House Republicans are again targeting the chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in an ongoing investigation over accusations that he berates fellow employees and creates a "chilled" work environment at the agency.

Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee want NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko, a Democrat, to explain whether employees are free to raise concerns without fear of retaliation, or whether his management style and intense focus on safety are drowning out other voices.

"The NRC appears to lack its own guidance for assessing and correcting a chilled work environment, a gap that has, in our view, facilitated a pattern of behavior we find unacceptable to an agency that is responsible for identifying and preventing similar behavior by its licensees," House Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and other committee Republicans wrote in a letter to Jaczko today.

Twenty-two other lawmakers signed the letter, including Reps. Ed Whitfield of Kentucky, Joe Barton of Texas, Sue Myrick of North Carolina, Cliff Stearns of Florida and John Shimkus of Illinois.

Eliot Brenner, a spokesman for the chairman, said Jaczko would be responding to the lawmakers through formal channels.

Jaczko has repeatedly said in speeches that allowing employees to raise safety concerns underpins the NRC’s safety mission, and the chairman has held "open door" meetings to meet with staff, according to NRC documents. The NRC also has a program through which NRC staffers can express different professional views or opinions.

But House Republicans in recent weeks have been peppering the chairman with information requests leading up to a hearing in the coming months before the Energy and Commerce Committee. All five commissioners have been invited to testify.

This week, lawmakers also asked Jaczko for information about the role that agency policies played in a public dispute that erupted last year between Jaczko and his colleagues (E&ENews PM, April 24). House Republicans asked Jaczko to explain what role he played in changing those rules since becoming chairman in 2009.

Last year, four commissioners -- two Democrats and two Republicans -- complained to the White House about Jaczko's leadership style, sparking a political battle on Capitol Hill between Republicans and Democrats that's still simmering today.

House Republicans are pulling information from reports that have surfaced since last year, including interviews with NRC staff, that Jaczko was "red-faced" and "shaking angry" at times.

But the chairman has repeatedly said disagreement among commissioners is a sign of a healthy agency because it shows that people are sharing ideas critical to nuclear safety. Jaczko has also tried to refute accusations that he berates staffers or targets women, and has said the internal dispute has not distracted the NRC from its crucial goal of securing the country's 104 operating reactors.

The dispute has also trickled over into the Senate.

Most recently, Senate Republicans accused the White House of holding up the renomination of Republican Commissioner Kristine Svinicki, whose term ends this summer.

The White House has said it will renominate Svinicki, rejecting criticism from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Senate Environment and Public Works Chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) that Svinicki had lied to Congress about her handling of the nuclear waste repository under Yucca Mountain, Nev. Even so, the White House has yet to act on her renomination (E&E Daily, April 20).