MEMORANDUM TO : FROM : SUBJECT : Chairman Jackson

In a Commission briefing on high-bumup fuel on March 25, 1997, the staff said that they would prepare a white paper on mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel in anticipation of a DOE program to bum excess weapons plutonium in commercial reactors. This memorandum and its attachment comprise that paper and are provided to inform the Commissioners of technical issues associated with such a program. More recently, on February 5, 1999, I was contacted by the Nuclear Control Institute regarding a paper they have written on this subject. They presented that paper to the staff in a public meeting on April 7, 1999. The Nuclear Control Institute's written paper had been provided to the staff earlier, and we have taken the paper into consideration in preparing this memorandum. Background In January 1997, the U.S. Department of Energy released a record of decision for the storage and disposition of weapons-usable fissile materials. In this record, DOE recommended that excess weapons-grade plutonium be disposed of by two methods: (1) reconstituting the plutonium into mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel rods and burning it in current light water reactors, and (2) immobilizing the plutonium in glass logs with appropriate radioactive isotopes to deter theft prior to geologic disposal. Based on current information, it now appears that, if the MOX fuel method is utilized, fuel fabrication will take place at the Savannah River site in South Carolina with burning in nearby Westinghouse-type PWRs. Although DOE will probably not receive funding in FY 2000 for developing a license application, Congress has already given its approval for NRC licensing authority over a MOX fuel fabrication facility operated under 2 In the 1970s, the NRC investigated the environmental impact of using recycled MOX fuel in commercial LWRs. That study was documented as the Final Generic Environmental Statement on the Use of Recycle Plutonium in Mixed Oxide Fuel in Light Water Cooled Reactors (GESMO, NUREG-0002, 1976). Although results of that environmental study were favorable, licensing-type safety analyses were not performed. Some related test reactor programs and commercial reactor demonstrations were also carded out in the U.S. Shortly after the publication of GESMO, however, the U.S. abandoned plans for recycling plutonium although several other countries continued this approach. Today, recycled (i.e., reactor-grade) MOX fuel is routinely used in Belgium, France, Germany, and Switzerland, and commercial use of MOX fuel is planned in Japan. Thus, technical and regulatory issues associated with reactor-grade MOX fuel utilization have …