A Framework for International Regulatory Efficiency to Accelerate Nuclear Deployment

Published September 2023

The success of the required ramp-up in clean and secure nuclear energy relies on the large-scale deployment of a fleet of standardized designs that are acceptable in multiple countries around the world. Such deployment relies on efficient project reviews, approvals, and licensing to achieve economies of scale across the supply chain and into operation, ultimately increasing the certainty in project reliability, deployment costs and schedules, while maintaining safety.

This report outlines a new step-wise phased approach that could drive efficient international regulatory design review activities, facilitating the ability of one regulator to leverage all, or part, of the outcomes from reviews undertaken by other regulators to support their own regulatory process. For this to be successful it will require:

Increased support from governments to enable groups of regulators to collaboratively review specific designs
Stakeholders to engage with the stepwise phased approach
Increased coordination between stakeholders of existing harmonization activities

This report has been produced by the Cooperation in Reactor Design Evaluation and Licensing (CORDEL) Working Group of World Nuclear Association in cooperation with Canadian Nuclear Association (CNA) and Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI).