ISLAMABAD, July 27: Pakistan has decided to further ensure safe operation of its nuclear facilities, especially the nuclear power plants, by strengthening the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) under a six-year phased monitoring and evaluation programme.
Official sources told Dawn here on Tuesday that a 72-month programme (from July 2004 to June 2010) would be undertaken to address the concerns of the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) about the safety requirements of nuclear power plants including the second Chashma Nuclear Power Plant (CNPP-2).
The future of nuclear energy in Pakistan would be guaranteed through safety operation of its nuclear facilities, specially the nuclear power plants. This will be achieved by a strong regulatory control over the nuclear power programme.
The government will initially allocate Rs418 million to start a project to be called Institutional Strengthening and Capacity Building of Pakistan Nuclear Authority (PNRA) to help discharge its responsibilities regarding the regulatory activities pertaining to CNPP-2.
A decision has been taken to create a Centre for Nuclear Safety (CNS) on the pattern of Technical Support Organization (TSO), which is a common practice worldwide, within the Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA).
The safety review and inspection of the nuclear power plant would be delegated to NRA, while the headquarters would do the management of licensing process. In addition, under the project, the staffing, training, consultancy and research would be arranged.
The objective is to improve the skills and knowledge of regulatory personnel by improving academic qualification, specialized training at local and foreign institutes, on-job training, exchange of visits to other nuclear regulatory bodies, participation in seminars, conferences in the country and elsewhere, participation in research projects and activities within Pakistan or outside, and the development of competency in Chinese language.
PNRA has informed the higher authorities that the continued viability and acceptance of nuclear energy was dependent on credible nuclear regulatory supervision of the nuclear energy programme. It was said that the construction of the second unit at Chashma could pose new challenges to the country's newly-established national regulatory authority.
During the last decade, there has been a significant upgradation of safety requirements and new areas of concern have been identified. Some of these relate to design of the plant.
For instance, plants need to be designed for better management of severe accidents and that the operational life is likely to be 60 years or more as compared to the present life of 40 years.
The management of safety and human factors during the operating life of the plant is getting increased attention. This would require a thorough safety review of the plant every seven or 10 years, and in this way the nuclear energy sector, in particular, and the energy sector, in general, would benefit.
Developing strong documentation base and information centre equipped with regulatory document (such as regulatory guides, review plans, safety reports, etc.) from countries such as the USA, the UK, Germany, France, China and the Republic of Korea and international organizations like IAEA, industrial standards such as ASME, IEEE, ANSI, ISO, IEC, DIN, BSS, etc., are also needed for regulatory decision-making.
Similarly, sources said, developing and strengthening links with nuclear regulatory bodies of the USA, China, etc., and international organization like IAEA, NEA, etc., were also required.