Remote Monitoring of Sensitive Nuclear Materials

Remote and/or unattended monitoring of safeguarded nuclear materials is a reasonably well-understood problem, and a number of well-developed measurement and data transmission technologies are available in this field. The advantages of remote monitoring - in terms of cost, time, and access requirements - have been widely documented. Even so, there are still some major challenges posed by remote/unattended monitoring, including (1) the culling of interesting events from very large data sets and (2) the authentication (by the inspector) of transmitted measurement data. In addition to these, remote/unattended monitoring of sensitive material brings another series of challenges. For examples, the host country may have concerns about information that could be released about the material itself. Not only could the material's characteristics be sensitive, but its location and movements could be as well. Although these issues are closely related to issues associated with measuring sensitive materials in an attended mode, they add another set of inspector needs and host requirements to the scenario. If a conceptual remote monitoring system for sensitive materials is created, three overlapping areas of concern can be seen. The first concern, primarily from the host's point of view, is that sensitive information must be protected without interfering in the efficient operation of the facility being monitored. The second concern, of particular interest to the inspector, is that it must be possible to authenticate the data, both during monitoring or measurement and after transmission. Finally, the third concern is that the verification system must be reliable and robust, which is a concern of both parties.