INNOVATIVE TOOLS APPLIED TO ENHANCED SAFEGUARDS APPROACHES AT CENTRIFUGE ENRICHMENT FACILITIES

ABACC has been involved in the application of safeguards to indigenous sensitive enrichment facilities since the start of its activities in 1994. The implementation of safeguards approaches for these centrifuge enrichment facilities were always guided by the necessity of reducing intrusiveness and by the protection of sensitive information which always were of great concerns to the Agencies and the Operator. Nevertheless, the approaches approved to be used shall be safeguards efficient and effective. In order to achieve these goals and considering that at the beginning the plants had small enrichment capacity, the approaches had a tendency to rely on significant inspection resources being man-power or facility equipment dedicated. The experience initially gained was very important and useful, and the approaches were implemented with priority on safeguards effectiveness. As far as the plant enrichment capacity increases the safeguards approach and measures must be updated in order to have an efficient and sound able scheme. Innovative safeguards tools were developed or the old ones were adapted, in order to cover the diversion scenarios on this new situation. New technology measures are also taking into consideration to improve the safeguards approach. This paper presents the tools used in the ABACC system enrichment facilities to maximize safeguards effectiveness taking into account the non-disclosure of sensitive information and the optimization of the inspection resources whenever the enrichment capacity is increased. Those elements include, among others, the random closing of the SWU and mass balance combined with operational declarations through mailbox; the unannounced access to the cascade hall strengthened by the use of surveillance on some strategic points; managed visual or surveillance access during DIVs and unannounced inspections; use of complementary conventional surveillance and containment on connected cylinders at the feed and withdraw stations and on potential feed points; and, swipe sampling. The paper addresses the benefits and difficulties of these tools when applied as verification measures to cover main diversion-misuse scenarios contemplated in the safeguards approach.