Ukraine seeks to reprocess spent nuclear fuel in France

KIEV, May 3 (Xinhua) -- Ukraine's state nuclear power company Energoatom said on Thursday it has signed a deal with French nuclear power company Orano on assessing a possibility to reprocess Ukraine's spent nuclear fuel in France.

The deal was signed by Oleksandr Shavlakov, the first vice president of Energoatom, and Pascal Aubret, the vice president of Orano's recycling business unit, according to a statement posted on Energoatom's website.

The contract is set to pave the way for reprocessing Ukraine's spent nuclear fuel from VVER-1000 reactors at the La Hague plant in northern France, the statement said.

The nuclear waste from Ukraine's VVER-1000 reactors contains about 96 percent of recyclable materials and 4 percent of final waste, it said.

According to Ukraine's state electronic procurement platform "Prozorro," the contract worth 1.395 million euro (about 1.7 million U.S. dollars) is due to be completed by 2021.

Ukraine, which saw the Chernobyl disaster, one of the worst nuclear accidents in human history, in April 1986, has pledged to gradually strengthen its radioactive waste management.

Currently, the construction of the central spent fuel storage facility, which will stockpile spent nuclear fuel from three Ukrainian nuclear power plants, is underway in Chernobyl exclusion zone.

Overall, 15 reactors in four nuclear power plants are currently functioning in Ukraine, with 13 of them the reactors of VVER-1000 type. Enditem