Here is an interesting but strange news story, what is strange about it?


Monju's fast-breeder technology remains far from practical

A Supreme Court ruling late last month in favor of the Monju prototype fast-breeder reactor may have been welcome news to its builder, the Japan Nuclear Cycle Development Institute, but putting the technology into practical use is still a long way away.

The top court upheld the government's 1983 approval to build Monju, once dubbed a "dream atomic reactor," paving the way to get it back online. The facility in Tsuruga, Fukui Prefecture, has been shut for more than nine years due to an accident and coverup.

Fast-breeder reactors like Monju are supposed to be able to produce more plutonium than they consume, and the government initially expected to get the technology into practical use in the 1970s.

The government has spent more than 800 billion yen on the reactor, Japan's largest scientific and technological project.

Monju reached criticality for the first time in 1994, but a massive sodium coolant leak in December 1995 triggered a claim that the accident resulted from shortcomings in the facility's safety assessment before it was built.

The Nagoya High Court's Kanazawa branch supported that claim by 32 plaintiffs, mostly residents living near the facility, who sought to nullify the approval to build the reactor. The Supreme Court's May 30 ruling overturned that decision.

Since the accident, mishaps at other nuclear plants and coverups have followed. In addition, the electricity market has been liberalized, sending power companies unable to adapt quickly into a tight financial corner.

Fast-breeder reactors use costly plutonium-uranium mixed oxide, or MOX, fuel, and the target year for putting the reactor technology to commercial use was put off to 2010, and then to 2030.

"The largest reason for the delayed target is economic efficiency," an official at the Atomic Energy Commission said. "The initial forecast proved wrong, and uranium prices have long been stable. Instead of reusing less economical plutonium, it's profitable to use the present light-water reactors as long as possible."

The Atomic Energy Commission, which works out long-term nuclear power plans, decided this year to begin a full-scale study in 2015 on the commercial use of fast-breeder reactors, with Monju's performance as a model.

However, precise blueprints are nowhere in sight, and introduction of a reactor for practical use has been further delayed, "until about 2050."

A power industry source said that even the next experimental fast-breeder reactor will probably be radically different from Monju.

"Various types of structures should be considered for the final reactor for practical use, including a water-cooled type," a nuclear power researcher said.

Despite all the questions about its future, maintaining Monju -- even while it is still shut down -- runs somewhere between 6.4 billion yen and 17.3 billion yen a year. The total since the 1995 accident is expected to reach 127 billion yen by next March.

Meanwhile, Monju still plays a major political and economic role in Fukui Prefecture and the city of Tsuruga. About 2 percent of the city's 70,000 residents are employees at the Japan Nuclear Cycle Development Institute and related companies.

"The economic effects are large. We want to coexist and jointly prosper" with Monju, said Tsuruga Mayor Kazuharu Kawase.

For Fukui Prefecture, which has 15 nuclear plants within its borders, the radically different Monju is also a tool to attract as much money as possible from the central government.

The Japan Times: June 9, 2005