Fully integrating the design process

The basic approach to designing nuclear facilities in the United States does not currently reflect the routine consideration of proliferation resistance and international safeguards. The fully integrated design process is an approach for bringing consideration of international safeguards and proliferation resistance, together with state safeguards and security, fully into the design process from the very beginning, while integrating them sensibly and synergistically with the other project functions. In view of the recently established GNEP principles agreed to by the United States and at least eighteen other countries, this paper explores such an integrated approach, and its potential to help fulfill the new internationally driven design requirements with improved efficiencies and reduced costs.