Year
2002
Abstract
While integrated safeguards is about effective safeguards with a maximum efficiency, the current safeguarding of COGEMA plutonium-handling facilities (La Hague reprocessing plant; Cadarache and MELOX MOX fuel fabrication plants) has been designed and is run in this very same objective. Effectiveness and efficiency shall benefit both the inspector and the operator. Analysing our experience led us to the following practical findings : - First, the utmost importance of inspectors who shall be knowledgeable of the plants and well informed on the specificity of those type of plants; this is clearly related to their continuous or nearly continuous presence on the site, allowing an intimate understanding of the facility, and a quick response to would-be anomalies. - Second, the value of the enhanced transparency of the operator, which agrees to supply a lot of daily information on material management and to make accessible to the inspectors some on-line data; those data must be treated automatically to help the inspector in its analysis; but the inspector retains the responsibility of making a judgement. - Third, the practicality of the \"unannounced factor\" in performing controls ; actual implementation can be effective and ways can be found to minimise interference with the plant operations. Combining those “qualitative” factors increases effectiveness and offers the possibility to reduce some costly “quantitative” measures such as sample taking or sample analysis. We trust that those principles can be implemented in any integrated safeguards framework.