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ONR welcomes first ‘Topical Peer Review’

The revised Nuclear Safety Directive introduced a European system of Topical Peer Review in 2017 and every six years thereafter. ONR played a leading role in the preparations for the first European ‘Topical Peer Review’ on Ageing Management of Nuclear Power Plants and welcomes the publication of the first peer review report by the European Nuclear Safety Regulator Group

Peer review forms an important part of delivering continuous improvement across the nuclear sector. Its purpose being to allow different countries to share operating experience and identify good practice; consider common issues; and define follow up actions to address the challenges posed.

ONR was pleased that a number of our experts were able to make a valuable contribution to the exercise alongside 16 European countries as well as Norway, Switzerland and Ukraine. The UK report was authored jointly between ourselves, EDF Nuclear Generation Ltd (NGL) and EDF-NNB GenCo.

As a regulator committed to ensuring the safety and security of the public, we were pleased the review acknowledges the continuous improvement of nuclear safety in the EU and neighbouring countries and welcome the two ‘good practice’ marks which the UK was awarded. A ‘good practice’ is an aspect of ageing management which is considered to go beyond what is required in meeting the appropriate international standard.

We will now review and examine the country specific findings and along with other key stakeholders will develop appropriate follow-up measures to further enhance safety across our ageing civil and research reactors.