The United States and Russia Evaluate Plutonium Disposition Options with Multiattribute Utility Theory

At the end of the Cold War, the United States and Russia entered into agreements to reduce the numbers of nuclear weapons in their arsenals. The excess-weapons plutonium recovered from dismantled weapons is extremely toxic in the environment, and the National Academy of Sciences has characterized th...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Interfaces (Providence) 2005-01, Vol.35 (1), p.88
Main Authors: Butler, John C, Chebeskov, Alexander N, Dyer, James S, Edmunds, Thomas A, Jia, Jianmin, Oussanov, Vladimir I
Format: Article
Language:eng ; ger
Subjects:
Analysis
Arms control & disarmament
Cold War
Decision making
International agreements
International cooperation
International relations-US
Laboratories
Nuclear reactors
Nuclear weapons
Objectives
Operations research
Plutonium
Treaties
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Summary:At the end of the Cold War, the United States and Russia entered into agreements to reduce the numbers of nuclear weapons in their arsenals. The excess-weapons plutonium recovered from dismantled weapons is extremely toxic in the environment, and the National Academy of Sciences has characterized the possibility that it could fall into the hands of terrorists as a "clear and present danger." A team of operations research analysts supported the Office of Fissile Materials Disposition (OFMD) in the US Department of Energy (DOE) by developing a multiattribute utility (MAU) model to evaluate alternatives for the disposition of the excess-weapons plutonium. Russian scientists modified the model with the aid of the US team and used it to evaluate Russia's disposition alternatives. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]
ISSN:2644-0865
2644-0873
DOI:10.1287/inte.l040.0112