Argentina is a signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), has signed and ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), being one of the 44 listed countries needed to sign and ratify for the CTBT to enter into force.

Argentina operates two reactors: Embalse and Atucha 1. Officially a second reactor is under construction at Atucha and in 2003 plans for completing the 692 MWe Atucha-2 reactor were presented to the government. The Siemens design of the Atucha PHWR units is unique to Argentina, and NASA was seeking expertise from Germany, Spain and Brazil to complete the unit for some US$400 million. However, the reactor has been officially under construction for 24 years and no clear completion date is available.

In August 2006 the government announced a US$3.5 billion strategic plan for the country's nuclear power sector. This involves completing Atucha-2 and extending the life of Atucha-1 and Embalse. Extending the life of the Embalse CANDU-6 type plant by 25 years in partnership with Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd is expected to cost $400 million, and producing the heavy water for Atucha-2 $200 million. Meanwhile, a feasibility study on a fourth reactor will be undertaken, to start construction after 2010, and US$2 billion has been projected for this.

From the 1960's Argentina was developing a nuclear weapons programme in response to that in Brazil. A gaseous diffusion enrichment plant was built. Construction of reprocessing facilities was pursued for some years, but was suspended in 1990.

A number of sites and facilities were developed for uranium mining, milling, and conversion, and for fuel fabrication. A missile development program was pursued for some years. Argentina's nuclear program was supported by a number of countries: power reactors were supplied by Canada and West Germany, a heavy water plant was supplied by Switzerland, and the Soviet Union was another supplier of nuclear equipment. Hot cells operated from 1969-1972, with no international safeguards; figures on the amount of spent fuel treated in the hot cells vary greatly.

In 1990 Argentina agreed to establish a bilateral inspection agency with Brazil to place both countries' nuclear material and facilities under their mutual supervision and ensure they were being used only for peaceful purposes, and they both signed a comprehensive safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

In 1993 Argentina became a member of the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean (the Tlatelolco Treaty).

Read the profile on Argentina from the Model Nuclear Inventory (pdf), produced by the Reaching Critical Will project of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.