Process Holdup The Regulatory View

Performance-oriented safeguards regulations reflecting the different strategic value of special nuclear material were recently published as final rules. These rules have a significant impact on the requirements for holdup calculations and measurements. For licensees processing low enriched uranium, it is expected that few, if any, holdup measurements will be made for safeguards purposes. However, for licensees processing high enriched uranium orplutonium, the new regulations require extensive analysis of holdup measurements and estimations in modeling process flows, holdup, and yields for individual unit processes. Good quality holdup measurements and estimations will be required for both physical inventory and process monitoring purposes.