|
INSIDE NRC, SEPTEMBER 18, 2006, p. 17
NRC restores policy of issuing information on HEU exports
The NRC is relaxing its policy on disclosure of information on license requests for shipments of high-enriched uranium, Chairman Dale Klein recently told an advocacy group that had pressed for the change.
In an August 31 letter to the Nuclear Control Institute, Klein said the agency would “discontinue automatically withholding material quantity information from the public versions of export license applications” for HEU. The letter was the latest installment in a six-month correspondence between NCI and NRC, prompted by the agency’s initial withholding of quantity information on proposed HEU exports to Belgium and Canada (INRC, 29 May, 13).
Until 2001 NRC had published the quantity information. In several cases, NCI had intervened and successfully argued that the commission should reject the request or reduce the amount of HEU licensed for export. But as part of its response to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the US, NRC stopped publishing the quantities.
NRC now will not withhold the information unless there is an “NRC determination of a compelling reason for nondisclosure,” Klein said in the letter. He added that the agency would continue to withhold information on “projected or actual shipment schedules, delivery dates, date required, mode of transport, storage arrangements, or any other related logistical information.”
In a September 13 e-mail to Platts, NCI senior policy analyst Alan Kuperman said, “The commission is to be applauded for taking NCI’s concerns to heart and restoring its openness policy, which will revive the public’s ability to comment meaningfully on proposed export license applications, thereby assisting the commission to fulfill its statutory role of minimizing international commerce in bomb-grade uranium to reduce risks of nuclear terrorism and nuclear proliferation.”—
Daniel Horner, Washington |