The FINANCIAL — Authorities of the southeastern German land of Saxony have taken decision to send a shipment of nuclear wastes to Russia by 2010, the German Sachsische Zeitung said on August 15, as Ria Novosti reported.
The shipment will include 951 used fuel slugs from nuclear pile placed at the German Dresden-Rossendorf research center, a spokesman for the Saxon Ministry of Science and Arts said.
Russia is the only country in the world accepting uranium hexafluoride in industrial quantities.
The Rossendorf nuclear pile was built in the German Democratic Republic with the assistance of the USSR, however it went out of service in 1991. The reactor's fuel slugs have been dumped in the Ahaus interim nuclear storage facility since 2005.
The expense of the shipment is assessed at approximately 10 million Euros ($12.75 million). Three transport vessels, each of them equipped with special containers, will conduct the transportation.
German environmentalists and ecologists have voiced concerns over the move. Placing nuclear waste in any country doesn't mean getting rid of it, they said.
German is capable of storing its nuclear wastes itself, Vladimir Chuprov, head of the Greenpeace Russia's energy department said. Russian environmentalists may organize anti-nuclear waste protests, he added.
In February 2010, Russian activists conducted several protests against nuclear waste transportation to Russia and its storage in the country.
The dangerous cargo belonged to the French nuclear group Areva, which has a contract with Russia. According to the deal, few thousand tons of depleted uranium were to be transported to the country.
