ML19259B901
| ML19259B901 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 02/26/1979 |
| From: | Bradford P NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML19259B902 | List: |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 7905150009 | |
| Download: ML19259B901 (4) | |
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7 THIS DOCUMEtlT C0tlTAltiS POOR QUAUTY PAGES TESTIMONY OF PETER A.
BRADFOPS i
COMMISSIONER, U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AtID THE E!!VIRONMENT i
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OF THE
.i-COliMITTEC ON INTERIOR AND INSULAR AFFAIRS UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPPISSNTATIVES p
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MONDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1979 e
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Let ce begin by stating that I have no fundamental disagreement with the thrust of the Chairman's statement.
F.a6 tire pe rcitted, I think perhaps we could have harmonized our views entirely, so while this is a separate view, I do not want to oescribe it as a dissenting one.
The licensing of nuclear power plants has always entailed uncertainties as to cost, as to waste disposal cethods and sites, as to low-level radiation hazard, and as to worldwide proliferation icplications.
The Reactor Safety Study was never designed to address any of these, and for these reasons i
as well as the unsupportable claims of precision that were cade on its behalf, it should not have occupied the central place that is has in the consideration of nuclear power.
Like the many overstated projections of detand for ncclear power, the nisuses of the Study have been a dis-traction, a contributor to the rcller-coaster eff ect that an industry as complex and capital intensive as this one cannot af ford and that sound energy policymaking cannot easily enco: pass.
In fact, the nuclear power program at its outset was inevitably experi= ental in nature.
It was an exceptionally carefully conducted experiment if one overlocks Fermi I,
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a bu t it was an expericent nonetheless.
The problem was that one was willing to use such a term in describing nuclear no pc.rer plants to the public, nor is it clear what would have happened if this had been done.
Instead, a corpulsion was felt, of which the.nisuse of the Reactor saf ety Study is just one of several exacples, ie to simplify, to state the unknowable with certainty, and to jg put the known in the cest possible or not so possible light.
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It is this syndrone that I think we as regulators nuat learn p.
to avoid, both in explicit statements and in phrases and
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comme nts that invite inf erences that we cannot substantiate.
L i-Thus, when we describe our licensing and inspection process and conclude that we believe that it affords adequate protection to the public health and saf ety, it seems to me that we are naking a judgment in which some assucptions and f-qualifications are best stated explicitly.
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For one thing, we do not check everything, or even i.
nearly everything in our licensir..g and inspections.
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Consequently, our progran depends heavily on responsible industry conduct, both in day-to-day operation and in quality assurance and quality control.
s For another, we as regulators cannot tell you with precision just what level of protection we have achieved, and you, cs the representatives of the public, have not
. told us, as perhaps you could not, just what level of prcrection would be " adequate."
The subject of adequate
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protection.of the public health and saf ety in the nuclear
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context retains an open one, subject to continuing examination F
and proceedings before us, in Congress, and in the states.
The subject is multif aceted and cannot be laid to rest solely by any assessment of accident risks at the power plants themselves.
Thus, while I as in general accord with g
Chaircan Hendrie's statement, I want to be clear that I E
Ji think it comes in the introduction rather than the concluding
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chapters of the' nuclear saf ety story.
While I hope the f-concluding chapters will be favorable, we are some time t
away from being able to write them.
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