SKI (The Swedish Nuclear Power Inspectorate) held a two-hour information meeting on March 24 at the Nordic Sea Hotel in central Stockholm on WENRA (Western European Nuclear Regulators' Association) and its project aimed at harmonising European nuclear regulations.
(647.5757) WISE Sweden - The meeting had been publicised as a general information meeting open to the public on the SKI Website (www.ski.se) a month in advance but of the 28 people in attendance, about 17 were from the Swedish nuclear industry and seven from SKI itself. Included in the remaining four were two representatives of environmental organizations.
In opening the meeting, Judith Melin, General Director of SKI, and WENRA Chairperson, expressed her appreciation that "the environmental movement" was in attendance. Melin then provided brief background information on WENRA - which is made up of the heads of European nuclear regulatory agencies - and the harmonization project, noting that, "We haven't gotten far on the decommissioning issue." Melin added that WENRA, "Encourages openness and continual improvement."
Erik Jende, SKI's International Coordinator presented details on WENRA's harmonization project, focusing on the European-wide survey of current regulations. Information on a comparison of the results obtained from the survey of current regulations, and in particular the results for Sweden, was shared with participants and despite noting that there were still several areas that need to be addressed - for example functional testing and protection against internal fires - Jende on several occasions insisted that Sweden was "doing great" and that "There are no acute issues." When discussing decommissioning, he actually stated that much had not been done in that area because, "An operating reactor should not be burdened with a decommissioning plan."
At one point Jende held aloft a thick report and stated that it documented the results of the European survey. His purpose was to prove that the documentation does exist but he then went on to add that the report had not been released into the public domain because any resulting comparisons would demonstrate a wide variation between countries and, "could be embarrassing for some countries." Thus the results of the international survey were not revealed. Despite this, he insisted that member countries were encouraged by WENRA to publish their own results on their Websites, and that Sweden's results would be published that very day. Jende further explained that the WENRA policy allowed each individual country to determine what national information it wished to make public but that all other international data had to remain confidential.
Once Jende's presentation, which included 39 slides with numerous bar charts and tables, was eventually over, there remained just ten minutes left for questions. When asked by one of the environmentalists present if any independent analysis had been done to reach the current results, he confirmed that it had not and that "the survey was purely an internal exercise." Judith Melin informed the meeting that comments from the general public were welcome and could be submitted via the WENRA Website (www.wenra.org). She added, "There are absolutely no restrictions on what can be commented on."
Despite the heads of European nuclear regulatory agencies encouraging themselves to publish their own data, at the time of this writing no national results, Sweden included, had yet been published. Further, considering the huge number of regulatory issues raised by Judith Melin and Erik Jende, it was remarkably quiet in the room. The meeting was able to end on time, perhaps thanks to Judith Melin's announcement at the outset that "the environmental movement" was in attendance.
Source and contact: Miles Goldstick at WISE Sweden
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