Bid to widen use of spent nuclear fuel facility in Aomori hits resistance

Efforts are underway to widen use of an interim storage facility for spent nuclear fuel in Aomori Prefecture, increasing the number of power plant operators that send fuel there from two to four, but authorities have yet to agree to the plan.

The four power plant operators informed the city of Mutsu on Friday of the proposal to have Kansai Electric Power (Kepco) and Tohoku Electric Power also make use of the storage facility, which currently stores spent fuel from plants run by Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (Tepco) and Japan Atomic Power. 

Tepco and Japan Atomic may not be able to transport the initially planned 5,000 tons of spent fuel from their own plants to the facility, so they have proposed “interoperator cooperation” to allow other power companies to make use of it as well.

But currently the storage facility doesn’t accept waste from plants other than those operated by Tepco and Japan Atomic. Aomori Gov. Soichiro Miyashita has said that the prefecture will not allow fuel from other companies to be stored there, as that was “not envisaged under the agreement” with the local governments that host it.

Japan’s government is hoping to restart as many nuclear reactors as possible, but securing interim storage space for the ever-increasing volume of spent fuel removed from nuclear reactors has become a more urgent issue. 

The purpose of the Mutsu Interim Storage Facility is to hold spent nuclear fuel generated by Tepco and Japan Atomic for up to 50 years. After that, the fuel is supposed to be reprocessed for reuse at the Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant, also in the prefecture.

But earlier this year, Miyashita said he would not agree to the storage of more fuel during this fiscal year because plans for the completion and operation of the Rokkasho plant, long delayed, remain vague.

“Regarding the interim storage project, we can’t confirm the environment is suitable (for accepting more fuel). This is primarily due to the fact that the progress of the Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant has become uncertain,” Miyashita said in March.