WORLD WORLDWIDE EUROPE FRANCE - news journal UPDATE - (en) France, UCL AL #350 - Ecology, Nuclear Safety: The end of the "transparent atom" (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 The creation of the Nuclear Safety and Radiation Protection Authority

(ASNR) by the merger of the former nuclear safety institutions and,
therefore, the disappearance of the IRSN is recorded. If it is not a
question of being fooled by what this institute was, it is a question of
realizing that what is at stake is the end of the attempt at
conciliation between nuclear power and democracy in the benefit from the
revival of this industry. ---- After the adoption of the bill relating
to the organization of the governance of nuclear safety and radiation
protection by the Senate and the National Assembly, it is planned to
merge the Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN ) and the Institute of Radiation
Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) to create the Nuclear Safety and
Radiation Protection Authority (ASNR). This reform aims to support the
revival of the nuclear industry, in particular the construction of new
EPR2 type reactors, but raises concerns about the independence of the
expertise and its transparency vis-à-vis the public.

The IRSN draws its source from a political attempt to incorporate
anti-nuclear criticism. One of the main criticisms that the
environmental movement had made since the 1970s was the authoritarian
lockdown of the State around this industry. The creation of the IRSN
from the IPSN was therefore an attempt at reform opening the
institutional field to associations which at the time enjoyed
significant credibility with the general public. This openness quickly
found itself limited and the "technical democracy" project came up
against both cautious industrial players but also internal resistance
unwilling to go further than informing the public.

The IRSN is therefore not a civil society actor facing the industrial
lobby but is a hybrid institution. Indeed, safety takes time and money,
which can sometimes conflict with the interests of the nuclear lobby as
in 2007 at Tricastin or more recently in 2021 at Cattenom[1].

At the same time, we were able to see the IRSN adopt the point of view
of the State as was the case at Arlit, a uranium mine in Niger under
French control, where a 2004 investigation had judged the contaminations
to be anomalies " localized" and the mining site monitoring network
"consistent with the standards applied in France"[2]. At the same time,
the CRIIRAD and Sherpa associations noted a general contamination of
drinking water in the town of Arlit and a glaring lack of basic security
and detection in the face of uranium activity[3].

Any criticism will now be impossible
This realism about the role of the IRSN should not prevent us from
understanding this reform for what it is: a threat to transparency and
access to information. Indeed, the accessibility of information related
to nuclear safety is already imperfect and non-systematic. Some IRSN
technical opinions are not published and documents remain inaccessible
on a recurring basis. This situation prevents environmental defense
associations and anti-nuclear activists from carrying out their work as
whistleblowers. In addition, the constant exchanges between the ASN, the
IRSN and the operator can sometimes lead to censorship and
self-censorship practices.

The IRSN unions fought for 15 months to prevent this merger. They
recently announced the creation of an Observatory for the governance of
nuclear and radiological risks responsible for verifying whether the
merger will degrade nuclear safety. This attempt at counter-power is a
way of continuing the fight to denounce the future merger which will
undoubtedly be an organizational nightmare as are all mergers imposed on
different public authorities. We can nevertheless definitively turn the
page on an attempt at the "transparent atom". The hope of reconciling
the nuclear industry and democracy will have fallen under the weight of
its own lobby.

Rose (UCL PNE) and Corentin (UCL Kreiz-Breizh)

To validate
[1]Rivet, Marion, "From the ASN-IRSN administrative merger to
uncontrolled nuclear fusion?» Getting out of nuclear power n°101 p.6-7.

[2]IRSN, "Uranium mining sites and Cominak (Niger)" (report), 2005.

[3]CRIIRAD, "Impact of uranium exploitation by Cogema-Areva subsidiaries
in Niger" (report), 2005.

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Surete-nucleaire-La-fin-de-l-atome-transparent
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