As Nuclear Reactors Proliferate, Trump Is Scaling Back Rules That Protect Workers

The Trump administration is scaling back radiation safety standards at federal nuclear laboratories and pushing the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to ease long-held limits on worker and public exposure to radioactivity, as part of its agenda to expand nuclear energy and modernize weapons production. The centerpiece is the elimination of ALARA ("as low as reasonably achievable"), a decades-old standard adopted in 1993 that required radiation exposure be kept below legal limits whenever possible—protections that have kept worker doses substantially lower than permitted maximums, according to a 2025 Idaho National Laboratory report. The rollbacks, enabled by scientific debate over low-dose radiation risks, sparked opposition from the United Steelworkers union and 41 organizations including scientists and doctors, who called it a "dangerous rewriting" of safety rules. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission plans to release a new radiation protection framework at the end of April, while the Energy Department said it is still evaluating what specific changes are needed. Without ALARA's guardrails, workers could face radiation exposure up to five times higher than current practice, though the agency says some protections will remain in place.