ASN Report 2017

160 ASN report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2017 Chapter 05  - Radiological emergency and post-accident situations 1.3.1 Local response organisation In an emergency situation, several parties have the authority to take decisions: ཛྷ ཛྷ The licensee of the affected nuclear facilities deploys the response organisation and the resources defined in its PUI (see point 1.1.1). ཛྷ ཛྷ ASN has a duty to monitor the licensee’s actions in terms of nuclear safety and radiation protection. In an emergency situation, aided by IRSN’s assessments, it can at any time ask the licensee to perform assessments and take the necessary actions. ཛྷ ཛྷ The Prefect of the département inwhich the installation is located takes the necessary decisions to protect the population, the environment and the property threatenedby the accident.Within the framework of the PPI, this comprises the ORSEC plans or the Off-site Protection Plan (PPE) in the event of amalicious act. The Prefect is thus responsible for coordinating the resources - both public and private, human and material - deployed in the plan. He/she keeps the population and the mayors informed of events. More specifically through its regional division, ASN assists the Prefect in managing the situation. ཛྷ ཛྷ The Prefect of the defence and security zone is responsible for coordinating reinforcements and the support needed by the Prefect of the département , for ensuring consistency between départements of the steps taken and for coordinating regional communication with national communication. ཛྷ ཛྷ Owing to his or her role in the local community, the mayor has an important part to play in anticipating and supporting the measures to protect the population. To this end, the mayor of a town included within the scope of application of an Off- site Emergency Plan (PPI) must draw up and implement a local safeguard plan to provide for, organise and structure the measures to accompany the Prefect’s decisions. The mayor also plays a role in passing on information and heightening population awareness, more particularly during iodine tablet distribution campaigns. 1.3.2 National response organisation In a radiological emergency situation, each Minister - together with the decentralised State services – is responsible for preparing and executing national level measures within their field of competence. In the event of a major crisis requiring the coordination of numerous players, a governmental crisis organisation is set up, under the supervision of the Prime Minister, with the activation of the Interministerial Crisis Committee (CIC). The purpose of this Committee is to centralise and analyse information in order to prepare the strategic decisions and coordinate their implementation at interministerial level. It comprises: ཛྷ ཛྷ all the ministries concerned; ཛྷ ཛྷ the competent safety Authority and its technical support organisation (IRSN); ཛྷ ཛྷ representatives of the licensee; ཛྷ ཛྷ administrations or public institutions providing assistance, such as Météo-France (national weather service). 1.4 Protecting the population The steps to protect the populations during the emergency phase, as well as the initial actions as part of the post-accident phase, aim to protect the population from exposure to ionising radiation and to any chemical and toxic substances that may be present in the releases. These measures are mentioned in the PPIs. 1.4.1 General protective actions In the event of a major nuclear or radiological accident, a number of measures can be envisaged by the Prefect in order to protect the population: ཛྷ ཛྷ sheltering and awaiting instructions: the individuals concerned, alerted by a siren, take shelter at home or in a building, with all openings closed, and wait for instructions from the Prefect broadcast by radio; ཛྷ ཛྷ administration of stable iodine tablets: when ordered by the Prefect, the individuals liable to be exposed to releases of radioactive iodine are urged to take the prescribed dose of iodine tablets; ཛྷ ཛྷ evacuation: in the event of a risk of large-scale radioactive releases, the Prefect may order evacuation. The populations concerned are asked to prepare a bag of essential personal effects, secure and leave their homes and go to the nearest assembly point. The Prefect may also take measures to ban the consumption of foodstuffs liable to have been contaminated by radioactive substances as of the emergency phase (before the facility has been restored to a controlled and stable state). The dose levels triggering implementation of population protection measures in a radiological emergency situation are defined by ASN resolution 2009-DC-0153 of 18th August 2009: ཛྷ ཛྷ an effective dose of 10 millisieverts (mSv) for sheltering; ཛྷ ཛྷ an effective dose of 50 mSv for evacuation; ཛྷ ཛྷ an equivalent dose to the thyroid of 50 mSv for the administration of stable iodine. The predicted doses are those that it is assumed will be received until releases into the environment are brought under control, generally calculated over a period of 24 hours for a one year old child (age at which sensitivity to ionising radiation is highest) exposed to the releases. In the event of the release of radioactive substances into the environment, measures are decided on to prepare for management of the post-accident phase; they are based on the definition of area zoning to be implemented as of the end of the releases on exiting the emergency phase and including: ཛྷ ཛྷ a Population Protection Zone (ZPP) within which action is required to reduce both the exposure of the populations to ambient radioactivity and the consumption of contaminated food, as far as is reasonably possible (for example a ban on consumption of produce from the garden, restriction on access to wooded areas, ventilation and cleaning of homes, etc.); ཛྷ ཛྷ a Heightened Territorial Surveillance Zone (ZST), which is larger and which is more concerned with the economic management of the area, within which specific surveillance of foodstuffs and agricultural produce will be set up; ཛྷ ཛྷ if necessary, an evacuation perimeter is created within the ZPP, defined according to the ambient radioactivity (external exposure); the residents must be evacuated for a varying length of time depending on the level of exposure in their environment.