WHAT THE NEW PROPAGATION OF ERROR PROCEDURE AT 7-12 NEEDS FROM THE MEASUREMENT CONTROL PROGRAM

The Oak Ridge Y-12 Plant is developing a propagation of error procedure to provide control limits for accountable material inventory differences. The overall effectiveness of the procedure depends heavily on the quality of the parameter estimates available for the measurement systems involved. Therefore the Y-12 Measurement Control Program is an important element of the safeguards system at Y-12. This paper considers what the propagation of error procedure requires from a measurement control program and some practical constraints encountered during implementation. The following four topics will be addressed: 1) parameter estimates needed for the control limit calculations, 2) identification of the measurement systems, 3) interfacing with the current accountability system, and 4) compromises to allow propagation of error to work in the real world.