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Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and 
Capabilities, Committee on Armed Services, U.S. Senate: 

July 2004: 

NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION: 

DOE Needs to Take Action to Further Reduce the Use of Weapons-Usable 
Uranium in Civilian Research Reactors: 

GAO-04-807: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-04-807, a report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on 
Emerging Threats and Capabilities, Committee on Armed Services, U.S. 
Senate 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

Nuclear research reactors worldwide use highly enriched uranium (HEU) 
as fuel and for the production of medical isotopes. Because HEU can 
also be used in nuclear weapons, the Department of Energy’s (DOE) 
Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors program is developing 
low enriched uranium (LEU), which would be very difficult to use in 
weapons, to replace HEU. To date, 39 of the 105 research reactors in 
the United States and abroad targeted by DOE have converted to LEU 
fuel. GAO was asked to examine (1) the status of the remaining 
research reactors in converting to LEU fuel, (2) DOE’s progress in 
developing new LEU fuels for reactors where conversion is not yet 
technically feasible, (3) DOE’s progress in developing LEU for the 
production of medical isotopes, and (4) the status of DOE and Nuclear 
Regulatory Commission (NRC) efforts to improve security at research 
reactors.

What GAO Found: 

Currently, conversion to LEU fuel is technically feasible for 35 of the 
66 research reactors in DOE’s program that still use HEU fuel, but most 
do not have plans to convert. In the United States, 8 research 
reactors, including 6 university research reactors, have not converted 
because DOE has not provided the necessary funding. Of the 20 foreign 
research reactors that use U.S.-origin HEU fuel, 14 do not have plans 
to convert because they have a sufficient supply of HEU fuel and either 
do not want to incur the additional cost of conversion or do not have 
the necessary funding. Finally, only 1 of 7 Russian-supplied research 
reactors that could use LEU fuel is scheduled to convert.

Conversion to LEU fuel is not technically feasible for 31 research 
reactors worldwide that still use HEU fuel. DOE has experienced 
technical setbacks in fuel development that have postponed the 
conversion of the 31 reactors until 2010 at the earliest. One fuel 
failed unexpectedly in testing, and DOE may cancel further development, 
depending on the results of additional tests. Initial testing of 
another LEU fuel produced positive results, but additional testing is 
required and the fuel will not be developed until 2010 at the earliest. 

Separately from the development of LEU fuel, DOE is developing LEU to 
replace HEU in the production of medical isotopes. DOE has not yet 
completed the work that would enable conversion of large-scale medical 
isotope production to LEU. One reactor has converted to LEU for 
small-scale production. However, large-scale producers are concerned 
that the cost of converting to LEU could be prohibitive.

DOE and NRC have taken steps to improve security at foreign and U.S. 
research reactors. While operators at most research reactors we 
visited said that security had been upgraded through DOE or NRC 
efforts, we observed areas where further improvements could be made. 
Recognizing the possible need for further improvements, DOE and NRC are 
engaged in separate efforts to assess and improve security.

Conversion Status of Research Reactors Included in DOE’s Reactor 
Conversion Program: 

[See PDF for image]

[End of figure]

What GAO Recommends: 

GAO recommends that DOE consider converting the 6 U.S. university 
research reactors, remove the HEU fuel from the reactors after their 
conversion, and evaluate providing additional incentives to foreign 
research reactors to convert to LEU. DOE agreed with our 
recommendations. GAO did not fully evaluate, and is not making 
recommendations on, DOE and NRC efforts to improve security at research 
reactors.

www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-807.

To view the full product, including the scope and methodology, click on 
the link above. For more information, contact Gene Aloise at (202) 
512-3841 or aloisee@gao.gov.

[End of section]

Contents: 

Letter: 

Results in Brief: 

Background: 

Many Domestic and Foreign Research Reactors Are Still Using Weapons-
Usable Uranium Even Though They Could Operate on Low Enriched Uranium: 

Technical Setbacks in Developing New Fuels Limit Progress in Converting 
the Largest Remaining Research Reactors: 

Using Low Enriched Uranium for Medical Isotope Production Is Feasible, 
but Concerns over Cost Could Limit Its Use: 

DOE and NRC Are Addressing Security at Foreign and Domestic Research 
Reactors: 

Conclusions: 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

Scope and Methodology: 

Appendixes: 

Appendix I: Reactor Conversion Program Expenditures and Projected 
Costs:

Appendix II: 39 Research Reactors That Converted to LEU Fuel under the 
Reactor Conversion Program: 

Appendix III: Comments from the Department of Energy: 

Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of State: 

Tables: 

Table 1: U.S. Research Reactors Using HEU Fuel That Could Convert to 
LEU: 

Table 2: 20 Foreign Research Reactors Still Using HEU Obtained from the 
United States: 

Table 3: Seven Foreign Research Reactors Using HEU from Russia That 
Could Convert to LEU: 

Table 4: 31 Research Reactors That Cannot Convert Using Currently 
Available LEU Fuels: 

Table 5: Number of Research Reactors Selected for Site Visits or Phone 
Interviews: 

Table 6: DOE's Projected Costs to Complete the Reactor Conversion 
Program: 

Figures: 

Figure 1: Locations of 105 Research Reactors Included in DOE's Reactor 
Conversion Program: 

Figure 2: Conversion Status of 105 Research Reactors Included in DOE's 
Reactor Conversion Program: 

Figure 3: Reactor Conversion Program Expenditures, Fiscal Years 1978 to 
2003: 

Abbreviations:

Argonne: Argonne National Laboratory: 

DOE: Department of Energy: 

HEU: highly enriched uranium: 

INEEL: Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory: 

LEU: low enriched uranium: 

NDF: Nonproliferation and Disarmament Fund: 

NRC: Nuclear Regulatory Commission: 

RERTR: Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors program: 

United States General Accounting Office:

Washington, DC 20548

July 30, 2004: 

The Honorable Pat Roberts: 
Chairman, Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities: 
Committee on Armed Services: 
United States Senate: 

Dear Mr. Chairman: 

Nuclear research reactors located throughout the world play a vital 
role in medicine, agriculture, industry, and basic scientific research. 
Many of the research reactors use highly enriched uranium (HEU) in one 
of two ways, either as fuel or as an ingredient for the production of 
medical isotopes used to treat cancer or conduct medical diagnoses. HEU 
is also a key component in the construction of nuclear weapons--it 
takes as little as 25 kilograms of HEU to build a nuclear weapon. The 
amount of HEU located at research reactors worldwide ranges from 
several kilograms to in excess of 20 kilograms.

The United States has a long-standing policy of reducing and, to the 
extent possible, eliminating the use of HEU in civilian research 
reactors. To support this policy, the Department of Energy (DOE) 
initiated the Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors (RERTR) 
program in 1978 to develop the technology to reduce and eventually 
eliminate the use of HEU in civilian research reactors 
worldwide.[Footnote 1] DOE's Argonne National Laboratory (Argonne) is 
the technical lead for the program and conducts research and 
development to find alternatives to the two uses of HEU in research 
reactors. The program's goal is to replace HEU with low enriched 
uranium (LEU), which would be very difficult to use in nuclear 
weapons.[Footnote 2] The Secretary of Energy reiterated DOE's support 
for the reactor conversion program and committed to the conversion of 
all U.S. civilian research reactors by 2013 in a speech on May 26, 
2004.

To achieve the program's objectives, Argonne conducts extensive tests 
on new LEU fuels and materials for isotope production to find suitable 
alternatives that do not negatively affect research reactors' 
performance, operating costs, or operational safety. Part of Argonne's 
strategy is to have multiple fuels under development to address the 
unique fuel needs of the different types of research reactors included 
in DOE's reactor conversion program. Research reactors are designed for 
different purposes and have operating characteristics that affect their 
ability to convert to LEU. As a result, an LEU fuel that can be used in 
one research reactor may not be suitable for another.

The scope of DOE's reactor conversion program includes LEU fuel 
development for 105 research reactors located in the United States and 
40 other countries. Since the inception of the program through July 
2004, 39 of the 105 reactors have either converted or are in the 
process of converting to LEU. Argonne officials estimate that prior to 
converting to LEU, these 39 research reactors used over 240 kilograms 
of HEU fuel per year, enough to build about 10 nuclear weapons. In 
contrast, they estimate that the remaining 66 research reactors, which 
have not converted to LEU, continue to use over 800 kilograms of HEU 
fuel per year. Thirty-five of these reactors could convert using 
currently available LEU fuels, and Argonne is developing new LEU fuels 
for 31 research reactors that cannot convert using any of the fuels 
already developed. In particular, after screening a large number of 
potential LEU fuels, Argonne has identified two fuels, dispersion fuel 
and monolithic fuel, for further testing and development. Both of these 
fuels use an alloy of uranium and another metal called molybdenum and 
differ in how the fuel is manufactured. Dispersion fuel consists of 
spherical particles of uranium-molybdenum alloy that are randomly 
dispersed in a thin layer of aluminum. In contrast, monolithic fuel 
consists of a thin sheet of solid uranium-molybdenum alloy.[Footnote 3]

The reactor conversion program also develops LEU alternatives for six 
medical isotope producers, all located outside the United States, that 
use an estimated 85 kilograms of HEU per year in their production 
processes. The use of HEU for medical isotope production is separate 
from the type of fuel used in research reactors. Developing the 
technology to convert to LEU for medical isotope production requires a 
technical effort that is separate from the development of new LEU 
fuels.

Concerned about the potential theft or diversion of HEU from research 
reactors, DOE and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) are engaged 
in efforts to monitor and improve security at research reactors, many 
of which are located on university campuses or other facilities used by 
students and researchers. Since 1974, DOE has engaged in efforts to 
improve nuclear material security in over 50 countries, including 
security over nuclear material at research reactors. In the United 
States, NRC regulates research reactors to ensure an acceptable level 
of safety and security and conducts regular inspections to ensure 
compliance with regulations on safety and security.

In response to your request concerning the use of HEU at civilian 
research reactors, we examined (1) the status of research reactors 
worldwide in converting to LEU fuels developed by DOE's reactor 
conversion program, (2) the program's progress in developing new LEU 
fuels for use in research reactors that cannot convert to currently 
available LEU fuels, and (3) the program's progress in developing LEU 
for use in the production of medical isotopes. In addition, because HEU 
continues to be used and stored at research reactors worldwide, we 
gathered information on the status of DOE and NRC efforts to improve 
the security of research reactors in the United States and other 
countries.

To address these objectives, we analyzed documentation on the reactor 
conversion program from DOE and Argonne, including information on the 
status of reactors in converting to LEU, development of LEU fuels, and 
development of LEU for medical isotope production. We visited research 
reactors in the United States, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, 
Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, and Ukraine; attended an annual 
international conference on DOE's reactor conversion program; and 
obtained information on the status of developing LEU fuels and LEU for 
the production of medical isotopes from reactor conversion program 
officials at Argonne. We also discussed the status of the program and 
security of HEU at foreign and domestic research reactors with foreign 
officials in the countries we visited and with DOE and NRC officials. 
However, we did not evaluate the effectiveness of the security at 
research reactors or DOE and NRC efforts to improve security. We 
conducted our review from July 2003 to July 2004 in accordance with 
generally accepted government auditing standards.

You also asked that we examine two other DOE programs closely related 
to the reactor conversion program: the Foreign Research Reactor Spent 
Nuclear Fuel Acceptance program and the Russian Research Reactor Fuel 
Return program. The Foreign Research Reactor Spent Nuclear Fuel 
Acceptance program is intended to recover and store U.S.-origin 
research reactor fuel, including both HEU and LEU, from 41 eligible 
countries throughout the world. The Russian Research Reactor Fuel 
Return program assists in the return of Russian-origin research reactor 
fuel to Russia, mostly from countries of the former Soviet Union and 
Central and Eastern Europe. Together with DOE's reactor conversion 
program, these programs support the objective of reducing and 
eventually eliminating the use of HEU for civilian applications. As 
agreed with your office, we will address these two programs in a 
follow-on report.

Results in Brief: 

According to Argonne's analysis, conversion to LEU fuel is technically 
feasible for 35 of the 66 research reactors in DOE's reactor conversion 
program that still use HEU fuel, but most do not have plans to convert. 
In the United States, 8 research reactors, including 6 university 
reactors, could convert to LEU fuel, but DOE has not provided the 
necessary funding (estimated by DOE at about $5 million to $10 million 
per reactor). In addition, a university research reactor that converted 
to LEU in 2000 is still storing HEU fuel because DOE has not removed 
it. DOE officials said they have not made the conversion of the 6 
university research reactors a priority because the reactors use only a 
small amount of HEU fuel. Officials at NRC, which regulates most of the 
U.S. research reactors included in DOE's reactor conversion program, 
said that they consider the conversion of the university reactors a 
security enhancement and one of their priorities and that the delay is 
purely a matter of funding. Operators of the 6 reactors said they would 
convert to LEU fuel when DOE provides the funding. DOE's reactor 
conversion program cooperates closely with operators of foreign 
research reactors and promotes conversion from HEU to LEU. Ultimately, 
however, it is the owners of the foreign reactors that make the 
decision to convert to LEU. Of the 20 foreign research reactors that 
use U.S.-origin HEU fuel, 14 do not have plans to convert to LEU 
because they generally have a sufficient supply of HEU and either do 
not want to incur the additional cost of conversion or do not have the 
necessary funding. Finally, since DOE's reactor conversion program 
initiated cooperation with Russia in 1993, no research reactors that 
use HEU fuel supplied by Russia have converted. Only 1 of 7 Russian-
supplied research reactors that could use LEU fuel is scheduled to 
convert. DOE officials said that 5 other Russian-supplied reactors are 
also likely to convert to LEU fuels that are currently available or are 
expected to become available within the next year.

Technical setbacks in developing new LEU fuels have postponed the 
conversion of 31 research reactors worldwide that cannot use currently 
available LEU fuels until 2010 at the earliest. According to Argonne 
officials, unexpected failures that occurred when testing dispersion 
fuel--the worst they have ever experienced during fuel development--
could render the fuel unusable for most research reactors. As a result 
of the test failures, Argonne has delayed the completion of dispersion 
fuel until 2010 and may recommend that DOE cancel further development 
altogether if the fuel cannot be sufficiently improved. Canceling 
development of dispersion fuel would leave monolithic fuel as the 
reactor conversion program's only remaining option for converting the 
remaining 31 reactors. Initial testing of monolithic fuel has produced 
positive results, and if tests continue to be successful, it should 
perform better than dispersion fuel. However, the development process 
is still at the beginning stages; additional testing is required, and 
the fuel will not be developed until 2010 at the earliest. Argonne 
officials said that the current fuel development schedule is already 
compressed and that no further acceleration is possible. Rather, any 
technical problems would likely result in further delays. Furthermore, 
if both fuels fail, Argonne is not working on any other LEU fuel that 
could replace HEU in the remaining research reactors.

DOE's reactor conversion program has not yet completed the work that 
would enable conversion of large-scale medical isotope production to 
LEU, and large-scale producers are concerned that the cost of 
converting to LEU could be prohibitive. Currently, one reactor in 
Argentina has converted from using HEU to LEU for the small-scale 
production of medical isotopes. Argonne officials said that further 
development is necessary on using LEU for large-scale production. 
Large-scale producers have built expensive facilities designed to 
produce medical isotopes using HEU. Any attempt to adapt the facilities 
to use LEU would involve additional costs. Furthermore, using LEU 
instead of HEU would increase the amount of waste generated by the 
production process. Argonne officials said they are working to overcome 
these challenges and expect to complete development of LEU for large-
scale medical isotope production in 2 to 3 years. Two large producers 
of medical isotopes told us that conversion to LEU would be difficult 
and costly, and one of them is currently assessing the economic 
feasibility of conversion.

While operators at most research reactors we visited said that security 
had been upgraded through DOE or NRC efforts, we also observed areas 
where further improvements could be made. Recognizing the possible need 
for further improvements, DOE and NRC are engaged in separate efforts 
to assess and improve security at foreign and domestic research 
reactors, respectively. A DOE task force established in 2004 is 
currently gathering information on all research reactors worldwide, 
including reactors that have been shut down, and prioritizing the need 
for increased security at reactors based on a number of factors, 
including how much HEU is stored on site. According to DOE officials, 
the task force addresses the need to combine data from different 
sources to identify potential security gaps. The task force has 
submitted a report to the Secretary of Energy with recommendations for 
possible implementation by DOE. The task force efforts are in addition 
to assistance that DOE has provided since 1974 to other countries to 
improve security at their research reactors. In the United States, NRC 
is conducting assessments of the security at research reactors under 
its jurisdiction and may increase security requirements based on the 
results of the assessments. NRC took actions after the attacks of 
September 11, 2001, to improve the security at domestic research 
reactors--for example, by requiring that some reactors consider 
installing additional physical barriers.

We are making recommendations to the Secretary of Energy and the 
Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration to 
consider placing a higher priority on converting the 6 U.S. university 
research reactors that are able to convert with existing LEU fuel, to 
place a high priority on removing the HEU fuel from the reactors after 
their conversion and transporting it to the appropriate DOE facility, 
and to evaluate the costs and benefits of providing additional 
incentives to foreign research reactors that currently use U.S.-origin 
HEU fuel to convert to LEU.

We provided draft copies of this report to the Departments of Energy 
and State and to NRC for their review and comment. DOE, State, and NRC 
generally agreed with the recommendations in our report and provided 
detailed comments, which we incorporated into the report as 
appropriate.

Background: 

Nuclear research reactors are used for training and research purposes 
throughout the world. Research reactors are generally smaller than 
nuclear power reactors, ranging in size from less than 1 to 250 
megawatts compared with 3,000 megawatts generated by a typical power 
reactor. In addition, unlike power reactors, many research reactors use 
HEU fuel instead of LEU in order to produce the appropriate conditions 
in the reactor cores for conducting a wide variety of research. DOE has 
identified 161 operating research reactors that were designed to use 
HEU fuel and has included 105 of them in the reactor conversion 
program. The research reactors included in the program are spread out 
among the United States and 40 other countries, including Canada, 
France, Germany, and Russia (see fig. 1).

Figure 1: Locations of 105 Research Reactors Included in DOE's Reactor 
Conversion Program: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

In addition to the 105 research reactors covered under the reactor 
conversion program, DOE has targeted six medical isotope producers that 
use HEU as an ingredient in their production processes, including four 
large medical isotope producers located in Belgium, Canada, the 
Netherlands, and South Africa.

For a variety of reasons, DOE has excluded from its reactor conversion 
program 56 research reactors that use HEU fuel, including 9 in the 
United States. Some of the reactors are used for military or other 
purposes, such as space propulsion, that require HEU. Others are 
located in countries such as China that so far have not cooperated with 
the United States on converting their reactors to LEU. Finally, the 
time and costs associated with developing LEU fuel for some of the 
reactors may exceed their expected lifetime and usefulness.

The United States has historically provided nuclear technology to 
foreign countries in exchange for a commitment not to develop nuclear 
weapons. Starting in 1953, the Atoms for Peace program supplied 
research reactors and the fuel needed to operate them to countries 
around the world. The research reactors supplied by the Atoms for Peace 
program initially used LEU fuel, but many countries gradually switched 
from LEU to HEU in order to conduct more advanced research. In 
addition, HEU fuel could remain in the reactor core longer and was less 
expensive than LEU fuel. By the late 1970s, most research reactors were 
using HEU fuel and the United States was exporting about 700 kilograms 
of HEU a year to foreign research reactors. Like the United States, the 
Soviet Union also exported research reactors and the HEU fuel to 
operate them to other countries.

In order to achieve the program's objective of reducing the use of HEU 
in civilian research reactors, Argonne is developing new LEU fuels in 
cooperation with counterparts in other countries, including Argentina, 
France, and Russia. Developing LEU fuels involves testing fuel samples 
in research reactors to determine how the fuels behave under normal 
operating conditions. Fuel manufacturers and reactor operators around 
the world participate in the program by manufacturing and testing LEU 
fuels. Owners of foreign research reactors fund conversion of their 
reactors from HEU to LEU. In 1993, Argonne expanded the reactor 
conversion program to include cooperation with Russia on the conversion 
of Russian-supplied research reactors to LEU fuel. The Soviet Union had 
independently initiated a program in 1978 to reduce the enrichment of 
HEU fuel in research reactors but suspended the program in 1989 due to 
lack of funding. Russian-supplied research reactors use fuels 
manufactured in Russia that are not interchangeable with fuels used by 
U.S.-supplied research reactors. Therefore, DOE's reactor conversion 
program differentiates between U.S.-supplied and Russian-supplied 
research reactors.

Since the reactor conversion program's inception in 1978, 39 of the 105 
research reactors included in the program have either converted or are 
in the process of converting to LEU fuel. (See app. II for a list of 
converted research reactors.)[Footnote 4] Of the remaining 66 research 
reactors that still use HEU fuel, 35 can convert using currently 
available LEU fuels but have not done so, and 31 cannot convert to any 
currently available LEU fuels and still require HEU in order to conduct 
the research for which they were designed (see fig. 2).

Figure 2: Conversion Status of 105 Research Reactors Included in DOE's 
Reactor Conversion Program: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

A research reactor can begin the conversion process after a suitable 
LEU fuel is developed and available commercially. The decision to 
convert from HEU to LEU also depends on research reactor owners having 
the necessary financial resources, including for the purchase of new 
fuel. In the United States, NRC regulations require that research 
reactors under its jurisdiction, including reactors operated by 
universities, convert to LEU fuel when an LEU fuel that can be used to 
replace HEU fuel has been developed and when federal funding is made 
available for the conversion.[Footnote 5] The conversion process begins 
with analyses to determine whether the reactor can safely convert and 
the impact of conversion on the reactor's performance. After the 
analyses are completed and regulatory approval for conversion is 
obtained, the operator can remove the HEU from the reactor and replace 
it with the new LEU fuel. The HEU fuel can be disposed of once it has 
been removed from the reactor core and has cooled.

Many Domestic and Foreign Research Reactors Are Still Using Weapons-
Usable Uranium Even Though They Could Operate on Low Enriched Uranium: 

According to Argonne's analysis, conversion to LEU fuel is technically 
feasible for 35 of the 66 research reactors worldwide that still use 
HEU fuel. However, only 4 of the reactors--3 foreign reactors that use 
U.S.-origin HEU and 1 Russian-supplied reactor--currently have plans to 
convert. Eight U.S. research reactors, including 6 university reactors, 
could convert to LEU fuel, but according to DOE officials, DOE has not 
provided the funding to convert them. In addition, DOE has not removed 
HEU fuel from a university research reactor that has been storing HEU 
since it converted to LEU in 2000. According to Argonne officials, of 
the 20 foreign research reactors that currently use U.S.-origin HEU 
fuel, 14 do not have plans to convert to LEU because they generally 
have a sufficient supply of HEU and either do not want to incur the 
additional cost of conversion or do not have the necessary funding. 
Finally, since DOE's reactor conversion program initiated cooperation 
with Russia in 1993, no research reactors that use HEU fuel supplied by 
Russia have converted. According to Argonne officials, only 1 of 7 
Russian-supplied research reactors that could use LEU fuel is scheduled 
to convert. They said that 5 other Russian-supplied reactors are likely 
to convert to LEU fuels that are currently available or are expected to 
become available within the next year.

Eight Research Reactors in the United States Could Convert to Low 
Enriched Uranium but Still Use Weapons-Usable Uranium: 

In the United States, there are 6 university research reactors and 2 
other research reactors that could convert to LEU fuel but still use 
HEU fuel. Although DOE has funded the conversion of 11 university 
research reactors to LEU fuel, the last university reactor converted in 
2000. DOE officials said DOE has not provided the funding to convert 
the 6 remaining U.S. university reactors. DOE recently added 2 other 
domestic reactors to the reactor conversion program, and neither of 
these reactors currently has plans to convert to LEU, also because DOE 
has not provided the necessary funding. (See table 1 for a list of the 
8 reactors."

Table 1: U.S. Research Reactors Using HEU Fuel That Could Convert to 
LEU: 

Reactor: 

Oregon State University. 

Purdue University. 

Texas A&M University. 

University of Florida. 

University of Wisconsin. 

Washington State University. 

General Electric NTR Reactor. 

DOE NRAD Reactor. 

Source: Argonne.

Note: The amount of HEU fuel used by these research reactors ranges 
from 0 to 0.2 kilograms per year. Reactors that use zero kilograms of 
HEU per year use HEU fuel but operate at such low power levels that 
they use up the fuel very slowly and can operate for many years or for 
their entire lifetime without replacing fuel.

[End of table]

In addition, the university research reactor that converted to LEU in 
2000 is still storing HEU fuel because DOE has not removed it. Because 
the reactor now uses LEU fuel and has no need for HEU, the reactor 
operator told us that he is eager to return the HEU to DOE for long-
term storage and disposal. DOE has a separate program that supports 
university research reactors, including provision of DOE-owned fuel, 
and funds their conversion to LEU and removal of spent fuel.[Footnote 
6] According to the DOE official in charge of the university reactor 
support program, the program has limited funding, and requests for 
additional funding to support conversion have not been approved by the 
Office of Management and Budget. Furthermore, the university reactor 
support program did not receive additional funding to remove HEU fuel 
from the research reactor that converted to LEU in 2000 until fiscal 
year 2004, after a group of domestic research reactor operators 
successfully lobbied Congress to add $2.5 million to the program's 
budget to pay for the removal of spent fuel from the reactors.

Officials at NRC, which regulates the 6 university reactors, told us 
that they consider the conversion of the reactors to LEU, the timely 
removal of HEU fuel after conversion, and the removal of HEU from the 
reactor that converted to LEU in 2000 as a security enhancement and one 
of their priorities. NRC officials said that converting the 6 reactors 
is technically feasible and that the delay in converting the reactors 
is purely a matter of funding and should be expedited by DOE. However, 
DOE officials said that DOE had not made the conversion of these 
reactors a priority. Furthermore, while operators at all 6 universities 
told us they are willing to convert to LEU fuel, they said it is not a 
high priority because they do not consider their HEU fuel to be a 
likely target for theft. For example, one reactor operator explained 
that the reactor is structured in such a way that the HEU is located 
inside a concrete enclosure that even experienced reactor staff need 
almost 2 days to access. These 6 reactors use only a small amount of 
HEU fuel--less than a kilogram per year, which is not enough to make a 
nuclear weapon. In contrast, there are other research reactors included 
in DOE's reactor conversion program that are larger than the 6 
university reactors and use tens of kilograms per year.

Nevertheless, operators of the 6 university research reactors said they 
would convert to LEU when DOE provides funding. Furthermore, the DOE 
official in charge of the university reactor support program said that 
converting domestic university reactors is an issue of U.S. 
nonproliferation policy. He said that converting domestic reactors to 
LEU would support U.S. efforts to influence foreign reactors to convert 
to LEU in accordance with the U.S. nonproliferation policy to reduce 
the use of HEU in civilian research reactors worldwide. Although they 
did not consider conversion a priority from a security perspective, two 
of the university reactor directors we spoke with recognized the 
importance of converting university reactors to LEU as part of U.S. 
nonproliferation policy.

According to DOE officials, conversion for each reactor is projected to 
cost between $5 million and $10 million. However, a project engineer at 
DOE's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory who 
tracks DOE expenditures on conversions of U.S. university reactors had 
originally told us that conversion would cost between $2 million and $4 
million per reactor, depending on the type of reactor. DOE could not 
provide documentation to support either of the estimates. DOE officials 
said that conversion costs for 4 of the university reactors are higher 
because their fuel is no longer manufactured in the United States and 
must be purchased in France.[Footnote 7]

Other than funding, there are no significant obstacles to converting 
the 6 university reactors to LEU. Based on our visits to 3 converted 
university research reactors and interviews with Argonne officials and 
the operators of the 6 remaining university reactors, converting to LEU 
does not reduce the performance of the reactors to the point that they 
cannot be used to conduct research and train students effectively. 
Operators at 5 of the 6 university reactors still using HEU fuel told 
us they expected performance to be adequate after conversion. In 
addition, operators of converted reactors told us that using LEU 
instead of HEU reduced security concerns and had a minimal impact on 
the cost of operating the reactors. Argonne officials said that one of 
their objectives when providing technical assistance to convert 
reactors to LEU is to complete the process with only minimal effects on 
performance and operating costs. In fact, two reactor operators (one in 
Rhode Island and one in Massachusetts) told us that performance at 
their reactors had improved as a result of conversion.

According to Argonne officials, 2 other reactors in the United States 
(the DOE NRAD and General Electric NTR reactors) could convert to LEU 
but are not currently planning to do so. The officials said they 
recently added these 2 reactors to the scope of the reactor conversion 
program so that the program would be comprehensive in its coverage of 
civilian research reactors that use HEU. The NRAD research reactor is a 
DOE reactor, and DOE would have to fund the purchase of new LEU fuel if 
a decision were made to convert the reactor. According to a DOE 
official responsible for the reactor, the budget for the NRAD reactor 
is limited, and purchasing new LEU fuel to convert the reactor would 
take funding away from other activities at the facility where the 
reactor is located. The DOE official considers the conversion of this 
reactor a lower priority because it has a sufficient supply of HEU fuel 
to last for the life of the reactor and because the facility has other 
nuclear material that would be more attractive to terrorists than the 
HEU fuel in the reactor. The General Electric NTR is a privately owned 
reactor and is also not required to convert until DOE provides funding.

Twenty Foreign Research Reactors Continue to Use Weapons-Usable Uranium 
Fuel: 

Fourteen of the 20 foreign research reactors that currently use U.S.-
origin HEU fuel do not have plans to convert to LEU. According to 
Argonne officials, these reactors generally have a supply of HEU 
sufficient to last many years (in some cases for the life of the 
reactor) and either do not want to incur the additional cost of 
conversion or do not have the necessary funding. Three of the reactors 
are planning to convert to LEU, and 3 others currently plan to shut 
down (or, in the case of 2 reactors, convert to LEU fuel if they do not 
shut down). See table 2 for a list of the 20 reactors.

Table 2: 20 Foreign Research Reactors Still Using HEU Obtained from the 
United States: 

Country: Argentina; 
Reactor: RA-6; 
Status: Conversion planned.

Country: Canada; 
Reactor: Slowpoke-Alberta.

Country: Canada; 
Reactor: Slowpoke-Halifax.

Country: Canada; 
Reactor: Slowpoke-Saskatchewan.

Country: France; 
Reactor: MINERVE.

Country: France; 
Reactor: Ulysee-Saclay.

Country: Germany; 
Reactor: FRJ-2; 
Status: Conversion planned.

Country: Israel; 
Reactor: IRR-1; 
Status: Shutdown planned.

Country: Jamaica; 
Reactor: Slowpoke.

Country: Japan; 
Reactor: KUCA.

Country: Japan; 
Reactor: UTR-10 Kinki.

Country: Japan; 
Reactor: KUR; 
Status: Shutdown or conversion planned.

Country: Mexico; 
Reactor: TRIGA.

Country: Netherlands; 
Reactor: HFR Petten; 
Status: Conversion planned.

Country: Netherlands; 
Reactor: LFR.

Country: Portugal; 
Reactor: RPI; 
Status: Shutdown or conversion planned.

Country: South Africa; 
Reactor: SAFARI.

Country: United Kingdom; 
Reactor: Consort.

Country: United Kingdom; 
Reactor: Neptune.

Country: United Kingdom; 
Reactor: Viper. 

Source: Argonne.

Note: The amount of HEU fuel used by these research reactors ranges 
from 0 to 38.3 kilograms per year. Reactors that use zero kilograms of 
HEU per year use HEU fuel but operate at such low power levels that 
they use up the fuel very slowly and can operate for many years or for 
their entire lifetime without replacing fuel.

[End of table]

Some of the foreign research reactors would like to convert but do not 
have the necessary funding. For example, the operator of a research 
reactor in Jamaica told us that converting to LEU would improve the 
reactor performance but that purchasing LEU fuel for the reactor would 
cost $1.5 million, which is more than the reactor operator can afford. 
Therefore, the reactor operator is planning to continue using its 
current supply of HEU, which will last possibly 20 years. Similarly, 
according to Argonne officials, the reactor operator in Mexico would be 
willing to convert to LEU but does not have the necessary funding. 
While funding may not be an issue for other foreign reactors, many of 
them are designed to operate on a small amount of fuel meant to last 
for the life of the reactor. Converting to LEU would require the 
disposal of the fuel that the reactor operator had already purchased 
and is still usable. According to Argonne officials, operators of 
certain reactors in France, Japan, the Netherlands, and the United 
Kingdom do not have plans to convert because the reactors have lifetime 
cores that do not need to be replaced.

To support the objective of the reactor conversion program to reduce 
and eventually eliminate the use of HEU in research reactors, the 
United States has implemented policies designed to influence foreign 
research reactors to convert to LEU. For example, DOE's Foreign 
Research Reactor Spent Nuclear Fuel Acceptance program provides foreign 
reactors that use HEU fuel of U.S.-origin the opportunity to return 
their spent fuel to the United States if they agree to convert their 
reactors to LEU fuel. In addition, the Energy Policy Act of 1992 
authorizes NRC to approve the export of HEU to foreign research 
reactors only if the recipients agree to convert the reactors once a 
suitable LEU fuel is developed.[Footnote 8] Since there are limited 
suppliers of HEU fuel and few options for disposing of spent fuel, the 
U.S. policies in support of the reactor conversion program have been 
effective in influencing some research reactors to convert to LEU. In 
particular, of the 20 foreign reactors that can convert to LEU but are 
still using HEU, the 2 that use the greatest amount of HEU per year are 
planning to convert by 2006. One research reactor in the Netherlands 
(HFR Petten) formally agreed with the United States to convert to LEU 
in order to continue receiving U.S.-origin HEU fuel until conversion 
could take place and to ship spent fuel back to the United States. The 
U.S. policies in support of conversion were effective in influencing 
the reactor operator because the reactor uses 38 kilograms of HEU fuel 
per year and regularly needs to obtain new HEU fuel and dispose of 
spent fuel. Similarly, the FRJ-2 reactor in Germany has an agreement 
with DOE to convert to LEU fuel as a condition of returning spent fuel 
to the United States.

However, U.S. policies in support of the reactor conversion program do 
not influence foreign reactors using so little HEU that they can 
operate for many years without replacing their fuel or disposing of 
spent fuel. While Argonne provides technical assistance for conversion, 
current DOE policy precludes purchasing new LEU fuel for foreign 
reactors that use U.S.-origin HEU fuel. Under this policy, purchasing 
new LEU fuel--which, according to a DOE project engineer, is the main 
cost of conversion--is the responsibility of the reactor operator. 
According to a DOE official, DOE has paid for new LEU fuel only once, 
in Romania, in exchange for the return of Russian-origin HEU fuel to 
Russia. DOE spent $4 million to purchase LEU fuel for the Romanian 
reactor, which is still only partially converted and requires more LEU 
fuel before conversion is complete. DOE officials said that current DOE 
policy allows purchasing LEU fuel for research reactors that use 
Russian-origin HEU fuel in exchange for returning the HEU to Russia. 
However, DOE does not have a similar policy for research reactors that 
use U.S.-origin HEU fuel. DOE officials said they are considering 
revising this policy to allow purchasing LEU fuel for U.S.-supplied 
research reactors.

Only One of Seven Russian-Supplied Reactors That Can Use Low Enriched 
Uranium Is Scheduled to Convert: 

According to Argonne officials, 7 Russian-supplied research reactors, 
all located outside Russia, could convert using LEU fuels that are 
currently available or are expected to become available within the next 
year. However, only 1 of the 7 reactors, located in Ukraine, is 
scheduled to convert.[Footnote 9] (See table 3 for a list of the 7 
reactors."

Table 3: Seven Foreign Research Reactors Using HEU from Russia That 
Could Convert to LEU: 

Country: Bulgaria; 
Reactor: IRT-Sofia.

Country: Germany; 
Reactor: ZLFR.

Country: Hungary; 
Reactor: VVR-SZM.

Country: Libya; 
Reactor: IRT-1.

Country: Libya; 
Reactor: Critical Facility.

Country: Ukraine; 
Reactor: VVR-M.

Country: Vietnam; 
Reactor: DRR.

Source: Argonne.

Note: The amount of HEU fuel used by these research reactors ranges 
from 0 to 13.9 kilograms per year. Reactors that use zero kilograms of 
HEU per year use HEU fuel but operate at such low power levels that 
they use up the fuel very slowly and can operate for many years or for 
their entire lifetime without replacing fuel.

[End of table]

The Ukrainian reactor operators told us that they expect to begin 
conversion to LEU at the end of 2004 at the earliest and that they are 
currently analyzing the safety of converting to LEU with the assistance 
of DOE's reactor conversion program. Unlike many of the U.S.-supplied 
research reactors that are not planning to convert because they have an 
adequate supply of HEU, the Ukrainian reactor is running out of HEU 
fuel and will have to place an order for new fuel by the end of 2004. 
The reactor operators told us they support conversion to LEU fuel 
because the negative impact on the reactor's performance will be 
tolerable, the operating costs will be about the same after conversion 
to LEU, and converting to LEU would eliminate the threat that HEU could 
be stolen from the facility. The reactor operators are scheduled to 
complete the safety analysis in November 2004 and then submit an 
application to obtain approval for conversion from the Ukrainian 
nuclear regulatory authority. However, Argonne officials said the 
schedule for converting the Ukrainian reactor is ambitious and 
conversion of the reactor could be delayed. According to Argonne 
officials, if the Ukrainian reactor does not get regulatory approval 
for conversion to LEU before it runs out of fuel, it may decide to 
place an order with the Russian supplier for more HEU fuel instead.

According to DOE officials, 5 other Russian-supplied reactors that can 
use LEU fuel are likely to convert. Conversion of the reactors in 
Bulgaria and Libya depends on the commercialization of the Russian-
origin LEU fuel, which DOE expects to take place in 2004. DOE has also 
engaged in discussions on conversion with the operators of the research 
reactor in Vietnam. According to Argonne officials, conversion of the 
research reactor in Hungary requires at least several more years of 
analysis. In particular, the reactor must test an LEU fuel sample 
before the Hungarian government approves conversion, and this process 
will take several years. Argonne officials said the research reactor in 
Germany has a sufficient supply of HEU fuel and therefore is not 
planning to convert to LEU.

Technical Setbacks in Developing New Fuels Limit Progress in Converting 
the Largest Remaining Research Reactors: 

Technical setbacks in developing new LEU fuels have postponed the 
conversion of 31 research reactors worldwide that cannot use currently 
available LEU fuels until 2010 at the earliest. Argonne is pursuing the 
development of LEU dispersion fuel and LEU monolithic fuel to convert 
these reactors. Argonne officials said the failures during testing of 
dispersion fuel are the worst they have ever experienced during fuel 
development. As a result, Argonne has delayed completion of dispersion 
fuel until 2010 and may recommend that DOE cancel further development 
altogether if solutions cannot be found. This would leave the reactor 
conversion program with only one alternative LEU fuel--monolithic fuel. 
According to Argonne officials, monolithic fuel has performed well in 
the one test conducted so far. However, many more tests are required. 
Because of lessons learned from dispersion fuel failures, Argonne 
recently delayed the projected completion date of monolithic fuel from 
2008 to 2010 in anticipation of the need for additional tests. Argonne 
officials said they have compressed the development schedule of both 
dispersion and monolithic fuel as much as possible and any further 
technical problems will result in additional delays. Moreover, Argonne 
is focusing all LEU fuel development efforts on dispersion and 
monolithic fuel, and if both fuels fail, no LEU fuel will be available 
to convert the remaining reactors in the reactor conversion program.

DOE May Cancel Development of One Low Enriched Uranium Fuel That Has 
Had Significant Problems: 

The 31 research reactors worldwide that cannot convert to currently 
available LEU fuels include some of the largest reactors in terms of 
amount of HEU used per year. Argonne officials estimate the reactors 
use a total of about 728 kilograms of HEU per year. Many of the 31 
reactors are used to conduct advanced scientific research that could 
not be done if they were to convert to currently available LEU fuels. 
Representatives of 8 of the research reactors told us they need HEU 
fuel to operate and conduct research until LEU fuel with the right 
performance characteristics is developed. (See table 4 for a list of 
the 31 reactors."

Table 4: 31 Research Reactors That Cannot Convert Using Currently 
Available LEU Fuels: 

Country: Belgium; 
Reactor: BR-2.

Country: Czech Republic; 
Reactor: LWR-15.

Country: Czech Republic; 
Reactor: VR-1.

Country: France; 
Reactor: ORPHEE.

Country: France; 
Reactor: RHF.

Country: Germany; 
Reactor: FRM-II.

Country: Kazakhstan; 
Reactor: VVR-K.

Reactor: VVR-K Critical Facility.

Country: North Korea; 
Reactor: IRT-DPRK.

Country: Poland; 
Reactor: MARIA.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: IRT-MEPhI.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: IR-8.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: IRT-T.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: VVR-TS.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: VVR-M.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: IVV-2M.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: MIR-M1.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: CA.MIR-M1.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: SM-3.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: CA.SM-3.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: RBT-6.

Reactor: RBT-10/2.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: PIK.

Country: Russia; 
Reactor: PIK Physical Model.

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MITR).

Country: United States; 
Reactor: University of Missouri (MURR).

Country: United States; 
Reactor: National Institute of Standards and Technology (NBSR).

Country: United States; 
Reactor: DOE HIFR.

Country: United States; 
Reactor: DOE ATR.

Country: United States; 
Reactor: DOE ATRC.

Country: Uzbekistan; 
Reactor: VVR-CM. 

Source: Argonne.

Notes: The amount of HEU fuel used by these research reactors ranges 
from 0 to 120 kilograms per year. Reactors that use zero kilograms of 
HEU per year use HEU fuel but operate at such low power levels that 
they use up the fuel very slowly and can operate for many years or for 
their entire lifetime without replacing fuel.

Research reactors located in the Czech Republic, Kazakhstan, North 
Korea, Poland, Russia, and Uzbekistan are Russian-supplied reactors.

[End of table]

DOE's reactor conversion program has run into problems in developing 
new LEU fuels intended to replace HEU in these research reactors. The 
most serious problems have occurred in tests of dispersion fuel, the 
development of which began in 1996. According to Argonne officials, 
dispersion fuel would be usable in the Russian-supplied research 
reactors and 1 U.S. reactor.[Footnote 10] Most recently, tests of the 
dispersion fuel have revealed weaknesses that would make the fuel 
unsuitable for use in research reactors. In particular, when samples of 
dispersion fuel were tested in research reactors, the fuel failed 
unexpectedly under reactor operating conditions the fuel was designed 
to withstand.

A number of factors illustrate the seriousness of the problems with the 
dispersion fuel. First, according to Argonne officials, the same 
problems have been encountered in separate tests and under different 
operating conditions in reactors in the United States, Belgium, France, 
and Russia. Second, the problems were unexpected and worse than 
encountered in previous LEU fuel development efforts. Finally, if the 
failures were serious enough, the fuel could leak radioactive material 
into the reactor coolant and cause facility contamination. If this 
occurred, the dispersion fuel would not be approved for use in research 
reactors.

Argonne officials said that, as a result of these test failures, they 
have delayed projected completion of dispersion fuel from 2006 until 
2010 to allow time for additional development and testing. Argonne 
officials plan to pursue options to modify dispersion fuel to make it 
resistant to failures. However, they said they would also consider 
recommending that DOE cancel further development of dispersion fuel if 
it is determined the fuel cannot be sufficiently improved. In addition, 
because of the problems encountered in the development of dispersion 
fuel, Argonne has shifted its primary focus to the development of 
monolithic fuel.

More Time Is Needed to Develop an Alternative Low Enriched Uranium 
Fuel: 

Initial testing of monolithic fuel has produced positive results under 
the same operating conditions under which dispersion fuel failed. 
According to Argonne officials, if they are successful in developing 
monolithic fuel, it will offer better reactor performance than 
dispersion fuel and could be used to convert the remaining research 
reactors in the reactor conversion program to LEU.

Nevertheless, the successful development of this fuel is still 
uncertain, and Argonne has not yet demonstrated that all remaining 
research reactors still using HEU could convert to it. Argonne 
officials said they began developing monolithic fuel relatively 
recently, in 2000, and to date have conducted only one test. Additional 
testing could reveal problems that have not yet surfaced. Furthermore, 
this fuel requires development of a new manufacturing method because 
the methods used to manufacture other research reactor fuels are not 
suitable for monolithic fuel. Argonne is conducting research on 
different manufacturing options but has not yet demonstrated that 
monolithic fuel can be manufactured on a large scale. Three reactor 
operators hoping to convert to this fuel told us it is impossible to 
predict whether the new LEU fuel will be successfully developed and 
that creating a reliable LEU fuel could take many years more than 
expected.

Development of monolithic fuel may be delayed if Argonne encounters any 
problems in the fuel development process. Argonne officials said they 
have already delayed projected completion from 2008 to 2010 to allow 
time for additional testing. The schedule for developing monolithic 
fuel does not factor in any technical problems that may occur during 
testing but rather assumes that every phase of development will be 
successful. Argonne officials said they have already compressed the 
schedule as much as possible and that it would be difficult to 
significantly accelerate fuel development any further because each set 
of tests requires a fixed amount of time. The officials also stated 
that fuel development would have been delayed even further had Congress 
not increased funding for the reactor conversion program from $6.1 
million in fiscal year 2003 to $8.5 million in fiscal year 2004, which 
enabled Argonne to pursue a more aggressive fuel development schedule. 
Assuming no further delays in fuel development, Argonne officials said 
the first research reactors could begin ordering new LEU for conversion 
within 6 months of completing the development of either dispersion fuel 
or monolithic fuel in 2010.

Support for Conversion to Low Enriched Uranium Fuel Varies among 
Research Reactor Operators: 

In our visits to foreign and domestic research reactors that cannot 
convert to currently available LEU fuels, we found that reactor 
operators' response to the prospect of conversion to LEU fuels varies 
widely. For example, the operator of the BR-2 reactor in Belgium said 
it had agreed to convert to LEU when feasible as a condition for 
continuing to receive U.S.-origin HEU fuel. In contrast, a new German 
reactor at the Technical University Munich designed to use HEU (the 
FRM-II reactor) may still not be able to convert to LEU even if Argonne 
is successful in developing monolithic fuel. The reactor operator has 
agreed to convert to a lower enrichment of HEU that is less usable in 
nuclear weapons. However, during our visit to the reactor, the operator 
said it had no plans to convert the reactor to LEU fuel because 
conversion would require expensive reconstruction.

Argonne has contracted with Russia to work jointly on development of 
new LEU fuels, but DOE has not negotiated a formal agreement with the 
Russian government to convert research reactors in Russia to LEU. DOE's 
reactor conversion program includes 14 research reactors operating in 
Russia that, combined, use 225 kilograms of HEU fuel per year. In 2002, 
the Secretary of Energy and Russia's Minister of Atomic Energy issued a 
joint statement identifying acceleration of LEU fuel development for 
both Russian-supplied and U.S.-supplied research reactors as an area 
where joint cooperation could lead to reduction in the use of HEU. 
However, the Russian officials responsible for developing LEU fuels 
told us they are focusing on converting Russian-supplied reactors in 
other countries first. The officials also do not consider the 
conversion of research reactors in Russia to LEU a priority because 
security has been improved at the reactors and the reactors need HEU 
fuel to conduct advanced research. Furthermore, Russian officials told 
us that under Russian law, operators of HEU reactors in Russia are not 
required to convert to LEU. In fact, since 1986, Russia has been 
building a new research reactor that is designed to use HEU fuel rather 
than LEU.

Three U.S. research reactors (at the Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology, the University of Missouri, and the National Institute of 
Standards and Technology) where conversion is not currently feasible 
fall under NRC regulations that would require conversion to LEU if the 
reactor conversion program is successful in developing new LEU 
fuels.[Footnote 11] Furthermore, the Secretary of Energy committed to 
the conversion of all U.S. research reactors by 2013 in a speech on May 
26, 2004. However, without federal funding to support the conversion, 
the reactors may continue to use HEU. For example, the operator of the 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology reactor said that conversion to 
LEU could be delayed even after a new LEU fuel is developed if DOE does 
not provide funding in a timely manner.

Using Low Enriched Uranium for Medical Isotope Production Is Feasible, 
but Concerns over Cost Could Limit Its Use: 

The reactor conversion program has demonstrated the potential for using 
LEU to produce medical isotopes on a small scale, but large-scale 
producers are concerned that the cost of conversion could be 
prohibitive. With assistance from the reactor conversion program, one 
reactor in Argentina used for the production of medical isotopes 
converted from HEU to LEU in 2003. However, Argonne officials said the 
conversion was feasible only because the reactor produces medical 
isotopes on a small scale, using a relatively small amount of material 
in the production process. (Prior to converting to LEU, the Argentine 
reactor used less than a kilogram of HEU per year. In contrast, four 
large medical isotope producers targeted by the reactor conversion 
program, located in Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, and South Africa, 
each use as much as 25 kilograms of HEU per year.) Argonne is still 
working to overcome problems with using LEU that limit the ability of 
the Argentine reactor to increase its production capacity.

Argonne officials said they are 2 to 3 years away from completing work 
that would allow the large medical isotope producers to convert from 
HEU to LEU. Argonne officials said they have developed LEU materials 
that can be used by all medical isotope producers and only the 
adaptation of the production processes from using HEU to LEU remains. 
They said that adapting the medical isotope producers' processes, each 
of which is unique in some aspect, is technically feasible and is just 
a matter of time. One reason why the production processes must be 
modified is that almost five times more LEU than HEU is required to 
produce the same amount of medical isotopes. The increased amount of 
nuclear material creates obstacles to conversion. For example, using 
LEU would produce more waste, which in turn could increase the burden 
of treating and storing the waste. In addition, the facilities, 
chemical processes, and waste management systems for producing medical 
isotopes are customized to use HEU and would require modifications to 
accommodate LEU.

In discussions with the two large medical isotope producers in Belgium 
and Canada, both cited a number of factors that would make conversion 
to LEU costly and difficult, including the fivefold increase in the 
amount of LEU that would be required to achieve the same level of 
output when using HEU. As part of its technical analysis, the Canadian 
producer is currently conducting an assessment of converting to LEU to 
determine whether conversion would be economically feasible. The 
Canadian producer currently uses U.S.-origin HEU and, under U.S. law, 
must agree to convert to LEU when a suitable LEU alternative is 
developed.[Footnote 12] (The other three large medical isotope 
producers currently receive their HEU from countries other than the 
United States and are therefore not subject to U.S. requirements to 
convert to LEU.) U.S. law also allows for an exception to the 
requirement to convert to LEU if conversion would result in a large 
percentage increase in operating costs. Officials at DOE and NRC, which 
implements the law governing U.S. HEU exports, acknowledge that medical 
isotope producers operate on small profit margins, and as a result, the 
cost of converting to LEU may be prohibitive. However, Argonne 
officials said that conversion to LEU could result in a more economic 
process. DOE officials said they would not accept a statement by the 
Canadian producer that conversion of medical isotope production to LEU 
is not economically feasible without documentation to support that 
conclusion.

DOE and NRC Are Addressing Security at Foreign and Domestic Research 
Reactors: 

Research reactor operators at most reactors we visited said that 
security had been improved because of DOE or NRC efforts. However, DOE 
and NRC have recognized the need to further improve security at 
research reactors throughout the world, including in the United States, 
and are engaged in separate efforts to assess research reactor security 
and its effectiveness.

At the foreign research reactors we visited, we observed security 
improvements to storage areas for HEU fuel, systems for controlling 
personnel access to the reactors, and alarm systems, including motion 
detectors and camera monitoring. DOE provided assistance to some of the 
foreign reactors to make the security improvements; other reactor 
operators had made the improvements with their own funding based on DOE 
recommendations. At U.S. research reactors, we saw physical security 
improvements around the reactor buildings, such as new fences and 
concrete barriers. Several operators of university research reactors 
told us they were using funding from DOE's university reactor support 
program to purchase new security equipment.

We also observed areas where further improvement could be made. For 
example, we visited one foreign research reactor's facility for storing 
spent HEU fuel where DOE had provided only minimal assistance to 
improve security. According to DOE officials, DOE has generally not 
provided assistance to improve the security of spent HEU fuel because 
it is radioactive and too dangerous for potential terrorists to handle. 
DOE has placed a higher priority on protecting fresh fuel--fuel that 
has not been irradiated in a reactor--because it is easier to handle. 
However, operators of the fuel storage facility said that the spent 
fuel had been in storage for a long time and had lost enough 
radioactivity to be handled and potentially stolen.

During a visit to another foreign research reactor, we observed a new 
alarm system monitoring the entrance to the reactor building, a fresh 
fuel vault, and motion detectors that had been installed with DOE 
assistance. DOE is in the process of adding further enhancements to the 
security of the facility. However, we also observed that the fence 
surrounding the facility was in poor condition, security guards at the 
front gate were unarmed, and there were no guards at the reactor 
building, which we entered without escort. At another research reactor, 
DOE identified security weaknesses and offered assistance to make 
security improvements. However, according to the U.S. embassy in the 
country where the reactor is located, the improvements had not been 
made as of March 2004 because the reactor operator did not act on DOE's 
offer of assistance. We discussed examples that raised questions about 
security of foreign research reactors with DOE officials during 
meetings on March 12 and 22, 2004, and they agreed that DOE needs to do 
more to address potential security concerns.

Recognizing that the security at some research reactors may need to be 
improved, DOE established a task force in 2004 to identify the highest 
risk reactors and to develop options for improving security at reactors 
believed to be of greatest concern. The task force is currently 
gathering information on all research reactors worldwide, including 
reactors that are shut down, and prioritizing them based on a number of 
factors, including how much HEU is stored on site, the vulnerability of 
the reactors to theft of HEU or sabotage, plans for conversion to LEU 
and removal of HEU fuel, and the potential terrorist threat to 
countries where the reactors are located. The scope of the initiative 
comprises 802 research reactors and associated facilities, including 
128 facilities possessing 20 kilograms or more of HEU on site.[Footnote 
13] DOE officials said the task force addresses the need to combine and 
coordinate information from different sources within DOE, which did not 
have a comprehensive database prior to the task force to document 
visits and security observations made by various DOE program officials 
to foreign research reactors. According to DOE officials, the task 
force has submitted a report to the Secretary of Energy with 
recommendations for possible implementation by DOE, such as expediting 
conversion to LEU and providing additional assistance to foreign 
research reactors to improve security. According to task force members, 
security assistance to foreign reactors could be provided by DOE, the 
International Atomic Energy Agency, or countries other than the United 
States.

NRC is also engaged in efforts to assess and improve the security at 
the U.S. research reactors it regulates. NRC took actions after the 
attacks of September 11, 2001, to improve security at U.S. research 
reactors--for example, by requiring some reactor operators to consider 
installing additional physical barriers and strengthening screening 
requirements for entrance to facilities. In addition, NRC is conducting 
assessments of the security at the research reactors it regulates and 
may increase security requirements based on the results of the 
assessments. According to NRC officials, the agency's security 
evaluations of U.S. research reactors will be completed in December 
2004. Based on the results of the evaluations, NRC will decide to 
strengthen current regulations, leave regulations as they are, or 
address security concerns at each reactor on a case-by-case approach.

Conclusions: 

While several research reactors are scheduled to convert to LEU fuel in 
the next few years, progress in converting many remaining reactors has 
stalled. In part, converting these reactors is a matter of completing 
development of new LEU fuels, which has been delayed by unforeseen 
technical problems. However, if DOE's reactor conversion program is to 
achieve its objective to reduce and eventually eliminate the use of HEU 
in civilian research reactors, DOE may need to re-evaluate its policies 
with regard to the program. Many of the research reactors that could 
use currently available LEU fuels have not converted because they lack 
incentives, funding, or both. Until recently, the policy of DOE's 
reactor conversion program has been to provide technical assistance to 
support conversion of research reactors to LEU but not to pay for 
conversion or, in particular, purchase new LEU fuel. In the case of six 
U.S. university reactors, DOE has not made purchasing LEU fuel for 
conversion (and completing the conversion process at another reactor by 
removing HEU fuel and shipping it to a DOE facility for disposal) a 
high priority. While many of the U.S. reactors that could convert to 
LEU use only a small amount of HEU per year, converting them would 
demonstrate DOE's commitment to the nonproliferation objective of the 
reactor conversion program.

DOE has generally expected the operators of foreign research reactors 
that use U.S.-origin HEU fuel to purchase new LEU fuel with their own 
funds. The policies DOE has relied on to influence operators to convert 
to LEU--requiring that reactor operators agree to convert as a 
condition of receiving U.S. HEU exports or returning spent fuel to the 
United States--do not work for reactors using so little HEU that they 
can operate for many years without replacing their fuel. Without 
funding for conversion, it is possible these reactors could continue 
using HEU for years. DOE may need to consider offering additional 
incentives to foreign reactors, including purchasing new LEU fuel, to 
influence them to convert to LEU.

Regardless of progress in converting domestic and foreign research 
reactors to LEU in the near term, delays in completing the development 
of new LEU fuels mean that other research reactors will continue to use 
HEU until at least 2010. If the reactor conversion program experiences 
additional problems in one or both of the two LEU fuels currently under 
development, some research reactors could be left without a viable 
option for conversion to LEU. Given the continuing use of HEU at these 
research reactors, DOE and NRC efforts to evaluate and improve reactor 
security are essential components of the overall effort to reduce the 
risk of proliferation of HEU at civilian research reactors.

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

In order to further reduce the use of HEU in research reactors in the 
United States and abroad, we recommend that the Secretary of Energy and 
the Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration take 
the following three actions: 

* consider placing a higher priority on converting the six remaining 
university research reactors in the United States that can use 
currently available LEU fuel;

* once a reactor has been converted, place a high priority on removing 
the HEU fuel and transporting it to the appropriate DOE facility; and: 

* evaluate the costs and benefits of providing additional incentives to 
foreign research reactors that use U.S.-origin HEU fuel to convert to 
LEU, particularly to reactor operators that are willing to convert but 
do not have sufficient funding to do so.

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

We provided draft copies of this report to the Departments of Energy 
and State and to NRC for their review and comment. Comments from the 
Departments of Energy and State are presented as appendixes III and IV, 
respectively. NRC's written comments were not for publication. DOE, 
State, and NRC generally agreed with the recommendations in our report 
and provided detailed comments, which we incorporated into the report 
as appropriate.

In its comments, DOE noted that the United States has 11 more research 
reactors to convert to the use of LEU fuels, with conversion currently 
feasible for 6 of the reactors. However, DOE's February 2004 project 
execution plan for its reactor conversion program identifies 14 U.S. 
research reactors still using HEU fuel that are included in DOE's 
reactor conversion program, with conversion currently feasible for 8 of 
the reactors. We used the number of reactors from DOE's project 
execution plan in our report.

In its comments, State questioned DOE's cost estimate for converting 
U.S. research reactors where conversion to LEU fuel is currently 
feasible. State noted that DOE's cost estimate of $5 million to $10 
million per reactor where conversion to LEU fuel is currently feasible 
seems much too high, especially in comparison with DOE's expenditures 
of about $0.4 million to $1.6 million per reactor to convert 11 U.S. 
university reactors to LEU fuel between 1984 and 2000. State wrote that 
the DOE office that administers the program for supporting U.S. 
university research reactors has been reluctant to fund the conversion 
of more research reactors and has a tendency to overstate the potential 
costs to deflect pressure to spend money on conversions. We asked DOE 
officials what support they had for the cost estimate. In response, a 
DOE official said that DOE does not have documentation to support its 
cost estimate.

In another comment, State suggested we include recognition of the 
growing number of new and planned research reactors around the world 
that have been designed to use LEU fuel. State wrote that modern world-
class reactors do not need HEU fuel to conduct high-quality research. 
DOE officials also provided information on the use of LEU fuel in new 
research reactors constructed since the inception of its reactor 
conversion program in 1978. Although our report does not focus on new 
research reactors designed to use LEU fuel, we agree that this is a 
positive development in keeping with the objective of DOE's reactor 
conversion program and we added a footnote recognizing these new 
reactors.

Scope and Methodology: 

To review the progress of the reactor conversion program, we analyzed 
program documentation, including DOE's February 2004 RERTR Program 
Project Execution Plan. We also interviewed key DOE, Argonne, NRC, and 
State Department officials; conducted site visits to foreign and U.S. 
research reactors and interviewed reactor operators by telephone; and 
attended an annual international conference organized by DOE's reactor 
conversion program.

For site visits and telephone interviews, we selected foreign and 
domestic research reactors from three categories: reactors that had 
converted to LEU, reactors that could convert using currently available 
LEU fuels but were still using HEU, and reactors that could not convert 
using currently available LEU fuels. Within each of the three 
categories of reactors, we selected a nonprobability sample of reactors 
based on a number of criteria such as reactor types, including U.S.-
supplied reactors, Russian-supplied reactors, and reactors that use HEU 
in the production of medical isotopes.[Footnote 14] We visited 5 
research reactors in the United States, including 3 that had converted 
to LEU and 2 that cannot convert to currently available LEU fuels and 
are still using HEU. We conducted phone interviews with reactor 
operators from 1 other U.S. reactor that cannot use currently available 
LEU fuels and all 6 of the U.S. university research reactors that can 
convert to LEU but are still using HEU. We also visited 10 foreign 
research reactors in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, 
Portugal, Romania, Russia, and Ukraine. These included 2 converted 
reactors, 4 reactors that can use LEU fuel but have not yet converted, 
and 4 reactors that still require HEU. (See table 5.)

Table 5: Number of Research Reactors Selected for Site Visits or Phone 
Interviews: 

Reactor status: Converted; 
U.S.-supplied: In the U.S.: 3 of 11; 
U.S.-supplied: Abroad: 2 of 28; 
Russian-supplied: In Russia: N/A; 
Russian-supplied: Abroad: N/A; 
Total: 5 of 39.

Reactor status: Convertible; 
U.S.-supplied: In the U.S.: 8 of 8; 
U.S.-supplied: Abroad: 3 of 20; 
Russian-supplied: In Russia: N/A; 
Russian-supplied: Abroad: 1 of 7; 
Total: 12 of 35.

Reactor status: Not yet convertible; 
U.S.-supplied: In the U.S.: 4 of 6; 
U.S.-supplied: Abroad: 2 of 4; 
Russian-supplied: In Russia: 2 of 14; 
Russian-supplied: Abroad: 1 of 7; 
Total: 9 of 31.

Total; 
U.S.-supplied: In the U.S.: 15 of 25; 
U.S.-supplied: Abroad: 7 of 52; 
Russian-supplied: In Russia: 2 of 14; 
Russian-supplied: Abroad: 2 of 14; 
Total: 26 of 105. 

Source: GAO.

[End of table]

In our site visits and telephone interviews, we asked a standard set of 
questions (depending on the conversion status of the reactor) on 
technical aspects of converting to LEU, cost of conversion, impact of 
conversion on reactor performance, and assistance provided by DOE's 
reactor conversion program.

To review the progress in developing new LEU fuels for use in research 
reactors, we conducted in-depth interviews with Argonne officials 
responsible for managing LEU fuel development; operators of reactors 
that plan to convert to new LEU fuels when they are developed; and fuel 
development experts at the Bochvar Institute in Russia, which is 
collaborating with Argonne. At the annual international conference 
organized by DOE's reactor conversion program, we participated in 
sessions on LEU fuel development, and we reviewed technical papers on 
the progress of fuel development. For technical expertise, we relied on 
GAO's Chief Technologist, who participated in meetings with Argonne 
officials and reviewed the information that Argonne provided. We used 
the interviews and annual conference to also review progress in the 
development of LEU for use in the production of medical isotopes. In 
addition, we interviewed two of the four large medical isotope 
producers (in Belgium and Canada) that are currently using HEU to 
produce medical isotopes and that would be candidates for conversion to 
LEU once Argonne completes development.

To gather information on DOE and NRC efforts to improve research 
reactor security, we interviewed officials at those agencies and 
discussed security improvements with reactor operators we interviewed. 
We also observed security improvements at research reactors we visited. 
However, we did not evaluate the effectiveness of the security at 
research reactors or DOE and NRC efforts to improve security.

We obtained data from DOE and Argonne on the conversion status of the 
105 research reactors included in the reactor conversion program, the 
amount of HEU used per year by the 105 reactors (including the amount 
used prior to conversion for the 39 research reactors now using LEU), 
and DOE expenditures for the reactor conversion program since its 
inception in 1978. All amounts are in constant 2003 dollars, unless 
otherwise noted. We assessed the reliability of data we obtained 
through discussions with Argonne officials. We also obtained responses 
from Argonne officials to a series of data reliability questions 
covering issues such as quality control procedures and the accuracy and 
completeness of the data. Based on our assessment, we determined that 
the data we obtained from DOE and Argonne was sufficiently reliable for 
our purposes.

We conducted our work from July 2003 to July 2004 in accordance with 
generally accepted government auditing standards.

We are sending copies of this report to the Secretary of Energy; the 
Administrator, National Nuclear Security Administration; the Secretary 
of State; the Chairman, NRC; the Secretary of Homeland Security; the 
Director, Office of Management and Budget; and interested congressional 
committees. We will also make copies available to others upon request. 
In addition, this report will be available at no charge on the GAO Web 
site at http://www.gao.gov.

If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please call 
me at (202) 512-3841. Key contributors to this report include Joseph 
Cook, Jonathan McMurray, Kirstin B.L. Nelson, Peter Ruedel, F. James 
Shafer Jr., and Keith Rhodes, GAO's Chief Technologist.

Sincerely yours,

Signed by:

Gene Aloise: 
Acting Director, Natural: 
Resources and Environment: 

Appendix I: Reactor Conversion Program Expenditures and Projected 
Costs: 

DOE estimates that the reactor conversion program will cost 
approximately $213 million through the program's projected end in 
2012.[Footnote 15] Expenditures since the program's inception in 1978 
through fiscal year 2003 totaled approximately $139 million in constant 
2003 dollars. (See fig. 3.)

Figure 3: Reactor Conversion Program Expenditures, Fiscal Years 1978 to 
2003: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

Costs for the reactor conversion program are broken into four 
categories: 

* Fuel development includes all of the activities associated with 
testing and analyzing new LEU fuels, such as the LEU dispersion and 
monolithic fuels that are currently under development. This activity 
also includes developing the methods for manufacturing new LEU fuels. 
Most of the reactor conversion program costs over the life of the 
program are in this category.

* Reactor analysis includes studying the conversion of individual 
research reactors, both domestic and foreign, once a suitable LEU has 
been developed. For example, Argonne provides technical assistance to 
research reactors to determine the impact of conversion on the 
reactors' performance and safety. This category does not include the 
cost of purchasing LEU fuel for research reactors. For example, the 
responsibility for purchasing LEU fuel for U.S. university reactors 
belongs to another program in DOE that is separate from the reactor 
conversion program.

* Development of LEU for medical isotope production includes activities 
associated with testing and analyzing LEU materials to replace HEU in 
the production of medical isotopes. This activity also includes 
development of manufacturing and waste management processes for using 
LEU instead of HEU and technical assistance to medical isotope 
producers.

* Assistance to Russia includes funding to support research and 
development on new LEU fuels for Russian-supplied reactors. It also 
includes analysis of the impact of conversion to LEU on Russian-
supplied reactors. The assistance to Russia was previously funded 
through a one-time grant of approximately $1.7 million, about two-
thirds of which has been spent, from the State Department's 
Nonproliferation and Disarmament Fund (NDF).

In addition to the $139 million spent by the reactor conversion 
program, DOE's university reactor support program spent approximately 
$10 million between 1984 and 2000 to convert 11 university research 
reactors in the United States, according to an official at the Idaho 
National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL). The cost of 
converting each reactor varied from around $400,000 to $1.6 million and 
was primarily for the cost of fabricating the fuel. The costs varied 
depending on the type of fuel and where it was manufactured.

DOE's projected costs for completing the reactor conversion program 
total about $74.7 million.[Footnote 16] (See table 6.) This amount 
includes $26.3 million for reactor analysis, $25.8 million for fuel 
development, $4.8 million for the development of LEU for medical 
isotope production, and $17.8 million for assistance to Russia.

Table 6: DOE's Projected Costs to Complete the Reactor Conversion 
Program (in thousands): 

Fiscal Year: 2004; 
Reactor analysis: $1,125; 
Fuel development: $4,122; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $890; 
Assistance to Russia: $2,404; 
Total: $8,541.

Fiscal Year: 2005; 
Reactor analysis: $1,586; 
Fuel development: $4,286; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $946; 
Assistance to Russia: $2,709; 
Total: $9,527.

Fiscal Year: 2006; 
Reactor analysis: $1,494; 
Fuel development: $3,426; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $1,000; 
Assistance to Russia: $3,604; 
Total: $9,523.

Fiscal Year: 2007; 
Reactor analysis: $1,692; 
Fuel development: $4,526; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $986; 
Assistance to Russia: $2,917; 
Total: $10,121.

Fiscal Year: 2008; 
Reactor analysis: $3,259; 
Fuel development: $3,023; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $638; 
Assistance to Russia: $1,984; 
Total: $8,904.

Fiscal Year: 2009; 
Reactor analysis: $3,835; 
Fuel development: $2,189; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $200; 
Assistance to Russia: $1,680; 
Total: $7,903.

Fiscal Year: 2010; 
Reactor analysis: $5,320; 
Fuel development: $2,284; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $75; 
Assistance to Russia: $1,064; 
Total: $8,743.

Fiscal Year: 2011; 
Reactor analysis: $4,784; 
Fuel development: $1,544; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $60; 
Assistance to Russia: $842; 
Total: $7,230.

Fiscal Year: 2012; 
Reactor analysis: $3,250; 
Fuel development: $409; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $0; 
Assistance to Russia: $560; 
Total: $4,219.

Total; 
Reactor analysis: $26,345; 
Fuel development: $25,809; 
Development of LEU for medical isotope production: $4,795; 
Assistance to Russia: $17,763; 
Total: $74,712. 

Source: GAO analysis of Argonne data.

[End of table]

DOE's cost estimates are based on the assumption that at least one of 
the two LEU fuels that Argonne is developing will be successful and 
will be used for the reactor conversion program. DOE also assumes that 
Russia and other countries will continue to assist Argonne in 
conducting fuel tests as necessary for fuel development. DOE's 
estimates do not include the cost of purchasing new LEU fuel to convert 
research reactors. These costs are expected to be funded by other DOE 
programs or by the operators of foreign research reactors.

[End of section]

Appendix II: 39 Research Reactors That Converted to LEU Fuel under the 
Reactor Conversion Program: 

Country: Argentina; 
Reactor: RA-3; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Australia; 
Reactor: HIFAR; 
Partially converted.

Country: Austria; 
Reactor: ASTRA; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Austria; 
Reactor: TRIGA; 
Partially converted.

Country: Brazil; 
Reactor: IEA-R1; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Canada; 
Reactor: MNR; 
Partially converted.

Country: Canada; 
Reactor: NRU; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Canada; 
Reactor: Slowpoke-Montreal; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Chile; 
Reactor: La Reina; 
Partially converted.

Country: Colombia; 
Reactor: IAN-R1; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Denmark; 
Reactor: DR-3; 
Fully converted. 

Country: France; 
Reactor: OSIRIS; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Germany; 
Reactor: BER-II; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Germany; 
Reactor: FRG-1; 
Fully converted.

Country: Greece; 
Reactor: GRR-1; 
Partially converted.

Country: Iran; 
Reactor: NRCRR; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Japan; 
Reactor: JMTR; 
Fully converted and Partially converted.

Country: Japan; 
Reactor: JRR-4; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Netherlands; 
Reactor: HOR; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Pakistan; 
Reactor: PARR; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Philippines; 
Reactor: PRR-1; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Romania; 
Reactor: TRIGA; 
Partially converted.

Country: Slovenia; 
Reactor: TRIGA; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Sweden; 
Reactor: R2; 
Fully converted and Partially converted.

Country: Sweden; 
Reactor: R2-0; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Switzerland; 
Reactor: SAPHIR; 
Partially converted.

Country: Taiwan; 
Reactor: THOR; 
Fully converted. 

Country: Turkey; 
Reactor: TR-2; 
Partially converted.

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Georgia Institute of Technology; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Iowa State University; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: University of Massachusetts at Lowell; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Manhattan College Zero Power Reactor; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: University of Michigan; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Ohio State University; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Rhode Island Nuclear Science Center; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: University of Missouri at Rolla; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: University of Virginia; 
Fully converted. 

Country: United States; 
Reactor: Worcester Polytechnic Institute; 
Fully converted. 

Source: Argonne.

Note: The amount of HEU fuel used by these research reactors prior to 
conversion ranged from 0 to 70.1 kilograms per year. Reactors that use 
zero kilograms of HEU per year use HEU fuel but operate at such low 
power levels that they use up the fuel very slowly and can operate for 
many years or for their entire lifetime without replacing fuel.

[End of table]

[End of section]

Appendix III: Comments from the Department of Energy: 

National Nuclear Security Administration:

Department of Energy:
National Nuclear Security Administration: 
Washington, DC 20585:

JUL 14 2004:

Mr. Gene Aloise: 
Acting Director: 
Natural Resources and Environment:  
General Accounting Office: 
Washington, D.C.: 

Dear Mr. Aloise:

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) appreciates the 
opportunity to have reviewed the General Accountability Office (GAO) 
Draft Report, NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION: DOE Needs To Take Action To 
Further Reduce the Use of Weapons-Usable Uranium in Civilian Research 
Reactors." We understand that the intent of this audit was for GAO to 
review the risks to national security of highly enriched uranium used 
in research reactors in Russia and countries of proliferation concern.

NNSA agrees with the recommendations contained within the draft report 
and notes that the U.S. has converted eleven of its research reactors 
to the use of Low Enriched Uranium (LEU) fuel - by far the largest 
number of reactor conversions in any single country. The U.S. has 
eleven more reactors to convert to the use of LEU fuels with six of 
these reactors currently being capable of using LEU fuels.

On May 26, 2004, in Vienna, Austria, the Secretary announced the Global 
Threat Reduction Initiative. The principal mission of the Initiative is 
to identify, secure, remove, or facilitate disposal of vulnerable high-
risk nuclear and other radioactive materials around the world that pose 
a threat to the international community. This mission will be carried 
out by, among other things, accelerating ongoing nuclear material 
removal and research reactor conversion efforts. This will include 
accelerating efforts to convert the six domestic University research 
reactors that can convert using currently existing fuels. The new 
Office of Global Threat Reduction will work with other offices, such as 
the Office of Nuclear Energy, Science & Technology, as well as the 
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, in order to achieve this goal.

Conversion of the remaining five domestic reactors is not possible 
until higher-density LEU fuels have been developed, qualified, and made 
commercially available. Once such fuels are available, we will complete 
conversion of all U.S. research reactors.

Through the U.S. Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) minimization policy, we 
are working to ensure that no nation has a reason to continue to use 
HEU in civil nuclear activities. In order to achieve the goal of 
minimization and eventual elimination of the civil use of HEU, we are 
working through the RERTR program to convert reactor cores from HEU to 
LEU. Under the Initiative, we will work closely with the Department of 
State, other U.S. agencies, and our international partners to address 
holdouts to our efforts through a revised, re-invigorated, and 
comprehensive diplomatic and operation action plan, to include 
incentives. This strategy is intended to encourage full participation 
in the program.

Should you have any questions related to this response, please contact 
Richard Speidel, Director, Policy and Internal Controls Management. He 
may be contacted at 202-586-5009.

Sincerely yours,

Signed by:

Michael C. Kane: 
Associate Administrator for Management and Administration: 

[End of section]

Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of State: 

United States Department of State:

Assistant Secretary and Chief Financial Officer: 
Washington, D.C. 20520:

JUL 1 2004:

Ms. Jacqueline Williams-Bridgers: 
Managing Director:
International Affairs and Trade: 
General Accounting Office: 
441 G Street, N.W.: 
Washington, D.C. 20548-0001:

Dear Ms. Williams-Bridgers:

We appreciate the opportunity to review your draft report, "NUCLEAR 
NONPROLIFERATION: DOE Needs To Take Action To Further Reduce the Use of 
Weapons-Usable Uranium in Civilian Research Reactors," GAO Job Code 
360374.

The enclosed Department of State comments are provided for 
incorporation with this letter as an appendix to the final report.

If you have any questions concerning this response, please contact 
Allan Krass, Action Officer, Bureau of Nonproliferation, at 
(202) 646-3272.

Sincerely,

Signed by:

Christopher B. Burnham

cc: GAO - James Shafer: 
NP - John Wolf:
State/OIG - Mark Duda: 
State/H - Paul Kelly:

Department of State Comments on GAO Draft report: NUCLEAR 
NONPROLIFERATION: DOE Needs To Take Action To Further Reduce the Use of 
Weapons-Usable Uranium in Civilian Research Reactors (GAO-04-807, GAO 
job Code 360374):

The Department of State (DOS) thanks the General Accounting Office 
(GAO) for the opportunity to respond to their review of Nuclear 
"Nonproliferation: DOE Needs to Take Action To Further Reduce the Use
of Weapons-Usable Uranium in civilian Research Reactors". The report is 
generally fair and accurate. State has only one criticism and one 
suggestion for additional content.

The criticism involves the parenthetical statement near the bottom of 
p. 4 that it will cost $5 to $10 million to convert each of the eight 
remaining US research reactors. This seems much too high, especially in 
view of the statement on p. 37 that DOE spent only about $10 million to 
convert 11 reactors between 1984 and 2000. Cost per reactor ranged from 
$0.4 to $1.6 million, with an average of less than $1 million. The DOE 
office that manages research reactors, Nuclear Energy Affairs (NE) has 
been reluctant to fund more conversions and has a tendency to overstate 
the potential costs to deflect pressure to spend money on them. Maybe 
there's a good reason why the final 8 should be 5 to 10 times more 
expensive to convert than the first 11, but frankly we doubt it.

State's suggestion is to include recognition of the growing number of 
new and planned research reactors that have decided to use low enriched 
uranium (LEU). This represents an understanding that modern world class 
reactors do not require high enriched uranium (HEU) to do high quality 
research and isotope production. The only exception to the rule is the 
reactor in Munich that GAO visited. It resisted for nearly a decade US 
efforts to get it to use LEU. The resistance was predicated on 
technical grounds, and the operators of the Research (Forschungs) 
Reactor Munich (FRM-1I) still insist that only HEU is satisfactory for 
a high quality reactor. But more and more countries are taking the 
other path, and there are new reactors in South Korea and Canada and 
planned reactors in Thailand, France, China, Australia and Morocco that 
are designed to use LEU. This should be mentioned, perhaps on p. 6 at 
the end of the discussion on new fuel development, and perhaps again on 
p. 31 just before the recommendations section. 

[End of section]

FOOTNOTES

[1] In this report, we refer to the RERTR program as the reactor 
conversion program.

[2] HEU is enriched in the isotope uranium-235 to 20 percent or 
greater. LEU is enriched to less than 20 percent.

[3] In this report, we use the terms "dispersion fuel" and "monolithic 
fuel" to refer specifically to the new LEU fuels being developed by the 
reactor conversion program that use an alloy of uranium and molybdenum.

[4] In comments on a draft of this report, the State Department also 
noted that a growing number of new and planned research reactors have 
decided to use LEU fuel.

[5] 10 C.F.R. § 50.64. The NRC regulates most of the U.S. research 
reactors included in DOE's reactor conversion program, with the 
exception of 4 DOE research reactors.

[6] DOE's Office of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology administers 
the program for supporting domestic university reactors. The program 
has an annual budget of about $18 million and provides a variety of 
assistance such as research grants, tuition assistance for nuclear 
engineering students, and funding to upgrade reactor facilities.

[7] If DOE provides funding for converting these 4 university reactors, 
the schedule depends on the ability of the French manufacturer to 
supply the fuel in a timely manner. However, the French supplier is not 
accepting new requests for reactor fuel until 2007.

[8] 42 U.S.C. § 2160d.

[9] The reactor conversion program includes 28 Russian-supplied 
reactors--14 in Russia and 14 outside Russia (primarily in countries of 
the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe). Conversion of 21 of the 
reactors, including the 14 in Russia, requires development of new LEU 
fuels.

[10] The development of LEU dispersion fuel also has important 
consequences for U.S.-supplied foreign research reactors that have 
already converted to LEU and participate in the Foreign Research 
Reactor Spent Nuclear Fuel Acceptance program. Many of these reactors 
had planned to switch to LEU dispersion fuel from the LEU fuel they are 
currently using because spent dispersion fuel could be disposed of 
through reprocessing. With the program scheduled to stop accepting fuel 
in 2009 and development of dispersion fuel delayed until 2010, foreign 
research reactors that have already converted to LEU fuel that cannot 
be reprocessed may not have a way to dispose of spent fuel. We will 
address this issue in more detail in a forthcoming report on the 
program.

[11] 10 C.F.R. § 50.64.

[12] 42 U.S.C. § 2160d.

[13] The task force is looking at all research reactors worldwide, 
while the reactor conversion program targets operating research 
reactors that use HEU. Not every research reactor that possesses HEU is 
part of the conversion program because some of the reactors have 
military applications that require HEU fuel or use a unique HEU fuel 
that would require a separate LEU fuel development effort.

[14] Results from nonprobability samples cannot be used to make 
inferences about a population because, in a nonprobability sample, some 
elements of the population being studied have no chance or an unknown 
chance of being selected as part of the sample.

[15] Dollar figures cited throughout appendix I are in constant 2003 
dollars, unless otherwise noted. 

[16] The projected costs for the reactor conversion program are not in 
constant 2003 dollars. Argonne adjusted these costs for inflation with 
an increase of 5 percent for every year after 2004 and using 2004 as 
the base year.

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