This is one to ponder, given the high stakes.
Federal inspections and security exercises at commercial nuclear power plants often overstate the level of protection and reduce the likelihood of security improvements, according to congressional investigators. The report said that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s inspection reports were found to not include incidents such as a guard found sleeping or falsification of security logs as security violations.Posted by Alan at September 27, 2003 07:58 AMIt also said that attack exercises that are supposed to test a plant’s ability to detect and repel a mock terrorist assault often are staged in such ways that they provide false assurances about a facility’s security.
The findings by the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, mirror claims made by nuclear industry watchdog groups and some industry whistle-blowers. They maintain that security at nuclear power plants, despite some recent attempts at improvement, cannot deal with a sophisticated, well-armed terrorist attack.
Article via MSNBC
Full report (pdf) available from GAO.