of relatively minor equipment malfunctions followed by operator errors.
2. Timely recognition and prompt corrections . . . could have prevented the accident from becoming significant.
3. Similar equipment malfunctions and operator errors had occurred on prior occasions, but did not lead to accidents because the starting conditions, or sequence of events, were slightly different. If the earlier incidents had been heeded, and prompt corrective actions taken, the subsequent catastrophic accident would have been avoided.
4. To reduce the probability of a repetition of similar or worse catastrophic accidents, adequate technical standards must be established and enforced, and increased training of operators must be provided.
This pattern has been characteristic of broken dams, aircraft crashes, ship sinkings, explosions, industrial fires etc.
“As was predictable,” the admiral said, the investigation into Three Mile Island “revealed the same pattern.” Rickover went on to identify many problems, from lack of training and discipline in operations to lack of standardization. “For example, it makes no sense that the control room for Unit 1 at Three Mile Island is designed much differently than the control room for Unit 2, even though both reactor plants were designed by the same manufacturer.”
Rickover did warn the president against relying upon a “ ‘cops and robbers’ syndrome” between government regulators and the nuclear power industry. Government regulators would never be sufficient and could not adequately do the job. Instead the admiral advocated that the utilities come together to create a central organization that could provide “a more coordinated and expert technical input and control for the commercial nuclear power program than is presently possible for each utility with its limited staff”—a position that he had advocated for years.22
Shortly after, the nuclear power industry founded the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations to serve exactly that purpose. The institute became the industry’s own watchdog, and a very tough one, with the utilities stringently evaluating one another. The companies all understood that the viability of nuclear power in the United States was at stake and that they were all in it together. The industry could not withstand another accident. It would operate at Rickover standards.
The accident at Three Mile Island brought the great nuclear bandwagon to a screeching halt. Orders for more than 100 new reactors in the United States were eventually canceled. The last nuclear power reactor to go into operation in the United States was one that had been ordered in 1976.
The next several years proved to be a time of agony for the U.S. power industry. A few utilities went bankrupt. Others came very close. Construction was halted on plants that were as much as 90 percent completed. The Shoreham plant on Long Island was actually fully completed and underwent low-level testing. But in the face of local opposition, after producing only a small amount of power, it was shut down forever. Eventually the $6 billion plant was sold off for a grand total of one dollar to the Long Island Power Authority.
Still, over 100 nuclear power reactors did end up operating in the United States, although often at far higher cost than originally expected and with construction extended over much longer time spans than planned. They became part of the base load of the nation’s power supply. But they were not operating anywhere near their full capacities. Improving operations became the top priority for the industry. To do so it drew on the most obvious pool of talent—the alumni from Admiral Rickover’s nuclear navy. The mission of the retired naval officers was to make the fleet of existing nuclear power plants work better, at Rickover standards.
Still what was remarkable was how fast the nuclear power industry had developed and how large it had grown. The design and building program had commenced only in the early 1960s. Yet within little more than two decades, nuclear power was supplying about 20 percent of U.S. electricity, and that remained the case even after the brakes were slammed on.
FRANCE’S TRANSFORMATION
Nuclear development was also stymied in other countries. Popular opposition to nuclear power had emerged in Europe prior to Three Mile Island. Austria completed a nuclear power plant at Zwentendorf, 20 miles from Vienna. But it was never turned on and it has sat idle ever since. In many other countries, political stalemate and indecision were also slowing ambitious programs.
One country that went resolutely ahead was France. In the immediate aftermath of the 1973 embargo, Jean Blancard, the senior energy official in the government, made the case to President Georges Pompidou that France had to decisively move away