Nuclear Power Plant Waste Storage

    In his article, entitled "Talk, No Action on Nuclear Waste Plan" (C and E News, 10/1/12), Jeff Johnson reports on the comments of Brent Scowcroft, chairman of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.
    The US has 104 nuclear power plants that have already produced 70,000 metric tons of radioactive waste. They will also continue to generate 2000 metric tons of waste per year in their operation to provide electricity. The problem is the disposal of that nuclear power plant waste.
    Because the nuclear power plant waste is highly radioactive and will remain so for a great many years, it has been the intention to store it deep underground. The major site for storage consideration has been Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The cost of study and possibly some storage preparation has been $12 billion over the last 30 years. Residents of Nevada have been opposed to storage at this site and President Obama has recently agreed to cancel any consideration of storage at that location.
    Let's look at some detail concerning how a nuclear plant operates and generates nuclear waste.
    Uranium is first processed to increase its concentration of one of its constituents (Isotope 235). The enriched uranium is made into pellets and loaded into tubes called "fuel rods". Each rod is about 14 feet long and about a half inch in diameter. The rods are then bundled to about 200 rods per bundle. The bundles are loaded into the nuclear reactor, where they generate heat to produce steam which is used by standard turbines to generate electricity. The bundles have an operating life of 18 to 36 months, after which time they are no longer efficient heat produces and must be removed and replaced with new bundles. The waste bundles are stored in isolated pools of water, where their radioactivity diminishes. At a relatively low point of radioactivity, the bundles are removed from the pools and can be stored dry. However, the bundles are still dangerously radioactive and must be stored away from humanity for perhaps 100 years. It is these 70,000 metric tons of bundles that we are concerned with.
    Other than storage, consideration has been given to processing the bundles, to separate the various radioactive components, some of which can be reused in new fuel rods, other components for other operations, such as medical, and finally leaving about 1/5 the original quantity, which would require long-term storage.
    In the processing, one of the separated components would be plutonium, which can be used to construct an atomic bomb. Presumably with that consideration, Congress passed the NUCLEAR WASTE POLICY ACT OF 1982, which was "An Act to provide for the development of repositories for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel." While this Act does not prohibit the processing of nuclear waste, it puts all handling of nuclear waste under government control and concentrates on storage rather than processing.
    If the intent of Congress in 1982 was to reduce the quantity of plutonium available for stealing and the outlaw preparation of an atomic bomb, let's take a look at the present global availability of plutonium.
    Processing of nuclear power plant waste is now done in France, India, Japan, Russia, and UK. That total annual processing capacity is indicated as 5600 metric tons per year. Another source gives a worldwide processing capacity of 4000 metric tons per year. let's take the low figure.
    The recoverable amount of plutonium by processing is about 1%. From 4000 metric tons, about 40 metric tons of plutonium is produced annually. In addition, 90,000 metric tons of waste nuclear power plant fuel has already been processed since the beginning of nuclear electricity production. That makes another 900 metric tons of plutonium already available. In terms of pounds, almost 2 million pounds of plutonium have been produced, and another 88,000 pounds are produced annually.
    The amount of accumulated nuclear power plant waste, which has been discussed for storage at Yucca Mountain is 70,000 metric tons, with continued generation of 2000 metric tons per year. If we were to process 70,000 metric tons, another 1.5 million pounds of plutonium would be available.
    Plutonium is useful in preparing new nuclear power plant fuel, which is and would continue to be the main consumption.
    From a production viewpoint, US processing would almost double the global quantity of plutonium produced to 3.5 million pounds. Since it takes only 20 pounds of plutonium to make an outlaw plutonium bomb, would US processing of nuclear power plant waste really increase the likelihood of preparation and use of an outlaw plutonium bomb?
    I believe it's time for the US to revise its policy concerning processing nuclear power plant waste. Government already has control of this waste through the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982. Government should now solicit bids from private industry to process this accumulated waste and future generated waste. The bids should be in dollars per pound and the lowest bid accepted, providing the conditions of safety and security are met. As the waste contractor picks up the waste from each utility site, utilities would be charged for the amount released. However the agreement should also include dollar credits for the quantities of recovered uranium 235 and plutonium or an actual return of the material to the utility for use in preparation of new fuel. The cost of the processing operation would be passed on to consumers as an increase in dollars per kilowatt hour charge.
    Processing will reduce the quantity of long-term waste storage space to about a fifth of the original, which will also decrease the intensity of argument. It is likely that there are locations with  populations, which would have no objection to nuclear waste storage and may actually welcome it. Another bid system should be used for communities to accept the remainder of processed waste. Qualified bidders would also need to meet the geological limitations required for such storage and also have state approval. The low bidder would then charge the processing company a one time fee for perpetual storage of every pound of residual waste delivered by the processor. Processor payments to the storage site holder would also be charged back to the original utilities for increasing customer electricity charges.
    The successful processing bidder would have to build a plant. Government should take no part in the funding for such construction, but should apply reasonable regulations for safety and security. The funding would come from private enterprise, whereby the bidder would fund the operation from loans of various sorts, including bonds and stock issues. Preparation of the storage site would use a similar system