Federal Authority For Nuclear Regulation (fanr) Experiences With Hybrid Export/import Inspection Techniques During The Covid-19 Pandemic

Inspectors of FANR’s Safeguards Department/Export and Import Section conduct quarterly inspections on the Barakah Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) site in order to verify the correctness and completeness of the Licensees’ quarterly reports and the Licensees’ compliance with the respective FANR regulation and licence conditions. Such reports record all nuclear material, equipment, software and technology listed in Part 1 and Part 2 of the Nuclear Suppliers Group Guidelines imported or (re-)exported during a calendar quarter. FANR export/import inspections also ensure the correctness of the UAE’s quarterly declarations subsequently submitted to the IAEA pursuant to Article 2.a.(ix) of the Additional Protocol. Considering the necessity to exercise precautionary measures to minimize the spread of the virus during the COVID-19 pandemic, FANR export/import inspectors conducted inspections on the Barakah NPP site utilizing both remote and physical inspection techniques. The combination of both techniques, known as a ‘hybrid’ technique, employed both on-line meeting software and the support of a FANR resident inspector on site. This paper describes the challenges for FANR export/import inspections due to the pandemic, the options available, the solutions chosen, the experiences gained and the lessons learned from conducting inspections using non-traditional techniques.