Beyond Nuclear, Inc. v. U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Beyond Nuclear and Sierra Club filed a petition for review in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals challenging the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) final rule and guidance on “Reviewing Nuclear Power Plant Operating Licenses – Environmental Review.” The organizations alleged that the rule violated the National Environmental Policy Act and Administrative Procedure Act by making the conclusions of the generic environmental impact statement (GEIS) for renewal of nuclear power plant licenses binding on NRC license renewal proceedings. The organizations asserted that the GEIS’s analyses of the environmental impacts of reactor license renewal were “irrational, unreasonable, incomplete, unsupported, and arbitrary and capricious.” The organizations’ comments on the draft GEIS (see below) contended that the GEIS was deficient because, among other reasons, it did not consider effects of climate change on accident risk, “a new and fast-developing issue.”