Euratom Safeguards Office. Report 1999-2000

This document comprises of the report from the Commission on the operation of Euratom Safeguards in 2002. It states that 2002 was a pivotal year for Euratom Safeguards. During 2001 the Commission had appointed a High Level Experts Group (HLEG) to examine the mission and the means of the former Euratom Safeguards Office. On the basis of their final report the Commission adopted a new Mission Statement for the former Office and instructed that it be fully integrated within DG TREN. To this end on 26 June 2002 two new Directorates were created: Directorate H Nuclear Safety and Safeguards, and Directorate I Nuclear Inspection. The adoption of the new Mission Statement will entail significant changes in the approaches employed for the execution of Euratom Safeguards controls. Therefore structures were created to provide new concepts and guidance in order to progress the introduction of new approaches. Internally, working groups of experienced personnel from H and I were set up. Externally, an advisory group of senior experts from the Safeguards community, SAGES, was established. In March 2002, the proposed new Regulation on the application of Euratom Safeguards was adopted by the Commission and submitted to the Council for approval. The new Regulation is intended to update the currently in force Regulation 3227/76 in line with legal and technical developments, in particular the Additional Protocol to the Agreements between the Member States, the Community and the International Atomic Energy Agency, modern data transmission techniques and a consistent Safeguards policy on waste. Discussions with the Council have progressed reasonably well and it is hoped that the new Regulation will enter into force at the end of 2003. The Additional Protocols to the Safeguards Agreements between the Community, Member States and the IAEA had been ratified by 11 of the 15 Member States by the end of 2002. In the meantime exercises were arranged together with the IAEA and some Member States to investigate the practicalities of implementation and to develop the necessary implementation procedures. A dedicated database is being developed for follow up of the Additional Protocols when they are in force. In order to increase transparency, a Stakeholders' seminar attended by 110 representatives of Member States and nuclear installations was held to brief participants on the implementation of the new Regulation and the Additional Protocols as well as upon the new missions of Euratom Safeguards. In a similar spirit of greater transparency, all the major nuclear installations of the European Union were invited to complete a questionnaire on their perception of the image and quality of Euratom Safeguards. The generally positive replies are considered as encouraging. It is expected that enlargement will not pose any major practical difficulties. The project to prepare software and hardware tools for nuclear material reporting for the enlargement states had entered its final phase by the end of 2002. At the end of 2002 the total amount of Plutonium under Euratom Safeguards was 569 tonnes, an 11 tonne increase compared with the end of 2001. Similarly the total amount of Uranium under Euratom Safeguards increased to 318 710 tonnes. Despite the increase in the amounts of material under control, careful streamlining andprioritisation of inspection activities allowed a 5% reduction in inspection-days compared to 2001. Reports made by the operators of installations on flows and inventories of nuclear materials in accordance with Regulation 3227/76 were processed and checked. In total more than 1 million lines of data were received, mostly in electronic format. All errors and inconsistencies detected were satisfactorily corrected by the operators concerned. In turn Euratom Safeguards furnished the IAEA with the accountancy reports which the Community supplies in fulfilment of its obligations under the Safeguards Agreements with the IAEA. All reports were supplied on time and correctly formatted. A number of discrepancies and inconsistencies were detected by inspection activities during 2002. However, subsequent investigation led to the conclusion that no diversion of nuclear material had taken place. Similarly, data analysis performed at Headquarters revealed no evidence for the diversion of nuclear materials. The Safeguards Implementation Report of the IAEA for 2002 concluded that there was no evidence of diversion of nuclear material or misuse of facilities or equipment under IAEA Safeguards. Lastly, concerning the budget for 2002, the specific operational appropriations in the EU Budget for the Euratom Safeguards represented EUR 19.1 Mio. From that amount EUR 18.9 Mio (99.1%) were actually committed.�