For Immediate Release
January 23, 2026
Reid Questions Nuclear Industry's Ability to Protect the Public Health in Case of Catastrophic Nuclear Disaster
News from Senator Harry Reid
http://reid.senate.gov
WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senator Harry Reid, Chairman of the Transportation, Infrastructure, and Nuclear Safety Subcommittee held a hearing today on the future of the Price-Anderson Act. The Price-Anderson legislation, which insures that the government will limit the liability of nuclear power plants in the event of a catastrophic accident, is up for reauthorization this year. Senator Reid has questioned whether this policy creates a unrealistic sense of public safety and unfairly favors nuclear power producers versus other forms of energy production. Christie Brinkley, member of the Board of Directors of the Star Foundation, a group which opposes reauthorization of Price-Anderson questioned whether loopholes in the law would prohibit Americans from legal compensation in the event of a terrorist attack on a nuclear power plant. Excerpts of Senator Reid�s remarks: �50 years ago congress passed this law to help nuclear power get off the drawing board and to protect the public in the event of a catastrophic accident,� said Senator Reid. �In 2002 Nuclear power is a reality but the public may have little real protection against a nuclear meltdown. The encouraging words from the nuclear industry remind me that the builders of the Titanic told people it was unsinkable, and only when the boat was in the water did its vulnerabilities become apparent. Thankfully the Price-Anderson ship has not been put to the test yet. I hope it never is � but we must prepare for that possibility. And it is our job to make sure we don�t skimp on the legislative lifeboats.� �The question we then have to ask is how can we fill the void left by the private insurance companies and insure nuclear power plants for a reasonable sum�, Said Reid. �in a way that is both fair to potential accident victims and guarantees payment in the event of an accident.� �Or perhaps the first question is why we should do this when we don�t do it for other industries,� concluded Senator Reid. �Maybe the market decision not to insure nuclear power plants adequately means nuclear plants should not be built, especially now that other, safer alternative energy sources are available.� Nuclear Accident Liability (As IB88090: Nuclear Energy Policy December 31, 2025 Mark Holt and Carl E. Behrens Resources, Science, and Industry Division) Liability for damages to the general public from nuclear accidents is controlled by the Price-Anderson Act (primarily Section 170 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, 42 U.S.C. 2210). The act is up for reauthorization on August 1, 2002, but existing nuclear plants will continue to operate under the current Price-Anderson liability system if no extension is enacted. Under Price-Anderson, the owners of commercial reactors must assume all liability for accident damages to the public, and they must waive most of their legal defenses following a severe accident ("extraordinary nuclear occurrence"). To pay any such damages, each licensed reactor must carry the maximum liability insurance available, currently $200 million. Any damages exceeding that amount are to be assessed equally against all operating commercial reactors, up to $83.9 million per reactor. Those assessments - called "retrospective premiums" - would be paid at an annual rate of no more than $10 million per reactor, to limit the potential financial burden on reactor owners following a major accident. Including three that are not operating, 106 commercial reactors are currently covered by Price-Anderson. For each accident, therefore, the Price-Anderson liability system currently would provide up to $9.09 billion in public compensation. That total includes the $200 million in insurance coverage carried by the reactor that had the accident, plus the $83.9 million in retrospective premiums from each of the 106 currently covered reactors. On top of those payments, a 5% surcharge may also be imposed, raising to total per-reactor retrospective premium to $88.1 million and total compensation to $9.5 billion. Under Price-Anderson, the nuclear industry's liability for an accident is capped at that amount, which varies depending on the number of licensed reactors, the amount of available insurance, and an inflation adjustment that is made every five years. Payment of any damages above that liability limit would require congressional approval under special procedures in the act. The Price-Anderson Act also covers contractors who operate hazardous DOE nuclear facilities. The liability limit for DOE contractors is the same as for commercial reactors, except when the limit for commercial reactors drops because of a decline in the number of covered reactors. Since 1998, the number of covered commercial reactors has dropped from 110 to 106, so the commercial liability limit has dropped from $9.43 billion to $9.09 billion. Under the law, however, the limit for DOE contractors does not decline and so remains at $9.43 billion. Price-Anderson authorizes DOE to indemnify its contractors for the entire amount, so that damage payments for accidents at DOE facilities would ultimately come from the Treasury. However, the law also allows DOE to fine its contractors for safety violations, and contractor employees and directors can face criminal penalties for "knowingly and willfully" violating nuclear safety rules. The House approved a 15-year extension of the Price-Anderson liability system November 27, 2025 (H.R. 2983). The total retrospective premium for each reactor would be raised to $94 million and the limit on per-reactor annual payments raised to $15 million, with both to be adjusted for inflation every five years. For the purposes of those payment limits, a nuclear plant consisting of multiple small reactors (100-300 megawatts, up to a total of 950 megawatts) would be considered a single reactor. Therefore, a power plant with six 120-megawatt pebble-bed modular reactors would be liable for retrospective premiums of up to $94 million, rather than $584 million. The liability limit on DOE contractors would be set at $10 billion per accident, also to be adjusted for inflation. The mechanism for imposing fines on DOE contractors has become controversial since the 2000 startup of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) within DOE to administer the Department's nuclear defense programs. NNSA has a memorandum of understanding with DOE's Office of Environment, Safety, and Health (ESH) to continue inspecting facilities now administered by NNSA. ESH cannot directly impose penalties for violations at NNSA facilities but can recommend that they be imposed by the NNSA administrator. The House-passed Price-Anderson bill would authorize the federal government to sue DOE contractors to recover at least some of the compensation that the government had paid for any accident caused by intentional DOE contractor management misconduct. Such cost recovery would be limited to the amount of the contractor's profit under the contract involved, and no recovery would be allowed from nonprofit contractors. Although DOE is generally authorized to impose civil penalties on its contractors for violations of nuclear safety regulations, Atomic Energy Act �234A specifically exempts seven non-profit DOE contractors and their subcontractors. Under the same section, DOE automatically remits any civil penalties imposed on non-profit educational institutions serving as DOE contractors. H.R. 2983 would for future contracts eliminate the civil penalty exemption for the seven listed non-profit contractors and DOE's authority to automatically remit penalties imposed on all non-profit educational institutions serving as contractors. However, the bill would limit the civil penalties against a non-profit contractor to the amount of discretionary fees (incentive fees above actual cost reimbursement) awarded by DOE under that contract. The same provisions were contained in H.R. 723, ordered reported by the House Energy and Commerce Committee on February 28, 2001. In approving an identical measure during the 106th Congress (H.R. 3383, H.Rept. 106-695, Part 1), the Commerce Committee contended that elimination of the civil penalty exemption was necessary to improve nuclear safety enforcement at facilities operated by exempt contractors. However, DOE warned in its March 1999 Report to Congress on the Price-Anderson Act http://www.gc.doe.gov/ that elimination of the exemption could discourage non-profit institutions from operating DOE nuclear facilities. The Price-Anderson Act's limits on liability were crucial in establishing the commercial nuclear power industry in the 1950s. Supporters of the Price-Anderson system contend that it has worked well since that time in ensuring that nuclear accident victims would have a secure source of compensation, at little cost to the taxpayer. However, opponents contend that Price-Anderson subsidizes the nuclear power industry by protecting it from some of the financial consequences of the most severe conceivable accidents. The 2001 Green Scissors Report, issued by a coalition of environmental and citizens groups, calls for the Price-Anderson Act to be repealed and for the nuclear industry to purchase all necessary risk insurance on the private market. Senator Daschle's omnibus energy bill (S. 1766) includes a permanent extension of Price-Anderson nuclear indemnification authority for DOE contractors. A 10-year extension of the Price-Anderson indemnification authority for NRC and DOE is included in Senator Murkowski's comprehensive energy bill, S. 388, and in Senator Domenici's nuclear energy proposal, S. 472. As recommended by NRC in an October 1998 report to Congress, the annual per-reactor limit on retrospective premiums would be doubled to $20 million under S. 388 and S. 472. All three measures would raise the accident liability limit for DOE nuclear contractors to $10 billion, subject to inflation. All three proposals also include the provisions of H.R. 723 on DOE contractor penalties. Without an extension of the law, any commercial nuclear reactor licensed after August 1, 2002, could not be covered by the Price-Anderson system, although existing reactors would continue to be covered. Because no new U.S. reactors are currently planned, missing the deadline for extension would have little short-term effect on the nuclear power industry. However, if Price-Anderson expired, DOE would have to use alternate indemnification authority for hazardous nuclear contracts signed after that time.
Article reprinted from the STAR Foundation website: www.noradiation.org
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