Watching the Watchdogs

Does the Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulate enough ?

The reactor accident on Three Mile Island brought into public glare a little-known federal agency with tremendous responsibilities: the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is charged with making sure that nuclear plants are safe before it licenses them, and then enforcing strict operating rules. President Carter's inquiry into the reasons for the near disaster in Pennsylvania will inevitably examine the performance of the NRC.

Regulation of reactors began under the Atomic Energy Commission, set up in 1946 shortly after the first atomic bomb fell on Japan. The AEC had the job of both promoting and safeguarding the development of atomic power. In 1974 President Gerald Ford signed a bill splitting the AEC into two agencies with separate functions: the Energy Research and Development Administration, which encourages the growth of nuclear power, and the NRC, which is concerned with safety.

This history is behind the main charge leveled against the NRC by the Union of Concerned Scientists, which is composed of 70,000 members, including 2,500 scientists and engineers, and three dozen nuclear experts. The nonprofit organization charges that the NRC has been far too lax about safety standards for nuclear power. Says U.C.S. Spokesman Robert Pollard, a former NRC safety inspector who resigned when his recommendations were overridden: "The top men at the NRC grew up [in the AEC] with the dream of nuclear energy. For that dream to work, it has to be economical. Even though they are only supposed to be regulating for public safety, these people take the cost of regulation into consideration and make safety decisions on that basis."

Pollard and his colleagues cite a series of safety hazards they claim the NRC has tolerated in nuclear plants around the nation, including Three Mile Island. For example, the scientists contend that defects in 26 reactors built by General Electric might cause the release of radiation in an accident similar to the one in Pennsylvania. The scientists have also produced a pamphlet, called the "Nugget File," that describes mishaps at nuclear plants, like the use of a basketball to plug a pipe leading from a radioactive tank.

The U.C.S. also claims that top staff members of the NRC are too cozy with the industry they are regulating. A 1975 study done by Common Cause found that 65% of NRC staffers had been employed by companies that held licenses, permits or contracts with the commission. In particular, the U.C.S. is critical of NRC Chairman Joseph M. Hendrie for not keeping at arm's length the industry he regulates. Retorts Hendrie: "I don't think my critics know my mindset. They have a po litical goal, which is to capture the NRC with antinuclear forces." And Hendrie insists: "I've never worked a day in my life for the commercial nuclear industry."

A nuclear physicist, Hendrie, 54, has spent 24 years in the Federal Government and academic world working on nuclear power, including six years as an adviser to the AEC. In 1977, Carter appointed him chairman, at a current salary of $57,500, of the five-man commission, which directs the work of 2,723 employees. Carter has also appointed as commissioners Peter Bradford, 36, who headed the Maine Public Utilities Commission, and John F. Ahearne, 44, the former deputy assistant secretary for resource applications at the Department of Energy. The other two members of the. commission are Victor Gilinsky, 44, formerly of the Rand Corp., and Richard Kennedy, 59, previously a presidential assistant for National Security Council planning, both appointed by President Ford.

The NRC is capable of making the industry it regulates as unhappy as it does its critics. In March the commission shut down five plants in the East, with a resulting loss of 4 million kilowatts of power. Engineers found a mathematical defect in the computer program used in designing the plants' coolant pipes to withstand a major earthquake. The chairman of the engineering company insisted there was no chance that the pipes would fail under predicted conditions.

The NRC has also been criticized by the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress. A GAO report upbraided the NRC for not requiring better emergency and evacuation plans. Ay Another report declared that the NRC should more carefully monitor the construction of plants, charging that the inspectors were relying too heavily on papers and test results provided by the contractors and not enough on independent on-site probing.

In his 1977 energy message, President Carter called for the NRC to have more on-site inspectors for nuclear power plants. A $6 million appropriation for this purpose was pushed through Congress last year by Senator Gary Hart, but so far only 22 of 70 proposed inspectors are on duty. The Harrisburg events, however, have shown Hart that such inspectors may not be adequate watchdogs. Living day in and day out at the same plant, he says, might cause them to adopt the power company interests as their own.

Hendrie is quick to agree that his beleaguered agency needs more people. Says he: "We'd be glad to inspect more if Congress would supply more money. We have 600 people in our inspection office now. If they want us to double our effort, we'll need another 300 or 400."

Last week, clearly drained by the ordeal at Three Mile Island, Hendrie considered the new dimensions of problems now facing his agency. "I suspect you would always like to inspect a little more," he acknowledged, but he felt that the present system of spot checking was all that was feasible, or necessary. To check even 10% of a nuclear power plant that took millions of man-hours to build, he said, "would require an enormous task force beyond anything that the Congress in its frugal mood would countenance." But in the wake of what happened in Harrisburg, Congress--and the American public--may be far more willing than before to spend whatever money is necessary to make sure that the genie of nuclear power stays safely in the bottle.

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