Two (that's 2) nuclear sites in the U.S. are in compliance with federal fire regulations

[Keith Bee]

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/04/atomic-snowflakes/73227/

See? I tolja there was nothing to worry about!

[msongs]

1. after obama gives them 46 billion in loans they won't pay back they can buy fire extinguishersnt

[highplainsdem]

2. K&R. This is a must-read.

[enough]

3. Interesting article.

one snip>

The ongoing failures at Japan’s Fukushima plant have put new emphasis on concerns about nuclear safety here in the United States. And on the heels of recent massive regulatory failures that left our financial markets in chaos and the Gulf of Mexico blackened, one wonders whether American nuclear regulation, handled by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), in Rockville, MD, is comparably insufficient.

An NRC Investigator General report from 2002, I found, showed that only 53 percent of the employees at NRC felt it was “safe to speak up in the NRC,’ and less than half -- 48 percent -- felt “that management actually trusts the judgment of employees at their level in the organization.”

A 2006 report observed: “Significant reservations still exist about the Differing Professional Opinions (DPO) program. Some employees feel comfortable raising an issue and going through the DPO process. However, a number of employees do not feel comfortable doing so, out of fear of retaliation.”

One former NRC commissioner, speaking on background last June, told me: “our nuclear plants are like snowflakes, they’re all different and they can all melt.”

According to John Grobe, the Associate Director for Engineering and Safety Systems at NRC, “Approximately one-half of the core damage risk at operating reactors results from accident sequences that initiate with fire events.”

Nonetheless, only two U.S. nuclear sites are in compliance with federal fire regulations; all others continue to operate with exemptions, a stopgap system that was implemented more than thirty years ago and was never intended as a permanent solution.

At a public meeting in July 2008, NRC commissioner Gregory Jaczko, whom President Obama has since appointed to chair the commission, noted: “ simple, straightforward regulations and I don’t think there is one plant right now that is in compliance with those regulations.” He continued, “That's simply unacceptable for a regulator.”

much more>

[crickets]

4. ... K&R