The state has no time to spare in planning for and investing in new, clean energy resources. To get the job done, California will need to develop lots of clean, cost-effective resources, including wind farms, solar generating stations, energy storage facilities and transmission lines.
Energy providers also need to step up investments in energy efficiency and conservation measures. But our success depends on the fortitude and vision of the five members of the California Public Utilities Commission to lead the effort. The whole nation — in fact, the whole world — will be watching whether California can solve this challenging problem. We want to hear from you. Want to submit a guest commentary or reaction to an article we wrote?
You can find our submission guidelines here. Next Up:. Available On Air Stations. All Streams. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email. Tags News Diablo Canyon. Angel Russell. In her spare time, she enjoys reading, playing guitar and piano, and hanging out with her dog and husband. See stories by Angel Russell. While living in the shadow of Diablo Canyon is scary, she is also well aware of the dangers of climate change. The NRC continues to find the plant remains seismically safe.
One reason is a growing number of California residents buying power through local energy purchasing groups called community choice aggregators, the legal documents say.
Many of those organizations simply refuse to buy nuclear. There are 23 local CCAs in California serving more than 11 million customers. There are financial factors at play, too. CCAs that have refused nuclear power stand to benefit financially when Diablo shuts down. Once Diablo is gone, that fee will be reduced. Meanwhile, CCAs are aggressively investing in renewable energy construction.
These are highly regulated firms. And so they're much more exposed to politics of the state than you would think of as a normal firm. At the times when the electricity grid is being turbocharged by solar power, the constant fixed supply of nuclear energy will actually become a financial handicap.
When California generates so much energy that it maxes out its grid capacity, prices of electricity become negative — utilities essentially have to pay other states to take that energy, but are willing to do so because it's often cheaper than bringing energy plants offline. Although the state is facing well-publicized energy shortages now, that wasn't the case in For example, the plant was has a system called "once-through cooling," which uses water from the Pacific Ocean to cool down its reactors.
That means it has to pump warmed ocean water back out to the coastal waters near Diablo , which alarms local environmental groups.
Finally, once the wheels are in motion to shut a nuclear plant down, it's expensive and complicated process to reverse. Diablo was set on the path to be decommissioned in and will operate until Then, the fuel has to be removed from the site. Only then can deconstruction begin. Usually, it takes about a decade to bring a nuclear plant offline, Victor told CNBC, although that time is coming down. All of these factors combine with a political climate that is almost entirely focused on renewables.
In addition to his academic roles, Victor chairs the volunteer panel that is helping to oversee and steward the closing of another nuclear power plant in California at San Onofre. There, an expensive repair would have been necessary to renew the plant's operating license, he said.
And there's no real place for nuclear in that kind of world.
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