Title:

Capabilities of an On Site Inspection

Speaker:

Dr. Harry Miley

Affiliation:

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

When:

Thursday, October 31, 2019 at 11:00:00 AM   Add to Calendar

Where:

Boggs Building, Room 3-47

Host:

Dr. Steven Biegalski
steven.biegalski@me.gatech.edu

Abstract

If remote signals dont give a conclusive picture about whether an underground nuclear explosion took place, what can be done? An On Site Inspection, or OSI, may gather data that allows a conclusion to be drawn one way or the other. The technical capabilities of a 10-person radionuclide team operating mobile labs and portable equipment against a nuclear anomaly that could be a contained underground nuclear explosion is described. Surveys, including flight, carborne, and backpack, help locate an area for investigation, then in situ survey and sample collections can identify isotopic anomalies in concentration, location, and ratio. Where surface radionuclides are not evident, sub-surface noble gas Xe and Ar collection and mobile lab measurements can detect leakage from even wellcontained nuclear tests. The authors will discuss the strategies for using these capabilities and the integration of information from other technical subteams in a 4week exercise

Biography

Harry Miley is the chief scientist of PNNLs Nuclear Explosion Monitoring Program, which for over twenty years has been focused on monitoring Earth's environment for radionuclide debris of nuclear weapons indicating a violation of a treaty or agreement. Some of the technologies developed by this program have been recognized with RANDD100 and FLC awards, and are in daily use in a worldwide monitoring network. The NEMP program serves the National Nuclear Security Administration, the Department of Defense, and the US State Department with technology developments, scientific analysis of monitoring network data, and technical advice related to the negotiation of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, or CTBT. Reporting real-time analysis and interpretation of Fukushima releases to DOE NNSA was a key milestone for the program and a key test of the aerosol monitoring technologies developed by Dr Miley. Recently, Dr. Miley has helped to form the corps of on-site inspectors for the CTBT through training of new inspectors and by leading the radionuclide component of the inspection team in field training exercises. Dr. Miley received his B.S. in Physics from South Carolina College, the honors college of the University of South Carolina, in 1982 and his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of South Carolina in 1987.

Notes

Refreshments will be served.