Nuclear+Reprocessing

• Use of breeder reactors combined with reprocessing could extend the usefulness of mined uranium by more than 60 times. A **breeder reactor** is a nuclear reactor that breeds fuel. A Breeder consumes fissile and fertile material at the same time as it creates new fissile material. In March 1977, fear of nuclear weapons proliferation (especially after India demonstrated nuclear weapons capabilities using reprocessing technology) led President Jimmy Carter to issue a **Presidential directive** to indefinitely suspend the commercial reprocessing and recycling of plutonium in the U.S. Other nations did not copy the policy and continued to reprocess spent nuclear fuel. i PUREX (Plutonium and Uranium Recovery by Extraction). The PUREX process is a liquid-liquid extraction method used to reprocess spent nuclear fuel, in order to extract uranium and plutonium, independent of each other, from the fission products. This is the most widely used process in the industry at present. If used on fuel from commercial power reactors, plutonium extracted using PUREX typically contains too much Pu-240 to be useful in a nuclear weapon. ** Examples of successful Implementation and use ** • Light Water Reactor Fuel COGEMA La Hague site, France • Thorp nuclear fuel reprocessing plant at Sellafield, United Kingdom • Rokkasho nuclear fuel reprocessing plant, Japan ** ADS ** • Less Nuclear waste sitting in storage. • When combined with breeder reactors almost no waste created but lots energy is ** DisADs ** fuel is also far more expensive than using uranium fuel and disposing of the spent fuel directly
 * Nuclear reprocessing **
 * Nuclear reprocessing ** separates any usable elements (e.g., uranium and plutonium) from fission products and other materials in spent nuclear reactor fuels. Usually the goal is to recycle the reprocessed uranium or place these elements in new mixed oxide fuel (MOX), but some reprocessing is done to obtain plutonium for weapons. It is the process that partially closes the loop in the nuclear fuel cycle.
 * Inherency ** - Why we are not doing this now?
 * How is it done? **
 * // 9 //** ** Reprocessing would increase the risk of nuclear terrorism- ** Less than 20 pounds of plutonium is needed to make a nuclear weapon. A U.S. Program would Up the international stockpile of plutonium that sits in storage today, which from 240 metric (enough for some 40,000 nuclear weapons) to 500 metric tons by 2020.
 * e **** Reprocessing would increase the ease of nuclear proliferation. - ** Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: The USA cannot credibly persuade other countries to forgo a technology it has newly embraced.
 * • Reprocessing is Expensive- ** Reprocessing and the use of plutonium as reactor