Nuclear Materials Management in the 1990's - Automated Procurement and Barcoding

Increasing the effectiveness of a nuclear procurement program has unquestionably become one of the major issues facing the nuclear industry in the 1980's. As nearly all of our nuclear power plants shift into their operational lives, several factors have had significant impact on the procurement process. In general, nuclear utilities recognize that simply ordering a replacement item by its part number and name offers little assurance they're going to get what is truly needed. A number of nuclear utilities have been successful in recent years in assertively developing cost-effective and efficient procurement programs. These select utilities have positioned themselves for what many consider the Nuclear Materials Management of the 1990's - Automated Procurement and Barcoding. This paper presents the elements most common to positioning these programs for technological advancement.