Nuclear Power 101
Nuclear power, which currently supplies about 20 percent of the electricity in the United States, is riskier than it should—and could—be. The United States has strong safety regulations on the books, but the federal agency that oversees the nuclear industry—the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC)—does not enforce them consistently. In addition, current security standards are inadequate to defend nuclear plants against terrorist attacks. A major accident or successful attack could kill thousands of people and contaminate large regions for thousands of years. Finally, if the United States or other nations begin to separate plutonium from the used nuclear fuel (by "reprocessing" the fuel), this would increase the risk that terrorists or additional countries could acquire nuclear weapons materials. Plutonium can be used to fuel nuclear reactors, but also to build nuclear weapons.
Since well before the 1979 accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant, UCS has been a leading watchdog on nuclear safety. We also work to increase security standards for nuclear reactors, and to prevent the United States from reprocessing its used fuel, which would create a risk where none now exists: that terrorists could acquire material to make a nuclear bomb from U.S. nuclear power facilities.
Our experts continue to be vigilant in monitoring the security and safety of U.S. nuclear plants and the performance of the NRC. We file formal petitions to the NRC, work with the NRC's Office of the Inspector General, testify before Congress, conduct technical analyses, and provide expert testimony in court cases. Based on our analysis, we make common-sense, pragmatic recommendations for how to make nuclear power safer and more secure against sabotage and attack. We also work to prevent the United States from beginning to reprocess used reactor fuel, and to instead reinstate its ban on reprocessing.
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