ASN Report 2017

19 ASN report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2017 Nuclear workers receive specific monitoring (more than 370,000 people in 2016); in 2015, the annual dose remained below 1 mSv (annual effective dose limit for the public) for 96% of the workforce monitored and the regulation limit of 20 mSv applicable to nuclear workers was only exceeded once; the collective dose has fallen by about 50% since 1996 even though the population monitored has grown by about 60%. Finally, aircrews are subject to particularly close monitoring owing to their exposure to cosmic radiation at high altitude. Of the recorded doses, 82% are between 1 mSv per year and 5 mSv per year, while 18% are below 1 mSv per year. Outlook For occupational radiation protection, monitoring of exposure of the lens of the eye, with gradual compliance with the new limit for this tissue (set at 20 mSv/ year as of 2022) constitutes the main objective in the next few years, more specifically in the field of fluoroscopy- guided interventional medical practices. Managing the doses of ionising radiation delivered to persons during a medical examination remains a priority for ASN. A second action plan, which continues on from the previous one (2011-2017), was drawn up jointly with the stakeholders (institutional and professional) and will be published in the first quarter of 2018. Deployment of the 3rd National Plan for Radon Risk Management, which accompanies the publication of the new map of the municipalities considered as high-priority with respect to this risk, should allow improved communication aimed at the public in order to encourage the implementation of measurements in existing homes and gradually organise the collection and analysis of the results. Significant events and outlook Nuclear activities must be carried out in compliance with the eight fundamental principles of the Environment Charter, the Environment Code and the Public Health Code: ཛྷ ཛྷ the principle of nuclear licensee responsibility for the safety of its facility; ཛྷ ཛྷ the “polluter pays” principle stipulates that the costs resulting from the measures to prevent, reduce and combat pollution must be borne by the polluter; ཛྷ ཛྷ the precautionary principle: the lack of certainty, in the light of current technical and scientific knowledge, should not delay the adoption of proportionate prevention measures; ཛྷ ཛྷ the participation principle: the populations must take part in drafting public decisions; ཛྷ ཛྷ the justification principle: a nuclear activity may only be carried out if justified by the advantages it offers by comparison with the exposure risks it can create; ཛྷ ཛྷ the optimisation principle: exposure to ionising radiation must be kept as low as is reasonably achievable; ཛྷ ཛྷ the limitation principle: the regulations set an individual’s ionising radiation exposure limits as a result of a nuclear activity; ཛྷ ཛྷ the prevention principle: anticipation of any environmental damage through rules and actions taking account of the “best available techniques at an economically acceptable cost”. The safety approach, governed more particularly by the ten fundamental principles of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), is characterised by the requirement for continuous improvement. The nuclear activity regulators The French nuclear safety and radiation protection regulation and oversight organisation is defined more specifically in the Environment Code. It was recently reinforced by the Energy Transition for Green Growth Act (TECV) 2015-992 of 17th August 2015 and Ordinance 2016- 128 of 10th February 2016 containing various nuclear-related provisions. 02 The principles of nuclear safety and radiation protection and the regulation and oversight stakeholders