Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
electronuclear facilities. In June 1954, the Obninsk nuclear plant was the
rst site to
product energy using this new technology.
The collaboration between scientists and technicians to exchange knowledge and
experiences on this new form of energy was enshrined at the
rst United Nations
conference on nuclear technology, which met in Geneva in 1955. Since mid 1950s
rst, in 1956, was that of
Calder Hall at Windscale, England, followed the next year by the Shippingport
nuclear plant in Pennsylvania.
At this stage, in order to better coordinate research programs, adopt uniform
security standards and promote the peaceful use of atomic energy, several important
international organizations were created. In 1955, the General Assembly of the
United Nations unanimously approved a resolution which established the United
Nations Scienti
rst commercial nuclear plants became operational: the
c Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR).
Composed of an international pool of scientists, the Committee was entitled to
collect and evaluate information on the ionizing radiation. In March 1957, the
Treaties of Rome, that also created the European Economic Community (EEC),
established the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM). In 1960, to
ensure to the signatory countries the regular supply of material for the energy power
production, this organization promoted the creation of a special Supply Agency.
Eventually, in 1967, EURATOM was incorporated within the EEC. A few months
after the creation of EURATOM, in July 1957, was also set up the International
Atomic Energy (IAEA). In early 1958, the Council of the Organization for Euro-
pean Economic Co-operation (OEEC), few years later renamed Organization for
Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), also created the European
Nuclear Energy Agency (ENEA), whose initial task was to promote the use of
Atomic Energy for civilian use in the pioneering and experimental phase.
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The security of the exploitation of nuclear energy was obviously one of the core
issues of the major international agencies. This particular attention to possible
catastrophic implications of atomic energy exploitation derived from the character
of the still experimental technologies, and by the high radioactivity of the waste
materials produced from the process of nuclear
ssion, which began to be stored,
depending on their risk and time decay, in special shielded deposits.
Despite the high security procedures already adopted, in this phase some sig-
ni
cant incidents still occurred. Some, like the Castle Bravo test done in the Bikini
atoll (Marshall Islands) in 1954, were the result of the release of radioactive
material occurred as a result of military experiments. Other incidents involved
directly nuclear facilities. Among the most serious can be mentioned the
re and the
release of radioactive material into the surrounding environment that occurred in
1957 in the British nuclear central of Windscale and the steam explosion and
meltdown of the Stationary Low
—
Power Reactor Number One (SL-1) occurred in
1961 in an experimental reactor of the United States Army.
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Sagan (
1993
).
