LOS ANGELES — In a jolt to the nation’s nuclear power industry, the owners of Southern California’s San Onofre plant announced Friday they are shutting it down for good after the discovery of damaged equipment led critics to charge it could never operate safely again.
The twin reactors — situated along the densely populated corridor between San Diego and Los Angeles — would be the largest to shut down permanently in the United States in the past 50 years, federal officials said.
Southern California Edison’s decision brings to a sudden end a dispute that began in January 2012, when a small radiation leak led to the discovery of unusual damage to hundreds of virtually new tubes that carry radioactive water. The plant hasn’t produced electricity since then.
Edison has already spent more than $500 million on repairs and replacement power and was facing a snarl of regulatory hurdles, investigations, and mounting political opposition as it planned to restart one reactor this year.
Ted Craver, chairman of SCE parent Edison International, said in a statement that the company concluded that ‘‘continuing uncertainty about when or if [the plant] might return to service was not good for our customers, our investors, or the need to plan for our region’s long-term electricity needs.’’
San Onofre, which opened in 1968, was capable of powering 1.4 million homes. California officials have said they can make it through the hot season without the plant as long as the summer is uneventful, but warned that wildfires or another disruption in supply could cause power shortages.
It will take months, and possibly years, to completely close the reactors, known as decommissioning.