**** This post has been updated as of May 4, 2024 ****
Take a stand against a new bill that keeps US taxpayers on the hook for the full costs of nuclear disasters and promotes nuclear energy worldwide. ACT NOW!
HELP US STOP S.1111 – The ADVANCE Act of 2023
What’s in the bill?
1. S. 1111 renews the Price-Anderson Act
o S.1111 includes a 20-year extension of the Price-Anderson Act, a 1957 law which caps the industry’s liability for nuclear disasters at only $13 billion. Instead, the Price-Anderson Act makes US taxpayers liable for the full costs of nuclear disasters – which could run into the hundreds of billions of dollars – and exempts the insurance industry from covering homeowners and businesses for damages from those disasters. The nuclear industry claims it has the greatest safety record and that the new reactors it still wants Price-Anderson to cover are “inherently safe” and disaster-proof. If that’s true, they shouldn’t need taxpayers to continue being their insurance company.
2. S. 1111 promotes nuclear reactor exports. It assigns the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to coordinate:
o Reactor import and export licensing
o Regulatory assistance and development to OECD nations and export countries
o Coordinate with the Department of Energy (DOE), corporations, and universities to train foreign workers
o Establish an International Nuclear Reactor Export and Innovation Branch, to be funded by taxpayers, not the corporations that would profit from exporting reactors
3. S. 1111 supports domestic nuclear fuel infrastructure expansion and development.
o S. 1111 allows for NRC to disapprove imports of nuclear fuel from Russia and China, and directs NRC to assess its readiness to authorize new and expanded nuclear fuel infrastructure in the US.
4. S.1111 incorporates a number of problematic provisions to promote nuclear energy:
o Nuclear reactor exports: It would direct the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to establish an office to approve exports and to assist countries in training workers and developing regulations; and it would direct the Energy and Commerce departments to facilitate reactor exports.
o Building reactors on coal plant sites: the bill provides $25 million over 5 years for development of reactors in the Appalachia region.
o Provides grants to cover the licensing costs of several “first-of-a-type” reactor designs.
o Creates regulations to promote construction of reactors on “brownfield” sites that are polluted with toxic waste.
o Allowing the use of lower-quality parts and materials in constructing nuclear reactors.
o Requiring NRC and DOE to collaborate on regulating and approving new types of fuel for nuclear reactors.
5. S.1111 would end national security protections against foreign ownership of nuclear power plants. It would authorize G7 nations and South Korea to own controlling interests in US reactors, and it would create a new federal department to promote exports of nuclear reactors to other countries.
6. Nominal Support for Uranium Mine Cleanups: S.1111 would authorize $100 million for reclaiming and remediating abandoned uranium mines. Funding is desperately needed, but $100 million is a pittance compared to what is needed to clean up the 15,000+ abandoned uranium mines.
7. It authorizes NRC to offer signing bonuses to new employees in a range of specialized technical fields, while cutting the NRC’s overhead budget and limiting the fees NRC charges to companies that submit license applications. Such fees ensure that US taxpayer dollars are not wasted reviewing incomplete, unviable applications for nuclear reactors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price%E2%80%93Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act
(UPDATE as of March 4, 2024: HR 6544 passed the House but we want to thank Pramila Jayapal and Adam Smith for voting to oppose this bill. If you would also like to thank them, here is a template letter to do so: https://nirs.salsalabs.org/housemembersthatvotednoonhr6544/index.html?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=81e06cfa-cd77-438f-9bb8-b1bf165b557d)
Action Alert from the Nuclear Information and Resource Service nirs@nirs.org
Tell your Congress Members to STOP HR 6544 the Atomic Energy Advancement Act!
Take a stand! A new bill would keep US taxpayers on the hook for the full costs of nuclear
disasters and promote nuclear energy worldwide. HR 6544, the Atomic Energy Advancement
Act of 2023 is a comprehensive pro-nuclear bill that includes a host of provisions propping up the
nuclear industry. Tell your Congress members to oppose HR 6544!
Even more concerning, H.R. 6544 aims to undermine the NRC’s core nuclear safety mandate by
revising its mission statement to emphasize the “public benefits” of nuclear energy. Unlike the
Department of Energy, which focuses on promoting nuclear energy, the NRC was established by
Congress in 1974 specifically to protect our health and safety by regulating nuclear power, separate
from promotion. Prior to the NRC, the Atomic Energy Commission’s job was to do both, and
safety took a back seat due to the evident risks associated with conflating the
The most dangerous aspect of the bill is the renewal of the Price-Anderson Act, a 1957 law which
caps the industry’s liability for nuclear disasters at only $13 billion. HR 6544 extends it for 40
MORE years. The Price-Anderson Act makes US taxpayers liable for the full costs of nuclear
disasters – which could run into the hundreds of billions of dollars – and exempts the insurance
industry from covering homeowners and businesses for damages from those disasters.
Taxpayers should not be the insurance company for the nuclear industry. Let your Congress
Members know that HR 6544 is bad news for US taxpayers and further entrenches the status quo of
dirty, dangerous, and expensive nuclear power in the country and abroad.
Comments from SSCAN partner, 350Seattle:
False Solutions: Nuclear Energy Nuclear energy has no place in a safe,
clean, sustainable future. Nuclear energy is expensive , Wall Street firm Lazard estimates
that it costs approximately $160/MWh rather than the $40/MWh that solar and wind cost;
the difference more than pays for needed solutions to intermittency. Nuclear energy
is dangerous , and the “safer” small, modular reactors (SMRs) are untested for both safety
and reliability. Nuclear energy isn’t ready —even if prototype safety testing is skipped, as
proponents are suggesting, commercialization would be unlikely before the 2030’s. To
reduce emissions at scale, we need clean power today. Nuclear energy still creates
radioactive waste , and there is still no place to safely put it. Almost every past and
present nuclear plant in the U.S. is a nuclear waste dump, and nuclear plants themselves
are running out of ways to store highly radioactive waste on site.
Such wastes will be deadly to biological life for hundreds of thousands of years. Nuclear plants
promote nuclear proliferation . The process for enriching uranium for fuel can be applied
to making bomb-grade material. Plutonium, a basic element of nuclear weapons, can be
derived from the waste. SMRs increase proliferation hazards by using uranium fuel more
enriched than large nuclear reactors, or plutonium. Nuclear energy sites are at risk of
a terrorist attack ; if attacked, people and the environment are at risk for millennia. Major
nuclear accidents such as Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, and many lesser
known close calls, have been caused by operator error or engineering flaws. Humans
make mistakes. We need to use technologies that do not have catastrophic consequences
when errors are made.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price%E2%80%93Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act
https://cleantechnica.com/2021/11/19/nuclear-power-wont-save-the-world-it-wont-even-
help/?fbclid=IwAR2esnWR_9dR5mOQYj-AswGjtF25_nNfmRjLR_O-
qU_EdKOixogFALxbRHs
https://cleantechnica.com/2021/11/19/nuclear-power-wont-save-the-world-it-wont-even-
help/?fbclid=IwAR2esnWR_9dR5mOQYj-AswGjtF25_nNfmRjLR_O-qU_EdKOixogFALxbRHs