ASN Report 2018

3 —  Multilateral International Relations 3.1  ̶  The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) The IAEA is a United Nations organisation based in Vienna. It comprises 170 Member States. IAEA’s activities are focused on two main areas: one of them concerns the control of nuclear materials and non-proliferation and the other concerns all activities related to the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. In this latter field, two IAEA departments are tasked with developing and promoting applications of radioactivity, and nuclear energy in particular, on the one hand, and the safety and security of nuclear facilities and nuclear activities, on the other. Following on from the action plan approved by the IAEA Board of Governors in September 2011 and with the aim of reinforcing safety worldwide by learning the lessons from the Fukushima Daiichi accident, the IAEA is focusing its work on the following fields: ∙ ∙ Revision and consolidation of the Safety Standards , describing the safety principles and practices that the vast majority of Member States use as the basis for their national regulations. This activity is supervised by the IAEA’s Commission on Safety Standards (CSS), set up in 1996. The CSS consists of 24 representatives from the highest levels of safety regulator organisations, appointed for four years and has been chaired since early 2012 by the Director General of the Czech regulatory body, Dana Drabova. The French representative participating in this Commission is the deputy Director General of ASN. The CSS coordinates the work of five committees tasked with drawing up documents in their respective fields: NUSSC (Nuclear Safety Standards Committee) for installations safety, RASSC (Radiation Safety Standards Committee) for radiation protection, TRANSSC (Transport Safety Standards Committee) for the safe transport of radioactive materials, WASSC (Waste Safety Standards Committee) for safe radioactive waste management and EPReSC (Emergency Preparedness and Response Safety Standards Committee) for preparation and coordination in the event of a radiological emergency. France, represented by ASN, takes part in each one of these committees, which meet twice a year. Representatives of the relevant French organisations also participate in the work of the technical groups drafting the documents. The mandates of the national representatives on these various committees were renewed in 2018 for a period of three years. In 2018, the CSS held its 43rd and 44th meetings. A specific committee for security, the Nuclear Security Guidance Committee (NSGC) was created, along with an interface designed to improve the analysis of the interaction between safety and security. For the longer term, an expansion of the scope of the CSS to security-related subjects overlapping with safety is being envisaged, in order to allow greater synergy between these fields; ∙ ∙ The rise in the number of peer review missions requested from the IAEA by the Member States and their increased effectiveness. IAEA’s ARTEMIS mission From 15 to 24 January 2018, a delegation of 10 international experts working under the auspices of the IAEA examined the organisation of radioactive waste management in France. The experts met teams from the General Directorate for Energy and Climate (DGEC), ASN, the Directorate General for the Prevention of Risks (DGPR), IRSN, Andra, and the radioactive waste producers. This international peer review was carried out within the framework of an ARTEMIS (Integrated Review Service for Radioactive Waste and Spent Fuel Management, Decommissioning and Remediation) mission organised by the IAEA department responsible for the themes of radioactive waste and spent fuel management, decommissioning and post-operational clean-out, thereby enabling foreign experts to examine the French system in the light of best practices. This review focused on the following subjects: ཛྷ ཛྷ the legislative, regulatory and organisational framework for the management of radioactive waste; ཛྷ ཛྷ the French National Radioactive Material and Waste Management Plan (PNGMDR), which aims to implement radioactive waste management policy and develop it within a pluralistic working group comprising, more specifically, environmental protection associations, representatives of elected officials and assessment and oversight authorities, alongside the waste producers and Andra; ཛྷ ཛྷ the national inventory of radioactive waste and the estimated future quantities of this waste; ཛྷ ཛྷ the safety requirements for the facilities intended for the management of radioactive waste, and the provisions regarding the information of and participation by the public prior to their licensing, particularly for the Cigéo deep geological disposal project; ཛྷ ཛྷ the mechanisms for financing the management of spent fuel and radioactive waste; ཛྷ ཛྷ the measures taken to ensure and maintain a high level of competence and expertise within the various organisations involved in radioactive waste management. The conclusions of the team of auditors, headed by Peter De Preter (Belgium), emphasised that France has established a framework for managing radioactive waste that covers all the issues and displays many strong points, particularly in terms of skills and its commitment to continuous progress. The improvements suggested by the auditors will be taken into account in the preparation of the next National Radioactive Material and Waste Management Plan. This plan will be subject to in-depth consultation with the stakeholders and the public. These peer reviews enable the French radioactive waste management system to be enhanced thanks to the sharing of experience. They also foster the establishment of ambitious internationally-recognised common rules for radioactive waste management and the protection of persons and the environment. 190  ASN report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2018 06 – INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS