Plan to Inject Gas Into Advanced Centrifuges

Spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran Behrouz Kamalvandi announced that the country plans to inject uranium gas into its latest generation of centrifuge machines, IR8, in the near future.

"The IR8 tests have come to an end and they will go into the stage of gas injection in the next few weeks," Kamalvandi told reporters in a press conference in Tehran on Tuesday, Fars News Agency reported.

The gas injection into the IR8 will be carried out based on last year's nuclear deal between Iran and major powers, which allows research activities on the latest generation of Iran's centrifuge machines, known as the IR8.

Kamalvandi also referred to the meeting of Joint Commission of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the formal name of the nuclear deal) due to be held on January 10 and said, "One or two days before this date, we will have technical discussions and the Americans will participate with the same old team [under the Barack Obama administration] … and different issues, including redesigning of Arak [heavy water] reactor, should be discussed in that meeting."

Asked about the result of Iran's discussions with International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Yukiya Amano last weekend on Tehran's decision to manufacture nuclear propulsion systems for marine transportation, Kamalvandi said, "Amano said it is not a violation [of the JCPOA] and he asked about the type of the propulsion system and Iran's goals and wanted to know the level of enrichment [of the nuclear fuel] for this purpose."

Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi had announced in August 2015 plans to produce the required fuel for five to six nuclear reactors using its IR8 centrifuges in the next 15 years.

"Most countries' development plans are for 10 years, but we will probably present a 15-year nuclear development plan to the agency [IAEA], based on which Iran will be producing one million SWUs [Separative Work Unit] of nuclear fuel at the end of the program, which will be sufficient for running five to six nuclear reactors," Araqchi told a parliamentary meeting.

Araqchi also said that in accordance with JCPOA, Iran will restrict the manufacture of new machines for eight years, but after the eighth year and based on its plans, Iran will begin making IR6 and IR8 enrichment machines.