Evaluating Testing, Costs, and Benefits of Advanced Spectroscopic Portals Final Report (Abbreviated Version) (2011) / Chapter Skim
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searches for smuggled nuclear and radiological material by scanning1 more than 20 million cargo containers that enter the United States each year. In the initial scanning step used at ports and border crossings today, a truck bearing a cargo container is driven slowly through a PVT radiation portal monitor (PVT RPM)
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in some cases, although they were still poorer in other cases. There are drawbacks to using handheld detectors for external screening of cargo containers, but this low-cost option, which substantially increases scanning effectiveness, should be an alternative in the cost-benefit analysis, and it might ultimately prove to be the preferred option.
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is approximately $600k, compared to approximately $1,200k for an ASP.5 2 Masking is when radiation from benign radioactive material makes it difficult for a detector system to detect and identify a threat object. 3 ASPs and PVT RPMs perform somewhat different functions in primary inspection: PVT RPM detect radiation and have only crude discrimination capabilities to evaluate the potential source of the radiation, so conveyances triggering the radiation alarm in primary inspection are referred to secondary inspection.
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In its interim report, the study committee recommended that DHS use a standard scientific approach in which scientists use computer models to simulate radiation from radioactive material, configurations of cargo, and detector performance; use physical tests to validate and refine the models; and use the models to select key new physical tests that advance our understanding of the detector systems, iteratively. This iterative modeling and testing approach is common scientific practice in the development of high-technology equipment and is essential for building scientific confidence in detector performance over a wide range of circumstances, not all of which can be tested physically.
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EVALUATION OF TEST RESULTS DNDO described the results of its performance testing in its Final Report on 2008 Advanced Spectroscopic Portals Performance Tests (March 2009)
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Aggregation may possibly require correction factors to adjust for differences between threat objects and is not a substitute for analyses of the performance of the individual threat objects. 11 The DHS Independent Review Team also cautioned DNDO against over-aggregating results.
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As is pointed out in DNDO's draft costbenefit analysis, ASPs cost more than existing radiation portal monitors, even when gains in operational efficiency provided by the ASPs are taken into account. This means that any justification for deployment of ASPs hinges on improvements in the ASPs ability to detect and thus prevent smuggled nuclear or radiological material from reaching destinations in the United States, deterring adversaries from attempting to do so, or increasing the ability to act upon warning or intelligence about smuggling of nuclear materials, i.e., the security benefits.
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The adversary's action would reduce the probability of successful interdiction using passive detectors. But if this passive detection enhancement forces an adversary to use enough shielding material so that it is easily identified as a suspicious object when scanned by a technology that can ascertain the amount of shielding in a container, such as a gamma or X-ray radiography device, it could lead to additional security enhancement.
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In its cost-benefit analysis, DNDO compared the ASPs to the currently deployed RIID, which the committee was told is relatively old technology, first deployed several years ago. DNDO concluded that handheld detectors in general are unsuitable for external inspection of cargo containers (DNDO 2010a)
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As noted above, the lifecycle cost of the PVT radiation portal monitor used in conjunction with the RIID is estimated to be $640k compared to over $1.2 million for the ASP and RIID. If improved software halves the difference between the current RIID and the ASP and DHS is simply looking for the greatest improvement detector performance at the least cost, then the improved software is a more cost-effective improvement to the current system than replacing it with the ASP.
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The configurations matter. However, the committee notes that the results comparing RIIDs with ASPs were not based on idealized, first-principle calculations, but on data collected by CBP officers operating the RIID as part of the 2008 performance tests in configurations identical to those examined using ASPs.
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If it is not the preferred option, the cost-benefit analysis should explain why. Setting aside different technology alternatives, the deployment alternatives considered in DNDO's cost-benefit analysis do not describe the actual alternatives under consideration: Alternative 1 in DNDO's draft cost-benefit analysis reflected the maximum possible deployment of ASPs in secondary inspection (over 400)
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has already demonstrated that the impact of such upgrades can be evaluated without rerunning physical tests. Using its Replay Tool, APL has taken raw data streams and reanalyzed them with a variety of assumptions (e.g., that two of three neutron detectors are not providing data; Heimberg 2010)
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Thank you for the opportunity to provide input to your decisions. The Committee on Advanced Spectroscopic Portals Robert C
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