Dr. Adam Stein

Markets don’t form around spending.
They form around contracts.

Until the government actually buys fuel, enrichment capacity will remain hesitant—and improvised workarounds will persist.

That’s why Congress created the HALEU availability program: to aggregate demand and act as the first buyer.

Nuclear fuel markets are thin, capital-intensive, and timing-sensitive.
Announcements don’t reduce risk. Contracts do.

The real problem is offtake.
No one will produce fuel at scale without durable, early purchase commitments.

Why Billions for Uranium Enrichment Still Won’t Deliver Nuclear Fuel Despite new federal spending, the missing ingredient for advanced nuclear power remains a buyer willing to commit early

DOE’s $2.7B for uranium enrichment is necessary, but it won’t solve the HALEU problem.

The constraint was never technical capacity. It’s the absence of early, durable offtake. The U.S. can already produce HALEU at pilot scale.

New piece www.breakthroughjournal.org/p/why-billio... 🔌💡

Ho Nieh was designated as the new Chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. thebreakthrough.org/press/releas...

No, the United States does not need a costly national cancer study near nuclear reactors Routine reactor emissions pose no meaningful health risk to the US workers and population, a health physicist and a nuclear engineer argue.

Link to full article: thebulletin.org/2026/01/no-t...

A credible nuclear expansion will not be constrained by physics or safety data.

It will be constrained by whether our decision frameworks can stop chasing statistical ghosts—and start governing real risk.

Complex energy systems succeed when regulation, science, and capital allocation are aligned around risks that are measurable, material, and tractable.

When they aren’t, we delay deployment, inflate perceived risk, and erode public trust—without improving safety.

The opportunity cost is real.

A multi-decade, multi-billion$ national cancer study would divert resources from hazards we know how to reduce—like radon exposure, which causes ~22,000 lung cancer deaths annually in the U.S.

From a systems perspective, this is a governance failure mode: symbolic action substituted for risk reduction.

We mistake activity for progress, and regulations for safety.

This is a hard methodological limit, not a failure of effort.

A massive population study at these doses would be just as likely to produce false positives as real effects with no reliable way to tell the difference

That’s what “chasing statistical ghosts” looks like in practice

Scale matters.

Living near a nuclear plant typically adds <0.01 mSv/year—comparable to a few hours of air travel and orders of magnitude below natural background and medical exposure.

At that level, epidemiology cannot distinguish signal from noise.

Decades of modern evidence already bound the risk.

Millions of nuclear workers—who receive higher routine doses than the surrounding public—have been tracked with modern dosimetry. These data show no definitive link between low-dose exposure and increased cancer risk.

Calls for a new national cancer study near nuclear power plants are not driven by a lack of data.

They reflect a misunderstanding of what epidemiology can and cannot do, and what statistics can and cannot show, at very low radiation doses.

No, the United States does not need a costly national cancer study near nuclear reactors By Adam Stein, PJ Seel | January 2, 2026

In nuclear safety, we spend too much time chasing statistical ghosts—deploying studies that cannot resolve risk instead of governing the risks that actually matter.

Today, @thebulletin.org published my article with PJ Seel on this exact problem.

Vanguardia Dossier "The New Atomic Era"

I had the opportunity to contribute to the issue "The New Atomic Era" In Vanguardia Dossier alongside many thoughtful writers. While I don't agree with everything, this issue covers a lot of topics all in one place.

Understanding the NRC Independence Debate The NRC Has Never Been a Wholly Independent Agency, But That’s Not Necessarily a Problem

But, when it comes to the NRC’s independence from other parts of the federal government—a factor in the NRC’s capacity to fulfill its statutory obligation—the reality is more complex.
full article: www.breakthroughjournal.org/p/understand...

It is true that the NRC must remain a regulator that has the authority and capacity to take necessary actions to achieve its statutory mandate, and is independent of, and not influenced by, the nuclear industry.

Swearing in of the first NRC Commissioners, January 23, 1975. From left to right, Richard T. Kennedy, Edward A. Mason, Victor Gilinsky, Marcus A. Rowden, William Anders, Vice President Nelson A. Rockefeller, Valerie Anders, and Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun

The NRC independence is being debated. However, most don’t understand the nature of the NRC’s independence or statutory history.
In short, the NRC has never been fully independent from other parts of government; instead, it is built on layers of independence and oversight 🔌💡

#energysky

Proud of this major work by Juzel Lloyd, @cookpj.bsky.social, @wang-seaver.bsky.social, Matt Wald, + myself.

🌐International governments' interests in diversifying and expanding uranium and enrichment sourcing should share best practices for regulating and licensing fuel cycle projects, and must crucially increase the flexibility of international nuclear cooperation.

Reasonably assured uranium recovery by country

⛏️Coordinate uranium supply chain efforts with allies (maintain and strengthen Russian uranium bans, cooperate on uranium exploration and enrichment, minimize trade barriers between allies)

🏢Mobilize federal agencies to pursue multiple solution sets (coordinate on stockpiled nuclear material, speed up enrichment facility licensing, research new enrichment/reprocessing/reactor technologies, map uranium deposits, and produce uranium via legacy mine cleanup efforts)

How do we get enough US enrichment?
📈Send firm market signals + prioritize commercial-scale enrichment (HALEU bank, federal power procurement from new nuclear, funnel grants to large-scale projects)

By leading the charge in expanding enrichment capabilities + diversifying the nuclear fuel supply chain, the US + allies can position nuclear deployment efforts for success and support a more resilient and sustainable global nuclear industry.

Separative work unit capacity requriements to meet global needs

The global supply chain is already constrained, and will become increasingly more constrained with expected growth. The U.S. cannot simply turn to the global market for a solution.

Separtive Work Unit capacity requirements to meet US 2050 LEU and HALEU needs

The higher enrichment level of HALEU fuel needed for advanced reactors correspondingly increases future enrichment needs for US scenarios that consider a higher share of advanced nuclear deployment.