Nuclear Safeguards, Security and Nonproliferation: Achieving Security with Technology and Policy

by James Doyle

Overview

With an increase of global security concerns over potential terrorist acts, the threat of WMDs, and increasing political issues with nations seeking nuclear capability, the need to track, detect, and safeguard nuclear material globally has never been greater. Nuclear Safeguards, Security and Nonproliferation is a comprehensive reference that covers cutting-edge technologies used to trace, track, and safeguard nuclear material. It is a contributed volume with sections contributed by scientists from leading institutions such as Los Alamos National Labs, Sandia National Labs, Pacific Northwest Nuclear Labs, and Texas A&M University, and the Monterey Institute of International Studies. The book is divided into 3 sections and includes 30 chapters on such topics as - the security of nuclear facilities and material, the illicit trafficking of nuclear materials, improvised nuclear devices, how to prevent nuclear terrorism. International case studies of security at nuclear facilities and illegal nuclear trade activities provide specific examples of the complex issues surrounding the technology and policy for nuclear material protection, control and accountability. Specific cases include analysis of the timely issues in the nuclear programs of countries such as North Korea, Iran, and Kazakstan among others. Nuclear Security is a must-have volume for the dozens of private and public organizations involved in driving Homeland Security, domestic, and international policy issues relating to nuclear material security, non-proliferation, and nuclear transparency. - Written by some of the world's top scientists including members of the Nuclear Division of Los Alamos National Labs (U.S.) - A timely discussion of current international nuclear security issues includes case studies on Iraq, Iran and North Korea - Book takes a global perspective on nuclear security and non-proliferation detailing the little-known real-world technologies used to secure, detect and track nuclear material

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780080888118
Publisher:	Butterworth-Heinemann
Publication date:	04/08/2011
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	624
File size:	8 MB

About the Author

James E. Doyle has worked in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Division at Los Alamos National Laboratory since 1997. His professional focus is on systems analysis, strategic planning, and policy development. Dr. Doyle holds a Ph.D. in international security studies from the University of Virginia. He has managed cooperative projects with Russia's nuclear weapons institutes on the development of technologies and procedures for monitoring the dismantlement and storage of nuclear warheads and fissile materials. Previously, Dr. Doyle was a senior policy analyst at Science Applications International Corporation.
James E. Doyle has worked in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Division at Los Alamos National Laboratory since 1997. His professional focus is on systems analysis, strategic planning, and policy development. Dr. Doyle holds a Ph.D. in international security studies from the University of Virginia. He has managed cooperative projects with Russia’s nuclear weapons institutes on the development of technologies and procedures for monitoring the dismantlement and storage of nuclear warheads and fissile materials. Previously, Dr. Doyle was a senior policy analyst at Science Applications International Corporation.

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Nuclear Safeguards, Security, and Nonproliferation

Achieving Security with Technology and Policy

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Butterworth-Heinemann

Copyright © 2008 Elsevier Inc.
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-08-088811-8

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Chapter One

Introduction: Nuclear Security in the Twenty-First Century

James E. Doyle

Objectives for This Book

Nuclear security today is considerably more complex than it was during the Cold War. The superpower nuclear confrontation has been replaced by greater concerns about the proliferation of nuclear materials or weapons to states and nonstate groups. The specter of nuclear terrorism is of particular concern following the horrific events of September 11, 2001. The need for scientific understanding of the evolving nuclear threat is critical to informing policy decisions and diplomacy. The scientific underpinnings for such an understanding are remarkably broad, ranging from nuclear physics and engineering to chemistry, metallurgy and materials science, risk assessment, large-scale computational techniques, modeling and simulation, and detector development, among others. These areas constitute what we term nuclear security science.

The objective of this book is to present these subjects in a form that will be useful to academic studies in the area of nuclear security. These topics form a necessary foundation for students interested in nuclear weapons policies, nuclear proliferation, nuclear terrorism, nuclear energy and other peaceful applications of nuclear technologies. The scientific areas must be complemented by scholarly studies of public policy, with focus on areas such as political science, international relations, energy policies, economics, history, and regional studies. Nuclear Safeguards, Security, and Nonproliferation: Achieving Security with Technology and Policy has been written recognizing the importance of combining the social sciences with the physical sciences when addressing issues of nuclear security. It is our hope that this book will provide the necessary foundation in nuclear security science for undergraduate and graduate courses dealing with these complex issues.

Another objective of the book is to expose students and practitioners of nuclear security to some of the fundamental disciplines of their craft and provide an understanding of the unique challenges that arise when we apply these fundamentals to specific real-world problems. To this end, the major parts of the book progress from the introduction of concepts and techniques to case studies that provide a picture of real policy and technical approaches. For example, Part I describes the state of the art for modern, comprehensive nuclear safeguards systems that integrate physical protection and nuclear materials control and accounting. It also stresses how essential it is for global nuclear security that every state possessing nuclear material implement a comprehensive safeguards system that is open to some kind of international evaluation. We have done this by including technical chapters on nuclear materials measurements and the design of physical security systems and chapters on the historical development of the international safeguards system. Two case studies describing the application of safeguards at two very different nuclear facilities, a shut-down experimental reactor in Kazakhstan and a large plutonium reprocessing plant in Japan, illustrate how technology is used together with legal and administrative procedures to provide security and accountability.

To effectively deal with problems of nuclear security, it is important to balance the risks posed by nuclear technologies against their benefits. For example, whereas a significant expansion of nuclear power globally may help slow global climate change, it may also increase the risk of nuclear proliferation and terrorism. It will be important to conduct credible risk assessments to guide the public policy discussions of the expansion of nuclear power.

Nuclear Safeguards, Security, and Nonproliferation: Achieving Security with Technology and Policy was inspired in part by a previous study by Carter, Steinbruner, and Zraket that focused on the organizational requirements for safely maintaining a nuclear arsenal during the Cold War era. Their 1987 book, Managing Nuclear Operations, is still an authoritative source on the challenges and requirements for the operational maintenance of a nuclear arsenal. The authors addressed what they perceived to be an imbalance in the study of nuclear security at the time. The imbalance they identified stemmed from a dominant focus on the doctrine of nuclear deterrence and the capabilities of nuclear weapons systems on one hand and a relative neglect of the process of managing the nuclear arsenals on the other. The authors believed this imbalance was both troubling and worthy of attention because they felt that overall security in the nuclear age of the time depended less on nuclear strategy and the capabilities of the weapons than on the effectiveness of human organizations to handle managerial problems that were more demanding and complex and with higher risks than any previously encountered. Their concern has been greatly magnified by the end of the Cold War and the challenges of dealing with the huge nuclear arsenal and nuclear complex of the former Soviet Union during the chaotic transition of governments in the 1990s.

This book takes a similar perspective, with a focus on the importance of effective policies, organizational systems, and procedures to provide nuclear security in the 21st century. It also stresses that these skills must be paired with innovative and reliable technologies to address a much broader range of nuclear security challenges than those prevailing during the Cold War period. Those challenges, which include preventing nuclear terrorism and expanding the use of nuclear energy while reducing the dangers of nuclear proliferation, demand the successful integration of effective policy and appropriate technology.

As Nuclear Safeguards, Security, and Nonproliferation: Achieving Security with Technology and Policy attempts to provide comprehensive coverage of the challenges of nuclear security today, it necessarily omits certain topics. Some topics, though vital to nuclear security in the traditional sense, did not fit with our focus on post-Cold War challenges. For example, we provide no detailed treatments of nuclear doctrine, deterrence, or force structure. Some other important topics were deemed too sensitive for treatment in the open literature. These include the specifics of nuclear weapons security, including unique physical protection methods or so-called "use control" features. These are aspects of a weapons design that prohibit any unauthorized party from gaining access to or detonating the weapons. Specific details of physical security measures taken during transportation of nuclear weapons or weapon-usable nuclear materials were also purposely omitted.

Finally, some topics were considered adequately covered in the existing literature and, hence, were described only briefly in the book. These include assessments of and recommendations for various government programs to improve nuclear materials security, such as the National Nuclear Security Administration's (NNSA) Nuclear Materials Protection, Control, and Accounting (MPC&A) program and the Second Line of Defense program. Similarly, historical treatments of traditional U.S.-Soviet and U.S.-Russian strategic nuclear arms control or speculation on what next steps, if any, might be taken along these lines are not included because several recent authoritative studies cover these subjects in depth.

Nuclear Security in the Twenty-First Century

A New Nuclear Age

Nuclear security during the Cold War was dominated by superpower confrontation and reliance on the strategy of classic nuclear deterrence. There is a large body of excellent studies and reports on these topics, issued over the full span of the atomic age. The focus of this book is on three interrelated objectives that we perceive as the major new nuclear security challenges in the post-Cold War and post-9/11 era:

1. The states that possess nuclear weapons, materials, and knowledge must effectively control and protect them from theft or misuse. Achieving this objective is imperative for all states that have developed nuclear weapons or nuclear energy. Loss of control of nuclear weapons or materials could cause international instability or conflict. All states are vulnerable to nuclear terrorism. The greatest challenge is that while huge quantities of nuclear weapons and materials have been produced across the globe for many years, the technical difficulties in securing them are not sufficiently appreciated and the resources and expertise for securing them have often been inadequate.

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Table of Contents

Preface (Michael Anastasio) Foreword (Sidney Drell) 1.Introduction to Nuclear Security Science – James Doyle Part One Technologies and Processes for the Protection, Control, and Accounting of Nuclear Material 2.Nuclear Safeguards and the Security of Nuclear Materials – Jim Tape, Joe Pilat 3.Nuclear Materials Measurements – Doug Reilly and Mark Abhold a.Measurement Technology – Doug Reilly b.Irradiated Fuel Measurements – Mark Abhold c.Measurement of Nuclear Material Process Holdup – Doug Reilly 4.Physical Protection - Mary Lynn Garcia, SNL 5.International Safeguards Inspection: An Inside Look at the Process – Brian Boyer, Mark Schanfein 6.International Atomic Energy Agency Unattended Monitoring Systems - Mark Schanfein 7.Evaluating International Safeguards Systems - Kory Budlong-Sylvester, Joe Pilat 8.Statistical Methods in Nuclear Nonproliferation Activities at Declared Facilities - Tom Burr 9.Case Study: Safeguards Implementation at the Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant – Susan Pickett 10.Case Study: Nonproliferation Activities at the BN-350 Reactor, Kazakhstan – Mike Browne Part Two Detecting Nuclear Proliferation and Verifying the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons Programs 11.Using Open Sources for Proliferation Analysis - Arvid Lundy, Rick Wallace 12.Commercial Satellite Imagery: Another Tool in the Nonproliferation Verification and Monitoring Tool-Kit - Frank Pabian 13.Nuclear Test Monitoring – Loren Byers 14.Evaluating Nonproliferation Bona Fides – Carol Kessler et. al. PNNL 15.Dismantling Nuclear Weapons Activities: Politics and Technology - James Doyle 16.South Africa - Sara Kutchesfahani and Marcie Lombardi 17.Argentina and Brazil – James Doyle 18.Libya - Wyn Bowen 19.Elimination of Excess Fissile Material – Charles Streeper and Elena Sokova 20.Case Study: Dismantlement and Radioactive Waste Management of DPRK Plutonium Facilities - George Baldwin Part Three Preventing Nuclear Terrorism and Illicit Nuclear Trade 21.Why We Need a Comprehensive Safeguards System to Keep Fissile Materials out of the Hands of Terrorists – Sigfried Hecker 22.Illicit Trafficking of Nuclear and Radiological Materials - Galya Balatsky, Stacey Eaton and William Severe 23.Nuclear Terrorism and Improvised Nuclear Devices - William Potter and Charles Ferguson 24.Radiological Dispersal Devices - Greg Van Tuyle and James Doyle 25.Responding to Radiological Threats - Lee Leonard 26.Field Detection of Nuclear Materials - Mark Abhold and Chris Lovejoy 27.A Model for Attribution of Terrorist Nuclear Attacks – William Charlton 28.Nonproliferation Export Controls - Carl Thorne 29.The Growing Role of Customs Organizations in International Strategic Trade Controls - Todd Perry 30.Case Study: The Khan Network - Sara Kutchesfahani

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Comprehensive reference on nuclear material security from the technology behind tracking, safeguarding, and transport to global non-proliferation issues.

Editorial Reviews

"A welcome addition to the literature on one of the greatest challenges of our time that looks at the conceptual and practical aspects of addressing those challenges from the perspective of both analysts and practitioners." —Lawrence Scheinman, Distinguished Professor James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies and Assistant Director of The U.S. Arms Control and Disaramament Agency during the Clinton Administration

From the Publisher