Variance and covariance calculations for nuclear materials accounting using ''PROFF''

To determine the detection sensitivity of a materials accounting system to the loss of Special Nuclear Material (SNM) requires (1) obtaining a relation for the variance of the materials balance by propagation of the instrument errors for those measured quantities that appear in the materials balance equation and (2) substituting measured values and their error standard deviations into this relation and calculating the variance of the materials balance. The authors have developed an interactive, menu-driven computer program, called PROFF (for PROcessing and Fuel Facilities), that considerably reduces the effort required to make the variance and covariance calculations needed to determine the detection sensitivity of a materials accounting system. PROFF is discussed in this paper.