Iran has been utilizing gas centrifuge enrichment to obtain nuclear fuel, where uranium hexafluoride gas is spun in cylindrical chambers at very high speeds. These chambers are called centrifuges, and they are connected to each other like a chain. The chain system is known as a cascade.The target of the UN, US and other major Western powers for its nuclear program for years, Iran announced on April 8, 2006, that it had managed to operate 164 centrifuges successfully at its Natanz enrichment plant and reached 3.5 percent enrichment, which was a major technological breakthrough. For this reason April 8 was declared National Day of Technology in Iran.
Following this breakthrough Iran claimed last year that it had achieved industrial-scale enrichment. Speaking on the first anniversary of the launch of the 164 centrifuges, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Iran had successfully joined the club of countries with industrial-level nuclear enrichment, reiterating once more that Iran would continue to develop its nuclear program and that the world powers could not stop Iran's nuclear drive.
The head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, Gholam Reza Aghazadeh, speaking on the same anniversary, elaborated on what Iran had achieved and what its future plans were.
''We are gathered here today to celebrate the entry of the uranium enrichment project to an industrial level. Now we are entering the mass production of centrifuges and starting to launch industrial-scale enrichment, another step toward the flourishing of Islamic Iran. When we say we have entered industrial-scale enrichment, it means there is no turning back. Installation of centrifuges will continue steadily to reach a stage where all 50,000 centrifuges are launched,'' he said.
As promised by both Ahmadinejad and Aghazadeh, Iran continues to expand its nuclear program and is adding new centrifuges to the existing 3,000 at Natanz. This fact was made public by Ahmadinejad this week while celebrating the National Day of Technology in Natanz. The president announced that Iran had started installing 6,000 new centrifuges at the site. What type of centrifuges the president was talking about is, of course, unknown.
The workhorse of Iran's enrichment program is the P-1 centrifuge, which is run in cascades of 164 machines. However, Iranian officials confirmed in February that they had started using the IR-2 centrifuge, which can produce enriched uranium at more than double the rate of the P-1. Iranian sources didn't say if the installation of the 6,000 new centrifuges included the older P-1 or the advanced IR-2 centrifuges.
In this regard it is reported that diplomats linked to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, told new agencies that Iran has assembled hundreds of advanced centrifuges at Natanz. One diplomat said more than 300 of the centrifuges have been linked up in two separate units and that a third was being assembled. He noted that the machines apparently are more advanced than the thousands already running, implying that they could be the advanced IR-2 centrifuges.
Of course at this stage no one can definitively say at what stage the enrichment program is or what type of centrifuge Iran is installing, but Iran's nuclear achievements to this point suggest strongly that it is advancing in the enrichment process, with new strides focused mainly on new, advanced centrifuges.
Iran defies the UN, US and the rest, withstands sanctions and at same time advances in its nuclear program. That is quite an achievement, to say the least.
