The Vienna Convention on Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage and Nuclear Installations: Application Problems Revisited
Abstract
Neither the Paris Convention on Nuclear Third Party Liability of 1960, nor the Vienna Convention on Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage of 1963 did specifically include several nuclear technologies into the scope of application. When the conventions were drafted, the question of hazards arising from certain uses of nuclear materials was not yet fully understood.
The lack of explicit provisions concerning these uses in the conventions is due to the fact, that when the conventions were drafted, the development of nuclear energy was in its infancy, and there was little concern about activities at the back end of the fuel cycle (radioactive waste management, storage, final disposal). However, most recently, problems are arising from disposal of radioactive waste, decommissioning of nuclear installations and also from launching of new nuclear technologies (e.g. floating nuclear power plants, nuclear fission etc.) raised again the questions concerning applicability of the liability regime of these conventions on various types of technologies (both civil and military).
This contribution intents to deal with these issues in the light of existing scientific literature and also in the light of the developments in other liability frameworks.