Abstract
Reliable measurements are needed for the verification measures of States’ declarations of their nuclear activities in line with international agreements and the EURATOM Treaty. Laboratories carrying out measurements of nuclear material need to follow stringent quality control concepts and are required to demonstrate their measurement capabilities on a regular and timely basis to legal and safeguards authorities. This includes participation in interlaboratory comparisons (ILCs). In the frame of the Regular European Interlaboratory Measurement Evaluation Programme (REIMEP), a new ILC (REIMEP-17) was jointly organized by the EC—Joint Research Centre—Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements (JRC-IRMM) and EC—Joint Research Centre—Institute for Transuranium Elements (JRC-ITU) for EURATOM and IAEA safeguards laboratories, nuclear plant operators and nuclear material laboratories. The focus in REIMEP-17 was on measurements of the uranium and plutonium amount contents and isotope amount ratios in synthetic dissolved spent nuclear fuel solutions. Participants received two test samples, REIMEP-17A and REIMEP-17B, with different uranium and plutonium amount contents. Laboratories were requested to report the results with associated uncertainties applying their standard measurement procedures and had the possibility to benchmark those results against the independent assigned (reference) values and the ones listed in the International Target Values for Measurement Uncertainties in Safeguarding Nuclear Materials (ITV2010). It can be concluded that the participants in REIMEP-17 performed well for the measurements of uranium and plutonium amount content in compliance with the respective ITV2010 values. In particular, the measurement performance for the isotope amount ratios was very satisfactory for both REIMEP-17 test samples. This confirms the measurement capabilities of laboratories in the field of nuclear material analysis and demonstrates that the stringent ITV2010 values are achievable targets under state-of-practice conditions. On the other hand, the spread of results for the minor uranium isotope amount ratios was larger. Moreover, for some of the measurands, differences in the measurement uncertainty estimations provided by laboratories were observed even when using the same instrumental technique. A summary of the participant results is presented and discussed in this paper.
Highlights
The aim of nuclear safeguards is the verification of the nondiversion of fissile material from its intended and declared use in line with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) [1] and the EURATOM Treaty [2]
The range of acceptable standard measurement uncertainty reported by a participant with a satisfactory performance expressed by zeta score has been evaluated as such: For all |zeta| B 2, it is evaluated whether umin \ ulab B umax, where umin = 0, ulab = ulab;rel and the respective ITV2010 values serve as umax [9]
Satisfactory performance in terms of zeta scores was achieved by 60 % of the participants in Regular European Interlaboratory Measurement Evaluation Programme (REIMEP)-17A and 88 % in REIMEP-17B, respectively
Summary
The aim of nuclear safeguards is the verification of the nondiversion of fissile material from its intended and declared use in line with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) [1] and the EURATOM Treaty [2] To achieve this goal, a reliable nuclear material accountancy system has to be established by the plant operator and a reliable verification system by the international or regional. Measurements of amount content and isotope ratios of uranium and plutonium in samples taken from proliferation-sensitive stages of the nuclear fuel cycle such as enrichment and reprocessing are of great importance [4] Laboratories carrying out such measurements need to comply with rigorous quality goals and demonstrate their measurement capabilities. One possibility for a laboratory to demonstrate technical competence in line with ISO/IEC 17025:2005 is the successful participation in an interlaboratory comparison (ILC) [5]
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