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International Nuclear Law in the Post-Chernobyl Period

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International Nuclear Law in the Post-Chernobyl Period Cov-INL PostChernobyl 6146 27/06/06 14:59 Page 1 International Nuclear Law in the Post-Chernobyl Period A Joint Report NUCLEAR•ENERGY•AGENCY A Joint Report by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency ISBN 92-64-02293-7 and the International Atomic Energy Agency International Nuclear Law in the Post-Chernobyl Period © OECD 2006 NEA No. 6146 NUCLEAR ENERGY AGENCY ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMIC CO-OPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT The OECD is a unique forum where the governments of 30 democracies work together to address the economic, social and environmental challenges of globalisation. The OECD is also at the forefront of efforts to understand and to help governments respond to new developments and concerns, such as corporate governance, the information economy and the challenges of an ageing population. The Organisation provides a setting where governments can compare policy experiences, seek answers to common problems, identify good practice and work to co-ordinate domestic and international policies. The OECD member countries are: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. The Commission of the European Communities takes part in the work of the OECD. OECD Publishing disseminates widely the results of the Organisation’s statistics gathering and research on economic, social and environmental issues, as well as the conventions, guidelines and standards agreed by its members. * * * This work is published on the responsibility of the Secretary-General of the OECD. The opinions expressed and arguments employed herein do not necessarily reflect the official views of the Organisation or of the governments of its member countries. NUCLEAR ENERGY AGENCY The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) was established on 1st February 1958 under the name of the OEEC European Nuclear Energy Agency. It received its present designation on 20th April 1972, when Japan became its first non-European full member. NEA membership today consists of 28 OECD member countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Republic of Korea, the Slovak Republic, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. The Commission of the European Communities also takes part in the work of the Agency. The mission of the NEA is: to assist its member countries in maintaining and further developing, through international co-operation, the scientific, technological and legal bases required for a safe, environmentally friendly and economical use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, as well as to provide authoritative assessments and to forge common understandings on key issues, as input to government decisions on nuclear energy policy and to broader OECD policy analyses in areas such as energy and sustainable development. Specific areas of competence of the NEA include safety and regulation of nuclear activities, radioactive waste management, radiological protection, nuclear science, economic and technical analyses of the nuclear fuel cycle, nuclear law and liability, and public information. The NEA Data Bank provides nuclear data and computer program services for participating countries. In these and related tasks, the NEA works in close collaboration with the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, with which it has a Co-operation Agreement, as well as with other international organisations in the nuclear field. LEGAL NOTICE The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development assumes no liability concerning information published in this report. © OECD 2006 No reproduction, copy, transmission or translation of this publication may be made without written permission. Applications should be sent to OECD Publishing: [email protected] or by fax (+33-1) 45 24 13 91. Permission to photocopy a portion of this work should be addressed to the Centre Français d’exploitation du droit de Copie, 20 rue des Grands Augustins, 75006 Paris, France ([email protected]). FOREWORD The accident which took place on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine was to have a decisive influence on the development of international nuclear law over the following two decades. Within six months of the accident, a convention on early notification of a nuclear accident and a convention on assistance in the event of a nuclear accident or radiological emergency were negotiated and adopted under the auspices of the International Atomic Energy Agency. In 1988, a joint protocol forming a bridge between the two existing international nuclear liability regimes was established. 1994 saw the adoption of a convention establishing international benchmarks for nuclear safety, followed by a convention on the safety of spent fuel and radioactive waste management in 1997. The existing international regimes governing liability for nuclear damage have been significantly reinforced and a new global regime created. The purpose of this compendium, jointly produced by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency and the International Atomic Energy Agency, is to provide thoughtful analysis on each of the above instruments, demonstrating the extent to which progress has been made and identifying areas in which further improvement would be desirable. It reproduces a number of articles which have been published in the OECD/NEA Nuclear Law Bulletin, accompanied by some previously unpublished works. It also summarises the practical steps taken by the respective international organisations that support the international legal framework. 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword ........................................................................................................................................ 3 Overview of the International Legal Framework Governing the Safe and Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy – Some Practical Steps, by J. Rautenbach, W. Tonhauser and A. Wetherall........ 7 International Nuclear Third Party Liability Law: the Response to Chernobyl, by J. Schwartz ...... 37 Learning the Hard Way: Did the Lessons Taught by the Chernobyl Nuclear Accident Contribute to Improving Nuclear Law?, by N. Pelzer..................................................................... 73 The IAEA Conventions on Early Notification of a Nuclear Accident and on Assistance in the Case of a Nuclear Accident or Radiological Emergency, by B. Moser ................................ 119 A Bridge Between Two Conventions on Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage: the Joint Protocol Relating to the Application of the Vienna Convention and the Paris Convention, by O. von Busekist .......................................................................................................................... 129 The Convention on Nuclear Safety, by O. Jankowitsch-Prevor...................................................... 155 The Protocol Amending the 1963 Vienna Convention, by V. Lamm ............................................. 169 The Compensation Convention: Path to a Global Regime for Dealing with Legal Liability and Compensation for Nuclear Damage, by B. McRae .................................................................. 187 The Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management, by W. Tonhauser and O. Jankowitsch-Prevor ........................... 201 The reform of the Paris Convention on Third Party Liability in the Field of Nuclear Energy and of the Brussels Supplementary Convention – An Overview of the Main Features of the Modernisation of the two Conventions, by R. Dussart Desart ........................................................ 215 5 Overview of the International Legal Framework Governing the Safe and Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy – Some Practical Steps – by Johan Rautenbach, Wolfram Tonhauser and Anthony Wetherall∗ Introduction The accident on 26 April 1986 in unit 4 of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the former Ukrainian Republic of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, near the present borders of Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine, was categorised at the time as “the most devastating accident in the history of nuclear power”.1 Two decades on, the assessment of the health, environmental and socio- economic impacts of the accident still continues, with the aim of providing definitive and authoritative answers.2 In addition, from a legal perspective the accident underlined some significant deficiencies and gaps in the international legal and regulatory norms that had been established to govern the safe and peaceful uses of nuclear energy. At the same time, it stressed the “need for a collective international focus on [nuclear] safety” and, in its wake, prompted a call for “the creation of an international regime for the safe development of [nuclear energy]” under the auspices of the IAEA.3 For all its devastating consequences, the accident was in fact a wake-up call for the “international nuclear community” and led to a new era in international nuclear cooperation, involving states which had so far been removed both geographically and technologically from nuclear power. In ∗ Mr. Johan Rautenbach is the Director of the Office of Legal Affairs of the International
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