The Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction (GP) will provide assistance to the international community on the conversion of plutonium to mixed oxide (MOX) fuel despite a recent shift in White House policy away from MOX and toward alternative plutonium disposition methods.
The action plan for the Global Partnership, one of five plans covering international institutions released at last week’s Nuclear Security Summit, says that upon the request of a recipient state, the partnership will “provide assistance to and coordinate programs and activities on” plutonium conversion to MOX. The document cites the “development, coordination, implementation and finance” of such projects as the contributions offered to nations requesting assistance. The GP currently consists of the Group of Seven nations: the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan.
This language comes less than two months after President Barack Obama and the Department of Energy (DOE) turned their back on using the MOX method for disposal of surplus U.S. weapon-usable plutonium. The administration’s fiscal 2017 budget request proposes terminating construction of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at the Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C., which previously was intended to convert 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-usable plutonium into fuel for commercial nuclear plants. The DOE instead says it can save years and billions of dollars by downblending the material at the Savannah River Site and storing the diluted material at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
Asked about the discrepancy between Obama administration policy and its most recent commitments under the action plan, a State Department official said the language in the Global Partnership action plan “reflects the overall goal of material consolidation, minimization, and elimination. It neither prejudges nor binds for any individual country the technology path identified as technically and economically feasible, including for the United States.” A National Nuclear Security Administration spokesperson offered the same statement by email. The White House did not return a request for comment.
The State Department official also noted that the GP, supported by 30 partner countries, is a Group of Seven initiative and that Russia has not attended partnership meetings since 2014 following its suspension.
