Charleston Leader

Today, U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, participated in a hearing on the nomination of Matthew Marzano to be a member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

During the hearing, Ranking Member Capito questioned Mr. Marzano on his experience in the nuclear industry and his views on serving as an NRC commissioner, as well as his stances on both previous and current issues before the Commission. Additionally, Ranking Member Capito pressed Mr. Marzano on how he would efficiently implement the ADVANCE Act and the importance of swift and predictable timelines to review and approve future nuclear energy projects.

HIGHLIGHTS:

ON POLICY DIFFERENCES WITH PREVIOUS COMMISSION DECISIONS:

Ranking Member Capito: “You spent two years working with Chair Carper as a fellow, and then a detailee at EPW. So based on this experience, could you point to two or three examples where you would have voted differently than how the majority of the Commission voted?”

Mr. Marzano: “In terms of examples of how I would’ve voted differently, I think it's a little bit inappropriate for me to comment exactly, without understanding some of the details on some of the votes that the Commission has made.”

ON NRC’S ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW REQUIREMENT POLICY:

Ranking Member Capito: “What about the decision to halt the NRC’s staff proposal to update, you sort of mentioned this in your response, the agency's environmental review requirements?"

Mr. Marzano: “I’m not too familiar, again, with some of the details. Are you talking in reference to the subsequent license review?”

Ranking Member Capito: “Yeah.”

Mr. Marzano: “Yeah, I wouldn't have voted – actually, I can't say, you know, how I would have voted on that. Again, I think there's a lot of things that I don't know about the information that the staff provides the commissioners, and it would be inappropriate for me to comment.”

ON ADVANCE ACT EFFICIENCY FOCUS:

Ranking Member Capito: “Do you agree with the opening part of my statement where I said that if we don't get [the ADVANCE Act] right more efficiently and in a more-timely manner we're going to lose our global superiority in this area?"

Mr. Marzano: “I do agree.”

ON NRC TELEWORK POLICY:

“Well if you've been in meetings – I'm sure you have – when I've talked with Chairman Hanson one of my [issues] with the NRC is telework policy. Now it's two days a week; I think a day is six hours in office. There was a push to change it to one day every two weeks with a day being four hours. The Commission came in and overturned what Chair Hanson had done. What's your opinion on telework policy and what changes would you make?”

ON ADVANCE ACT IMPLEMENTATION:

“There’s a lot of excitement about small nuclear in my State of West Virginia. There's a specific provision in there that could be very helpful to us to develop these placements of these small nuclear reactors on abandoned coal mine sites that already have generation in place. It would be great for economics of region and also for workforce so it's win-win here and it would probably have environmental benefits as well so if I'm sitting here community I'm talking my folks West Virginia about promise ADVANCE Act when soonest reactor actually go online your opinion?”

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF QUICKLY AND SAFELY IMPLEMENTING NUCLEAR ENERGY PROJECTS:

“So I would say that as Commission nominee want efficient want timely without sacrificing any safety or environmental aspects course not follow history NRC which has been lot foot-dragging lot redoing decisions already made implore direction heed those words.”

Click HERE to watch Ranking Member Capito’s questions.

Click HEREto watch Ranking Member Capito’s opening statement.

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