The Management Situation of Japan’s Plutonium was published on
September 11. We republish it here in English as reference material.
There was no change due to movement of plutonium since last year. There
was quite a large change in the amount of plutonium stored overseas,
but in the case of France, this is thought to be due to nuclear loss
(Plutonium-241, with a half-life of 14 years, decaying to
Americium-241). In the case of the UK, the increase of Pu cannot be
explained in this way. It is clear that reprocessing has been completed
and that there has been no movement of plutonium. The Atomic Energy
Commission has not been able to give a clear explanation of whether
this was an entry error by the Japanese power companies or an amendment
by British authorities.
The number of fuel assemblies has been estimated by
CNIC, those associated with Monju being the number of assemblies in the
reactor core, and the remainder calculated from the actual amounts of
plutonium transported.
(Hideyuki Ban)
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