consensus resolution Beyond Nuclear Today, one of the groups that filed the appeal, said the dismissal by three judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia of an appeal based on climate change risks to nuclear reactor safety is a shocking disregard for ever-deteriorating weather conditions that could put reactor communities in grave danger.
The petition that the court denied was brought by Beyond Nuclear and the Sierra Club, against the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), and others. The NRC is federally charged with protecting public safety. NEI is the lobbying arm and trade group representing the nuclear energy industry.
The petitioners argued that the NRC and industry did not adequately take into account how aging components and climate change would affect the risk of serious accidents involving damage to the reactor core. Of greater concern is the extension of operating licenses for the country’s already aging nuclear power plants beyond the initial forty-year licensing period, and the NRC’s refusal to view more extreme conditions caused by climate change as risk factors that threaten safe operation in the future.
“We are astounded by the court’s decision, which allows the NRC to escape the blanket claim that overly conservative approaches in its accident risk analyzes could cover up the unique, site-specific impacts of climate change,” said attorney Diane Curran, who argued the case on behalf of Beyond Nuclear and the Sierra Club. “The NRC has never provided any evidence to show that it has in fact assessed the impacts of climate change on accident risks – how could it know that?”
“This decision allows NRC to look into the rear-view mirror of future safety challenges for nuclear plants caused by worsening climate conditions,” said Paul Guenther, Reactor Monitoring Project Manager at Beyond Nuclear. “What we are already seeing today – raging wildfires, severe floods, rising sea levels and frequent violent storms due to climate change – sends a warning that assessing reactor safety based on the worst climate conditions of the past is not only unrealistic, but also reckless.”
“Just last week, we saw extreme conditions caused by climate change with raging wildfires in Canada that could just as easily occur in the hotter United States and catastrophic flooding in Texas,” Guenther said. “Shockingly, the court accepted the NRC’s argument that the chances of a serious accident occurring under future climate conditions are ‘small.’ Instead of assessing the real risks, the court decided to decide whether the NRC’s environmental review was ‘reasonably explained’ or not. This does not serve the interests of public safety,” Gunter said.
Beyond Nuclear is carefully evaluating its legal options and will continue to challenge maximum license extensions at the Oconee (SC), Peach Bottom (PA), and North Anna (VA) nuclear power plants.
“Oconee is of particular concern because it lies below two earthen dams filled with boulders and two million acre feet of water,” Gunther noted. “In bringing this case, we were striving to ensure that this community did not become a tragic test case for the failure to ensure robust safety rules at our nation’s nuclear plants for the remainder of their operational lives.”
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