Once upon a time, when fuel pric-es were high, nuclear fast-breed-er reactors enjoyed brief fame

based on a singular claim. While pro-ducing energy by splitting some urani-um atoms, they could create an evenlarger number of plutonium atoms. Thisplutonium could then be turned intofuel to generate much more energy.

Economics and politics, though, havenot been kind to breeder reactors. Withoil prices at historic lows and formercold war adversaries awash in plutoni-um and uranium, the idea has seemedto lose considerable luster. In February1994 Secretary of Energy Hazel R.OÕLeary ended U.S. research into breed-er technologyÑafter some $9 billionhad been spent on it.

Almost two years later, however, in aclimate as hostile as ever to the technol-ogy, breeder reactors areÑalmost in-crediblyÑresurging. In the past year thelargest such reactor ever built, the 1,240- megawatt Superph�nix near Lyons,France, was restarted after a long hia-tus following some technical problems.A smaller breeder reactor in Japan gen-erated electricity for the Þrst time lastAugust. And in recent months, engi-neers in India, which is pursuing twodiÝerent breeder-reactor technologies,were preparing to connect a tinyexperimental breeder reactor nearMadras to the electricity grid.

These operational milestoneswere supplemented by a study andconference supporting the tech-nology. Last August a panel led byNobel laureate Glenn T. Seaborgissued a report calling on indus-trial countries to develop and usebreeder and other reactors as away of making more fossil fuelsavailable to less developed coun-tries, many of which are strug-gling to electrify. The panel, as-sembled by the American NuclearSociety, also chided the U.S. gov-ernment for halting its breeder re-search. Then, in early October, atechnical meeting, held in Madrasunder the auspices of the Vienna-based International Atomic EnergyAgency, drew experts from Rus-sia, Japan, China, the Republic ofKorea, Brazil and India. Accordingto an attendee, participants con-cluded that breeders have a high

level of operational reliability and safety.But others looking at the same data

might call the record mixed. In the U.S.,for example, three breeder reactorswere built, two of which were signiÞ-cant. Argonne National LaboratoryÕs Ex-perimental Breeder Reactor II operatedfor three decades (until 1994) withoutany serious problems. On the otherhand, a commercial, power-generatingplant named Fermi began operating in1963 near Detroit and suÝered a par-tial core meltdown three years later. Itwas repaired but soon closed becauseof safety concerns. FranceÕs Superph�-nix, too, has had problems, mostlylinked to ßaws in its liquid-sodium cool-ing system. (Such a coolant is necessaryin a fast-breeder reactor because thewater used in conventional reactorswould slow the neutrons liberated byÞssion, limiting the number that couldcause breedingÑthe conversion of ura-nium 238 to useful plutonium 239.) Inlate October a steam leak forced a tem-porary shutdown of the plant.

There are several reasons for the in-terest in expensive, exotic plants tomake fuel, even though there is plentyof it around. For Japan and India, espe-cially, the impetus is national self-suÛ-ciency. These countries have relatively

few fuel resources and appear to beplanning for a day when fuel is not socheap. ÒIn Japan, actually, we donÕtneed a fast-breeder reactor in this cen-tury,Ó says Toshiyuki Zama, a spokes-man for Tokyo Electric Power Compa-ny, the largest Japanese utility. ÒBut wehave to develop technologies for thefuture.Ó More pragmatically, JapaneseoÛcials spent some $6 billion on the280-megawatt breeder reactor, namedMonju after the Buddhist divinity ofwisdom, and are eager to recoup someof this outlay by generating electricity.

France, which already has largeamounts of plutonium from its exten-sive nuclear power program, plans toconvert Superph�nix so that it can de-stroy plutonium rather than produce it.According to engineering manager Pat-rick Prudhon, a reactor core and fuelrods are being designed for this pur-pose as part of a project budgeted at$200 million a year. The new hardware,to be tested after the year 2000, will letthe reactor consume about 150 kilo-grams of plutonium per year, PrudhonÞgures. Unfortunately, FranceÕs powerreactors add about 5,000 kilograms ofplutonium every year to an already siz-able stockpile. Growing accumulationsof plutonium have fueled concerns thatsome of the poisonous, Þssile elementcould fall into the wrong hands [seeÒThe Real Threat of Nuclear Smuggling,Óby Phil Williams and Paul N. Woessner,page 40].

ÒOur aim is to demonstrate the capa-bility, to let the politicians of the nextcentury decide whether it is a good op-portunity to use fast reactors to de-

stroy plutonium,Ó Prudhon com-ments. In fact, in this mode thereactor can destroy not just plu-tonium but virtually all the ac-tinides present in nuclear waste.Actinides are isotopes with atom-ic numbers between 89 and 103.Some are radioactive for thou-sands of years, making them themost troublesome components ofwaste.

Far from the esoteric, futuristicnotion it has become, this appli-cation was envisioned even beforethe nuclear power industry wasborn. ÒFrom the 1940s on, it wasalways [Enrico] FermiÕs idea touse fast-spectrum reactors to con-sume all the actinides,Ó says H.Peter Planchon, associate directorof the engineering division of Ar-gonne National Laboratory. Thisway Òyou would be faced with dis-posing of Þssion products withrelatively short half-lives. ThatÕsstill the view of the French andJapanese.Ó ÑGlenn Zorpette

34 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN January 1996

TECHNOLOGY AND BUSINESS

Return of the BreederEngineers are trying to teach an old reactor new tricks

FUEL-HANDLING and coolant-pump machineryare visible in the dome over the Superph�nix reac-tor vessel. The reactor is near Lyons, France.

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Copyright 1995 Scientific American, Inc.