The International Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management

Esko Seppänen 3.7.2002

The rapporteur:

The convention came into force on the 18th of June 2001. All Member States, with the only exception of Portugal, for technical reasons, have signed it.

The Commission has put forward a proposal (Com(2001) 520 - C5-056/2002 - 2002/0225(CNS)) aiming towards the European Communities to sign the Convention. It is proposed that the Euroatom Community puts forward a reservation with regard to the non-compliance of Community law with a specific requirement (Article 27) of the Directive 92/3/Euroatom. It does not stipulate for export authorisations the consent of the state of destination.

The preambula of the text (xii) of the Convention says: "Recognizing that any State has the right to ban import into its territory of foreign spent fuel and radioactive waste." The article 27(1.i) says: "a Contracting Party which is a State of origin shall take the appropriate steps to ensure that transboundary movement is authorized and take place only with the prior notification and consent of the State of destination." In his e-mail to the secretariate of the ITRE Committee (14.6.2002) Mr. Morero Molinero from the Commission says: "I confirm that Directive 92/3/Euroatom on the supervision and control of shipments of radioactive waste between Member States and into and out the Communisty is under revision", and "on the basis of this work, DG ENV/C4 issued an internal working document which aimed to propose legislative solutions. This working document takes into account the need to revise Article 11 of the Directive ("Member States shall contact and ask for the consent of the Country of detination"... When radioactive waste is to be exported from the Community to a third country.")."

It needs to be reminded that according to the Article 1 (92/3/Euratom) the directive shall apply to shipments of radioactive waste not only into and out of the Community but also between Member States.

Article 11 of the above mentioned directive says: "The competent authorities of Member States shall not authorize shipments: 1. either to: (a) a destination south of latitude 60° south; (b) a State party to the Fourth ACP-EEC Convention which is not a member of the Community..."; 2. or to a third country which, in ten opinion of the competent authorities of the country of origin, in accordance with the criteria referred to in Article 20, does not have the technical. legal or administrative resources to manage the radioactive waste safely."

From the compatibility point of view one must ask, why the commission does not see it necessary to put forward a proposal about modification of Article 12 of the Euroatom directive which says more about need of the consent of the Country of destination of the radioactive waste.

I read the text of the Joint Convention so that what applies to radioactive waste applies to spent fuel, too.

On the grounds of what I say above, I put forward a question to the Commission related to its reservation to the Article 27 of the Joint Convention:

Is Commission preparing a modification of the Directive 92/3/Euratom so that it is fully compatible with the Joint Convention and includes the right of any Member State, if needed, to ban imports from another Member State or a third country of radioactive waste and/or spent fuel for permanent repository?

The Commission: The answer to your question is yes for the shipments from a Member State to a third country (The only type of shipments concerned by the proposed reservation of the Community).

The rapporteur: Can I read your reply so that the Joint Convention has nothing to do with the shipments between the member states and they are regulated by some other rules? In that case, by what regulations?

The Commission: The shipments between Member States are regulated by Directive 92/3/Euratom. Art 6 provides for the possibility of bans if the conditions of Art 3 are not met.

This situation will not change when the Community becomes a contracting party to the Joint Convention (pending the adoption of the proposal of the Commission - DG TREN).

Spent fuel is not under the scope of Directive 92/3/Euratom.

The shipments from the Community to a 3rd Country are already addressed in my previous answer to your question.

The rapporteur: In the case of the spent fuel is the full consent needed from the state of destination?

The Commission: The answer to your question is yes for the shipments from a Member State to a third Country ( the only type of shipments concerned by the proposed reservation of the Community).

Another mail from the Commission: My previous statement on spent fuel describes the practical situation to date.

As regards to spent fuel, the implementation of Directive 92/3 shows that the shipment of spent fuel have to date only been made for the purpose of reprocessing.

Therefore in practice, such shipment have to date always fallen outside the scope of Directive 92/3.

The rapporteur: I make the following conclusions:

1. There is no problem concerning your interpretation about the shipments of radioactive waste and/or spent fuel between a Member State and a third country.

2. The Joint Convention stipulates both nuclear waste and spent fuel.

3. The Commission wants to make a reservation on the article 27 of the Joint Convention pending the revision of the directive 92/3/Euratom.

4. The Commission says that the transportation of spent fuel between member states is not under the scope of the mentioned Directive.

Question 1: When the transportation is made into the permanent repository, is it under the scope of this directive?

5. I have not yet received enough information to know if spent fuel is radioactive waste at the moment when it is transported to be buried into permanent repository in another member country.

Question 2: Is it then under the scope of the Joint Convention which gives the state of destination a right to ban a shipment also from another member country?

Question 3: Has commission any plan to write or revise treaties or directives concerning transportation of spent fuel from a member country to a permanent repository which locates in the territory of another member country?

The Commission´s last response:

Statements: 1, 2 and 3 no comments;

4- The Commission says that the shipment of spent fuel for reprocessing between member states is not under the scope of the mentioned Directive.

5- According to the Directive on shipments, the answer is yes.

Answers to the questions: 1- Yes; 2- Yes; 3- Yes, the Commission has the intention to propose an amendment of Directive 92/3/Euratom.