Dr. Sulgiye Park: From Crust to Core: Analyzing North Korea’s Fissile Material and Strategic Resource Production
Join the Berkeley Risk and Security Lab for a research seminar about the latest in forecasting North Korea’s nuclear weapons production capabilities.
Tuesday, March 17 2026, 1:00-2:30pm PT
Dr. Sulgiye Park will discuss her research on North Korea’s production of critical materials for its nuclear weapons program. Combining satellite imagery, geological analysis, and technical assessment, she provides new, open-source intelligence on North Korea’s fissile material and nuclear weapons production capabilities. Her findings contribute to improved forecasting of future nuclear risks.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s recent remarks highlighting the goal of exponentially increasing North Korea’s nuclear weapons arsenal underscore the regime’s aggressive pursuit of advanced nuclear capabilities. This growing threat poses a critical concern for global security, particularly amid escalating geopolitical tensions and the burgeoning military cooperation between Russia and North Korea. This study utilizes an integrated methodology, combining satellite imagery, geological analysis, and technical assessments, to evaluate North Korea’s fissile material production capacity and strategic resources availability necessary to fulfill its nuclear ambitions. By examining the evolving state of North Korea’s plutonium production and uranium enrichment capacities, as well as its efficiency of mining operations and critical metal reserves, this research provides key insights into the country’s potential for sustained nuclear development, highlighting how control over strategic resources remains a pivotal factor in North Korea’s pursuit of military development and geopolitical leverage.
Dr. Sulgiye Park is a Research Scholar at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at Stanford University, where she studies nuclear fuel-cycle pathways, with a focus on North Korea, Iran and China. She earned her Ph.D. in Geological Sciences from Stanford University, researching nuclear materials in extreme environments. As a Stanton and MacArthur Fellow at CISAC, her work has included geologic analyses of uranium and critical-metal resources, fissile-material production pathways, nuclear waste governance, and U.S. critical-mineral supply chains.