Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management, Second Spanish National Report

The present document constitutes the Second Spanish National Report, issued in compliance with the requirements of article 32 of the Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management (hereinafter, Joint Convention), made in Vienna on September 5th 1997. This report will be examined during the Review Meeting between the Contracting Parties contemplated in article 30 of the Joint Convention, which is scheduled to start on May 15th 2006. The Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade (Span. Ministerio de Industria, Turismo y Comercio, MITYC), the Nuclear Safety Council (Consejo de Seguridad Nuclear, CSN) and the Spanish radioactive waste management agency Empresa Nacional de Residuos Radiactivos, S.A. (ENRESA) have participated in drawing up this report. The information and data contained herein are those available as of December 31st 2004, unless some other date is expressly specified. The objective is for this report to be not only explanatory but also critical and serve as a tool for assessment. In this respect, the criteria and guidelines used in its preparation have been as follows: As a starting point, the report has been drawn up taking into account the IAEA document INFCIRC/604 “Guidelines regarding the Form and Structure of National Reports” adopted by the Contracting Parties pursuant to article 29 of the Joint Convention. To the extent possible, repetition of the contents of the first National Report has been avoided, the progress made and novelties arising since the previous report being underlined and the data and explanations required to justify compliance with each article, or otherwise, being included. Consideration has been given to the comments and suggestions arising during the process of reviewing the previous National Report. At the end of the section corresponding to each article there is an assessment of the degree of compliance by Spain of the requirements established therein. Section K includes a general identification of those aspects that are considered to be open to improvement and of the measures to be adopted for this purpose. The terminology of the Joint Convention has been used throughout this report, except in those sections in which the appropriate clarifications have been indicated1. It should specifically be pointed out that what is considered in the Convention under the generic name of “nuclear installation” corresponds in the Spanish legislation – and is considered in this sense throughout the present Report – not only to those facilities that are known under national law as “nuclear installations” – that is to say nuclear power plants, nuclear reactors, nuclear fuel manufacturing facilities, installations for the treatment of nuclear substances and installations for the storage of such nuclear substances – but also to those others that are qualified by the Spanish legislation as “radioactive installations”, whenever radioactive material is produced, handled or stored at such facilities.