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Newsletter:  Dec 2001/ Issue 1
Enhancing Transparency in Warhead Dismantlement

PNNL has been engaged in warhead dismantlement verification and transparency research for several years. The Lab’s support work in this area, in concert with US nuclear weapons design laboratories, includes cooperative technical information exchanges with Russian weapons specialists to develop physical monitoring technology. Most recently, this work has been conducted as part of the Lab-to-Lab Program on Warhead and Fissile Materials Transparency, under the auspices of the Warhead Safety and Security Exchange (WSSX) Agreement, signed by former Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin in 1994. WSSX is intended to promote the exchange of unclassified technical information relating to the safety and security of nuclear warheads and their components during dismantlement “through the exchange of accumulated experience.” The technical knowledge that is shared under WSSX is unclassified and parties may designate information as sensitive in accordance with domestic laws and practice.

In December 1997, PNNL signed contracts to conduct information exchanges under the Lab-to-Lab Program with the Institute of Automatics (VNIIA) in Moscow, the Institute of Technical Physics (VNIITF, formerly Chelyabinsk-70), and the Institute of Experimental Physics (VNIIEF, formerly Arzamas-16), the latter two of which were closed nuclear cities during the Soviet era and are now part of the Russian nuclear weapons complex. Collaborations are facilitated through periodic Joint Technical Interchange Meetings and US-Russian Work Reviews. PNNL-Russian collaboration focuses on information barriers, non-nuclear measurement technologies, nuclear archaeology and irreversibility.

Information Barriers are used with measurement/monitoring systems on sensitive items and materials to protect classified information while still providing an authentic measurement. These hardware and software barriers can be applied to devices such as gamma spectrometers to protect classified weapons design information by delivering a simplified response such as “yes” or “no.”

Non-Nuclear Measurement Technologies are being pursued to enhance transparency in warhead dismantlement by employing methods that are inherently faster and less intrusive than the use of ionizing radiation indicators. For example, thermal methods might be able to determine if containers hold heat-generating fissile materials by checking the temperature of the container’s exterior. PNNL researchers are investigating electromagnetic methods that might be able to provide unclassified, unique measurements of containerized components. Other methods, such as vibro-acoustic approaches being developed by Russian colleagues, might be able to determine whether containers are full or empty, similar or dissimilar.

Nuclear Archeology uses records, power production histories, analytical methods, and other tools to help validate plutonium and highly enriched uranium production levels declared by host countries. Analytical tools include the graphite isotope ratio method, originally developed by PNNL, which examines specific isotopic impurity ratios to determine the accuracy of plutonium production estimates in graphite-moderated reactors. If these tools were more fully developed and understood by Russian counterparts, they could help to verify complete production inventories.

Irreversibility processes ensure that weapons dismantlement and the cessation of weapons material production cannot be quickly or easily reversed to provide one weapons state with a strategic advantage over another. Measurements of physical parameters and administrative procedures (e.g., chain-of-custody procedures) can be used in this area. PNNL staff members have gained experience in this field through collaborations with US contractors during the irreversible dismantlement of production reactors and processing facilities at the US Department of Energy’s Hanford Site.

Dr. John L. Smoot, who manages the Lab-to-Lab exchange for PNNL, says that cooperation through the programs has been a real success. He also states, “If policy-makers in the Russian and US governments agree to nuclear warhead reductions, these technologies would be available to assist monitored warhead dismantlement transparency according to the provisions of future agreements.”

Last year, the US and Russia extended WSSX, originally a five-year agreement, through 2005. The exchanges under WSSX strengthen global security by reducing the nuclear threat and fostering US-Russian cooperation. Exchanges also contribute to the development of technologies to enable implementation and verification of future arms control agreements that could reduce US and Russian stockpiles to levels which, with the proper physical assurances, would prevent either country from having a strategic advantage over the other.