Nuclear Plant Journal, May-June 2015 NuclearPlantJournal.com
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7.
How does the NEA envision the post-
Fukushima changes in the industry?
I think that for anyone who is
interested in a future for nuclear power,
it’s clear that public confidence in
the safe operation of the plants is the
essential element. Without that there’s no
future for nuclear. However good your
technology is, whatever the economics
are, it just doesn’t matter if the safety’s
not something that the public has faith in.
I think it’s appropriate that our members
and other countries around the world
place the highest emphasis on safety. In
the case of the NEA, about half of what
we do is in the safety area. So, I think
we’ll continue to see that as a pattern
going forward, and I think that you’ll also
see that what we are working on in terms
of safety will also evolve. We’ve focused
very much on hardware, on improving
the resistance of plants to severe acts, to
beyond-design-basis events.
All
countries
have
made
improvements in those areas, adding extra
electric generating capacity and adding
pumping capacity, adding water supplies,
adding and improving seismic and other
types of barriers. All these things have
been done at huge costs, but it remains
hard to improve people. People still have
the ability to make bad decisions, still
have the ability to fail to do what one
would hope they would do. And the only
way to deal with that is to make sure
that people are very highly trained, that
they operate in excellent organizations
that make good decisions that have top-
notch safety cultures. I think you will see
that in the future there will be a lot more
emphasis on those areas and those softer
subjects of culture and training than on
the hardware. I think every country has
spent a great deal of effort to try to find
where the hardware can be improved,
but we have to find ways to improve the
human part of this as well. And so, I
think that will be the safety challenge of
the next 10 years.
8.
What is the NEA’s law school’s
contribution to the industry?
My colleague, now Chairman Steve
Burns of the NRC, had led this area of the
NEA before departing, and I think he did
a fantastic job in nurturing and growing
this. The international school is a huge
success. We have some difficulty keeping
up with the demand. But we have great
cooperation with the IAEA, because the
IAEA supports students that go to the
school. I’d like to see us expand it further,
however. I think there’s so much interest
in the legal aspects of nuclear that it would
be appropriate for us to make that service
available as much as we can, because it’s
a unique one, and it’s something that you
really can’t obtain elsewhere.
9.
Concluding remarks.
The role of the NEA is to facilitate
cooperation among ourmember countries.
And that’s something that requires us to
be forward looking, and in some cases,
we may even have to look a little beyond
what the members are focused on to try
to anticipate where things are going. That
includes areas such as technology, where
right now many of our members are not
pursuing very aggressive R&D programs,
but at the same time they are also setting
very aggressive goals for climate change.
One of the things that we can do to be
helpful is to identify the technologies
that will help them meet those goals
in the long-term future so that we can
identify what the gaps are in today’s
R&D programs versus the technologies
needed for tomorrow. I think that my role
as Director-General is to help facilitate
forward-looking conversations to make
sure that we aren’t just looking at today
but also looking at tomorrow so that
we can make the best decisions and be
prepared for whatever comes.
Contact: OECD Nuclear Energy
Agency, telephone: 33 (0) 1 45 24 10 15,
email:
.
A More...
countries or the regulatory bodies. So,
of course, IAEA can bring support in the
emergency situation but probably more
directly to the regulator or the country
facing the situation than the operator
itself. And we try to be of much more
support to the operator because it is the
role of WANO.
9.
What is the objective of WANO’s
upcoming conferences? Are they open to
public, or are these for members only?
Some of them are also open to
the public, not all. It is very important
for WANO to guarantee a strict
confidentiality of the results of its reviews
and assessment, but we want to be more
visible and to interact with the other
international organization. For example
when we organize every two years our
scientific conference, usually we organize
it with another organization. And last
year it was in Düsseldorf, Germany, and it
was organized with the VGB, the German
organization of the power operators.
And we try to strengthen cooperation to
be more visible and to interact with the
different organizations.
WANO is the only organization
including all the nuclear operators. I
believe this is our strength. We decided
after Fukushima to strengthen our
programs and also to strengthen our
demands with our members. And I think
we’re probably on the right track, and
now our priority is more and more to
work as one organization, more integrated
organization between the regions because
we want to be sure that we exactly work
the same way and that our peer reviews
and our assessment have the same value
whether done in Atlanta center or Paris
center, Moscow center, or Tokyo center.
The idea is really to work as one WANO,
integrated WANO, strong and consistent
to enhance nuclear safety. That’s really
the priority, my major objective, I think,
for the future.
Contact: Fabien Lagriffoul, WANO,
22-30 Avenue de Wagram, 75008, Paris,
France; telephone: 33 1 40 42 20 22,
email:
