A few days ago, I posted a blog entry about a Chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission named Gregory Jaczko who just resigned. There was a controversy about his resignation with claims that he was essentially driven out of his position by supporters of the nuclear industry because of his criticism of the NRC regulatory process being too lenient with the industry. Jaczko and nuclear proponents are currently engaged in a very public argument about the safety of U.S. commercial nuclear reactors.
Recently, at the Carnegie International Nuclear Policy Conference, Jaczko said that the problem of dissipating the heat from radioactive decay in the case of an extreme accident such as Fukushima was simply unsolvable for existing U.S. nuclear reactor designs. He suggested that the current reactor be phased out and replace. One option would be a new generation of small modular reactors with passive safety systems which could prevent potential core meltdowns following accidents without having to be supplied with any external power.
The U.S. nuclear industry trade group, the Nuclear Energy Institute, quickly responded to Jaczko’s charges and claimed that NRC was successful in keeping the U.S. nuclear fleet safe. The NEI talked about the new FLEX response strategy which consists of adding more portable backup equipment to each existing reactor. This equipment would include portable electrical generators, diesel-driven pumps and satellite phones which could provide power, cooling water and communications at plants experiencing extreme events. This sounds great but there are some serious problems with the industry assurances.
There are many documented instances of power plants failing to purchase and install equipment mandated by NRC regulations and industry standards. In addition, there are documented instances of power plants purchasing substandard or non-functional equipment. Often, equipment is installed improperly. Even if the proper equipment is purchased and correctly installed by each plant, there are many recorded instances of plants failing to maintain the equipment that they have and many cases of falsification of tests.
The NRC has a poor record of conscientious inspections. When inspections are made and problems found, the NRC often just warns the plant operators over and over without taking any other action. When the NRC demands that repairs and corrections be made, there are many case of incompetence during the repairs that lead to problems later on. There are also promises for repairs and improvements made by plant operators that are never kept.
When two parties are arguing opposite sides of an important question, there is always the problem of who to believe. In this debate, you have a dedicated public servant who has already had his career derailed by speaking out against the current fleet of nuclear reactors. On the other side of the debate, you have an industry trade group that is supported by companies making billions of dollars off the construction and operating of the current type of nuclear reactors. Even if I had no knowledge about the safety of current U.S. reactors, I would have to wonder if the opinions of the trade group might not be biased in the direction of saying things that would allow their members to continuing profiting from nuclear energy generation whether or not what they were saying was really true.
