1.1 Joint Convention on the Safety of Spent Fuel Management and on the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management. The Convention has 41 signatories and 22 Contracting States. 34 signatories to the Convention met from 18 - 21 October 1999 to prepare a review process required under the treaty. The review process requests Parties to issue formal reports on the status of their national waste management practices. For the status of the Convention go to http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/updates/convention.html

1.2 Geological disposal remains the only truly available option for ensuring safe waste disposal, according to an OECD/NEA report, Geological disposal of radioactive waste: review of developments in the last decade, released late October 1999. The experts acknowledge that achieving public consensus towards radioactive waste management strategies poses the greatest barrier to improving public attitudes towards nuclear energy.

1.3 At a conference in November 1999, the IAEA Director-General, Mohamed ElBaradei called for immediate action towards the permanent disposal of high-level radioactive waste. He commented on the collective opinion of experts, that geological disposal can be realised and its safety assessed by methods that are already available. Public acceptance remains the greatest barrier.

1.4 The International Commission on Radiological Protection (IRCP), Publication 77, Radiological Protection Policy for the Disposal of Radioactive Waste, Annals of the ICRP Vol. 27 Supplement, reaffirms the Commission's current policy of radiological protection, in particular its policy on public exposure, and aims to clarify the practical application of that policy to the disposal of radioactive waste. It discusses the justification of a practice, the optimisation of protection, the use of collective dose assessed over long distances and times, the implications of potential exposure, and the distinction between practices and intervention. In particular, it explains why collective doses should not be ignored simply because the individual doses contributing to them are small. However, it also stresses that collective doses may need to be presented separated into blocks of limited ranges of dose and time, and forecasts of collective dose over long time periods should include a critical examination of their uncertainty. This report is expected to be important to anyone dealing with radiation protection policy, obviously in the context of waste disposal, but also in general because of the explanations of the Commission's policy concerning collective dose.

1.5 The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reviewed the plans for a high level waste repository submitted by the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company, SKB. The Swedish concept, which proposes the use of copper-steel canisters buried 500 m deep in the Swedish bedrock, was judged sound. The IAEA team did, however, consider it necessary to recommend more frequent safety reviews to update scientific and technical information. In addition, the Agency requested SKB to initiate discussions with the Swedish safety authorities, SSI and SKI, on their future requirements for risk assessment and safety analysis.

1.6 The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP), Publication 81, Radiation Protection Recommendations as Applied to the Disposal of Long-lived Solid Radioactive Waste, Annals of the ICRP Vol. 28. This publication makes recommendations to apply to new disposal facilities. The present publication deals with the radiological protection of members of the public following the disposal of long-lived solid radioactive waste using the 'concentrate and retain' principle. The main protection issue concerns a potential exposure situation.

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