APPLICATION OF PROCESS MONITORING TO VERIFY FACILITY DESIGN*

Process monitoring has been proposed as a safeguards measure to ensure that a facility is operating as designed, or as a surveillance measure to ensure that material is not removed from the facility in an undeclared manner. In a process-monitoring system, the facility operator monitors process operations such as tank levels, densities, and temperatures; process flows; and physical parameters such as valve positions to ensure that the operations performed are both desired and required. At many facilities (for example, Idaho), the process-monitoring system is also an important safety feature to prevent criticality. Verifying facility design is necessary for application of safeguards in a reprocessing plant. Verifying all pipes and valves through comparison of blueprints with the as-built facility is an almost impossible task with the International Atomic Energy Agency's limited inspection resources. We propose applying process monitoring for international safeguards facility design verification. By carefully selecting process-operating variables, it may be possible to verify that plant flows are as described and that key measurement points are not bypassed.