The Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee’s Advice to Ministers on the Application of Partitioning and Transmutation in the UK

This study was undertaken in response to a request for advice from Ministers in the UK Government and the Devolved Administrations for Scotland and Wales on the potential application of partitioning and transmutation (P&T) technology to radioactive waste management. Partitioning is a series of physical and chemical separation processes, while transmutation involves the conversion of one chemical element into another by means of particle bombardment in a nuclear reactor or accelerator.

A further aim of the study is to contribute to the national debate launched by Managing Radioactive Waste Safely. This initiative envisages a process of stakeholder and public consultation and participation leading to a recommendation to Government on the option, or options, for the long-term management of the UK’s higher activity solid radioactive wastes, that will protect the safety of people and the environment. An independent body, the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM) has been appointed to oversee the process. P&T was included in the Managing Radioactive Waste Safely consultation paper as one of the options that ‘‘could be considered further’’, i.e., by CoRWM.

At first sight, the P&T concept is very attractive. Potentially, it offers a means of transforming hazardous long-lived waste into less harmful and/or shorter-lived forms – the apparent answer to all our long-term radioactive waste management problems. But there are major practical problems. This report concludes that P&T does not represent a comprehensive solution to the radioactive waste management problem. In the context of the problem as it exists in the UK, P&T cannot be considered as even a partial solution in the absence of a commitment to maintain nuclear power in the long-term.

See also this News Release.

This report is available in Adobe Acrobat format (240 KB)