US/RUSSIAN PROGRAM IN MATERIALS PROTECTION, CONTROL AND ACCOUNTING AT THE RRC KURCHATOV INSTITUTE: 1996-1997

Year
1997
Author(s)
John Smoot - Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Leslie G. Fishbone - Brookhaven National Laboratory
B. Siskind - Brookhaven National Laboratory
James E. Stewart - Los Alamos National Laboratory
T. E. Sampson - Los Alamos National Laboratory
P. Gary Eller - Los Alamos National Laboratory
James D. Williams - Sandia National Laboratories
Vladimir Sukhoruchkin - Kurchatov Institute
Rena Whiteson - Los Alarnos National Laboratory
P. Singh - Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Bradley Weil - Oak Ridge National Laboratory
John A. Blasy - Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Wayne Ruhter - Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
A.N. Roumiantsev - Kurchatov Institute
James R. Griggs - Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
L.E. Predika - Sandia National Laboratories
Sergei Antipov - Kurchatov Institute
Rob York - Los Alamos National Laboratory
Igor Bryagin - Kurchatov Institute
Richard R. Paternoster, - Los Alamos National Laboratory
Abstract
Six US Department of Energy Laboratories are carrying out a program of cooperation with the Russian Research Center Kurchatov Institute to improve nuclear material protection, control and accounting (MPC&A) at Kurchatov. In 1996 the primary thrust of this program was directed to the two buildings which constitute the Central Storage Facility (CSF). Substantial improvements in physical protection, upgrades in the physical inventory taking procedures, a test and evaluation of gamma-ray isotopic measurements, and evaluations of nuclear material portal monitors and neutron-based measurement equipment were carried out at this facility. The hardware for an improved computerized materials accounting system was installed at the CSF; the software for this system, named KI-MACS, has been developed at Kurchatov and the system has been fully integrated with the bar code printing and reading equipment, electronic scales, and nondestructive assay equipment provided under this program. Additional 1996 activities at Kurchatov included development of a tamper indicating device program, vulnerability assessments of several facilities, an integrated demonstration of the MPC&A improvements at the CSF, development of a new criticality measurements procedure, and the start of the development of accounting procedures for transfers of nuclear materials between material balance areas.