[COPY] Accelerating Versatile Advanced Nuclear for Clean Energy Act of 2023

Figure 1. NRC Rockville, still standing, ugly as ever.

The Advance Act has finally passed both Houses by very large margins. It is on the President’s desk and will shortly become law. The Act is being widely hailed as breakthrough legislation which will “reform” the NRC, and revitalized US nuclear power. But what is actually in the Act? GKN looked into this a year or so ago when it came out of committee. The final Act has a bit more detail than the bill we looked at, but no substantive changes. So I can just reprint the old post in honor of the occasion. The Advance Act does nothing but dole out a few more goodies. No wonder it received such strong bipartisan support.

In 2018, Congress passed the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act, asking the NRC to come up with an expedited licensing process. Four years later the NRC responded with a 1200 page draft process that was so onerous that all the applicants to date have chosen to use one of the pre-existing routes.

Recently the Senate has tried again, voting the ADVANCE Act out of committee. Here's a look at this bill.

Section 101

Instructs the NRC to take the lead in international forums to develop regulation for advanced nuclear reactors. Establishes a new regulatory branch to carry out this activity

Translation: extend the crippling Goldstandard that has served the United States so well to everywhere on the planet and to all technologies.

Section 102

Denies licenses to Russian and Chinese connected fuel suppliers.

Translation: protect the Goldstandard from possibly non-Goldstandard countries

Section 103

No fuel to any country that has not ratified the IAEA Additional Protocol.

Translation: force Saudi Arabia to buy nuclear from Koreans, Chinese, or Russians.

Section 104

Establishes a joint Commerce and Energy initiative to facilitate outreach to nations seeking advanced nuclear energy programs.

Translation: make sure that countries that do not already have a nuclear regulatory apparat don't take advantage of that fact and, God forbid, use something like Underwriter Certification.

Section 201

Hourly rates for reviewing Advanced Nuclear Applicants shall not exceed hourly rates for other NRC activities,

Translation: we were charging applicants higher rates in the past.

Section 202

NRC can rebate licensing costs of the first new applicants to get an Operating License.

Translation: don't worry about the outrageous application fees. You might get them back. But a half a billion dollars has to be worth something. Right?

Section 203

Requires report addressing unique licensing issues for providing district heat, making hydrogen, and other processes.

Translation: more paperwork, which will say NRC needs more control.

Section 204

Excludes costs of early site reviews at labs and DOD properties from the money that must be recovered from applicants and licensees,

Translation: Applicant money can only be spent by NRC.

Section 205

Makes clear all the nonsense that NEIMA is trying to change does not apply for fusion applicants.

Translation: Fusion would be as dead as fission if NEIMA and the Advance Act were necessary.

Section 206

Commission has 1 year to "evaluate" regulatory changes for brownfield sites, 2 years to "implement timely reviews", 3 years to report on how well they've done.

Translation: You guys are still in charge. You decide what's ``timely". We are content to once again allow the NRC to evaluate itself.

Section 207

Authorizes $5,000,000 in nuclear grants to Appalachia.

Translation: Capito and Manchin have a lot of pull. Besides it’s other people’s money.

Section 301

Allows issuing nuclear licenses to certain formerly prohibited foreign entities

Translation: Maybe Urenco should be allowed to make HALEU in the States after all.

Section 302

Extends Price Anderson Act from 2025 to 2045.

Translation: under the rules we have set up, nuclear power plants are uninsurable.

Section 401

Requires report on licensing issues with innovative manufacturing processes, asks NRC to examine the need for nuclear grade components.

Translation: the NRC needs another opportunity to say why we need nuke stamps such as those granted to Shaw Industries.

Section 402

Establish a new Traineeship.

Translation: early indoctrination is important.

Section 403

Requires report of licensing additional conversion and enrichment facilities.

Translation: Congress may be fed up with Centrus, but is unwilling to impose any real requirements. NRC report will say we need more people.

Section 404

Requires Annual Report on Spent Fuel/HLW Inventory and its Costs

Translation: let's kick the can down the road on spent fuel again.

Section 405

$100 million more money per year to ``clean up" sites on Tribal Lands, where the radiation levels were so low they did not even exceeed DOE FUSRAP standards.

Translation: background dose rate levels are even more dangerous if they are on Indian reservations.

Section 406

Report to the Congress what DOE and NRC are doing to develop and license advanced nuclear fuels.

Translation: Please give us more self-congratulatory paperwork.

Section 501

Can violate federal pay standards for hiring for a long list of specialties.

Translation: NRC gets even more expensive.

Section 502

You have three years to tell us how NEIMA is going.

Translation: Some staffer snuck in a sick joke.

Section 503

NRC must periodically review and assess performance metrics and milestone schedules to ensure licensing can be completed on an efficient schedule.

Translation: Please may I have another sir.

Section 601

35 million annually in grants to communities impacted by nuclear closures. plus 5 million/yr to administer these grants

Translation: even after they've made a plant uneconomic, it must still support bureaucrats.

Section 602

Changes AEA 104(c) 50% limit of revenues from power sales by test reactors to 75%; but the wording is contradictory.

Translation: Half committee said yes; half said no.

What's firm legislation in all this:

1) About 150 million per year in taxpayer handouts, plus money for more bureaucrats to do the handing.

2) Extension of the Price Anderson Act.

3) Restrictions on the ability of the NRC to license Russian, Chinese related fuel sources.

4) A possible partial relaxation of the limits on test reactor power sales, depending on how you read the verbiage.

Everything else is a polite request that the NRC please reform itself. And do tell us how you think you are doing. Oh, and we do have some goodies for you. Some new slots.

There are no licensing time limits. There are no licensing cost limits. There is no requirement that the NRC justify failure to license with a cost benefit analysis, which includes a safety and economic evaluation of the alternatives. There is no way to appeal the NRC's failure to license. There is no exemption from licensing for test reactors. There is no threat of withholding money if things do not improve. There is not even an outside evaluation of the whole mess. The imperium has been reaffirmed.

Nobody at Rockville is worried. They are chuckling. This is NEIMA 2.0.