Moscow, Sep 27 (UNI) Developments by Russian specialists in the field of new nuclear power reactors will make nuclear energy “green” by neutralizing the most dangerous radioactive waste, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Deputy Director General Mikhail Chudakov told RIA Novosti.
On Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia was planning to launch the world’s first nuclear power system with a closed fuel cycle in the Tomsk Region in 2030. This is in the full sense a revolutionary development of Russian scientists and engineers, almost the entire volume of spent nuclear fuel will be repeatedly used in reactors, Putin said. Such a mechanism will make it possible in the future to almost completely solve the problems of accumulation of radioactive waste and, most importantly, to remove the issue of uranium security.
Fast neutron reactors make it possible to “burn” the most radioactive elements – minor actinides – and convert them into elements with much shorter half-lives, Chudakov said.
“In fact, actually bring them to equilibrium – to the same half-life with which we extract radioactive elements from the earth when we mine uranium. And this is already quite acceptable. In other words, it’s clean, ‘green’ energy,” he said.
