Digital Declarations: The Provision of Site Maps under INFCIRC/540 Article 2.a.(iii)

The modernization of information technology for safeguards is necessary to increase both the availability and the security of safeguards information, a vital asset for Safeguards implementation. The Safeguards Information Management Division's State Infrastructure Analysis Section has initiated several new Member State Support Programme tasks to test and demonstrate how site maps attached to Additional Protocol declarations provided under Article 2.a.(iii) might be submitted to the IAEA in a digital format. This would allow the IAEA to automatically ingest site maps into its Geospatial Exploitation System which would save time and resources as well as result in better, more accurate site maps for the IAEA. The benefits to States include a more well-defined, standardized approach to submitting 2.a.(iii) information. This could mean more consistency across all sites within a country and a simplified annual update process. In addition, creating digital site maps using industry-standard geographically-aware information systems provide tools for data management and data visualization, including temporal changes. The overall verification process would be enhanced since the digital site maps can be easily compared to other data sources, thus enhancing the efficiency and accuracy of verification. Germany, Canada, Finland and Japan have accepted support programme tasks on this subject and agreed to evaluate the provision of digital declaration data on selected nuclear sites. The IAEA will use this opportunity to work with site operators to evaluate what this means to current practices. The IAEA will use the results of these tasks as lessons-learned to evolve and to optimize the process to the benefit of all. A complementary E-poster within this panel section will demonstrate new, more standardized templates and recommended workflows for submission of digital declaration data. (author)