If passing laws were an Olympic sport, last year’s Senate would have taken home the gold. The bill creating the Philippine Atomic Energy Regulatory Authority (PhilAtom) breezed through its third and final reading in a single day—and without a single interpellation on the floor. By all indications, that sparked a major celebration for nuclear advocates.

Fast-forward to today, and the agency appears to have discovered the opposite of nuclear fission: bureaucratic fusion, where everything slows to a crawl.

President Marcos signed the measure into law (Republic Act No. 12305) on Sept. 18, 2025. If there was one thing unmistakable about the bill's journey, it was the extraordinary urgency with which its proponents and sponsoring parties drove it across the finish line.

Following that legislative “gold rush” toward the country’s nuclear ambitions, however, the momentum appears to have fizzled. The law’s implementing rules and regulations (IRR) remain unwritten, no PhilAtom officials have been appointed, and the agency still exists more on paper than in an actual physical office.

So, what happened, PhilAtom? After a feverish push that made it look like the country was ready to flip the nuclear switch at a moment’s notice, why has the agency spent the past year virtually ghosting the very industry it was so enthusiastic to regulate?

Why does implementation now feel like a very long coffee break? What are we not seeing in this equation?

Even during the early stages of the legislative bill’s deliberations, there were already flashing red flags, particularly over one critical complication: where the funding for PhilAtom’s operationalization would actually come from.

Given the deregulated structure of the Philippine power industry, many stakeholders also raised early concerns that they were largely left out of the legislative process for PhilAtom. However, they received assurances from Energy Secretary Sharon Garin that they would eventually be brought to the consultation table during the drafting of the IRR—where the gaps and legal ambiguities of the law are expected to be addressed.

First off, on PhilAtom’s funding requirement, the law is explicit. It mandates financing through the universal charge (UC)—specifically one-half centavo per kilowatt-hour (₱0.005/kWh)—collected from consumers by the state-run Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM). That fund is intended to sustain the agency’s operations for at least 10 years from the effectivity of the law.

The law further specified that “as administrator of the fund, PSALM shall create a special trust fund with the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) which shall be automatically released to PhilAtom every 20th day of the month following its collection.”

The funds drawn from PSALM are earmarked for PhilAtom’s core operations: the construction of buildings or acquisition of office and laboratory space; human resource development and expansion (including the hiring of local and foreign consultants); the purchase of equipment and motor vehicles; the upgrading of facilities, equipment, and maintenance; as well as other operating expenses incurred in performing its mandate to ensure adequate protection for the public and the environment.

Yet, PSALM has emphasized that there is no UC allocation for PhilAtom yet, pointing to a simple but telling reason: the agency’s leadership has not even been fully constituted at this point.

It similarly noted that any UC allocation for PhilAtom would require approval from the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC). Nevertheless, that just deepens the puzzle, because UC collections are already earmarked for specific purposes under the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA): primarily for missionary electrification, stranded debt and qualified stranded contract cost payments, equalization of taxes and royalties, and environmental charges.

The law is pointedly prescriptive: funding PhilAtom through the UC must not translate into new collections or any increase in what consumers already pay in their electricity bills.

Yet, this is where the legal gap becomes critical. The law references PSALM in the UC allocation for PhilAtom but does not explicitly require ERC approval, while PSALM itself insists on regulatory clearance. The question now is whether the IRR will close this gap, or whether new rules will have to be created just to make the funding flow work.

At this stage in the process, the central question is accountability: between PSALM and the ERC, who would bear the legal risk—administrative, civil, or even criminal liabilities—if funds are allocated under unclear or insufficient legal authority? These are not theoretical concerns; if left unresolved, these legal blind spots risk leaving the nuclear regulatory agency in prolonged limbo.

While ERC authorization is mentioned in the law, its role is specifically defined: it is tasked with determining, in consultation with PhilAtom, the amount to be set aside for the radioactive waste and spent fuel management fund, but not with approving the broader UC allocation for the nuclear regulatory agency.

As nuclear power gradually carves out its space in the country’s evolving energy landscape, it is becoming increasingly clear to relevant players that PhilAtom is the central regulatory body tasked with overseeing the safe development and utilization of nuclear energy.

But as developments unfold, one major question is coming into focus: which agency is really in charge of nuclear power siting?

Section 14 (a) of RA 12305 clearly states that: “without an authorization issued by the PhilAtom, the following facilities and activities shall be prohibited: siting, construction, operation, commissioning and decommissioning of a nuclear radiation facility and its associated activities.”

The law further states that: “within 60 days from the issuance of the IRR, the PhilAtom, in consultation with the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS), Department of Environment and Natural Resources – Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB), DENR-Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) and other government agencies that the PhilAtom deems relevant, shall establish the requirements for site selection and evaluation of a particular site and pre-construction review and assessment of a proposal for such facility.”

It is worth noting that the Department of Energy (DOE) appears absent from the core role of nuclear site selection, unless it is folded into the law’s catch-all provision of “other government agencies that PhilAtom deems relevant,” where its involvement becomes discretionary rather than statutorily demarcated.

So, this is where the narrative becomes increasingly confusing: despite the DOE’s apparent absence from the formal site-selection framework under the PhilAtom law, it recently announced plans to enter into a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with an industry player and the National Power Corporation (NPC) to conduct feasibility studies on potential nuclear energy sites.

Hmmm. It looks like the DOE may be reading the PhilAtom law a bit too loosely. Site selection is a core function vested in the nuclear regulatory agency itself. Unless another government body is formally deemed relevant under PhilAtom’s mandate, any independent move into siting could fall into legally prohibited territory.

As it stands, the country’s nuclear path remains disorganized: the PhilAtom law still lacks implementing rules, while key agencies appear unsure of what role they are supposed to play in delivering the promised nuclear renaissance for the Philippines.