Management and Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium (1994) / Chapter Skim
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Chapter 1: Introduction: Task and Context
Chapter 1: Introduction: Task and Context
Pages 19-38
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From page 19... ...
, will no longer be needed for military purposes. These two materials are the essential ingredients of nuclear weapons, and limits on access to them are the primary technical barrier to acquiring nuclear weapons capability in the world today.
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From page 20... ...
The HEU from nuclear weapons can be blended to make a reactor fuel that poses little proliferation risk and can return a substantial economic benefit, but disposition of weapons plutonium is far more problematic; hence, plutonium is the primary focus of this report. There are no easy answers to the plutonium problem.
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From page 21... ...
Dismantlement Intermediate Storage Technical Intact Pits Deformed Pits Oxides Ingots Others Indefinite Storage Long-Term Disposition Minimized Storage Elimination FIGURE 1-1 Phases of plutonium management Institutional Who Safeguards? Who Protects?
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From page 23... ...
to strengthen the national and international control mechanisms and incentives designed to ensure continued arms reductions and prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. In addition to these security objectives, all options must protect worker health and the environment, and be acceptable to the public.
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From page 25... ...
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From page 26... ...
If Ukraine actually reversed its commitment and attempted to acquire an independently controlled nuclear arsenal, the entire framework of nuclear arms reduction and nonproliferation would be severely, perhaps fatally, damaged. Security concerns may well be the driving factors in Ukraine's ultimate decision, but that decision could be affected by measures to ensure that weapons and fissile materials transferred to Russia will not be reused for military purposes, and to provide compensation for these materials.
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From page 27... ...
Moreover, acceptance by the major nuclear powers of safeguards and constraints on substantial portions of their nuclear programs would help to reduce the inherently discriminatory nature of the nonproliferation regime. These steps, while probably not dissuading all nations that might be attempting to acquire nuclear weapons, would help build global political support for indefinite extension of the NPT and strengthening the regime, which are major U.S.
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From page 28... ...
irradiated plutonium and HEU in spent fuel from reactors; and 7. military and civilian plutonium and HEU outside the categories above, including excess stocks, scrap, residues, and the like.
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From page 29... ...
That figure is expected to grow, as more civilian plutonium continues to be separated each year than is used in reactor fuel.9 Several kilograms of separated weapons-grade plutonium and a somewhat larger amount of "reactor-grade" plutonium a minuscule fraction of the world stock-would be enough to build a nuclear weapon. Thus, the plutonium in a truckload of spent fuel rods from a typical power reactor is enough for one or more nuclear weapons.
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From page 30... ...
With more sophisticated designs, reactor-grade plutonium could be used for weapons having considerably higher minimum yields. Thus, the difference in proliferation risk posed by separated weapons-grade plutonium and separated reactor-grade plutonium is small by comparison to the difference between separated plutonium of any grade and unseparated material in spent fuel (see "Reactor-Grade and WeaponGrade Plutonium in Nuclear Explosives," p.
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From page 31... ...
Options should be designed to avoid any increase in the risk of proliferation as a result of arms reductions, which could result if weapons and materials become more accessible to theft during the processes involved in dismantlement, storage, and disposition. Thus, to the extent possible, the high standards of security and accounting applied to storage of intact nuclear weapons should be maintained for these materials throughout these processes.
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From page 34... ...
Options that left the weapons plutonium more accessible would mean that this material would continue to pose a unique safeguards problem indefinitely. Conversely, the costs, complexities, risks, and delays of going beyond the spent fuel standard to eliminate the excess weapons plutonium completely or nearly so would not offer substantial additional security benefits unless society were prepared to take the same approach with the global stock of civilian plutonium.
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From page 35... ...
The president should establish a more systematic process of interagency coordination to deal with the areas addressed in this report, with sustained top-level leadership. The new interagency examination of plutonium disposition options envisioned in President Clinton's September 27, 1993, nonproliferation initiative is a first step in that direction, but much more remains to be done.
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From page 36... ...
Chapter 2 describes the international context in which policy choices with respect to dismantlement, storage, and disposition must be made, including the crisis in the former Soviet Union, the a~s reduction and nonproliferation regimes, ongoing civilian plutonium programs, and existing standards of safeguards and security for fissile materials. Chapter 3 describes in more detail the criteria for judging policy choices.
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From page 37... ...
INTRODUCTION: TASK AND CONTEXT 37 chapters: Chapter 4 addresses dismantlement, and the related question of an overall regime to limit and monitor the size of stockpiles of nuclear weapons and fissile materials; Chapter 5 addresses requirements and choices related to the storage of plutonium, and the related issue of measures to reduce the accessibility of fissile materials in the former Soviet Union; and Chapter 6 discusses the options for long-term disposition of the plutonium from dismantled weapons. Finally, Chapter 7 summarizes the committee's recommendations.
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