





SMRs and waste in France by Virgine Wasselin (ANDRA)
👉 for more info from ASNR on this click here (only in French for the moment)
Prevent and anticipate through transparency and participation
Some members of NTW have collectively published a book, on Transparency and Public Participation for Radioactive Waste Management in Europe investigating how the pillars of the Aarhus Convention, and a broader understanding of transparency by Civil Society (CS), can be transposed into Radioactive Waste Management (RWM), particularly in the establishment of Radioactive Waste (RW) facilities in different national contexts.
With an analysis of nine national cases from Europe, the book provides the results of the investigations, including comments, suggestions, questions, and other observations, collected in interaction with other EURAD-1 participants from civil society. It discusses the feedback provided within a questionnaire completed by ROUTES members for the development of national programmes on radioactive waste management submitted to the waste directive, based on effective access to information, public participation, justice, resources, and transparency.
The book will interest nuclear energy policymakers, government employees, and radioactive waste management facility operators. It will also aid researchers and academics investigating public perception and facility siting considerations.
Andrey Ozharovskii was detained by Mongolian authorities while measuring radiation levels with a personal dosimeter near uranium mining sites operated by the French company Orano. Although released, his passport has not been returned, and he faces uncertainty about his freedom of movement.
Ozharovskii’s activities form part of a long-standing European tradition of “citizen science” in the nuclear field: independent experts and local communities taking radiation measurements to help ensure transparency, safety, and accountability. Nuclear Transparency Watch and its members have supported such initiatives across Europe in cooperation with regulators, laboratories, and NGOs.
The principle at stake is simple but crucial: environmental information, including radiation data, must be accessible to the public. This is at the heart of the Aarhus Convention, the international treaty guaranteeing the rights of access to information, public participation in decision-making, and access to justice on environmental matters. Under its Article 3(8), people exercising these rights must not face persecution or harassment.
Mongolia is currently considering accession to the Aarhus Convention. This incident highlights why such commitments matter: ensuring that those who act to protect the public and the environment can do so without fear. At this moment, Andrey Ozharovskii should regain access to his ability to travel freely.
You can read the open letter here.
In the frame of the EU joint programme on radioactive waste management EURAD-1, the NTW members involved, together with other civil society members and EURAD participants, addressed aspects of rolling stewardship in radioactive waste management in the context of research and fruitful Interactions with Civil Society (ICS) methodology.
This helped in developing the following outputs within the 2 “strategic studies” work packages in which NTW was participating:
In parallel, NTW also launched a working group on this topic in which several presentations have been made by knowledgeable speakers from various backgrounds and with complementary knowledge such as Robert Del Tredici, Dr. Gordon Edwards, Marcos Buser, Reinhard Uberhost or Maryna Surkova. For NTW, Niels Henrik Hooge and Gilles Hériard-Dubreuil also provided some inputs.
The following presentations proposed in this working group are also available on NTW’s You Tube channel:
“Darkness, Visibility, and Transparency”
by Robert del Tredici has a Master’s degree in Comparative Literature at the University of California, and he has been a teacher for much of his life, giving courses in Photography, Drawing, Mythology, and History of Animated Film at the University of Calgary in Alberta and at Vanier College and Concordia University in Montreal. He is and has been a prolific graphic artist and documentary photographer: The People of Three Mile Island (1980), At Work in the Fields of the Bomb (1987), Closing the Circle on the Splitting-off the Atom (1993); Linking Legacies (1995); From Cleanup to Stewardship (1997).
Webinar #2 – part 2
“History of disposal projects and need for stewardship”
by Marcos Buser, a geologist with a degree from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, also consultant and expert who has been active for more than four decades in the management of industrial and radioactive waste projects, and a former member of several scientific commissions for the Swiss government, including the Swiss Federal Commission for Nuclear Safety. He was a member of the StocaMine steering committee.
In fact, NTW has envisioned connected topic related to the concept of Rolling Stewardship addressing challenges of the long-term engagement and maintenance in various way, such as “Intergenerational Stewardship” or “Long-term Stewardship” for instance. This work is meant to be continued within the same platforms which were previously used such as the SITEX.network and EURAD but also with any interested partners such as researchers specialized in environmental stewardship or in radioactive waste management in the long term.
NOAH, the Danish member of Friends of the Earth (Foe), and member of NTW, has just release the following press released advocating together with the green NGO Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) and Urani Naamik-Nuuk that “Mining Companies In Greenland Should Be Better Controlled”.
To know more about the Institutional mechanisms in Greenland to facilitate transparency and public participation in radioactive waste management in general, Niels Henrik Hooge, member of Nuclear Transparency Watch and NOAH Friends of the Earth Denmark, wrote an article about it in the EURAD deliverable D9.17 ROUTES – Implementation of the ROUTES ICS action plan second phase (p. 91).
This article was also presented orally in the frame of a webinar series (click here to watch).
Nuuk, Copenhagen and Melbourne, June 9, 2025
PRESS RELEASE
Mining Companies In Greenland Should Be Better Controlled
On May 29, the owner of the large Kuannersuit/Kvanefjeld uranium and rare earths mining project, Energy Transition Minerals (ETM), held its annual general meeting in Melbourne, Australia. The mining company has sued the Danish and Greenlandic governments for 10 billion EUR – equivalent to almost four times Greenland’s GDP – which is likely to make the case the largest in the history of the Danish Realm.
“For more than ten years, ETM has tried to force through a mining project that few residents in Greenland want,” says Erik Jensen, chairman of the URANI? NAAMIK / The No To Uranium Association in Nuuk. “The general meeting shows that the mining company has learned nothing and has no respect for the local population. Apparently, ETM still spares no effort to promote its project, even though it has been illegal for four years.”
One of the participants in the general meeting was Dave Sweeney from the green NGO Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF), who ensured that shareholders could ask questions of ETM’s management. His briefing from the meeting demonstrates that ETM does not deny that Julie Bishop, a former Australian foreign minister, who has been hired as a strategic advisor to promote the Kuannersuit/Kvanefjeld mining project, may be liaising with the Trump administration. She is already accused of double play in Myanmar, where she is both a UN special envoy and a lobbyist for Chinese mining companies. 290 environmental organisations have signed an open letter to the UN Secretary-General, calling for an investigation into the conflict of interest.
“The Australian uranium sector has over-promised and under delivered for decades”, says ACF nuclear analyst Dave Sweeney. “This history of leaks, damage and division has seen sustained and often successful community resistance to uranium mining. We do not want Australian mining companies seeking to ignore or override community concerns in Greenland. People must have a right to choose their future and to say no to mining and ETM and other companies must listen”.
Since the lifting of the ban on uranium mining in 2013 which ETM pushed through by threatening the Greenland government that it would not extract rare earths in Kuannersuit if uranium could not be mined, the company has only caused problems. This could have been prevented twelve years ago when questions were raised in the Danish and the Greenlandic parliaments about, among other things, the ETM ownership group’s alleged connection to organized crime in Australia.
“The fact that dubious mining companies can gain access to license areas is still a problem,” says Palle Bendsen from NOAH Friends of the Earth Denmark. “Together with three European and two Australian environmental organizations, NOAH complained to Nasdaq in late 2024 about the Australian-American mining company Critical Metals Corp. The company is on its way to take over Tanbreez Mining Greenland A/S, which owns the large Kringlerne/Killavaat Alannguat mining project in South Greenland. The deposit is reportedly the largest occurrence of rare earths in the world. Our complaint documents that Critical Metals Corp has misled the public, the authorities, and current and possibly future shareholders in at least twelve cases.”
After Donald Trump threatened to annex Greenland, the more than hundred large-scale license areas pose not only a serious environmental, but also a security problem. Together, they cover a fifth of Greenland’s habitable areas and instead of occupying the country with military means, Trump-supporters can buy it up piece by piece. For example, the American investment company GreenMet has 10 billion USD at its disposal for investments in Greenland. The company’s management includes a former Senior Advisor to the Director of National Intelligence and National Security Special Operations Advisor with a history as a Commander of a Special Operations Detachment in Afghanistan, a former highly decorated Special Forces Weapons Sergeant with more than 10 years of experience in special operations, an ex-CIA operative, and a former Director of Oval Office Operations, who used to be head of security for the Trump Organisation, while serving as Donald Trump’s personal bodyguard.
“With only a handful of employees, the Greenlandic Department of Mineral Resources has no chance of controlling the many mining areas, let alone who owns the companies that possess the licenses,” says Niels Henrik Hooge from NOAH Friends of the Earth Denmark. “Based on the experience with ETM, the Department can’t count on much support from the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Justice in Denmark, which together with the Greenlandic authorities are responsible for security and law enforcement in Greenland. Both the Greenlandic population and Greenlandic politicians want a closer relationship with the EU, so perhaps Denmark could use its upcoming EU Presidency to promote Greenlandic interests. Simultaneously, a moratorium on large-scale mining could be introduced for the next four years in order to protect the environment and avoid unwanted interference from the outside.”
Australian Conservation Foundation’s briefing on ETM’s annual general meeting
Regarding Energy Transition Minerals, etc., see: Mariane Paviasen and others, Greenland Is Under Attack, Nuclear Monitor #917, June 28, 2024, p. 8-12
For more information, contact:
URANI? NAAMIK / The No To Uranium Association in Nuuk: Erik Jensen, Tel.: +299 496790, E-mail: erikjensen1967(at)icloud.com
NOAH Friends of the Earth Denmark: Niels Henrik Hooge, Tel.: +45 21 83 79 94, E-mail: nielshenrik(at)noah.dk and Palle Bendsen, Tel.: +45 30 13 76 95, E-mail: pnb(at)ydun.net
Australian Conservation Foundation: Dave Sweeney, Tel.: +61 (0)408 317 812, E-mail: dave.sweeney(at)acf.org.au
The following feedback can be found here.
“First and foremost, its important to recall that the countries supporting this revival are obviously mostly concerned and interested – they are operating nuclear energy and even industrializing it – and those 13 EU Member States are led by France a country reported to be lacking democracy in energy debates in various occasions including currently with the PPE (Programmation Pluriannuelle de lEnergie).
Also, before addressing this revision of the EUs Illustrative Programme for Nuclear Energy (PINC) in itself, its interesting to look back at the 2016 PINC which projected 14 GW of new nuclear capacity by 2025 when only 3.6 GW materialized because promises and reality are two different things especially when it comes to energy production which requires safety, time and a certain stability both political and financial. Today, the political situation in the EU and worldwide is more polarized and uncertain than ten years ago, in 2022 Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine leading to many issues around the Nuclear Power Plants there (Chernobyl and Zaporijia) and this year Donald Trump has created some major instability on the markets over night with its Liberation Days tariffs showing the economical vulnerability and dependency of most of the countries in the world. Therefore, when it comes to energy its crucial to have a broad and transparent perspective to support more easily EUs values and strategy because Europes current reliance on Russian uranium (valued at over 700 million in 2024) contradicts its sanctions regime for instance in addition to weaken its energy security (NTW supports the EU Commission’s roadmap for ridding itself of energy imports from Russia, including uranium and nuclear fuel published yesterday).
Furthermore, nuclear energy is highly represented in the EU – with around 100 operating reactors – compared to other regions in the world, but also not new. Its aging nuclear infrastructure (e.g., Frances fleet with an average age of 37 years) is in fact increasingly vulnerable to both climate change and cyber or military threats. In addition the nuclear sector is also aging and declining with more decommissions than new builds which face chronic delays and cost overruns (e.g., Flamanville-3 (France) and Olkiluoto-3 (Finland) – took over a decade longer than planned).
Instead of promising a «nuclear revival» to achieve carbon neutrality, the EU should focus on safety of the existing nuclear facilities including radioactive waste for which there isn’t yet any proven solution for the thousands of years ahead of us. In fact, from 2009 to 2024, nuclear Levelised Cost of Energy (LCOE) rose by 49%, while that of solar PV and wind decreased by 83% and 63% respectively providing quicker returns and less financial risks (WNISR 2024). Furthermore, nuclear energy’s exposure to climate-related disruptions such as droughts and heatwaves, which reduce reactor cooling efficiency and increase shutdown risks should also be compared to other source of energy because this undermines its reliability in a warming climate.
The European Commissions decision to allow only 4 weeks for public consultation after an 8-year gap is questionable especially when EU countries have also proven to be undemocratic on this topic. In the eye of trust building and citizen engagement, its important to be ambitious in including public in a meaningful way.
For those reasons, NTW believes that the main concern and interest should remain the safety of the life around the existing nuclear installations still operating or decommissioned before anything. Democratizing nuclear energy is a key aspect for safety and transparency especially nowadays with the serious economic, security and military challenges we’re facing, therefore resources should be given to citizens willing to engage beyond polarization and distrust to overcome potential misinformation or opacity.”
This report of the ACN round table held on 21-22 January 2025 was drafted by the co-organisers (NTW and DG ENER), reflecting the discussions and the presentations given during the event.
More information is available ▶️ here
Small Modular Reactors waste🛢️☢️ were addressed during the FORSAFF seminar 1 from 23-24 April 2025 🗓 at the ASNR‘ facility in Fontenay-aux-Roses 🇫🇷 gathering around 50 participants in person or online.
This Work Package dedicated to Small Modular Reactors waste 🛢️☢️ had 2 objectives:
• to identify stakeholder perceptions and concerns related to SMR waste management and develop recommendations for transparent information exchange and dialogue including improving communication with the public.
• to discuss on topic “Policy and Regulatory Framework” with challenges posed to existing policies and regulations by introduction of SMRs and associated spent fuel and radioactive wastes.
A good part of the seminar was dedicated to civil society concerns with some time for working groups exchanging on different challenging cases.
1st CLIMATE WP workshop 🗓 26-27 March 2025
Radioactive waste 🛢️☢️ and climate change impacts 🔥 🌊 were addressed during the 1st Climate workshop from 26-27 March 2025 🗓 at the Mines’ facility in Fontainebleau. A technical visit focusing on climate change impacts in Nemours 🇫🇷 (CEREEP center) launched this event.
Presentation, analysis, cross-study of keynote papers prepared by different waste management actors, including civil society, helped the 41 participants in elaborating shared viewpoints and outcomes regarding the prior topics to be considered.
The Summary Report from the Third NEA Stakeholder Involvement Workshop on Optimisation in Decision Making, which took place in Paris from 5–7 September 2023, where NTW was actively involved, has now been published.
The report captures the key findings from the discussions, including case studies, practical reflections, and proposals on how to facilitate optimisation in decision making through meaningful stakeholder involvement. It also outlines the next steps toward a generic framework for optimised decision making in the nuclear sector and beyond.
A Fourth NEA Stakeholder Involvement Workshop, will take place in Paris on 15–17 October 2025.
In preparation for the workshop, the NEA will be hosting a series of preparatory webinars. The third and final webinar is set to take place on 7 May 2025 and is now open for registration.
Continued participation and contributions will help in contributing for the next workshops.
In fact, the Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) will hold its Fourth NEA Stakeholder Involvement Workshop on Optimisation in Decision Making: From Insight to Action on 15-17 October 2025 in Paris, France
The workshop is the latest in a series of events that began in 2017 and seeks to foster dialogue and collaboration among diverse stakeholders in the nuclear sector.
The Third NEA Stakeholder Involvement Workshop on Optimisation in Decision Making, held in September 2023, brought together 120 participants from 23 countries, including representatives from regulators, operators, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), civil society and indigenous communities. Discussions centred on creating a framework for decisions that are optimised, inclusive and sustainable. The next event in the series will feature further discussion on developing a practical framework for optimised decision making.
In the lead-up to the October 2025 event, the NEA has hosted two preparatory webinars exploring key factors that contribute to power imbalances and their mitigation when engaging stakeholders in nuclear decision making. Each webinar attracted approximately 50 participants, offering focused discussions. A third webinar is planned for 7 May 2025 to further equip participants with tools to support meaningful stakeholder engagement.
The three-day Fourth NEA Stakeholder Involvement Workshop will feature:
Participants will include representatives from government bodies, industry, academic and research institutions, NGOs, international organisations and civil society to foster a broad and inclusive dialogue. The workshop outcomes will be compiled into a publicly available report, contributing to the ongoing discourse on the role of stakeholder engagement in the optimisation of decision making in the nuclear sector.
The NEA is looking for case studies on the practical application of approaches and tools for stakeholder engagement, building on trust and ensuring transparency.
Contributions are welcome: the NEA can be contacted at stakeholder2025@oecd-nea.org
Find this article and more information on NEA home page: https://www.oecd-nea.org/jcms/pl_99778/fourth-nea-stakeholder-involvement-workshop-to-be-held-in-paris
A letter of NTW’s member, Tim Knowles, was published in a regional newspaper in Cumbria 🇬🇧 relating to the withdrawal of the only other area than Cumbria as a potential UK Deep Geological Facility location.
This letter underlines how this decision marks a very significant stage in the siting process and clearly affecting the “balance of power” between government, industry and communities.
19th March 2025
Sir,
The inevitable has happened in that the only alternative UK site for a deep nuclear waste repository has been withdrawn by Lincolnshire County Council in response to local hostility and other concerns. That leaves only West Cumbria and its two artificially split “communities” as the only potential location, unless government chooses to ignore the legal “volunteerism” approach and impose another solution.
By now everyone who takes an interest knows that an undersea mudstone type geology will be the likely location. Now that Lincolnshire is out of the picture that only really leaves a repository site fifteen to twenty miles out under the Irish Sea, probably accessed by tunneling out from a surface location near Sellafield. We have lived with this probability for decades and while it may be the most logical solution, huge issues remain to be resolved.;
🔹There is still no proof that the currently accepted high level waste packaging approach will survive the necessary thousands of years or that retrievability of the waste might be appropriate.
🔹The complex issues of whether plutonium should really be treated as waste given its potential as fuel plus the growing security and possible military use options are still not fully resolved.
🔹The issue of the major impact on our community, its infrastructure and the compensation benefits it should receive for hosting are far from resolved. It should be remembered that applying UK law and using comparator schemes like the Swedish system for repository benefit, West Cumbria should receive at least three billion pounds.
We need our politicians to gear up, learn about the international dimensions and risks associated with nuclear waste management and not to accept at face value what they are told by the nuclear industry and its regulators. This community should be professionally represented by independent experts and although the UK Treasury wont like it, government money should provided to allow peer reviews, impact assessments and strategic planning in a way to be
agreed by West Cumbrians.
It is sad but true that many of the promises made by both nuclear industry and government over many years have frequently not been delivered This huge project must be handled honestly and fairly, not only for West Cumbria today but because it will affect the lives of many future generations.
Tim Knowles
in the Whitehaven News
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