Managing spent fuel in the United States: The illogic of reprocessing (report on

Transcription

1 Managing spent fuel in the United States: The illogic of reprocessing (report on Frank von Hippel, Princeton University Co-chair, International Panel on Fissile Material Carnegie Endowment; Washington, DC; May 22, 2008

2 How it started: U.S. nuclear utilities wanted Department of Energy to start removing spent fuel from reactor sites and sued to recover their extra costs for storage since 1998 ($ billion/year) 2

3 2006: DOE proposed a program to subsidize construction of a reprocessing plant and fast-neutron reactors to fission transuranics (mostly plutonium). Would have cost $billions/year but would provided a place to ship spent fuel. LEU Fuel 100 water-cooled reactors $ billion/yr Spent LEU fuel storage Reprocessing plant would become centralized interim storage for radioactive wastes $20+ billion +$1+ billion/yr? Reprocessing Plant Transuranics Cs-137, Sr-90 storage ( years) Other radioactive waste Transuranics [Interim storage DOE style] Fuel fabrication plant(s) Reprocessing plant(s) Cs-137, Sr-90 storage ( years) Other radioactive waste MWe liquid sodium-cooled fastneutron reactors $ billion subsidy? 3

4 DOE now appears to have accepted AREVA s view that U.S. should separate & recycle plutonium once in mixed oxide (MOX) fuel and store the spent MOX fuel at the reprocessing plant -- as in France. It is cheaper and shifts the radioactive waste problem to a central site.. LEU Fuel Water-cooled reactors Spent LEU fuel storage MOX Fuel Spent MOX Fuel MOX Fuel fabrication plant plutonium Spent MOX fuel storage Reprocessing Plant Radioactive waste Centralized Interim storage, French style Doubled estimated disposal costs (Report to the Prime Minister, 2000) 4

5 Challenge is to reduce stocks -- not separate more! (Global stocks of separated plutonium, metric tons, end 2005, Global Fissile Material Report, 2007) Legacies of civilian reprocessing to fuel breeder reactors Being recycled To be recycled U.S. excess plutonium will cost >$10 B to dispose 5

6 Separated plutonium can be carried away easily. Spent fuel is self-protecting for more than a century. Separated plutonium PWR Spent fuel assembly (500 kg and 3.7 m long) 2.5 kg Pu in light-weight container. Can be processed in a glove box. 3-4 cans enough for Nagasaki-type bomb. (Mayak Reprocessing Plant, 2004) 5 kg Pu. Lethal dose in half hour at 1 meter 50 years after discharge. 20-ton container to transport & reprocessing behind thick walls to recover. 6

7 U.S. nonproliferation policy on reprocessing Since India used its first separated civilian plutonium to make a bomb in 1974, U.S. policy has been: We don t reprocess. You don t need to either. No additional non-weapon states have launched civilian reprocessing in the past 30 years and several have stopped. The new GNEP policy on reprocessing: The weapon states and Japan will do it for you. Negative reactions. Result has been to increase interest in reprocessing in South Korea at least. 7

8 Merchant Reprocessing has failed in any case Customer Countries that have not renewed their reprocessing contracts Nuclear generating capacity (billions of Watts ) Countries supplying the reprocessing service Armenia 0. 4 Russia Belgium 5. 8 Franc e Bulgaria 2. 7 Russia Czech Republic 2. 6 Russia Finland 2. 7 Russia Germany 20.3 France and UK Hungary 1. 7 Russia Slovak Republic 2. 5 Russia Spain 7. 6 France and UK Sweden 8. 9 France and UK Switzerland 3. 2 France and UK Ukraine 13.1 Russia Total 71.5 Only the Netherlands has renewed its reprocessing contract (one old, small reactor). Japan has built a domestic reprocessing plant. UK is quitting. AREVA is in trouble. 8

9 Spent fuel will have to be removed from reactor sites eventually. But no reason to panic. Only 5% of U.S. spent fuel is not at sites with operating reactors. All U.S. nuclear power plant sites can accommodate spent fuel from 60 years of operation. Dry cask storage is safe. Consequences of accidents and attacks would be orders of magnitude less than from attacks on reactors or storage pools. 9

10 Summary Reprocessing: Exchanges interim, on-site storage of self-protecting spentfuel for interim stockpiling of plutonium-containing material that is easily carried and from which plutonium could easily be separated. Cost much higher than on-site storage. Provides cover for countries to develop nuclear-weapon options. 10

11 Growing Skepticism in Congress June 2007: House Appropriations Committee Report on House FY08 Energy and Water Development Appropriations Bill, (Report , 11 June 2007, pp ) aggressive program proposed by the Department is at best premature. Embarking on a costly process leading to major new construction projects is unwise, particularly where there is no urgency. before the Department can expect the Committee to support funding for a major new initiative, the Department must provide a complete and credible estimate of the life-cycle costs of the program. 11

12 December 2007: Rush to build a U.S. reprocessing plant stopped by Congress DOE: Hoped by end of Bush Administration to let construction contracts for a reprocessing plant and a fastneutron reactor. Congress: no funds are provided for facility construction for technology demonstration or commercialization. --Statement accompanying FY2008 Appropriations bill 12