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How can one regulate an endeavour that is so inextricably entwined with the military and government prestige? How do you set up a genuinely independent regulat

How can one regulate an endeavour that is so inextricably entwined with the military and government prestige? How do you set up a genuinely independent regulator that has strong enough teeth, one that cannot be leaned on by industry heavyweights lobbying the government? These problems are not unique to nuclear power, of course; Australia seems to have similar problems with coal, and the US with oil.

bb123 6y ago
Is nuclear power particularly an element of Japanese government prestige? I have to say when I think of Japan, nuclear power doesn’t spring to mind. Same goes for the military - is there any evidence that nuclear power is particularly entwined with the Japanese military?
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  JAXA is basically a Japanese ICBM program, so start there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAXA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAXA
- garmaine 6y ago
  Energy independence is a matter of Japanese government prestige. As Japan being a resource-poor nation pretty much led to WW2, becoming energy independent was a major post-war goal. Nuclear was a very essential part of that (not anymore).
  - fomine3 6y ago
    That's true. 1973 oil crisis was another great reason to go nuclear plants.
- sandworm101 6y ago
  >> I think of Japan, nuclear power doesn’t spring to mind. It does for me, but that probably has more to do with Godzilla movies. Japan is also unique in its experience with nuclear energy. I think of Japan as a country that has a mature understanding of nuclear power. I would not lecture them on the subject.
duxup 6y ago
>inextricably entwined with the military and government prestige? Is that a thing? For some reason when I think of nuclear accidents, I don't often think that "military and government prestige" were the biggest issues. Maybe Chernobyl was?
visualradio 6y ago
> How do you set up a genuinely independent regulator that has strong enough teeth, one that cannot be leaned on by industry heavyweights lobbying the government? Directly elected local environmental assessors, which are required to attend annual meetings at the state and federal level? The auditors which make up the regulatory panel would then be directly elected by residents throughout the country and would inspect the work of their colleagues. Solve the waste storage and disposal problem first, then treat it as an emissions problem, and ensure the nuclear industry is investing in technologies which continually recycling or minimizing the total mass of high level waste it is producing in exchange for disposal and storage services.
- vkou 6y ago
  As an educated voter, I would not want to vote for my nuclear inspector, because their job solely consists of managing tail risk[1], and I have zero ability to evaluate their qualifications, or job performance. I have no ability to accurately determine whether or not one of five candidates actually knows what they are doing, or if they are just a hustler who knows how to play Buzzword Bingo. I suppose I could spend months of my life trying to get educated on the subject, but I don't have time to do so, and neither do my neighbors. This is why representative democracies exist. You vote for a representative, and it becomes their job to wrangle domain-specific underlings. [1] The only feedback signal I can trust is 'Did a one-in-a-thousand-year event occur under their watch?' [2] [2] And if it did, well shucks, what am I going to do now? Fire them in the next election? The damage is already done.
  - clairity 6y ago
    the flaw in that reasoning is that you’re creating a single point of subvertible power (and failure). that might have made sense 250 years ago before the advent of electricity and telecommunications (and smaller systemic dangers), but not so much anymore. it also doesn’t solve the ‘aww shucks’ issue you mention at all, which really is an incentives issue beyond representation (you could instead, as a wild supposition, make all representatives live within 20 miles of the plant to align incentives). we should elect 10s if not 100s of such representatives at a time (and those folks can hire further experts as necessary) so that no one rep has inordinate power, because depending on a single person is certain to fail at some point. that also is more likely to provide diversity of thought, which is crucial to effective decision-making. we’re rich enough as a nation to support such a panel without batting an eye.
Narann 6y ago
In France we have an "Autorité de sûreté nucléaire"[1] which is an independent administration (having its own budget, own lawyers, not connected to governments, etc). France have 25 of such administrations[2]. I can't say it's perfect, but anyone (individuals, parliamentarians, justice) can seize one of them to require its action or explain why it does not act. It's defenitly a "contre-pouvoir". [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_de_s%C3%BBret%C3%A9_nucl%C3%A9aire https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_de_s%C3%BBret%C3... [2] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_administrative_ind%C3%A9pendante_en_France https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_administrative_i...

bb123 6y ago

Is nuclear power particularly an element of Japanese government prestige? I have to say when I think of Japan, nuclear power doesn’t spring to mind. Same goes for the military - is there any evidence that nuclear power is particularly entwined with the Japanese military?

redis_mlc 6y ago
JAXA is basically a Japanese ICBM program, so start there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAXA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JAXA
garmaine 6y ago
Energy independence is a matter of Japanese government prestige. As Japan being a resource-poor nation pretty much led to WW2, becoming energy independent was a major post-war goal. Nuclear was a very essential part of that (not anymore).
- fomine3 6y ago
  That's true. 1973 oil crisis was another great reason to go nuclear plants.
sandworm101 6y ago
>> I think of Japan, nuclear power doesn’t spring to mind. It does for me, but that probably has more to do with Godzilla movies. Japan is also unique in its experience with nuclear energy. I think of Japan as a country that has a mature understanding of nuclear power. I would not lecture them on the subject.

duxup 6y ago

>inextricably entwined with the military and government prestige? Is that a thing? For some reason when I think of nuclear accidents, I don't often think that "military and government prestige" were the biggest issues. Maybe Chernobyl was?

visualradio 6y ago

> How do you set up a genuinely independent regulator that has strong enough teeth, one that cannot be leaned on by industry heavyweights lobbying the government? Directly elected local environmental assessors, which are required to attend annual meetings at the state and federal level? The auditors which make up the regulatory panel would then be directly elected by residents throughout the country and would inspect the work of their colleagues. Solve the waste storage and disposal problem first, then treat it as an emissions problem, and ensure the nuclear industry is investing in technologies which continually recycling or minimizing the total mass of high level waste it is producing in exchange for disposal and storage services.

vkou 6y ago
As an educated voter, I would not want to vote for my nuclear inspector, because their job solely consists of managing tail risk[1], and I have zero ability to evaluate their qualifications, or job performance. I have no ability to accurately determine whether or not one of five candidates actually knows what they are doing, or if they are just a hustler who knows how to play Buzzword Bingo. I suppose I could spend months of my life trying to get educated on the subject, but I don't have time to do so, and neither do my neighbors. This is why representative democracies exist. You vote for a representative, and it becomes their job to wrangle domain-specific underlings. [1] The only feedback signal I can trust is 'Did a one-in-a-thousand-year event occur under their watch?' [2] [2] And if it did, well shucks, what am I going to do now? Fire them in the next election? The damage is already done.
- clairity 6y ago
  the flaw in that reasoning is that you’re creating a single point of subvertible power (and failure). that might have made sense 250 years ago before the advent of electricity and telecommunications (and smaller systemic dangers), but not so much anymore. it also doesn’t solve the ‘aww shucks’ issue you mention at all, which really is an incentives issue beyond representation (you could instead, as a wild supposition, make all representatives live within 20 miles of the plant to align incentives). we should elect 10s if not 100s of such representatives at a time (and those folks can hire further experts as necessary) so that no one rep has inordinate power, because depending on a single person is certain to fail at some point. that also is more likely to provide diversity of thought, which is crucial to effective decision-making. we’re rich enough as a nation to support such a panel without batting an eye.

Narann 6y ago

In France we have an "Autorité de sûreté nucléaire"[1] which is an independent administration (having its own budget, own lawyers, not connected to governments, etc). France have 25 of such administrations[2]. I can't say it's perfect, but anyone (individuals, parliamentarians, justice) can seize one of them to require its action or explain why it does not act. It's defenitly a "contre-pouvoir". [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_de_s%C3%BBret%C3%A9_nucl%C3%A9aire https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_de_s%C3%BBret%C3... [2] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_administrative_ind%C3%A9pendante_en_France https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorit%C3%A9_administrative_i...