Dabbling in nuclear non-pro futures worth creating

I recently published an article (pdf) on nuclear non-proliferation in the journal Energy Politics.  Here's your four-minute summary:

With high energy prices, nuclear power will grow in importance for many states with attendant proliferation risks (see Iran circa 2003-present).  To mitigate this proliferation risk, the proliferation-prone portions of the nuclear fuel cycle -- in particular, uranium enrichment, reprocessing and spent fuel storage/disposal -- ought to be internationalized such that all states with electricity-generating nuclear power plants can receive nuclear fuel, either uranium or plutonium, from a multilateral entity (I don't go into what the entity should be exactly, but there are a lot of ideas out there).  This concept is known as Multilateral Nuclear Approaches or MNAs.

The problem with MNAs is that the wording on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the cornerstone of the international nuclear non-proliferation regime, specifically provides for non-nuclear-weapon states to be entitled to "any peaceful applications of nuclear explosions" ... "especially in the territories of non-nuclear-weapon States Party to the Treaty."  It would seem that MNAs are no-go in this case since the NPT specifically outlines that peaceful uses of nuclear energy should occur on the territory of non-nuclear-weapon states.

So I propose a compromise.  The NPT was really a grand bargain between the nuclear haves and the nuclear have-nots: The nuclear haves agree to reduce and eventually foreswear their nuclear weapons while the nuclear have-nots agree to never acquire nuclear weapons.  If there is to be a reinterpretation of the NPT's wording for the sake of MNAs, which most experts agree are good for preventing nuclear proliferation, there needs to be a bargaining chip between the nuclear haves and have-nots.  One idea is the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) that has been talked about for many decades.  An FMCT would entail all countries that produce fissile material like weapons-grade uranium to cease fissile material production.  This would be a dramatic step forward on the issue of nuclear haves' disarmament, one pillar of the NPT grand bargain.  In exchange for the negotiation and ratification of a verifiable FMCT, the nuclear have-nots would agree to reinterpret the NPT's wording to allow for MNAs.

There's obviously much more complexity to that, for instance the Chinese stance of tying any negotiations over an FMCT to the negotiation of a treaty on space-based weaponry.  But in Washington at least, the foreign policy mainstream understands that both MNAs and the cessation of fissile material production would strengthen the global non-proliferation regime.  I believe tying those two together to generate progress on the former is the strongest way forward.

(This post is cross-posted at my new personal blog.)