38th Annual Meeting
The 38th Annual Meeting of the Spanish Nuclear Society (SNE) took place in Cáceres, from 17-19 October 2012 (www.reunionanualsne.es).The meeting was supported by 25 sponsors and 31 companies participated in the parallel exhibition. It was attended by 630 delegates and 80 accompanying guests.
The programme included the submission of 308 technical papers and featured two interesting "Learn more about ..." courses, three monographic sessions and three plenary sessions that were attended by a large number of participants.
The three sessions focused on highly relevant issues. The first session was entitled: The centralized temporary storage facility for irradiated fuel. It provided an analysis of the main features of this Spanish project from an ENRESA management perspective, featured the associated technology centre and its importance to research and development into spent fuel and radioactive waste and outlined its economic impact on the neighbouring population.
In the session entitled: Impact of Fukushima on the continuous improvement of safety participants representing different countries provided status updates on Fukushima one year after, highlighting the security improvements that have been made as a result of the accident in Japan, United States and Europe. As regards Spain, in particular, participants were provided with the perspective of the operator and regulator.
In the third session, entitled: Challenges of the new nuclear generation, speakers from the USA, the UK and Finland presented different solutions for overcoming the difficulties of financing new build schemes and providing the stable regulatory framework that is required to ensure the viability of new build projects that have achievable construction and the commissioning deadlines.
In addition, monographic sessions devoted to such interesting topics as Nuclear Emergency Plans, New safety requirements: International organizations approach and Energy model and climate change also took place.
Courses aimed at encouraging the exchange of information and knowledge about topics such as Reorganization, adaptation and improvement of fire protection plans in nuclear power plants, Implementation of the IS-30"and Decontamination and remediation of contaminated sites were also presented.
Nuclear Youth presented, with great success, a Basic Course in Nuclear Science and Technology and Women in Nuclear (WiN) organised a conference entitled: Applications of Ionizing Radiation.
In addition to the plenary sessions, and as part of the wide-ranging programme of technical sessions, the latest state-of-the-art technology used in our industry was presented in connection with such topics as nuclear safety, fuel, radioactive waste, nuclear medicine or radiation protection. Special importance was given to research and development aimed at continuously improving the operation and maintenance of our plants, as well as the participation of Spanish industry in new international projects.
The technical programme was complemented by a cultural and social programme, which centred on the beautiful city of Cáceres - an old city that was awarded official UNESCO World Heritage status - and on the art, gastronomy and culture of the region of Extremadura.
During the official dinner SNE presented their awards. The SNE Medal was awarded posthumansly to Diego Molina, who died in February. He was Vice President of SNE and Nuclear Production Manager at IBERDROLA, and would have become the next President of SNE.
The thirty-ninth Annual Meeting will be held this time next year in Reus and will be hosted by ENDESA.
Technical Seminar 2012
The SNE’s Technical Seminar 2012 took place in Tarragona on September 20. The level of participation made it a great success. It was dedicated to the subject of Safe actions in nuclear facilities: Human factors in engineering”. The participants also had a look at the Human Factors Simulator unit, which had been installed by TECNATOM.
SNE scholarships
The SNE awarded 8 scholarships from the 26 applications that were received as a result of the 2012 call for post-graduate scholarships in nuclear expertise.
Other prizes
SNE also awarded a prize for the best SNE 2012 thesis, Master's thesis or dissertation and for the prizes for the 5th AREVA Photo Contest.
IYNC 2014
The Spanish Young Generation Nuclear will host the 2014 edition of the International Youth Nuclear Congress (IYNC), in the city of Burgos.
Garoña NPP
Finally, Nuclenor did not request authorisation of an extension to the operation of the Santa Maria de Garoña NPP. The plant will definitely shutdown in 2013 and will be dismantled. |
