Current and Projected Worldwide Separated Civil Plutonium Inventory

Worldwide inventories of separated civil plutonium have been increasing for a number of years. Since a relatively small quantity of separated plutonium can be used to make a nuclear explosive, a number of countries began meeting in 1992 under the sponsorship of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to discuss issues realted to the management of separated civil plutonium. In order to provide credible projections of worldwide separated civil plutonium and to estimate the scope of the growing inventory problem, a model was developed. This model (which has undergone many refinements) employs a series of regional submodels to project future inventories to project future inventories of separated civil plutonium. A diagram showing the structure/methodology of a typical submodel is shown in Figure 1. The worldwide plutonium.