Prospects for Spent Fuel Measurements Using High-Rate Germanium Detectors

The Department of Energy's Oce of International Safeguards Next Generation Safeguard Initiative (NGSI) Program includes an eort to determine the mass content ofssile isotopes contained within spent fuel through the spectroscopy of high-energy delayed gamma rays. The primary diculty in performing these measurements directly is the inability to detect the desired signal in the presence of the intense radiation background emitted from spent fuelssion products. A potential enabling technology for this application is the use of high- purity germanium (HPGe) detectors, which are capable of operating eciently at extremely high count rates. This paper describes the prospects of high-rate germanium detectors and delayed-gamma techniques, focusing on the eorts to merge these into a unique and viable system for measuring spent fuel.