skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Can containment and surveillance play a more important role in safeguards

Conference · · Transactions of the American Nuclear Society; (USA)
OSTI ID:5565409

The implementation of safeguards by international inspectors presently relies, in an important way, on the independent assay of nuclear materials by destructive and nondestructive analysis (NDA) techniques. Significant experience has been gained in the application of those techniques on a variety of nuclear materials and for different parts of the fuel cycle. The basis for the evaluation of capabilities and performances of destructive analysis and NDA applied in field conditions exists and is now being exploited extensively. In the field of containment and surveillance (C/S), the degree of maturity for implementation is rather different. After a long development period, a good level of reliability and tamper resistance has been reached for a limited number of devices, which appear to be acceptable for implementation in safeguards in combination with assay techniques. The usefulness of these techniques to the inspectors and the impact of their use on plant operation needs to be assessed before further steps are taken to reach production of C/S devices on an industrial scale. Two conditions that will probably enhance the deployment of C/S are the increased radiation hazard and the high degree of automation of storage and process lines, which will lead to a much lower degree of accessibility to the nuclear material for direct assay.

OSTI ID:
5565409
Report Number(s):
CONF-871110-; CODEN: TANSA; TRN: 89-027978
Journal Information:
Transactions of the American Nuclear Society; (USA), Vol. 55; Conference: 3. international conference on facility operations safeguards interface, San Diego, CA (USA), 29 Nov - 4 Dec 1987; ISSN 0003-018X
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English