CONTRIBUTORS

Russia holds the largest stocks of civilian highly enriched uranium (HEU) of any country, operating more than fifty research reactors, pulsed reactors, and critical assemblies using HEU, as well as nine HEU-fueled icebreakers. Russia's participation in international efforts to phase out civilian HEU is crucial if international HEU minimization efforts are to succeed. Individual Russian institutes and organizations participate in international programs to replace HEU with low-enriched uranium in Soviet-supplied research reactors, develop alternative fuels, and repatriate fresh and spent HEU fuel from third countries. However, an overarching national policy on HEU phase-out has yet to be adopted. There are many obstacles to obtaining such a commitment from Moscow. At the same time, the ongoing reform of the Russian nuclear industry and plans for expansion of domestic nuclear power generation and for increased nuclear exports create opportunities for securing such a commitment.     

THE HARD CASES

Many countries received Soviet-origin highly enriched uranium (HEU) for civilian nuclear research purposes. Because of inadequate nuclear security at a number of the research sites, U.S. policy has sought to remove or otherwise safely dispose of their HEU stocks as quickly as possible. Although the pace of HEU disposition has accelerated significantly in recent years, several sites have posed formidable technical, economic, and political challenges. This article identifies the major obstacles to HEU removal at two key installations—Kharkiv in Ukraine, and Sosny in Belarus—and recommends a strategy for overcoming these impediments. Key components for a successful disposition strategy include: treating these cases with the urgency they deserve, expanding potential compensation packages, explicitly addressing the institutional and political issues involved, engaging high-level political leaders, working with third parties, and promoting these efforts as part of a nondiscriminatory initiative to phase out HEU in the civilian nuclear sector globally.     

HEU FUEL CYCLE INVENTORIES AND PROGRESS ON GLOBAL MINIMIZATION

In 2007, 334 nuclear reactors (including for naval propulsion) and isotope production facilities employed highly enriched uranium (HEU) fuel or target material. One year of operations at these reactors and facilities required more than 3,100 kilograms (kg) of HEU for naval propulsion, more than 750 kg for research reactors, and 40?–50 kg for isotope production in civilian facilities—in addition to several tons used in other types of reactors. Material with high enrichment levels and low radiation barriers stored or handled in large batches, such as HEU target waste and certain types of fuel from isotope production, research reactors/critical assemblies, and naval fuel, presents serious safety and security concerns. Forty-eight civilian research reactors have converted to low-enriched uranium as a result of a three-decade international effort to minimize HEU use, resulting in a decrease in HEU consumption of 278 kg per year. This article's establishment of baseline measurements for assessing the results of HEU minimization efforts calls for additional focus on the scope and methodology of HEU minimization. Facility decommissioning and dismantling should play a larger role in the future HEU minimization effort, materials with specific weapons-relevant properties should be given higher priority compared to bulk HEU material, and the use of large quantities of weapon-grade HEU fuel for naval propulsion should be reconsidered.     

MEDICAL ISOTOPE PRODUCTION

Nearly 95 percent of the world demand for molybdenum-99 (Mo-99)—perhaps the world's most important medical isotope—is met by just four manufacturers, all of whom use highly enriched uranium (HEU) targets in their isotope production programs. Research and development on the use of low-enriched uranium targets and gel generators to produce Mo-99 began in the 1980s; some success has been achieved, but Mo-99 is still mainly produced by irradiating HEU targets in a reactor. Fission-produced Mo-99 has a high specific activity, but activation methods provide low specific activity Mo-99, which is unsuitable for the generators routinely used in most of the world's medical centers. This article evaluates the use of enriched Mo-98 to produce Mo-99 by activation methods; the use of medium specific activity Mo-99 for the preparation of alumina-based generators is also discussed. This article concludes that if support is provided for the production of enriched Mo-98, it may replace to a significant extent the use of HEU and LEU for the production of Mo-99.     

Reflections on Transparency and Monitoring under the 1993 United States-Russian Federation Highly Enriched Uranium Purchase Agreement

ABSTRACT

The 1993 Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) Purchase Agreement between the United States and Russian Federation is often described as one of the world's most successful nuclear nonproliferation programs. In 2013, the two states achieved the agreement's major goals of downblending 500 metric tons of Russian weapon-origin HEU to low enriched uranium (LEU) and delivering all resultant LEU to the United States. At one time, the LEU delivered under the agreement generated nearly 10 percent of all electricity in the United States. The agreement achieved its nonproliferation goals through a unique government/industry partnership. Commercial executive agents contracted for the annual sale and delivery of downblended LEU, while the US and Russian governments exercised reciprocal transparency monitoring measures to demonstrate that all LEU delivered under the agreement was derived from Russian weapons-origin HEU, and that the same LEU was used for exclusively peaceful purposes in the United States. The commercial development, negotiations, and implementation of the agreement have been well documented. This article describes the scope of US transparency monitoring activities in Russian HEU processing facilities, as well as Russian monitoring in the United States. In addition, it discusses the results of twenty years of reciprocal transparency monitoring and data analysis, and outlines lessons learned that are potentially applicable to future transparency monitoring and verification regimes and similar cooperative efforts.     

The Trust Paradox in Nuclear Smuggling

ABSTRACT

This article explores the paradox of trust in the largest nuclear smuggling operation involving highly enriched uranium (HEU) discussed in open source literature. In the first effort to understand the type, extent, and role of trust in nuclear smuggling enterprises, it draws from literature on trust development in legitimate businesses as well as criminal enterprises. Observed behavioral patterns in this case challenge traditional notions of the internal dynamics of temporary groups engaged in nuclear smuggling and operational realities of such activities. The article seeks to explain why individuals agree (and continue) to operate in this high-risk environment, unbound by close personal ties, without any effort to verify the background, motives, or qualifications of the fellow conspirators. It offers ways to advance current nonproliferation efforts in non-state actor interdiction by exploiting the environment of shallow trust in temporary groups.     

REFASHIONING AUSTRALIA'S NUCLEAR BARGAIN?

This article explores the challenges that Australia faces in reconciling its commitments to nonproliferation and uranium exports during a time when the international nuclear nonproliferation regime is under major stress and the world uranium market is bullish. The “grand bargain” that has framed Australian participation in the nonproliferation regime and the nuclear fuel market since the 1970s was only tenable in an era of stagnant uranium demand and a stable nuclear balance. However, contemporary nuclear proliferation dynamics and the revival of interest in nuclear energy have accentuated the incompatibility between Australia's commitment to nonproliferation and the desire to profit from uranium exports. The contemporary international strategic environment, international nonproliferation regime, and nuclear energy market are characterized by developments that not only undermine the basis of Australia's grand bargain, but also present challenges and opportunities for the refashioning of Australian policy.     

Uranium yellowcake trafficking incidents in Africa

The perpetuation of an otherwise astute fissile material safeguards model by the current non-proliferation regime raises a number of concerns, not least the efficacy of the approach in reducing clandestine weapon developments and the nuclear terrorism threat. Mindful of potential shifts in illicit nuclear material and weapon acquisition, following an excessive focus on fissile material safeguards and the proliferation of nuclear weapon technology, this article uses proliferation trend and scenario analysis in a bid to identify potential proliferation threats and non-proliferation opportunities. The results of the article's assessment of reported incidents (1992–2013) involving theft, unauthorised possession, and attempts to smuggle or sell highly enriched uranium (HEU), plutonium, low-enriched uranium (LEU), natural uranium and uranium yellowcake reveal a decline in occurrences involving fissile material but an increase in uranium yellowcake incidents, particularly in Africa. Presumptions that yellowcake may have provided the newest threat to clandestine weapon developments and nuclear terrorism wane amid concerns over possible biases in reporting, scepticism over an organised and demand-driven nuclear black market, and the difficulties of non-state actors’ development of crude nuclear weapons off the tedious yellowcake conversion-enrichment-fabrication pathway. To secure Africa's uranium yellowcake from potential proliferators, the article proposes concerted domestic, regional and multilateral non-proliferation efforts.     

Nuclear Subsidies and Proliferation: Clarifying the Link

ABSTRACT

In March 2015, the South Australian state government established a royal commission to investigate the financial, social, technical, diplomatic, and nonproliferation benefits and risks of expanding its nuclear industry, including activities related to uranium mining; enriching, reprocessing, and fabricating nuclear fuels for both domestic use and export; producing nuclear power; and storing radiological waste, including foreign spent reactor fuel. Given its enormous uranium reserves and current mining activities, some Australians have argued that Australia could benefit financially by expanding the mining sector and by adding value to its uranium exports by enriching the material and fabricating it into reactor fuel assemblies. Others have maintained that Australia can realize significant economic benefits by recycling and storing foreign spent fuel and producing carbon-free nuclear power. In the end, the commission recommended that Australia consider opening up a high-level waste repository to take in foreign spent fuel. It did not recommend any other nuclear activities at this time. The following viewpoint is based on testimony I delivered to the commission on the nuclear weapon proliferation implications of the proposed activities. If Australia wants to avoid the temptation of selling nuclear goods to states that might use these goods to make bombs, it should only consider new nuclear activities that can be entirely financed by the private sector and turn a profit without having to resort to foreign sales. This policy would also enable Australia to set an important, new international nonproliferation standard.     

INTERNATIONAL REGIME OF FRESH FUEL SUPPLY AND SPENT FUEL DISPOSAL

Recent events in Iran and elsewhere demand a reevaluation of the need for increasing nuclear fuel supplies and assuring reliable flow of fuel to nuclear power user states vis-à-vis the need for strengthened security for all countries against the use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The right of countries to a guaranteed supply of nuclear energy for peaceful uses must be balanced with the global community's desire to limit flows of nuclear material and sensitive nuclear facilities that could create opportunities for nuclear proliferation. This article proposes elements of an international regime of fresh fuel supply and spent fuel disposal that will guarantee fresh fuel supplies to countries honoring their obligations under the Treaty for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), while reducing concerns about diversion of spent fuel for weapons purposes. A specific application to countries with small pre-commercial uranium enrichment plants is also proposed.     

NUCLEAR ISLANDS

Current International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards do not provide adequate protection against the diversion to military use of materials or technology from certain types of sensitive nuclear fuel cycle facilities. In view of highly enriched uranium's relatively greater ease of use as a nuclear explosive material than plutonium and the significant diseconomies of commercial spent fuel reprocessing, this article focuses on the need for improved international controls over uranium enrichment facilities as the proximate justification for creation of an International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Association (INFCA). In principle, the proposal is equally applicable to alleviating the proliferation concerns provoked by nuclear fuel reprocessing plants and other sensitive nuclear fuel cycle facilities. The INFCA would provide significantly increased nonproliferation assurance to its member states and the wider international community by holding long-term leasehold contracts to operate secure restricted zones containing such sensitive nuclear facilities.     

FACILITATING NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT: Verified Declarations of Fissile Material Stocks and Production

Unprecedented interest in seeking progress toward nuclear disarmament exists today; even some nuclear weapon states are looking for new ways to strengthen this process. National declarations of fissile material holdings—highly enriched uranium and plutonium—could play an important role in supporting this effort, facilitating not only transparency but also the irreversibility of the process. This article discusses what kind of content such declarations could have in order to be meaningful and effective, the sequence of data on fissile material holdings that states might release, and some of the challenges to be expected in reconstructing historic fissile material production; it also summarizes current attitudes of weapon states toward making such declarations. Initial declarations can be valuable as confidence-building measures, but better and more background data are necessary if declarations are to serve as the groundwork for deeper cuts in the nuclear arsenals. A robust verification approach would ultimately require inspectors to have access to fissile material production and storage sites. The methods and tools of nuclear forensic analysis—in this context also dubbed nuclear archaeology—would be a key element of this process. This article discusses the capabilities and limitations of potential approaches to verifying declarations of historic production of plutonium and highly enriched uranium; it also identifies and discusses opportunities for further research and development.     

Contents and Author Index,Volume 20, 2013

The United States has multiple nuclear detection initiatives to secure against a terrorist nuclear attack, including the Container Security Initiative, installation of radiation detectors at U.S. border points of entry, and establishment of the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO). The current nuclear detection system architecture falls short of being able to reliably catch fissile nuclear material in transit, specifically shielded Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) and Plutonium (Pu), both within the US and abroad. Checkpoints at border crossings can be circumvented, and no adequate system is under development to deter the transport of fissile materials. Using nuclear link-budget calculations, we show why a network relying primarily on handhelds, fixed detectors, and portals is not sufficient. We examine the technical, economic, and operational feasibility of a comprehensive national network incorporating in-vehicle detectors to reliably detect and deter the transport of fissile material inside the vehicle itself.     

THE SECURITY IMPLICATIONS OF CHINA'S NUCLEAR ENERGY EXPANSION

Nuclear energy is an integral part of China's energy strategy and will increasingly contribute to China's total energy supply. China has more than twenty civilian facilities, including power reactors, mines, and enrichment plants, to support its nuclear power program. As China operates more nuclear plants, more nuclear materials will be produced and stockpiled, and more nuclear facilities will be spread around the country. To ensure that this expanded network of nuclear facilities does not increase the risk that nuclear materials will be diverted or become the target of attack, China will need to develop more reliable domestic nuclear security strategies. China is also poised to become a major exporter of nuclear energy technology. China has committed to keeping nuclear technologies out of the hands of dangerous states and/or sub-state organizations, but in order to fulfill its nonproliferation obligations as well as its treaty-based commitment to share nuclear technologies, China will need to strengthen nuclear export controls and practices. This report examines and evaluates security measures at Chinese civilian nuclear power plants and suggests ways to improve them. It also reviews current export control policies and systems, identifies likely challenges to the expanding nuclear sector, and proposes possible solutions.     

Confronting the “Perpetual Menace to Human Security”

Nuclear weapon states historically have attached great secrecy to their nuclear weapon and fissile material production programs and stockpiles, despite warnings that this would fuel fears, handicap informed debate and decision making, and drive arms races. As evidenced by the “Action Plan on Nuclear Disarmament” agreed upon at the 2010 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) Review Conference, however, the international community now sees greater transparency about nuclear weapon and fissile material stocks as necessary for enabling and monitoring progress toward nuclear disarmament. To support this effort, the International Panel on Fissile Materials has proposed a step-by-step program for weapon states to declare their inventories, production histories, and disposition of nuclear warheads and fissile materials, and to set up joint projects to develop methods for verifying these declarations. This openness initiative is described here, and could be adopted at the 2015 NPT Review Conference, laying a basis for negotiating verifiable deep reductions in nuclear arsenals and their eventual elimination.     

EDITOR'S NOTE

The Nonproliferation Review (NPR) recently interviewed Ambassador Sergio de Queiroz Duarte of Brazil, who presided over the 2005 Seventh Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Ambassador Duarte discussed his views on the outcome of the conference and the future of the treaty. He provided NPR with valuable insights into the outcome of the conference and also shared his thoughts on some of the most pressing issues confronting the NPT today, including the Middle East, nuclear terrorism, elimination of the threat of highly enriched uranium in the civilian nuclear sector, proposals to limit access to the nuclear fuel cycle, nuclear disarmament, and negative security assurances. Blaming the failed conference on a general lack of political commitment among states parties and their unwillingness to negotiate common solutions, Ambassador Duarte stressed that “the conference should face squarely its own failure without my attempting to disguise or sugarcoat the deep differences of view, which must be resolved with courage and determination by the states parties if they want the treaty to remain effective.”?He emphasized that if states fail to act on their overriding interest in upholding the NPT, especially if states parties continue to ignore or disregard their nonproliferation and nuclear disarmament obligations, some states might come to believe that their security interests are no longer served by the treaty. The future prospects of the NPT would then “look dire indeed.”     

Deferred verification: verifiable declarations of fissile-material stocks for disarmament purposes

ABSTRACT

Nuclear disarmament is often seen as eventually requiring access to nuclear warheads or to the warhead-dismantlement process to verify that a state has not hidden weapons or weapon-materials despite promising to disarm. This article suggests this view is misplaced, and that what is needed is a verification mechanism able to provide reliable assurances of the absence of fissile materials available for use in weapons after a state has disarmed. Such a mechanism will need an initial declaration of the amount of fissile materials held by a state for all purposes, military and civilian. In a state with a nuclear arsenal awaiting elimination, this declaration would have to include materials that may not be available for verification because they are in nuclear weapons or are in other classified or proliferation-sensitive forms. This article describes a verification arrangement that does not require access to materials in weapons and in sensitive forms while still allowing checks on the overall accuracy of the declaration. Verification of the completeness and correctness of the declaration is deferred to the time when the weapons-relevant material enters the disposition process, at which point it no longer has any sensitive attributes. By removing the focus on monitoring warheads and dismantlement, this new approach could provide a more manageable path to nuclear disarmament.     

India nuclear weapons: No first use or no full disclosure?

This article argues India is laying the foundation to move away from “no-first-use” (NFU) as its nuclear weapons employment policy. Since the inception of its nuclear weapons program, India has claimed NFU as the centerpiece of its nuclear strategy. But India has a history of developing foundational changes to its nuclear weapons program before such changes actually occur. For example, the infrastructure of India’s nuclear weapons program was already being created in the 1950s under the guise of civilian nuclear power. Similarly, the weaponization of India’s program, which did not officially occur until after the 1998 tests, had its genesis in far earlier decisions. A close examination of trends in India’s nuclear weapons production complex, its delivery systems, and its command and control complex all lead to the conclusion that India is laying the groundwork for more flexible employment options, up to and including first use. This article does not argue such a decision has been taken. Rather, it argues the underpinning is in place to allow for a move to more flexible options, perhaps very quickly, at some point in the future. This could occur during crisis or it could occur incrementally over time.     

Reactor-grade plutonium and nuclear weapons: ending the debate

The claim that reactor-grade plutonium cannot or will not be used to produce nuclear weapons has been used to justify non-nuclear-weapon states’ large stockpiles of plutonium that has been separated from highly radioactive spent fuel. However, by using reduced-mass plutonium cores, it is possible to manufacture reliable nuclear weapons with reactor-grade plutonium. These weapons can have the same design, size, weight, and predetonation probability as weapons using weapon-grade plutonium and would require no special cooling. The increased radiation from reactor-grade plutonium could be easily managed by shielding and operational procedures. Weapons using plutonium routinely produced by pressurized-water reactors could have a lethal area between 40 percent and 75 percent that of weapons using weapon-grade plutonium. In the past, both Sweden and Pakistan considered using reactor-grade plutonium to produce nuclear weapons, and India may be using reactor-grade plutonium in its arsenal today. Despite claims to the contrary, the United States used what was truly reactor-grade plutonium in a successful nuclear test in 1962. The capability of reactor-grade plutonium to produce highly destructive nuclear weapons leads to the conclusion that the separation of plutonium, plutonium stockpiling, and the use of plutonium-based fuels must be phased out and banned.     

EXTRAORDINARY VISITS

North Korea has the bomb but not much of a nuclear arsenal. For fifty years, it pursued the plutonium path to the bomb in parallel with its pursuit of nuclear electricity. My visits to North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear complex provided a window to its plutonium capabilities. After having made six visits to North Korea, Pyongyang surprised me during my seventh visit last November by showing me a small, modern uranium enrichment plant, which I was told was needed for its new indigenous light water reactor program. However, the same capabilities can be used to produce highly enriched uranium bomb fuel. Following a pattern of having made poor risk-management decisions during much of the past twenty years of diplomacy dealing with the North Korean nuclear threat, Washington remains in a standoff with Pyongyang.