Year
2001
Abstract
This project of the Stanford Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) is intended (1) to gain better information about actual national physical protection practices and why they are the way they are; (2) to help improve training for those responsible for physical protection; (3) to help develop physical protection demonstration techniques useful for such training, including a Virtual Walk-through Facility – a three-dimensional, computer based, simulation which models physical protection for a nuclear facility containing nuclear material. Past Stanford CISAC research showed that domestic physical protection practices varied widely from country to country. Many reasons were given, including the differences from country to country in national laws and regulations. These differences were probably related to the lack of any internationally required standards for domestic practices. This lack may disappear if current efforts to amend the Convention on Physical Protection of Nuclear Material are successful. That could strengthen national practices and perhaps help to deal with the other reasons for differences in those practices. New Stanford research seeks responses to confidential questionnaires to gain more information on practices. The research will also attempt to respond to the recent recommendations of the experts from many countries who have been meeting at the IAEA. They have recommended, among other things, that training in physical protection be strengthened. Among other things, these recommendations suggest the development of a one-day training workshop for policymakers/ managers -- the people who often make decisions about the degree of security to be provided for nuclear material, how much money should be spent for it, and what threats security personnel should be trained to meet. In addition, the project has continued the effort to design a training “computer game” to demonstrate physical protection of weapons-usable material against attacks by thieves or terrorists.