Lord West of Spithead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord West of Spithead on 2015-11-30.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether there are any treaty obligations that the development of a solution for the disposition of plutonium will have to meet, and if so, what are those obligations.

Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth

Any solution for the disposition of plutonium will need to be fully compliant with the UK’s obligations under such treaties as the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and the Euratom Treaty (including any Euratom directives issued thereunder, for example the COUNCIL DIRECTIVE 2013/59/EURATOM of 5 December 2013, which requires safety standards for the protection of the health of workers and the general public against the dangers arising from ionizing radiation). The particular treaty obligations that may be triggered will depend on the nature of the chosen disposition solution.