The US Geological Survey estimates the cost of installing a ShakeAlert system on the west coast of the country will be around $40 million, and some $16 million a year will be required to operate it, Courthouse News reports.
"We've seen the devastation earthquakes have caused in California," Brown said in a statement. "This keeps us on track to build a statewide warning system that can potentially save lives."
On Saturday, the Governor's Office of Emergency Services put the state on heightened alert of the possibility of a major earthquake following a series of small tremors along the San Andreas fault.
The San Andreas typically experiences a massive quake about once every 300 years, but the southernmost end hasn't ruptured significantly since 1690.
"There is significant stress stored on the southern end," Morgan Page, a geophysicist with the USGS, told Fox 11.
Residents in Ventura, San Diego, San Bernardino, Riverside, Orange, Los Angeles, Kern and Imperial counties have been advised that the chance of a large earthquake happening between now and Tuesday is about one percent higher than normal.
"The scientists rated that there was an increased probability of up to 1 percent, so a slight increase," Ventura County Office of Emergency Services spokesman Kevin McGowan said in a statement, adding, "it is a great reminder to us that we live in earthquake country and that earthquakes […] strike suddenly, violently and with no warning, so everyone's best bet is to be prepared."
