Antinuclear

Megatons to Megawatts will turn old nuclear weapons into fuel for commercial nuclear power!

turns highly enriched uranium into lightly enriched uranium.

Nuclear twist sees Russian warheads warming US homes Herald Sun   AFP , April 13, 2010, IN A strange twist of Cold War enmity on the melt, uranium from what once were Russian nuclear warheads is used to heat and light American homes, thanks to the Megatons to Megawatts Program – a successful example of nuclear non-proliferation.

The 20-year agreement was signed back in 1994 between Russia and the US.

“Megatons to Megawatts is the most successful non-proliferation program in history,” argues Philip Sewell, senior vice-president at USEC, a private US company that runs the agreement that turns highly enriched uranium into lightly enriched uranium.

In 1994, the US and Russia cut a practical-minded deal to turn 500 metric tonnes of highly enriched uranium, the equivalent of 20,000 nuclear warheads, into weakly enriched uranium that could be used in US nuclear power plants….

The deal so far has made it possible to reprocess 15,000 nuclear warheads stockpiled in the Russian federation, Ukraine and Kazakhstan between 1950-1987.

When it expires in 2013, the program will have handled 20,000 nuclear warheads, and supplied the US with about 10 per cent of its annual power use, or half of its nuclear energy………….

And USEC, which does $2 billion in business annually with 3200 employees in the uranium enrichment industry, acknowledges making a “small profit” along the way.

Over two decades, the operation will have had a total budget of $8 billion and will have sent back about $500 million to the Russians, Sewell said.

The US company pays for the uranium to be treated, which is done in Siberia, and the long 1.5 metric tonne cylinders turned back into fuel are shipped by boat from St. Petersburg to Kentucky where USEC has its conversion facility.

USEC then supplies the specially prepared fuel to operators of the 104 US nuclear reactors.

With an international summit on nuclear security looming for Monday and Tuesday in Washington, Mr Sewell is hopeful that the program will get a new lease on life.Nuclear twist sees Russian warheads warming US homes | Herald Sun

April 13, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, business, uranium | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear weapons, uranium