DIZDAREVIĆ: SAYING THERE IS NO DANGER FROM NUCLEAR WASTE STORAGE IS PREMATURE

SARAJEVO, DECEMBER 13 /SRNA/ – Emir Dizdarević, Chairman of the BiH Expert Team for Trgovska Gora, told SRNA that it is premature to claim there is no risk from storing nuclear waste at the Čerkezovac site in Croatia, right on the border with BiH.

Dizdarević emphasized that such conclusions can only be made after Croatia submits detailed results of its research to the Expert Team, prepared by qualified experts, and after those results are compared with the data available to BiH. “We have our own results; we are waiting for the environmental impact assessment that Croatia is required to prepare,” Dizdarević said, explaining that from a technical standpoint Croatia must publish an environmental impact study. He recalled that in 2022 Zagreb meeting, the Expert Team received a general promise that results of measurements for all activities being carried out in Croatia at that time would be submitted, which included geological and geophysical drilling, seismological measurements, and other parameters. “These are preliminary results that are prepared for a study, i.e. results intended for safety analyses, which we have not received,” Dizdarević stressed. He added that at a meeting in May last year, the Fund for Financing of Decommissioning and Radioactive Waste Management and Spent Nuclear Fuel of the Krško Nuclear Power Plant appeared, acting as the operator rather than the regulator. According to him, it is the regulator that should regulate radioactivity in a given area - someone acting on behalf of the state and ultimately issuing the operating license. Dizdarević said that once the documentation from Croatia is delivered, the Expert Team will proceed in accordance with international standards. “This concerns a nuclear facility, so it is precisely defined what must be included in a comprehensive study and documentation, which is complex and consists, as they say, of ‘several thick volumes,’” Dizdarević said.