Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said today that Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko could serve the remainder of his term at the agency despite his announced resignation.

The embattled NRC chairman -- accused by his fellow commissioners of withholding key information and bullying female agency staffers -- said yesterday he will leave the commission after the Senate confirms his successor. His term expires June 2013.

But Reid (D-Nev.), who once employed Jaczko as his science adviser, said he's comfortable with the NRC chairman staying in office if a replacement isn't immediately found.

"His term expires at the first of July of next year," Reid told reporters. "We hope to have a replacement for that. But if we don't, Greg will be there for the duration. And if something doesn't work out, he can always be renominated."

Reid also called Jaczko a "brilliant man" and the first "really non-nuclear-industry chairman of that commission."

He declined to comment on efforts to find a new chairman.

Obama appointed Jaczko in May 2009 to be NRC chairman. Although he holds a doctorate in physics from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Jaczko hasn't worked as a nuclear engineer or industry official but spent years as a staffer on Capitol Hill.

Jaczko was Reid's science policy adviser from 2001 to 2005. Nuclear issues are important to Reid, a staunch foe of plans to use Yucca Mountain, Nev., as a permanent nuclear waste repository.

The chairman's three-year tenure at NRC has been plagued with agency infighting and accusations that he halted the NRC's review of the Yucca Mountain dump to appease Reid. Jaczko's backers say he was pushed out for trying to reform nuclear safety (E&E Daily, May 22).

Reid said the other commissioners at the NRC -- two Republicans and two Democrats -- are "pro-nuke."

House hearing on NRC

House Republicans eager to see Jaczko leave the agency will question the five NRC commissioners at a hearing before two Energy and Commerce subcommittees next week.

The Subcommittee on Environment and the Economy and the Subcommittee on Energy and Power will hold a hearing May 31 to gather information about Jaczko's management style, controversial votes and a "chilled work environment" at NRC.

"We have been actively monitoring the NRC during these tumultuous times and will continue our oversight," Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Republican Reps. Ed Whitfield of Kentucky and John Shimkus of Illinois said in a joint statement.

House Republicans are likely to zero in on Jaczko's involvement in halting the agency's review of the Yucca Mountain waste dump.

Shimkus and Upton told Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Jaczko last year that they were launching an investigation into the Department of Energy's attempt to withdraw its application for the permanent nuclear waste storage site in Nevada (E&E Daily, May 2, 2011).