The Swedish nuclear power establishment openly boasts that Sweden is best in the world (25). Together, the UN nuclear energy organization, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Swedish Government and Swedish nuclear companies share the responsibility for the myth about Sweden having "solved" the waste problem. The responsibility of the Government arises through approval of the KBS method. The IAEA is in part responsible because the two Swedish IAEA leaders Sigvard Eklund and Hans Blix, have promoted Sweden as a site for an international nuclear garbage dump. For example, on May 21, 1987 Hans Blix stated in a lecture at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg that,
"Sweden is a country that could possibly store radioactive waste from the world's nuclear power stations. Due to ancient, stable rock formations, Sweden has very favorable conditions for storing nuclear waste" (26).
The Swedish Government must issue forceful official denials of these myths and cancel all plans to import waste. Sweden must also point out that Hans Blix is only expressing strictly personal views in a very irresponsible way, and that he in no way represents Sweden.
Further, the 140 tonnes of spent fuel from Swedish reactors sent to the reprocessing plant at Sellafield (formerly Windscale) in England and the 57 tonnes sent to La Hague in France, must be immediately returned to Sweden. Not only do these reprocessing plants produce plutonium for nuclear weapons, they also have well-documented histories of discharge of radioactive material into the surrounding environment. The radioactive discharge from Sellafield is one of the world's worst sources of contamination from nuclear installations.
In addition, Sweden must not import foreign nuclear waste by stealth through trumped-up exchange agreements. One such exchange resulted from the COGEMA agreement, explained below.
The KBS-1 method was approved in 1979. It assumed that spent fuel would be reprocessed. The approval included a reprocessing agreement with the French nuclear company COGEMA. The authorities declared the agreement secret, in spite of continued demands that it be made public. However, much of the agreement was leaked to the environmental movement which then made it public (27). It was disclosed that the agreement in no way contained any guarantees for complying with the Stipulation Act.
In actuality, the only item guaranteed by the agreement was the investment of four billion Swedish crowns (US$613 million) in the French UP3 reprocessing plant at La Hague. This unit is expected to begin operating in 1989, when, according to the agreement, the French would try to reprocess the Swedish spent fuel. If this was unsuccessful, the spent fuel was to be returned. The UP2 reprocessing plant at La Hague opened in 1966, though was not equipped to reprocess light water fuel (like that received from Sweden) until 1976. The UP2 unit is notorious for its direct supply of plutonium to the French nuclear weapons program and its poor safety record.
It is notable that the plutonium part of the waste was totally overlooked in the KBS plan. Or was it in fact a foregone conclusion that the plutonium would be handed over to the French nuclear weapons program under cover of silence? Later, plans to mix the plutonium into reactor fuel (known as MOX - mixed oxide fuel) were made public, but these plans could not be economically justified.
The reprocessing agreement with COGEMA, signed in order to attain fueling permits for Swedish reactors, is a moral catastrophe and puts to shame the official anti-nuclear weapons policy. Swedish politicians secretly gave economic support to the French nuclear weapons program in the face of the Swedish peoples' united opposition to all nuclear weapons. For Swedish credibility in this issue to be regained, the contract with COGEMA must be cancelled. This should not entail suspicious exchange affairs with West Germany (explained below) or others interested in reprocessing. The COGEMA contract should be ended immediately so that no further payments take place. From a moral perspective it is completely legitimate for Sweden to refuse further payments and demand that the waste already shipped to La Hague be returned.
The COGEMA agreement showed the carelessness of nuclear power companies and politicians in handling the nuclear waste issue. In 1982, despite recognition of Sweden's contribution to the French nuclear weapons program, the Social Democratic Government continued this catastrophic connection with France. In the midst of protests by the environmental and peace movements, including full page advertisements in the daily press, the Swedish Government allowed further shipments of spent fuel by the Swedish vessel SIGYN to La Hague. In total, 57 tonnes of spent fuel were sent from Sweden to France for reprocessing. The original agreement, however, was for 729 tonnes.
In 1985, after France had already received the Swedish spent fuel, the Swedish Government tried to get it back (28). The official reason was that the spent fuel would be easier to store without being reprocessed. But, the importance of public opposition to reprocessing, and any trade in nuclear materials with France, cannot be denied. Meanwhile, the West German Government maintained a policy of reprocessing. However, the first generation of spent MOX fuel produced by West German reactors is not possible to reprocess. The Swedish Government had to deal with the massive public protest, and the West German Government had no place to store its first generation spent MOX fuel. Thus, in June 1986, Sweden, France, and West Germany made a trade agreement. In exchange for the 57 tonnes of Swedish spent fuel sent to France, Sweden accepted 24 tonnes of West German spent MOX fuel (to be stored in CLAB). The financial aspects of the trade deal are not known.
The Swedish spent fuel stayed in France to be reprocessed under West German ownership. West Germany has a trade agreement with France where West German spent fuel is sent to La Hague for reprocessing and the plutonium, depleted uranium, and reprocessing wastes are sent to Hanau, West Germany. There, plutonium fuel rods are made. In another trade agreement between France and West Germany, 11% of the plutonium fuel for the French Superphenix breeder reactor is provided by West Germany, which receives in return an equivalent amount of plutonium produced by the Superphenix.
West Germany gained by trading non-reprocessable spent fuel that presented a storage problem, for reprocessable spent fuel. On the Swedish side, the only gain was relieving political pressure against trade in nuclear materials with France. The trade arrangement did not stop the Swedish spent fuel from being reprocessed, nor the resulting plutonium from being used by the French. Further, the plutonium and reprocessing wastes are not less dangerous when owned by West Germany rather than France.
On July 9, 1987 the first of eight shipments of the West German spent MOX fuel was taken by SIGYN from Lübeck, West Germany to Simpevarp, Sweden. The shipment consisted of one container from the Gundremmingen-A reactor. SIGYN was met by demonstrators in both Germany and Sweden. At Simpevarp, about 60 police with boats and helicopters kept close watch over six protesters in two small boats. Two of the protesters jumped into the water in front of SIGYN. All six were arrested.
In Sweden, a coalition called NIX-MOX was specially formed to protest against the shipments. The NIX-MOX coalition is made up of The Peoples' Movement Against Nuclear Power And Weapons ("Folkkampanjen mot kärnkraft och kärnvapen" - FMKK), The Non-violent Network ("Ickevåldsnätet"), and Women for Peace ("Kvinnor för fred") (29). Protests and arrests occurred in both Germany and Sweden almost every time SIGYN went to port.
Police had to violently disperse about 200 demonstrators in Lübeck on January 13, 1988 so that SIGYN could load the seventh shipment. A train delivered the cargo of 23 spent MOX-fuel elements to the port. The train was met when it arrived at six in the morning by a crowd of demonstrators, a number of who sat on the track and were beaten out of the way by police. On January 14th SIGYN unloaded its cargo at Simpevarp.
Finally, in a victory for the anti-nuclear movement, on February 16, 1988 SIGYN was refused permission by the West German regional government of Schleswig-Holstein to load the eighth and last shipment of spent MOX-fuel. This decision was a direct result of massive public protest. Because of the Transnuclear scandal, on February 5, 1988 the majority of the regional government of Schleswig-Holstein voted not to let further shipments of radioactive materials through their region, though an exception in the SIGYN case may have been made. However, crowds of demonstrators waiting for the ship in Lübeck, West Germany made certain no exception was made (30).
Importing the West German MOX fuel is a deviation from the fundamental Swedish principle of not importing any foreign waste. A precedent has been established that may later be used to make Sweden accept nuclear waste from other countries, as part of future "exchange affairs" in other circumstances.
To summarize, the COGEMA agreement is a political scandal and a blow to Swedish neutrality and anti-nuclear weapons policy. The import of the German spent-MOX fuel, which is an attempt to escape the COGEMA agreement, must be strongly condemned.
According to its statutes, the IAEA has two tasks:
The tasks clearly contradict each other. It is not possible to promote the use of nuclear technology and at the same time regulate it.
Sigvard Eklund, a Swede, was Director General of the IAEA from 1961-1981 and the present head, Hans Blix, is also Swedish. Blix started his job in 1981 after working for the Swedish Liberal Party as campaign leader for "line 2" in the Swedish nuclear referendum of 1980 (see Chapter 4). By his lack of knowledge, naiveté and extreme Jesuit morals (the aims justify the means, even in referenda) Hans Blix has embarrassed Sweden and undermined the credibility of the IAEA as a regulatory agency.
Sweden has a special role within the IAEA because the last two Director Generals have come from Sweden. Sweden should use this position to urge that nations withdraw all financial support for the IAEA, and strongly demand that the IAEA be quickly replaced with an agency that has as its main tasks halting the spread of nuclear technology and supervising the decommissioning of this technology.
However, it is important that Sweden continue to participate in serious international scientific projects to find a "solution" to the waste problem. Such projects present the opportunity for voicing an anti-nuclear perspective. For example, Sweden ought to denounce the horrendous custom of industrialized countries procuring storage areas in the third world. Such transactions have been planned between the U.S.A. and Somalia and between West Germany and China.