ON THE FEASIBILITY OF SAFEGUARDING URANIUM MINES

Abstract

This research report explains why safeguards on uranium-ore mines are a theoretically interesting way of dealing with clandestine enrichment facilities, complementing several nonproliferation schemes. A description of mining operations explains how safeguarding mines could fulfill two nonproliferation objectives: ensuring the non-diversion of uranium from mines, and establishing a certified inventory of uranium for use in follow-on material accounting. However, this report also finds that it is essentially impossible to detect undeclared mining, and that this fatal flaw eliminates the ability of safeguards on mines to be useful in addressing the clandestine enrichment problem.

Keywords:

• Safeguards
• Mines
• Uranium
• Ore

Notes

1. James Franck, Donald J. Hughes, J.J. Nickson, Eugene Rabinowitch, Glenn T. Seaborg, J.C. Stearns, and Leo Szilard, Report of the Committee on Political and Social Problems, Manhattan Project Metallurgical Laboratory (The Franck Report), University of Chicago, June 11, 1945, <http://www.dannen.com/decision/franck.html>.

2. Chester I. Barnard, J.R. Oppenheimer, Charles A. Thomas, Harry A. Winne, and David E. Lilienthal, A Report on the International Control of Atomic Energy prepared for the Secretary of States's Committee on Atomic Energy by a Board of Consultants, March 16, 1946, <http://www.learnworld.com/ZNW/LWText.Acheson-Lilienthal.html>.

3. See J. Doo, D. Hurt, R. Fagerholm, and N. Tuley, “Safeguards Approach for Natural Uranium Conversion Plants,” International Atomic Energy Agency, presented at the 44th Annual Meeting of the Institute for Nuclear Materials Management, July 13–17, 2003, Phoenix, Arizona, USA. For the definition of safeguard-qualifying material, see the IAEA Safeguards Agreement: The Structure and Content of Agreements Between the Agency and States Required in Connection with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, (INFCIRC/153) para. 34(c), International Atomic Energy Agency. This definition is not changed by the Additional Protocol, Model Protocol Additional to the Agreement Between State(s) and the International Atomic Energy Agency for the Application of Safeguards, Information Circular of the International Atomic Energy Agency (INFCIRC/540b).

4. At present there is no publicly known way of detecting centrifuges directly at significant distances. There may be ways to detect centrifuge plants if located within a few kilometers of the plant. There may also be ways to infer the existence of a centrifuge plant by the detection of related activities. However, none of the current proposals would be practical on a large scale and so could not be used as a general safeguards tool.

5. INFCIRC/153.

6. INFCIRC/153., para. 112; INFCIRC/540, Article 18.h.

7. INFCIRC/540, Article 2.a(vi).

8. INFCIRC/540, Article 2.a(v).

9. INFCIRC/540, Article 4.a.

10. Uranium Information Centre, Ltd. (UIC), “World Uranium Mining,” Nuclear Issues Briefing Paper, No. 41 (July 2006), Uranium Information Centre Ltd., Web Site, <www.uic.com.au/nip41.htm>.

11. UIC, “World Uranium Mining.”

12. NUKEM, “2004 World Natural Uranium Production” from RWE NUKEM Market Report Online: Data Feature, RWE NUKEM Corporation Web Site, <www.nukemonline.com>. See also UIC, “World Uranium Mining.”

13. T.C. Pool, “Primary and Secondary Uranium Supplies: Different Cost Structures, Different Goals” presented at the 22nd Annual International Symposium of the Uranium Institute, World Nuclear Association, London, Sept. 4–5, 1997, <www.world-nuclear.org/sym/1997/pool.htm>.

14. UIC, “World Uranium Mining.”

15. An excellent discussion the geology of ore bodies and the implications for mining can be found in Frank J. Rahn, Achilles G. Adamantiades, John E. Kenton, and Chaim Braun, A Guide to Nuclear Power Technology: A Resource for Decision Making (Malabar, FL: Krieger Publishing Company, 1992), pp. 135–160.

16. Except in the cases where natural uranium is used as reactor fuel, such as for CANDU-type reactors. For these reactors, purified yellowcake goes directly to a fuel fabrication facility.

17. It is important to note that the significant quantities used by the IAEA are contested. The Natural Resources Defense Council argues that as little as 2.5 kilograms (kg) of highly enriched uranium (HEU; one-tenth of the IAEA's value) could be used to make a low-yield bomb using a highly sophisticated bomb design. Even a Hiroshima-size bomb (15 kilotons) needs only about 14–15 kg of HEU when assembled with “low” technical sophistication. See Thomas B. Cochran and Christopher E. Paine, “The Amount of Plutonium and Highly-Enriched Uranium Needed for Pure Fission Nuclear Weapons,” Natural Resources Defense Council, revised April 13, 1995.

18. These ores can have veins that are much richer in uranium. In principle, a sophisticated diversion scheme could divert only rich veins, but as this case does not change this article's conclusions, it is not considered.

19. Corresponding to 0.2 percent and 0.3 percent tails-assay from an enrichment cascade. The extra feed required for the hold-up inventory is ignored.

20. K. Mayer and R. Wellum, “Sample Analysis Methods for Accountancy and Verification. A Compendium of Currently Applied Analytical Methods”, ESARDA Bulletin, No. 31 (April 2002), pp. 6–10.

21. See, for example, V. Bragin, J. Carlson, and R. Leslie, Implementation of the Additional Protocol: Verification Activities and Uranium Mines and Mills, Proceedings of the Symposium on International Safeguards: Verification and Nuclear Material Security Oct. 29–Nov. 2, 2001, Vienna. International Atomic Energy Agency document IAEA-SM-367/6/01/P.

22. Assuming that a light water reactor requires about 200 tons of unenriched uranium per gigawatt-year during its routine refueling process.

23. Using the real annualized cost of nuclear power for light-water-reactor production: 6.7¢ kilowatt hour, according to The Future of Nuclear Power: An Interdisciplinary MIT Study (Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2003), p. 7, <http://web.mit.edu/nuclearpower/>.

24. Typically done with sulfuric acid, the sulfate ion forming a complex with the oxidized uranium. In an alkaline rock matrix, uranium is oxidized with hydrogen peroxide, and carbonate is supplied as the complexing ion.

25. G.A. Borstad, et al., “Satellite Hyperspectral Imaging in Support of Nuclear Safeguards Monitoring,” presented at the 46 Annual Meeting of the Institute for Nuclear Materials Management, Phoenix Arizona, July 10–14, 2005. See also IAEA, Fourth Consolidated Report of the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency Under Paragraph 16 of UN Security Council Resolution 1051 (1996), <www.iaea.org/OurWork/SV/Invo/reports/s_1997_779.pdf>.

26. “Geology of Uranium Deposits,” Nuclear Issues Briefing Paper, No. 34 (Nov. 2001), <www.uic.com.au/nip34.htm>.

27. Peter Diehl, “Uranium Mine Ownership–Asia,” WISE Uranium Project Web Site, <www.wise-uranium.org/uoasi.html>.

28. Mark Hibbs, “Iran Can Produce Impure UF6, Trying to Solve Upstream Process Issues,” Nuclear Fuels (Aug. 2005). The conversion of uranium to UF6 is historically a process that leaks significant amounts of uranium into the atmosphere. Studies on detection of clandestine conversion plants are now underway at the IAEA and elsewhere.