ML20054J085
| ML20054J085 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Indian Point  |
| Issue date: | 06/16/1982 |
| From: | Kaagan L PARENTS CONCERNED ABOUT INDIAN POINT, PUBLIC INTEREST RESEARCH GROUP, NEW YORK, ROCKLAND CITIZENS FOR SAFE ENERGY, UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS, WEST BRANCH CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION |
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| ISSUANCES-SP, NUDOCS 8206280094 | |
| Download: ML20054J085 (16) | |
Text
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g p 71 s
ff UNITED STATES OF AMERICA j
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BEFORE THE ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD In the Matter of
)
CONSOLIDATED EDISON COMPANY OF NEW YORK
)
Docket Nos.
50-247sP
)50-286SP Endian Point Unit 2)
POWER AUTHORITY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK (Indian Point Unit 3)
)
TESTIMONY OF LARRY KAAGAN My name is Larry Kaagan, and I am, by training, a sociologist and journalist.
Since 1972, I have studied, written about, and taught on a variety of social and political issues, ranging from police-community relations, electoral politics, the foreign policy-making process, tax and economic policy at both the national and local level, energy development and changing social values.
In each of these issues, my area of special focus was the role played by public attitudes and perceptions on the formation and implementation of policy.
My current professional position is that of Senior Research analyst, and assistant to the chairman of Yankelovich, Skelly and White, the public opinion research firm located in New York and Stamford, Connecticut.
I have studied the question of public opinion in the area of energy development for several years.
Particularly after having been commissioned to write on the subject by a corporation which has a major stake in energy-intensive industry, including the use of nuclear-generated electricity, I feel I am able to make some observations on the public opinion climate in which nuclear facilities are built, function, and prepare for safety-related emergencies. I speak here purely as an individual; my views are not necessarily shared by my ggg6jggg4B2ggg6 employer, Yankelovich, Skelly and White, Inc.
G PDR L
(Statement of Larry Kaagan)
I would begin my comments by separating two questions.
There are, of course, public concerns about the safety, propriety or even cost of nuclear generated power, as well as the nature of any plans devised for industrial and safety procedures.
But prior to those matters, there is the question of public confidence in both public and private institutions whose task it would be to convey information to the population, both before and during any emergency which might occur involving a nuclear facility.
I would like to address that question first, with documentation available in Appendix I.
Sociologists, political scientists, and, I might add, political leaders, have all noted, each by professional antennae that serve them best, a dramatic decline in the past two decades of the degree to which the American public believes or has confidence in the leading institutions of our society.
Public skepticism and disaffection with government has been the subject of numerous books and conferences, and the highly visible decline in the proportion of voter participation has been the shame of the nation.
But beneath that defection from the political process lies a much broader phenomenon, namely the evolution of disbelieving minority into an often embittered, mistrustful majority.
When researchers
. (Statement of Larry Kaagan)
(
at the University of Michigan's Center for Political Studies asked a nationally projectable sample of Americans in 1958 to respond to the statement "the government is run by a few big interests looking out for themselves," a confident 82% disagreed; only an 18% minority thought the accusation true enough to agree with it.
But when the question was repeated in 1980, the world had been turned on its head.
A 76% majority now agree that the government is run by and for big players in their own interest.
Similar reversals in confidence were measured on questions of public expectations that government officials would "do what is right,"
and even on such basic matters as whether those in government even
" knew what they were doing," or cared about the problems of "the average man."
One of the most extensive measurements of public confidence in institutions is conducted annually by Louis Harris in the Harris Survey.
When the survey first began asking about the degree of public trust in public and private institutions in 1966, a " great deal" of confidence was recorded for a wide array, including 73%
for conduct of American medicine, 61% each for the U.S. military and institutions of higher education, and 55% saying they had b
- (Statement of Larry Kaagan) a " great deal" of confidence in major American companies.
When first measured in 1973, television news programs, as an institution, garnered a 41% high confidence rating, basking somewhat in the afterglow of the intensive coverage of the Watergate affair.
More generally, the institution of "the press" enjoyed a surge of confidence during the same period, with 30% of the public in 1973 saying that they had a great deal of confidence in all of the American news media.
But without exception, all of those measurements, and additionally the confidence ratings of all other institutions as well, have plummeted to fractions of their former levels.
What was a 61%
vote of confidence in the military stood, in 1981's last reading, at 28%.
Major corporations, which enjoyed a 55% rating of high confidence, now receive a mere 16% measurement.
And both the executive branch of the federal government and the news media now receive barely half of the confidence measures that the public accorded them a decade or so ago.
Perhaps more damning, and certainly more narrowly focused on the topic of this testimony, is the public skepticism which surfaced in the aftermath of the accident at the Three Mile Island nucle'ar u
a (Statement of Larry Kaagan) facility in Pennsylvania.
In a nationwide poll conducted by CBS and the New ork Times, only a 20% minority believed that officials honestly " told all they knew" about the public dangers that ensued from the accident.
Rather, a 55% majority said they thought public of ficials masked the truth, and that there was "more danger than they said."
Another measure of the public ambivalence about information or dis-information being offered them on the subject of nuclear safety is that in a survey conducted by the Bureau of Social Science Research in the summer of 1978, nearly identical 6 out of 10 majorities said they believed what the government said on the subject and also what was said by activist opponents of nuclear power.
Studies of public confidence in institutions paints a clear, disturbing and unambiguous picture: the American public is less likely now than at any time ~in our recent history to place un-questioning trust in either the public or private sector, particularly where the well-being of "the people" in general seems to be in contrast with the self-interest of the institutions involved.
Much more conflicted is the picture of American public opinion on the matter of nuclear power, particularly regarding its safety.
(Statement of Larry Kaagan)
In the early post-war years, when the concept of " Atoms for Peace" was introduced, the American public was certainly more broadly enthusiastic about nuclear power than it is now.
But even in 1948, accorfding to an early Gallup poll, only a 42% plurality expected that atomic energy will do more good than harm.
More people (35%)
had no opinion on the subject than actually thought atomic energy would do more harm than good (23%).
Nevertheless, firm majorities confirmed that they were not particularly afraid to have atomic generating plants located in their communities.
(See figures in Appendix 2)
As the 1950's.became the 1960's and 70's, however, public ambivalence about nuclear power began to grow.
Even when arguments touting
" cheap, clean" energy were accepted, doubts about safety persisted.
concern Pluralities who felt Aat ' having a nuclear facility located near where they lived were growing annually for several years before the accident at Three Mile Island.
l Much of the variance in measured support for nuclear power ffected -
facilities seems to b by how the questions are phrased, and when.
l Profound public ambivalence on the issue is documented by the " migrating" of " Don't Know" responses into both the favor and oppose columns, t
and by " flip-flops" of attitudes depending on the currency of recent news developments regarding nuclear energy.
. (Statement of Larry Kaagan)
However, one question which has been asked annually for the past six years has, in 1982, produced the first majority of public sentiment that perhaps nuclear power plants are too dengarous to continue with any plans for building more facilities.
Despite the often-made assertions that no life has been lost in any mishap in a nuclear power plant, strong majorities feel that accidents like the one at Three Mile Island are likely to happen again elsewhere.
The public also recognizes some of the technical distinctions which nust be applied when discussing nuclear safety.
Concerns about radioactive seepage causing illness or death are at majority levels after having grown in yearly increments since 1976; however, only slightly more than 4 in 10 say they are afraid of an atomic " explosion" at a nuclear plant (these concerns have been growing too, as a reflection of overall public concern about nuclear plant safety and vulnerability).
The point at which these two trends -
growing lack of confidence in institutions and deep, lingering doubts about the safety of nuclear generating facilities -- intersect is a dilemma for both the public and leaders of government, industrial and communications 1
J
' (Statement of Larry Kaagan) organizations.
Bluntly put, the public is none-too-certain that the appropriate government regulatory agencies have their "act together" on the subject of nuclear safety, and are fairly certain that special interests have undue influence in 1) what is regulated, 2) how effectively oversight and controls are managed, and 3) how honestly any of this information is conveyed to the public.
Arguments are often presented that emergency situations often aring out "the best" in individuals and communities.
Recent examples of the several Northeast blackouts, floods in Fort Wayne and other natural and technological calamaties are often cited.
In many of these cases, in fact, volunteer efforts, in accordance with either spontaneous determination of needs or previously devised plans, produce remarkable results.
Those who are injured or at risk are evacuated, those needing food and shelter are provided for, and the elements of civil authority with a voice in the matter are heard from and of ten obeyed without debate.
However, there is no reason to believe that the record of any of these experiences is particularly germane to what would (Statement of Larry Kaagan) occur during a serious accident at a nuclear generating plant and in the communities which surround it.
The best observations of people's willingness to cooperate with authorities in hurricaines and earthquakes, or to make heroic sacrifices during floods or blackouts, does not address the psychological horror which is associated with radiation.
The most recent studies of public attitudes to stressful situations and high-risk exposures place " radiation-based" episodes in a qualitatively different category from all others.
It is my best professional sense that even when other concerns about nuclear power are set aside -- its cost, its safety and its attendant problems with transportation, storage and disposal of nuclear wastes --
there is the high probability that public responses to plans and procedures for evacuation, relocation, or community action in the-event of a serious accident will be highly volatile, unpredictable, and perhaps unmanageable in the extreme.
6' L
APPENDIX 1 Measures of confidence in institutional representative-ness, trustworthiness and accountability.
1)
"The government is run by a few big interests looking out for themselves."
1958 1980 AGREE 18%
76%
2)
"The government in Washington cannot (only some of the time /
none of the time) be trusted to do what is right."
1964 1980 AGREE 25%
71%
3)
Feel that "quite a few of the people running the government don't seem to know what they're doing."
1958 1980 AGREE 28%
63%
s (SOURCE:
Center for Political Studies, Institute for Social Research University of Michigan Election Studies) i 4)
"Most public officials (people in public office) are not really interested in the problems of the average man."
1980 AGNEE 73%
l
~"
DISAGREE 27%
(SOURCE:
National Opinion Research Center; General Social Surveys, 1980)
(
P 5)
"As far as people in charge of nmning (READ EAG I131) are concerned, would you say you have a great deal of confidence, only some confidence, or hardly any con-fidence at all in them?"
CONFIDENCE IN INSTITUTICNS 1981 1980 1979 1978 1977 1976 1975 1974 1973' 972 1971 1966 Medicin]
37 34 30 42 43 42 43 49 57 48 61' 73 Highsr educational institutions 34 36 33 41 37 31 36 40 44
-33 37 61 Tha U.S. Supreme Court 29 27 28 29 29 22 28 34 33 28 23 50 Th3 military 28 28 29 29 27 23 24 29 40 35-27 61 Th3 hhite House 28 18 15 14 31 11 X
18 18 X
X X
Th7 cricutive branch of th: federal government 24 17 17 14 23 11 13 16 19 27 23, 41 Television news 24 29 37 35 28 28 35 32 41 X
X X
Majorcompanies 16 16 18 22 20 16 19 15 29 27 27 55 Congress' 16 18 18 10 17 9
13 16 X
21 19 s42 Tha press 16 19 28 23 18 20 26 25 30 18 18 29 (X=not asked)
~
c _.
30URCE: Harris Survey: Trends in Confidence in Institutions; 1981/#85; as of Oct. 22,1981) 6
6) "Do you think public officials have been honest in telling the peo-ple all they know about the danger from the Three Mile Island acci-dent, or was the danger greater, or less than they said?"
1979 More danger than they 55%
said Told all they knew 20%
Danger was less than they said 8%
No opinion 17%
(SOURCE:
CBS/New York Times Poll; April, 1979)
.s-7)
"How much trust do you have in what the government tells you about the i tsks of nuclear power?"
1978 A great deal 16%
Some 42%
Very little 42%
"How much trust do you have in what the opponents of nuclear power tell you about the risks of nuclear power?"
1978 i
A great deal 8%
?
Some 51%
~
.a..
Very little 41%
(SOURCE:
Bureau of Social Science Research, for Resources for the Future; July /Aug, 1978) s
l l
APPENDIX 2 Measures of attitudes toward nuclear power, on issues of safety, proximity, and general desirability.
1)
"Would you be afraid to have a plant located in this community which was run by atomic energy?"
1956 Yes 20%
No 69%
Don't Know 11%
(SOURCE:
Gallup; January, 1956) 2)
"....Ho'w do you feel -- that it would be safe to have an atomic energy plant somewhere near here, or that it would present dangers?"
1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 "Are safe "
36%
37%
42%
33%
39%
"Present dangers" 44%
41%
- 3%
46%
47%
" Don't know" 23%
22%
15%
21%
14%
(SOURCE:
Roper Organization, as of October 1, 1977) 3)
"All in all, from what you have heard or read, how safe are nuclear power plants that produce electric power?"
1975 1977 1978 1979 Safe
- 64%
65%
64%
67%
Not safe
- 18%
23%
28%
30%
)
l
~
~
Not sure 18%
12%
8%
3%
l l
- (Safe =very 6 somewhat safe)
(Unsafe =not so safe 6 dangerous)
(SOURCE:
ABC/ Harris Poll; Lou Harris 4 Associates, as of April 4, 1979) t
4)
"Would you approve or disapprove if the nuclear plants for generating electricy~are built in your community?"
1977 1979 Approve 55%
38%
Disapprove 33%
56%
(SOURCE:
CBS/New York Times Poll; as of April 7,1979) 5)
"Do you agree or disagree with the following statement:
no more nuc-lear power plants should be built in this country until questions about safetfy are resolved, even though this will mean energy short-S-
ages within ten years?"
1978
. ;ree (no more plants until safety saestions resolved) 57%
~~ ~
Disagree 43%
i' (SOURCE:
NBC/ Associated Press Poll; as of September 20, 1978)
- 6)
"Considering the accident (at Three Mile Island) do you approve or i
disapprove of the following policies...?
The federal government should allow the 44 more nuclear power plants now planned, but should supervise their construction more strictly than has been the case up to now."
1979
~
Continue with stricter supervision 73%
Should not continue 27%
"Do you feel that what happened (at Three Mile Island) could happen l
at any of the other nuclear power plants in the United States, or do I
you think an unusual series of things went wrong there that are ex-tremely unlikely to happen in other nuclear plants?"
1979 Could happen ~at~6ther plants -
70%
Unusual occurence 30%
(SOURCE:
ABC/ Harris Poll; April 9, 1979)
(
7)
"I'm going to read you several statements relating to ways that have been suggested to improve our energy situation.
As I read each state-ment, please tell me whether you strongly favor it, mildly favor it, mildly oppose it, or strongly oppose it....--More nuclear power plants to generate electricity..."
March, 1979 March, 1981 Strongly favor 51%
31%
Mildly favor 26%
25%
Mildly oppose 12%
15%
Strongly oppose 12%
29%
(SOURCE:
Opinion Research Corporation, for LTV Industries Co.; as of March, 1981) 8)
"We now import from foreign countries about 45% of the oil we use, and estimates are that at present usage rates we will need to import more over time.
Furthermore, while other oil producing countries now have excess oil supplies, these excess supplies cannot last forever.
Ex-perts say this all means that we must find ways both to conserve oil and to develop new energy sources.
Here are some stiggestions that have been made...For each, tell me whether it is something you think should or should not be done....'go into greatly increased program to develop nuclear energy.'"
2/1977 3/1979 3/1980 3/1981 Should go into nuclear development program 61%
57%
45%
49%
Should not 23%
30%
43%
35%
Don't know 16%
13%
12%
16%
(SOURCE:
Roper Organization, #81-4; as of March 28, 1981)
~.
e L
~
9A)
"In' general, do you feel that we should continue to build nuclear power plants or'do you feel it's too dangerous to continue to build these plants 7" 1982 1981 1980 1979 1978 1977 Should continue to build 41 50 47 50 49 50 Too dangerous to continue building 50 41 40 39 37 32 Don't know/no answer 9
9 13 11 14 18 9B)
"Some people say that we will be using more and more nuclear power plants to generate electricity, but this seems to worry some people.
Which of the following, if any, worry you about nuclear power plants?"
1982 1981 1980 1979 1978 1977 1976 Problem of radioactive waste disposal 76 69 70 67 62 Possibility of small seepage causing h::alth hazards 60 62 54 48 46 44 45 Contamination of water 61 61 53 49 46 47 47 Possibility of massive seepage caus-ing dsath 58 58 52 42 33 32 31 Danger to workers 53 50 49 47 44 36 40 Atomic explosion 45 47 42 37 35 25 28 Possibility of sabotage 42 44 45 34 32 32 28 Danger of seepage from earthquakes 45 41 42 36 33 33 30 Theft of nuclear materials 36 37 38 29 29 32 27 Problem of what to do with plants Ghat are no longer in use 34 34 35 None of these 4
8 (SOURCE:
Yankelovich, Skelly and White surveys; as of March,1982)
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