Disarmament Documentation: US Department of Energy announces Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, February 6, 2006

'Announcing the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership', Press Briefing by Deputy Secretary of Energy Clay Sell, February 6, 2006.

SEC. BODMAN: Hello again. Thank you all for being here as we will be discussing the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership that we alluded to in the other room.

GNEP is part of the President's Advanced Energy Initiative, the one that he announced last Tuesday evening in the State of the Union. If we are successful in implementing GNEP, we will be able to increase energy security, both here in the United States and abroad; we'll be able to encourage clean economic development around the world; and we'll be able to improve the environment.

The idea is that GNEP will leverage new technology to effectively and safely recycle spent nuclear fuel without producing separated plutonium. That's the whole idea behind it. By doing so we will extract more energy from nuclear fuel, reduce the amount of waste that requires permanent disposal, and greatly reduce the risk of nuclear proliferation. If we can make GNEP a reality, we can make the world a better, cleaner and safer place to live.

We're very pleased with the President's request of $250 million, which is an initial investment in what we believe will be a very ambitious plan to accelerate the development of nuclear technologies. GNEP, like other aspects of the President's Advanced Energy Initiative and the American Competitiveness Initiative, is based on the idea that scientific discovery will ultimately hold the answers to the questions that the world is facing today, and in particular, the questions that we in the energy department are facing today.

Deputy Secretary Sell is going to walk you through the details of the GNEP policy, but before he does, I want to thank the many people here at this department who have worked so hard on this initiative, both here in the headquarters building as well as in our laboratories. These include the Deputy Secretary himself, who I asked to undertake the leadership in this area of looking at the questions related to the development of a nuclear initiative when he came on board about 10 months ago, 11 months ago.

They also include Under Secretary Dave Garman and Linton Brooks, both of them, and I want to thank them for their participation in this; Ray Orbach, who is here, who is the Director of the Office of Science; and the Acting Director of the Office of Nuclear Energy, Shane Johnson; as well as the Acting Assistant Secretary of the Civilian Radioactive Waste Management Program, Paul Golan. These people and their teams have provided quite extraordinary insight and direction, and they have worked really day and night to develop a program that we all believe has the potential to change the world - we believe that.

I would also say, before introducing the Deputy - and that the Deputy Secretary, by tradition in the government is - looks after the day-to-day operations and is in effect the chief operating officer of the department. And I have chosen to associate with that job the person who is the chief budgeting officer that makes the tough decisions, and he has worked very closely with Susan Grant and her folks in the CFO's office, and in my judgment, he's done a first-class job.

I'm pleased today to finally gather together today with you and discuss the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. And the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership at its core is a way that we anticipate dramatically expanding nuclear power here in the United States, but also in the world in a way which effectively addressed two of the great concerns that have historically been associated with nuclear power here in the United States, but also in the world, in a way which effectively addresses two of the great concerns that have historically been associated with nuclear power. Those are what do you do with the waste and what about the proliferation of technologies that can lead to the bomb. We think the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership effectively addressees both of those great questions in a way which will enhance the expansion of nuclear power worldwide. Those are the policy goals.

I want to spend a little time on this next chart and step back and really focus on the problem that we are contemplating. In the next 50 years, world energy demand is expected to double, and not only is it expected to double, it is our great desire that it double. Large segments of the world today are still coming up the development curve, and those countries need great increases in the amount of power in order to come up the curve, and we're going to have a lot more people in 2050.

Now if we try to manage that increased energy growth on the backs of fossil fuels, we will have a very significant greenhouse gas concern and a very significant pollution concern, and it is our view here in the Department of Energy that we need all alternatives to address this. We need a great expansion of renewables, we need a great expansion of biomass, we need a great expansion of clean coal technology, but we must - anyone that fairly looks at this question whether you're from the energy side of the debate or the environmental side of the debate concludes that nuclear power must play a significant role in meeting this dramatic growth in energy demand.

I'd like to make a point about nuclear. The world has recognized that nuclear power must play a significant role in meeting this demand. There are over 130 nuclear power reactors either under construction, in the planning stage or under consideration around the globe. Now when I started briefing this slide a few months ago, the United States was nowhere on this list. Now, fortunately, due to the provisions that the president signed into law in the Energy Policy Act last summer, there is now talk and consideration of new nuclear power plants, even here in the United States.

But the point of this slide is nuclear power is going to go on without us. We can either be a part of it or we can observe, and it's our view that from a non-proliferation standpoint, from an economic - U.S. economic standpoint, we are in a much stronger position to shape the future if we are part of it and if we are building it.

And so really the initiative began with us thinking forward to the year 2050, a world with perhaps 1,000 nuclear reactors in it, and thinking about what are the technologies, what are the policies, what are the international regimes we would want to have in place when we get there, and that is the origin, and that's what we seek to address in the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

The provisions of GNEP are consistent, quite frankly, with the policies that were laid out in the President's National Energy Policy five years ago. It was a - I recall - I was working on the Hill at the time. I recall what a dramatic thing it was when the President called for an expansion of nuclear power five years ago, and that he advocated developing advanced reprocessing/recycling technologies. Now it is accepted, really, that the world must have a great expansion of nuclear power, and the United States must have an expansion of nuclear power. And as that realization has set in, our thinking as to what policies and technologies we need have also evolved.

As the Secretary indicated, GNEP is going to start with $250 million budget in fiscal year '07. We do have some monies in fiscal year '06 that we think we can dedicate towards it to get moving on it, and this budget is expected to increase dramatically in the coming years, and most notably in the three years remaining in this administration.

The benefits of - if we can in fact expand nuclear power in concert with the way we think about the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, we think the benefits are substantial. It will allow us in the United States to dramatically reduce America's dependence on fossil fuels: certainly coal; certainly natural gas, which we are increasing our imports of and plan to dramatically increase our imports of, but in the future as we think about a transportation sector more dependent on the electricity sector, through hybrid vehicles or through hydrogen fuel cells, nuclear power and the electricity power generation sector will have a growing impact on the transportation side as well.

And I would also add, to the extent we dramatically expand nuclear power worldwide, that can significantly reduce world demand for oil. Many countries around the world generate a significant amount of their electricity with fuel oil and, in fact, much of the increased demand and growth out of China over the last few years has been driven by their greater use of diesel generation in that country. So to the extent we can replace diesel and fuel oil generation for electricity with nuclear power, that can significantly affect and reduce the growth in demand for oil worldwide.

The fifth point - through recycling and utilization of the actinide fuel and fast reactors, we are able to get much greater efficiency from nuclear fuel. Today in our policy we burn spent nuclear - we burn nuclear fuel once and then it goes for ultimate disposition, and when it goes - under current policy, when it goes in Yucca Mountain, it will still have over 90 percent of its energy value to it.

Under the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership and advance recycling technologies, we can utilize a great - much greater percentage of the energy value in fuel. And then if we are able to do that, we will dramatically reduce the volume and radiotoxicity of the material that ultimately has to be disposed of, and instead of having to build many Yucca Mountain-like facilities over the course of this century, we think we can dramatically grow nuclear power and dispose of all of the waste that would be generated in one Yucca Mountain facility, and we would not have to face the prospect of building a second, third, fourth, fifth or sixth throughout the century.

I want to focus on one of the key - the benefits of GNEP here and the key program elements are in developing the technology and in facilitating a regime of the future that allows for fuel leasing. And there's really - there's a key non-proliferation benefit that I want to focus on, that is today much of the world has gone on. The other major nuclear economies have continued with reprocessing. The United States stopped reprocessing in 1970. We stopped reprocessing because the technology of that day separated plutonium, and that presents a significant proliferation concern, but the rest of the world - France, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom - went on and continued to develop these reprocessing technologies, and we now have over 200 metric tons of separated civil plutonium around the globe today.

It is our goal to develop, in partnership with these other nations, technologies that will allow for the recycling of spent fuel but not separate plutonium, and in the process of developing those technologies and coupling them with fast reactors that can burn down the spent fuel. We hope to develop an international regime that will allow for fuel leasing so that fuel can be leased to a county interested in building a reactor and taking fuel, but then the fuel can be taken back to the fuel cycle country.

I'm going to tick through a number of the key elements here, kind of stepping back and going through the seven elements of GNEP. Certainly the first part of it is to expand the use of nuclear power, consistent with the provisions in the Energy Policy Act, Nuclear Power 2010, and the other provisions that have been passed. We're confident that a number of current-generation or next-generation reactors will be built in the United States. I've talked about the goal - the importance of minimizing the nuclear waste. I've talked about the advanced recycling demonstration. That's a key part of what we're going to try to accomplish in the next few years. The technologies on this will be - there are two key technologies that we're looking at - one called UREX Plus - which, instead of separating out pure plutonium combines the plutonium with other actinides and some portion or uranium so that it is not attractive or usable as weapons material. And the other technology is dry reprocessing, or pyroprocessing, which uses a slightly different technology.

And of course, in addition to the recycling piece we will couple that with fast reactors. We've built a number of fast reactors in this country over the years. Japan, France, Russia have also developed fast reactors. The key will be developing a fast reactor which can burn the actinide-based fuel and reduce that down, and we hope to demonstrate that technology over the course of the next 10 years. Once again, that will allow a system of reliable fuel services, which is elaborated - I can elaborate somewhat on with this chart.

It is our hope to develop this technology in partnership with a number - with the other great nuclear economies of the world. Two weeks ago the Undersecretary of State for Nonproliferation Bob Joseph and I visited the other capitals of the leading nuclear economies. We went to London, Paris, Moscow, Beijing, Tokyo. We also stopped to see Dr. ElBaradei in Vienna to lay out our vision of reordering the global nuclear enterprise. And it would be our hope to work in partnership with these other countries to develop these advanced recycling technologies to a state where they could be deployed in the existing countries that have the full elements of the fuel cycle. And once those advanced technologies are deployed, that will lead us to a situation where we can sell reactors to other countries that are interested in the benefits of nuclear power, lease that fuel to those countries, and then take it back for recycling and for waste disposition.

Now, the value in that - we have found that it is unproductive often to talk in terms of rights, and what rights do the countries have to develop the fuel cycle? Well, what we're hoping to do is develop commercially attractive incentives so that a country interested in bringing the benefits of nuclear power to the their economy can purchase a reactor and then lease fuel and not have to worry about making their own investments in the fuel cycle. So the goal here and the reason we think this can work from a nonproliferation standpoint is that we are seeking to provide commercially attractive incentives for countries to lease fuel rather than make investments in their own fuel cycle.

It is also a key element of this initiative that we would cooperate with existing fuel cycle states or any other country in the development of small-scale reactors. And we think there is a great opportunity here to enhance our nuclear cooperation with many countries on developing reactors of a size and with the nonproliferation benefits that would be appropriate for the developing world. It would be of a smaller scale appropriate for smaller grids.

Another key aspect of the initiative is enhanced nuclear safeguards and ensuring that we install best practices on handling nuclear material and in building the advanced fuel cycle of facilities. And so what are the next steps? We're going to continue to work to expand nuclear power here in the United States by implementing the provisions in the Energy Policy Act and making progress on Yucca Mountain as quickly as possible. It is our goal, with the GNEP initiative, to raise the level of debate and to make progress more quickly on Yucca Mountain than we have in the past. And as part of this we will be sending for a legislative package in the coming weeks that will make a number of legislative changes to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act that will allow us to make progress much more quickly on Yucca Mountain. We hope to join in partnership and broaden our consultation with other countries to develop the advanced recycling technologies and we hope to continue to build on the - build the global consensus for this GNEP vision, and that is that we need a world with a dramatic expansion of nuclear power. We must recycle in order to manage the waste. We should recycle in a way that does not separate plutonium, and we should develop a fuel-leasing regime that ensures we do not see a greater proliferation of the key aspects of the fuel cycle which worry us the most, which are the enrichment technology and the reprocessing technology.

So in conclusion, we think the U.S. and the world are faced with a set of challenges related to energy supply, nuclear proliferation and global climate change. And the global nuclear energy partnership, we think, uniquely addresses these challenges to meet the rapidly growing energy demand, reduce carbon emissions, enable the clean development of the world, and avoid proliferation.

MR. SELL: We think it's consistent. In our meetings in Moscow, as well as our meetings elsewhere, the vision, the goals, were all very well received - in some cases enthusiastically received. But as is the case between partners, there are different perspectives and different angles and there are many details to be worked out, and quite frankly, many more consultations to occur with those countries that we've been to as well as other countries. But the ideas were very well received in all of the capitals.

MR. SELL: What we mean to do is develop the technologies that allow us to effectively deal with waste on the backend. If we can do that - and, sir, it's our view that those technologies should be in existing fuel cycle states. If we can do that there is certainly - you know, if you look at the existing fuel cycle states, that's almost 70 percent of the nuclear reactors in the world. And so certainly those countries have a significant incentive and economic reasons to make investments in the full elements of the fuel cycle, including in ultimate repository.

But what we really want to do is develop the technologies that allow us to deal with the waste. And whether the final waste is ultimately disposed of in a repository in a fuel cycle country, or whether it is ultimately disposed of in a repository elsewhere, the nonproliferation goals have been met.

Q: (Inaudible.) My question is aimed at what you're going to be doing with this waste. From what I understand, when you separate it, over 90 percent is depleted uranium. Is this then going to be put back into a fast reactor or re-enriched and then put into a fast reactor to create more energy, or does it need to be disposed of?

MR. SELL: Either way. It could be re-enriched or it could be disposed of, but if it's disposed of I believe that it would be disposed of as low-level waste. And so the cost of doing something - the cost of that is substantially less, but it certainly - we contemplate that it could be re-enriched, and the market may drive it to be re-enriched in the future.

Q: Hi. Dan Whitten with Inside Energy. Looking at the legislation, would it expand the capacity of Yucca Mountain - would your legislative proposal expand the capacity of Yucca Mountain, and do you envision retrieving the waste from Yucca Mountain for reprocessing, or would it be stored somehow above ground? And then finally, is there anything related to GNEP authorization in the legislation, or is that separate?

MR. SELL: As far as what we intend to do over the next few years, specifically as it relates to GNEP, we will work with the Congress on that, but it is our view that we have sufficient authority under the Atomic Energy Act to proceed. As to Yucca Mountain, it is our great desire, and it is in the nation's interest, and it is the interest in facilitating a nuclear renaissance, which we greatly need, that we get Yucca Mountain licensed and that we get it opened. And once we get it opened, then we can start moving spent fuel there. And we would certainly contemplate it as possible that fuel could move there and then be recycled, or it is possible that we would build recycling centers - and I think there will be significant interest from various states in building these centers in which spent fuel would be staged there temporarily while it is in the process to be recycled and before it ultimately goes to Yucca Mountain for disposition.

Q: Matt Wald, New York Times. Do you have a target price in mind for uranium and a target year at which point it makes sense to use something besides virgin newly enriched uranium - would make sense to use actinides or something else instead, or are you putting some dollar value on the kilos of waste that don't go into Yucca?

MR. SELL: We think, from a - the scale of what we are proposing to undertake is massive, and this is still a technology development and demonstration program. And so there is significant uncertainty about the cost of it. But a few things we are confident in. One, the cost of disposing of once-through spent fuel in Yucca Mountain is significant. It is very significant when you contemplate what we will do in order to license a facility for a million years, which is what is contemplated. The spent fuel going into Yucca Mountain will not have its peak dose until approximately year 1 million. And so, in order to license a facility with material like that in it, we are going to have to spend a tremendous amount of money and build massive packaging materials in order to ensure that that is possible.

So one of the benefits of disposing of recycled waste is that it's much more stable, it has a much lower radiotoxicity, and therefore it is a simpler and more straightforward proposition to ultimately dispose of it, and that will result in significant cost savings on Yucca Mountain, or the multiple Yucca Mountains that would have to be built over the coming years.

Secondly, there are significant, we believe, nonproliferation benefits in recycling and burning down spent fuel. And we start from the view that economics, the environment, clean development, and concerns about greenhouse gases are going to drive the world to many, many more nuclear power plants, and that is going to present a significant proliferation challenge if we have not thought through and presented a well organized way to address it, and the way we think is appropriate to address it is by recycling that spent fuel in a way that does not separate plutonium, and building an international regime that allows for fuel leasing and take back to eliminate concerns about proliferation.

So the nonproliferation benefit of what we are talking about is quite substantial, and it's also quite difficult to quantify, but we are seeking to develop these technologies, we are seeking to lessen the amount of uncertainty as to what it would cost to build these facilities on a commercial scale, and ultimately we hope to be in a position to make a judgment about the commercial viability of this approach in the coming years.

MR. SELL: Each year under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act the Secretary is called upon to make a judgment as to whether the 1 mil fee is sufficient. And certainly it is my view that in the coming years, if we do not develop a better way, we may come to the conclusion that it's not sufficient.

Q: Thank you. Just a brief clarification. I am - (unintelligible) - from Kyoto News Japanese Wire Service. You mentioned that you have visited United Kingdom, France and Russia, China and Japan to discuss this partnership. Are these all the countries you plan to working on this partnership?

MR. SELL: No. This was just the initial round of consultations, and we expect to have many more consultations and with many other countries, but the countries that we've been to certainly today represent the most advanced - the countries that have mad the most significant investments in the commercial fuel cycle.

MR. SELL: We would contemplate in the future that once India has met the nonproliferation commitments that it has made and that were memorialized in the joint statement between our two heads of state last summer, that they would be a great candidate for participation as well. But we also anticipate that there are many countries that have significant technologies, particularly as far as reactors, that we would look forward to participating with.

MR. SELL: It makes it dramatically more difficult because the radiotoxicity of the material and the quantity of the material, and we believe if we - we only contemplate deploying these technologies on a commercial scale in existing fuel cycle countries. And we contemplate doing that with the most sophisticated of safeguard arrangements. And it is the ability to have these advanced recycling technologies, and most importantly the ability to dispose of the actinides, which offer the great nonproliferation benefit over the coming decades.

Q: Tom Doggett with Reuters. To be clear, so when you recycle this fuel and you're going to loan it to other countries for fuel for their reactors, if they give it back, if we had it working today, this program, would we have these worries we do now about Iran, if indeed they wanted to have a nuclear program for electricity production? Would we loan this to future countries like Iran to make sure they don't develop a nuclear weapon? Will this avoid that?

MR. SELL: All countries that are signators to the Nonproliferation Treaty, like Iran, have the right to develop the fuel cycle for commercial nuclear purposes. It is our concern that that right - and we've seen it in history - has been used as a cover to develop a clandestine weapons program. As far as GNEP we have found the discussion of rights to be unhelpful. But what we hope to do is provide commercial, attractive - or commercially attractive opportunities for countries that are genuinely interested in bringing the benefits of nuclear power to their country, to buy a reactor, build it, and then lease fuel and return that fuel to a fuel-cycle state for ultimate recycling, and we think we can offer that on terms that would be very attractive commercially, and in exchange that country would agree to suspend any investments in the fuel cycle, and we think that can be a very workable framework going forward to greatly discourage the proliferation of the fuel cycle.

Q: I am Suzanne Struglinski with the Deseret Morning News, serves Salt Lake City. In December, several companies dropped out of the private fuel storage program. I was wondering if the administration presented this plan to them at that point and if you could talk a little bit more about what the industry and how they are involved at this point and what their opinions are on the waste storage ideas that you are talking about.

MR. SELL: We did not present this plan to industry, but certainly last year we saw a significant up tick under the leadership of Chairman Hobson in the House. I had discussion of advanced recycling. And so certainly that prospect has been out there, but I don't know of any direct link between our initiative and what has transpired with PFS. It is our view I would say that Yucca Mountain is the right answer and PFS is not.

Q: You have talked about this program as a technology development effort at this point. What about the implementation? And do you have any target dates for when GNEP would be a viable program for implementation or is it something that could be done in stages with other countries with the technologies such as -(inaudible)- or reprocessing or what not to begin implementing right away.

MR. SELL: As far as the technologies it is our goal to work in partnership with our nations to develop these technologies and to demonstrate them on an engineering scale. The reprocessing technologies, the recycling technologies that we have talked about have only been demonstrated at a laboratory scale, and so we need to demonstrate those on an engineering scale, and make judgments, and understand them better so that each of the involved countries can make a judgment on commercialization. We would hope to demonstrate those technologies over the next five to 10 years and then be in a position to make judgments on the next round of investments thereafter.

Q: To follow up on that, is it too soon - is it too soon at this point to be talking about whether the United States is contemplating the building of new nuclear power plants or are these recycling facilities that you talked about in certain states, where those would go, how you would negotiate with states to build them. Is all that too far down the road?

MR. SELL: As far as new nuclear power plants, that is an issue that is before us now, and there are a number of states that are interested; there are a number of potential applications to the nuclear regulatory commission for new plants, and that is something that is quite exciting and quite encouraging.

MR. SELL: We have an understanding and one of the - the scale of what we are proposing is substantial, and the level of R&D and demonstration funding that would be required of this country is significant. That was discussed at length on an interagency basis as we developed this proposal with OMB and they are aware and committed to a level of investment, which will get us where we need to be.

We hope to do this and we seek to do this on a partnership basis with significant foreign contributions as well but we would contemplate that the budget would increase substantially or could increase substantially over the next few years, and there is agreement within the administration to do that.

Q: (Off mike) - Financial Times. Has any thought been given to who would decide what countries could be eligible for the renting on this fuel? For example, Beijing might be more interested in working out something with a place like North Korea than Washington might feel more comfortable with that? Would it be determined by the United States? Would it be something that would be done in conjunction with other partners of the IAEA play into this at all? How would it work out?

MR. SELL: We expect that that IAEA will play some role in this. Certainly the proposal is attractive to user nations only if they can have some sense of energy security, and energy security comes from a diversity of potential suppliers. And so certainly that is a key element of this, and that is why we contemplated early on developing these technologies in the existing major nuclear economies including China, including Russia, so that there would be a diversity of potential fuel cycle nations that could supply on a commercial basis to user nations.

Q: Yeah, hi. Steve Tetreault, Las Vegas Review Journal. I want to make sure I understood. Does this plan envision that GNEP fuel at the end would be disposed at Yucca Mountain, and if so, does that necessitate any further design changes or legislative changes to accept this type of fuel?

MR. SELL: If ultimately a - we do contemplate. You did understand correctly that we contemplate disposing of the ultimate disposition, the ultimate waste in Yucca Mountain. We think it is absolutely the right place and it is the place that we should do it. Certainly the design requirements for disposing of once through spent nuclear fuel are dramatically different than the design requirements for the product that would ultimately be disposed because the product after recycling is a substantially lower radio toxicity. It is in a stable glass form. And so the packaging that would be association with it and the design requirements associated with disposing of it would change.

PAUL GOLAN: Sure. And today we contemplate putting reprocessed waste in Yucca Mountain, the glass that was manufactured at Savannah River at West Valley and the glass that will be manufactured at Hanford. So it is already contemplated as part of our waste acceptance criteria - also the spent nuclear fuel from the Navy and from the commercial sites are and our designed case right now is to accommodate all of that fuel certainly as this moves forward. We are just going to keep our eye on that but we are going forward with all of the things that currently Yucca Mountain is envisioned to accept today.

MR. GOLAN: The only fuel that we have in our current inventory today is university fuel that went out in the '50s and '60s that the United States is accepting today, and it's U.S.-origin fuel, and so that is included in our waste acceptance criteria, but it's a very small fraction of the total fuel that is envisioned at Yucca.

MR. SELL: I think it is an open question in my mind when we think about the vision, and this is still - this is a vision as to how the world we would like to see in 50 years and it is dependent on a number of things, the development of the technology, international agreements, and other things, and it is an open question in that vision as to where the ultimate waste material would go. It is certainly possible that it could stay in a country where it is recycled and burned down, but it is also possible that it could go back to the user nation as well. But once that material has been recycled and burned down, it does not present the proliferation risk that spent fuel does today.

Q: Dan Horner from McGraw-Hill Nuclear Publications. A couple points of clarification: Since you're talking about fuel supply in the context of this initiative I gather you are talking about supplying mixed oxide fuel rather than low enriched uranium fuel, and if you could talk about that a little bit and all of that. And secondly, the $250 million for this year, how much of that is new money and how much of that is existing programs that are now just being grouped for better cohesion under the rubric of GNEP? Thanks.

MR. SELL: Let me address your first question. We did not contemplate a MOX fuel cycle as part of GNEP and I want to be clear on that. This issue came up when we were in Paris. The French have moved forward with commercial reprocessing using the PUREX, which separates plutonium and then burning that plutonium in light water reactors in a MOX fuel cycle. We do not concur in their - (audio break, tape change) - use of an actinide-based fuel so plutonium and other actinides to be burned in a fast reactor, what we call the advanced burner reactor. That is the GNEP vision that will allow for a significant burn down in reduction of the world actinide inventory.

Q: I'm sorry, if I could just clarify that. So what we're talking about - having the separation facilities and the fast reactors only in a limited number of countries, not to the countries that are being supplied or are you envisioning fast reactors in the recipient countries of the fuel supply as well?

MR. SELL: We would anticipate - I mean, certainly there are some small reactor technologies that may involve fast spectrum technology. But as it relates to the recycling facilities and the burn down of the actinide-based, plutonium-based fuel in fast reactors, we contemplate that all occurring within fuel cycle nations, not the user nations. We anticipate the sale of many, many more light-water reactors all around the globe to user nations as well as to fuel cycle states in the decades to come.

MR. GOLAN: There is a couple of things. First is the funding stream. The second large aspect of that is land withdrawal, and we have to permanently withdraw 147,000 acres of land as a condition for getting a license to receive and possess on the nuclear regulatory commission. I think that is what I am prepared to talk about today on that as we have to get clearance from our office and management and budget before we can talk much more.

Q: David Kestenbaum, Nation, al Public Radio. It is my understanding that reprocessed fuel can be used in a bomb, that it is not the best stuff to work with but you can still make a nice kiloton explosive. So to be clear, you're saying that reprocessed fuel will not be sent to other countries to be used as fuels in reactors there?

MR. SELL: The stuff that comes out of UREX Plus provides significant non-proliferation benefits from the - from its radiotoxicity, its handle-ability, as well as the quantity that would have to be utilized. And all of these advanced recycling facilities would only be built as we contemplate in existing fuel cycle states. The most important thing from a non-proliferation standpoint is the burn down of that material to your question would occur in these burner reactors in the fuel cycle states and that would not be exported or we would not contemplate that that would be exported to other what we call user nations.