Word: nrc
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Another issue is the lack of imagination in the scenarios used for training guards at private plants. TIME is refraining from publishing DBT specifics on the weapons that nuclear plants must defend against, but the relatively small arsenal that the NRC gives the "attackers" in its drills doesn't impress Representative Christopher Shays, a Connecticut Republican. The DBT attack force is barred from using many of the weapons detailed in the opening scenario of this story, but, says the Congressman, "if I were a terrorist, I'd feel more than free to use them." The agency doesn't require defenses...
According to the NRC and the NEI, a force as big as Atta's band or anything bigger than the DBT is an "enemy of the state." That means it's the Pentagon's problem. "We recognize that there can be threats to our plants that are greater than what is defined by the DBT," Marvin Fertel, chief nuclear officer of the NEI has told Congress. "Although our security would provide an initial deterrence, at some point such threats are the responsibility of the Federal Government." That wouldn't necessarily do the plant's defenders any good, though. "They could...
...NRC's website, the agency ducks the issue--after raising it in a Q&A--of whether today's nuclear plants are "capable of withstanding a 9/11-scale attack." Before 9/11, there was "reasonable assurance" that the guard force could defeat the then small DBT, the agency says. In the wake of 9/11, it continues, "the defensive capability of the industry has been significantly enhanced." But the website never answers the question it just posed. Could a 9/11-size terrorist force take down a U.S. nuclear power plant...
...could perish eventually from cancers spawned by the attack. Millions of people in the greater New York area would have to be permanently relocated, and economic losses could top $2 trillion. Lyman's study echoes the findings of one done by the Sandia National Laboratories for the NRC in 1982 that said as many as 50,000 early deaths could be caused by a reactor accident at Indian Point...
...part, Diaz insists that the improvements made in the nation's nuclear plants since 9/11 are adequate. They have included adding physical barriers, checking approaching vehicles at greater stand-off distances and improving coordination with local police and military authorities. Says the NRC chief: "Any terrorist who looks at one of these facilities is going to say, 'This is a hardened target, and I'm not going to have any confidence that I am going to be successful [attacking it].'" Plants have also improved training for guards and capped their workweeks at 72 hours to eliminate the not-uncommon tendency...