Nuclear waste arrives in Japan from France

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

Nuclear waste arrives in Japan from France
Feb. 23, 2000 (Kyodo)

High-level radioactive waste transported by a British cargo ship 
from France arrived Wednesday at a storage facility in the village of 
Rokkasho in northern Japan, nuclear industry officials said. 

The waste, in vitrified blocks stuffed into cylinder-like containers, 
was carried by the 4,527-ton Pacific Swan from Cherbourg, 
northwestern France, and arrived Wednesday morning at Mutsu-
Ogawara port, Aomori Prefecture, on Pacific Ocean coast. 

The shipment, the fifth of its kind since 1995, comprises 104 
containers produced on behalf of five electric power companies in 
Japan -- Tokyo Electric Power Co., Chubu Electric Power Co. 
based in Nagoya, Kansai Electric Power Co. in Osaka, Chugoku 
Electric Power Co. in Hiroshima, and Kyushu Electric Power Co. in 
Fukuoka. 

The cargo will be stored for 30-50 years at the facility, which is 
operated by Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd., the officials said. 

Another 168 containers of nuclear waste are already in storage at 
the facility, about 7 kilometers from the port. 

The vitrified blocks are made by heating a material -- in this case, 
radioactive waste -- to an extremely high temperature, turning it 
into a glassy substance. 

In the final stage of disposal, the containers will be buried at an 
undetermined location, a couple of hundred meters below ground, 
officials of Japan's Science and Technology Agency said. 

More than 100 protesters surrounded the port, demanding that 
Rokkasho, a village about 620 km from Tokyo, not be turned into a 
nuclear waste dump. 

Rokkasho is expected to receive one or two shipments of 
processed nuclear waste a year for at least the next 10 years, they 
said. 

Of the 104 containers, 84 contain waste from other countries, 
including waste from a fast-breeder reactor in France and a 
German plant using mixed oxide (MOX) nuclear fuel. 

French national nuclear power company COGEMA processes 
waste from various countries, the officials said. 

Japan will receive the same amount of high-level radioactive waste 
as it has commissioned the French company to process. 

Waste from fast-breeder reactors and MOX plants is said to be 
harder to treat because it contains radioactive substances called 
transuranic elements, which take longer to cool. 

The agency's officials say there will be no problems in the way the 
Japanese nuclear industry stores and disposes of the waste. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle					Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100   				    	
Director, Technical				Extension 2306 				     	
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Personal Website:  http://www.geocities.com/scperle
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