Abalone alliance
Encyclopedia
The Abalone Alliance was a nonviolent civil disobedience
group formed to shut down the Pacific Gas and Electric Company
's Diablo Canyon Power Plant
near San Luis Obispo on the central California
coast in the United States. They modeled their affinity group
-based organizational structure after the Clamshell Alliance
which was then protesting the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant in coastal New Hampshire. The group of activists took the name "Abalone Alliance" referring to the tens of thousands of wild California Red Abalone
that were killed in 1974 in Diablo Cove when the unit's plumbing had its first hot flush.
The Abalone Alliance staged blockades and occupations at the Diablo Canyon Power Plant site between 1977 and 1984. Nearly two thousand people were arrested during a two-week blockade in 1981, exceeding Seabrook as the largest number arrested at an anti-nuclear protest in the United States.
at Bodega Head
, 71 miles north of San Francisco. The Bodega struggle started in 1958, but was opposed by a group led by a University of California
professor and young Sierra Club
activist named David Pessonen. This was the first anti-nuclear power campaign in the US. The main reason that the facility wasn't built was due its location less than 1,000 feet from the fault zone that struck
San Francisco in 1906.
Rather than face public opposition at Diablo Canyon, PG&E approached the Sierra Club's president and cut a deal with certain board members where Diablo would be chosen rather than the Nipomo Dunes area. The wife of the Sierra Club president, who worked out the deal, would then be elected to PG&E's board of directors. As part of the plan, the decision was made when Sierra Club board member Martin Litton was out of the country, the only member who knew of Diablo's history and importance. The board was flown down to see the site in Frank Sinatra
's Lear Jet with Danny Kaye
on board providing entertainment. Kaye would later become opposed to nuclear power.
The Sierra Club president forbade any chapter from opposing Diablo Canyon, so The San Luis Obispo Chapter formed the Shoreline Preservation Conference to oppose the construction on the grounds that the area had been proposed as a state park, was a sacred Chumash Indian site, had some of the largest oak trees on the West Coast, was located on the second-to-last coastal wilderness area in California, and could be sitting on the fault that lightly shook Santa Barbara
in a 1927 earthquake. The internal dispute over Diablo Canyon was a primary reason for the split-up of the Sierra Club, that led to the formation of Friends of the Earth
by David Brower.
In 1965, the Shoreline Preservation Conference demanded that regulators investigate the danger of faults near the proposed site, but was ignored. In 1972 a Los Angeles reporter discovered a report by Shell Oil Company
geologists completed prior construction of Diablo Canyon Power Plant
of the existence of the Hosgri Fault
2½ miles offshore from the facility. As a result of the discovery, regulators forced PG&E to redesign and reinforce the facility.
On August 7, 1977, 1,500 people demonstrated at the gate of Diablo Canyon, resulting in 47 arrests. The next year, 5,000 people rallied and 487 were arrested. On September 10, 1981, the Abalone Alliance occupied the site, leading to 1,960 arrests. Nearly 30,000 people showed up in support. At the end of the ten-day action, a 25-year-old engineer discovered a mirror image reversal in the seismic blueprints. PG&E was forced spend $3 billion and three additional years of repairs before reopening. Anti-War Activists Daniel Ellsberg
and Tom Hayden
, activist stars like Ed Asner
, Martin Sheen
, Martin Landau
, Blythe Danner
, Patti Davis
, Robin Williams
, Lily Tomlin
, Harrison Ford
, Carrie Fisher
, Marsha Mason
, John Belushi
, Jane Fonda
and Robert Blake
and performers such as Jackson Browne
, Bonnie Raitt
, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, The Eagles, Linda Ronstadt
, Peter Yarrow
, Holly Near
, Joan Baez
, Dan Fogelberg
, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, James Taylor
, Carly Simon
, Chaka Khan
, The Doobie Brothers
, Jesse Colin Young
, Stevie Wonder
, Gil Scott-Heron
, Stevie Nicks
, Tom Petty
, Poco
, Wavy Gravy
, Warren Zevon
and others joined the anti-nuclear concerts, protests and larger movement - which included a series of concerts at Madison Square Garden through Musicians United for Safe Energy
, as well as 'Peace Sunday' at the Rose Bowl (with over 100,000 in attendance) and multiple 'Survival Sundays' held at the Hollywood Bowl both through the Alliance for Survival, a Los Angeles based Abalone Alliance affiliate. A number of the high profile participants were included in the arrests at Diablo and the mass jailings were described as a "tornado of talent". Jackson Browne defending his civil disobedience at a San Luis Obispo courthouse after his arrest for trespassing at the blockade (“I consider my actions to be patriotic”). In 1984, the Alliance organized the Peoples Emergency Response Plan, where affinity groups blockaded at the Diablo Gates over a four-month period.
In late 1981, Alliance activists primarily from Davis
and Sonoma, along with local opposition held an eight-day sit-in at the State Capitol, encouraging then-Governor Jerry Brown
to use emergency powers to shut down the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station
. The plant was closed by a public vote in 1989, a decade before its operating license was to expire. Other Alliance activists went on to form the Livermore Action Group, the Vandenberg Action Coalition, Environmental Defense Center, the Lenten Desert Experience at the Nevada Test Site
and Musicians United for Safe Energy
. At its peak, there were over 60 groups who were affiliated with the Alliance, including Greenpeace
and Alliance for Survival. The group was hit with one of the first known SLAPP suits in U.S. history, where the Pacific Legal Foundation
and San Luis Obispo County attempted to legally obtain the names of all members and supporters, demanding that they pay for the costs of the 1981 blockade. The suit lasted nearly five years, before being withdrawn just before going before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Mothers for Peace filed a legal challenge with the D.C. Circuit Court in an attempt to stop the operation of Diablo Canyon but was denied in November 1984. In January 1985, NRC Commissioner Asselstine leaked a copy of the NRC's secret transcripts to KRON-TV
in San Francisco, documenting how the NRC had illegally licensed Diablo Canyon without properly reviewing evacuation plans as previously required. The Mothers then reopened their challenge based on the leaked NRC transcripts. Judge Robert Bork
of the DC Court took the lead in denying the appeal April 25, 1986. Bork claimed that to look at the leaked transcripts would be judicial activism
.
ordered the United States Environmental Protection Agency
to give the company nearly $2.5 billion in loans.
The controversy did not come to a close until December 1988 when the California Public Utilities Commission
gave PG&E a $54 billion 30-year, cost plus rate contract to operate Diablo Canyon Power Plant. It has been considered the most controversial nuclear power plant in U.S. history because of its location 2½ miles offshore from the Hosgri Fault.
, 1982, won the Grand Prize at the Sundance Film Festival
in 1983 as well as a Emmy Award
for "Outstanding Individual Achievement in News and Documentary" in 1990.
A Question of Power, Dir. David L. Brown, Prod. by David L. Brown, Tom Anderson and Jane Kinzler, 1986
No Nukes
Dir. Daniel Goldberg, Anthony Potenza Prod. Julian Schlossberg
, 1980
Civil disobedience
Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal to obey certain laws, demands, and commands of a government, or of an occupying international power. Civil disobedience is commonly, though not always, defined as being nonviolent resistance. It is one form of civil resistance...
group formed to shut down the Pacific Gas and Electric Company
Pacific Gas and Electric Company
The Pacific Gas and Electric Company , commonly known as PG&E, is the utility that provides natural gas and electricity to most of the northern two-thirds of California, from Bakersfield almost to the Oregon border...
's Diablo Canyon Power Plant
Diablo Canyon Power Plant
Diablo Canyon Power Plant is an electricity-generating nuclear power plant at Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County, California. The plant has two Westinghouse-designed 4-loop pressurized-water nuclear reactors operated by Pacific Gas & Electric. The facility is located on about in Avila Beach,...
near San Luis Obispo on the central California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
coast in the United States. They modeled their affinity group
Affinity group
An Affinity group is usually a small group of activists who work together on direct action.Affinity groups are organized in a non-hierarchical manner, usually using consensus decision making, and are often made up of trusted friends...
-based organizational structure after the Clamshell Alliance
Clamshell Alliance
The Clamshell Alliance is an anti-nuclear organization co-founded by Paul Gunter, Howie Hawkins, Harvey Wasserman, Guy Chichester and other activists in 1976. The alliance's coalescence began in 1975 as New England activists and organizations began to respond to U.S...
which was then protesting the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant in coastal New Hampshire. The group of activists took the name "Abalone Alliance" referring to the tens of thousands of wild California Red Abalone
Abalone
Abalone , from aulón, are small to very large-sized edible sea snails, marine gastropod molluscs in the family Haliotidae and the genus Haliotis...
that were killed in 1974 in Diablo Cove when the unit's plumbing had its first hot flush.
The Abalone Alliance staged blockades and occupations at the Diablo Canyon Power Plant site between 1977 and 1984. Nearly two thousand people were arrested during a two-week blockade in 1981, exceeding Seabrook as the largest number arrested at an anti-nuclear protest in the United States.
History
The Diablo Canyon controversy started in 1963 when PG&E scrapped its attempt to build the Bodega Bay Nuclear Power PlantBodega Bay Nuclear Power Plant
The Bodega Bay Nuclear Power Plant was proposed but never built.Pacific Gas & Electric planned to build the first commercially viable nuclear power plant in the USA at Bodega Bay, California, a fishing village fifty miles north of San Francisco...
at Bodega Head
Bodega Head
Bodega Head is a small promontory on the Pacific coast of northern California in the United States. It is located in Sonoma County at , approximately 40 mi northwest of San Francisco and approximately 20 mi west of Santa Rosa....
, 71 miles north of San Francisco. The Bodega struggle started in 1958, but was opposed by a group led by a University of California
University of California
The University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University...
professor and young Sierra Club
Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is the oldest, largest, and most influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. It was founded on May 28, 1892, in San Francisco, California, by the conservationist and preservationist John Muir, who became its first president...
activist named David Pessonen. This was the first anti-nuclear power campaign in the US. The main reason that the facility wasn't built was due its location less than 1,000 feet from the fault zone that struck
1906 San Francisco earthquake
The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 was a major earthquake that struck San Francisco, California, and the coast of Northern California at 5:12 a.m. on Wednesday, April 18, 1906. The most widely accepted estimate for the magnitude of the earthquake is a moment magnitude of 7.9; however, other...
San Francisco in 1906.
Rather than face public opposition at Diablo Canyon, PG&E approached the Sierra Club's president and cut a deal with certain board members where Diablo would be chosen rather than the Nipomo Dunes area. The wife of the Sierra Club president, who worked out the deal, would then be elected to PG&E's board of directors. As part of the plan, the decision was made when Sierra Club board member Martin Litton was out of the country, the only member who knew of Diablo's history and importance. The board was flown down to see the site in Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
's Lear Jet with Danny Kaye
Danny Kaye
Danny Kaye was a celebrated American actor, singer, dancer, and comedian...
on board providing entertainment. Kaye would later become opposed to nuclear power.
The Sierra Club president forbade any chapter from opposing Diablo Canyon, so The San Luis Obispo Chapter formed the Shoreline Preservation Conference to oppose the construction on the grounds that the area had been proposed as a state park, was a sacred Chumash Indian site, had some of the largest oak trees on the West Coast, was located on the second-to-last coastal wilderness area in California, and could be sitting on the fault that lightly shook Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, California
Santa Barbara is the county seat of Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Situated on an east-west trending section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States, the city lies between the steeply-rising Santa Ynez Mountains and the Pacific Ocean...
in a 1927 earthquake. The internal dispute over Diablo Canyon was a primary reason for the split-up of the Sierra Club, that led to the formation of Friends of the Earth
Friends of the Earth
Friends of the Earth International is an international network of environmental organizations in 76 countries.FOEI is assisted by a small secretariat which provides support for the network and its agreed major campaigns...
by David Brower.
In 1965, the Shoreline Preservation Conference demanded that regulators investigate the danger of faults near the proposed site, but was ignored. In 1972 a Los Angeles reporter discovered a report by Shell Oil Company
Shell Oil Company
Shell Oil Company is the United States-based subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, a multinational oil company of Anglo Dutch origins, which is amongst the largest oil companies in the world. Approximately 22,000 Shell employees are based in the U.S. The head office in the U.S. is in Houston, Texas...
geologists completed prior construction of Diablo Canyon Power Plant
Diablo Canyon Power Plant
Diablo Canyon Power Plant is an electricity-generating nuclear power plant at Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County, California. The plant has two Westinghouse-designed 4-loop pressurized-water nuclear reactors operated by Pacific Gas & Electric. The facility is located on about in Avila Beach,...
of the existence of the Hosgri Fault
Hosgri fault
The Hosgri Fault is an offshore fault zone located near the Central Coast of California in San Luis Obispo County. The main fault stretches for about , and the coastal communities closest to it are Cambria, San Simeon and Morro Bay, Baywood Park-Los Osos, and Avila Beach...
2½ miles offshore from the facility. As a result of the discovery, regulators forced PG&E to redesign and reinforce the facility.
Diablo Canyon protests
During the late 1970s, the Abalone Alliance organized protests in San Luis County and regularly picketed PG&E offices across the state. The Alliance published a newspaper, It's About Times, which provided a forum for activist debate. Separate groups within the Abalone coalition "developed their own foci and protest styles".On August 7, 1977, 1,500 people demonstrated at the gate of Diablo Canyon, resulting in 47 arrests. The next year, 5,000 people rallied and 487 were arrested. On September 10, 1981, the Abalone Alliance occupied the site, leading to 1,960 arrests. Nearly 30,000 people showed up in support. At the end of the ten-day action, a 25-year-old engineer discovered a mirror image reversal in the seismic blueprints. PG&E was forced spend $3 billion and three additional years of repairs before reopening. Anti-War Activists Daniel Ellsberg
Daniel Ellsberg
Daniel Ellsberg, PhD, is a former United States military analyst who, while employed by the RAND Corporation, precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released the Pentagon Papers, a top-secret Pentagon study of U.S. government decision-making in relation to the Vietnam War,...
and Tom Hayden
Tom Hayden
Thomas Emmet "Tom" Hayden is an American social and political activist and politician, known for his involvement in the animal rights, and the anti-war and civil rights movements of the 1960s. He is the former husband of actress Jane Fonda and the father of actor Troy Garity.-Life and...
, activist stars like Ed Asner
Ed Asner
Edward Asner , commonly known as Ed Asner, is an American film, television, stage, and voice actor and former president of the Screen Actors Guild, primarily known for his Emmy Award-winning role as Lou Grant on both The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spin-off series, Lou Grant...
, Martin Sheen
Martin Sheen
Ramón Gerardo Antonio Estévez , better known by his stage name Martin Sheen, is an American film actor best known for his performances in the films Badlands and Apocalypse Now , and in the television series The West Wing from 1999 to 2006.He is considered one of the best actors never to be...
, Martin Landau
Martin Landau
Martin Landau is an American film and television actor. Landau began his career in the 1950s. His early films include a supporting role in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest . He played continuing roles in the television series Mission: Impossible and Space:1999...
, Blythe Danner
Blythe Danner
Blythe Katherine Danner is an American actress. She is the mother of actress Gwyneth Paltrow and director Jake Paltrow.-Early life:...
, Patti Davis
Patti Davis
Patti Davis is an American actress and author. She is the daughter of former President of the United States Ronald Reagan and Reagan's second wife, First Lady Nancy Reagan...
, Robin Williams
Robin Williams
Robin McLaurin Williams is an American actor and comedian. Rising to fame with his role as the alien Mork in the TV series Mork and Mindy, and later stand-up comedy work, Williams has performed in many feature films since 1980. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance...
, Lily Tomlin
Lily Tomlin
Mary Jean "Lily" Tomlin is an American actress, comedienne, writer, and producer. Tomlin has been a major force in American comedy since the late 1960's when she began a career as a stand up comedian and became a featured performer on television's Laugh-in...
, Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford is an American film actor and producer. He is famous for his performances as Han Solo in the original Star Wars trilogy and as the title character of the Indiana Jones film series. Ford is also known for his roles as Rick Deckard in Blade Runner, John Book in Witness and Jack Ryan in...
, Carrie Fisher
Carrie Fisher
Carrie Frances Fisher is an American actress, novelist, screenwriter, and lecturer. She is most famous for her portrayal of Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy, her bestselling novel Postcards from the Edge, for which she wrote the screenplay to the film of the same name, and her...
, Marsha Mason
Marsha Mason
Marsha Mason is an American actress and television director.She received four Academy Award nominations as Best Actress for her performances in Cinderella Liberty, The Goodbye Girl, Chapter Two, and Only When I Laugh. She is also known for starring in the 1986 film Heartbreak Ridge.-Life:Mason was...
, John Belushi
John Belushi
John Adam Belushi was an American comedian, actor, and musician, best known as one of the original cast members of the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live, The Star of the Films National Lampoon's Animal House and the The Blues Brothers and for fronting the American blues and soul...
, Jane Fonda
Jane Fonda
Jane Fonda is an American actress, writer, political activist, former fashion model, and fitness guru. She rose to fame in the 1960s with films such as Barbarella and Cat Ballou. She has won two Academy Awards and received several other movie awards and nominations during more than 50 years as an...
and Robert Blake
Robert Blake (actor)
Robert Blake is an American actor who starred in the film In Cold Blood and the U.S. television series Baretta. In 2005, he was tried and acquitted for the 2001 murder of his wife, but on November 18, 2005, Blake was found liable in a California civil court for her wrongful death.-Early...
and performers such as Jackson Browne
Jackson Browne
Jackson Browne is an American singer-songwriter and musician who has sold over 17 million albums in the United States alone....
, Bonnie Raitt
Bonnie Raitt
Bonnie Lynn Raitt is an American blues singer-songwriter and a renowned slide guitar player. During the 1970s, Raitt released a series of acclaimed roots-influenced albums which incorporated elements of blues, rock, folk and country, but she is perhaps best known for her more commercially...
, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, The Eagles, Linda Ronstadt
Linda Ronstadt
Linda Ronstadt is an American popular music recording artist. She has earned eleven Grammy Awards, two Academy of Country Music awards, an Emmy Award, an ALMA Award, numerous United States and internationally certified gold, platinum and multiplatinum albums, in addition to Tony Award and Golden...
, Peter Yarrow
Peter Yarrow
Peter Yarrow is an American singer who found fame with the 1960s folk music trio Peter, Paul and Mary. Yarrow co-wrote one of the group's most famous songs, "Puff, the Magic Dragon"...
, Holly Near
Holly Near
Holly Near is an American singer-songwriter, actress, teacher, and activist for social change.-Early years:...
, Joan Baez
Joan Baez
Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....
, Dan Fogelberg
Dan Fogelberg
Daniel Grayling "Dan" Fogelberg was an American singer-songwriter, composer, and multi-instrumentalist, whose music was inspired by sources as diverse as folk, pop, rock, classical, jazz, and bluegrass music...
, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, James Taylor
James Taylor
James Vernon Taylor is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, Taylor was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000....
, Carly Simon
Carly Simon
Carly Elisabeth Simon is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and children's author. She rose to fame in the 1970s with a string of hit records, and has since been the recipient of two Grammy Awards, an Academy Award, and a Golden Globe Award for her work...
, Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan
Chaka Khan , frequently known as the Queen of Funk, is a 10-time Grammy Award winning American singer-songwriter who gained fame in the 1970s as the frontwoman and focal point of the funk band Rufus. While still a member of the group in 1978, Khan embarked on a successful solo career...
, The Doobie Brothers
The Doobie Brothers
The Doobie Brothers are an American rock band. The group has sold over 40 million units worldwide throughout their career. The Doobie Brothers were inducted into The Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2004.-Original incarnation:...
, Jesse Colin Young
Jesse Colin Young
Jesse Colin Young is an American singer / songwriter / folksinger and a founding member of the group The Youngbloods.-Early life:...
, Stevie Wonder
Stevie Wonder
Stevland Hardaway Morris , better known by his stage name Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, record producer and activist...
, Gil Scott-Heron
Gil Scott-Heron
Gilbert "Gil" Scott-Heron was an American soul and jazz poet, musician, and author known primarily for his work as a spoken word performer in the 1970s and '80s...
, Stevie Nicks
Stevie Nicks
Stephanie Lynn "Stevie" Nicks is an American singer-songwriter, best known for her work with Fleetwood Mac and an extensive solo career, which collectively have produced over forty Top 50 hits and sold over 140 million albums...
, Tom Petty
Tom Petty
Thomas Earl "Tom" Petty is an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He is the frontman of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and was a founding member of the late 1980s supergroup Traveling Wilburys and Mudcrutch. He has also performed under the pseudonyms of Charlie T...
, Poco
Poco
Poco is an Southern California country rock band originally formed by Richie Furay and Jim Messina following the demise of Buffalo Springfield in 1968. The title of their first album, Pickin' Up the Pieces, is a reference to the break-up of Buffalo Springfield. Highly influential and creative,...
, Wavy Gravy
Wavy Gravy
Wavy Gravy is an American entertainer and activist for peace, best known for his hippie appearance, personality and beliefs. His moniker...
, Warren Zevon
Warren Zevon
Warren William Zevon was an American rock singer-songwriter and musician noted for including his sometimes sardonic opinions of life in his musical lyrics, composing songs that were sometimes humorous and often had political or historical themes.Zevon's work has often been praised by well-known...
and others joined the anti-nuclear concerts, protests and larger movement - which included a series of concerts at Madison Square Garden through Musicians United for Safe Energy
Musicians United for Safe Energy
Musicians United for Safe Energy, or MUSE, is an activist group founded in 1979 by Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Bonnie Raitt, and John Hall. The group advocates against the use of nuclear energy, forming shortly after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in March 1979...
, as well as 'Peace Sunday' at the Rose Bowl (with over 100,000 in attendance) and multiple 'Survival Sundays' held at the Hollywood Bowl both through the Alliance for Survival, a Los Angeles based Abalone Alliance affiliate. A number of the high profile participants were included in the arrests at Diablo and the mass jailings were described as a "tornado of talent". Jackson Browne defending his civil disobedience at a San Luis Obispo courthouse after his arrest for trespassing at the blockade (“I consider my actions to be patriotic”). In 1984, the Alliance organized the Peoples Emergency Response Plan, where affinity groups blockaded at the Diablo Gates over a four-month period.
In late 1981, Alliance activists primarily from Davis
Davis, California
Davis is a city in Yolo County, California, United States. It is part of the Sacramento–Arden-Arcade–Roseville Metropolitan Statistical Area...
and Sonoma, along with local opposition held an eight-day sit-in at the State Capitol, encouraging then-Governor Jerry Brown
Jerry Brown
Edmund Gerald "Jerry" Brown, Jr. is an American politician. Brown served as the 34th Governor of California , and is currently serving as the 39th California Governor...
to use emergency powers to shut down the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station
Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station
The Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station is a decommissioned nuclear power plant built by the Sacramento Municipal Utility District in Herald, California.-History:...
. The plant was closed by a public vote in 1989, a decade before its operating license was to expire. Other Alliance activists went on to form the Livermore Action Group, the Vandenberg Action Coalition, Environmental Defense Center, the Lenten Desert Experience at the Nevada Test Site
Nevada Test Site
The Nevada National Security Site , previously the Nevada Test Site , is a United States Department of Energy reservation located in southeastern Nye County, Nevada, about northwest of the city of Las Vegas...
and Musicians United for Safe Energy
Musicians United for Safe Energy
Musicians United for Safe Energy, or MUSE, is an activist group founded in 1979 by Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Bonnie Raitt, and John Hall. The group advocates against the use of nuclear energy, forming shortly after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in March 1979...
. At its peak, there were over 60 groups who were affiliated with the Alliance, including Greenpeace
Greenpeace
Greenpeace is a non-governmental environmental organization with offices in over forty countries and with an international coordinating body in Amsterdam, The Netherlands...
and Alliance for Survival. The group was hit with one of the first known SLAPP suits in U.S. history, where the Pacific Legal Foundation
Pacific Legal Foundation
Pacific Legal Foundation is the first and oldest conservative/libertarian public interest law firm in the United States. PLF was established for the purpose of defending and promoting individual and economic freedom in the courts...
and San Luis Obispo County attempted to legally obtain the names of all members and supporters, demanding that they pay for the costs of the 1981 blockade. The suit lasted nearly five years, before being withdrawn just before going before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Mothers for Peace filed a legal challenge with the D.C. Circuit Court in an attempt to stop the operation of Diablo Canyon but was denied in November 1984. In January 1985, NRC Commissioner Asselstine leaked a copy of the NRC's secret transcripts to KRON-TV
KRON-TV
KRON-TV, virtual channel 4 , is a television station in San Francisco, California, serving as the Bay Area affiliate of the MyNetworkTV programming service; the station is owned by Young Broadcasting...
in San Francisco, documenting how the NRC had illegally licensed Diablo Canyon without properly reviewing evacuation plans as previously required. The Mothers then reopened their challenge based on the leaked NRC transcripts. Judge Robert Bork
Robert Bork
Robert Heron Bork is an American legal scholar who has advocated the judicial philosophy of originalism. Bork formerly served as Solicitor General, Acting Attorney General, and judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit...
of the DC Court took the lead in denying the appeal April 25, 1986. Bork claimed that to look at the leaked transcripts would be judicial activism
Judicial activism
Judicial activism describes judicial ruling suspected of being based on personal or political considerations rather than on existing law. It is sometimes used as an antonym of judicial restraint. The definition of judicial activism, and which specific decisions are activist, is a controversial...
.
Diablo Canyon opens
The Diablo Canyon reactors were originally estimated to cost just over $300 million when PG&E was first given permission to construct the facility. When finally opened in 1985, construction costs were $5.8 billion and financing costs nearly an additional $7 billion. After the 1981 blueprint mirror image mistake was discovered, the reactor's construction costs stood at $2.1 billion. PG&E permission to go ahead with operation was reversed by the NRC and the company was required to go through a major review and rebuild. PG&E was unable to find further financing from any source to continue construction, until president Ronald ReaganRonald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
ordered the United States Environmental Protection Agency
United States Environmental Protection Agency
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is an agency of the federal government of the United States charged with protecting human health and the environment, by writing and enforcing regulations based on laws passed by Congress...
to give the company nearly $2.5 billion in loans.
The controversy did not come to a close until December 1988 when the California Public Utilities Commission
California Public Utilities Commission
The California Public Utilities Commission is a regulatory agency which regulates privately owned public utilities in the state of California, including electric power, telecommunications, natural gas and water companies...
gave PG&E a $54 billion 30-year, cost plus rate contract to operate Diablo Canyon Power Plant. It has been considered the most controversial nuclear power plant in U.S. history because of its location 2½ miles offshore from the Hosgri Fault.
See also
- Alliance for Nuclear ResponsibilityAlliance for Nuclear ResponsibilityAlliance for Nuclear Responsibility is a non-profit public interest organization founded in 2005, and based in San Luis Obispo, California. It is focused on public citizen activism and public participation with regard to the Diablo Canyon Power Plant, which some people also call the Diablo Canyon...
- Anti-nuclear movement in the United StatesAnti-nuclear movement in the United StatesThe anti-nuclear movement in the United States consists of more than 80 anti-nuclear groups which have acted to oppose nuclear power or nuclear weapons, or both, in the United States. These groups include the Abalone Alliance, Clamshell Alliance, Institute for Energy and Environmental Research,...
- Shad AllianceShad AllianceThe Shad Alliance was an active and influential anti-nuclear group which used non-violent, direct action methods in the late 1970s and 1980s. It grew out of the "alliance movement" started in New Hampshire by the Clamshell Alliance...
- Anti-nuclear protests in the United States
- Diablo Canyon earthquake vulnerabilityDiablo Canyon earthquake vulnerabilityDiablo Canyon Power Plant, located on the water's edge in San Luis Obispo County California, was originally designed to withstand a 6.75 magnitude earthquake from four faults, including the nearby San Andreas and Hosgri faults, but was later upgraded to withstand a 7.5 magnitude quake...
- Great Peace March for Global Nuclear DisarmamentGreat Peace March for Global Nuclear DisarmamentThe Great Peace March for Global Nuclear Disarmament, Inc. was a cross-country event in 1986 aimed at raising awareness to the growing danger of nuclear proliferation and to advocate for complete, verifiable elimination of nuclear weapons from the earth...
- Mothers for PeaceMothers for PeaceSan Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace is a participant in the anti-nuclear movement in California which is depicted in the anti-nuclear Dark Circlefor its activity in the early years of protests against the Diablo Canyon Power Plant...
- Musicians United for Safe EnergyMusicians United for Safe EnergyMusicians United for Safe Energy, or MUSE, is an activist group founded in 1979 by Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Bonnie Raitt, and John Hall. The group advocates against the use of nuclear energy, forming shortly after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in March 1979...
- Clamshell AllianceClamshell AllianceThe Clamshell Alliance is an anti-nuclear organization co-founded by Paul Gunter, Howie Hawkins, Harvey Wasserman, Guy Chichester and other activists in 1976. The alliance's coalescence began in 1975 as New England activists and organizations began to respond to U.S...
Films
Dark Circle, Dir. Chris Beaver, Ruth Landy and Judy IrvingJudy Irving
Judy Irving is an American filmmaker. She directed the documentary The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, about writer Mark Bittner's relationship with a flock of wild parrots. The film won the Genesis Award for "Outstanding Documentary Film" in 2005, and is one of the 25 top-grossing theatrical...
, 1982, won the Grand Prize at the Sundance Film Festival
Sundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival is a film festival that takes place annually in Utah, in the United States. It is the largest independent cinema festival in the United States. Held in January in Park City, Salt Lake City, and Ogden, as well as at the Sundance Resort, the festival is a showcase for new...
in 1983 as well as a Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for "Outstanding Individual Achievement in News and Documentary" in 1990.
A Question of Power, Dir. David L. Brown, Prod. by David L. Brown, Tom Anderson and Jane Kinzler, 1986
No Nukes
No Nukes (film)
No Nukes is a 1980 documentary and concert film that contained selections from the September 1979 Madison Square Garden concerts by the Musicians United for Safe Energy collective, with Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Bonnie Raitt, and John Hall being the key organizers of the event and guiding forces...
Dir. Daniel Goldberg, Anthony Potenza Prod. Julian Schlossberg
Julian Schlossberg
Julian Schlossberg is an American motion picture, theatre and television producer.- Biography :Following a tour of duty in the United States Army, Schlossberg studied at New York University, completing his degree and graduating with honors...
, 1980
Further reading
- Brown, Jerry and Rinaldo Brutoco (1997). Profiles in Power: The Anti-nuclear Movement and the Dawn of the Solar Age, Twayne Publishers.
- Lovins, Amory B.Amory LovinsAmory Bloch Lovins is an American environmental scientist and writer, Chairman and Chief Scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute. He has worked in the field of energy policy and related areas for four decades...
and Price, John H. (1975). Non-Nuclear Futures: The Case for an Ethical Energy StrategyNon-Nuclear Futures: The Case for an Ethical Energy StrategyNon-Nuclear Futures: The Case for an Ethical Energy Strategy is a 1975 book by Amory B. Lovins and John H. Price. The main theme of the book is that the most important parts of the nuclear power debate are not technical disputes but relate to personal values, and are the legitimate province of...
, Ballinger Publishing Company, 1975, ISBN 0884106020 - Natti, Susanna and Acker, Bonnie (1979). No Nukes: Everyone's Guide to Nuclear Power, South End Press.
- Ondaatje, Elizabeth H. (c1988). Trends in Antinuclear Protests in the United States, 1984-1987, Rand Corporation.
- Price, Jerome (1982). The Antinuclear Movement, Twayne Publishers.
- Smith, Jennifer (Editor), (2002). The Antinuclear Movement, Cengage Gale.
- Walker, J. SamuelJ. Samuel WalkerJ. Samuel Walker is an American historian and book author based in Maryland. Although not the subject of any widely known biography, he is notable for his widely recognized contribution to the enduring historical record in his specific field of study. His particular focus is on the nuclear age,...
(2004). Three Mile Island: A Nuclear Crisis in Historical PerspectiveThree Mile Island (book)Three Mile Island: A Nuclear Crisis in Historical Perspective is a scholarly history of the Three Mile Island accident, written by J. Samuel Walker and published in 2004...
, University of California Press. - Wellock, Thomas R.Thomas WellockThomas Wellock is the historian for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Trained as both an engineer and a historian, he writes scholarly histories of the regulation of commercial nuclear energy....
(1998). Critical Masses: Opposition to Nuclear Power in California, 1958-1978Critical Masses: Opposition to Nuclear Power in California, 1958-1978Critical Masses: Opposition to Nuclear Power in California, 1958-1978 is the first detailed history of the anti-nuclear movement in the United States, written by Thomas Wellock. It is also the first state-level research on the subject with a focus on California...
, The University of Wisconsin Press, ISBN 0299158500 - Wills, John (2006). Conservation Fallout: Nuclear Protest at Diablo CanyonConservation Fallout: Nuclear Protest at Diablo CanyonConservation Fallout: Nuclear Protest at Diablo Canyon is a 2006 book by John Wills.Widespread public opposition accompanied the rise of the U.S. nuclear industry during the 1960s and 1970s...
, University of Nevada Press. - Rayl, Salley (1981). On D-Day at Diablo Canyon, It Was Jackson Browne If by Land and Robert Blake If by Sea, People Magazine.