TOKYO (AP) — Japan on Friday restarted a nuclear reactor that uses plutonium-based fuel, the first of that type to resume operations under stricter safety rules introduced after the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
Japan’s large stockpile of plutonium has raised international nuclear security concerns, and the government has come up with the idea of burning it in reactors as it desperately tries to reduce the amount.
The stockpile stems from Japan’s ambition to reprocess spent fuel – an ambition yet to be realized.
The No. 3 reactor at Takahama nuclear plant in western Japan, operated by Kansai Electric Power Co., went back online Friday. It is the first that uses a plutonium uranium hybrid fuel known as MOX to go back online since the accident.
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