- clusion, go ahead with construction The bed rock itself', they re-at Codega would be made by ported, was 93 million years the Atomic Energy Commis-old and much of California's sion, after it held public hear-rock had undergone similar ings in Santa Rosa later this damage-without the help of year.
New.ilovement. But they had found one disturbing fac-tor: Evidence of movement in the much newer soil above the bed rock. These breaks -
r,hifts of two to eight inches
-occurled in soil that may have been formed only 42,000 years ago.
And while Fred Mautt.
PG&E's chief engineer, was telling the engiccer's ' annual meeting at the Fairmont Hotel that his firm was tak-ing extraordinary safety pre-cautions at Bodega, to pre-I vent radiation poisoning. Ad-olph Ackerman (one of s?ven i
consulting engineers hired by 1
the State.to report on the California water plan) com-mented that the plant could not qualify for private inspr-l ance, and PG&E was trans-ferring "the consequences of 1
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I2T THE PUnlC ciPEAK clae plant on tu mrthern eoa c
of Sonoma County would be es-
' Locate PG&E A-plant
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On North Count.y Coasf
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tors attracted to a state park EDITNIt:
of the importance of one that The Sonoma
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Taxpayers Association has gone would extend from Bodega Bay i*
on record as favoring PG&E's to Salmon Creck.
proposed nuclear plant at Bo '
3-Bodega Bay, Sonoma Coun-dega Bay because it will broad-ty's only harbor, would escape en the tax base. I question the the. curse of a nuc!mr factory wisdom of the as.uciation's en-en Bodega Head and the blight dorsement: to me it is a com-of power poles running the full bination of near.sightedness and length of Doran Park. In fair-poor econom!cs. There is an al-ness to today's citizens and es-tornato approach to this matter
, pecially to future generations, we that would bring Sonoma Coun-must ask ourselves, "Do people ty more revenue and at the same go to the ocena to sco power time would take greater heed of
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factories and associated hard-public safety and of land use.
ware, or do they go there to We must remember that PG&E's escape this sort of a scenc!
clutch on Bodega Head is by no
" 4-In event of a nuclear acci-means secure and if the utility dent the d a i r y industries of company loses this battle an al-southem Sonoma County and all ternate plan possibly similar to of Atarin County would have a the one outlined below, becomes greater margin of safety. %c mandatory, chances of this type of accider.t
%e basics of this alternate may be small, but not small plan are that PG&E's nuclear enough to convince the insurance plant be located in a sparsely companies who have undying re-habited area on the northern
- spect for the San Andreas fault coast of Sonoma County, at some after their cmshing losses m spot where the land has no rec, sulting from the 190G carthquake.
reational value, and that the Any organizatim sincemly en-coastal strip from Bodega Head cerned with the welfare of So-to Sahuon Creek be converted noma County citizens should carefully compare the benefits into a state park as originally planned by the State of Cali.
of this atternate plan with tho
,fornia.
one PG&E would liko to initiate.
Following are some of the rea-ne triple values of. greater sons why this alternate plan safety, better land use, and no-would be more beneficial to the ditional revenue are facts that public than the one that PG&E canst be ignond. In view d tlu,s, I h e the Taxpayers As-P is trying to ram through:
sociation as flexible enough to 1--Chances of damage or de-re<xamine its position in this struction by a major earthquake matter.
would be sharply reduced if the PG&E can be stopped if the plant is not built on the cadh.
people let their voices be heard quake - tortured rock at Bo-dega Head. Twenty to tidrty five.
miles north of Bodega Bay there are numerous places on the east nn. Furdermoro top level side of the San Andreas fault state officials could help the peo-where the plant could be built ple in this battle if they would on a basement of hard Fran-take positive action. Why should
.they stand idly by and allow ciscan sandstane; a rock that the AEC, in the role of a visit.
i resists carthquake shock - waves ing judge, decide the fate of Bo-l to a much greater dagree than the crumbly marine sediments dega Bay
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