Nuclear Horror Stories: The NRC

Major Barriers to a US Nuclear Resurgence and Energy Independence

Recent Events

Unless you’ve been living under a rock the past month or so, you’ll have noticed that Russia has invaded Ukraine and the world is facing a major energy crisis. Oil, Natural Gas, and even Coal prices are spiking and there is significant uncertainty around how a transition away from fossil fuels can continue. There is a small amount of hope on the horizon, this renewed focus on energy has put nuclear power, the US’s single largest source of carbon-free energy, back in the spotlight. Aside from all the buzz that battles at nuclear sites in Ukraine has been generating there are two stories that I would like to look at and feel highlight some major barriers to new nuclear energy expansion in the US. Those two stories are the recent NRC decision to rescind the subsequent license extensions for Turkey Point and Peach Bottom, and the story about US utilities lobbying for exempting Uranium from any Russian energy sanctions. This post will cover the NRC decision.

Regulatory Horror Story

Alright, imagine for a moment that your driver’s license is about to expire. You need to go get a new one. So you look online, see the list of documents you need for a renewal, collect everything you need and head on down to the DMV. You wait in line for a few hours, get up to the desk, present your documents, pay $100 (RealID), and get your shiny new license. Great right? All set for a few more years.

Fast forward a month and you get a letter in the mail from the DMV. It informs you that your new license is no longer valid and that you need to go back into the DMV to get a new one. So you get your docs, wait in line, get up to the counter, and the lady behind the desk asks you for your written evidence of having completed a driver’s ed course. It’s been years and you have no idea where any of that is, you’ve never needed it before. You ask the person behind the counter what gives, what law requires this? They show you this:

Aha! You say, but that’s only for the initial licensure, I already have a license I’m just getting it renewed. Wrong the DMV rep tells you, the heads of the DMV recently decided that they felt the “initial” language shouldn’t really apply in this case and have decided that previous interpretations should have ignored the “initial” wording and gotten rid of that wording. So you ask “but isn’t this written document the literal word of law?”. “Yes” they respond, “we want to update it and we will do so in the future, but felt that this was a grave risk to public safety so we are changing the implementation of the law”.

”Well then, what do I need to do to get my driver’s license back” you ask? Oh, just everything you had to do to get it in the first place, pay for and attend driver’s ed, complete the program, return to the DMV, and pay the fees for a new license. No the DMV won’t help cover any of it, no you do not get credit for the fee you already paid, oh, and the rules might change before you get done doing your driver’s ed course such that it becomes invalid! What will the new rules be? No one knows!

Sounds like a nightmare right? Well that’s basically what went down with the NRC and the license extensions for two nuclear power plants. Except instead of being out a few hours / days and $100, those operators are out 18-20 months and millions of dollars…

NRC Rescinds Previously Issued 80y Life Extensions

On Feb 24th, 2022, under pressure from anti-nuclear NGOs, such as Beyond Nuclear and the NRDC, the NRC made the unprecedented move to rescind previously granted life extensions for several plants. These extensions were granted in 2020 after an 18 month review process. The TL;DR of the argument for walking back on the previous decision was the lack of language applying specifically to subsequent license extensions with regards to requirements to produce a new full environmental report. The current language of the regulation says that a reduced report can be used by “seeking an initial renewed license” but there is no language for “any renewed license”. The previous commission interpreted this as meaning that the reduced process allowed by the only renewal process, which is lableled “initial” should and could be applied to subsequent renewals. The current commission believed that this reduced process was not applicable and that the full EIS should be required.

The argument was that this language was ambiguous and should not have been interpreted the way it was. Frankly this is ludicrous, the GEIS was already scheduled for review this year. There were numerous actions the NRC could have taken if they felt the previous language was ambiguous. The easiest would have been to update the language and grandfather in the previously granted approvals. Instead they chose an option that says one of two things; The NRC screwed up in 2020 and there was a safety issue, or the NRC screwed up in 2022 by imposing unnecessary regulatory burden. Either way this is an incredible blow to the credibility of an extremely important regulatory body.

Dissension in the Ranks

Currently only 3 of the 5 NRC commission seats are filled. Two democrats and one republican. The decision to rescind the license extensions was split along party lines with the Republican commissioner, David Wright, dissenting. Wright wrote a scathing dissension of the decision noting the wide reaching ramifications the decision would imply. You can read the full decision and Wright's dissension here.

Hints of Shenanigans

I think this twitter thread from Adam Stein demonstrates more broadly ways in which the NRC has been, and continues to be, an impediment to the nuclear industry. Not in any way that enhances safety, and possibly in ways that reduce it.

Adam Stein @Dr_A_Stein

NRC to NuScale - You don't consider uncertainty in the method. You need to do that. NuScale: the NRC requested that we remove the section on uncertainty analysis to be in line with defense in depth from rev. 1, which we did. We also agreed to add internal fire and flood events.

Adam Stein @Dr_A_Stein

UCS - I can't beleive that the NRC is allowing NuScale to not consider uncertainty in this ridiculous manner and jeopardize public safety NuScale - Then just let us put the process back in! It was there in Rev 1 of the method. (Narrator: it was on p.37)

Adam Stein @Dr_A_Stein

NRC - You need to consider uncertainty! NuScale - We were going to. NRC said remove that section. Just let us put it back NRC - Maybe we should wait and schedule another public meeting

Adam Stein @Dr_A_Stein

This is how any regulator can be an impediment (or active obstructor) of innovation while appearing to do their job - inefficiency. Revision 1 was submitted in 2018. Rev. 2 was submitted Aug 2020.

Nuscale’s design license application was submitted in 2016 and finally approved in Sept of 2020. Four years and $500 MILLION later… OH WAIT, NEVERMIND. The NRC’s website still lists it as ‘under review’…

Until recently the NRC was processing Oklo’s design license application, which they rejected out of the blue in January 2022. Currently there are 0 reactor designs, well aside from NuScale…, and 0 combined license applications under review at the NRC. Yeah, 0. This is absolutely pathetic.

Conclusions

So, the question is, given the NRC’s history, the incredibly costly and time consuming process of applying for and receiving licenses, and the new policy that the NRC can just change it’s mind after a stakeholder spends years and millions of dollars on an application, why would anyone invest in anything nuclear power related? This is happening right alongside renewed calls for energy independence, climate action, renewed environmental awareness, a global energy crisis, and an invasion of a nation by a former super power funded largely by fossil fuel sales. So why, why is the gatekeeper of all things nuclear in the US so absurdly hostile to the one technology that we have at our disposal to combat these things TODAY. At this point the NRC is either acting with malice and outright hostility towards the industry it has been set to regulate or it is so utterly incompetent that it cannot communicate effectively to applicants what needs to be done to have a successful application. Either way, something needs to be done ASAP.

Background

As this is my first foray into writing for substack allow me to give a little background on myself. I graduated from MIT in 2012 with a double major BS in Nuclear Engineering and Physics and an SM in Nuclear Engineering. From there I went to Los Alamos National Laboratory where I was a scientist in CCS-7, the applied computer science group. There I developed and worked on numerous physics simulations and developed a reputation for being the “solvers guy”. I left Los Alamos in 2020 and accepted a position at an advanced reactor company and I now focus mainly on reactor design and systems modeling.

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