The Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority (NRPA) and the IRSN organized an international conference co-sponsored by WHO by on the prevention of radon risk in homes, on Thursday 11 & Friday, April 12 in Paris.

On this occasion, the speakers from eight countries (United Kingdom, Ireland, Finland, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, Norway and France) presented their actions to reduce exposure to radon in the home.

IRSN and the Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) have just signed a seven-year cooperation agreement in the area of radioecology and environmental radiation protection. The agreement identifies several areas of mutual scientific interest that will be pooled so that the two partners can take advantage of a joint technical platform and expanded skill sets.

IRSN publishes a new report about transport events involving radioactive materials that occurred in France from 1999 to 2011. For each of the 1 304 events recorded, many parameters have been collected and analysed from information listed in the declarations and reports of events sent by users (type of event, purpose, package design, INES level, etc.).

IRSN and GRS are jointly developing the ASTEC software system dedicated to nuclear meltdowns in the different types of reactors currently in operation. A late-January meeting of the ASTEC Users Club in Aix-en-Provence in southeastern France bolstered its position as an international reference and consolidated its scope of applications, which has progressively been extended to include most types of reactors, existing and future.

Last autumn, a delegation from IRSN took part in two seminars organized by the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization (JNES), the Institute’s Japanese counterpart and an associate member of the ETSON network of European TSOs, with the goal of discussing current collaboration in fire risk and deepening collaboration in areas of mutual interest related to severe accidents in light water reactors.