1793 



administration appears to have decided that enrichment will remain 

 a Government monopoly and that additional capacity will be added 

 by the Federal Government. However, since 1974 the United States 

 lias lacked the enrichment capacity to take on new foreign orders, a 

 situation that has accelerated foreign ejirichment ventures and 

 brought the Soviet Union into the world enrichment market as a sup- 

 plier. The United States for perhaps the next 5 years will remain the 

 principal free world source of enricliment, but thereafter will face 

 competition from European plants. This situation can change over 

 tlie coming decade if new enrichment technologies, primarily the 

 centrifuge and laser separation methods, prove substantially supei'ior 

 to the gaseous diffusion process of the U.S. plants. The policy issues 

 for uranium enrichment are epitomized in a series of questions pre- 

 sented in the case study : 



Will the United States, for reasons of economic and foreign policy, seek to pre- 

 serve its position as the world's leading supplier of enriched uranium and enrich- 

 ment services? 



What measures should the United States consider if other nations, singly or in 

 concert, attempt to^reak the longstanding U.S. enrichment monopoly by building 

 their own enrichment facility? 



Is the further development of gas centrifuge technology in Europe likely to 

 lead to a technological surprise for the United States, should the economic and 

 technological feasibility of this technology be demonstrated? 



What measures can or should the United States consider to discourage further 

 development of the gas centrifuge? 



What diplomatic options are open to the United States should the Soviet Union 

 seriously enter the world enriched-uranium market? 



Since supplying enrichment services requires the use of large amounts of elec- 

 tricity which, in the United States, comes from coal-burning powerplants, and 

 considering present air pollution problems of the United States and the environ- 

 mental impacts of mining coal, do the foreign policy benefits of supplying enrich- 

 ment services to foreign customers balance the energy and environmental costs to 

 America? *^* 



Two future questions also involve the public/private interface: 

 (1) As nuclear power technology moves forward to the breeder reac- 

 tor — as it may well do — what role will private industry be permitted in 

 this somewhat controversial technology, both in the United States and 

 abroad? And, as the world's nuclear industry moves toward the es- 

 tablishment of international standards for the design, construction, 

 and operation of nuclear powerplants, how should the U.S. interest 

 be represented, what standards should be proposed, and what should 

 be the respective roles of the Government and private industry in this 

 matter? 



In view of the great uncertainties surrounding the formulation and 

 implementation of U.S. energy policy in recent years, there would 

 appear to be reason for concern that in the particularly complex and 

 dangerous area of nuclear power policy, decisive policymaking will not 

 come easily. Always in the background is the threat that fissionable 

 plutonium, a byproduct of power reactors, might be surreptitiously 

 diverted to unfriendly use by a foreign power or even by a gang of 

 terrorists. The question is whether the separation of control by Gov- 

 ernment and operation by industry would weaken security against 

 such diversion. Again, a close working relationship in these matters 

 would seem to be called for, between the Department of State and the 

 private sector, supported by a highly competent departmental plan- 

 ning staff. 



«3< Donnelly, op. cit., p. 265. 



