A Licensee's view of the LEID issue

A facility licensed to handle Special Nuclear Material (SNM) is subjected to various regulations which are intended to safeguard the physical inventory by periodic accounting verification. One tool used to accomplish this is the Limit of Error of Inventory Difference(LEID)calculation,whichhas received much debate and criticism in recent literature. This paper examines a few of the regulations regarding inventory reconciliation, both current and proposed, and suggests that these rules should be modified somewhat to account for the inherent limitations and practicality restrictions of the LEID calculation.