A. ANA DC Days Update

From May 7-10 members and affiliates of the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability gathered in Washington DC to meet with elected and administration officials to discuss a wide range of nuclear weapons and waste policy issues. In addition to a Russian delegation from the Movement for Nuclear Safety, several activist groups from Georgia and South Carolina were also represented and made visits to their Congressional delegations to discuss MOX.

Anti-MOX activists and members of the Russian delegation met with Laura Holgate, head of the Office of Fissile Materials Disposition. Some highlights from that meeting:

• The US-Russian agreement on plutonium disposition is scheduled to be released at the June 4-5 Clinton-Putin summit. Each side will disposition 34 metric tons of plutonium at a rate of about 2 metric tons per year and will use two technologies: MOX and immobilization. It is up to each country to decide how much plutonium will be dispositioned under each track. Under current plans, the US will use MOX for 25 tons of plutonium and immobilization for 9 tons. Russia will use MOX for 33 tons of plutonium and immobilization for one ton.

• On the Russian side, where disposition rate has been a concern, the 2 metric tons per year rate would possibly be met by using 100% MOX cores in the BN-600 reactor or using reactors in the Ukraine.

• She said that Russia has "stopped fighting us" on the nine tons slated for immobilization in the first phase of the US program, but they still feel immobilization creates a "plutonium mine" that can be used in the future.

• The agreement would prohibit reprocessing of MOX fuel, but *only during the course of the disposition program.*

• After the first year of the disposition program, an "expansion plan" would come into play that would increase the disposition rate in each country (in parity). This is when additional reactor capacity might be sought by the US (meaning they would look for reactors to replace the Virginia Power reactors). The choice of utility would be up to the MOX consortium, Duke-Cogema-Stone and Webster. Holgate said she did not expect there to be an EIS process associated with this program expansion.

• DOE does not feel that weapons plutonium MOX in light water reactors is significantly different from commercial-grade plutonium MOX. Consequently, the computer codes DOE will be using to analyze weapons plutonium MOX performance in reactors will be those from French reactors using commercial MOX fuel.

• The Russian Parallex shipment to Canada will probably take place in June. DOE has no say or apparent opinion about how it is transported to the US (that is, if it is shipped by air it is not their concern - they have given this part of the Parallex project over entirely to Atomic Energy of Canada, Ltd. - AECL).

• A comprehensive life-cycle cost study of plutonium disposition in Russia will be available in a few weeks on the web or hard copy or both. Holgate stressed this is just a beginning point and does not identify funding sources. Current estimate is the Russian program will cost $1.7 to $2.5 billion. [Note: It is likely we will see funding proposals for Russian MOX delivered at the meeting of the G-8 in July.]

• US funding for safety upgrades of VVER 1000s will only cover modifications to bring the reactors up to Russian safety standards, not US standards. Those modifications are covered in the cost estimate above.

B. NGO Proposal Suggests Alternative to MOX

The Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (Takoma Park, MD) has drafted an "Alternative Plutonium Disposition Plan" in conjunction with several other anti-MOX organizations and individuals which will be released just before the Clinton-Putin summit in early June.

Key provisions include:

• Disposition of both surplus weapons plutonium and commercial plutonium in the US and Russia using immobilization technologies in each country.

• A halt to commercial reprocessing.

• Storage of immobilized plutonium in each country under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards.

• Lease or purchase of Russian plutonium by the West.

For more information and to obtain a full copy of the proposal or to sign on, contact Michele Boyd at IEER, michele@ieer.org, phone: 301-270-5500. SIGN-ONS ARE REQUESTED BEFORE THE JUNE 4-5 SUMMIT.

A. BNFL Update

Continued fallout from a series of management and safety crises at British Nuclear Fuels, Ltd. have kept the company in the news over the last month. Highlights in brief:

• "The Mirror" reported on May 5th that several BNFL executives who were fired in the wake of severe management scandals will be awarded "six-figure" bonuses upon their departure. Six other non-executive directors who will leave BNFL when their contracts expire will not be offered remuneration, according to a BNFL spokesman.

• On May 8th, DOE Secretary Bill Richardson announced that he is terminating a contract with BNFL for a high-level waste vitrification project in Hanford, Washington after BNFL increased its estimated cost for the program from $6.1 billion to $15.2 billion. In unusually harsh language, Richardson described BNFL's proposal as "outrageously expensive and inadequate in many ways." DOE still must pay BNFL $200 to $300 million for costs already incurred under the contract. Not surprisingly, BNFL is considering submitting a new bid: its US-based contracts must increase 15% before it can be approved for partial privatization in the UK.

• On May 10th BNFL's biggest reprocessing customer, British Energy, demanded a £2.6 billion reduction in its existing reprocessing contracts with the company. British Energy would like to switch to a plan of fuel storage, calling reprocessing "economic nonsense that should stop straight away."

(Thanks to David Lowry, Pete Roche of Greenpeace UK, and Lynn Sims of Hanford Watch for background stories and information.)

C. Cogema's Growing Plutonium Stocks

A report by the Paris-based World Information Service on Energy (WISE) released on May 2nd said that only a small amount of plutonium separated from spent fuel in France is actually fabricated into MOX fuel, resulting in an ever-growing stockpile of separated plutonium. The findings showed that less than half of the plutonium and no more than 10 per cent of the uranium separated from spent fuel at Cogema's reprocessing plants at La Hague and Marcoule is being re-used in reactors. The national stockpile of plutonium in France was over 40 metric tons at the end of 1998. The report was commissioned by Greenpeace France.

Copies of the entire 23-page report (in French) are available on the WISE-Paris website, . For a summary (in English) of the main findings of the report, see www.pu-investigation.org/listing/U-PuReport-Concl.html.

(Thanks to Mycle Schneider of WISE-Paris for this information.)

A. US-Russian Agreement Finally Completed?

The long-awaited US-Russian agreement on plutonium disposition is likely to be released when Presidents Clinton and Putin meet in Moscow June 4th and 5th (though we've seen such deadlines come and go before). See item #IA above for details on what DOE says we can expect to find in it.

Activists will be releasing an alternative plan just before the summit that calls for an immobilization-only plan in both countries among other provisions (see #IB above). Though the agreement is key to allowing the US and Russian disposition programs to move forward, it will not come with money attached to make it all possible. Funding proposals for the Russian disposition (MOX) program are expected to be presented at the meeting of the G-8 in July.

B. NRC News

(Thanks to Stephanie Broughton of WAND for this write-up.)

On May 9, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) held a public meeting at their headquarters in White Flint Maryland to discuss comments received on its Draft Standard Review Plan for construction of a MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility (NUREG 1718). As mentioned in last month's NIX MOX Bulletin, NUREG 1718 establishes criteria by which safety provisions in a license application for a MOX fabrication plant will be evaluated.

Several important points came out of this meeting, including an timeline for DOE process on the MOX Fuel Fabrication Plant at the Savannah River Site:

• The second draft of NUREG 1718 will come out at the end of June and the NRC is considering holding public meetings near the Savannah River Site (where the plant will be built), as has been requested by several anti-MOX organizations.

• The MOX Consortium (Duke-Cogema-Stone & Webster) will submit a "construction authorization request" (CRA) near the end of 2000. This appears to be the initial stage of their license application for the MOX plant at the Savannah River plant (SRS).

• Also at that time, the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) process on the MOX facility would begin with the "scoping" stage. It is expected to take two years before a final EIS is issued.

With regard to the other facilities planned for SRS (pit disassembly & conversion facility and the immobilization facility) and modifications to the Duke reactors, NRC noted that the EIS process was concluded with the Record of Decision issued earlier this year. Because the EIS will not be re-opened in the absence of "significant" new information, the only avenue for public hearings on these facilities will be the license amendment procedure for the Duke reactors that will use MOX fuel.

Of note: During ANA's DC Days (See item IA above), several activists met with Richard Meserve, Chair of the NRC, and asked about reactor-community hearings on MOX. He said if an EIS is required (which during the May 9th meeting they said was unlikely), they would hold public meetings, but otherwise they would not. However, in meetings with DOE one day later, activists were assured by officials that they firmly believed the NRC would be holding such hearings. It appears the public process battle is just beginning.

For a transcript of the NUREG 1718 public meeting, go to the NRC Public Electronic Reading Room at www.nrc.gov/NRC/ADAMS/index.html and link to "ADAMS" (Agencywide Documents Access and Management System). The transcript accession number is: ML003715630.

Paper copies are available for a fee from the NRC's Public Document Room (2120 L St. NW, Washington, DC). Contact:

Phone: 1-800-397-4209 (or 202-634-3273); fax: 202-634-3343
email: pdr@nrc.gov
US Mail: USNRC, PDR, LL-6, Washington DC, 20555

(Thanks to Tom Clements of Nuclear Control Institute and Kathy Crandall of ANA for this information.)

C. PDCF Off to a Troubled Start

The Pit Disassembly and Conversion Facility (PDCF) to be built at SRS that would convert plutonium pits to an oxide form that can be fabricated into MOX pellets is currently in the design phase but is already falling behind schedule. Months into the project, contractual roles and responsibilities are still in an undefined, confused state, repeating a DOE pattern that has not infrequently driven costs up and compromised safety and sound engineering.

One unresolved issue is a decision on which type of filter to use on the plant to prevent off-site releases -- a sand filter or a HEPA (High Efficiency Particulate Air) filter. The HEPA filter is cheaper, but may not perform well if there were heavy smoke from a fire in the facility. Andre Cygelman, director of materials and immobilization in DOE's Office of Fissile Materials Disposition said that current tests are looking at ways to keep excessive smoke away from the filters, thus preventing their failure. It remains unclear how this would actually prevent releases of airborne radionuclides.

The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) fears there will be "safety implications" resulting from a combination of management shortcomings, among them: designing a facility before the technology is fully tested (an old DOE favorite), and accelerating facility design, thus compromising safety.

For more information, see the DNFSB Weekly Site report for SRS, 3/31/00, on the web at: www.dnfsb.gov/weekly/sr/sr2000.htm.

D. More Reprocessing at SRS

(Thanks to Tom Clements of NCI for this write-up.)

SRS is primed and ready to begin reprocessing of materials containing plutonium -- Mark 42 targets (.04 metric tons) and fuel from DOE's Experimental Breeder Reactor II (16.7 metric tons). (EBR II is a now-closed experimental plutonium breeder reactor located at the Argonne Lab facility in Idaho.) When reprocessed in the F-Canyon reprocessing building, DOE estimates that 114 kg of plutonium would result, with the material being converted to metal and stockpiled for use in the plutonium disposition program.

For more information, contact Nuclear Control Institute, 202-822-8444, or visit the NCI website, www.nci.org/nci.

A. Newsletters of Note

1. Radioactive Waste News
   Quarterly summary of generation, transportation, storage and disposal issues from the National Conference of State Legislatures. To get on the mailing list write a request to: Radioactive Waste News, National Conference of State Legislatures, Suite 700, 1560 Broadway, Denver, Colorado 80202 or call 303-830-2200.

2. The May issue of the Uranium Enrichment Newsletter has been posted at www.earthisland.org/yggdrasil.

3. IEER Science for Democratic Action Newsletter on "Energy for Peace."
   Covers waste transmutation, nuclear power issues (waste, Cold War propaganda, etc.), comparison of nuclear power to fossil fuels and renewables, special "Atomic Puzzler." See www.ieer.org/sdafiles/vol_8/8-3/index.html or contact IEER at 301-270-5500 for a hard copy.

4. Physicians for Social Responsibility: PSR Monitor on MOX.
   Contact Kimberly Roberts at the PSR national office, kroberts@psr.org, 202-898-0150.

B. Other Announcements

1. To receive emails from the NRC on MOX facility licensing announcements, contact Amy Bryce and ask to be put on her email list. Her email: ALB2@nrc.gov.

2. Summer Camp for Activists!
   The Nuclear Free Great Lakes Campaign will hold its Second Annual Activists Action Camp August 20-26. This year's theme: "Organize to End the Nuclear Age!"

   The focus of the Camp will be on: 1) teaching energy issues to build a movement to create a sustainable energy future for the Great Lakes Basin, and 2.) developing activist skills in areas such as direct action/non-violence training; media; fundraising, community organizing.

   The Camp will begin with a rally in Kalamazoo, MI, hold a demo and caravan at the Cook Reactors, and conclude with a nonviolent/direct action at the troubled Palisades reactor near Covert, MI.

   For more information contact Dave Kraft, Director, Nuclear Energy Information Service: phone: 847-869-7650, fax: 847-869-7658, email: neis@forward.net, web: www.neis.org.

   ---

   See Nix MOX Bulletin Board for:
   April 29, 2000
   March 22, 2000

   Return to Nix MOX Bulletin Board Index

   ---

   The MOX BULLETIN BOARD is compiled by Women's Action for New Directions (WAND) Education Fund. For comments, suggestions, or to add or remove names from this distribution list, contact Pat Ortmeyer, WAND Field Director for Nuclear Waste Issues, at port@bigsky.net or 406-327- 0785. Feel free to forward this bulletin, and please include acknowledgment of WAND.