The ESARDA Working Group on Containment and Surveillance: Activities and achievements

The working group on containment and surveillance (C/S) is one of the discipline-oriented working groups of ESARDA ¿ the European Safeguards Research and Development Association. Its mission is (a) to provide the safeguards community with expert advice on C/S instruments and methods and on their performance and (b) to act as a forum for the exchange of information on such instruments and methods, including unattended and remote monitoring systems. Currently, sixteen institutions contribute to the working group as members or observers. The institutions represent safeguards authorities including the European Commission¿s Directorate General for Energy (in charge of the implementation of the EURATOM treaty) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), instrument developers, plant operators, national authorities and research laboratories. The working group meets twice per year, in order to address and discuss topics of interest. To this end, individual working group members volunteer to prepare discussion and working papers. The goal is to publish the results of the working group¿s discussions, preferably in the ESARDA Bulletin. The working group¿s current topics include: (i) Guidelines for developing sealing systems; (ii) XCam: IAEA¿s Next Generation Surveillance System; (iii) Interface between Safeguards and Security; (iv) 3D Laser based applications in Safeguards; (v) New generation of sealing developments; (vi) Enhanced Data Authentication System; (vii) Designing and simulating tools for surveillance and remote monitoring, and (viii) Performance & assurance of C/S instrumentation. For the ESARDA web site, the working group maintains a compendium of C/S instruments and methods and contributes to drafting technical sheets on safeguards-specific topics. When appropriate, the working group holds joint meetings with other ESARDA working groups to discuss topics of common interest. Regarding the annual ESARDA course on Nuclear Safeguards and Non-Proliferation, the working group provides a lecturer and material on C/S instrumentation and methods. The paper describes the working group¿s current terms of reference, membership, working method, topics of interest, achievements, and gives an outlook on the topics to be addressed in the near future.JRC.E.9-Nuclear security (Ispra