The Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management

Abstract

The importance of the safe and environmentally sound management of radioactive wastes had been strongly reaffirmed by the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. This question was dealt with in Chapter 22 on “safe and environmentally sound management of radioactive wastes” of Agenda 21, adopted at the time of the Conference, which specifically referred to the necessity for States to “support efforts within IAEA to develop and promulgate radioactive wastes safety standards or guidelines and codes of practice as an internationally accepted basis for the safe and environmentally sound management and disposal of radioactive waste”. This political statement was probably the first step in the process which has led to the adoption, in September 1997, of the Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management (hereafter the “Joint Convention”). In 1994 the importance of elaborating safety standards for radioactive waste management appears again in the Convention on Nuclear Safety of 20 September 1994, the Preamble to which (paragraph ix) reads: “Affirming the need to begin promptly the development of an international convention on the safety of radioactive waste management as soon as the ongoing process to develop waste management safety fundamentals has resulted in broad international agreement.”