IRAN’S NUCLEAR ACTIVITIES

Dr. Frank Barnaby ^(*)

The major powers suspect that Iran is clandestinely developing nuclear weapons. Firm evidence for this suspicion comes mainly from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Nuclear-weapon activities in Iran are not new – in fact, they date back 40 years to the days of the Shah who had ambitions to acquire a nuclear force. Because of its long experience in nuclear physics and engineering and because it has been operating nuclear research reactors for decades, Iran has a cadre of trained personnel that could be switched to a nuclear-weapon programme.

If it produces the fissile material – highly-enriched uranium or plutonium or both – needed for nuclear weapons it could fabricate them in a relatively short time of some months rather than years. But today’s Iranian government insists that its nuclear activities are solely related to its civil nuclear programme and that it is not developing nuclear weapons.

The IAEA has announced that Iran is building two plants at Natanz to enrich uranium, plans to construct a heavy-water research reactor in Arak, and a plant to produce heavy water for the Arak reactor. The Iranian government has acknowledged the existence of these previously secret facilities and plans but claims they are part of its civil nuclear programme and not part of a military nuclear-weapon programme. The Iranian government, however, admitted to these activities only after the National Council of
Resistance, an Iranian opposition group, announced that they were underway.

Both of the uranium enrichment and the heavy water production plants raise concerns. A heavy-water reactor is a particularly efficient way of producing plutonium for use in nuclear weapons. A uranium enrichment plant can produce the highly enriched uranium needed for nuclear weapons.

Many argue that because Iran has enormous reserves of oil and gas it does not need nuclear energy and that its nuclear programme demonstrates ambitions to produce nuclear weapons. Iran claims that it needs to export as much of its oil as possible to earn much needed foreign currency, that its oil reserves are finite and that nuclear power is a sensible investment for the future.

Iranian Nuclear Activities

Apart from the heavy water and uranium enrichment plants and plans to build a heavy-water reactor, there are other Iranian nuclear activities that raise suspicions. These include:

• the development of uranium mines;
• the construction of a uranium conversion facility at the Esfahan Nuclear Technology Centre (ENTC) to convert uranium ore (yellow cake) into uranium hexafluoride gas, suitable for use in gas centrifuges for the enrichment of uranium; and
• the operation of a pilot laser enrichment facility at Lashkar Ab’ad, now shut down.

The IAEA has also discovered that Iran has in the past:

• imported uranium hexafluoride gas to test gas centrifuges at the Kalaye Electric Company, thereby producing some enriched uranium;
• imported uranium metal for use in laser enrichment;
• produced uranium dioxide, uranium hexafluoride, and a number of other uranium compounds using imported uranium dioxide; and
• produced uranium dioxide targets at ENTC and irradiated them in the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR). The targets were then processed in hot cells to separate the plutonium.

Iran violated its Safeguards Agreement with the IAEA, required by the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), by failing to report many of these activities to the Agency as the Safeguards Agreement requires. Disclosures by Iran of its nuclear programme show that it had concealed many of its nuclear activities, and consequently violated its obligations under the Safeguards Agreement and the NPT.

Iran has signed an Additional Protocol to its Safeguards Agreement with the IAEA but the Iranian parliament (the Majlis) has not yet ratified it. The Additional Protocol permits the IAEA improved access to Iran’s nuclear facilities, including the collection of environmental samples.

These violations are the basis of the international suspicions that Iran is secretly developing nuclear weapons. None of these activities are in themselves illegal; it is the failure to report them to the IAEA that is illegal.

Iran’s Current Nuclear Activities

It is common knowledge that Iran has a civilian nuclear-power reactor under construction. The Russians have essentially completed the 1,000 megawatt-electrical light-water reactor, of the Russian VVER type, at Bushehr. It will use low enriched (about 3.5 percent in uranium-235) as fuel. Under the contract Iran has with Russia, Russia will provide the fuel for the lifetime of the reactor and will take back to Russia the spent fuel for storage and possibly reprocessing.

Once the fuel has been loaded into the reactor and the reactor goes critical it will quickly produce a very large amount of highly radioactive fission products. To bomb the reactor after it has gone critical would spread radioactivity over a very large area indeed.

This power reactor is, according to Iran, the first of a series of power reactors planned to generate 6,000 megawatts of electricity. It is reported that Iran intends to build a second power reactor at the Bushehr site of a similar type as the first and with Russian assistance. Iran explains that it is interested in establishing a capability to produce low-enriched uranium so that it has an indigenous supply of nuclear reactor fuel for its reactors and possible to export to other countries. Again, observers question the need for an extensive nuclear power infrastructure, given Iran’s huge fossil fuel reserves and rather limited uranium ore fields.

Iran operates four small research reactors, supplied by China, three at the Estahan Nuclear Technology Centre and one, supplied by the USA, at the Nuclear Research Centre in Teheran. Two, at Estahan, are sub-critical assemblies used for training nuclear physicists and technicians; they have both been operating since 1992. The third at Estahan (Tehran) is a 30-kilowatt research reactor used for research purposes; it has been operating since 1994. The fourth is a 5 megawatt-thermal reactor also used for
research; it has been operating since 1967, an indication of the length of time during which Iran has been interested in nuclear technology.

The two facilities suspected of being part of a nuclear-weapon programme are: a plant to produce heavy water, located near the town of Arak, about 250 kilometres from Teheran; and two gas centrifuge plants under construction at Natanz, 40 kilometres from Kashan. One is a Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant (PFEP) and the other is a large commercial-scale Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP). Iran has acknowledged that components for gas centrifuges have been produced and tested in the workshop of the Kalaye Electric Company in Tehran.

PFEP will apparently contain about 1,000 centrifuges and may already be completed. Iran plans to install more than 50,000 centrifuges at the commercial scale FEP; installation of centrifuges started in early 2005.

A uranium Conversion Facility at Isfahan converts yellowcake (U3O8) into uranium dioxide that is in turn converted into uranium hexafluoride gas. The facility also produces other uranium compounds; it is also the fuel fabrication part of Iran’s nuclear fuel cycle. There is a Zirconium Production Plant nearby that produces ingredients and alloys for nuclear reactors.

Uranium hexafluoride gas was introduced into the first centrifuge at PFEP in June 2003 to test a single centrifuge. In August 2003, Iran began testing a ten-centrifuge cascade with uranium hexafluoride gas.

Saghand is the location of Iran’s first uranium ore mines that have recently become operational. The deposit reportedly contains between 3,000 and 5,000 tonnes of uranium spread over an area of roughly 130 square kilometres.

The Bonab Atomic Energy Research Center is a facility to investigate the applications of nuclear energy and technology to agriculture and there is a Center for Agricultural Research and Nuclear Medicine at Hashtgerd, Karaj.

The IR-40 research reactor

Iran claims that it wants to replace the aged (35-year old) Tehran Research Reactor and plans to do so by building a new heavy water reactor, called the IR-40, at Arak. The IR-40 will be a 40-megawatt (thermal) reactor cooled with heavy water and fuelled with natural uranium. According to the IAEA, Iran plans to manufacture the fuel (uranium dioxide) elements for the IR-40 in the Fuel Manufacturing Plant (FMP) to be built at the Esfahan establishment. Iran says that the purpose of the IR-40 reactor is the production of radioactive isotopes for medical and industrial uses.

IR-40 could produce about 8 kilograms of plutonium a year, enough to produce two nuclear weapons a year. Plutonium from the Arak research reactor is, however, unlikely to be available before about 2014

Iran says that about 85 tonnes of heavy water will be initially required for IR-40 and less than 1 tonne will be need annually. Iran is constructing a heavy water plant at Khondab near Arak with an initial capacity of 8 tonnes of heavy water per year. Apparently, a second production with a similar production capacity is under construction.

^(*)Frank Barnaby is Nuclear Issues Consultant to Oxford Research Group (ORG). This paper is an update of a briefing first published by ORG in November 2004 and updated in November 2005.

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