The Nation - News from Aug. 9, 1988

President Reagan is expected to sign legislation to require nuclear power companies to take a bigger financial responsibility for damages arising from a reactor accident, an Administration official said. “We have strongly supported this bill,” an Office of Management and Budget official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said of the proposed 15-year renewal of the 1957 Price-Anderson Act that won final congressional approval on a voice vote Friday in the Senate. The bill would set the liability limit for the nuclear generating industry at $7.1 billion for all damages from a single accident. That is 10 times the amount the industry was responsible for under the previous law, which expired a year ago.