A key enabler for advanced fuel cycle safeguards research and technology development forprograms such as the Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative (AFCI) is access to facilities and nuclearmaterials. This access is necessary in many cases in order to ensure that advanced safeguardstechniques and technologies meet the measurement needs for which they were designed. One suchcrucial facility is a hot cell based laboratory which would allow developers from universities,national laboratories, and commercial companies to perform iterative research and development ofadvanced safeguards instrumentation under realistic operating conditions but not be subject toproduction schedule limitations. The need for such a facility arises from the requirement toaccurately measure minor actinide and/or fission product bearing nuclear materials that cannot beadequately shielded in glove boxes. With the contraction of the DOE nuclear complex following theend of the cold war, many suitable facilities at DOE sites are increasingly costly to operate and arebeing evaluated for closure.A hot cell based laboratory that allowed developers to install and remove instrumentation from thehot cell would allow for both risk mitigation and performance optimization of the instrumentationprior to fielding equipment in facilities where maintenance and repair of the instrumentation isdifficult or impossible. These benefits are accomplished by providing developers the opportunity toiterate between testing the performance of the instrumentation by measuring realistic types andamounts of nuclear material, and adjusting and refining the instrumentation based on the results ofthese measurements. In this paper, we review the requirements for such a facility using the Wing 9hot cells in the Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Chemistry and Metallurgy Research facility as amodel for such a facility and describe recent use of these hot cells in support of AFCI.
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