Kevin's Politics Blog

Under the JCPOA, Iran agreed to eliminate its stockpile of medium-enriched uranium, cut its stockpile of low-enriched uranium by 98%, and reduce by about two-thirds the number of its gas centrifuges for 13 years. For the next 15 years, Iran will only enrich uranium up to 3.67%. Iran also agreed not to build any new heavy-water facilities for the same period of time.^[1] A nuclear weapon uses a fissile material to cause a nuclear chain reaction. The most commonly used materials have been uranium 235 (U-235) and plutonium 239 (Pu-239). Both uranium 233 (U-233) and reactor-grade plutonium have also been used.^[2]^[3]^[4]

With Separative Work Units Estimated to begin production of fissile material at about 35 SWU, the estimated amount of fissile material needed to produce one bomb is estimated to be about 30 kilograms, with perfect centrifuge production of such fissile material accomplished after the use of about 50,000 unique centrifuges.[5][6] This is thought to precipitate from the production of crude IR-1 centrifuges which have a Uranium Produced to Centrifuge Use Ratio of 0.0867% (Uranium: Centrifuge Ratio).[7] This is a certain disadvantage for any country which hopes to produce an indigenous supply of fissile material, for any illicit nuclear program, and its activities. This means that an order to produce the previously estimated Separative Work Units needed to attain 30 Kilograms of Low Enriched Uranium (LEU), the program in question would have to expend an inordinate number of centrifuges of the IR-1 grade, which would add up to something of the order of magnitude of at least 122,268,924 Centrifuges, again of the IR-1 generation, which is the crudest workable generation of centrifuges available.

It’s estimated that the Islamic Republic of Iran has about 19,500 of these installed in a cascading assay at any one time.[8] Numbers like these continue for some time when talking about the Uranium to Centrifuge Ratio for less crude centrifuge devices, IR-2, .15937%, topping out at 33,270,455 IR-2 Centrifuges alone an order to produce enough Uranium for one bomb (30 Kgs). IR-3, a respectable centrifuge technology that requires 9,053,185 to produce the same amount of fissile material, giving it a Uranium to Centrifuge Cannibalization Ratio of 0.292843%.

Amongst these lesser centrifuge technologies, it is presumed from testimony from inspectors, and reports from the IAEA, as well as intelligence agencies, that the maximum number of Centrifuges which can be installed at any one time is north of 15,000 per assay, for these centrifuge technologies alone.

This would explain the IR-1 Assay which has over 15,000 centrifuges installed (19,500).[9]

While IR-4 has a Uranium to Centrifuge Ratio of 0.538099% Cannibalized, meaning that the number of centrifuges needed to produce the requisite amount of LEU fissile material drops considerably to 2,463,451. However, it’s thought that the Iranians only have 5,000 of the more high-tech IR-4 in existence.

But this number is up for discussion and it here posited by me, that the number of centrifuges which are currently put into production by Iran, number at least 10,000 total, with IR-3 being the most plentiful of them all. This means that by most estimates 7,800 may be the maximum declared allotment by the Ayatollah and his regime, but the figure varies accordingly due to the size of the program, meaning suspected undeclared facilities, and the scope and nature of the program as well.[10] After all, it was Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi Fedayeen, who were suspected of concealing what was in fact a defunct Nuclear Weapons Program, on trailers which were supposedly on mobile platforms throughout the desert in 2003.[11]

The number of centrifuges thought to be acquired by Iran, and their efficiency, therefore, begin to deviate from each other dramatically, after this. With highly advanced IR-5, and IR-6 Centrifuges collapsing to no greater than 1,000 for the foreseeable future, after implementation of the JCPOA, and even yet still Cannibalized Yields accelerating to only 1.8% with Centrifuges, and Centrifuges used, numbering in the hundreds of thousands.

The production of these centrifuges, and their capabilities was summed up in Nuclear Crises with North Korea and Iran, a 2019 book by Robert S. Litwak, from the Woodrow Wilson Center at Princeton University which sums up the state of the program, and the issues succinctly:

“Centrifuges are essential equipment for uranium enrichment, the multistage industrial process in which natural uranium is converted into special material capable of sustaining a nuclear chain reaction. Natural uranium occurs in two forms—U-238, making up 99 percent of the element, and the lighter U-235, accounting for less than 1 percent. But the latter is a fissionable isotope that emits energy when split. Uranium ore is crushed into a powder, refined, and then reconstituted into a solid form, known as “yellowcake.” The yellowcake is then superheated and transformed into a Nuclear Crises with North Korea and Iran: gas, uranium hexafluoride (UF6). That gas is passed through a centrifuge and spun at high speed, with the U-238 drawn to the periphery and extracted, while the lighter U-235 clusters in the center and is collected. The collected U-235 material is passed through a series of centrifuges, known as a cascade, with each successive pass-through increasing the percentage of U-235. Uranium for a nuclear reactor should be enriched to contain approximately 3 percent uranium-235, whereas weapons-grade uranium should ideally contain at least 90 percent. Iran developed indigenous facilities to support each phase of the uranium enrichment process: two uranium ore mines, whose reserves could produce 250-300 nuclear weapons, according to U.S. intelligence; a yellowcake production facility; a facility for Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at Natanz (aerial view) From Transformational to Transactional Diplomacy converting yellowcake into uranium hexafluoride gas in Esfahan; and two enrichment sites, Natantz and Fordow, with 19,000 centrifuges, of which some 10,000 were operational. They were predominantly the first-generation IR-1 model, although Iran had begun installing the more sophisticated IR-2 model, which is more reliable and estimated to have six times the output of IR1s. The industrial-scale Natanz site, located 200 miles south of Tehran, could potentially house 50,000 centrifuges. The Fordow enrichment site near Qom is too small to be Economically rational as part of a civil nuclear program and is invulnerable to a military strike because it is deeply buried. Those attributes, as well as its location on a Revolutionary Guard base, aroused concern that its intended purpose was to receive low-enriched uranium produced at Natanz for further enrichment to weapons-grade material.”[12]

Figure 10 Fick’s Equation, Courtesy of National Research Nuclear University (Russia), Nuclear Reactor Physics Basics, Yury Volkov (Instructor), Coursera.org, Accessed On: 2/25/2024

This extant, which was provided by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Public Policy, gives a clear and concise explanation of the basis for ongoing nuclear negotiations, which have currently reached an impasse, as of June 2021.

Add to that a resourceful, and diligent case study of the Ayatollah’s finances in Iran. And it’s estimated that he personally has accumulated over $US 350 Billion Dollars, in personal wealth, over the course of time since the signing of the JCPOA agreement, and the wars in both Syria, Yemen, as well as Gaza. This summation, the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Public Policy Extant, however, does not include the existence of undeclared sites, which may be yet smaller in scope, but could number in the tens or more. The exclusionary nature of the Iranian Nuclear Program, along with its undeclared assets, and facilities, is one of the historical hallmarks of covert nuclear programs around the world, and is what makes it so dangerous. It should be noted however that the main conduits of the Nuclear Program, the Uranium and Plutonium Milling Mines outside of the processing facilities, including Gchine, and Saghand, as per News reports, are no longer functioning, owing to the laborious processes the Iranians have gone through to produce Nuclear Fissile Materials, and the limited capabilities which they have been able to covertly develop, after its acquisition.[13] If true, this revelation should be of the utmost of issues which the Americans, and the other P5+1 interlocutors can use to leverage Iranian compliance with their nuclear program. As the lack of raw fissionable material, negates the programs efficacy for the purposes of exploiting current technologies for the development of Nuclear Fission Weapons. And the inclusion of sensitive monitoring equipment, such as cameras, and other positive scoring sensors, and devices, at these, and other mining, and milling technology sites, must be included in any further discussions of the renegotiation of the JCPOA, and its compliance regime.

Figure 11 CERN Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) Experiment at Light Hadron Collider #2, Cessy, France, Courtesy of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)

As for experimental centrifuges which Iran has under its command, the introduction of IR-6s, and IR-7’s was at first thought to completely transform the character and nature of the Iranian nuclear program, and the threat it poses. However, after initial analyses were conducted by western intelligence communities, using lasers pointed at the heat emanating from suspected nuclear sites, it was discovered that the Iranians are enriching at only a slightly more efficient level, and that the amount of these so-called experimental centrifuges must not number in less than 500 totals.

Nevertheless, when they are able to acquire these more advanced centrifuges, the Assay really only begin to decrease to so called super efficiencies at the IR-8 and above. That’s not to say that the amount of Enriched Uranium produced by these centrifuges is negligible, with Cannibalized Assays reported at 11.27%, and 20.71% Respectively, these technologies, should they ever fall into the Government of Iran’s Hands could precipitate another nuclear crisis.

And, while I suspect that the technology already exist. The added knowhow, such as Krytron Switching, and other light, and gas based, vaporous, diaphanous, vaporizing devices. Needed an order to perfect certain Nuclear Fission, and thus Weaponization technologies. I’ve concluded they may not have mastered the knowhow of.

Figure 12 CERN Light Hadron Collider (b) (LHCb) ALICE Propulsion Experiments. (Image Courtesy of CERN)

Figure 13 CERN ALICE pPb Heavy Ion Collisions Experiments, Courtesy of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)

These numbers which are articulated in the above section on capabilities, do not negate the presence of current Iranian enrichment capabilities, indeed by the time the JCPOA negotiations began in 2015, it was already revealed by the Iranian side, that they possessed enough enriched Uranium to make at least five (5) nuclear weapons. The numbers on cannibalized arrays simply relate to the capabilities of their current centrifuge campaign for their Nuclear Weapons Program, and is indicative of the Iranian sides inability to progress past certain technological thresholds.

^[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Comprehensive_Plan_of_Action

^[2] Holdren, John; Bunn, Matthew (1997). “Managing Military Uranium and Plutonium in the United States and the Former Soviet Union”. Annual Review of Energy and the Environment. 22: 403–496. doi: 10.1146/annurev.energy.22.1.403.

^[3] Barnaby, Frank (5 March 2014). Barnaby; Holdstock, Douglas (eds.). Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Retrospect and Prospect. p. 25. ISBN 9781135209933

^[4] Matthew; Holdren, John P. “Managing military uranium and plutonium in the United States and the Former Soviet Union” (PDF). pp. 403–409.

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Separative_work_units

[6] “Explainer: How close is Iran to producing a nuclear bomb?”, Francois Murphy, Reuters.com, Found At: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-nuclear-explainer/explainer-how-close-is-iran-to-producing-a-nuclear-bomb-idUSKBN2880NU

[7] This ratio is made by taking the amount of Uranium needed for feedstock and dividing it by the number of centrifuges used, an order to obtain 30 Kilograms of High Enriched Uranium. For actual numbers used see the Appendix.

[8] Explainer: How close is Iran to producing a nuclear bomb? François Murphy, Reuters.com, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-nuclear-explainer/explainer-how-close-is-iran-to-producing-a-nuclear-bomb-idUSKBN2880NU

[9] Ibid.

[10] The Logic of Restoring Compliance With the 2015 Iran Nuclear Deal, Arms Control Association, Vol. 14, Issue 2, February 16^th, 2022; Found At: https://www.armscontrol.org/issue-briefs/2022-02/logic-restoring-compliance-2015-iran-nuclear-deal?emci=b29c911a-ad8e-ec11-a507-281878b83d8a&emdi=326f4403-378f-ec11-a507-281878b83d8a&ceid=15330559

[11] Comprehensive Report of the Special Advisor to the DCI on Iraq’s WMD, with Addendums (Duelfer Report), Iraq Survey Group (ISG), Central Intelligence Agency, April 25^th, 2005, found at: https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GPO-DUELFERREPORT/, Accessed On: 02/16/2022

[12] Nuclear Crises with North Korea and Iran: From Transformational to Transactional Diplomacy, Pgs. 83-85, Robert S. Litwak, Princeton University Press, 2019

[13] Is Iran running out of yellowcake? By David Albright, Jacqueline Shire, and Paul Brannan, February 11, 2009, Institute for Science and International Security, Found At: https://isis-online.org/uploads/isis-reports/documents/Iran_Yellowcake_11Feb2009.pdf, Accessed: 06/06/2021

On Tuesday an agreement was reached by the P5+1 powers with the Islamic Republic of Iran to curtail their nuclear program through the JCPoA agreement which will have to be signed onto by both nations and the U.N. Security Council. The following are a couple of positive things which I think came out of the agreement and that are likely to prevent the manufacture of nuclear weapons by the Islamic State of Iran.

The reconfiguration of the IR-40 Heavy Water Production Plant (HWPP), or the Arak HWPP, is a very positive step in my estimation. By Iran being forced to for one totally scrap the main enrichment component of the plant by removing the enrichment components. Or destroying them with injections of epoxy resin, leaving it’s only further use for Isotope research, this plant which will be the only Heavy water plant that Iran will have will allow for peaceful research with a non-weaponized component. When the reconfiguration of the plant is complete this will make it that much harder for the Iranians to backslide and will allow for the International community to have its trust built up about the Iranians intentions going forward.

Various parts of other plants are to be stored in Hall B of the Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant under IAEA continuous monitoring. This is also positive since the removal of weaponized components of the Plants and the continuous monitoring of these items will allow for verification and further safeguarding by the IAEA of anything which could be misconstrued for a weaponized function of the former Possible Military Dimensions (PMD) of the Iran nuclear program.

The Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant will be the only plant that will have fuel enrichment capablilites for R&D purposes, and will be neutered to be de-weaponized with all weaponization materials stored in Hall B of the Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant under IAEA continuous monitoring. This means not Fordow, not Parchin, or any other fuel enrichment plant (FEP) will have fuel enrichment capabilities for at least 15 years guaranteeing a severe limiting of the amount of nuclear related sites which will have the hallmarks of R&D for the purposes of nuclear fuel enrichment.

Most sanctions are equipped with a snapback mechanism for 15 years which doesn’t require a U.N. vote. The ability to have the sanctions come back into place is a powerful one since by having this available to them the United States can further leverage future negotiations concerning the PMD of the Iranian nuclear program. Also in the event that a situation arises that requires the Dispute Resolution Mechanism the U.S. should worse come to worse can rely on their own judgement an order to determine whether or not Iran is compliant with the JCPoA

A Robust and fair system for logging complaints and settling unresolved issues: The Dispute Resolution Mechanism guarantees that the games that Sadaam Hussein played with the world before the Iraq War in 2003 cannot be played this time against the backdrop of possible nuclear war. By agreeing before hand as to what conflict resolution will look like the powers involved have guaranteed that any sort of chicanery by the Iranians will be short lived and will lead to nothing but the snap back of sanctions, or even the specter of war.

Iran will have the ability, once the implementation period has begun, and the requisite sanctions have been lifted, to be able to participate in all facets of the world economy including purchasing commercial western airplanes, and banking in Europe. I think this is an important aspect of the agreement since it allows for Iran to participate in the western economy and they can then begin to become suffused with western ideas and customs in the Iranian government and amongst the Iranian people. This will mean that if Iran does indeed decide to backslide that they will be unable to extricate themselves from the world economy as quickly as they may have thought that they would be able to. Also this will prevent them from attempting to backslide in the first place since they will have a panoply of reasons manifest in front of them not to even attempt.

The U.S. and E.U. countries will participate with Iran on a raft of nuclear related R&D. Also Iranians will now be able to study nuclear science in the west including the United States. By intertwining the R&D of Iran with western countries on a whole host of subjects ranging from isotope, and cancer research, to fusion technologies, I think this is a positive step since as I said earlier this will allow for the Iranians to be comfortable with the idea of cooperating with the west and will intertwine them so to the point that they will not want to backslide on the agreement making the likelihood that less probable.

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is not a perfect document in terms of concessions from the Iranians but it is a far broader and wide reaching document than some of the skeptics would care to admit. I believe that by pursuing this plan of action we can ultimately win the day which is why I feel compelled to support this line of reasoning.