Nuclear Nonproliferation
U.S. Agencies Have Limited Ability to Account for, Monitor, and Evaluate the Security of U.S. Nuclear Material Overseas Gao ID: GAO-11-920 September 8, 2011In Process
DOE, NRC, and State are not able to fully account for U.S. nuclear material overseas that is subject to nuclear cooperation agreement terms because the agreements do not stipulate systematic reporting of such information, and there is no U.S. policy to pursue or obtain such information. U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements generally require that partners report inventory information upon request, however, DOE and NRC have not systematically sought such data. DOE and NRC do not have a comprehensive, detailed, current inventory of U.S. nuclear material--including weapon-usable material such as highly enriched uranium (HEU) and separated plutonium--overseas that includes the country, facility, and quantity of material. In addition, NRC and DOE could not fully account for the current location and disposition of U.S. HEU overseas in response to a 1992 congressional mandate. U.S. agencies, in a 1993 report produced in response to the mandate, were able to verify the location of 1,160 kilograms out of 17,500 kilograms of U.S. HEU estimated to have been exported. DOE, NRC, and State have established annual inventory reconciliations with five U.S. partners, but not the others it has transferred material to or trades with. Nuclear cooperation agreements do not contain specific access rights that enable DOE, NRC, or State to monitor and evaluate the physical security of U.S. nuclear material overseas, and the United States relies on its partners to maintain adequate security. In the absence of access rights, DOE's Office of Nonproliferation and International Security, NRC, and State have conducted physical protection visits to monitor and evaluate the physical security of U.S. nuclear material at facilities overseas when permitted. However, the agencies have not systematically visited countries believed to be holding the highest proliferation risk quantities of U.S. nuclear material, or systematically revisited facilities not meeting international physical security guidelines in a timely manner. Of the 55 visits made from 1994 through 2010, U.S. teams found that countries met international security guidelines approximately 50 percent of the time. DOE has taken steps to improve security at a number of facilities overseas that hold U.S. nuclear material but faces constraints. DOE's Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI) removes U.S. nuclear material from vulnerable facilities overseas but can only bring back materials that have an approved disposition pathway and meet the program's eligibility criteria. GTRI officials told GAO that, of the approximately 17,500 kilograms of HEU exported from the United States, 12,400 kilograms are currently not eligible for return to the United States. Specifically, GTRI reported that over 10,000 kilograms of U.S. HEU are believed to be in fuels from reactors in Germany, France, and Japan that have no disposition pathways in the United States and are adequately protected. In addition, according to GTRI, 2,000 kilograms of transferred U.S. HEU are located primarily in European Atomic Energy Community countries and are currently in use or adequately protected. GAO suggests, among other things, that Congress consider directing DOE and NRC to compile an inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas. DOE, NRC, and State generally disagreed with GAO's recommendations, including that they conduct annual inventory reconciliations with all partners, stating they were unnecessary. GAO continues to believe that its recommendations could help improve the accountability of U.S. nuclear material in foreign countries.
RecommendationsOur recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.
Director: Eugene E. Aloise Team: Government Accountability Office: Natural Resources and Environment Phone: (202) 512-6870GAO-11-920, Nuclear Nonproliferation: U.S. Agencies Have Limited Ability to Account for, Monitor, and Evaluate the Security of U.S. Nuclear Material Overseas
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United States Government Accountability Office:
GAO:
Report to the Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives:
September 2011:
Nuclear Nonproliferation:
U.S. Agencies Have Limited Ability to Account for, Monitor, and
Evaluate the Security of U.S. Nuclear Material Overseas:
GAO-11-920:
GAO Highlights:
Highlights of GAO-11-920, a report to the Committee on Foreign
Affairs, House of Representatives.
Why GAO Did This Study:
The United States has exported special nuclear material, including
enriched uranium, and source material such as natural uranium under
nuclear cooperation agreements. The United States has 27 nuclear
cooperation agreements for peaceful civilian cooperation. Under the
U.S. Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (AEA), as amended, partners are
required to guarantee the physical protection of U.S. nuclear
material. GAO was asked to (1) assess U.S. agency efforts to account
for U.S. nuclear material overseas, (2) assess the Department of
Energy‘s (DOE) and U.S. agencies‘ efforts to evaluate the security of
U.S. material overseas, and (3) describe DOE‘s activities to secure or
remove potentially vulnerable U.S. nuclear material at partner
facilities. GAO analyzed agency records and interviewed DOE, Nuclear
Regulatory Commission (NRC), Department of State (State), and partner
country officials. This report summarizes GAO‘s classified report
issued in June 2011.
What GAO Found:
DOE, NRC, and State are not able to fully account for U.S. nuclear
material overseas that is subject to nuclear cooperation agreement
terms because the agreements do not stipulate systematic reporting of
such information, and there is no U.S. policy to pursue or obtain such
information. U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements generally require
that partners report inventory information upon request, however, DOE
and NRC have not systematically sought such data. DOE and NRC do not
have a comprehensive, detailed, current inventory of U.S. nuclear
material”-including weapon-usable material such as highly enriched
uranium (HEU) and separated plutonium-”overseas that includes the
country, facility, and quantity of material. In addition, NRC and DOE
could not fully account for the current location and disposition of
U.S. HEU overseas in response to a 1992 congressional mandate. U.S.
agencies, in a 1993 report produced in response to the mandate, were
able to verify the location of 1,160 kilograms out of 17,500 kilograms
of U.S. HEU estimated to have been exported. DOE, NRC, and State have
established annual inventory reconciliations with five U.S. partners,
but not the others it has transferred material to or trades with.
Nuclear cooperation agreements do not contain specific access rights
that enable DOE, NRC, or State to monitor and evaluate the physical
security of U.S. nuclear material overseas, and the United States
relies on its partners to maintain adequate security. In the absence
of access rights, DOE‘s Office of Nonproliferation and International
Security, NRC, and State have conducted physical protection visits to
monitor and evaluate the physical security of U.S. nuclear material at
facilities overseas when permitted. However, the agencies have not
systematically visited countries believed to be holding the highest
proliferation risk quantities of U.S. nuclear material, or
systematically revisited facilities not meeting international physical
security guidelines in a timely manner. Of the 55 visits made from
1994 through 2010, U.S. teams found that countries met international
security guidelines approximately 50 percent of the time.
DOE has taken steps to improve security at a number of facilities
overseas that hold U.S. nuclear material but faces constraints. DOE‘s
Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI) removes U.S. nuclear
material from vulnerable facilities overseas but can only bring back
materials that have an approved disposition pathway and meet the
program‘s eligibility criteria. GTRI officials told GAO that, of the
approximately 17,500 kilograms of HEU exported from the United States,
12,400 kilograms are currently not eligible for return to the United
States. Specifically, GTRI reported that over 10,000 kilograms of U.S.
HEU are believed to be in fuels from reactors in Germany, France, and
Japan that have no disposition pathways in the United States and are
adequately protected. In addition, according to GTRI, 2,000 kilograms
of transferred U.S. HEU are located primarily in European Atomic
Energy Community countries and are currently in use or adequately
protected.
What GAO Recommends:
GAO suggests, among other things, that Congress consider directing DOE
and NRC to compile an inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas.
DOE, NRC, and State generally disagreed with GAO‘s recommendations,
including that they conduct annual inventory reconciliations with all
partners, stating they were unnecessary. GAO continues to believe that
its recommendations could help improve the accountability of U.S.
nuclear material in foreign countries.
View [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-920]. For more
information, contact Gene Aloise at (202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov.
[End of section]
Contents:
Letter:
Background:
DOE, NRC, and State Are Not Able to Fully Account for U.S. Nuclear
Material Located at Foreign Facilities:
DOE, NRC, and State Do Not Have Access Rights to Monitor and Evaluate
That U.S. Nuclear Material Located at Foreign Facilities Is Adequately
Protected:
DOE Seeks to Increase Security or Remove Vulnerable U.S. Nuclear
Material at Partner Facilities but Faces Challenges:
Conclusions:
Matters for Congressional Consideration:
Recommendations for Executive Action:
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology:
Appendix II: Current and Previous U.S. Nuclear Cooperation Agreement
Partners:
Appendix III: International Guidelines for the Categorization of
Nuclear Material:
Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Energy:
Appendix V: Comments from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission:
Appendix VI: Comments from the Department of State:
Appendix VII: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments:
Table:
Table 1: Categorization of Nuclear Material According to IAEA Security
Guidelines:
Figure:
Figure 1: Cooperating Partners with Which the United States Currently
Has or Previously Had a Nuclear Cooperation Agreement:
Abbreviations:
AEA: Atomic Energy Act:
DOE: Department of Energy:
EURATOM: European Atomic Energy Community:
GTRI: Global Threat Reduction Initiative:
HEU: highly enriched uranium:
IAEA: International Atomic Energy Agency:
IPPAS: International Physical Protection Advisory Service:
LEU: low enriched uranium:
NMMSS: Nuclear Materials Management and Safeguards System:
NNPA: Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978:
NNSA: National Nuclear Security Administration:
NPT: Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty:
NRC: Nuclear Regulatory Commission:
NSC National Security Council:
NSG: Nuclear Suppliers Group:
SILEX: Separation of Isotopes by Laser Excitation:
TRIGA: Training Research Isotope General Atomics:
[End of section]
United States Government Accountability Office:
Washington, DC 20548:
September 8, 2011:
The Honorable Ileana Ros-Lehtinen:
Chairman:
The Honorable Howard L. Berman:
Ranking Member:
Committee on Foreign Affairs:
House of Representatives:
The United States has 27 nuclear cooperation agreements in force for
peaceful civilian cooperation with partners including foreign
countries, the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM), the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and Taiwan.[Footnote 1] A
nuclear cooperation agreement is a bilateral agreement that
establishes the legal framework for significant civilian nuclear
cooperation between the United States and other parties, including the
transfer of certain nuclear material, including special nuclear
material such as enriched uranium,[Footnote 2] and source material
such as natural uranium, nuclear reactors, and certain components of
nuclear reactors.[Footnote 3] The agreements are reciprocal, with both
parties generally agreeing to all conditions specified in them. Under
the U.S. Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (AEA), as amended, these agreements
must contain certain obligations that govern, among other things, the
U.S. rights of approval over the transfer, retransfer, enrichment, and
reprocessing of certain kinds of nuclear material transferred from the
United States and, in some cases produced overseas. A list of current
and former U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement partners can be found in
appendix II.
Thousands of kilograms of U.S. highly enriched uranium (HEU) and tens
of thousands of kilograms of U.S. plutonium in spent fuel have
accumulated overseas, as a result of foreign nuclear research and
commercial nuclear power activities, which are subject to the terms in
U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements. Inventories of U.S. nuclear
material overseas could continue to grow as the result of reprocessing
or recovery activities.[Footnote 4] As we have previously reported,
tracking and accounting for nuclear materials are important to (1)
ensure that nuclear materials are used only for peaceful purposes, (2)
comply with international treaty obligations, and (3) provide data to
policymakers and other government officials. According to DOE and NRC
officials, the United States obtains written assurances from partners
in advance of each transfer of U.S.-obligated nuclear material that
commits the partner to treat the transferred nuclear material
according to the terms of its nuclear cooperation agreement with the
United States. Nuclear material transferred from the United States, as
well as special nuclear material produced overseas through the use of
U.S.-supplied nuclear material or reactors, is known as "U.S.-
obligated" material.
As the technology to design and create nuclear weapons has spread, one
of the most serious threats facing the United States and other
countries is the possibility that a nation or terrorist organization
could steal weapon-usable nuclear materials from poorly secured
stockpiles in various locations around the world.[Footnote 5] In April
2009, President Obama made securing all vulnerable nuclear material
worldwide within the next 4 years a key U.S. nonproliferation goal,
[Footnote 6] and the Department of Energy (DOE) has stated that doing
so will require greater security cooperation with key countries;
pursuing new partnerships to secure nuclear material; and
strengthening nuclear security standards, practices, and international
safeguards.
Securing nuclear material worldwide is a priority for DOE, through its
National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA),[Footnote 7] which, as
one of its core mission areas, aims to keep dangerous nuclear
materials out of the hands of terrorists by securing nuclear weapons
and nuclear materials at their source and by improving security
practices around the world. In particular, two key DOE NNSA offices
work with U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement partners to strengthen
nuclear security practices and identify and secure vulnerable nuclear
materials. First, DOE's Office of Nonproliferation and International
Security works with countries to ensure that provisions in the
agreements are met by, among other things, providing physical
protection training, assessment, and guidance on a bilateral basis,
and leading U.S. interagency physical protection visits to countries
with U.S. nuclear material. Second, DOE's Office of Global Threat
Reduction implements the Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI)
and, among other things, identifies, secures, removes, and/or
facilitates the disposition of high-risk, vulnerable nuclear and
radiological material at civilian sites around the world that pose a
threat.
In November 2010, we reported on the export benefits facilitated by
U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements.[Footnote 8] In light of the
quantities of nuclear material exported overseas under the framework
of U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements, you asked us to also report on
how U.S. agencies account for nuclear material overseas and monitor
and evaluate the materials' physical security. Specifically, our
objectives were to: (1) assess U.S. agency efforts to account for U.S.
nuclear material overseas, (2) assess DOE's and other U.S. agencies'
efforts to monitor and evaluate the physical security conditions of
U.S. nuclear material subject to the terms of nuclear cooperation
agreements, and (3) describe DOE's activities to secure or remove
potentially vulnerable U.S. nuclear material at partner facilities. In
June 2011, we reported to you on the results of our work in a
classified report. This report summarizes certain aspects of our
classified report.
To conduct this work, we reviewed relevant statutes, including the
AEA, as amended, and the texts of all current U.S. nuclear cooperation
agreements. We obtained data from the Nuclear Materials Management and
Safeguards System (NMMSS), a database jointly operated by DOE and the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). This database, among other
things, maintains data on U.S. peaceful use exports and retransfers of
enriched uranium and plutonium that have occurred since 1950. To
assess the reliability of data in NMMSS, we interviewed officials from
DOE and NRC and a former DOE contractor to identify any limitations in
NMMSS's data on the location and status of U.S. material overseas and
found these data to be sufficiently reliable for the purposes of
accounting for U.S. exports of nuclear material. We also compared
NMMSS data with other sources of information regarding U.S. nuclear
material transfers, including DOE data on nuclear material returns. We
reviewed DOE, NRC, and Department of State (State) records and
interviewed officials at those agencies to determine the extent to
which DOE, NRC, and State are able to identify where U.S. nuclear
material was exported, retransferred, and is currently held. We
selected a non-probability sample of partners based on, among other
considerations, quantities of U.S. special nuclear material
transferred to them.[Footnote 9] We conducted site visits in four
countries that currently hold U.S.-obligated nuclear material and
interviewed governmental officials and nuclear facility operators in
these countries to discuss material accounting procedures and observe
physical protection measures. Further, we interviewed officials from
several other partners regarding their observations about working with
the U.S. government to account for material subject to the terms of
nuclear cooperation agreements. We reviewed IAEA's security
guidelines, "The Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and Nuclear
Facilities," INFCIRC/225/Rev.4,[Footnote 10] and relevant
international treaties. We also obtained and analyzed available
records of U.S. physical protection visits to partner facilities from
1974 through 2010. We reviewed agency documents and interviewed
officials from DOE, NRC, and State to determine the process used for
conducting physical protection visits at partner facilities. We
obtained information from GTRI regarding its program's activities. We
interviewed IAEA officials and reviewed relevant documents to better
understand IAEA's role in maintaining safeguards and evaluating
physical security measures. Additional details on our scope and
methodology can be found in appendix I.
We conducted this performance audit from September 2010 to June 2011
in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.
Background:
The AEA, as amended, sets forth the procedures and requirements for
the U.S. government's negotiating, proposing, and entering into
nuclear cooperation agreements with foreign partners. The AEA, as
amended, requires that U.S. peaceful nuclear cooperation agreements
contain the following nine provisions:[Footnote 11]
1. Safeguards: Safeguards, as agreed to by the parties, are to be
maintained over all nuclear material and equipment transferred, and
all special nuclear material used in or produced through the use of
such nuclear material and equipment, as long as the material or
equipment remains under the jurisdiction or control of the cooperating
party, irrespective of the duration of other provisions in the
agreement or whether the agreement is terminated or suspended for any
reason. Such safeguards are known as "safeguards in perpetuity."
2. Full-scope IAEA safeguards as a condition of supply: In the case of
non-nuclear weapons states, continued U.S. nuclear supply is to be
conditioned on the maintenance of IAEA "full-scope" safeguards over
all nuclear materials in all peaceful nuclear activities within the
territory, under the jurisdiction, or subject to the control of the
cooperating party.[Footnote 12]
3. Peaceful use guaranty: The cooperating party must guarantee that it
will not use the transferred nuclear materials, equipment, or
sensitive nuclear technology, or any special nuclear material produced
through the use of such, for any nuclear explosive device, for
research on or development of any nuclear explosive device, or for any
other military purpose.
4. Right to require return: An agreement with a non-nuclear weapon
state must stipulate that the United States has the right to require
the return of any transferred nuclear materials and equipment, and any
special nuclear material produced through the use thereof, if the
cooperating party detonates a nuclear device, or terminates or
abrogates an agreement providing for IAEA safeguards.
5. Physical security: The cooperating party must guarantee that it
will maintain adequate physical security for transferred nuclear
material and any special nuclear material used in or produced through
the use of any material, or production or utilization facilities
transferred pursuant to the agreement.[Footnote 13]
6. Retransfer rights: The cooperating party must guarantee that it
will not transfer any material, Restricted Data, or any production or
utilization facility transferred pursuant to the agreement, or any
special nuclear material subsequently produced through the use of any
such transferred material, or facilities, to unauthorized persons or
beyond its jurisdiction or control, without the consent of the United
States.
7. Restrictions on enrichment or reprocessing of U.S.-obligated
material: The cooperating party must guarantee that no material
transferred, or used in, or produced through the use of transferred
material or production or utilization facilities, will be reprocessed
or enriched, or with respect to plutonium, uranium-233, HEU, or
irradiated nuclear materials, otherwise altered in form or content
without the prior approval of the United States.
8. Storage facility approval: The cooperating party must guarantee not
to store any plutonium, uranium-233, or HEU that was transferred
pursuant to a cooperation agreement, or recovered from any source or
special nuclear material transferred, or from any source or special
nuclear material used in a production facility or utilization facility
transferred pursuant to the cooperation agreement, in a facility that
has not been approved in advance by the United States.
9. Additional restrictions: The cooperating party must guarantee that
any special nuclear material, production facility, or utilization
facility produced or constructed under the jurisdiction of the
cooperating party by or through the use of transferred sensitive
nuclear technology, will be subject to all the requirements listed
above.
In addition, the United States is a party to the Treaty on the Non-
Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). The NPT binds each of the
treaty's signatory states that had not manufactured and exploded a
nuclear weapon or other nuclear explosive device prior to January 1,
1967 (referred to as non-nuclear weapon states) to accept safeguards
as set forth in an agreement to be concluded with IAEA. Under the
safeguards system, IAEA, among other things, inspects facilities and
locations containing nuclear material, as declared by each country, to
verify its peaceful use. IAEA standards for safeguards agreements
provide that the agreements should commit parties to establish and
maintain a system of accounting for nuclear material, with a view to
preventing diversion of nuclear energy from peaceful uses, and
reporting certain data to IAEA.
IAEA's security guidelines provide the basis by which the United
States and other countries generally classify the categories of
protection that should be afforded nuclear material, based on the
type, quantity, and enrichment of the nuclear material. For example,
Category I material is defined as 2 kilograms or more of unirradiated
or "separated" plutonium or 5 kilograms of uranium-235 contained in
unirradiated or "fresh" HEU and has the most stringent set of
recommended physical protection measures. The recommended physical
protection measures for Category II and Category III nuclear materials
are less stringent. Appendix III contains further details on the
categorization of nuclear material.
DOE, NRC, and State Are Not Able to Fully Account for U.S. Nuclear
Material Located at Foreign Facilities:
DOE, NRC, and State are not able to fully account for U.S. nuclear
material overseas that is subject to nuclear cooperation agreement
terms because the agreements do not stipulate systematic reporting of
such information, and there is no U.S. policy to pursue or obtain such
information. Section 123 of the AEA, as amended, does not require
nuclear cooperation agreements to contain provisions stipulating that
partners report information on the amount, status, or location
(facility) of special nuclear material subject to the agreement terms.
However, U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements generally require that
partners report inventory information upon request, although DOE and
NRC have not systematically sought such data. We requested from
multiple offices at DOE and NRC a current and comprehensive inventory
of U.S. nuclear material overseas, to include country, site, or
facility, and whether the quantity of material was rated as Category I
or Category II material. However, neither agency has provided such an
inventory. NMMSS does not contain the data necessary to maintain an
inventory of U.S. special nuclear material overseas. DOE, NRC, and
State have not pursued annual inventory reconciliations of nuclear
material subject to U.S. cooperation agreement terms with all foreign
partners that would provide the U.S. government with better
information about where such material is held. Furthermore, according
to DOE, NRC, and State officials, no U.S. law or policy directs U.S.
agencies to obtain information regarding the location and disposition
of U.S. nuclear material at foreign facilities.
U.S. Nuclear Cooperation Agreements Generally Require That Partners
Report Inventory Information upon Request, but DOE and NRC Have Not
Systematically Sought Such Data:
Section 123 of the AEA, as amended, does not require nuclear
cooperation agreements to contain provisions stipulating that partners
report information on the amount, status, or location (facility) of
special nuclear material subject to the agreement terms. However, the
texts of most U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements contain a provision
calling for each partner to maintain a system of material accounting
and control and to do so consistent with IAEA safeguards standards or
agreements.[Footnote 14] In addition, we found that all agreements,
except three negotiated prior to 1978 and the U.S.-China agreement,
contain a provision that the other party shall report, or shall
authorize the IAEA to report, inventory information upon request.
However, according to DOE and NRC officials, with the exception of the
administrative arrangements with five partners, the United States has
not requested such information from all partners on an annual or
systematic basis.
Nonetheless, the AEA requires U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements to
include terms that, among other things, obligate partners to obtain
U.S. approval for the transfer, retransfer, enrichment and
reprocessing, and the storage of U.S.-obligated uranium-233, HEU, or
other nuclear materials that have been irradiated. In addition,
according to DOE and NRC officials, the United States obtains written
assurances from partners in advance of each transfer of U.S. nuclear
material that commits them to maintain the transferred nuclear
material according to the terms of its nuclear cooperation agreement
with the United States. DOE and NRC officials told us these assurances
help the United States ensure that partner countries comply with the
terms of the nuclear cooperation agreement.
In addition, IAEA, DOE, NRC, and State officials told us that IAEA's
safeguards activities provide a level of assurance that nuclear
material is accounted for at partner facilities. The safeguards
system, which has been a cornerstone of U.S. efforts to prevent
nuclear proliferation, allows IAEA to independently verify that non-
nuclear weapons states that signed the NPT are complying with its
requirements. Under the safeguards system, IAEA, among other things,
inspects facilities and locations containing nuclear material declared
by countries to verify its peaceful use. Inspectors from IAEA's
Department of Safeguards verify that the quantities of nuclear
material that these non-nuclear weapons states declared to IAEA are
not diverted for other uses. IAEA considers such information
confidential and does not share it with its member states, including
the United States, unless the parties have agreed that IAEA can share
the information.
IAEA's inspectors do not verify nuclear material by country of origin
or associated obligation. DOE, State, and IAEA officials told us that,
because IAEA does not track the obligation of the material under
safeguards, IAEA may notice discrepancies in nuclear material balances
through periodic reviews of countries' shipping records. However,
these officials said that IAEA does not have the ability to identify
whether and what volume of nuclear material at partner country
facilities is U.S.-obligated and therefore subject to the terms of
U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements.
DOE and NRC Do Not Have a Current Comprehensive Inventory of U.S.
Material Overseas:
DOE and NRC do not have a comprehensive, detailed, current inventory
of U.S. nuclear material overseas that would enable the United States
to identify material subject to U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement
terms. We requested from multiple offices at DOE and NRC a current and
comprehensive inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas, to include
country, site, or facility, and whether the quantity of material was
Category I or Category II. However, the agencies have not provided
such a list. DOE officials from the Office of Nonproliferation and
International Security told us that they have multiple mechanisms to
account for the amount of U.S.-obligated nuclear material at foreign
facilities. They stated that they use NMMSS records to obtain
information regarding U.S. nuclear material inventories held in other
countries. However, NMMSS officials told us that NMMSS was an accurate
record of material exports from the United States, but that it should
not be used to estimate current inventories. In addition, NMMSS
officials stated that DOE's GTRI program has good data regarding the
location of U.S. nuclear material overseas and that this information
should be reconciled with NMMSS data. However, when we requested
information regarding the amount of U.S. material at partner
facilities, GTRI stated that they could not report on the amount of
U.S. nuclear material remaining at facilities unless it was scheduled
for GTRI to return. In addition, in February 2011 written comments to
us, GTRI stated it was not responsible for acquiring or maintaining
inventory information regarding U.S. nuclear material overseas. A long-
time contract employee for DOE's Office of Nonproliferation and
International Security stated he has tried to collect information
regarding U.S. nuclear material overseas from various sources
including a list of countries eligible for GTRI's fuel return program,
NMMSS, and other sources, but it is not possible to reconcile
information from the various lists and sources and consequently there
is no list of U.S. inventories overseas.
According to public information, the United States has additional
measures known as administrative arrangements with five of its trading
partners to conduct annual reconciliations of nuclear material
amounts. In addition, for all partners, DOE and NRC officials told us
that an exchange of diplomatic notes is sent prior to any transfer to
ensure that U.S. nuclear material is not diverted for non-peaceful
purposes, and which binds the partner to comply with the terms of the
nuclear cooperation agreement. However, the measures cited by DOE are
not comprehensive or sufficiently detailed to provide the specific
location of U.S. nuclear material overseas.
NRC and DOE could not fully account for U.S. exports of HEU in
response to a congressional mandate that the agencies report on the
current location and disposition of U.S. HEU overseas. In 1992,
Congress mandated that NRC,[Footnote 15] in consultation with other
relevant agencies, submit to Congress a report detailing the current
status of previous U.S. exports of HEU, including its location,
disposition (status), and how it had been used. The January 1993
report that NRC produced in response to the mandate stated it was not
possible to reconcile this information from available U.S. sources of
data with all foreign holders of U.S. HEU within the 90-day period
specified in the act.[Footnote 16] The report further states that a
thorough reconciliation of U.S and foreign records with respect to end
use could require several months of additional effort, assuming that
EURATOM would agree to participate. According to DOE and NRC
officials, no further update to the report was issued, and the U.S.
government has not subsequently attempted to develop such a
comprehensive estimate of the location and status of U.S. HEU overseas.
The 1993 report provided estimated material balances based on the
transfer, receipt, or other adjustments reported to the NMMSS and
other U.S. agencies. The report stated that the estimated material
balances should match partners' reported inventories. However, the
report did not compare the balances or explain the differences.
Our analysis of other documentation associated with the report shows
that NRC, in consultation with U.S. agencies, was able to verify the
location of 1,160 kilograms out of an estimated 17,500 kilograms of
U.S. HEU remaining overseas as of January 1993. NRC's estimates
matched partner estimates in 22 cases; did not match partner estimates
in 6 cases; and, in 8 cases, partners did not respond in time to NRC's
request.
The 1993 report noted that, in cases where U.S. estimates did not
match partners' inventory reports, "reconciliation efforts are
underway." However, DOE, NRC, and NMMSS officials told us that no
further report was issued. In addition, NMMSS officials told us that
they were unaware of any subsequent efforts to reconcile U.S.
estimates with partners' reports, or update the January 1993 report.
In addition, we found no indication that DOE, NMMSS, or NRC officials
have updated the January 1993 report, or undertaken a comprehensive
accounting of U.S. nuclear material overseas.
NMMSS Does Not Contain Data Necessary to Identify Where U.S. Material
Is Located Overseas:
We found that NMMSS does not contain the data necessary to maintain an
inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas subject to U.S. nuclear
cooperation agreements. According to NRC documents, NMMSS is part of
an overall program to help satisfy the United States' accounting,
controlling, and reporting obligations to IAEA and its nuclear trading
partners. NMMSS, the official central repository of information on
domestic inventories and exports of U.S. nuclear material, contains
current and historic data on the possession, use, and shipment of
nuclear material. It includes data on U.S.-supplied nuclear material
transactions with other countries and international organizations,
foreign contracts, import/export licenses, government-to-government
approvals, and other DOE authorizations such as authorizations to
retransfer U.S. nuclear material between foreign countries.[Footnote
17] DOE and NRC officials told us that NMMSS contains the best
available information regarding U.S. exports and retransfers of
special nuclear material.
DOE and NRC do not collect data necessary for NMMSS to keep an
accurate inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas. According to NRC
officials, NMMSS cannot track U.S. nuclear material overseas because
data regarding the current location and status of U.S. nuclear
material, such as irradiation, decay, burn up, or production, are not
collected. NMMSS only contains data on domestic inventories and
transaction receipts from imports and exports reported by domestic
nuclear facilities and some retransfers reported by partners to the
United States and added to the system by DOE. Therefore, while the
1995 Nuclear Proliferation Assessment Statement accompanying the U.S.-
EURATOM agreement estimated 250 tons of U.S.-obligated plutonium are
planned to be separated from spent power reactor fuel in Europe and
Japan for use in civilian energy programs in the next 10 to 20 years,
our review indicates that the United States would not be able to
identify the European countries or facilities where such U.S.-
obligated material is located.
DOE, NRC, and State Have Not Pursued Annual Reconciliations of
Inventories of Nuclear Material Subject to U.S. Nuclear Cooperation
Agreement Terms with All Partners:
DOE, NRC, and State have not pursued annual inventory reconciliations
of nuclear material subject to U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement
terms with all partners that would provide the U.S. government with
better information about where such material is held overseas.
Specifically, once a nuclear cooperation agreement is concluded, U.S.
government officials--generally led by DOE--and partner country
officials may negotiate an administrative arrangement for an annual
inventory reconciliation to exchange information regarding each
country's nuclear material accounting balances. Inventory
reconciliations typically compare the countries' data and material
transfer and retransfer records, and can help account for material
consumed or irradiated by reactors.
Government officials from several leading nuclear material exporting
and importing countries told us that they have negotiated with all
their other partners to exchange annual inventory reconciliations to
provide a common understanding of the amount of their special material
held by another country or within their country. For example,
Australia, which exports about 13 percent of the world's uranium each
year, conducts annual reconciliations with each of its partners, and
reports annually to the Australian Parliament regarding the location
and disposition of all Australian nuclear material. NRC officials told
us that Australia has some of the strictest reporting requirements for
its nuclear material.
The United States conducts annual inventory reconciliations with five
partners but does not conduct inventory reconciliations with the other
partners it has transferred material to or trades with.[Footnote 18]
According to DOE officials, for the five reconciliations currently
conducted, NMMSS data are compared with the partner's records and, if
warranted, each country's records are adjusted, where necessary, to
reflect the current status of U.S special nuclear material. As of
February 2011, the United States conducted bilateral annual exchanges
of total material balances for special nuclear materials with five
partners. Of these partners, the United States exchanges detailed
information regarding inventories at each specific facility only with
one partner. DOE officials noted that they exchange information with
particular trading partners on a transactional basis during the
reporting year and work with the partners at that time to resolve any
potential discrepancies that may arise. In the case of EURATOM,
material information is reported as the cumulative total of all 27
EURATOM members. For the purposes of nuclear cooperation with the
United States, EURATOM is treated as one entity rather than its 27
constituent parts. None of the 27 EURATOM member states have bilateral
nuclear cooperation agreements in force with the United States.
According to a 2010 DOE presentation for NMMSS users, the difference
in reporting requirements results in a 69-page report for Japan and a
1-page report for EURATOM. In addition, information exchanged with
other trading partners also is not reported by facility. DOE and NRC
officials told us that the United States may not have accurate
information regarding the inventories of U.S. nuclear material held by
its 21 other partners.
DOE officials told us that, in addition to benefits, there were costs
to pursuing facility-by-facility reconciliations and reporting. In
particular, DOE officials told us they have not pursued facility-by-
facility accounting in annual reconciliations with other partners
because it would be difficult for the United States to supply such
detailed information regarding partner material held in U.S.
facilities. DOE and NRC officials told us this would also create an
administrative burden for the United States. According to DOE
officials, the relative burden with which the United States can
perform facility-by-facility accounting by foreign trading partner
varies greatly based on the amount of material in the United States
that is obligated to such partners. For example, the United States can
perform facility-by-facility accounting with one country, because U.S.
officials told us there is not much of that country's nuclear material
in the United States. However, if the United States were to conduct
facility-by-facility accounting with Australia, it would create
burdensome reporting requirements. Specifically, according to DOE
officials, Australia would have to report to the United States on the
status of a few facilities holding U.S. nuclear material, but the
United States would be required to report on hundreds of U.S.
facilities holding Australian nuclear material. Without information on
foreign facilities, however, it may be difficult to track U.S. nuclear
materials for accounting and control purposes.
No U.S. Law or Policy Directs U.S. Agencies to Obtain Information
Regarding the Location and Disposition of U.S. Nuclear Material at
Foreign Facilities:
DOE, NRC, and State officials told us neither U.S. law nor U.S. policy
explicitly requires the United States to track U.S. special nuclear
material overseas. Moreover, U.S. law does not require peaceful
nuclear cooperation agreements to require cooperating parties to
provide reports to the United States of nuclear material on a facility-
by-facility basis. A March 2002 DOE Inspector General's audit raised
concerns about the U.S. government's ability to track sealed sources,
which could contain nuclear or radioactive material.[Footnote 19] In
response to the audit's findings, NNSA's Associate Administrator for
Management and Administration wrote that "While it is a good idea to
be aware of the locations and conditions of any [U.S.] material, it is
not the current policy of the U.S. government." Furthermore, the
Associate Administrator asserted that various U.S. government
agencies, including State, DOE, and NRC, would need to be involved
should DOE change its policy and undertake an initiative to track the
location and condition of U.S. sealed sources in foreign countries.
Similarly, DOE, NRC, and State officials told us that if it became the
policy of the U.S. government to track nuclear material overseas--and
in particular, by facility--then requirements would have to be
negotiated into the nuclear cooperation agreements or the associated
administrative arrangements.
NMMSS officials told us that NMMSS is currently capable of maintaining
information regarding inventories of U.S. nuclear material overseas.
However, as we reported in 1982,[Footnote 20] NMMSS information is not
designed to track the location (facility) or the status--such as
whether the material is irradiated or unirradiated, fabricated into
fuel, burned up, or reprocessed. As a result, NMMSS neither identifies
where U.S. material is located overseas nor maintains a comprehensive
inventory of U.S.-obligated material. In addition, NMMSS officials
emphasized that this information would need to be systematically
reported. According to these officials, such reporting is not done on
a regular basis by other DOE offices and State. In some instances,
State receives a written notice of a material transfer at its
embassies and then transmits this notice to DOE. Officials from DOE's
Office of Nonproliferation and International Security told us that,
while they could attempt to account for U.S. material overseas on a
case-by-case basis, obtaining the information to systematically track
this material would require renegotiating the terms of nuclear
cooperation agreements.
DOE has recently issued proposed guidance clarifying the role of DOE
offices for maintaining and controlling U.S. nuclear material. An
October 2010 draft DOE order states that DOE "Manages the development
and maintenance of NMMSS by: (a) collecting data relative to nuclear
materials including those for which the United States has a safeguards
interest both domestically and abroad; (b) processing the data; and
(c) issuing reports to support the safeguards and management needs of
DOE and NRC, and other government organizations, including those
associated with international treaties and organizations."[Footnote
21] However, we did not find any evidence that DOE will be able to
meet those responsibilities in the current configuration of NMMSS
without obtaining additional information from partners and additional
and systematic data sharing among DOE offices.
DOE, NRC, and State Do Not Have Access Rights to Monitor and Evaluate
That U.S. Nuclear Material Located at Foreign Facilities Is Adequately
Protected:
Nuclear cooperation agreements do not contain specific access rights
that enable DOE, NRC, or State to monitor and evaluate the physical
security of U.S. nuclear material overseas, and the United States
relies on partners to maintain adequate security. In the absence of
specific access rights, DOE, NRC, and State have jointly conducted
interagency physical protection visits to monitor and evaluate the
physical security of nuclear material when given permission by the
partner country. However, the interagency physical protection teams
have neither systematically visited countries believed to be holding
Category I quantities of U.S. nuclear material, nor have they
systematically revisited facilities determined to not be meeting IAEA
security guidelines in a timely manner.
U.S. Agencies' Ability to Evaluate the Security of U.S. Nuclear
Material Overseas Is Limited by Lack of Access Rights, and the United
States Relies on Partners to Maintain Adequate Security:
DOE's, NRC's, and State's ability to monitor and evaluate whether
material subject to U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement terms is
physically secure is contingent on partners granting access to
facilities where such material is stored. Countries, including the
United States, believe that the physical protection of nuclear
materials is a national responsibility. This principle is reflected
both in IAEA's guidelines on the "Physical Protection of Nuclear
Material and Nuclear Facilities" and in pending amendments to the
Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material. Our review
of section 123 of the AEA and all U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements
currently in force found that they do not explicitly include a
provision granting the United States access to verify the physical
protection of facilities or sites holding material subject to U.S.
nuclear cooperation agreement terms. However, in accordance with the
AEA, as amended, all nuclear cooperation agreements, excepting three
negotiated prior to 1978, contain provisions requiring both partners
to maintain adequate physical security over transferred material.
The AEA, as amended, requires that the cooperating party must
guarantee that it will maintain adequate physical security for
transferred nuclear material and any special nuclear material used in
or produced through the use of any material, or production, or
utilization facility transferred pursuant to the agreement. However,
it does not specify that State, in cooperation with other U.S.
agencies, negotiates agreement terms that must include rights of
access or other measures for the United States to verify whether a
partner is maintaining adequate physical security over U.S. material.
Our review of the texts of all 27 U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements
in force found that most of them contain a provision providing that
the adequacy of physical protection measures shall be subject to
review and consultations by the parties. However, none of the
agreements include specific provisions stipulating that the United
States has the right to verify whether a partner is adequately
securing U.S. nuclear material.[Footnote 22] As a result, several DOE
and State officials told us the United States' ability to monitor and
evaluate the physical security of U.S. nuclear material overseas is
contingent on partners' cooperation and access to facilities where
U.S. material is stored.
State, DOE, and NRC officials told us that they rely on partners to
comply with IAEA's security guidelines for physical protection.
However, the guidelines, which are voluntary, do not provide for
access rights for other states to verify whether physical protection
measures for nuclear material are adequate. IAEA's security guideline
document states that the "responsibility for establishing and
operating a comprehensive physical protection system for nuclear
materials and facilities within a State rests entirely with the
Government of that State." In addition, according to the guidelines,
member states should ensure that their national laws provide for the
proper implementation of physical protection and verify continued
compliance with physical protection regulations. For example,
according to IAEA's security guidelines, a comprehensive physical
protection system to secure nuclear material should include, among
other things,
* technical measures such as vaults, perimeter barriers, intrusion
sensors, and alarms;
* material control procedures; and:
* adequately equipped and appropriately trained guard and emergency
response forces.
In addition, according to DOE and State officials, key international
treaties, including the Convention on the Physical Protection of
Nuclear Material--which calls for signatory states to provide adequate
physical protection of nuclear material while in international
transit--do not provide states the right to verify the adequacy of
physical protection measures. A senior official from IAEA's Office of
Nuclear Security told us that physical security is a national
responsibility and that governments may choose to organize their
various physical security components differently, as long as the
components add up to an effective regime.
Despite these constraints on access, the U.S. government can take
certain actions to protect U.S. nuclear material located at foreign
facilities. For example, NRC licensing for the export of nuclear
equipment and material is conditioned on partner maintenance of
adequate physical security. NRC officials stated that, when an export
license application for nuclear materials or equipment is submitted,
the U.S. government seeks confirmation, in the form of peaceful use
assurances, from the foreign government that the material and
equipment, if exported, will be subject to the terms and conditions of
that government's nuclear cooperation agreement with the United
States. In addition, NRC officials stated that this government-to-
government reconfirmation of the terms and conditions of the agreement
meets the "letter and spirit" of the AEA and Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Act of 1978 (NNPA) and underscores that the partner is aware of and
accepts the terms and conditions of the agreement.
NRC officials also noted that the NNPA amendments to the AEA were
designed and intended to encourage foreign governments to agree to
U.S. nonproliferation criteria in exchange for nuclear commodities.
However, the AEA does not empower the U.S. government through
inspections or other means to enforce foreign government compliance
with nuclear cooperation agreements once U.S. nuclear commodities are
in a foreign country. Importantly, according to NRC, the onus is on
the receiving country as a sovereign right and responsibility and
consistent with its national laws and international commitments, to
adequately secure the nuclear material.
According to DOE and State, as well as foreign government officials,
the United States and the partner share a strong common interest in
deterring and preventing the misuse of nuclear material, as well as an
interest in maintaining the rights afforded to sovereign countries.
The partner's interest in applying adequate security measures, for
instance, is particularly strong because the nuclear material is
located within its territory. Moreover, specific physical security
needs may often depend on unique circumstances and sensitive
intelligence information known only to the partner.
In addition, the AEA requires that U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements
with non-nuclear weapon states contain a stipulation that the United
States shall have the right to require the return of certain nuclear
material, as well as equipment, should the partner detonate a nuclear
device or terminate or abrogate its safeguards agreements with IAEA.
However, DOE, NRC, and State officials told us that the U.S.
government has never exercised the "right to require return"
provisions in its nuclear cooperation agreements. In addition, the
United States typically includes "fall-back safeguards"--contingency
plans for the application of alternative safeguards should IAEA
safeguards become inapplicable for any other reason. DOE and State
officials told us, however, that the United States has not exercised
its fall-back safeguards provisions, because the United States has not
identified a situation where IAEA was unable to perform its safeguards
duties.
U.S. Agencies Have Visited Foreign Sites to Monitor and Evaluate the
Physical Security of U.S. Nuclear Material:
U.S. agencies have, over time, made arrangements with partners to
visit certain facilities where U.S. nuclear material is stored. As we
reported in August 1982 and in December 1994,[Footnote 23] U.S.
interagency physical protection teams visit partner country facilities
to monitor and evaluate whether the physical protection provided to
U.S. nuclear material meets IAEA physical security guidelines. In
1974, DOE's predecessor, the Energy Research and Development
Administration, began leading teams composed of State, NRC, and DOE
national laboratory officials to review the partner's legal and
regulatory basis for physical protection and to ensure that U.S.
nuclear material was adequately protected. In 1988, the Department of
Defense's Defense Threat Reduction Agency began to participate in
these visits, and officials from other agencies and offices, such as
GTRI, have participated. The visits have generally focused on research
reactors containing HEU but have also included assessments, when
partners voluntarily grant access, of other facilities' physical
security, including nuclear power plants, reprocessing facilities, and
research and development facilities containing U.S. nuclear material.
According to DOE documents and DOE, NRC, and State officials, the
primary factors for selecting countries for visits are the type,
quantity, and form of nuclear material, with priority given to
countries with U.S. HEU or plutonium in Category I amounts. In
addition, in 1987, NRC recommended that countries possessing U.S.
Category I nuclear material be revisited at least every 5 years. DOE
and NRC officials told us this has become an official goal for
prioritizing visits. According to DOE, interagency physical protection
visits are also made whenever the country has had or expects to have a
significant change in its U.S. nuclear material inventory, along with
other factors, such as previous findings that physical protection was
not adequate. These criteria and other factors are used to help U.S.
agencies prioritize visits on a countrywide basis and also supplement
other information that is known about a partner's physical protection
system and the current threat environment. Moreover, while the U.S.
physical protection program assesses physical security conditions on a
site-specific basis, NRC's regulations permit the determination of
adequacy of foreign physical protection systems on a countrywide
basis.[Footnote 24] Therefore, DOE, NRC, and State officials told us
that the results of the interagency physical protection visits,
combined with other sources of information such as country threat
assessments, are used as a measure of the physical security system
countrywide.
The U.S. teams visit certain facilities where U.S. nuclear material is
used or stored to observe physical protection measures after
discussing the relevant nuclear security regulatory framework with the
partner government. DOE and State officials told us these physical
protection visits help U.S. officials develop relationships with
partner officials, share best practices and, in some cases, recommend
physical security improvements.
We visited four facilities that hold U.S.-obligated nuclear material.
The partner officials and facility operators we met shared their
observations regarding the U.S. physical protection visits.
Representatives from one site characterized a recent interagency
physical protection visit as a "tour." These officials told us the
U.S. government officials had shared some high-level observations
regarding their visit with government officials and nuclear reactor
site operators but did not provide the government or site operators
with written observations or recommendations. On the other hand,
government officials from another country we visited told us that a
recent interagency physical protection visit had resulted in a useful
and detailed exchange of information about physical security
procedures. These government officials told us they had learned "quite
a lot" from the interagency physical protection visit and that they
hoped the dialog would continue, since security could always be
improved. In February 2011, DOE officials told us they had begun to
distribute the briefing slides they use at the conclusion of a
physical protection visit to foreign officials. State officials told
us that the briefings are considered government-to-government
activities, and it is the partner government's choice on whether to
include facility operators in the briefings.
In addition, we reviewed U.S. agencies' records of these and other
physical protection visits and found that, over the 17-year period
from 1994 through 2010, U.S. interagency physical protection teams
made 55 visits. Of the 55 visits, interagency physical protection
teams found the sites met IAEA security guidelines on 27 visits, did
not meet IAEA security guidelines on 21 visits, and the results of 7
visits are unknown because the physical protection team was unable to
assess the sites, or agency documentation was missing.
According to DOE, State, and NRC officials, the visits are used to
encourage security improvements by the partner. For example, based on
the circumstances of one particular facility visited in the last 5
years, the physical protection team made several recommendations to
improve security, including installing (1) fences around the site's
perimeter, (2) sensors between fences, (3) video assessment systems
for those sensors, and (4) vehicle barriers. According to DOE
officials, these observations were taken seriously by the country,
which subsequently made the improvements.
When we visited the site as part of our review, government officials
from that country told us the U.S. interagency team had provided
useful advice and, as a result, the government had approved a new
physical protection plan. These government officials characterized
their interactions with DOE and other U.S. agency officials as
positive and told us that the government's new physical protection
plan had been partly implemented. Moreover, although we were not
granted access to the building, we observed several physical
protection upgrades already implemented or in progress, including: (1)
the stationing of an armed guard outside the facility holding U.S.
Category I material; (2) ongoing construction of a 12-foot perimeter
fence around the facility; and (3) construction of a fence equipped
with barbed wire and motion detectors around the entire research
complex. We were also told that, among other things, remote monitoring
equipment had been installed in key areas in response to the
interagency visit. The Central Alarm Station was hardened, and the
entrance to the complex was controlled by turnstiles and a specially
issued badge, which entrants received after supplying a passport or
other government-issued identification. Private automobiles were not
allowed in the facility.
Not all U.S. physical protection visits proceed smoothly. In some
cases, U.S. agencies have attempted repeatedly to convince partner
officials of the seriousness of meeting IAEA security guidelines and
to fund improvements. For example, a U.S. interagency physical
protection team in the early 2000s found numerous security problems at
a certain country's research reactor. The site supervisor objected to
the interagency team's assessment because physical security was a
matter of national sovereignty, and IAEA security guidelines were
subject to interpretation. The site supervisor also objected to some
of the U.S. team's recommendations. In some instances, under U.S.
pressure, countries have agreed to make necessary improvements with
DOE technical and material assistance.
Our review of agency records indicates that, in recent years, as the
number of countries relying on U.S. HEU to fuel research reactors has
continued to decline, U.S. agencies have succeeded in using a
partner's pending export license for U.S. HEU or expected change in
inventory of U.S. special nuclear material as leverage for a U.S.
interagency physical protection visit. For example, we identified two
cases since 2000 where a partner country applied for a license to
transfer U.S. HEU, and a U.S. interagency team subsequently visited
those two sites. In addition, we identified a recent situation where a
partner country's inventory of U.S. plutonium at a certain site was
expected to significantly increase, and a U.S. interagency team
visited the site to determine whether the site could adequately
protect these additional inventories.
According to DOE officials, requests for U.S. low enriched uranium
(LEU) export licenses have increased in recent years.[Footnote 25] In
response, DOE officials told us that U.S. agencies have begun to
prioritize visits to countries making such requests, and our review of
agency documentation corroborates this. For example, physical
protection visit records we reviewed state that recent interagency
physical protection visits were made to two sites to evaluate the
facilities' physical security in advance of pending U.S. LEU license
applications. In addition, a DOE contractor and State official told us
that a U.S. team planned to visit another partner country site in late
2011 in order to verify the adequacy of physical protection for U.S.-
obligated LEU.
U.S. Agencies Do Not Have a Formal Process for Coordinating and
Prioritizing U.S. Physical Protection Visits:
DOE, NRC, and State do not have a formal process for coordinating and
prioritizing U.S. interagency physical protection visits. In
particular, DOE, which has the technical lead and is the agency lead
on most visits has neither (1) worked with NRC and State to establish
a plan and prioritize interagency physical protection visits, nor (2)
measured performance in a systematic way. Specifically:
* Establishing a plan and prioritizing and coordinating efforts. A
U.S. agency formal plan for which countries or facilities to visit has
not been established, nor have goals for the monitoring and evaluation
activities been formalized. In October 2009, DOE reported to us that
it had formulated a list of countries that contained U.S. nuclear
material and were priorities for U.S. teams to visit. However, in a
subsequent written communication to us, a senior DOE official stated
that DOE had not yet discussed this list with State, NRC, or other
agency officials.[Footnote 26] As a result, the list of countries had
not been properly vetted at that time and did not represent an
interagency agreed-upon list. In February 2011, DOE officials told us
that U.S. agencies will be considering a revised methodology for
prioritizing physical protection visits. NRC officials told us they
thought the interagency coordination and prioritization of the visit
process could be improved. A State official, who regularly
participates in the U.S. physical protection visits, told us that
interagency coordination had improved in the past 6 months, in
response to a recognized need by U.S. agencies to be prepared for an
expected increase in requests for exports of U.S. LEU.
* Measuring performance. The agencies have not developed performance
metrics to gauge progress in achieving stated goals related to
physical protection visits. Specifically, DOE, NRC, and State have not
performed an analysis to determine whether the stated interagency goal
of visiting countries containing U.S. Category I nuclear material
within 5 years has been met. In addition, although DOE has stated U.S.
physical protection teams revisit sites whenever there is an
indication that security does not meet IAEA security guidelines, DOE
has not quantified its efforts in a meaningful way. In response to our
questions about metrics, DOE officials stated that there is no U.S.
law regarding the frequency of visits or revisits and that the
agency's internal goals are not requirements. These officials told us
that DOE, NRC, and State recognize that the "number one goal" is to
ensure the physical security of U.S. nuclear material abroad. DOE
officials stated that the best measure of the U.S. physical protection
visits' effectiveness is that there has not been a theft of U.S.
nuclear material from a foreign facility since the 1970s, when two LEU
fuel rods were stolen from a certain country. However, officials
reported to us that, in 1990, the facility was determined to be well
below IAEA security guidelines. Our review of DOE documentation shows
that other U.S. LEU transferred to the facility remains at the site.
In July 2011, in conjunction with the classification review for this
report, DOE officials stated that while DOE, NRC, and State work
together on coordinating U.S. government positions regarding
priorities and procedures for the interagency physical protection
program, no updated document exists that formalizes the process for
planning, coordinating, and prioritizing U.S. interagency physical
protection visits. We note that the documents that DOE refers to are
internal DOE documents presented to us in 2008 and 2009 in response to
questions regarding nuclear cooperation agreements. These documents
are not an interagency agreed-upon document, but reflect DOE's views
on determining which countries and facilities interagency physical
protection teams should visit. Further, DOE officials in July 2011
stated that DOE, NRC, and State do not have an agreed-upon way to
measure performance in a systematic way, and that while the goals for
the monitoring and evaluation activities have not yet been formalized
through necessary updated documents, a prioritized list of countries
to visit does exist. These officials noted that the U.S. government is
working to update its planning documents and is examining its
methodology for prioritizing physical protection visits. Any changes
will be included in these updated documents.
DOE and U.S. agencies' activities for prioritizing and coordinating
U.S. interagency physical protection visits and measuring performance
do not meet our best practices for agency performance or DOE's
standards for internal control. We have reported that defining the
mission and desired outcomes, measuring performance, and using
performance information to identify performance gaps are critical if
agencies are to be accountable for achieving intended results.
[Footnote 27] In addition, DOE's own standards for internal control
call for "processes for planning, organizing, directing, and
controlling operations designed to reasonably assure that programs
achieve intended results— and decisions are based on reliable data."
[Footnote 28] However, DOE, NRC, and State have neither established a
plan nor measured performance to determine whether they are meeting
internal goals and whether U.S. agencies' activities are systematic.
DOE and U.S. Agencies Do Not Systematically Visit Countries with
Category I U.S. Nuclear Material or Revisit Foreign Facilities Not
Meeting Security Guidelines:
U.S. agencies have not systematically evaluated the security of
foreign facilities holding U.S. nuclear material in two key ways.
First, U.S. interagency physical protection teams have not
systematically visited countries holding Category I quantities of U.S.
nuclear material. Second, interagency teams have not revisited sites
that did not meet IAEA security guidelines in a timely manner.
U.S. Physical Protection Teams Have Not Systematically Visited
Countries Holding Category I Quantities of Nuclear Material:
U.S. interagency physical protection teams have not systematically
visited countries believed to be holding Category I quantities of U.S.
special nuclear material at least once every 5 years--a key
programmatic goal. In a December 2008 document, DOE officials noted
that, in 1987, NRC recommended that countries possessing Category I
nuclear material be revisited at least once every 5 years. This
recommendation was adopted as a goal for determining the frequency of
follow-on visits. In addition, DOE, NRC, and State officials told us
that they aim to conduct physical protection visits at each country
holding Category I quantities of U.S. nuclear material at least once
every 5 years. We evaluated U.S. agencies' performance at meeting this
goal by reviewing records of U.S. physical protection visits and other
information.[Footnote 29] We found that the United States had met this
goal with respect to two countries by conducting physical protection
visits at least once every 5 years since 1987 while they held Category
I quantities of U.S. nuclear material. However, we estimated that 21
countries held Category I amounts of U.S. nuclear material during the
period from 1987 through 2010 but were not visited once every 5 years
while they held such quantities of U.S. nuclear material.
In addition, U.S. interagency physical protection teams have not
visited all partner facilities believed to contain Category I
quantities of U.S. special nuclear material to determine whether the
security measures in place meet IAEA security guidelines.
Specifically, we reviewed physical protection visit records and NMMSS
data and identified 12 facilities that NMMSS records indicate received
Category I quantities of U.S. HEU that interagency physical protection
teams have never visited.
We identified four additional facilities that GTRI officials told us
currently hold, and will continue to hold, Category I quantities of
U.S. special nuclear material for which there is no acceptable
disposition path in the United States. In addition, these facilities
have not been visited by a U.S. interagency physical protection team,
according to our review of available documentation.[Footnote 30]
Moreover, U.S. interagency physical protection teams have not
systematically visited partner storage facilities for U.S. nuclear
material. The AEA, as amended, requires that U.S. nuclear cooperation
agreements contain a stipulation giving the United States approval
rights over any storage facility containing U.S. unirradiated or
"separated" plutonium or HEU. DOE and NRC officials told us there is
no list of such storage facilities besides those listed in a U.S.
nuclear cooperation agreement with a certain partner. They stated--and
our review of available documents corroborated--that a number of the
U.S. physical protection visits have included assessments of overseas
storage sites for U.S. nuclear material, since such sites are often
collocated with research reactors. However, our review also found two
instances where partner storage areas containing U.S. HEU or separated
plutonium did not meet IAEA guidelines or were identified as
potentially vulnerable.
U.S. Teams Have Not Revisited Facilities That Did Not Meet IAEA
Security Guidelines in a Timely Manner:
DOE and U.S. agencies do not have a systematic process to revisit or
monitor security improvements at facilities that do not meet IAEA
security guidelines. Based on our analysis of available documentation,
we found that, since 1994, U.S. interagency physical protection teams
determined that partner country sites did not meet IAEA security
guidelines on 21 visits. We then examined how long it took for a U.S.
team to revisit the sites that did not meet IAEA security guidelines
and found that, in 13 of 21 cases, U.S. interagency teams took 5 years
or longer to revisit the facilities.[Footnote 31]
According to DOE, NRC, and State officials, the interagency physical
protection visits are not the only way to determine whether partner
facilities are meeting IAEA security guidelines. For example, the
United States is able to rely on information provided by other visits
and U.S. embassy staff to monitor physical security practices. These
visits include DOE-only trips and trips by DOE national laboratory
staff and NRC physical protection experts who worked with the host
country to improve physical security at the sites. NRC officials also
stated that, in some cases, the partner's corrective actions at the
site are verified by U.S. officials stationed in the country, and a
repeat physical protection visit is not always required.
IAEA officials told us that U.S. technical experts often participate
in voluntary IAEA physical security assessments at IAEA member states'
facilities. Specifically, IAEA created the International Physical
Protection Advisory Service (IPPAS) to assist IAEA member states in
strengthening their national security regime. At the request of a
member state, IAEA assembles a team of international experts who
assess the member state's system of physical protection in accordance
with IAEA security guidelines. As of December 2010, 49 IPPAS missions
spanning about 30 countries had been completed.
DOE Seeks to Increase Security or Remove Vulnerable U.S. Nuclear
Material at Partner Facilities but Faces Challenges:
DOE has taken steps to improve security at a number of facilities
overseas that hold U.S. nuclear material. DOE's GTRI program removes
nuclear material from vulnerable facilities overseas and has achieved
a number of successes. However, DOE faces a number of constraints.
Specifically, GTRI can only bring certain types of nuclear material
back to the United States that have an approved disposition pathway
and meet the program's eligibility criteria. In addition, obtaining
access to the partner facilities to make physical security
improvements may be difficult. There are a few countries that are
special cases where the likelihood of returning the U.S. nuclear
material to the United States is considered doubtful.
DOE's Office of Nonproliferation and International Security and GTRI
officials told us that when a foreign facility with U.S.-obligated
nuclear material does not meet IAEA security guidelines, the U.S.
government's first response is to work with the partner country to
encourage physical security improvements. In addition, the GTRI
program was established in 2004 to identify, secure, and remove
vulnerable nuclear material at civilian sites around the world and to
provide physical protection upgrades at nuclear facilities that are
(1) outside the former Soviet Union, (2) in non-weapon states, and (3)
not in high-income countries. According to GTRI officials, the U.S.
government's strategy for working with partner countries to improve
physical security includes: (1) encouraging high-income countries to
fund their own physical protection upgrades with recommendations by
the U.S. government and (2) working with other-than-high-income
countries to provide technical expertise and funding to implement
physical protection upgrades. If the material is excess to the
country's needs and can be returned to the United States under an
approved disposition pathway, GTRI will work with the country to
repatriate the material.
According to GTRI officials, GTRI was originally authorized to remove
to the United States, under its U.S. fuel return program, only U.S.-
obligated fresh and spent HEU in Material Test Reactor fuel, and
Training Research Isotope General Atomics (TRIGA) fuel rod form.
According to GTRI officials, GTRI has also obtained the authorization
to return additional forms of U.S. fresh and spent HEU, as well as
U.S. plutonium from foreign countries, so long as there is no
alternative disposition path. The material must (1) pose a threat to
national security, (2) be usable for an improvised nuclear device, (3)
present a high-risk of terrorist theft, and (4) meet U.S. acceptance
criteria.
To date, GTRI has removed more than 1,240 kilograms of U.S. HEU from
Australia, Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile,
Colombia, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Japan, the Netherlands,
Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden,
Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, and Turkey.[Footnote 32] It has also
performed security upgrades at reactors containing U.S. nuclear
material that were not meeting IAEA security guidelines in 10 partner
countries. As we reported in September 2009,[Footnote 33] GTRI has
improved the security of research reactors, and GTRI officials told us
in April 2011 that they plan to continue to engage other countries to
upgrade security.
In a separate report published in December 2010, we noted that GTRI
has assisted in the conversion from the use of HEU to LEU or verified
the shutdown of 72 HEU research reactors around the world,[Footnote
34] 52 of which previously used U.S. HEU. GTRI prioritizes its
schedule for upgrading the security of research reactors and removing
nuclear material based on the amount and type of nuclear material at
the reactor and other threat factors, such as the vulnerability of
facilities, country-level threat, and proximity to strategic assets.
Our review identified several situations where GTRI or its predecessor
program removed vulnerable U.S. nuclear material.
Notwithstanding these successes, the GTRI program has some
limitations. GTRI cannot remove all potentially vulnerable nuclear
material worldwide because the program's scope is limited to only
certain types of material that meet the eligibility criteria. GTRI
officials told us that, of the approximately 17,500 kilograms of HEU
it estimates was exported from the United States, the majority--12,400
kilograms--is currently not eligible for return to the United States.
According to GTRI officials, over 10,000 kilograms is contained in
fuels from "special purpose" reactors that are not included in GTRI's
nuclear material return program because they were not traditional
aluminum-based fuels, TRIGA fuels, or target material. As a result,
this material does not have an acceptable disposition pathway in the
United States, according to GTRI officials. GTRI officials stated that
these reactors are in Germany, France, and Japan, and that the
material has been deemed to be adequately protected. GTRI reported
that the other approximately 2,000 kilograms of transferred U.S.
nuclear material is located primarily in EURATOM member countries and
is either currently in use or adequately protected.
In addition, the potential vulnerability of nuclear material at
certain high-income facilities was raised to us by officials at the
National Security Council (NSC)--the President's principal forum for
considering national security and foreign policy matters--and included
in a prior report. Specifically, we reported that, there may be
security vulnerabilities in certain high-income countries, including
three specific high-income countries named by the NSC officials. For
sites in these countries, GTRI officials told us the U.S. government's
strategy is to work bilaterally with the countries and to provide
recommendations to improve physical protection, and follow up as
needed.
Our analysis of available agency physical protection visit documents
also raises concerns regarding the physical security conditions in
these countries, including facilities that did not meet IAEA security
guidelines and interagency physical protection teams' lack of access
issues.
DOE also works with countries to remove material if it is in excess of
the country's needs and meets DOE acceptance criteria. The ability of
DOE to return U.S. nuclear material depends, however, on the
willingness of the foreign country to cooperate. As we reported in
September 2009, because GTRI's program for physical security upgrades
and nuclear material returns is voluntary, DOE faces some challenges
in obtaining consistent and timely cooperation from other countries to
address security weaknesses. Our report further noted that DOE has
experienced situations where a foreign government has refused its
assistance to make security upgrades. For example, we reported that
one country had refused offers of DOE physical security upgrades at a
research reactor for 9 years. However, this situation was subsequently
resolved when all HEU was removed from this country, according to GTRI
officials. In addition, we reported that DOE had experienced two other
situations where the partner country would not accept security
assistance until agreements with the United States were reached on
other issues related to nuclear energy and security.
There are several countries that have U.S. nuclear material that are
particularly problematic and represent special cases. Specifically,
U.S. nuclear material has remained at sites in three countries where
physical protection measures are unknown or have not been visited by
an interagency physical protection team in decades. GTRI removed a
large quantity of U.S. spent HEU recently from one of these countries.
According to NRC and State officials, U.S. transfers to these three
countries were made prior to 1978, when the physical protection
requirements were added to the AEA. Therefore, these countries have
not made the same commitments regarding physical security of U.S.-
transferred material. Finally, we identified another country that
poses special challenges. All U.S-obligated HEU has been removed from
this country, which was one of the GTRI program's highest priorities.
Previous U.S. interagency physical protection visits found a site in
this country did not meet IAEA security guidelines.
Conclusions:
The world today is dramatically different than when most U.S. nuclear
cooperation agreements were negotiated. Many new threats have emerged,
and nuclear proliferation risks have increased significantly. We
recognize that the United States and its partners share a strong
common interest in deterring and preventing the misuse of U.S. nuclear
material--or any nuclear material--and that flexibility in the
agreements is necessary to forge strong and cooperative working
relationships with our partners. The fundamental question, in our
view, is whether nuclear cooperation agreements and their underlying
legislative underpinnings need to be reassessed given the weaknesses
in inventory management and physical security that we identified.
Specifically, we found these agreements may not be sufficiently robust
in two areas--inventories and physical security. Without an accurate
inventory of U.S. nuclear materials--in particular, weapon-usable HEU
and separated plutonium--the United States does not have sufficient
assurances regarding the location of materials. As a result, the
United States may not be able to monitor whether the partner country
is appropriately notifying the United States and whether the United
States is appropriately and fully exercising its rights of approval
regarding the transfer, retransfer, enrichment and reprocessing and,
in some cases, storage of nuclear materials subject to the agreement
terms. NRC and multiple offices within DOE could not provide us with
an authoritative list of the amount, location, and disposition of U.S.
HEU or separated plutonium overseas. We are particularly concerned
that NRC and DOE could not account, in response to a 1992 mandate by
Congress, on the location and disposition of U.S. nuclear material
overseas--and that they have not developed such an inventory in the
almost two decades since that mandate.
We recognize that physical security is a national responsibility. We
also recognize that neither the AEA, as amended, nor the U.S. nuclear
cooperation agreements in force require that State negotiate new or
renewed nuclear cooperation agreement terms that include specific
access rights for the United States to verify whether a partner is
maintaining adequate physical security of U.S. nuclear material.
Without such rights, it may be difficult for the United States to have
access to critical facilities overseas--especially those believed to
be holding weapon-usable materials--to better ensure that U.S.
material is in fact adequately protected while the material remains in
the partner's custody. We note the agreements are reciprocal, with
both parties generally agreeing to all conditions specified in them.
We acknowledge that any change to the nuclear cooperation framework or
authorizing legislation will be very sensitive. Careful consideration
should be given to the impact of any reciprocity clauses on U.S.
national security when negotiating or reviewing these agreements.
However, it may be possible to do so in a way that includes greater
access to critical facilities where weapon-usable U.S. nuclear
material is stored, without infringing on the sovereign rights of our
partners or hampering the ability of the U.S. nuclear industry to
remain competitive.
In the course of our work, we identified several weaknesses in DOE,
NRC, and State's efforts to develop and manage activities that ensure
that U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements are properly implemented.
Specifically, the lack of a baseline inventory of U.S. nuclear
materials--in particular, weapon-usable materials--and annual
inventory reconciliations with all partners limits the ability of the
U.S. government to identify where the material is located. Currently,
annual reconciliations with five partners are undertaken. However, the
information, with the exception of one country, is aggregated and not
provided on a facility-by-facility basis. Without such information on
facilities, it may be difficult to track U.S. material for accounting
and control purposes. No annual reconciliations currently exist for
the United States' other partners that it has transferred material to
or trades with. The NMMSS database could be the official central
repository of data regarding U.S. inventories of nuclear material
overseas if DOE and NRC are able to collect better data.
We are concerned that DOE has not worked with NRC and State to develop
a systematic process for monitoring and evaluating the physical
security of U.S. nuclear material overseas, including which foreign
facilities to visit for future physical protection visits. In
particular, U.S. interagency physical protection teams have neither
met a key programmatic goal for visiting countries containing Category
I quantities of U.S. special nuclear material every 5 years, nor have
they visited all partner facilities believed to be holding Category I
quantities of U.S. nuclear material, nor revisited facilities that
were found to not meet IAEA security guidelines in a timely manner.
Moreover, relying on reported thefts of U.S. nuclear material as a
gauge of security is not the best measure of program effectiveness
when accounting processes for inventory of U.S. material at foreign
facilities are limited. Improving the U.S. government's management of
nuclear cooperation agreements could contribute to the administration
achieving its goal of securing all vulnerable nuclear material
worldwide in 4 years.
Matters for Congressional Consideration:
* Congress may wish to consider directing DOE and NRC to complete a
full accounting of U.S. weapon-usable nuclear materials--in
particular, HEU and separated plutonium--with its nuclear cooperation
agreement partners and other countries that may possess such U.S.
nuclear material.
* In addition, Congress may wish to consider amending the AEA if
State, working with other U.S. agencies, does not include enhanced
measures regarding physical protection access rights in future
agreements and renewed agreements, so that U.S. interagency physical
protection teams may obtain access when necessary to verify that U.S.
nuclear materials have adequate physical protection. The amendment
could provide that the U.S. government may not enter into nuclear
cooperation agreements unless such agreements contain provisions
allowing the United States to verify that adequate physical security
is exercised over nuclear material subject to the terms of these
agreements.
Recommendations for Executive Action:
We are making seven recommendations to enable agencies to better
account for, and ensure the physical protection of, U.S. nuclear
material overseas.
To help federal agencies better understand where U.S. nuclear material
is currently located overseas, we recommend that the Secretary of
State, working with the Secretary of Energy and the Chairman of the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, take the following four actions to
strengthen controls over U.S. nuclear material subject to these
agreements:
* determine, for those partners with which the United States has
transferred material but does not have annual inventory
reconciliation, a baseline inventory of weapon-usable U.S. nuclear
material, and establish a process for conducting annual
reconciliations of inventories of nuclear material on a facility-by-
facility basis;
* establish for those partners with which the United States has an
annual inventory reconciliation, reporting on a facility-by-facility
basis for weapon-usable material where possible;
* facilitate visits to sites that U.S. physical protection teams have
not visited that are believed to be holding U.S. Category I nuclear
material; and:
* seek to include measures that provide for physical protection access
rights in new or renewed nuclear cooperation agreements so that U.S.
interagency physical protection teams may in the future obtain access
when necessary to verify that U.S. nuclear materials are adequately
protected. Careful consideration should be given to the impact of any
reciprocity clauses on U.S. national security when negotiating or
reviewing these agreements.
In addition, we recommend that the Secretary of Energy, working with
the Secretary of State, and the Chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission take the following three actions:
* develop an official central repository to maintain data regarding
U.S. inventories of nuclear material overseas. This repository could
be the NMMSS database, or if the U.S. agencies so determine, some
other official database;
* develop formal goals for and a systematic process to determine which
foreign facilities to visit for future interagency physical protection
visits. The goals and process should be formalized and agreed to by
all relevant agencies; and:
* periodically review performance in meeting key programmatic goals
for the physical protection program, including determining which
countries containing Category I U.S. nuclear material have been
visited within the last 5 years, as well as determining whether
partner facilities previously found to not meet IAEA security
guidelines were revisited in a timely manner.
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
We provided a draft of this report to the Secretaries of Energy and
State, and the Chairman of the NRC for their review and comment. Each
agency provided written comments on the draft report, which are
presented in appendixes IV, VI, and V, respectively. All three
agencies generally disagreed with our conclusions and recommendations.
DOE, NRC, and State disagreed with GAO in three general areas of the
report. Specifically, all the agencies (1) disagree with our
recommendations to establish annual inventory reconciliations with all
trading partners and establish a system to comprehensively track and
account for U.S. nuclear material overseas, because the agencies
believe this is impractical and unwarranted; (2) maintain that IAEA
safeguards are sufficient or an important tool to account for U.S.
nuclear material overseas; and (3) assert that any requirement in
future nuclear cooperation agreements calling for enhanced physical
protection access rights is unnecessary and could hamper sensitive
relationships.
With regard to the three general areas of disagreement, our response
is as follows:
* DOE, NRC, and State assert that it is not necessary to implement
GAO's recommendation that agencies undertake an annual inventory
reconciliation and report on a facility-by-facility basis for weapon-
usable material where possible for all countries that hold U.S.-
obligated nuclear material. We stand by this recommendation for
numerous reasons. First, as stated in the report, we found--and none
of the agencies refuted--that the U.S. government does not have an
inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas and, in particular, is not
able to identify where weapon-usable materials such as HEU and
separated plutonium that can be used for a nuclear weapon may reside.
In fact, NRC commented that "inventory knowledge is very important for
high-consequence materials, e.g., high enriched uranium and separated
plutonium." Because DOE, NRC, and State do not have comprehensive
knowledge of where U.S.-obligated material is located at foreign
facilities, it is unknown whether the United States is appropriately
and fully exercising its rights of approval regarding the transfer,
retransfer, enrichment, and reprocessing and, in some cases, storage
of nuclear materials subject to the agreements' terms. In addition,
the lack of inventory information hampers U.S. agencies in identifying
priorities for interagency physical protection visits. We are
particularly concerned that NRC and DOE, in response to a 1992 mandate
by Congress, could only account for the location and disposition of
about 1,160 kilograms out of an estimated 17,500 kilograms of U.S.-
exported HEU. Furthermore, the agencies have not developed such an
inventory or performed an additional comprehensive review in the
almost two decades since that mandate. We believe it is important that
DOE, NRC, and State pursue all means possible to better identify where
U.S.-obligated material is located overseas--and for weapon-usable HEU
and separated plutonium, seek to do so on a facility-by-facility
basis. Annual inventory reconciliations with all partners provide one
way to do that. The United States has demonstrated it has the ability
to conduct such exchanges, which none of the agencies disputed. Our
report notes that the United States conducts annual inventory
reconciliations with five partners, including one where facility-level
information is annually exchanged. We believe the recent signing of
nuclear cooperation agreements with India and Russia, as well as the
situation where current partners whose agreements are set to expire in
coming years must be renegotiated--including Peru and South Korea--
provide a convenient and timely opportunity for DOE, NRC, and State to
pursue such enhanced material accountancy measures.
* DOE, NRC, and State commented that IAEA's comprehensive safeguards
program is another tool to maintain the knowledge of locations of
nuclear material in a country, including U.S.-obligated material, and
that IAEA inspection, surveillance, and reporting processes are
effective tools for material tracking and accounting. We agree that
IAEA safeguards are an important nuclear nonproliferation mechanism.
However, our report found IAEA's safeguards have a limited ability to
identify, track, and account for U.S.-obligated material.
Specifically, as our report notes, and as confirmed to us by senior
IAEA officials, IAEA does not track the obligation of the nuclear
material under safeguards and, therefore, IAEA may not have the
ability to identify whether and what volume of nuclear material at
partner country facilities is U.S.-obligated and subject to the terms
of U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements. In addition, our report notes
that IAEA considers member country nuclear material inventory
information confidential and does not share it with its member
countries, including the United States. Therefore, IAEA has a limited
ability to account for nuclear material subject to the terms of U.S.
nuclear cooperation agreements. Importantly, safeguards are not a
substitute for physical security and serve a different function. As
our report notes, safeguards are primarily a way to detect diversion
of nuclear material from peaceful to military purposes but do not
ensure that facilities are physically secure to prevent theft or
sabotage of such material.
* DOE, NRC, and State disagreed with our recommendation that State,
working with DOE and NRC, should seek to negotiate terms that include
enhanced measures regarding physical protection access rights in
future and renewed agreements. They also raised concerns with our
Matter for Congressional Consideration to amend the AEA should State
not implement our recommendation. We do not agree with agencies'
comments that our recommendation that agencies "seek to include" such
measures is impractical. As we note in our report, an enhanced measure
for access rights is in place in the recently negotiated U.S.-India
arrangements and procedures document. Further, while partner countries
pledge at the outset of an agreement that they will physically protect
U.S.-obligated material, the results of our work show that they have
not always adequately done so. Specifically, our report noted that, of
the 55 interagency physical protection visits made from 1994 through
2010, interagency teams found that countries met IAEA security
guidelines on only 27 visits; did not meet IAEA security guidelines on
21 visits, and the results of 7 visits are unknown because the U.S.
team was unable to assess the sites or agency documentation of the
physical protection visits was missing. In addition, we identified 12
facilities that are believed to have or previously had Category I U.S.
nuclear material that have not been visited by an interagency physical
protection team. We agree with the agencies' comments that the
licensing process for U.S. nuclear material offers some assurances
that physical security will be maintained and that an exchange of
diplomatic notes at the time of a transfer is designed to ensure the
partners maintain the material according to the terms of the
agreements. However, these measures are implemented at the time of
licensing or material transfer, and insight into the physical security
arrangements of the nuclear material over the longer-term, often 30-
year duration of these agreements is by no means guaranteed. Ensuring
that the United States has the tools it needs to visit facilities in
the future--even after an initial transfer of material is made per a
conditional export license--is important to supporting U.S. nuclear
nonproliferation objectives. We continue to believe that our
recommendation and Matter for Congressional Consideration are
consistent with the report's findings and would enhance the security
of U.S.-obligated nuclear material in other countries.
In addition, DOE and NRC commented that (1) our report contained
errors in fact and judgment, (2) our report's recommendations could
result in foreign partners requiring reciprocal access rights to U.S.
facilities that contain nuclear material that they transferred to the
United States, which could have national security implications, and
(3) our recommendation that agencies establish a process for
conducting annual reconciliations of inventories of nuclear material
and develop a repository to maintain data regarding U.S. inventories
of nuclear material overseas would be costly to implement. Our
response to these comments is as follows:
* None of the agencies' comments caused us to change any factual
statement we made in the report. DOE provided a limited number of
technical comments, which we incorporated as appropriate. Importantly,
some of the facts that agencies did not dispute included: (1) our
analysis that found U.S. agencies made only a single attempt to
comprehensively account for transferred U.S. HEU almost 20 years ago
and, at that time, were only able to verify the amount and location of
less than one-tenth of transferred U.S. HEU; and (2) partner countries
did not meet IAEA physical security guidelines for protecting U.S.
nuclear material in about half of the cases we reviewed from 1994
through 2010. In our view, these security weaknesses place U.S.-
obligated nuclear material at risk and raise potential proliferation
concerns. These agreements for nuclear cooperation are long-term in
scope and are often in force for 30 years or more. As we noted in our
report, the world today is dramatically different than the time when
most of the agreements were negotiated. New threats have emerged, and
nuclear proliferation risks have increased significantly. NRC
commented that countries may not want to change the "status quo" as it
pertains to nuclear cooperation agreement terms, including those
regarding the physical protection of U.S.-obligated nuclear material.
In our view, the status quo, or business-as-usual approach should not
apply to matters related to the security of U.S.-obligated nuclear
material located at partner facilities throughout the world. Moreover,
implementing a more robust security regime is consistent with and
complements the administration's goal of securing all vulnerable
nuclear material worldwide within a 4-year period.
* DOE and NRC's comment that the United States may be asked to
demonstrate reciprocity by nuclear cooperation agreement partners to
verify that adequate physical protection is being provided to their
nuclear material while in U.S. custody has merit and needs to be taken
into consideration when developing or reviewing nuclear cooperation
agreements. As a result, we added language to the conclusions and
recommendation sections to additionally state that "careful
consideration should be given to the impact of any reciprocity clauses
on U.S. national security when negotiating or reviewing these
agreements."
* In addition, DOE and NRC commented that we are suggesting a costly
new effort in recommending that agencies account for and track U.S.-
obligated nuclear material overseas. However, we noted in our report
that NMMSS officials told us that NMMSS is currently capable of
maintaining information regarding inventories of U.S. nuclear material
overseas. Moreover, DOE and NRC did not conduct an analysis to support
their assertion that such a system would be costly. Although we did
not perform a cost-benefit analysis, based on our conversations with
NMMSS staff and the lack of a DOE cost-benefit analysis, to the
contrary, there is no evidence to suggest that adding additional
information to the NMMSS database would necessarily entail significant
incremental costs or administrative overhead. We are sensitive to
suggesting or recommending new requirements on federal agencies that
may impose additional costs. However, it is important to note that the
U.S. government has already spent billions of dollars to secure
nuclear materials overseas, as well as radiation detection equipment
to detect possible smuggled nuclear material at our borders and the
border crossings of other countries. The administration intends to
spend hundreds of millions more to support the president's 4-year goal
to secure all vulnerable nuclear material worldwide. If necessary, an
expenditure of some resources to account for U.S. nuclear material
overseas is worthy of consideration. We stand by our recommendations
that State work with nuclear cooperation agreement partners that the
United States has transferred material to, to develop a baseline
inventory of U.S. nuclear material overseas, and that DOE work with
other federal agencies to develop a central repository to maintain
data regarding U.S. inventories of nuclear material overseas.
DOE disagreed with our findings that the U.S. interagency physical
protection visit program (1) lacked formal goals, and that (2) U.S.
agencies have not established a formal process for coordinating and
prioritizing interagency physical protection visits, in addition to
the three areas of general disagreement. During the course of our
work, we found no evidence of an interagency agreed-upon list of
program goals. In its comments, DOE stated that the formal goal of the
program is to determine whether U.S.-obligated nuclear material at the
partner country facility is being protected according to the intent of
IAEA security guidelines. This is the first time the goal has been
articulated to us as such. Moreover, we disagree with DOE's second
assertion that it has established a formal process for coordinating
and prioritizing visits. Our report notes that we found DOE has not
(1) worked with NRC and State to establish a plan and prioritize U.S.
physical protection visits or (2) measured performance in a systematic
way. In particular, our report notes that, in October 2009, a DOE
Office of Nonproliferation and International Security official
reported to us that it had formulated a list of 10 countries that
contained U.S. nuclear material and were priorities for physical
protection teams to visit. However, a senior-level DOE
nonproliferation official told us that DOE had not discussed this list
with State or NRC, or other agency officials, and it could not be
considered an interagency agreed-upon list. In addition, NRC Office of
International Program officials told us they thought interagency
coordination could be improved, and a State Bureau of International
Security and Nonproliferation official told us that agency
coordination has improved in the past 6 months. Moreover, as we
further state in the report, in February 2011, DOE officials told us
that the department is conducting a study of its methodology for
prioritizing physical protection visits.
In addition, in July 2011, in conjunction with the classification
review for this report, DOE officials stated that while DOE, NRC, and
State work together on coordinating U.S. government positions
regarding priorities and procedures for the interagency physical
protection program, no updated document exists that formalizes the
process for planning, coordinating, and prioritizing U.S. interagency
physical protection visits. We note that the documents that DOE refers
to are internal DOE documents presented to GAO in 2008 and 2009 in
response to questions regarding nuclear cooperation agreements. These
documents are not an interagency agreed upon document, but reflects
DOE's views on determining which countries and facilities interagency
physical protection teams should visit. Further, DOE officials in July
2011 stated that DOE, NRC, and State do not have an agreed-upon way to
measure performance in a systematic way, and that while the goals for
the monitoring and evaluation activities have not yet been formalized
through necessary updated documents, a prioritized list of countries
to visit does exist. These officials noted that the U.S. government is
working to update its planning documents and examining its methodology
for prioritizing physical protection visits. Any changes will be
included in these updated documents. Therefore, we continue to believe
that DOE should work with the other agencies to develop formal goals
for and a systematic process for determining which foreign facilities
to visit for future physical protection visits, and that the process
should be formalized and agreed to by all agencies.
NRC commented that in order to demonstrate that U.S. nuclear material
located abroad is potentially insecure, GAO made an assessment based
on U.S. agencies not conducting activities which are, according to
NRC, neither authorized nor required by U.S. law or by agreements
negotiated under Section 123 of the AEA. In fact, we acknowledge that
U.S. agencies are not required to conduct certain activities or
collect certain information. Moreover, we do not suggest that agencies
undertake activities that are not authorized by law. We recommend that
the agencies either expand upon and refine outreach they are already
conducting, contingent on the willingness of our cooperation agreement
partners, or negotiate new terms in nuclear cooperation agreements as
necessary. If the agencies find that they are unable to negotiate new
terms we recommend that Congress consider amending the AEA to require
such terms.
State commented that determining annual inventories and
reconciliations of nuclear material, as well as establishing enhanced
facility-by-facility reporting for those partners with which the
United States already has an annual inventory reconciliation is a DOE
function, not a State function. We agree that DOE plays a vital role
in carrying out these activities--once such bilaterally agreed upon
measures are in place. However, we believe it is appropriate to
recommend that the Department of State--as the agency with the lead
role in any negotiation regarding the terms and conditions of U.S.
nuclear cooperation agreements--work with DOE and NRC to secure these
measures with all U.S. partners. State also commented that there is a
cost to the U.S. nuclear industry in terms of lost competitiveness
should the requirements in U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements be
strengthened to include better access to critical facilities for U.S.
interagency physical protection teams. State provided no further
information to support this point. Our report acknowledges that any
change to the nuclear cooperation framework or authorizing legislation
will be very sensitive and that flexibility in the agreements is
necessary. We also stated that it may be possible to change the
framework of agreements in a way that does not hamper the ability of
the U.S. nuclear industry to remain competitive. While we would not
want to alter these agreements in such a way that our nuclear industry
is put at a competitive disadvantage, in our view, the security of
U.S. nuclear material overseas should never be compromised to achieve
a commercial goal.
Finally, State asserted that interagency physical protection teams
have been granted access to every site they have requested under the
consultation terms of U.S. nuclear cooperation agreements. As a
result, State believes the provisions of the current agreements are
adequate. As we note in our report, access to partner facilities is
not explicitly spelled out in the agreements and, in our view, this is
a limitation for the U.S. agencies in obtaining timely and systematic
access to partner nuclear facilities. While State may be technically
correct that access has been granted, our report clearly shows that
many sites believed to contain Category I quantities of U.S. nuclear
material have been visited only after lengthy periods of time, or have
not been visited at all. We continue to believe that enhanced physical
protection access measures could help interagency teams ensure that
they are able to visit sites containing U.S. nuclear material in a
timely, systematic, and comprehensive fashion.
We are sending copies of this report to the appropriate congressional
committees, the Secretaries of Energy and State, the Chairman of the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and other interested parties. In
addition, this report will be available at no charge on the GAO Web
site at [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov].
If you or your staff members have any questions about this report,
please contact me at (202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov. Contact points
for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be
found on the last page of this report. GAO staff who made key
contributions to this report are listed in appendix VII.
Signed by:
Gene Aloise:
Director, Natural Resources and Environment:
[End of section]
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology:
We addressed the following questions during our review: (1) assess
U.S. agency efforts to account for U.S. nuclear material overseas, (2)
assess the Department of Energy's (DOE) and other U.S. agencies'
efforts to monitor and evaluate the physical security conditions of
U.S. nuclear material subject to the terms of nuclear cooperation
agreements, and (3) describe DOE's activities to secure or remove
potentially vulnerable U.S. nuclear material at partner facilities.
To assess U.S. agency efforts to account for U.S. nuclear material
overseas, we reviewed relevant statutes, including the Atomic Energy
Act of 1954 (AEA), as amended, as well as the texts of all current
nuclear cooperation agreements. We obtained data from the Nuclear
Materials Management and Safeguards System (NMMSS), a database jointly
run by DOE and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), which, among
other things, maintains data on U.S. peaceful use exports and
retransfers of enriched uranium and plutonium that have occurred since
1950, and reviewed DOE and GAO reviews of the NMMSS database. To
assess the reliability of data in the NMMSS database, we interviewed
officials from DOE and NRC and a former DOE contractor to identify any
limitations in NMMSS's data on the location and status of U.S.
material overseas and found these data to be sufficiently reliable for
the purposes of accounting for U.S. exports of nuclear material. We
compared NMMSS data with other official and unofficial DOE sources of
information regarding U.S. nuclear material transfers, including DOE
data on nuclear material returns, to determine the reliability of
DOE's inventory data for U.S. nuclear material transferred overseas.
We reviewed DOE, NRC, and other U.S. agency records and interviewed
officials at those agencies to determine the extent to which DOE, NRC,
and State are able to identify where U.S. nuclear material was
exported, retransferred, and is currently held. We selected a non-
probability sample of partners based on, among other considerations,
quantities of U.S. special nuclear material transferred to them.
Results of interviews of non-probability samples are not
generalizeable to all partners but provide an understanding of those
partners' views of the U.S. government's efforts to account for its
nuclear material inventories overseas subject to nuclear cooperation
agreement terms. We conducted site visits in four countries holding
U.S.-obligated material and interviewed governmental officials and
nuclear facility operators in these countries to discuss material
accounting procedures. Further, we interviewed officials from five
partners regarding their observations about working with the U.S.
government to account for material subject to the terms of nuclear
cooperation agreements. We analyzed the texts of administrative
arrangements with key countries to determine the extent to which DOE
conducts inventory reconciliations of inventory transferred between
the United States and a partner country.
To assess DOE's and other U.S. agencies' efforts to monitor and
evaluate the physical security conditions of U.S. nuclear material
overseas subject to nuclear cooperation agreement terms and describe
DOE's activities to secure or remove potentially vulnerable U.S.
nuclear material at partner facilities, we reviewed all U.S. nuclear
cooperation agreements in force, as well as other U.S. statutes, and
IAEA's security guidelines, "The Physical Protection of Nuclear
Material and Nuclear Facilities," INFCIRC/225/Rev.4,[Footnote 36] and
other relevant international conventions to determine the extent to
which such laws and international conventions provide for DOE and U.S.
agencies to monitor and evaluate the physical security of transferred
U.S. nuclear material subject to U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement
terms. We interviewed officials from DOE, NRC, and the Department of
State (State) to gain insights into how effective their efforts are,
and how their efforts might be improved. We selected a nonprobability
sample of partners based on, among other considerations, quantities of
U.S. special nuclear material transferred to them and interviewed
officials to determine how DOE and other U.S. agencies work with
partner countries to exchange views on physical security and the
process by which U.S. nuclear material is returned to the United
States. Results of interviews of non-probability samples are not
generalizeable to all partners but provide an understanding of those
partners' views of the U.S. government's efforts to monitor and
evaluate the physical security conditions of U.S. nuclear material
overseas subject to nuclear cooperation agreement terms. We also
obtained and analyzed the records of all available U.S. physical
protection visits to partner facilities from 1974 through 2010. We
reviewed agency documents and interviewed officials from DOE, NRC, and
State regarding the policies and procedures for determining which
partners to visit, how they conducted physical protection visits at
partner facilities, and mechanisms for following up on the results of
these visits. In particular, we compared the sites visited with NMMSS
records of U.S. material exported and retransferred, and other
information to evaluate the extent to which U.S. physical protection
visits were made to all sites overseas containing U.S. special nuclear
material. We obtained written responses from Global Threat Reduction
Initiative (GTRI), and reviewed other information regarding their
program activities. To better understand IAEA's role in maintaining
safeguards and evaluating physical security measures, we interviewed
IAEA officials and reviewed relevant documents.
We conducted this performance audit from September 2010 to June 2011
in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.
[End of section]
Appendix II: Current and Previous U.S. Nuclear Cooperation Agreement
Partners:
The United States currently has 27 agreements in force for peaceful
nuclear cooperation with foreign countries, the European Atomic Energy
Community (EURATOM), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),
and Taiwan. Figure 1 shows the partner countries with which the United
States currently has or previously had a nuclear cooperation agreement
with.
Figure 1: Cooperating Partners with Which the United States Currently
Has or Previously Had a Nuclear Cooperation Agreement:
[Refer to PDF for image: illustrated world map]
The following categories are depicted on the map:
Countries with which the United States has a nuclear cooperation
agreement:
Countries with which the United States previously had a nuclear
cooperation agreement:
Countries with which the United States has not had a nuclear
cooperation agreement:
Countries with which the United States has or has had a trilateral
project and supply agreement.
Sources: GAO analysis of Department of State data; Map Resources
(map).
[End of figure]
As indicated in figure 1, the United States has nuclear cooperation
agreements in force with Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Brazil,
Canada, China, Colombia, EURATOM, Egypt, India, Indonesia, IAEA,
Japan, Kazakhstan, Morocco, Norway, Peru, Russia, South Africa, South
Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, and United Arab
Emirates.[Footnote 27] In addition, the United States previously had
nuclear cooperation agreements with Chile, Dominican Republic, Iran,
Israel, Lebanon, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, Uruguay,
Venezuela, and Vietnam.[Footnote 38]
[End of section]
Appendix III: International Guidelines for the Categorization of
Nuclear Material:
IAEA's INFCIRC/225/Rev.4 security guideline document establishes the
standard by which the United States and other countries generally
classify the categories of physical protection that should be afforded
nuclear material, based on the type, volume, and disposition of the
nuclear material. Table 1 lists the material category according to
IAEA's security guidelines, INFCIRC/225/Rev4. Specifically:
Table 1: Categorization of Nuclear Material According to IAEA Security
Guidelines:
Material: 1. Plutonium[A];
Form: Unirradiated[B];
Category I: 2 kilograms or more
Category II: Less than 2 kilograms but more than 500 g;
Category III[C]: 500 g or less but more than 15 g.
Material: 2. Uranium-235;
Form: Unirradiated[B];
- uranium enriched to 20% 235U or more;
Category I: 5 kilograms or more;
Category II: Less than 5 kilograms but more than 1 kilogram;
Category III[C]: 1 kilogram or less but more than 15g;
- uranium enriched to 10 10% 235U but less than 20% 235U;
Category II: 10 kilograms or more;
Category III[C]: Less than 10 kilograms but more than 1 kilogram;
- uranium enriched above natural, but less than 10% 235U;
Category III[C]: 10 kilograms or more.
Material: 3. Uranium-233;
Form: Unirradiated[B];
Category I: 2 kilograms or more;
Category II: Less than 2 kilograms but more than 500 g;
Category III[C]: 500 g or less but more than 15 g.
Material: 4. Irradiated fuel (The categorization of irradiated fuel in
the table is based on international transport considerations. The
State may assign a different category for domestic use, storage, and
transport taking all relevant factors into account.)
Form:
Category I:
Category II: Depleted or natural uranium, thorium, or low-enriched
fuel (less than 10% fissile content)[D,E].
Source: IAEA INFCIRC225r4.
[A] All plutonium except that with isotopic concentration exceeding
80% in plutonium-238.
[B] Material not irradiated in a reactor or material irradiated in a
reactor but with a radiation level equal to or less than 1 Gy/hr (100
rad/hr) at 1 meter unshielded.
[C] Quantities not falling in Category Ill and natural uranium,
depleted uranium and thorium should be protected at least in
accordance with prudent management practice.
[D] Although this level of protection is recommended, it would be open
to States, upon evaluation of the specific circumstances, to assign a
different category of physical protection.
[E] Other fuel which by virtue of its original fissile material
content is classified as Category I or II before irradiation may be
reduced one category level while the radiation level from the fuel
exceeds 1 Gy/hr (100 rad/hr) at 1 meter unshielded.
[End of table]
[End of section]
Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Energy:
NNSA:
Department of Energy:
National Nuclear Security Administration:
Washington, DC 20585:
August 5, 2011:
Mr. Gene Aloise:
Director:
National Resources and Environment:
Government Accountability Office:
Washington, D.C. 20548
Dear Mr. Aloise:
The National Nuclear Security Administration appreciates the
opportunity to review the Government Accountability Office's (GAO)
draft report, Nuclear Nonproliferation: U.S. Agencies Have Limited
Ability to Account for, Monitor, and Evaluate the Security of U.S.
Nuclear Material Overseas, GA0-11-920. I understand that the GAO was
asked to: (1) assess U.S. agency efforts to account for U.S. nuclear
material overseas; (2) assess the Department of Energy's (DOE) and
U.S. agencies' efforts to monitor and evaluate the physical security
of U.S. material overseas; and (3) describe DOES activities to secure
or remove potentially vulnerable U.S. nuclear material at partner
facilities.
Overall, NNSA is concerned with the errors in fact and judgment that
appear in the Congressional Considerations and recommendations for
U.S. Government agencies. NNSA is working with other partners to
secure weapons-usable nuclear materials in additional parts of the
world and to strengthen security at civil nuclear and radiological
facilities. We recognize that further work is needed and we are
working with our partners to improve international security. Below arc
comments to clarify points in the draft report.
Comments Related to GAO Report Contents:
1. The GAO report asserts on pages 26 and 37 that the U.S.
interagency has not "formalized its goals for ... monitoring and
evaluation activities." This is incorrect. The U.S. interagency has
developed and formalized goals for monitoring and evaluating
activities to use during assessment visits. Specifically, during
bilateral physical protection assessment visits, the adequacy of
physical protection provided to U.S.-obligated nuclear material in
another state is determined based on whether a site meets the intent
of the recommendations contained in the IAEA Nuclear Security Series
document on "The Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials and Nuclear
Facilities," Information Circular 225 (INFCIRC/225). This fact is
displayed in a table, found in Appendix VI, that reviews the physical
protection visits conducted since 1994.
2. The GAO report asserts that "DOE, which has the technical lead and
is the agency lead on most visas has not ...worked with NRC and State
to establish a plan and prioritize US physical protection visit" and
states that the U.S. interagency has not established a formal process
for coordinating and prioritizing such visits. This statement is
inaccurate and contrary to the information contained in the report.
Specifically, the GAO report acknowledges on page 27-28 that DOE, the
NRC, and State Department work together on coordinating U.S.
Government positions regarding the priorities for the physical
protection visits; and the U.S. interagency is working to update its
planning documents and methodology. As part of the preparation for all
physical protection assessment visits, we work with other U.S.
agencies, including the NRC and State Department, to prioritize and
plan visits to countries based on criteria that were developed by all
three agencies. Although visits to countries with highly enriched
uranium (HEU) or plutonium in Category I amounts are priorities,
visits also are scheduled whenever a country has had or expects to
have a change in inventory of U.S.-obligated nuclear material, along
with other factors, such as a finding of inadequate physical
protection. Finally, the list of priorities may change from time to
time, based on other factors such as a country's readiness for a
visit, or the urgency of pending license requests for the provision of
U.S. obligated nuclear material to a partner.
3. The GAO report asserts on pages 18, 28 and 37 that the U.S.
interagency has not "systematically visited countries believed to be
holding Category I quantities of U.S. nuclear material." We disagree
with this assessment. The U.S. interagency has a specific methodology
for prioritizing visits that includes consideration of, among other
things, the following variables: the type, and quantity of U.S.-
obligated nuclear material at a facility; whether a country is making
recommended improvements; pending NRC licenses; information from
previous physical protection assessments; and concerns raised through
other available information. The current system for planning and
prioritizing bilateral assessment visits is being updated, as
necessary, to take into account the following changes: the increasing
repatriation of a large amount of U.S.-obligated HEU; a shift to
greater use of low enriched uranium (LEU); and the recent revision of
INFCIRC/225.
4. We also disagree with the GAO assessment that "DOE and US. agencies
do not have a systematic process to revisit or monitor security
improvements at facilities that do not meet IAEA security guidelines."
While the U.S. interagency does hold follow-up visits, these
subsequent visits are not the only manner of ensuring that necessary
improvements are made. NNSA and the National Laboratories also have
used informal visits and other arrangements to work with countries to
make needed improvements that were revealed as a result of a visit.
Unfortunately, the GAO report has not integrated site visits and
improvements into its analysis, and thus implied that nothing was done
in between visits to improve the security of facilities.
5. On page 23, we disagree with GAO's characterization of the April
2008 U.S. physical protection assessment of a country's facilities as
"as a 'tour'." Of particular concern is their comment, later on this
page, that "officials told us the U.S. government had shared some high-
level observations regarding its visit with the country's government
officials and the site operators but did not provide the government or
site operators with written observations or recommendations."Asa
result of the high-level observations the U.S. Government verbally
shared with the government officials regarding its physical protection
visit, those officials were well aware of the in-depth U.S.
assessment. In years past, the U.S. interagency did not always provide
the host country a copy of the slides its presents, but now does so on
a routine basis.
Comments Related to GAO Report Recommendations:
While NNSA appreciates the GAO's effort with the review, it has
concerns with the recommendation to institute an "annual inventory
reconciliation, reporting on a facility-by-facility basis for weapon-
usable material where possible ..." for all states that hold
U.S.obligated nuclear material. We do not believe that this is
necessary, particularly since the GAO's interviews with foreign
governments mirror the U.S. interagency view that nuclear material can
be accounted for at the overall State-level, as required pursuant to
Section 123(a)(1) of the Atomic Energy Act. In addition, the IAEA's
comprehensive safeguards program is another important tool that helps
maintain the continuity of knowledge of the location of nuclear
materials in a country, including U.S.-obligated nuclear material. We
believe that IAEA inspection, surveillance, and reporting processes
serve as an effective, internationally sanctioned and U.S.-supported
tracking and accounting mechanism.
With the existence of a system that has long proved its worth, we also
are concerned that the GAO is suggesting a costly new system without
addressing the inherent costs and benefits of either its
recommendations or issues raised for Congressional consideration. In
addition to the fact that maintaining a comprehensive inventory of
U.S.-obligated nuclear material is neither practical nor always
necessary to the mission of protecting U.S.-obligated nuclear material
in all cases, such a new system would be highly costly. Should changes
be made to the U.S. Nuclear Materials Management and Safeguards System
(NMMSS) to accommodate the GAO's recommendations, there would be
significant increase in costs, due to an increase in staff and
equipment needed to accomplish this new objective.
In addition to the obvious economic costs, there are potential
security concerns related to the new system the GAO is proposing.
There is a significant possibility that other states may respond to a
request for tracking information by asking for the same information
from the United States. Should the U.S. Government decide to act on
the GAO recommendation to "amend the AEA ... [to include] enhanced
measures regarding physical protection access rights in future
agreements and renewed agreements, so that U.S. physical protection
teams may obtain access when necessary to verify that US. nuclear
materials have adequate physical protection," it is likely that the
United States would be asked to demonstrate the physical protection of
nuclear material in the United States. This, in turn, raises the
question of whether this U.S. sensitive information would be
adequately protected, an issue that never was raised in the GAO report.
While NNSA appreciates the GAO's recognition that the United States
and its partners share a strong common interest in deterring and
preventing the misuse of U.S. nuclear material or any other nuclear
material, we caution against requiring physical protection access in
future bilateral agreements. Physical protection assessment visits
provide an important opportunity to exchange information and best
practices to enhance controls in the host country and, as relevant, in
the U.S. The United States has the option of placing conditions on
licenses to further control U.S.obligated nuclear material, if
necessary. This is preferable, to the GAO recommendation to disallow
"nuclear cooperation agreements ... [that do not] contain provisions
allowing the United States to verify that adequate physical security
is exercised over nuclear material subject to the terms of these
agreements." since in the former, the United States would still have
the opportunity to provide assistance and conduct follow-up visits to
facilities to ensure that upgrades have been implemented to adhere to
international physical protection standards. Should the United States
press other states, there is a chance that the security of nuclear
materials and facilities would decrease, if states chose not to pursue
such agreements with the United States. Although the current system is
not perfect, we recognize that it does allow for formal and informal
follow-up visits that help improve the security of nuclear materials
in another country.
If you have any questions related to this response, please contact
JoAnne Parker, Director, Office of Internal Controls at 202-586-1913.
Sincerely,
Signed by:
Kenneth W. Powers:
Associate Administrator for Management and Budget:
cc: Deputy Administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation:
[End of section]
Appendix V: Comments from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission:
United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission:
Washington, D.C. 20555-0001:
July 27, 2011:
Mr. Gene Aloise:
Director:
Natural Resources and Environment:
United States Government Accountability Office:
Washington, D.C. 20548:
Dear Mr. Aloise:
On behalf of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), I am
providing the NRC's views of the U. S. Government Accountability
Office (GAO) draft report, "Nuclear Nonproliferation: U.S. Agencies
Have Limited Ability to Account far, Monitor, and Evaluate the
Security of U S. Nuclear Materials Overseas."
The NRC appreciates the opportunity to comment on this report. As is
reflected in the report, the NRC conducts licensing activities for
exports of special nuclear material (SNM), equipment and components,
and works closely with other U.S. Government agencies to implement
other aspects of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (AEA). In
the staff-level discussions on March 2, 2011, concerning the Statement
of Facts which preceded the final report. and in response to this
draft, NRC notes its belief that GAO's study contains serious errors
in fact and in judgment that undermine the Congressional
Considerations and the recommendations for U.S. Government agencies.
The overarching thesis of the report is that, although U.S Government
agencies, including NRC, are complying with applicable national laws,
the United States is not informed about locations and inventories of
U.S.-origin SNM located abroad, and that this material is potentially
insecure. To demonstrate this thesis, the GAO made an "assessment"
based on U.S. agencies not conducting activities which are, in fact,
neither authorized nor required by U.S. law or by agreements
negotiated under Section 123 of the AEA. The AEA establishes clear
criteria for authorizing exports and imports of nuclear materials,
equipment and components. The countries which have entered into an
Agreement for Cooperation with the United States pursuant to AEA
Section 123 have been evaluated using those criteria, and, among other
things, have agreed to verify peaceful end use and to implement
internationally-accepted standards for physically securing the U.S.-
origin exports. The GAO report clearly states that the AEA does not
require Section 123 Agreements to stipulate that partners report
information on the quantity or location of SNM subject to the
Agreement. However, at the conclusion of this report the GAO indicates
that the lack of this information, which is not authorized or required
by U.S. law, or agreed to by the importing country, is a weakness of
the Section 123 Agreements.
The GAO acknowledges the existence of the International Atomic Energy
Agency's (IAEA) comprehensive safeguards program, but does not view it
as an additional important tool to safeguard the SNM. The NRC believes
that IAEA safeguards maintain the continuity of knowledge of the
location of nuclear material in countries, including U.S.-origin SNM.
For example, in the case of spent power reactor fuel, representing a
significant fraction of the U.S.obligated SNM located outside the
United States, the IAEA inspection, surveillance, and reporting
process serves as an effective internationally-sanctioned and U.S.-
supported tracking and accounting mechanism.
Further, the NRC believes the GAO report does not give sufficient
weight to foreign sovereign responsibilities for ensuring physical
protection of imports within their borders consistent with national
law and international obligations. Countries must report to the United
States any changes in chemical or physical form of the exported SNM
unless prior approval is granted in a Section 123 Agreement. All
locations of U.S.-origin Category I material must be reported to and
approved by the U.S. Government prior to the exports of the SNM. In
GAO's interviews with foreign governments, the latter do not suggest
that additional intrusive measures be taken bilaterally by the United
States to account for the U.S.-origin material, nor do the foreign
governments indicate that they would be willing to have their current
Section 123 Agreements altered for that purpose. Instead, they do
agree that overall State-level reconciliation could be undertaken
between countries.
The GAO report maintains that the legally binding agreement to
physically protect U.S.-origin SNM, equipment and components which is
framed in the Section 123 Agreement text and implemented through the
bilateral physical protection program has not been adequately
implemented. We disagree with this view. The Executive Branch develops
a nonproliferation assessment of each country before entering into a
Section 123 Agreement which, inter alia, assesses the country's
ability to protect and account for any material which may be
transferred pursuant to the Agreement. The NRC independently reviews
that assessment and relays its findings to the President and Congress.
Physical protection and safeguards practices are part of a wider
network of relationships between the agencies of the United States and
its corresponding partners in which the country's practices as a whole
are taken into account. For each SNM export, government-to-government
peaceful use assurances are received which reinforce these
requirements. Prior to issuing an export license, NRC staff conducts a
review of all available foreign physical protection and threat
information. Physical protection bilateral visits are used to exchange
information and best practices to enhance controls in the host country
and, as relevant, in the United States.
The NRC has the option of placing conditions on licenses to further
control SNM, if that is deemed prudent. Where appropriate, the United
States, with active NRC participation, has worked closely with
partners to provide assistance and has revisited facilities to ensure
that upgrades have been implemented. The NRC does not believe that the
GAO's assessment is based on risk-informed approach nor dos it posit
the cost-benefit basis for the Congressional Considerations or the
recommendations. It is NRC's view that obtaining and maintaining a
comprehensive and current inventory of U.S.-origin SNM is neither
practical nor critical to the mission of security of U.S.-origin
materials in all cases. For example, the inventory knowledge is very
important for high-consequence materials, e.g., high enriched uranium
and separated plutonium, while the precise amount of plutonium in
spent fuel is less risk significant. Knowing that reactor fuel has
been irradiated and is in storage under IAEA safeguards is sufficient
and consistent with the requirements established under the AEA and the
1978 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act. Were the U.S. Government's
database tasked with tracking U.S.-origin SNM after export, the Nuclear
Materials Management and Safeguards System (NMMSS. which is jointly
funded by NRC and DOE) would need changes to the database and
software, and additional staff and funding resources. Although the GAO
emphasizes the current inventory reconciliation with five partners as
a best practice, the NRC notes that these reconciliations are not
facility-specific but at a State level and do not indicate if the
material is irradiated or non-irradiated. In addition, the foreign
government declared holding of nuclear material is not entered into
NMMSS. Furthermore, the outcome of the necessary sustained diplomatic
effort to engage foreign governments to discuss inclusion of facility-
specific physical protection visits would hinge on foreign government
consideration of whether a change to the status quo is in their national
interest. Should the outcome be favorable, and that cannot be assumed,
its implementation would be costly, requiring additional staff and
funding at multiple agencies, including the NRC. The GAO makes no
estimate of the cost, nor of the time, effort, or possible success of
its recommendations.
Finally, we believe alterations in the current Section 123 Agreement
and/or AEA language would need to take into account reciprocity. The
GAO's report is silent with regard to the information security aspect
of sharing detailed facility-specific location of nuclear materials. In
the United States facility-specific information on the quantity and
form of high-enriched uranium and separated plutonium would be
considered "Safeguards Information" or classified as "Confidential
National Security Information." Most of the Section 123 Agreements are
reciprocal in nature and the trend in negotiating new or renewals of
such agreements is to emphasize reciprocal responsibilities. The
implementation of some of the GAO recommendations may require the
United States to share facility-specific sensitive information with
dozens of countries, most of which are not currently authorized to
have such access. If the United States seeks to further impose on
sovereign responsibilities for its exports, it must be willing to
accept foreign imposition of reciprocal rights on imports. It should
be noted that the NRC anticipates licensing greater numbers of imports
if nuclear energy new builds increases. The GAO recommendations would
need a thorough assessment of whether the physical protection of the
material is, in fact, enhanced by the recommended changes, and whether
the United States' sensitive information can be protected
appropriately.
In short, we believe the study does not persuasively demonstrate that
the AEA is insufficient as a framework for ensuring U.S.-origin SNM is
protected; that there is a physical protection problem with exported
SNM that is not addressed through existing agreements or ongoing
bilateral exchanges; that any country with a Section 123 Agreement has
or is likely to divert U.S.-origin SNM to weapons programs; that
unilateral changes to existing agreements will be accepted by foreign
partners; or that there is a clear cost-benefit basis for suggesting
these changes based on a risk-informed approach.
The NRC takes its export and import licensing responsibility very
seriously, and welcomes the GAO's study of the existing system to
protect U.S.-origin material. It should be noted that the NRC has
actively participated in the U.S. governments efforts to urge the
world to amend the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear
Material, and in revising IAEA security guidance documents in order to
establish more stringent internationally accepted norms that obligate
all countries equally. The NRC continuously reviews the effectiveness
and efficiency of its relevant processes. It has worked closely with
appropriate federal agencies to improve and document the process used
to determine the periodicity of bilateral physical protection visits,
focusing on new exports of SNM, and reflecting changes made in the
IAEA security guidance documents.
If needed, I would be glad to discuss the NRC's comments with you or
have a member of the NRC staff discuss our comments with your staff.
Sincerely,
Signed by:
R.W. Borchardt:
Executive Director for Operations:
[End of section]
Appendix VI: Comments from the Department of State:
United States Department of State:
Chief Financial Officer:
Washington, D.C. 20520:
August 1, 2011:
Ms. Jacquelyn Williams-Bridgers:
Managing Director:
International Affairs and Trade:
Government Accountability Office:
441 G Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20548-0001:
Dear Ms. Williams-Bridgers:
We appreciate the opportunity to review your draft report, "Nuclear
Nonproliferation: Agencies Have Limited Ability to Account for,
Monitor, and Evaluate the Security of U.S. Nuclear Material Overseas,"
GAO Job Code 361315.
The enclosed Department of State comments are provided for
incorporation with this letter as an appendix to the final report.
If you have any questions concerning this response, please contact
Jake Mentz, Foreign Affairs Officer, Bureau of International Security
and Nonproliferation, Office of Nuclear Energy, Safety and Security at
(202) 647-3342.
Sincerely,
Signed by:
James L. Millette
cc: GAO ” Gene Aloise:
ISN ” Eliot Kang:
State/OIG ” Evelyn Klemstine:
[End of letter]
Department of State Comments on GAO Draft Report:
NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION: Agencies Have Limited Ability to Account
for, Monitor, and Evaluate the Security of U.S. Nuclear Material
Overseas (GAO-11-920, GAO Code 361315):
The Department of State appreciates the opportunity to comment on
GAO's draft report, "Nuclear Nonproliferation: Agencies Have Limited
Ability to Account for, Monitor, and Evaluate the Security of U.S.
Nuclear Material Overseas."
The GAO report outlined four recommendations for the Secretary of
State, working with the Secretary of Energy and the Chairman of the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The first recommendation is "to
determine, for those partners with which the United States has
transferred material but does not have annual inventory
reconciliation, a baseline inventory of weapon-usable U.S. nuclear
material, and establish a process for conducting annual
reconciliations of inventories of nuclear material on a facility-by-
facility basis." Determining annual inventories and reconciliations of
nuclear material is a Department of Energy/National Nuclear Security
Agency (DOE/NNSA) function, not a Department of State function.
The second recommendation is "to establish for those partners with
which the United States has an annual inventory reconciliation,
reporting on a facility-by-facility basis for weapon-usable material
where possible." Establishing annual inventory reconciliations is a
DOE/NNSA function, not a State Department function.
As we noted to the authors of this report, we do not believe that the
recommendations noted in the preceding two paragraphs are necessary.
Moreover, with IAEA Safeguards declarations, U.S. export license
applications and U.S. physical protection visits, we believe that we
have sufficient data to confirm adequately the quantities of U.S.-
obligated nuclear material in other countries.
The third recommendation is "to facilitate visits to sites that U.S.
physical protection teams have not visited that are believed to be
holding U.S. Category I nuclear material." Facilitating physical
protection visits requested by the Department of Energy is the
Department of State's current practice.
The fourth recommendation is "to seek to include measures that provide
for physical protection access rights in new or renewed nuclear
cooperation agreements so that U.S. interagency physical protection
teams may in the future obtain access when necessary to verify that
U.S. nuclear materials are adequately protected." The U.S. must take
into account the fact that physical protection of nuclear material is
considered a sovereignty issue by all States and by international
treaty. Therefore, the Department of State believes that careful
consideration should be given to the potential impact on our bilateral
relationships, on U.S. national security and U.S. commercial
competitiveness in the nuclear arena of including new explicit rights
for physical protection access. U.S. physical protection teams have
been granted access to every site that they have requested access to
under the consultation provisions of our nuclear cooperation
agreements currently in force, and we therefore believe that the
provisions of the current agreements adequately facilitate the
accomplishment of U.S. policy objectives.
The Department of State believes that the implementing these GAO
recommendations would adversely impact U.S. commercial competitiveness
in overseas markets, diminish U.S. influence overseas to advance our
national nonproliferation objectives and cost jobs at home. There are
multiple suppliers for nuclear material and equipment and little
reason why a country, when given a choice to purchase from the United
States under the regime recommended by the GAO or from another country
without the more onerous conditions, would not chose the latter. In
that regard, we note the following quote in the GAO report: "However,
it may be possible to do so [i.e., add access requirements to nuclear
cooperation agreements] in a way that includes greater access to
critical facilities where weapon-usable U.S. nuclear material is
stored, without infringing on the sovereign rights of our partners or
hampering the ability of the U.S. nuclear industry to remain
competitive." Based upon our decades of experience working with our
partner governments on these issues, the Department of State does not
believe this would be possible.
[End of section]
Appendix VII: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments:
GAO Contact:
Gene Aloise, (202) 512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov.
Staff Acknowledgments:
In addition to the individual named above, Glen Levis, Assistant
Director; Antoinette Capaccio; Julia Coulter; Michelle Munn; and
Alison O'Neill made key contributions to this report.
[End of section]
Footnotes:
[1] For the purposes of this report, we refer to all countries,
EURATOM, IAEA, and Taiwan as partners. EURATOM is composed of the 27
countries of the European Union. IAEA, an independent international
organization based in Vienna, Austria, is affiliated with the United
Nations and has the dual mission of promoting the peaceful uses of
nuclear energy and verifying that nuclear materials intended for
peaceful purposes are not diverted to military purposes. IAEA had 151
member states as of November 2010. Governmental relations between the
United States and Taiwan were terminated on January 1, 1979. All
agreements concluded with the authorities on Taiwan prior to January
1, 1979, are administered for the United States by the American
Institute in Taiwan, a nonprofit corporation based in Washington, D.C.
The United States has two nuclear cooperation agreements with
Australia, including one for Separation of Uranium Isotopes by Laser
Excitation (SILEX) technology, bringing the number of agreements to 27.
[2] Special nuclear material includes uranium enriched in the isotope
of uranium-235, uranium-233, and plutonium.
[3] U.S. companies can obtain a license from the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC) to export certain small quantities of nuclear
material and minor reactor components to foreign countries without a
nuclear cooperation agreement in place. Dual-use items––items that can
be used for both civilian and military applications”can be exported
without a nuclear cooperation agreement.
[4] GAO, Nuclear Nonproliferation: Concerns With the U.S.
International Nuclear Materials Tracking System, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO/T-RCED/AIMD-96-91] (Washington, D.C.:
Feb. 28, 1996).
[5] Weapon-usable nuclear materials are HEU”uranium enriched in the
isotope uranium-235 to 20 percent or greater; uranium-233; and any
plutonium containing less than 80 percent of the isotope plutonium-
238. Such materials are also often referred to as fissile materials or
strategic special nuclear materials. In addition, weapon-grade HEU is
generally defined as HEU enriched in the isotope of uranium-235 at 90
percent or greater.
[6] GAO, Nuclear Nonproliferation: Comprehensive U.S. Planning and
Better Foreign Cooperation Needed to Secure Vulnerable Nuclear
Materials Worldwide, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-227] (Washington, D.C.: Dec. 15,
2010).
[7] NNSA was created by the National Defense Authorization Act for
Fiscal Year 2000, Pub. L. No. 106-65 (1999). It is a separate
semiautonomous agency within DOE, with responsibility for the nation‘s
nuclear weapons, nonproliferation, and naval reactors programs.
[8] GAO, Nuclear Commerce: Governmentwide Strategy Could Help Increase
Commercial Benefits from U.S. Nuclear Cooperation Agreements with
Other Countries, [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-36]
(Washington, D.C.: Nov. 4, 2010).
[9] Results of interviews of non-probability samples are not
generalizeable to all partners but provide an understanding of those
partners‘ views of the U.S. government‘s efforts to account for its
nuclear material inventories and monitor and evaluate the physical
security conditions of U.S. nuclear material overseas subject to
nuclear cooperation agreement terms.
[10] In January 2011, IAEA issued an updated revision of its security
guideline document, IAEA, ’Nuclear Security Recommendations on
Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and Nuclear Facilities“ (IAEA
INFCIRC/225/Rev.5 (2011).
[11] The President may exempt proposed agreements for peaceful nuclear
cooperation from any of these requirements if he determines that the
requirement would be seriously prejudicial to the achievement of U.S.
nonproliferation objectives or otherwise jeopardize the common defense
and security.
[12] Section 104 of the Henry J. Hyde United States-India Peaceful
Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006 authorized the President to
exempt India from the full-scope safeguards requirement if the
President made a determination that India had taken certain specified
actions and that the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) had decided by
consensus to permit the supply to India of nuclear items covered by
the NSG Guidelines. On September 10, 2008, the President made the
requisite determination, the agreement was approved by legislation
enacted on October 8, 2008, and that agreement with India entered into
force on December 6, 2008.
[13] A production facility is any equipment or device, or any
important component of such equipment or device, capable of the
production of special nuclear material in such quantity as to be of
significance to the common defense and security or in such a manner as
to affect the health and safety of the public. A utilization facility
is any equipment or device, or any important component of such
equipment or device, other than an atomic weapon, capable of using
such material.
[14] The U.S.-China agreement states that parties shall exchange views
on their national material accounting systems.
[15] Energy Policy Act of 1992, Pub. L. No. 102-486, § 903(b), 106
Stat. 2776, 2945-46.
[16] NRC, The United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission‘s Report to
Congress on the Disposition of Highly Enriched Uranium Previously
Exported from the United States, Washington, D.C. (January 1993).
[17] NMMSS has been used to account for U.S. imports and exports of
nuclear material since 1967 and has been upgraded several times, most
recently in 2009, though some of its information dates to 1950.
[18] The United States has two agreements with Australia. One
agreement concerns broadbased nuclear cooperation; the second is
limited to collaboration in SILEX technology.
[19] According to DOE, a sealed source may contain nuclear or
radiological material, and is packaged to be environmentally safe and
are generally used for calibration of radiation measuring and
monitoring instruments in nuclear research and development.
[20] See GAO, Obstacles To U.S. Ability to Control And Track Weapons-
Grade Uranium Supplied Abroad, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO/ID-82-91] (Washington, D.C. Aug. 2,
1982).
[21] DOE Draft Order O 470.6 Nuclear Material Control and
Accountability, issued Oct. 6, 2010.
[22] An arrangements and procedures document negotiated pursuant to
the 2008 U.S.-India nuclear cooperation agreement contains a provision
providing for consultation visits at two reprocessing facilities
established to reprocess material including U.S.-obligated material.
In addition, the 1988 U.S.-Japan nuclear cooperation agreement
provides for what is known as ’advance consent rights“ by the United
States to Japan to reprocess its U.S.-obligated spent nuclear fuel.
Specifically, a provision in the nuclear cooperation agreement allows
for either party to ’have access to all places and data, and any
equipment or facility—necessary to account for the nuclear material...
and to make such independent measurements as may be deemed necessary
by the safeguarded party to account for such nuclear material“ if
either party becomes aware that the IAEA is not applying safeguards as
required by the agreement.
[23] We reported in August 1982 and December 1994 that the United
States evaluates foreign countries physical protection systems under
what was then known as the U.S. Bilateral Physical Protection Program.
For a list of countries visited, number of facilities visited, and
date of visits from 1974 through 1981, see [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO/ID-82-81]. In 1994, we reported that
the United States had conducted bilateral physical security
consultations with approximately 46 nations, including site visits to
review the physical protection at fixed sites and during transport.
For a list of the countries visited by U.S. physical protection teams
from 1974 through 1994, including country, number of visits, and date
of last visit, see appendix II of that report, GAO, Nuclear
Nonproliferation: U.S. International Nuclear Materials Tracking
Capabilities Are Limited, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO/RCED/AIMD-95-5] (Washington,
D.C.: Dec. 27, 1994).
[24] NRC‘s regulations pertaining to the review of license
applications for exports of nuclear equipment, material including
exports of material subject to nuclear cooperation agreements, permit
the determination of adequacy of foreign protection systems on a
countrywide basis. See 10 C.F.R. §110.44 (2011).
[25] LEU is uranium that contains less than 20 percent of the isotope
uranium-235.
[26] Our analysis shows three countries were visited between October
2009 and April 2010, one more in early 2011, and DOE and State
officials reported they expect to visit one other in late 2011.
[27] GAO, Executive Guide: Effectively Implementing the Government
Performance and Results Act, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO/GGD-96-118] (Washington, D.C.: June
1996).
[28] DOE Order O 413.1B.
[29] Because DOE and NRC did not have a comprehensive inventory of
U.S. material located overseas or any comprehensive analyses of the
U.S. interagency physical protection visits‘ results-”as described
elsewhere in this report-”we obtained and analyzed NMMSS records of
U.S. nuclear material exports and retransfers, GTRI records of fuel
returns and, where available, information from U.S. physical
protection visits records indicating the volumes and disposition of
U.S. nuclear material overseas at the time of the U.S. interagency
visit. We developed an estimate of which partner countries held
Category I quantities of U.S. nuclear material during the review
period, and for how long. We used the IAEA security document
INFCIRC/225/Rev.4 to categorize material. We shared the results of
this analysis with DOE and NRC officials and made adjustments based on
agency officials‘ comments on where they believe nuclear material
subject to U.S. nuclear cooperation agreement terms resides.
[30] GTRI reported to us that these sites are not a physical security
priority as, compared with other facilities around the world, their
physical protection is adequate.
[31] In three cases, GTRI, or its predecessor organization, returned
the material determined to be vulnerable within 5 years from the date
of assessment by the U.S. interagency physical protection team. In two
cases, a U.S. physical protection team made a revisit in less than 5
years. In the most recent two cases, 5 years have not elapsed to make a
determination on whether the team visited within 5 years or not. We
chose 5 years to evaluate because U.S. agencies have a goal of
visiting countries with Category I nuclear material at least once
every 5 years.
[32] GTRI has removed all U.S.-obligated HEU from Brazil, Chile,
Colombia, Denmark, Greece, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia,
South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand, and Turkey.
[33] GAO, Nuclear Nonproliferation: National Security Administration
Has Improved the Security of Reactors in its Global Research Reactor
Program, but Action is Needed to Address Remaining Concerns,
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-949] (Washington, D.C.:
Sept. 17, 2009).
[34] See [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-227].
[35] See [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-09-949].
[36] In January 2011, IAEA issued an updated revision of its security
guideline document, IAEA, "Nuclear Security Recommendations on
Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and Nuclear Facilities" (IAEA
INFCIRC/225/Rev.5 (2011).
[37] The United States has a set of trilateral project and supply
agreements with Mexico and IAEA. We included these agreements because
they were entered into pursuant to the United State's nuclear
cooperation agreement with IAEA. The United States has two nuclear
cooperation agreements with Australia, including one for Separation of
Uranium Isotopes by Laser Excitation (SILEX) technology, bringing the
number of agreements to 27.
[38] The United States also previously had trilateral project and
supply agreements with Malaysia, Yugoslavia, and IAEA.
[End of section]
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