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NASA is running out of the special kind of plutonium needed to power deep space probes, worrying planetary scientists who say the U. S. urgently needs to restart production of plutonium-238. But it's unclear whether Congress will provide the $30 million that the administration requested earlier this year for the Department of Energy to get a new program going. Nuclear weapons use plutonium-239, but NASA depends on something quite different: plutonium-238. A marshmallow-sized pellet of plutonium-238, encased in metal, gives off a lot of heat.

The UK Government is facing key decisions about what to do with what is the world's largest plutonium stock pile. A report, published in full for the first time last night (November 26), revealed the UK's estimated 100 tonnes of plutonium is not just a potential terrorist target it's increases the 'risk of nuclear weapon proliferation'. The report, by the highly regarded working party British Pugwash, is called The Management of Separated Plutonium in the UK. The report is an 'optioneering study' which identifies some major issues which it believes must be tackled if the expansion of nuclear power is to be considered as a 'viable future energy option' both in the UK and worldwide. Deputy chairman of British Pugwash, Dr Christopher Watson, said: "The strategy developed in the 1990s for utilising the UK stockpile of separated plutonium is currently in disarray.

The UK Government is facing key decisions about what to do with what is the world's largest plutonium stock pile. A report, published in full for the first time last night (November 26), revealed the UK's estimated 100 tonnes of plutonium is not just a potential terrorist target it's increases the 'risk of nuclear weapon proliferation'. The report, by the highly regarded working party British Pugwash, is called The Management of Separated Plutonium in the UK. The report is an 'optioneering study' which identifies some major issues which it believes must be tackled if the expansion of nuclear power is to be considered as a 'viable future energy option' both in the UK and worldwide. Deputy chairman of British Pugwash, Dr Christopher Watson, said: "The strategy developed in the 1990s for utilising the UK stockpile of separated plutonium is currently in disarray.

"Russia and the United States signed a new protocol Tuesday on a long stalled agreement to complete the disposal of 34 tons of excess weapons grade plutonium each, pumping new blood into the 2000 Plutonium Disposition Agreement that has been foundering on the shoals of bureaucratic foot dragging and mutual distrust for seven years. Though the signing of the Plutonium Management and Disposition deal between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will be touted as one of the successes of the 46 nation, two-day summit convened by President Barack Obama - alongside laudable agreements by Ukraine to relinquish its weapons uranium - it will also spark a new battle among non-proliferation officials and environmentalists both in Russia and the United States. As has been clear for more than 15 years, Russia regards its stockpiles of weapons plutonium as a money-spinner for a new nuclear economy in Russia that relies on plutonium and reactors that produce it. "

France's nuclear safety watchdog said on Thursday it had suspended efforts to dismantle a plutonium technology plant after nearly 3 times the expected levels of the radioactive element were found at the site. [ID:nLF530004] Around eight kilograms of plutonium were believed to have been stored at the site when it was up and running, but some 22 kilograms had been discovered to date and the final figure could be closer to 39 kilograms, the nuclear safety watchdog ASN said.

France's nuclear safety watchdog said on Thursday it had suspended efforts to dismantle a plutonium technology plant after nearly 3 times the expected levels of the radioactive element were found at the site. [ID:nLF530004] Around eight kilograms of plutonium were believed to have been stored at the site when it was up and running, but some 22 kilograms had been discovered to date and the final figure could be closer to 39 kilograms, the nuclear safety watchdog ASN said.

France's nuclear safety watchdog said on Thursday it had suspended efforts to dismantle a plutonium technology plant after nearly 3 times the expected levels of the radioactive element were found at the site. [ID:nLF530004] Around eight kilograms of plutonium were believed to have been stored at the site when it was up and running, but some 22 kilograms had been discovered to date and the final figure could be closer to 39 kilograms, the nuclear safety watchdog ASN said.

Decommissioning nuclear weapons is a good thing. But when our boldest space missions depend on surplus nuclear isotopes derived from weapons built at the height of the Cold War, there is an obvious problem. If we're not manufacturing any more nuclear bombs, and we are slowly decommissioning the ones we do have, where will NASA's supply of plutonium-238 come from? Unfortunately, the answer isn't easy to arrive at; to start producing this isotope, we need to restart plutonium production. And buying plutonium-238 from Russia isn't an option, NASA has already been doing that and they're running out too…

"To his credit, Dick Polman included concerns about nuclear waste in last Sunday's Currents section. He stated, "Current plants produce 2,200 tons of waste a year. ... Do the math: That's more than 60,000 tons over the last 30 years." However, Polman missed certain important details about the waste. The waste element plutonium is not mentioned. According to the 2009-10 CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, one of the most trusted references in science, plutonium has "a half-life of 24,100 years [and is] produced in extensive quantities in nuclear reactors." And, "because . . . of the element being specifically absorbed by bone marrow, plutonium [is a] . . . radiological poison and must be handled with very special equipment and precautions." Interestingly, in the 1973-74 edition of the handbook, additional details are provided: "The amount of plutonium that can be maintained indefinitely in an adult without producing significant body injury is 0.6 micrograms" - less than a grain of salt. And, that "plutonium, therefore, is one of the most dangerous poisons known." I believe the public must know these additional facts about nuclear waste because, as Polman states, "there is still no solution to the radioactive waste storage problem.""

France's nuclear safety authority has suspended work at a nuclear fuel plant after discovering it had underestimated plutonium levels. The ASN safety agency says the plant in Cadarache failed to notice and then waited months to report several extra kilograms of plutonium in closed spaces used to manipulate radioactive material. The ASN said in a statement Wednesday "the incident had no consequences." But it issued a warning to plant operators and suspended work on dismantling the plant. The plant, which manufactured fuel for nuclear plants for 40 years, is being decommissioned. It was operated by French nuclear manufacturer Areva and belongs to the state Atomic Energy Commission, which reported the excess plutonium on Oct. 6.

France's nuclear safety authority has suspended work at a nuclear fuel plant after discovering it had underestimated plutonium levels. The ASN safety agency says the plant in Cadarache failed to notice and then waited months to report several extra kilograms of plutonium in closed spaces used to manipulate radioactive material. The ASN said in a statement Wednesday "the incident had no consequences." But it issued a warning to plant operators and suspended work on dismantling the plant. The plant, which manufactured fuel for nuclear plants for 40 years, is being decommissioned. It was operated by French nuclear manufacturer Areva and belongs to the state Atomic Energy Commission, which reported the excess plutonium on Oct. 6.

"t's not out of the question that the United States might not be around long enough to see the complete cleanup of its Cold War legacy in Washington State. Not far from the banks of the Columbia River resides the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, once the most important manufacturer of plutonium for America's nuclear arsenal. Today, the 560-square-mile decommissioned facility is teeming with plutonium, one of the most toxic substances on earth (minute particles of it can cause cancer), with a half-life of 24,000 years. The U.S. Department of Energy estimated back in the mid-1990s that Hanford had more than 111,000 kilograms of plutonium to dispose of. A former department official, Robert Alvarez, recently went over old Energy reports and determined that the original math was way off. It turns out that Hanford has three times more plutonium than was calculated in 1996."

Work to get weapons-grade plutonium off the Hanford site is running ahead of schedule, and all the weapons plutonium may be gone by early June, according to the Department of Energy. More than half the plutonium already has been shipped off site. With good weather, the work could finish even sooner than June, said Doug Shoop, deputy manager of the DOE Hanford Richland Operations Office. DOE had planned to have all the plutonium shipped to the Savannah River, S.C., nuclear site by the end of September 2009 when shipments started in fall 2007.

The National Nuclear Security Administration recently announced that a team led by Baker Concrete Construction Inc. of Monroe, Ohio, has been awarded a $91.5 million contract for the construction of NNSA's Waste Solidification Building at the Savannah River Site. The Waste Solidification Building will process waste streams from the NNSA's plutonium disposition efforts at SRS - principally wastes from the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility and from weapons pit disassembly operations - by converting them to a cement-like material for off-site disposal. "This announcement is an important step forward for our plutonium disposition program," said Ken Baker, principal assistant deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation. "The Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility and the supporting Waste Solidification Building are key elements in this important nonproliferation effort to eliminate surplus plutonium in a transparent and irreversible manner." The MOX program, a critical part of NNSA's nuclear nonproliferation efforts, will take at least 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-grade plutonium - enough material for about 8,500 nuclear weapons - and use it to create mixed-oxide fuel for use in nuclear power plants to generate electricity and render the plutonium unusable for nuclear weapons.

Playing with plutonium is not a good idea. But this is exactly what will happen if the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) implements its plan to open the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge for public recreation. For almost four decades the Rocky Flats Plant located about nine miles south of Boulder produced the explosive plutonium "pit" at the core of every warhead in the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Major accidents and routine operations released very fine plutonium particles to the environment on and off the site. Because this highly toxic material remains radioactive for a quarter-million years, its presence in the environment poses a permanent danger. Inhaling or otherwise taking such particles into the body can induce cancer, disrupt the immune system or damage genetic material. Children, who would be encouraged to visit the refuge, are especially vulnerable, because they stir up dust, breath in gasps, eat dirt, or may scrape a knee or elbow.

Playing with plutonium is not a good idea. But this is exactly what will happen if the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) implements its plan to open the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge for public recreation. For almost four decades the Rocky Flats Plant located about nine miles south of Boulder produced the explosive plutonium "pit" at the core of every warhead in the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Major accidents and routine operations released very fine plutonium particles to the environment on and off the site. Because this highly toxic material remains radioactive for a quarter-million years, its presence in the environment poses a permanent danger. Inhaling or otherwise taking such particles into the body can induce cancer, disrupt the immune system or damage genetic material. Children, who would be encouraged to visit the refuge, are especially vulnerable, because they stir up dust, breath in gasps, eat dirt, or may scrape a knee or elbow.

"Russia's nuclear chief Sergei Kiriyenko has estimated the country's program on the disposal of weapons-grade plutonium at between $2.5 billion and $3 billion. At the nuclear summit in Washington on April 12-13, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signed the Plutonium Disposition Protocol, which stipulates that Russia and the United States would each dispose of 34 metric tons of excess weapons-grade plutonium. "The final cost of the [disposal] program will become known only when it is completed...We estimate it at between $2.5 billion and $3 billion," Kiriyenko said, adding that the United States will contribute $400 million to the Russian program. Kiriyenko, who heads the Russian state nuclear corporation, Rosatom, said the protocol meets Russia's interests as it retains the goals of a framework agreement on disposing plutonium, which was signed in 2000."

Hanford has completed shipping its leftover weapons-grade plutonium and unirradiated nuclear fuel to South Carolina, a major step toward reducing security requirements at the nuclear reservation. About 2,300 containers of material were shipped, most of them coffee-can-sized canisters of plutonium that had been stored at the Plutonium Finishing Plant. Shipments of the canisters ended in April. Since then, the Department of Energy has been shipping about a dozen packages of unirradiated fuel, with those shipments completed in September. DOE had set a goal to have the shipping done before the start of fiscal 2010, which began today. "It is a major accomplishment with a lot of effort by many people here at Hanford, a lot of effort by transportation crews and by the people at the Savannah River Site," said Geoff Tyree, a DOE Hanford spokesman.

Hanford has completed shipping its leftover weapons-grade plutonium and unirradiated nuclear fuel to South Carolina, a major step toward reducing security requirements at the nuclear reservation. About 2,300 containers of material were shipped, most of them coffee-can-sized canisters of plutonium that had been stored at the Plutonium Finishing Plant. Shipments of the canisters ended in April. Since then, the Department of Energy has been shipping about a dozen packages of unirradiated fuel, with those shipments completed in September. DOE had set a goal to have the shipping done before the start of fiscal 2010, which began today. "It is a major accomplishment with a lot of effort by many people here at Hanford, a lot of effort by transportation crews and by the people at the Savannah River Site," said Geoff Tyree, a DOE Hanford spokesman.

"The amount of plutonium buried at a U.S. nuclear reservation in Washington state is almost triple what the government had previously reported, officials say. The New York Times Sunday reported the discovery of the higher plutonium levels at the 560-square-mile Hanford Nuclear Reservation will likely make long-term cleanup a greater challenge than previously thought. The plutonium poses no immediate radiation danger because of "institutional controls" such as guards, weapons and gates, the Times said. "

An old glass jar inside a beaten up old safe at the bottom of a waste pit may seem an unlikely place to find a pivotal piece of 20th century history. But that's just where the first batch of weapons-grade plutonium ever made has been found - abandoned at the world's oldest nuclear processing site. See a gallery of images of the find and where it came from The potentially dangerous find was made at Hanford, Washington State, the site of a nuclear reservation, established in 1943 to support the US's pioneering nuclear weapons program. Hanford made the plutonium-239 for Trinity, the first ever nuclear weapon test, on 16 July 1945. Just three-and-a-half weeks later, more Hanford plutonium was used in the nuclear strike on the Japanese city of Nagasaki.

With nuclear energy, uranium atoms split inside a reactor, and radiation heats water to its boiling point creating steam to spin a giant turbine. It all seems like ingenious, efficient, and clean energy production. So where's the mess? Now consider plutonium, a horribly carcinogenic and highly fissionable substance, radioactive for more than half a million years. If exposed to air, it will ignite. Like little pieces of confetti, very fine plutonium particles will disperse after ignition. A single particle -- like talc, to give you some perspective -- can give you lung cancer. In the words of Helen Caldicott, M.D.: "Hypothetically, if you could take one pound of plutonium and could put a speck of it in the lungs of every human being, you would kill every man, woman, and child on earth" -- not immediately, but over time "from lung cancer," Caldicott explains.

With nuclear energy, uranium atoms split inside a reactor, and radiation heats water to its boiling point creating steam to spin a giant turbine. It all seems like ingenious, efficient, and clean energy production. So where's the mess? Now consider plutonium, a horribly carcinogenic and highly fissionable substance, radioactive for more than half a million years. If exposed to air, it will ignite. Like little pieces of confetti, very fine plutonium particles will disperse after ignition. A single particle -- like talc, to give you some perspective -- can give you lung cancer. In the words of Helen Caldicott, M.D.: "Hypothetically, if you could take one pound of plutonium and could put a speck of it in the lungs of every human being, you would kill every man, woman, and child on earth" -- not immediately, but over time "from lung cancer," Caldicott explains.

Russia has reneged on an agreement to deliver a total of 10 kilograms of plutonium-238 to the United States in 2010 and 2011 and is insisting on a new deal for the costly material vital to NASA's deep space exploration plans. The move follows the U.S. Congress' denial of President Barack Obama's request for $30 million in 2010 to permit the Department of Energy to begin the painstaking process of restarting domestic production of plutonium-238. Bringing U.S. nuclear laboratories back on line to produce the isotope is expected to cost at least $150 million and take six years to seven years from the time funding is approved.

Russia has reneged on an agreement to deliver a total of 10 kilograms of plutonium-238 to the United States in 2010 and 2011 and is insisting on a new deal for the costly material vital to NASA's deep space exploration plans. The move follows the U.S. Congress' denial of President Barack Obama's request for $30 million in 2010 to permit the Department of Energy to begin the painstaking process of restarting domestic production of plutonium-238. Bringing U.S. nuclear laboratories back on line to produce the isotope is expected to cost at least $150 million and take six years to seven years from the time funding is approved.

"The amount of plutonium in high-level waste converted to glass at Savannah River Site will nearly triple this year as a consequence of the U.S. Energy Department's decision to abandon its Yucca Mountain waste repository. The SRS-based Defense Waste Processing Facility uses a process called vitrification to convert liquid radioactive wastes into a solid glass form suitable for long-term storage and permanent disposal. Plutonium is among many dangerous materials in the 36 million gallons of waste left behind at SRS by decades of nuclear weapons production. In 2008, as the department prepared its application to license the Yucca Mountain site in Nevada -- where vitrified waste was to be buried -- SRS lowered plutonium levels in vitrified waste from 2,500 grams per cubic meter to 897 grams per cubic meter."

"The U.S. Energy Department has rescinded an order that would have nearly tripled the amount of plutonium in high-level waste converted to glass at Savannah River Site. * Comment (1) * E-mail * Bookmark and Share Advertisement "The Office of Environmental Management has decided not to move forward at this time with its February decision to direct contractors to start planning for higher concentrations of plutonium in waste canisters at the Savannah River Site," said Jen Stutsman, a spokeswoman at the department's Washington headquarters. The SRS-based Defense Waste Processing Facility uses a process called vitrification to convert liquid radioactive waste into a solid glass form suitable for long-term storage and permanent disposal. Plutonium is among many materials in the 36 million gallons of waste left behind at SRS by decades of nuclear weapons production."

We all know that Entergy Vermont Yankee prides itself on its safe, clean, reliable, and 24/7 production of power. But there's no fine print on those full-page color newspaper ads advising us that some 200 toxic radionuclides are also produced, not all of them safely, cleanly or reliably prevented from contaminating the Vermont, New Hampshire or Massachusetts countryside. Vermont Yankee also produces Plutonium 239, a carcinogen, teratogen, and mutagen; more than enough every month (2.13 pounds) to provide a lethal dose for every human being on the planet. In 37 years of operation, Vermont Yankee has produced enough Plutonium 239 to kill everyone on Earth hundreds of times. Also, as competent proliferators certainly know, civilian reactor-grade plutonium can be used to make nuclear weapons.

We all know that Entergy Vermont Yankee prides itself on its safe, clean, reliable, and 24/7 production of power. But there's no fine print on those full-page color newspaper ads advising us that some 200 toxic radionuclides are also produced, not all of them safely, cleanly or reliably prevented from contaminating the Vermont, New Hampshire or Massachusetts countryside. Vermont Yankee also produces Plutonium 239, a carcinogen, teratogen, and mutagen; more than enough every month (2.13 pounds) to provide a lethal dose for every human being on the planet. In 37 years of operation, Vermont Yankee has produced enough Plutonium 239 to kill everyone on Earth hundreds of times. Also, as competent proliferators certainly know, civilian reactor-grade plutonium can be used to make nuclear weapons.