U.S. And Colombia Radiological Security Cooperation: A Case Study In Successful Inter-governmental Collaboration

In 2013 the Ministry of Mines & Energy (MME) of Colombia and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) signed a Memorandum of Understanding making it possible to carry out many activities to provide Colombia with the tools to improve its systems for the safe and secure management of nuclear and radioactive materials. Under the framework of this partnership and through experience acquired through years of collaboration, Colombia has become a reference for radiological security throughout the Latin America region. These efforts have included physical protection upgrades to enhance security in approximately sixty-six facilities with Category 1 through Category 3 radioactive materials, many of which have begun sustaining these upgrades themselves. Multiple Colombian federal agencies and authorities, including the regulatory body (MME), have participated in workshops and training courses on security regulations development, fundamentals of physical security, response to material theft or sabotage, and transportation security. Through this international cooperation with DOE, MME and its licensees were able to improve the physical security of radioactive facilities in Colombia, promote a culture of safety and security, enhance the safe management of radioactive material, and reduce the number of dangerous radioactive sources within the country. MME, through national investment projects, developed and updated the regulatory framework for security of facilities. DOE and MME have also collaborated on secure transportation of radioactive materials with training and workshops. DOE provided a secure transport vehicle with a hardened container and enhanced security components to the Colombian Geological Service (SGC) to transport disused radioactive materials to the national waste repository. The collaboration in transportation security has culminated in Colombia co-hosting the 2021 Latin America Regional Workshop on Security in Transportation with DOE. Finally, MME and DOE also recently initiated collaboration to replace Colombia’s only cesium-based blood irradiator with an x-ray irradiator, further reducing the overall threat risk within the country. This is a first-of-its-kind collaboration in Latin America where the site is providing an in-kind contribution to this process by coordinating the return of the source to the supplier.