Security Economics - How Voluntary Standards Can Help

The potential benefits from the development of consensus standards in nuclear safety and security and then in voluntarily compliance with those standards could be significant. Those benefits can offset the cost of compliance. This paper describes how independently-certified compliance with such standards, based on existing international guidelines and agreed-on good practices, can help operators and other entities that manage nuclear materials and technologies prioritize their risk management decisions in areas of critical concern. Voluntary standards can also harmonize disparate international practices which are costly to industry. This paper summarizes our findings on ways to incentivize appropriate security measures based on two years of research, more than 200 interviews with nuclear industry stakeholders, and our analysis of other industries where voluntary standards stimulated the adoption of good practices. This Stimson Center research has been supported by the MacArthur Foundation, the US State Department Partnership for Nuclear Security and the Stanley Foundation.