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Reprocessing (Plutonium Extraction)
In February 1995, China announced its plan to reprocess spent nuclear fuel, stating: "China will follow Japan's lead and use the separated plutonium to fuel fast-breeder reactors." [Quoted in Motoya Kitamura, "Japan's Plutonium Program: A Proliferation Threat?" Nonproliferation Review, Winter 1996, p. 8.]
China has had only limited success with extracting plutonium from enriched uranium spent fuel. China has not developed the sophisticated mechanical and chemical processes required to separate spent fuel from zircalloy cladding past the experimental stage. China attempted this process once in April 1977.
China plans to reprocess spent fuel and to recycle mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel for use in its pressurized water reactors (PWRs) and fast reactors. China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) has announced plans to construct a facility to reprocess spent fuel with a capacity of 400-800 tons per year, and China has pledged that its new plutonium extraction facilities will be open to international inspections.
REPROCESSING (PLUTONIUM EXTRACTION) FACILITIES
(1) GOBI DESERT
Xinjiang Autonomous Region. Pilot reprocessing plant under construction. 20,000 sq km complex to reprocess fuel, extract uranium and plutonium, and store solid waste. To use PUREX reprocessing method. To be completed by 1995. Planned capacity of processing 100 kg of uranium per day. Previously used as a production and disposal facility for China's nuclear weapons program.
(2) GOBI DESERT (ADDITIONAL FACILITY)
Xinjiang Autonomous Region. China reportedly plans an additional reprocessing plant in this region, to be completed in 2000.
(3) GUANGYUAN
(4) JIUQUAN ATOMIC ENERGY COMPLEX
(5) LANZHOU NUCLEAR FUEL COMPLEX
(6) PILOT REPROCESSING PLANT
China is constructing a pilot reprocessing plant with a capacity of 50-100 tons of spent fuel per year. On 12 April 1995, speaking at the Japan Atomic Industrial Forum's (JAIF) annual conference, China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) Nuclear Fuel Bureau Chief Engineer Sun Donghui stated that China decided to construct a "multi-purpose reprocessing pilot plant" in the next three years and complete it shortly after 2000. Sun said the pilot plant would be capable of reprocessing 300 kg of heavy metal daily. In March 1995, a Japanese Ministry of International Trade & Industry (MITI) visit to China prompted reports that Japan had offered technical assistance to China for the construction of the pilot reprocessing plant. Sun said a larger facility may begin operation after 2010, with an annual reprocessing capacity of 400 to 800 MTHM.
However, construction on the pilot plant has slowed. CNNC reportedly does not have enough money to finish the plant on schedule and Russia has delayed an export license for some plant equipment. In addition, the construction company contracted by CNNC may be replaced because of faulty work, including cracks in the concrete floor of the plant.
[Sources: Yan Kong and Tim McCarthy, "The Proliferation Risks Of The PRC-Supplied Algerian Nuclear Reactor," Eye on Supply, No. 4, Spring 1991, p. 72; Simon Rippon, "China: Ready For More Nuclear Power," Nuclear News, June 1995, p. 33; Risk Report, November 1995, pp. 3, 5; Yan Kong, "China's Nuclear Bureaucracy," Jane's Intelligence Review, July 1993, p. 324; "Reprocessing Plant For Gobi Desert?" Nuclear Engineering International, February 1989, p. 14; "China: Major Restructuring," Nuclear Engineering International, June 1989, pp. 21-22; Ann MacLachlan, Nucleonics Week, 13 April 1995, pp. 67; Ann MacLachlan, Nuclear Fuel, 24 April 1995, pp. 15-16, pp. 15-16; "China/Japan: New Reprocessing Facility?" Nucleonics Week, 16 March 1995; Chen Zhaobo, "Development Of Nuclear Power In China," Nuclear Europe Worldscan, November-December 1995, p. 50; Mark Hibbs, "Chinese Reprocessing Program Awaiting Decision On Pu Needs," Nuclear Fuel, Vol. 25, No. 7, 3 April 2000.]
This
material is produced independently for NTI by the James Martin
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