# The NRC Survey Act: What It Does

This bill asks the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC)—the federal agency that approves and oversees nuclear power plants and reactors—to survey its own employees about how the agency operates. The goal is to find ways to make the NRC faster and more efficient at approving new nuclear reactor designs, especially newer, smaller, or innovative reactor types that don't fit traditional licensing procedures.

Here's what actually happens: Within 60 days of the bill passing, the NRC's inspector general must create an anonymous survey and send it to NRC employees who work on licensing. The survey asks detailed questions about bottlenecks in the approval process, outdated regulations, staffing challenges, budget constraints, and whether current rules unnecessarily slow down innovation. For example, it asks employees whether reviewing applications chapter-by-chapter instead of all at once wastes time, or whether certain regulations created after the Fukushima nuclear accident are still necessary. The inspector general then has 60 days to compile the responses and send a report to Congress with both a summary of answers and every individual response.

The bill also asks the inspector general to conduct a similar survey of nuclear industry stakeholders—companies and organizations working with the NRC—if they request one. This gives the private sector a chance to share their frustrations with the licensing process anonymously. The underlying message is clear: Congress believes the NRC's approval process takes too long and is too rigid, which discourages companies from investing in new nuclear technology. By collecting insider feedback from both NRC staff and industry players, lawmakers hope to identify specific reforms that could speed things up while maintaining safety standards. The bill also exempts the cost of running these surveys from the NRC's normal fee structure, so the agency doesn't have to charge applicants for this feedback-gathering effort.

NRC Survey Act

Donalds, Byron

Nuclear Regulatory Commission Survey Act or the NRC Survey Act This bill requires the inspector general of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to distribute surveys about NRC's efficiency and effectiveness. The inspector general must first draft and distribute an optional and anonymous survey to NRC's employees. If feasible, the inspector general must also draft and distribute a similar survey to stakeholders in the nuclear industry.