THE APPLICATION OF GAME THEORY FOR THE INTERPRETATION OF INVENTORY DIFFERENCES (ID)

In a study performed by the Test and Evaluation Branch, Division of Safeguards, at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission with contract assistance from Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, the validity of the ID concept for establishing assurance concerning possible unauthorized diversion of SNM was examined. The evaluatic methodology was based upon the theory of games and produced results that were quite different from those derived by classical statisti- cal hypothesis testing. A model was developed based upon a decisic maker's utilities and solved for generic facilities. Based upon the value of ID, obtained from each inventory, and specific for each facility, there is a best policy for estimating unauthorized deliberate diversion and establishing action limits (alarm thres- holds) . This paper will present the results of this study as applied to a generic facility.