Year
2008
Abstract
In April 2005, the United States Department of Energy (DOE) and the Brazilian-Argentine Agency for Accounting and Control of Nuclear Materials (ABACC) signed an action sheet entitled “Cooperation on Nondestructive Assay Isotopics/Enrichment Measurement Systems,” commonly referred to as Action Sheet 14 (AS-14). The purpose of AS-14 is to test and evaluate software codes used by ABACC to verify enriched uranium at facilities in Argentina and Brazil. The two agencies agreed to collaborate on the project in response to inconsistencies in the types of hardware and types and versions of software used to determine the isotopic abundances for uranium and plutonium. The project is significant because it provides a regional forum for technical experts to evaluate and understand the application and limitations of these codes when used as a verification tool. The cooperative effort also identifies a set of recommendations for code developers that will improve the application of these codes by safeguards inspectors in the field. DOE and ABACC initiated the project by establishing an Isotopics Measurements Working Group (IMWG). This working group developed a defined test plan to evaluate and compare uranium enrichment codes commonly used by international safeguards inspectors. Several codes that use the enrichment meter, peak fitting, and peak ratio methods were evaluated for the uranium enrichment technique. The IMWG collected more than 7500 spectra during the study. These spectra were used to analyze and compare software performance. This paper discusses results obtained by the IMWG. It provides an overview of the final report with details on the methods and procedures used for testing and evaluating the performance of various software packages and recommendations for standardization and improvements of analysis methods and algorithms. Technical personnel from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) were invited to participate as observers in the study. Their participation and the success of the cooperative effort between DOE and ABACC resulted in expanding this regional working group to a more international forum to develop a standard test method for new or revised codes and to address issues related to sustainability and version control for the codes.