Updated (May 9, 2012 05:47 am) This now includes information from Southern California Edison and the California Independent System Operator explaining why they had published an “estimated return to service date” for San Onofre. Original post starts here. Stories that underly other stories can be fascinating topics for discussion. Yesterday morning, a friend sent me […]
Nuclear regulations
Congressman Upton to Chairman Jaczko: Should NRC Issue “Chilling Effect Letter” to Itself?
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 […]
Making art with radioactive materials – In memory of James Acord
An alternative title for this piece might be – Seeing the art that already exists in radioactive materials. Until today, I had never heard of James Acord, a sculptor who devoted more than 20 years of his life to sustained efforts to create art from radioactive materials. The first part of that struggle involved 12 […]
Radiation Doses – As Low As UnReasonably Achievable (ALAURA)
A friend tweeted a link to a terrific satire titled Roentgen Shrugged that was published in the March 2011 issue of Health Physics News. The piece describes what might happen to modern medical care in the foreseeable future if the radiation protection guild keeps ratcheting down allowable radiation dose exposure levels to an ever more […]
Senator Carper advises Chairman Jaczko to follow the golden rule
Senator Tom Carper (D-DE) is a retired US Navy Commander and a former governor of the state of Delaware. In the below clip taken from the December 15, 2011 hearing held by the Senate committee on Environment and Public Works, he offers some sage advice to the inexperienced and poorly trained Chairman of the Nuclear […]
Jaczko apologizes for distraction and implies he has been the victim of a coup
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 […]
Boxer defends Jaczko’s harassing behavior with classic anecdotal quotes from anonymous women
As the father of two professional daughters, one of whom has spent the past ten years in the male dominated US Navy, I have been taken aback by the way that the Democratic Party leaders have reacted to testimony from four appointed Commissioners on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. These four experienced, mature professionals took the […]
Hearing on Jaczko’s leadership at Nuclear Regulatory Commission
I have spent the past several hours viewing and clipping highlights from an extraordinary hearing conducted yesterday by the House Oversight Committed on “Leadership at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission”. If you want a similar experience, you can find the complete hearing video – of both panels – at http://youtu.be/qEduKirfpTY. In the next several days, I […]
Jaczko must go
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 […]
Please sign petition at Change.org to ask President Obama to remove Gregory Jaczko from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
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 […]
Examples of regulatory costs for nuclear energy development
This exchange with Robert Bradley, who is a self-described free market advocate, focuses on my frustration with the inability of his “community” to acknowledge the imposed costs of excessive regulation on nuclear energy projects. Robert blogs at Master Resource, the same place where I have encountered Jerry Taylor, who shares some of the same ideas. […]
Audit the NRC
Businessweek published an article titled Nuclear Reactor License Renewals May Be Slowed, Jaczko Says that made my heart race and made me (silently) string together a whole bunch of 4-letter words that I learned from my sailors. One of my favorite candidates has made a lot of headway in his presidential bid by proposing that […]
