Glico plans for Plutonium Pocky(tm)!

[Taro Toporific]

Plutonium-Pocky.gif

Japan sticks to plan for extracting plutonium, but has little use for the tons it already has
The Washington Post (AP News) December 28, 2012
ROKKASHO, Japan --How is an atomic-powered island nation riddled with fault lines supposed to handle its nuclear waste? Part of the answer was supposed to come from this windswept village along Japan’s northern coast.
By hosting a high-tech facility that would convert spent fuel into a plutonium-uranium mix designed for the next generation of reactors, Rokkasho was supposed to provide fuel while minimizing nuclear waste storage problems. Those ambitions are falling apart because years of attempts to build a “fast breeder” reactor, which would use the reprocessed fuel, appear to be ending in failure...
... Japan still intends to reprocess spent fuel at Rokkasho. It sees few other options, even though it will mean extracting plutonium that could be used to make nuclear weapons.
If the country were to close the reprocessing plant, some 3,000 tons of spent waste piling up here would have to go back to the nuclear plants that made it, and those already are running low on storage space. There is scant prospect for building a long-term nuclear waste disposal site in Japan.
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[Coligny]

I don't get it ... can you write slower please ?

[Taro Toporific]

I don't get it ... can you write slower please ?

Ok, ok, here's the long version.

1) The foundation of Japan's post-WWII policy prohibits any kind of nuclear weapons (aka Plutonium).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan's_no ... ons_policy
2) All Japanese attempts to build a “fast breeder” reactor that would use reprocessed Plutonium fuel have failed.
3) Currently, the use of nuclear power power is totally shut down in Japan so there is no need for additional Plutonium (and importantly there's no place to store it).
4) So, what can Japan do with all the additional Plutonium?
Eat it as Plutonium PockyTM!

[yanpa]

Surely there's some way of involving AKB48 with this?

[Russell]

They could export all that plutonium to China...

[Taro Toporific]

They could export all that plutonium to China...

Nah, but I hear that Best Korea is in the market for Plutonium for coloring their arirang/mass games pompoms.


north korea - arirang or mass games by Retlaw Snellac, on Flickr