Education on Nuclear Safeguards for European Nuclear Engineering Students

The knowledge retention problem in the nuclear field was acknowledged by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 2000. ESARDA, the European Safeguards Research and Development Association (http://www.jrc.cec.eu.int/esarda/), reacted to that with a strategy to tackle the problem and created a Working Group on Training and Knowledge Management (ESARDA WG TKM). The final objective of the ESARDA WG TKM is the setup of course modules to an internationally recognized reference standard. This project is in line with the movement of establishing a European curriculum for nuclear engineering. Teaching in the nuclear safeguards field is indeed strongly influenced by national history so the objective of the course is to provide homogeneous material in nuclear safeguards and nonproliferation matters at the European level. The harmonization of a European curriculum is driven by factors of economy and safety. In the nuclear safeguards field in Europe, the harmonization force is the Euratom Treaty that any nuclear facility should observe. This paper reports on the feedback of the course that was held by some of the leading experts in the field of nuclear safeguards in Europe. Its content deals with the general background of safeguards legislation and treaties, the nuclear fuel cycle, various safeguards techniques, verification technologies and the evolution of safeguards. The audience -- forty university students and five young professionals (STUK and JRC) – from twelve different European countries was highly interested and provided positive feedback. The course has been introduced in the course database of the European Nuclear Education Network on the Web site http://www.neptuno-cs.de. Further, a recognition as academic course of three credits under the European Credit Transfer System has been requested to the Belgian Nuclear higher Education Network. In the future, this course will be repeated on a regular basis and evaluated, aiming to achieve recognition by the European Nuclear Education Network (ENEN). With an ENEN label it will be included in the list of optional courses for a European master’s degree in nuclear engineering.