October 1999 Highlight

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Highlight

Third Conference on Chornobyl Draws International Participation

On October 13 through 16, the third annual scientific conference of the International Chornobyl Center (ICC) was held in Slavutych, Ukraine. Some 230 people from eight countries attended the conference. Among these were scientists and directors of scientific centers, ministries, and offices of Ukraine, Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, Germany, France, and the Czech Republic.

The Slavutych division of the ICC organized the conference. Support came from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Ministry of Trade and Industry of the United Kingdom, Energoatom (Ukraine's national nuclear utility), and Chornobyl nuclear power plant (NPP).

Key topics discussed in 17 plenary and 60 topical presentations included safety enhancement in the nuclear industry; nuclear power plant decommissioning; transformation of the Chornobyl Unit 4 Shelter into an ecologically safe system; ecology research in the Chornobyl exclusion zone; medical consequences of the Chornobyl accident; and social and economic development of the Slavutych region. Conference attendees learned of the establishment in the last year of the International Radioecology Laboratory in Slavutych, which aims to further radioecological research in the exclusion zone.

Overall, the conference provided an opportunity to bring international attention to the challenges that remain at Chornobyl NPP and to focus cooperative efforts on resolving key problems. The success of the conference emphasizes the importance of the ICC's Slavutych division as a logical focus for organizing international cooperation to resolve the technical and social challenges that are a legacy of the 1986 accident at Chornobyl Unit 4.