Europe Agrees 'Stress Tests' Conditions for Nuclear Power Plants

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--Stricter safety tests for Europe's 143 nuclear reactors have been agreed by the European Union (E.U.) and the nuclear regulators of its member states, but specific security tests against potential terrorist attacks have been ruled out.

The battle over what exactly the 'stress tests' would cover has been hard fought for weeks behind closed doors, with most nuclear power plant operators against tests for acts of terror. The issue has been neatly sidestepped by the E.U. and the European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group (ENSREG), claiming that they will be excluded from the test criteria on the basis of national security. Instead, the potential impacts of certain man-made threats, such as crashing a plane into a reactor, will be addressed.

"I appreciate that the Commission and the Member States' regulators have been able to agree on comprehensive and ambitious risk and safety assessments for nuclear power plants," said Günther Oettinger, Commissioner for Energy. "We will put all our efforts into implementing the highest safety standards for nuclear power plants in and close to the European Union. The tough part starts now: implementing the criteria with all the necessary rigour."

From June 1 the tests will follow three key steps:

• Pre-assessment by the nuclear power plant operators, who will answer the stress tests questionnaire, submitting supporting documents, studies and plans.

• A national report drawn up by the national regulator checking whether the answers of the nuclear power plant operators are credible.

• Peer reviews. Multinational teams will review the national reports. These teams will consist of seven people--one European Commission representative and six members of the 27 national regulators. The exact composition of each team will be decided later. Teams can decide to inspect nuclear plants on the spot.

Defending the exclusion of plant security testing, he added: "The questions of how to defend against the dangers of terror do not belong to the tasks of the supranational authorities, but are part of the internal national security. It seems to me that the quality of these stress tests is sufficient to fulfil the requirement of European citizens. The criteria is comprehensive, but at the same time, we are not prepared to be a sort of 'off switch' [for nuclear power plants]."

The countries most opposed to the security tests were France, the U.K. and the Czech Republic. It has also just come to light that the U.K.'s Sellafield site on the coast of Wales, which suffered radiation leaks in the 1950s, will not be tested under the new stress tests. Despite assuring Irish ministers that it would be tested under the new testing regime, the British government now claims that it will not test the plant, as it is now used for nuclear fuel reprocessing and not power generation.

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