PNNL

Abstract

Nuclear power is enjoying rapid growth as government energy policies and public demand shift toward carbon neutral energy production. Accompanying the growth in nuclear power is the requirement for increased nuclear fuel production, including a significant expansion in uranium enrichment capacity. Essential to the success of the nuclear energy renaissance is the development and implementation of sustainable, proliferation-resistant nuclear power generation. Unauthorized production of highly enriched uranium (HEU) remains the primary proliferation concern for modern gaseous centrifuge enrichment plants (GCEPs). While to date there has been no indication of declared, safeguarded GCEPs producing HEU, the massive separative work unit (SWU) processing power of modern GCEPs presents a significant latent risk of nuclear breakout and suggests the need for more timely detection of potential facility misuse. The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is developing an unattended safeguards instrument, combining continuous aerosol particulate collection with uranium isotope assay, to provide timely HEU detection within a GCEP. This approach is based on laser vaporization of aerosol particulates, followed by laser spectroscopy to characterize the uranium enrichment level. We demonstrate enrichment assay, with relative isotope abundance uncertainty