Nuclear Regulatory Commission - Criticism

Criticism

The Atomic Energy Commission was dissolved because it was perceived as unduly favoring the industry it was charged with regulating, and the NRC "seems to have fallen into the same trap". A 1987 Congressional report entitled "NRC Coziness with Industry" concluded that the NRC "has not maintained an arms length regulatory posture with the commercial nuclear power industry... has, in some critical areas, abdicated its role as a regulator altogether". To cite just three examples:

A 1986 Congressional report found that NRC staff had provided valuable technical assistance to the utility seeking an operating license for the controversial Seabrook plant. In the late 1980s, the NRC 'created a policy' of non-enforcement by asserting its discretion not to enforcement with license conditions; between September 1989 and 1994, the 'NRC has either waived or chosen not to enforce regulations at nuclear power reactors over 340 times'. Finally, critics charge that the NRC has ceded important aspects of regulatory authority to the industry's own Institute for Nuclear Power Operations (INPO), an organization formed by utilities in response to the Three Mile Island Accident.

According to Byrne and Hoffman, since the 1980s the NRC has generally favored the interests of nuclear industry and has been unduly responsive to industry concerns. The NRC has often failed to pursue tough regulation. At the same time, it has sought to hamper or deny public access to the regulatory process and created new barriers to public participation.

According to Frank N. von Hippel, despite the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, the NRC has often been too timid in ensuring that America’s 104 commercial reactors are operated safely:

Nuclear power is a textbook example of the problem of “regulatory capture” — in which an industry gains control of an agency meant to regulate it. Regulatory capture can be countered only by vigorous public scrutiny and Congressional oversight, but in the 32 years since Three Mile Island, interest in nuclear regulation has declined precipitously.

There are many forms of regulatory failure, including regulations on the books which lie dormant by the common consent of regulators and industry:

A worker (George Galatis) at the Millstone nuclear power plant in Connecticut kept warning management that the spent fuel rods were being put too quickly into the spent storage pool and that the number of rods in the pool exceeded specifications. Management ignored him, so he went directly to the NRC, which eventually admitted that it knew of both of the forbidden practices, which happened at many plants, but chose to ignore them. The whistleblower was fired and blacklisted.

In 2007, Barack Obama, then running for president, said that the five-member Nuclear Regulatory Commission had become "captive of the industries that it regulates" and a nuclear policy analyst at Greenpeace USA has called the agency approval process a "rubber stamp".

In Vermont, the day before the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami that damaged Japan's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, the NRC approved a 20-year extension for the license of Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant, although the Vermont state legislature voted overwhelmingly to deny an extension. The plant had been found to be leaking radioactive materials through a network of underground pipes, which Entergy had denied under oath even existed. Tony Klein, chairman of the Vermont House Natural Resources and Energy Committee asked the NRC about the pipes at a hearing in 2009 and the NRC did not even know they existed.

On March 17, 2011, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released a study critical of the NRC's 2010 performance as a regulator. The UCS said that over the years, it had found the NRC's enforcement of safety rules has not been “timely, consistent, or effective" and it cited 14 "near-misses" at U.S. plants in 2010 alone.

In April 2011, Reuters reported that the NRC exists to police, not promote, the domestic nuclear industry -- but diplomatic cables show that it is sometimes used as a sales tool to help push American technology to foreign governments, when "lobbying for the purchase of equipment made by Westinghouse and other domestic manufacturers". This gives the appearance of a regulator which is acting in a commercial capacity, "raising concerns about a potential conflict of interest".

San Clemente Green, an environmental group opposed to the continued operation of the San Onofre Nuclear Plant, says that instead of being a watchdog, the NRC too often rules in favor nuclear plant operators.

Edward J. Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts, has been a longtime critic of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. He has been critical of the NRC's decision-making on the proposed Westinghouse AP1000 reactor design and the NRC response to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.

In July 2011, Mark Cooper said that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is "on the defensive to prove it is doing its job of ensuring safety".

In October 2011, Gregory B. Jaczko, chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, described "a tension between wanting to move in a timely manner on regulatory questions, and not wanting to go too fast".