How is the nuclear complex that the Iranian regime could use for military purposes by increasing the stock of enriched uranium?

This is the requirement of limit stocks of enriched uranium and heavy water produced locally, sell any excess on the international market agreed in the "Joint and Comprehensive Plan of Action" (JCPOA) signed between Iran and the P5 + 1 group (the "permanent" of the United Nations Security Council, United Kingdom, Russia, France, China and the United Kingdom, plus Germany), in order to In this way, the Persian nuclear program was only oriented towards peaceful purposes.

Currently, Tehran he can not keep a stock above 300 kilograms of enriched uranium at 3.67% nor more than 130 tons of heavy water, and must sell any surplus.

In addition, if the requirements are not met, Iran has indicated its intention to take two further measures, although without establishing aor first to enrich the uranium to higher levels and, in the background, complete the renovation of the Arak heavy water production plant, a project that was to be carried out under the JCPOA but is delayed due to tensions with Washington.

Although the nuclear pact, anchored in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and Security Council Resolution 2231, It remains in force between Iran and five of the signatories. The exit of the United States ordered by Donald Trump in 2018 has strongly impeded its implementation. since Washington has reinstated the economic sanctions against the country that should be lifted under the agreement. Iranians even argue that the expansion of enriched uranium and heavy water stocks is envisioned in the pact if sanctions are not lifted.

Therefore, the dangers Nuclear proliferation around the two demands that Tehran threatens to abandon is latent.

In the first case, the Uranium enrichment is one of the main indications of a country's intentions of being in search of nuclear weapons. Natural uranium, present in the deposits of the whole world, is composed predominantly (about 99%) by the isotope U-238, of which less than 1% is composed of uranium 235 and others.

Although uranium in its natural state can be used in power reactors, but to generate the nuclear fission necessary for an atomic bomb, it is necessary to artificially increase the percentage of uranium 235.

It's about enrichment, which can be done in different ways although the use of Gas diffusion centrifugation is one of the most common.

It is generally considered that the uranium required for an atomic bomb must be enriched to a level equal to or greater than 90% of the U-235 isotopes in its composition. Nuclear reactors used to propel warships, such as submarines and aircraft carriers, as well as those of research require an enrichment higher than 20%. And the peaceful energy reactors, which are among the most advanced as opposed to those using natural uranium, they require an enrichment of between 3% and 5%.

For this reason, and recognizing the right of Iran to obtain nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, The JCPOA allows Tehran to enrich up to 3.67% and not to accumulate more of this element than necessary for its reactors.

On the other hand, although natural uranium reactors seem to present, at first glance, a minor problem of proliferation,There is a danger due to a by-product generated precisely in the fission of the element: plutonium.

Natural uranium bars used in the production of electrical energy by nuclear reaction they find themselves loaded with plutonium in their Pu-239 and Pu-240 isotopes.

This plutonium can then be separated from the uranium by different methods and then becomes a raw material for atomic bombs even more effective than uranium enriched to 90% U-235.

For this reason, the control of heavy water, necessary to run natural uranium energy reactors, it is one of the pillars of the fight against the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

The nuclear complex in Iran

The facilities that make up the nulcear Iranian complex have been inspected and inspected by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as part of the JCPOA, and with the purpose of its monitoring and control.

In the latest report prepared by the Federation of American Scientists for the US Congress in April 2019, It details the number and quality of facilities known in Iran and dedicated to its nuclear program.

It is currently believed that the "breakthrough"the time that Tehran would need to produce the fuel needed for an atomic bomb if it abandoned all agreements and engaged in research, it's been a year, as noted by the NGO Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI). In 2013, before the start of the talks that led to the JCPOA and when the country was enriching uranium to 20%, it was estimated that it only took two or three months.

One of the most important sites of the Iranian complex is the aforementioned industrial complex at Arak.in the north-west of the country, which houses a heavy water manufacturing plant opened in 2006 and a nuclear reactor running on natural uranium and under construction, the IR 40. This development is occurring late, in accordance with specifications established by the JCPOA to avoid plutonium production, as stated by the World Nuclear Association, an badociation of companies dedicated to the nuclear industry and formerly known as The Uranium Institute.

In both Natanz, center of Iran, operates an underground uranium enrichment plant, which uses the gas centrifuge method to separate U-235 from U-238, in accordance with FAS.

Another uranium enrichment plant, discovered by the IAEA in 2009, operates in Fordow, south of the city of Qom. The secret around Fordow was perceived at the time as a clear indication of the alleged military intentions of the Iranian nuclear program. why its dismantling as a facility for enrichment and transformation into a research center is one of the central points of the JCPOA, today in doubt.

In Bushehr currently operates the only Iranian nuclear reactor, whose construction began in 1975, before the Islamic Revolution. It is a reactor located in the south of the country and on the coast of the Persian Gulf, which uses 3.67% enriched uranium and light water., according to SAF, generate 1,000 megawatts of energy. During the war between Iran and Iraq (1980-1988), it was damaged by air strikes launched first by Iraq and then by Israel.

By contrast, in Isfahan, central Iran, The nuclear technology center of Iran works, which operates nuclear research reactors.

There is also a research reactor at Tehran, which was provided by the United States in 1967 as part of the Atoms for Peace program, which at that time was aimed at bringing nuclear energy to the world.

In Parchin, in the vicinity of Tehran, operates a complex of Iranian armed forces where perform tests of conventional explosives and in which it is suspected that they might have nuclear weapons development sitesIt is therefore under the magnitude of the IAEA.

Finally in Saghand, center of the country, and Bandar Abbasin the south, the uranium mines are working and in Ardakan a production plant of "yellow cake"Uranium oxide concentrate extracted from deposits According to an estimate made by the United States and cited by the FAS, there are reserves on this site for manufacturing 250 to 300 nuclear weapons, although more details have not been published.