Brussels, 21/06/2011 (Agence Europe) - Following up the work of the G8 in Deauville at the end of May and the meeting of G8 nations and OECD agency on nuclear energy in early June, member nation ministers of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) gathering this week in Vienna called for safety standards to be improved worldwide, and for greater international cooperation and an increased role for the IAEA. However, nuclear powers find it hard to conceal their reluctance to give up a little of their sovereignty.
The first day of the IAEA ministerial conference devoted to safety norms, in Vienna from 20 to 24 June, concluded with the adoption of a very consensual declaration by member states of the UN agency, calling for improvements to be made on nuclear safety at global level. At the same time, the declaration underlines the need to receive from Japan and the IAEA a comprehensive and fully transparent assessment of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station accident to be able to act upon the lessons learned, including a review of the relevant IAEA safety standards, in particular those pertaining to multiple severe hazards. The declaration also highlights the advantages of carrying out strengthened and high quality independent international safety expert assessments, in particular within the established IAEA framework. Ministers also state their commitment to strengthen the central role of the IAEA, by encouraging international cooperation to improve global nuclear safety. The declaration insists, moreover, on the need to improve the state of national, regional and international emergency preparedness and response to nuclear accidents, and calls for a stronger role for the IAEA by promoting and possibly expanding existing IAEA response and assistance capabilities. Ministers also call for increased education and training for nuclear regulators and operators, and underscore the need for a truly global nuclear liability regime. Finally, the IAEA director general was called upon to prepare and present a report on the conference and a draft action plan, which will address relevant issues relating to nuclear safety.
Opening the conference, IAEA President Yukiya Amano had earlier acted as watchdog on nuclear safety, recommending the generalisation within 12-18 months of stress tests followed by inspections applied to all nuclear reactors worldwide. Speaking on Monday, the UN agency official said they must systematically and regularly verify that all nuclear power plants are safe. He was careful, however, to challenge the states' responsibility concerning their nuclear plants, wishing to go further and expressing the wish for the agency to be allowed to play the role of “gendarme” when it comes to safety. This would entail bitter negotiation between member states that are very divided on the matter. Calling for stress tests to be widely applied to all reactors, in particular given the risk of natural disaster and loss of electrical current or cooling systems, and on the model of tests decided by the EU after Fukushima or similar controls carried out in the United States and Russia, Amano underlined that national assessments should be followed up with tests by international experts from the UN agency. Given that it is impossible for the IAEA, whose mission it is to promote civil nuclear use, to examine all 440 nuclear reactors in the world, Amano suggests this be carried out on a basis of random selection. For example, the IAEA could test one power plant out of ten within three years, which would encourage operators likely to be controlled at any moment to apply stricter safety criteria.
In a message addressed to the conference, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he awaited concrete proposals for nuclear safety as a global public good. Amano, for his part, was confident that member state approval would be received for the post-Fukushima era for his proposals. However, as the French ecology minister, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, admitted, nuclear powers agreed to the need to work together and accept the opinions of others without publicly criticising stress tests or peer scrutiny. They did, however, remain very sensitive with regard to their sovereignty in this field. Antonio Guerreiro of Brazil, at the head of the IAEA, was bolder, announcing to the press that he had no doubt some of his proposals would be received with reticence. Diplomatic sources report that the United States and China are sceptical. Only Russia has publicly deemed Amano's proposals to be “very interesting”. (E.H./transl.jl)