Carter had entered office 1977 with significant energy ambitions.\u00a0 Intent on decreasing US dependance on oil and natural gas, Carter produced a National Energy Plan after his first 90 days, and created the cabinet-level Department of Energy soon after.\u00a0 A crucial component of Carter\u2019s energy policy was his nuclear plan: the president hoped to speed the development of conventional uranium-based reactors and produce more American energy (CQ Almanac 1977).<\/p>\n Two years into his presidency, the TMI accident proved an untimely development for Carter\u2019s plans.\u00a0 Intent on easing public skepticism around nuclear energy, Carter set out to prove that the executive was doing something about the risks of nuclear accidents. \u00a0Carter tapped John Kemeny, president of Dartmouth College, to lead a President\u2019s Commission on the TMI accident.\u00a0 Consistent with his policy ambitions, Carter directed the Commission to focus more on repairing the public\u2019s perception than evaluating the future of nuclear policy (Nelkin 1981, 136-7).<\/p>\n Maintaining Carter\u2019s approach, the Kemeny Commission did not take a stance on nuclear power\u2019s future in its report, neither calling for its demise or advocating for its increase.\u00a0 The Commission instead lambasted the lax attitude that had permeated the nuclear industry in the years before the accident, with no organization more responsible for deficient practices and approaches than the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the federal agency that had initially responded to TMI and was tasked with regulating the nuclear power industry (Commission 7).\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n The NRC, a Public Pariah<\/strong><\/p>\n If the government had to bear some blame for the way events at TMI spiraled out of control, it would be the NRC that was held responsible.\u00a0 The five-member panel at the top of the NRC was so dysfunctional, opined the Kemeny Commission, that it needed to be abolished entirely and restructured as a consolidated, independent agency in the executive branch (Commission 61).<\/p>\n To be fair, the NRC probably deserved it.\u00a0 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission as an agency was itself fairly new, having existed five years earlier as the Atomic Energy Commission. \u00a0The AEC was responsible both for nuclear promotion and regulation, creating an unfortunate conflict of interest that left the nuclear energy industry largely free from restriction.\u00a0 Recognizing the problem, Congress acted in 1974 to split these incongruous goals, creating the NRC to oversee the regulation piece. \u00a0Much of the AEC\u2019s existing staff, however, remained in the NRC, and carried their industry connections and sympathies with them (Nelkin 1981, 137).<\/p>\n The NRC\u2019s soft side for industry interests proved costly.\u00a0 In 1975, the Commission produced the infamous Rasmussen Report, which emphatically downplayed the risk of nuclear accident.\u00a0 Even if an accident did occur, the report claimed, it would affect human life and property only minimally (Nelkin 1981, 135).<\/p>\n To its credit, the NRC did repudiate parts of this report in January 1979, but the damage to its credibility had already been done (CQ Almanac 1979).\u00a0 When the TMI accident occurred, the NRC was little more than a line judge in the vast nuclear energy industry.\u00a0 The Kemeny Commission found that the regulations the NRC did enforce were geared broadly toward large-scale, dramatic accidents; smaller and more subtle failures, such as what happened at TMI-2, were of little concern (Commission, 9).<\/p>\n Bureaucratic Fever Dreams: Responding to the Commission\u2019s Report<\/strong><\/p>\n The Kemeny Commission\u2019s report was, in the end, only a report, and not all of its recommendations were considered as different players in the government had different ideas for how to proceed.\u00a0 For once, however, everyone in Washington agreed that action needed to be taken, and the pressing question became one of shape and scale.\u00a0 Shortly after the Kemeny Report was made public, the NRC responded with a letter of its own, affirming that the Commission\u2019s recommendations were \u201cgenerally\u2026 necessary and feasible\u201d (NUREG-0632, 1979, 1).\u00a0 Naturally, the NRC disputed the Commission\u2019s suggestion that it be dissolved, arguing instead for its role in nuclear emergencies to increase.<\/p>\n For his part, President Carter responded to the Kemeny Report by reiterating his administration\u2019s support for nuclear power, which the president viewed as a national necessity.\u00a0 Carter broadly agreed with the Commission\u2019s appetite for change, but stressed that once the necessary reforms were instituted, the nation should proceed with its nuclear development.\u00a0 Carter also pushed to maintain the existing structure of the NRC, replacing its chairman and asking Congress to grant him increased power.\u00a0 Despite Carter\u2019s distinctive approach, Kemeny deferred to the executive\u2019s discretion, lauding Carter\u2019s proposals as \u201ccompletely responsive\u201d to the goals his Commission sought (CQ Almanac 1979).<\/p>\n After the TMI accident, the NRC\u2019s budget grew from $325.8 million to $423 million, and myriad other changes were implemented (Nelkin 1981, 138).\u00a0 Ten years on, the NRC had indeed restructured and implemented many Kemeny principles, if it didn\u2019t follow its exact recommendations.\u00a0 The NRC ultimately maintained its five-member leadership structure, though its chairman gained increased authority as Carter desired (NUREG-1335, 1989, 9).<\/p>\n By narrowing public attention and blame on the NRC and its shortcomings, the Carter administration was in some ways able to dodge the broader question of whether nuclear power was worthwhile.\u00a0 Public trust would take some time to rebuild, but Carter had walked a fine line in pursuit of his energy ambitions.\u00a0 The most dire potential consequences of TMI outcry had been avoided, and Carter\u2019s legacy remained sound.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" At the end of a long decade that began with war in Vietnam and the Watergate scandal, popular distrust in government was at a fever pitch when the TMI disaster occurred (Wills 2006, 120).\u00a0 Indeed, public fear in the disaster\u2019s aftermath was often coupled with a sense of betrayal \u2013 many Americans believed that Met … Continue reading “President Carter’s Measured Response”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-51","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/51\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/history-2203-fall-2020-wbuschin\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/456\/2020\/12\/Carter-at-TMI-300x202.jpg\")