U. K. nuclear power industry

The majority of this book (Chapters 2 through 7) is devoted to our case studies of the U.S. air and rail industries and the U.K. nuclear power industry. In particular. Chapter 2 summarizes the available literature on the effects of... 

Our initial round of interviews in the U.K. nuclear power industry was conducted in July 1999 with the British nuclear safety authorities— the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (Nil)— and the private nuclear generating company in England (British Energy). A second round of interviews was conducted in January 2000 to follow up on open issues. Additional background information was obtained from discussions with trade union representatives and a local U.K. trade press correspondent. The U.K. interviewees were given considerable latitude to describe the process and impacts of industry restructuring in their own terms, in part because a sensitive audit was still pre-decisional at the time of the interviews. 

A report on the work imdertaken by the HSE to grant replacement nuclear site licenses (U.K. HSE, 1996) describes the historical context of the restructuring and privatization of the U.K. nuclear power industry. Privatization of the nuclear power industry commenced with the country s 1993-1994 nuclear review, in which Her Majesty s Government (HMG) examined the prospects for... 

The sweeping transformation of the British ESI that began in 1988 for the purpose of privatizing the electricity sector and increasing market efficiency had substantial impacts on hardware reliability, human factors, and safety regulation in the U.K. nuclear power industry. Those impacts are each briefly discussed below. 

In both the aviation and rail industries, deregulation was quite disadvantageous to labor, resulting in major concessions in both work rules and wages. We were not able to assess the impact of privatization on labor relations in the U.K. nuclear power industry. However, deregulation (at least in its initial phases) has almost uniformly been unfavorable for labor in the U.S. For example, IFeeA (Barber, 1999, pg. 6) reports that In other businesses... 

In the U.K. electricity industry, there were dramatic reductions in nuclear research and development (R D) funding—cuts of well over 50% in six years. This was primarily associated with the fact that no new reactor orders are anticipated at present in the U.K. However, the observed cuts in R D expenditures could reduce the levels of expertise available to deal with critical safety problems that may arise. For example, the reduced funding could result in R D staffing levels falling below a critical mass, or lead to attrition of the most talented researchers. The U.K. nuclear power industry also experienced problems with loss of specialized skills among the technical support staff. 

Another concern is the potential of deregulation to create challenges to the maintenance of an effective corporate safety culture. In the aviation and rail industries, corporate culture problems affected safety in the aftermath of mergers and acquisitions, and also at some of the new entrant airlines established after deregulation. In the years after deregulation, there were also indications of pressure to under-report some types of safety problems in the railroad industry, and evidence of maintenance violations at several major airlines. In the U.K. nuclear power industry, corporate culture concerns dealt with the excessive use of contractors and the loss of corporate expertise and institutional memory. 

In the U.K. nuclear power industry, no empirical evidence of a link between poor profitability and poor safety was observed, since the privatized nuclear plants were highly profitable following deregulation. A contributing factor to this financial success was the fact that the structure of the U.K. privatization process provided significant subsidies for nuclear power. These subsidies helped to ensure the profitability of the country s privatized nuclear operating company in the years immediately following privatization, and may have prevented adverse effects due to fmancial difficulties. 

U.K. Health and Safety Executive (1996), Restructuring and Privatisation of the U.K. Nuclear Power Industry Report on the Work by the Health and Safety Executive to Grant Replacement Nuclear Site Licences, Sudbury, United Kingdom, HSE Books. 

We begin this chapter with a brief overview of the concept of economic deregulation, as implemented both in the U.S. electricity industry and in other industries. We then discuss the approach taken in this book to understanding the effects of deregulation on nuclear power safety. In particular, our approach rests on a detailed review of how economic deregulation has affected safety in three other industries with important similarities to the U.S. nuclear power industry—namely, the U.S. air and rail industries, and the nuclear power industry in the United Kingdom (U.K.). 

The nuclear power industry has been at a standstill in the United States based on fears that nuclear is too dangerous. Besides France at 80%, Belgium generates 60% of its power from nuclear, Switzerland 42%, Sweden 39%, Spain 37%, Japan 34% and U.K. 22%. These countries that generate a higher percentage of their power with nuclear energy than the U.S. have done so without any loss of life or harm to the environment. 

The nuclear power sector of the U.K. electricity supply industry also experienced dramatic reorganization and downsizing after deregulation, coupled with increased use of contractors. Problems identified in the aftermath of these changes triggered safety regulators to impose a new license condition on reactors in the U.K. 

In the U.K., privatization of nuclear power plants was accompanied by extensive subsidies in the form of an obligation to purchase nuclear power, as well as a tax on electricity from fossil fuel sources (the proceeds of which went to the privatized nuclear industry). These subsidies provided substantial protection for the financial health of the nuclear power industry after privatization. Thus, downsizing and other potential tlueats to safety could have been substantially more severe in the absence of these financial... 

Island/Thurrock Area, HMSO, London, 1978. Rasmussen, Reactor Safety Study An Assessment of Accident Risk in U. S. Commercial Nuclear Power Plants, WASH-1400 NUREG 75/014, Washington, D.C., 1975. Rijnmond Public Authority, A Risk Analysis of 6 Potentially Hazardous Industrial Objects in the Rijnmond Area—A Pilot Study, D. Reidel, Boston, 1982. Considine, The Assessment of Individual and Societal Risks, SRD Report R-310, Safety and Reliability Directorate, UKAEA, Warrington, 1984. Baybutt, Uncertainty in Risk Analysis, Conference on Mathematics in Major Accident Risk Assessment, University of Oxford, U.K., 1986. 

The results of HMG s nuclear review were reported in a 1995 White Paper (U.K. Department of Trade and Industry, 1995). That document proposed an initial three-phase plan to (1) restructure the nuclear industry (2) privatize the more modem (AGR and PWR) nuclear power stations within British Energy and (3) keep the older Magnox reactors in the public (government-owned) sector for eventual transferal to BNFL ownership. Within the phase one restructuring, the following three stages were envisioned ... 

U.K. Department of Trade and Industry and the Scottish Office (1995), The Prospects of Nuclear Power in the UK, White Paper Cm. 2860, London, HMSO. 

Today s actions follow API s August 2010 testimony and its October 2010 letter to the Presidential Oil Spill Commission, regarding the industry s review of five other safety programs, including the U.K. s Step Change in Safety, the chemical industry s Responsible Care program, the Institute for Nuclear Power... 

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