home > by publication type > articles > Nuclear Safeguards for a New Nuclear Age
Email
| Author: | Charles D. Ferguson, Philip D. Reed Senior Fellow for Science and Technology |
|---|
December 19, 2007
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
The commercial nuclear age started on December 2, 1957, when the Shippingport Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvaniabegan operating—the first use of a nuclear power plant dedicated solely to peaceful purposes. Five months earlier, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was founded with a dual mandate—promote the peaceful uses of atomic energy and prevent its military uses. Ever since, the tension inherent in this mission has strained and constrained the application and evolution of IAEA safeguards.
Safeguards comprise a set of nuclear material accountancy and surveillance tools and techniques that are supposed to help ensure that a country’s civilian nuclear program remains peaceful. The first formal safeguards agreement wasn't established until 1961, and throughout the 1960s, uranium enrichment was exempt from safeguards agreements. (A prevailing belief during that time was that developing countries wouldn’t be able to master the advanced technology of uranium enrichment—a false pretense given Pakistan’s ability to enrich uranium in the late 1970s.) The primary concern was that these countries could divert spent nuclear fuel from reactors to reprocessing plants where weapons-usable plutonium would be extracted. Thus, safeguards focused on reactors and reprocessing plants.
To order Task Force reports, Council Special Reports, and Critical Policy Choices, please call, fax, or order online from our distributor, the Brookings Institution Press: phone +1.800.537.5487, fax +1.410.516.6998.
For information on other reports that are not for sale, or for general publications information, please call +1.212.434.9516 or email publications@cfr.org.
Start-Up Nation addresses the trillion-dollar question: How is it that Israel—a country of 7.1 million, only sixty years old, surrounded by enemies— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? With the insights of geopolitical experts and investors, the authors examine this nation’s adversity-driven culture to answer this question and offer prescriptions for a global economy on the rebound.
In Forces of Fortune, Vali Nasr presents a paradigm-changing revelation that will transform the understanding of the Muslim world at large. He reveals that there is a vital but unseen rising force in the Islamic world—a new business-minded middle class—that is building a vibrant new Muslim world economy and that holds the key to winning the cold war against Iran and extremists.
In Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Julia E. Sweig presents a remarkably accessible portrait of Cuba's unique place on the world stage over the past fifty years, including its internal politics, its often fraught relationship with the United States, and its shifting relationship with the global community.
Complete list of CFR Books
Copyright 2009 by the Council on Foreign Relations. All Rights Reserved.