The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is one step closer to having a new mission statement. On January 24, 2025, the NRC Commission voted to update the NRC mission statement. The new NRC mission statement approved by the Commission now reads:1
The NRC protects public health and safety and advances the nation’s common defense and security by enabling the safe and secure use and deployment of civilian nuclear energy technologies and radioactive materials through efficient and reliable licensing, oversight, and regulation for the benefit of society and the environment.
So why did the NRC update its mission statement?
Mission statements are important because they can simply explain an agency or organization’s purpose, values, and role. While the Atomic Energy Act (AEA) directs the NRC to regulate and license nuclear technologies and materials as the agency’s “mission”, the AEA does not explicitly articulate the agency’s mission statement. The NRC’s mission statement instead developed based on Commission direction and has changed over the agency’s fifty-year history. The NRC most recently published its mission statement in 2022:2
The NRC licenses and regulates the Nation’s civilian use of radioactive materials, to provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety, to promote the common defense and security, and to protect the environment.
In 2024, Congress enacted the ADVANCE Act with significant bipartisan support and directed the NRC to make changes to help modernize nuclear regulations and make the NRC a more efficient, effective, and predictable regulator.3 Section 501(a) of the ADVANCE Act is the first time Congress directed the NRC to update its mission statement to include specific elements.4 Specifically, Section 501(a) of the ADVANCE Act provided the following direction to the NRC:5
SEC. 501. MISSION ALIGNMENT.
(a) Update.—Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Commission shall, while remaining consistent with the policies of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (42 U.S.C. 2011 et seq.) and the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 (42 U.S.C. 5801 et seq.) (including to provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of the public health and safety, to promote the common defense and security, and to protect the environment), update the mission statement of the Commission to include that licensing and regulation of the civilian use of radioactive materials and nuclear energy be conducted in a manner that is efficient and does not unnecessarily limit—
(1) the civilian use of radioactive materials and deployment of nuclear energy; or
(2) the benefits of civilian use of radioactive materials and nuclear energy technology to society.
In October 2024, the NRC Office of the General Counsel (OGC) submitted a paper (SECY-24-0083) to the Commission that outlined options and provided recommendations on how the NRC could meet the mission update requirements in Section 501 of the ADVANCE Act.6 The paper outlined four different options for updating the NRC mission statement that the OGC believed would meet the requirements of the ADVANCE Act. The four options provided were:
Option 1a. The NRC efficiently licenses and regulates the Nation's civilian use of radioactive materials to provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety, to promote the common defense and security, and to protect the environment without unnecessarily limiting the civilian use or deployment of radioactive materials and nuclear energy or their benefits to society.
Option 1b. The NRC licenses and regulates the Nation's civilian use of radioactive materials to provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety, to promote the common defense and security, and to protect the environment, efficiently and without unnecessarily limiting the civilian use or deployment of radioactive materials and nuclear energy or their benefits to society.
Option 2. The NRC licenses and regulates the Nation's civilian use of radioactive materials to provide reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety, to promote the common defense and security, and to protect the environment. We accomplish this mission efficiently and without unnecessarily limiting the civilian use and deployment of radioactive materials and nuclear energy or their benefits to society.
Option 3. The NRC protects public health and safety and the environment and promotes the common defense and security by licensing and regulating the Nation’s civilian use of radioactive materials. We accomplish this mission efficiently and without unnecessarily limiting the civilian use or benefits to society of radioactive materials and nuclear energy, while providing reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety.
In the paper, the OGC recommended that the Commission approve Option 3 for the mission statement update to fulfill the requirements of the ADVANCE Act while the NRC Office of the Executive Director of Operations (OEDO) recommended that the Commission approve Option 2. The OGC and OEDO provided the basis for their recommendations in the paper to the Commission. The paper was submitted to the Commission for their consideration and votes in October 2024.
On January 24th 2025, the Commission published its directions to OGC and NRC Staff on the NRC mission statement update in a Staff Requirement Memo (SRM).7 The Commission Voting Record (CVR) on the paper provides the individual votes and views on the NRC Mission Update for each of the five NRC Commissioners.8 The five individual Commissioner votes for the updated NRC mission were:
Commissioner Caputo9: The NRC enables the safe and secure civilian use of nuclear technologies by efficiently licensing and regulating their uses for the protection and benefit of public health and safety, and the environment; and to promote the security of our Nation.
Commissioner Wright10: The NRC protects public health and safety and advances the nation’s common defense and security by enabling the safe and secure use and deployment of civilian nuclear energy technologies and radioactive materials through efficient and reliable licensing, oversight, and regulation for the benefit of society and the environment. (note: identical to Commission Crowell)
Commissioner Crowell11: The NRC protects public health and safety and advances the nation’s common defense and security by enabling the safe and secure use and deployment of civilian nuclear energy technologies and radioactive materials through efficient and reliable licensing, oversight, and regulation for the benefit of society and the environment. (note: identical to Commission Wright)
Commissioner Marzano12: The NRC provides for the safe and secure civilian use of radioactive materials thereby enabling the deployment of nuclear technologies through efficient licensing, oversight, and regulation for the protection and benefit of public health and safety, and the environment, and to promote the common defense and security of our Nation.
Chair Hanson13: The NRC protects people and the environment and advances the common defense and security through efficient licensing, oversight, and regulation, thereby enabling the Nation’s safe and secure use of civilian nuclear energy technologies and radioactive materials without unnecessarily limiting their deployment or benefits to society.
Each of the individual Commissioner votes provides more detail on their views of the OGC paper on the mission statement, the basis for their individual vote, and perspectives on their preferred change to the mission statement. Based on these five individual votes, the NRC Commission Secretary then prepared the composite Commission vote that provided the majority opinion of the Commission. The final approved update to the NRC mission statement by the Commission is:14
The NRC protects public health and safety and advances the nation’s common defense and security by enabling the safe and secure use and deployment of civilian nuclear energy technologies and radioactive materials through efficient and reliable licensing, oversight, and regulation for the benefit of society and the environment.
The updated mission statement is the same as the updated mission statement proposed by Commissioner Wright and Commissioner Crowell.
With the Commission vote on the updated mission statement completed, the NRC staff will begin preparing guidance “to ensure effective performance of the mission” and will include “specific, practical examples of actions that serve to clarify how to implement and successfully execute the mission”.15
The NRC has made significant progress to complete Congress’s direction in the ADVANCE Act to update the NRC mission statement. The final step is NRC staff completion a report in early 2025 that documents the update to the NRC mission statement and steps taken to ensure effective performance. The Commission will submit the report to Congress by July 9, 2025 to fulfill the statutory requirements in Section 501 of the ADVANCE Act.16