"There were special political circumstances," said Harry Finger, president of the United States Council for Energy Awareness, a nuclear industry trade group.

At the U.S. Council for Energy Awareness, the nuclear industry's public relations arm, Carl Goldstein, a spokesman, agreed.

The Energy Curtain: Energy Awareness.

In 1986, two TV networks pulled an ad placed by a predecessor agency of the trade group, the U.S. Committee for Energy Awareness.

It is not simply, as the Council on Energy Awareness argues, design, small scale or such technology as automation that make a nuclear power plant safer.

"We don't want to see a single plant go down," said Scott Peters, a spokesman for the United States Council for Energy Awareness, which represents the industry.

USCEA was originally founded in 1979 as the U.S. Committee for Energy Awareness.

"It's a horrible waste of resources," said Carl Goldstein, a spokesman for the U.S. Council on Energy Awareness, a trade association representing the nuclear industry.

Lynne Sairobent of the United States Council for Energy Awareness, a nuclear trade association, said: "This is a major piece of work.

"We see this primarily as a local issue," said Donald Winston, a spokesman for the United States Council for Energy Awareness, a trade group.