P 5+1 foreign ministers had enough?
Hmm.
P5+1 foreign ministers meeting at #Iran talks in Lausanne has broken up - after only 18 minutes.
(Removes extraneous word)
— Matt Lee (@APDiploWriter) March 30, 2015
Maybe this has something to do with it:
#Quote of the Day from UK Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond on Iranian nuclear deal negotiations: pic.twitter.com/f9PTjXXgGi
— CFR (@CFR_org) March 30, 2015
And the five countries other than the US are convinced that the deal does nothing of the sort?Maybe this is what convinced them (Hat Tip: Memeorandum):
For months, Iran tentatively agreed that it would send a large portion of its stockpile of uranium to Russia, where it would not be accessible for use in any future weapons program. But on Sunday Iran’s deputy foreign minister made a surprise comment to Iranian reporters, ruling out an agreement that involved giving up a stockpile that Iran has spent years and billions of dollars to amass.
On Saturday, former IAEA chief inspector Ollie Heinonen published a paper that concluded that based upon leaks about what is in the current deal, Iran could have a nuclear breakout in 7-8 months.“The export of stocks of enriched uranium is not in our program, and we do not intend sending them abroad,” the official, Abbas Araqchi, told the Iranian media, according to Agence France-Presse. “There is no question of sending the stocks abroad.”
What is Iran's current breakout time?
Natural uranium has only 0.7 percent of the isotope U-235, and the effort required to enrich it to one SQ of WGU is about 5,000 Separative Work Units (SWUs). Iran currently has about 9,000 functioning first-generation IR-1 centrifuges, with another 9,000 not in operation. The IR-1s installed in the Natanz and Fordow facilities have been performing at an average per unit rate of 0.75 to 1 SWU per year. Using the 1 SWU/year performance of the latest IR-1 model, the breakout time with 9,000 machines using a natural uranium feed would be six to seven months. However, Iran also has substantial stocks of 3.5 percent enriched uranium hexafluoride (UF6) that can be used as an alternative feed, shrinking the breakout time to three months.
If Iran brought online its other nearly 9,000 IR-1s, breakout time would be about three months with natural uranium feedstock and four to six weeks with 3.5 percent UF6 feedstock. Iran has also developed the more advanced IR-2m centrifuge, rated at 5 SWU/year. If the 1,000 IR-2ms installed at Natanz were used in conjunction with all 18,000 IR-1s, the respective breakout times would be cut by a third.
According to media accounts, the proposed nuclear agreement would lower the number of operating centrifuges to around 6,500. In that circumstance, what would Iran's breakout time be?
Using IR-1s with natural uranium as a feed, the breakout time for 6,500 centrifuges would be about nine months. A crucial question will be how much 3.5 percent enriched UF6 will remain in Iran. Yet even if UF6 stocks are reduced from their current 7.5-8 tons to 500 kg, a breakout time of between seven and eight months would still be possible given the program's enrichment capabilities with natural uranium feed. Since these breakout times are less than the goals set by the U.S. administration, it is important to know what parameters Washington used for its estimates.So everyone other than the Obama administration has figured out that this is a bad deal? What could go wrong?
Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, centrifuges, enriched uranium, Iranian nuclear threat, P 5+1, uranium enrichment
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 5:06 PM
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