SCIENCE sciencemag.org 18 JANUARY 2019 • VOL 363 ISSUE 6424 237PHOTO: ALEX WONG/GETTY IMAGES
L
ess than a year after the Fukushima
nuclear accident in Japan, physicist
Gregory B. Jaczko tried to break the
“first commandment” of nuclear regu-
lation: Thou shalt not deny a license to
operate a reactor. As chairman of the
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC),
he knew that the tradition was to encourage
doomed applications to be withdrawn. But
when one company refused, Jacz-
ko dug in his heels and opposed
the license. It turned out to be a
futile gesture that the other com-
missioners opposed. But it was
one of many examples, he con-
tends, of the weaknesses in the na-
tion’s top nuclear regulatory body
and an exemplar of its obeisance
to the nuclear power industry.
Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear
Regulator is one part engrossing
memoir and another part seeth-
ing diatribe, depicting a govern-
ment agency that routinely caves
to industry pressure. The book cannot help
but also feel like a rationalization of Jacz-
ko’s own actions during his conflict-ridden
tenure as chairman, a position offered to
him in 2009 by President Barack Obama.
Jaczko first came to the commission in
2005, after working for Nevada senator HarryReid fighting the project to store the nation’s
high-level radioactive waste at Yucca Moun-
tain. He had a notoriously abrasive personal-
ity, and that did not change while at the NRC.
Yucca Mountain set the tone for Jaczko’s
tenure, and his autocratic leadership style
alienated Republicans and Democrats alike.
When he terminated a licensing review for
the storage project, the other commissioners
interpreted it as an illegal abuse of authority.
The ensuing political fracas convinced Jacz-
ko that the nuclear industry used
the NRC as a tool for promoting
rather than regulating nuclear
power. He believes that a national
repository for radioactive waste
puts too much responsibility on
the taxpayer. “No other industry
is able to complain so loudly that
someone else has failed to take
care of its waste,” he laments.
The answer is to stop produc-
ing nuclear waste, argues Jaczko,
and indeed stop producing nu-
clear power at all. He wishes that
as chairman, he’d “had the cour-
age to say this, but my courage had its limits.”
Most of Jaczko’s short book hammers on
the theme that industry lobbyists hold sway
over the would-be regulators. He highlights
the longstanding concept of “enforcement
discretion” and skewers it as one of nuclear
regulation’s “greatest oxymorons.”
Rather than demand safety compliance,
the NRC historically has allowed nuclear
plants to develop alternative approaches
and has granted exceptions and exemp-tions. Recounting an episode in which he
tried to abolish enforcement discretion in
fire safety, Jaczko writes: “What happened
over the next several weeks was more brutal
than Roman imperial succession.”
The political infighting was particularly
intense after the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
Jaczko visited Japan and grew impatient
with the “litany of guarantees” from industry
about American nuclear facilities. He tried to
insist on new requirements to mitigate acci-
dents triggered by natural disasters such as
floods, earthquakes, and tsunamis. One in-
ternal NRC report drafted after Fukushima
criticized the practice of relying on voluntary
industry initiative to address safety concerns.
Jaczko’s descriptions of other commission-
ers’ attempts to quash or edit the report pro-
vide a disturbing glimpse of the dynamic of
trust and betrayal within the agency.
Confessions comes across as a story of one
man and his loyal staff against a whole indus-
try and its political toadies. Jaczko portrays
himself as a naïve scientist, pushing hard for
progressive reforms amid a corrupt bureau-
cracy. His critics might not be persuaded.
Toward the end of his tenure, Jaczko’s
fellow commissioners lodged a formal com-
plaint against him, including accusations of
mistreatment of women in the workplace.
He survived the coup (his term) but ulti-
mately resigned in 2012 at the request of his
old mentor Harry Reid, who wanted to use
his position as a political bargaining chip.
Although Jaczko’s account will become
standard reading as an antinuclear book, his
reasons have more to do with regulation than
nuclear energy per se. Jaczko sees two paths
ahead. One has a sustainable future with
nuclear reactors that includes widespread
recognition that accidents will happen and a
greater commitment to safety. The other path
is the one he witnessed as NRC chairman,
featuring waning public trust in a secretive,
uncooperative industry that regards safety
regulations as unfair and cumbersome.
The problem that plagued the old Atomic
Energy Commission—that the promoters and
regulators were too cozy with each other—is
clearly alive and well. Jaczko describes the re-
lationship as a “corrupt, toxic environment.”
It may be a hard warning to hear, but it comes
from one who had a fuller view of the nuclear
regulatory landscape than most. j10.1126/science.aav8854NUCLEAR POLICYBy Jacob Darwin HamblinNuclear power and promise
Deference to industry trumps safety in the U.S., warns a controversial former regulator
Gregory Jaczko prepares to testify at a Senate hearing on nuclear reactor safety on 15 December 2011.INSIGHTSConfessions of
a Rogue Nuclear
Regulator
Gregory B. Jaczko
Simon and Schuster,- 207 pp.
The reviewer is at the School of History, Philosophy,
and Religion, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331,
USA. Email: [email protected]Published by AAASon January 17, 2019^http://science.sciencemag.org/Downloaded from