Une longue marche vers l'indépendance et la transparence: L'histoire de l'Autorité de sûreté nucléaire française by Philippe Saint Raymond, and: Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator by Gregory B. Jaczko (review)

The debate on including nuclear energy in the new EU energy taxonomy for a CO2-free economy has put this form of energy back on the political agenda, along with topics like technology, national independence, financial arguments, risk, and proliferation. Despite attempts in public debates, with the exception of the American case, there is surprisingly little research on nuclear regulatory institutions and their role in nuclear development.

The books presented here target a different readership and objectives but complement each other in that they help explain regulators' fundamental role in nuclear policy. The authors are not professional historical researchers, so a certain indulgence is required regarding methodology and argumentation. Their works are, however, valuable testimonies of the institutional environment of nuclear energy from the moment it ceased to be an eminently technical matter to becoming a means of generating economic benefits.

At the time of writing Une longue marche, Philippe Saint Raymond, representing the French technocratic elite in charge of state infrastructures, was deputy director of safety at nuclear facilities and radiation protection. With an epic title referring to a previous technical report, Une longue marche traces the history of the French regulator from the 1950s to the establishment of the Autorité de sûreté nucléaire (ASN, the French nuclear safety authority) five decades later. In that time, it evolved from a ministerial department to an independent administrative authority. The author focuses on the legal and political implications defining the creation of the new regulatory agency—part of the French government's strategy to ensure the future of the nuclear sector, crucially important for France's economy. Following a policy initiated in 1998 with legislative provisions for democratizing institutions, the ASN was established by law in 2006 as a truly independent agency, competently controlling all activities linked to the nuclear sector.

The value of this book lies in its description of French state officials' attempts to reposition nuclear activities under a surveillance system capable of avoiding accidents while projecting an image of independent control and transparency to an increasingly sensitive society. This was in advance of the EU's 2009 guidelines for regulatory authorities in its member countries.

The book describes how competent officials perceived the accidents at Three Mile Island (1979), Chernobyl (1986), and Épinal (2005–06) then discloses the lessons learned. Saint Raymond tells the story of the leukemias that affected ASN radiologists and the candid reflections by the official responsible for the Three Mile Island accident. The Chernobyl disaster gives the author enough material to paint a grim portrait of those responsible for protection from ionizing radiation; there was confusion about roles, and the regulator felt responsible for solving the problems instead of attributing responsibility to those regulated. We learn about little-known accidents, such as the partial fuel meltdown at the Saint Laurent reactor. The timing of the book's publication did not allow enough perspective on Fukushima.

More than an institutional story, Une longue marche is arguably an attempt to justify both the French authorities' regulatory commitment as well as the French government's commitment to nuclear energy at a time of great financial difficulties for AREVA, manufacturing defects in Flamanville, and problems with the Cigeo nuclear waste disposal facility, etc.

Unlike the French case, there are invaluable historical studies on the American regulator by George T. Mazuzan, J. Samuel Walker, David Okrent, Joseph V. Rees, Michelle Adato, James MacKenzie, Robert Pollard, Ellyn Weiss, Joan Aron, and Constance Perin, among others. Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator is a particular contribution in that its author, Gregory Jaczko, describes his experience as head of the U.S. Nuclear...