NR Effort to Develop the Nuclear Pumping Station in California

The California Nuclear Water Project: A Naval Reactors Initiative

I. Introduction

In the early 1960s, California embarked on an ambitious mission to ensure long-term water security through the California Water Project—a massive state infrastructure initiative aimed at redistributing water from the northern part of the state to the increasingly arid and populous south. One of the major challenges of this system was the Tehachapi lift: the transportation of water over the rugged Tehachapi Mountains, which demanded a constant, reliable source of large-scale electrical power. This energy-intensive need prompted the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) to explore innovative energy sources, including nuclear power.

What followed was a unique partnership between the State of California and Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, head of the U.S. Navy’s Naval Reactors program. Though ultimately unsuccessful in deployment, the effort remains a compelling case study in intergovernmental cooperation, visionary engineering, and the political and technical boundaries of nuclear innovation. This report offers a detailed account of the technical design, challenges, political negotiations, and eventual cancellation of the nuclear pumping project, highlighting Rickover’s role and the broader implications for nuclear energy policy.

II. Project Background: Water Scarcity and the Promise of Nuclear Power

By the late 1950s, water shortages in Southern California had reached a crisis point. Under the leadership of Governor Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, the state passed the $1.75 billion bond measure in 1960 to fund the California Water Project. This included the construction of the Oroville Dam, hundreds of miles of aqueducts and tunnels, and a series of powerful pumping stations. The centerpiece of the challenge was the Tehachapi pumping station, which would require over 1,000 megawatts of electrical capacity to lift water nearly 2,000 feet over the mountain pass.

State officials, including DWR Director William E. Warne, began investigating nuclear power as a long-term, cost-stable solution to this immense energy requirement. The potential use of nuclear power aligned with the state’s ambition to lead in modern infrastructure while reducing dependence on fluctuating fossil fuel markets.

III. Naval Reactors Engagement and Rickover's Initial Pitch

Admiral Rickover had long shown interest in expanding the use of nuclear energy beyond naval applications. Already successful in deploying pressurized water reactors (PWRs) aboard submarines and the first U.S. civilian plant at Shippingport, Rickover maintained close watch over civilian nuclear developments. In 1963, California contracted with industry for a feasibility study, and Naval Reactors (NR) soon entered the conversation.

On September 23, 1963, Rickover and Harry Mandil (NRHQ 1949-1964) briefed state officials in Los Angeles on a seed-blanket breeder reactor design, capable of delivering 500 megawatts with an unprecedented 10-year core life. Rickover was clear-eyed about the economics—nuclear power would not be cheaper than conventional sources in the short term—but he stressed its long-term potential, reliability, and strategic value.

The pitch intrigued California leadership. Governor Brown expressed strong interest, especially following a July 1964 visit to the Mare Island Naval Shipyard where he toured the Polaris submarine USS Stonewall Jackson with Rickover. That visit symbolized Brown’s faith in the emerging nuclear age, as he saw potential to link California’s infrastructural challenges with national technological leadership.

IV. The Seed-Blanket Reactor Design: Promise and Complexity

The seed-blanket design was a variant of a thermal breeder reactor concept. It featured a "seed" region containing highly enriched uranium that would drive the reaction, surrounded by a "blanket" of fertile material like thorium-232 or uranium-238 to breed new fissile fuel. In theory, this arrangement could extend fuel life, reduce refueling downtime, and even produce more fuel than it consumed.

However, implementing this concept at scale for a civilian project introduced new challenges:

• Fuel Anomalies: Testing revealed unexpected swelling and deformation of oxide fuel pellets under irradiation. The fuel exerted excessive pressure on the cladding, raising risk of breach.

• Materials Uncertainty: Original estimates for thermal conductivity, mechanical strength, and chemical compatibility of materials were found inadequate during irradiation testing.

• Analytical Modeling Gaps: Bettis Lab developed a computational code (CYGRO-I) to simulate fuel-cladding interaction, but its predictions were only as good as the input data—which remained incomplete.

The reactor's ten-year core life, triple that of most commercial plants, demanded fuel reliability far beyond proven limits. Rickover emphasized no compromise would be made on reactor safety or performance.

V. Negotiation and the Draft Agreement

In late 1963, Warne visited the Bettis Laboratory and Shippingport facility, accompanied by James Ramey of the AEC and Congressman Chet Holifield. Warne was impressed by Naval Reactors' technical rigor and began serious negotiations.

A draft agreement submitted by Warne in December 1963 proposed a cooperative arrangement:

• California would provide the site and fund $80 million in capital expenses.

• The AEC would provide $20 million in reactor R&D and training.

• California would operate the plant and own all assets except the first core.

• The power cost from the plant would not exceed alternatives available at the site.

By early 1965, with support from Seaborg, Holifield, and the Bureau of the Budget, the project was formally included in the president’s federal budget.

VI. Mounting Technical Concerns and Rickover's Decision

Despite initial momentum, technical reviews in early 1965 revealed disturbing anomalies. In January, a review led by Philip Clark (NRHQ 1954-1979)  raised doubts about fuel fabrication and test consistency. In February, Rickover attended a Bettis meeting and sensed growing unease.

A task force led by Robert Ross (Bettis) was convened to reanalyze the fuel program. Their April report revealed fundamental gaps in data, modeling, and testing. While many engineers still believed the challenges were surmountable, Rickover's instincts told him otherwise.

On April 9, 1965, after consulting David Leighton (NRHQ 1953-1980), who advised killing the project, Rickover gathered the rest of his team. One by one, they expressed support for continuation. Rickover overruled them.

Within days, he flew to California and informed Governor Brown, William Warne, and others that Naval Reactors would withdraw. Though disappointed, Brown and Warne accepted the decision without public protest, reaffirming respect for Rickover’s integrity and transparency.

VII. Reflections from the California Oral Histories

The oral histories preserved by the Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley capture how state leaders viewed the project. William Warne recalled the technical brilliance of Rickover's team and the high standards at Bettis, noting that the effort was a rare example of cooperation between state and federal engineering leadership.

Governor Pat Brown, in interviews conducted years later, described the nuclear project as a bold idea that epitomized the optimism of the 1960s. He admitted that Rickover’s decision, though disappointing, reinforced the trustworthiness of federal partners: "He didn’t leave us in the lurch—he came in, looked us in the eye, and told us the truth."

Chet Holifield and Glenn Seaborg, both close observers, later remarked on the absence of political fallout. Rickover's reputation had only grown due to his principled stance. Rather than pushing forward to save face, he had preserved institutional integrity—a rare act in the political-technical world.

VIII. Aftermath and Reorientation: Lessons for Shippingport

Following the project’s cancellation, Naval Reactors reoriented efforts toward demonstrating breeding in the Shippingport plant, which had been Rickover's flagship civilian nuclear site. The breeder concept, refined through the California studies, informed the core design used in Shippingport's 1977 Light Water Breeder Reactor (LWBR) experiment.

The lessons learned in California—particularly regarding fuel behavior, core life modeling, and breeder ratios—proved invaluable. Shippingport successfully demonstrated breeding with uranium-233 and thorium, validating much of the theoretical groundwork despite the California project's demise.

IX. Summary and Legacy

The California nuclear water project remains an instructive case of how visionary public infrastructure, military-industrial technical expertise, and political ambition can intersect. The collaboration between Rickover and the State of California marked a rare convergence of federal and state engineering visions.

Ultimately, the project was ahead of its time. The seed-blanket reactor concept was technically feasible but required a level of fuel performance, testing, and modeling that exceeded the limits of the 1960s. Rickover’s decision to cancel the project preserved his program's credibility and prevented costly delays to California’s critical water infrastructure.

More than anything, the episode reflects Rickover's core principles: uncompromising technical standards, personal accountability, and a deep respect for public trust. In a time when many leaders might have doubled down, Rickover backed away. The decision, far from being a failure, became a defining moment in his legacy.

X.  Non-Nuclear Completion of the Tehachapi Lift

Although Naval Reactors withdrew from the California nuclear water project in 1965, the underlying hydraulic problem it was intended to solve did not go away. California still had to move vast quantities of water from the northern reservoirs across the Tehachapi range and down into the thirsty metropolitan areas of Southern California. As described in the earlier sections of this paper, the proposed seed-blanket reactor was conceived as a dedicated, long-lived power source for this lift; when that option disappeared, the Department of Water Resources proceeded with a fully conventional alternative powered from the state’s electrical grid.

By the early 1970s that alternative had taken physical shape as the A. D. Edmonston Pumping Plant at the Tehachapi crossing. A September 1972 feature in Popular Science—“Slaking California’s Mammoth Thirst with the World’s Largest Water Project,” by Joseph Zmuda—presented the plant and the broader California Aqueduct as a completed or nearly completed system and explicitly highlighted the Tehachapi lift as its most demanding technical element. The article’s diagrams and photographs show the Edmonston facility occupying essentially the same geographic role envisioned for the nuclear plant: it lifts water from the San Joaquin Valley floor through tunnels and surge chambers to crest the Tehachapi Mountains before it flows south toward Los Angeles and San Diego.

Instead of a single nuclear unit coupled directly to the pumps, the finished station relies on a bank of very large motor-pump assemblies drawing power from the interconnected California grid. The Edmonston plant was designed with fourteen pump units, each a multi-stage centrifugal pump driven by a high-horsepower synchronous motor rated at 60MW each. According to the 1972 account, the station can raise water on the order of 1,900–2,000 feet—one of the highest single lifts in the world—moving on the order of several billion gallons per day when operating at full capacity. A pair of steel-lined tunnels, surge tanks, and massive butterfly valves control the flow as it accelerates up the mountain and smooths out transients that would otherwise damage equipment downstream.

Number of units: 14 

Normal static head: 1,970 ft 

Motor rating: 80,000 hp (60 MW) each

Total motor rating: 1,120,000 hp (840 MW))

Flow per motor at design head: 315 cubic feet per second

Total flow at design head: 4410 cubic feet per second

Edmonton Pumping Plant - Popular Science September 1972

The same article underscores that the Tehachapi lift is embedded in a far larger, system-of-systems architecture that mirrors many of the operational concepts discussed during the nuclear option’s formative period. Lake Oroville and other northern reservoirs regulate inflow; an underground hydroelectric station at Oroville generates power as water is released; off-peak electricity is used to pump additional water into afterbays; and a centralized control center in Sacramento supervises system status while regional centers handle day-to-day pump and valve operations. In essence, the State Water Project achieved the reliability and dispatchability once sought through a dedicated nuclear plant by integrating hydropower, fossil-fueled generation, and sophisticated remote control into a single coordinated network.

From an engineering-history standpoint, the Edmonston Pumping Plant can therefore be seen as the non-nuclear realization of the problem Naval Reactors was asked to solve. The mission—lifting California’s water supply over the Tehachapis to sustain the growth of Southern California—remained unchanged. What differed was the choice of energy source and the risk posture. Rather than accepting the technical uncertainties of an advanced breeder-type reactor, California and its federal partners chose to rely on proven pump and motor technology backed by a rapidly expanding statewide grid. The resulting facility became a showcase element of what contemporary commentators called “the world’s largest water project,” and it has continued to perform the function that, for a brief period in the early 1960s, was slated to be carried out by a Naval Reactors–designed nuclear power plant.

Bibliography

• Duncan, Francis. Rickover and the Nuclear Navy. U.S. Department of Energy, 1990.

• California Department of Water Resources. Oral Histories on California Water Policy. University of California, Berkeley, Regional Oral History Office.

• Seaborg, Glenn T. Stemming the Tide: Arms Control in the Johnson Administration. (For insight into AEC dynamics).

• Warne, William E. Administration of the Department of Water Resources, 1961-1966. Oral History Transcript, UC Berkeley.

• Joseph Zmuda, “Slaking California’s Mammoth Thirst with the World’s Largest Water Project,” Popular Science, vol. 201, no. 3 (September 1972).