On 14th and 15th November 2023, WENRA held its regular biannual plenary meeting in Paris.

On the 5th and 6th of April 2023, WENRA held its regular biannual plenary meeting in Helsinki.

This meeting, hosted by the Finnish nuclear safety authority STUK, was an opportunity for the association to address a number of important topics.

On the 9th and 10th of November 2022, WENRA held its regular biannual plenary meeting in Liverpool. This meeting was hosted by ONR, the UK regulatory body.

WENRA members discussed several important topics.

In 2010, WENRA issued safety objectives for new nuclear power plants (NPPs). These objectives were developed on the basis of a systematic review of the Fundamental Safety Principles (SF1 document issued in 2006 by the IAEA) and formulated in a qualitative rather than quantitative manner.

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WENRA is today re-publishing revised versions of two of its reports covering its Safety Reference Levels (SRLs) for Waste Storage and for Decommissioning. These reports were last published in 2014 and 2015 respectively and the new versions provide updates on the benchmarking of the national regulatory frameworks of 18 WENRA members that has been carried out since the previous reports.

The WENRA Terms of Reference (ToR) were updated at the November 2023 plenary meeting held in Paris.

At its November 2023 plenary meeting held in Paris, WENRA approved its new strategy.

In 2014 WENRA published the revised Safety Reference Levels (SRLs) as the result of a review in light of the learning from the TEPCO Fukushima Daiichi NPP accident. The first task for WENRA countries was to implement the new SRLs into their national regulations. Following this WENRA’s Reactor Harmonization Working Group (RHWG) started to discuss options for a benchmarking process on the implementation of SRLs at the Nuclear Power Plants (NPPs). 

The discovery of some intergranular stress corrosion cracks (IGSCC) on some non-isolable pipes of the main primary system of French pressurized water reactors (PWR) in December 2021 led to a large scale inspection programme on all French PWRs, considering the potential impact of those cracks on safety of the reactors. 

On the 15th June 2023, WENRA issued a position on the safety situation of the Zaporizhzhya NPP with regards to the consequences of the Kakhovka dam rupture. This position is based on the work conducted by experts from WENRA, TSOs and the European Commission.

At its April 2023 plenary meeting, WENRA addressed the growing interest of many stakeholders of the nuclear sector in SMR projects. WENRA issued a statement that highlights its members’ interest in developing collaboration on SMRs, for instance through joint assessment processes. WENRA also expressed its expectations for the nuclear industry to ensure that such joint assessments can be carried out successfully.

Olivier Gupta, as WENRA’s Chairman, was invited as a key note speaker to participate in the 6th international Conference on Effective Nuclear Radiation Regulatory Systems organised by the IAEA in Abu Dhabi (UAE) from 13 to 16 February.

At its November 2022 plenary meeting, WENRA discussed the consequences of the current energy crisis on regulatory activities and issued a statement which highlights the importance of nuclear safety in this new challenging context.

The WENRA Working Group on Research Reactors met from 11 to 15 October in Garching, Germany. After more than two years of virtual meetings, the group could finally meet again in real life. Besides spending the necessary time on the on-going benchmarking (self-assessment and peer review) of the national regulation against the Safety Reference Levels for Research Reactors that were issued in 2020, the group wrapped-up its review of the transition of issues S to SV and T to TU for SRLs for RRs. Furthermore the position on the applicability of existing RHWG guidances on Issue F and Issue T to research reactors was practically finished. The group also visited the FRM-II research reactor and had an interesting walkdown of this installation.

On the 10th August 2022, WENRA issued a position on the safety situation of Zaporizhzhya NPP after reported shelling activities.