Virtual Mission of the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to the Russian Federation

24.08.2020 On August 19 - 20 the first Virtual Mission of the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to the Russian Federation took place. The Russian Party was represented by the delegation from the State Corporation ROSATOM headed by Mr. A.E. Likhachev, Director General, and by the delegation from Rostechnadzor headed by Mr. A.V. Ferapontov, Deputy Chairman. On the part of NEA OECD the Virtual Mission was participated by Mr. William D. Magwood IV, Director-General, leaders of divisions, and leading employees of the Agency. The Mission was conducted in a virtual format for the first time due to a new coronavirus pandemic.

In the course of the Mission a wide range of issues was discussed concerning the major directions of the joint cooperation. Mr. A.V. Ferapontov made a report on participation of Rostechnadzor and SEC NRS specialists in the activity of the Multinational Design Evaluation Programme (MDEP). The MDEP goal is to analyze regulators' approaches to the review of documents substantiating nuclear and radiation safety, to specify a mutually acceptable regulation practice to be further used for safety review of new design reactors. The Parties expressed a high opinion about the results of the activity of the MDEP VVER Working Group (VVERWG), including technical reports and general positions, prepared by the Working Group, and discussed perspectives for further cooperation in frames of MDEP.

Mr. S.A. Shevchenko, Head of SEC NRS Calculated Safety Justifications Division, made a report on cooperation of the Russian nuclear industry organizations with the OECD NEA Data Bank. In 2013 the Russian organizations obtained an access to such Bank resources as computer codes, supporting computed modeling of nuclear facilities, and also to the international experimental databases in the field of nuclear and radiation safety. In total, 43 Russian organizations are involved in cooperation with the Data Bank, and they have already received more than 1500 data packages from the Data Bank. Meanwhile, SEC NRS is one of the four Russian organizations, which contributed to the Data Bank development via forwarding computer codes of its own development. In 2019 the Data Bank was enlarged with the computer code "INES Classifier 1.00", developed by the specialists of SEC NRS Division for Nuclear and Radiation Safety General Issues to provide scientific and technical support to the activity of the Rostechnadzor Information and Analytical Center.

In the process of the Mission, there were also discussed issues related to development of human resources, nuclear and radiation safety, nuclear science, management of radioactive wastes and nuclear facilities decommissioning.

The second day of the NEA OECD Virtual Mission coincided with the 75th anniversary of the Russian nuclear industry. In his speech presented that day, Mr. William D. Magwood IV, NEA OECD Director-General, warmly congratulated Mr. A.E. Likhachev, Director General of the State Corporation ROSATOM, on the anniversary and wished further success to the whole Russian nuclear industry.

Information source: Rostechnadzor official website.