NRC's services don't necessarily need to be free. But they should be reasonable, both in fees, and in the process. They are a service run by government.

And it shows.

> They are a service

They are not a service. They are a regulator. It's almost the opposite of a service.

Any governmental agency is formally in service of the public good.

Are they doing a reasonable job of that?

> in service of the public good.

being in service of the public good is not offering a service. Their job is to regulate industry, not offer it a service.

If you want a service you hire someone to fulfill it. The US government created the 'service' but not for industry, but for the regulation of industry. The 'service' isn't offered to industry for the good of industry. It's the opposite of a normal understanding of service.

If you are regulated have no choice whether to take the service or not, and your say in their 'services' is extremely limited.

Calling it a service is an activity in intentionally misleading what an organization like the NCR does. They are not a service. They are a regulator.

You are intentionally conflating two disparate definitions of service ('they offer a service' vs 'they are in the service of') and really for no gain except to come up with your own mandate for an NCR that already has one, and doesn't care about your opinion because they receive their mandate from government and not from you and your intentionally misleading arguments.

At home, I have a water pressure regulator. It came welded shut by the manufacturer because, no water flowing at all means no risk of overpressure at all.

Regulation doesn't means only hindering the industry, but accompanying its development safely through overseeing.

now you're doing the same conflating words game with the word "regulator" as if a regulator on a pipe is the same as a regulatory agency.

Can you not just make a logical persuasive argument that doesn't rely on conflating two things that aren't the same?

I think the point is a valid one. Not all nuclear regulators are as blinkered as the NRC. Canada, for example, has a very effective regulatory regime, while being much friendlier to new technology. Terrestrial Energy, a molten salt reactor company in Canada, is making good progress and has spoken highly of their regulators. But I don't think anyone would say that Canada makes unsafe reactors.

No, NRC services are not free. They charge several hundred dollars per hour.

All the reactor people were asking for was to pay in several stages, instead of all at the end after a very expensive reactor design process.

It seems strange to me that they'd want that rather than finding out up-front before they spent a much greater amount of money actually building something which might be rejected.

They do want that. The guys didn't want blid acceptance, just doing this in stages so that they can focus on the things that might need improvement.

Yes, exactly. I'm trying to figure out how I could have communicated better, since so many people here are so wildly misinterpreting what I wrote.