Hearing of the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee - Department of Energy: Nuclear Nonproliferation

Hearing of the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee - Department of Energy: Nuclear Nonproliferation

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REP. JO ANN EMERSON (R-MO): Thank you, Chairman.

Welcome, thanks for being here.

I've got three questions I want to ask you about reprocessing activities, if I could.

In the larger scheme of all the different proliferation risks around the world, how would you rank the relative risk of the plutonium separated by reprocessing activities in France and the United Kingdom?

MR. TOBEY: I don't see the activities in France and the United Kingdom as serious proliferation threats. As you know, both of those are nuclear weapons states. However, this is a technology that we as an administration -- the president personally -- has said he would like not to spread.

REP. EMERSON: So what -- so how would you compare the nonproliferation risk of this weapons usable material in those countries relative to the same material in other countries and also relative to other special nuclear materials and dirty bomb materials?

MR. TOBEY: I guess I would -- well, there are two ways in which, in the abstract, without talking about specific countries, in which separated plutonium might pose a threat. One is that the government of the country in which the material resides could use it for its own program -- a breakout program, if you will, under the NPT -- and the other is in which it might be diverted either to a rogue state or to a terrorist organization. You know, and I think you have to look at each of those circumstances before looking at what --

REP. EMERSON: So from a nonproliferation standpoint, is the real concern the materials, the reprocessing activities that produce those materials or the countries that are running the activities that produce the materials -- from your perspective?

MR. TOBEY: I guess it's all three. I mean, the -- I don't mean to be difficult, but, you know, North Korea achieved its nuclear capability by reprocessing its spent fuel. Obviously that's an enormous proliferation threat from our perspective. What France and the U.K. has done is not a threat, from our perspective.

REP. EMERSON: Okay. I think -- let me just stop there only because my -- I'm losing my voice here. So if you all want to follow up at all with those questions, feel free.

Thanks.

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