Whether nuclear regulations have improved enough to ensure public safety is still a controversial issue 10 years after the partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island Unit 2 reactor.

While regulations have been improved with regard to safety since the TMI accident on March 28, 1979, they are still uncoordinated and, therefore, difficult to understand, said Forrest J. Remick, associate vice president for research at the University and chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards.

"We learned a lot from TMI," Remick said. "One of the big things is that the human element is extremely important."

In an effort to decrease the possibility of human error, the NRC introduced new regulations to increase education of plant operators, expand the plant staff and provide instruments designed to guide operators in the event of an accident. The physical and mental condition of plant operators is regulated to insure alertness, Remick said.

"The commercial industry has also stepped in and made their own regulations. Industry has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in training programs and simulators," he said.

Furthermore, the NRC has improved emergency planning, expanded research, made licensing standards higher and conducted in-depth inspection of plants, Remick said.

The NRC recently established a "safety goal" for all plants which attempts to answer the question "How safe is safe enough?" The NRC has set several quantitative goals to determine this. Remick said these include:

- The chance of the prompt fatality of a person living within one mile of the boundary of a plant should be .001 as much as the risk from all other accidents including car accidents.

-- The chance of dying from cancer induced by the plant's radiation should be .001 as much as the risk of dying from cancer from all other sources.

-- The chance of a core meltdown should be one in 10,000.

While this may seem very safe, not everyone agrees the regulations are enough.

Judith Johnsrud, co-director of the Environmental Coalition on Nuclear Power, said, "Accidents that are more serious than the safety systems can handle can occur. Long lists of safety issues that have been raised since TMI have not been resolved."

She said the NRC needs to regulate stress corosion -- damage to piping in plant systems which could result in accident situations. Piping in plants is subjected to a rapid temperature change in emergencies which can cause hairline cracks in the metal.

"These issues have been around for decades. Plus, the NRC has only just begun to address such important factors as human performance," Johnsrud said.

Edward H. Klevans, University department head and professor of nuclear engineering, said too many unnecessary regulations have been established since TMI.

"Before TMI there were regulations based on a lack of knowledge of accidents and how accidents proceed. A lot of things came down as a result of TMI. Now it's recognized these regulations are really not necessary" Klevans said. "TMI showed we could sustain a substantial fuel melting and not have substantial radiation lost."

Johnsrud disagreed with claims of safety in nuclear reactors, saying "After more than 20 years of experience in this field, I am skeptical about any claim of safety."