California Attorney General Rob Bonta has signed onto two multi-state letters opposing a Trump administration plan to loosen nuclear safety regulations.
Back in May, President Trump issued an executive order to reform nuclear regulations as part of an effort to expand the energy source across the U.S. The order said current regulations are inefficient and lack scientific basis.
One proposal is to drop a current standard that requires facilities that use radioactive material to keep radiation exposures for workers as low as reasonably possible.
In a press release on the proposed changes, Bonta said the Trump administration is “more concerned with corporate interests than the health and safety of the American people.”
A spokesperson for the anti-nuclear advocacy group Mothers for Peace told KCBX the rule change is “callous beyond belief” and applauded Bonta’s decision to join Attorneys General from 11 other states in signing the letters.
“We need less, not more, exposure” to radiation, the statement says.
Heather Hoff, head of the group Mothers for Nuclear, has worked in the nuclear industry for multiple decades. She told KCBX she was initially cautious when the rule changes were proposed due to her distrust for the current administration.
“They haven't done the best at protecting the environment, and so it's hard to not jump to that conclusion about what they're doing with nuclear too,” Hoff said.
However, after looking at the proposals, she said her conclusion was that the rule changes would not impact safety, but instead eliminate some redundancies.
“It's rolling back a lot of layers of complexity,” Hoff said. “Which, we think, will actually raise public health and protect the environment by enabling more new nuclear instead of natural gas.”
