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This page contains abstracts and archived recordings of lectures on global security issues, including missile defense, North Korea and Iran, nonproliferation, and US nuclear weapons. The lectures come from webinars, presented on Youtube, or in either shockwave (.swf) or video files that can be viewed in a web browser.
For more information, please contact:
- George Lewis at Cornell University, gnl3 [at] cornell.edu
- David Wright with the Union of Concerned Scientists, dwright [at] ucsusa.org
Note: As of January 1, 2017, webinars and lectures from this series will be posted exclusively on Youtube, accessible here. Older presentations can still be found below.
2019 lectures
Lauren Borja
“Cybersecurity Risks in U.S ICBMs"
Lindsay Krall
“Backend Implications for Advanced Fuel Cycles”
Lisbeth Gronlund
“US Plans for New Nuclear Warheads”
T.D. MacDonald
“Hide and Seek: Space Based Radar and Strategic Nuclear Stability”
2018 lectures
Valentin Stanev
“Estimating the Amount of Weapon-Usable Nuclear Material Outside Government Control”
Chantell Murphy
“Developing a New Safeguards Approach for Pyroprocessing Facilities”
Dave Schmerler
“Geolocations in North Korea: Using ground images, videos, and context to map North Korea’s missile tests and production activity”
Markus Schiller
“Was 2017 the Grand Finale for North Korea’s Missile Program?”
2017
Laura Grego
“Shielded From Oversight: The US Ground-based Midcourse Missile Defense System”
Mathew Bunn
“Insider Threats: The Challenge to High-Security Organizations”
Lisbeth Gronlund
“US Plans for New Nuclear Warheads: The 3+2 Program”
Robert Goldston
“Breakout and Timely Verification at Large Gas Centrifuge Enrichment Plants”
Wu Riqiang
“Modeling First Strike Uncertainty and China's Nuclear Deterrence”
Katlyn Turner
“Emerging Technologies in the Nuclear Fuel Cycle”
2016
Matthew Bunn
“The Cost of Reprocessing in China”
Jonathan McDowell
“The Globalization of Space: What's Up?”
Tong Zhao
“China’s Challenges for Achieving a Credible Sea-Based Nuclear Deterrent”
Bemnet Alemayehu
“Environmental Radiation Monitoring and Citizen Science”
Li Bin
“Chinese Thinking on Nuclear Weapons”
Frank von Hippel
“Proposals for Reducing the Danger of Spent Fuel Pool Fires and the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Response”
Cervando Banuelos
“Replacing Highly Enriched Uranium in Naval Reactors”
Sébastien Philippe
“A Physical Zero-Knowledge Object-Comparison System for Nuclear Warhead Verification”
Areg Danagoulian
“Warhead Verification Using Physically Encrypted Data”
George Lewis
“The Aegis Missile Defense System and Future Nuclear Arms Reductions”
2015
Timur Kadyshev
“An Assessment of Russian Concerns about Missile Defenses in Europe”
Tamara Patton Schell
“3D Modeling for Nuclear Facility Analysis”
Meghan McGarry
“Modeling Diversion of Nuclear Material using the Cyclus Fuel Cycle Simulator”
Will Marshall
“Imaging the Earth Daily”
Sasha Asghari
“Looking Forward: A Framework for Robust IAEA Neutron Detection Capabilities”
Eva Uribe
“Protactinium and the Proliferation Risks of Thorium Reactors”
Vitaly Fedchenko
“The New Nuclear Forensics: Analysis of Nuclear Materials for Security Purposes”
Mark Gubrud
“A Test Ban for Hypersonic Missiles”
2014
Frank von Hippel
“A Global Cleanout of Fissile Material”
Li Bin
“A Deductive Analysis of North Korea’s Nuclear Weaponization Trajectory”
Jonas Siegel
“Comprehensive Nuclear Material Accounting”
James Acton
“Fast and Furious: Analyzing Hypersonic Boost-glide Weapon Test Flights”
Brian Weeden
“An Open Source Analysis of China's Anti-satellite Testing in Outer Space”
Pavel Podvig
“Modernization of the Russian Strategic Forces”
Mark Gubrud
“Stopping Killer Robots: Prospects after the May 2014 Geneva Meeting”
David Wright
“An Introduction to Ballistic Missiles”
Wu Riqiang
“How to Reach a Sino-U.S. Common Understanding on Missile Defense”
Adam Bernstein
“WATCHMAN: A Water Cherenkov Monitor for Anti-Neutrinos”
Ali Ahmad
“Balancing the Sword: A Conversion Proposal for Iran’s Arak Reactor”
Bethany Goldblum
“Informational Sensing for Arms Control & Nonproliferation”
2013
George Lewis
“How Not to Build a National (or Global) Ballistic Missile Defense System”
Markus Schiller
“North Korea’s Unha-3 Launcher: Insights and Consequences”
Matthew McKinzie
“Reducing Alert Rates of Nuclear Weapons”
Ted Postol
“Analyzing Iron Dome”
Mark Gubrud
“Stopping Killer Robots: Compliance Measures for an Autonomous Weapons Convention"
Scott Kemp
“Revisiting the History of Centrifuge Proliferation”
Alex Glaser
“A New Approach to Nuclear Warhead Verification Using a Zero-Knowledge Protocol”
Ed Lyman
“Small Modular Reactors: Safety, Security, and Cost Concerns”
Lisbeth Gronlund
“The Future of the US Nuclear Weapons Complex”
Ivanka Barzashka & Ivan Oelrich
“The Iranian Nuclear Deal: Technical Context and Prospects”
T.D. MacDonald | Thursday, May 16, 2019
“Hide and Seek: Space Based Radar and Strategic Nuclear Stability"
ABSTRACT: Advances in remote sensing technologies have raised concerns that nuclear arsenals are becoming more vulnerable as making weapons survivable through concealment becomes more difficult. Space-based radar (SBR) has been raised in the literature as a technology that could have particular impact on the survivability of road-mobile missiles as SBR can operate at night and through cloud cover, conditions where traditional optical imaging may not be useful. To evaluate the potential impact of the widespread deployment of SBR on the survivability of mobile missiles, this talk formulates the problem as a game of hide-and-seek where the seeker employs a remote sensing system to determine the location of a set of mobile missiles concealed by the hider. Analysis of the capabilities and limitations of radar modalities is used to estimate number and capability of SBR satellites that would be needed to meaningfully threaten the survivability of road-mobile missiles. The cost of such a system is compared to the cost and efficacy of countermeasures available to the hider that degrade or defeat it. This analysis indicates that the widespread deployment of SBR could threaten arsenal survivability if the hider took no compensating actions, but that decisive countermeasures are available at low cost.
BIO: TD MacDonald is a Ph.D. candidate in the Laboratory for Nuclear Security and Policy in the Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering at MIT. He comes from an interdisciplinary background, having earned a B.Sc. in Biochemistry from the University of Waterloo and a M.Sc. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Toronto before coming to MIT to study radiation detection and measurement techniques. His current work focuses on the implications of changing technologies for strategic nuclear stability, a problem at the intersection of political science and physics.
Lauren Borja| December 5, 2019
“Cybersecurity Risks in U.S ICBMs"
ABSTRACT: Evaluating the cybersecurity of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, a highly technical and complex system whose details are often classified, is challenging. In this webinar, Borja presents a high-level assessment of cybersecurity principles within the U.S. nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) forces using publicly available information. Her assessment draws on priorities established in the fields of dependable and secure computing, while assessing possible conflicts between them within U.S. ICBMs. Based on this framework, she discusses the potential for new vulnerabilities to emerge as modernizations to the nuclear arsenal are made and how these vulnerabilities are exacerbated by current U.S. nuclear command and control policy choices. This webinar describes her forthcoming paper, “Assessing Priorities towards Achieving Dependable and Secure Computing in the U.S. ICBM Force,” in Science & Global Security
BIO: Lauren Borja is a Stanton Nuclear Security Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. She is broadly interested in the effect of new technology on nuclear security issues, leveraging her technical skills as a scientist to inform and contribute to the issues in nuclear policy. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, where she constructed an ultrafast laser apparatus for studying fundamental interactions inside semiconductor materials with unprecedented resolution. Lauren was previously a Simons Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of British Columbia, where she studied nuclear disarmament and risk. Her articles on the Nuclear Ban Treaty, nuclear false alarms, and cybersecurity risks in the nuclear arsenal have appeared in the Vancouver Sun, the American Physical Society’s Physics and Society Newsletter, and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Lisbeth Gronlund | March 28, 2019
“US Plans for New Nuclear Warheads"
ABSTRACT: For decades, the United States produced a stream of nuclear warheads, with new types replacing previous types on an ongoing basis. It did not really consider the behavior of aging warheads until it declared a moratorium on nuclear explosive testing in 1992. At that time the United States believed it could not validate new warhead designs without nuclear testing, and that it would therefore have to extend the life of existing warheads. Two warhead types have undergone life extension programs that were straightforward refurbishments. However, weapons designers now believe their computer models allow them to validate new designs without explosive testing, and the plan is to replace—not refurbish—warheads in the future. What is the rationale for doing so, and the potential costs and benefits of this approach?
BIO: Lisbeth Gronlund is Co-Director and Senior Scientist in the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. She has a PhD in theoretical physics from Cornell University. Her work focuses on technical issues related to US nuclear weapons policy, new nuclear weapons, and ballistic missile defenses. Since 1990, she has been a primary organizer of the International Summer Symposiums on Science and World Affairs, which foster cooperation among scientists around the world working on arms control and security issues. She is the co-recipient of the 2001 Joseph A. Burton Forum Award of the American Physical Society (APS) and is a fellow of the APS and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Lindsay Krall | February 21, 2019
“Backend Implications for Advanced Fuel Cycles"
ABSTRACT: Programs for spent fuel disposal remain in the planning stage or are stalled in many countries, such as the United States. In this context, industry and policy-makers are supporting R&D for molten salt and sodium-cooled fast reactors on the pretense that they will eradicate the burden of nuclear waste. However, the metrics employed to support this proposition—spent fuel volume, total radiotoxicity, and longevity (driven by actinide content)—provide no insight into a fuel cycle’s economic, safety, and security implications.
Since most spent fuel repositories are designed to inhibit spent fuel dissolution, the durability of spent fuel in geologic media is more relevant to storage and repository planning than is actinide content. Compared to the uranium-oxide fuels used by water-cooled reactors, the metallic and fluoride- or chloride-based fuels required for sodium-cooled and molten salt reactors, respectively, are violently reactive in air and water. Furthermore, advanced reactors cannot enhance actinide burn-up unless implemented in conjunction with unconventional reprocessing technologies. In fact, at the Oak Ridge Molten Salt Reactor Experiment and the Idaho National Lab Experimental Breeder Reactor II (sodium fast reactor), the US Dept. of Energy determined that these technologies are needed simply to prepare their spent fuels for geologic disposal.
If eventually advanced fuel cycle technologies are implemented, then geologic disposal will still be required for high-level waste—in the form of fission products. In the instances that reactor developers acknowledge the short- and long-term risks posed by these radionuclides, they posit their disposal in deep boreholes. However, the number of geologically-suitable locations for borehole disposal may actually be more limited than for standard, deep-mined repositories.
Ultimately, advanced reactors may complicate waste-management schemes, while increasing radiation exposures to present populations and the risk of nuclear weapons-proliferation. Policy-makers should carefully assess the fuel cycle implications for these technologies in clean-energy initiatives.
BIO: Lindsay Krall is a post-doctoral Macarthur fellow at George Washington University, interested in the management and geologic disposal of spent nuclear fuel and other radioactive wastes. After graduating from the University of Michigan, she moved to Stockholm to work for the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company and worked toward a PhD in Geochemistry with a focus on the behavior of uranium in deep groundwater. Her position as an “industri-doktorand” offered an opportunity to learn about the operations of an effective waste management organization, ranging from groundwater monitoring to community engagement programs. In 2017, she moved to Washington, DC, to improve her understanding of the stalemate on backend progress in the United States and to study the policy implications for the radioactive waste streams generated in advanced fuel cycles.
Valentin Stanev | May 24, 2018
“Estimating the Amount of Weapon-Usable Nuclear Material Outside Government Control” (PDF)
ABSTRACT: Terrorists could acquire nuclear weapons by using weapon-usable nuclear material that was stolen or otherwise diverted from legitimate authorities. Multiple well-documented seizures suggest the existence of a black market that draws on an unknown stock of weapon-usable nuclear material that is not under the control of authorities. In this talk I will discuss several statistical methods and models that can be used to estimate the total amount of uncontrolled material based on publicly reported seizures. In a recently published paper (Science & Global Security, 25, 125, (2017)) we have estimated that 90 to 250 kilograms—sufficient for up to a dozen nuclear weapons—remain outside the control of legitimate authorities. While this estimate is subject to large uncertainties and potential bias, governments may have additional information about nuclear material seizures that could be used to improve estimates.
BIO: Valentin Stanev is a Research Scientist at University of Maryland, College Park. He holds an MSc in Physics from Sofia University, Bulgaria, and PhD in Theoretical Physics from Johns Hopkins University. Before joining UMD, he was a postdoctoral researcher at Argonne National Laboratory. Valentin’s current research focuses on using statistical and machine learning methods in physics and materials science.
Markus Schiller | April 12, 2018
“To be continued…? Was 2017 the Grand Finale for North Korea’s Missile Program?”
ABSTRACT: In 2017, North Korea launched a total of 6 different new types of ballistic missiles – a record that would have seemed impossible just a few years ago, and which might seem out of reach for even most industrialized countries today. The fireworks had a highlight with the launch of North Korea’s first ICBM, the Hwasong-14, in July and culminated with the launch of the large Hwasong-15 ICBM in late November. This presentation will discuss the development of the missiles and the technology North Korea used in them, and will give an idea of their capability, with the goal of understanding whether 2017 was the grand finale, or if the program will hold its pace over the coming years.
BIO: Markus Schiller holds degrees in mechanical and aerospace engineering from Technical University Munich. He has been employed at Schmucker Technologie since 2006, except for a one-year fellowship at the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California, in 2011, where he wrote a report assessing North Korea’s missile program. In 2015, he started his own consulting firm, ST Analytics, focusing on space technology, security and threat, and—of course—rockets and missiles. He has contributed to missile-related studies for NATO, the German federal government, the European Union, the International Institute for Strategic Studies, the German and Austrian armed forces, the EastWest Institute, various aerospace companies, and other institutions.
Dave Schmerler | March 22, 2018
“Geolocations in North Korea: Using ground images, videos, and context to map North Korea’s missile tests and production activity”
ABSTRACT: Over the past four years, North Korea’s missile program has vastly accelerated in type, technology, and manufacturing capability. Luckily for us, the North uses its various media outlets to boast of their successes. While they rarely mention the geographic locations where events take place, they often leave clues that allow the everyday person the ability to identify where tests or other test/production related sites are. Using these media sources, the increasing access to satellite imagery, and contextual clues, we can build a better macro view of how North Korea’s missile program is laid out across the country. With this better insight, we can utilize out increasing access to more frequent satellite imagery to proactively monitor and analyze developments as they occur.
BIO: Dave Schmerler is a Research Associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey. He holds a MA in Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, Monterey.
Chantell Murphy | January 25, 2018
“Developing a New Safeguards Approach for Pyroprocessing Facilities”
ABSTRACT: Traditional International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards are based on nuclear material accountancy (NMA) and detection of the loss of a significant quantity of fissile material. For large throughput nuclear facilities, such as commercial reprocessing plants, it is difficult to satisfy the IAEA safeguards accountancy goals for detection of diversion. The inherent design of pyroprocessing facilities presents several challenges for applying traditional NMA and mass balance techniques making it difficult to attain low uncertainty requirements on mass balance accounting.
Several publications have demonstrated benefits from using process monitoring (PM) on nuclear facilities as a complementary safeguards measure to NMA. More recently, this concept has been expanded and preliminarily demonstrated for pyroprocessing technology. The concept of Signature Based Safeguards (SBS), being developed by the University of New Mexico and the University of Utah, is part of this expansion and is built around the interpretation of input from various sensors in a declared facility coupled with complementary NMA methods to increase confidence and lower standard error inventory difference (SEID).
One proposed safeguards solution is to track plutonium throughout a pyroprocessing facility using the nondestructive assay (NDA) method of neutron counting. The basis for this suggested approach is that curium and plutonium have very similar chemical properties in the molten chloride salts used for pyroprocessing, and Cm-244 has a very high spontaneous neutron emission rate. Measuring the neutrons from Cm-244 is sometimes referred to as the neutron balance method. Essentially, safeguarding would be implemented by verifying that the neutrons per second entering the process are equal to the neutrons per second leaving the process. If curium tracks plutonium throughout the process, the neutron balance method is a logical and accurate safeguards approach. SBS aims to couple the neutron counting method with other electrochemical process monitoring systems to detect signatures that could indicate diversion. To further advance SBS development and implementation, my work has two main components. The first focuses on validating a physics-based electrorefiner model called Enhanced REFIN with Anodic Dissolution (ERAD) with lab-scale experiments. The second is correlating electrochemical signatures of diversion derived from ERAD with the neutron balance method.
BIO: Chantell Murphey is a PhD candidate in nuclear engineering at the University of New Mexico developing signature based safeguards for pyro-processing facilities. For the past seven years, she was a research assistant at Los Alamos National Laboratory focusing on international safeguards for new and advanced nuclear fuel cycle facilities, providing technical support to the International Atomic Energy Agency, and serving as a visiting scientist at the Forschungszentrum Jülich in Jülich, Germany applying a game theoretical approach for acquisition path analysis. She has a Master of Science in health physics from Georgetown University and a Bachelor of Science in physics from Florida State University.
Katlyn Turner | November 30, 2017
“Breakthrough or Obstruction? The Potential Promise and Plight of Emerging Technologies in the Nuclear Fuel Cycle”
ABSTRACT: Emerging technologies are developing that have the potential to change both the outlook of nuclear power as an electricity source and the security paradigms that protect the international community from clandestine uses of nuclear technology to develop weapons. On one hand: the standard technologies employed in most nuclear fuel cycles around the world for uranium enrichment, nuclear reactor design, and reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel are somewhat outdated and inefficient. The present nuclear fuel cycle generates tonnes of highly radioactive, toxic waste each year that must be effectively managed, and long-term solutions to the waste management problem are not presently available—this is itself a security risk. This naturally creates a drive for a more efficient fuel cycle, and scientists and engineers worldwide have developed innovations in recent years that, if implemented, could dramatically change the nuclear fuel cycle and potentially make it more efficient.
On the other hand: these innovations present serious concerns, drawbacks, and even threats to nuclear security. The currently used proliferation safeguards and verification mechanisms in place rely on indicators from currently used technologies for enrichment, reactor design, and spent fuel reprocessing. New fuel cycle technologies, if implemented commercially without a coherent framework and plan to address any proliferation concerns, present risks, known and unknown, for nuclear security and proliferation. Here, I discuss a few developing technologies in the areas of uranium enrichment, reactor design, and spent fuel reprocessing in technical detail, and evaluate these technologies for both their 1) potential utility to change inefficiencies, costs, and waste production in the fuel cycle, and 2) the potential risks these technologies may pose toward nuclear security and proliferation concerns. I propose the development of a framework for use by the technical and security communities to responsibly evaluate these and future technological advancements to the nuclear fuel cycle.
BIO: Katlyn Turner is a postdoctoral fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University, in the Project on Managing the Atom and the International Security Program. She earned her PhD in Geological Sciences from Stanford University; her dissertation focused on the structural behavior of complex actinide-bearing nuclear materials in extreme environments. She focuses on issues related to nuclear waste management, current and emerging nuclear fuel cycle technologies, and nuclear proliferation risk.
Wu Riqiang | July 18, 2017
“Modeling First Strike Uncertainty and China's Nuclear Deterrence”
ABSTRACT: China’s nuclear deterrent relies on so-called “first strike uncertainty,” which means not letting the other side be confident of a completely successful disarming strike. Previous work has evaluated the evolution of the first strike uncertainty in China’s nuclear history. This talk will present a mathematic model of the first strike uncertainty and try to quantitatively evaluate the uncertainty in history and predict the future development. Based on publicly available information, pessimistic assumptions for China are applied. Tentative findings show that the probability of China’s nuclear retaliation after absorbing a first strike from the United States or the Soviet Union may be low. US missile defense has the potential to reduce the first strike uncertainty greatly, which effect depends on its capability to discriminate real warheads from decoys. As a response, China could decide to build more mobile missiles or raise the alert level of its nuclear forces.
BIO: Wu Riqiang is an Associate Professor at School of International Studies, Renmin University of China. He received his PhD in political science from Tsinghua University in 2012. Before that, he worked for six years at the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation as a missile engineer. He holds a M.Sc. and B.E., both from Harbin Institute of Technology. His research combines the technical and political aspects of arms control issues, such as missile defense, China-U.S. strategic stability and crisis escalation.
Robert Goldston | June 15, 2017
“Breakout and Timely Verification at Large Gas Centrifuge Enrichment Plants”
ABSTRACT: It is well known that large gas centrifuge enrichment plants, GCEPs, have the ideal separative work capacity to produce large quantities of highly-enriched uranium, HEU, rapidly, particularly if they are fed with low-enriched uranium, LEU. We have examined practical means for a large GCEP to approach this ideal capacity, and found misuse scenarios that require minimal reconfiguration and yet achieve about one half of the ideal capacity, both in HEU production rate and LEU usage. We have also investigated potential new unattended real-time means to detect misuse of a large GCEP. Such timely detection is key to deterrence, particularly for states that do not have a “Broader Conclusion” under the IAEA Additional Protocol. The Broader Conclusion provides increased assurance of the absence of undeclared nuclear activities. Starting with fully prepared equipment and components, the time to complete a weapon using highly-enriched uranium hexafluoride from a GCEP is just a few weeks.
This work is described in a recent paper, “Timely Verification at Large-Scale Gas Centrifuge Enrichment Plants,” M.E. Walker and RJ Goldston, Science and Global Security (2017)
BIO: Professor Goldston does research and teaches at Princeton University and at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. His areas of research include nuclear fusion energy, arms control, and non-proliferation. He worked with Professors Alex Glaser and Boaz Barak (now of Harvard), and student Sébastien Philippe on the development of a Zero-Knowledge Protocol for warhead verification. He was director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory from 1997 to 2009.
Lisbeth Gronlund | April 21, 2017
“US Plans for New Nuclear Warheads: The 3+2 Program”
ABSTRACT: The United States plans to build a new generation of delivery systems for nuclear weapons—bombers, land-based missiles, submarine-based missiles, and submarines. Under its “3+2” plan, the United States will also replace its existing nuclear warheads with newly designed ones.
While aging nuclear warheads eventually need to be refurbished, the United States has rejected that approach. According to the Obama administration, the 3+2 plan offers several benefits: it will allow the United States to cut its reserve force of nuclear weapons, it will save money, and it will improve warhead safety. Are these benefits real? We find that the United States can already significantly cut its reserve force, that the 3+2 plan will almost certainly increase costs, and that the safety benefits are marginal.
There are also downsides to the plan. Building weapons that have not undergone nuclear explosive testing could reduce confidence in their reliability. It could also lead policymakers to call for a resumption of nuclear testing.
The 3+2 plan is also motivated by a desire to keep the weapons labs and weapons designers engaged, under the theory that otherwise the expertise to build new nuclear weapons will be lost. What skills does the United States need to maintain into the future, and how best to go about it?
BIO: Lisbeth Gronlund is Co-Director and Senior Scientist in the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. She has a PhD in theoretical physics from Cornell University. Her work focuses on technical issues related to US nuclear weapons policy, new nuclear weapons, and ballistic missile defenses. Since 1990, she has been a primary organizer of the International Summer Symposiums on Science and World Affairs, which foster cooperation among scientists around the world working on arms control and security issues. She is the co-recipient of the 2001 Joseph A. Burton Forum Award of the American Physical Society (APS), and is a fellow of the APS and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Mathew Bunn | March 16, 2017
“Insider Threats: The Challenge to High-Security Organizations”
ABSTRACT: High-security organizations around the world face devastating threats from insiders—trusted employees with access to sensitive information, facilities, and materials. From Edward Snowden to the Fort Hood shooter to the theft of nuclear materials, the threat from insiders is on the front page and at the top of the policy agenda. The talk will outline key insights from the new book Insider Threats, which was co-edited with Scott Sagan of Stanford University. The book offers detailed case studies of insider disasters across a range of different types of institutions, from biological research laboratories, to nuclear power plants, to the US Army. It also includes an unprecedented analysis of terrorist thinking about using insiders to get fissile material or sabotage nuclear facilities. The talk will discuss cognitive and organizational biases that lead organizations to downplay the insider threat, and “worst practices” from these past mistakes, offering lessons that will be valuable for any organization with high security and a lot to lose.
BIO: Matthew Bunn is Professor of Practice, and Co-Principal Investigator of the Project on Managing the Atom, in the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. His research interests include nuclear theft and terrorism, nuclear proliferation and measures to control it, the future of nuclear energy and its fuel cycle, and policies to promote innovation in energy technologies.
Before joining the Kennedy School in January 1997, Bunn served for three years as an adviser to the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and was at the National Academy of Sciences, where he directed the two-volume study Management and Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium. He is the winner of the American Physical Society's Joseph A. Burton Forum Award and the Federation of American Scientists' Hans Bethe Award, and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He holds a doctorate in technology, management, and policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Laura Grego | February 9, 2017
“Shielded From Oversight: The US Ground-based Midcourse Missile Defense System”
ABSTRACT: After abandoning the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty’s negotiated limits, in 2002 President George W. Bush began to field the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system on an extremely aggressive schedule, nominally to respond to threats from North Korea and Iran. In our recent report “Shielded From Oversight,” we took a look back nearly 15 years later at what progress has been made on this $40 billion system. We found that its test record is poor and the system still has no demonstrated ability to stop an incoming missile under real-world conditions. No credible strategy is in place to solve the issue of discriminating countermeasures. Insufficient oversight has not only exacerbated the GMD system’s problems, but has obscured their full extent.
BIO: Laura Grego is a Senior Scientist in the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. She earned a PhD in experimental physics at Caltech and a BS in physics and astronomy at the University of Michigan. Before joining UCS in 2002, she was a postdoctoral researcher at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Laura focuses on the technology and security implications of national missile defense and of space security. Among other activities, she is currently heading the technical group advising the MILAMOS project, which plans to elaborate the existing international legal framework that governs space security issues.
George Lewis | December 1, 2016
“The Aegis Missile Defense System and Future Nuclear Arms Reductions”
ABSTRACT: Next steps with the US Aegis ship-based missile defense system, in particular deployment of large numbers of the next generation SM-3 Block IIA interceptors, could affect future efforts to reduce nuclear arsenals.
Under current plans, the number of advanced capability Aegis missile defense ships will begin to increase rapidly in the next few years, and the number of Block IIA interceptors will begin rapidly increasing in the early 2020s. By the mid- to late-2030s there could be 400-600 or more Block IIAs (or successors) deployed, mostly on ships. At that point, the number of US strategic-capable interceptors, including ground-based systems, could be comparable to the number of survivable Russian ICBM/SLBM warheads and larger than the number of Chinese warheads.
This talk considers the effects of these deployments on future nuclear reductions, and possible steps to mitigate those effects.
BIO: George Lewis is currently a Visiting Scholar at the Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies at Cornell University. He received a PhD in experimental solid state physics from Cornell in 1983 and then worked as a research associate in Cornell's Department of Applied Physics for five years on ion beam technology. Since then he has focused on technical analyses of arms control and international security issues. Before joining the Reppy Institute, he had positions in Cornell's Peace Studies Program, the Center International Security and Arms Control at Stanford University, and MIT’s Security Studies Program, where he served as Associate Director. He has been a MacArthur Foundation Research and Writing Fellow and a Social Science Research Council-MacArthur Foundation Fellow in International Peace and Security.
Areg Danagoulian | November 17, 2016
“Warhead Verification Using Physically Encrypted Data”
ABSTRACT: The abundance of nuclear weapons is one of the largest threats to human civilization, and ambitious, aggressive nuclear disarmament treaties are needed to reduce this existential danger. Future treaties will need to stipulate verified dismantlement of not just the delivery systems, as the current treaties do, but of the warhead themselves. To enable such treaties, new verification technologies are necessary to demonstrate compliance, which will involve proving to inspectors that the warheads being dismantled are real, without revealing any direct nuclear or physical information about the weapon structure.
Our group is working on a physical cryptography system, which uses Nuclear Resonance Fluorescence (NRF) in transmission mode to produce a physical “hash” of the weapon, ie, physically encrypted data about the warhead. This encrypted data is then compared to that from measurements taken on a warhead of known authenticity to determine if the two weapons are identical. A successful comparison will help verify the authenticity of the first weapon, and since the comparison is done in cryptographic domain no direct information about the weapon is revealed. The technique and some of the early experimental results will be presented and discussed. This work is being done collaboratively with Prof. Scott Kemp of MIT.
BIO: Areg Danagoulian is an assistant professor in MIT's Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering. After completing his PhD in experimental nuclear physics in 2006 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, he moved to Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he worked on a variety of research programs including stockpile stewardship, physics beyond the standard model, and nuclear security. He then worked for six years at Passport Systems, Inc., where he developed an award-winning active interrogation system that used fast neutrons to detect shielded fissionable materials hidden in cargo containers. Areg is currently working on a variety of research programs relevant to nuclear security, including developing physical cryptographic and zero disclosure methods for weapons verification.
Sébastien Philippe | October 13, 2016
“A Physical Zero-Knowledge Object-Comparison System for Nuclear Warhead Verification”
ABSTRACT: Zero-knowledge proofs are mathematical cryptographic methods to demonstrate the validity of a claim while providing no further information beyond the claim itself. The possibility of using such proofs to process classified and other sensitive physical data has attracted attention, especially in the field of nuclear arms control. In this talk, I will present a non-electronic fast neutron differential radiography technique using superheated emulsion detectors that can confirm that two objects are identical without revealing their geometry or composition. We recently demonstrated key aspects of the technique experimentally, as described in Nature Communications.
Such a technique could form the basis of a verification system that could confirm the authenticity of nuclear weapons without sharing any secret design information. More broadly, by demonstrating a physical zero-knowledge proof that can compare physical properties of objects, this experiment opens the door to developing other such secure proof-systems for other applications.
BIO: Sébastien Philippe is a doctoral candidate at Princeton University’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. His research lies at the intersection of nuclear science and statecraft, with his dissertation focusing on new verification concepts and technologies to support future arms reduction treaties. Sébastien is a member of Princeton’s Nuclear Futures Laboratory and the Program on Science and Global Security at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He is also editorial assistant of the peer-reviewed journal Science & Global Security. Before joining Princeton, Sébastien has held positions in the French Ministry of Defense, including: graduate research fellow at the French War College (IRSEM) and nuclear safety and security engineer for the oceanic strategic nuclear forces within the French defense procurement agency (DGA). He holds a MSc from France’s National Institute of Applied Sciences in Lyon (2010) and a MA from Princeton University (2014).
Cervando Banuelos | September 29, 2016
“Replacing Highly Enriched Uranium in Naval Reactors”
ABSTRACT: Minimization or elimination of globally held stockpiles of highly enriched uranium (HEU) has been a long-standing policy goal. Most states recognize that elimination or minimization of HEU would have significant benefits for global nonproliferation and counterterrorism efforts and these concerns have driven the efforts to eliminate or minimize HEU use. This minimization of usage in civilian receptors, medical applications, and weapon stockpiles have had varying degrees of success, but the largest non-weapon use of HEU continues to be as fuel for naval propulsion reactors.
In contrast to the attention to other HEU minimization efforts, there has been relatively little international effort to eliminate or minimize this use, largely due to the perceived advantages of HEU. This presents a unique set of problems for the nonproliferation regime in the form of a “loophole” in the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). The paper and the talk will give an overview of the current status of naval propulsion programs worldwide with a focus on the U.S. Navy’s program, and include a technical assessment of less risky low-enriched uranium alternatives and recommendations to enable conversion to such alternate technologies.
BIO: Cervando A. Banuelos II is currently a master’s of science student in computer science and information assurance at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He holds a BS in nuclear engineering with a minor in radiological health engineering from Texas A&M University and a, MA in nonproliferation and terrorism studies from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. Research interests include virtual reality simulations for nuclear weapon dismantlement and verification research, supervisory control and data acquisition system cybersecurity in nuclear power systems, passive cooling systems in reactors, and network traffic analysis. Research for this paper was conducted in collaboration with George Moore and Thomas Gray at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies under a grant with the Nuclear Threat Initiative.
Their report, Replacing HEU in Naval Reactors (March 2016) can be found here.
Frank von Hippel | July 21, 2016
“Proposals for Reducing the Danger of Spent Fuel Pool Fires and the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Response”
ABSTRACT: The consequences of a spent fuel fire, such as almost happened in Fukushima pool #4, could have been much worse than those of the reactor accidents that actually occurred. The reason is that 98% of the cesium-137 from the core melt-downs was trapped in the reactor containments while, after the hydrogen explosion, there was no containment structure over pool #4.
In a 2013 assessment, the regulatory staff of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission estimated that, on average, for a spent fuel pool fire in the United States, the area from which the population would have to be relocated would be larger than New Jersey. It also concluded that the danger would be dramatically reduced if the NRC mandated a policy of “expedited transfer” in which spent fuel would be removed from the pools to dry-cask storage after 5 years of cooling instead of today’s 20-25 years.
When the staff multiplied its estimate of the cost savings to the public of the reduced accident consequences by its estimate of a probability of 1/10,000 of a spent fuel fire during the remaining licensed life of the average U.S. reactor, however, it found that the expected economic benefits to the public would be less than the estimated $50 million per reactor that it would cost U.S. nuclear utilities to buy the extra casks.
A recent National Academy study found that the benefits to the public were underestimated due to a number of incorrect assumptions including: zero risk from terrorism, exclusion of accident consequences beyond 50 miles, an obsolete value for a human life, no indirect consequences such as the economic costs from the shutdown of all Japan’s reactors for 5 years after the Fukushima accident and no psychological costs. More recently, as a result of a lawsuit by the State of New York, we learned the staff assumed that decontamination would be quick and almost everyone would be back in their homes within a year. Still more recently, we found that the staff set the dose threshold for relocation higher than recommended by the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA).
If just some of these errors were corrected, the staff’s estimate of the base-case benefits to the public would exceed the costs of expedited transfer. However, the staff argues that NRC policy is not to limit collective costs but rather the risks of radiation doses to individual members of the public, which can be done by relocation. Therefore, expedited transfer would still not be required.
Thus, while the U.S. nuclear regulatory system may not have defense-in-depth against accident consequences, it certainly has defense-in-depth against decisions that would inflict significant costs on the U.S. nuclear industry.
BIO: Frank von Hippel is an Emeritus Professor of Public and International Affairs in Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School and co-chair of the International Panel on Fissile Materials. For many years he was the head of Princeton’s Program on Science and Global Security, and in 1993-4 served as assistant director for national security in the White House Office of Science and Technology. Prior to coming to Princeton, he worked for ten years in the field of elementary-particle theoretical physics. He has written extensively on the technical basis for nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament initiatives, the future of nuclear energy, and improved automobile fuel economy. He won a 1993 MacArthur fellowship in recognition of his outstanding contributions to his fields of research. He holds a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from Oxford University.
Li Bin | May 5, 2016
“Chinese Thinking on Nuclear Weapons”
ABSTRACT: The Chinese have their special understandings about important nuclear weapon terms and their indigenous paradigm in security studies. China’s nuclear weapon policy is rooted from Chinese thinking on nuclear weapons. I will discuss these issues and their implications for China’s approach to nuclear weapons and international discussions.
A recent article by Li Bin on this issue can be found here.
BIO: Li Bin is a professor in the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University and a Senior Associate in the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy. He received his PhD in physics from the Graduate School of China Academy of Engineering Physics (CAEP) in 1993. He was the first person in China to receive a PhD related to technical issues of security and arms control; his thesis studied technical issues related to controlling laser weapons for missile defense and anti-satellite uses.
From 1994-6 he spent a year as a fellow at the Defense and Arms Control Studies Program at MIT, at a second year at the Center for Energy and Environmental Studies (now the Program on Science and International Security) at Princeton University.
On returning to China, he became director of the arms control division at the Institute of Applied Physics and Computational Mathematics (IAPCM). In 1996, he joined the Chinese delegation on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty negotiations. In 2000, he moved to the Institute of International Studies at Tsinghua University and created the Arms Control Program.
In 2011 he joined the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace as a senior associate working jointly in the Nuclear Policy Program and the Asia Program, splitting his time between the U.S. and China. He returned to China full-time in 2015.
Prof. Li's current research includes Sino-US relations in the areas of nuclear weapons, China 's arms control policy and non-proliferation export control. In addition to his published articles, he has published two books, Theories and Analysis in Arms Control and Strategy and Security: A Technical View, and has contributed to four others: Nuclear Turning Point (Brookings Institution Press), Transparency in Nuclear Warheads and Materials (Oxford University Press), Security Cooperation in East Asia (Peking University Press), Comparative Studies on China C US National Interests (Shishi Press).
Bemnet Alemayehu | April 21, 2016
“Environmental Radiation Monitoring and Citizen Science”
ABSTRACT: Citizen science can be broadly defined as the involvement of lay people in science. Over the past decade there has been an increase in the number of citizen science initiatives. Citizen Radiation Monitoring (CRM) is a citizen science application which provides citizens with information about radiation exposure. Its primary purpose is to provide a source of accurate and credible information concerning radiation levels to citizens. In the United States, citizen radiation monitoring networks have been developed and deployed to collect radiation measurement data for the purposes of: characterizing radiation background prior to a radiological incident; or serving as a public early warning system in the event of a severe nuclear accident. While federal and state government agencies and commercial nuclear power providers collect environmental radiation data, this data is largely inaccessible to the public in real time.
A prototype CRM project has been designed, implemented and tested at NRDC, working in partnership with IMI-International Medcom, Inc. (https://medcom.com/) and Safecast (http://blog.safecast.org).The monitoring network consists of usage of radiation detectors integrated with real-time data communication. The sensors used in this project are the Hawk Radius radiation detectors. In its standard configuration, the Hawk Radius probe detects beta, gamma, and x-radiation with one channel and energy-compensated gamma with a second channel. The energy compensation feature permits accurate exposure rate measurements from low to high energies and sensor redundancy. A web framework called Wizkers (http://www.wizkers.io/) was used for real-time data communication and visualization. That framework lets one control, visualize and log data from radiation detectors. Wizkers now supports as many radiation sensors as required for a network, archiving measurements online and forwarding data to other web services. This talk will discuss field experiences in building, deploying and running the prototype CRM network, and recent exploratory work in applying CRM systems to problems in a nuclear security context.
BIO: Bemnet Alemayehu is a project scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, where he concentrates on issues relating to the environmental monitoring of radiation and the health and environmental impacts of radiation. He received his PhD in radiation health physics from Oregon State University, where his dissertation focused on designing and developing advanced radiation spectrometers and new digital-pulse processing techniques. During the course of his doctoral studies, he also worked at Oregon State’s Radiation Detection and Dosimetry Laboratory.
Tong Zhao | Thursday, March 24, 2016
“China’s Challenges for Achieving a Credible Sea-Based Nuclear Deterrent”
ABSTRACT: As part of China’s efforts to shift its nuclear deterrent from one based on “uncertain retaliation” to one based on “assured retaliation,” Beijing is making great investment into modernizing its nuclear ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) force and starting to have them conduct patrols. Aiming at countering the growing Chinese submarine capability, the United States and its allies are reinvigorating their anti-submarine warfare (ASW) capability in the Asia-Pacific region, especially in waters close to China. Although both the United States and China have committed themselves to maintaining bilateral strategic stability, the lack of shared understanding about how to address potential confrontations between Chinese SSBNs and U.S. ASW is undermining existing strategic stability and driving up conventional military tensions in the region.
This presentation discusses Chinese motivations for developing and deploying sea-based nuclear weapons and whether and how this new capability fits into China’s overall nuclear strategy. It examines potential challenges China will face in ensuring the survivability of its SSBNs in the future and discusses policy options that can avoid having a destabilizing impact on regional security.
BIO: Tong Zhao is an associate at the Nuclear Policy Program of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, based at the Carnegie–Tsinghua Center for Global Policy in Beijing. His research focuses on strategic security issues, including nuclear arms control, nonproliferation, missile defense, conventional prompt global strike, and China’s security and foreign policy. He was previously a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at Harvard Belfer Center. He holds a PhD in science, technology, and international affairs from Georgia Institute of Technology, and received a B.S. in physics and an M.A. in international relations from Tsinghua University.
Jonathan McDowell | February 11, 2016
“The Globalization of Space: What's Up?”
ABSTRACT: The space race isn't what it used to be. What started off as a competition between superpower governments has become a free-for-all with dozens of countries and many commercial and non-profit entities. I'll bring you up to date on the internationalization, commercialization and democratization of Earth orbit. How much stuff is in space now, who is putting it there, and what kinds of things are going on? I'll also review the different kinds of orbits satellite use.
BIO: Dr. Jonathan McDowell is an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, MA, USA. He studies black holes, quasars and X-ray sources in galaxies, as well as developing data analysis software for the X-ray astronomy community. He has a BA in Mathematics (1981) and a PhD in Astrophysics (1986) from the University of Cambridge, England. He currently leads the group which plans and tests the science analysis software for the Chandra space telescope. Dr. McDowell's scientific publications include studies of cosmology, black holes, merging galaxies, quasars, and asteroids.
Jonathan is also the editor of Jonathan's Space Report, a free internet newsletter founded in 1989 which provides technical details of satellite launches, and was formerly a columnist in Sky and Telescope Magazine. His web site, planet4589.org, provides the most comprehensive historical list of satellite launch information starting with Sputnik, and he carries out research on space history topics using original sources including declassified DoD documents and Russian-language publications.
Matthew Bunn | January 21, 2016
“The Cost of Reprocessing in China”
ABSTRACT: As it expands its fleet of nuclear power plants, China faces an important decision: whether to make large capital investments in facilities to reprocess spent nuclear fuel and recycle the resulting plutonium in fast-neutron reactors, or continue to store nuclear fuel, leaving for the future decisions on whether to reprocess the fuel or dispose of it as waste. This talk summarizes estimates of the cost of current proposals for building and operating reprocessing plants and fast reactors in China. It is based on his recent report with Hui Zhang and Li Kang, which can be found here.
BIO: Matthew Bunn is Professor of Practice, and Co-Principal Investigator of the Project on Managing the Atom, in the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. His research interests include nuclear theft and terrorism, nuclear proliferation and measures to control it, the future of nuclear energy and its fuel cycle, and policies to promote innovation in energy technologies.
Before joining the Kennedy School in January 1997, Bunn served for three years as an adviser to the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and was at the National Academy of Sciences, where he directed the two-volume study Management and Disposition of Excess Weapons Plutonium. He is the winner of the American Physical Society's Joseph A. Burton Forum Award and the Federation of American Scientists' Hans Bethe Award, and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He holds a doctorate in technology, management, and policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Mark Gubrud | November 19, 2015
“A Test Ban for Hypersonic Missiles”
ABSTRACT: Hypersonic flight, defined as sustained atmospheric flight at speeds greater than Mach 5, has been an objective since the 1950s, but has been repeatedly frustrated by engineering and budgetary realities and the lack of any compelling need for the technology. However, interest was revived by the United States in the context of “conventional strategic strike” in the early 2000s, and has since been taken up by China, Russia, India and worldwide. US technology and programs to develop hypersonic missiles, both as rocket-launched gliders and scramjet-powered cruise missiles, appear to be the world’s most advanced, but five tests of China’s WU-14 glider within two years, four of them reportedly successful, have demonstrated that the US lead is narrow and no monopoly. Consequently, commentators assert that “the race is on” to gain “a huge strategic advantage.”
Yet actual military advantages, as compared with other weapons systems, are unclear and probably marginal where they exist at all. Rather than embark on a new, costly and futile leg of the strategic arms race, would it not be better to Just Say No to hypersonic missiles? Fortunately, this is one emerging technology where arms control could be simple, highly effective and verifiable. A test ban, now or in the near future, would prevent the development of operationally usable weapons. This could begin as an informal moratorium, which could be initiated at little strategic risk by any of the major powers, inviting and challenging the others to join. This talk will discuss the logic of such an initiative, its verifiability, and obstacles to its realization.
BIO: Mark Gubrud is an analyst of emerging technology and advocate for arms control and human security. He received his PhD in experimental physics from the University of Maryland in 2010. He has taught physics at the University of North Carolina, and was a postdoc in Princeton’s Program on Science and Global Security. Currently he is an adjunct professor in UNC’s Curriculum on Peace, War and Defense.
Vitaly Fedchenko | October 29, 2015
“The New Nuclear Forensics: Analysis of Nuclear Materials for Security Purposes”
ABSTRACT: Nuclear forensic analysis can be defined as the science of determining the history of a sample of radioactive material through the study of the material's characteristics. While normally associated with investigations and prosecutions in the context of trafficking of nuclear materials or nuclear terrorism, it has wider applications in various national security contexts, such as nuclear non-proliferation, disarmament, and arms control.
This presentation will discuss issues covered in the new SIPRI/Oxford University Press book The New Nuclear Forensics: Analysis of Nuclear Materials for Security Purposes, edited by Vitaly Fedchenko.
The book provides a survey and analysis of the scientific discipline of nuclear forensic analysis, and the way it is applied to specific issues of international peace and security, from the 1940s to the present day. It describes the various methods used in nuclear forensics, giving first a general introduction to the process followed by details of relevant measurement techniques and procedures. In each case, the advantages and limitations are outlined. The book also contains a compendium of nuclear forensic signatures, both in the nuclear fuel cycle, as well as in the post-explosion environment.
BIO: Vitaly Fedchenko is a Senior Researcher with the SIPRI European Security Programme, responsible for nuclear security issues and the political, technological and educational dimensions of nuclear arms control and non-proliferation. Previously he was a visiting researcher at SIPRI and worked at the Center for Policy Studies in Russia at the Institute for Applied International Research in Moscow. He is the author or co-author of several publications on international non-proliferation and disarmament assistance, the international nuclear fuel cycle and Russian nuclear exports. Vitaly has a Masters in nuclear physics from the Moscow Engineering Physics Institute.
Eva Uribe | September 10, 2015
“Protactinium and the Proliferation Risks of Thorium Reactors”
ABSTRACT: Since their conception in the 1960s, thorium-fueled reactors have been lauded as one of the most promising, yet never fully realized, future technologies in the nuclear energy complex. Compared to uranium, thorium is approximately three times more abundant in nature, and nearly 60% of the world’s thorium reserves are estimated to be in just 7 countries (India, Brazil, Australia, United States, Egypt, and Turkey). Like 238U, the most abundant thorium isotope, 232Th, is a fertile isotope. Upon neutron capture it decays through 233Pa to 233U, a fissile isotope that, with the proper quantity and geometry, can sustain a nuclear chain reaction in either a reactor or a weapon.
A clear advantage of thorium-fueled reactors is that they would greatly simplify challenges in long-term nuclear waste storage and disposal. Compared to typical uranium-fueled light water reactors, most designs significantly reduce or eliminate the production of transuranium elements, including very long-lived isotopes such as 237Np, 239,242Pu, 241,243Am, and 247,248,250Cm. Thorium-reactors have also been called “proliferation resistant” for two reasons. First, they produce far less, if any, weapons-usable plutonium compared to nuclear power reactors used today. Second, irradiated 233Pa forms 232U upon neutron absorption. 232U has a short half-life (69 years) and decays through a highly radioactive daughter isotope, 208Tl. The presence of 232U thus causes the uranium content of the fuel to be highly radioactive, which could significantly hinder its weaponization from both a materials and human safety perspective.
However, if the protactinium content of irradiated thorium is isolated from neutron bombardment, it will decay with a 27 day half-life to 233U that is largely free from 232U. The proliferation risks of any thorium-fueled reactor design therefore hinge on how easily 233Pa can be isolated from the bulk fuel. This presentation will review the basic chemistry of protactinium, which is one of the least well-understood actinides, will describe ideas for a 233Pa separation scheme, and will discuss the proliferation dangers inherent in the thorium fuel cycle.
BIO: Eva Uribe is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley. She currently works with the Heavy Element Nuclear and Radiochemistry Group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. As part of her dissertation research, she investigates the sorption of uranium and plutonium on organically-modified mesoporous silica materials, and evaluates their utility as solid-phase extractants for the sequestration and separation of actinides in aqueous solutions. In the past year, she has also worked with Professor Michael Nacht in the Goldman School of Public Policy analyzing the use of cross-domain deterrence and compellence in historical case studies of U.S. foreign policy crises.
Eva received a B.S. in chemistry with a double major in political science from Yale University in 2011. During the summer of 2010, she attended the American Chemical Society Nuclear Chemistry Summer School at San Jose State University, where she learned she wanted to be a radiochemist. Prior to that, she spent two summers interning at Los Alamos National Laboratory with the Safeguards and Security Group in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Division. There she conducted a study comparing the Additional Protocols of the nuclear weapons states and analyzing their benefits to international nonproliferation efforts. Since joining graduate school she has attended numerous workshops on international nuclear security and safeguards, as well as two International Summer Symposiums on Science and World Affairs.
Sasha Asghari | June 11, 2015
“Looking Forward: A Framework for Robust IAEA Neutron Detection Capabilities”
ABSTRACT: Due to its favorable neutron detection characteristics and historically low price, the international safeguards regime has come to heavily rely on helium-3-based neutron detectors to aid in the verification of compliance with the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). However, the recent helium-3 shortage has the potential to create instability in international safeguards. This work focuses on possible short-, medium-, and long-term options to decouple the efficacy of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards from uncertainty in the helium-3 market. By exploring the establishment of a framework for incorporating alternate neutron detectors in the long run, the IAEA can help maintain the efficacy of international safeguards and the nonproliferation regime.
BIO: Alexandra (Sasha) Asghari is currently a graduate student at UC Berkeley pursuing a PhD in Nuclear Engineering with an emphasis on radiation detection and nuclear nonproliferation policy. She graduated with a BS in Physics from California State University-Sacramento in 2012. Currently, she is working with Adam Bernstein and Steven Dazeley at LLNL on a novel Gadolinium-doped water Cherenkov neutron detector as a possible alternative to some helium-3 detectors. Sasha is particularly interested in the nexus of science (radiation detection) and policy (nonproliferation of nuclear weapons).
Will Marshall | May 21, 2015
“Imaging the Earth Daily”
ABSTRACT: Planet Labs designs, builds and operates a network of micro-satellites, called “Doves.” In January 2014, we launched 28 Doves, which was the world’s largest constellation of Earth-imaging satellites. Today we have launched 71 Doves, working toward the goal of imaging the entire Earth, every day. Fresh data from any place on Earth is foundational to solving commercial, environmental, and humanitarian challenges. Our goal is to make this data available for commercial and humanitarian uses. Our global sensing and analytics platform unlocks the ability to understand and respond to change at a local and global scale.
This talk will describe the Doves themselves, how we configure and manage the constellations, what kinds of data we collect, and what we do with it.
BIO: Will Marshall is the Co-Founder and CEO of Planet Labs. Before that, he was a Scientist at NASA/USRA where he developed a low-cost planetary bus, was Deputy System’s Engineer on lunar orbiter mission “LADEE”, a Science Team member for the lunar impactor mission “LCROSS”, served as Co-Principal Investigator on PhoneSat, and was the technical lead on research projects in space debris remediation.
Will has published over 30 articles in scientific publications including Science magazine and has written a variety of space related op-eds. He received his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Oxford and his Masters in Physics with Space Science and Technology from the University of Leicester. Will was a Postdoctoral Fellow at George Washington University and Harvard University.
Twitter: @wsm1 and @PlanetLabs
Meghan McGarry | April 30, 2015
“Modeling Diversion of Nuclear Material using the Cyclus Fuel Cycle Simulator”
ABSTRACT: As part of the Consortium for Verification Technology, we are currently using the Cyclus nuclear fuel simulator to model diversion of nuclear material and develop methods and techniques to detect diversion. Cyclus is an innovative fuel cycle simulator that employs an agent-based modeling framework and an open-source philosophy to create a tool that can be used by policy makers, industry, and academia. Cyclus has the ability to incorporate both physics models and social/behavior models while tracking discrete material flow through a user-defined fuel cycle. In this talk I will present a simple simulation in which small quantities of highly-enriched uranium (HEU) are produced at an enrichment facility that is nominally providing low-enriched uranium (LEU) to a buyer such as a reactor. For sufficiently large amounts of HEU, the diversion can be detected by analyzing the declared LEU output over time: regularly occurring HEU diversion is identified using fourier analysis, and gaussian diversion using simple statistical methods. Of course, this example is overly simplistic, so I am seeking input from the audience in two areas: types of datasets that we can expect to be available in safeguards monitoring of nuclear facilities, and innovative signal processing techniques to identify anomalies in those signals.
BIO: Meghan McGarry is a Postdoctoral Fellow working with Paul Wilson in the Computational Nuclear Engineering Research Group at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. She uses the Cyclus fuel cycle simulator to study the diversion of nuclear material from declared and undeclared facilities as part of the NNSA Consortium for Verification Technology. She has previously consulted on energy policy issues for the Natural Resources Defense Council. Additionally, she has done independent policy research into the implications of high-powered microwave weapons in space, which she presented in 2009 and 2011 at the Summer Symposia on Science and World Affairs, organized by the Union of Concerned Scientists. She holds a Ph.D. in plasma physics from the University of Wisconsin, Madison and a B.A. in physics and astrophysics from University of California - Berkeley.
Tamara Patton Schell | April 2, 2015
“3D Modeling for Nuclear Facility Analysis”
ABSTRACT: This presentation will take an in-depth look at 3D modeling with SketchUp and other tools to examine nuclear infrastructure and equipment. Patton Schell will discuss analytic applications of models through cases relevant to the DPRK, Iran, Pakistan and Syria. She will also discuss 3D construction methods and techniques, including how to extract heights from satellite imagery and how to usefully integrate photos into the modeling process.
An article about her work on Pakistan’s Khushab reactor can be found here.
BIO: Tamara Patton Schell is a Research Associate at the Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation (VCDNP), which she joined in December 2013. She previously served as a Researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) in the Arms Control and Non-Proliferation Programme. Prior to that, she worked as a Visiting Fellow with the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs in Geneva where she supported the work of the Conference on Disarmament. Additionally, she has worked with the US Naval Postgraduate School's Common Operational Research Environment (CORE) Laboratory and Remote Sensing Center, as well as the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies in Honolulu. Patton holds an MA in Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies from the Monterey Institute of International Studies and a BA in International Studies from the University of Washington.
Timur Kadyshev | February 5, 2015
“An Assessment of Russian Concerns about Missile Defenses in Europe”
ABSTRACT: Over the last several years U.S. missile defense deployments in Europe have been one of the greatest sources of friction between NATO and Russia. These defenses will supposedly protect European NATO member countries against limited regional threats from the Middle East, but Moscow fears the system will eventually undercut its nuclear deterrent and has threatened to undertake “asymmetric” military countermeasures.
This research work includes technical assessment of Russian concerns about U.S. missile defenses, based on mathematical modeling of missile interception. Some of the conclusions of this work include: the capabilities of the European defenses against Russian ICBMs depend not only on the parameters of interceptors and radars used, but also on the intercept scenario, i.e. on the timing and sequence of the system’s operation; even for the “optimistic” interception scenario, the system is not capable of affecting a significant part of Russian ICBMs; real interception is much more complex than the kinematic model used, and is hardly possible against countermeasures. However, since military planning has to take into account worst case scenarios, and given the expandable nature of European system, Russian concerns regarding future deployments and upgrading of the systems could be justified.
BIO: Since 1995, Timur has worked at the Moscow Center for Arms Control, Energy and Environmental Studies, one of the first non-governmental think tanks in Russia providing independent technical expertise on international security issues. He received his Ph.D. in mathematical modeling from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in 1991, and then spent nine months at MIT working on a project to assess the North Korean ballistic missile program. From 1995-2001 he worked on the Strategic Aviation part of the Russian Nuclear Weapons Project and spent the 2001-2 academic year at Stanford CISAC analyzing the future US-Russian strategic nuclear balance in light of changing US-Russian relations. Since then he has worked on studies of strategic weapons control and reduction, arms control and security issues raised by ballistic missile proliferation, and missile defenses.
Bethany Goldblum | November 13, 2014
“Informational Sensing for Arms Control & Nonproliferation”
ABSTRACT: Sensing capabilities have led to major shifts in international agreements to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. New capabilities today in the form of informational sensing have set the stage for another major change in arms control verification and, in turn, nuclear nonproliferation. The growth of worldwide Internet connectivity and information sharing has made available previously impossible volumes and variety of information. This has been accompanied by the spread of social networks, and networked handheld computing with associated pervasive sensing capabilities; the emerging Internet of Things will amplify these trends. The result is a radical democratization of content as well as access to the tools to distribute it. Via open source and other data, network science approaches to informational sensing augment the nonproliferation physical sensing portfolio and represent a powerful opportunity for arms control verification and nuclear security solutions.
BIO: Dr. Goldblum is a member of the research faculty in the Department of Nuclear Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, and Founder and Director of the Nuclear Policy Working Group, an interdisciplinary team of undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral scholars focused on developing policy solutions to strengthen global nuclear security. She also serves as Director of Education for the Nuclear Science and Security Consortium, a multi-institution initiative established by the National Nuclear Security Administration to train the next generation of nuclear security experts. Since graduating from the University of California, Berkeley in 2007 with a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering, she has worked at UC Berkeley and earlier at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in fundamental and applied nuclear physics, nuclear-plasma interactions, scintillator characterization, and nuclear energy and weapons policy. Goldblum maintains active technical collaborations with the United States Department of Energy national laboratories, and is an affiliate at Lawrence Berkeley, Lawrence Livermore and Sandia National Laboratories.
Ali Ahmad | October 16th, 2014
“Balancing the Sword: A Conversion Proposal for Iran’s Arak Reactor”
ABSTRACT: The future of the IR-40 (Arak) reactor has been a central element of the negotiations between Iran and the countries of the P5+1—China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany—because of concerns that the reactor could be used to make plutonium for weapons purposes. This webinar examines possible modifications of Iran's Arak reactor that would limit its plutonium production without compromising its usefulness for civilian purposes. The suggested changes would significantly reduce the reactor's production of plutonium from 7--9 kilograms to less than 1 kilogram per year. The analysis is relevant beyond the case of Iran's Arak reactor and may provide some future guidance for converting other heavy-water reactors that continue to operate today.
BIO: Dr. Ahmad is a post-doctoral research fellow in Nuclear Technology Policy at Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security. His interests include nuclear technology and fuel cycle assessments, nuclear energy and climate change, nuclear security and nonproliferation and the introduction of nuclear power to new markets. Since joining Princeton University in October 2013, his work has focused on the prospects of nuclear energy in the Middle East and informing nuclear diplomacy with Iran. He obtained his first degree in Physics from The Lebanese University in Beirut in 2008 and his PhD in Nuclear Engineering from Cambridge University in 2013.
A short discussion of this work appeared in Arms Control Today in April, 2014.
Adam Bernstein | September 25th, 2014
“WATCHMAN: A Water Cherenkov Monitor for Anti-Neutrinos”
ABSTRACT: WATCHMAN is a US-based collaboration whose purpose is to demonstrate the feasibility of using a gadolinium-doped water Cherenkov detector to detect antineutrinos emitted by distant nuclear reactors. The relatively high rate of emission of antineutrinos from reactors leaves open the prospect of discovering, or excluding, the existence of hidden reactors at hundreds of kilometer standoff. The goal of WATCHMAN is to demonstrate such detection by deploying a kiloton-scale water detector a few kilometers from an operating nuclear reactor, and measuring the antineutrino flux therefrom. While few-kilometer detection of reactors is in itself of limited utility for nonproliferation, a successful deployment will demonstrate and exercise the water-based technology on a large scale, and serve as a stepping-stone to the much larger – 100 kiloton to megaton mass (not yield) devices that would be required for true remote detection. Water-based technology is likely the only approach scalable to such large detector sizes. The same technology is being considered for future large scale physics experiments which focus on extragalactic supernovae detection, neutrino oscillation studies, neutrino mass hierarchy experiments and other fundamental studies. I will discuss the technical goals of the WATCHMAN demonstration, and the long-term nonproliferation and physics potential of these large scale detectors.
BIO: Dr. Bernstein is a staff physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and leads the Rare Event Detection Group in Physics Division. Since graduating from Columbia University in 1995 with a Ph.D. in physics, he has worked at LLNL and earlier at Sandia National Laboratories California Branch, on the development of advanced low noise, low cost, high efficiency and high resolution radiation detectors for use in fundamental and applied physics. He has pioneered and helped bring to maturity what has become a wide international effort to develop antineutrino detectors as a tool for monitoring nuclear reactors. In the area of applied physics, his main interested in the development of improved radiation detection techniques that facilitate and support global nuclear arms control, nonproliferation and disarmament. His interest in fundamental physics is primarily in the study of rare neutral particles, in particular the measurement of neutrino oscillations using reactor sources, and the search for direct interactions of dark matter in Earthly detectors. Prior to his career in the National Nuclear Laboratory complex, Bernstein consulted for Union of Concerned Scientists, and worked as a post-doctoral fellow at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute for International Studies in Monterey California, on the technical aspects of nuclear policy.
Wu Riqiang | July 10th, 2014
“How to Reach a Sino-U.S. Common Understanding on Missile Defense”
ABSTRACT: The impact of U.S. ballistic missile defense (BMD) on Sino-U.S. strategic stability depends on its effectiveness. At present, the effectiveness of U.S. BMD is limited, and Sino-U.S. strategic relation is stable. But the effectiveness could be improved via the combination of forward-deployed sensors and advanced interceptors, and China’s nuclear deterrence might be neutralized. Given the fact that China’s nuclear deterrence is based on first strike uncertainty, which means letting the other side be unconfident of a completely successful disarming strike, a possible solution is that the United States maintains the effectiveness of its BMD low, which could counter simple North Korean intercontinental ballistic missiles, if any, without threatening China’s advanced strategic missiles, in return for China’s promise to not expand its nuclear arsenal. However, it seems to me that U.S. missile defense will probably be developed and deployed through a technology-driven approach, and U.S. will not accept any limitation on missile defense. I am pessimistic on reaching such a solution.
BIO: Wu Riqiang is Associate Professor at the School of International Studies, Renmin University of China. He received his Ph.D. in political science from Tsinghua University in 2012. Before that, he worked for six years at the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC) as a missile designer, focusing on guidance and control systems. He visited MIT's Science, Technology and Global Security Working Group in 2009 fall, and was a 2010/2011 Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at Stanford University. He holds a M.Sc. and B.E., both from Harbin Institute of Technology, China. His current work focuses on missile defense, strategic stability, and Sino-U.S. crisis management.
In 2011, he published “The Survivability of China’s Sea-Based Nuclear Weapons.”
David Wright | June 19th, 2014
“An Introduction to Ballistic Missiles”
ABSTRACT: This is a version of a presentation I gave as part of a training course on non-proliferation. While missiles are complicated from an engineering point of view, they are relatively simple from a physics point of view. My goal is to use the basic physics of missiles to explain what countries developing ballistic missiles must do to increase their range, payload, and accuracy, and what the main challenges are that they face along the way. I illustrate these issues with North Korea and Iran’s development programs.
Decisions that missile designers make are also strongly shaped by engineering issues, availability of materials, and other issues. We plan to follow this talk with a presentation in the fall that looks at the development programs of emerging missile states from an engineering point of view.
BIO: David Wright is Co-Director and Senior Scientist in the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, where he has worked since 1992. Before that he was a Fellow in the Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard, a Senior Analyst at the Federation of American Scientists, and an analyst in the MIT Security Studies Program. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) and was a recipient of the 2001 APS Joseph A. Burton Forum Award. He received his Ph.D. in physics from Cornell University in 1983. One focus of his work for many years has been technical studies of North Korea’s ballistic missile program.
Mark Gubrud with Frank Sauer, commentator | May 29th, 2014
“Stopping Killer Robots: Prospects after the May 2014 Geneva Meeting”
ABSTRACT: Autonomous weapons are robotic systems that can select and engage targets without human intervention. In recent years, such weapons have been increasingly heralded as the next military technical revolution, and at the same time, an international campaign has rapidly taken shape which is calling for such weapons to be banned. In May 2014, the 117-member Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons convened an informal experts' meeting at the UN in Geneva, to consider the issue of "lethal autonomous weapon systems." Mark Gubrud reviewed the issue and the outcome of the meeting, and discussed prospects for further progress in this and other international forums. Frank Sauer acted as commentator.
BIO: Mark Gubrud is an experimental physicist, a former postdoctoral researcher in Princeton's Program on Science and Global Security, and a member of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control.
BIO: Dr. Frank Sauer is a Research Associate and Lecturer at Bundeswehr University Munich. His work is on international relations and international security, specifically nuclear issues, terrorism, cybersecurity and the growing military use of unmanned systems.
Pavel Podvig | May 8, 2014
“Modernization of the Russian Strategic Forces”
BIO: Pavel Podvig is an independent analyst based in Geneva, where he runs his research project, "Russian Nuclear Forces". He is also a Senior Research Fellow at the UN Institute for Disarmament Research and a member of the International Panel on Fissile Materials.
Pavel started his work on arms control at the Center for Arms Control Studies at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT), which was the first independent research organization in Russia dedicated to analysis of technical issues of disarmament and nonproliferation. Pavel led the Center for Arms Control Studies project that produced the book, Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces (MIT Press, 2001). In recognition of his work in Russia, the American Physical Society awarded Podvig the Leo Szilard Lectureship Award of 2008 (with Anatoli Diakov). Podvig worked with the Program on Science and Global Security at Princeton University, the Security Studies Program at MIT, and the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. He has a physics degree from MIPT and PhD in political science from the Moscow Institute of World Economy and International Relations.
Brian Weeden | April 24, 2014
“An Open Source Analysis of China's Anti-satellite Testing in Outer Space”
ABSTRACT: On May 13, 2013, China launched a rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan Province. The Chinese Academy of Sciences stated it was a high-altitude scientific research mission, but unofficial U.S. government sources say it was actually a test of a new ballistic missile related to China’s anti-satellite (ASAT) program.
In this webinar, Brian Weeden discusses the open source analysis he recently published on the May 2013 launch. This analysis, which included commercial satellite imagery purchased from DigitalGlobe, strongly suggests that the launch from Xichang was the test of the rocket component of a new direct ascent ASAT weapons system derived from a road-mobile ballistic missile. The system appears to be designed to place a kinetic kill vehicle on a trajectory to deep space that could reach medium earth orbit (MEO), highly elliptical orbit (HEO), and geostationary Earth orbit (GEO). If true, this would represent a significant development in China’s ASAT capabilities.
Brian’s recent paper is available here.
BIO: Brian Weeden is the Technical Advisor for Secure World Foundation, a non-profit organization that focuses on the long-term sustainability of space. He has 14 years of professional experience in the national and international space security arena. Prior to joining SWF, he was an officer in the U.S. Air Force working on space and nuclear operations. He is currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Science and Technology Public Policy at George Washington University.
James Acton | March 27, 2014
“Fast and Furious: Analyzing Hypersonic Boost-glide Weapon Test Flights”
ABSTRACT: There is currently a resurgence of interest in hypersonic boost-glide weapons. The United States has been developing them for a decade under the Conventional Prompt Global Strike program and conducted its first successful test in 2011. China conducted its first test in January 2014 and there is evidence that Russia is also pursuing them. These programs are already complicating arms control efforts and, if fielded, boost-glide weapons could have profound implications, both positive and negative, for international security. Understanding these weapons and their effects therefore presents an important challenge. To this end, I present a simple mathematical model of the boost-glide trajectory. I use it to analyze the tests flights from one prototype U.S. system (the Hypersonic Technology Vehicle-2) to infer certain characteristics of the glider, including its lift-to-drag ratio. This analysis highlights the technical challenges confronting the development of boost-glide weapons and their potential military weaknesses.
BIO: James M. Acton is a senior associate in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment. He has a PhD in theoretical physics from Oxford University. He specializes in deterrence, disarmament, nonproliferation, and nuclear energy. His current research focuses on the implications of next-generation conventional weapons for both the nuclear disarmament process and international security more broadly.
Jonas Siegel | March 6, 2014
“Comprehensive Nuclear Material Accounting”
ABSTRACT: Current national and international standards for accounting for nuclear materials are insufficient to meet current nuclear security, nonproliferation, and international security demands. Detecting and deterring both the diversion of nuclear materials to state-level nuclear weapons programs nuclear material accounting and the diversion or theft of materials by non-state actors requires improvements in current standards. Reductions in nuclear weapons stockpiles and the stockpiles of nuclear materials designated for military use also necessitate more stringent accounting standards and greater transparency about both material stockpiles and operational practices. This presentation will examine a range of current material accounting practices and requirements and argue that in order for nuclear material accounting to contribute to global nuclear risk reduction activities, it will need to transition from ensuring the non-diversion of nuclear materials to military uses to providing positive inventory control of nuclear materials, whereby national and international authorities can actively account for all designated nuclear materials on a continuous and detailed basis. It will also identify a set of facility- and national-level MC&A requirements that would help to fulfill the goal of comprehensive nuclear material accounting. This presentation is based on a new CISSM report, “Comprehensive Nuclear Material Accounting,” available here.
BIO: Jonas Siegel is a project manager at the Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland (CISSM), a research center at the University of Maryland's School of Public Policy. Siegel contributes to the center’s Nuclear Past, Present, and Future project, and currently leads an effort to develop minimum requirements for a comprehensive global nuclear material accounting system. Prior to joining CISSM, Siegel was the editor of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Li Bin | February 20, 2014
“A Deductive Analysis of North Korea’s Nuclear Weaponization Trajectory”
ABSTRACT: North Korea has made consistent efforts in developing its nuclear devices and delivery systems and it has caused deep concerns in the international community on North Korea’s nuclear missile capability. If North Korea could successfully miniaturize its nuclear device, it would have big chance to develop and deploy nuclear missiles. As there is very little information publicly available about the technical details of North Korea’s nuclear devices, some deductive analysis is therefore useful to understand the trajectory and stage of North Korea’s nuclear weapon program.
BIO: Li Bin is a professor of international relations at Tsinghua University in Beijing, where he was the founding director of the Arms Control Program at the Institute of International Studies. He previously directed the arms control division at the Institute of Applied Physics and Computational Mathematics (IAPCM), where he also served as executive director of the Program for Science and National Security Studies. Li was a Social Science Research Council–MacArthur Foundation Peace and Security Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Princeton University. He is also a senior associate working jointly in the Nuclear Policy Program and the Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington DC.
A physicist by training, Li got a PhD from IAPCM, becoming the first person in China to earn a degree in Arms Control Physics. In 1996, he joined the Chinese delegation on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty negotiations. His research focuses on China’s nuclear and arms control policy and on U.S.-Chinese nuclear relations.
Frank von Hippel | January 23, 2014
“A Global Cleanout of Fissile Material”
BIO: Frank von Hippel is an Emeritus Professor of Public and International Affairs in Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School and co-chair of the International Panel on Fissile Materials. For many years he was the head of Princeton’s Program on Science and Global Security, and in 1993-4 served as assistant director for national security in the White House Office of Science and Technology. Prior to coming to Princeton, he worked for ten years in the field of elementary-particle theoretical physics. He has written extensively on the technical basis for nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament initiatives, the future of nuclear energy, and improved automobile fuel economy. He won a 1993 MacArthur fellowship in recognition of his outstanding contributions to his fields of research. He holds a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from Oxford University.
Ivanka Barzashka & Ivan Oelrich | December 17, 2013
“The Iranian Nuclear Deal: Technical Context and Prospects”
BIOS: Ivanka Barzashka is an affiliate of the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University and a research associate at the Centre for Science and Security Studies at King's College London. Previously, Barzashka managed the Federation of American Scientists' interdisciplinary assessment of Iran's nuclear capability. She is based in Stanford, California.
Ivan Oelrich is a defense analyst who has held senior research positions at the Institute for Defense Analyses, Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, and the Federation of American Scientists. Oelrich received his Ph.D. in chemistry from Princeton University. He was a pre-doctoral Research Associate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
Lisbeth Gronlund | November 21, 2013
“The Future of the US Nuclear Weapons Complex”
ABSTRACT: This talk will discuss the future of U.S. nuclear weapons and the nuclear weapons complex. The complex is a set of eight sites for nuclear weapons research and development, production, and testing. UCS recently released a report Making Sound Security Choices: The Future of the US Nuclear Weapons Complex, which takes a broad look at the complex and assesses what is going well and what needs improving, what there is too much and too little of, and how to make its work consistent with the U.S. commitment to further reducing its nuclear arsenal.
Under the administration’s current plan, the U.S. will replace its existing nuclear weapons with a suite of new designs over the next 25 years. While the U.S. needs to extend the life of its arsenal, it could refurbish its existing weapons instead of building new types. Building new nuclear weapons would entail both political and technical downsides.
The U.S. is planning to build several new facilities to produce weapon components, but some of these should be cancelled or downsized. Over the past 20 years the US has invested in both experimental and computational facilities to increase its fundamental understanding of nuclear weapons. The utility of these facilities will depend on the extent to which the US modifies existing nuclear designs. The U.S. also has a program to monitor warhead aging, which has been undervalued and underfunded.
Since the end of the cold war, some observers have warned that the complex would not be able to hire and retain qualified technical personnel, but this concern has not been borne out. The complex stores many metric tons of weapons materials, and these need to be stored and disposed of in a way that minimizes security risks. Current U.S. plans fall short. Finally, the U.S. should spend more resources to develop ways to verify further arms reduction agreements.
BIO: Lisbeth has been at UCS since 1992. Before that, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the MIT Defense and Arms Control Studies Program and an SSRC-MacArthur Foundation Fellow in International Peace and Security at the Center for International Security Studies at the University of Maryland. She earned a PhD degree in physics from Cornell University in 1989.
Ed Lyman | October 10, 2013
“Small Modular Reactors: Safety, Security, and Cost Concerns”
ABSTRACT: Small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs) are reactors that generate up to about a third the power of the typical commercial reactor. They have received positive attention in Congress and elsewhere as a possible way of introducing nuclear generating capacity in smaller and more affordable increments. Advocates assert that SMRs would cost less and be inherently safer than large reactors, so they could be located closer to densely populated areas, even replacing coal-fired power plants at existing sites.
Less expensive does not necessarily mean cost-effective, however. The safety of the proposed compact designs is unproven and the arguments in favor of lower overall costs depend on convincing the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to relax existing safety regulations.
Reactor owners can be tempted to lower costs by cutting corners. We need research that will show how to lower the cost of nuclear reactor systems while increasing their levels of safety and security. Safety and security improvements are critical if nuclear power is to be a viable energy source for the future.
Click here for Ed’s report on SMRs.
BIO: Ed has been at UCS since 2003. Before joining UCS, he was president of the Nuclear Control Institute. From 1992 to 1995, he was a postdoctoral research associate at Princeton University’s Center for Energy and Environmental Studies (now the Science and Global Security Program). He earned a PhD degree in physics from Cornell University in 1992.
Alex Glaser | September 19, 2013
“A New Approach to Nuclear Warhead Verification Using a Zero-Knowledge Protocol”
ABSTRACT: Warhead verification systems proposed to date fundamentally rely on the use of information barriers to prevent the release of sensitive information. Measurements with information barriers significantly increase the complexity of inspection systems, make their certification and authentication difficult, and may reduce the overall confidence in the verifiability of future arms-control agreements.
We are pursuing a new approach to nuclear warhead verification that minimizes the role of information barriers from the outset and envisions instead an inspection system that avoids the measurement of sensitive information using a so-called zero-knowledge protocol. This is a protocol in which the data learned by one party (i.e., the inspector) allow him/her to verify that a statement is true (e.g., the inspected warhead is identical to an authenticated template), but does not reveal any additional information, e.g., does not leak any information that would help infer the design of the inspected warhead.
There is a wide literature on zero-knowledge proofs in the digital domain using cryptographic tools, and we draw on these ideas to achieve this in the physical domain. The proposed inspection system relies on active interrogation of a test object with 14-MeV neutrons, including both radiographic transmission measurements that are sensitive to warhead configuration and scattering/fission measurements that are particularly sensitive to material properties. The viability of the method is examined with MCNP Monte Carlo neutron transport calculations modeling the experimental setup, an investigation of different diversion scenarios, and a mathematical analysis of the detected data.
BIO: Alexander Glaser is Assistant Professor at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Princeton University. He is a participant in the University’s Program on Science and Global Security and works with the International Panel on Fissile Materials, which publishes the annual Global Fissile Material Report. His PhD in Physics is from Darmstadt University of Technology, Germany.
Scott Kemp | June 13, 2013
“Revisiting the History of Centrifuge Proliferation”
[recording not available]
ABSTRACT: Over the last three decades, uranium enrichment via the gas centrifuge has become the dominant mode of proliferation. There have been a total of nine proliferation attempts since 1975, and all but one pursued the gas centrifuge. Latent proliferators are also pursuing centrifuge technology: Japan, Brazil, South Africa, and perhaps soon South Korea are eager to get or maintain centrifuge capabilities that have neither economic nor energy-security justification.
Policymakers have tried to stem the tide by focusing on centrifuge technology transfer. Governments have worked to enhance export controls, improve options for interdiction, and shutdown individual proliferators like A.Q. Khan and associated black markets. These policies are rooted in a presumption that technology controls can be effective because, without help from outsiders, proliferators would find centrifuges too difficult to build. However, considering that centrifuges are now fifty-year-old technology, we will revisit this assumption with a view to establishing policies that reflect the ever changing nature of technology and its globalization.
BIO: Scott Kemp's research combines physics, engineering, and the history of science to draw more clearly the limits and policy options for achieving international security under technical constraints. His primary interest lie with policy issues relating to uranium enrichment. He has also worked on space arms control, cyber security, and methods for detecting covert nuclear-weapon programs.
Mark Gubrud | May 16, 2013
“Stopping Killer Robots: Compliance Measures for an Autonomous Weapons Convention"
ABSTRACT: Dramatic growth in the use of drones and robotic systems in warfare by the United States since 2001 has led to rapid global proliferation and a fast-paced robot arms race, with severe implications for nuclear arms control and other aspects of international and human security. While most of the systems in use today are remotely operated, there has been increasing interest in the use of artificial intelligence to make robotic systems more autonomous.
The most salient and profound issue is armed autonomous robotics, or systems that can autonomously determine the selection and engagement of targets. A strong moral argument posits that this is a red line which we should not cross. A growing global movement is demanding the prohibition of such "killer robots." However, in November the Pentagon announced a policy indicating the intent to develop, acquire and use autonomous weapon systems.
This talk will address the following questions:
- What are autonomous weapon systems (AWS)?
- Why is this an issue now?
- What makes AWS dangerous?
- What is the current status of AWS?
- Why a ban on AWS, and on what basis?
- What would an AWS convention look like?
- What compliance measures are proposed?
- What questions call for further research?
BIO: Mark Gubrud is a postdoctoral research associate at the Program on Science and Global Security, Princeton University. Previously he was an adjunct professor of physics at the University of North Carolina. His PhD in experimental physics was completed in 2010 at the University of Maryland, College Park. He is a member of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control.
Ted Postol | April 25, 2013
“Analyzing Iron Dome”
ABSTRACT: This presentation gives an initial analysis of the performance of Israel’s Iron Dome defense against short-range missiles.
BIO: Ted Postol is Professor of Science, Technology and National Security Policy in the Program in Science, Technology, and Society at MIT. After receiving his PhD in nuclear engineering from MIT, he joined the staff of Argonne National Laboratory where he conducted physics research. Subsequently he went to the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment to study methods of basing the MX Missile, and later worked as a scientific adviser to the Chief of Naval Operations. After leaving the Pentagon, he helped build a program at Stanford University to train mid-career scientists to study developments in weapons technology of relevance to defense and arms control policy before coming to MIT in 1989.
Matthew McKinzie | March 14, 2013
“Reducing Alert Rates of Nuclear Weapons”
ABSTRACT: Although the Cold War ended more than two decades ago, the United States, the Russian Federation, France and the United Kingdom altogether maintain approximately 2,000 nuclear warheads on high levels of alert, ready to launch within minutes. Keeping nuclear forces on alert incurs the risk of accidental or unauthorized launch, and reduces the decision time available for leadership in a crisis. Nevertheless reducing the operational readiness of nuclear forces has proved a difficult goal to achieve. A new report commissioned by the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) and published in late 2012 re-examines the de-alerting issue, analyzing policy, nuclear postures and scenarios of conflict, with a focus on a central question: Can de-alerted nuclear forces create a stable deterrent? Perhaps surprisingly, this study finds that the nuclear-weapon states have in fact taken some unilateral steps in the recent past to reduce nuclear alert levels. One of the report’s authors will present data and key findings from the study, and discuss how the de-alerting issue could evolve in the second term of U.S. President Barack Obama.
BIO: Matthew McKinzie, has a PhD in nuclear physics from the University of Pennsylvania. He is currently Director of the Nuclear Program and Senior Scientist, Lands and Wildlife Program, at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Markus Schiller | February 14, 2013
“North Korea’s Unha-3 Launcher: Insights and Consequences”
ABSTRACT: This presentation discusses current insights into North Korea’s Unha-3 launch vehicle based on information gleaned from North Korea’s satellite launches combined with a technical understanding of rocket design.
BIO: Markus Schiller is a senior associate at Schmucker Technologie in Munich, a consulting company that specializes in security and defense issues related to rocket and space technology. This work has included projects for various national and international companies and institutions, including NATO and the European Union. From 2010-11, he worked as a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at RAND in Santa Monica, where he developed a new methodology for defense related intelligence analysis and applied it to the North Korean missile program. Markus received a PhD in astronautics from the Technical University Munich in 2008.
George Lewis | January 17, 2013
“How Not to Build a National (or Global) Ballistic Missile Defense System”
[recording not available]
ABSTRACT: The United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2001 in order to begin deploying a nationwide ballistic missile defense system. The resulting system, known as the Ground-Based Midcourse (GMD) system, achieved an “initial operational capability” in 2004. Now, more than ten tears after deployment began, the core of the GMD system is nearly complete and the emphasis of the U.S. missile defense program has shifted to the development and deployment of regional defenses, such as the one being developed under President Obama’s European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA). Ultimately, the objective is to merge the GMD and these regional defense systems into a single, integrated global Ballistic Missile Defense System.
However, despite numerous claims about its effectiveness, the GMD system is deeply flawed. It has interceptors that are both unreliable and highly expensive, a very sparse and poor test record, and most importantly, a neglected sensor infrastructure that lacks discrimination capabilities. These problems cannot be fixed short of deploying a largely new system. Although the EPAA is still early in its development, it is showing some of the same problems that led to the current situation with the GMD, particularly with regard to its sensor infrastructure. This talk will, from a somewhat technical perspective, describe the current state of the GMD system, attempt to explain how it got into this state, and assess the extent to which the GMD experience might have lessons for EPAA.
BIO: George Lewis has a PhD in applied physics from Cornell University. He is currently a Senior Research Associate in the Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies at Cornell.
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