Nuclear Nonproliferation
On June 18, 2007, the House passed the International Nuclear Fuel for Peace and Nonproliferation Act, H.R. 885, which supports the creation of an international nuclear fuel bank so that any country seeking to develop peaceful nuclear power-producing capability will not have to enrich uranium. This bank will make sure that any state that keeps its nuclear nonproliferation commitments can get the fuel it needs without establishing its own fuel production facilities.
Since 1945, it has been U.S. policy to try to prevent an increase in the number of states that possess nuclear weapons and the means to create them, because such weapons production makes the world less secure. The same is true for the technology used to produce both nuclear reactor fuel and nuclear weapons material, particularly uranium enrichment.
This legislation addresses this general proliferation problem – and removes any pretext for a country's own “peaceful” enrichment plant – by promoting the development of international nuclear fuel production centers under multilateral control and direction. It also supports the establishment of an independent international nuclear fuel bank that would guarantee reactor fuel to countries that forgo their own enrichment plants and are in good standing with existing international nuclear safeguards commitments, should there be a disruption in the world’s supply of uranium fuel.