San Onofre shutdown will mean tight electricity supplies

[PamW]

103. Engineers can engineer for the forces.

I always ask people who are so concerned about earthquakes how they would feel if when the "big one" strikes San Francisco, they happened to be in a branch office of the Wells Fargo bank. The branch manager gets all the employees and customers into the vault.

If you are fortunate enough to ride out the "big one" in a bank vault; you are really lucky. The bank vault is designed to withstand forces that are much greater than what earthquakes can engender.

Just because earthquakes can be deadly to our homes and other buildings; doesn't mean that humans can't build structures that can survive the forces of an earthquake.

The bank vault can withstand anything even a large earthquake can engender.

One just has to analyze the faults that threaten a plant. One determines what type of earthquake forces and accelerations those faults can engender. Then one designs the structure to survive those forces / accelerations.

That's what is done in nuclear power plant design.

PamW