Nonproliferation Alternative Systems Assessment Program Research Articles

Nuclear fuel recycling may be best alternative

Just as a baseball pitcher goes with his best pitch when he's in a tight spot, the world's nuclear power industry should go with its best fuel cycle. At least, it should until one that is proven to be better comes along, according to Joseph R. Dietrich, chief scientist at Combustion Engineering's Nuclear Power Systems in Windsor, Conn. Right now, Dietrich says, the nuclear industry's best pitch is the uranium fuel cycle, coupled with recycled uranium and plutonium. Dietrich's practical advice was nestled among many philosophical and politically oriented papers on the problem of nuclear proliferation at the Atomic Industrial Forum's International Conference on Nuclear Nonproliferation and Safeguards in New York City. Dietrich, a nuclear scientist, has no argument with studies now being made to come up with alternate fuel cycles, such as the International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Evaluation Program and, in the U.S., the Nonproliferation Alternative Systems Assessment Program. But he does believe that, ...