• Indian National Report - CNS

  The Convention on Nuclear Safety (CNS) was adopted in Vienna on 17 June 1994 by a Diplomatic Conference convened by the International Atomic Energy Agency at its Headquarters from 14 to 17 June 1994. The Convention entered into force on 24th October 1996.

The objectives of this Convention are:

1. To achieve and maintain a high level of nuclear safety worldwide through the enhancement of national measures and international co-operation including, where appropriate, safety-related technical co-operation;
2. To establish and maintain effective defences in nuclear installations against potential radiological hazards in order to protect individuals, society and the environment from harmful effects of ionizing radiation from such installations;
3. To prevent accidents with radiological consequences and to mitigate such consequences should they occur.

CNS is an incentive convention that aims to legally commit participating States operating land-based nuclear power plants to maintain a high level of safety through exhaustive peer review process conducted every three years. The Convention obligates Contracting Parties to submit reports on the implementation of CNS articles for "peer review" at meetings of the contracting parties to be held every three years.

The obligations under the convention covers

1. Review of Safety of the existing nuclear installations.
2. Establishment of legislative and regulatory framework, establishment of regulatory body and responsibility of the license holder.
3. General safety considerations for priority to safety, financial and human resources, human factors, quality assurance, assessment and verification of safety, radiation protection and emergency preparedness.
4. Safety of installations during siting, design & construction and operation.

All countries with operating nuclear power plants are parties to the Convention. As of now, there are 65 signatories to the Convention and 63 Contracting Parties.

India ratified the Convention on March 31, 2005. The first National Report of India was submitted for review by the Contracting Parties to the Convention on 24th September 2007. On India’s national report, 20 Contracting Parties asked 143 questions.

The responses to these questions were posted well before the stipulated last date March of 31, 2008. Sixty questions / comments were raised by India on the national reports of 12 countries.

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• 4th Review Meeting of the Contracting Parties to CNS - 2008

  India participated in the 4th review meeting of CNS in Vienna in April 2008. The Indian delegation comprised of experts from AERB, NPCIL and BARC and was led by Shri S. K. Sharma, Chairman, AERB. In the review meeting, the national report was orally presented where after there was a discussion on the presentation. The contracting parties appreciated the effective regulatory review structure, the strong R & D support available for nuclear safety from BARC and IGGAR and the excellent safety status of nuclear power plants in India. They also commended the several good safety practices like strong experience feedback review mechanism, utility’s internal safety review mechanism and systematic collective radiation dose reduction programme that are followed in India. India also mentioned the planned measures to improve safety like extended work on probabilistic safety analysis, development of severe accident management guidelines for nuclear power plants and technology improvements in areas like en-masse replacement of coolant channels in Naraora-2 and Kakrapar-2 reactors, life management of Zr-Nb coolant channels, primary heat transport system feeders and flow assisted corrosion of secondary systems piping.. Future challenges were identified in the areas of recruitment and training of additional experts to strengthen AERB, Licensing of new designs for upcoming plants, reliability of digital I&C for safety functions and reliability of passive safety systems.