A key U.S. government agency has put forward a plan to narrow the scope of environmental reviews for nuclear reactors, limit public involvement, and grant full exemptions from review for some reactor types.

The National Research Corp. (NRC) announced on Wednesday that it will scale back the scope of reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a foundational law for environmental protection.

This includes completely exempting certain activities from review, such as the relicensing of existing reactors and the approval of some new reactor designs.

For other projects, the agency would still review radiation impacts but proposes to no longer consider factors like dust, noise, and air pollution, stating these fall outside its regulatory purview.

NRC Chairman Ho Nieh stated the agency also proposes to stop issuing draft environmental assessments. This would shorten the window for public comment, allowing input only at an early stage in the process before environmental impacts are fully analyzed.

In a written statement, Nieh described the move as "focusing on the types of environmental impacts that are within NRC's authority to address," adding it would "strengthen environmental protection while making the licensing process more efficient and predictable."

However, Edwin Lyman, the nuclear power safety director at the Union of Concerned Scientists, argued the reforms would cut off public access to critical scientific information.

Lyman said, "If you don't do a NEPA review, the public may never even know, let alone understand, the potential consequences of a severe accident."

This move to streamline reviews comes as the NRC is advancing several deregulatory measures, aligning with the Trump administration's goal of quadrupling U.S. nuclear power capacity.

Last week, the NRC proposed repealing a long-standing nuclear safety principle that required power plants to keep radiation levels "as low as reasonably achievable."