NUCLEAR WASTE TRANSPORTS FOR GERMANY

by Constance Harness

A September 22, 2000, Reuters report states that Germany will begin shipment of nuclear waste for reprocessing after a two-year ban imposed by the previous government of Helmut Kohl was lifted. The ban had been imposed because the transport containers had been leaking many times the acceptable limit of radiation.The first of eight shipments could be as early as next month to France’s La Hague reprocessing facility after approval by The Federal Agency for Protection Against Radiation (BFS).

Disposal with the French firm Cogema’s La Hague and British Nuclear Fuel’s Sellafied plant will continue until 2005; after that, other means must be found. The recycling of plutonium won back from the nuclear reprocessing was a condition for allowing the lifting of the 2-year ban states the Environment Ministry.

One-third of Germany’s energy comes from nuclear power yet Germany has no reprocessing facilities. A landmark pact was signed by Germany’s government with industry to begin a phase-out of nuclear energy to be accomplished by around the mid-2020s.