In the wake of the devastating tsunami damage to the Fukushima
Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Japan, seismologists in the United
States are focusing on a potentially dangerous fault system near
the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant in California. Perched
over Point Buchon on the Central Coast, the Pacific Gas and
Electric Co. plant was built four decades ago near two active
faults: the Hosgri and the Shoreline. The electricity-generating
plant on a barren stretch of coastline is about 12 miles from
the college town of San Luis Obispo. While PG&E maintains the
Hosgri and Shoreline are too small to threaten the aging plant,
some government scientists suspect the faults - acting with
others in the region - could produce an earthquake much more
powerful than the plant was built to withstand. For now, the
scientists are being cautious. Sam Johnson, a U.S. Geological
Survey scientist, was reluctant to speculate about whether the
area's fault system is actually much longer, and therefore more
powerful, than now predicted