CHAPTER 1 OBJECTIVES, SCOPE AND DEFINITIONS

to establish a Community framework in order to maintain and promote the continuous improvement of nuclear safety and its regulation;

to ensure that Member States shall provide for appropriate national arrangements for a high level of nuclear safety to protect workers and the general public against the dangers arising from ionizing radiations from nuclear installations.

‘nuclear installation’ means:

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‘nuclear safety’ means the achievement of proper operating conditions, prevention of accidents and mitigation of accident consequences, resulting in protection of workers and the general public from dangers arising from ionizing radiations from nuclear installations;

‘competent regulatory authority’ means an authority or a system of authorities designated in a Member State in the field of regulation of nuclear safety of nuclear installations as referred to in Article 5;

‘licence’ means any legal document granted under the jurisdiction of a Member State to confer responsibility for the siting, design, construction, commissioning and operation or decommissioning of a nuclear installation;

‘licence holder’ means a legal or natural person having overall responsibility for a nuclear installation as specified in a licence;

‘accident’ means any unintended event, the consequences or potential consequences of which are significant from the point of view of radiation protection or nuclear safety;

‘incident’ means any unintended event, the consequences or potential consequences of which are not negligible from the point of view of radiation protection or nuclear safety;

‘abnormal operations’ means an operational process deviating from normal operation which is expected to occur at least once during the operating lifetime of a facility but which, in view of appropriate design provisions, does not cause any significant damage to items important to safety or lead to accident conditions;

‘design basis’ means the range of conditions and events taken explicitly into account in the design, including upgrades, of a nuclear installation, according to established criteria, so that the installation can withstand them without exceeding authorised limits by the planned operation of safety systems;

‘design basis accident’ means accident conditions against which a nuclear installation is designed according to established design criteria, and for which the damage to the fuel, where applicable, and the release of radioactive material are kept within authorised limits;

‘severe conditions’ means conditions that are more severe than conditions related to design basis accidents; such conditions may be caused by multiple failures, such as the complete loss of all trains of a safety system, or by an extremely unlikely event.