Return to sender – more nuclear waste is on its way back to Japan

• energy
• Japan

By Camilla Lie JenssenFeb 1st, 2010

Source: BBC News

The UK is about to send it’s first shipment of nuclear waste back to where it first came from – Japan. This is not the first batch to reach Japanese shores. Since 1995, 12 shipments of nuclear waste originating in Japan have already been returned from facilities in France. The UK shipment is due to arrive in Japan before the end of March, where there are already local storage facilities in place. The UK plant, Sellafield, is not only fulfilling contractual obligations from the 1970’s, but is returning the nuclear waste in accordance with international policy.

The waste is from Japanese power plants during the 80’s and 90’s. The wasted fuel rods were sent for reprocessing at the UK facility. Reprocessing nuclear waste is a way of extracting Uranium and Plutonium, which can be reused as new nuclear rods. The wasted fuel rods are first broken down and dissolved in acid, which is where the Plutonium and Uranium are extracted. The radioactive “leftover” is then stored as liquid waste for years, and eventually solidified into nuclear glass stored in large steel canisters. At Sellafield, these canisters are kept in the floor of a vast warehouse with 2meter thick concrete lids and 3 meter thick walls sealing the radioactive waste.

UK and France are the only countries currently reprocessing nuclear waste. However, the process of repossessing nuclear waste is scheduled to stop, which is counter intuitive considering the scarce natural occurrence of these materials. The complex process of shipping highly radioactive materials to the other side of the world, and then back again, also doesn’t entirely seem to add up from a sustainability point of view.

The shipment on its way to Japan now contains 28 steel canisters, sealed in a custom-made 113tonne steel storage flask. Even though the steel is 25cm thick, the heat generated by the waste can be felt from several meters away from the flask.

The complicated process, efforts and danger involved in dealing with nuclear waste is clear evidence that the energy we use is not an “invisible” resource that once used as hours of using hairdryers, watching TV or making toast, goes away. As individuals we need to take increasing responsibility of the energy we use and realise that it is precious.

Visible and invisible resources are scarce, and dealing with waste from as far back as the 70’s shows that long term, big picture thinking is needed to keep the planet, our home, safe. After all, what we are using now is not likely to become our problem, but that of our children.

Via BBC news <link to http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8469249.stm>
Images from BBC webiste < http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/8469708.stm>