Japan’s Aomori Prefecture will sign a safety agreement to allow an interim storage facility for used nuclear fuel in the city of Mutsu to start operations, Aomori governor Soichiro Miyashita has told a press conference.
The prefecture will conclude the agreement with the city government of Mutsu and Recyclable-Fuel Storage Co (RFS), the operator of the facility, at a ceremony on 9 August. A safety agreement is necessary for a spent nuclear fuel interim storage facility to start operations.
The facility, the first of its kind in Japan, will store used fuel from NPPs operated by Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (Tepco) and Japan Atomic Power Co (JAPC) for up to 50 years pending reprocessing.
The conclusion of the safety agreement will be the final procedure required before RFS can begin to receive nuclear fuel. The safety agreement will set out the rights of the prefectural and city governments as well as the duties of the company to secure the safety of local residents and protect the environment. RFS is a subsidiary of Tepco and JAPC.
Mutsu will begin receiving waste in March 2025. RFS plans to deposit its first cask containing 12 tonnes of used fuel from Tepco’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa NPP in Niigata Prefecture. Within two years the site will contain 96 tonnes of used fuel in eight casks.
The prefectural and municipal governments expect to generate more than JPY300m ($1.9m) by March 2029, through taxes of JPY620 per kilogram of stored material. RFS opposition to the tax on the grounds that it could make the project unprofitable, caused delays. Mutsu had proposed hosting the facility in 2003, since when the national government has provided financial support for the project.
Although the safety deal limits storage at the Mutsu facility to 50 years, residents are concerned that its life could be extended and that the site may become a permanent disposal site for radioactive waste because there is no clear national policy for used fuel management, Asahi Shimbun reported.
Japan’s official policy is to reprocess and recycle used fuel, However, construction of the fuel reprocessing plant in Rokkasho in Aomori Prefecture has faced repeated delays. The plant was initially scheduled for launch in 1997.
