The CAREM nuclear plant has inherent safety characteristics based on the use of simple passive systems of high intrinsic reliability level. Each system is doubled (redundancy), which provides it with an excellent level of protection.

These characteristics make it unnecessary to have the intervention of an operator during the first 48 hours as of the occurrence of an accident that may affect the safety of the plant, which represents a substantial improvement with respect to current designs, where the deadline for the intervention of an operator or of the active safety systems is in the order of a half hour.

The design complies with the standards and regulations issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Authority and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) - working within the United Nations Organization - and with the most recent recommendations of the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP).

In view that the basic objective of a nuclear power plant is to produce energy in a safe and economically-competitive way, special emphasis was placed during the design stage on the observance of the basic functions of nuclear safety, accident prevention and protection and consequence mitigation.

These three functions, together with the different physical barriers available in the plant to retain radioactive elements, represent the well-known in-depth defence philosophy.

The safety systems of the CAREM reactor observe redundancy, diversity and physical separation criteria and are designed with the Zero-Risk Fault condition, i.e. the fault condition itself makes them shut down the reactor and maintain it in controlled safety conditions.

A key attribute of these systems is their "passivity", i.e. they act without making use of components requiring external power, such as electric pumps and/or operator actions, taking advantage of the laws of nature.

Following the in-depth defence philosophy, the nuclear module is located within a watertight building known as "Containment", which allows mitigating the consequences of an eventual release of radioactive material from the core. Should this condition be registered, the enclosure is isolated from the outside environment, preventing the radioactive material from reaching the public.

Finally, the design of the CAREM nuclear plant allows a significant reduction and simplification of the Emergency Plans and Actions that must be contemplated to protect the general public.