What is the Asian Nuclear Safety Network (ANSN)?

Knowledge Network for Global Nuclear Safety Regime

Nuclear safety is a global issue. There are many instruments for achieving high level of nuclear safety on a global basis, such as nuclear-safety-related conventions, IAEA safety standards, safety review services provided by the IAEA.

In additions to such international instruments, knowledge networking plays an important role in establishing and enhancing national and regional nuclear safety infrastructures that consist of the elements such as safety regulation, operational safety, research activities and education & training of staffs involved in nuclear safety. Self-sustaining knowledge networking is expected to be a useful tool for sharing nuclear safety information and experience and eventually for achieving high level of nuclear safety.

Objectives of the ANSN

The primary objective of the ANSN is to pool, analyse and share existing and new nuclear safety knowledge and practical experience among Asian countries. It operates as a platform for facilitating sustainable regional cooperation among the scientific communities of those countries. The combination of knowledge networks and human networks contributes to enhancement of nuclear safety infrastructures in the participating countries, and to continuous enhancement of regional cooperation and the safety of nuclear installations in the region. The current participating countries are China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. Australia, France, Germany and the USA are ANSN supporting countries. Pakistan and Bangladesh are associated countries in activities related to the safety of nuclear power plants and/or strengthening their regulatory frameworks.

Structure of the Network

The ANSN is a decentralized autonomous network system composed of three hubs in China, Japan and Korea, five national centres (NCs) in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, the IAEA's ANSN web site and other web sites of the supporting countries. Hubs and NCs have their own databases and are interconnected via the internet. A general web site, www.ansn.org, under development, is open to the public. It provides overall information and serves as a portal for the various web sites.

Outstanding Features of ANSN

The hubs in China, Japan and Korea and the IAEA ANSN web site play a core role in providing the knowledge for the entire ANSN as well as implementing related IAEA safety activities. The NCs are mostly intended to serve and promote knowledge sharing among the national experts and to facilitate access to the information and knowledge contained in the ANSN. NCs also provide technical reports and other specific safety information, in the national language.

The hubs and NCs are independently operated by designated organizations in the participating countries, but in line with the overall ANSN implementation policies. Some ANSN documents are catalogued in a master index using a taxonomy which is a tool for users to locate and retrieve information. The master index is currently hosted and maintained by the IAEA, but may be relocated to any other hub or NC in the future. A system for exchanging the data among the distributed databases using XML (eXtensible Markup Language) procedure is provided to automatically update the master index. Access to the ANSN knowledge base is restricted to authorized persons in the participating and supporting countries. To simplify users’ access, the ANSN uses a single sign-on procedure that allows authorized users to access other hubs and NCs without being requested to sign in again once they log on to any of the centres.

Management and operation of the ANSN

The ANSN Steering Committee composed of the representatives from the participating and supporting countries and the IAEA, is in charge of overall coordination for developing and implementing the ANSN. The Committee has a major role in ensuring efficient and effective planning and implementation of the ANSN activities and its sustainable operation.

Several technical groups called Topical Groups are working in specific thematic areas as forums to share experience and to create new knowledge. Each topical group is composed of specialists working in the specific technical area dealt by the group. Online and offline meetings are organized by the groups for selecting documents to be shared, finding workable solutions to emerging issues and exchanging experience in the respective areas.

Six Topical Groups are currently active, namely: Education & Training, Operational Safety, Safety Analysis, Emergency Preparedness & Response, Radioactive Waste Management and Safety Management of Research Reactors.In addition, an Information Technology (IT) Support Group provides IT support to the ANSN and develops technical solutions to meet users’ requirements.

Promotion of the ANSN

In order to increase the outreach of the ANSN, a newsletter is published on a bi-weekly basis since March 2005 and distributed electronically to more than 800 subscribers. The newsletter provides an overview of recent technical activities carried out and those planned. It can also be accessed via the ANSN public web site. To promote the use of the ANSN among the participating countries, several promotional meetings — known as ‘caravans’ — have been held during the past two years in various countries to introduce the ANSN and also to demonstrate the practical utilization of the network. These meetings were very much welcomed and some countries decided to organise additional caravan meetings to further promote the use of the ANSN at national level. The ANSN was also presented at major international conferences including the 15th Pacific Basin Nuclear Conference in October 2006 in Sydney and the International Conference on Knowledge Management in Nuclear Facilities in June 2007 in Vienna and has been displayed at the IAEA General Conferences.

Towards the Future

Since its inception in 2002, the ANSN has matured to become a regional mechanism for sharing nuclear safety knowledge amongst countries in the Asian region. To date, it has focused primarily on technical issues associated with nuclear safety. However, in recognition of the rising interest in nuclear power in the region, it would be timely to use the ANSN as a forum for discussion of broader strategy issues that are essential for a nuclear safety infrastructure. This would help to facilitate a common understanding of current and emerging nuclear safety issues and the formulation of strategies to address them. The IAEA is also exploring ways to encourage greater utilization of the ANSN in support of capacity building, emergency preparedness and response, to bring better synergy with other regional organizations, and to promote participation of Member States in international safety conventions and codes of conduct. In this framework the IAEA has initiated contacts with the Nuclear Energy Safety Sub-Sector Network that is being established by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries.