Workshop for Asian Nuclear Experts on
Transparency in the Back End of the Fuel Cycle

July 24-27, 2000

Problems related to disposal and storage of spent fuel and high level wastes in the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle are entering a critical phase. All nuclear operating systems are investigating new engineering projects, either domestic or regional, to address the problem areas. For a timely solution to be realized, the site selection and licensing processes for implementing geologic repositories and interim storage facilities must begin now. International and regional cooperation in the technical aspects of geology, hydrology and system management has begun; however, methods to communicate necessary information to stakeholder groups have not been well integrated within the various projects. Based on the experience at WIPP, increased transparency will be necessary so that interested observers can make independent assessments of the safety, security and legitimate use of nuclear materials. Without transparency, public acceptance and regulatory licensing may be doubtful.

The CMC effort is founded upon several years of technical support for the Asia Pacific Nuclear Transparency Project under the auspices of the non-governmental Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP). Regional cooperation in transparency of airborne radiation measurements, as displayed on the CSCAP transparency web-site (www.cmc.sandia.gov/Nuc_Trans) has set the stage for progressing to the more pressing and sensitive issues in the back end of the fuel cycle. Members of CSCAP’s Nuclear Energy Experts Group -- operated under the auspices of CSCAP’s International Working Group on Confidence and Security Building Measures -- were among the Workshop participants, which included representatives from Canada, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Mongolia, New Zealand, Taiwan, and the U.S.

Furthermore, the CMC and Sandia previously conducted an exploratory workshop for US experts to consider the transparency issue and identify demonstration experiments that could use technologies available in Sandia, Los Alamos and WIPP facilities. These demonstrations, which were featured at the International Conference on Geologic Repositories in November 1999, showed monitoring of transportation safety above ground and various activities and conditions underground at WIPP. The monitoring demonstrations were all viewed remotely at the Denver, Colorado conference.

Attendees at the July 2000 workshop reflected a merging of the technical and transparency efforts. Sandia organizations that have bilateral technical programs with Japan, the Republic of Korea, and Taiwan invited their technical counterparts. Participants from the CSCAP working group contributed their transparency experience and represented stakeholder interests from Japan, Canada, New Zealand and Mongolia. (Participants from China and Russia, who unfortunately did not have adequate time for their respective nomination and visa processes, were unable to attend and will be briefed on the workshop results separately.) The 15 Asian attendees represented research laboratories, regulatory agencies, the power industry, and academia. The US participants from Sandia, Los Alamos, Westinghouse Waste Isolation Division, and the DOE provided the US perspective, relevant experience, and technical support. Pacific Forum CSIS, a non-governmental institution in Honolulu, acted as co-sponsor and workshop organizer.

While the high level goal of the workshop was to combine transparency development with geoscience and technology, a large portion of the workshop focused on bridging the gaps between these specialties. Transparency concepts were the subject of the first day: Sandia’s cooperative monitoring experts summarized the Nuclear Transparency in the Asia Pacific Project and repeated the transparency demonstrations from the November 1999 International Conference on Geologic Repositories. Particular attention was given to defining transparency and identifying, from the US perspective, the potential stakeholders, i.e., the people, institutions and organizations who would need information provided through transparency mechanisms. Providing access to process in site selection and regulatory decisions and access to data, complementary activities, were identified as methods to satisfy stakeholder concerns. Professor Atsuyuki Suzuki summarized many "back end policy" issues in his address, and introduced a number of thought-provoking ideas. Primary among these were "going slow in order to go fast" and the need for smaller nuclear systems to look for regional solutions or assistance. Prof. Suzuki called for a flexible approach to balance interim storage, reprocessing and direct disposal in the national programs of Japan and the U.S. He also advised the use of transparency as a tool to affect public perceptions of disposal options.

In the second day representatives from the Asian Pacific delegations discussed the status and plans for storage, repositories and transportation. Particular attention was given to the critical nature of the next few years for meeting long-term needs in the coming decades. Dependence upon nuclear power for economic growth and for energy security was a central theme in all discussions; clearly, meeting site selection and licensing time-lines is critical. The large number of international technical cooperation activities in the back end illustrated the strong interest in identifying regional approaches problem solving.

WIPP, as the world's only licensed and operational deep geologic repository, offered many insights into the role of transparency during the third day of the workshop. The WIPP facility operator, Westinghouse Waste Isolation Division, and the DOE's Carlsbad Area Office (DOE-CAO) provided introductory briefings on the WIPP project and facility and on the infrastructure available to support cooperative experiments within the framework of an operational facility. The attendees toured all above and below ground facilities, descending 2150 feet below the surface to view storage and experimental areas. While underground, particular attention was given to monitoring devices installed on simulated waste containers and digital cameras that monitor activities, all of which are accessible through the Internet.

Although the WIPP site tours emphasized technologies that can provide transparency by means of access to data, the after-dinner presentations that night illustrated the need for access to process as well. Carlsbad City Mayor, Gary Perkowski discussed the transparent cooperation between the City of Carlsbad, the DOE and the WIPP operator in order to develop a safe and well-regulated facility. The Asian attendees found the Mayor's description of Carlsbad's political cooperation on an interstate and national level to be extremely interesting and relevant to their own need to foster volunteer sites. The evening session concluded with brief discussions of other access to process issues, such as traceability of technical data, and the variety of non-technical stakeholder needs.

In the final day the workshop strove to integrate the information from all attendees, tours, and demonstrations into potential areas for further cooperative study. First, the workshop participants split into three groups to consider transportation, storage and repositories separately; about ten people were in each breakout session group. Initial discussions identified the respective stakeholders and their concerns about the back end of the fuel cycle. Next, those concerns were analyzed in terms of the information or access to process that could alleviate the concerns. Finally, based on the programs and policies in place in the various Asia Pacific nuclear industries, attendees hypothesized potential transparency strategies to address the concerns. The groups recombined for a general summary session to compare the results from the three topical areas.

As expected, the group identified both "access to process" and "access to data" ideas as suitable for further study. Access to process emphasized an educational approach to understanding waste transportation. For example, a video might feature an end-to-end simulation of a waste shipment, including collateral information on regulations, emergency response and operator training. Teachers and local citizen groups could use the video to facilitate a more balanced discussion of this sensitive topic.

For the same topic, transportation, access to data could be helpful. Monitoring airborne radiation along a route and sharing that data through the Internet, if done with the non-technical public in mind and without sacrificing security, might show that routine shipments pose no hazard to the public. Cooperation in designing an understandable display might itself be a topic of future study.

A more sensitive suggestion, and one that would probably require long term development in cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), would be to provide certain material accounting information in a near real time, internationally-linked manner. Although the IAEA considers this data to be confidential, some states' accounting systems release some data periodically. More frequent release, if negotiated through the proper authorities, might help assure policy makers and the general public that spent fuel or other fissile material is secure and being used for legitimate peaceful endeavors.

Relating back to one of the key ideas introduced by Dr. Suzuki on the first day, "going slow in order to go fast", another example considered the usefulness of a monitored interim storage facility to demonstrate safety. A storage facility, from which material could be retrieved if safety performance did not meet the public's expectations, could offer a reversible demonstration of safe operation in the back end of the fuel cycle. That is, while interim storage might be seen by some as delaying repository development, a reversible and monitored interim storage facility may be a necessary step toward the ultimate goal of building a repository.

Cooperation in developing user-friendly displays and measurement methodologies could be an important component of monitored interim storage. Transfer of the technologies demonstrated in the WIPP transparency system to bilateral or multilateral experiments in Japan, Canada or Europe could be a starting point for cooperation. Conversely, Asian experts could gain experience in an operating repository by applying their technologies underground at WIPP.  A portion of the tour during this workshop featured a tunnel area that is designated for future cooperative experiments.

These and other ideas illustrate the importance of transparency to developing public acceptance and promoting nonproliferation in the back end of the fuel cycle. Both needs for access to information - to process and to data - generated ideas for further study. In the coming months additional discussions must be conducted to identify more concrete steps. These future discussions will utilize the regional forum offered by CSCAP as well as the separate bilateral technical cooperation agreements.

Countries not present at the workshop will be included in follow-up activities; the workshop organizers plan to carry out individual briefings with Chinese and Russian authorities. Reflecting comments made by the Mongolian delegate, the follow-up activities will continue to include current non-nuclear power countries, who may need to become better informed on the back end before embarking on nuclear power development.

This workshop marks the successful start of the long process of integrating transparency into engineering solutions for the back end. Attendees agreed that transparency efforts would ultimately speed progress toward solving sensitive problems arising from public acceptance and policy concerns with safety and nonproliferation.