While shows like the Simpsons and games like the Fallout series portray radioactive materials as glowing green slime capable of creating monsters and superpowers,[1] the reality is far less exciting[2]. Yet the destructive power shown isn’t that far from the truth.[3] Standing between regular civilians and this possibility, is one international organization and their national equivalents.
Who Are They and What Do They Do?
The IAEA, or the International Atomic Energy Agency officially formed on October 23, 1956, after the United Nations passed the Statute on the International Atomic Energy Agency at a conference of the same name.[4] In the years since, anything related to nuclear power or weapons has become so carefully monitored that the nuclear power sector is now one of the most heavily regulated in the world.[5] These regulations are typically because of safety concerns, but a safety regulation is only as good as its enforcement.[6] That’s where the IAEA comes in. IAEA employees go wherever radioactive materials, or their remnants are, monitoring water quality, ensuring structural regulation compliance, and if necessary, stepping in to keep a location safe as outside threats encroach.[7] They also draft safety protocols[8] and create monitoring software to implement inside the mostly computerized reactors.[9]
One of their most important tasks is enforcing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty by verifying all 191 signatory states are complying.[10] Specifically, Article III reads “Each Non-nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty undertakes to accept safeguards, as set forth in an agreement to be negotiated and concluded with the International Atomic Energy Agency in accordance with the Statute of the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Agency’s safeguards system, for the exclusive purpose of verification of the fulfilment of its obligations assumed under this Treaty with a view to preventing diversion of nuclear energy from peaceful uses to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. Procedures for the safeguards required by this Article shall be followed with respect to source or special fissionable material whether it is being produced, processed or used in any principal nuclear facility or is outside any such facility. The safeguards required by this Article shall be applied on all source or special fissionable material in all peaceful nuclear activities within the territory of such State, under its jurisdiction, or carried out under its control anywhere.”[11]
India, Israel, Pakistan, and South Sudan are the only nations that have never signed or ratified the treaty.[12] While the treaty’s policies and the subsequent enforcement’s exact effectiveness is hard to know, the Agency continually updates their policies to close loopholes as they find them.[13] In fact, in 2023 the Agency was so busy doing inspections and monitoring activity their Deputy Director Massimo Aparo reported their staff spent more than a collective 14,000 days at facilities or outside locations for monitoring.[14]
What Makes the IAEA Different Than Other Agencies?
The IAEA’s parent organization, the United Nations, works on supervising five primary areas[15] but the organization is often criticized for allowing political pressure and bureaucracy to make it slow to respond and weak.[16] “When people ask whether the UN is relevant today, they usually have in mind the UN Security Council. … Time and again, the Security Council has failed to take any action on Ukraine, Israel, Sudan, and countless other crises because one or more P5 members blocks things.”[17]
Similarly, enforcement of international law is complicated and sometimes difficult to pursue at the state and local levels.[18] Even when there are multiple enforcement mechanisms, their implementation is slow especially in the modern era where declaring war is disfavored.[19] In contrast, the IAEA is run by scientists; referrals to political arms like the Security Council are optional.[20] This allows the agency more flexibility to send its staff into places and situations where a more political group would not be permitted.[21]
One particularly timely example of this is the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant, located near the site of the former Vladimir Ilyich Lenin Nuclear Power Plant or as it is more commonly known, Chernobyl.[22] Today, Zaporizhzhya faces an even bigger problem than residing in the shadow of one of the most famous nuclear meltdowns in human history[23], the ongoing war in Ukraine.[24] Since February 24, 2022, the IAEA has maintained a presence at the plant to support local staff, address safety concerns, and when possible, continue to create power for the people that rely on it.[25] Even when explosions and fighting were practically on the front door, the team stayed on site to observe and assist in safely managing Zaporizhzhya.[26]
What Can This Tell Us?
IAEA is a unique, little-known agency with a big job, applying a statute created over 50 years ago to the forefront of technology. And yet, it is precisely this strange combination that allows the agency to work. Staff must balance being on the cutting edge of science and in the middle of a political warzone[27], sometimes, from inside an actual war zone. Nevertheless, they continue to push forward, serving as a role model for what a modern science focused agency could look like. They might not have any pink sprinkled doughnuts, but the IAEA is absolutely okily dokily.
[1] Radioactive Waste, Simpsons Wiki (accessed Mar. 17, 2025), https://simpsons.fandom.com/wiki/Radioactive_waste; Fallout, NukaPedia (accessed Mar. 17, 2025), https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Fallout.
[2] Nsikan Akpan, Why Radiation Can’t Give You Superpowers, PBS (Aug. 10, 2015), https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/can-radiation-give-superpowers.
[3] See Basic Effects of Nuclear Weapons, AtomArchive.com (https://www.atomicarchive.com/science/effects/basic-effects.html).
[4] IAEA Charter preface ¶ 2 (the note before the actual statute can be found on page 3 of the statute PDF as maintained on the IAEA homepage at https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/statute.pdf).
[5] Safety of Nuclear Power Reactors, World Nuclear (Aug. 23, 2024), https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-security/safety-of-plants/safety-of-nuclear-power-reactors.
[6] See Id.
[7] See generally, Press Releases, IAEA (accessed Mar. 17, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/news?type=3243 (showing the wide variety of projects the group is engaged in through their frequent press releases).
[8] For example, Codes of Conduct, IAEA (accessed March. 17, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/topics/codes-of-conduct.
[9] Software, IAEA (accessed March. 17, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/resources/software.
[10] IAEA and the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (accessed Mar. 17, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/topics/non-proliferation-treaty.
[11] Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons art. 3, July 1, 1968, 21 UST 483, 729 UNTS 161.
[12] Id.
[13] Kelsey Davenport, IAEA Safeguards Agreement at a Glance, Arms Control Ass’n (Nov. 2024) https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/iaea-safeguards-agreements-glance.
[14] Adem Mutluer, IAEA Performed Over 3,000 Verification Activities Around the World- Safeguards Implementation Report 2023, IAEA (June 18, 2024), https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-performed-over-3000-verification-activities-around-the-world-safeguards-implementation-report-2023.
[15] Our Work, United Nations (Accessed Mar. 17, 2025), https://www.un.org/en/our-work#:~:text=Maintain%20International%20Peace%20and%20Security,Deliver%20Humanitarian%20Aid.
[16] Judy Dempsey, Judy Asks: Is the United Nations Still Fit for Purpose, Carnegie Endowment for Int’l Peace (Sep. 21, 2023), https://carnegieendowment.org/europe/strategic-europe/2023/09/judy-asks-is-the-united-nations-still-fit-for-purpose?lang=en; Anjali Dayal and Caroline Duton, The U.N. Security Council Was Designed for Deadlock — Can it Change?, U.S. Inst. of Peace (Mar. 1, 2023), https://www.usip.org/publications/2023/03/un-security-council-was-designed-deadlock-can-it-change; Minh-Thu Pham, A UN Expert on the Institution’s Successes, Failures, and Continued Relevance, Carnegie Endowment for Int’l Peace (Sept. 21, 2023).
[17] Dempsey, supra note 16 (quoting Louis Charbonnaeu in the article).
[18] Frederic Kirgis, Enforcing International Law, 1 Am. Society of Int’l L.1 (Jan. 22, 1996).
[19] Jack Goldsmith and Eric Posner, The Limits of International Law Fifteen Years Later, 22 Chi. J. of Int’l L. 1 (June 22, 2021), https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1802&context=cjil; see Yuji Isasawa, Various Means of Enforcement in International Law, 65 Havr. Int’l L. J. Symp. 1 (Mar 24, 2023) (describing different methods of enforcement), https://journals.law.harvard.edu/ilj/wp-content/uploads/sites/84/HILJ-651-Iwasawa_compressed.pdf.
[20] Pierre Goldschmidt, Safeguards Noncompliance: A Challenge for the IAEA and the UN Security Council, Arms Control Assn. (accessed Mar. 17, 2025), https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2010-01/safeguards-noncompliance-challenge-iaea-and-un-security-council.
[21] See id.
[22] Chris Young, Are the Chernobyl and Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Plants the Same? Here’s Everything We Know?, Interesting Eng’g (Mar. 4, 2022), https://interestingengineering.com/culture/chernobyl-and-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-power-plants?group=test_a
[23] To be specific the two are 310 miles away including the roughly 20-mile-wide circle that forms the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. Young, supra note 22; Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, Encyclopaedia Britannica (March 26, 2025), https://www.britannica.com/event/Chernobyl-disaster#ref1255320.
[24] IAEA Director General Statement on the Situation in Ukraine, IAEA (Feb. 24, 2022), https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/iaea-director-general-statement-on-the-situation-in-ukraine.
[25] Two Years of IAEA Continued Presence at the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant, IAEA 1,7 (Sep. 4, 2024), https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/documents/two-years-of-iaea-continued-presence-at-the-zaporizhzhaya-nuclear-power-plant.pdf.
[26] Update 276 – IAEA Director General Statement on Situation in Ukraine, IAEA (Feb. 15, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/update-276-iaea-director-general-statement-on-situation-in-ukraine.
[27] A helpful summary of the political debate can be found in this classroom handled created by Dr. Lana Aref, “The use of Nuclear Power has been controversial for a long time. Proponents of its use claim that it is a very ‘clean’ form of energy since very little fuel is needed to generate a lot of energy, and since no air pollution is produced, as in the burning of coal. However, because of accidents such as the one at Three Mile Island in the U.S., and the one at Chernobyl in the former Soviet Union, many people are opposed to Nuclear Power. Also, environmentalists, as well as other citizen groups, are concerned about the disposal of the radioactive waste generated by the mining, processing and use of Nuclear fuel. Currently. there are no universally acceptable methods for the storage and disposal of these wastes. and there is concern that buried wastes might leak into groundwater and eventually make it into surface waters or into drinking water supplies.” Lana Aref, Nuclear Energy: the Good, the Bad, and the Debatable, MIT 1, 3 (last accessed Apr. 2, 2025), https://www.niehs.nih.gov/sites/default/files/health/assets/docs_f_o/nuclear_energy_the_good_the_bad_and_the_debatable_508.pdf.
[EI1] https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/24/06/20240607_sir_2024_part_ab.pdf
