What a difference falling flat on your renewable face time after time after time and again makes.

Eventually, attitudes come around a teensy weensy bit.

Recently, there was panic among nuclear advocates and premature celebration among anti-nuclear voices when @NRCgov correctly told @PGE4Me that they had to start a new application process rather than continue the old one that @PGE4Me had told the NRC cancel back in 2017.

All good

— Mark Nelson (@energybants) March 2, 2023

Not without a significant bit of CYA tapdancing from someone who led the push to close it to begin with.

…Newsom says the plant, which provides 10% of the state’s electricity, should stay open until 2030 to help the state meet its clean energy targets and avoid power outages.

During an intense heat wave that prompted a state of emergency, state legislators and Newsom approved a $1.4 billion loan for PG&E to maintain operations at the plant until 2030.

…Newsom visited the plant on Wednesday. “As we experienced during the record heat wave last September, climate change-driven extreme events are causing unprecedented stress on our power grid — the Diablo Canyon Power Plant is important to support energy reliability as we accelerate progress towards achieving our clean energy and climate goals,” he said.

The Devil came to Diablo Canyon so they could thank him personally for saving their bacon – the same bacon he’s already spent a couple of years trying to fry.

The world has changed.

The man who helped broker the deal to close Diablo Canyon finally visited the plant itself after having brokered the deal to save it.

People can change. Leaders can change. States can change.

The future is nuclear. pic.twitter.com/1xdT86M7sp

— Mark Nelson (@energybants) March 3, 2023

The NRC extension only allows the plant to keep operating while it pursues the full application process and approval to operate past 2030. In 2016, they had initially planned and then agreed to shut the plant down, so in 2017 they consequently let the application already in progress for continued plant operation lapse. There seemed to be no point in the effort, for one, and part of the lawsuit settlement agreement to shutter the facility included not asking for a licensing renewal.

Fast forward a few, disastrous, shortsighted energy crisis years. Pacific, Gas and Electric (PG&E) along with the state realized they’d best get that application restarted because there was no way they could afford to turn the lights out permanently. All parties were shocked when the NRC threw a “nyet” curveball into that mix.

After refusing to allow Diablo Canyon to restart from where they’d left off, CA was sweating bullets the NRC would deny an extension of operation giving them grace time to redo everything, and the plant would have to shut down. That would have been a nightmare scenario, not that it wouldn’t have been a self-induced one. Now they have some breathing room and reliable electricity.

…The decision by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission means Diablo Canyon can keep running under its current license as Pacific Gas & Electric seeks full approval to extend its lifespan. PG&E has until Dec. 31 to submit its renewal application, which must outline issues related to safety and integrity of the aging reactors.

PG&E said it will seek permission to keep the plant, now slated for shutdown in 2025, operating for up to 20 additional years — the full extent that is customary for a nuclear power plant application.

But state officials have not indicated that they intend to allow Diablo Canyon to stay open past 2030. Under a law passed last summer, SB 846, Unit 1 can keep running through Oct. 31, 2029, and Unit 2 until Oct. 31, 2030.

Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislators say allowing Diablo Canyon to provide electricity until 2030 is critical to ensure the reliability of the grid as California transitions to renewable energy and weans itself off fossil fuels.

As you would imagine, environmental groups lost their cookies when PG&E requested the extension last month.

The U.S. nuclear safety regulator has no legal basis to give PG&E Corp an exemption that could allow California’s Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant to keep running with expired federal licenses, according to a petition filed by environmental groups.

Friends of the Earth, San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace and the Environmental Working Group told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission(NRC) Monday that the two nuclear units at the plant, once slated for closure, pose potentially severe environmental and safety risks, making them ineligible for an exemption to agency rules requiring renewal applications be received at least five years before licenses expire.

I’m sure their heads are exploding at this news. I expect lawsuits will be flying like mosquitos.

They are more than happy to go kicking and screaming into darkness and drag the rest of us with them.