Management and Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium (1994) / Chapter Skim
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Chapter 5: Intermediate Storage
Chapter 5: Intermediate Storage
Pages 111-140
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From page 111... ...
As a central part of managing this intermediate storage, the United States and Russia should rapidly make formal commitments that: 1. specific, agreed amounts of fissile materials from dismantled weapons will never again be used for weapons; and 2.
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From page 112... ...
assistance in construction of a fissile material storage site in Russia are continuing. The United States Pits at Pantex The U.S.
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From page 113... ...
weapons complex, including Rocky Flats, Hanford, Los Alamos, and Savannah River. This plutonium ranges from material that could be rapidly incorporated into weapons, such as relatively pure metal and oxides, to material that would be rather difficult to recover, such as plutonium in liquid residues from processing operations or discarded equipment and 3 U.S.
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From page 114... ...
In principle, reserve materials could be stored in a separate module or storage area subject to differ ent transparency arrangements. The principal alternative to building such a consolidated storage facility is to upgrade existing plutonium storage facilities.
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From page 115... ...
Nevertheless, the United States has agreed to provide assistance in designing and equipping a large fissile material storage facility in Russia. $90 million in Nunn-Lugar assistance funding has been allocated for this purpose to date.
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From page 116... ...
Opposition grew after the explosion of a nuclear waste tank there in early 1993. There are now reports that the Tomsk authorities will allow only a storage site for the materials already stored there, so that the facility would provide no additional space for materials from weapons now being dismantled, and the objective of consolidating all excess plutonium and HEU at a single site would be compromised.
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From page 117... ...
Second, sites must be secure against theft or diversion, by "insiders" or "outsiders." They should therefore have effective material control and accounting systems for all stored materials in whatever form, as well as appropriate physical security. The form in which the plutonium is stored (pits, metal ingots, and oxides are among the main possibilities)
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From page 118... ...
Forms of Plutonium for Storage Each of the criteria for forms of plutonium just mentioned are considered below in turn: ES&M, Costs, Schedules, and Facility Availability Storage as pits is the quickest, lowest-cost means to achieve safe and environmentally benign storage of plutonium from dismantled weapons. Leaving the pits in their current form during intermediate storage would postpone whatever costs, hazards, and wastes would be incurred in changing them to other forms.
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From page 119... ...
A complete safety analysis would be required to assess this judgment, however. Proliferation Risk Plutonium in any relatively pure form poses similar proliferation risks (except, of course, in the form of an assembled nuclear weapon, in which case the risks are substantially greater.
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From page 120... ...
Moreover, there are no significant stocks of separated civilian plutonium available for this purpose in the United States, and in either the United States or Russia, substantial processing would be required. Therefore this is not a promising approach to reducing the security risks posed by storage of weapons-grade plutonium.
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From page 121... ...
Compromise of Classified Information Fissile materials in the form of weapons components contain classified weapons design information. Currently, a wide variety of information concerning weapons components is classified, although as noted in Chapter 4, a substantial amount of this information could be declassified without compromising U.S.
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From page 122... ...
nuclear weapons complex, may be substantially more expensive in some cases, particularly if processing is required. At a site dedicated solely to fissile material storage, which both the United States and Russia now envision building, all the capital and operating costs should be allocated to the storage mission, thereby raising costs substantially above those at Pantex.
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From page 123... ...
As discussed in Chapter 6, it is the security risks and political disadvantages of storing the material indefinitely in readily weapons-usable form that create the primary incentive to move expeditiously to long-term disposition. INSTITUTIONAL ISSUES The committee considered a variety of institutional arrangements for plutonium storage, including options such as continuing current practices without change; adding additional bilateral transparency measures; setting up a new international group to fund and manage an internationally managed plutonium repository; setting up IAEA safeguards similar to the long-discussed "international plutonium storage" (I:PS)
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From page 124... ...
or in modified form. In the case of material in the form of weapons components, fissile materials would arrive at the storage site in tagged and sealed containers from dismantlement facilities.
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From page 125... ...
It is important, however, to bring the IAEA into the process rapidly. For the near term, storage facilities should remain nationally owned and controlled, with the IAEA being given, in effect, a "subcontractor" role, monitoring the amount of material in the storage site and safeguarding any material removed from the site to verify the commitment to non-weapons use or disposal.
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From page 126... ...
The 1985 NPT Review Conference (the last successful review) called on the IDEA "to establish an internationally agreed effective system of international plutonium storage." On several occasions since 1989, IAEA Director-General Hans Blix has offered the agency's services in safeguarding fissile materials from dismantled weapons.
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From page 127... ...
Although this is an extreme scenario, setting up a mechanism for this purpose ahead of time could be useful, as it would greatly simplify orchestrating the response if the need ever arose. For example, the United States, Russia, and possibly other interested parties might agree that in the event of disorder threatening a plutonium storage site in any of their countries, outside forces could be brought in to help protect it, possibly under a United Nations mandate, with the agreement of the state involved.
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From page 128... ...
should not significantly exceed $1 billion and might be substantially less. Like the HEU deal, such a purchase would provide a financial incentive for dismantlement and safeguarded storage, encouraging not only Russia but other states such as Ukraine to follow through on their disarmament commitments.
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From page 129... ...
However, as in the case of the HEU deal, substantial risks would remain after a purchase limited to excess weapons plutonium because large numbers of nuclear weapons and large quantities of fissile materials not declared excess would remain in the former Soviet Union. Such a plutonium purchase would also have important disadvantages.
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From page 132... ...
The United States is already providing some financial incentive for secure storage of Russian fissile materials by helping to finance a new fissile material storage site. Additional financial incentives might be based on payment of specified sums for placement of specified quantities of plutonium into safeguarded storage.
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From page 133... ...
Both the HEU deal and the planned construction of a fissile material storage site in Russia address this issue in part, but both deal only with fissile materials from weapons dismantlement that Russia considers excess. Yet in addition to these quantities there are substantial stocks of fissile materials not incorporated in weapons throughout the Russian nuclear weapons complex; substantial stocks of civilian separated plutonium at the Mayak reprocessing plant; and a wide variety of military and civilian research facilities with more than enough fissile materials for a bomb.
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From page 134... ...
An urgent program of security and accounting inspections and improvements at all of these sites. As recently as the mid-1980s, the United States undertook such a crash program at its own nuclear weapons complex, and made critical improvements, such as the installation of portal monitors, within days of the initial inspection in some cases.2i · Improved economic conditions for personnel responsible for accounting and security for weapons and fissile materials, to reduce incentives for corruption and insider theft.
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From page 135... ...
Ultimately, it would be desirable if the high standard for security and material accounting that should be set for the planned jointly built storage facility were applied to all fissile materials in Russia. One means to achieve this would be for Russia to follow the same approach that DOE plans for the United States, consolidating all of its stored plutonium and HEU at a single site.
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From page 136... ...
of these materials, in a concept the IAEA is now calling an "international management regime." Safeguarded storage for excess fissile materials from dismantled weapons in the United States and Russia can and should be seen as a first step toward building such a broader regime. Negotiations should be pursued to: 22 For a similar proposal, see Jonathan Dean, "Safeguarding Nuclear Warheads and Fissile Materials in Ukraine and Russia," Union of Concerned Scientists, September 22, 1993.
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From page 137... ...
· The United States should continue providing assistance for a Russian fissile material storage facility, which should be designed to consolidate all excess weapons materials at a single site, to facilitate security and international monitoring. · Plutonium from dismantled weapons should continue to be stored as intact pits for now.
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From page 138... ...
· Appropriate arrangements for intermediate storage are to a large extent decoupled from long-term disposition decisions and should be considered more urgent. · Urgent steps are needed to improve safeguards and security for all fissile materials in the former Soviet Union, including materials beyond those considered excess.
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From page 139... ...
use the U.S.-Russian safeguarded storage regime recommended above as a base for a broad international storage and management regime for fissile materials, including registration and safeguards for all civilian separated plutonium and HEU; 3. extend the U.S.-Russian declaratory regime mentioned above to a global regime of public declarations of stocks of fissile materials; 4.
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