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Press backgrounder, July 30, 2020
Permalink * Prior press releases
Earthquake today near Capulin NM, in context
Contact: Greg Mello, 505-265-1200 (office) 505-577-8563 (cell)
Re: Richter 3.7 earthquake near Capulin, NM
Somewhat rushed bulletin. I have since updated this bulletin with a few more lurid details and handy references, and have corrected a couple of typos.
h/t Los Alamos Reporter, which alerted us to this quake and whose article was published while the first version of this review was in process ("Seismic Activity Reported Thursday Morning In Los Alamos Possibly Due To Earthquake In Rio Capulin Area, No Reports Of Local Damage," LAR, July 30, 2020).
Dear colleagues --
The modest Capulin earthquake at 9:04 am this morning, which sources tell us was felt at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), serves as a reminder that LANL is bordered on the west by an active fault which has experienced multiple Holocene (<11,650 years before present) earthquakes in the high Richter 6 or low Richter 7 scale, i.e. roughly 2,500 times as much energy as today's Capulin earthquake.
Accelerations comparable to those experienced at the Fukushima Daishi nuclear power station in 2011 are possible, including vertical accelerations greater than 1 gravity at LANL's plutonium area (TA-55) (tables ES-1 & ES-2, 2007 PSHA).
An active fault lies beneath the main technical area at LANL (TA-3); other faults also traverse LANL (plates 1 &2, 2007 PSHA).
The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and LANL management, and more so key members of Congress, do not appear to have taken on board the full measure of seismic hazard at LANL -- specifically at TA-55 although also elsewhere -- in their planning assumptions.
Of special note, the incompetent lower horizon of Unit Three of the Tshirege Member of the Bandelier Tuff ("Qbt3L"), which is present across LANL, is of signal importance in any plans to construct new or replacement nuclear facilities on the south portion of TA-55, the only portion available for construction. The geologic and seismic properties of this stratum necessitated a complete redesign of the then-proposed Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Nuclear Facility (CMRR-NF) to meet the nuclear safety requirements of 10 CFR 830. The proposed underground production modules, currently required by statute if CMRR-NF was not built (it wasn't; this is inexplicably not mentioned in NNSA's Draft Supplement Analysis) would not meet those standards, according to NNSA's Engineering Assessment.
NNSA does not know at this time, and will not know until at least the end of 2021, whether its main plutonium facility would remain standing in a design-basis earthquake (in context, see slide 49, referencing the important DNFSB Weekly Site Report of 12/28/18). (I would have to check my notes, but I believe completion of the referenced dynamic seismic analyses have been extended beyond 2021 and are now contingent upon the results of physical models being constructed in Nevada.)
NNSA identified these geotechnical issues in 2011 facing CMRR-NF (see p. 4-45), resulting from the combination of high seismicity, the presence of a thick, loose stratum of volcanic ash beneath TA-55 (Qbt3L), and the lateral proximity of a deep canyon (Twomile Canyon) on the south side of TA-55:
- Potential for static deflection (compression)
- Potential for hydro-collapse, due to wetting
- Potential for excessive movement of buttress, due to dynamic slope instability
- Inadequate resistance to dynamic sliding forces
- Seismic shaking and building response
These geotechnical issues were among the primary drivers of the cost increases experienced in the case of CMRR-NF, necessitating complete a redesign featuring replacement of the Qbt3L stratum with 60' thick concrete subfoundation, the bottom of which would lie at a depth of 130' below the ground surface. A 10' thick foundation was to rest on this, on top of which three building floors would be constructed below ground, with the 4th floor and an equipment penthouse above ground (pp. 45-46).
Also, numerous LANL facilities did not meet federal life safety standards even in 1994, when design basis earthquake accelerations were much smaller than today, including some nuclear facilities (the CMR Building, Main Shops, and Sigma Building in TA-3; the Tritium Facility in TA-16 [sitting almost atop the Pajarito Fault], and what is now the WCRR facility in TA-50 were among the known examples in 1994; to this list we must add the newer Emergency Operations Center, which was unfortunately built more or less on the Pajarito Fault, evidence of which was mapped during foundation trenching for the facility). Potential mass wasting threatens some canyon-bottom and mesa-edge facilities, possibly including -- according to one LANL report -- the Los Alamos Medical Center, as well as well as roads accessing LANL. It should be noted that Los Alamos County recently replaced its main administrative building in part because of seismic inadequacy. We have not been able to obtain a current list of seismically-challenged LANL facilities.
The primary analysis of the geological aspects of seismic risk at LANL remains this, from 2007:
This older web page provides some additional limited background to the ever-evolving subject of seismic risk to LANL buildings. We maintain extensive files on this topic.
After a review in our office beginning in 1996 (occasioned by a tip-off from industrial safety experts in the Bay Area, former clients of mine), and thanks to a local retired geologist, we were finally able to break the story of LANL's high seismic risk in 1997, leading -- via joint litigation we co-organized later that same year -- to the court-ordered studies that confirmed faulting in TA-3 beneath the CMR Building, which was at the time an essential facility for the new pit production mission. That mission has never gotten off the ground at LANL.
Dr. Jamie Gardner, then LANL's leading seismologist, told us in 1997 that LANL management had offered to classify his geological and seismic studies. He refused. Later, Dr. Gardner briefed the conclusions of what became the 2007 PSHA years to the Los Alamos Geological Society on September 13, 2005 (please see our 2007 review, "Numerous Infrastructure and Safety Deficiencies Impact Plutonium Pit Production at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL)"). This was in plenty of time for the higher accelerations by then known to be possible to be fully incorporated into the design of the Radiological Laboratory, Utility, and Office Building (RLUOB, now called "PF-400"). Since RLUOB was not at the time slated to be a nuclear facility, they were not. Nevertheless PF-400 is being slowly transformed post-hoc, at great cost, into a Hazard Category III Nuclear Facility, partly by means of self-granted variances from the stringent nuclear safety requirements of 10 CFR 830.
Although the details have changed since 1997 (e.g. there is apparently no evidence of an active fault under TA-55), the overall picture has not changed: LANL is a far more seismically-active site than was understood up to then, with high seismic hazard for nuclear activities and facilities. Senior management -- scientists generally, but not of the right sort for this issue apparently -- do not want to admit this. Neither do many members of Congress, who tend to think they can legislate different realities than those existing in specific faraway places.
These geological realities -- however apparent they may be, in the non-cliff-forming, powdery stratum comprising unstable slopes below the striking cliffs visible to the most casual visitor to Los Alamos -- remain below official consciousness, because they conflict in costly ways with the nuclear safety standards of 10 CFR 830. Over the past quarter-century, sometimes sound engineering has come out on top and sometimes Cold War geopolitics, institutional growth imperatives, and blind inertia have won.
We remain mystified as to why anyone would imagine LANL to be a good place for industrial plutonium activity. The tectonic rift and resulting volcanism that created the beautiful scenery of the region have also made the ground unstable and topographically challenging for industrial activity.
Greg Mello
***ENDS***
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