Another Friday, Another Episode of “As the Chairman of the NRC Turns” On Friday, April 27, 2012, Congressman Fred Upton, Chairman of the US House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce, released a letter addressed to Chairman Jaczko of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. That letter, cosigned by 23 fellow US Congressmen, asked Chairman…
Following a flurry of news reports about the renomination of Ms. Kristine Svinicki, one of his colleagues at the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko decided to hold a previously unscheduled press conference at the National Press Club. Inquiring minds, like mine, are wondering why he made that decision. First of all, I…
Joris, a frequent contributor to Atomic Insights discussions, provided the following story in a recent comment. I have lightly edited his comment, mostly to provide some white space with paragraph breaks. I hope his remarks provoke thought and discussion. As Atomic Insights readers know, I firmly believe that the success – so far – of…
Bud Ryan is a documentary filmmaker who is deeply concerned that the world has forgotten about the fight against nuclear weapons. As part of his effort to remind people that there is still a need for activism in support of disarmament, he produced a film titled The Forgotten Bomb. In it, he interviews a number…
Following the afternoon session of the public meeting about the Lee nuclear power station draft environmental impact statement, I had an interesting conversation with a man from the Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR). He had spoken during the meeting about the large amount of taxpayer money that had been wasted on building and then not…
A letter to the editor of the Asheville Citizen-Times published on January 6, 2012 got me riled up. The letter is intended to encourage people who live in Asheville to organize to resist the William States Lee nuclear power plant development project proposed for a site in Gaffney, SC., which is about 60 miles from…
Joseph Mangano and Janette Sherman are at it again with their infamous efforts to scare as many people as possible about the effects of atomic radiation. With much fanfare and a coordinated issuance of press releases, they announced the publication of a new “study” claiming that radiation released by the three reactors at Fukushima Daiichi…
On December 15, 2011, at the end of a long hearing in which four dedicated, experienced, mature commissioners from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) testified that Chairman Jaczko was an abusive leader who filtered information and berated professional staff members, Senator Barbara Boxer offered the opportunity for closing statements from her colleagues on “the other…
On December 15, 2011, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing titled “Review of the NRC’s Near-Term Task Force Recommendations for Enhancing Reactor Safety in the 21st Century”. Instead of remaining on that topic, the hearing turned into a story where he said ‘A’, another guy said ‘A’, a woman said ‘A’, and a…
I am a deeply disappointed supporter of many Democratic platform planks who strongly believes in protecting the environment, building a strong educational system that is freely available to all comers, enabling workers to earn a decent wage for their hard work, increasing the number of jobs available to all residents of the United States, building…
My professional work habits and standards were formed by 33 years in the US naval service, an organization with a proud tradition of developing independent decision makers who could be entrusted with billions of dollars worth of national assets and thousands of lives. Our tradition includes demanding training, strong mentoring programs, regular competitive evaluations and…
John Wheeler who blogs at This Week in Nuclear started a petition on Change.org titled President Barack Obama: Remove Gregory Jaczko from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Here is the description from the “why this is important” tab on the petition page. Gregory Jaczko, the Chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has lost the confidence of…