Don’t Spread It Around

In the beginning, on Aug. 20, 1942, the world’s supply of plutonium consisted of a single speck, barely visible to the naked eye. The separation of plutonium from other materials at the University of Chicago under the direction of Glenn T. Seaborg was a turning point in the race to build a nuclear weapon, in hopes of bringing a swift end to World War II.

Today, the United States has a far different problem: finding ways to dispose of more than 50 tons of plutonium that has been declared surplus in the wake of the Cold War and as a result of nuclear disarmament. Much of it comes from dismantled warheads.

The Clinton administration has studied a variety of ways to safely dispose of plutonium, which will retain its radioactivity for hundreds of thousands of years. We can give thanks that the Department of Energy has discarded some of the early suggestions, such as launching the material into deep space or burying it in the ocean floor.

Now, the department is down to twin proposals to be studied jointly over the next two years for technical feasibility, and undoubtedly tested for public and political acceptance. One plan is to mix the plutonium with other nuclear waste and bake it into a form of glass. The glass then would be buried in a repository such as one proposed for Yucca Mountain in Nevada. This method, called vitrification, enjoys general support, though there are concerns about the safety of long-term storage.

Much more controversial is the proposal to process much of the plutonium into fuel for use in nuclear reactors operated by electric utilities. Critics decry this plan as a violation of the long-standing U.S. policy of keeping all plutonium under military control, making it very difficult for terrorists to obtain bomb-grade material.

The Energy Department argues that using plutonium as fuel would not violate that policy or increase the risk of plutonium falling into the wrong hands. The department adds that disposal in this fashion would overcome Russian fears that the United States may one day retrieve vitrified plutonium and process it back into weapons material. If used as power plant fuel, virtually all of the plutonium would be destroyed, and the United States would hope to convince the Russians to dispose of their plutonium stocks in like fashion. But the conversion of plutonium to commercial use would be costly and time-consuming and would generate doubts about safety among a skeptical public, no matter how carefully the material might be guarded.

The administration should put the fuel use idea on the shelf and proceed with the vitrification concept on a priority basis. Then, Washington should find other ways of convincing the Russians that a stockpile of plutonium is not a nice thing to keep around.