When exporting nuclear-related items, export control is required from two perspectives: the control of “Trigger List Items” as controlled by Nuclear Supplier Groups (NSG) and the control of the “Items Subject to the Agreement” as specified in bilateral Nuclear Cooperation Agreements. While Trigger List Items and Items Subject to the Agreement are largely similar, there are some items where they do not overlap. Furthermore, national law for controlling each item is different. The Trigger List Items are governed by the Foreign Trade Act, and the Items Subject to the Agreement (Internationally Controlled Items) are governed by the Nuclear Safety Act. As a result, the detailed procedures and requirements for controlling each item are quite distinct. For the Trigger List Items, export license must be obtained in accordance with the Foreign Trade Act. The details such as responsible authority, the items subject to license, license requirements and procedures, penalties are specified in the Public Notice on Import and Export of Strategic Goods. For the Items Subject to the Agreement, the process and obligations set forth in bilateral agreements and related administrative agreements are fulfilled in accordance with the Nuclear Safety Act. However, in contrast to the Trigger List Items, the details for complying with the agreements are not specified legally. Since most of the Items Subject to the Agreement are fall within the category of the Trigger List Items, the obligations in accordance with the agreements are reviewed and implemented during the export license assessment process. However, if the Items Subject to the Agreement are not are fall within the category of the Trigger List Items, there is a risk of control omission. For example, this applies to cases of exporting tritium and tritium removal facilities, which are not the Trigger List Items, to Canada and Romania. Moreover, since subjects to the agreement and compliance procedures are respectively different for 29 bilateral Nuclear Cooperation Agreements signed with different countries, it is difficult for enterprise to recognize the appropriate procedures and obligations under the agreement by their own. The bilateral Nuclear Cooperation Agreements establish legal obligations between state parties while NSG are non-legally binding arrangements. Therefore, it could be even more necessary to comply strictly with the agreements. Consequently, legal improvements are required for effective implementations of Nuclear Cooperation Agreements. While it may be challenging to institutionalize details of 29 Nuclear Cooperation Agreements, it is essential to legally specify key elements such as the list of items subject to agreements, responsible authority, requirements and procedures for implement the agreement obligations, and penalties. Furthermore, domestic awareness on compliance with Nuclear Cooperation Agreements is lower compared to the system of export license for Trigger List Items. The continuous outreach is also necessary, along with institutional improvements.

Under the Foreign Trade Act, an export license from the Nuclear Safety Commission is required to export items specified in Part 10 of Schedule 2 of the Public Notice of Exportation and Importation of Strategic Items (Trigger List Items). In the case of nuclear materials, deuterium, and heavy water, its cumulative amount determines whether it is trigger list item. An export license is required only if the cumulative amount exported to a single end-user country from January 1st to December 31st exceeds the regulation criteria. The reason for this cumulative control is to exclude small amounts of materials from the scope of control as they are considered less important in view of nuclear proliferation, but to prevent the possibility of acquiring large quantities of materials by importing small amounts several times. As a result, export control of nuclear material, deuterium, and heavy water requires different considerations than other Trigger List Items. First, materials exported by different companies must be consolidated to manage the cumulative amount. Second, it is necessary to continuously follow up the actual export status. If the material is not exported after it was classified as ‘non-Trigger List Items’, it should not be included in the cumulative amount. Third, there may be a difference between the accumulated quantities aggregated at the time of the classification and the time of the actual export. The classification should be changed if an export of the classified material is postponed or another export of same materials occurs before the export of the classified material. Fourth, the classification result of these materials should not be reused. Generally, the classification result could be reused within the expiration date (2 years) but in the case of substances. However, the reuse of classification result for materials should be limited as the classification results could be change depending on the cumulative amount. In addition, the sharing of classification results between different entities should also be restricted. The government approval procedures are required even for export of small amounts of nuclear materials which are less than the regulation criteria. The cumulative quantities of nuclear materials are systematically managed in the Nuclear Export & imPort control System (NEPS) through these procedures. NEPS is also linked to the custom clearance system of Korea Customs Service, which enables to track actual exports and the time of exports. However, cumulative quantities for the heavy water and deuterium are managed individually by classification reviewers. The annual export plans are received in advance from major entities which deal with the materials for nuclear uses, and the cumulative quantities for each application are managed manually. The systematic management has not been required as there were a few cases of exporting small quantities. However, systematic management may be required in the future as overseas expansion attempts from various companies in the nuclear field has been increasing. In addition, further study is needed on the criteria and system for calculating the cumulative amount. The time of aggregate the cumulative amount should be clarified by considering the difference between the time of classification and actual export. It is required to devise an efficient way to follow up the actual export.

An administrative agreement (AA) was signed between NSSC and UAE FANR in January 2023 under Article 5 of the ROK-UAE Nuclear Cooperation Agreement. The AA aims to enhance regulatory efficiency in safeguards and export control. This study reviewed the export control measures for the items subject to the agreement (ISA) and implementation procedures under ROK-UAE AA by comparing them with other countries cases. First of all, the ROK-UAE AA distinguishes between ISA and the inventory management target items. Technology is divided into two categories, one requiring consent for retransfer and the other, considering the characteristics of technology that is free to be copied and deleted, and thus less useful for inventory management. Only the former is included in the annual report, which differs from the ROK-Canada or ROK-Japan NCA, which includes all technologies subject to the agreements in the annual report. When ROK notifies export information, it is mandatory to specify whether the technology requires consent for retransfer. Furthermore, some technologies should be controlled as strategic information, even if excluded from the annual report, so efforts to prevent confusion are required. Secondly, the ROK-UAE AA covers all items in INFCIRC/254/rev.9/part1, unlike the ROK-U.S. and ROK-Canada NCA, which listed equipment subject to them. This is significant because it clarifies the criteria for regulation by increasing the consistency between the trigger list items in the domestic law and the ISA. However, the expanded ISA scope could result in some changes in export control procedures. For example, when importing nuclear material (NM) from the US, only uranium was controlled as ISA, and the packages were not considered. In contrast, when exporting fuel assemblies (FA) for UAE, both uranium and zirconium cladding should be treated as ISA. To this end, NEPS was improved to implement the features of the ROK-UAE AA. Consideration of the criteria and methods for imposing obligations under the agreement is essential because this is the first case of Korea concluded AA under exporting NPP and as a supplier of FA. Generally, the obligations for NM are imposed by the country of origin, conversion, and enrichment countries. Canada and EU recognize the fuel fabrication process as a substantial transformation and impose customs origin where the process takes place. Hence, NM fabricated from Canadian equipment is also subject to the same obligations as NM of Canadian origin. From this perspective, it would be appropriate to ensure ROK acts as a supplier and controls when exporting domestically manufactured FA. Moreover, a proper national obligation code system will be required to specify Korea’s control rights.

Under the bilateral nuclear cooperation agreements (NCA) and its administrative arrangement (AA), Korea annually exchanges the inventory of subject items (including nuclear materials (NM), non-nuclear materials, equipment, and related information) with US, Canada and Australia. Also, the government performs export control procedures such as notification or prior consent during importing and exporting of relevant items. It makes NCA a means of realizing the nuclear non-proliferation regime. However, it raises difficulties in management because the entity that uses and treats those items are end-user, not the authorities of AA, the government agency of each country. Accordingly, to increase the accuracy and effectiveness of item management at the national level, it is required to establish a system for the individual company that has the NCA items, considering the characteristics of each company. In this study, significant companies are classified into more than three types, and the management system of the items subject to the agreement is analyzed. Each company’s item management status has different characteristics depending on its role (position) within the entire nuclear fuel cycle, the type of facility, its possessed items, the main form of national trade, and the frequency of domestic movement. Those differences lead to diversity in the management systems currently owned by each company. For example, from the perspective of nuclear materials, institutions requiring bulk management have systematically organized their management system and obligation code program compared to the ‘item institutions’ that can track batch history for all facility inventory changes. Although Domestic law imposes only the duty of origin management on NMs, fuel manufacturers or research institutes have established their standard obligation codes to manage multiple obligations. The non-nuclear materials and equipment can be easily tracked and controlled by individual items. However, the management of NCA items is a complicated task involving various processes, from importing goods to using, storing, managing inventory change, selling to others, or fulfilling the obligations of AA when exporting. In particular, when the movement of items within a company or international trade occurs frequently, or when the end-users are diverse, the management difficulties increase. So a system that can accurately convey and track items subject to the AA is needed. In addition, since various entities are related, it is necessary to improve understanding of NCA items to increase the system’s utilization and effectiveness. The comparison result and requirement for system improvement based on the review above will be reflected in the history management system for items subject to NCA under development.

The ROK conducts several export procedures, communications in connection with transfers; exchange of information on export plan, shipments, and receipt of nuclear materials, in accordance with bilateral Nuclear Cooperation Agreements (NCA) and Administrative Arrangements (AA) signed with US, Canada, and Australia. Also, the inventory amount of items subject to NCA has reported annually. This study reviewed the export procedures and management methods for spent nuclear fuel subject to NCA. The re-transfer procedures start with obtaining consent from the original exporting country. It is impossible to retransfer nuclear material without consent, whether long-term or individual case-bycase. If the material has multiple obligations, prior consent from all of those countries is required. Therefore, it is necessary to clarify the foreign obligated materials correctly. In general, nuclear fuel is subject to multiple obligations of all countries through which the materials have passed during the front-end fuel cycle. Then the new obligations are imposed on those irradiated materials or their by-products after ‘used-in’ or ‘produced through the use of ’ equipment subject to NCA. For example, fuel assemblies manufactured under CANDU fuel fabrication equipment subject to ROK-Canada NCA or burned in nuclear reactors where US equipment is installed have obligations based on Canada or US agreements. In order to impose obligation to irradiated materials, the principle of proportionality is applied as stipulated in each Agreement. According to the AA between US and ROK, nuclear materials used in the equipment transferred under the Agreement and produced through them are differently controlled. After the cycle in the reactor with US-made equipment, uranium in the irradiated fuel is considered a material used in the equipment. So it would be appropriate to apply obligation proportionality according to its origin, regardless the US-made equipment. Meanwhile, the obligation under US NCA is given to the entire amount of produced plutonium in the irradiated fuel. Although the contribution to the production of fuel is to be discussed case-by-case basis in the case of Canadian obligation, applying a similar method is proper. Since the fuel is burned in the form of bundles or assemblies, it is impossible to separate the spent fuel into uranium and plutonium physically. However, as discussed above, to clarify the rights and obligations pursuant to Agreement and ensure accuracy in inventory management, the obligation codes should be imposed on irradiated fuel as not a single item but separated individual substance of materials. Moreover, when an obligation swap occurs for the irradiated fuel, its movement and combustion history should be considered to prevent confusion in confirming multiple obligations and implementing export procedure.

In April 2015, the government of the Republic of Korea and the United States of America signed a new Nuclear Cooperation Agreement (NCA). Subsequently, in April 2016, the Nuclear Safety and Security Commission (NSSC) of the ROK and the Department of Energy (DOE) of the US signed the Administrative Agreement (AA) under the new Nuclear Cooperation Agreement. Accordingly, when Korea imports items subject to the Korea-US agreement, it is required to determine the inventory of imported agreement items and notify the United States of the inventory amount every year. In addition, when re-exporting an agreement item to a third country, prior consent of the original exporting country (USA) must be obtained. Nuclear companies that import items subject to the Korea-US Atomic Energy Cooperation Agreement must report their inventory to the government every year, but the standards and procedures for managing the inventory are not clearly stipulated in the national law. This makes it difficult for the government to verify the adequacy of the report submitted by nuclear companies, adding to the administrative burden on both the government and the companies. Accordingly, it is required for the government to establish and operate a system for history management system for import and export items subject to the agreement so that related information can be recorded and managed at each stage, such as first import of items to Korea, generation, disposal, and exports to third countries. This system provides history management functions such as initial import information record for items imported through import/export procedures according to administrative agreements, change of owned company due to domestic movement, deletion of inventory due to loss/disposal, deletion of inventory due to export or addition of inventory due to derived materials. Through this system, operators can easily manage agreement items, and the government can obtain reliable information on agreement items in close to real-time. In addition, when this system applies to exports of items subject to the agreement, the number of items subject to the agreement exported by Korea can be provided first so that the importing country can more quickly check the items subject to the agreement. It is expected to contribute to securing control of the items subject to the agreement and reducing concerns over nuclear proliferation.