Aarhus Convention and Nuclear roundtable on information and public participation

🗓️ 21 – 22 January 2025 : NTW 🇪🇺 🔎 co-organised a roundtable on “Aarhus Convention and Nuclear”(ACN) ☢️ with the European Commission (DG ENER) 🇪🇺 in Luxembourg 🇱🇺 in coordination with ANCCLI, the EEB (European Environmental Bureau) and the ENSREG (European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group).

🔽 #Topic “Implementation of the Nuclear Safety Directive (NSD): transparency, public participation and role of the civil society in the independence of nuclear regulation” 👥

🔽 #Objective Identify the challenges and the best practices to implement the 3 pillars of the Aarhus Convention, enhancing a pluralistic dialogue with a large panel of countries and stakeholders represented 🎯

🔽 #Reflexions Access to a transparent information is an absolute necessity to ensure an effective public participation to the decision-making processes as well as long-term engagement. Initiatives like this roundtable are essential to build trust and enable safety culture where fruitful dialogue in the frame of the Aarhus Convention are possible 🤝

🔷 Agenda

🔷 Session 1

Practical experiences of public participation under the Aarhus Convention and the Nuclear Safety Directive

● Nuclear regulators as facilitative authorities for access to public participation (Aarhus Article 3(2) and NSD Article 8(4))
● Role of public participation to support independent regulatory decision-making
● Concrete examples from civil society

– European Commission – Adam Daniel Nagy (DG ENV.E4)
– Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee – Jerzy Jendrośka
– Nuclear regulators – Christoph Quintin (ASN – France)
– Nuclear regulators – Štepan Kochánek (SÚJB – Czechia)
– Civil society – Pauline Boyer / Roger Spautz (Greenpeace France)

🔷 Session 2

Practical experiences with transparency & access to information under the Aarhus Convention and the Nuclear Safety Directive

Nuclear regulators and licence holders as facilitative authorities for access to information (Aarhus Article 3(2) and NSD Article 8(1))
● Provision of information without clearance as an element of regulatory independence
● Concrete examples from civil society
● Issues around relations between regulators and civil society, compared to other stakeholders (e.g. information access for licensees, industry players, government institutions, democratic representatives, e.a.)

– Nuclear regulators – Maryna Surkova (FANC – Belgium)
– Nuclear regulators – Matjaž Podjavoršek (SNSA – Slovenia)
– Civil society – Michal Daniška (Chceme zdravú krajinu, Slovakia)
– Civil society – Patricia Lorenz (Global2000, FoE Europe)