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How the Next US Nuclear Accident Might Happen

Posted by samzenpus on from the big-boom dept.

Lasrick writes: Anthropologist Hugh Gusterson analyzes safety at US nuclear facilities and finds a disaster waiting to happen due to an over-reliance on automated security technology and private contractors cutting corners to increase profits. Gusterson follows on the work of Eric Schlosser, Frank Munger, and Dan Zak in warning us of the serious problems at US nuclear facilities, both in the energy industry and in the nuclear security complex.

1 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Profit over safety by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    There is no way you are a GM of a nuclear power "plan". I have 25 years of engineering, operations, and management experience in nuclear power plants in Canada and the United States and am currently a licensed Senior Reactor Operator. If you were a GM you might recognize that no one pump failure would result in a meltdown, and that we don't shut down nuclear plants typically when one pump has an issue - we have Technical Specification Limiting Conditions for Operation that provide a fixed time period for you to fix the equipment before you have to shut down. This is typically 72 hours, seven days, or longer if a risk-informed Technical Specification action time has been licensed by the NRC. How do you manage to cover up a failed periodic surveillance test of the pump that is mandated by your Technical Specifications? In my plant, about 10 people would all have to be complicit with you. Seems pretty unlikely given that they all make a lot more money than they'd make outside the industry, and you are opening yourself up to sanction - up to and including being barred from licensed activities for life.

    By the way - in my experience privately-run US nuclear power plants run far better than publicly-run Canadian nuclear plants, and the regulator is more potent. High production plants typically have much better equipment reliability and corrective action programs. This ensures that the equipment is available when it is called upon in an event. That tends to mean that higher performing plants are in fact safer.

    So yes - I'm calling you a liar.