４月１日に発足する予定だった原子力規制庁は、未だ法案審議飲めども立たず、現行体制での原子力規制が当面継続されることになった。岡早稲田大教授は、早く新体制に移行すべきだという。
国民の保安院や安全委員会に対する不信感はピークに達している。とはいえ、政府からの独立性を保てないような規制庁ならば、保安院や安全委員会の二の舞になるのが落ちだろう。
日本が規制庁を作るに当たって必ずお手本として引き合いに出されるのが、アメリカのNRCだ。たしかに、原子力工学に関する識見や災害など非常事態への対応については、日本の原子力ムラの技術者よりはるかに優っていることは、３．１１以降のNRCの3000ページの報告書を見れば歴然としている。しかし、安全性よりも経済を優先する政府の原子力発電推進政策に真っ向から立ち向かうことはできないという点では、NRCにも自ずから限界がある。
むろん、アメリカや中国のような地震の少ない大国は日本などとは違って、たとえ原発事故で半径３０キロ圏内、８０キロ圏内の土地が放射能まみれになったところで、たちまち国全体が危機に陥ることはないけれども。
NRCの問題に関しては、アメリカの原発新設に日本の東芝の子会社であるWestinｇhouseの加圧水型軽水炉を採用することを昨今許可した点、マサチューセッツ州のMarkey議員が指摘するように、発電所の安全にとってもっとも大切な緊急用ディーゼル発電機のたびたびの故障など様々な問題があるにもかかわらず操業させている点、アメリカの技術を途上国に売り込む際のセールス・ツールになっている点などが、これまで指摘されてきている。
日本の規制庁を独立した機関にするためには、原子力工学、放射線防御学、地質学、地球物理学、土木工学などなどに精通し、清廉潔白な人格を備え、かつシロアリと戦うための世知と体力を兼ね備えた優れた専門家と実務家だけで固める必要があるが、原子力ムラの手垢にまみれていない優秀な人材が、どれほど日本の国内に残っているか、心もとない限りである。
ましてや、東電の子会社の社員や原発メーカーの社員や自衛隊員が採用され、原発推進派の細野環境大臣が指名するような人物がトップに据えられるようなことでは、規制庁の先は、見えている。
規制と推進を行う機関を別個に独立して作るといえば、いかにも聞こえはいい。しかし、NRCでさえ、結局は初めに原発ありきで、規制と言う名を借りて、原発推進の裏付け・正当化を行っているだけのことに過ぎないのではないか。
ある自治体の首長は、「規制庁の設置を、再稼働の条件」に掲げているそうだが、新しく発足される規制庁にはいる職員は中立性を保つことができるようなメンバーが集められているわけでもない。
にもかかわらず、とりあえず国の規制機関さえ新設されれば、原発の再稼働を認めるなどというのは、自治体の住民の健康と安全を守るべき立場のリーダーの判断として、あまりにも軽々に過ぎるのではないか。
政府は東京電力福島第１原発事故を受けて設置を決めた「原子力規制庁」の４月１日発足を断念した。野党側が「政府からの独立性が不十分」などと反発し、同庁設置法案の国会審議入りのめどが立たないためだ。発足が５月以降にずれ込む可能性もあり、信頼を失った現行体制での原子力規制が当面、続くことになる。関西電力大飯原発３、４号機（福井県）再稼働の判断にも影響を与えそうだ。
政府は１月末、規制庁を環境省の外局として、４月１日に設置する法案を国会に提出。事故後、原発を規制する原子力安全・保安院が、推進する経済産業省の中にあることへの批判が噴出したため、経産省から「規制」当局を分離し、環境省に移すことにした。枝野幸男経済産業相は２７日の記者会見で「エネルギー需給と原子力安全を所管する大臣が同一人物という状況が長く続くのは望ましくない」と述べ規制庁の早期発足への理解を求めた。
しかし、自民、公明両党は「人事面、予算面での独立性をもっと確保しなくてはいけない」（茂木敏充・自民党政調会長）と、法案審議への慎重姿勢を崩していない。
自民党は２８日、茂木氏と関係部会長らが、規制庁問題で会合を開催。党の「原子力規制組織に関するプロジェクトチーム」の塩崎恭久座長が、国家行政組織法に基づく独立性の高い３条委員会としての「原子力規制委員会」設置を提案した。一方、党内には「３条委では独立性が高すぎる。政府の影響力を残すべきだ」との反対論もあり、独立性を高めるための具体策はまとまっていない。
公明党の石井啓一政調会長は２５日のＮＨＫ番組で「独立した委員会か、（政府の影響が残る）行政組織でやるかどちらもあり得るが、独立委員会の方が望ましい」と強調。ただ、「３条委員会にすると設置までの時間がかかりすぎる」（幹部）との意見があり、公明党の意見集約もできていない。
発足時期どころか、法案審議入りの日程すら定まらないため、民間からの登用を目指している長官人事や、細野豪志環境相自ら面接して決めるとしている幹部人事も進んでいない。さらに国会事故調査委員会が報告書をまとめる６月まで設置を遅らせるべきだとの声が野党側から出ている。政府関係者は「法案が仮に４月いっぱいで成立しても、国会事故調査委の報告を待て、などとなれば、発足は７月にずれ込む可能性もある」と懸念する。【笈田直樹、念佛明奈、岡崎大輔】
◇ストレステスト、審査進まぬ恐れ 安全委、予定立たず
規制庁の設置が遅れると、４月以降も経済産業省原子力安全・保安院と内閣府原子力安全委員会が引き続き原子力の規制を担う。だが、存続の行方が見えない組織は何も決められない可能性が高く、原発再稼働に絡む安全評価（ストレステスト）の審査などで機能不全に陥る恐れもある。
法案によると、規制庁は保安院、安全委の業務のほか、文部科学省が所管する研究炉の規制や放射線モニタリングの司令塔機能、内閣府原子力委員会が受け持つ核物質の防護対策などが移管される。
規制庁に計上されている予算は、元の担当省庁に振り替えられるので、予算上業務の遂行は可能。保安院の森山善範・原子力災害対策監は「存続する限り、しっかりやる」と強調する。
しかし、保安院の施策などをチェックする安全委は４月１日以降の活動予定を立てられていないのが実態だ。法案では、安全委は３月末に役割を終えるとあって、「いつまで続くか分からないのに議論してくれというのは無責任」（班目春樹委員長）というのが理由だ。おまけに、国会同意人事である安全委員５人のうち、班目委員長らを除く３人は４月１６日に任期が切れる。事務局職員は「４月２日から何をしたらいいのか」と漏らす。
こうした影響を受けるのが、安全評価の審査だ。電力８社から１６基分が提出されたが、安全委の確認が終わったのは２基。再稼働同意の条件に規制庁発足を求める首長もいる。
原子力規制に詳しい岡芳明・早稲田大特任教授は「保安院と安全委は国民の信頼を失った。早く新体制に移行すべきだ」と問題視する。【西川拓】
Disaster Plan Problems Found at U.S. Nuclear Plants
Published: May 12, 2011
ROCKVILLE, Md. — Despite repeated assurances that American nuclear plants are better equipped to deal with natural disasters than their counterparts in Japan, regulators said Thursday that recent inspections had found serious problems with some emergency equipment that would have made it unusable in an accident.
Saul Loeb/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
R. William Borchardt of the N.R.C.
A blog about energy and the environment.
DigitalGlobe, via Associated Press
N.R.C. employees said the agency had insufficiently weighed two factors found in the crisis at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi plant.
In addition, the staff of the
Nuclear Regulatory Commissionacknowledged that the agency’s current regulations and disaster plans did not give enough consideration to two factors that had greatly contributed to the continuing Fukushima Daiichi crisis in Japan: simultaneous problems at more than one reactor and a natural disaster that disrupts roads, electricity and other infrastructure surrounding a plant.
The briefing was part of a review requested by the commissioners to evaluate the vulnerability of American reactors to severe natural disasters like the ones that hit the Japanese plant in March.
Marty Virgilio, the deputy executive director of the agency, told the five commissioners that inspectors checked a sample of equipment at all 104 reactors and found problems at less than a third of them. The problems included pumps that would not start or, if they did, did not put out the required amount of water; equipment that was supposed to be set aside for emergencies but was being used in other parts of the plants; emergency equipment that would be needed in case of flood stored in places that could be flooded; and insufficient diesel on hand to run backup systems.
Many of the emergency systems were put in place after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Officials said the problems that had been found were addressed immediately but not everything had been inspected. Mr. Virgilio said he expected to have a fuller picture soon.
He said an entire category of new procedures, called “severe accident mitigation guidelines,” had been adopted voluntarily by the nuclear industry and thus was not subject to commission rules.
R. William Borchardt, the commission’s chief staff official, said some of the preparations for severe accidents “don’t have the same kind of regulatory pedigree” as the equipment in the original plant design.
The two-hour briefing given to the five-member commission was an early assessment, 30 days into a 90-day review being conducted by an N.R.C. task force.
Charlie Miller, the staff member leading the effort, said the staff was considering “enhancements” to its disaster plans and procedures. But as laid out by the staff, some of the changes under consideration could be far-reaching.
For example, the N.R.C. now looks at how well a plant’s design can handle a problem at just one reactor, even if there is more than one reactor at the site.
“You have to take a step back and consider what would happen if you had multiple units affected by some ‘beyond design basis’ events,” Mr. Miller said.
Another problem, staff members acknowledged, is that they have never paid much attention to the issues posed by handling an emergency when there is widespread damage to surrounding roads, power systems and communications links. In the past, the commission has explicitly rejected the notion that it should consider such combined events when reviewing a plant’s safety preparations.
Simultaneous with the commission’s meeting, Representative Edward J. Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, released a report arguing that a variety of other shortcomings existed at nuclear plants, including the frequent failure of emergency diesel generators, which are essential to plant safety if the power grid goes down. He also criticized the commission for not requiring plants to have a backup power source for spent fuel pools while the reactor is shut for maintenance or refueling.
The Fukushima accident has cast new attention on spent fuel pools; the reason the United States government recommended that Americans stay 50 miles from the plant was damage to the spent fuel pool of Fukushima’s Unit 4, a reactor that was shut down before the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
Mr. Markey pointed out that in the last eight years, the commission had received 69 reports of inoperable diesel generators at 33 plants, with six of those generators out for more than a month. The diesels provide power for water pumps that allow removal of “decay heat,” the heat that fuel generates even after a reactor shuts down. The Fukushima plants shut down successfully but decay heat wrecked their cores.
The N.R.C. said it was aware of the reports. But on Wednesday, attention was called to that problem by the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, an industry group formed after the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 to provide peer-to-peer safety reviews. That group said one of the few safety measures that was getting worse was the reliability of diesel generators.
Mr. Markey also complained that the commission had allowed some plant operators to remove equipment that eliminates hydrogen produced by overheating fuel. In addition, there is no requirement for equipment to remove hydrogen in the rooms where spent fuel is stored; the building surrounding Fukushima Unit 4 was destroyed by the explosion of hydrogen that came from the spent fuel pool.
Commission officials said they were reviewing their previous decision to permit very heavy loading of the spent fuel pools. Thinning them out would reduce the amount of heat production that had to be dealt with in case of a severe accident, they said.
The subject is particularly sensitive at a time when there are concerns about whether the operator of the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant, which was designed by U.S. conglomerate General Electric Co., had been properly supervised by the NRC's equivalent in
Japan.
The NRC's own chairman has said that in the nuclear business, avoiding conflicts of interest is paramount.
"The important point is that all countries should strive to maintain a strict independence between the regulator and the industries that it oversees," Gregory Jaczko said in an April 2010 speech to an international forum in Seoul.
EMBRACING THE MODEL
But the cables -- from 2006 to early 2010 -- show that the NRC's role in promoting its regulatory model around the world can easily turn it into an advocate for U.S. nuclear technology, whether its officials realize it or not.
For example, an unclassified January 2009 cable from the U.S. embassy in Kuala Lumpur noted that the Malaysian government, as it pursued a nuclear policy, preferred to work with contractors the NRC had already approved.
The diplomatic corps there was quick to point out how that might be used to financial advantage.
The stance "places the (U.S. Government) and US companies in a favorable position to build stronger relations with both representatives and (Government of Malaysia) officials," the embassy said.
In other countries the message was even more pointed, as in
Italy in late 2009. Former NRC Chairman Dale Klein, then still a commissioner, visited the country to discuss nuclear cooperation as the government looked to restart the country's civilian nuclear program and build as many as 10 new plants.
Klein was there to talk regulation, but he also unwittingly figured in the embassy's efforts to promote American vendors.
"Commissioner Klein's visit gave additional support to U.S. nuclear energy companies. A (embassy) co-sponsored public forum on nuclear energy featuring Commissioner Klein as keynote speaker and U.S. companies as panel members attracted a large audience of senior public and private Italian officials and local press coverage," a cable said.
Klein, now a vice chancellor at the University of Texas System and a board member at two utility companies with nuclear operations, said that while he was a firm believer in the NRC playing a more international role, commercial advocacy was never part of his job.
"As a regulator we would never take a position of recommending one reactor over another. The NRC's position was safety and security, and you can get the safety and security in a variety of ways," Klein said. "I never recall having been asked the question of what reactor should a country use."
ALLERGY TO COMMERCIALISM
The NRC was created in 1975 because its predecessor, the Atomic Energy Commission, had been criticized for conflicts in both policing and promoting an industry. The NRC was tasked with regulation, while a separate agency, later folded into the Energy Department, promoted nuclear power.
It's common for NRC staff and commissioners to be asked to attend international meetings, but they accept only invitations where they can press for strong safety regulations, said Margie Doane, director of the NRC's international programs, who declined to comment directly on the cables.
"You want to talk about safety right at the very inception of someone's thinking about nuclear power," Doane said.
"As long as we make sure our role is only safety and only regulation, it's a very important aspect, and it doesn't have anything to do with whether they buy U.S. technology or not," she said. "If we're invited into something which looks promotional, we make sure that there's a good opportunity for us to get the safety message out, and that it's going to be understood in the right way."
BEAT THE FRENCH
The fear for diplomats is that U.S. equipment companies need government help, lest they be elbowed aside by foreign state-owned competitors such as France's Areva.
The main concern is for the two nuclear reactor builders most closely tied to the United States -- General Electric Co.'s nuclear joint venture with Japan's Hitachi Ltd and Westinghouse Electric Co, the U.S.-based nuclear reactor builder 77 percent owned by Japan's Toshiba Corp. and 20 percent owned by Shaw Group.
That beat-the-French theme comes up over and over again in cables from around the world -- embassies noting with a sense of urgency that foreign competitor X is already on the ground meeting with government officials, and U.S. interests need to act fast at the highest levels to counteract the threat.
"U.S. company representatives and their Italian allies are apprehensive that absent high-level U.S. lobbying, French pressure will push the decision toward a purchase of their technology. We clearly need to engage at the highest level, given the stakes involved ...ens of billions of dollars in contracts and substantial numbers of high-technology jobs could be involved," a cable from the Rome embassy said in February 2009.
In some cases, NRC officials, while not lobbying for American companies, may have smoothed their way. In February 2007, former NRC commissioner Jeffrey Merrifield visited Hanoi to discuss cooperation on nuclear regulation with Vietnam.
According to the embassy, the Vietnamese told Merrifield they had already been approached by French and Japanese companies about a proposed nuclear plant scheduled to start up by 2020. Merrifield, the embassy said, responded in kind that the Vietnamese should expect to hear from American firms like GE and Westinghouse as well.
A spokeswoman for Merrifield's current employer, Shaw Group, was not available for comment.
That push for American counter-action sometimes resulted in overt lobbying, but sometimes the response was more subtle. One striking example came from South Africa in November 2008.
The embassy in Pretoria, so the story goes, helped the American Society of Mechanical Engineers hold a workshop on nuclear codes and standards in Johannesburg. The workshop was sponsored by Westinghouse and Areva, and featured speakers including NRC engineering officials.
While the official purpose of the event was to promote ASME standards to South African suppliers looking to participate in the global nuclear supply chain, the embassy was not shy about explaining its real purpose.
But the embassy indicated there was another purpose: "The unofficial purpose of the workshop was to support Westinghouse's bid as a global supplier committed to localization in South Africa and the ASME standard in its global supply chain, although ASME was technically neutral on the bidding competition," it said.
Their argument was subtle but unmistakable - standards are important, and Westinghouse uses a key international standard, but Areva doesn't, so go Westinghouse instead.
An ASME spokesman declined to comment.
One NRC critic said the very idea of the commission was to divorce the commercial from the professional.
"The whole point in creating the NRC was to get out of the business of looking like they were in the business of promoting anything other than safety," said Henry Sokolski, a conservative nuclear proliferation expert.
"That they should somehow be seen as advantageous to making people comfortable about getting into the business so to speak is itself an abomination. They should be allergic to that," Sokolski said.
(Reporting by Ben Berkowitz in New York and Roberta Rampton in Washington, Editing by Martin Howell)
