San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
PLANT PROJECT ON SCHEDULE
Massive job of dismantling San Onofre nuclear facility, more than 60% complete, set to end in 2028
California lost 817,669 residents to other states in 2022.
No state had a larger outflow of its population to other parts of the nation, according to Census Bureau data. New York was No. 2 with 545,598 exits, followed by Texas (494,077), Florida (489,905) and Illinois (344,027).
So where did ex-californians move to in 2022? And how did that flow change over the year?
Texas was the No. 1 spot for ex-californians with 102,442 relocations. Then came Arizona (74,157), Florida (50,701), Washington (49,968) and Nevada (48,836).
The least popular states included Delaware, which snared only 660 Californians, followed by Vermont (855), West Virginia (879), Rhode Island (919) and South Dakota (957).
Consider these moves as a share of a state’s population. Or, thinking about the flow another way: What are the odds someone would meet a new California transplant in another state?
Nevada has the highest concentration of former Californians in the Exiting Class of 2022, at 155 per 10,000 residents. Then comes Idaho (140), Arizona (102), Oregon (87) and Hawaii (74).
Conversely, where is it hard to find a newly minted ex-californian? West Virginia was tops at 5 per 10,000, then Mississippi at 6, and Delaware, New Jersey and Iowa at 7.
By the way, how common are new ex-californians in the state’s big rivals? Texas was No. 14 at 35 per 10,000 and Florida was No. 23 at 23.
Part of the dismantlement involves cutting out the internal components of the two reactor vessels, the Unit 2 and Unit 3 domes.
While it may be difficult to see as drivers zoom past the two distinctive domes on the west side of Interstate 5, the dismantlement of the San Onofre nuclear power plant is more than 60 percent complete.
“We’re just under two-thirds of the way through,” said Vince Bilovsky, director of the decommissioning project at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, known as SONGS for short. “We’re where we need to be.”
Demolition work on the eightyear, $4.7 billion project started in October 2020 and is scheduled to finish by the end of 2028.
The scope of the job is massive. About 1.1 billion pounds of equipment, components, rebar, concrete, steel and titanium will be removed. About 80 percent of the material is presumed to be radioactive.
“My wife always asks me, ‘What do you do for a living?’ and I always say, ‘I get paid to worry,’” Rich Kalman, executive sponsor at SONGS Decommissioning Solutions, said during a virtual meeting last month that reviewed the progress of the dismantlement. “Make sure we do it safely, and keep everyone out of harm’s way. That’s my major job at SONGS.”
The vast majority of the plant’s
About 900 rail-car shipments have sent more than 300 million pounds of material out of the 84-acre facility; by the time the dismantlement wraps up, some 5,500 will be completed.
material is labeled Class A waste, the lowest level of radioactive material. Most of the rubble goes by rail to a disposal facility in Clive, Utah.
Class B and C low-level waste gets sent to a site near the town of Andrews in west Texas. Non-radioactive material goes to Las Vegas for
recycling or a landfill facility in Arizona.
About 900 rail-car shipments have sent more than 300 million pounds out of the 84-acre facility and by the time the dismantlement wraps up, some 5,500 will be completed.
Rail shipments are monitored by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Transportation. A host of local, state and federal agencies that include the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board, the state’s Department of Toxic Substances Control and the U.S. Environmental Protection Administration also conduct environmental and building inspections.
One of the most complex parts of the dismantlement deals with literally cutting out the internal components from two reactor vessels — one in the Unit 2 containment dome and the other in Unit 3.
Since the internal parts were close to nuclear fuel, the components are radioactive. That means the process of cutting and retrieving the pieces is done underwater, making the job slow and painstaking.
“Because it’s radioactive, you need to shield yourself from it, and water is an excellent shield for radioactivity,” Bilovsky said. “It’s tough to get machinery to be reliable underwater. It’s a complicated design and it’s a lot harder to operate ... You’re using remote operations, underwater cameras, manipulators and things like that.”
Work in the reactor cavities is about 96 percent done, Bilovsky said. When finished, the hundreds
Last year, 23,396 fewer Californians left than the year before — a 3 percent drop from 2021.
The swings
The population flow out of California is by no means static. Last year, 23,396 fewer Golden Staters left than the year before — a 3 percent drop from 2021.
And destinations changed, too. Florida had 2022’s biggest increase in gaining former Golden Staters at 13,237. Then came Arizona (4,725), Alabama (4,643), Massachusetts (3,503) and Kentucky (3,386).
At the other end of the spectrum, Oregon’s inflow shrank by 15,194 — the No. 1 drop among the states. Then came Nevada (off 13,601), Washington (off 7,608), Hawaii (off 5,554) and Texas (off 5,104).
Or you can look at the one-year change in migration in percentage-point terms.
Delaware’s flow of inbound Californians grew by 469 percent, followed by West Virginia (139 percent), Alabama (138 percent), Kentucky (130 percent) and Louisiana (41 percent).
The largest shrinkage was Nebraska’s 68 percent loss, then came Rhode Island (off 68 percent), Iowa (off 58 percent), South Dakota (off 43 percent) and Wyoming (off 40 percent).
Rival Texas ranked No. 30 with a 5 percent dip. Florida was No. 8 with its 35 percent jump.
Bottom line
Among the smaller number of Californians moving out, there seems to be a simmering desire for life east of the Mississippi River.
Yes, Western states are still the top destination, taking in 474,235 from California last year vs. the East’s 343,434.
But the West’s Golden State intake was down 54,287 from 2021 compared with the East’s 30,891 increase.
So, the East grew its share of the California outflow — grabbing 42 percent of former Golden Staters last year vs. 37 percent in 2021.
Caveat
As I often point out, California is better than you think at retaining its residents.
Consider the outflow as a share of the state’s population.
In 2022, 2.1 percent of Californians left for elsewhere in the US, but 2.5 percent of all Americans switched states.
Only eight states had a smaller share of its residents leave in 2022 topped by Texas, Michigan and Ohio at 1.7 percent. And Florida had a 2.3 percent exit rate.