NRC's experiment with plant personnel training: the acid test of self-regulation

In February 1985, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) initiated an experiment with a form of nuclear utility self-regulation. The commissioners unanimously endorsed the nuclear utility industry's commitment to achieve self-improvement voluntarily in the area of training and qualification of nuclear plant personnel, and accepted that commitment as a basis for deferring rulemaking. In taking this action, the Commission may have signaled a marked departure from the post-Three Mile Island (TMI) era of prescriptive (and occasionally pedantic) regulatory practices to a new era of increased cooperation with nuclear utilities