Nuclear Regulation: NRC's Assurances of Decommissioning Funding During Utility Restructuring Could Be Improved

[摘要] A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "In most of the requests approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to transfer licenses to own or operate nuclear power plants, the financial arrangements have sought to ensure that adequate funds will be available to decommission those plants. However, when new owners proposed to continue relying on periodic deposits to external sinking funds, NRC's reviews were not always rigorous enough to ensure that decommissioning funds would be adequate. Varying cleanup standards and proposed new decommissioning methods introduce additional uncertainty about the future costs of decommissioning nuclear power plants. Changes to the Financial Accounting Standards Board's financial reporting standard will require, for the first time, owners of facilities that require significant end-of-life cleanup expenditures--such as nuclear power plants--to consistently report estimated decommissioning costs as liabilities in their financial statements. However, the new accounting standard is not intended to, and will not, establish a legal requirement that these licensees set aside adequate funding for decommissioning costs."

[发布日期] 2001-12-03 [发布机构] United States. General Accounting Office.

[关键词] Government accountability -- United States.;energy;nuclear regulation;chapter report