Vigilance Over Profits: Nuclear Plant's Recurring Cracks Spark Safety Debate

The nuclear power industry stands at a crossroads today.

• Advanced small modular reactor (SMR) designs offer the promise of safer, more flexible carbon-free energy production, leading to renewed interest in nuclear growth after years of decline.
• However, any major incident - even at an aging legacy plant - could quickly reverse momentum and return the industry to the days of mass protests and financially ruinous legal challenges.
• Public trust, once lost, is difficult to regain after accidents like Fukushima led nations like Germany to irrationally and completely abandon nuclear power.
• This fragile context means the industry must uphold the highest safety standards and secure public confidence through exceptional transparency and regulatory compliance.
• Recent serial lapses like those at V.C. Summer remain a liability.
• While cost and competition pose very real challenges, sub-optimal safety culture, and lax or reduced oversight issues represent an existential threat to nuclear's "second chance."
• Renewed expansion requires steadfast vigilance and resistance to complacency at all levels - from investors to utility operators and from politicians to regulators.
• The stakes could not be higher.

A recent warning issued to the V.C. Summer nuclear plant in South Carolina has cast a spotlight on the critical importance of rigorous safety inspections and oversight of the nuclear power industry. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) gave the plant a preliminary “yellow” warning - its second most serious category - after recurring cracks were discovered in an emergency backup fuel line.

This comes even as the industry lobbies for reduced regulatory scrutiny.

The incidents at V.C. Summer serve as a clarion call for maintaining robust NRC oversight of aging nuclear reactors.

Read: South Carolina nuclear plant gets warning over another cracked emergency fuel pipe

Since 2003, small cracks have been found repeatedly in the plant’s piping for emergency diesel generators needed to cool the reactor in a blackout. Despite corrective actions, cracks reappeared, and leaks worsened during a November 2022 test.

The NRC’s warning underscores the long-established principal that critical safety components can and will degrade over time. South Carolina stakeholders argue that the recurrent issues should prompt extensive inspection prior to license renewal. V.C. Summer’s owner Dominion Energy is seeking a 20-year extension beyond 2042.

However, the nuclear industry contends that the “exceptional” safety culture of U.S. nuclear power today warrants relaxing oversight. With operating costs rising at aged plants, operators seek regulatory changes to reduce inspections, drills, reporting requirements, and public notices of problems.

But independent industry experts (and yours truly) counter that the stakes are far too high to cut corners on nuclear safety, whether due to accidents, natural disasters, or terrorist threats. While reasonable steps to curb ineffective regulation make sense, proposed rollbacks could jeopardize public health, according to watchdog groups.

Read: Nuclear industry has been pushing for less oversight, and it’s working

The NRC appears largely receptive to industry arguments for deregulation, with minimal public awareness or input. But allowing economics to blur the focus on safety would be negligent. V.C. Summer’s recurring cracks demonstrate that rigorous NRC oversight remains vital - both for existing reactors and proposed extensions. The agency must maintain independence and fully enforce standards despite industry pressure. The public interest depends on it.

The incidents at V.C. Summer are not isolated cases of lapses in nuclear safety culture. Over the past few years, NRC inspections and enforcement actions have uncovered troubling deficiencies at numerous facilities:

1. Facility: Vogtle Electric Generating Plant, Georgia

• "Nuclear Regulatory Commission cites safety culture issues at Vogtle nuclear expansion"
• Date: January 30, 2020
• Summary: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) identified a "chilled work environment" at the Vogtle nuclear expansion project in Georgia, where employees felt hesitant to raise safety concerns. This environment could suppress the identification and correction of safety issues.

2. Facility: Perry Nuclear Power Plant, Ohio

• "Nuclear power plant fined for safety violations"
• Date: February 6, 2020
• Summary: The Perry Nuclear Power Plant in Ohio was fined for multiple safety violations, including the failure to properly maintain emergency preparedness capabilities and not conducting adequate fire drills.

3. Facility: Westinghouse Electric Co. fuel plant, South Carolina

• "Safety concerns halt work at SC nuclear fuel plant"
• Date: February 10, 2020
• Summary: Work was halted at the Westinghouse Electric Co. nuclear fuel plant in South Carolina due to safety concerns. Inspectors found that the plant failed to properly analyze hazards and did not have an adequate process for reviewing safety protocols.

4. Facility: Palisades Nuclear Generating Station, Michigan

• "Nuclear plant operator fined over safety breaches"
• Date: January 31, 2020
• Summary: The operator of the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station in Michigan was fined for safety breaches, including the failure to ensure that safety systems were available and functional during plant operations.

5. Facility: Arkansas Nuclear One, Arkansas

• "NRC cites nuclear plant for safety violation"
• Date: March 4, 2019
• Summary: The NRC cited the Arkansas Nuclear One plant for a safety violation related to the failure to properly maintain and test emergency diesel generators, which are crucial for ensuring the safe shutdown of the plant during power outages.

This pattern demonstrates that even plants with a positive safety record on paper can develop complacency and gaps over time without vigilant oversight. While reasonable deregulation may cut ineffective red tape, these recent lapses provide sobering evidence that reducing NRC inspections and enforcement would likely jeopardize public confidence and safety.

Case in point: The Davis-Besse plant in Ohio was considered a top performer until the discovery in 2002 of severe, dangerous corrosion in its reactor vessel head. This near miss - caused by institutional complacency - occurred at a plant labeled as having an exemplary safety culture. It prompted an overhaul of NRC inspection regimes and culture assessments.

Complacency Breeds Corrosion: The Davis-Besse Cautionary Tale

The Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in Ohio had a significant near miss in 2002 due to reactor pressure vessel (RPV) head degradation. This incident highlighted flaws in the NRC's assessment of safety culture:

1. Davis-Besse was considered a top-performing plant with an excellent safety record. NRC gave it high marks for safety culture.
2. In March 2002, a maintenance worker was standing on scaffolding installing insulation around the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) head.
3. When he leaned against a metal rail for support, the rail detached from the wall, and the worker nearly fell.
4. Upon investigation, workers found the metal rail had corroded, and half of its bolts were missing. The corresponding metal beam on the wall also showed severe corrosion.
5. Further inspection revealed a football-sized cavity eating through 6 inches of the RPV head - the corrosion originated from the other side. Only a thin layer of stainless steel was left, preventing a catastrophic breach and LOCA (loss of coolant accident) event.
6. The corrosion was caused by leaking borated water that reacted with the head. This went undetected for years.
7. NRC later concluded that Davis-Besse staff had succumbed to complacency, ignoring warning signs of corrosion to avoid unwanted outage extensions.
8. Safety culture assessments failed to identify this complacency. The NRC inspection regime at the time was insufficient to detect such imminent, catastrophic mechanical failures.
9. If the RPV head had breached, it could have resulted in a major loss of coolant accident, core damage, and large radiation release. It was considered one of the worst near misses in US nuclear history.
10. The incident prompted significant changes in NRC inspection procedures and safety culture assessments to better identify latent organizational weaknesses. It showed oversight lapses can occur even at model plants.

The Davis-Besse case study highlights the need for robust NRC oversight and skepticism regarding industry claims of "exceptional" safety culture. Mechanistic inspection is essential to complement cultural assessments, which can fail to detect imminent threats. Complacency can take root unnoticed over time, underscoring the vital deterrent role of NRC enforcement.

V.C. Summer's recurring emergency system cracks highlight the vital need for the NRC to fully exercise its authority, independently of industry lobbying. With reactor licenses now being extended to 60+ years, maintaining the highest safety standards is imperative - both for aging plants and new projects.

“The unexpected became the expected, which became the accepted.” — Columbia Accident Investigation Board

The risks of normalization of deviance - where organizations become desensitized to anomalies over time - are not unique to the nuclear industry. The 2003 Columbia space shuttle tragedy revealed similar cultural failings at NASA.

In the years prior to Columbia's demise, NASA had waived over 3,200 critical safety hazards that could result in orbiter and crew loss. Their near-perfect occupational safety record bred high confidence, but also dangerous complacency. Columbia disintegrated on re-entry, killing 7 astronauts. The CAIB post-accident review board concluded: “The unexpected became the expected, which became the accepted.”

Likewise, the NRC must remain attuned to early warning signs and resist the allure of reducing its much-needed scrutiny. Normalization of deviance results in the tolerance of safety lapses slowly accumulating over time in aging plants, with the ultimate failure magnitude unseen until revealed through catastrophic failures.

While NASA's safety record outpaced nuclear regulators, Columbia showed that exceptional performance is no guarantee against such cultural drift. Complacency still takes root when vigilance wanes.

V.C. Summer's recurring cracks are red flags not to ignore. As with NASA pre-Columbia, increased tolerance for the lowering of standards and fewer inspections threaten hazard detection at nuclear plants. The NRC must respond appropriately to warning signs, rather than acquiesce to economic or political pressure for deregulation.

Safety margins exist for a reason - wavering commitment will eventually exact a high cost. The public depends on the NRC's continued rigor and resistance to pressure for deregulation.