San Onofre Community Engagement Panel Meeting to Provide Update on Dismantlement Progress, Future Site Remediation

ROSEMEAD, Calif., Nov. 24, 2021 — The San Onofre Community Engagement Panel will receive a briefing Dec. 2 on dismantlement progress to date of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station. The fourth-quarter CEP meeting will begin at 5:30 p.m. The meeting will take place via Microsoft Teams video conference since Southern California Edison and CEP members continue to follow COVID-19 protocols for safety, which include physical distancing.

SCE issued a notice of deconstruction to local residents in January 2020, indicating major dismantlement work would soon begin at San Onofre. Since then, 26 major structures have been demolished and dismantlement work has begun on the Unit 2 turbine building. More than 1,200 shipments of debris have been safely sent off-site via truck and rail, comprising about 50-million pounds of material.

“With the large office complex removed, known as the AWS building, work has begun to install additional rail lines on that site, which will help accommodate many more rail cars for transporting material to the disposal site outside of California,” said Vince Bilovsky, SCE decommissioning director.

Watch this time-lapse video of the demolition of the AWS building.

Bilovsky will brief the CEP members on the activities taking place inside the containment domes, which includes segmenting, or cutting, various reactor vessel components in Unit 2.

An in-depth presentation by the SONGS decommissioning contractor will focus on the SCE decommissioning principle of environmental stewardship. Specifically, the presentation will look at the work that must be completed to eventually terminate the site’s Nuclear Regulatory Commission license and return the land to the U.S. Navy. That would happen once the spent nuclear fuel stored at San Onofre has been relocated.

“This phase of the project is not only deconstruction but also decontamination. The presentation will help CEP members and the public understand the process to remediate the site for transfer back to the Navy,” Bilovsky said.

The CEP will also receive an update on the Action for Spent Fuel Solutions Now coalition, an effort to encourage the federal government to relocate the spent nuclear fuel stored at San Onofre.

Members of the public can view the meeting video conference by first visiting SONGScommunity.com, where a link to the meeting is provided, as well as register to provide comments during the meeting.

When SCE announced the retirement of San Onofre Units 2 and 3 in June 2013, it established the core principles of safety, stewardship and engagement to guide decommissioning.

For more information about San Onofre, visit SONGScommunity.com and follow us on Twitter (@SCE_SONGS) and Facebook (@SONGScommunitypage) or subscribe to our YouTube channel.

About Southern California Edison

An Edison International (NYSE: EIX) company, Southern California Edison is one of the nation’s largest electric utilities, serving a population of approximately 15 million via 5 million customer accounts in a 50,000-square-mile service area within Central, Coastal and Southern California.

Media Contact: John Dobken, (626) 302-2255