COSTS OF
EFFECTIVE SAFEGUARDS
It may appear
to some readers that the development and application of a system of
safeguards that will keep the risks of nuclear theft very low
indeed will result in enormous costs for the nuclear power
industry. This, however, is not the case, even for a safeguards
system which employs the best available technology and
institutional mechanisms, as we believe it should.
To place the
cost of safeguards in perspective, the cumulative capital
investment in nuclear power by 1980 is projected to be more than
$75 billion, and the cost of the electricity generated with nuclear
fuel will be more than $8 billion per year. These estimates are
highly uncertain, however. Costs of nuclear electric power may
differ considerably from our projections, especially on the high
side, and still be considered acceptable. Indeed, there is a
variation of more than 10 percent in the estimates of future
nuclear power costs made by various individuals and organizations.
A 10 percent difference in the estimated $8 billion annual nuclear
power costs for 1980 would amount to $800 million in that year.
Therefore, even if the costs of safeguards were as high as $800
million per year in 1980, this would hardly be sufficient, by
itself, to affect substantially the overall economics of nuclear
power. We hasten to add, furthermore, that we see no basis for
expecting the costs of highly effective safeguards to be this
high.
We can make,
for example, some very crude estimates of possible costs of a
special nuclear security force organized and operated by the
federal government for comparison with the projected overall costs
of nuclear electric power. Consider the use of rather large numbers
of specially trained security personnel to provide protective
services at fixed nuclear facilities other than power plants. We
have projected a total of nineteen such facilities in the U.S. in
1980. Suppose an average of twenty security personnel are on duty
at each site at all times. Allowing for three shifts, vacations,
sickness, and some reserves, a