Posing a threat to the safety of Russia, the international
nuclear lobby is going to solve one of the most difficult problems
of the nuclear energy industry - disposal of radioactive waste.
According to the IAEA report "Multilateral Approaches to the
Nuclear Fuel Cycle" from February 22, 2005, Russia is a site for
international nuclear repository. In all the Agency plans to
establish 8 such repositories worldwide: 2 - in North America, 1-
in South America, 2 - in Western and Central Europe, and three more
in Russia, Southeast Asia and China. However, neither the US, nor
Australia, nor Canada, nor any other large states want to pursue a
whim of the IAEA. The exception is the position of the Russian
government, which seems to ignore the opinion of citizens -
according to the opinion poll by ROMIR Monitoring, 92% of the
Russians are against the international repository.
The IAEA states that disposal of nuclear waste in Russia will
contribute to nuclear non-proliferation. However the Agency
connives at some Russian nuclear energy projects that promote to
expanding the list of the countries owning nuclear weapons and
increase nuclear terrorism risks. Among reckless schemes of Rosatom
there are construction of a nuclear power plan in Iran and sale of
floating NPPs to Southeast Asian countries.
Rosatiom and the IAEA think that bringing SNF containing
plutonium back to Russia will enable countries with unstable
political regimes to use atomic energy for peaceful purposes only.
Nevertheless, the experience of North Korea and India shows that
any peace program will finally transom into the military one. There
is a risk that Iran, where the Russian NPP is being constructed, or
Indonesia, which is going to buy a floating NPP, will decide to
hold radioactive materials in their countries or will produce them
on their own
In Russia additional disposal grounds will increase a risk of
nuclear terrorism because there is no proper security system at
such sites. It's noteworthy that in 2002 Greenpeace activists and
the deputy of the State Duma Serguey Mitrokhin met not obstacles to
climb the roof of the spent nuclear fuel disposal facility in the
Krasnoyarsk Krai and then get out of there. Several months later
the same operation was carried out there by officers from
intelligence services.
"In Russia there are already tens of thousands of tons
ofdomestic nuclear waste. The storage grounds are virtually leaking
and they have poor control and physical security system", says
Vladimir Chouprov, Greenpeace Russia Energy Unit Head. "Greenpeace
demands to reject the plans to create nuclear repositories in
Russin and to look for alternative ways to solve the problem of
radioactive waste. As the first step, we propose to stop
constructing new reactors and producing more waste.
Contacts: Vladimir Chouprov, Evgeny Usov - 257 41 16/18/22
Additional information
On February 22, 2005, the work group of the IAEA issued the
report "Multilateral Approaches to the Nuclear-Fuel Cycle".
According to this document, Russia is a site for an international
nuclear repository.
Starting from mid-90s Rosatom (Minatom) has been actively
lobbying import of foreign SNF for storage, reprocessing and
disposal.
On June 16, 1997, the Russian government on the initiative of
Minatom issued a closed regulation to import a limited amount of
spent nuclear fuel from the Hungarian NPP Paksh: "To show our good
will and to meet the request of the Hungarian government we resolve
to accept, as an exception, SPF from the Paksh NPP on condition of
the previous practice, i.e. without further returning solidified
radioactive waste and reprocessing products to the Hungarian
Republic". The regulation of the Russian government, which conveys
this decision, was revoked by the resolution of the Supreme Court
of the Russian Federation from February 26, 2002.
In September 1998 a secret protocol on intentions was signed
between Minatom, the Swiss company Electrizitatagesellschaft and
the German company Internexco, in accordance to which the Swiss
party expressed their desire to transport 2000 tons of Swiss SNF to
Russia "for reprocessing without further return".
Radioactive waste, which would occur as a result of SNF
reprocessing, was proposed to leave in Russia. The Russian party in
the person of Minatom emphasized that such methods of managing
spent nuclear waste could be performed "on condition of introducing
appropriate amendments in the Russian legislation".