NRC Blocks Longstanding Challenge to MOX License
Kenneth Fletcher
NS&D Monitor
5/22/2015
Rejecting a longstanding challenge to the operating license of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility regarding security concerns, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission recently struck down an appeal by activist groups in a 2-1 vote. The groups, including Nuclear Watch South, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League and Nuclear Information and Resource Service, claimed that the security system proposed by contractor CB&I AREVA MOX Services relies too heavily on computer systems and is vulnerable to cyber-attacks. The NRC vote on the appeal comes after a February 2014 decision against the claims by an NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Board.
MOX Services heralded the latest NRC decision, supported by NRC Commissioners William Ostendorff and Kristine Svinicki and opposed by Commissioner Jeff Baran. “This is a very significant ruling for us as we continue to make progress on the MOX facility and with our licensing,” contractor President and Project Manager David Del Vecchio said in a statement. “The safety of our employees and the security of the facility continue to be first and foremost in the design, construction and operation of the MOX facility.”
However, the groups challenging the operating license strongly disagreed with the vote. “The NRC’s decision reflects an astonishing level of complacency about growing cyberthreats to our nation’s critical infrastructure,” Edwin Lyman, a senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) and an expert witness during the ASLB proceeding, said in a statement. “It is tantamount to leaving a door wide open for hackers, terrorists and foreign governments to interfere with the computer systems that the MOX facility will rely on to detect stolen weapon-usable plutonium. Cyber intruders could exploit these vulnerabilities to facilitate or cover up plutonium thefts by falsifying accounting records and compromising security systems.”
