The head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission called on the agency and the nuclear industry today to implement far-reaching safety lessons from Japan's nuclear crisis within five years.

NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko said today at the National Press Club that all lessons learned from the accident at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex should be reviewed within 90 days and integrated into U.S. nuclear plants by 2016. The Japanese plant was hit with a magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami on March 11, triggering hydrogen explosions, radioactive leaks and evacuations.

Last week, a task force that NRC assembled released recommendations for revamping the agency's safety requirements and beefing up security at the United States' 104 nuclear plants (Greenwire, July 18). Those changes would be the most sweeping the agency has made since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Jaczko also proposed a "road map for taking action on the report," including a series of public meetings with staff and stakeholders, and opportunities leading up to the meetings for the public comment.

The chairman said he has consulted his colleagues about fast-tracking the process, but when asked whether he had garnered support from other NRC commissioners, he only said, "We'll see."

But Jaczko's push forward is receiving a cold reception from industry officials, who say the commission does not have enough information about what happened in Japan to make such sweeping regulatory changes at home. J. Scott Peterson, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, said part of the NRC task force's recommendations include regulatory changes that are unrelated to the Fukushima accident and need to be analyzed separately in a longer-term process with a cost-benefit analysis.

"There are fundamental changes in the regulatory framework of how the NRC operates that have nothing to do with Fukushima that are in that task force report," Peterson said. Those include changes to emergency planning at nuclear plants and how the agency defines the "safety basis" for how the reactors should operate, he added.

NEI sent a letter to NRC on Friday, asking the agency to prioritize new requirements during the next five years, justify any new requirements according to the "adequate protection standard" and review them on a case-by-case basis.

Jaczko said his request to fast-track the implementation of Fukushima lessons is "reasonable" because NRC must make the changes before addressing a number of new reactor license applications.

"We need to move on this in 90 days or it will be difficult to see how we move forward on new reactors," he said. "We won't have certainty about these reactors, about whether they apply or don't apply."

A number of nuclear plant developers are waiting for NRC to approve Westinghouse Electric Co.'s redesigned Advanced Passive 1000 reactor (E&ENews PM, June 30). A spokesman for Westinghouse said the company still expects to receive approval for the AP100 design this fall.

Click here to read NEI's letter to NRC.

Reporter Mike Soraghan contributed.