Switzerland has sent 2.2 kilograms of weapon-grade uranium reactor fuel to the United States for storage, the Department of Energy’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration said on Wednesday. The shipment makes Switzerland the 27th country, plus Taiwan, to divest itself of all highly enriched uranium, according to an NNSA press release. The spent U.S.-origin HEU fuel had previously been used at the University of Basel’s now-retired AGN-211-P research reactor. The NNSA worked with the university, the Swiss government, and the Paul Sherrer Institute to package and transport the 13 irradiated HEU fuel elements, which ultimately were shipped by sea in a single storage cask to DOE’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The material will be kept in safe storage “pending final disposition, which often involves blending to low enrichment and distribution to the Tennessee Valley Authority for generation of electricity,” the NNSA said.
“We are delighted to share this important milestone with the Swiss Government and the Paul Sherrer Institute, and want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the important partnership that made this possible,” NNSA Deputy Administrator Anne Harrington said in the release. “Our collaboration advances global efforts to secure, consolidate, and minimize the use of highly enriched uranium so that it does not fall into the hands of terrorists.” The press release did not indicate when the HEU transfer occurred. But in a post Tuesday on the International Panel on Fissile Materials (IPMF) blog, Savannah River Site Watch Director Tom Clements said the Swiss government had confirmed by email that the ship arrived in the U.S. on Aug 18. The vessel, the Oceanic Pintail, also carried low-enriched spent fuel from a research reactor in Berlin, according to Clements. The IPMF and other organizations have estimated that Switzerland had never held more than 10 kilograms of HEU, Clements said.
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