Year
2001
Abstract
In September 2000, the U.S. and Russia signed an agreement committing each nation to disposing of 34 metric tons (MT) of surplus weapons-grade plutonium (WG-Pu) at an initial rate of 2 MT per year, commencing in 2007. According to the agreement, on the U.S. side, 25.6 MT of WG-Pu would be fabricated into mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel and irradiated, and 8.4 MT would be immobilized in a ceramic form and disposed of in canisters containing vitrified high-level radioactive wastes (HLW) at the Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF) at the Savannah River Site (SRS). On the Russian side, MOX fuel use (in both light-water and fast reactors) was the only designated option. The proposed utilization in the U.S. of both MOX and \"can-in-canister\" (CIC) immobilization in the Agreement conformed to the U.S. policy that a \"dual-track\" be instituted to ensure the availability of at least one disposition method. However, the Bush Administration has decided to indefinitely suspend development of immobilization in the U.S. and has ordered the dismantlement of the Plutonium Ceramification Test Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), which was to have tested the process for incorporating WG-Pu into ceramic pucks. Unless reversed by Congress, this foolish decision will effectively terminate development of a promising plutonium disposition technology with significant benefits from the standpoint of cost and non-proliferation, and will probably result in a significant delay in implementation of the U.S.-Russian agreement.