Fuel cycle

Russia prepares to bring spent fuel from Hungary

2008-09-08T20:59:43Z

Bellona reports that Rostechnadzor announced today its approval of a spent fuel shipment from Hungary. Spent fuel of the VVR-SM research reactor in Budapest is expected to be brought to Russia later this year. It is not clear if the reactor is being shut down or converted to LEU fuel.

U.S. withdraws 123 agreement with Russia from Congress

2008-09-08T19:14:41Z

The Bush administration decided to withdraw the agreement on civilian nuclear cooperation (123 agreement) with Russia from Congress. This move was expected and may, in fact, help the agreement in the long run - it did not have a chance to come into force during this congressional session anyway.

NSG approves nuclear trade with India

2008-09-06T14:58:16Z

The Nuclear Suppliers Group approved a Statement on Nuclear Cooperation with India (armscontrolwonk.com has a discussion of earlier drafts), which lifts restrictions from nuclear trade with the country. The approval was part of the U.S.-India nuclear deal process. To begin nuclear trade with India, the United States would now need to get the 123 agreement with India to be approved by Congress. Other countries, however, do not depend on the U.S. Congress approval. Earlier, countries like Russia and France expressed interest in exporting their nuclear technologies to India.

Bushehr reactor will not start in 2008

2008-09-04T16:14:24Z

The power reactor in Bushehr will not be ready to begin operations in 2008, as it was planned. After a visit of a high-level delegation of Atomstroyexport to Bushehr, Iran announced that the reactor would start in 2009.

UPDATE 09/08/08: Atomstroyexport projects that the launch of the reactor is unlikely to happen before March 2009.

Last Russian plutonium production reactor to shut down in 2009

2008-09-04T14:32:11Z

The last Russia's plutonium production reactor, ADE-2 in Zheleznogorsk, will indeed be shut down earlier than it was originally planned (in 2010). Construction of the replacement heat-generating plant in Zheleznogorsk is expected to be completed in the fall of 2009, after which Rosatom would shut down the ADE-2 reactor. The construction of the plant is financed by the United States. Sergey Kiriyenko, the head of Rosatom, said that if the U.S. financing is delayed, the reactor would continue to operate producing weapon-grade plutonium. According to Kiriyenko, Rosatom is spending about 1 billion rubles ($40 million) a year to keep the reactor in operation.

Rosatom plans for Zheleznogorsk

2008-09-04T14:18:41Z

During his visit to Zheleznogorsk, Sergey Kiriyenko, the head of Rosatom, announced the plans to build a large spent fuel storage and reprocessing hub in Zheleznogorsk.

The first part of the plan includes completion of the spent fuel storage facilities there. The pool storage, is expected to be filled to its current capacity of 6,000 tonnes of heavy metal (MTHM) sometime next year. The facility will be expanded to bring its capacity to 8,600 MTHM in 2009-2010. After 2015 the capacity would be increased to 11,000 MTHM, which is expected to satisfy the demand in spent fuel storage capacity through 2025.

Construction of the first stage of the dry storage, which encountered some problems earlier this year, is expected to be done in the first half of 2010. The facility is scheduled to reach its (unspecified) full capacity by 2015.

By 2015 Rosatom plans to create in Zheleznogorsk a "technology demonstration center", which would apparently include a pilot-scale reprocessing facility. The technologies developed by the center would then be used in a new large-scale reprocessing plant that would be built in 2020-2025.

In addition to this, Zheleznogorsk has been chosen as a place for a MOX fuel fabrication facility (Mayak was hoping to get this project). The plant is expected to begin initial operations in 2012. (Some reports indicate that the facility would produce MOX fuel pellets only.)

USEC American Centrifuge Plant to cost $3.5 billion

2008-09-03T18:10:41Z

USEC has estimated that its American Centrifuge Plant project would cost $3.5 billion. The lead cascade of the plant being built in Piketon, Ohio, will consist of 50 AC100 machines. The cascade is expected to be operational by the end of the first quarter of 2009.

Construction of spent fuel storage facility in Zheleznogorsk to resume

2008-08-29T08:32:18Z

In April 2008, Spetsstroy, the company that was building the spent fuel storage facility in Zheleznogorsk, suspended the construction citing financial dispute with Rosatom. Rosatom responded by launching a tender for the completion of the project. This week, the contract was awarded to the "Gruppa E4" (Group E4) company.

Group E4 will build dry storage for spent fuel of RBMK-1000 and VVER reactors at the cost of 9.5 billion rubles (about $390 million). It will also upgrade the existing pool storage facility that contains VVER-1000 reactor fuel. The cost of this project is 420.5 million rubles (about $17 million).

123 agreement in danger

2008-08-28T18:26:21Z

The 123 agreement on civilian nuclear cooperation between the United States and Russia was in trouble from the very beginning - the Bush administration got the timing wrong (here is an CRS report with a detailed analysis of the statutory requirements). Now the administration is saying that it is considering scrapping the agreement altogether. Which may be a good thing, in fact - this way Congress would not get a chance to pass a resolution of disapproval, which would complicate any future attempts to reintroduce the agreement.

No centrifuge safeguards in Angarsk

2008-08-27T17:53:32Z

As it turns out, Russia has no plans to offer the enrichment facility in Angarsk to IAEA safeguards. According to a presentation of Alexey Grigoryev, the Director of the International Uranium Enrichment Center, the Angarsk Electrolysis Chemical Combine will remain under exclusive control of Rosatom (through it's daughter company Atomenrgoprom). The International Center that Russia is creating in Angarsk would simply outsource the enrichment work to the Combine. So, the promise to place the Center under safeguards is still there, but the only facility that IAEA would get to safeguard is a storage of UF6 containers.

Rosatom took control over nuclear icebreakers

2008-08-27T11:18:38Z

One of Rosatom's subsidiaries, Atomflot, formally took control over nuclear icebreaker fleet (and auxiliary ships) from the Murmansk Shipping Company. This is probably a positive development - refueling of icebreaker reactors require regular shipments of fresh HEU fuel (see discussion of the icebreaker fleet in Oleg Bukharin's paper). Now that the entire operation is under Rosatom control, it could (in theory at least) make it safer.

Ukraine considers fuel fabrication

2008-08-20T18:47:19Z

Ukraine continues to diversify its nuclear fuel supply sources. This time it is considering building a fuel fabrication facility, which would be part of a concern "Nuclear Fuel of Ukraine".

UAE supports NTI fuel bank

2008-08-07T12:42:21Z

As reported by TotalWonkerr. UAE's $10 million adds to previous contributions from Norway ($5 million) and the United States ($50 million). It is $35 million to go to meet the goal of $100 million, which is a condition of releasing the $50 million pledged by Warren Buffet in September 2006.

MOX fuel controversy

2008-08-05T12:27:02Z

The plan to burn 34 MT of excess weapon-grade plutonium in civilian power reactors may be delayed. The MOX fuel manufacturer, Areva, terminated the test of its fuel assemblies that was underway at the Catawba power plant. According to an account of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Areva would have to begin the tests anew, causing significant delays and cost overruns. Areva, naturally, disputes the need to repeat the tests.

U.S. donates $50 million to fuel bank

2008-08-04T12:48:44Z

DoE announced that it donates $50 million to the IAEA fuel bank project supported by NTI. This contribution would go toward the $100 million that is necessary to release the $50 million pledged to the fuel bank by Warren Buffet. Previously, Norway committed $5 million to the bank.