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The transformation of the NRC: 50 years of commissioners
The dust is beginning to settle following the whirlwind of changes at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission over the past year, and 2025 ultimately may be viewed as a transformative year, as well as the year the NRC celebrated its golden anniversary. The 12 months of that milestone year brought more change to the agency in its composition, its mandate, and its relationship to the executive branch than any comparable period in the preceding four decades.
Now at 51 years and counting, the NRC is working with a full commission and issuing new rulemakings to both regulate and support the next round of nuclear deployments. With the turbulence of 2025 still fresh in our minds, Nuclear News decided it was a good time to revisit the professional backgrounds of all 42 NRC commissioners who have served over the agency’s 50-year history to see how the composition of the commission has evolved over time.
Emily V. Meilus, Isabelle O. Lindsay, Jamie B. Coble, Nicholas R. Brown
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 200 | Number 3 | March 2026 | Pages 653-663
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2025.2495610
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This work adapts historical literature and existing phenomena identification and ranking tables to be applicable to a novel nuclear power plant (NPP) and chemical or thermal process integrated energy system (IES), particularly focusing on the process heat and heat transport system failure events that are not a concern during normal NPP operation but become vital when an IES is considered. Nuclear energy has been suggested to go beyond baseload applications and be used for hydrogen co-generation systems, among other IESs. Prior to the implementation of nuclear IESs, sufficient analysis must be performed on accident events to ensure public safety. The events considered were deemed important because of their potential to damage systems, structures, and components. Process thermal events of concern include loss of heat load and temperature transient events. Loss of heat load events were characterized as having high importance and being well understood. Temperature transient events may be further categorized by the cyclic loading and harmonics phenomena. Cyclic loading issues were classified as medium to high importance with knowledge gaps existing regarding fatigue and low power operation, while harmonics phenomena were classified as low importance and are well understood. Heat transport system failure events of concern include intermediate and process heat exchanger failures, mass addition to reactor coolant, ingress of material from thermal manifold/energy storage, and loss of intermediate fluid. These events tended to be of high or medium importance, with some knowledge gaps needing to be filled for individual reactor systems due to unique designs.