2021-27836: Additional Protocol Regulations: Mandatory Electronic Submission of Reports Through the Additional Protocol Reporting System (APRS)

Summary

The Additional Protocol is an agreement between the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to allow monitoring and reporting of certain civil nuclear fuel cycle-related activities. The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) administers the Additional Protocol Regulations (APR), which implement the provisions of the Additional Protocol affecting U.S. industry and other U.S. persons engaged in certain civil nuclear fuel cycle-related activities that are not regulated by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), or its domestic Agreement States, and are not situated at certain U.S. government locations. The APR describe the requirement to report such activities to BIS, as well as the conduct of on-site activities in conjunction with IAEA complementary access to locations where such civil nuclear fuel cycle-related activities take place. This rule proposes to amend the APR to replace the existing manual reporting and processing procedures with a mandatory requirement to submit reports and other documents on-line through the Additional Protocol Reporting System (APRS). As a result of this proposed change, all persons and locations in the United States that are subject to the reporting requirements in the APR would be required to register on-line to set up an APRS account, submit reports and other documents to BIS via APRS, and maintain current user account information in APRS. This rule also proposes to amend the APR to clarify and update other requirements (e.g., by removing the provisions that address the Initial Report requirements for calendar year 2008, replacing the provisions that address Amended Report requirements, and revising the definitions of certain terms used in the APR).

The agency’s own summary, as published.

What this changes

Amends 6 parts of the Code of Federal Regulations — the standing rules this notice rewrites.

• 15 CFR 781 General Information and Overview of the Additional Protocol Regulations (APR)
• 15 CFR 782 General Information Regarding Reporting Requirements and Procedures
• 15 CFR 783 Civil Nuclear Fuel Cycle-Related Activities Not Involving Nuclear Materials
• 15 CFR 784 Complementary Access
• 15 CFR 785 Enforcement
• 15 CFR 786 Records and Recordkeeping