ASN Report 2020

Declaration, which extensively incorporates the principles of the European Directive on the Safety of Nuclear Facilities, sets precise and ambitious safety objectives aiming to prevent other nuclear accidents worldwide and to mitigate the radiological consequences if one were to occur. The Convention makes provision for review meetings by the contracting parties every three years, to develop cooperation and the exchange of experience. As Competent Authority, ASN coordinates French participation in this three-yearly peer review exercise, in close collaboration with the institutional and industrial partners concerned. This coordination work concerns the drafting of the national report, analysis of the reports from the other contracting parties and participation in the review meetings. The French report for the 8th review meeting of the contracting parties to the Convention was submitted in August 2019 and published on that date on the ASN website. Owing to the health crisis, it was not possible to hold this review meeting in March 2020 and it was postponed to 2023. 4.2  The Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management The Joint Convention is the counterpart to the Convention on Nuclear Safety for the management of spent fuel and radioactive waste from civil nuclear activities. France signed it on 29 September 1997, and it entered into force on 18 June 2001. There were 83 contracting parties to this Convention at the end of 2020. In the same way as the Convention on Nuclear Safety, it is based on a peer review mechanism comprising the presentation of a national report by each contracting party every three years, which undergoes review by the other contracting parties, as well as a contracting parties peer review meeting. The French report, the production of which is coordinated by ASN, was presented to the IAEA in October 2020 and is available on the ASN website. At the end of 2020, with the support of the French Institute for Radiological Protection and Reactor Safety (IRSN), ASN also began the review of the national reports from the other contracting parties. Owing to the health crisis, the Joint Convention’s 7th review meeting scheduled for May 2021, was postponed to the summer of 2022. 4.3  The Convention on Early Notification of a Nuclear Accident The Convention on Early Notification of a Nuclear Accident entered into force on 27 October 1986, six months after the Chernobyl accident and had 127 contracting parties at the end of 2020. The contracting parties undertake to inform the international community as rapidly as possible of any accident leading to the uncontrolled release of radioactive substances into the environ­ ment and liable to affect a neighbouring State. For this purpose, the IAEA proposes a tool to the Member States for notification and assistance in the event of a radiological emergency. ASN made an active contribution to the production of this tool, the Unified System for Information Exchange in Incidents and Emergencies (USIE), which is present in ASN’s emergency centre and is tested on the occasion of each exercise. The Interministerial Directive of 30 May 2005 specifies the con­ ditions of application of this text in France and mandates ASN as the Competent National Authority. It is therefore up to ASN to notify the events without delay to the international institutions, to rapidly provide pertinent information about the situation, in particular to border countries, so that they can take the neces­ sary population protection measures and, finally, to provide the ministers concerned with a copy of the notifications and the information transmitted or received. 4.4  The Convention on Assistance in the Event of a Nuclear Accident or Radiological Emergency The Convention on Assistance in the event of a Nuclear Accident or Radiological Emergency entered into force on 26 February 1987 and had 122 contracting parties at the end of 2020. Its aim is to facilitate cooperation between countries should one of them be affected by an accident having radiological consequences. This Convention has already been activated on several occasions as a result of irradiation accidents caused by abandoned radioactive sources. More specifically, France’s specialised medical services have already provided treatment for the victims of such accidents. It is in this respect that following the explosion in the Port of Beirut on 4 August 2020, the Lebanese government called on the IAEA for help, through its RANET assistance network, notably to examine the potential loss of integrity of medical and industrial radioactive sources. The IAEA then in turn called on ASN, which submitted an assistance proposal, together with the French Institute for Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety, the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs and the international relations department at the Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA). The delegation, which went to Beirut from 11 to 18 September, found no evidence of any radiological anomaly. 5. The bilateral framework for ASN’s international relations ASN collaborates with about 20 foreign safety regulators under bilateral agreements. Most of these agreements are bilateral administrative arrangements between ASN and its counterparts, but they are sometimes part of broader Governmental agreements (as is the case with Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and Luxembourg). The countries with which ASN maintains particularly close relations are, on the one hand, neighbouring countries, especially those whose border is situated close to a French nuclear facility and, on the other, the major nuclear countries and the countries using French nuclear technologies. Bilateral relations allow the exchange of information at several levels. First of all, at the strategic level, notably through high- level bilateral meetings, the exchanges concern points of doctrine and regulations and topical subjects concerning each authority (organisational and regulatory changes, events, experience feedback, etc.). Exchanges are also held at the technical and operational levels, in particular during thematic workshops or cross-observations of inspections, enabling practices to be compared in greater detail and, as applicable, identify those from which ASN could draw inspiration. 202 ASN Report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2020 06 – INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS