Trump’s nuclear power push weakens regulator and poses safety risks, former

President Donald Trump‘s push to approve nuclear plants as quickly as possible threatens to weaken the independent regulator tasked with protecting public health and safety, former federal officials warn. 

Trump issued four sweeping executive orders in May that aim to quadruple nuclear power by 2050 in the U.S. The White House and the technology industry view nuclear as powerful source of reliable electricity that can help meet the growing energy needs of artificial intelligence.

The most consequential of Trump’s orders aims to slash regulations and speed up power plant approvals through an overhaul of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The NRC is an independent agency established by Congress in 1975 to make sure that nuclear reactors are deployed and operated safely.

Trump accuses the NRC of “risk aversion” in his order, blaming the regulator for how few nuclear plants have been built in the U.S. over the past three decades. The president says that the NRC is focused on protecting the public from “the most remote risks,” arguing that such a cautious approach to approving plants restricts access to reliable electricity.

“We’ll be very safe, but we’ll be fast and safe,” Trump said about expediting nuclear plants at a conference on energy and artificial intelligence in Pittsburgh on Tuesday. The president said his administration would get a “whole different group of people” to regulate the industry.

But three former NRC chairs who spoke to CNBC say Trump is blaming the regulator that protects the public, when the industry’s fundamental problem is that new nuclear plants are incredibly expensive to build. The chairs were appointed by Democratic presidents. CNBC also spoke to the chief of staff for a chair appointed by George W. Bush.

Only two new reactors have been built from scratch in the U.S. over the past 30 years. Those new units at Plant Vogtle in Georgia came in $18 billion over budget and seven years behind schedule. Two reactors in South Carolina were canceled in the middle of construction in 2017 due to cost overruns. The mismanagement of the Georgia and South Carolina projects led to the bankruptcy of industry stalwart Westinghouse.

Trump’s intervention at the NRC threatens the independence that the regulator needs to protect the public interest, the former chairs said. If NRC independence is compromised, the regulator could become vulnerable to industry or government influence in ways that raise the risk of a nuclear accident, they warned.

Japan’s regulators and government focused on promoting nuclear power as safe and did not force the operator to implement measures that would have made the plant less vulnerable to a natural disaster, according to the 2012 investigation. In the wake of the accident, Japan shut down all of its nuclear plants for safety inspections, losing a power source that supplied 30% of the nation’s electricity.

“There was a massive impact on the economy and that is an issue of national security,” Macfarlane said of the accident in Japan.

“The reason why we have independent regulators, and by independent I mean free of industry and political influence, is to protect the public safety and to protect national security,” she said.