Bodega Bay
One of the gems of our Northern California coast is Bodega Bay, with a population of about 1300. When we moved here 55 years ago it was a tiny fishing village, but since then many elegant homes and second homes have been built. It is often foggy and cool there, so in hot weather folks make a beeline there for the cool weather, the views, and the restaurants. The area which protrudes furthest into the ocean is called Bodega Head. It’s the best spot for whale watching and we go there often.
Standing at the Bodega Head parking lot.
Looking back at the Bay and homes.
On a recent stay at one of those homes, I was reminded of an event from the late 50s. In the post-war years the Bay area was expanding and our electric utility, Pacific Gas and Electric, was also expanding to meet demand. In May 1958, the company acquired property on Bodega Head, revealing plans to build a “steam-electric generating plant” there. Rose Gaffney owned 400 acres on The Head, which PG&E wanted to purchase. A PG&E official confided to her that the company planned to build a nuclear plant there, “but they didn’t want the public to know yet.”
In 1961, finally, PG&E revealed that the proposed plant would be a 340-megawatt nuclear power plant. The state Public Utilities Commission OK’d the permit, subject to approval from the federal Atomic Energy Commission (AEC). PG&E was so confident of future permitting that it began to ready the site, including digging what was designed to be a 90-foot by 120-foot hole to house the reactor.
Public action against the plan went on for years. “PG&E said that if there was any threat to public safety, they would not build it,” Pesonen said. “What tripped up PG&E was the geology of the place.” PG&E claimed that innovative engineering techniques would eliminate damage to the reactor building in the event of an earthquake. Pesonen and others were skeptical and brought in Pierre Saint-Amand, a respected geologist who prepared the definitive reports on the catastrophic Chilean earthquake of 1960. He discovered the San Andreas fault ran right through the foundation.
On Oct. 30, 1964, PG&E president Robert Gerdes withdrew its application and canceled plans for the plant.
Of all California locations, this would seem to have been one of the worst. Prevailing winds would have carried radiation over the entire Bay area. On Memorial Day 1963, organizers released 1,500 helium-filled balloons from Bodega Head. The balloons represented radioactive isotopes, and their random flight dramatized to local dairy farmers how far airborne contamination from the PG&E site could drift.
I asked an image AI program to show what this might have looked like.
Hot water discharge; no more whales.
Had y’all heard of this before? I thought of it when I saw The Head from the view of our rental house.
The distant hill on the center left is Bodega Head.
