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NRC Chairman Resigns
After years of accusations of creating a 'chilled work environment,' Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko resigned this morning (PDF). His largest achievement was perhaps killing the Yucca Mountain waste repository, and he oversaw the certification of the AP1000 reactor. It is unknown whether a new chairman will be appointed from within the NRC. Quoting the Washington Post: "The reason for his resignation is unclear. He is stepping down before the release of a second inspector general report rumored to be into allegations of Mr. Jaczko's misconduct. NRC spokesman Eliot Brenner told The Washington Times that the report had no impact on the timing of Mr. Jaczko's resignation announcement. Mr. Jaczko's statement was vague, saying that it 'is the appropriate time to continue my efforts to ensure public safety in a different forum. This is the right time to pass along the public safety torch to a new chairman...' While his statement did not specifically touch on the embarrassing revelations of his tyrannical approach to the job or its impact on NRC staff, he did sound a defiant note by claiming the NRC was 'one of the best places to work in the federal government throughout my tenure.'"
Today also marks the start of the annual nuclear industry conference.
In case anyone was wondering.
This is what he deserves for pressuring Sony to fire Community creator Dan Harmon. #sixseasonsandamovie
Because for a minute there I was really worried about the Norwegian Refugee Council.
The upcoming election made it necessary for Obama to replace him, lest he become an issue in the campaign. The WH Chief of Staff (Jacob Lew) is the one who would do the deed, but he's only been on the job since January, and there is always a crush of other stuff to worry about, so that might be why it hasn't happened sooner.
(disclaimer: this is from my reading articles just now, not prior knowledge).
a "chilled work environment" is a great thing for any NOC. maybe NRC not so much...
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It appears to be just as good a place as any to dispose of nuclear waste..... certainly better than leaving it in the plants, waiting for a disaster (like Fukushima where some of the stored waste was washed out to sea). Stupid politicians. Yucca has been shown to be stable. Just do it.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
it's always "the appropriate time to continue ... efforts ... in a different forum" when you're about to be slammed with "allegations of ... misconduct."
insensitive clod overlords obligatory xkcd car analogy russian reversals whoosh pedant fanbois ftfy in 3...2...1..PROFIT
I guess people were on him to get angry enough to go nuclear and have a meltdown..
~~"Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong." ~~Dennis Miller
Maybe the people whining about how safe nuclear waste storage is should volunteer to keep it in their basement.
You win! The first NIMBY comment of the article!
And what is your prize you might wonder? Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt by the hogshead.
Please sir, tell us, how do you plan to spend your winnings?
Hell, if the US government wants to pay me for it, they can store it in my basement. Those travel canisters they use are as damn near to indestructible as you can get. And the armed guards they'd have to supply would take care of any security monitoring I'd want.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
He is simply stepping down to pursue a career for a nuclear energy corporation as a consultant, where he will get losts of money with consulting fees... Totally unrelated to his work as the chairman of the NRC...
We need a number of new reactors. In particular, we need the micro to medium size reactors that can be built in a factory. In addition, we need GE's IFR (to burn up nuke 'waste'), as well as thorium reactors.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
...is job #1 in the nuclear regulatory business.
Expect no less.
I don't see how it's possible to whine about a positive thing.
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
A house committee watched while Jaczko's four fellow NRC board members, two of which were appointed by Obama, publicly condemned him while sitting to his immediate left and right. In recent congressional history, that scene is only trumped by Vollmer claiming executive privilege.
Understand that their world, political appointees near the very top of regulatory bureaucracy, is one of connections. You don't do dramatic things in public unless you really, really mean it, because whatever you do will be with you forever. Jaczko has to be some kind of way over-the-top SOB to wind up in that situation before Congress.
He's never offered one genuine, unqualified note of concession about any of it. Everyone else is wrong. "I believe strongly in safety" is as close as he's ever gotten to an explanation. Turning the NRC board of commissioners into a snake pit is somehow supposed to promote safety.
You-know-who will just foist another anti-energy extremist on the NRC after the election, so don't bet on any improvement.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
Well, if I lived in a place where "basement" was more than just a word in a dictionary, I wouldn't mind it at all.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Yeah we'd be atomic everything in a year!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
We know that Obama is very serious about global warming, because in a speech he said we need to consider all low-carbon energy sources "including nuclear".
And the actual policy changes coming out of the Obama administration? Almost total opposition to all things nuclear, and scuttling the waste storage at Yucca Mountain. Why, it's almost as if Obama is actually opposed to nuclear power.
It remains to be seen if Obama actually believes in global warming, in which case his policy seems to be "destroy energy sources without creating any new ones", or if he just says whatever he thinks will help him at the current moment, and doesn't actually believe it.
Much as I hate dishonesty, I think I'm more worried if our president thinks destroying energy sources without viable replacements is the right thing to do, especially during a depression. Worst yet would be if he really believes that solar, wind, and tidal power are viable replacements for a large coal plant or a nuclear plant.
That was kind of an odd metaphor. "Chill" usually means the opposite of Dr. Jaczko's alleged style, which was hotheaded-ness.
What was the matter with "hostile work environment"? Maybe that was considered not hip enough. But, the hip use of "chill" is as in "chill out".
The Google guys might tweet a complaint about /. throwing sand in their search algorithms.
Ship it to France.
Apparently they have the facilities to reprocess it into new usable fuel for their reactors.
Apparently America is too stupid to do the same.
Where do you live?
Who's the racist now?
That would be you. Unless you are just a troll, which is bad also.
First off, it never should have been built in Nevada. The best site was west Texas. But it was a decision that Poppa Bush made, hence the reason why NV was chosen.
Second, there is loads of energy in nuclear 'waste'. We should be burning it up. Right now, we are talking about transporting loads of 'waste' all over the USA. Instead, on all of the sites that are to be retired, we could instead put up a number of new GE IFR reactors. These would then be loaded with a small amount of normal nuke fuel, that is then mixed with on-site waste. Then in the future, nothing but on-site 'waste' fuel would be added. So, would there be waste from this? Absolutely. But NONE of it would be useful for a regular bomb (but it would work for a dirty bomb). In addition, the worst of it would be done within 200 years, rather than 20,000 years.
Note the difference with this approach. Basically, you have a site that has active cooling, transmission lines, generators, etc. and some old reactors. You put up enough GE reactor to replace one or more of the old ones, start it, and then start the destruction of one or more of the old reactors. Basically, you keep the site going to provide power. At the same time, we put up a NEW reactor that is based on a NEW design with physics behind it that prevents melt downs.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Good riddance.
Though gone from 'office' I'm well sure there are still plans in action for his killing, since 'real' money has already been transferred and 'assets' mobilized.
non-LoL
Note that none of the criticism was about technical issues, it was all about "style". Jaczko was publicly critical about failings in the safety culture at the NRC and the industry, and his position became more pronounced after Fukushima. He was saying that we were at risk for a similar accident because the NRC was not holding the reactor operators to a high enough standard. So if his concern about poor risk management is correct, and they want to get rid of him, the best option is a personal attack, which is exactly how this is playing out.
In that vein, there were just a reports on KCBS in Southern California about serious safety lapses at the now closed San Onofre nuclear plant:
If that isn't bad enough, the NRC is now cutting back on evacuation planning requirements.
Given this context, there is a good case to be made that Jaczko being forced out is an example of how meaningful criticism is punished by inbred bureaucrats. This is exactly the same mechanism that lead the Japanese regulators to ignore tsunami warnings at Fukushima and make equally bad decisions about on site back up power.
Don't be surprised when we have a serious nuclear accident here in the US. With this kind of broken regulation, it is inevitable.
Why is Snark Required?
His position got nuked.
Probably Florida or someplace else with a similarly high water table.
Unfortunately, everything that Obama has actually done shows a path to reducing energy availability and energy use rather than changing the way energy is generated in the US. He has said openly that he wants to financially destroy coal generation, and I believe him. No changes have been made in the licensing and permitting process for nuclear generation, which means a very small group of people (one, perhaps?) can block construction at any point in the process.
Obviously he believes in two things: AGW is real, and resource use in the US is out of line with the rest of the world and must be reined in.
As the Republican candidate for president can only win if people are so totally disgusted with Obama that it is "Obama Must Go"
(OMG!), there is a substantial chance that we will be looking at the next four years where energy use becomes more expensive and less reliable. Reliability is the key because businesses will be forced to self-generate in some manner without a reliable external source. Homes will go the same route for people with the money to do so - how many times can you tolerate a blackout for eight or more hours? And what would it really take for you to be able go off-grid?
The real problem is going to be for people that simply do not have the disposible income to invest in solar or wind systems. For example, anyone living in an apartment complex in the northern part of the US - solar simply isn't practical for the building owners and so the tenants are going to be at the mercy of whatever is left over after commercial interests get priority on electricity during the day. You will have a remote switch on your meter to simply turn off your electricity soon.
Obviously he believes in two things: AGW is real, and resource use in the US is out of line with the rest of the world and must be reined in.
I could believe this up until the point where the administration refuses to invest in wind and solar solutions that cannot viably provide the energy needed for the most basic needs of the American populace. Not only invest in it but continually fail due to their inability to comprehend market competition and/or solution oriented systems for most of America. Even Obama's supposed home town of Chicago could never rely on wind or solar to solve any significant percentage of its energy needs due to the low return dependent on climate for those technologies.
If someone in the current administration believed that AGW was real they would be champions for liquid flouride thorium reactor (LFTR) technologies. Small footprint systems, can burn nuclear waste, cannot meltdown, cannot make weapons-grade elements. I believe that these could be produced for far less than comparable densities of other carbon-free energy technologies. Yet we continue to ignore technology in favor of a politically controlled "public" energy utilities packed with fairly obvious positions of payoff that look to the future by using whatever energy creation method makes them the most money.
LFTR is ignored because the nuclear lobby is entirely backed by owners of light water reactors. It would be stupid for them to back competing technology - heck, they used their leverage to get Jakczko ousted because he was pro safety and they were pro profit. One of the previous lobby groups (the current lobby is a amalgamation of several separate ones from the 1970s) also managed to get Nixon's ear to get Weinberg ousted from Oak Ridge in the 1970s when he wanted us to invest more in molten salt reactors in the name of safety (Weinberg invented the LWR and was running the MSRE or molten salt reactor experiment at the time). Once again, the almighty dollar trumps safety, because as BP proved with their oil well (not to mention numerous refinery issues before the disaster, like the Texas City one that killed 15 people), profits are much more valuable than safety.
southern california also has precious few basements, for some reason.
insensitive clod overlords obligatory xkcd car analogy russian reversals whoosh pedant fanbois ftfy in 3...2...1..PROFIT