Inside the proposal that could reshape U.S. nuclear power

A nation isn't just built. It's powered by people like us.

In 2024, Chevron increased its US production nearly 20% to help keep energy reliable.

Since 2022, we spent $44 billion with local suppliers supporting good jobs across all 50 states.

And this year, we're planning to invest about $10.5 billion in American energy projects

to help build the future right here at home. We put in the work because America depends on it.

Learn more at chevron.com slash America.

Hey, welcome back to the Politico Energy Podcast,

where we explore the stories and people shaping energy and climate policy.

I'm Normal Moleical, your Wednesday and Friday host and executive producer of the show.

For more than half a century, there was this guiding principle at the Nuclear Regulatory

Commission that radiation exposure should be as low as possible to protect human health.

But now, the NRC is taking its first steps to repeal that standard as part of a new policy

proposal circulating within the agency. In theory, from a big picture perspective,

removing this principle would help the Trump administration's push to expand nuclear power

after decades of slow or no growth. But what are the health implications of this move?

And where do lawmakers and the nuclear industry itself actually stand on this issue?

That's what I want to talk about today with Politico's AJ Kamacho.

It's Friday, March 20th.

AJ, what's up, man? Welcome back to the show. Appreciate your time.

Normal, it's great to be back. I am radiating with excitement to talk to you today.

Love the pun. Yeah, so speaking of, that's our topic of the day. You're reporting

there's a proposal circulating within the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that would remove

the Alara principle before we get to that proposal itself. Can you kind of explain what this

principle is and why it's important? Alara is an acronym. It stands for as low as reasonably

achievable. So that is basically keep radiation as low as reasonably achievable radiation exposure

to humans, taking into account economic and social factors. It stems from this debate in health

physics that has been going on since the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and is still going on

today about whether low dose radiation is actually bad for you. We all know high dose radiation is

bad. But at low levels, I mean, everyone gets radiation from the sun, from natural

radon gas in the environment and so forth. So is that bad for you? Now, there's evidence that says,

yes, it's bad. There's evidence that says, it doesn't do anything. And there's even some evidence

that it is good for your health. But regulators decided back in the 1970s and since to air on the

conservative side. And once you assume, as regulators do, that there is no safe level of radiation,

Alara is the natural result. Keep it as low as reasonably achievable. Now, a lot of the stress

in the debate since has been on that are in Alara reasonably achievable. There's a lot of debate

as to whether that principle is lived in practice or whether it is overly stringent. But when we

get to sort of ways that it's applied, you know, the NRC, for example, has a rule of thumb at about

$7,100 today per unit of radiation per person. If it costs more than that to reduce that unit of

radiation, it's probably not worth it. If it costs less than that, it probably is. And then you get,

you know, the questions of the importance of this principle and, you know, public confidence is

an interesting aspect there. Because on the one hand, it might give people more confidence in the

industry to see that the regulator takes it very seriously. On the other hand, there's arguments

that it makes people worried that any amount of radiation is going to kill them. And it makes

them panic more about nuclear stuff. Okay, so that was a great summary of kind of Alara up until

today. And now the NRC internally is trying to figure out what to do with that principle. And

some other related principles. So what have you learned about this proposal? What are you hearing?

Last week, Chairman Hony confirmed to reporters at a conference that he and the commissioners had a

draft rule for Alara's fate on their desk, but he did not confirm the contents. My reporting

indicates that this draft rule would do four main things. First of all, it would get rid of Alara

and it would get rid of the idea that any amount of radiation is harmful. As a result, the radiation

protection would be pretty much just down to the annual dose limits. The way Alara worked was

as a tiered system. You had your first tier. You have to be under the radiation dose limit that

is your ceiling. And then Alara was the second tier, reduce radiation further if it's economically

and socially reasonable to do so. Now it's just that first tier. It's just a ceiling. If you're

above it, you're in trouble, if you're below it, you're good to go. But then the second thing it does

is it gives exceptions for those dose limits or workarounds might be the better word. For example,

if you're a worker, you have a five-rem annual dose limit. This draft rule would create a bank.

So by that I mean if I was at three-rem one year, the next year I can actually go up to seven-rem,

because the previous year I was two-rem under my limit. So the next year I can go two-rem over my

limit. It creates a sort of bank system of workarounds there. The third thing it does is it gets rid

of the hourly dose limit. Not a lot of concern there because it was already pretty high.

And then the fourth thing it does is it increases by 10 fold the caregiver radiation dose limit.

So this is think about folks who are going through radiation therapy. They might leave the hospital

literally radioactive. This was the dose limit for the amount of radiation that their parents or

their spouses could receive subsequently. Again, not a lot of concern there because there's already

a lot of doctor discretion involved. But those are kind of the four main things that this draft

proposal would change if the commission were to ultimately adopt it.

So a lot of different details, but kind of the big idea behind this proposal seems to me to be

that the Trump administration wants to help the nuclear industry build power plants quicker,

faster. And so is this actually going to make a difference for the industry? Are we going to get

cheaper nuclear power plants coming online faster?

I got to tell you, normal, that's the billion dollar question right there.

Probably more than a billion. No, I mean, honestly, yeah, we're probably talking tens of

billions. You, Alara is an interesting thing because you get so many anecdotes in the industry

about how costly it is. You get stories about a refueling at a nuclear power plant.

And the NRC says, go back to the drawing board. Yes, you are below the dose limit,

but you should add shielding here. You should give people respirators here to reduce

there and take even further. But on the other hand, this is the system that the nuclear industry

has developed around. And so if you are like Westinghouse, which already builds nuclear reactors,

are you going to think it's worth it to change your design in the first place and change the way

you operate? And also, if there are negative health impacts from low doses of radiation,

which again, we do not know. But if there are, and that leads to people getting sick,

you know, that leads to lower manpower, that leads to more workers compensation and things like

that. And so the fact is, as much as there's a lot of anecdotes about this costing money,

people point to the Fukushima disaster, say that the evacuation decision was far too stringent

for the radiation doses that were maybe not that bad. People say the cleanup is targeting levels

of radiation that are so low. For all that, there are these anecdotes. There's never really been

a comprehensive study that says what the costs are. So certainly that's the goal to save money and

build nuclear power plants faster without this additional hurdle. And I think everyone would say

that's probably going to be the case to some extent. But whether this is going to be a dramatic

reduction in cost and timelines or whether it's going to be pretty minimal, it's hard to say.

And it probably depends on the type of nuclear company you are. Like I said, Westinghouse,

they kind of know what they're doing. Maybe they don't want to change things up. But if you're a

startup who hasn't even built your first reactor, this might be more appealing to change your way

before you get started. I feel obligated as a political employee to ask this next question.

So forgive me, but where do lawmakers on the hill stand on this? You know, it seems like

from your reporting or our colleagues reporting, there's some division on the hill.

My colleague Nico Portundo, also at E&E, has done some great reporting on this asking around

Capitol Hill what he's found is that Republicans unsurprisingly perhaps are generally supportive.

Democrats, on the other hand, historically have been more skeptical of nuclear power. And so to

them, Alara is the cost of protecting people. $7,100 per unit per person. That might sound like a

lot, but that's the cost of protecting people. That's sort of your typical democratic response,

but then you do have some. For example, Representative Jake Achenklaus from Massachusetts,

he is very skeptical of Alara. And he seems to think that repealing it or at least strongly

reconsidering it might be a good thing. After all, then it would theoretically be easier to build

nuclear power plants. Those are low emissions. That's good for the environment. And from his

perspective, that's going to be beneficial to the party's goals, to the government's goals.

To close, what are the health implications for Americans if this proposal does become a reality?

I know you've talked about kind of the mixed like science on this, but what are the implications

for the regular American that we should know? Maybe this is your other 10 billion dollar question

normal. We really do not know. Most of the health physicists I have spoke with have sort of

given me a response of, don't panic. The clear connection where radiation starts to have a negative

impact on your health is about 10 REM in a lifetime. With the dose limits remaining as they are,

members of the public would have to live probably more than 100 years and live right next to a

nuclear power plant and so forth to be able to get the level where they're clearly going to get

cancer. But this is one of the interesting things about health physics right now. It's a field

where there's a lot of new information coming in. There's an ongoing million person study that's

taking years to complete. So I'm giving you this answer now. The truth is, when this million

person study is done, you know, a few years when there's more research, the answer to that could be

changing. And that's why even folks who think that a lot of us flawed are a little bit weary about

these changes being implemented. All right, AJ Kamacho, appreciate your time. Thank you, normal.

Also, Politico is hosting the Politico Pub at Sarah Week just outside the conference in a first of

its kind media partnership with S&P Global starting Monday. Please join us at the pub,

which will offer live interviews with influential global executives, government leaders, innovators,

and policy experts led by Politico journalists. And if you want to follow Sarah Week like an insider,

we're exclusively offering a free seven day trial of Politico Pro's Morning Energy Newsletter,

delivering the deals, policy moves, and conversations shaping the week. Go to PoliticoPro.com

Backslash Energy to sign up. All right, that's it for Politico Energy. For more news on energy and

the environment, subscribe to our free newsletter PowerSwitch at Politico.com Backslash Newsletters

and subscribe to Politico Pro to read our Morning Energy Newsletter. Stuff into Dorvik is the

show's video producer. I'm the show's executive producer and co-host, Debra Khan, Matt Daly,

and Saisan Eski are the editors of the show. Our theme music was made by Pran Bandi.

Please subscribe to Politico's YouTube page if you like our content and follow our show on Apple,

Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Nirmal Malikal and we'll see you back here on Monday.

A nation isn't just built. It's powered by people like us. In 2024,

Chevron increased its U.S. production nearly 20% to help keep energy reliable.

Since 2022, we spent $44 billion with local suppliers supporting good jobs across all 50 states.

And this year, we're planning to invest about $10.5 billion in American energy projects to help

build the future right here at home. We put in the work because America depends on it.

Learn more at chevron.com slash America.