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Ministry signs atomic pact

Energy agreement will send nuclear fuel to Russia

By Victor Velek
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
September 19th, 2007 issue

Two tons of nuclear fuel and related construction parts stored at the Nuclear Research Institute in Řež, central Bohemia, will return to Russia, thanks to an agreement signed between the Industry and Trade Ministry and the U.S. Department of Energy Sept. 17.
The agreement, part of the Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI), should prevent the institute’s spent nuclear fuel from falling into terrorist hands by shipping it to a secure facility. The program’s costs, amounting to $35 million (694 million Kč), will be covered by the United States, which launched the GTRI in 2004.
The agreement was signed by Richard Graber, U.S. ambassador to the Czech Republic, and Industry and Trade Minister Martin Říman. Apart from the fuel relocation, the pact also provides a legal framework for other GTRI projects in the country.
Nuclear fuel stored in Řež “could become a security threat, should it fall into the wrong hands,” Říman said. “In Russia, the fuel will be processed in such a way that it will be impossible to use for constructing a weapon of mass destruction. Then, after 20 or 30 years, the fuel will be sent back to the Czech Republic.”
“This is the kind of concrete international action that increases security around the world,” Graber said after the signing ceremony.
The nuclear cargo will be placed in a high-security facility built with financial support from the United States. The first shipment should be dispatched later this year, according to Graber.
The pact will only affect fuel from research reactors, which are more vulnerable to theft and abuse than nuclear fuel used in power plants, since research reactors use highly enriched uranium fuel, said František Sviták, a researcher at Řež. Enriched uranium can be used to create nuclear weaponry.
The spent nuclear fuel at the country’s two nuclear power plants in Dukovany and Temelín will remain stored at the stations, Sviták added.
This is not the first time the country has gotten rid of radioactive material through the GTRI program: At the end of 2005, the Czech Technical University swapped its research reactor’s 20 rods — each filled with highly enriched uranium — for ones with lower-enriched uranium. The United States spent $2 million on the replacement.
The Czech Republic is one of 10 countries that have sent some or all of their highly enriched uranium deposits to Russia. So far, more than 500 kilograms (1,100 pounds) of fuel have been sent there.
The GTRI program is run by the National Nuclear Security Administration, an agency within the U.S. Department of Energy. It is supported by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN body dedicated to atomic energy cooperation.

Victor Velek can be reached at vvelek@praguepost.com


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