WASHINGTON, D.C. – Industry analysts told a subcommittee of the Government Oversight Committee Tuesday that Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) standards are slowing down advanced nuclear deployment.
At the same time, a former NRC chairman said stripping NRC of its independence could undermine public confidence in the safety of nuclear power plants.
Alex Epstein, founder of the Center for Industrial Progress, and Joshua Smith, energy policy lead of Abundance Institute, testified at a House Oversight subcommittee on Economic growth, Energy Policy and Regulatory Affairs hearing.
The two industry representatives said NRC has stifled advanced deployment through irrational regulations.
The NRC’s current regulation is not suited for microreactor and small modular reactor (SMR) deployment, Smith said. Bipartisan legislation such the ADVANCE Act, and Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act (NEIMA) have been enacted to enable new forms of nuclear technology. However, the ADVANCE Act is only a year old and Smith said NEIMA has failed to garner the intended surge of SMR deployment.
House oversight subcommittee chairman Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) concurred with the sentiment as he said advanced nuclear technology, particularly SMR and microreactors, are ready but is held back by strict regulations.
Former NRC commissioner and chair Stephen Burns, who was the third panelist at the hearing, voiced concerns about the “push and pull over efficacy and appropriateness of the licensing process”, as he said in his opening statement.
Burns also indicated that past nuclear accidents like the partial nuclear meltdown at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania during 1979 have damaged public confidence in prior years.
Epstein offered recommendations of how the NRC streamline such as using general environmental impact statements over project-specific ones and replacing as low as reasonable allows (ALARA) with science-based radiation limits.
Reevaluating ALARA was also something President Donald Trump’s administration called one of its May 23 nuclear-related executive orders, Ordering the Reform of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
However, Burns voiced concerns about stripping the nuclear regulator’s independence, which could undermine the agency’s credibility and public trust instilled at the national and international level.
The existence of the independent agency is needed not only to prioritize nuclear safety but to ensure public trust on a national and international level, Burns said. Burns said past nuclear accidents like the partial reactor meltdown at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania as events that hurt public trust in nuclear in prior years.
Democrats Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) and Dave Min (D-Calif.) shared similar concerns with Burns.
“I think this is really important and I think this can actually do nuclear a huge disservice in deregulating out the wazoo just to rubber stamp stuff for something to happen and can put us back decades, decades and decades,” Frost said in his opening remarks.
