Greenpeacers Blockade Plutonium Transport Road in France

CHERBOURG, France, October 5, 2004 (ENS) - Greenpeace activists have blockaded the only road that can be used to transport the first shipment of American plutonium from Cherbourg Harbor to the La Hague where it is scheduled to be reprocessed into mixed oxide (MOX) reactor fuel. Two ships carrying the 140 kilograms of plutonium are due to arrive in Cherbourg today.

Greenpeacers have attached a truck to the only road from Cherbourg to the Areva reprocessing facility at La Hague. (Photo courtesy Greenpeace)

Ten activists have locked themselves onto the truck and the road in protest of the plutonium shipment.

Also in connection with the plutonium protest, Greenpeace has been summoned to appear in the Cherbourg Court today, where the international environmental organization faces a request for an injunction preventing it from approaching within 300 meters of the two ships carrying plutonium from the United States to France or within 100 meters of the Cherbourg harbour.

The nuclear companies Areva, through its subsidiary Cogema, and British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) are seeking to keep Greenpeace from getting closer than 100 meters from the road that the nuclear transport will take from the harbor to the La Hague plant - the road that is now blockaded.

Greenpeace is threatened with a € 300,000 penalty for each recorded violation at sea, and € 150,000 for each recorded violation on the road between Cherbourg and the plant in La Hague, to which some € 19,000 lawyer expenses also have to be included.

"Once more the nuclear industry is trying to gag peaceful protest," said Tom Clements of Greenpeace International. "They have nothing to fear from Greenpeace, rather the courts time would be better focused on the threat posed by 140 kg of bomb grade plutonium traversing the high seas and France's highways."

French police approach the Greenpeace blockade (Photo courtesy Greenpeace)

Areva says the protesters and the public have nothing to worry about because the shipment complies with national and international regulations. "The shipping company involved has safely transported nuclear material over four million nautical miles without a single incident involving the release of radioactivity. The cargo is protected by armed guards throughout its journey and the ships are equipped with naval guns," Areva says.

By signing the START I and START II disarmament agreements in the early 1990s, the United States and the Russian Federation committed to reducing their nuclear stockpiles, notably by dismantling “excess” nuclear warheads.

Each country agreed to eliminate 34 metric tons of plutonium recovered from its dismantled weapons. In January 2002, following comparative studies of two disposition options -immobilization or recycling in reactors- the US administration chose to recycle its 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium into MOX fuel A MOX fuel fabrication facility will be built in the United States for this purpose.

The MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility project is managed by Duke Energy, Cogema and Stone & Webster, on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). The plant, which will be located on the Savannah River site in South Carolina, will implement Cogema technology. The DOE intends to validate the MOX fuel performance in an American reactor before pursuing construction of the MOX facility.

Four MOX fuel assemblies will be fabricated by Areva in France from American weapons plutonium, and will be loaded in a commercial U.S. reactor operated by Duke.

French law enforcement officers subdue Greenpeace protesters Monday in front of the arsenal in Cherbourg. (Photo courtesy Greenpeace)

Areva explains that the shipment is part of a program being implemented by the United States Department of Energy for the disposition of former weapons-grade plutonium, by using it in reactors to generate electricity. "The program starts with the manufacturing of four nuclear fuel assemblies in France," Areva says.

Greenpeace wants an immediate end to plutonium production and separation. The organization says both civil and military plutonium "should be treated as nuclear waste not shipped around the world as reactor fuel."

Plutonium should be mixed with radioactive waste, solidified or vitrified, and stored. This approach would be cheaper, faster, safer, and more secure than shipping it across the Atlantic for reprocessing, the organization believes.

On Monday, Eugene Riguidel, one of France's most famous sailors, John Castle of Guernsey, and Pernilla Svenberg from Greenpeace International were released from the military arsenal in Cherbourg. They were arrested Sunday for mounting a protest against the plutonium shipment inside the military port.

"We have a military exclusion zone in Cherbourg against small yachts while plutonium transports are free to threaten the lives and livelihoods of everyone in their wake. It is the trade in nuclear bomb material that should be banned not peaceful protest," said Riguidel, upon his release from jail.

In France the Atlantic flotilla is made up of sailors concerned about the safety aspects of this transport, and the direction that the nuclear industry is taking in their country.

"Areva claims that with this transport it reduces the nuclear threat of proliferation. It is all the opposite," said Greenpeace France activist Yannick Rousselet. "Areva produces always more plutonium with its factory of La Hague. Already 70 to 80 tons of plutonium are stored there."

"Plutonium makes it possible to manufacture bombs, in France, in the United States or in North Korea. Its handling and its circulation throughout the world are a terrible threat," Rousselet said. "Program "MOX for Proliferation" must cease."

In France, more than 10,000 kilograms of plutonium each year are transported from the La Hague reprocessing plant in Normandy to nuclear fuel fabrication plants elsewhere in France. In contrast to high level of security surrounding U.S. plutonium transports, in France weekly transports of weapons-usable plutonium are carried out in non-armored vehicles under low-level police protection.

Shaun Burnie of Greenpeace International said, "The French government now has a real dilemma. If this shipment is conducted with U.S. style military security then how will state nuclear industry Areva be able to continue justifying the paltry protection for the thousands of kilos of plutonium transported around the country each year?"