Will Korea Expand Nuclear Capability?
By Kim Sue-young
Staff Reporter
To reprocess spent fuel or not: that is the question for South Korea, the fifth largest nuclear power user in the world.
The country has voluntarily refrained from reprocessing nuclear materials since 1974 when it signed a nuclear cooperation agreement with the United States.
However, spent fuel has piled up and concerns are rising that the country's storage facilities will reach capacity by 2016.
Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan said the Seoul-Washington pact should be revised to allow for more activity when it expires in 2014.
``I think we need to have consultations to maximize commercial benefits from the supply of fuel or the reprocessing of spent fuel,'' he said Thursday.
Some conservatives claimed, after Pyongyang's second nuclear test on May 25, that Seoul has to arm itself with nuclear weapons by revising the agreement.
The top diplomat did not elaborate but noted that the revision is aimed at coping with climate change.
``In a bid to deal with climate change, we should increase dependence on nuclear energy. I think we should have concrete discussions for reusing spent fuel,'' he said.
The nation is currently operating 20 atomic power plants and uses 4,000 tons of uranium annually.
About 700 tons of spent fuel are left every year and nearly 95 percent of it can be recycled as a source of energy.
But the nuclear pact has prohibited the recycling and deprived Korea of the economic benefits.
Reports say the government will likely have working-level talks on the revision of the accord this autumn in a bid to begin full-scale talks from 2012.
Japan has reprocessing facilities and uses enriched uranium, also material for atomic weapons, as fuel for its nuclear power plants.
It remains uncertain, however, whether Washington would agree to lift the restrictions.
Ellen Tauscher, U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said in a recent congressional hearing that there was no need to revise the current agreement.
She said that ``programmatic consent'' for reprocessing given to the EU, Japan and India under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 cannot be extended to South Korea.
``The administration does not believe that such programmatic consent to reprocessing is necessarily appropriate in other cases, including Taiwan and the Republic of Korea,'' she said.