NEW SECURITY DOCTRINE | SAFETY & SECURITY
barrier to the development, deployment, and scaling of nuclear technologies. The paper says that to begin, it is necessary to possess
complete digital models of most nuclear power plants worldwide, including physics, technology, infrastructure, and all relevant characteristics. This will allow supranational bodies to answer critical questions and solve highly specialised technical tasks. Expanding the profile of probable threats also requires
new concepts and doctrines for safety analysis during design, operation, emergency/crisis response, and physical
protection of nuclear plants. This includes: ● Modifying the concept of physical protection, shifting emphasis from guarding to defending nuclear plants; updating design basis threats and developing requirements for beyond design threats.
● Developing new safety analyses that account for military, terrorist, and sabotage threats, including deterministic and probabilistic safety assessments for specific crisis conditions is required.
● Developing new emergency response regulations for crisis conditions and interaction with national and regional military forces.
● Creating more flexible analytical tools and action protocols for protecting nuclear facilities during military operations and terrorist threats.
● Incorporating physical protection components into the design of new nuclear facilities, including military grade protection, defence, and de occupation capabilities for both existing and future sites.
● Developing international requirements and mechanisms for collective defence of nuclear facilities worldwide.
Transforming nuclear security Current nuclear power plant safety regulations do not account for military scenarios or new terrorist and sabotage threats whose scale exceeds traditional design basis threats. This requires the development of new requirements for beyond design threats. Standards must also be expanded to include cybersecurity requirements for the most vulnerable elements of nuclear infrastructure, notably control and telemetry channels, remote access redundancy, and protection of critical data transmission systems. What is needed is a new security architecture, one that shifts the focus toward seven layers of crisis
condition governance: ● Operational and emergency resilience of NPPs. ● Electrical resilience and interaction with the power grid. ● Long term autonomy (house load operation and the NPP centered energy ecosystem).
● Black/Cold Start without diesel generators during complete loss of external power.
● Physical protection and defence, and a new concept of design and beyond design threats.
● Modified requirements for crisis emergency centres, and interaction with AI based centres for informational support, forecasting, emergency response, cybersecurity of data transmission, secure communication, and connectivity
● Crisis safety analysis for military and other global threats – technological and natural – and the creation of tools to prevent and mitigate their consequences.
● The roadmap to develop such a safety architecture includes the following steps:
● Audit of nuclear power plant and grid vulnerabilities, including design and beyond design threats, and development of emergency response strategies for new threat types.
● Integration of military and specialised units into the plant’s emergency response and defence system.
● Implementation of new power manoeuvring protocols, combined with modifications to electrical systems of the grid and critical plant equipment sensitive to external disturbances.
● Creation of local microgrids and energy ecosystems around nuclear plants, integrating multiple facilities and ensuring their emergency interaction.
● Creation of digital twins of nuclear sites and physical models of reactor units, along with simulators for modelling, training, and forecasting. Improvement of personnel training and development of new modules for integrated plant protection and emergency response.
● Reassessment of the role, communication security, and capabilities of crisis centres, as well as specialised national and supranational military units responsible for plant defence and liberation.
● Creation of regional (international) mechanisms for the collective defence of nuclear facilities, coordination of critical infrastructure management, and cooperation among nuclear operators, regulators, military forces, and security services.
● The new architecture of nuclear security is a response to a global transformation in which nuclear facilities become targets and energy systems become battlefields.
Ukraine’s experience has proven that even under the most
extreme conditions, nuclear power plants can remain sources of stability if their operational model, response protocols, and infrastructure are built on principles of autonomy, flexibility, and technological independence. These principles must form the foundation of a new international security system capable of functioning under conditions of war, terrorism, cyberattacks, and systemic crises. The global community faces a choice: remain within
outdated standards that have already demonstrated their inadequacy, or transition to a new paradigm in which nuclear energy becomes not a vulnerable asset, but a pillar of national and regional resilience. The paper argues that Ukraine has already taken this step and it is time to transform this experience into a global standard. As Balakan concludes, the doctrine for transforming the
existing nuclear security architecture is not a concept, it is a necessity and its formation must begin now. ■
www.neimagazine.com | June 2026 | 25
A rethink of emergency response systems and operational resilience is needed to develop a set of measures that can be adapted and scaled to nuclear plants operating or being designed worldwide. Source: IRNA
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