The IAEA announces, and ISNA confirms, that IAEA inspectors will be able to visit the 40 MW Heavy Water Reactor near Arak.
I am deeply suspicious of this reactor—which looks a lot like the reactors that were used in India, Israel Pakistan and Taiwan’s bomb programs. Getting the IAEA in, along with appropriate monitoring arrangements, is a priority.
No one in the open source community has been keeping a closer eye on construction at Arak than David Albright and Paul Brannan.
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This reactor, going full-bore, can at best produce enough fissile material for 1 or 1.5 nuclear weapons per year. Not exactly a “bomb factory” now, is it?
— hass · Jul 13, 10:41 AM ·
The last link is not correct. It should be
http://www.isis-online.org/publications/iran/ArakConstruction20March2007.pdf
— Locked · Jul 13, 11:20 AM ·
Hass:
30-50 MW was big enough for the nuclear weapons programs of India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea.
— Jeffrey Lewis · Jul 13, 01:10 PM ·
Neither of which are/were monitored by the IAEA…
— hass · Jul 13, 01:49 PM ·
There is a difference between given access and given access, is there not? What are the chances that they are given full and unfettered “access”?
— MEC · Jul 13, 01:49 PM ·
To return to a previous question:
Is there any indication of tritium removal/recovery technology being used at Arak? Bombs are frequently yummier if spiced up with a soupçon of DT.
— Allen Thomson · Jul 13, 02:07 PM ·
What’s with the green belt around the plant and in the distance? Does somebody’s cousin have a landscaping business? Is it like a canary in a coal mine: dead vegetation = slow reactor leak? Is it to keep prying roadbound eyes away from the plant? Or do nuclear proliferators work better when they have soothing greenery to look at outside the window? Did AQ Khan bring a fondness for horticulture back from the Netherlands too?
— Muskrat · Jul 13, 02:32 PM ·
Actually, Khan did -- according to Bill Langeweische:
You can see that KRL is actually quite lush.
— Jeffrey Lewis · Jul 13, 03:58 PM ·
Suspicious landscaping! PROOF of a nuclear weapons AT LAST!
— hass · Jul 13, 05:10 PM ·
Actually, I would bet the trees surrounding the complex serve primarily as windbreaks, but also may be productive orchards (judging by the uniformity of both species and spacing). If one were to “google earth” around the city of Arak and its environs, one would see many similar orchards in similar configurations.
— Andy · Jul 13, 10:27 PM ·
Given that heavy-water reactors use natural uranium, which is easy for the Iranians to produce themselves, it’s just a good idea to build a heavy-water based research reactor.
In its current state the Natanz facility is just large enough to produce the needed LEU for the Busher 1000 MW LW reactor.
Therefore it’s just safe to have a research reactor which uses fuel from another source than the, at that time still experimental centrifuge enriched uranium program.
The technologies which might have been available to Iran on the market were most likely designs like those from Pakistan and India.
The option of a light-water research reactor provided by the Europeans, would mean that the fuel would also come from aboard (there would be no Iranian enrichment program if the European package was taken by Iran).
— Pedro · Jul 14, 09:44 AM ·
Actually, the Pakistanis often use lush vegetation to cover their buildings from aerial or space surveillance. It’s an old trick. You can either burn something to create an artificial cloud cover, or you can plant trees and stuff. To illustrate, check out the location of Pakistan’s main ordinance factory at (33°47’1.04”N 72°44’34.18”E): the concentration of green stuff in the middle of the compound is extraordinary.
— Andreas Persbo · Jul 16, 05:04 AM ·
Actually, North Korea managed a bomb program with only a five megawatt reactor… And the fear was that they would go to a 50 MW reactor…
[Ed. note: the Yongbyon reactor is 5 MW(electric) but -- for an apples to apples comparison with Arak -- 20-30 MW(thermal). And, of course, it is graphite moderated.]— miles · Jul 16, 08:25 AM ·
Does anyone else think that this won’t slow down the Cheney administration’s push for war with Iran one bit given that they haven’t suspended uranium enrichment?
— Binh · Jul 18, 09:33 AM ·