nuclear-news

United States: White House Threatens Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Independence

 Energy Intelligence Group, Jessica Sondgeroth, Washington, 21 Feb 25,

The Trump administration’s expansive assertion of presidential power now threatens the independence of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) after the White House this week issued an executive order (EO) claiming control over federal agencies that were established to be independent of politics. The Feb. 18 EO tasks the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) with the authority to manage independent agencies’ obligations and spending to ensure they align with “the President’s policies and priorities.” These agencies will also have to submit for review to an OMB office “all proposed and final significant regulatory actions.” The extent to which this erodes the NRC’s independence may vary depending on how NRC responds and on OMB actions taken, but nuclear energy sector veterans, critics and advocates are nonetheless waving red flags.

The White House decision “to meddle in safety regulation” is “devastating,” former NRC chair Allison Macfarlane, now a policy professor at the University of British Columbia, told Energy Intelligence. “The US NRC used to be referred to as the ‘gold standard’ for nuclear regulators. No longer. Now other countries can take that mantle.” Macfarlane said that as NRC chair, she spent years championing regulatory independence “to ensure national security and economic security. A nuclear accident, as happened in Japan, can devastate a country’s economy, not to mention its nuclear industry. I guess the folks at the White House have never learned this lesson?”

The EO, titled “Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies”, is only the latest White House challenge to the independence of various executive agencies and to Congressional lawmaking, from science and health research to environmental oversight to public education. This particular EO seeks to broaden the White House’s authority over independent regulatory agencies, including the Federal Trade Commission, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Federal Communications Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission. The EO does make some exceptions, but the NRC is not among them.

……………………………………………Given “the blatant and unmitigated conflicts of interest in the White House, and the newfound love among Trump and Elon [Musk]’s tech bro friends for nuclear power,” Ed Lyman, a nuclear regulatory watchdog at the Union of Concerned Scientists, warned in an email that the agency “could be turned into a mere rubber stamp for whatever projects are favored by the President at the moment.” This could override the NRC’s “public health and safety mandate in the name of ‘consistency with the President’s policies and priorities.'”

The NRC was established as an independent agency by Congress in the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974. That law took the NRC’s predecessor, the Atomic Energy Commission, and split its regulatory and promotional roles into the NRC and what is today the US Department of Energy (DOE), respectively. “The NRC was explicitly created to be independent of energy system policy goals under the Atomic Energy Commission that Congress perceived as too political and influenced by the industry,”  Adam Stein, nuclear energy innovation director, noted. “Shifting from an independent agency to an agency under direct control of one party under the President creates the same problem from a different influence.”

……………………The nuclear industry lobbies Congress for favorable policies but also communicates directly with the NRC through filings and public meetings to advocate for its interpretation of Congressionally-mandated regulatory reforms.

…………………….For agencies as specialized as the NRC, mass layoffs or buyouts threaten to undermine core competencies and training activities — particularly given the recent hiring of 600 staff, a growing workload of new reactor licensing activities and concerns over the aging workforce.
https://www.energyintel.com/00000195-25b1-ddbd-a9dd-3ff520010000

February 26, 2025 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety, USA