Plutonium

This book provides a readable and thought-provoking analysis of the issues surrounding nuclear fuel reprocessing and fast-neutron reactors, including discussion of resources, economics, radiological risk and resistance to nuclear proliferation. It describes the history and science behind reprocessing, and gives an overview of the status of reprocessing programmes around the world. It concludes that such programs should be discontinued.

While nuclear power is seen by many as the only realistic solution to the carbon emission problem, some national nuclear establishments have been pursuing development and deployment of sodium-cooled plutonium breeder reactors, and plutonium recycling. Its proponents argue that this system would offer significant advantages relative to current light water reactor technology in terms of greater uranium utilization efficiency, and that separating out the long-lived plutonium and other transuranics from spent fuel and fissioning them in fast reactors would greatly reduce the duration of the toxicity of radioactive waste. However, the history of efforts to deploy this system commercially in a number of countries over the last six decades has been one of economic and technical failure and, in some cases, was used to mask clandestine nuclear weapon development programs.

Covering topics of significant public interest including nuclear safety, fuel storage, environmental impact and the spectre of nuclear terrorism, this book presents a comprehensive analysis of the issue for nuclear engineers, policy analysts, government officials and the general public.

Auteur

Jungmin Kang is a member the International Panel on Fissile Materials and a consultant for Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security and the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington, DC. Kang received a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering from University of Tokyo, Japan, and M.S. and B.S. degrees in nuclear engineering from Seoul National University, South Korea. Kang worked in Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security in 1998-2000 and Center for International Security and Cooperation, Stanford University in 2006-2008. Kang was a senior research fellow at the Natural Resources Defense Council in 2015-2017. Previously, Kang spent four years at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in Daejeon, South Korea, as a visiting professor. During 2018, Kang served as the Chairman of South Korea's Nuclear Safety and Security Commission.

Frank von Hippel is Senior Research Physicist and Professor of Public and International Affairs emeritus at Princeton University. He has a Ph.D. in nuclear physics (1962) from Oxford University. He co-founded Princeton's Program on Science and Global Security and was founding co-chair of the International Panel on Fissile Materials from 2006-14. During 1993-4, he served as Assistant Director for National Security in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. In 1993, he received the MacArthur Foundation's genius award and, in 2010, the American Physical Society's Leo Szilard Award for his outstanding work and leadership in using physics to illuminate public policy in the areas of nuclear arms control and nonproliferation, nuclear energy, and energy efficiency." He has worked on fissile material policy issues for over forty years.

Masafumi Takubo is a self-taught, Tokyo-based writer on nuclear-policy issues. He is a member the International Panel on Fissile Materials and a consultant for Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security. He set up the Kakujoho.net (Nuclear Information) website in 2005 to provide Japanese policy makers, journalists and citizens, with timely, in-depth analysis and research tools related to nuclear issues. He publishes in several Japanese magazines, and taught a course on Peace Studies at Hosei University in Tokyo, Japan. Since 1975 he has worked with Gensuikin, the Japan Congress against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs, in various capacities and helped organize numerous international conferences.

Contenu

OVERVIEW

1. Overview

Dreams of plutonium breeder reactors Downsides of breeders

Much more uranium found and demand growth much lower than projections

Reprocessing spent power-reactor fuel

A wake-up call from India's nuclear test

Plutonium fuel for light-water reactors

Reprocessing for radioactive-waste management?

The nightmares

THE DREAM

2. The dream: a future powered by plutonium

Dual-purpose reactors

How plutonium is made

­Light-water reactors and uranium enrichment

Plutonium breeder reactors

THE NIGHTMARES

3. Civilian plutonium separation and nuclear-weapon proliferation Nuclear-weapon proliferation

The wake-up call of Smiling Buddha

The Carter administration's review of the US breeder-reactor program

Electricity consumption growth slows and nuclear power stalls

Fading of the breeder dream

Legacies of the failed breeder-reactor dream

4. Continuation of plutonium separation without breeder reactors

France: Recycling plutonium in light-water reactors

United Kingdom: A reprocessing program finally winding down

Japan: The only non-nuclear-armed country with a reprocessing program

Russia: Continuing breeder reactor development

Weapon-usability of reactor-grade plutonium

The persistence of civilian reprocessing

5. A much worse accident that almost happened in Fukushima: A fire in a dense-packed spent fuel pool

Concerns about fires in spent-fuel pools

Land contamination by cesium-137

Regulatory considerations in the United States

Potential impacts from spent-fuel-pool fires in South Korea

A PATH FORWARD

6. Early dry-cask storage: A safer alternative to dense-packed pools and reprocessing

Dry storage

Cost advantages

Safety advantages

Central storage

How long can dry storage endure?

Transport

Conclusions

7. Deep disposal of spent fuel without reprocessing

Reprocessing and proliferation

The modest environmental hazard from plutonium in a spent-fuel repository

Can reprocessing significantly reduce the size of a radioactive-waste repository?

Hazards of reprocessing

Conclusions

8. The case for a ban on reprocessing

A Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty

Attempts to limit stocks of civilian plutonium

Parallel efforts to limit HEU use

A ban on plutonium separation

Bibliography

Index