HEU Repatriation from Vinca

Past and Current Efforts to Reduce Civilian HEU Use

Background


Nonproliferation has been an important issue since the beginning of the atomic age. The use of low enriched uranium or LEU fuel (uranium with the proportion of the U-235 isotope under 20%) was an integral part of the Atoms for Peace Program initiated by President Eisenhower in 1953; many of the first foreign research reactors were fueled with LEU. The LEU fuel technology used at that time soon reached its limits. In order to improve the performance of the reactors with existing technology and to allow more powerful reactors to be built, HEU fuel soon became the standard used by the vast majority of research reactors. In the decade after the launch of the Atoms for Peace program, the United States, the Soviet Union, and other nuclear weapons states exported research reactors fueled with HEU to approximately 40 countries. In addition to research and test reactors, HEU was and continues to be used in other civilian technologies: for naval and space propulsion, medical isotope production, and as fuel for commercial fast neutron reactors.

[For more, see http://www.nti.org/db/heu/pastpresent.html ]