Future Roles of SSAC Inspections in the ROK

The role of verification for undeclared nuclear activities falls on to the IAEA’s mandate, but the role of member state which gives the supports for the IAEA cannot be ignored. Safeguards agreements provide for member states to report to the IAEA on their nuclear facilities and holdings of nuclear material, and for IAEA inspectors to verify the correctness and completeness of the member states’ reports. Under the terms of the agreements, member states must establish SSAC (State system for accounting and control of nuclear material). The SSAC Guidelines describes that a SSAC may have two objectives: a national objective for accounting and control of nuclear material, an international objective for providing the essential basis for IAEA safeguards application. The ROK has somewhat different and unique SSAC from other countries, which comprises physical protection and export control functions, which can be interpreted as somewhat extended concept than the national objective is being applied. The ROK has been being performed its own inspections since 1997, which is independent from the IAEA’s. These efforts are surely helpful to enhance the nuclear transparency but the methods and procedures are nearly identical with the IAEA’s. This situation can be misinterpreted as a kind of “double regulation,” so there must be some necessity to establish the philosophical backgrounds and prepare clear purposes of independent national inspection, which also help raise the usability of the inspection data. There are various types of nuclear facilities in Korea, including nuclear fuel fabrication plant, light water reactors, on-line refueling reactors, and nuclear research facilities as well, so it needs to prepare pertinent procedures for inspection, considering the characteristics of each facility. It is highly required to improve the procedure of transfer campaign in on-line reactors which requires more than 50% of national inspection resources on annual base. In this paper, the current situation of the ROK’s national inspection is reviewed and the ideas for improvement are presented.