ASN Report 2018

2 —  Relations within Europe European harmonisation of nuclear safety and radiation protection principles and standards has always been a priority for ASN. In this context, ASN participates actively in exchanges between the national nuclear safety and radiation protection authorities of the Member States. 2.1  ̶  The EURATOM Treaty The Treaty creating the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) was signed on 25 March 1957 and constitutes the primary law in the field. It has allowed the harmonised development of a strict oversight system for nuclear safety and security and radiation protection. In an Order of 10 December 2002 (Case C-29/99 Commission of European Communities versus EU Council), the EU Court of Justice, ruling that no artificial boundary could be created between radiation protection and nuclear safety, recognised the principle of the existence of Community competence in the field of safety, as in the field of management of radioactive waste and spent fuel. Independently of bilateral agreements on information exchanges in the case of an incident or accident with potential radiological consequences, France is committed to applying the Euratom Council Decision of 14 December 1987 on community arrangements for the early exchange of information in the event of a radiological emergency. The Interministerial Directive of 30 May 2005 specifies the conditions of application of this text in France and mandates ASN as the competent national Authority. 2.2  ̶  European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group (ENSREG) It supports the European Commission’s European legislation initiatives. ENSREG is supported by three working groups, devoted to installations safety (WG1), the safe management of radioactive wastes and spent fuels (WG2) and transparency in the nuclear field (WG3) respectively. A fourth group (WG4) dealing with international cooperation was embedded in the mandate of WG1 and more specifically focuses on the European Commission’s Instruments for Nuclear Safety Cooperation (INSC – evaluation and programming). ENSREG and the European Commission created the stress tests initiative for the European NPPs, organised in 2012 in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi accident. New arrangements for following up the recommendations of the stress tests were proposed in 2017 and presented to the ENSREG meeting of WG1. ENSREG is also organising the first peer review of ageing management for power reactors and research reactors with a power of 1 MWth or more. In this context, each of the 19 countries taking part in this review drafted a national report devoted to an assessment of ageing control for the reactors concerned, which was placed on-line on the ENSREG website. After a cross-examination of these reports by experts appointed by the Member States and a Q&A session, the thematic peer review was held from 14 to 18 May 2018 in Luxembourg: the purpose of this review, which comprised 140 participants, was to establish a picture of the current situation and recommend measures with respect to ageing control. The reports presenting the results of this review, a report on the generic results of this review and a report on the specific results per country, were adopted in the ENSREG plenary session of 4 October last, and were then presented at a public event on 22 November in Brussels. On this basis, each participant shall produce a national action plan to be submitted in September 2019 and which will be monitored by ENSREG. 2.3  ̶  The European Directive on the Safety of nuclear installations The Council 2009/71/Euratom Directive of 25 June 2009 aims to establish a Community framework to ensure nuclear safety within the European Atomic Energy Community and to encourage the Member States to guarantee a high level of nuclear safety (see “Regulation” section on asn.fr ). The Ostrovets NPP in Belarus undergoes European stress tests At the request of Belarus, the Ostrovets NPP, a third- generation installation under construction, underwent European stress tests in 2017. The review team consisted of 17 European experts (including one representative from ASN) headed by Mark Foy, Chief Inspector of the ONR (Office for Nuclear Regulation): it examined the robustness of the facility to extreme events and its ability to manage a severe accident, in the light of the most recent safety standards. Apart from the design of the installation which has passive systems, the best practices observed include the existence of a full-scale simulator for staff training and the continuous presence on the site of a brigade more than 100 strong. The recommendations state that additional studies are needed to verify the installation’s seismic margins. The Board, chaired by Marta Ziakova (Slovak safety regulator) assisted by Vice-President Sylvie Cadet-Mercier, ASN Commissioner, presented the review team’s report to the Belarus safety regulator in June 2018. This report was then approved by ENSREG on 2 July 2018, presented to the public the following day and posted on-line on the ensreg.eu website. Its recommendations will give rise to a national action plan, the implementation of which will be the subject of a follow-up mission in 2020. ASN chaired the ENSREG from November 2015 to October 2018 While it was Chair, ASN oversaw the work to implement measures resulting notably from the Safety Directive revised in 2014, by allowing correct monitoring of the action plans by the Member States, following the post-Fukushima stress tests, by launching and successfully completing the first peer review on ageing control of power and research (≥ 1MWth) reactors, with the help of WENRA, by organising stress tests outside the EU, notably in Armenia and Belarus, or by ensuring that the Member States schedule ARTEMIS waste management reviews. 186  ASN report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2018 06 – INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS