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| Issue date: | 03/14/2023 |
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1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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35TH REGULATORY INFORMATION CONFERENCE (RIC)
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SPECIAL PLENARY
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TUESDAY, MARCH 14, 2023
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The Plenary Session convened at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel and Conference Center, located at 5701 Marinelli Road, North Bethesda, Maryland and via Video Teleconference, at 9:00 a.m.
EDT, The Honorable Christopher T. Hanson, Chairman, NRC, presiding.
PRESENT:
RAFAEL MARIANO GROSSI, Director General, IAEA CHRISTOPHER T. HANSON, Chairman, NRC NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
2 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S (9:00 a.m.)
CHAIRMAN HANSON: It is a tremendous honor for me to welcome, as our RIC keynote speaker, Mr.
Rafael Mariano Grossi. Mr. Grossi has led the International Atomic Energy Agency as Director-General since December of 2019. And just a few days ago, in recognition of his leadership in conducting the agency with a visionary and courageous approach in challenging times during his first term, the IAEA Board of Governors unanimously reappointed him for a second four-year term. Congratulations.
Mr. Grossi is a diplomat with over 35 years of experiences in the fields of nonproliferation and disarmament, having also served as Ambassador of Argentina to Austria, and the Argentine representative to the IAEA, and other Vienna-based international organizations.
Since the first days of the war in Ukraine, Mr. Grossi has worked tirelessly to focus IAEA's efforts to support Ukraine with ensuring nuclear safety and security of its nuclear facilities and radioactive materials. And he has provided regular updates on these efforts to the international community.
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3 He is a strong advocate for assisting IAEA member states to be prepared for new and advanced reactors. He consistently highlights peaceful uses of nuclear technology to meet the United Nations sustainable development goals.
For example, his Rays of Hope Initiative strives to bring critical cancer treatments to underserved areas. Mr. Grossi is an international gender champion, and supports development of the next generation of youth in nuclear fields. Please join me in welcoming IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi.
MR. GROSSI: Thank you very much Chris, and good morning to all. It's great to be here. This conference is of course, one of the reference points for the international regulatory community. So I felt it was, especially this year, important that I would be here with you, listening to you. And thanks Chris for this comprehensive overview of what you are doing, the way in which you are leading the NRC.
I heard and I listened with enormous interest. And I commend you for that. And I also have to say as he mentioned in passing, just a few days ago, the IAEA Conference on Effective Regulatory took place in the UAE.
And you were presiding there at that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
4 conference, honoring us with your leadership there, and the way that we do things in the IAEA, as a real community. With us, and us the institution, and you our member states playing a partner role, and together with us in this effort. So thank you, thank you very much and congratulations on that leadership.
The American Regulatory community must be very proud of you, of the help. And I think these are obvious, these are incredibly challenging times. So I want to focus in my thoughts, my remarks today on a few things so you have an idea of how I'm seeing them.
How we, from the IAEA are looking at them from a global perspective as an institution that has 176 member states.
So we're meeting at a time of great promise for the nuclear sector. Across all continents, policy makers, and the public are turning to nuclear energy to mitigate climate change, ensure energy security, and deliver a just reliable, affordable, and timely decision to a world of net zero carbon emissions.
If ever there was a time to show up and step up as international organizations, regulators, policy makers and industry, the time, for me, is now.
As I said, I will talk about two ways the IAEA is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
5 doing just that.
First, of course, it will not come as a surprise that I will give you an update about our work in Ukraine. Our Ukrainian friends are here. You'll recognize them, we're working with them, for them, supporting them, every step of the way. For the first time, war is threatening the sites of a major nuclear power program.
Second, I will talk about the IAEA's efforts towards this future that the title of your conference is referring to. And here I will focus on something some of you are already working on, and we will hear more about that in the course of the final sessions, I should propose.
And I'm talking about our Nuclear Harmonization and Standardization Initiative, NHSI, which is more than an initiative. It's a way to respond to the moment, to this particular time, and to the opportunities that are opening in front of us.
Over the past year, I have led six missions to Ukraine. We have crossed front lines, and checkpoints, and see first-hand the physical damage the war has caused at nuclear sites, and the enormous need challenging circumstances under which Ukrainian operators and regulators work.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
6 Very early in the war, we realized that the expert safety and security language every one of us here is so deeply familiar with, was not good enough to describe exactly what was at stake. The politicians and public now keenly aware of the dangers in Ukraine.
War made it necessary to speak with laser precision about what really mattered. It was crucial to lay a foundation from which we could build clarity and trust, enlist support, and enact changes to reduce the threat of nuclear accident. This how the seven pillars of nuclear safety and security came to be.
Physical integrity of the facilities, reactors, fuel ponds, radioactive waste storage must be maintained. Safety and security systems and equipment must be fully functional at all times.
Operating staff must be able to fulfil their safety and security duties and have the capacity to make decisions free of undue pressure.
Secure off-site power supply must be available from the grid for all nuclear sites.
Logistical supply chains and transportation to and from the sites must function uninterrupted. Effective on-site and off-site radiation monitoring systems and emergency preparedness and response measures must be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
7 present. Reliable communications with the regulator and others must be maintained. Seven fundamental safety pillars.
Every one of these concepts exist in our safety standards, so we haven't invented anything new.
But all our communications regarding Ukraine, and indeed our own analysis, have been based on these pillars. After a year, even at this very fractured time, they have been accepted. And not a single word has to be changed.
I think when we look back, hopefully sooner, rather than later, we will find this an important lesson of what an international, credible, and trusted community like the IAEA writ large with member states can do at a time of crisis. When clarity and speed are of the essence.
The pillars themselves, may have been accepted, but they have been neglected. Over the past year, every one of these seven pillars, of nuclear safety and security have been compromised. We have observed holes blown into buildings, and into pipelines, at nuclear power plants. Daily off-site supply outages caused by shelling. And Ukrainian operators working under an unimaginable stress.
At one point, 23rd and 24th of November, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
8 Thanksgiving here in the United States. Every single one of Ukraine nuclear power plants lost off-site power, all at once. Can you imagine? Can you imagine being an operator, or regulator in such circumstances?
Nothing is business as usual.
At the IAEA, our Incident and Emergency Center has been operating continuously. Our safeguards teams, have created clarity and defused tensions by offering science and certainty, amid the rhetoric of war. And the IAEA has international teams of safety and security experts stationed at every Ukrainian nuclear power plant at the personal request of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to me.
They are there to assist, to observe, and to report, with the overall aim being to reduce the chance of an accident. Today, as it has been for the past months, the most serious situation is that separation, as Chris was reminding us. A plant on the front lines of war. Our teams report increased military operations that put the plant at risk. And the IAEA has been calling for the urgent implementation of a nuclear safety and security protection at the site.
This is a conclusion we drew in September, and I will not stop my diplomatic efforts and my NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
9 public appeals until it happens. Such a zone is in everyone's interest. But getting anything agreed, when the two principles parties are at war with each other, is not a straight forward endeavor.
Nothing worthwhile is easy. As a diplomat and a Director-General of the IAEA, it is my job not to shy away from hard things. It is my job to build platforms on which people can solve problems and grasp opportunities that really matter.
That brings me to a look at the future.
The IAEA's Nuclear Harmonization and Standardization Initiative, and what it matters, and why it matters.
It's participants, thank God, may not be meeting in a war time bunker, but ladies and gentleman, the stakes are high. Every year wild fires are laying waste to communities across the world, from California to Australia. Floods are devastating lives from Pakistan to Germany. The world need nuclear energy and it knows it.
Policy makers from South Korea to Brazil, and from France to here in the United States, are looking again, at nuclear. And in many countries public opinion polls are swinging in favor. It's quite simple. We will not reach net zero without nuclear, whether you ask the IAEA experts or those of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
10 the International Energy Agency, or those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Investment in nuclear power and in advance and small modular reactors will need to grow, by multiples, if countries around the world are to meet their economic and environmental goals.
And investing is indeed coming.
Governments, including of course, here in the United States, are laying the ground work. Private investment is growing. So the momentum seems to be here. The need is here. But will the nuclear be able to live up to its promise?
A big part of the answer is here, in this room. The industry has done it once before. Spurred by the oil shocks of the 1970s, which brought us many of the nuclear power plants we rely on today. But this time, it's different. The nuclear sector is not only growing, it's also changing. It's becoming much more global. An industry whose robust and effective regulatory requirements were developed when nuclear was largely a national endeavor, are going to need to adapt.
Even though we have international agreements, like the IAEA Safety Standards and Security Guidelines, the way they are interpreted and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
11 applied can vary across the world. Bring into this reality, the small modular reactors that can be built in a factory a thousand miles from where they will operate. And the benefit of harmonizing regulatory environments, and standardizing industrial approaches becomes clearer.
Harmonization of the regulatory processes reduces uncertainty and helps to lower the cost of building and deploying as much. Harmonization of requirements facilitates international trade of SMRs and components, as developers design and manufacture reactors that comply with a more uniform set of global standards. Rather than having to deal with multiple, sometimes even, conflicting, sets of requirements in different countries.
Harmonization ensures SMRs across the world meet the highest safety and security standards.
Reducing the risk of accidents and the consequences of malicious acts, whether those reactors are deployed in the Netherlands, or in Nigeria. This is particularly important given that they may be deployed in remote and vulnerable areas.
Harmonized regulations sell new countries.
And those countries with less experience than the United States, fewer resources and a smaller pool of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
12 the necessary talent. It allows them more easily to collaborate with others and implement the higher standards of safety and security.
Harmonized regulations and requirements could also help streamline research and development efforts across different countries. Promoting collaboration and knowledge sharing, and avoiding unnecessary duplication of efforts.
In this hyperconnected world, consistent and sensible regulations developed with a consistent and honest engagement of all stakeholders, could help foster also a body of trust and acceptance of new nuclear, including SMRs for their deployment. And when it comes to the design of SMRs, working toward global standardization of approaches, by developing generic user requirements, for example, could increase trade and create economies of scale, for manufacturing, construction, and operation.
By homing on the successful designs, operators and regulators become more familiar with ecology, leading to a greater understanding of potential risks and vulnerabilities. Several harmonization and standardization initiatives already exist. And this has been mentioned to me several times.
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13 The regulatory agencies of the United States -- Canada, you were mentioning that, and Rumina is somewhere over there -- and the UK are working together as are some other European countries.
Industry groups, like the World Nuclear Association, and international organizations, like the Nuclear Energy Agency, they also have had working groups and extraordinary useful efforts looking at these issues.
These are necessary. These are all very welcome, and we need them with us. But we need this at a global scale. Here is why NHSI is different, and why it is going to work at pace, and with impact. It is the first truly global, global, effort with wide international backing, plus, imitated by the IAEA.
NHSI brings together key stakeholders including regulators, and industry together. We have to talk to each other. Not to preach to each other.
And it is happening at the right time, when the need and the momentum are here.
Ladies and gentlemen, safety is at the heart of what the IAEA does, whether it's building a safety culture across the globe, making sure the lessons of Chernobyl and Fukushima are learned and implemented, while applying its milestones approach to assist newcomer countries in developing the regulatory NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
14 and safety infrastructure needed for a safe and secure nuclear power program.
But NHSI is not our initiative, it is yours. The goals of NHSI are not my goals. They are the goals of the regulators and industry representative work in their separate tracks. Each track is asking, what do we need to do? What do we need the others to do? They are each defining their scope of work, and identifying outputs.
The regulatory track is focused on reducing barriers to information sharing, increasing collaboration between regulators who are reviewing our reactor design, and determining how regulators can best leverage other reviews. How far we can go in this regard, it's for us to agree and decide.
The industry track is working towards developing more standardized industrial approaches.
For SMR manufacturing, construction, and operations that can reduce license and timelines, costs, and ultimately the time to actually deploy SMRs.
Both tracks are running in parallel, and the IAEA is facilitating coordination and communication between them. Keeping everyone working together. The works producing specific, useable results by the end of next year.
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15 Ladies and gentlemen, the IAEA, I like to say never stops. Not even for a single minute. We are determined to assist our member states when it comes to the use of nuclear technology in a safe manner. For many of them, SMRs and other new nuclear designs have enormous potential to make a real difference in reducing energy poverty, fueling their economy, giving them the capacity. And how important these days to have autonomous positions to face the energy, security crisis in the best possible way.
For many countries and communities across the world, power outages are a stark, constant, sad, reality. Although the number of people without access to electricity has halved in the past 20 years, 717 million people live without it.
When I traveled to Africa, to Asia, to Latin America, the Caribbean, achieving this fundamental necessity is the top national priority for many leaders I meet. And they ask about nuclear.
They ask what nuclear, or if nuclear can be there for them? It is possible, but some of the questions I have just laid out, are important. And we need to solve them.
Ladies and gentlemen, I will not sugar coat it, you were saying, rose colored glasses. We NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
16 don't need those. We don't want those. This is going to be hard. It is going to be hard to set aside what we believe are our entitled rights and principles. It is going to be hard to continue working at war time.
It is going to be hard to do all these things, bearing in mind, that as the basis of this, a thriving, private sector has to also be bringing the economic gains that we all need in the free world.
But all of this requires you, requires us. Because we are the place where this trust, where our societies can give us this indispensable trust.
I like the title, Chris, of your conference. Because it talks about the process of navigation. Your remarks were wisely sparkled with wise thoughts of Einstein and others. I also remember one from classic times, where the Romans used to say, that there are no good winds for those who do not know where they want to go. We know, where we want to go.
It's up to us. Let's do it. Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Thank you for those remarks.
MR. GROSSI: Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: We really, you know, really appreciate that enormously. Let's start with NHSI --
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17 MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: -- for a minute.
And I appreciate very much the distinction that you made. I think, I want to make sure I have this right. The way in which NHSI can kind of lift all boats. Yes, right. But also recognizing that there are potentially separate -- we can go a lot of places with the naval analogies here, right.
We're all in the same boat with regard to climate change. But with regard to our individual regulatory schemes too. The word that gets thrown around a lot if kind of sovereignty and the need to maintain that.
MR. GROSSI: Yes, yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: And so on, and so forth, right. And yet also there are opportunities, and I want to recognize that our friend Ramzi Jammal from Canada, often says a neutron is a neutron is a neutron. Right.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: There are certain basic principles of engineering and physics that apply across the world. So talk about how, maybe you can talk for a minute about kind of how more developed countries, that potentially are interacting with NHSI NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
18 and the potential then for others who are either coming up, or considering nuclear, or exploring that as a possibility to improve their societies.
MR. GROSSI: Yes, indeed. I think this is an issue of what we could define as flexible geometries, within an overarching constant. It is clear that you have different degrees of maturity, institutional maturity, and regulatory experience.
And it is obvious as well, that you may have, like you were describing, and I've seen this also in some existing European partnerships, which are developing friends with other Eastern European countries. All of that, all of that is possible and is compatible, and it helps a global initiative like NHSI.
What we feel here, is that what we need to do is to bring all these efforts together in a compatible way. It doesn't mean that you're going to be blurring national competencies, where they cannot be blurred. It doesn't mean any of that.
What it means is that we are going to be growing levels of convergence, up to the highest point possible. And we are going to be coexisting as well with other initiatives. To put it in simple English, those who can run faster, can do it. And it is not a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
19 problem having systems that are in a different level of competent abilities.
If you look at the safety standards, and I think in the nuclear regulatory experience, you have that. And we've created a working system where you have standards which are accommodating in nature.
That allow us to work as all in a, I would say, coherent way.
I mean it's obvious that you, the United States or other countries may have other standards.
Sometimes, more stringent, sometimes different, which coexist. What we should set aside is this idea that it is all or nothing at all. Since you cannot have a NHSI that is observed by all to the letter, then we can't have anything.
That is fundamentally wrong. And I think it doesn't add justice to the fine and noble nuclear regulatory tradition of having this flexible geometries, which I think has been one of the most remarkable features of nuclear regulation over the years.
So the challenge here is to move, to advance, to have ambition. And to push a little bit.
Why not? The limits of what we can accept and when leveraging other countries, regulatory, it strains us.
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20 And I'm sure that here, because the United States and Canada, there are partnerships that are so close, that can allow for that to happen. In Europe, it may also be the case. And the effect, the example set by you, will be tremendously positive for developing countries and for exceeding countries.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Thank you. So it makes sense that a lot of the conversation this morning, given the word, The Regulatory Information Conference is on regulators. But the other half of the equation is on the industry and on, and how this --
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: -- idea kind of came out of, I think for you, out of the Group of Vienna.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: So talk for a minute about the importance of that --
(Simultaneous speaking.)
MR. GROSSI: Well, that is exactly. This is what I meant when I said, well we should not preach to each other. We should not be looking at what the others need to do. We should have a very clear view on what we need to do.
And in reality, I was inspired to go to NHSI, and to try to move this forward, ironically, out NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
21 of conversations with industry and with CEOs that were complaining. They were complaining, maybe about you guys, I don't know.
(Laughter.)
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Probably.
MR. GROSSI: It's possible. I don't know.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Just another day at the N --
(Simultaneous speaking.)
MR. GROSSI: I don't know why I say this.
but just crossed my mind. But now we started the process. We have the working groups, and some of the homework for them is also emerging, quite clearly.
What are the areas where they need to be a bit more bold, a bit more open? And of course, here we have to understand that they have a different culture, which is nurtured by the principle of earning money, and competition, healthy competition of course.
So I think we are seeing, we are recognizing what their efforts should be. And the good thing is that, in the logic of NHSI, we have this interface. So that nothing is excluded, and we can have this cross fertilization, if you want, which is another way to say that we can spy on each other.
It's no problem, it's authorized.
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22 And we can work together and see what the regulator debate is doing and how they see. Seeing from the perspective of an industrialist or a CEO.
What they are saying. What they are complaining about. What the limitations are. And the industrial family, so to speak, as well, to see how is the regulatory family working towards this?
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Yes, good. Yes, thank you. So one of the things I wanted to ask you about this morning was, you know, obviously, your efforts in Ukraine have received a lot of well-deserved attention.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: And of course, NHSI is something, that as regulators, we're out there talking about. But there are also these other big, key pieces of the work of the agency.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Particularly, around nonproliferation.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: And around the safety and security of material sources, and working with non-weapon states. So can you just talk a little bit about, you know, the efforts that the IAEA is making NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
23 on these things. And maybe how they touch these other parts? You mentioned your safeguards inspectors in Ukraine. New reactor designs will have a security and safeguard implications, potentially, et cetera.
MR. GROSSI: Well, I think it's a time of great transformation, I believe. When people talk about renaissance, it's not renaissance. I think we are not into that. We are into an industry that is there, that is growing, that is adapting to a new set of circumstances all over the world.
And this brings also the need to adapt and to adjust. To adapt and to adjust to an industry that is going to be presenting new products that will require a different approach, also from the safeguards perspective, and from the regulatory, as we were saying as well, because NRC is just one.
Of course, we are zeroing in on something which is very visible, and where money is flowing. So projects are coming to maturity. But there are a number of those. And we need to make sure because of the globality of the effort, and my responsibility, we're going to make sure that we lift countries to the level that is required.
There are many, many important, very important projects, ongoing in countries that are not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
24 there yet, in terms of their institutional maturity, and work force. And here, I recognize also your bilateral efforts with some countries that you are assisting. From the IAEA side, I can tell you that the demand is huge, the demand is simply huge.
Countries need it, they need it now. They want it now. And the answer can never be, we don't have time.
We can never be that, please.
So this why I ask countries, and especially the nuclear countries in this world, the 32 plus, the 50 plus that are at the core of this, to support us. Because if we tell those looking at nuclear that we don't time for them, that we don't have the resources to assist them, come later, come next month, the opportunity will be lost.
And it would be lost, I think, for a very long time. So this is why we are devoting so much, so many resources into training, into capacity building, into peer reviewing, into all this missions that are dispersed all over the world. But of course, we are challenged and we, in a good way, I would say, by Ukraine, and what happens there. And we are devoting of course, lots of resources and time and energy, as should be, to this.
But it is obvious, that an agency that has NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
25 such a small budget, has enormous difficulties. And this is why countries like the United States are trying to support us through extra budgetary contributions. So that we can do what we need to do.
But when you look at the mission we have, the responsibility we have, when you look at our work force, and the means that we have to do it, I think there's a big discrepancy. Of course, we need to be realistic and not dream about things that are impossible to achieve in terms of a growing capacity for the agency.
But simply to say, that all the support we get, is indispensable. And we are motivated and ready to take up the task.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Thank you. I think the prospect of expanded nuclear energy is really important. But I think you and I both share a passion for supporting developing countries to use peaceful uses.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Of radioactive materials.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: You've had the Rays of Hope initiative.
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26 MR. GROSSI: Rays of Hope.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: The NUTEC Plastics initiative. It was a great -- I really enjoyed the conference in Abu Dhabi with Steve Burns, hopefully highlighting some of that. Again, the capacity building --
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: You know, the effort to build and support technically competent, independent regulators. But just for our audience here, talk for a minute about all of, you know, these other things that are really --
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: They are supporting sustainable development goals, they are important for human health, and economics, et cetera.
MR. GROSSI: You know, thanks for asking this, because sometimes it's an issue that is, especially in this race of nuclear excellence, like this, are a little bit forgotten. And the reality is that from my 176 member states, the vast majority is in, not for the nonproliferation. Of course, they respect it. They need something, yes. They need help.
And the good thing about us, nuclear, is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
27 that we are about concrete things. One of the things that as head of an international organization, happens to me, is that sometimes to my great frustration, I participate in fora, and in places where there is so much blah blah, so much, when it comes to development goals, when it comes to gender, when it comes to, you know, human health.
We in the nuclear and in the groups as a whole, we are about very concrete things. When we talk about human health, well where is it that we excel? Nuclear medicine, radiotherapy, Rays of Hope.
And we are providing radiotherapy services in many places that did not have a single -- can you imagine -
- a single, simple, cobalt-60 radiotherapy, period, in countries, right?
Seventy-five percent of Africans don't have any access to any, at all. You have a cancer, you die. Very simple. So this is what nuclear brings. People talk about ocean, maritime problems.
Well, we have isotopic hydrology drones. And, you know, next week there is one of these big conferences, the UN, the ocean conferences. And we go there, not with a speech. We go there to set up the global, the global network of water laboratories in the world.
So we are the guys who are looking into NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
28 the problem that you have in your waters, in sedimentary fish. We are giving policy makers the tools to solve the problems. And the same goes to plastics, where we can, through irradiation technologies, we can solve the problems, and so on.
So I believe that one of the things and this has been one of my, I would say, inspiring and more, I would say, pressing forces, driving me in my first term of office, is to use this formidable tool, the IAEA is that, it's a tool, too, it's potential.
And I think there's a lot we can do there.
With 5 million U.S., 5 million U.S. dollars, I can build a radiotherapy center in a country, in a small African country and make the mortality rate drop by 50 percent. How about that? How about that?
And this is possible, this is really possible. And this was not being done, this was not being done. A few months ago, President Biden, had this occasion of the Africa Summit here, in Washington, and committed $55 billion, only on health issues. It's much more when you look at the package.
And I need $5 million to go to the central Africa, and we got zero, point, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero, zero of what the United States is already giving. So I think we must do this. We must NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
29 take this seriously. And we must realize that we are privileged. That we, in nuclear, have this ability to improve the conditions of so many around the world.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Yes, yes. Well and I think from the United States, one of the things that I've appreciated about the way you approach this, is you called it, flexible geometries, earlier. And we're maybe alternate geometries. Where you can go into these countries, and with $5 million, and do a lot of good. And sometimes the United States can too, from various mechanisms, not, you know, not always the NRC. We're focused more on the regulatory capacity building.
But we can work with the countries who have influence in some of these places, right.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: We can support Argentina, Morocco, you know, other places that are leaders in their regions, where they are the ones who are doing the most work, and could use some support from us.
So that it's not always a, you know, the big countries swooping in to do X, Y, or Z. But we can help the multilateral organizations. We can create these formal and informal frameworks that I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
30 think are so important to making progress on these issues.
MR. GROSSI: And I'm so grateful for that.
You know, it's so heartwarming to see how consistently the United States is the number one extra-budgetary contributor. And the Ambassador here, thank you, Ambassador, again, for that. But, you know, what? We need much more.
So keep doing that, but do it more. And there are in the room regulators from industrialized nations, and with a tiny bit, we can do so much. And the nuclear guys, as I was saying, are the guys of the concrete solutions, fast. Each taxpayer's dollar that comes to the IAEA, goes immediately to a lab somewhere. We are not creating positions, or offices, or special representatives.
What we are doing is science, technology for this so, thank you for that.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Thank you. Wow, Rafael, thank you so much.
MR. GROSSI: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: For spending your time with us this morning.
MR. GROSSI: Thank you.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: It's been a very and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1716 14th STREET, N.W., SUITE 200 (202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20009-4309 www.nealrgross.com
31 great pleasure to have you here at the RIC. I wish you all the best for your time here in Washington, and look forward to seeing you soon. Thank you to everyone who submitted questions on the app. I hope we covered a lot of those things.
MR. GROSSI: Yes.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: In terms of the answers about industry, and about the NRC, and other things that we can be doing. It's a great pleasure.
MR. GROSSI: I really enjoyed it. Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: Thank you.
MR. GROSSI: Thank you very much.
CHAIRMAN HANSON: We're going to take a 15-minute break and then we'll hear from Commissioners Baran and Wright. Thanks, everybody.
(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 9:46 a.m.)
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