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Key Topics
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Nuclear Materials
Regulated Materials
- Special nuclear material
- consists of uranium-233 or uranium-235, enriched uranium, or plutonium
- Source material - natural uranium
or thorium, or depleted uranium that is not suitable for use as reactor fuel
- Byproduct material - generally,
nuclear material (other than special nuclear material) that is produced or
made radioactive in a nuclear reactor. Also the tailings and waste produced
by extraction or concentration of uranium or thorium from an ore processed
primarily for its source material content.
NRC does not regulate all nuclear material. See Who
Regulates Radioactive Materials and Radiation Exposure for details.
For general information, see the How
We Regulate page. For details, see the following:
Responsibilities
The Office of Nuclear
Material Safety and Safeguards has overall responsibility for NRC's materials
program and NRC's Regional Offices (Region
I - Northeast, Region
II - Southeast, Region
III - Midwest, and Region
IV - West/Southwest) implement these programs in the states for which
they are responsible. Materials regulation is also supported by a Nuclear
Materials Safety Research program and by independent advice from the Advisory
Committee on Medical Uses of Isotopes.
Of the over 20,000 active source, byproduct, and special nuclear materials
licenses in place in the United States, about a quarter are administered
by NRC; the rest are administered by the 32 Agreement states.
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