The Export reorganization act, 1975 : hearings before the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, Ninety-fourth Congress, first session, April 24, 30, and May 1, 1975 online

that for the record.

Senator Glenn. All right.

[Information referred to follows:]



96

NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL

WASHINGTON. D.C. 20506

April 29, 1975



MEMORANDUM FOR

THE CHAIRMAN

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

SUBJECT: Annual Report to the President on

Domestic Nuclear Safeguards



The President requested in a memorandum of April 27, 1974, that the
Atomic Energy Commission, in coordination with other agencies,
submit an annual report on the effectiveness of the nuclear safeguards
systems, program developments, and related recommendations regarding
the domestic control and security of nuclear materials and facilities.
Following the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the Energy Research
and Development Administration, working with other Executive Branch
agencies, has undertaken the preparation of this report. Since the NRC
has extensive responsibilities in domestic safeguards, your contribution
to the annual report would be most valuable. The President has indicated
that he would welcome the contribution of your staff and the comments of
your Commission in developing this annual report on domestic safeguards,
and would hope that your organization would be prepared to participate.



Henry A. Kissinger fa j



cc: The Administrator, Energy
Research and Development
Administration



97

Senator Percy. Mr. Anders, we appreciate your being here this
morning. As you know, this committee put a great deal of time in
the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, and we have no pride of
authorship at all. It is a good procedure to occasionally check on
reorganization matters that we create here, in the law, to make sure
that they are working, and to revise them as we go along, and possibly
seek interpretations and make legislative history if there are points
of confusion on them.

I think this is a good chance to do it. We have not anticipated so
quickly changing our export procedures. When we started this study,
we had anticipated originally that it would lead to legislation which
we have now embodied in the Export Reorganization Act for your
consideration. But as we went through this study, it seemed that in
order to tighten up our safeguards procedures, some reorganization
might be desirable. But, again, we offer it for suggestions and thoughts.

You indicate in your testimony at the bottom of page 4, that the
Commission is now in the process of analyzing the proposed legisla-
tion, but that it has not yet developed its formal position.

Do you have any idea how long a period of time might elapse
before you will formally come up with a recommended position?

Mr. Anders. Within a week or so, Senator.

Senator Percy. Could we then have that. Rather than your again
coming before the committee, could it be submitted to us in written
form?

Mr. Anders. Yes, sir.

Senator Percy. And we can take it in the context of your testimony
here.

On page 2 you indicate that you are seeking a reorganization of
the NRC decisionmaking procedures to the end that export will be
used, in your words, exclusively for peaceful purposes, and not di-
verted to military uses.

Can you review for us what procedures are used in, say, the
shipment of materials to South Africa? What controls do we have
over their transshipment of materials, let us say, to the Mideast, or
shipments made from South Africa to any countries in the Mid-
east, which obviously is a very sensitive area right now.

Mr. Anders. You have asked some questions, which I do not have
all of the answers for at the moment, Senator.

I am sure they are available. But, I do know that there is an agree-
ment of cooperation between the United States and South Africa
which was established July 8, 1957 and modifications, and other
agreements relating to cooperation and exchange of technology,
were approved as late as May 22, 1974.

The basic elements of these agreements of cooperation demanded
by the Atomic Energy Act demand very tight control over the
accounting and reshipment of the agreeing nation.

I will have to go back and check the details of what has actually
transpired and submit it for the record, but there has been no viola-
tion of the agreement, as far as I know.

There is an export request before us which we are processing.
It is one in a series related to the refueling of a research reactor.
This request is in the process and it will not be appropriate for me
to comment upon it at this time.

[The information requested follows:]



98



UNITED STATES
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

WASHINGTON. D. C. 20555



M 6 w5



Honorable John Glenn
United States Senate

Dear Senator Glenn:



GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS COMM

*j" JUN3Q1975



During my appearance before the Government Operatl/M8|f\fl3<pojifi:ii££e^gr;ig
on April 30, 1975, Senator Percy asked me to supply for the
record information on U.S. nuclear fuel and facilities shipments
to South Africa and re-exports by South Africa of U.S. -supplied
fuel and facilities. Attached is a compilation of data on the
above questions:

— Attachment 1: Data on the U. S .-supplied SAFARI-I
research reactor.

- Attachment 2: Fuel shipments of high-enriched
uranium for use in SAFARI-I.

- Attachment 3: Re-exports by South Africa of U.S.-
supplied fuel for use in SAFARI-I.

— Attachment 4: Data on U. S . -supplied low-enriched
uranium shipments for use in the South African critical
assembly at the National Research Center at Pelindaba.
All of this material was re-exported to the U.K. and
from there returned to the U.S.

I hope this information will be helpful to the Committee.

Sincerely,




William A. Anders
Chairman







Attachment


s:






As


listed


above


f-


pOJT/Cvv


\

f m






o \

tt

\









/; >6-A9l fo



99



ATTACHMENT



REACTOR TYPE:



POWER:



LOCATION':



U.S. -SUPPLIED SAFARI-I RESEARCH REACTOR



Oak Ridge Research Reactor (tank), fully enriched
(90%) uranium, light water moderated and cooled,
beryllium reflected.

20 MW thermal: Initially 6.67 MW cooling
capacity.

National Nuclear Research Center, Pelindaba,
near Pretoria, South Africa.



OWNER:

DESIGNER/BUILDER:

CONSTRUCTION:



South African Atomic Energy Board

Reactor: Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Co.

Building, process equipment, etc: Atomic Energy
Board and South African Firms

Start of Construction: 1961
Reactor Critical: 1965



Typical operating core consists of:



22 fuel elements

5 control rod elements

22 Beryllium reflector elements

23 Al filler pieces



"With the present schedule of operation at 20 megawatts thermal
operating 5 days a week SAFARI-I requires a reload every 3 weeks,
when 4 new elements of 200 gm U-235 each are leaded. Every 6 weeks
1 new control rod containing 135 gra of U-235 is loaded. Over a
period of 1 year taking in account a total of 10 weeks shutdown
time, the reactor requires an average of 14 reloads of fuel elements
and 7 reloads of control rods. The annual requirement is therefore
56 times 200 gm elements and 7 times 135 gm control rods giving a
total of 12.145 kg of U-235 contained in 13.494 Kg uranium at 90%
enriched .



Data from: Directory of Nuclear Reactors
Volume V

Research, Test and Experimental Reactors
Page 95.
Published by : IAEA

* Supplied by South Africa



May 22, 1975



100



ATTACHMENT



U.S. - SUPPLIED URANIUM FOR SAFARI-I RESEARCH REACTOR

The following is a list of shipments of highly enriched uranium
supplied to South Africa for the operation of the SAFARI-I research reactor.
All material was supplied in the form of finished fuel elements by the
fabricator. Material supplied by the UKAEA was of U.S. origin, originally
shipped to the U.K. specifically for fabrication into SAFARI-I elements.
Its subsequent transfer from the U.K. to South Africa was authorized
before the fact by the U.S.



DATE



U-235



FABRICATOR/SHIPPER



Feb


65


4.315


3.874


May


65


3.446


3.096


Oct


67


2.526


2.273


Nov


67


8.299


7.469


Dec


67


2.541


2.286


Dec


69


7.558


6.802


June


70


5.767


5.190


Dec


70


.975


.878


July


71


13.334


12.001


Sept


71


.663


.596


May


72


.971


.874


Dec


72


4.641


4.177


June


73


2.139


1.925


Aug


73


3.167


2.850


Apr


73


.300


.270


Oct


73


3.089


2.780


Jan


74


5.217


4.6 96


Apr


74


3.691


3.322


May


74


3.092


2.780


June


74


3.530


3.177


Nov


74


4.299


4.006


Dec


74


3.437


3.203


Mar


75


3.444


3.209


Apr


75


4.879


4.552



TOTAL

Less Returns
Less Burnup

thru 12/31/73
Less Burnup
12/31/73 to
4/30/75 at
0.333 kg/mo.



95.320

(34.251)
(11.473)

( 5.33)



(28.154)
(13.897)

( 6.460)



Babcock & Wilcox
Babcock & Wilcox
UKAEA, Harwell, U.K.



U.S. Nuclear, Inc



Inventory



44.263 kg. 37.777 kg.



May 22, 1975



101



ATTACHMENT



RE-EXPORT BY SOUTH AFRICA OF U.S. - SUPPLIED FUEL
USED IN SAFARI-I RESEARCH REACTOR



Shipments to U.K.

U U-235



3.039


2.465


.019


.015


11.055


9.133


.421


.320


(.213)


(.220)


4.989


4.134


.457


.327


.034


.041


3.306


2.711


6.293


5.233



29.400 24.209 At least 11.300 kgs of this amount has been
■ — returned to the U.S.



Shipments to France :

4.851 3.945 Returned to the U.S. 7/30/74.



34.251 28.154 TOTAL RETURNS 34.251



Adjustment to reflect the difference between computed and measured
burn-up.



May 22, 1975



102



ATTACHMENT 4



U.S .-SUPPLIED FUEL FOR CRITICAL ASSEMBLY, NATIONAL RESEARCH CENTRE,

PELINDABA, SOUTH AFRICA



This South Africa-built critical assembly was used in the study of
reactor physics, including reactivity effects, reactor kinetics,
pile noise analysis and control methods. It was constructed at
the National Nuclear Research Centre, Pelindaba, near Pretoria,
South Africa, using components of an exponential facility which
was dismantled. It was used as an unreflected critical facility
using four fuel elements containing 2% enriched uranium as driver
elements. The fuel was manufactured by NUKEM, Germany, using U.S.
supplied UFg. The critical assembly has been decommissioned.



Shipments of Uranium metal spheres from Germany to South Africa:
From Lease Account GE/ML/16-15 to LEASE ACCOUNT SA/ML/3-2.











Kgs.


Kgs.


Shipment


No.


Date
Aug


66


U


U-235


1


64.984


1.294


2




Sept


66


65.586


1.307


3




Sept


66


66.682


1.328


4




Sept


66


67.179


1.343


5




Nov


66


67.989


1.355


6




Nov


66


67.863


1.352


7




Dec


66


67.941


1.353


8




Dec


66


67.989


1.355


9




Dec


66


59.371


1.187


10




Dec


66


4.416


.088


Adjustment






.088


.002


11




Mar


67


6.675


.133



TOTAL 606.763 12.097



Less: Transfers Out (605.532) (12.062) 1/
Less: Consumption ( .928) ( .012)

BALANCE: .303 .023 2/



1/ Transferred to U.K. for reprocessing. 602.522 Kgs U and 11.954 Kgs
U-235 were returned to U.S. on September 8, 1971.

2/ Purchased by South Africa as unaccounted losses.



May 22, 1975



103

Senator Percy. Last week we received testimony that the licensing
functions consumed exactly one-half man-year.

That would seem to be a very small personnel complement, to be
admired for a Federal bureaucracy, but also of some concern as to
whether or not we have an adequate function there.

What is the size of the NRC's licensing staff and its professional
and technical competence?

Mr. Anders. We have just been informed by 50 percent of our
staff that we have two people who are dedicated to this activity.
But I must say, Senator, tliat with the recent involvement of the
Commission, our effort certainly represents more than several man-
years in the short time we have been in business.

Clearly if the intent of the Energy Reorganization Act is to be
satisfied, and if we are going to proceed with the kind of efficiency
that I think the agreement mentions and the industry deserves, we
are going to have to get a better overall operation than that.

Senator Percy. Along the lines of our chairman's questions, I am
not sure that I am clear as to your own intention in the future, for
providing for your own analytical staff, so that you can take infor-
mation provided to you by the State Department and by ERDA,
regarding export licenses, and then analyze it, appraise it, and reach
your own independent judgment, fitting for an independent agency.

Could you clarify a little bit how much faith you feel you can
place on the material you receive from the executive branch of
Government? Whether or not you are prepared to assume full re-
sponsibility for your own decisions? Once you have taken that
material into account, and put into it your own analytical appraisal
and study, it might be that 90 percent of the time the material you
receive is absolutely adequate, and may be 10 percent or 5 percent,
in which a mistake might be made. Can you tell us about that?

Mr. Anders. I think you put your finger right on the dilemma,
that is an interesting question that is before the Commission right
now, Senator.

I believe we have to operate on a very high measure of faith
within our Government. The NRC has the responsibility to work
within the Energy Reorganization Act and to issue export licenses.
We do not have the vast resources required to gather information
relating to the determinations that somebody has to make on the
adequacy of the recipient country's ability to receive this material. I
would expect that in certainly 90 percent of the cases, maybe closer
to 100 percent, we would have sufficient confidence in issuing a
license based on assimilation and assessment of the information we
receive from the executive branch.

I worry though about the tough call, and how much we should
not only aggregate the information received, but actually get down
and check it ourselves. Here you run into the question of what is
the rightful job of an agency with a major domestic focus in nuclear
activity, an agency with enough problems to solve at home. This
raises the question of the appropriateness of the NRC in the business
of verifying, or gathering information overseas, some of which is the
responsibility of the other nations.

There is a fundamental issue here that we all need to think
through more. These hearings will be helpful to not only me, but to



104

all of us, in getting a flavor of the intent of the farmers with regard
to the details of the Energy Reorganization Act. The intention
was to the full ultimate responsibility of that decision. We want to
be organized, and to set up the Commission in such a way that the
buck stops there, as far as these matters are concerned.

I have filed a rather lengthy report on the Mideast, 91 pages, with
the Foreign Relations Committee, within the last week or so, follow-
ing my trip out there.

A large part of it, I felt, was my deep concern about whether
policy has been established as to what we are doing in the way of
selling arms all over the world.

I can speak with some feeling on the industrial military complex.
I know always the tremendous pressure to move and sell the goods
that are coming off the line. I saw planeloads of people from indus-
trial and military complexes, whether they be military, from our own
Department of Defense, or commercial people from all over the
United States, selling in the Arab oil, and selling all over Israel,
all over the Mideast, to Israeli and other countries our most sophisti-
cated weapons. This makes you sometimes really wonder whether the
commercial end of America has not taken over and gotten us away
from sitting back and saying, what is the consequence going to be
of our arming both sides so extensively; what would be the fifth
war in the Middle East? I think with even greater consequences,
we have to look at our nuclear energy, and nuclear power, to see
whether or not we are emphasizing too much the commercial, whether
the sales department, or whether the control and regulatory end is
actually the top drawer in the matter.

Could you comment on whether or not there is a commercial
bias in your judgment in the export licensing process? Do commer-
cial considerations predominate over regulatory considerations, as-
suming that NRC takes over the regulatory decisionmaking pro-
cedure for ERDA with respect to exports, and in what way can it
be insulated from commercial pressures in deciding whether safe-
guards abroad are sufficient to permit a license to be issued ? Could you
give us your policy statement on that?

Mr. Anders. The basic, shortest answer is no. In looking ahead
to the kinds of questions we would ask of the executive branch,
relating to the appropriateness of the license, none of these in my
mind are related to commercial aspects, though I do think we owe
it to those we regulate, to at least give efficient service processing
their application. Quite frankly, we are not now very efficient and
are moving along on an ad hoc basis. A major purpose of the Atoms
for Peace program was to internationalize the interest of other
nations who did not have nuclear technology, and to get them to
turn away from private nuclear development which, of course, could
well lead to nuclear weapons development on their own.

Some have done this, and we need to get others to join in the
beneficial aspects of the nuclear activity under international agree-
ments such as the NPT, with safeguards worked into them. A key
feature of the NPT is embodied in Article 4 which essentially gives
to all parties of that treaty the right to the use of nuclear energy for
peaceful purposes without discrimination. Therefore, we have to be
careful in the various agreements that this country has signed, for



105

nuclear fuel, for nuclear power, to not on the one hand seem to
correct what is perceived by some to be a safeguards problem, while
at the same time, encourage nations to go it on their own due to
lack of reliability in the U.S. supply of nuclear fuel.
It is a delicate matter, sir.

Senator Percy. When I ask the next question, I would like to
precede it, by stating that, as a trustee of the University of Chicago
for 25 years, I certainly have followed nuclear chain reactions and
what happened under the Stag with deep interest, and I have been
deeply involved in Argon, Octavia. In Illinois, I suppose we have
been more dependent for electrical needs, and so forth, on nuclear
energy than any other State in the Union. A third of our electricity
comes from nuclear energy, and we have had a truly remarkable
relationship I think with the Atomic Energy Commission. I have
felt that our public utility, Commonwealth Edison, and others have
done an outstanding job and worked very closely with the Commis-
sion, and had a harmonious and fine relationship with them. For
the most part, I think our safeguards program has been extra-
ordinarily good and well worked out, so I have seen first hand how
we can with improvements move ahead. I have met with environmen-
talists for 9 years who have protested of nuclear plants, and for the
most part, we have worked out our difficulties and problems, I am
concerned, however, about the casualness which others somewhat
less sophisticated might approach this problem, and I am concerned
as to whether or not pTutonium reprocessing is being carried on
with the same degree of caution with regard to theft and diversion,
and so forth.

Has there been any thoughts given to any kind of moratorium on
plutonium reprocessing, and until such time as safeguards are equal
to the threat of tests and diversion, what is your own thinking in
that area?

Mr. Axders. Senator, there essentially is no plutonium reprocessing
at this time. As you know, the various power reactors in Illinois
and the rest of the country do breed plutonium in the business of
producing electricity.

I must remind the committee that plutonium recycle is an issue
before the Commission. The Commission has not made a finding on
plutonium recycling. Therefore, it would be inappropriate for me to
take a stance one way or the other at this time. It would not be
fair to the parties involved on both sides of the issue.

I would say though that we have received a correspondence from
the Counsel on Environmental Quality, that did suggest that the
review procedure relating to safeguards aspects of the environmental
impact statement being followed by the Atomic Energy Commission,
was not adequate in that it did not take into account a cost benefit
associated including safeguards costs. CEQ's recommendation was to
include safeguards considerations before the Commission made a
determination. We expect to announce our findings on this point
in the very near future.

Senator Percy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My time is up.

Senator Glexn. I will get into the questions that Chairman Kibi-
coff left with me here, and ask some of these here.



106



What specific recommendations, what specific situation led to the
NRC to make its original announcement last month that no addition-
al nuclear export-import licenses would be processed pending a re-
view of recent regulations and procedures? Can you explain that?

Mr. Anders. We were concerned that there was so much misinfor-
mation around, some of it which we were responsible for, that related
to the issue of the export licensing. There have been several stories
in the press indicating that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had
put a ban on exports.

This was and is not the case. I must say that we were not pro-
ceeding at a particularly efficient rate but, we were proceeding. We
have had this issue under review. Our main activity has been directed
at developing the various modes of interaction with the executive
branch. The actual processing of licenses has been given somewhat
a lower priority. But where there was a critical need — the licenses
were being brought up for review. In summary, our release was not
issued on the basis of any new concern over safeguards. It was issup.H
because of the bum information that seemed to be around.

Senator Glenn. If the Nuclear Regulatory Commission assumed
the safeguards role, as provided in the Export Reorganization Act,
would you favor the Commission having an international inspection
role, assuming it could be done unobtrusively now through normal
diplomatic channels ?

That is a big assumption, but I realize that is a question anyway,
if it could be done, would you see yourself as an international in-
spection team, or participate in such activities. I presume this would
also be apart from IAEA?

Mr. Anders. Well, that is a big assumption, Senator, and I guess
I do not have a view on that at the moment.

We could reflect on the general question. It seems to me, as I said
earlier, that as important as the international safeguards question
is, the main intent of the Energy Reorganization Act, the main focus,
the main discussion, was with regard to domestic health, safety and
safeguards for domestic nuclear power. That is the way the NRC is
currently organized. That is the way we are mainly staffed. One
wonders if that is not really our main function, if we elevate another
function into importance, something has to give since we do not
have an underutilyzed staff. I would hope that we could come up with
procedures that would use the capabilities of the executive branch.
Even that would relate to their more natural functions with regard
to gathering information on foreign policy, and so as not to duplicate
that capability ourselves.

Senator Glenn. As a followup on that question, which Senator
Ribicoff left with me, I think it puts its finger on something very,
very important. We are talking about regulations, international agree-
ment. What followup means do we have that these conditions will be
met?

If we are not inspecting unobstrusively through diplomatic chan-
nels, who is inspecting? How do we know what is going on? Are we to
rely completely on IAEA? That is really the heart of the question,
and that is a very serious matter.

That is the heart of the question as to what we license or do not
license. Part of it is done on faith. Part of it cannot be done on faith,
and if it is not done on faith, what can we do?



107

Mr. Anders. I guess we have to bring the discussion around to
whether the United States should provide leadership. I would say
we certainly must.

The IAEA has been the instrument used to insure the safeguards