INDUSTRY: Private Atomic Power

Two years ago the Atomic Energy Commission took the first step toward letting private industry work on the development of nuclear power. It set up five teams, of two companies each, to study the problem.* Last week, with some optimistic team reports on hand, AEC Chairman Gordon Dean took the second big step to end the Government's monopoly. Dean and his colleagues decided the time had come to change the Atomic Energy Act. To Congress, AEC recommended that:

> Private companies should be allowed to own atomic reactors.

> Qualified companies should be allowed to buy fissionable materials from AEC, or produce their own, to run their reactors.

> "Outside groups" should get more liberal patent rights on atomic-energy developments. At present, the Government gets the rights to developments made by private companies under contract to AEC.

> AEC should be allowed to sell and lease special Government equipment that might be useful to private industry in developing commercial atomic power.

No sooner had AEC brought out its proposals than Congress' Joint Committee on Atomic Energy announced that it would hold hearings on the plan within the next month. Even if Congress changes the act, private industry may well move slowly. Said Gordon Dean: "A nuclear plant built on the basis of today's technology could not compete with conventional power." Yet . . . there is hope and "considerable optimism that economic nuclear power can be attained within a few years."