Publications

Alexander Glaser and Zia Mian, Appendix 7A. Global stocks and production of fissile materials, 2010, in SIPRI Yearbook 2011, Oxford University Press, 2011

The International Panel on Fissile Materials (IPFM) will present the findings of a new international study on the experience in ten countries with management of spent nuclear fuel. The two volume study focuses on the policy and technical challenges faced over the past four decades by efforts at site selection and construction of long term storage and geological repositories for the disposal of spent nuclear fuel from nuclear power reactors and high level radioactive waste. These challenges have so far prevented the licensing of a geological spent fuel repository anywhere in the world.

IPFM's draft of "A Treaty Banning the Production of Fissile Materials for Nuclear Weapons or Other Nuclear Explosive Devices", with article-by-article explanations is now available as an official document of the United Nations Conference on Disarmament (CD). The CD has been charged with negotiating this Treaty.

The draft Treaty was jointly submitted to the CD by Japan, Canada and the Netherlands in September 2009. The three delegations noted that while the draft treaty does not represent the official positions of these states, it "is intended to provide the Member States of the Conference on Disarmament with useful resource material for our work in the prospective negotiations on a fissile material cut-off treaty."

The draft Treaty is now available in all official UN languages:

• Arabic: عاهدة (وقف) إنتاج المواد الانشطارية,
• Chinese: (禁产)裂变材料条约,
• English: A Fissile Material (Cut-Off) Treaty,
• French: Traité sur les matières fissiles (arrêt de la production) (TMF(A)),
• Russian: Договор относительно (прекращения производства) расщепляющегося материала, 
• Spanish Tratado (de cesación de la producción) de materiales fisibles.

A Fissile-Material Approach to Furthering the Disarmament and Nonproliferation Objectives of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty

(Download a PDF copy of this document)

The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) establishes a system of controls on the production and use of fissile materials -- most commonly separated plutonium and highly enriched uranium (HEU). Since these materials are the key ingredients in nuclear weapons, such controls are critical to halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

The 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference and the Thirteen Steps agreed at the 2000 Review Conference included commitments by NPT state-parties to achieve quickly a multilateral Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) that would end production of fissile materials for weapons in all states and extend the international system of control over fissile materials to cover civilian and excess weapon materials in nuclear-weapon states.

The International Panel on Fissile Materials (IPFM) recommends that, to further the disarmament and nonproliferation objectives of the NPT, the 2010 Review Conference should: