Radioactive Waste Disposal at Sea: Public Ideas ... - IMO

Changing the Global Ocean Dumping Regime 149
The 1993 Radwaste Disposal Ban: Emphasis on Precautions
In the late 1980s, Greenpeace, Scandinavian and certain Northern
European countries, and a few marine scientists successfully advocated the
precautionary principle at the scientific working group meetings of the
global ocean dumping regime. 70 They succeeded in changing the underlying
principles and norms of the regime as well as the scientific basis of regulation,
with significant consequences for the radwaste disposal issue.
According to the precautionary principle, unanimously adopted by the
1991 annual London Convention meeting, “preventive measures are taken
when there is reason to believe that substances or energy introduced in the
marine environment are likely to cause harm even when there is no conclusive
evidence to prove a causal relation between inputs and their effects”
(LDC 1991, Annex 2). Equally significant, the concept of the assimilative
capacity was rejected as the scientific principle underlying ocean dumping
regulation, and countries agreed that “existing pollution control
approaches . . . have been strengthened by shifting the emphasis from a system
of controlled dumping based on assumptions of the assimilative capacity
of the oceans, to approaches based on precaution and prevention”
(ibid.). By this decision, governments shifted the emphasis from “dispose
and dilute” approaches to “isolate and contain”approaches. Countries had
earlier often been deadlocked because some, especially Britain, traditionally
preferred regulation based on the assimilative capacity of the oceans,
while others followed a more cautious approach. 71 Also the scientific debate
on the radwaste disposal issue to a significant degree revolved around the
concept of the assimilative capacity. 72
In July of 1993, IGPRAD finalized its work. The final report listed seven
policy options, but IGPRAD did not recommend any in particular as this
would have been outside the terms of reference for its work. However, the
report noted “the growing awareness within the national and international
communities that new and more effective measures are needed to protect
the global marine environment” (LC/IGPRAD 1993, Annex 2, p. 50). At
the legal level, during the past 20 years “a trend towards, first, restricting
and controlling, second, prohibiting sea disposal of radioactive wastes on
a regional basis” was acknowledged in the report (ibid.). In regard to the
scientific and technical issues, it was noted that ocean disposal, in comparison
with other disposal alternatives for radioactive waste, could result in